Community Theatre and the Head of the Navigator

Last night went to an English pub. Funny place really. Anat and Sa'ar have this weird friend Frolick who is a pool shark and a heavy drinker. Couldn't understand a word the guy said, but then again, neither does he, by his own account.
Also, there are a lot of very randy, very old women who should act their age at these places. BrrRRrRRRr.

We headed home and played a game of drunk Monopoly, got pissed completely and headed for bed. But not before trying (and FAILING, thank God...) to send messages to people we knew in high school... That could have been quite embarrassing, considering our state of mind at the time...

This morning, after rising, we headed out to Reading, where we had walked around the market and had a nice lunch at a restaurant with very, very slow service... It started raining, so some nice wintery pictures for all!

Now, let me make this absolutely clear.
I'm stating this right here, on the web, for all to see.
If I ever argue about this with anyone, ever, you can just tell me to go read it in my own words, over here at http://morbid88.blogspot.com.
Okay, here goes.
Here we go, I'm going to say it.

I, Jon Barel, am not, have never been, nor will I ever be, able to navigate anywhere for anything. I have no sense of direction, I have zero ability to apart different landmarks and buildings, and no matter where I try to go, it will always, always, always take me three times as long to get there as it will anyone else, at least for the first few times.
In other words, I will never get "ahead" in navigation...

There, I've said it.

As for why... well, it's like this. I had to be at the theatre (okay, the school, really, but forget that for now) at 19:30. It's a twenty minute walk. I left at 18:40, and got there at the last minute. It took me an hour-fifteen to get back to the house.
I took every wrong turn, every familiar-looking but wrong road along the way... and this is how I spend just about every day of my life when I go outside. rap, when will it ever change? Now, I don't blame myself, 'cos really you go outside and everything looks the same -- I can't tell one "road" from another "lane" in this area, all the houses are exactly alike, and there are hardly any street names posted anywhere. All you get is houses marked with their names, so when I look at a house and saw "The Laurels" I just naturlly figured I was on the wrong road and went off in the opposite direction, not knowing that that's the name of the HOUSE, not the street. Crap. So it went on like that for the better part of the evening, there and back again.

As for the play, I went to see Terry Prachett's "The Truth" tonight, performed by the Kennet Amateur Theatrical Society, in Thatcham, Berkshire. Don't know how many out there know this, but I'm a big fan of Terry Pratchett's books. I just happened to spot a notice for the play on one of the notie borads in town, and I just had to go see it.
I gotta say, community theatre is wonderful... It's just fun, and people do a great job with what few resources they pool together. Sure, it's a lot like the stuff we used to do in highschool, I bet. And obviously it's not the same as going to a high-class professional theatre, that's just the charm of it -- it's amateurs, i.e. people doing something because they love it and for no other reason whatsoever . I'm sure most of them don't make much money this way.
The leads were very good, though, and I had a really good time, 'cos it brought back a lot of good memories -- of theatre and of Pratchett. Maybe we should try to do this at home as well?
I bet some of you (those who give a sh*t about Pratchett and the stage...) are wondering how the hell you get a Pratchett book onto the stage, ey? Well, there's Stephen Briggs' adaptations of most Prachett novels, but the nice thing about this one in particular is that it's not too focused on the fantasy aspets of the Discworld, and is really more about the story and plot, which is great for a small town community theatre.