Happy New Year

Happy New Year to all of my beloved readers,

So in the final days of 2009, I had some time off while others in my cast rehearse the beautiful show AMORE. My first instinct, after opening 2 shows, was to hole up in my room and sleep the days away.

However, it soon occured to me that, when you are travelling the world in a cabin with no window, you have to get up to see it. And I couldn't be more convinced of this than when I woke up at 6:00 AM one morning to witness our ship...

ENTERING THE PANAMA CANAL







I admit now, that in spite of learning of the canal systems in school, I was always kind of clueless about how they actually work. Having now witnessed it in person, I find the mechanics amazing, especially when you consider how long they have been in operation. Seriously worth getting up early for.

Time is a funny thing on a ship. The only way I ever really know what day it is is by looking at the rugs they put in the elevators. (They change them out every day so people can know what day it is. But I digress) When you are at the beginning of a cruise, you feel like there is tons of time ahead of you. However, you eventually realize that it passes quickly, and before I knew it, it was the last day of 2009.

I got to thinking of where I was a year ago. I had a great day. Saw Pal Joey on Broadway with dear friends (Miss you Paul and Stacie!), went to my favorite haunt, Marie's Crisis, went to a silver and white party at another dear friend's house (Miss you Penny!), and ended the evening at midnight at the apartment of yet more dear friends (Miss you Dale and Mike!). It didn't feel like it had already been a year, and yet here we were saying goodbye to 2009! While I admit there was a sadness not being with the dear ones I have in New York and not having phone service to talk to my loved ones in Indiana, it did help that my final day of 2009 was spent in...

ACUPULCO ;-)



and then was followed by a lovely evening of champagne and dancing on the lido deck with some very well dressed people

Megan, the ship's fabulous Aussie lifestylist

The dashing David Proffeta, our costume coordinator

Our beautiful (and TALL) dancers, Jessica and Katelyn

The handsome Dustin Cunningham, our own Pavarotti

A true triple threat, Justin Allen Tate

The beautiful soprano, Courtney Cunningham

The sweet and gorgeous Darbie Pokorskie, singer of the HAL cats band and soon to be cast member

Kimberly Hamby, the diva of dynamite! (I helped her pick out the dress that day in Acupulco)

Thomas Weber, handsome company manager and John Gavin Thompson, choreographer extraordinaire!


I know some of the pictues may look a little fuzzy, but doesn't everything on New Year's Eve?

So folks, our first cruise is about to draw to a close if you can believe that! The day after tomorrow (January 4th) we port in San Diego and disembark our passengers in the morning, only to take on a whole new batch of passengers in the afternoon! In short, stay tuned for cruise number two. Some of the port of call for this one are Hawaii, Tahiti, Bora Bora, I am sooo jazzed! I promise there will be some great pictures coming up. So with love from your singing seafarer,

HAPPY 2010!

Ciao for Now!