Quickenings 2013

Happy New Year! Quickenings is the annual newsletter that my family creates around this time of year. It has been a regular "publication" since 1999. Here is my portion of the letter. If you are interested in reading the full document, there is a link at the bottom of this post. 

Happy New Year to you, Friends! My pen pal gave me this quote on a birthday, and I’d like to share it with you: “May the best of the last year be the worst of the next!”

I have spent about half of 2013 travelling for work as a Production/Stage/Company Manager for various contemporary dance companies. This has taken me to Toronto, Halifax, PEI, North Carolina, and all around BC. This winter and spring I will continue touring with two other companies across Canada, the USA, and the UK.  If I’m in your town I hope we can meet for a meal or a cup of tea! Eating all one’s meals at restaurants can get tiring, especially in small town BC (I’m looking at you, Kitimat).

Last winter I was very sick with pneumonia for almost two months. This was partly due to overwork and high stress at my job at Presentation House Theatre. I learned a huge amount working there, managing shows and running the venue, but it was disorganized and difficult to do my job well. With some offers to tour, and desiring the flexible life of a freelancer, I left PHT at the end of June. Leaving that job gave me a chance to reflect on my work style and priorities. As a result I have made some different choices in my daily life. Cutting down on caffeine, getting more sleep, adding in regular exercise, and reading more fiction have all helped refresh me.

While I’m on the road, in different hotels, theatres, and airports, I am learning what things I need to make it feel like “home.” Some of these are CBC podcasts, good teas, fantasy books, and movies filmed in Vancouver. In 2010 I spent the summer away training at the Banff Centre, and that was the only time I’ve felt homesick. Since then I have picked comforts to bring with me, and have let the dancers and technicians I travel with become family (which happens surprisingly fast).

This year has been a positive one. I feel as though I have been steadily climbing up a hill. I am trying to value rest and leisure time as much as I value work and activity, and to tend to my complete wellbeing – physical, intellectual, emotional and spiritual. It has been a real highlight to visit friends and family while I am touring. Another highlight was attending the Production Managing the Arts conference in Toronto in March. It was a crazy four days, full of seminars, meals, and conversations. There is no training of this kind in Vancouver, and I’m very glad that I was able to go.

Since the majority of eight months was to be spent travelling, I sublet my place to an old friend while I tour. My initial plan was to put my things in storage and couch-surf during the short times I was in Vancouver. However, since my brother had just moved out to Victoria to attend UVic, my parents offered me space at their house. My mailing address is still the same, as I will be returning to Dundee street in June. 

I have been attempting to write about my work and travels – quite inconsistently- but if you would like to read about them, you can visit my neglected blog at http://h.quicke.blogspot.ca. I will post my 2014 travel itinerary there as well in the hopes of seeing a few of you!

We are so blessed with many things in our North American lives: readily available food, safe communities, shelter, and the chance to pursue our interests. In 2014, I hope you will consider how you can help others who may not have these things, or who are going through struggles. Perhaps through giving blood, volunteering in your neighborhood, or donating to charity.

Another quote to wrap this up, this time from C.S. Lewis: “ Friendship is unnecessary, like philosophy, like art… It has no survival value; rather it is one of those things that give value to survival.” 

Thank you for your friendship!

- Heidi

To read this year's complete Quickenings newsletter click HERE. 

2014 Touring - Canada, USA, UK

This afternoon I have been working on my contribution to our family's annual newsletter "Quickenings" which should be complete by Dec 31st. Watch this space! In the meantime, here are a few of the cities I will be visiting between January - May 2014. First I will be touring a show called Me So You So Me with Out Innerspace Dance Theatre. Immediately after that tour ends, I will be joining the Kidd Pivot company's production Tempest Replica. If we are in your city, I hope you can come to a performance! Or leave me a comment with suggestions as to good eats and attractions to check out in these places.

Out Innerspace
January 21-25 - Quebec City, PQ - La Rotonde
January 26-29 - Sherbrooke, PQ - Centennial Theatre
January 30-Feb 2 - Longueuil, PQ - Theatre de la Ville
February 4-7 - Victoria, BC - Metro Theatre
February 8-13 - Rimouski, PQ - Theatre du Bic
February 14-22 - Montreal, PQ - L'Agora de la Danse
February 23-March 1 - Vancouver, BC - Cultch

Kidd Pivot (exact details forthcoming)
March 2-March 8 - Vancouver, BC - SFU Woodwards
March 9-15 - Rockville, MD - American Dance Institute
March 18 - Sherbrooke, PQ - Centennial Theatre
March 21 - Kingston, ONT - Grand Theatre
March 25 - Kitchener-Waterloo, ONT - Centre in the Square
March 27-April 21 - Toronto, ONT - Hiatus Period
April 22-28 -  London, UK - Sadler's Wells
April 29 - May 3 - Birmingham, UK - Hippodrome
May 4-11 - Toronto, ONT - Can Stage
May 21 - Victoria, BC - Royal Theatre
May 29-31 - Quebec City, PQ - Le Grand Theatre de Quebec

Top 10 Travel Tips

I was going to call this post "Tour Planning Tips" but I realized that most people aren't planning trips for large groups. However, many of you will probably take a vacation at some point, so I thought I would share these tips. And on the subject of vacations, they are really important! Our bodies and our minds were not meant to work constantly 24/7. This is something I keep re-learning as I forget to take breaks. So whether you are a freelance contractor, like me, or an employee, manager or student make sure you plan a rest for yourself. If you don't plan it, it won't happen, and then your brain will switch off or you'll have to run away to Europe (not the worst option).

Planning the trip is half of the fun! And will instantly lift your spirits as you look forward to it.

Heidi's Top 10 Travel Tips

1. Do Your Homework. There is something to be said for the backpacking trip where one books a round trip plane ticket and leaves the rest up to chance. I hope to take that kind of adventure someday. However, most times you will be planning more aspects of your trip, so step one is do do some research. Get to know the area you are visiting, lookup other traveller's reviews on TripAdvisor or other websites. If you are booking a hotel, TripAdvisor Room Tips are great to help you pick the newest, quietest space. Turn on Private Browsing on your internet browser as you compare hotels, flights, and car rentals. Often the prices will go up if the websites track you searching the same parameters.

2. Talk to a Real Person. This may seem obvious for those of you who grew up before Google, but for those of you who didn't, listen up. Often I find it's faster to get the information I need about a hotel or flight connection by calling directly. It's also easier to ask a real person if they have any discounts or special offers. Some hotels have phone-only discounts available, and others will be able to tell you that the rooms on the first floor have been recently renovated. Clarify fees over the phone, and ask to get emailed a copy of the quote if you are not booking right away.

3. Plan Your Meals. One of my favourite parts of travelling is discovering new restaurants. The website/app Urbanspoon is particularly helpful for this in larger cities. Sometimes it's nice to stumble across a gem of a restaurant, but other times you will be hungry and just want to eat. Plan a few go-to meal places so you're not stuck at the hotel restaurant or with pizza delivery. (This is especially important when your dance company is in small-town BC and needing dinner at 11pm).

4. Get the rewards. It's free to join most frequent flyer and hotel rewards programs. Even if you don't fly often, the rewards often last for 5-10 years, so small trips can add up. Any international flights will give you a huge amount of points, which can often be used for rewards such as cameras, groceries, clothing, etc. And you can earn things like Air Miles and Aeroplan points through day-to-day purchases anyways. A hazard of signing up for every program is that you'll end up with a few extra wallets, but I think it's worth it. (If you travel for work, make sure that you or your company is adding frequent flyer numbers to the bookings. You can still earn the points when someone else pays for the flight)

5. Pack well. There are lots of articles on how to pack well for travel, so I won't repeat them. Again, a little bit of planning will save you stress and overweight baggage fees. I have recently started using packing cubes to organize and love them. I bought the Onsight Clothes Box from Mountain Equipment Co-op.

6. Don't go into debt. Part of planning a vacation or a trip, or a dance tour, is budgeting. If you can't afford a vacation, don't put yourself into debt to go. Look into other more affordable options or use some or all of your rewards points. House-sitting or volunteer trips can be good ways to see a new area, take a break, and save some money. That said, make your budgeting realistic and set aside enough money to keep it low stress. If your vacation budget means you have to eat at McDonald's every day just to get to Prague, you're not going to enjoy the trip. And if you have more than one bag plan to take a taxi to the airport instead of trying to take the Canada Line. Your travel day will be much more pleasant.

7. Allow for contingency time. Most of these tips seem to have to do with the planning side of things, which if you know me should not be a surprise. I love having the key things planned and orderly, so that I can relax and enjoy myself. Things go wrong with travel, flights are delayed, bags are lost, or the Santa Claus parade delays the airport shuttle. Allow yourself extra time in your travel plans, whether you be driving, busing, or flying. If you ever think to yourself "that connection is a little tight, but I can make it" the connection is too tight. Remember that with any travel you also need time to eat, visit the bathroom, and navigate a new space. Better to have an extra hour enjoying a leisurely lunch that to be running across O'Hare. (This tip should be #1 if you have children or people with mobility challenges with you)

8. Bring things to travel well. Travel days suck the energy out of you, even if you are excited and are going somewhere warm. More so if you are on a red-eye from Vancouver to Charlottetown at the end of November (ask me how that one goes next week). Bring along things to make you comfortable and happy. My essentials are: gum, full water bottle, book or magazine, podcasts, and snacks. Other things that are awesome: neck pillows, earplugs, sleep mask, crosswords, iPad. Make sure you bring some entertainment in case the TVs cut out, or if you are flying in the US where many planes don't have TVs. If travelling with kids, bring toys and books! Don't forget to plan your meals and hydration, as most airlines charge ridiculous amounts for an average sandwich once you're in the air.

9. Don't over-schedule.  This is one I keep re-learning, in all aspects of my life. I like to fit as much as possible into a day. But you're on vacation, and the Louvre will still be there next time you're in Paris. Whether you're on vacation or travelling for business, you still need to have some restful "me" time scheduled in. It might be doing some exercise, or going for a walk, or getting room service instead of going out for food. Make sure you don't overextend yourself (and remind me to take my own advice).

10. Enjoy Yourself! Have fun! And let me know what your best travel tips are, or when a trip went horribly wrong!


Links:
Lifehacker.com has lots of great articles on travel, efficiency, and packing. Just set yourself a time limit or you could spend all day there.

How to Fit Two Weeks of Luggage Under the Seat In Front of You (also from LifeHacker)

Report from Northern BC

Hello Everyone!

It's been a little longer than I planned since my last blog entry, but the days on tour fill up quickly. Today is Performance Day in Prince Rupert. Amber and I treated ourselves to room-service for breakfast this morning, and then went for a little walk to get tea and coffee at Cowpuccino's Coffee House which was full of parents and babies this morning.

I have a whole bunch of photos from the Golden Civic Centre, which is a really unique venue. In the next few days I will post those and write a little bit about that venue's story and what it was like to put up a show there.

A week ago we spent Saturday driving back to Vancouver from Golden, through fog that was so thick we couldn't see more than 100m ahead of us at points. On Sunday we met at the airport at 7am to fly up to Kitimat (via Terrace), where we stayed at Minette Bay Lodge.

If you every have the chance, you should visit the Lodge. It was the most beautiful, idyllic place. The Lodge was  built by a British couple and is a Bed and Breakfast with fishing trips, bear sightseeing tours, and a gorgeous property. Dr. Howard and Ruth Mills are very sweet and so welcoming. Their property has trails, stables, a suspension bridge, water access, and horses. We were treated to delicious home-made breakfasts everyday, and spent our last night there on the beach watching stars. One morning I was up early and got to watch a beautiful sunrise over the mountains outside my window. Here's a photo of the sunrise that Jeff took:

Kitimat itself is not very big, and it took some effort to plan meals since there is not very much selection. Our hosts, the Kitimat Concert Association, provided us with wonderful hospitality at the theatre with lots of fruit, vegetables, sandwiches, and snacks. The Mount Elizabeth Theatre is quite nice, especially for a theatre situated in a high school. It's a standard proscenium stage, approx 40' across at the proscenium opening. Lots of wing space and good dressing rooms. I had fun working alongside some of the stagecraft students who helped us with load-in and strike.

We drove to Prince Rupert on Thursday (Halloween) and I am struck by the beauty in this part of the province. I would like to come back to Prince Rupert for a vacation to actually see the town, as most of my time is spent at the theatre, restaurants, or the hotel room. On Thursday night we went over to the community centre for Halloween fireworks but it started hailing and we all got pretty soaked. We ended up watching them from our minivan, before retreating to the hotel. The whole company got together to watch The Conjuring.

Yesterday, Friday Nov 1st, was Load-In day. The dancers had the day off, except for Josh and Lisa who taught community outreach workshops in the evening. Jeff (TD) and I were at the theatre from 9am to load-in and setup. Yesterday was a pretty typical load-in day, except that there is no local tech crew here - just James, the TD for the Lester Centre. 

On a load-in day Jeff and I arrive at the theatre and unpack our gear from the minivan. We tour with a yellow linoleum floor that travels in two six foot ski bags, a black scrim in a backpack, a projector in a hard case, our lighting console in a hard case, and Jeff's yellow tech suitcase. All this gear is small enough to travel as checked baggage when we fly, which is a lot cheaper and more convenient than shipping it. Jeff will usually start the day by assessing how much of the lighting hang has been completed, and then by finishing that with the local crew. While he does that, I inspect the dressing rooms, greenroom and laundry facilities and start unpacking.

Once the stage is ready, Jeff and I make a grid with chalk lines for Lighting Focus. The yellow linoleum floor at the centre of the stage has 20 to 25 lighting areas on it, depending on the venue. Once we have made the grid and marked the corners with spike tape, the technicians can use this to finish focus. In Golden the local crew is all volunteer, so I assisted Jeff with lighting hang and focus. In the larger venues, such as Toronto and Nanaimo, we have union local crew to do this work.

I went back to unpacking costumes, and setting up the greenroom. Yesterday I did a lot of tour planning tasks while Jeff and James finished lighting focus: booking our airport shuttle in Toronto, confirming workshop details with the next tour spot, replying to interview requests, and updating schedules in the Tour Book. 

The Tour Book is the master copy of all the information related to the tour. The tour "bible," if you will. Performers get a copy of parts of it - a schedule overview, the day-by-day information pages, contact list, and travel summary. Some parts of it are useful for myself and the artistic directors in planning the tour, such as a spreadsheet of hotel costs or flight costs. Some sections are for my use only, as the tour coordinator, such as a checklist of correspondence with each venue. All the big things such as when we arrive, depart, or when our shows are, have been confirmed way ahead of time, but smaller things, such as whether we will be doing a post-show talkback, are often decided within a week of arriving at a venue. And, of course, plans often change. Tweaking the Tour Book will continue to be part of my duties until the day before we fly home at the end of the tour.

I will be heading to the theatre in a few minutes with the dancers . Jeff went in at 11am to finish up some lighting and projection notes. Performance Days are fun, and of course what we are here for, but they tend to be long. While the dancers warmup, I will iron the costumes that hang-dried overnight, and then we will do a quick spacing and a run-through. We take a dinner break next, but some of the dancers elect to remain at the theatre and just snack, instead of having a heavy meal before dancing. Next will be warmup and the performance! Prince Rupert has a post-show reception in the lobby that we will attend, and then the company will go out for second dinner, then back to the hotel to pack and to bed. So that's what I'll be doing today!

Oh, the Lester Centre for the Arts, here in Prince Rupert, is a fairly nice venue. It was designed by the same architect who planned the Vernon and District Performing Arts Centre, which I love. The Lester Centre is about 15 years older than the Vernon Centre, and has older technology, but the structure of both buildings is very sensible and makes it easy to work there. The dressing rooms have countertops and chairs that are both a horrible orange colour, but those surface elements are easy to change. The layout of a theatre, access to catwalks, the grid, dressing rooms, etc is much more important that what technology it has or the colour of the chairs. Those things can be changed, but the structure of the building is less malleable. Working in the city of Vancouver is very interesting because most venues are converted spaces, and were not originally conceived as theatres. Think of the Firehall Arts Centre, the Waterfront Theatre, Little Mountain Studios, or the Roundhouse, just to name a few. 

Time to pack up my laptop and head down to the lobby.

I hope you've enjoyed reading this. Send me any questions or comments!

Love from the road,

Heidi

New Animal on Tour!

Hi Everyone (Hi Mom! Hi Dad!),

I'm sitting in my motel room in Golden, bantering with my tour roommate Amber Funk Barton and getting the summary of this evening's dance workshop. We (605 Collective) arrived in Golden yesterday evening after a long drive up from Vancouver. This is the first stop on a tour that will take us to Kitimat, Prince Rupert, Nanaimo, Toronto, Burnaby, Summerside (PE), and Halifax. The first portion of our tour is through the Made in BC networks of presenters. A friend suggested that I write about the tour, so here I am!

One thing I love about touring is seeing all the different venues - how they are built, what best practices the crew have in place, and learning their stories. The Golden Civic Centre has an amazing story, but I will write about that later this week once I have collected a few good photos. The company is in Golden until Saturday morning doing outreach events with the community before our performance on Friday night.

The show we are touring is New Animal and you can watch a trailer on YouTube HERE. It explores the inner animalistic traits in humans, has lots energetic movements, and is just fun to watch. If you are in the Vancouver area, we will be at the Shadbolt Arts Centre November 20-23.

Part of my preshow/running duties include purchasing, massaging, and washing lemons that are used during the show. The dancers tear them from each other's mouths and then basically have a lemon husk food fight. This morning our first outreach activity was a photoshoot with lemons, to imitate some film and photo content that was created with the dancers for New Animal. Jeff Harrison, the Technical Director, and I got to participate as well:

For this tour I am in a Production Coordinator/Company Manager role, with some ASM duties as well. My involvement in planning the tour began in August, and took up most of my time in September. Tour planning continues, since we will be on the road until early December, and schedules for the later venues are only now getting finalized. Some of the tour-planning things I do for the company are booking flights, booking car rentals, planning cargo transport, confirming outreach activities, confirming/booking hotels, and creating all the tour schedules. There's lots of excel spreadsheets. It's fun! (Honestly, it is.)

One thing I didn't anticipate in coming to Golden was the fact that many restaurants and shops shut down during October, in the slow season. Last night we walked over to a restaurant only to find that it is closed this week. (And only this week!) We found another option, but the city is pretty quiet when it's not tourist or ski season.

Today Jeff and I did the lighting hang and focus. Tomorrow morning I get a little bit of a sleep-in because the Civic Centre is booked for a community meeting, and then we finish with projector setup and lighting levels. The dancers have two outreach activities tomorrow: a mid-day outdoors "animal" photo shoot at the campground, and another evening dance workshop.

If you're in Golden, come by the Civic Centre and say hello!

Let me know in the comments what you want me to write about in future, or if you will be in one of our upcoming tour spots!

All the Best from the Road,

HQ

Plastic to Oil Technology

A few months ago my dad emailed me a video link that I proceeded to leave in my inbox - until today. It's not a new video - it was originally posted in 2009 - and I was surprised that I have not heard about it before. I'm the kind of person who rips the sticky part off my post-it notes before I recycle the paper (that sticky part can't be recycled) and who actually reads the newsletters from Greenpeace, and who gets frustrated with her parents when they buy unsustainable seafood. (Have you heard about Oceanwise?)

The video is called "Man invents machine to turn plastic to oil." In summary, the Japanese company Blest has developed machines that convert soft plastics into oil. The CEO, Akinori Ito, demonstrates the counter-top machine at 1:48 into the video. He then tells about taking the machine all around the world - educating children and communities about the potential of what we consider waste plastics.

The technology itself is not earth-shattering - large recycling plants have been processing plastics this way before, although not very efficiently. What interests me is the small-scale unit. Could low-income families around the world create new income streams by collecting and processing plastic waste? Would municipalities or businesses open up depots to buy back unprocessed oil from individuals? Could my cousin, living on a farm outside in Saskatchewan, process her own oil out of packaging and plastic products? 

I looked around the internet a bit, and found this article about the same process in Whitehorse, Yukon: http://yukon-news.com/business/plastic-to-oil-machine-comes-to-whitehorse  The community of Whitehorse installed a plastic to oil machine in September 2012 for a one-year trial. They realized that much of their waste was travelling overseas to be processed, using methods that may not be the cleanest. "The goal of this pilot project is to give P&M Recycling the ability to process plastics onsite, rather than sorting it and trucking it south, while producing enough energy to heat the 600-square-foot recycling centre." I am going to keep an eye out for updates on this project as we move into September.

Some thoughts that come out of this:How does the City of Vancouver process it's plastics? How far do they travel to be processed? Are we shipping out waste out-of-country?

Can this technology be used as the base of small businesses in the developing world? What additional technology is required to process the oil into diesel, gas fuel, etc? Could this even the playing field for countries that have less oil resources?


I hope the fact that we can cycle plastic to oil will not drown out the fact that plastic products are inherently wasteful and destructive to our planet. When you think about the amount of water, oil, and energy that goes into making a plastic water bottle, for example, it is absolutely obscene. 

The original article on Blest Co's device can be found here: http://ourworld.unu.edu/en/plastic-to%20-oil-fantastic/

What do you think? How would you want to see this technology used or not used? 

On the next tour I will...

I am spending April touring with the dance company Out Inner Space, working on their piece Vessel. My official title is Stage Manager, but on tour that job also includes production management duties like confirming schedule with upcoming venues and making sure everyone gets to their flights on time.

We are spending our first week at the Banff Centre doing a residency in the theatre to work out all the details of projections and lighting. I love working in Banff - they take really good care of you and the crew is awesome. In 2010 I did the Opera Stage Management workstudy program here, and I was back with the 605 Collective last February, so I have many good memories of "Banff Camp."And all the running around campus as an ASM means that I now know most of the shortcuts around campus.

It's only a few days into tour, but I find myself often saying "On the next tour I will [blank]." Some of the things are small and silly, but some are bigger. I wanted to make sure I remembered these, and maybe you will find some of them useful as well.

1. Schedule work around the dining room times while you are in Banff (we did this, but it's important).
2. Pack cube tabs. The hotel room will invariably have too few plugs for your phone, laptop, etc.
3. Bring flip flops so you don't have to walk to the pool in a house robe and combat boots (okay... this is mostly a note for me...)
4. Don't spend 8 hours sitting hunched over at a theatre production table. Ouch. Walk and stretch or come up with a better work position.
5. DO spend time chatting with the house crew, getting to know them better, and trading stories. I always learn so much from this, and I make lots of new friends!

Here's a good resource on tour planning from the Canada Council website. It's a good overview of some of the things to think about, but it forgets to mention that you should hire a Production Manager (cough cough): http://www.canadacouncil.ca/development/ontheroad/touringhandbook/

More updates from the road to come!