Puzzling Progress

I’m about to spend a week at a cottage with fellow puzzler D, and I figure we’re gonna get through at least one jigsaw while we’re cooped up together. So, in advance of that, I thought I would share the puzzles I’ve worked on over the last few months.

The Kiss by Klimt
I picked up both this one and the Tulip Fields puzzle at Costco over the winter months and, while they were inexpensive, the fact that all the pieces are the same shape (i.e two opposing tabs and two opposing notches) made these puzzles somewhat less fun to play with.

Still, the painting by Gustav Klimt was quite enjoyable – at least it was once I got to the sections with people and clothing. The speckled brown bits surrounding the couple, however, were just awful. Those portions were trickier than simple blue sky because the speckles kind of messed with my vision. They made it harder to register exactly what I was looking at.

Still, once I got those border parts done, the rest was lovely.

Tulip Fields
This one was deceiving.

Thi puzzle got significantly more difficult the further along I got. Usually puzzles get easier, given you have fewer pieces to play with.

But the trouble here was that I left the foreground sections until the end. And because the quality of the image was somewhat blurry in the foreground, it was really hard to distinguish the correct orientation for the pieces. The flowers were too big to get a sense of whether they were upright or upside down.

Working with greenery is always tricky. Leaves, ferns, palm trees – those are the hardest images to find any sort of pattern in.

Lizard Wig
I felt that this puzzle presented a good level of challenge for me.

There were several easily identifiable sections, like the giant pink lotus flower or the lady’s face and shoulders, where I could focus attention early on before I got to the joining material.

I also really liked that this one had so much vibrant colour throughout, PLUS, there were segments of glitter!

I worried that the glitter would be flaky and make a mess all over the living room, but the puzzle is well made. The glitter doesn’t come off – it wasn’t applied at the last minute.

This one is part of a series and my friend M has several more that she’s willing to loan me. In fact, I’ve already done a second one as you’ll see below.

Hot Air Balloons
This one was trickier than it looked.

I thought that each balloon would be easy to work on by itself. And in part that was true – but because there’s so much sun and shadow on each balloon, the small puzzle pieces can be deceiving. What looks like red and white on one half of a balloon turns out to be blue and purple on the other half – so when searching for pieces, you can’t just look for the colour you start with. You have to account for the change in colour temperature due to the shadowing.

That made it tricky to pick pieces based on colour alone – and with a lot of the balloons having similar patterns, my brain needed to work extra hard.

Still it was a fun one.

Rainbow Mother
Th second in the series of glitter puzzles after lizard wig, this one was mother $@%#& hard! Not that I’m complaining – I’m certainly up for a challenge.

But aside from the rainbow bit at the bottom, a lot of this colours and patterns can be really hard to place. And the night sky was basically a big guessing game when I finally got to it.

What made this slightly more of a challenge was that Tiwi decided she wanted to get in on the action. She just would just NOT leave this puzzle alone, despite my best efforts to cover it with a towel and loads of books. I assume it’s because the person I borrowed it from also has cats and Tiwi smelled them on the puzzle. She would paw at the corners and, if I was sloppy when I covered it for the night, she would manage to reach the puzzle from time to time.

Ultimately she did finally managed to grab a corner piece and chew it up pretty badly. The fact that this was a borrowed puzzle means I had to buy a new one to replace it – so I do have this one to loan out if anyone is interested…assuming you don’t mind a dog-eared (cat-eared?) corner.

Back to Puzzling

Yarn

Now that we’re smack in the dead of winter, I’m a little less inclined to leave the house for long walks, which means I have less time to just pop in my headphones to listen to a book.

To compensate (and to help while away the long winter hours) I’ve returned to puzzling. Puzzling is mindless enough that I can concentrate on what I’m reading as I hunt and peck for pieces.

Aside from the first puzzle listed here, I’m also noticing a trend towards working on destination puzzles. Do you think it’s time to plan a getaway again?

I think the first puzzle (the one captioned “Yarn) looks more challenging than it actually is. The gradients within each distinct yarn ball make it tricky to distinguish from piece to piece, but thankfully there is a good bit of texture to work from.

Iceland

The different wool types are easy to recognize on the puzzle pieces and that made it much easier.

Still, you need good light for this one.

Moving on… given the amount of sky in the Iceland puzzle, and the significant amount of colour gradient, I expected this one to be incredibly difficult.

While not easy, it wasn’t so challenging that I ever contemplated giving up on it the way I did the 1500-piece gradient-heavy puzzle I wrote about last fall.

Even so, this one took me the longest to complete from this batch of puzzles. Not that I’m in a rush.

Miditerranean

The Mediterranean one, by contrast, was lovely to work on. Just the right difficulty level. The solid blocks of colour in each building made it easy enough to work in sections, but the sections were big enough and complex enough that it wasn’t super easy either. Plus the significant amount of sky provided a challenge.

More than the sky, I had no idea the three palm trees would be so difficult to work on. Getting those done was largely an exercise in trying pieces at random until one snapped into place. Definitely the most challenging part of this puzzle.

I must remember to never buy a puzzle that features palm tree prominently.

Most recently, I completed a puzzle called Globetrotter that I thought would have been simpler than it was.

Globetrotter

I figured that each photo would essentially be a mini puzzle all its own – and it was, but the border bits between each postcard were somewhat trickier than I initially gave it credit for.

I still managed to get it put together in less than one week, but the connective tissue proved challenging right up until the end, so much so that, aside from having fewer unplaced pieces to sort through, there was never a point where this puzzle got significantly easier as it neared completion.

It takes a special, mensa-minded, spatial brain to look at the white border lines and know exactly where they might fit.

I picked up a couple of jig saws at Costco this week, so I’m all set for my next few weeks of puzzling.

Winter is Coming

Fall is officially here, and the changing leaves confirm what I already know: patio season is coming to a close.

That sucks, but honestly I can’t complain about the summer season we had this year. COVID-19 is a beast, but having the capacity to host a small gathering outdoors has been a huge bonus – a blessing. And since the weather this summer was so spectacular, we were able to take advantage of our little outdoor oasis to spend physically distanced time with friends pretty much every weekend (and even on the odd weeknight) all season long.

This year’s garden was lush, too, and before it gets torn out for the winter, I just wanted to capture a quick photo of the out-of-control greenery we enjoyed all summer.

Not looking forward to shutting it down. 😦

Friends, Food, Fire: Flawless!

Thanks to Jenn for the selfie – sadly the angle was not wide enough to show two of our fellow party-goers.

It’s rare that a dinner party or an evening with friends goes off without a hitch. Usually some little thing – some hiccup – prevents an event like that from being over-the-top perfect. Thankfully, it’s usually only some trifling trouble – maybe the weather is a little too wet. Maybe one of your guests is feeling a bit out of sorts and not their usual effervescent self. Maybe the host plays music that brings the mood a little too low.

It’s tricky to make sure every little detail aligns to make a perfect evening. So when it does happen – when it IS perfect – it’s such a joy that you don’t ever want it to end! I’m pretty sure that’s how everyone felt on Saturday night when six of us gathered at our friends’ place in rural Ottawa for a physically distanced dinner and campfire.

The weather was ideal – clear and still, and just warm enough to keep everyone comfortable. All guests were is great spirits. The conversation flowed effortlessly and easily, much like the wine. And the food was out of this world!

Even the fire behaved – keeping us all toasty as the evening grew chilly, and cooperating by sending the smoke drifting harmlessly away from where we gathered to laugh and drink.

The only time we went indoors was for dinner – a massive spread of food for raclette, giving us all a chance to cook for ourselves at the table and freeing up our hosts to entertain and not be tied up in the kitchen. With fresh bread and a bubbling bowl of fondue cheese to accompany our table-side, cheese-covered creations, it was no wonder we were full before the decadent dessert even made its appearance. The highlight – a creme brûlée with a perfectly crisped topping – was stunningly good. And consuming it fireside with a delicious cup of coffee felt like the height of luxury!

The only thing about the evening that makes me sad is that winter is on its way and soon it will be too nasty outside to do this all again. But I would, in a heartbeat!

Thanks to our hosts, D and S – and to my designated driver, N – I had a stellar time!

Just a small portion of the spread available to us.

Pandemic Puzzling

Usually I only puzzle when I’m at a cottage…and sometimes not even then. It generally depends on the weather. I don’t want to be stuck indoors when there’s beautiful swimming weather happening outdoors. But with the pandemic keeping us all locked down in our homes, I rediscovered the joy of working on puzzles!

The Stepping Stone

I only had one jig saw puzzle in the house when the pandemic started – a 1000-piece that I had bought a few years prior to work on at a cottage and that I wound up never opening. A lovely painting of a scene from late 19th century America, the puzzle was satisfying in that it was easy enough to keep me interested with challenging sections that gave my brain a good, if short, workout.

Ultimately it wasn’t terribly challenging – but a puzzle that only took me about three days of work was probably a very good place to start to get back on the hobby horse.

The Challenge

Next up, my friend Joanna gave me a 1,500-piece monstrosity. I assumed it would take me abut a week, given my experience with the first one. But I was incredibly incredibly mistaken.

This one took me a good month to get through it. It was so challenging I nearly gave up, early on. The pieces are so small that there’s very little to get your bearings from. Each piece is mostly gradients rather than actual, identifiable brush strokes. Still, it was a lovely image to work on, even if it nearly broke me.

It made it that much more satisfying to put the last piece in place.

Lighthearted Fun

While I was working on that beast, I discovered that Deb ALSO loves puzzles, and that she has a collection! Deborah only buys high-end puzzles, though, so when she offered to loan me a few, I was eager. Both my own and the one I borrowed from Joanna were cheap, so I was keen to try out a puzzle that has better-quality pieces. The first one I tried was from Springbok and it was delightful!

The pieces were all sorts of zany shapes, but they snapped together really tightly. And the picture was of dozens of designer shoes. A nice puzzle to work on in small, identifiable sections.

But the second one I got from Deb was probably the the best of the bunch: a painting of Paris at night.

The Perfect Balance

It looks quite challenging – and it is, but the buildings are just different enough to make it difficult without ever being frustrating. Everything except the night sky, that is. THAT was frustrating. But monochromatic bits always are.

I’ll never understand people who do single-colour puzzles. Joanna showed me one she completed recently that is more or less one gradient that changes colour as you tilt the puzzle. I can’t imagine having the patience to do that. I told her I didn’t need to borrow that one.

Most recently, during our week at the cottage, Deb and I collaborated on a puzzle together – this time one from the Cobble Hill company.

The Cottage Collaboration

The pieces were closer to what Springbok provided in the shoe puzzle. Very odd shapes from your standard puzzle piece. And given how much gradient there is on the sizes, we both thought this puzzle would be more challenging.

Ultimately, we completed it in less than two full days. We started it on the only full-on rainy day we had at the cottage and wrapped it up the next morning before we headed out to the dock for some sun and swimming.

I suppose it’s time to grab myself another puzzle somewhere. The weather is starting to change and fall always brings plenty of rainy days. Might be smart to order a puzzle before I find myself bored some Sunday afternoon.

Tales from the Outback – Part 8: Let’s Show the World We Can Dance

Our production of Priscilla was not without its backstage drama, but it’s the best example I’ve seen of the old adage, the show must go on.

While there were absolutely moments of joy involved in getting this show to the stage, I know there were also moments of frustration. At any given time, I could have pointed out at least one person involved who simply wanted to walk away from the production altogether. To their credit, everyone leaned into it instead.

They put in the hard work needed to polish it, and that hard work paid off.

And even if this show has a mixed pedigree – even if it’s not the artistic vision of any one person – there is no hiding the smiling faces I saw backstage before every performance.

And of course, the roars of applause from the audience as the curtain fell every night.

Tales from the Outback – Part 7: The guy who colored our world

Tony is incredibly talented with a brush and some paint.

There’s a moment at the end of Priscilla when the three drag queens we’ve been following across Australia’s Outback finally make it to Ayers Rock. They proceed to climb this massive, sacred monolith to sing the show’s final number: Pat Benetar’s We Belong.

How do you put that on stage?!

Well, long story short, you ask the immensely talented Tony Walker – Orpheus’s incredible scenic artist – to paint Uluru in all its glory on one of the massive sets: the bus.

But the bus is THE central set piece and you couldn’t just slap a mural of a mountain on the side of it and have it visible throughout the entire show. That would look stupid!

No, the bus actually had a really cool design that made this bit of stage magic possible. Aside from being mounted on air casters that allowed it to pivot and move about the stage, the bus was also hinged at the rear so that the front could split open to create one massive, stage-spanning panel that was perfect for a mural. If you look closely at the front of the bus, you can kind of see the latches that hold the bus halves together for most of the performance.

You can see the seam if you know to look for it, and the latches that hold the bus together until the time is right.

But when the time was right, just as the three queens set off for their final mountaintop performance, the bus turns and heads straight for the audience with one of the ladies standing on top. And just before it drives off the end of the stage, it stops and four crew members quickly haul the halves apart to reveal the massive painting of Ayers Rock, with a drag queen dressed in full showgirl tits and feathers now standing atop it, belting at the top of her voice.

Spectacular!

The way Tony painted it, when you’re sitting in the audience, it truly looks like a photograph. Close up, you could see the brush strokes, but I was floored every time it happened.

Such a talented artist, and such a creative way to tackle an incredibly challenging set piece!

All photos: Alan Dean Photography

Even in a high rez photo, it’s hard to tell this is a painting.

Tales from the Outback – Part 6: My On-Stage Debut

Had a super fun time being part of the amazing props team for an afternoon – shown here with a giant Teletubby prop.

I made my on-stage debut with Orpheus during this production of Priscilla Queen of the Desert!

Don’t worry, you didn’t miss anything.

One afternoon, one of the props team had a conflict and couldn’t be backstage to help get props into the hands of the actors. So I got recruited.

It was super fun. I got to pass stuff to actors headed onstage, and I got to catch props as they were carried off by actors on their way to change quickly for their next scene.

I got to witness exactly what’s involved in ensuring everything is in its proper place at the top of the act so that our cast aren’t caught onstage looking for a prop that’s not on-set, where it’s supposed to be.

I got to wave this massive silver cape from the wings.

I even got to help wave a massive silver cape while standing on a ladder in the wings as DJ lip-synced to an opera aria. It was meant to look like the cape was blowing behind him as he is supposed to be sitting on top of a moving bus. By all accounts, it looked great!

But the highlight was when I got to make a quick loop out onto the stage in the middle of act two to help collect a few loose props sitting on a set piece. Right on cue, I followed behind Emmett (who was in charge of props at stage right) and collected a lantern while the actors diverted the audience’s attention at stage left.

So yeah, no one was paying attention to me as I casually wandered on stage mid-show, but still, technically I was out there in front of a live audience while the show was in progress.

What a rush!!

I need to say a massive thanks to Emmett and to our Props Designer Mo for inviting me to take part and for showing me the ropes – making me an honorary member of the props team for a day.

I learned a ton – most importantly that I do want to try being part of a props team for another show soon.

That lantern was my focus as I darted onstage and back off again as quickly as possible, before anyone could catch of glimpse of me!

Tales from the Outback – Part 5: Dickie does Drag

I’ve written before about how much I love working with Shaun, so I won’t repeat myself. But as you’ll recall, Shaun’s alter ego, Dickie, played an important part in making sure Mamma Mia! was a success.

Well, Shaun apparently has multiple alter egos.

With Priscilla, Shaun got to be in drag every night. And each night, when he would put on his wig (her name is Bernice) he would utterly transform.

His new personality, it turned out, has plenty to say, which she did in the form of nightly posts on Facebook.

In the interest of posterity, I recreate those posts here, for your viewing pleasure, complete with the caption given to each.

Bernice is thinking about writing a tell-all book about you.

When not judging your life choices Bernice wrestles bears for charity.

Bernice plays all the rolls in your Nativity play.

Bernice stole all the Percocet from your bathroom cabinet.

Bernice won all the medals at your high school gymnastics meet.

Bernice is a pet physic. Only she won’t tell you that your dog is plotting to kill you.

The secret ingredient in all of Bernice’s cooking is viagra. Shhhhhhh.

A withering glance from Bernice is 99.9% more effective at killing germs than bleach.

A Bernice on your front lawn will increase your property value AND scare away Jehovah’s Witnesses.

The two words Bernice hates most in the world are business casual.

Bernice doesn’t say goodbye… So peace out, bitches. Catch ya on the flippy.

 

Tales from the Outback – Part 4: Finding our groove thing

Given the huge number of personnel changes this production went through, I don’t think it will surprise anyone to find out that the show took longer than usual to come together.

I’m not gonna lie, it looked pretty rough when we wrapped up rehearsals at Orpheus House (our main rehearsal space) to move into the theatre.

But to be fair, up to that point, not a single person had even had the opportunity to move Priscilla around – Priscilla being a bus: a massive, lumbering set piece that was waaaaay too big to use in the limited space we have in our rehearsal hall.

The weekend before the opening Friday night performance, everything got moved to the theatre. That gave us only Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday to rehearse with the bus before our invited dress rehearsal on Thursday evening. These would be the only opportunities that cast would have to rehearse with all the sets, props and lighting cues before we had to put this show on for an audience – just three days to take what they had been learning for the past few months and find out exactly how it translated to the full-size stage.

There are always adjustments to be made, and the Monday before dress rehearsal doesn’t even count as a rehearsal for cast. Monday is the roughest evening: tech night.

Tech night is basically a stop-and-go walkthrough of the entire show, when the stage manager, lighting designer and sound designer go through every scene with a fine tooth comb to make sure lighting cues are correct, locations of set pieces are marked on the stage with brightly coloured tape, and the sound is balanced and clear.

Tech night is always a slog.

So when the cast returned on Tuesday for the first real run though, everyone was a little hesitant to finally rehearse the entire show, start to finish, trying to make it through without stopping. And while Tuesday’s run through was far from perfect, it showed a marked improvement over not just tech night, but over every rehearsal we did at Orpheus House as well.

Yes, we had to stop a few times to make a change or a correction, but it really did go mostly very smoothly. The cast powered through and, while it plodded a bit, everything was more or less there. It just needed a lot of polish.

I think the success of the Tuesday rehearsal lit a fire under everyone. On Wednesday, the entire case was raring to go, and that night, they took that bus from zero to 60!

It was an unquestionable improvement, and such a joy to see the smiles on the cast faces after so many weeks of hard work. I’m so proud of everyone involved for managing to get the show ready for an audience.

The following night was the invited dress rehearsal and the show looked amazing. There was no doubt that opening night on Friday was gonna be a spectacle!

It’s strange though. From the time an Orpheus show moves into the theatre until opening night, there’s never a moment to spare. It always comes down to the wire, and you never know for sure if the show is gonna be stage-ready.

Maybe the added pressure is what prompts people to step up. Or maybe it’s just that it’s too expensive to rent the theatre for any additional time. I’m not sure. And Orpheus has been doing this long enough to know what works.

But whatever the reason, the work that happened in those three days before dress rehearsal was astounding – and the end result was a show that was praised by everyone that I spoke to who saw it.

All photos by Alan Dean Photography, taken during invited dress rehearsal.