A Midwinter Comedy of Errors (or All's Well That Ends Well)

I knew it was going to happen. When you've been a part of the "Fox Family" for as long as I have (or for at least one winter), you know you're going to get a snow day, or two, or seventeen. We could see this one coming days ago. Yesterday I ended rehearsal early due to the weather. Today we didn't even attempt rehearsal, and we won't tomorrow, either (oh--did I mention that we have another blessed day off tomorrow?). And, in case anyone was counting, we are as of this moment, 9 days away from opening night.

Being the prepared director that I am, I brought home not one but TWO computers, so that I could be industrious and productive on my projected day(s) off. One is a lap-top. You see, once we get to these last couple weeks of rehearsal, I like to have a lap-top on which to take notes for the cast. This way, I can type my note, but continue to keep my eyes on the stage so I don't miss anything. And there's the added bonus of the fact that I can actually read said notes when rehearsal is over.

So yesterday, I took my notes for the whole first half of Act I. Then, in my haste to get everything put away and everyone out of the theater before the roads got too bad, I simply closed the lap-top without trying to save my notes onto my flash drive.

Today, I sit down at nap time to get some work done. This lap-top also has Publisher (the program with which I've started the playbill). So I figure, I'll chip away at that, right? WRONG-O! I put my flash drive in, only to find that the tech guys have put some sort of magical spell on the lap-tops so that one cannot access nor save to a flash drive (something about viruses), basically rendering my possession of said lap top utterly USELESS.

[Sidebar: We're doing The Wizard of Oz, and for our production we will be projecting a video of the "Great Oz" onto the stage for the scenes when Dorothy and company go to visit the wizard. you need to know this information for the next part of the story.]

'No problem,' I think to myself. 'I've got another computer here. I can work on the video and the program downstairs.' See, I brought home the CPU with the video-editing software, as well as the partially edited video that I need to finish up. I brought home the CPU, but no other parts. I thought I could just hook up my monitor and stuff to the other computer and be fine.

I thought wrong.

My monitor has a stupid cord that hooks it up to the tower. Of course, this is not a cord that is compatible with the school computer, and we have nothing on hand that will make them compatible.

At about 8:00 this evening, we finally gave up the ghost and my saint of a husband put on his coat and gloves to shovel our driveway for the second time today (while snow is still falling, of course). He made the dreaded trip to the store to see if they had a cord or a converter that would allow me to be productive tonight. They did not. Radio Shack was closed due to the poor weather, but we can check back tomorrow at 9:00 am (if we're lucky).

I forgot to mention that while Caleb was shoveling our driveway, a snowplow started working in our subdivision. By the time Caleb called from his cell to tell me that we were out of luck on the computer issue, the snowplow was busy on our street. Actually, it was stopped at the beginning of our street, helping the car that was stuck trying to get into its driveway. I was watching all of this from my window when Caleb called. So I was able to warn him to be careful as he approached the curve where this was going on. He elected to go around the block and approach our house from the other direction.

I'm sitting in my bay window, watching the car at the top of the street. By this time, 5 people are out pushing and the snow plow is stopped in the middle of the street. Then I see headlights and hazards flashing on my right. And I get a phone call from my husband. He's now stuck. He asks me to open the garage door so that he can shovel his way out of the spot (and shovel the new mountain of snow at the foot of our driveway).

All this for a stupid cord.

But now, we're all safe and warm inside our house. Hopefully tomorrow, I'll be able to get a cord and work on my school stuff. Hopefully my cast members will be busily reviewing their lines 9boy, do they need it!) and putting the finishing touches on their costumes. Hopefully, we will manage to pull this show out of our rears despite lack of rehearsal in the theater.

Well, a girl can dream, can't she?