This and that

Thanks to everyone for their kind words and support over the last little while. It is greatly appreciated, and I am reminded yet again that I have wonderful friends and am greatly blessed by the number of awesome people in my life. Grandma's funeral was Saturday and it was, I think, a fitting tribute to her. Simple and elegant, lots of laughter and fond remembrances, full of comfort and acknowledgement of a life well lived and that she had come to the end of her days in peace and surrounded by love. I was honoured to participate in the eulogy and I think I did well -- SerdMom told me afterwards that we painted a beautiful picture of her and helped everyone who was there to know her a bit better, which was exactly our goal. We will miss Grandma dreadfully, but I am thankful that we had her as long as we did, and I know that her influence will journey with me through the rest of my life.

Other random life observations:

Is it ever appropriate to say to someone, in public, "Excuse me, ma'am, but you appear to have forgotten your pants?" Like, say, on the bus? When she is all bundled up in a coat, hat, gloves, knee high boots ... and tights? (I should add that her coat only came to her waist, so I can say with some certainty that she was not wearing a dress. She appeared to have some sort of sweater on that covered her bottom, barely, and then ... tights.)

People who allow their cell phones to ring repeatedly and loudly at the theatre should be shot on sight. Just sayin'.

J and I saw Macbeth at the NAC last night. It was a fantastic production. Macbeth is one of my favourite Shakespeare plays, mostly because there's a lot of action in it (unlike, say, Hamlet, where he spends the majority of the play standing around dithering) and the themes are so universal. This production is set in WWII Scotland, and the director envisioned Lady Macbeth as a Wallis Simpson type, which was an interesting take on the character. The production values were top notch and the acting was superb. Sometimes these "updated" adaptations of Shakespeare are difficult to pull off, but this one worked beautifully. It also included one of the best moments of "we're live, dumbass" theatrical shenanigans I've ever seen ... during the banquet scene as Macbeth was soliloquizing down front in the background someone opened a bottle of champagne and managed to spray it across the entire stage and a number of the other actors. It was fascinating to watch their reactions as they fought desperately to keep it together and clean up (while staying in character), without distracting from the very tense scene that was supposed to be taking place. The carefully blank faces as each actor passed his or her napkin (thank goodness it was a banquet scene!) down the table were hysterical and the whole thing was just a perfect example of the joy and excitement of live theatre. Macbeth, by the way, never so much as blinked and continued on with the scene beautifully. I would have loved to have been backstage during intermission, though!

And finally, is it the weekend yet?