This weekend, Tammy and I found a book store going out of business at our local mall. Tammy bought the “last” Harry Potter book, hardback, for $7. I picked up Steve Martin’s autobiography “book on tape” (actually, it’s 4 CDs) for just under $10.

I’ve always had a warm spot in my heart for Steve Martin probably because he was my brother’s favorite comedian back in the late 70’s, when I was just a little guy. I snuck out of bed once and watched Steve on Saturday Night Live with my brother.

I’ve had this Steve Martin quote in my quip database for ages. Now, I’m inspired to post it. It’s from his comedy album that I bought about ten years ago.

Some people have a way with words… others not have way.

I haven’t really taken the time to talk about my theatrical pursuits lately. Time for some catching up.

In early December, I played Joseph, Mary’s betrothed husband, in Stage Right Theatre’s* presentation of “Christmas Heirlooms”. For me it was a tough role to play. Not only am I physically incapable of growing a beard, it was the first time I had role with so much emotional depth. In Heirlooms, Joseph hears of Mary’s pregnancy from a friend and is forced to confront her about it. He runs the gamut from rage, to heartbreak, to shame, and finally reconciliation. I also had to sing, but only a little.

On February 8th and 9th, I’ll be part of an ensemble cast in Stage Right’s dessert theater show, “You Know the Old Slaying.” It’s an “interactive” murder mystery in which the cast and audience work together to figure out who done it.

As an actor, this requires me to stay in character and improv throughout the show. In order to separate our own personas from the roles we are playing (since 90% of the audience will know us outside of the theater) most of the cast will learn new accents for their parts. I’ve always been pretty good at doing foreign accents, but I had to pick one that no one has heard from me before. That is to say, I had to learn a new one. I went with a North Plains, Minnesota/Wisconsin accent (think “Fargo”) and I think I’ve pulled it off.

This show is going to be amazing and the best part is that the audience, for the most part, gets to decide how it ends. If you’re going to be in the area, I strongly recommend attending. We’ll get started at 7:30 PM both nights. Tickets are $7.50 each and desserts are served during the intermission. I can hold tickets for you if you let me know. You can also use my PayPal link at the bottom of the sidebar to pay in advance.

See ya there!

*I continually rib Stage Right’s founder Michael Winters about misspelling “theater.” He insists that the correct spelling, if you are serious about it, is “theatre.” Then I follow with something like, “So if you want to be hoity-toity, you spell it wrong on purpose?”

Normally, if I don’t get a new WBQotW posted by Tuesday, I just let the week slide and post a new one the following Monday. It just doesn’t seem fair for a white board quip to get short changed, spending only four or five days on the board rather than seven.

But today is Wednesday. I didn’t post a new quip last week and if I don’t post one this week, our current quip, clever as it is, will have been on the board three weeks, and that’s just not right.

Thus, I present a “short week” white board quip.

Why is “abbreviated” such a long word?

Get it? Ahaa… Ahaa ha.

Tuesday, January 22nd, at 10 AM, I’ll be observing a moment of silent prayer.

It was on January 22nd, 1973 at around 10 AM that the supreme court sided with the plaintiff in the infamous Roe vs. Wade case. I didn’t know until recently that the Roe case started out right here in Dallas, Texas.

Jane Roe was the pseudonym for Norma McCorvey, a 9th grade drop-out and runaway who was taken under the wings of a couple of feminist attorneys. She was a pawn in the political battle over abortion. Those attorneys had Norma sign an affidavit and from that point on, Norma, as Jane Roe, was no longer welcome in the feminist, pro-abortion movement. All they needed was a name and a piece of paper to trot before a liberal court. They didn’t care about Norma just like they don’t care about the tens of millions of women who have suffered the physical and psychological effects of abortion. And they certainly don’t care about the incredible number of lives that have been stolen thorough this barbaric practice.

48,589,993 abortions were performed between January 1973 and December 2006.

That means that as of this writing there have been over 49 million American’s executed on the alter of our “modern” culture.

What’s really amazing is that the woman who’s name is forever associated with those 49 million deaths, the helpless pawn, has been speaking out against abortion since 1997. You can read Norma McCorvey’s testimony here. Please do. It speaks not only to the madness of “abortion rights”, but also to the love and grace of a mighty God.

Clicky clicky.

It has only recently occurred to me that I never blogged about our apartment flood that happened back in March of 2007. Well, our apartment flooded. So there. Now I’ve blogged it.

We had always had low water pressure and complaints were answered with, “We can only give you what the city gives us.” Then, one day I turned on the water in the shower and it almost knocked me over. Seems someone had figured out the problem. About a week later, the increased pressure blew the fittings off the back of our dishwasher when no one was home and the adventure began.

We lost a fair amount of “stuff” when the water rained down from our second story apartment into our garage and storage room. But having just returned from our mission to New Orleans, we were mentally and emotionally prepared for that.

After almost a year we were still dealing with some of the issues created during the flood. By using our lease renewal as leverage, I convinced the management to install new carpet and baseboards. We tried to plan the work to have minimal impact on our lives. Tammy’s business trip to Wisconsin dovetailed nicely into this plan. Also, a friend of ours was looking for some cheap, first-apartment furniture and after about nine years we were ready to replace our living room set. Perfect! All these things coordinated pretty well and the last couple of weeks have gone swimmingly.

We moved all of our furniture into our garage. Then, Tammy headed out. The new carpet was installed on Monday, the new baseboards on Wednesday, and the new furniture arrived Saturday. In the mean time I vacuumed the new carpet over and over, trying to get all the fuzz out before we had to move back in. It literally overpowered our vacuum, require a couple of “trail repairs”. I collected the fuzz in a separate trash bag and it now has the size, shape and weight of a small dog. I am not making that up!

We are about 95% moved back in. Tammy and I have both decided to lower our “stuff factor”. It’s truly amazing how much stuff you can accumulate over time. Tammy culled her clothes once before the carpet arrived and then once more while moving back into her closet. She produced four (Yes, four!) 30 gallon trash bags full of clothes that either don’t fit her physique or don’t fit her fashion. I am so not making this up. There must be 200 pounds of clothes in our garage waiting for a ride to Goodwill.

In that same spirit, the couch and love seat that we planned to give away have now been joined by a badly weathered computer desk, a recliner, and a heavily abused coffee table. We’ve cleaned out all our “junk” drawers, our kitchen, our pantry… the list goes on. The large boxes in which our new pub table and chairs arrived are now overflowing with cast offs.

Culling the cruft from your house can be a liberating experience. We actually have room now! Our tiny kitchen no longer has drawers that won’t quite close. Our walk-in closets can actually be walked in. And for the first time in months, my desktop computer has a desk top surrounding it, rather than piles of things I would never “get back to” no matter how much I wished I could.

It’s like I can breath again. Now, if only we could keep it this way. Wish us luck. Or better yet, pray!

P.S. Is anyone in the market for a wedding gown? Seriously.