Bridges of Madison County and Easter!

Happy Easter!

My easter weekend has been relatively low key, but still quite enjoyable.  Work was pretty slow on Friday because both the Canadian and UK offices were closed.  Then on Saturday I met up with Seth and we went wandering around Brooklyn.  The weather was actually starting to warm up, so we were able to take a long walk around Prospect Park.  We walked close to 3 miles!

Entrance to the park

Somebody lost their kite in the trees

After walking around all day I was tired!  So when Sunday rolled around I wanted to take it pretty easy.  Kari made hot cross buns for breakfast, which was quite yummy.  It was my idea to dye the frosting green!

After relaxing some more, we headed out to see a show.  Kari and I had been wanting to see Bridges of Madison County before it closes (we think the end must be near for this show).  It had Kelli O'Hara and Hunter Foster in it, who are two actors I really like and who are super talented.  Plus, the music was done by the same guy who did The Last Five Years (which I really enjoyed).

The show was pretty interesting.  The music in it was really pretty, but I'm not sure what I thought about the plot.  Now, I've never read the book or seen the movie so I really can't compare, but I just thought the plot left a lot to be desired.  I still don't really know how to describe the plot except that a woman has an affair with a passing by photographer (there to photograph the covered bridges) and then has to decide whether or not to leave her family to go with him.



After the show we came back to make dinner!  A good end to a good weekend :)

Upright Citizens Brigade

Wednesday night I was able to experience my very first every show at the Upright Citizens Brigade!  UCB is a comedy club where they do a lot of improv and sketch shows and they also hold classes.  A lot of famous actors (particularly SNL alums) got their start performing at UCB so you never know who's going to show up.

In this particular case, my coworker knew there was a good show coming up so some of us from work went!  The show is hosted by Mike Birbiglia (a comedian I've actually heard of!) He's generally a stand up comedian but I guess he likes to dabble in improv.  The format of the show is he talks to the audience about their day, then might tell a short story of his own, and then his back up improvers and him improv a little scene that's related to whatever they were just talking about.  The other fun surprise was that one of the improvers was Cristin Miloti!  She was the actress who played the mother on How I Met your Mother as well as starring in the original broadway cast of Once.

We were even sitting in the front row so I could see everything and was inches away from the performers!

We then stayed to see another short 1/2 hour sketch show called Billy Joel, Sketches from an Italian Restaurant.  It was a sketch show all based on the music of Billy Joel and was really funny and silly.

I've just realized it's much harder to write about improv than it is about a musical!  Far less pictures and video exist :)

Mom and Daughter Days!

It all started when I realized I had some vacation days that I had to take before the end of March otherwise I would lose them.  Then I realized I had guaranteed tickets to see the Rachael Ray show being filmed but since it films in the middle of the day I couldn't really find anyone to go with me.  I thought this would be the perfect opportunity for my mom to come visit!  Also because I really wanted her to come see Cinderella starring Fran Drescher too.  Long story short, she came to visit and we had excellent adventures!

The first day she was here (Wednesday) was our day to see Cinderella.  We had actually already seen this show the last time my mom was visiting, but we both really wanted to see Fran Drescher perform, having loved her for a long time in The Nanny.  

The show was just as great as I expected it to be.  Fran played the evil stepmother and wore some of the most fantastic outfits!  Basically it was a lot of fun.

Here's Fran as the wicked stepmother!

Thursday was Rachel Ray day.  I had guaranteed tickets which meant that we didn't have to wait in a giant line or get there super early.  We got to go in ahead of everyone else waiting in line as well.  The taping itself was pretty fun although watching her cook all the food made me hungry!  Some of the audience got to try some of the snacks, but we were too far over to get anything.  We did get some freebies though!  Even when it's some ridiculous gadget you'll probably never use in your life, it's still fun to get something for free!

The show that we saw taped won't air until sometime in July, but they did do part of a segment from a show that aired this past Monday.  It ended up being the Vice President of the United States skyping in!  He was pretty funny to watch and my dad got a good shot of the screen where you can see us :)

After the show, even though we were pretty tired, we thought we'd try our hand at the lottery for Matilda.  Unfortunately we didn't get our names pulled, but we were kept amused by an 8 year old boy and his mother who we were chatting with while we were waiting for names to be drawn.  When they found out I lived and worked in NYC the little boy looked up at me astonished and said "You have a job already?  How old are you!?"  It was pretty hysterical.  So I countered with "I'm 26 years old, can you believe it?"  He thought for a second, and replied with "My mother is only 2 years older than you!"  Then, turning to his mother, "You can get that big in only 2 years??"  Needless to say, the three of us were cracking up.  Their names ended up getting called so we were glad they were able to see the show.

On Friday it was time for our Sex and the City bus tour.  This is something my mom has been wanting to do forever and we both really really enjoyed it.  The tour guide was great and we got to see parts of the city that I normally wouldn't hang around in since they are so far from my apartment.

In the subway!

Central Park Selfie

Tina at the Plaza!

I should be a bus model clearly

On the bus

They played clips from the show while we were on the bus

There was a little rain but not too bad

Pizza stop!

Mom holding the pizza before we got back on the bus

Cupcakes - an important part of any tour

Cosmos - also an important part of any tour

Outside the bar

I was just really amused at this empty window front

After the tour we ended up wandering around, which included going into the Bryant Park public library.  I got to show my mom the cool exhibits and we had a nice time walking around.

Saturday was pretty gross so we just hung around the apartment and then had dinner with my cousin down in the east village which was fun.  On Sunday, though, we thought we'd try again for Matilda, just for fun.  And not only was my mom's name drawn, mine was too!  So we ended up taking Kari and Seth with us.

I'm really glad I got to see the show.  I've been wanting to see it since I saw a clip from the Olivier Awards (the London version of the Tonys).  It was really cute and the kids in the show were ridiculously talented!

I think I may have posted this before because I think it's so cute but here's a video sneak of the show!



And here's the song "Naughty" sung by all 4 Matildas from the original London cast.



I couldn't have asked for a better long weekend with my amazing mom!

Filming Glee

Sometimes my roommate is crazy.  And sometimes she takes me with her down her rabbit hole of crazy.  But at least usually the rabbit hole tends to lead somewhere awesome.

Last night Kari's sister had heard a rumor via the internet that Glee was going to be filming in Grand Central today.  We knew they had been in the area, in fact they were definitely right near my work a couple days ago but I missed it.  Originally the plan for the day was for us to get up early and wait in line for rush tickets for a show but instead Kari really really wanted to go see if we could find the filming and I agreed.

So instead of leaving the apartment at 7am like crazy people to go stand in line, we left the apartment at 6am like crazy people to follow an internet rumor.....like crazy people.

We started and didn't see anything, but we did walk past the trailers and saw a bunch of signs.  Eventually we followed the signs pointing to the set and saw them setting up and going in and out of a subway station.

They were calling it "Downtown"
probably so they could be subtle

This is apparently where they were holding people

To the set!

The set from across the street

Unfortunately, at this point we thought thats all we were going to see.  We couldn't figure out how to get into the subway where they might be filming, as it all seemed blocked off.  The internet was also less than helpful.

We were going to do some shopping anyway, so decided to wait around until the shops opened at 10. While we were waiting, however, we kept checking twitter and other various social networking sources and eventually people kept posting things like "I saw the Glee cast on the subway!" or "I saw the Glee cast in Grand Central".  We knew they must be somewhere!  So we wandered alll over Grand Central, eventually heading down into the subway and made our way all the way back to the shuttle to Times Square.  And sure enough, there they were!

It was so neat to be able to watch them rehearse.  Lea Michelle (Rachel) and Kevin McHale (Artie) were there.  It was also just fascinating to be able to see the filming process and watch the crew move around and watch people direct the extras.  We waited around and watched for a little while but eventually more and more people found it and it got to be so busy with annoying fans that we left.  But it was such a fun experience!!  The production assistants were pretty nice and let us take pictures as long as there was no flash, so here are some fun ones!

One thing I thought was funny is that they put up fake signs that said 14 Street - Union Square, even though there were still other signs that still said Grand Central.  Oh the magic of television.

Proof I was there!

It's the wand that chooses the wizard, Allison

This has been a fairly low key weekend and will continue to be so because my plans for today revolve mostly around finally cleaning my room.

However, yesterday I finally set up my wand remote control that I got for Christmas.  I kind of kept forgetting about it and then not having the time to read through the directions and set the whole thing up.  I still haven't programmed a command for every gesture it can do, but that will come in time.  So far the wand can turn the TV on and off, mute it, and flick the channels up and down.  My next plan is to teach it to control the volume.

The opening paragraph in the directions on how to work the wand are also written in such a way that I was very amused.  Harry Potter fans are amazing (I can only assume that's why this object exists in the first place).  Here's what it says:

This product is not a toy; it is an instrument of control. In order to use it properly and become an expert wizard or witch, you will have to practise using it. Once you are the wand's master, you will need to teach it to control things in your home. Only then will you be ready to perform your magic.

To be completely honest, all of the reviews of this object are completely accurate in that it's very difficult to control and do the right movements.  But it is oh so satisfying when it works that it just about makes up for it.

I made a little video for you to enjoy to highlight what it can do since I was so excited about it!

Everything is Awesome!

Over the weekend I saw the Lego movie with Seth and it was actually really cute.  It had gotten good reviews both critically and by word of mouth so I had high hopes for it, and it was great!  I really liked how the animation was done in that it's clearly very smoothly animated, but it's also purposely clunky because in theory everything is made of legos.  I thought the humor was very smart and while it is a kids movie it did a good job at putting in adult humor without making it too blue.

The best part is that there is a song that keeps repeating throughout the movie called "Everything is Awesome" and let's face it, that tends to be my mantra in life.  It will now be stuck in my head forever.

Here's a fun clip from the movie where you hear the song:



And these are just fun "bloopers" they released online from the movie that doesn't give anything away.



Just for fun, this is my other new favorite happy song.  I just learned (thanks to the Oscars) that it was in the movie Despicable Me 2.