Thank you for the music!

Friday night I saw Mamma Mia in London with Maria. I'm still pretty sick, and if I could have given away my ticket, I probably would have. Unfortunately, I put both tickets on my credit card, which meant that only I could pick them up, so if I didn't go, Maria couldn't either. So I took a lot of Sudafed and some Motrin and got on the train to London.
Sadly, Mamma Mia wasn't that great. The songs are very fun and very high-energy, and the performance wasn't either. A couple of the songs were very good, like Voulez-Vous and Super Trouper, but a lot of the quieter songs were far too quiet, and mixed poorly. The backup singers were often louder than the main characters, and once or twice I was almost sure they were lip-syncing. Still, it was fun to watch, perhaps more so because I was lightheaded from being sick.

Piccadilly Circus

There's a band playing in Paddington Rail station on Friday evenings. It's a really nice pick-me-up at the end of the week to hear music in the train station.

Despite feeling awful, on the way to Mamma Mia I bought a ticket to see Grease in Oxford on Saturday. I wouldn't have, except I thought by Saturday I'd be feeling better. I wasn't. So Saturday I crawled out of bed, put some clothes on, and went to see Grease. I was pretty surprised by it. The only production I've ever seen of Grease was last spring at North Baltimore High School. Rachel played Marty, and I really enjoyed the show, so I thought I'd enjoy seeing it again. What I didn't realize is how toned-down the high school version is. I was shocked by the amount of sexual references in the full version. The whole musical is basically about sex! I think it was probably a good show, but I didn't really enjoy it. I'm pretty sure I was running a fever, and I had a serious headache.

It's Sunday now, and I slept most of the day. I think I'll be feeling all right in a day or two. I can relax tonight and tomorrow night since I won't be seeing another show until Tuesday. You probably won't hear from me until then.