Dear Grandma...

This is a letter I wrote to my grandmother that tells about what's going on in my life recently.

Hi grandma! Mom forwarded me your message, so I thought I'd take some time to tell you about my trip to Chicago.

The bus ride was insane. We left at 4:30 PM on Wednesday and didn't get there until almost nine o'clock the following morning. It was difficult to sleep on the bus due to the uncomfortable seats, but also because the people who sat near me wouldn't stop talking. In spite of them, however, I did manage to get three or four good hours of sleep.

The first day was tiring. We went to a very nice planetarium, but everyone was too tired to appreciate it completely. It was awesome, though, because we had a beautiful panorama of the Chicago skyline. It was a gorgeous 75-degree day without a cloud in the sky and a slight breeze to keep things moving. I couldn't have imagined better weather.

We ate lunch at the Navy Pier, which is basically a giant shopping center on the lakefront, and then moved on to the zoo. Parts of it were kind of depressing since the animals were confined to such small spaces, but it was too beautiful a day to complain much.

We ate dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe before the highlight of the journey: The Phantom of the Opera.

What an awesome, awesome musical. The voices were incredible, and the technical effects were stunning. The Phantom's voice was probably the most resonant baritone I've ever heard, and the other voices were only slightly less impressive. The lighting rig was ingenious given the age of the theatre, since it was built before the development of modern stage lighting theory. Instead of trying to light the stage from the limited positions available, the electricians elected to rig their own positions in midair. It's hard to explain quite what they did, but they hung a very industrial-looking light bridge from the ornate 19th-century ceiling. It was clever. Also, they had a chandelier which crashed to the stage floor from hanging above the audience's heads. Not to mention all the awesome pyrotechnics that they coordinated, and the spectacular movement effects...I am astonished by the ingenuity of the designers for the Phantom of the Opera. I really don't think I could have been any more impressed with it.

Unless I was sitting a little closer. We were in the nosebleeds (where the tickets only cost $25 apiece) so I missed a lot of how cool it could have been. But I definitely got the general idea.

The hotel was nice. It was a lot like the holidome in Hutch, except I like yours better. My roommates were quieter than my seatmates on the bus, so I was able to sleep soundly from 11:30 until 6:30 the following morning.

The other major highlights of the trip were the aquarium and the Museum of Science and Industry. The aquarium had a lot of fish, which weren't really all that fun to watch, but it also had really beautiful beluga whales and dolphins and (my personal favorite) a lot of little penguins. Those suckers swim really really fast! When they get out of the water, they kind of leap onto the shore. It's really fun to watch. I could have stayed at the penguin habitat for hours, but we had to watch the dolphin show. It was cool, I guess, but I didn't come away that impressed with the dolphins. They were really pretty, and I'd like to be one, but they weren't really that awesome to watch. No, the penguins were the hit at the aquarium.

And the Museum of Science and Industry was pretty much everyone's favorite of the museums we visited. It was a different sort of museum. It followed the "show, don't tell" theory, and so it was notably lacking in those placards that you have to read explaining this and that, but full of hands-on stuff that explained very complicated concepts in very awesome ways. I was very impressed.

One of the best parts of the trip, though, was that I hit it off with a girl who I'm going to take to prom. It's kind of my first relationship (certainly the first where the other party has shown interest :) so I'm excited about it.

And on top of all that, we're doing Sweeney Todd. It's an absolutely insane musical. I worked for six and a half hours on it today, and we got a lot done, but there is so much that needs to happen before we open that it seems impossible. However, we'll get it done--we always do--and it's going to rock.

It'd be cool if the whole Kansas crowd came out to see one of my plays next year. The spring one should be just awesome enough. I think you guys would really enjoy it. I'm sure Max would be interested to see one. I think I'll bug you until you give in, so you might as well just agree to it right now. :)

I hope you guys are all well and happy.