My VERY White Christmas and crowded New Year

I'm tuckered out.

Haven't had much computer access since I left for Christmas in the Scottish Highlands.

What had been going on before I left...oh yeah, there had been a teeny weeny bit of snow in Leeds and I was all "OH MY GOD IT'S SNOWING THIS IS FRICKIN AWESOME".

Aw bless. I knew NOTHING about snow then. See, in the Highlands in

Scotland? Tons and tons of snow.

On the first day of my trip we went for a walk in a park.

You see what I'm sayin'? It was like Narnia. You know, in the bit when everyone's all depressed and the evil Witch is all power trippin'. It was like Narnia but happier.

So Christmas was pretty awesome and amazingly beautiful and we had Scottish men in kilts serving us at Christmas dinner so really, what more could you want?

The only bummer about snow - okay thinking about it I've learnt there are a couple of bummers about snow, in that it's hard to walk on, I'm a champion at NOT seeing black ice and falling over on it and snow's FRICKIN cold! - but the bummer I'm talking about is that you can't actually SEE any of the countryside. You can see the snow covered countryside. So I don't know what Scotland usually looks like, but I know what it looks like when in shades of white. And it sure is pretty.

My friend Bec arrived in Edinburgh to party with me at the biggest Street Party in the world, which is Hogmanay (New Years) in Edinburgh and it was a lot of fun...to start with.

Yes. There were LOTS of people, but also pockets of space and we were quite happily watching one of the free bands in the street party, having a good time. But then more and more people came. And most of them were drunk. And they were very pushy. As in they would walk and shove you aside. And the crowd got so big that there wasn't actually anywhere for you to be shoved to.

And this photo is from when the crowd was manageable.

I was nearly trampled at one point, standing beside the bit of a trailer that connects to a car, I was pushed by the crowd from behind so that my legs got caught on the trailer, the guy standing on the other side of the trailer was holding my top half up, screaming at the crowd to stop pushing. But they didn't. I was worried I was going to break one of my legs cos it was getting bent in a direction it really shouldn't. But I managed to get it free and stand up again. That was when the police arrived to ask if I was okay. I am - I'm fine. I just have some doozies of bruises on my legs. It's been over a week and they're still purple. That's probably bad, right?

So um, Hogmanay was great before that little hiccup.

I do really like Edinburgh and Scotland though. Must see it in the summer sometime.

London & my new love

It just happened. It wasn't supposed to but it did.

Hi everyone. My name is Sarah and I am a total theatre addict. Since I discovered such a thing as half price theatre tickets? I'm obsessed. I love it. The shows are amazing. I was in London for 5 nights with my friend Bec. How many West End musicals do you reckon we went to? 5. FIVE. Well I went to 5. She went to 4 plus a comedian. Love love love it. Expensive habit though, the theatre, even if they ARE half price. Yikes.

I've been interested in writing films for a couple of years now, and have a couple of scripts under my belt but was never into plays. But now I have another new passion. I like to think of myself as versatile.

It's amazing how inspired I was in London. I DID do other things in London as well, don't worry. I went to Kensington Palace, Shakespeare's Globe Theatre, Buckingham Palace, Camden Market, Harrods (never seen a department store like it!) the London Bridge Experience - not even REMOTELY what I thought it was going to be - The Tower of London...lordy...I went to lots of places. And was INSPIRED. And was snowed on.

Yesterday afternoon nearly the ENTIRE of a brand spanking new idea poured out of my head and into my computer in synopsis form. And it's COMPLICATED. And it just...yeah. Really. It DID pour out of me. Not something I'd been ruminating on, but an idea I only got yesterday and it came out nearly fully formed.

I think it would make a really good play. I think it would make a good MUSICAL. But I'll need to find someone to collaborate with on the music side of things. I don't have character names yet, but I definitely have characters arcs and needs and I wrote right up to the third act climax but couldn't finish cos I had to go out...to the theatre. :D

So you wanna know what I saw?

I honestly don't think I could pick a favourite. I was most looking forward to Hairspray and I loved it, but the set design and utilisation of the stage area in Dirty Dancing was SO clever and dancing phenomenal, and Legally Blonde was even better than I thought it was going to be because the actress who played Elle was absolutely ADORABLE in the role and I'd never seen anything like Avenue Q where you have the puppeteers on stage in plain view and you start merging their facial expressions with the puppets...and I mean, I'd never seen muppet sex before. That was definitely new. Though We Will Rock You definitely wasn't my favourite of the lot, the scenes with all the rebels were so fun. The baddest, heaviest metal man there ever was, "Britney Spears" was my favourite character, but the evil Queen lady? She's sure got a set of pipes on her. Wow what a voice.

Maybe that's it. Having seen so many different shows, I'm realising just how versatile theatre is and that there's so much creativity and so much you can DO with it. It's exciting.

Sairz