Busy, Busy, Busy

Strauss Theatre has a lot going on this month. I am imagining staring at the calander in the office, so I might get a few days wrong. If my "mind's eye" isn't half-blind, then during the month of March there will be a total of 13 performances of Smoke on the Mountain; 9 performances of Bullets for Broadway; 2 performances of Corey/Lisa, and 6 performances of Mark Twain(at the Young Troupe). 30 performances, 31 days in March. But, some of the performance days overlap. There are some days we won't have any performances and some days there will be 2 or 3. Don't get me wrong, I am not complaining, just informing. SO......if you live in Northeast Louisiana, please come and see some of the productions. Did I mention I have a 'bit part' in Smoke on the Mountain? Yeah, I get to sit in the audience and play an older member of the Mt. Pleasant Baptist Church, who "thinks" she disapproves of Pastor Oglethorpe inviting the singing Sanders Family to their revival. It just involves saying Amen, Hallelujah, Praise the Lord and other assorted comments at opportune moments.

Have a great day!

Visit my Web Page

Well I did it! I spent a little time and a little money and created my own space on the world wide web. If you have a few minutes, take a look. It is a work in progress, and I did it mostly for the learning experience. It is a "blog" web site. I am not trying to sell anything, although that might not be a bad idea in this day and age. Let me know what you think. You should be able to comment on the articles, but you'll have to let me know if it doesn't work. If it does work, I should be able to see the comments.

You can click on the title of this blog to take you to my page or you can copy and paste the following link in your address bar:

http://cthybrgss.com/

Sad Day at Strauss

The failing economy has affected Strauss Theatre. I am sad to report that several positions will be terminated because of financial issues. Several staff were notified yesterday that their positions will be terminated on Wednesday, Novemeber 26, and one employee will leave on Friday, December 11. The positions affected are the MainStage Artistic Director, the MainStage Box Office Manager, and the Bookeeper for both theatres. The Assistant Technical Director and Costumer were let go last week. That leaves Bob, Scot, and myself to take care of the MainStage and Laura Michelle and Steve Barton to take care of the Young Troupe. We will all have a significant amount of responsibilities added to what we already do. Yes, I am (as are all employees) extremely sad.

Dennis will finish directing You're a Good Man Charlie Brown, as this is a Christmas show and not part of the regular season.

Far Cry 2

If you are not familiar with computer games, forgive this blog. But I have to rant.

I typically don't like sequels of computer games... Why? Mostly because they don't stick to what made the first game great. Take Far Cry for example. Far Cry has been my all-time favorite game. There are a lot of reasons I enjoyed the game; the game play, the characters, the mission, etc. Far Cry was mostly set in jungle type environments, and you played as Jack Carver, a mercenary of sorts. Jack wore a red and white kind of flowered shirt, it was his trademark. In Far Cry, you mostly fought soldiers of the Krieger Corporation and mutants (Trigens). The Krieger Corporation was trying to create a kind of "super soldier", but their experiments went wrong, hence the Trigens. Fast forward to Far Cry 2......

You no longer play as Jack Carver. When you first start the game, you have your choice of several characters you can play. None of them are Jack Carver. Instead of jungle environments, you are now in Africa. Now Africa has lots of jungle, but you are not playing in the jungle. You are playing in what appears to be a savannah type environment. Now since I haven't play the complete game, I don't know if you ever get to play in the jungle, maybe you do. There is no evil Krieger Corportation to fight against, and no Trigens. BTW, they left Val out too. What's up with that?

Weapons have changed as well. Gone is the M4 carbine, the standard weapon. As a matter of fact, the only weapon that makes a reappearance is the MP5 SMG. Gone are my favorite weapons, the AG36 assault rifle and the OIWC assault rifle. You can still get a sniper rifle in Far Cry 2, but I haven't played far enough in the game to come across one. They changed the sniper rifle too....from an AW50 to an M1903 Springfield.

And what's up with no longer being able to go prone? How can you steady a sniper rifle if you can't go prone? I don't know.

To say the least, I am rather disgusted. If you want to make a sequel, then make a sequel...keep the basics. Don't make a Batman movie without Batman. Get it?

Now, is Far Cry 2 a horrible game? No, it's actually rather fun, so my objection is not to the game play, but to the name. This game is definitely NOT a Far Cry sequel. They should have called it something else, and be done with it. Like "African Mercenary", "Savannah Soldier".

Go figure.

Attack Cat

My cat Simon has been behaving badly. So badly in fact, that I am considering taking him to the shelter. His latest mission is the t.v. He will sit and watch it and then without warning, jump up and start scratching at the screen. Now if I had a CRT or tube t.v. I don't suppose I would care all that much. But I am talking LCD. I have tried several ways to get him to stop. One of the best ways to stop bad behavior is to spray the cat with water. Well, I am not about to spray water at the cat while it is in front of the t.v. because water may get inside the t.v. and then that would be that. I have gone over and just casually removed him from the t.v., and yes I have even given him a "tap" or two.

I can't allow this behavior to continue, but I obviously don't know how to stop it. So it looks like I will be making a visit to the humane society.