Eric @ UT Soccer Camp

Eric is taking a break from The Music Man rehearsals this week to attend the UT soccer camp in Austin. It hardly can be called a break. It's extermely hot in Austin this week. They are working in the 95F+ degree heat from 9am to 3pm each day, with an hour lunch break.

Eric loves soccer, though, and Susan reports from her base at Scooter's that he is having a good time.

Did I mention that it's hot?

Cozumel, et al

I took a short break from The Music Man rehearsals to go to Cozumel with Susan and some friends. It was just a few days, but it was a lot of fun and a very needed vacation. We've been to Cozumel numerous times and I made a few dives as usual, but this trip we added a jeep rental and explored the eastern shore of the island.

Too cool! We drove the beach road circling the island, stopping at every beach bar along the way. We ended up at Bob Marley's, the coolest beach bar on the island.

We had a great trip, even though our room had a bizzare energy-saving device that turned off the air conditioner if a motion sensor did not detect movment in the room. Imagine that as you slept, the sound of the air conditioner shutting off would awaken you and you would have to wave your arm in the air to turn the thing back on!  After complaining to the front desk several times and getting promises that it had been "fixed", it was already time to go home.

Thankfully, the breezes were enough to keep things comfortable without constant air conditioning. The rooms were round in shape and were nicely furnished with a full tiled-bath and king sized bed. Cozy!

Practice, practice, practice

Rehearsals for The Music Man are coming along nicely. Eric has made a lot of new friends and appears to be genuinely enjoying the many hours he is spending at the theatre. We are all a long way from being off-book and the set design has been scrapped and started anew, so it looks a little barren on stage for now. Still, I think we are exactly where we should be about now.

It has been my experience that these productions often don't really come together until the final couple of weeks of rehearsal. By then, everyone is off-book and can concentrate on tweaking scenes and choreography, adding the special touches that really can make a good show a great one. I'm looking forward to that phase. It used to make me nervous. Now I just try to trust in the magical theatre fairies who seem to always show up and pull the show together. Wait, ...did I just say theatre fairies? I mean the imaginary winged-ones. Don't want to be feeding any stereo-types here!

Meanwhile, I have been concentrating with the quartet trying to make us sound as good as possible. It's really coming along. Since I don't have what you might call a booming bass voice, I wasn't the first choice for bass in some people's eyes, but I blend pretty well with the rest of the guys. I think we may just surprise them!