weekend in review

In no particular order...

1. I meet my Japanese friend yesterday for coffee and she's really great to talk to. She speaks pretty good English but she's still learning. She always tells me new words that she's recently learned. Last week while translating at a physical therapy conference, she told me, she learned specular. It sounded like a legit word, but I immediately thought she meant speculum (see last gyno post on that word). But then she described the word and we figured out that she meant scapular (shoulder). Don't you love the subtle complexities of English?

2. I saw The National Theater of Scotland's production of The Bacchae this weekend, staring Alan Cumming. It was a new translation of the classic Euripides tragedy, by David Greig. This production was really good. The chorus was a group of black female singers all with outstanding vocal range. Every main character got to have at least one song with the chorus. The set was minimalistic and modern. Alan Cumming was reminiscent of the Emcee from Cabaret, but it worked. Then, the entire pace of the play halted to a crawl after Agave's (mother of Pentheus, the bad guy), entrance. It was as if she was trying to act through her actions and not the text and she took waaaaaaaayyyyyy to long to get from her musical moment to her monologue. Everyone else worked really hard and then she comes in the last 15 minutes of the play and fucks it all up. Nice going, lady.

3. I love the great outdoors but the great outdoors does not love me. Exhibit A: bug bites...everywhere. Legs, back, neck, arms, you name it. I was at the home of the Jost yesterday for a BBQ and while I was feasting of chicken wings and s'mores the bugs were feasting on me. There was not enough bug spray and anti-itch cream to take care of the problem. But, the good thing was by the time I had at least one drink from every drink group the bugs stopped biting or I didn't know they were biting because I was numb from the alcohol. Despite, it was a fun party.