Category: En route

Finding Xanadu 上都 and Five Years of Triscribe

Last night P- got me tickets to see Xanadu the musical as an advanced birthday present, as the show is closing this weekend. I got to see the talented Kerry Butler, who I actually knew in high school – she was the lead in all of our high school musicals when I was on the stage crew. It was hysterical in how it embraces the Olivia Newton-John movie score, rejects the movie, and yet imbues the Three’s Company-era Venice Beach of the 80’s.


Cheyenne Jackson & P-


Me and Kerry Butler

According to Wikipedia, Xanadu was Kubla Khan’s summer capital Shengdu. From Marco Polo’s description, it seemed to be a resort of sorts. This became the inspiration for the Samuel Taylor Coleridge poem.

If you are looking for a message from the musical, it is the search for “Xanadu”, which is defined in the story as “finding true love, and creating and sharing art.” I guess that is what we have been trying to do with Triscribe for the last five years, and it has worked: I’ve found true love (who I’m going to marry in 2 weeks – we’re picking up the rings today), and we have been able to share our love for food, travel, news, writing, and just about everything else.

As always, thanks to my compatriots SSW & YC for keeping this going!

Chicago!

In Chicago for a vacation until Wednesday. I still want a really great staycation, but this will have to do.

FC had done the Chicago deep dish (okay, “stuffed”) pizza and the Amazing Race-like escapade. Can’t say that my siblings and I had any Amazing Race; it was mostly smooth, but for weather-related delay, thanks to rain. Atop of that, the Chicago White Sox game was postponed due to the rain. Rain, rain, go away… The deep dish pizza at Giordano’s in Oak Park tonight was pretty impressive, but I agree with FC – you can’t call that pizza (not if you’re a NY’er!).

Oak Park’s very pretty – amazing architecture for a suburb (well, Frank Lloyd Wright was from here – we barely saw too much of his house/studio, since it was pretty dark tonight; I wouldn’t call it mere ‘burb either; some of it felt very classic and well-tended – plus how many ‘burbs would claim to being the hometown of Ernest Hemingway?).