Friday, November 21, 2008

Driving blues

Safe and sound in Athens GA, we just had a nice dinner and drinks at a great Mexican place next door to the motel. The trip here, though, was a little bit of an adventure. Extremely windy up in the West Virginia hills, but low temperatures wreaked a little havoc on the windshield washers on our van. We figure some other renter must have put some water in with the windshield fluid, because when we opened the hood (this was after trying to keep our van on the road looking through either a haze of white or at the most a tiny clean gap on the windshield), the wiper fluid was basically a big blue ice cube! After a comedy of bad choices for interstate exit ramps we stopped at a Kmart for some new fluid, which we topped off, but it was only 75 miles south of there that the temperature got warm enough for the lines to thaw. Ridiculous.

The actors and director just showed up at the motel, after their own drive from Charlotte this evening, and we are anxious to perform the show tomorrow night. Some of us have relatives that are coming to the show, which always makes the trip a little more special than when we perform only for strangers.

Almost Heaven...West Virginia

Thursday Nov. 20

After a flight to Charlotte NC, our day of travel ended on wooded, windy roads in the mountains of West Virginia. I brought along a new (old) board game based on the crime sprees of Bonnie and Clyde, Dillinger, and other gangs. Pretty fun, and we got a lot of the guys to play. I think we were having board game withdrawal. Our show at Concord University in Athens, WV was intimate. We stayed at the beautiful Pipestem State Park lodge (out in the sticks, though), with a homey atmosphere, mountain vistas, and deer--lots of deer!








Tomorrow we meet up with the actors and head to Athens Georgia for our first touring performance of All is Calm at the Univesity of GA. Looking forward to touring that show, and bringing it to other audiences around the country.