Wednesdays and Thursdays

Jon

(More in the Weekday Chronicles of Jon.—L)

Wendesday

We have gym in the morning on Wendsday. I like going to play T-ball in the gym. Do you like to go into the gym? I like going to do a warmup. Tamara puts on some music in the gym.

Jon

Thursday

We have snoezelen this afternoon. I love going to go to the snoezelen room to look at the fish and the eggs. I like going to moov around in the snoezelen room. Sally likes to put on some quiyit music.

Jonathan

LOTR: The Musical

Cool Stuff, Family Life

Thanks to Grandma’s generosity, on Friday we got to see The Lord of the Rings, the play currently playing at the Princess of Wales Theatre. (For those not in the know, it’s a world premiere of a big-budget musical—based on, yes, the Tolkien trilogy—that is hoped to eventually move on to London and Broadway.)

What did we think? Hot and cold. Lots of interesting bits, but spoiled somewhat by other aspects:

Good stuff:

  • Beautiful costumes, and effective lighting and set design (with one exception, in more detail below).
  • Lovely, haunting, “un-musical-y” music, much of it by Finnish group Värttinä.
  • Most of the performances: James Loye and Peter Howe (hobbits Sam and Frodo) were dramatic standouts; Rebecca Jackson Mendoza (Galadriel the elf queen) a superlative singer. Michael Therriault was an effective, limber Gollum. Surprisingly, veteran actor Brent Carver made a rather unremarkable Gandalf.
  • A giant spider operated as an eight-person bunraku puppet. Very low-tech, very stagey, but brilliant.

Not-so-good stuff:

  • Orcs. I loved the leg-extending springs that they ran around on, making them taller and more acrobatic, but what was with the crutches attached to their arms? That was copied directly from the hyenas in The Lion King, but anatomically it made no sense here, and ended up making the orcs look like rampaging ski accident victims.
  • Book. Meh. Though actually I recognized some of the dialogue as coming straight from Tolkien, so I guess the book problems predate the show a bit!
  • Clumsy ending. Right near the end they stuck in a voice-over to get through the last bits, which came across as a lazy way to shoehorn as much exposition as they could in ten minutes.
  • Set, specifically the amazingly complicated rotating stage that raises and lowers in about 18 separate pieces. Impressive piece of technology to be sure, but guys: you’re six weeks into previews! Don’t you think you should’ve gotten the major kinks worked out yet? I could take a lot more pure old-fashioned stagecraft than any number of spinning, tilting stages. In our performance the show stopped dead twice because of problems with the stage, most annoyingly during the climactic scene at Mount Doom: instead of Gollum falling and disappearing dramatically into the pit, he was revealed by a half-sunken/half-raised platform, and had to slink offstage directed by a befuddled-looking technician in plain sight. Oops.

The Lord of the Rings is an interesting stage show that contains some thrilling moments, but as a whole theatrical experience it’s not quite there yet. It would be very interesting to see what a total Tolkien virgin would think of the play: Would they understand any of it? Would it be worth their investing three-and-a-half hours in this? Would it have killed the producers to put a plot/character synopsis in the programme?

Lemon Squairs

Family Life, Jon

(Jon made delicious lemon squares with me for show and tell yesterday, and this is what he wrote today. One of the words on his current spelling list is “their”, so it makes perfect sense to spell “share” like that! —L)

I am going to eat lemon squairs. I love going to sheir lemon squairs with my frends. I ate lemon squairs after gym. Do you like lemon squairs? I love them. I ate them in class. Mommy made them with me.

Jon

Mondays and Tuesdays

Jon

(A couple of stories about the goings-on in his classes. Apparently during the writing of the second story, Jon had written the music teacher’s name as “Erick” (misspelled, but otherwise correct), but on his own Jon went back through the story and changed it to Mr. C (which is what the kids call him). Wait till Jon discovers spellcheck find-and-replace!—L)

Monday

I have gym on Monday in the afternoon. I do a warmup in the gym. We have show and tell on Monday morning. I like going to ask questions with Jonathan on Monday.

Jon

Tuesday

We have music on Tuesday. I love going to music. I like going to play games with Mr. C. I am going to go to the music room. On Tuesday I have music with Mr. C. Do you like going to go to the music room on Tuesday? Do you like going to play the sownd game?

Jon

My Weekend

Jon

(Jon’s teacher Tami questioned him about the last sentence in this story—it seems like a non-sequitur—but Jon insisted it stay in because it was important. And from Jon’s view, it IS important: Paul and Judy’s house actually had a bathroom on the main floor, so bathroom runs were much easier than usual for him!

From the teacher’s note following the story: “I find it interesting that he wrote the whole story in present and future tense (except last line) as if while remembering it, he was right back in the moment! I didn’t bother to correct him this time!” —L)

I love going to go luging on Saturday. On Saturday I like to go into the hot tub. I love going to go into the hot tub to get warm. I’m about to go luging on Sunday. I’m about to visit Uncle Pall. I’m about to luge with Uncle Pall. I went to the bath room.

Jonathan