#4 Driving Driving Driving...

7+ hours on the road! 7+ hours I spent driving... but guess what?
It was worth it :)
Here's the breakdown...
roughly 4 hours to Des Moines (I had frequent breaks, I left early so I wandered around Walmart finding maps and stopped at various gas stations)
roughly 2 hours from Des Moines to Ceder Falls (with Emily :D )
roughly 2 hours from Ceder Falls to Dubuque (for rehearsals)
and then 20 mins from Dubuque to Pville.

Anyways... I met Em and her fam at the airport, I drove Em to Ceder Falls following her fam. Saw her Uncle Keith's place. Stayed the night at UNI. Went to Wal-Mart at 7am! Wandered around UNI for a couple of hours memorizing lines and such. Helped Em organize a few things and then drove back. All in all, a good two days.

Next weekend Em is meeting my ma and sisters (and little Topher).

Weenend after, I'm going to UNI for Friday-Sun morning.

First read thru for Passion, Peril, and CPA went extremely successfully! I'm really quite excited for this whole process. My actors are near perfect for their respected roles and both have an energy that I absolutely love! Next rehearsal is Wednesday!

Three Days of Rain is coming along nicely, just have to get off book now! Tried on Costumes yesterday and I must admit that they rank high on my favorite costumes list!

I submitted my TDoR bio today, this is what I have...
"Ben is a Senior Mathematics Major at the University of Wisconsin-Platteville. Although this is his first Fly By Night Production, he has been able to perform with The Heartland Festival, Pioneer Players, Dubuque Fine Arts Players, The Grand Opera House and The Heartland Ballet Academy. A native of Southwest Wisconsin, he considers himself very lucky to be able to perform with a wide variety of theater companies in many diverse roles. His favorite roles have been Cogsworth (Beauty and the Beast), Cliff Bradshaw (Cabaret), Matt (The Marriage of Bette and Boo), Mrs. Meers (Thoroughly Modern Millie), Moonface Martin (Anything Goes), and Matt (The Fantasticks). Ben would like to thank his family and friends for all of their support!"

Work is coming along nicely. I'm putting all the information for the PAS into electronic form :P It can be frustrating sometimes, but I'm sure it'll happen.

Some sad news... My Grandmother Lois Barlow passed away last Sunday. She has been really tough and although it was unexpected, it's not as though it was never going to happen. I'll be one of the pallbearers in the funeral Thursday and I'm sure my family is going to enjoy all the memories of my Grandma.

Until Next Time,

Ben Barlow

#3 :(

Emily's flight was canceled :( The original plan for today was that I would meet her at the airport (along with many members of her family) in Des Moines, then drive to Ceder Falls with the party, and stay with Emily. It would've been right now :( Then tomorrow would've been her birthday party with the many members of her family. Although I'm nervous about meeting some of her family, I would've rather have her in the states now rather than her on her way now. But oh wells... Anyways, the plan now is that she's going to come in tomorrow at the same time and I'll stay tomorrow night and then leave in the afternoon on Monday. I do have two rehearsals on Monday, so it would be very unwise to miss those.

Well I'm watching the Packers v Seahawks preseason game, and although these games don't matter, I just love watching football. I'm probably more excited about watching the second stringers to see how much depth the Packers have this year. For example, Matt Flynn had quite an awesome few throws!

I cleaned my room! I got all my clothes washed, floor vacuumed, and general organizing!

I found the SD disk I thought I lost! When I went to help move Luke into Winona I brought the camcorder and the extra SD disk (which I use mostly for my phone) up there, but I absent mindidly didn't secure it so I looked everywhere and I had given up on it :( but... after cleaning and still not finding it, I found it just lying in the middle of the floor! Me happies :)

well that's all I can think to mention as of now.

Until Next Time,

Ben Barlow

#2 Rehearsals

I got another 15 minutes before I have to leave for a Three Days of Rain rehearsal. I'm driving today since Baker drove the last 4 (two because I wasn't called :P ). Stuff that has happened since the last post. Emily's Birthday, got offered another job, cleaned my room, scheduled and organized rehearsals for the one acts, Noah's Ark with Ma and Bro, and wrote another song. I'll post the song below if I can. Anwyways, everything is going quite good. I'm really quite proud of Emily's birthday music video. It was an original idea that turned out to be quite awesome. I wrote, recorded, filmed and edited the entire thing by myself. It was quite nervewracking to be in public taping myself lip sync to a very faint speaker system, but the end result turned out quite nicely. I learned how to use iMovie (even if it's a few years old [iMovie 3]). What's to Come? Rehearsals for One Acts start Monday! Should be very much memorized on half the play at least soon! Emily is coming back tomorrow! :D

Until Next Time,

Ben Barlow



Lyrics
---
boy says to the girl, girl I am sorry,
girl says to the boy, don't feel that way,
even with the flaws that we all have here,
words like those are words you should not say,

live your life as though you always knew,
how your life would end and see it through,
for one life here to live is one you can't miss,
this I say to you, what you are to do,

make time stand still, breath the air,
keep whats loved close and show you care,
don't waste your time, fulfill your dreams,
close your eyes, see you there
---

#1 First Post

Hey,

So I've tried blogs in the past to no success, but this time could be very different. I've identified the problem being too committed to the information I want to record. This makes for long time consuming posts that after a while lose their novelty of recording. What makes this one different? I'm treating the BBB as middle ground between Twitter and long detailed Journal entries. Rather than a lot of 120 character "updates" and going in full detail about every little thing, this will ideally be a few quick paragraphs at a time (and maybe as small as a few sentences). That's 'bout all I'd like to say at this point in time :P

Until Next Time,
Ben