Adler Planetarium

There's always a point in the campaign debates where I just can't take it anymore. Tuesday it was the third time McCain referred to the Zeiss planetarium projector as an "overhead projector". Whether McCain can't discern the difference, or if he is that disingenuous with the American people, it's alarming and annoying. I wanted to Ralph Cramden him to the moon!

Saturday's workshop about teaching "stress-free" preschool might have been stretching the truth a bit, too. Teaching preschool has built-in stress. The presenter was terrific, and she used a real overhead projector with transparencies.

The Field Museum, Adler Planetarium, and Shedd Aquarium in Chicago are some of my very favorite places. The Adler was the first planetarium in the western hemisphere. Every forty years or so, the projector that displays the stars on the dome wears out.

This is not the night sky. It's my rust-dyeing experiment. The rust results weren't dramatic, so I tie-dyed the ochre fabric with RIT black, then discharged the fabric with a mist spray of bleach. Think I'll dress as a black hole for Halloween.




© 2008 Nancy L. Ruder

$295/yard

The air is just faintly crisp. Fall has officially arrived. My creative energy is coming back, but sadly, the hummingbirds have left the patio.

Back to the design problem of the Kansas car window storm quilt blocks. I have decided to use two or three of the blocks as stand-alone wall-hangings to work out design and technical questions. I received some great input on fabric and color options, including using headliner car fabric or trying a batik pattern.

Although I've worked near Kay's Fabric Center in Richardson, Texas for a long time, I'd never visited the store. I don't sew clothes for myself any more, and no longer make childrens' theater or Halloween costumes. Still, I felt like I'd entered Aladdin's cave when I found the incredible designer fabrics in this thirty-eight year-old, family-owned store at 518 W. Arapaho Rd,. Suite 113, Richardson, TX 75080.

Maybe a more timely analogy would be Howard Carter telling Lord Carnarvon that he could see "wonderful things" as he peered into Tut's tomb in 1922. These were fabrics fit for pharoahs, fairy godmothers, overpaid professional athletes, and Mozart's Queen of the Night. King Tut's treasures will be on display at the Dallas Museum of Art beginning this month.

When I reached visual stimulus overload, the store's staff led me on a tactile tour of luxurious wools. Like a tasting of fine wines, this experience took me far beyond my station in life! These fabrics were finer than those sewn for the Emperor's New Clothes. Even my inexperienced fingers could tell the difference between $150/yd. wool and $295/yd. wool. Three and a half yards would make a suit for a normal-sized captain of finance. It could take six or more yards to create a suit for a Dallas Cowboy or Dallas Maverick.

Sadly, I had to admit I was looking for a flat-fold remnant priced near $1.99/yd. to test color and construction techniques for my Kansas blocks. My price range is closer to Laura Ingalls Wilder's dugout on the banks of Plum Creek than Aladdin's jewels or Michael Irvin's closet. It was on up the trail to the sewing/craft chain store for me.


This gray quilting cotton could pass fairly well as the interior of a slightly rusty '96 Buick. It wouldn't detract from the intense colors of a July thunderstorm over lush green Kansas fields.


© 2008 Nancy L. Ruder

Cincy Verdi

My oldest is attending his second production of the Cincinnati Opera's Summer Festival this weekend, a premiere production of Verdi's "La Traviata" in the historic Music Hall. Nobody's twisting his arm. He enjoyed "Madama Butterfly" in June, and is going back for more. I think that's very cool!

The Cincinnati Opera website gives a preview of the costume designs, which is great fun. At the masked ball in Act II the partygoers are dressed as different operas. See if you can guess them!

Dallas Opera's 2004 "La Traviata" was one of my first operas, my first Verdi. I didn't know enough to prepare before attending to enhance my appreciation. It seems to me the Dallas production had giant chairs and gilded picture frames suspended over the stage.

The Dallas Music Hall at Fair Park is home to the Dallas Opera for one final season. The facility has the same charm as my high school's auditorium, circa 1970. The exterior of the Hall dates from 1925. Cincinnati's Music Hall dates from 1878, and is an impressive brick structure with a beautiful chandelier. I'm awaiting a Monday cultural review from Mr. Speech-Debate.

© 2008 Nancy L. Ruder

Cat's pajamas and bee's knees bedrooms

This bedroom with tape-player is by a five year old girl. She has good taste in drawer pulls! The one below is by a five year old boy.



After our "Cat's Pajamas" art class, one girl came to school in her kitty cat pajamas for Crazy Day, and another wore a pink leopard hat. Other kids had some outfits that were truly the fish's galoshes.

© 2008 Nancy L. Ruder

Credit Crunch Charleston

As we cut up our credit cards in this economic downturn/identity theft era, imagine what fabulous outfits we could create for dancing. Much better than sequins and fringe when twirling!

© 2008 Nancy L. Ruder

Beetle Belly

The big boys threw the basketball over the playground fence. Heading across the parking lot to retrieve their ball, I was stunned to see this beautiful, if deceased, beetle on the ground. Do we really have beetles this fabulous in Texas? Or is it a planted teaser for a Curse of the Mummy movie?





This gem is in a box in the elementary classroom now. Look at its belly! How exquisite! What a costume it would make. "Thank you" isn't usually my thought when I have to chase escaping playground equipment. I can see I'm going to have to expand my casual study of insects and other creepy creatures.

© 2008 Nancy L. Ruder

Intermission at the Met

During the second intermission of the live broadcast of the Metropolitan Opera's "Die Walküre" today (heard on WRR 101.1 fm), there was a brief interview with David Sylvester, the Assistant Wardrobe Supervisor. His job is making sure each singer arrives on stage wearing his costume just as the designer intended.

Sometimes singers are not thrilled with their costume and pretend to have lost part of it. Sometimes they want to wear their costume in a manner they consider more personally interesting, comfortable, or flattering.

Oh, geez, can I relate?! My students are always trying to lose their hats or wear their jackets upside down. Sometimes they get confused about which coat hook is theirs. More often they have pink furry princess parka envy, and just "borrow" someone else's coat.

Does this David Sylvester person ever have to teach the singers to spread their costume out on the floor, stand by the collar or hood, put their arms in the sleeves, and flip the whole garment up over their head? Does he have to stand behind them and reach around to zip their zippers, lining up the engine and coal car before pulling the train along the track?

I have a lot of experience reminding my little singers to fetch their lunchboxes and the notes from their cubbies. I could easily expand my repertoire to remind singers to fetch their swords, veils, and mustaches. True, my little singers are singing Looby Loo* in raspy false baritones with contorted lyrics, but the skills required for the job are the same.

Most tellingly, Mr. Sylvester reports his essential role reminding soloists to use the facilities. "Did you go before you put on your costume?," he asks them. "Are you sure?"

I've been asking this question professionally since I went back to work in 1994. Before that I asked it at home for a decade. True, I was the Assistant Wardrobe Supervisor for snowsuits, swim lessons, karate class, scout meetings, and peewee sports teams, not the Metropolitan Opera. But David Sylvester didn't say anything about asking the singers if they remembered to fuh-fuh-fluh-flush and wah-wah-wash their hands!

*My students prefer these Looby Loo lyrics:

Here we go looby loo
Here we go looby light
Here we go looby loo
Hickory dickory dock!

[repeat ad nauseum]


© 2008 Nancy L. Ruder

What Would Jesus Laminate?

I made two expeditions into unfamiliar territory this week in the pursuit of twenty-five cents per foot self-serve laminating. Laminating is a soul-searching effort for me, as I have to weigh the non-recyclable and non-biodegradable effect on paper against the sturdiness, weather-readiness, and preservation of the art or teaching items being laminated. Plus, I have to go to the friendly neighborhood Christian bookstore, home-schooling supply center, and vacation Bible school headquarters to get the best do-it-yourself laminating price.

It's a busy time at the bookstore. The woman ahead of me in the check-out line had her entire cart filled with identical ceramic nativity scenes that looked like Fred Flintstone's house spray-painted with gold glitter paint. The woman ahead of her wanted to use expired limit-one-per-customer coupons to buy three soft Christian rock music cds.

The three kids behind me in line were whining and badgering their mother because she had only said they could LOOK at the new "Veggie Tales" video, not that they would BUY it. Down the aisle another family values drama was being performed about a boy's desire for a Bibleman laser sword. I thought it was just kids in Target who threw tantrums over GI Joe, Star Wars, and Disney Princess videos. When my sons acted like that we knew it was time to read The Berenstain Bears Get the Gimmes.




Bible action figures are hot toys. Who wouldn't want the Almighty Heroes action set? The characters have the physique of the Incredible Hulk, but cuter tunics and slingshots. I'm sure they can be entwined through the chainlink baseball backstop the same way my youngest posed his GI Joes. They can be buried in the playground gravel and lost just as easily as a Ninja Turtle.



We agonize as parents over the toys we buy and media influences on our children. If we let our children play with toy guns, are we raising the schoolshooters and mallshooters of the next decade? If we give our children plastic action figures with Bible verses, will they become the peacemakers, the philosophers, the charitable and ethical leaders we desperately need? If our daughters dress Queen Esther and Deborah the Warrior dolls in their fashion sets with they live with more purity and purpose than if they played with Bratz and Barbie dolls? If our son prefers dressing Joseph in his amazing coat to putting on the Full (silver plastic) Armor of God playset, will he become gay? Is there really any difference between wearing a Power Rangers costume trick-or-treating, or wearing a Samson Super-Muscles costume to the Sunday School fall harvest carnival?



I don't know. My sons are grown now. They are already teacher, administrator, photographer, law student, volunteer, writer, artist, runner, chef, and traveler. They will work in many other fields in their lifetimes. They have a core set of values guiding their relations with others, a respect for nature, an inner motivation, an appreciation of art and the lessons of history, and they are kind to their mommy.

So what toys do they insist that I never give or throw away? The "good wood rifles" and the Legos. The toys of imagination, role-playing, empowerment, and construction--and of precious memories.



© 2007 Nancy L. Ruder

My Inner Milliner

There's a hat-maker deep inside me hollering to get out, particularly today after I've seen the Dallas Opera's "Merry Widow". What fun someone at the San Franscisco Opera's costume shop had making all the wonderful hats for this production!

The hats are giant feathery confections whipped up in black and white, lovely blues, and lastly a splendid range of reds. They bring to mind Audrey Hepburn on Ascot Opening Day, and Carol Channing in "Hello, Dolly".

Hat-making appeals to me as an individual textile sculptural design experiment. It revels in curves, layers, textures, opacities, embellishments, and eccentricities. It's over the top in more ways than one. Plus, it's a fabulous art project for young students I've forgotten to include in recent semesters.

"The Merry Widow" was composed a hundred or so years ago by Franz Lehar (and someday a hundred years from now I'll learn how to add the proper accent marks to his name). That's about the same time my young great-aunties in Northeast Nebraska modeled these non-Parisian millinery creations of their mother.



My great-auntie Ada, on the right, later had her own millinery shop on Main Street in Pierce, Nebraska. This was long, long before I knew her. I have only one real memory of her, but it is very vivid. Auntie Ada is standing by a bed of tall flowers, calmly waiting for the flitting butterflies to become still enough for her to pick them up by their folded wings with her fingers.



A hat, with all of its sculptural qualities, should still have that sense of a fragile, quivering butterfly held gently in the artist's fingers and being placed into the creation yet wanting to fly free.


© 2007 Nancy L. Ruder

Halloween role-call

Dad had only a handful of trick-or-treaters to enjoy the candy bars. The kids on his block have suddenly grown too old, or else attend church alternative costume parties.
Halloween was pretty simple when I was a kid. We decorated a paper grocery sack with orange and black crayon drawings. We wore a mom-made costume from a McCall's or Simplicity sewing pattern. Raggedy Anns had braided yarn wigs. Ground Folger's stuck to the cheeks of hobos. Kids all walked like Frankenstein's monster due to wearing snowpants and parkas under costumes. A designated dad went with us, or a mom in her winter coat and holding a flashlight.

What ghouls came to the preschool class at school?

• Two knights
• Dora and Diego, the explorers
• Two ballerina/fairies
• One Home Depot guy
• One pumpkin girl
• One religious objector to Halloween
• Spiderman
• One Gypsy girl
• Buzz Lightyear
• Sonic the Hedgehog
• One each cowgirl, surfer dude, and witch
• One firefighter and one police officer
• One Disney princess
• One royal queen with her king/All Star baseball player

© 2007 Nancy L. Ruder

My favorite Wild West characters

Why do cowboys need guns? Only to shoot the rattlesnakes disturbing the cattle. Why do bison need Tonka bulldozers? Why do alligators ride bucking broncos? Is Two Hat reading his Wanted poster? What do these cowboys eat? Beef, red beans, and coffee, of course!


© 2007 Nancy L. Ruder

Memorable staging

In my dream I stomped about in purple spike-heeled knee-high microfiber boots, ready to impale grapes, not just mash them. Alas, I had to bleach a Chef-Boyar-Dee stain off a table in the school lunchroom. Some of the Comet cleanser dusted down onto my boots, leaving faded spots. What a metaphor for womanhood! Bathtub cleanser ruins sexy boots--I can just imagine the verismo soprano aria! Welchismo Squelchismo... Okay, maybe it's time for jelly opera glasses...

The most memorable stagings by the Dallas Opera since I began attending in 2003 follow. Some had boots. Some had purple. A few had cleanser. All had amazing women:

Jenufa 2004
Cosi fan tutte 2003
Nabucco 2006
Pagliacci 2005
Magic Flute 2006
La Boheme 2003



© 2007 Nancy L. Ruder

Laughter is good medicine

Don't drink rootbeer at the Dallas Opera's production of "Lohengrin" this week. You know how weird it feels when you laugh so hard the rootbeer shoots out your nostrils.

Gotta say I was leary about attending my first Wagner opera, and not just because it is four and a half hours long. I had the feeling that as a tone deaf latecomer to opera, I would never be worthy of The Master. Plus, I've been laughed out of a room of musicians for pronouncing the Wag like a bag. Ooops! That's the equivalent of ripping open a package of potato chips and having them fly out all over the table at a four-star restaurant.

Who's laughing now?

In the Sixties there was a fad in little girl fashions of petticoats with pink inflatable inner-tubes at the hems. I think it was a few years before the "pettipants" fad. Imagine the female members of the opera chorus in grey cheesecloth gowns with wired hems circling out about eight inches above their ankles. Hours of construction went into the costume for each chorus member, but the visual effect was of the failed projects of a seventh grade sewing class.

The male chorus members are dressed as ... as... as WHAT? They wear wide full-length Samurai culottes and vaguely military jackets. Some scenes they accessorize with Incredible Hulk rubber armor breastplates that tend to ride up on the guys, necessitating frequent adjustments. Other scenes they wear white paper collars that make them look like Puritans at the dentist's office. And why are the Samurai Puritans playing volleyball in that decaying vacant warehouse with the tree growing through the window???

In Act II Ortrud and Telramund's faces are rarely lit, so opera glasses are of little use. When the sorceress, Ortrud, writhes on the floor invoking Wotan and other pagan gods, she appears to rip the head off a little yellow ducky puppet like my baby sons had. We will never know why she was wearing a ski headband of the type my brother used to call an "ear bra" with her wig.

The set, costumes, and lighting design are from Teatro Muncipal di Santiago (Chile). The nonsensical stage direction is by Alfred Kirchner.

(CollageMama's representations)

The music is glorious. Don't stay home. I haven't given all the laughs away by far. And laughter is something we all need.

Evening with a Yink

Seussian evening in the Dallas Arts District tonight with a bit of Mayan art, the Dallas Museum of Art's Thursday Jazz in the Atrium, and the Nasher Sculpture Center's Third Thursday program, this time in conjunction with the Dallas Opera. Good golly! That's an all-you-can-handle buffet of culture with free parking.

The Nasher's signature color is Green/Eggs/Ham green. Sitting on the green chairs that match the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles bandaid over my hot glue gun burn, with my purple thumb from a week of art projects with stamp pads, I listened to the iconic British textile designer, Zandra Rhodes, and Dallas Opera's maestro Graeme Jenkins discuss the process of costume design for opera. Several folks in the audience were dressed head to toe in Nasher green, while others showed off jingling and clanging fashion accessories made of antlers and mirrors.

Zandra Rhodes designed costumes for the San Diego Opera's 2001 production of Mozart's "The Magic Flute". The Dallas Opera's "Magic Flute" opens Friday night with those costumes. Rhodes has designed royal looks of both Princess Di and Queen's Freddie Mercury. Rhodes' Yinkian pink hair and Louise Nevelson-style heavy eye makeup are her trademark looks. She talked about those looks as a costume she wears, an easily recognizable caricature of herself that she can "be inside". Interesting to ponder if the rest of us are wearing caricature costumes of ourselves...

Ms. Rhodes let us in on a secret of forming the fabric feathers, scales, and petals for "Magic Flute"--weed whacker line! In Nasher green?



This one,
I think,
is called
a Yink.

He likes to wink,
he likes to drink.

He likes to drink, and drink, and drink.
The thing he likes to drink
is ink.
The ink he likes to drink is pink.
He likes to wink and drink pink ink.

SO...
if you have a lot of ink,
then you should get
a Yink, I think.

Puffy Shirts

I don't get out much. I've been Wendy for a long time now, taking care of little boys, reading stories, making pockets, and sewing shadows. Most of my boys can fly now, and they are growing up, unlike Peter Pan.

I have a great fondness for pirates, and a huge dislike for brussel sprouts. One year when the Mary Martin/Cyril Richard stage version of "Peter Pan" was being shown on t.v., I couldn't choke down the brussel sprouts at supper. In a rare moment of vegetable aggressive action, my parents told me I had to eat the slimy sprouts before I could watch my absolute favorite show. I know it is difficult to imagine a time when one couldn't just pop a recording into the DVD player, possibly while driving across town to Gymboree, but this was a difficult and primitive era! We could see "Peter Pan" once a year ONLY by hovering near our tiny black and white t.v.

The colder the brussel sprouts on my plate got, the less possible it was to chew and swallow the repulsive things. Somehow I got the dreadful job done, but I could probably spend a couple years in therapy just on the long-term ramifications of the experience.

So, after attending a splendid play performed in the round last weekend, when a friend took me to a nearby sports bar, it was a trip to Never-Never Land (it's not on any chart; you must find it with your heart). Suddenly I was not grown up! Then I couldn't believe my eyes when a guy dressed up as Captain Morgan began visiting the tables to promote spiced rum. Oh my gosh! I don't like rum, but I sure want a Captain Morgan costume to use at work. Puffy shirt! Puffy pantaloons! Tall boots! Big hat! Red coat!

Somewhere out there is a person who knows where Captain Morgan costumes go when they get too worn out. Contact me, please. I want one!

Tiny bubbles on the floor

After last evening's Dallas Opera production of Verdi's Luisa Miller you'd think I'd be humming something more highbrow than Don Ho. Maybe I just need more sleep. I put Joy dishwashing liquid in the dishwasher instead of Cascade.

Normally this mistake isn't possible because I can't even find the Joy. My resident photographer takes it upstairs to his bathroom to perform lighting experiments, setting up a la-bor-a-tory with lamps, tripods, curtains amid the general disgusting debris of a teen male's bathroom.


I am on my third beach towel cleaning the bubble mess on the kitchen floor. That's nowhere near the number of towels used during the various cleaning adventures of the belated Batmobile, but it is significant. I finally got the needed impetus to mop the kitchen floor.

The opera was quite wonderful even though there wasn't a luxury automobile on display outside the Music Hall. The stage is set with an elegant minimalism, a picture within a picture, and successful use of light and shadow. The music was splendid, especially the mezzo voice of Mzia Nioradze as the Duchess Federica. The costumes were styled appropriately for the Austrian Alps in a pleasant palette of greens and RED. The biggest flaw in the whole production was the Sam's Club bulk buy of RED velveteen. Miles of the same RED. No wine, no rose, no scarlet or crimson. No satin or bombazine, challis or damask. I could go on, but you get the idea. And if you're curious, check out the Phrontistery word list and definitions.

Dotted Swiss doesn't appear on the list, but the bubble mess on the floor reminds me of my mom's fancy robe when I was little. Excuse me. I have to go look for more towels.

Never Smile At a Crocodile

Once a year I turn into a wild woman for the camera. It's not quite those aura polaroids at the metaphysical bookstore. Still, each year's photo shoot reveals something about me.

We dress in costumes for the staff Christmas card photo, and for individual photos for the school calendar months. Yes, I'm a calendar girl. I worry for 360 days about what I will wear for this event. Then I plan and collect everything I need.

This may have been my best. I was the crocodile in Kipling's The Elephant's Child. I had the green Master's Championship look-alike blazer over a poison lime green shirt. Then I wore a truly reptilian donated necktie, a leaf lei, a split pea soup green fishing net from Oriental Trading Co. over my shoulders, a plush elephant puppet, a large and bendable bicolored python rock snake, and a straw safari hat with a leopard print band. Instead of saying, "Cheese," the photographer let me snarl, "I collect really BAD neckties."

Red Rover, Red Rover

Scott Cantrell's review of the Santa Fe Opera production of "Don Giovanni" in the Dallas Morning News was pretty tough on the totally red and pink set by David Zinn. Noelle and I liked it. The patterns across the building fronts reminded me of over-dyed Indian bedspreads from Pier One that I had in college. The hippie Summer of Love vintage seems appropriate for the legendary Don Juan.

I wish Zinn had thought more about the costuming. The colors worked, but the time periods didn't make sense. If he wanted to remove the production from an historical time-frame he could have gone way more eccentric, or way more tame. Half of each didn't do it. I liked the private eye Baretta trench-coat look for Leporello, but the other males needed something beyond leather coats. Are we thinking Brando? Gatsby? Hamlet? 007? And even if he is dead, the statue of the Commendatore needs to look more weathered. Most of the lighting was too dim for persons of my advanced age, but when the statue appeared it was bug-zapper spotlight on chicken pieces just rolled in flour for frying. If we are going in that direction, why don't we just do it in black light???

I've been rather recently added to the list of Don Giovanni's conquests. The comparison of this opera to "Hamlet" makes sense. There are so many ways to interpret it. So far, Donna Anna has been a big dud. She's engaged to the safe wimp, Don Ottavio, but doesn't really want him, and who can blame her? She's known all along who murdered her father, but she still finds the murderer attractive. Why does she just stand in one spot singing? With so many internal conflicts how does she keep from physically using the entire stage to express them? This is a woman with serious ISSUES. What kind of car would she drive?

And speaking of vehicles, what was the idea behind the hedge that rolls on stage from the right in Act II? As I mentioned, the whole set is red and pink. So is the hedge. Its function could easily be replaced by a fence of any sort. But, NOOOOO! We have the giant mutant Brillo woolly caterpillar from Mars!!
Thanks so much to Spirit and Opportunity for finding life on the Red Planet:
Red Rovers Come Over

Huzzah!

Five weeks down, five to go on summer camps. Today we had our Castle Faire, an annual event during Knight's Quest camp. We turn the theatre into a medieval faire with booths selling food, swords, horses, and jewelry for a few hours. There's a tent and crystal disco ball for the fortune-teller. The kids and staff all dress up in costumes. The king welcomes everyone to the faire. We let kids with July birthdays be the kings and queens. The oldest kids perform an improv drama. The middle kids dance. Everyone has play money to purchase things, and we all go around bowing to each other. The little kids think the faire is the most fun since Halloween. We have bread and cheese, Pepperidge Farms Goldfish just caught fresh from the moat, dried fruits, and jerky. Everyone suspends disbelief for half an hour. Sometimes a kid goes crazy for prunes, and we have to warn his mom or nanny. Today I got to be a ragged lame hunchbacked beggar with lice, fleas, and rheumy eyes. I collected a lot of alms and a few rodents from the Pied Piper. It was a splendid faire!

Click on the link to Itty Bitty Art Projects to see how our crowns and castles are going.

Surely you vest

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and squirrels! Please give a big round of applause to that most versatile costume piece of all, the vest. Yes, there’s a thespian near you that would love to have your vest.

Remember how cute your son looked in that little three-piece Godfather suit when he played “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” in the piano recital? Did he ever wear that suit again? Feel better about the great condition it is still in, and let some little kids wear it to be pirates, presidents, and father-knows-bests.

Ya know the brown vest Leroy wore to Alvira’s third wedding over at the VFW? It could be an explorer’s vest, or a pioneer's. The cute plaid flannel one that went with the denim broomstick skirt? I know you loved those apple buttons, but it is soooo last millennium. The seven dwarfs could wear it to when off to work they go. The silk one with the embroidered mirrors from your “ethnic” phase would look great on either Aladdin or a genie. Is it size 4T to forty? There’s a theater that can use it. And furry? Oh, my gosh, the Neanderthals will go bonkers.

Now lets talk about weddings. We know you never wear the bridesmaid dress again. What your local children’s theater really needs is the flower girl and junior bridesmaid dresses. They’ve got to costume twelve dancing princesses who all want to look royal and twirly! And the teen troupe needs to costume everyone for the Ascot opening day in "My Fair Lady".

Witches pose special costume problems. Being the witch is very fun, but not as glamorous as the dancing princesses. Coaxing is often needed. Young witches love to wear the sequin chiffon floating things that go over your little black cocktail dress, or maybe figure skating outfits. What about the peignoir or Chinese robe your Aunt Millie never got up the nerve to wear?

Dr. Frankenstein, can you hear me? After that last little explosion you gave up your work in the laboratory, right? A children’s theater won’t mind if your lab coats have those little burn holes. They like your scrubs, too, and they will perform a special version of “Putting on the Ritz” for you and your neck bolt friends.

And dear President Bush--I heard Karl won’t let you wear the flight suit anymore. Please donate it to a theater group inside the Beltway. They would love to have your dad’s parachute suits, too. You could maybe get a tax deduction.

If you have too many green jackets from Augusta, I know some dragons that would like to breathe fire on you....