opera and rain

It's 11am and the singing has begun. There's a street fair today outside my apartment and this is occassion for all types of musical expression. Singers of children's songs. The ABC song. Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Old Oak Tree. One man barked into the microphone, like a dog. He was pretty good.

Then, there's the karaoke, which makes sense from a one-performer-has-to-break-down-and-another-set-up point of view. That's about the only way it works. Joe six-pack is up there, singing Lionel Ritchie's "Hello, Is It Me You're Looking For?" With feeling. Besides that the street fair is a pretty fun thing. There are giant rubber castles filled with screaming children. There are street vendors -- mostly local businesses. The fish tank guy has a half a block again this year.

Today I cook. My friends R and R dropped Tosca tickets on me last night, and I took my book club friend S, who used to work at the SF Opera. It was a very informative evening. For instance, I learned that the orchestra can't actually hear the singers, so they all have to watch the conductor -- the performers watch him in TV monitors installed on the front of the balconey -- to make sure they all stay in synch. One folk tale: the final scene, Tosca leaps to her death. Fade to black. A high-drama moment. Only in this one performance, the Tosca character hits the trampoline behind teh set with too much force, and actually bounces back up above the wall, in view of the audience. It was a type of comic relief they were not seeking.

Weevil Paranoia

This is the first time I'm really cooked since the weevils came. (Full disclosure: the banana bread I took on the camping trip with the shark attack victim? Weevils. It slowed us all down.) They appear to have decamped, but since you can't prove the non-existence of something I continue to be wary. Is that a weevil, sealed into the gummy bit of a cereal bag? No. They look like coffee grounds when they're dead, so that makes the lid of the coffee canister suspect. It's like that famous line from the movie Sixth Sense: "I see dead people." Only in my case, it's "I see dead weevils."

I'm not even sure they're weevils. They came into my house in a hiking guide my old housemate gave me. I thought they were paper bugs, so didn't worry about much besides my cookbooks. Then they moved in on the oatmeal, corn meal, and flour. One friend said they were "flour mites." In Australia, they had little bugs called chiggers that were in everything. They just ate them. "Extra protein."

But in a thank-you dinner to friends, I'd like to hold the weevils. Maybe I'll cook at their place.

Last night it began to rain. It's a big winter thing in SF. It was nice. I walked through the Castro in the drizzle, watching the Saturday night party people and singing a Tosca tune. I could get into opera. Only, if I'm going to buy my own ticket, I'm going to have to get a better job.

The interviews on Thursday went pretty well. Jay wants to hire me -- we talked money -- so it's just down to how well I did with the other 3 folks I met. But I am thinking of accepting. And they are thinking of offering. So I may be employed. After all this time.

OK, they've given microphones to children. Time to go food shopping.