Exit Life Through Window

Trev and I just decorated our Christmas tree. It looks very pretty! I'm really getting into the Christmas vibe now - last night I went out on London's South Bank with the cast of Forever Godard (the play I'm directing) and sang a mixture of German and English carols at the German Christmas market that's there right now. We made £25 in an hour which I think is pretty impressive! I'm sure it'll all just get spent on drink after next week's rehearsal, but oh well...

On an unrelated note, I've been listening to the Weepies a lot recently, and I think one their songs really sums up this year in some ways:

Not Your Year

Scattered shadows on a wall, you watch the long light fall
Some impressions stay and some will fade
Tattered shoes outside your door, clothes all on the floor
Your life feels like the morning after all year long.

Every day it starts again
You cannot say if you're happy
You keep trying to be
Try harder, maybe this is not your year.

Movies, TV screens reflect just what you expected
There's a world of shiny people somewhere else
Out there following their bliss
living easy, getting kissed
while you wonder what else you're doing wrong

Breathe through it, write a list of desires
Make a toast, make a wish, slash some tires
Paint a heart repeating, beating "don't give up, don't give up, don't give up."

http://www.last.fm/music/The+Weepies/_/Not+Your+Year if you want to hear the track!

The essay of doom finally got done, although some confusion over deadlines now means that I may not have had to stay up writing it yesterday, since apparently I can hand it in Friday after all. Still, I've printed now, so I think I might go give it in before my singing lesson tomorrow morning, just to be on the safe side. Wow, this week is complicated! Still, nqdonne and I went to see Children of Men, which was really really good, both the film and the chance to relax and chat and stuff :)

Now I'm just contemplating having another go at my Realism essay. It's one of those where I write a sentence, don't really like what I've written, and then spend hours procrastinating because I'm dissatisfied with the whole thing. But having got down to some serious work yesterday, I'm actually feeling quite good about it now, so maybe tonight will be a bit more successful. I bunked off Music Theatre rehearsals (managed to persuade them I'd lost my voice... go me with the acting skills!) so I feel I should do something constructive with the free time. I have a feeling it may involve sleeping, though.

Ooh, a couple of questions for anyone who has done drama-y stuff at all: do any of you know any good vocal exercises to help with voice projection? Because I'm now MD for the German play, I've been nominated to do a sort of vocal class thing tomorrow night.

I've also been told I have to go anyway, because apparently I'm crap at pronouncing umlauts... ah well. If that's the only thing wrong with my German, then I'm happy! Apparently, other than the umlaut thing, I could be German... wicked! I think the grammar mistakes would mark me out when I'm not reading lines though... hehe.

( And finally, something hilarious (and German related, heh) behind the cut... )

Ack, I so far only have 128 words for Yuletide.  And I'm not even writing it now, I'm just sat here singing along to songs from the musicals and Glashaus :)  I will finish my Yuletide story, but I have a horrible suspicion it's going to be last minute, before I go to Berlin... ah well.  I come up with good stuff last minute!  And to be honest, if I don't get that much more done tonight, it's not so much of a problem.  I have some things I need to do for uni anyway - namely, deciding which essays I'm actually going to write over Christmas.  I know that for medieval, I'm going to do the Wagner one - it's interesting, because I can discuss the music quite closely as well as the text, which is always good.  But other than that...  hmm.  Maybe I'll go look now, actually. 

( musings on essay topics behind the cut - v boring! )

Other than deciding on essays, I'm so busy until Christmas, anyway.  This week I don't have so much to do, but next week it's my housemate's 20th so we're having a party on Tuesday night, and on Monday night I'm going to a gig that a guy from my course is playing.  Wednesday night some of my hallmates from last year are having a house party, and Thursday I'm working.  Then I'm off to Berlin on Sunday!  Hurrah!  And when I get back I'm going straight home.  In between all of that I've got to make a real start on the songs for the German play, because I met with the producers today and so now I actually know what I'm doing, finally!  It should be fantastic, but gosh, the pressure.  I'm now definitely committed to playing the Chesire cat and Tweedledum, writing the music, arranging the music, recording the music/providing a live band, and teaching the cast the songs.  I may also be playing the piano during the show itself (they quite liked the idea of a cat playing the piano, hehe) and singing some of the songs for those people who can't/won't sing.  So I'm going to be busy, then!!  I also need to find time to write Yuletide, and also somewhere in amongst all that, finish my Guiding warrant - ie, send off for all the signatures from different people. 

And I still haven't heard back as to whether I got into the Music Theatre revue...  although apparently they liked me!  If I have, then I definitely need to have finished my essays over Christmas, because next term is shaping up to be this busy for the whole term!  Why do I put myself through all this?  Actually, I can answer that.  It's because last year I didn't do anything musical or on stage, and I ended up miserable and stressed.  I like being busy, I really do.

Ack, I just remembered I promised I'd try and set up the choir society over Christmas too.... *makes a scared face* 

Still, I have Berlin to look forward to before facing my first Christmas in the new house, and essays.  It's going to be sooooo cool.  I've never been to Germany for any kind of festival before, and this time I get to go to the Weihnachtsmarkten, so it should be fantastic.  Plus, I get to show Trev the city I'm going to be living in next year, and show him all the bits I love about it.  And drink beer and eat sausage and Turkish food and sushi.  And go up the Reichstag at night and go and look at the canopy in the Sony centre and go and see what the East Side gallery looks like this time, and talking German to random people on the street, and going to KaDeWe, and Alexanderplatz and Hackischer Markt...  can you tell I'm obsessed?!?  I'm just so excited! Seriously, it's my favourite city in the world... and I live in London.

OK, I'll stop now, because if I babble on any longer it really will turn into total nonsense! Tschuessi all :) xxx