finally!

I know, it's been ages. My only excuse is that I've been taking tons of photos, so the medium of words has suffered as I learn more about pictures. I've inherited a Canon Digital Rebel from my dad, so I'm a very lucky girl with a camera that's too good for her! Right now it's a bit of a crapshoot as to how the pix turn out, as I slowly learn about shutter speeds, exposures, f-stops, and the like. I'll sprinkle this entry with some of the new shots so you can judge for yourselves how I'm doing...

A tribute to Ansel Adams.
Where to start? I wrote here during week 1 of rehearsals in Enderby, just before things started to get crazy. I'll sum up the last 2 weeks up there in a few choice words: script rewrites, heat, mosquitos, more rewrites, overtime, biking, tension, not-enough-time, more rewrites, Saba's fab cooking, Riverfront Pub de-briefing sessions, MORE rewrites, MORE @#$% mosquitos, girls' night out in Kelowna, dirt, dogs, mogs, Stephan's killer reefer, allergies, surreal cue-to-cue, did I mention rewrites, opening night!
There. Well, that doesn't quite tell the whole story, but it'll have to do. Let's just say that there were good times and frustrating times, that the play turned out to be good in the end, but getting there was challenging at times, and that although we had our moments of tension, I think everyone came out of it still liking one another. I'm going to be there for closing night, so it'll be interesting to see how the show has evolved. And I'll take more pictures this time- I only got one shot of the theatre while I was working there!
Lovely Jon came to see me (and the show) the last 3 days I was in Enderby. He rented us a wonderful little cottage on the river where Sarah May, Camille & I were healed somewhat by sausages and calm words one late night after a looong rehearsal.
After the cheerful chaos of Cathy's house, it was a pleasant shock to my system staying in Kelowna with Dad & June at their VERY neat abode for a few days. June, her friend Yvonne & I had a beautiful road trip the 2nd day I was there, driving south on highway 33 (a road I'd not explored before in all my years of touring this province) to an alternative healing clinic 13 km up Cougar Mountain, near Rock Creek. June is going back there in about a week to spend 2 weeks getting acupuncture and learning to meditate to strengthen her mind in this fight against this cancer. I really admire her spirit- the oncologist has basically said she has 6 months left and she has refused to take that overwhelming news lying down- she's determined to eat, meditate and will herself back to health. She is not yet feeling much discomfort, so this is a good time to fight as hard as she can, because once pain sets in it's much harder to keep your strength and resolve alive. I told her "You're going to come out of this with so much more knowledge about yourself and your spirituality." It's a fascinating journey she's taking- learning about auras, visualisation, meditation and naturopathy- I just WISH she didn't have to take this journey for such a horrible & scary reason.

And now I'm back in East Van (Greyhound having conveniently ended their strike just before I had to leave Kelowna) and I'm not doing too much of anything right now. Taking pictures, avoiding the heat, played a Reptiles gig yesterday, saw "The One That Got Away" at the JCC yesterday (an incredible play set in a swimming pool!), spent the day inside staying cool and reading trashy novels.
Things I'm happy about right now: having lots of time to hang out with Jon (and yes, hang out is partially a euphemism), some killer boots I scored from Burcu after my Reps gig yesterday, free time!, going to the Playhouse BBQ and seeing some old friends, Gord's BBQ tonight- ahh, this is summer!

The Boots!