Grantblings

Puppet Up Down Under 2014 – March 25, 2014 – Austria

Today was supposed to be a pretty full Puppet Up day with press and a big tech rehearsal for the Melbourne International Comedy Festival Gala we will be part of. Those plans fell through partially because of a small snafu with the box of puppets we are using for the Gala. We can’t get into the main boxes of puppets until tomorrow, Customs thing, and so a small box was being sent to us via FedEx. Perfect plan except that box of puppets wound up in Austria instead of Australia. So, the press stuff with the puppets had to be rescheduled. That gave us a more relaxed morning.

I got up around 8:00 AM and then went to the gym to run on the treadmill a bit. After showering, I met with Peggy and Colleen and we walked over to Queen Victoria Market.

Queen Victoria Market is a big indoor/outdoor Farmer’s Market in Melbourne. It’s a little touristy, but we are tourists! It was a pleasant walk over and then a nice walk around the Market. I grabbed breakfast there, including a hot cross bun and then just strolled around looking at all the different stuff for sale.

I was also helping Uncle Interloper film a few segments for his podcast when he was attacked by a fish monger wielding an octopus. Seriously. It was pretty hilarious and I’m glad I caught it all on video. Uncle Interloper was terrified and I was too.

After spending a bit of time at the Market, we had a leisurely walk back and then it was time to get set to meet in the lobby for our rides to the tech rehearsal.

The Gala is taking place in the Palis Theatre which is the largest indoor theatre in Australia. It was pretty impressive. The Gala is going to be televised so the tech rehearsal seemed, at least to me, kind of like an awards show tech. We worked through our piece, we get 4 minutes, twice and made sure everything sounded good and then it was back to the hotel. The Gala is tomorrow night so I’ll have info on how it went tomorrow.

Once back to the hotel, the company split a bit. Some went down to the river while me and Dan decided to walk a bit around the streets near the hotel and get some dinner. I have absolutely no idea how this happened, but we ended up at the only barbecue place in town, Big Boy’s BBQ. Odd.

Anyway, we had some great Barbecue and talked a bit with the owner Lance. A great guy. He said he was on vacation in the United States and discovered barbecue, then came back to Australia and started cooking it for himself and all his friends told him to open a place, and he did. And it was pretty good too. I have a feeling I’ll be going back sometime in the next few weeks to sample some other stuff on the menu.

After dinner, we walked around a bit more downtown, then came back to the hotel. I spent a good amount of time once I was back just looking out over the city. Have a mentioned I like it? A lot? I do.

Excited for tomorrow’s activities. Some rescheduled press and then the Gala. Should be a lot of fun.