Heading Home

That's Fringe number two done and gone. They're taking down the big purple cow this very minute. Working for a venue is a great deal towards the end, what with the posh George Street club staff party, and drinking the venue bar dry... No but really. During load-out I basically stuck with the techies, footing ladders and coiling cable and storing lights. Then brought flight cases back from main Underbelly. Then loaded flight cases on to a Huge Ass Truck, feeling like a rock and roll roadie. Helped take down the Underbelly scaffolding (with no near-accidents, no siree!), and BEST of all got mistaken for a techie. That's the way to go.

Now hold on to your udderpants, it's time for reentry. Thanks for reading, all four of you. Love and, for the last time, purple cows.

MIA

Wow. Failure on my part with the updating. Guess I got festivalled out. I've been working night shift quite a bit, protecting the cow's honor, cleaning a stage covered in Bacardi Breezer, seeing a show here and there, making pasta sauce and lots and lots of caprese-sans-mozzarella (Edinburgh just happens to have good tomatoes).

I saw Camille O'Sullivan, Irish-French cabaret singer who, so to speak, melted my brain and broke my heart. She sings a combination of Brecht, Brel, standards and then Bowie and Tom Waits. Last year she brought Spiegeltent down, this year they put her in Assembly's Queen's Hall, and it turned out very well. The show sized up to match the venue, and she kept her usual of climbing on the audience, offering people wine etc.

I also saw Terrible Infants again - find a good thing and go with it, why not? Oh, and two gems from my very own little Baby Belly: The Echo Chamber, site-specific theater set in one of our vaults, very spooky and scary and wonderful. And a staging of The Rape of Lucrece, wonderfully acted. Plus it's poetry, PLUS it's Shakespeare. I was a happy gal.

Basically, if you want a picture of what I get up to, think of me sitting in a plastic chair at the top end of our cobblestone alley, watching seagulls and wearing a Britney/Madonna style headset.

Next time I will tell tales of Stirling - we're taking a day trip tomorrow.

Cello/Disco

Not much to report, except that yesterday I saw The Terrible Infants which was five-star wonderful. It reminded me a lot of an Aquila production, complete with music, puppets, wonderful costumes, and a human-drawn wooden cart. And tons of energy! The show was a series of cautionary tales, one about Tom who ate his Mum because he listened to his Tum and not his Mum, another about Tilly who told tall tales until she grew one. I'm particularly in love with the woman who played cello, piano, and accordion and had fabulous makeup.

Had the night shift last night working the bar, which means that one very important part of my job is actually, factually keeping drunk crazies from climbing that life size cow we have outside (whose name, I am told, is Keith). No worries, though - they quake in fear the second I step outside and give them a Look.

Last night I also went to Silent Disco, at long last, and I don't think I want to admit how much of a dancing fool I was. A good night, a very good night indeed.

in which our poet squees

All it took was a half-hour lunch break for me to become a card carrying borrower at the Scottish Poetry Library.
The Scottish Poetry Library! Eeeeee!
First stop Stevenson and Yeats.

grumble grumble

Two things to note:
- a supervisor who refers to the Front of House people on duty as "my staff" does not give me fuzzy feelings. Your staff? The hell I am.
- a publicist for a not-that-great show talking down to me about walking people in to a show unticketed (which is illegal and not just asinine) makes me want to scream. Last year I was the authorized signer for two shows' comp allocations - I know how this shit works! Take your ugly boots down to the box office and make them print you a comp for your little friend, I don't care who you are.

On a different note entirely, I finally saw a great show yesterday, called Aeneas Faversham Forever. The costumes and plot echoed a Sherlock Holmes novel, plus a little Count of Monte Cristo, except the script was peppered with anachronisms - "this is awkward" "it's a total sausage fest". Three actors played about ten characters. There were ascots. I got flipped off by the villain for hissing. 'Twas wonderful.

There is another dog who hangs out in the lane sometimes, he is the oh-so-floppy Winston, white and brown cocker spaniel puppy. SO superlatively CUTE. Lola acts like his mother sometimes, but mostly like a big sister. And when Dan the Techie picked me up over his shoulder (I hate when they do that) to carry me back to my post at the top of the lane, Lola went into defense mode and came barking after him. Good girl.

In the Belly of the Beast

It has arrived: the official first day of the Fringe Festival. Supposedly there's a parade, but I haven't laid eyes on it yet. Preview days have been busy ones for this member of the Cow Crew. A brief but complete rundown of what I've seen so far:

Glenn Wool - American comedian, the kind of material where you can't believe you find it funny. Jokes about divorce, pot and Schindler's list, and not-being-a-pedophile.
Sword of Maximum Damage - a play about one really intense game of Castles and Kings. Cute, but I have certain siblings who with their wit and expertise could write a much better version of the same play.
Umbrage Swain - Indiana Jones/The Mummy type plot, but set in the eighties with a lot of music cues.
The Absurdity of Vanilla - Absurdly bad play about... what? Exploring kink? Kind of. Sexual stereotypes? Kind of. All I know is that the characters were 2 male gynecologists, 1 female gyn student, and a boy in drag who narrated the whole thing.
Stoning Mary - About a girl sentenced to death for killing a boy who killed her parents. Interesting but incomplete.
Lough/Rain - Intense. Wife deals with her husband going semi-vegetable after a car accident.
Eco-Friendly Jihad - Irish comedian talking about climate change, Sept. 11, and his ex-girlfriend. Really clever, hilarious, my first wholehearted recommendation.

All for free! Yay Underbelly staff pass.
I have my second night shift tonight, which truly exemplifies the Fringe lifestyle: get up 10ish, see shows all day, work 6PM-2AM and get in an hour and change of drinks and chat before bed.

I think the only other tidbit of interest is that outside the bar adjacent to Baby Belly there is a life size fiberglass cow. She now sports a sign that says Please Respect the Cow by Not Mounting It.