wow

Held a very exciting and productive nascent League of Independent Theater meeting last night. Goal is to recruit a Steering Committee to birth this beast. So gratifying to sit in a room with people smarter than yourself in so many areas and have them all nodding their heads at the same time. Feels like a good idea whose time has come. Many questions and statements and whatnots to come, I'll be looking for everybody's reaction. Watch this space as they say in the advertising bidness.

Other highlights of the week:

Jude and Ben from Grid Iron theatre are in town from Scotland, had a drink with them last night. Well, several. Known these guys for years, they won the big Carol Tambor Award a few years back, they're in town scouting for an outside location for their children's thing that New Victory is bringing over next fall. Tribal kin from another kingdom. Sitting in a bar bitching and laughing about the exact same things, knowing the ending of each other's stories as soon as we hear the set-up.

Great meeting with Audrey and Eric of Bouffon Glass Menagerie. They're thinking about Edinburgh next year, I'm pitching them to help out with the Overlord development. Need me some clowns and a good clown wrangler.

Nancy and I went out to Long Island City to see Robert Pritchard's new space, the Queensbridge Theater. Robert ran Surf Reality for years, he was a veteran when I doped onto the scene. Great to see him having a second or third act. Space is massive and Robert's business parter bought it. Oh yes. Six story warehouse in LIC, owned by the man. They are talking massive cash to make it state-of-the-art, shooting to open in the spring. From the L.E.S. to the L.I.C., Pritchard remains a pioneer, right out there ahead of the curve.

Figured out the White Stripes' Icky Thump. Start on track 6, Prickly Thorn but Sweetly Worn and you can rock right through to the end. If you have a low tolerance for faux Celtic soul nonsense, then start on track 8, Little Cream Soda. Either way, 8-13 are worth the cost of the album. Little Cream Soda, Rag and Bone, I'm Slowly Turning into You and the killer closer Effect and Cause are as good as anything these guys have done. Nancy listened to the beginning of the album a few times and said it sounded derivative. I thought, well, sure. But it's derivative of Zeppelin and AC/DC, so that's like being derivative of God. Am I spelling derivative right? Looks weird.

That's me. Hope everyone's well.