MemeMachineGo!

One of the things I enjoy about summer is free theatre in the park. Saw the San Francisco Mime Troupe's current show, Mr. Smith Goes to Obscuristan today. As always, the singing and production were great. This was one of the productions where they pretty much stuck to taking down people in power. As usual when they do so, I agreed with them completely. (When they advance their own alternatives I tend to disagree with them completely.) There're plenty more shows the rest of this month — if you're local, check it out.

And today was the kickoff of the Berkeley Arts Festival and it is to be hoped that some time really soon that link won't return a 403 error. Anyway, with information obtained from an old-fashioned paper flier, I found out about a Woman's Will production called "That Takes Ovaries" which turned out to be dramatized readings from a book of the same name, whose subtitle is "bold females and their brazen acts," which ought to give some idea what was up.

Woman's Will puts on all-women productions of Shakespeare's plays every summer (mostly: one year they had men play the women's parts), and I go every year, and I'm looking forward to their Pericles next weekend.

In between, I was biking by a yard sale when I saw they had a few books. While not especially optimistic, I still compulsively stopped to look. And they had China Mieville's The Scar, the brand new sequel to Perdido Street Station for $1. Score!

And it's a good thing I could find a cheap book, 'cause I'm a sucker and paid through the nose for all that free theatre. Reciprocity, dontcha know.