QOTD: "If you steal from one author, it's plagiarism; if you steal from many, it's research." - Wilson Mizner
Reading: Reginald Hill, Death's Jest Book
Listening to: Send in the Clowns: The Ballads of Stephen Sondheim
Decluttering accomplishments: cleaned a bunch of papers off my desk
This entry is all about entertainment and food, but I don't want to give the impression that I didn't actually work. I was actually pretty busy this week, since three (out of five) people in my group were on vacation. But none of that is particularly noteworthy. And the entertainment is.
Thursday night, I went down to the National Mall, where the Smithsonian Folklife Festival is going on. The places being celebrated this year are Appalachia, Mali, and Scotland. The Scotland area had an evening concert, which featured (amongst others) Alasdar Fraser and Adam MacNaughton. Fraser is a phenomenal fiddler and he performed in conjunction with a cellist - apparently, a common combination in Scotland a century ago. If you think about it, you couldn't combine a fiddle with bagpipes or accordions before amplification, so the cello makes a lot of sense, even though one ordinarily wouldn't think of it as a folk instrument. As for MacNaughton, his set was entirely a capella and was very funny. I was particularly pleased that he sang "Oor Hamlet," which is probably his most famous song. It was a lot of fun, despite the extreme heat. I'm planning on going again on Wednesday night, when the Mali area has a concert featuring Salif Keita.
Then, I went to Chicago for the weekend. I got together with my friend, Kek, during the day. She was one of the people I traveled with in Papua New Guinea last year so we had a lot of travel related conversation. Anyway, Kek belongs to the Chicago Architecture Foundation and we took their riverboat tour. The docent was full of details about Chicago architecture, a lot of which went past me. The main thing to note is that the Chicago fire allowed the city to become a "laboratory for architecture." The most amusing comment I noted was a reference to the firm of Skidmore, Owens and Merrill as "three blind Mies, " as all three were followers of Mies van der Rohe. I'm not particularly fond of the blocky Miesian look and far prefer the so-called "identity tops" which put interesting shapes at the tops of skyscrapers - e.g. a pyramid or a miniature Greek-style temple or the like. There are also a lot of art deco buildings and a few neogothic ones. My favorite of the more modern glassy buildings is one that I missed the name of but which reminded me of the Chrysler building in New York, which is pretty much my favorite skyscraper in the world.
After the tour, we walked over the Michigan Avenue bridge and looked at the Chicago Tribune Tower, which has blocks from a lot of famous buildings from throughout the world embedded in its side. That's the sort of detail I'd be unlikely to notice on my own and Kek mentioned that she hadn't known about it until the first time she'd taken the architecture tour. Then we had lunch at the Billy Goat Tavern, which is famous for the "cheeseburger, cheeseburger" skit on Saturday Night Live. Apparently, it was a regular hangout for a lot of Chicago journalists, such as Mike Royko. The atmosphere is the interesting part, rather than the food.
Then we went to the Field Museum, where we saw Sue, the largest and most complete T. Rex ever found. Sue was named after the woman who found her and is referred to as "she" because of her name. Paleontologists can't successfully sex T. Rex skeletons as there have only been about 25 ever found and that's not enough of a basis for comparison. I hadn't realized that T. Rex finds have been limited to the western U.S..
Our major priority at the museum was, however, the Pacific Islands section. We saw a lot of Sepik artifacts, stirring up memories of the trip. There are other travel temptations in the region, as there were fascinating masks and carvings from New Ireland, New Caledonia, and Vanuatu. I've always found the art of that region to be particularly fascinating and it was fun looking through the exhibits with someone who understands the appeal.
Overall, we spent almost three hours at the museum (including a few other exhibits) and didn't even see half of it. But I needed to get back to my hotel and change my clothes for the main event of the weekend. My motivation for the trip was an item on my life list. I have now been to the world premier of a Sondheim musical. The new musical is called "Bounce!" and the big event was at the Goodman Theatre. This sort of theatre gala is definitely not within my normal social circles, but I figured that Sondheim isn't getting any younger and who knows how many more musicals he'll write? It was bloody expensive, but a lot of it was a tax-deductible contribution to the Goodman.
So I got to get all dressed up, even down to putting on some of the makeup I'd bought a couple of weeks ago and using one of these superhold style gels on my hair so I could wear it down without it looking weird. I'd intended to wear press-on nails, too, but didn't leave myself enough time for dealing with them. Anyway, I guess I did well enough, since I got complimented by total strangers. I hadn't brought a camera, alas, so you'll just have to take my word for it that I do clean up well. By the way, I always find it interesting to see how women interpret a "black tie" dress code. Men have well-defined rules, although there were a handful of men there who didn't live up to the standard. I'd say that only about 1-2% of the men were underdressed, but at least 5% of the women were.
As for the musical, it's the story of Addison and Wilson Mizner, who made and lost a few fortunes in the late 19th through early 20th century. The title comes from the way they kept bouncing back from all the ups and downs of their fortunes. The show was enjoyable, but the first act needs some editing. There's a long sequence when Wilson marries Nellie (who'd gone from being a bar girl in the Yukon to being a wealthy widow in New York, so obviously did some bouncing of her own). Various people who Wilson has invested in keep interrupting and getting shot. I'm sure the concept sounded amusing, but it's too confusing. The other problemmatic part of the show is the premise that the Mizner brothers have met up again after death and are looking back at their lives. I'd have to say that, in general, starting a musical with the deaths of the major characters is not a good idea.
On the plus side, the title song is very enjoyable and there's plenty of cleverness in the lyrics throughout. And there are some genuinely funny moments. I loved the sequence where Addison, who became an architect, is describing a house to a client and explains the various influences as things like "a gang of Saracens break in, tear down the tower, and install a breakfast nook." (I'm paraphrasing, but the whole idea of various invaders remodeling a house is something I find terribly amusing.)
The comments I heard from other people were mixed. There seemed to be a consensus that the second act was more successful than the first. A lot of people also seemed to have trouble with having as unsympathetic a character as Wilson Mizner. I was also surprised at how few people picked up on Sondheim's recycling of a song from "Sweeney Todd." Not quite a literal recycling, but a decided similarity.
The even also included a ritzy dinner, which was at the Palmer House Hilton. I'd chosen to stay there before knowing that (on the grounds of its location and a very good rate deal), so it turned out to be very convenient. For the benefit of anyone else who has ever wondered just what gets served at these sort of events, the meal started with "wild greens salad bouquet wrapped with cucumber ribbon, peppered salmon and apricot-mango chutney, and saffron caper vinaigrette." The main course was "petit filet mignon and slices of chicken roulade filled with arugula, sun dried currants, apricot and cranberries." There was merlot sauce for the beef and various vegetables - haricots vert, baby turnips, baby sweet pepper, golden beets, and a potato dish that included cheese and basil and was shaped like a pear. And dessert was "mini godiva mousse; brie cheesecake topped with sliced strawberry glace garnish; brandy basket with strawberry, basil and balasmic sorbet; poached baby pear; raspberry coulis and seasonal berries." In summary, reasonably creative and tasty, although the beef was overcooked and the sorbet was pretty weird.
Today was more food-oriented. One of the other things going on in Chicago this weekend was the annual Taste of Chicago festival in Grant Park. Think of this as the world's largest shopping mall food court. There were booths from 65 restaurants, as well as various musical performances and a few booths promoting other products. I came away with free samples of some spice mix and of nail polish, for example. You have to pay for the food, with coupons that cost $7 for 11 tickets. That sounds like a good deal, but most of the food items cost at least 3 tickets, so you can go through a lot quickly. And a liter of bottled water (kind of essential on a hot day) costs 5 tickets. The other problem with this sort of thing is that it's easy to eat more than you really want to, since there's always something else interesting to sample. I limited myself to two strips of tickets. In addition to the water, I had shrimp potstickers from Star of Siam (6 coupons and worth it, as these were the best item I sampled), tasuk adana (a sort of chicken and greens in pita) from Cousin's Turkish Dining, half a hot link from Stevie B's (since barbecue is a Chicago specialty), a samosa from Arya Bhavan (a bargain at only 2 coupons, but a bit greasy and with too much cumin), and rainbow ice cream from Original Rainbow Cone. I completely fail to understand the people who come to events like this and stop at booths from McDonad's. I'm also rather appalled that there were at least three places selling "fried dough" and I'm puzzled by the existence of something called "pickle on a stick." Still, there was enough interesting food to make sure that I didn't suffer from the lack of a meal on my flight home.
Copyright 2003 Miriam H. Nadel