Snowshow Rant

We attend a lot of theatre. Last year we saw over 80 shows. This year we have seen 21 since January. We see comedies, dramas, musicals, operas, revues and other strange theatrical performances. Last night we saw the lamest show ever put on a professional stage. “Slava’s Snowshow” is a complete waste of time. Our $47 tickets got us barely 50 minutes of a 'show' along with a 20 minute intermission. We arrived at 8 and left at 9:10. In the meantime, sitting in our regular mezzanine seats in an almost empty theater, we missed much of the show which was performed in the orchestra, out of our sight.

We love clowns. We have been to many famous and not-so-famous clown performances, here and in Europe. We were looking forward to this show. The performance was the blandest, slowest, most pointless performance of any kind we have seen in several years. There was little energy and hardly any laughter or clapping from the audience. Maybe Slava, who is known to change his performance each evening, looked at the mostly empty audience and decided to call it a night before the show started.

We left so angry it took a couple of hours to calm down. Wasting an evening like that is not fun. We realize we will not like every play (e.g., the recent disappointing "Lestat"), but we do expect a full evening and a major effort by the cast. Last night was neither.

Cocktails 'til two

We felt young and crazy last Saturday night. We had an interesting dinner with another couple at a Brazilian steakhouse in SF called Espetus. The place is an all the meat you can eat restaurant. Waiters wearing poofy pants and red scarves bring slabs of meat on a spear to your table. They cut off a piece that you grab with your tongs. It was a bit overwhelming, especially since E doesn’t eat beef or lamb and neither one of us eat pork or much meat in general. They had a good salad bar however.

After dinner we walked a couple blocks to the New Conservatory Theatre Center is see "Franc D'Ambrosio's Broadway." D'Ambrosio played the Phantom in San Francisco for five years and holds the record for playing the part for more than 2,600 performances. His talent nearly surpasses his ego, which is huge. It was a good cabaret show. Excellent selection of Broadway tunes. His melody from “The Phantom” was worth the price.

Even though we enjoyed the evening so far, we were not ready to go home yet. We decided to stop by Martuni’s and visit their piano bar. When we arrived at 10:30 the place was not crowded. But there were mostly straight people there. Fortunately, by 11pm the place turned over. Most of the straights were gone and the room was packed with men. We spent the next three hours, until they kicked us out at closing, drinking martinis with this group of four younger men. Two of guys were friends who work together and the other two were a couple visiting from Chicago. One of the guys was on crutches because he had been in a recent cheerleading accident. E and I have no recollection of what we talked about over the three hours. All we remember is that it was a blast. We didn’t get home to bed to almost 4am!

First Night Passover Menu

Date, Cherry & Mixed Nut Haroset
Eggplant & Olive Spread

Baked Halibut with Saffron and Peppers

Twice-Made Sephardic Chicken Soup with Minted Chicken/Matzah Balls

Walnut-Stuffed Prunes in Red Wine
Stuffed Mediterranean Vegetables (Onions, Young Potatoes, Zucchini)
Artichokes in Tomatoes
Fruited, Spiced & Rolled Chicken Breasts

Strawberry & Apple Crumble with Almond Topping

Hag sameach

Happy Passover. Tonight we are hosting a dozen men in our small townhouse for a first night gay seder. Two recipes. Complete menu later. Shalom.

Fruited Baked Chicken
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1 1/2 cups dry white wine or vermouth
6 chicken breasts
1 red onion sliced lengthwise
1 teaspoon each of ground coriander, cumin and paprika
1/2 teaspoon dry mustard
1/4 teaspoon each of cinnamon, salt, and pepper
1 cup dried apricots
1/2 cup dried cranberries
1 cup chicken broth

Heat wine to boil.
Remove from heat and add apricots and soak 10 minutes.
Drain and reserve wine and apricots separately.
Arrange chicken in pan, skin side up.
Spread onion, spices, and fruits over chicken.
Combine wine and broth. Pour over chicken.
Cover pan tightly with aluminum foil and bake at 375 degrees until chicken is tender. Takes about 1 hour.

Fruit and Nut Charoset
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4 ounces walnuts, toasted
4 ounces almonds, toasted
4 ounces dried cherries
4 ounces pitted dates,
3 green apples, peeled and cored
1 large orange, zested and segmented
1/2 cup sweet Passover wine
2 tablespoons Kosher for Passover brandy (optional)
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
1/8 teaspoon nutmeg
1 tablespoon lime juice


Using the steel blade of a food processor or another type of chopper, chop very fine but not to a paste the walnuts, almonds, cherries, dates, apples, orange zest, and orange segments.
Add the wine, brandy, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, and lime juice.
Can be made a day ahead. Refrigerate overnight bring to room temperature before serving. Makes 4 cups

Netflix replies and follows through

A couple weeks ago I wrote about gay-bashing comments occurring in the Member Reviews section of Netflix. I sent them e-mail and snail-mail requesting that they investigate. I received a positive e-mail reply last week:

Dear Mr. J,

Thank you for your letter. I apologize for the delayed response. Ms. Kilgore (Chief Marketing Officer) makes every effort to read each and every letter addressed to her, but is unable to personally reply to all of them. We appreciate you taking the time to forward us your inquiries regarding our service. Providing the best Unlimited Rental Service possible and addressing our customer's concerns are our top priorities. We are continually striving to improve our subscription service and all feedback and suggestions we receive are carefully reviewed.

We appreciate your concern regarding the member reviews posted on our site for “Brokeback Mountain”. Per our terms we do not regularly review the content posted on the Web site. However, we do reserve the right to reject or edit such content at anytime without notice. Within the past few weeks we have exercised this right and have removed several member reviews which had been posted for “Brokeback Mountain”. You may reference the Terms of Use by using the following link:http://www.netflix.com/TermsOfUse?hnjr=8

Again we appreciate your concern. If you would like to discuss this further you may contact me at (408) 540-**** Monday through Friday from 6:00am to 2:30pm (Pacific Standard Time).

Sincerely,
Sharon Miller
Netflix
Inc.

Brokeback Ballet

Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake is stunning reinvention of Tchaikovsky’s ballet. It has been touring around the world since 1995 but this is the first time it has performed in San Francisco.
It is beautiful, strong and masculine production. Both E and I were brought to tears when we saw it Tuesday night. It is an emotional and tragic story of suppressed love and transformation.


The following evening, Wednesday, we attended American Conservatory Theatre’s production of The Rivals.
This was a well serviced production of Richard Brinsley Sheridan’s 1775 comedy of love and deception. It had good acting (Anthony Fusco & Charles Dean pictured), sets, lights and costumes. The dazzling costumes are by local designer Beaver Bauer.

Thursday was opening day of Giants baseball. E is a long time, loyal Giants fan. I like the Giants and baseball because E likes them. E considers opening day to be a holiday. We took the high school son and one of his friends to the game.

There was a little arts news to report from a Giants game. Smooth jazz trumpeter, Chris Botti tried to play the Star-Spangled Banner. I have never seen him in concert. And I still haven’t. The public address system and sound were awful. You couldn’t hear him.
I own most of his CDs. I love to look at his picture when I listen to them. His music is better heard in the bedroom than a sports stadium.

No respect from IMDB, an Amazon Co.

Another blogger, Faggoty-Ass Faggot, started a campaign to contact IMDB on why the site doesn't recognize government sanctioned same-sex marriages or civil unions. FAF discovered that IMDB has a policy that says:

We are not yet accepting homosexual marriages until their status has been fully determined by legal challenges. Such unions, along with civil unions, can be noted as biographical trivia.

I received a pathetic response from Internet Movie DataBase. It is just a BS form letter. One thing I didn't know, IMDB is an Amazon company. Amazon has no problem selling gay merchandise and taking money from gays. But don’t expect any respect.

same-sex marriage details in IMDB
by - guydads(31 Mar 2006 04:30:30 PM)

Your policy of not listing same-sex marriage or civil unions except as trivia is insulting and bigoted. Please change your policy to reflect the progressive changes happening in equality around the world. England, Canada and several other intelligent western nations now recognize same-sex unions.

Re: same-sex marriage details in IMDB
by - IMDb Help Desk (3 Apr 2006 11:10:54 AM)

Thank you for sharing your concerns with us. We always welcome comments, constructive criticism and suggestions aimed at improving our content and our features.

Due to the massive quantities of feedback we receive every day, we regret that we are unable to provide a personalized response or follow-up on the progress of every issue that is brought to our attention, but please rest assured that your concerns have been forwarded to the the staff in charge of the relevant section of the site.

We appreciate that you took the time to share your thoughts with us. Though we cannot make any promises as to if or when we'll actually be able to act on your suggestion, we do consider all feedback from users when making changes to the site and thank you for your support.
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Regards,
George
The IMDb Help Desk