It rained all yesterday evening. Paul and I walked through it for something like two miles while we went out to dinner, a Wassail put on by the SCA at Kraftbrau, and finally to see Titus Andronicus at the Epic Center, starring our own Zee as Tamora, Queen of the Goths.
Everything was great fun; dinner was marvellous, the wassail was well-attended, and I got to sit in on a couple tunes on bodhran. The wassail itself -- well, let's just say they did a very good job recreating it, but I'm quite glad I'm in the 21st century. The spiced apples they plunked in on top of the hot wassail made it positively yummy, though, and the stuffed bread thingies were outrageously good.
Titus Andronicus (Tightass Androgynous, Paul and I snickered with juvenile glee) was a really well done play, and one that I'd never read or seen performed, despite my addiction to all things Shakespearean in College. Talk about gore! Fourteen deaths, nine on stage, cannibalism, rape, infanticide, three chopped off hands -- you name it, it's got it. Zee was an excellent Goth Queen, resplendent in red and completely alien from everyone else onstage. The girl who played Lavinia was also quite good, keening and tongueless and bloody. Titus and Saturninus were showstoppers, and stole the play, especially when they had to get creative with the staging in the second act, because the fake stage blood was so expensive. We came home and I dragged out my enormous collegate-era Big Book o' Shakespeare and read most of the notes and play, catching some of the more subtle historical references I'd missed. I knew some of them -- but Tarquin? He was a bit of a mystery.
Today I got up and tried to ski in the four inches of snow that fell overnight. Yes, you heard correctly -- it bucketed down rain until midnight and then switched to snow. Welcome to Michigan, and its schizophrenic weather. This morning it was blue and sunny and beautiful -- and 35 degrees. I attempted to go skiing, but finally gave up after about a half-hour and walked home with my skis over my shoulder. I was spending more time knocking the packed-on snow off my skis than I was actually going forward. Le sigh.
Still, it was time well-spent; it's absolutely beautiful now, even though there ain't much snow left.