Fine, I'll Date Myself (Hunger Games Date)

I have been worried for a couple days about the night-out we have planned later this week. Cavalia went okay over the weekend because we had tickets to an afternoon show. Key. Getting home at 6 instead of leaving at 6. The husband also was then forced to take an actual entire day off of work. Which right now is rare to say the least.

I even went so far as to try to get the hubby to cancel our next circled date on the calendar, but he refused. I was really cool about it, and up until the minute we go out later this week, I am totally fine canceling. He's already overdoing it at work. It's not a big deal - I would rather him actually just have a night off at home at this point.

Last Wednesday, he actually said, "Hey, I've worked 80 hours in the past seven days!" Like it not only surprised him but sort of pleased him.

In my head, he then did an imaginary blow on his knuckles and pretended to shine them on his invisible lapel.

I knew he'd been working a lot, but hell. I tried again to get him to reconsider. No luck.

In fact, at some point, he went on a tangent about how I should buy Hunger Games tickets for a night this week (you know, one of the other four nights this work week when we're not going to be out and about). "Lets go see the 7 o'clock show on the Mega Screen!"

A-hem. I said something along the lines of, "Listen, Crazy Pants, no."

One night out during the week for us is practically unheard of... Even during his easier weeks at work. Going full speed ahead, he wanted to go ahead and do TWO nights. This from the man who hasn't even read the book and is going solely on my desire to see the movie, plain and simple. He doesn't even want to see that movie, to be honest. He just wanted to take me because of how damn excited I am about it.

I refused this offer, of course. I figured if I wanted to go bad enough, I would go while he was at work.

So this morning, I got up, and I thought, "I'm doing this thing!"

I said, "Hi, Pretty Lady!" in the mirror, and convinced myself to go out with... Myself.

*Insert awesome pick up line here*

I made the mistake of also saying, "Hey, Self, go early and see if you can find a white jacket while you're on that side of town. You are totally allowed to go into whatever store you want." Which led to me going into the I-should-never-go-in-there Dressbarn and finding WAY too much stuff. White jacket included. It was a very enjoyable-for-me, horrific-for-the-bank-account morning.

By the time I got to the theater, I was all, "Woooooo! One ticket to The Hunger Games on the Mega Screen, please!"

I had to stop myself from doing a little happy dance. Which I think would have freaked out the poor young blond girl working the ticket counter. Since it was just us in the ghost town of a theater.

Hi, first showing on a Monday morning! I don't like people! We're meant to be! 

*Grits teeth and squeals*

HUNGER GAMES!

I even got a popcorn and pop, which I never do. Yes, please put four gallons of butter and 3 cups of salt in my gigantic popcorn bag (but I refused the bucket! So points for that!) and, um, a Diet Pepsi? Because they then cancel each other out.

Just what I should do. Drink more Diet Pepsi than would fit into my bathtub while watching a 2 1/2 hour movie. Hi, Bladder. So you're messing with me again, are you? Yeah. Okay. It's not like I don't know what is happening on the screen. I did just read the book.

Anyway, me and about 10 other people, many of whom were much older men by themselves, settled in for the movie. Creepy much? Story about children and their gory, gory deaths? Or flip that coin and you get a teen love triangle. Yeah, I don't know which way I would even want that to land.

Oooooo, how can I say anything? I'm there on a date with myself.

The movie was great, although I think having read the book is what made it great. Probably decent on its own, though. While I wait for books 2 and 3 to get here from Amazon, I think I'm actually going to re-read book 1. That's a first for me. I want to re-read things but wanting doesn't equal doing. Even with good intentions, it's usually many years between the first and next readings if they actually happen.

Well, the husband called after I got home to say he'll be very late tonight. Again.

Just you and me, Self.

Twinkie for supper?

Oh, Self.

Catch up on some DVRed crap the hubby could care less about on the tv?

Oh, you know me so well, Self.

It's sad how we're such a perfect, perfect match.

You'd think I'd get sick of me. Nope.

Although the day does make me appreciate an actual other person wanting to spend time with me and taking me out and about. Or just coming home to me. Good guy, that one.

I'm going to just keep him fed, try to make him get enough sleep, and wait for things to calm down.

Until then, if I need to be entertained, I can manage.

Cavalia Date

To say that I was excited to see Cavalia is an understatement. I told my hubby that it was like we were going to see the supermodels of horses, only supermodels that I want to see since regular supermodels make me all rage-y.

Although I did wear these, and may I say, "Meow."

Or neigh. Whatever.

They were surprisingly and wonderfully comfortable. I swear.

Plus, I look so much thinner at 8 feet tall!

Before we left, the hubby filled his time waiting for me to get Mav ready for our departure by taking her picture.

She says, "Get out and give me my treat balls!"

Then, the hubby turned to Atlas and Sweet Pea.

They couldn't have cared less if we were still home or not.

It's like he knows he's going to hate it.

But he loves me, so it's okay.

And yes, I do decorate with the laser disc.

Yes, we do have the laser disc player.

No, we don't watch them. We're not neanderthals.

We were early, mostly because between the time I bought our tickets and the show, Cavalia started selling tickets for parking that you were supposed to buy with your show tickets. I went online a couple days ago to see if they had better seats than ours available in case we wanted to see the show again during its run in St. Louis. That is when I noticed you were supposed to buy a ticket for parking with your damn show tickets and had a little spaz attack. That had definitely not been there when I got our tickets. Sigh.

The hubby told me to go ahead and get the parking ticket, so I did. I hate doing new things in that I don't like not knowing where I'm going, where I'm parking, the lay of the land, and so on. We left 90 minutes before the show, which was when the doors opened. We made good time and I snapped this photo from the car as we drove by on the underpass.

Let's pretend I'm not freaking out right about now.

"HORSES!"

Well, my husband, always good with directions, drove us by a million parking lots that we could have parked in without our lovely parking ticket. I started telling him, "I have enough cash that we can just park in one of these if you want."

He pulled into the actual part with the tents and guess what?

Boo-yah! Parking nirvana!

There was a small line to get in, but we walked through the tents without much wait time and found our seats with a little help. There were already a good chunk of people there. For a giant cathedral-tent-amphitheater type of thing, it was remarkably cozy. I wish they had allowed cameras. I know my descriptions won't do the show justice.

We had great seats - just off center, on an aisle, 10th row back. The first set of seats you could get without having to buy tickets where you meet the horses afterwards. Do I regret not spending an extra hundred bucks to meet the horses? HOLY F-YES.

The horses were beyond beautiful. They have over 45 horses in the stables, all either stallions or geldings (neutered stallions). No ladies. Males, especially stallions, are notoriously difficult when all together. They usually don't tolerate being around each other without fighting breaking out. It is kind of amazing that they are all together and do this show.

They don't use every horse in every performance, so we probably saw 25 or so horses. There were lots of white horses, 3 paints which were brown and white, and a lot of deep chestnut brown ones. There was even a mini-horse. Stun-ning. Every one of them.

The actual show was almost 3 hours long with a half hour intermission. That sounds like a long intermission but it wasn't if you wanted to use the restroom or get a souvenir or a snack (check, check, and check). They had concessions like you were at the movie theater. We were able to walk around and get back to our seats with time to spare, which is impressive considering how many people were there. They say the place seats over 2,000 people, and that sucker was full. It's hard to describe the show but I'll write here about some of the more memorable details and specific acts.

The band and singer were live during the show, and they followed the horses instead of following a set score. The set was lovely. There was this huge rectangular stage. The size of it is hard to describe. You had to turn your head all the way to one side and then quickly to the other - you could not take in the whole stage with a look. This was difficult when acts were happening on all parts of the stage and when acts were entering from both ends of the stage.

There was a sand floor, and a large curtain that changed with the scenery that could be raised, making the area twice as large with the back part being opened up. They could shut off and open up certain parts, so for example, if the horses were to run in a giant circle, they could. If they left the area open and the horses were to cross from front to back in the middle of the stage, then they would have to jump if they didn't take the long, gradually-raised-oval way around. If the horses were supposed to just run in front of the audience, they could shut off the back and then have that front run be in the spotlight.

Lots of the scenery was semi-see-through, and the band was about 2 stories up in the very back behind a gauze curtain. If they were lit up, you could see them, almost like ghosts. Otherwise, they were there but hidden from view.

There were fog and snow machines (the snow from the snow machines literally made the audience gasp when it came down at its fullest). They released leaves from the ceiling as well, as the show was sort of separated into seasons. Even though I was sure the horses would be the most beautiful thing in the show, there were parts where heavy rain fell through the middle of the stage, all the way from one end to the other, and in the darkness, they were able to light up the raindrops as they fell with this breathtaking vision of a giant (think 3 stories tall) white horse. It moved and ran and bucked, mane flowing.

If I'm being honest, I think the show we saw wasn't their best show. But that kind of made it even more interesting. One of the things they emphasize is that they don't force the horses to do anything. And some of the horses that were in our show were like, "Listen, Buddy. I don't wanna."

One of the first acts was a unbridled, unsaddled, completely free white horse. There was a little lake in the middle of the stage, and a woman danced all around in her long, ribbon-y, flowing costume. I think the horse usually interacts with her and drinks from her hands and all that, but this horse was sort of looking at her like, "Seriously?" At one point, the woman jumped up in the water, did a twirl, and flicked a little wave of water at the horse very forcefully with her feet as she completed a full circle in the air. The horse sort of stood there like, "Try that again. Do you realize I outweigh you by 1500 pounds? You are annoying the crap out of me."

And then the curtain on one end of the stage opened and that horse trotted out of there like, "La dee da."

Sometimes, one of the performers would ride a horse fully bridled and saddled around the ring. And we would all clap. Oh, St. Louis, how we like to clap at things. It's hilarious. Anyway, there was A LOT of clapping. During these times, I would think to myself, "Golly gee whiz, good job, Sir. Hats off to you. You rode a horse."

Then, you'd have another act where these aerial performers were whipping all over the damn place while riders circled on horses. The performers would flip all around, and they would reach out to the riders, and the horses would gallop around the stage as the riders held onto the fingertips of the aerialists. The performers on wires just floated with them. It was amazing, especially when you consider the costumes. Human and horse hair was long and flowing, and the performers' costumes were very elaborate. Very animated in movement and very colorful. Any normal horse would be all kinds of spooked by this crazy person in long glittery garb in the air flying next to them, right out of eyesight. To their credit, no matter what, the horses didn't seem bothered by anything like that during the show.

They had 6 bridled and saddled white horses with riders at one point doing all these synchronized moves. The costumes were so long that they puddled on the ground at the sides of the horses. That mixed with their shimmering colors and long human and horse hair... And the singing, which was essentially entirely a soprano making "ah ah ah ahhh ah ah" noises and not words for the whole show, and string accompaniment...

More than once, I had to keep myself from leaning over to the hubby and going, "One ring to rule them all!"

The horses would all stand facing us in a line, and then they would walk. Sideways. Crossing their front feet over one another. It's been a while but since I used to have a horse and kept him boarded at a working cattle farm that had lots of other horses, I know a little about the animal. They do not like to do stuff like that. There were a lot of little tricks in the show where the horses would do something that seems simple, but I'd think, "Oh, wow. That's pretty good. I know horses don't like to do that. They don't do those moves naturally." I especially thought this when they had the horses do a lot of dressage alone and in tight clumps.

One of the most memorable parts of the show was when a rider wiped out in spectacular fashion. Here is a link to a Cavalia video. I recognize the people and horses from the show we saw, so even though it's a little slow to watch, it's recent. The red headed woman in the video is the one who fell. At one point there, she is riding 2 horses while standing, one horse under each foot, horses side by side. In the show, there were 4 pairs of horses like this, each pair with a rider standing on top with one foot on each horse. In the show, they were, ahem, racing. Racing. RACING.

They turned the corner of the large oval stage, a very huddled together pack, right on top of each other, and the woman was in second place. She fell off quickly, so fast we couldn't tell what happened. She belly flopped to the ground between her own horses, hitting FACE FIRST.

Face first.

Complete face plant.

And then there were all the horses behind her. Thankfully, she rolled quickly out of the way, but it was very close. The audience audibly gasped. She popped up after a minute, gave a great big smile to the audience, and took a little humorous bow to our thunderous applause. Lord. If I had had time to think, I would have thought, "Oh, we just saw a horrible death where a woman was trampled."

During a similar routine, 2 performers stood on the ground and held out a long pole. They raised it to their waists. The pairs with riders standing on top of them would run and jump over the poles, horse and rider flying over easily.

Then, the performers on the ground got second performers to sit on their shoulders, raising the pole very, very high. I grabbed the hubby's leg at this point and actually said, "No."

The first time, of course, the man on the pair of horses just ducked while standing as they ran through. The audience laughed.

Then, he came around again, fast. The performer jumped up and over as the horses ran underneath. He landed on his feet again, one horse under each foot. And those horses were not trotting. They were running. It was very impressive. Terrifying, but impressive.

There was also an act where 6 unbridled, unsaddled, free chocolate brown horses came out with one performer standing on the ground. Now, one of these little bastards was in a mood. Which should not have been funny. Of course, it was.

He and one other horse from the group went to the side of the stage. He nipped at the other horse, refusing to let him by to join the others in the middle with the performer. Nip, nip, nip. The performer finally got him to come over, and the other followed, and then the 6 did these amazing little runs and zigzags around the performer.

Still, the little punky one nipped at his fellow horses and kicked his back feet up at everyone. It was like he agreed to do all that was required but he wasn't going to be that cool about it. There was never real viciousness but you also couldn't just pass it off as play. The tricks were done in a very close pack, so the 6 horses were all over each other. You literally couldn't have put a piece of paper between them most of the time. To get totally free horses to do moves that that is truly amazing.

The performer would then instruct the horses to run in a circle around him. Now, one of them and not the one who was being a little a**, decided he wanted to sort of stick to the game plan but throw in an extra set of fun for himself. That horse was adorably hilarious. The stage was open, but there was a barrier between the front half of the stage and the back. It was over waist high and was the length of the stage. The horses therefore were supposed to stay in the front half of the stage and do their act with the performer there.

However, every single time the guy asked the horses to do a full circle around him, that little bugger was like, "Weeeeeeeeeee! I jumps over the barrier and make a SUPER FULL oval run ALL the way around the stage!" He jumped up, ran around the back of the stage, jumped down, and joined the others. He'd run through the front of the stage with everyone doing the zigs and zags and turns and such, and then ha ha! Big oval time again! Jump up, over the barricade, around the back, then down, join the others. Heh heh heh. The poor performer just sort of kept looking at him and couldn't do a thing about it.

It was like the performer was thinking, "Oh, he's going around in the circle with the other horses! Got it out of his system!" Cue performer sigh. Then, "Wait! Oop. No. There he goes again. Bye, Horsey!"

And the horse was all jump, run, jump, "I'm back! He-ey! How's it hanging?" Zig, zag, and he's off again doing his solo fun run.

Good times. I guess we all like a little rebel once in a while.

There was also trick riding, where a fully bridled and saddled horse would run by at lightening speed with a rider/acrobat doing things like clinging upside down with one foot attached as they raced by. We've never seen Cirque de Soileil, but I imagine the performers were similar to the ones in those shows. There were a lot of acrobatics and, you know, general "I didn't know the human body could do that?" type of things happening. Also, it made me think about how I was never that flexible and how my goal weight is now my birth weight. I mean, I was there once, right? I can get back to it.

All in all, the show was great to see. Hard to describe, although my husband certainly was able to do so. In the car he said what we had just seen was, "A French-Romanian rodeo."

The husband tolerated the show, but I knew he didn't want to see it again. We compromised by buying the DVDs for me at the souvenir stand. And he doesn't know it yet, but I also bought something last week that will serve as a wonderful reminder of our Cavalia time. I will be taking his photo when that is unveiled. So stay tuned for that.

The Hunger Games Book

3 nights ago, I started reading the first book in The Hunger Games trilogy. I was pulled in immediately and finished it last night. How ashamed should I be? I know it's less embarrassing than liking Twilight but don't know where it falls on the Harry Potter scale.

I blame an English degree. All those difficult to get through, look-at-all-my-thousands-of-pages toodle-dee-do books that made reading often feel like a punishment have created a vacuum in my soul that I guess can only be filled with young adult lit. Lit that is easy to read and has a great story.

I didn't like The Hunger Games and I'm not looking forward to the movie.

I AM LOSING MY SH*T OVER THEM.

Sigh.

Well, that's one more thing the hubby needs to take me to - the movie. I was excited about the movie in general, but now that I've read the first book, holy hell.

I just stopped typing and actually clapped right there. Without thinking. Just had to express the excitement, I guess.

I wish I was kidding.

Wow. I'm a level of dork that may not have existed before now.

I don't even know if I can wait. I might sneak out and see it on my own, which I am going to pretend doesn't make me feel a little lonely and sad. I used to go to movies alone all the time, especially as a teen. I felt more independent and a little victorious about it then. Although I think there was always a little voice in my head that said, "Seriously? You can't find one frickin' friend?" Cue dial on self esteem to lower at least one notch.

Anyway, the hubby has been pretty busy lately. He's been working a lot again, although thankfully not in California. He's come home every night, although last night he snuck in so late that I don't know when he came in. I thought for a minute this morning that he was still here. His jeans were tossed on the floor, and his shoes were still by the front door... I looked for him, ran out of rooms. Checked the garage. Yep, car was gone. That's when it hit me and I checked the closet. Man wore a suit to work. Huh. Well, that makes sense with all the extra hours. Guess something exciting is happening today.

We're getting closer and closer to a few big events, big dates that he can't squirrel out of, so there will be a couple dates in our near future.

Things are about to happen. I have a good feeling. A non-American Idiot feeling. Cavalia, hockey, and a birthday. For once, I feel ready for it. For whatever memories we're about to make and however great or terrible a time we're about to have.

Also, cake. I'm ready for cake.

American Idiot Date

Well, we've been a touch busy. The hubby and I spent the other weekend up north with my family, where we had "Christmas" 2 months too late. Festive is a difficult thing to force but we gave it a go. Was good to get out of the house and have a little road trip and see everyone. The hubby drove AND he fixed my parents' computer. So he was on fire. Good husband.

Sunday night, we went back to the Peabody Opera House, now my favorite venue in St. Louis.

It took forever to get my camera to take this picture.

*Someone* needs a new camera.

We were very close to the stage and had excellent seats. Incredible seats. Great seats!

Hooray... for our seats.

We saw American Idiot. Which I thought would be nice and testosterone-y for the hubby. I would like to say for the record that I actually really like Green Day. I also like the theater and I like musicals.

SO WHAT THE F^%$!#)*&^&*%$!#(**&%^%$)!!#$%$%^**?

Yes, I know that is not even the right length for any word up there, but I needed to punch something and the keys were right there and just let me have my little typing tantrum, will you?

The cast was good - they sounded a lot like Green Day. Yay, Green Day. We knew a lot of the songs. Yay, catchy Green Day songs. We were able to see the details of everything - sets, costumes, facial expressions... There was a lot to see, so that was good. Yay! Yes, Happy Wife, focus on the positive!

GAHHHHHHHHH, I CAN'T!

The thing that is missing from the show is, oh, I don't know, a story of some kind and really anything coherent. We're Green Day! Sort of!

Character one: I had a lot of sex and did a lot of drugs (Sold! Believable! You are Green Day!).

Character two: I knocked up my girlfriend and that made life sucky because I had responsibilities and sh*t. (I know, Green Day, I know. You want to be a little punk until your senior citizen days but life got in the way. Instead of drugs and sex, you have boatloads of beer and a very defiant pouty face.)

Character three: This show is about America! so I am a soldier and I lost my leg in a pointless war and I have something important to say about America! but the commentary I want to get across is vague and I am failing miserably at conveying much of anything. (Um... Green Day? Where did you go? I don't know a ton about you but I know zero of your band members are vets.) Oh, also I, character number 3, spent my time doing things like having wild dreams about a super clothed Islamic woman who then turns into a genie stripper.

*Happy Wife managed to both laugh inappropriately and hang her head in shame at dragging her husband to this*

The genie stripper flew through the air on wires, so that was impressive.

Positive thoughts! Say something positive!

The same cast member also hung upside down at one point in her non-stripper slutty clothes and head banged. Upside down. From about 3 stories up. So that was, you know, something you don't see every day.

Entertainment!

*Jazz hands*

The music of choice for Muslim-stripper-genie there was non-Green Day. It was your generic Middle Eastern woman singing a very stereotypical song complete with matching scribbly foreign language words on all the screens behind her that no one could read. Even though the husband can, I believe, speak some Urdu, I just crossed my fingers that he couldn't read whatever that said since I'm pretty sure it would be better for everyone if no one ever translates that.

I just get my feathers tussled a little whenever something tries to be anti-anything-different-from-here and sort of anti-soldier, which I am also super not okay with. The whole time I was like, what are you trying to say here? I know we're not mocking the damn military. Right? I mean, what?

The soldiers are fighting for our freedom to do things like watch this stupid musical.

And, Guys, maybe put your pants back on. Guys, Green Day did not perform naked all the time, did they? And zero of these 3 main characters really need to be in their skivvies. Plus the 10 or so background people? Not necessary, thanks. Did I miss that part of their act back when I was young and knew more about Green Day? Were they exhibitionists? Every one in this show was in their underwear WAY too much. I just kept thinking, "Way to commit, Everybody. I guess."

In some regards, the seats were too good. I did not need to see that.

I do not know what your point is, American Idiot, other than that everyone is an idiot and maybe then one of your main characters shouldn't be an injured frickin' soldier.

The husband had to go into work Saturday, then he slept all day Sunday in order to take me to the show Sunday night. We had Starbucks on the way there, which was awesome and something we never do. So he was full of caffeine and really just doing this whole thing for me.

Within the first 15 minutes of the show, they flashed 2 names on the screen as "evil" and the first was Halliburton and the second was where my husband has been working for over 10 years. Just what he wanted to see after he's been working so many long hours lately. He did say on the way there, "I hope they don't bash me."

And I said, "HAHA! What? They won't. Have you never heard a Green Day song? They're walking the boulevard of broken dreams, Honey. They're not political masterminds. They're not all f-you, software engineers, you're ruining the world!" Ha. Ha ha. Lord.

The people in the row behind us had a lengthy conversation before the show about why there wasn't a synopsis in the playbill. Afterwards, I think we were all like, "Oh, that's why. Because the synopsis would have said, 'There is a lot of headbanging and dancing in our underwear, then some more headbanging.'" A synopsis would have had to make sense.

Maybe I'm just not appropriately artsy anymore. Also, the hubby and I had a discussion and came to the realization that we're at a weird age. Too young to want to see things like Fiddler and Mary Poppins (coming soon to the Peabody!) and too old to enjoy stuff like American Idiot. I fussed about this at length in the car on the way home.

The husband said, "We're in the tv age. We're the same age as the people who write SNL and The Office and that's why we like those things. Now we just have to wait for them to get older and write other things, and then we'll like other things."

I just kept thinking that the show we just saw was a really crappy version of Rent and a pretty decent version of Green Day, whatever that even means.

Then we passed a billboard for the next show to come to The Fox, our other favorite venue in town.

Bring It On. The Musical.

...

So we're going to go ahead and stay home with our cats and watch a lot of DVRed programming and call that good. Yeah.

Riverdance and Yanni are also coming to The Fox.

Please. Shoot. Me. I'm at an age where EVERYTHING IS HORRIBLE! EVERYTHING! HORRIBLE!