Bringing You Up to Date

The latest word on the camera is not good. Alice Nan writes:

I have no positive news about the camera so my hopes of finding it are slipping. Brianna did not do as she should have and they are still trying to track down the camera. Brianna says she put it in a drawer at the receptionist desk with a note that it belonged to Sykes. But Walt and I checked all those drawers on Saturday night when we went back and it wasn’t there. I am sure Walt can veryify that too. I shared this information with Robyn today when I went by.

I am not optimistic, but I did tell Alice Nan that I feel the place is financially responsible, since they knew it belonged to someone in Alice's family and didn't try to contact us and since it has now disappeared.

I have pretty much given up hope of ever seeing the photos again, but if I can be reimbursed for the camera, the extra batteries, and the brand new camera bag I had just purchased, I will be satisfied, if still unhappy. They are lucky that it is Alice Nan they are dealing with. I would be parked in the office, frothing at the mouth, if I were the one handling the hunt!

After a night of sleep following the episode with the exploding lightbulb, Walt was all set to attack the set-up of the new TV. Naturally, it did not go smoothly, but after lot of head scratching, manual reading, and button pushing, the new TV was finally set up and working. Which means, of course, that I have no excuses not to get back on the treadmill again.

Now I learn that in order to get a hi-def signal, I have to call Comcast and sign up for a hi-def account. I will have to call them tomorrow and see how much that is going to cost. Nothing comes inexpensively, I know.

Tonight we went to see Mamma Mia! again. I reviewed it in 2003 and again in 2005 and, like a bad penny, it's back again. The long line outside the Sacramento Community Center theatre told me all I needed to know about why they are bringing it back yet again. Because it sells out, that's why!

I had been dreading seeing it yet again this evening, but was pleasantly surprised. I'd forgotten what a fun show it is. And, since I just saw the story of ABBA on the Biography channel recently, I could now put the whole thing in a bit better perspective (did you know ABBA was "bigger than the Beatles" in Australia, yet during the time they were together they only had one #1 hit in the United States? (That was "Dancing Queen," back in 1976.)

It wasn't until someone named Catherine Johnson got the idea to weave a story around the lyrics of 22 of the group's songs (albeit a fairly simple, kind of dumb story) that the music really took off. In March of 2002, "Mama Mia" became the highest grossing show in North America, taking $3.7 million in a single week. The original cast recording is consistently in the Top 20 of the Billboard Catalog Charts, selling more than 4,000 copies a week in the U.S. alone. It is celebrating six sold-out years at the Winter Garden Theater on Broadway and is currently playing record-breaking engagements in Las Vegas and on National Tour in the United States. The original West End production has played more than 3,500 performances and an international tour has played in more than 30 foreign cities. A feature film based on the stage show will be released in July 2008.

So there!

(I suspect the production of Pajama Game that we are seeing on Friday won't have quite as impressive statistics!)