So, after my mother died, I took basically half a year off from my career. No auditions, and I sang basically at the concerts I had previously signed up for and where I had a contractual obligation.

I started off April by getting new recordings to send out for pre-screening (many opera companies nowadays will ask you for pre-screening video recordings before they'll give you a live audition)- particularly for two roles I really wanted to sing: one for Handel's opera Xerxes, for the role of King Xerxes (no golden speedo, no), and Mozart's Magic Flute for the role of Prince Tamino. Tamino, I've done before and can do in my sleep. Xerxes is one of my dream baroque roles.

Well, I heard nothing for months, so I assumed I had been passed over. Today I get a double-whammy in my email: I got Xerxes. They apparently wrote down my e-mail incorrectly and have been trying to get in touch with me for a month. But I got the role!
I just have, like, a month to memorize it. Yay >_> but yay!

And I also got an audition date for next Friday. So yay, I'm actually making my comeback.

I am going to honor her wish, so-

Carrie Fisher (1956-2016): Drowned in moonlight, strangled by her own bra.

When you're RPing with a group of people who are all comfortable with throwing story twists and features without powergaming, and suddenly the scene you started turns into this unpredictable collaborative storytelling and you have no idea what's going to happen next.

That is awesome.

When my boss decides to surprise me on Friday by leaving my favorite coffee drink on my desk with a note thanking me for everything I do. And the fact that this finally arrived this morning in the mail and is now at my desk:

I have a theory that Sir Terry Pratchett is organizing the greatest concert of Music With Rocks In in the history of the universe.

I have to share because this was pretty funny.

Today I had a patient call in. Hispanic woman, Spanish speaker, about 20 years old.
Her name?
America Chavez.

I kid you not.

I was so tempted to ask her if she had two mothers.

@Ganymede said in Flights 'n Tights MUX:

I don't think anything I have stated has been passive-aggressive. I don't think it's passive-aggressive to point out that a game can be more-inclusive. I don't think it's passive-aggressive to say that a game can do more.

I am sorry, but it is one hell of a passive-aggressive move to tell someone that their game can do more than the actual scope they have chosen for their game. That’s like walking into a “Save Tibet” fundraiser and going “Hmm, nice fundraiser you’ve got here, but what are you doing for the Guatemalan children?” It’s utterly and thoroughly classless- it’s the the worst kind of 'I know what's best for everybody so you had better listen to me' level of entitlement.

If someone wants to open a game that focuses exclusively on lesbian superheroes , they're well within their rights to tell you to go feff yourself if you pull something like that. Let’s not hide behind the pusillanimous "Oh! I applaud it, I do, old chap, but it could do so much more!" which is so thoroughly condescending. The game is dedicated exclusively to playing gay male superheroes and their mis/adventures. As far as performing the function the game was intended for, there is no humanly possible way it could do more outside of the game being set in a 24 hour Groundhog Day loop of Fire Island with the Young Avengers fighting RuPaul’s evil stepbrother, EvilLynn.

Let's break this and call a spade a spade here. By saying "This game could do more" you are using code for "This game could do more of what I want it to do more of whether or not it is part of the stated mission and theme of the game." There. It doesn’t look so pretty and polite when it’s stripped of the false pretense and revealed for the condescension that it is. This is a case of “How dare you not cater to my preferred group” disguised as “Oh, jolly good for you!”

My workplace is still awesome. So, on Friday, Credentialing and IT are moving to a new building a mile away from here because we're growing. IT moving means relocating equipment and servers, and since we do billing and practice management for the local anesthesiologists and whatnot, the servers being offline means we can do jack shit while that move takes place.

All work stops at noon on Friday so the move can take place. So the CEO is throwing a company-wide BBQ in the parking lot for all of us and we get paid lunch during it. We were allowed to come in an hour early every day of this week, so we won't be missing any hours after the shutdown post-BBQ. This week I'm getting to leave at 1pm, have most of Friday to myself, and not taking a hit on my paycheck. Yay!

I chose team Instinct so that I could wear yellow in honor of the garb of the original Pokemon trainer, April O'Neil, who was able to find and train four Wartortles to protect her along with their Raticade mentor.

Or I chose yellow 'cause I like yellow. Maybe.

Like sand shifting through the hourglass, these are the MUDs of our lives.

This is a pity- I think that an OC-driven game would be a good solution for the Queen Beeing and the clique-gatekeeping that you see on an IP-based game, at least in the superhero sphere.

Any interest? Dear lord, yes! I love the witches, and I'd especially love playing another apprentice way over her head but too earnest to realize it.

@meg ... now his recent penchant for idly flipping through canoe catalogs makes sense.

Bless you, @meg , it's a fantastic idea! If you don't have any Grand Lake locals on staff, you can always shoot my husband questions of trivia or history of the place that may not be easily found.

Okay, this is kind of creepy. I've been to Grand Lake for holidays. My husband grew up in the area. I know that place, and know that Miss Miyauchi's hamburgers are the best in the world...

You guys had better have Miss Miyauchi's hamburgers in there.

@tinuviel I guess physics work differently in the Utopian Paralell.

Ah, the recurring flaw of typing way too quickly and being way too eager to hit return.

In one scene back in CoMUX, I was playing America Chavez and in the middle of a scene, she was lying in wait to ambush someone with Kate Bishop. The pose ended with something along the lines of "Peeing around the corner, America gestures for Kate to come closer." Kate, understandably, stated she had no intention of coming any closer.

The other one was in a scene with Booster Gold, where my character wanted to say something to him in secret so he wanted to get his attention. What should have read as 'quietly nudges Booster' became 'quietly nudes Booster' - that one was almost as embarrassing as the time I examined a clock on the wall in a pose, and accidentally omitted an 'l'.

He was one of my favorite people. He always made you feel welcome and tried his best to see how he could include you in whatever insanity was going on. We only started chatting last year but in that time I came to really like him.

He was awesome, warm, witty and he never stopped giving me guff for liking Sondheim. I wish I had been able to spend more time with him. I wish I had known him sooner.

Life got busy, I had a move, etc- long story shot, I was absent for quite a bit because real life. I got my bearings and managed to log back in to... yeah.

I met some cool people on '63, and Theorem was one of the best. I always felt bad that I couldn't spend as much time as I wanted to in-game, and with him. He was an absolute joy to RP with and he always made everybody feel welcome and included- I enjoyed chatting and hanging around with him just as much as I enjoyed being in-character. I'm sort of at a loss for words.

@ganymede said in Good or New Movies Review:

@arkandel said in Good or New Movies Review:

I do hope though there's room for something falling in the range between light-hearted and edgelord-dark. I really liked Thor but I'd like a more serious take for the next JLA movie (assuming there is one, of course).

When Wonder Woman is considered the most light-hearted of the series, there's a serious edgelord-dark weight on the entire franchise.

Pretty much. The worst thing is that Snyder's concept of 'serious' is in line with what the New 52 concept of 'serious' was- which basically can be summed up as a thirteen year old writing stories full of violence, hopelessness and brooding and saying "Oh wow I am so mature!" - the soundtrack to Snyder's approach could easily be Batman's'Darkness, No Parents' song from the Lego Movie.