Day 7

That's what my boots look like from three days of North Dakota mud!

 Today was another beautiful North Dakota day. After a 2.4 mile run (picture above) it was our first day with the cast. So we showed up at 12:30 (early for call) and waited till 3 (when we all thought downbeat was at 2pm) and in the second song my bow exploded. All the hair fell out and I have to use a back up bow for now and send mine off for repair. Basically I had a very well contained meltdown complete with behind-sunglasses-crying. It was not even a little funny. I was stomping my foot and pouting. Luckily over dinner I worked out a game plan for fixing my bow with the stage manager Patty. After that I felt better and stopped pouting. The lame part is that there is nowhere in North Dakota to send it to get fixed so I have to fed ex it back to Kansas or Nashville. So tomorrow morning I call music stores and then Patty the AWESOME stage manager will take it, pack it right, insure it and send it off. After all the hair fell out of my bow I was crazy paranoid and I wouldn't let sun hit my violin for fear that it would crack. So for all of the blinding sunlight today and half of tomorrow I am the girl with the UV protectant (is that a word?) umbrella held carefully over my violin but not my face.

In previous years the band has been over in the corner of the stage with the rhythm section inside a house and only the fiddle, steel and guitar in the open. This year they are building us a gazebo in the middle of the stage. They must have heard I was playing the show this year. Who wouldn't want me center stage?

The theater is fantastic. As cheesy as I assumed it would be I have to say it is shaping up to be pretty good. It is a Country Review which means it is a bit goofy, but you know what? Ain't nothin' wrong with goofy! I think it will be pretty well done. It will sure help when we are not in some random corner they put us in so that we could play until they get our gazebo done.

On that note let me say a giant THANK YOU to all the tech boys and girls who have been working their asses off in the rain to try to get the stage ready. Also I appreciate that when I realized I needed a sweatshirt (since it drops 30 degrees when the sun goes down here) I knew exactly what to do: go find the big tech guy and smile real cute and ask for a sweatshirt. I totally got one. I always love the Tech crew!

Here's to hoping I have no more violin disasters while I'm here!!