Awesome week

On Tuesday I saw Love, Loss, and What I Wore.  (Isn't it awesome that I can just, you know, say that?  Or rather that I can just, you know, do that?)  I'd been kind of wanting to see it for a very long time, but tickets seem to be always (a) sold out ages in advance, and also (b) extremely expensive.  This week they were discounted; either the show's popularity is finally starting to wane, or the summer weather and holiday weekend has dampened theater attendance.  Either way, I had a really fantastic seat - a side seat, but on the aisle and near the front and, the way the theater was laid out, with nobody directly in front of me.  The cast rotates, and the show I saw included two actresses I vaguely recognized (one of whom is, according to the program on Desperate Housewives) and Susan Sullivan, the brilliant actress behind, among other things, the uptight mother-in-law on Dharma and Greg.  The show is a series of monologues about clothing, mothers, clothing, friendship, clothing, love, clothing, purses, and clothing.  I couldn't identify with everything - a lot of the generational markers were clearly targeting an older crowd - but a lot of it was side-stitchingly funny.  I came away with a very strong sense of how women - across ethnic, class, and generational lines, regardless of their education or profession or outlook - share a common language and experience, the details which vary over time and from woman to woman, but the essence of which is constant.  Unfortunately, this essence is - underneath the funny stories about first bras and horrible bathing suits - a deep-seated fear of and ambivalence regarding one's own body.

On Wednesday I made another visit to Balade.  I love this place.  This time I had the Balade Pitza, which is not like normal pizza; it's pita with hummus and ground meat.  It was very, very good.

Yesterday - Thursday - I saw X-Men.  Everyone else in the theater was going to see Transformers.  I firmly believe that X-Men must have been the better movie, because it was very good, although I do think they played a little fast and loose with the Holocaust in the first half-hour.  That notwithstanding, it was exciting and interesting (although did drag a bit in the last third), was not markedly more sexist than the typical action movie, and - not being familiar with the X-Men from anything other than the movies - it was a lovely dose of backstory and of course made me want to watch all the other movies again.

Today I am going to Nebraska.  That should be interesting.