Day 131: The Real Alfalfa Farm of Topsfield, MA

Another beginning of the end -- Rumors closing performance, to great success!  To me, the whole thing felt odd because I was feeling rather tired and essentially chugged a coffee just beforehand, but that didn't stop me from giving it all that I could -- and man, so did everyone.  Some of my favorite bits happened tonight.  I had originally been plotting to try to steal some of "Claire"'s funny one-liners -- as she always beats me to some of mine (or rather, I forget them and she saves me!) -- but then I thought of something funnier, and replaced "...Cookie's walking around like a elephant" with "Cookie's walking around like a honey badger."  Really it was for our stage director, who apparently was too busy stage directing to catch it, but which made BNap ("Claire") nearly die of laughter on stage.  Having not quite recovered from this, I was caught unawares and she stole my next funny one-liner ("Cookie blew up the microwave, what else?"), so I decided she wasn't getting the last word and not only stole but rewrote her next "steal-able" line (also my cue): "You know what this night is beginning to remind me of?  -->Platoon. Weekend at Bernie's."  We had a blast at the performance and at the cast after-party at our producer's -- what a good crew.

BEFORE Rumors, which was a matinee showing today (not until 3p, though), my car-ful (the OG's: "Pudney", D., and E., plus the addition of my mom) decided we would finally go to find the holy grail of our route from Boston to Georgetown: the wine at Alfalfa Farm.  Pudney had discovered long ago that no, this landmark on the route was NOT a lowly dairy farm, but rather that they also produced wine.  So she called them up on one of our rides ("Hello? Is this Alfalfa Farm?"), and made sure we could come in for about 45 minutes prior to our performance.  The wine may not have been up to our expectations (which were VERY high, granted), but the experience was a great way to kick off the last performance of our tenure as amateur actors.

Technically Alfalfa Farm was not quite the kick-off to the day, which was brunch at Rosebud with E. and his parents and my mom -- which was lovely. Rosebud was also the coda to our day, after the cast party, where we had decided to check out the Sunday night karaoke scene.  Mostly we just chatted as we were so wiped, but D. got to sing some Gordon Lightfoot (one of the songs that will always remind me of this summer, "Sundown"), and I took a crack at the Supremes song I'd been wanting to do for a while -- really under-played in my opinion, the song "The Happening."

Day 114: Alfalfa Farm

For some reason, the phrase "Alfalfa Farm" just seems to roll off the tongue so readily -- and it is our welcome sign on the way to Georgetown, location of the stage where we will perform Rumors in two weeks (! - just two weeks!).  Alfalfa is to Georgetown what alpacas were to Kokomo for me as a child.  Each time my dad would take us to Westfield to eat at his favorite buffet (oh yes, buffet), we would pass the alpaca farm just before arriving in Kokomo on the way back.  Home sweet home... and that's what Georgetown is beginning to feel like, a bit.

Alfalfa screams hippie to me a bit, which is fitting for today, because I finally decided to try to purchase some vegan "replacement" items for my cupboard -- or rather, for the refrigerator at work.  Apparently it's never a good idea to buy soy-based fake cheese product (never again), but almond milk is still OK by my book.  D. was displeased with my ranting about the horrors of replacing cheese, but that was ok, because the result was that he used some _good_ fake cheese (apparently tapioca-based Daiya shizz) to create vegan pizza for the whole cast -- some sort of win-win going on there, I think.

For me, the biggest down-side of having rehearsals in Georgetown has nothing to do with gas money or mileage on my car or time -- but everything to do with missing (or being disastrously late for) B11 LBK at the Asgard. Tonight we missed the singing entirely, though we didn't miss the band, and I chatted with them and hung out at the Asgard for a while before calling it a night.  I sometimes find myself thinking that my rent really isn't too high when I consider I got live-band karaoke for free across the street from my house every Thursday.

Also -- whoa. I just realized when mapping Alfalfa Farm that it's not a farm.  It's a winery.  Well, then.