Sunday in the Park with George

Went to see Sunday in the Park with George, got good seat in stalls, had heard about it, raised the sceptical eyebrow as, hello, a musical about art and the painting of Seurat's painting of a park by the Seine? Riiiight. Anyway. Got there, saw added bonus of Jenna Russell, who I saw twice in Guys and Dolls, went 'okay, no loss there', saw Michael Buerk in the bar and blinked slightly. Got in, and first thing? The stage design and lighting team seriously deserves an award. The effect of space, duplication of characters, recreation of painting, taking characters out of paintings, dogs gambolling on canvas and projections interacting with other actors... My *god*. The play itself is about art, the making of, the obsession with, having to live with artists, trying to get it noticed, selling yourself to a certain extent, and others' perceptions. It's more 'play with incidental musical bits' than a straight musical. Very, very funny and beautifully poignant in places. Recommended, but not something I'd see twice. Gushed over lead actors when they came out, and I think I was the only one ther for signing. Took over camera duties for the american tourists who'd gone to see Avenue Q at the Coward/Albery whose stage door back onto the Wyndham, and proved self an obvious veteran by the fact that one carries a sharpie rather than a biro.

Observations of the night : it is hotter than fucking *Rio*, and was 29 degrees when I got to Victoria Station at 11pm, so god knows what the temperature was during the day. When in Pizza Express, and ordering a G'n'T, and the guy asks whether I want a single or double, my response was 'all that I really care about is how much ice you put in it.' Recommend their new Siciliana pizza. Theatre, when someone pointed out that everyone was buying programs to use as fans, I quoted Topsy Turvy and made people laugh and go 'so true'. 'You could barely hear the actors over the sound of programs flapping.'

Butted into people in row behind's conversation when they were trying to explain Seurat's painting technique of dots of different colours making up a completely different one when seen from a distance. They were unhappily struggling, so I turned round and said 'think TV screen. Red-green-blue.'. Cue 'oh, *now* I get it'. Then struggling to think of movement 'It's like impressionism, but has it's own name, can't think -' 'Pointilism.' 'Cheers, pointilism because of all the little points.' Never underestimate the sheer amount of useless trivia the Wallace brain can hold. Cousins were discussing this at Garden Party on sunday. 'Boss was going on about something, and I heard this little voice go 'actually, the inception of this was due to' and then realised it was *me*.' You will, never, ever beat Team Wallace at pub quizzes. Accept this and take your second place gracefully.

Also, Internet Jesus speaks the truth about what the people across the pond call 'Independence Day' here.

stupid little trivia piece on scars

One place I can guarantee you nearly every single woman in the north-west hemisphere, Japan and Australia has scars. Which they will never have thought of. And never, ever get counted as in those stupid 'scar tally-up' conversations everyone gets into at some point or another.

No, we're not talking TB vaccinations. Those are mostly Brits, and how I realised the L'Enfant poster that was so popular in the 80s was using a a British model. It's also cross-gender.

Nor are we talking burns from cookery.

Or stretch marks you get from your hips/tits growing faster than your skin has time to catch up with at puberty.

Give up?

BACK OF THE ANKLES.

From wearing shoes. We've all had blisters from straps, new shoes, trainers after running for ages - you get blisters, they bleed, you put on a plaster, the skin heals. Only it's not just once in your life. It's regularly. Often it's once a year. That skin scars. Scars by their definition are where the new skin hasn't merged in seamlessly with the old. And this skin has been cut over and over again. Every single woman I saw on the tube tonight had scars from shoes on the back of their ankles. Some it was a faint mark, some it was pretty obvious. But all of them had it.

So if anyone ever tells you they have no scars and're female? They lie, my children, they lie. The only way you can get away with not having them is if you've gone barefoot or only worn flip-flops your entire life. Not sandals. Flip-flops. You have a strap going round your ankles, that strap will rub and cause blisters at some point.

This random piece of trivia brought to you by going up the stairs and going 'huh, what's the mark on the back of everyone's ankles?' this morning.