Hay fever & musicals

Tuesday I had an appointment with an allergist, which meant my first allergy testing ever. We did the scratch test, and let me tell you, it's the "scratch" test in more ways than one. The nurse came with these rods, each with six pins stuck in their own solutions, and she pricked me on the arms with ten rods, leaving me with sixty holes covered in some type of allergen. I was to sit there not moving my arms for 20 minutes, after which time the nurse examined the level of allergic reaction to each allergen. Two large welts developed on my right arm, the largest being "mixed grasses" and the other being some type of tree pollen; the others to which I had allergic reactions were other grasses and weeds. My left upper arm was devoted to molds, to which I did not have much reaction, and the lower left arm had pet dander, dust, cockroaches, tobacco, etc. I showed an allergy to tobacco. Pretty much had little bumps all over, though. And my right arm -- trees, grasses, and weeds -- is still itchy as all hell. Next week I get to do food allergies and something like intradermal tests, which I am afraid sounds a lot like injections -- yuck.

Tonight, I went somewhere in New Jersey, a little place called Oradell, near Paramus, which, if you are like who me didn't know till now, is a little bit northeast of New York City. Shane's friend Brad wrote the libretto to a musical about the Charles Manson Family, and Shane wrote the music. Tonight they put on a musical revue, 30 minutes in length, for which they had only two and a half week's notice to cast and rehearse, in a small theater. Given the short amount of time to put it on, Shane starred as Charles Manson, because he already knew all the words to all the songs, having written the music himself.

I was nervous for him all day -- I have no idea why. He wasn't even nervous, he's performed so much already. I guess I have such terrible performance anxiety that it is aroused when people close to me have to perform.

It turned out to be great. It's crazy, a musical about Charles Manson. It was campy and funny, as one would expect, but it was also actually quite interesting and tragic, these messed up women who followed Manson around, who was, as we all know, pretty messed up himself. And, of course, the music was good and the lyrics hilarious. Shane played guitar and sang a few songs onstage, which pretty much blew me away. Most of the other music, due to the extreme time constraints, had to be prerecorded and played over speakers instead of being played live. I had the opportunity to hear some of the music recorded beforehand, when Shane and his friend Dave played it, and it sounded incredible. Amazing what one can do with some recording equipment in a living room!

I don't need to say it, but I will: I am privileged to know someone with such talent but also with such a wonderfully open attitude towards making music as Shane. I am what they call "classically trained" -- well, as "trained" as I could ever get -- no improvisation at all; I also felt pushed most of my life to be the best at whatever I did, so playing music became more of a stressful thing than a relaxing activity, even when I loved it. Now I feel absolutely blessed to have someone teach me to play guitar while encouraging me to just have fun and to do it for myself. And his example is inspiring; he writes, plays, and sings music for the sheer joy of it.

I suppose I should practice more.

But speaking of musicals, Shane had never seen The Sound of Music before, so I requested it from the public library and we watched it this weekend. We had a great time watching it, though I have to say it goes on for a long while before it finally ends. I hadn't seen it in a long time. We sang along, our favorite song being the goatherd one with the marionettes. That song is freaking fun to sing. Also, one of our favorite movies is Moulin Rouge, so we simply had to watch The Sound of Music, because it's probably the most awesome part of the movie when Ewan McGregor breaks into song with the words, "The hills are alive with the sound of music... with songs they have sung for a thousand years." The sound of music, indeed!