An Afternoon at the Ballet

Saturday morning I received a phone call whilst reading my book from my friend Tonya. She was going to see Ballet West's performance of Cinderella that afternoon, and would I like to go with. I thought about it for a few seconds, hesitating as I wasn't sure I was the type of person to enjoy the ballet. But I love watching dancing shows and stuff so why not ballet. I hadn't really been exposed to it very much. I had been to a free performance given at the University where the dance students were showcasing their pieces which ranged from ballet to modern dance. I remember really liking the ballet portion but was it just the use of music by Edith Piaf, which I went and bought a c.d. right after? Now that I think about it I did see a ballet performance of Romeo and Juliet when I was in middle school or junior high but I don't remember what I thought about it. Probably, thought it was interesting but more enjoyed seeing it performed as it was meant to be as I done a few times before in movies and at the festival.

With all these thoughts, I decided to say yes and promptly bought my ticket over the phone. Unfortunately seats were filling fast and Tonya and I didn't get seats together but that's okay. She picked me up for a quick and inexpensive (my idea, as I had just dropped a pretty penny for the ballet, I'm cheap and I'm okay with it) lunch at Chili's. It was so fun catching up on work stories and mutual friend stories and whatever else we talked about. It's so easy to talk to Tonya because I don't have to worry about what I'm going to say to please the listener. We've been friends for a long time.

Then we barely made it to the theatre in time to get our tickets and get in the door to find our seats in the dark before they would have made us wait for intermission. The dancing was lovely and the two step-sisters were played by men and were very funny being extremely ungraceful in their movements, falling down several times. They even stayed in character through the curtain call. There were lots of children in the audience so I think they found those parts enjoyable. When Cinderella and the Prince danced together it was so beautiful or "just lovely" as the ladies sitting next to Tonya kept saying over and over.

Cons to the performance:

Clapping. I never know when it is okay to clap in ballet performances and there was one time when the prince and cinderella had danced together that they took bows for the audience before the rest of the story continued. I assume that is normal but it did take you out of the play which was a little annoying. I was glad they didn't do it again when they danced together for the second time. Also, people tended to clap when some amazing movements were made by the dancers or great successions of movement like jumps and turns and whatever but again at times it took away from the feeling of the dancing. Luckily it didn't happen too often in the wrong places to cause that much of an annoyance.

In this version of the play, Cinderella's father is still alive but he is seems to be a very weak character because he lets the step-sisters tease him until Cinderella comes to his rescue and then stands by looking sadly on as the sisters then turn their malice onto Cinderella. I did in the beginning sympathize with the step-sisters a little. It would be hard to not be as pretty or as accomplished as a step-sister, constantly overlooked. I don't say that as a good excuse for their behavior but I understand where it comes from.

People walking out of the theatre as the final curtain was coming down and then even more filing out down the aisles during the curtain call. I don't think I had ever seen anything as bad as that before. There is usually a few here and there that do it, anxious to get to their cars and beat the traffic, but this time the aisles were full of people as the rest of us are clapping for dancers as they take their bows. I thought it the rudest thing.

photos taken from BalletWest.org and are by Quinn Farley

New Blog for Salt Lakers or those living in the vicinity

So if you have not already found the great website called Your Heart Out and you are living in or around Salt Lake or visit often then you need to check it out. It gives such great insight into the city telling about cute boutiques, new restaurants, unknown restaurants, craft tutorials, areas of town to see, upcoming events and much more. It has opened my eyes to the wonderful town that I live in and I have got to start checking some of this stuff out and really experience what Salt Lake has to offer. Who's with me?!

It's amazing to me how fast your moods can change. Seriously, you have just had a great time with your friends who were all nice and complimentary to you and then something happens and now you are depressed. The littlest thing that really shouldn't mean anything somehow seeps into your thoughts and emotions creates a sadness. The same thing can be said of being sad and then suddenly made happy but I think that's harder. Of course, you don't have to go into a depression. You can let whatever it was slide and move and on and not let it affect your mood, but that's not really my style. I go the other route and wallow, as you who are constant readers might have guessed. Sometimes I wonder if I enjoy being depressed. I even get a little excited if I think I am going to cry. I don't cry very often. Okay I get teary pretty often, you know at commercials and movies and lines in songs. If you don't get teary-eyed at "She's in Love With the Boy" when the lines "She looks at Tommy like I still look at you." are belted out then you are just a little too unfeeling. But I'm talking about you are really sad type of crying. I really don't do that that much, which is good I guess. But sometimes it reminds me that I do feel things because sometimes I just feel like I am just moving through life completely stagnant. Plus crying just feels good. It is such a release. In fact, I was crying when I started this post, but then my roommate invited me out to see a "Singin in the Rain" that a girl in our ward was in and whole bunch of people were going. I never pass up the theatre, or something similar to it. So I went and now I'm back to my normal way of feeling, just moving through life. A little sad that I don't get to cry, but it's good too. I spent a whole day wallowing and tomorrow I have to go back to work. So I'll just look forward until the next depression hits. Aren't I so weird? It could be soon or not for a few months. Either way, it's all good and healthy I think.

Boy are you all lucky that I went to that play. You were seriously in store for one bitter diatribe, but I think it turned out a little funny there in the end. So you are reprieved for now.

Valentine Fun and Late Cake Making

So I'm sure you are all wondering how I fared with passing another Valentine's Day and still single. Remarkably unscathed. Probably because I was too busy worrying about making my cake that night that I didn't have time to feel sad about being alone. Actually, I just don't really care about Valentine's Day anymore. I've never had a valentine, so to speak, so mostly it just passes like any other day other than these days my friends and I get each other little gifts. I wasn't even jealous of Loralee when David had made her dinner and they ate by candlelight in her room. My mind was just elsewhere.

First, I had sort of forgotten about Valentine's Day until a few days before and realized I needed to think of a little gift to give my friends. A great idea occurred to me, but then the next few days I was just so unmotivated to create it that it didn't happen. So Thursday night, right after work I went to Walmart to pick up a few things for home and went by the holiday section seeing if there was anything that would be fun to give. Stuffed Animals? No. Flowers? No. Candy? No. Then there is was a barage of stuff, extremely inexpensive and fun to boot. I gathered all the stuff together and found the rest of my items and then wanted to hurry and get home to put the gifts together and get started on preparing my cake for class the next night. Unfortunately, I picked the slowest line ever. It was short but I think the girl was new and was being incredibly slow. I was most irritated.

So I get home, quickly eat a little and then hurry to put my gifts together. When I walked in my room, there was something different. My room was still incredibly messy as it was that morning when I left it but there was one glaring difference. My bed was made and I hadn't made it. On the bed resting against my pillow was a card attached to a bad of Peanut M&Ms. It was from Loralee, with a lovely note inside. It made me feel very happy. I wanted to make a card to go with my gifts but I just didn't have time. There was a knock on the door and so I went to answer it, but there was no one there. Just a chocolate flower with a note to me, not signed. I asked that I didn't know who it was from (obviously either Carrie or Melanie). Loralee recognized Melanie's handwriting and they had always done the knock and run thing when delivering Valentines. I went back to getting my gifts ready and about ten minutes later there was another knock on the door. We figured it was Melanie again delivering Loralee's present so we looked out the window to see where she had gone and Loralee went outside and spied her hiding behind her car. So she came and we chatted. I gave her her gift and Loralee as well. Here they are:

And this is what I got from my friends:

Here's a closeup of the card Loralee made me. Isn't it adorable?


I was up until 1:00 am preparing my cake for class the next day. The finale cake! So Here is what you have all been waiting for:



I really like it. Poor Julie got to hear my range of likeness going from "Oh that border is so horrible, the fondant isn't done very well" to "Actually it's really quite cute." The cake part is made out of white cake flavored with a little freshly squeezed orange juice and orange zest with a nice rasberry filling. The icing is all fondant so it's edible but you probably wouldn't want to eat it.

Really Quick Post on the Weekend

My wonderful mother came up to visit this weekend and stayed at my brother's house. Her birthday was last Monday so I arranged for us to celebrate it with her but later. I met up with Mom, Jordan, Stacey, and little Lincoln at California Pizza Kitchen, her place of choice, for dinner on Friday night. I decided to get the White Pizza this time. Julie has gotten the last couple of times we have eaten there and after hearing her ravings I decided to give it a go and I definitely concur. It was so good. Of course some dessert was to follow. Mom got apple crisp sans ice cream (I know she's crazy) and Jordan and Stacey got red velvet cake that was so moist and I got the brownie sundae and we all shared.

My friend Carrie was having a game night that night so I said goodbye to the family and looked forward to seeing mom the next day. Stopped in at the party but spent most of it in Carrie's room talking to Kevin Rasmussen on the phone. His calls are few and far between so I wanted to take it because he is pretty amusing (as he is usually slightly inebriated) but he is really such a good guy and is always so enthusiastic about having a chat and wanting me to come visit and everything. So we caught up. Game night wasn't really very exciting so I went home and went to bed.

The next morning I woke up as early as possible (9 am) to deliver cookie dough to my mingles committee members for our mingle the next day. Then quickly went and home and got ready to meet mom at Bath and Body Works at Jordan Landing. The rest of the day went with mom spending a lot of money. I only bought a cake book and circle cutouts at Joann's. Even after being tempted by some really cute shoes. I kind of had a headache coming on and when we got to Tai Pan for mom to spend her gift card I knew I couldn't handle the potpourri smell. It would have just set my headache into major pounding mode. So I stayed in the car and took a little nap. 40 minutes later, mom was still in the store so I went to fetch her because we needed to get going. We made a quick jaunt to Target to get Lincoln a toy and then met Jordan + Fam at Ruby Tuesdays for dinner. Boy did they take a long time getting there. We needed to kind of hurry because Mom, Stacey, and I had tickets to see "Lend Me A Tenor" at the Hale Theatre. A few minor obstacles made us a little late (lost keys and such) but no worries. Even though I was super stressed driving myself with mom and stacey following me to the theatre, worrying our seats would be given away. It's a good thing I was alone in the car, there were a few profanities uttered here and there. Once we were in our seats I relaxed and enjoyed the show.

There were some funny moments. I had the seen in a musical form at the Shakespeare Festival last summer so this one didn't really compare, but it was alright. Thankfully the lead character stopped his gay antics and played a little more straight. I was worried for the first ten minutes of the play. Then homeward bound. With a small stop at Walmart for supplies for the mingle.

The next morning I quickly arose (ha ha like that really happened) and started making my cookies for the mingle. Mom was coming to say goodbye and meet up with Alyson and Katie to take Katie home to Vernal with her. We all had a nice little chat and then each drove away (Alyson almost without her purse but with impressive speed I was able to catch her). So that's pretty much it. After that it was church, mingle and Carrie cooked a wonderful dinner for me and a few other friends. I chatted with Melanie for a while. Then visiting teachers came over and then it off to bed.

I guess that wasn't really that quick, other than I typed it pretty quick.

I Voted!!!

So I voted today. The first time I have voted since the 2000 Presidential election, where I yes, voted for Bush. Gasp! I wasn't even really planning on voting today. Actually, I just hadn't decided. I mean really what do the primaries matter. Yesterday I decided to listen to the most recent debates between the candidates to get a feel. I didn't have too much time and mostly focused on the Democratic ones since that was the way I was leaning this time around, but I got a half hour or so of the Republican debates and didn't really get a feel. So I didn't feel prepared to vote today. I still don't. So I wasn't planning on it but then my roommate asked me if I was and I said I didn't know who I wanted to vote for yet. So in order to get more clarity, like most people do, I went to a movie. Juno, to be exact. Seriously that is the coolest movie. I laughed and cried. It is right up there with Lars and the Real girl. Did I mention that I didn't go to work today. I needed a little "me" time. Which really means that I just couldn't drag myself out of bed and had already made the decision to call in and really it is so hard to talk myself out of doing that especially on a day when it wouldn't matter if I'm there.

But back to voting. So after the movie I headed straight to the voting booth with the constant back and forth going in my head "Democrat or Republican, Democrat or Republican, Democrat or Republican." I knew they were going to ask me this and I didn't have a definite answer. I knew who my favorite candidate was for each party but I just didn't know. I was kind of stressing out. Should I vote Democrat to go against the grain in an overly conservative society or go with my roots, my peeps. That's right I just said peeps. I pulled into the small parking lot and as I was parking, I heard a small thud and looked in my rear view mirror. Some lady had just backed into another ladies car. They got out and the one made her apologies, but that's all I heard because I was on my way in. Maybe I rushed in because the back and forth was still going on as the nice man held the door open for me to enter the school where the voting was taking place. But I knew if I went home, I would not get my lazy butt up again to do it. Seriously, once I'm home you have better have something tempting to get me out of there again.

I walked into the gym where the voting signs on arrows pointed me to go. There were a couple old ladies and a couple old gents sitting at a long table. "What's your name, honey?" (Actually, I don't know if she said, honey, but I can imagine it.) "Mangum, Cassie." Of course they are going to look me up by last name, I like to save people time. But just to make sure she says, "Your last name is Mangum, right." "Yes, I figured that's how you would look me up." I don't think she heard that last part which is kind of good because it kind of came out snotty but I didn't mean for it to. "Sign your name here" And then they did some clarical work or something, assigning numbers and what not and then I was asked the dreaded question, "Do you want Republican ballot or a Democratic ballot?" Oh crap! I still wasn't sure. I stood and thought for a second feeling the pressure. Then I just spit it out. They gave me what looked like a room key card and this old gent guided me over to the new-fangled computer booth. I was a little disappointed to not get to go into an actual booth covered with red, white, and blue fabric. Oh well. I stuck my card into the slot and followed the directions. I touched the screen next to the name and before I knew it, it was over. I had voted. I gave my card back to the voting squad and walked out the door feeling very unsure about my vote. I think I would have felt that way either way. "Why was I so stressed out about this?" I'll tell you why, as I have just had a realization while getting the mail and walking through the door into my house. Who you vote for is just another thing someone can judge you and I hate the feeling of being judged (you'd think that would stop me from judging others but sadly know). I feel the sting sometimes when someone says how awful it is that Bush got elected. I don't much like the guy now, but how was I to know? I voted for him in 2000 and had I voted in 2004, I would have voted for him again. So now I'm just worried that say I vote for the same person in November and that person turns out to be terrible president. I know I don't have to tell people who I voted for (hence the vagueness I am giving you now) but I'll know and I don't think I made an informed decision. So I'm going to really try to inform myself about the candidates that make it through the primaries so when November comes and I cast my vote that I will know that I did all I could to feel good about my decision. And if the person I voted for turns out to be terrible then I will be disappointed in them and not myself.

Another Amazing Masterpiece!

Do you think I'm starting to get a little full of myself? Well, I'm not. There is 3/4 sarcasm in that title. So this cake was my first cake using fondant. Which is a lot easier to decorate with, I think. Too bad it doesn't taste the best. The cake part is German Chocolate Cake (with coconut pecan frosting mixed into the batter) with a coconut pecan frosting filling. My next cake will be a two tiered cake, but that won't be for two more weeks. Hope it turns out and I need to make a bajillion roses, okay more like 30 but still.