Mexican Baby Mama

It is so rare that we have a day off. When you are on the road, you work, work, work. Even if you are not actually working, you know that in a few hours, you have to head to a theatre to go to work.

Welcome to Paducah, Kentucky. I looked it up on Google to see if it was possibly a place my sister could come visit, since it borders Ohio. Nope. Super far away.

I was in need of some serious girl time today, so my friends Stacie and Amelia joined me at a Mexican place across the street from the hotel. We had our girl talks (boys, relationships, friends, etc.) and then texted a few other friends who were in town with us. The Mexican bar wound up being a hilarious afternoon, filled with Corona's, margarita's, Jesus, Judas, and drinks being drank from feet... LONG story! It was just what we needed. Four hours of laughing. :)

Next on the agenda was the new movie "Baby Mama" with Tina Fey. I wasn't going to go, then decided to suck it up and trek it the 1 mile to the theater. I thought it was funny... like laugh out loud funny. But I couldn't help but wonder (saw a SATC preview)- would I have thought it was as funny as I did if I didn't have 20 friends in the theater laughing out loud with me!? Regardless, other than the previews for "What Happens In Vegas", it's your best bet for a laugh. "Forgetting Sarah Marshall" made me laugh too, but I was by myself for that one, so I probably didn't laugh as much.

It was freezing when the movie was over (like 37 degrees, according to Yahoo). So my friend and I paid some chick in a Camero with a really loud muffler $10 to take us back to the hotel. She was due in 5 days and thought we were nuts, but it was way better than walking that mile!

The Worst Western

Here we are in Appleton, WI for the weekend. The town is actually great! College St. downtown (this is where Lawrence University is) has about 5 blocks of restaurants, bars and shops. It's really cute. I love coming across things like this.

However, we are staying at the Best Western. Their sign out front says "Tropical Domed Pool and Atrium!". Wow. The people staying here seriously think they are in Florida or something! It's hilarious! There is a glass dome in the middle of the hotel, with a pool, hot tub, ping pong table, video games, and umbrella tables. People are sitting out there this morning in bathing suits with sunglasses on. I mean, really!? We are inside, and it's WISCONSIN!!

While the bathing beauties are funny, the college age kids playing beer pong until the area closes at midnight every night are not as humorous. The hotel does nothing to stop the party, and our room is right in the middle of it all.

Gotta love the Worst Western.

Off to Peoria tonight for three days....

Who Knows Me?

On tour, I handle all of our media and PR requests. I also sell the merchandise every night during the show.

To backtrack- there are fans of this show who will drive hours, fly across the country, fly across the WORLD, to come see it. The star of our shows name is Ted, so these people have been deemed "Ted Heads". Ted is known for staying after the shows to talk to fans and meet with people. However, as time goes on, he does this less and less. Where as last year he did it about 95% of the time, I would say this year we're looking at about 65% of the time.

Here is the strange part, for me: on a weekly basis, total strangers come up to me in the lobby while I am working and say "you must be Shannon!" or, "are you Shannon?" My first thought is, do I know you? Then I quickly remember that these Ted Heads have taken the liberty of writing about me on their websites (sometimes nice, sometimes not- I have not read them, but others have). I am the only face on the tour they see- the actors are on stage, and everyone else works behind the scenes. So everyone who reads these fan sites knows my name, who I am, and what I do! It's just weird.

I think the reason these people do this is to try to use me to get to Ted after the show. They know that I often stick around with him, just to make sure things are in order. Because Ted plays the character of Jesus, people seem to really take to him much more than someone who plays, lets say, the Wizard in Wicked. There is one woman who I call the "Ted Petter". She literally pets his hair when she talks to him. Others bring him bags of gifts, family photo albums, one guy made him an award like an Oscar for playing Jesus...

I don't mind nice people who really enjoy the show, and loved Ted's performance. These people bring their albums from the 70's for him to sign, tell their stories about growing up with the music- it's pretty cool. I DO mind the people that feel they have a right to see him after the show just because they bought a ticket, and take advantage of his time. That is a whole other blog that I will not write, since you never know who reads these things!

My point is- I don't think you should write about people on the internet you do not know. Especially telling people to say hello to them to try and get something out of them. It's fine to read about people you do not know who have written about themselves, like this blog.

The question after they introduce themselves is: "where will Ted be doing a meet and greet tonight"? If he's not doing one, they don't believe me anyway and they wait around after we have already left, so what is the point in asking!?

Darrel's 30th WEEK

Darrel's 30th birthday was on the 10th, and I must say, we celebrated it many times over! The two of us went to dinner on Monday night in Schenectady at this old mansion that had a restaurant in it. He ordered a great bottle of wine, and we had great steak dinners. Even though his birthday was not until Thursday, it was the only night we had off for just the two of us to do something.

On Thursday, I surprised him with a little birthday lunch- about 20 of our friends came to this cool little restaurant that was kind of a mix between a diner, lounge and 80's bar. The whole company ate there all week- they had different things on their menu, like a turkey sandwich with brie and cranberry. I called ahead to see if we could get a cake, and they literally ordered a cake big enough for an army!!! He had no idea, so it was a fun afternoon for everyone. And, it got us out of the hotel for a few hours!

Darrel with his huge birthday cake!

The BIG night out was going to be Friday. We were in Rochester, NY, and they have this amazing place there called Dinosaur. It is a BBQ joint. We have been there on tour 4 times over the last two years, and NEVER miss going!!! The bus dropped us off after the show, there was a great band playing, and we all ate pounds and pounds of BBQ, and had buckets of beers. Our friends decided to be really nice and keep buying us drinks. Lets just say on Saturday, I was really, really happy the birthday week was over, because I was not exactly feeling 100%!

Darrel and I at Dinosaur- so happy he's old now!

Lorelei and I- she loved the Mojito!

And we all wonder why we didn't feel well on Saturday...

Tour Fever

So you know the term "cabin fever". When you have been cooped up somewhere and you are so bored, and just going crazy. Well I officially have "tour fever". I AM SO BORED!! I can not even count how many times I have said/thought this recently. In the past week, we have been in Schenectady, Rochester, and Binghamton. All towns in NY. There was literally nothing to do in Schenectady for five days. I ate a few good meals, but other than that, we sat around the hotel. Sometimes living like this is great. Take Naples for example. A full week with some free time during the days to go to the beach, explore, go to lunch, enjoy life. Other times living like this is a little challenging. Why can't we be in Chicago and Boston every week!?

The good news is that I have definitely caught up on movies. In the past week, I have watched:

• The Martian Child (highly recommended)
• Leatherheads (slightly recommended if under the age of 60, highly recommended if over)
• Becoming Jane (not so much, unless you really enjoy time period pieces)
• Proof (not recommended at all because Gwenyth Paltrow never cracks a smile)
• The Starter Wife mini-series (not what I expected, but held my attention. But is was long)

Thank god for Netflix!

Vacation Pics

Darrel finally got his computer back up and running, so here are a few pictures from our vacation to Ft. Lauderdale!With Debbie for dinner!

Darrel and I doing "Spring Break '08" on A1A

Enjoying some time with Poppy

We found his bar for Happy Hour!

Ft. Lauderdale

We had a great few days in Ft. Lauderdale, staying at the "shack" my grandfather rented for the winter. We were there for four nights and four days, with my dad, Chuck, and Heidi. Heidi is the BEST cook in the world! We ate in two nights, and she amazed us once again with a wonderful prime rib that was cooked very nontraditional. It was six pounds- Darrel rubbed it down with a bunch of spices and garlic and other good stuff, we put it in the oven at 350 for one hour, at noon. Then the oven was turned off for the entire day, but we were NOT allowed to open the door (fear of death by Heidi made us follow the rules). Then we turned the oven back on to 350, 45 minutes before we wanted to eat. Believe it or not- voila! A perfect medium rare roast for six of us!

Darrel and I took a little boat cruise one afternoon, to see the sights of the yachts and mansions. Wow, is there a lot of big places down there! A house that might be a few million in Cleveland is easily 30 million there, if it's right on the water. Everyone who owned them was someone- usually a sports player, actor, or CEO of some company like Bally's or Netflix. We saw yachts worth over 70 million dollars! Just when you think you're doing pretty well in life... :)

Darrel and I went to dinner one night at Mai Kai. It has been there since the 50's or 60's, and is a really fun place. Imagine the Polynesian at Disney World- kind of the same thing. You go to dinner, then the Tiki girls and musicians put on a show. And fire throwing men! It was a bit expensive- $45 a person for dinner and the show, not including any drinks. We happened to check out the happy hour specials at the bar, and low and behold, half price apps! So we opted to eat dinner in there instead of the main restaurant.

It was so nice to spend time with Poppy- I miss him so much when I am on the road. He pulled a good one on me... we are planning a trip to Germany for my 30th birthday (to go to Oktoberfest), and guess who decided to come- Poppy and Heidi! They are a step ahead of us and already booked plane tickets. Sneaky people they are!