Silly · things · do · cease · to · be · silly...

hi all. :D

day two of the wicked chicago expedition (saturday):
in the morning, meg and i took the metra train from elmhurst into chicago. we called kyle and had him mapquest how to get to the ford oriental from the train station. we wrote down the directions on a notepad i had with me, but when we left the train station we went seven blocks in the exact wrong direction. XD meg called a cab and we got to borders about 10 minutes before the matinee lottery drawing. we raced up to the lottery and found only like twenty five people there. so we totally thought we had it in the bag. but we totally lost. :[ so we walked from the ford oriental to the cheesecake factory, maybe like, a mile away, and collapsed at the table with aunt mary and her colleagues. we ate far too much and discussed how the light was strange and far too dim. theeeen aunt mary drove meg and i to the hot tickets booth.... no luck. they had nothing for wicked. we went to the box office... nothing. so our only option was to win. we had no choice. so what did we do? we prayed like hell.


after mary dropped us off at borders, we bummed around in the soundtrack section for like, an hour. then we wandered to the alley behind the ford oriental to stagedoor. there was no one there. sooo... we sat there on the corner for like, twenty minutes wondering how long it took curtain call to get over with, for cryin' out loud. so then a few girls came running like crazy around the corner and rushed into the alley, so we followed. we chit chatted briefly with them, and were joined by like, three different families of small children who were all talkative and ancy and free-range (like, they roamed all over the place with no sense of personal space). aaaaanyway. so. we waited. and waited. and then some ensemble came out.

and then telly leung (boq) came out. :D meg and i talked him up and then got pictures with him. he was the cutest thing. he's a little taller than me, but pretty small and stocky, and SO CUTE. he's very bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. bouncy, and eager to please, and very sociable. yay telly. the next person we talked up was kristoffer cusik (fiyero) who was the only person we recognized (having not seen the show yet, aheh) so we got a picture taken with him, and he definitely groped meg. he had his hands on our backs for the picture, and meg told me after he left that he totally slid his hand down the back of her halter. but not so much that it was creepy. she said she was totally okay with it. XDD funny. she wants a t-shirt made that says "fiyero felt me up" sometime.

so we sat around and sat around and sat around and eventually an ensemble girl told us that she didn't think ana or kate would come out. so we waited a little more, and a guy came out and said they weren't coming for sure. so then it was like two hours before the next lottery. so meg and i went shopping. we went to old navy and bought bags; the same kind, the thin strap and the deep square pouch. mine is navy blue with white hearts (i'm contemplating dying it black so it'll be an elphabag) and hers is pink and white plaid-ish looking woven something-or-other. then we wandered around. we went to H&M which was a totally bad idea because we were scared we'd spend all our money and then win and then not be able to go because we'd be broke. i wound up buying a dress for $9.90. :x it's light green with darker green 70's swirls (not paisley) on it... the reason why is it looks like the dress idina wore the night i met her last year. i was like "OMG ITS A SIGN" and it was cheap and cute and it fits me just right so i got it. we went to nordstrom's off the rack or whatever it's called; the rich people's dollar store, meg said. i found the cutest shoes i've ever seen in my entire life there. they were like indian flats, pale green brocade, with metallic green embroidery, and emerald green rhinestones. it doesn't sound like something i'd like, but OMFG they were cute. and my size. and $35.00. so i hid them in the size 12 tennis shoes and promised God that i wouldn't buy the shoes if He'd let us win the lotto. meg promised not to buy the galinda-ish blazer she saw if He'd let us win the lotto. we left the store to avoid further temptation.


we took our time going back to borders, talking about strategy. from two previous losses at the lottery, we deciphered a sort of pattern. the very last person to put their name into the hat both times had won at one point or another in the name-calling for tickets. so. when we got there, we took our sweet time filling them out, and when we'd finished we waited until the guy said "last call! we have like a minute left before we draw!" before we put them in. i told meg that i'd leave mine untouched, flat, pristine. she crumpled hers up real bad, over and over in her hand, and then unfolded it and tried to smooth it out. i put mine in, and meg stuffed hers in awkwardly as the last person of the night. we stood in the back as the guy unlocked the canister under the hat and reached in, rooting around for a ticket. meg and i stood there feeling sick. we'd walked around, wasted hours and hours of praying and walking and moping and wishing, and we wanted it so bad we could cry, or throw up, or faint or something after all the exertion we'd undergone. we just had to see ana and kate. had to.

"okay," said the lottery man. "our first winner is meghan..."

voice in my head: no way. he won't say selke. he won't say selke. he won't say--

"meghan selke?"

meg and i blinked, then meg made a strangled cry, and i was like "GAH?!" we made our way to the front, totally shocked. how could that be possible? last name in, first name called? he even shuffled the damn canister. holy GOD that was lucky. soooo lucky. i started to cry but held myself back, knowing i'd need those tears later for the show. THE SHOW!!! WE WOULD GET TO SEE THE SHOW!!!! AAAAAHHHH. lotto winning is so exciting. i had forgotten how great it was to win. so then time flew. we called everyone we knew to tell them. none of the people i called (except for dad) picked up, so i left a ton of messages. :\ we went straight to the box office to get our tickets, then went to marshall field's across the street in a giddy daze to eat something quickly. meg spent the duration of the meal talking to her parents, convincing them it would be fine for us to take the 12:40 am train back to elmhurst after the show, we were big girls and could take care of ourselves. they surprisingly agreed to let us do it. it was nuts.

so we went and waited in the lobby of the theatre for the doors to open. meg wanted time before we got to our seats to do bathroom and souvie booth. so we went to the bathroom and then came up and meg bought a popular shirt and a poster, and a keychain for me on my request (it's one of the few things i don't have). then we noticed the TOUR MERCH!?!?!?! and were like WTF! so when i go august 12 i'm getting a tour tank top for me and a tour t-shirt for meg. bitchin. then they opened the doors about 15 minutes later... and meg and i practically flew down the aisle. we were the first people to our seats. and they were the first seats of the theatre: A 101 and A 102. i was 101, meg was 102. we sat down, bounced in the cushiony goodness of the front row, waved at musicians, gave ourselves sore necks by staring up at the ceiling, bounced some more, meg called people, i spazzed, she spazzed, we all spazzed. it was beautiful. and it was a damn long time before the show started.

but start it did.


***see my other entry, a full review of the performance. :D***



so meg and i SPED out of the theatre like mad and made it to the stagedoor. there was a flexible yellow-and-black barricade up (i suspect because of ana, because they've never had barricades in chicago before). we mushed close to the front and chit-chatted with some other lotto winners and some girls from madison wisconsin. people started coming out. more people came to the barricades. meg had her poster, i had my playbill, and the camera was on hand for photo ops. telly was the first of our lovers the principals to come out. sweet and bouncy as ever, when he got down the line to us we reminded him that we'd met him earlier and he did like six double-takes and then was like "omg yeah!" and i was like "we won lotto tonight" and he was like "OMGOMG WERE YOU LIKE YAAY!?!?! i bet you guys were so excited, that's so freaking awesome! omg! congratulations!" it was cute. rondi reed came out next and was like "HELLOOOOO CHILDREN! MAADAM MOOOOOOORRIBLE HERE!" and signed everyone's playbills and stuff. so funny. she's like I HAVE A DRAMATIC VOICE, AHA. she was nice though. she said she liked scaring people as morrible, but children didn't seem to be very scared when she asked them about the show at the stagedoor. i told her to make more faces at them. gene weygandt (the wizard) came out and was soo funny. he's very airheaded, i think. he doesn't seem like he's quite all there when he's talking to you. as he signed i was like "hey, you were just great, you did such a good job" and he was like "no, no, you don't understand. you're supposed to say 'wonderful'. i was 'wonderful', see?" and i was like "omg sorry, you WERE wonderful." and he was like "that's better." and he posed for a picture with me and meg. he seems like rondi, very professional I AM AN ACTWEUR type person, but nice, and decent at what he does. which is good. he signed my playbill something that looks like "GeWey" (short for gene weygandt?) and "oz" underneath it. as if we forgot who he was. XD kristoffer came out again and signed for us. we told him that we met him earlier too and told him we won lotto, and he was like "oh, that's great, that's awesome!" and we told him he was good and meg totally flirted with him XD. theeeeen after a while of no one coming out, the door opened halfway so the people on our side of the barricade couldn't see; the people on the other side were like "AAAAHAHHHHH" and then this wonderfully short, strong looking woman pokes out looking stunned at the number of people, her hair kept up in this army green funny looking cap, and a black t-shirt and jean crop pants and sneakers. ana fucking gasteyer. she is SHORT. well, shorter than you think she is. she was like, "oh, my, GOD there's a lot of people here.. wow... hi everyone..." and started at the end of the line. she got to us and meg and i told her how we won lotto and we were right there front row on the end. she was like "oh wow! that's so much fun... have you seen the show before?" and i was like "this is my fifth time seeing wicked." everyone around us looked at me, and ana stopped and her jaw dropped at me. "five times?" she repeated "with this cast? or...?" and i was like "twice original broadway cast, twice touring cast, and once you, but i'm coming back in august to see you again." she shook her head in amazement and kept signing meg's poster, then got to my playbill. "that's so awesome," she was saying. "and i got this for you," i added, holding out the little beaded green shiny flower ring (dorky but cute) that i got for her. "i have one too," i added, showing her mine. she was like "oh my gosh, this is so cute.... ohhh, thank you, so much!" and put it on promptly. i couldn't believe she put it on right away! XD then meg was like "will you take a picture with us?" and ana was like "sure, of course" and leaned towards meg, putting her arm around me. then we were both like "thank you so much ana, you rock, you were so great," and she was like "thank you guys, very sweet of you!" and moved on. shortly after ana, kate came out. she's tiny too. she reminds me so much of cheno without it being irritating, which i find odd. she was like *dazed look* "oh! hi! yes! hi, thank you for coming, hi!" and bounced back and forth in zigzaggy patterns to sign playbills. she came to us and we told her how much we loved her and meg gave her the pink ring like the one i gave to ana, and was like "this is for you... it's pink." kate was like "OMG CUTE how sweet of you!" and put hers on too. we got her to pose with us for a picture and then she bounced away. we asked kate if heidi was coming out, but kate said heidi always zips out near the beginning, and nobody EVER recognizes her. so it's a mission for me and meg to meet heidi sometime. cause heidi rocks a lot. but yes. XD yay for ana and kate, our new best friends!

so that's like. what we did. after we stagedoored, meg and i got a cab to the train station, sat on the floor and rolled up the streamers we picked up in the aisles at the show, and then got on a train, put our iPods on, and vegged out all the way back to elmhurst. then we walked home talking about how bitchin the day had been, and collapsed soon after on her floor upstairs.

then today we got up around 10:30 and went to brunch with her mom and kyle (her friend in elmhurst). we went to wal mart and got the pictures printed/developed (i'll have the digital copies tomorrow everyone, i promise!) and then drove home to milwaukee. we all took my dad to see "the island" for his birthday (which is tomorrow; the movie was fuggin awesome) and then came home and ate cousins subs for dinner. and now i'm here typing a long ass entry about how cool i am. :]

fin. :D