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Yesterday & today
Feb. 20th, 2006 03:32 amI got up early and left at about 8 to drive out to Wheaton to pick up my book. Had I known that it was -8ยบ F.,I might have stayed in bed! So it's a good think I didn't know. The lake, though, was astounding. There was a veil of steam over it, and big clouds sitting on the horizon line.
Anyway, I got the book, stopped at the library, mailed a couple of books and a postcard (my stuff gets to go to New Zealand and Egypt!), did some grocery shopping and then spent the rest of the day inside where it was warm. Got some stuff done around the house, listened to the Metropolitan Opera broadcast of Aida, and made a blanquette de veau (fancy name for veal stew) for dinner.
Today I went to the Chicago Opera Theatre. It was a double bill: The Padlock, by Charles Dibdin, and Purcell's Dido and Aeneas. The first is a very funny comic opera which has apparently not been performed professionally in over two hundred years. It's about an old man who wants to marry his young ward, who in turn is in love with a young scholar, and, of course, all comes right in the end. Unlike Dido. That was beautifully done. I'd never seen the opera before, though I'd seen the Mark Morris dance version. The set was quite simple, a black and gold chaise, and two walls and a ceiling made of a collage of Renaissance images of the legend. The costumes were black tie for the men and elegant satin ball gowns in shades of taupe, champagne, mauve, etc., for the women (except for the sorceress, who wore black). The voices were lovely. Suzanne Mentzner, always wonderful, was Dido.
Came home, made quail and risotto and a green salad for dinner, and have just watched Bleak House.
I have all weekend been plowing through a back log of National Law Journals and Guardian Weeklys. Next up, that stack of New Yorker magazines.
The Gay Games will be held in Chicago this summer, and it seems that some of the events will be held in my neighborhood, in Jackson and Washington Parks, and at the University of Chicago. So if anyone is planning to attend, let me know! (This happens over my birthday, so that's another excuse to come to Chicago, if you need one.)
Anyway, I got the book, stopped at the library, mailed a couple of books and a postcard (my stuff gets to go to New Zealand and Egypt!), did some grocery shopping and then spent the rest of the day inside where it was warm. Got some stuff done around the house, listened to the Metropolitan Opera broadcast of Aida, and made a blanquette de veau (fancy name for veal stew) for dinner.
Today I went to the Chicago Opera Theatre. It was a double bill: The Padlock, by Charles Dibdin, and Purcell's Dido and Aeneas. The first is a very funny comic opera which has apparently not been performed professionally in over two hundred years. It's about an old man who wants to marry his young ward, who in turn is in love with a young scholar, and, of course, all comes right in the end. Unlike Dido. That was beautifully done. I'd never seen the opera before, though I'd seen the Mark Morris dance version. The set was quite simple, a black and gold chaise, and two walls and a ceiling made of a collage of Renaissance images of the legend. The costumes were black tie for the men and elegant satin ball gowns in shades of taupe, champagne, mauve, etc., for the women (except for the sorceress, who wore black). The voices were lovely. Suzanne Mentzner, always wonderful, was Dido.
Came home, made quail and risotto and a green salad for dinner, and have just watched Bleak House.
I have all weekend been plowing through a back log of National Law Journals and Guardian Weeklys. Next up, that stack of New Yorker magazines.
The Gay Games will be held in Chicago this summer, and it seems that some of the events will be held in my neighborhood, in Jackson and Washington Parks, and at the University of Chicago. So if anyone is planning to attend, let me know! (This happens over my birthday, so that's another excuse to come to Chicago, if you need one.)
