Behind....

Hi all,

So...I realize it's been a while since I posted anything about my life on here because with midterms and all of that I've gotten pretty busy.  And....it's gonna be a bit longer before anything more is posted haha.  But!  After Thanksgiving is over I promise I will do posts on the following:  (this is also to remind myself haha)

1. Muggle Quidditch!
2. Coffee & Dessert with friends!
3. Seeing Urinetown the musical at Columbia!
3. Adventures to the Disney store in Times Square
4. Seeing A Life in the Theatre starring Patrick Stewart and T.R. Knight!
5. And finally, Thanksgiving Adventures of course!

I won't have my computer with me over Thanksgiving break (I'm going to Washington DC) so I can't update then but I'll try to when I get back.  Have a wonderful Turkey Day! ^_^

An Evening of Comedy w/ Rosie

So on Friday night I went with a friend to see Rosie O'Donnell do some stand up.  I believe she was appearing because of the NYC Comedy Festival or something like that.  I really only heard about it because it was listed on my discount tickets list and, 1) I thought it sounded fun and interesting to see her live and 2) I knew I had to go see her if only so my mother could live vicariously through me :)

When I was little I remember watching Rosie's talk show with my mom. I never watched her on the view because I pretty much can't stand that show but I've also seen her in several movies and things.  Anyway, what I didn't know until we got there is that it wasn't just Rosie but was actually 5 other female comedians as well.  It was actually pretty interesting because we got about 20min of each stand up act and then Rosie started the whole thing and also did a little bit in between each of the others.  I had never heard of any of the others but they were all pretty funny.  All in all I think it was an enjoyable evening.

The other funny thing that happened is that right across from Town Hall where Rosie did her one night show is the theatre where Pee Wee Herman is currently playing his show.  So after the show was over we were walking back to the subway and saw all these people crowded around something so we went to investigate and we saw Pee Wee Herman!  He was talking or something to the crowd.  So that was kind of cool even though I've never really watched any of his show or movies so I guess it wasn't as exciting for me.

Rosie O'Donnell!!

The Town Hall Auditorium

Another view of the outside of the theatre

We had AMAZING seats.  5th row on the left!

The inside of the theatre

Halloween!

So I finally have pictures from actual Halloween! Basically my friends and I dressed up as each other. We were all super busy with homework and everything so we ended up getting together, taking some pictures, switching clothes, taking some more pictures, and then we went back to our own devices. A little pathetic I know, but what can you do? We had fun though! :D

Also I have some more pictures from Phantom :)

another picture of the stage from our amazing seats :)

yay!

Having fun and being silly

Serious Photo - Dressed as ourselves

Serious Photo - People Switch

Happy Photo - Dressed as ourselves

Happy Photo -People Switch

Okay, so it might not have been the cleverest of costumes.  But we were amused and that's what matters in the end isn't it?

Also, the following picture is actually from several days before Halloween when I was just hanging out with friends, but I thought it was funny so I'll post it :)

The Angel of Music

First of all,

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!

My Halloween isn't going to be amazingly crazy and fun, but I think a couple of friends and I are going to get together and dress up and take pictures....and then go back to working on our midterms. Lame, I know, but I guess that's what happens when you get to grad school. But last night...last night was awesome!

I went with friends to see Phantom of the Opera on Broadway. This is actually the 3rd time I've seen that musical, but the first two times were in Portland and there is really no comparison. Somehow seeing a show in its home where it has been being performed for the past 20 years means that everything is so spot on perfect that after a while you don't even realize you're seeing a stage show and you just end up getting lost in the story. I think all of us who saw it are going to be humming the songs for several days...or weeks haha. Also, I got the tickets through my discount membership thing and so I figured we were going to be in the rear mezzanine but, in fact, we ended up being in the back of the orchestra so our seats were awesome!

Because we saw the show the day before Halloween we saw so many people dressed up on the subways and walking around the city. Some of the costumes were fairly crazy haha. But it was kind of fun to see everybody all dressed up.

The Stage

Because of the flash this picture turned out very Phantom-like I think

 That's really all the news for now.  I'm headed off to work on my midterm essay.  But because I'll be humming it all day anyway, I'll leave you with a video of The Phantom of the Opera performing at the 1988 Tony Awards.  :)

Flash Assignment

Okay, I'm trying to test out this work around I found to try and embed flash files into blogger.  Let's see if it works!

This is the front of the website we had to create.

*Update* I know the flash isn't really working on anyone's computer. I'm still not sure why, it's on my to do list to figure out :)

Day at the Museum

Saturday morning was a morning of culture.  Some friends and I went to the Guggenheim Museum of Art. I think I've said this already but one of the cool things about being a Columbia student is that we get into most of the museums in the city for free!  So we're trying to work our way through the museums.  Hopefully the next one will be the Museum of Natural History because I'm especially excited for that one.  You can see in the pictures, but the coolest thing about the Guggenheim has to be its architecture.  It was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright and has this giant spiral ramp which you walk around to see all of the exhibits.  The museum is mostly modern art and they were having an exhibit on Classicism which I guess is the period between WWI and WWII.  As a part of admission we were given an audio listening tour as well which provided a lot of historical background on many of the pieces.  I think my favorites that I saw were a couple of Manet paintings.  There was one other that I saw which was really interesting but I can't remember what it was called or who it was by (I know, helpful).  It was a painting of the painter but in the picture the painter was making an sculpture of his head.  So it was like a double self portrait which I think was a cool concept.

This is one of Manet's paintings I really liked

In front of the Guggenheim

The spiral ramp inside the museum

Me inside the Guggenheim

The start of the ramp

The ceiling

Improv Night!

The cool thing about TC is that they have a good number of free events on campus.  Just like when I went to the comedy night a few weeks ago, last night there was a similar event where they brought in members of The Upright Citizens Brigade to perform improv.  For those that don't know, this is, I'm fair sure, a very well known group in the world of improv.  There were two groups, both did what is called Long Form Improv (versus short form, which is what they do on "Whose Line is it Anyway?")  It was very good.  The only time I've ever seen long form performed was when we used to do a few long form games in improv club as an undergrad and, I'm only speaking for myself here, but I know I'm not very good at it haha.  So it was fun seeing the professionals in action.  I'm not sure what the name of the long form that the 2nd group did was but the first group did what is called a Harold, which (as I've been told by my friend) is the original and best form of long form improv.  It was basically made up of little vignettes, all centering on a similar topic.  It was very good actually.

On another note, today is my first day videotaping in the schools for my job!  I'm pretty nervous, but I think it will be okay.  I spent this week getting all of the equipment together and everything.  I also learned that TC has a Video Services office where students can check out video equipment and they also have a pool of freelance videographers that can be hired out for something like $35 an hour.  The person in charge of the office also showed me the recording studio they have set up.  Nobody really used it too much now because they don't have a full staff, but it used to be a fully functional tv recording studio and now they just use it for little projects.  He also has a music recording studio set up in the next room.  I think he was excited that I got so excited about the different capabilities of the room and I was telling him a little bit about my background with music and video recording and he seemed pretty impressed.  So that was cool :)

7 Cities 1 Night

So last night I went to an event hosted by Willamette of all places!  They set up this event for alumni that was held on the same night in 7 different cities (NYC being one of them of course).  I think there must have been 30-40 people there.  It was at a bar on Wall St (very fancy lol) in the Andaz Hotel and so that was definitely an adventure.  They had food and drinks and I met a lot of interesting and cool alums :)  It was fun to be able to talk to people and be able to say things like "mill stream" and have them know exactly what I'm talking about.  I didn't take any pictures, unfortunately because I was trying to wander around and meet people but you can check the bar out on their website, and I pulled the following picture from there as well.

Bubbles!!!!

Today I met up with a friend and we went to see the show Gazillion Bubbles but actually my interesting day started on the subway when a Mariachi band was randomly playing.  So I had a very musical start to my day.  Anyway, back to Bubbles.  It was actually a pretty good show.  I can definitely see kids liking it, I mean I liked it!  haha.  They had a lot of cool effects with lasers and at a couple of points in the show they filled the audience with bubbles (I think I must have counted at least 18 bubble makers around the room).  The theatre where it is housed is called the New World's Stage and is the same building that houses Avenue Q and 3 other shows (a total of 5).  I was talking to one of the ushers and he was saying it used to be a movie theater and they refurbished it for stage theatre.  2 of the theatres seat about 500 and the other 3 seat about 200.  (I'm pretty sure we were in a 200 seat one).

The outside of the theatre

The inside of the theatre building

This show is great for merchandising haha

The stage at the end of the show

After the bubbles show we went to find the Hungarian restaurant that I went to with my family earlier in the semester and we were successful!

mmmmm delicious food :)

mmmm polochinta (aka crepes w/ chocolate)

After we had the deliciousness that is both wienerschnitzel and polochinta (I have no idea if I spelled either of those correctly) we went adventuring.

Good idea:  Saving money for a taxi and walking home.
Good idea:  Walking through Central Park because it is the shortest route (also very pretty)
Bad idea:  Getting lost in Central Park when it's really cold outside...

Central Park

The Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Reservoir in the park

I think you get the idea, basically we walked ALOT.  We walked about 3 blocks from the restaurant to Central Park, then who knows how many blocks in the park, but it was at least about 20min of walking.  Then we thought it'd be a good idea to ride the subway from 96th street to 116th (Columbia) except that somehow we ended up on the express (even though they were supposed to be running local) instead of the local and ended up about 4 blocks too far east in Harlem. So then we had to walk those extra blocks.

Needless to say....my legs were TIRED!

And that was enough adventures for one day :)

Accomplice

Today I went to a show type thing called Accomplice in downtown Manhattan.  Now I don't want to give too much away in case anybody reading this ever decides to do it, which I highly recommend.  Basically the day before the show they call and tell you the location and then you have to meet there.  There are 10 people in the group and you have to walk around and solve clues in order to get to the end.  It takes about 3 hours, but you stop sometimes and go into bars (2 drinks were included plus appetizers) or restaurants and there are actors posted along the way to give you hints.  The actors were totally great, it was set up really well and I had a blast :)  It takes you through the financial district, soho, chinatown, and little italy so its a really fun way to see the city while also being immensely entertained.  I'll try not to go into too much detail but here are a few pictures from the trek:

***Caution! If you plan on going on this adventure at some point and don't want any spoilers then don't look at the rest of this post.  There, you've been warned***

We met at Seaport, which also is really fun to visit

One of the actors we interacted with

Yes...one of the clues involved buying a frog in Chinatown...

This doesn't have anything to do with the tour but aren't the fire hydrants cool in Little Italy?