Last Saturday, Mer went to Canton to pick up her parents, and I met them at EJ Thomas Hall in Akron. We met in the main lobby with no trouble. We were there to see “Tuba Christmas,” which is happily a free concert.

Akron’s Tuba Christmas is one of the biggest in the country, with over five hundred tuba players and two “sell-out” performances. Tuba Christmas started in the 70s as a way to get people interested in the tuba family. It plays in over a hundred cities around the country, and it is all made of Christmas music arranged for the tuba family.

At Akron, the tubas play through the song once, and then they play through again while the audience sings. Song books are not provided for the singers, so half the fun is in seeing how many songs the audience knows. Mer and I did pretty well, with Mer knowing (and prompting me on) all the songs except the lyrics to “O Christmas Tree.” We need to learn that one for next year, since we had been stumped by that last year as well.

As a fun bonus, the usher for our row, which was in the balcony, was a former colleague of ours (from CVCA). Mer said that she had run into our former colleague when she had gone with Ellen to see My Fair Lady back in November. Since there are dozens of ushers, that is quite the happy coincidence.

All in all, the concert was much fun. The tubas were decked out in lights and garlands, and we sang lots of carols, and Dale and Carlene seemed to enjoy themselves. I hope to be able to see Tuba Christmas again next year.

On Sunday, we headed down to Canton to Aunt Mary’s place, for lunch with the family and with Mer’s “Aunt” Zovie (her adopted aunt). We had a good lunch together, and then Aunt Zovie had to go. The rest of us had our family Christmas. Since we are all grown-ups (and me), and we all have tons of stuff, this year we decided to to give to charities as gifts for people. We did decide to spruce the gifts up by giving the details of the charity as a riddle or as limericks. So, we made a good show out of the “gift” opening, and we all felt pretty good about how things turned out.

Mer’s parents got to town Monday evening. Mer’s candle party was Tuesday, and her parents and Aunt Mary were coming up to attend. The event seemed to me to be leaning in a girls’-night sort of way, so I made plans to go out with Mer’s father, Dale. We headed over to the Texas Roadhouse restaurant, where we had a very good supper and chatted for about an hour.

Mer’s friend Jill was the woman behind the natural candles, and she seems like a lot of fun. The party had Mer and Jill, Aunt Mary, Carlene (and later Dale), and four others. That seemed like a good-sized crowd. I retreated to my bedroom when I got home so I could read, but the party went on until about 10:00.

On Wednesday, Mer went down to North Canton to Aunt Mary’s for supper and visiting with her parents. I stayed home and cleaned up some from the party.

On Thursday, I had thought that Aunt Mary and Dale and Carlene had plans. Those plans fell through, so Mer went to North Canton to visit, but I had already made plans to go see CVCA’s hockey team in action again. This was a very tough opponent, and it was a great game. I only stayed through the end of the second period, when CVCA was up 4-3. I then left because I had to work the next day, but CVCA ended up winning the game 8-4. It was a very entertaining evening.

On Friday, Mer and I went south to Canton again, and we all went to Taggart’s Ice Cream shop. Taggart’s is a family favorite place to eat, and I was very happy that we managed to get there. They serve good simple food (like burgers and sloppy joes), and have great ice cream concoctions. We drove back to Aunt Mary’s, but Mer and I did not stay long. We did, however, make plans to get together on Saturday to see Tuba Christmas in Akron.

Last Saturday was Mer’s day, but she had a couple of events coming up during the week – she was hosting a natural candle and natural lotions party with an old high school friend, and her parents were coming into town for an early Christmas visit. So, while she wanted to do something out and about, she wanted to keep the outings fairly short and simple so that we could get the house clean and ready to go.

To that end, our big social outing of the day was our heading over to Kent State University, to the ice rink, to see CVCA’s hockey team in action. I was delighted. Two of the seniors on the team are in my Connections group at school, so I wanted to support them. Also, I like hockey – it is a fast game, and the checking at the high school level is not vicious, so people do not get hurt often. Lastly, the Kent ice arena has good food. I got french fries and a hot chocolate.

The game started off quickly, with CVCA scoring a goal in the first few seconds, and going up 3-0 within the first four minutes. CVCA has a pretty good hockey team, and they were playing a team that has struggled this season. I’m afraid it was not much of a game. Even with lots of substitutions and an attempt to slow the game down some, CVCA won 11-0 at the end of the second period (high school hockey has a “mercy rule” where if you are winning by 10 or more at the end of the second, the game is over).

I liked seeing my guys play, and I enjoyed the action, but there is not much fun in watching a blow-out. I’m hoping future games will be more entertaining.

Last Friday, we had the first Royal Fools improv show of this school year. I had no idea what to expect, even above the nature of improv shows, in that fourteen of my fifteen students were new this year, and so this was their first show.

The kids were excited in warm-ups, and it took some patience to get through all my notes, but it was worth it. They listened to me and did all my guidelines in the show. I was very pleased with that. I always tell the Fools to greet the audience as they come in, and my charges ran out to do so. I was setting up the stage and making sure everything was ready to go when I realized the students were all singing made-up songs as guests came in. That made me smile.

We were performing against the opening night of boys’ basketball, so I was not sure about how the crowd would be. People came and went between our show and the game, but I’m guessing we had about eighty people in attendance. That is fifteen or twenty people smaller than some of our shows, but the crowd was very responsive and fun to play to.

The show went very well. The students did a great job, and followed the “rules” of improv for each skit. The show ran about an hour and fifteen minutes, and we had a huge buffet of desserts to share with the audience. There had been a junior high girls’ “fun night” earlier in the evening, and they donated the food to our dessert table. We had a lot left over. Sadly, I had been fighting a mild migraine during the evening, and so I went home pretty quickly after the show. Mer went out with her friend Marie, who had come to see Mer and the show. They went out to Friday’s for some light food. I went to bed.

I was very happy with and for my new Fools. They should be proud. Some of the things that happened during the show:

– an expert explanation of three paintings from the “nervous era” of art
– a recitation of an original poem about playing with Barbie dolls, that was simultaneously danced out
– a very bumpy ride to China
– a cat washing service
– a mother playing favorites by giving her son’s teeth to her daughter
– a debate about unicorns and one about stuffed animal health insurance
– a singing competition with a song about air pumps

CVCA has “Connections Groups,” which are groups of eight to twelve students who are assigned faculty or staff to meet with the groups once per week, opposite chapel service. The idea is to connect with the students and to give them an adult to whom they can go for advice or help. I have a Connections group that I have been with since last school year, and I like to offer social get-togethers once in awhile. So, last Monday we got together at Cici’s Pizza.

Cici’s is a pizza buffet, which is always a good thing with teenaged guys. Two of the guys faced off in an eating contest, and the final count (with proper conversions of pasta-to-pizza) was something like twenty-four pieces to twenty-two. I did not try to eat competitively, but I still enjoyed three or four plates of pizza and one plate of dessert. Not all the guys could make it, but it was still a fun group of five of the eight guys. We played or watched people play a few video games and called it a successful night.

On Tuesday, CVCA gave its annual administration Christmas party. While no one (including myself) ever really knows what category I fall under, I have been invited to the admin party every year, and Mer and I have gone every year except when we have been sick. The evening is very casual now. We mill around and chat and eat finger foods and desserts. Mer and I are not the best at the stand-and-eat skill set, so we sat at a table. People came over and said hello, and a couple of people joined us for much of the evening. We ate and chatted for a little over an hour, and then we went to the band Christmas concert in the chapel.

The band concert was short, featuring the junior high band playing four songs and the high school band playing four songs. Mer and I sat in the front row, and had a very good time. Our high school band is especially good, and they did a couple of difficult pieces. We like knowing the students, and we enjoy being part of a community in the audience, since there are always multiple people whom we know and to whom we can say hello.

On Wednesday, Mer and I had both scheduled haircuts, but separately. Normally this is not a blog-worthy event, but the place at which I get my hair cut is next to the Cheesecake Factory. Since Mer and I are trying hard to be good this holiday season, I actually skipped getting dessert to bring home. I was both proud and sad.

I have been training for a longer-run race for some months now, without really having a race in mind. I thought I had putzed around too long and missed my opportunity for a local race, and I did not really want to travel to run. Happily, on a website dedicated to listing half-marathons, I stumbled across the Tour de Ashland run. It took place, not surprisingly, in Ashland, Ohio, which is about seventy-five minutes away from our house. It was a fund-raiser run that benefited the Ashland High School cross country teams. It was scheduled to take place on December 3rd, and it had same-day registration (which I liked, in case the weather was bad). I had a race.

Saturday was sunny and clear, but quite cold. I told Mer to sleep in because I saw no need for her to freeze “watching” a race that was not very spectator-friendly. I drove to Ashland without incident, and found the start area, and the church where registration was happening. Registration was crowded, but easy, and the only downside was a long wait at the restroom. I walked back to my car to put some stuff in it, and decided to try the nearby high school, to see if it was open. There was a wrestling tournament going on, so it was open, and they were kind enough to let me use the bathroom.

The start of the race was near the high school stadium/track, which was the finish line. We started on the road, and the start was noisy enough with chatter that I never heard the start command; the mass of people in front of us just started moving. We started several hundred feet behind the 5-k runners, but they had instructions to stay on the left side of the road, so even though the road was crowded, it was not too bad. I was able to get to full speed right away. I hit a fast stride, and knew it was fast, but decided to see how things would go.

The course was mostly through housing areas, with a few major streets. The streets were not closed, but major streets had crossing guards at them. I kept up the fast pace, and looked longingly at the finish line, which I passed at mile three before heading out into Ashland itself. I found myself in a bit of a “hole” – I had one runner in sight in front of me, and no one close behind me, and I was closing in on the man in front of me. I caught him at about mile five, and we were not sure where the next turn was. Things looked weird to me as we approached a major road, and I heard someone yelling; I turned and saw the woman behind me turning off the street we were on. I let the man with me know, and we turned around. It was very kind of the woman, and I thanked her when I caught her about a mile further on. I suspect I lost about thirty or forty seconds on the little detour.

The rest of the race was fine. I finally figured out at about mile eight that the race had set out realtor signs with arrows on them, in addition to the arrows painted on the road. That helped. I was keeping up the fast pace, but miles eight to ten were quite hilly, and were very difficult. I tried to just keep running and not worry about the pace. I was passed around mile twelve by a young runner (high school), and by the woman who had warned me that I had missed a turn. I thought about running with them, but I could not – I was too tired.

I made the turn into the stadium, gasping and exhausted, expecting to find the finish line. It came as a major mental blow when I understood from the officials that I had to run three hundred meters around the track. That was very difficult. I made it, though, and when I looked up at the clock as I crossed the finish line, it read about 1:29:00. I had broken my previous best time by over four minutes. As an added bonus, the people at the finish line asked me my age, and when I told them I was forty, they gave me a hat, which was given out to the top three finishers in each age group (in addition to a finisher’s medal). That meant I had come in somewhere in the top three. What a great run.

I checked out the church to see if I could find a phone to let Mer know I was okay. The church was open and had food and drink, so I grabbed a bagel and some water. A kind woman lent me her cell phone, and I called Mer, who had just gotten out of bed. That made me smile. I returned the phone, walked back to the car, and drove back home.

My official stats:
13.1 miles
1:28:56
6:48 per mile
15th place overall, out of 278 people
2nd out of 41 in my age group (40-49 years old)

It was a great run!

I did celebrate with Mer by going out to eat at a burger place in Hudson in the afternoon. Otherwise, we were pretty mellow!

Last Wednesday, Mer took me out on a special midweek date, and we even went up to Cleveland, to Playhouse Square, to the newly renovated and just-opened Allen Theater. Mer had received teacher tickets to go see The Game’s Afoot!, a murder-mystery/comedy about William Gillette, an early twentieth-century stage actor who famously played Sherlock Holmes for over thirty years.

The new theater is magnificent. It is much smaller, since they carved up the old, huge theater into three smaller theaters, but they made it work. There are main-floor seats, and one level of balcony seats, where we sat. All the sight lines are good, and we were able to easily hear, even though the actors were not miked (at least not that I could tell).

The set for the play was jaw-dropping. It was mostly the interior of Gillette’s famous Connecticut mansion, and the set designers went all out. There were exposed beams along the roof-line, wooden floors, a secret room that rotated in the corner, a huge fireplace, a grand staircase and balcony, and ornate doors leading to other rooms. It must have been a set designer’s dream.

The play was very funny. The main death, of an obnoxious theater critic, is played way over-the-top, and is very, very funny. A later death is shown onstage and is very real looking, and I found that disturbing, and very odd in a comedy. Other than the too-realistic death, the play was funny and engaging throughout, and slipped into farce at times, which I enjoyed very much. The combination of really funny humor with a whodunnit plot that engaged the mind (I did not guess correctly) made for a really great, if somewhat late, evening. It was especially worthwhile when Mer told me they were free teacher tickets (which is why we were at a Wednesday showing). A fun play.

Last Monday, we said goodbye to the foster kittens. One of Mer’s students has a mother who is a vet, and she was kind enough to offer to try to place the kittens in homes, and she even had several leads before the kittens even were sent along.

We had the kittens for twenty-nine days, and they were noticeably bigger, but still very much kittens. They were not quite fully social cats, but they were no longer terrified of people, so I am hoping they will adjust to new homes in just a few weeks. They were very cute, but it is good to be back to five cats again, and I am happy to have the use of the spare bedroom, if only to hang my clothes in the closet. I had been piling my clothes in a pile in our library while the kittens were in residence. I hope they find good homes.

Last Saturday was Mer’s day. We slept in, and I went running in the morning. We ate lunch, and then headed down to the First Ladies’ Museum in Canton. Neither of us had ever been.

The museum is right downtown in Canton, and is in two buildings. One building is an old bank that now houses the First Ladies’ Library, as well as rotating exhibits. Mer and I were there early, so we wandered down the street for twenty minutes or so (it was a lovely day), and we returned to watch several short films on various First Ladies and how they handled crises like the burning of the White House in the War of 1812, or how Mrs. Roosevelt helped out by visiting troops in WW2. We then toured the current exhibit, which was on First Lady dresses, especially their Inaugural Ball gowns. Some of the First Ladies were tiny, even in their forties and fifties. There were some displays of the White House china, which the First Ladies selected, and in the basement there was an exhibit on women in the Red Cross. The exhibits were not extensive, but they were interesting.

We then made our way over to the second building of the museum, which is the Stanton House, which belonged to Mrs. McKinley’s sister’s family. William and Mrs. McKinney often stayed at the Stanton House, so it has a definite tie-in to a real First Lady. The house had been restored to how it would have looked around 1900, and the third floor’s major room is lined with the portraits and short bios of all the First Ladies. I had not known that the White House always has a First Lady, even if it is not the President’s wife. In the case where the President’s wife is dead, usually the oldest daughter would become the First Lady and act as hostess at White House functions. It was an interesting display. The museum is small, but well done, and the house is in very good shape now.

After the museum, we headed south toward Amish country. We went to The Amish Door bakery and restaurant, largely because Mer had a coupon for a free piece of pie. It was great – there was a buffet that we both took advantage of, and we both got pie for dessert (my peanut butter pie was only okay – I need to go for the Amish Door sundae next time!). As a bonus, there was a man playing the piano for entertainment – mostly playing Christmas carols, although he did a few hymns as well. It was very atmospheric and helped both me and Mer start to get in the holiday spirit.

The day after Thanksgiving has become known as “Black Friday,” and is largely dedicated to consumers buying lots of things. I’m not sure what would make me go out to stores on Black Friday, but sales are not enough. Instead, Mer and I took advantage of the day off to finally go through our basement storage room, and clean it out of all the stuff we have accumulated over thirteen-plus years of marriage. Much of the stuff in there was still packed in boxes from when we moved four and a half years ago. It was time to be pretty ruthless with this stuff. We enjoyed the irony of getting rid of stuff on a day dedicated to the acquiring of more things.

We were. I hauled the stuff up from the basement and emptied the boxes to make sure they were bug-free. Mer then sported the contents into “keep,” “pitch,” and “give away” piles. It took all day, and we did not quite finish; we still had five small boxes to go through, which we finished up on Saturday. We both ran out of steam, and we had a play to go to anyway.

In the evening, we got to go see Actors’ Summit’s latest production, a Christmas-season play called Winter Wonderettes. It was basically a musical review, with a loose storyline of a group of four women singing in a small hardware store for the store’s Christmas celebration. The play was set in the early 1960s, so the music was largely from the 50s. I am often skeptical about musical reviews – they usually are just glorified concerts. So, I was pleased when I enjoyed this one. I liked the characters of the four women, and there was quite a bit of humor involved, including pulling random men out of the audience to help out with the Christmas presentation. The music was recorded and played over speakers, but the singing was excellent, and the set was festive (simple holiday decorations). The lighting for the play was extensive, with various lighting effects for the songs, and that was new (at least to me). It was not a deeply moving play, but I had a good time with it.

Mer and I try to go on opening nights because there are small desserts served, and you can chat with the cast. I got to talk to the oldest sister of one of Mer’s best students (who graduated in 2007), and it was a great conversation. We chatted about her role in this play, as well as her role in the production of Rosecrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead that Mer and I saw at Kent State a few years ago. In fact, Mer and I pretty much closed out the place, as we were the last guests to leave. It helped redeem the day spent pawing through boxes of stuff.