I love this place!

I have never in my life seen such a fabulous rehearsal dress as the one I got given to wear today! Transparently the costume department could find nothing worse along those lines in my body shape; it is the most stunning hot pink satin fishtail dress (à la Jessica Rabbit), just skimming the floor and with a plunging décolletage that appeared to inspire the director to hilarious flights of fancy. It could have been made for me to wear to a ball (it felt vaguely blasphemous, actually, to be fainting around a rehearsal stage in it...). What fun! I do hope they don't find something worse (i.e. more suitable to actually rehearse in) and confiscate it. They will have to work bloody hard to make the actual costume any better!

I got a little light-headed because I found the rehearsal so funny (OK, yes, I admit it; not helped by enquiring of the costume assistant whether I had to take off my slip before changing into this dress. From her aghast expression, I very quickly gathered that "slip" in German probably means the same as "slip" in French - knickers, rather than an actual blasted slip, as intended... I apologised, but imagine my reputation is forever sealed). I suspect I shall have trouble mastering myself during my friend's first words to me - she's meant to be remarking on my sour expression, however every time I looked at her I was overtaken by giggles. Good thing there's a long rehearsal period...

It now feels like the building I'm living in is polarising around me. On the anti side, we have tired-looking youth below, and hermaphrodite to the left. On the pro, luckily, the building superintendant and his wife, and a lovely couple on the first floor (I got a card from the postman saying he'd left a package with them, and when I knocked and asked for it, they were so charming, saying we had to have coffee, they loved my voice, and would I please accept this gift of a book from his publishing company about the "underworld" of the city - i.e. the cellars etc; he said that the theatre had the deepest point in the city, and of course that was of interest, as I was heading off directly to my rehearsal in that very place). Ah well, I've always said I would prefer to be either loved or hated, rather than simply tolerated, in terms of my voice; this is simply such preferences made concrete and quotidian. Interesting thought.