6th of June
Okay so I was off today and happy about it. I packed my bags, made sure I had everything ready, fed my cats and went for the train station at 2.
I took te train and ended up in the docklands O.o turns out I took the wrong train. But I heard the conductor tell this guy that walking from the Docklands to City Centre was like 10 minutes, so I figured I could do it to. I recognized some of the buildings from the bus I took before, so I knew I was on the correct road... but I got lost anyway!! I think I need a GPS system to find my way XD so when I finally found the main street in City Centre, I turned out to be right at the shop that I wanted to go to as I still wanted to buy a book for Sarah Earnshaw ^_^. **elaborate.... she sent me a letter back with a picture of her as Glinda and she wrote me on Winnie the Pooh paper, so I wrote her back immediately saying that if she liked Pooh so much I would get her something, so I did ** and luckily, there was only one book left of "Tao of Pooh", so I bought it!! I also bought little cards and envelopes that said "Note From Sarah" in fancy letters with roses printed on it. It was so adorably cute, that I just had to buy it. I also bought three key chains I found of Margaret Hamilton!!! One for Sophie, One for Kristine and one for me :D you know Margaret Hamilton, she was the original Wicked Witch of the West in The Wizard of Oz... the keychain was of her in the melting scene.. then I also saw a set of fridge magnets from The Wizard of Oz, so I bought those as well :D
After that, I walked to the post office, where I knew I had enough place to wrap Sarah's presents. And when that was done I went to the Bus station to wait for my bus... I found 10 euro on the floor there, always a good thing... and then at a quarter past 7 I got my boarding card for the bus and got on. At 8 in the evening we left Dublin behind and drove to the Docklands to get on the bus on the boat to Birmingham and from there to London.
7th of June.
Okay so at like a quarter past one in the morning or something we arrived in Birmingham..we had to have a passport check and then got back on the bus as it was pretty cold. I didn't really like the look of Birmingham to be honest, it looked like the buildings weren't maintained all that well... or just at all O.o the buildings looked like they were falling apart and perhaps they were, I don't know. And they were covered in moss as well. But we had to stop there as some people were getting off the bus. The we stopped somewhere near Milton Keys and Luton and then we were in London... it was a quarter to or past nine, I can't remember all that well as I was sleep deprived. I walked quickly to Victoria station where I was meeting Sophie and Kristine. The first thing I wanted to do was get a coffee as I hadn't had one since the day before or something :P and my legs were killing me as well from the 13 hour bus ride...First we got tube tickets though and then we went outside to the Starbucks to get a Caramel Frapachino with whipped cream **finally some caffeine!!!!!** and to gander a look at the Apollo theatre... didn't see that many people yet for front row seats, but Soof said there were people that had been camping there for a week **GROSS!!**
After we got our Fraps we went to the hostel to see about our room. This really slow guy was explaining us in a slow monotone voice that the rooms weren't ready yet as there were other people in there and we couldn't go in until 2 in the after noon **which is kinda weird, if you think about the fact that we had to leave our room at 10 in the morning...** But we could dump our bags there... so we went to the toilet and I got changed in to my Cast Change Shirt. **banged myself against the toilet a few times -_- ** then we went back to the tube and left for the Dress Circle... only to realise that I left my £10 in my backpack at the hostel -_- so I didn't buy anything... We did browse the Dress Circle a while and took almost all of the Wicked leaflets they had XD and then the guy behind the counter asked us if we were going to the Cast Change of Wicked and we said YES!!! and he told us that Kerry's album wasn't coming for another 18 months max **not good -_- ** and that there was a teaser cd coming next month with three songs **hurray!!** We also went to the Stage Door before the Matinee show, so we could see the cast that was going on. I got a picture taken with Dianne Pilkington, who also happened to have her birthday that day, so everybody was giving her presents and we all sang happy birthday to her. I think it made her blush! haha, it was cute. The I saw Sarah Earnshaw and just HAD to have my picture taken with her and give her my presents, which she seemed to like **it's not everyday you get birthday presents six months late haha!** Ha! Rachel tried to take a picture of me and Sarah too, but my camera was set of film, so I have a 4 second video of me and Sarah blinking XD hahaha, so cool!! and then we did take a picture together **yayness!!**
Then we also saw Oli, but he basically ran for the door and said he was late O_O even though there was people coming in like 10 minutes after him... We also met some people from the Kerry-Ellis.net forum :D first was Rachel! Rachel and I got along really well **she's crazy like ME!** and we talked about how HOT Oli was and we talked about Kristin Chenoweth and Pushing Daisies and then Mark Evans showed up O_O OH MY GOD! he is SO HOT! he's like a smaller version of Oli **faints** me, Rach and Kris basically drooled all over this guy! so I asked him to sign my cast change shirt, which he did and then I asked him if I could have my picture taken with him and he told me "you stand on this side of me so I can point at my signature" and the picture turned out really funny **and I'm grinning like an idiot in it XD **. Then some kids asked Mark to sign his signature on the Oliver photo and he said "that's not me! I'm not gonna sign something I'm not" which probably confused the hell out of those poor kids XD
I also had my picture taken with Nigel Planer **aka Neil from The Young Ones** which was one thing I really wanted to do. And he looks like such a sweet grandpa in the picture haha! and to think he is the Wizard of Oz!! :o and then we saw Katie rush by **for the 5th time in a year XD ** Rach went to her mom to ask if they could go to the matinee as well, but her mom didn't want to. But she did say Rach could go, so Rach got a really good seat :O.
Then we also saw Oli, but he basically ran for the door and said he was late O_O even though there was people coming in like 10 minutes after him... We also met some people from the Kerry-Ellis.net forum :D first was Rachel! Rachel and I got along really well **she's crazy like ME!** and we talked about how HOT Oli was and we talked about Kristin Chenoweth and Pushing Daisies and then Mark Evans showed up O_O OH MY GOD! he is SO HOT! he's like a smaller version of Oli **faints** me, Rach and Kris basically drooled all over this guy! so I asked him to sign my cast change shirt, which he did and then I asked him if I could have my picture taken with him and he told me "you stand on this side of me so I can point at my signature" and the picture turned out really funny **and I'm grinning like an idiot in it XD **. Then some kids asked Mark to sign his signature on the Oliver photo and he said "that's not me! I'm not gonna sign something I'm not" which probably confused the hell out of those poor kids XD
I also had my picture taken with Nigel Planer **aka Neil from The Young Ones** which was one thing I really wanted to do. And he looks like such a sweet grandpa in the picture haha! and to think he is the Wizard of Oz!! :o and then we saw Katie rush by **for the 5th time in a year XD ** Rach went to her mom to ask if they could go to the matinee as well, but her mom didn't want to. But she did say Rach could go, so Rach got a really good seat :O.
The show was A-FREAKIN-MAZING!! We had Dianne as Glinda and Cassidy as Elphaba **since it was Cassidy's last show, she got to be Elphie!! YAY** they were doing some really funny things in it XD like Nadine was wearing a pair of Harry Potter glasses hahaha and one of the flying Monkeys was wearing a bikini O_O one of the Shiz students had a monkey tail. Dianne and Cassidy did an amazing Loathing, it had me laughing my ass off. As did Dianne's Popular, she did the "Toss Toss" three times, which is already once more then normal, but her last "Toss Toss" was more like "Tosstosstosstoss" Which CJ copied in to the next scene and Oli did it as well!. I was kind of weary at first because I thought Dianne's voice was annoying on the recordings I heard **shame on me**, but live she is a lot better!
**IstilllikeSarahEarnshawbetterthoughbutImnotgonnatellanyonethat O_O** I was also surprised with Dianne's regular voice as she has a pretty deep voice! but as Glinda, her voice is high pitched. She also did this evil possessed voice sometimes that had the whole audience laughing. I don't think any of the Glinda's do it THAT much. Some of them can sound outraged or insulted, but Dianne is Positively Possessed. During "As Long As You're Mine" Cassidy had to laugh for some reason and, knowing Oli, he started laughing as well. So that made that song suddenly funny. When Oli first come up as Fiyero he did his regular "guy salute" with Averick, but this time Oli slapped him on the ass at the end **haha! XD ** During "Dancing Through Life" Oli walked behind the statue **like he normally does** and then hid behind it, only to pop out at one point. James got spun around and landed in the arms of one of the girls, who kissed him full on the lips. After that James was waving some fresh air towards himself for the next 5 minutes XD Then at the end of Dancing Through Life there is a part that the fans refer to as "the Elphie dance" Where Elphie goes to the ball and people laugh at her, but she ignores it and dances this special dance.... but Cassidy did a hip hop step in it. And we were all laughing, even though the song is normally really sad. And then Dianne has to do the Elphie dance as well, because Glinda feels guilty.... but Dianne did a one-man wave at the end :'D which created a lot of cheering and shouting from the audience. The For Good that they did was soooooo sad. Kris, Soof and I were all crying **show me one For Good where I won't cry!** and it was sooo amazing!! This was also the first time we saw Harriette Thorp as Madam Morrible and she is both Scary with a capital S and funny. She is absolutely brilliant. And I have to say that Dianne's imitation of Harriette was to die for it was so funny.
**IstilllikeSarahEarnshawbetterthoughbutImnotgonnatellanyonethat O_O** I was also surprised with Dianne's regular voice as she has a pretty deep voice! but as Glinda, her voice is high pitched. She also did this evil possessed voice sometimes that had the whole audience laughing. I don't think any of the Glinda's do it THAT much. Some of them can sound outraged or insulted, but Dianne is Positively Possessed. During "As Long As You're Mine" Cassidy had to laugh for some reason and, knowing Oli, he started laughing as well. So that made that song suddenly funny. When Oli first come up as Fiyero he did his regular "guy salute" with Averick, but this time Oli slapped him on the ass at the end **haha! XD ** During "Dancing Through Life" Oli walked behind the statue **like he normally does** and then hid behind it, only to pop out at one point. James got spun around and landed in the arms of one of the girls, who kissed him full on the lips. After that James was waving some fresh air towards himself for the next 5 minutes XD Then at the end of Dancing Through Life there is a part that the fans refer to as "the Elphie dance" Where Elphie goes to the ball and people laugh at her, but she ignores it and dances this special dance.... but Cassidy did a hip hop step in it. And we were all laughing, even though the song is normally really sad. And then Dianne has to do the Elphie dance as well, because Glinda feels guilty.... but Dianne did a one-man wave at the end :'D which created a lot of cheering and shouting from the audience. The For Good that they did was soooooo sad. Kris, Soof and I were all crying **show me one For Good where I won't cry!** and it was sooo amazing!! This was also the first time we saw Harriette Thorp as Madam Morrible and she is both Scary with a capital S and funny. She is absolutely brilliant. And I have to say that Dianne's imitation of Harriette was to die for it was so funny.
After the show we went to the stage door again to see if we could get some more autographs and pictures and we had also met with some more people from the forum. Then we had also met Beth, Ella, Lindsay and some of the others from the Forum and most of us had our Cast Change shirts on, which made people stare at us. hahaha. Beth, Ella and I were discussing Mark and Oli and how hot they were **I think Oli takes the cake, but Mark is a really really close second** We took a whole bunch of pictures basically and even the mother of the girl that created the forum came to us and asked if she could take a picture of us with the shirts :D which was pretty cool!! We grabbed a quick bite to eat before we rushed back to the theatre for the evening performance. We took some crazy ass pictures there too.. I think Beth and Ella have proof of that.. Then we sat down as the lights went down. The people were screaming their lungs out even when nothing happened yet. XD
But then the lights went out completely, the music started and the monkeys came down for start of the Show. The crowd went wild!! We saw Katie on the left side as one of the villagers, James **dressed in a curly, long haired, black wig and a dress O_O ** on the right side. Oli was on stage, clinging to Nadine from time to time **IswearIwasn'tcompletelyjealousofNadine! O_O** And then Dianne came down in her bubble and the whole audience started screaming like mad! Dianne loved it! I could see the twinkle in her eyes and the grin on her face. When, after like 5 minutes, we still didn't stop. She, as Glinda, raised her arms and silenced the crowd. We al stopped abruptly **like the well trained puppies that we are XD ** Same thing happened when James ran up the stage. We all screamed and applauded again. Which made him grin like an idiot XD and then the doors opened and Kerry Ellis came on as Elphie and she whole house went crazy! Like this lasted for 10 minutes or something. We screamed and shouted **some people even shouted WE LOVE YOU KERRY!!!!!** and it just went on and on and Kerry absolutely loved it. I could see her take a deep breath and blow it out to get the adrenaline rush out. The whole show after that was pretty much the same XD we all went MAD after every song, because it was the best show EVER! ... The Wizard and I was awesome, Loathing was the funniest thing ever!! Both Kerry and Dianne were clawing at each other. During Dancing Through Life, Dianne hugged James and he made a face at the crowd which made him look like a lovesick fool XD and then he walked away with Katie in the wheelchair and he gave a HUGE wink at Dianne... Popular had me laughing like an idiot. Kerry does her "Toss Toss" with such distaste which makes it even funnier. And through out the whole show, both Kerry and Dianne were making faces at each other or making fun of each other. Kerry did the Bunny Ears to Dianne when she wasn't looking. She did a little dance with her skirt when Dianne WAS looking. And there For Good had all the fans sobbing like non I have ever seen. **I even heard some guy blowing his nose and sobbing XD ** and Dianne was crying as well, but Kerry poked her in the stomach to make her laugh so she probably wouldn't start crying either. And I think the biggest applause came after For Good. And when the finished the performance and all the cast came on stage to take their bow, they got the standing ovation that they deserved! Especially Dianne and Kerry. This show was so good that even Brian May came to see the last one **yes that's right, Brian May... the lead guitarist of Queen!!! **
Oli gave the speech for Cassidy, James, Katie, Nigel and Kerry because they all had their last show that day and I think we screamed so loud that most of the people lost their voice at one point. And then Andy said that Oli had forgotten to include Nigel and Oli was like "We already did Nigel, and this is my speech stay out of it!" which got a good response from the audience.
After the show we ran almost to the stage door, but as soon as we left the theatre we were already in line for the stage door. There was such a crowd!!! I've never seen it that busy. James came out first and I had him sign my shirt :D I basically collected signatures from the whole cast on my shirt. Except from Oli, I had him sign his album for me and I told him that I loved it! and he gave me a big smile and a "aaw thank you very much!" and then I also asked him for a picture and he opened his coat for me so I could hug him. So I jumped to the opportunity and embraced him with both arms **I fit perfectly under his arm!!!!** and we had the picture taken. And with another girl was taking a picture with him, I told him he should smile, which made him grin and then smile widely **he he, I made Oli smile XD ** and I told him he always looks so serious in his picture and he responded with that he just "smiled a hundred times in the pictures".
And I also had Nigel and Harriette sign my program booklet and Dianne as well **even though Dianne had signed my shirt in the afternoon haha** and we gave Dianne a birthday card **she got sooo much presents from everyone we were joking with her she should have brought a trailer, she said she should have brought an entourage haha** And we also gave Kerry a present, but she was running late... I didn't get her to sign my shirt or a picture with her **cries** but she was rushing like mad **there were just too many fans out there** I did get Sarah to sign my shirt **she was reaching out for my chest first and I was just O_O what are you signing?! but then she signed my shoulder XD so it was cool ** and I asked her if she unwrapped my presents yet and she her head shot up, and I got a full dose of those sparkly Sarah eyes and she smiled hugely and said "yes! thank you so much!! that was soooooo sweet!!" and I thought I just died there on the spot :P I felt like bouncing around going "Sarah likes my presents! Sarah likes my presents!" but instead I just gave her a huge smiley of my own :p And she said that since she already sent me a picture of her in the Glinda Bubble dress, she wasn't gonna send me that one again... O_O I wouldn't mind at all!! but I;m kinda wondering if that means that she won't send me a picture or a completely different one...
And I also had Nigel and Harriette sign my program booklet and Dianne as well **even though Dianne had signed my shirt in the afternoon haha** and we gave Dianne a birthday card **she got sooo much presents from everyone we were joking with her she should have brought a trailer, she said she should have brought an entourage haha** And we also gave Kerry a present, but she was running late... I didn't get her to sign my shirt or a picture with her **cries** but she was rushing like mad **there were just too many fans out there** I did get Sarah to sign my shirt **she was reaching out for my chest first and I was just O_O what are you signing?! but then she signed my shoulder XD so it was cool ** and I asked her if she unwrapped my presents yet and she her head shot up, and I got a full dose of those sparkly Sarah eyes and she smiled hugely and said "yes! thank you so much!! that was soooooo sweet!!" and I thought I just died there on the spot :P I felt like bouncing around going "Sarah likes my presents! Sarah likes my presents!" but instead I just gave her a huge smiley of my own :p And she said that since she already sent me a picture of her in the Glinda Bubble dress, she wasn't gonna send me that one again... O_O I wouldn't mind at all!! but I;m kinda wondering if that means that she won't send me a picture or a completely different one...
And then finally!!!! after 5 times of seeing Wicked without any success... there was Katie Rowley Jones!!! OMG!!! And we went up to her for an autograph and a picture. She had to do it quickly as she was in a hurry too. I've waited so long for that moment, as Katie always eluded us by going the other way after the show O.o but now for her last show I got my shirt signed and a picture!! I also took a picture of Katie with Soof and Kris, but it was too light so I wanted to ask her if she could pose again with them so I could take a better one. But she just kept on walking... and I don't think she heard me anymore O.O
So since Katie was the last to come out, we decided to go to the tube to go to the hostel **we still had to check in XD** and we were basically watching Katie trying to hail a taxi, but she didn't have much success.... 5 taxi's without people just drove by without stopping for her...
So... after all that excitement we went back to the hostel, grabbed a sandwich at the Subway Sandwich thing and checked in to our room. We quickly put on our PJ's and talked for like 2 hours haha.. I gave Soof and Kris my presents... ooh and I got a present from Kris as well!! a freaking THE APPLE TREE PLAY BILL!!! **squeeeeeeeeee** best thing ever????? I love the Apple Tree and Kristin Chenoweth **squeeeeeeeeee thank you Kris!!!!!** And while we were talking Sophie had fallen asleep and Kris and I kept talking and at one point I realised I must have dozed off because I couldn't remember what Kris had just said haha. So we went to sleep as well.
8th of June.
Final day in London. I woke up waaaay to early because some idiot was banging on the door across from our room, trying to let his room mate let him back in to the room. But it woke both me and Sophie up **ust have been raised in a barn!!!** Then I fell back asleep again and woke up because of my alarm.. fell asleep again and then woke up to "I stand" by Idina Menzel XD which is a nice way to wake up though hahaha. Then we got dressed, packed our bags and checked out. Then went downstairs to get some breakfast. After breakfast we went to Tesco to buy some food for lunch. We then decided to go to Oxford street so Kris could buy some shoes she wanted, I looked at some shoes as well but I thought they were pretty expensive.... We also stepped in to a Disney Store and I was looking at all the Tinker bell stuff and Winnie The Pooh stuff... I wanted to have Rosetta from Tinker bell, but all they had from the movie was Tink :-/ Sophie bought a ball and we then went to Hyde Park where Sophie and I did the worst version of Popular EVER! XD she was laughing her head off, I forgot my lines **EEK!** and the whole thing was just a little weird because we were sitting on the ground on a blanket instead of two separate beds XD **and it's not really graceful to have to stand up before you can do a part of the song... at least not when I do it** and then I didn't even know what I had to do for a dance at all... so we just skipped it and decided to go to the Cyber Candy shop instead and after that we went to the Pizza Hut... where we ordered a CheeseyBites bottom, half hot 'n spicy, half Hawaii... after like 15 minutes the guy comes over and says the kitchen made a mistake... the made a Pan bottom instead of CheeseyBites :-/ and Pan just means normal.... but we ate it anyway, drank three glasses of orange juice for the price of one =D and then we kind of had to rush back to Victoria Station to catch my bus. I had half an hour left.... to both check in and get on the bus, but I made it!! I was able to check in immediately and keep on walking to step in to the bus. I took the back seats because I was planning on lying down to sleep... but some guy came to sit next to me **which I didn't really like** and then he start yapping away at me **which I didn't like even more** and then he asked me if I didn't want to talk and I told him I was really tired, so no not really. And then we drove off to Birmingham again, where a woman stepped in with two kids and the woman placed the kids in the chairs in front of us and she sat between the guy and I and started talking to me **joy -____- ** Then I was drifting off to sleep a few times. When we got to the boat I half ran to deck 7 so I could find a couch to sleep... but I was being interrupted by some loud mouth woman that was asking someone "ARE YOU ALRIGHT, DEARY?" like 20 times and I was just going mental and thinking why no one would tell her to quiet down as most people were trying to sleep!! Then we finally got in to Dublin again after 3 and a half hour on the ferry. We had to go through passport check and the guy doing the checking was SUCH a sour puss! he looked like we all smelled bad **okay I can't really blame him haha as some people did smell bad, but what can you expect when you have to sit on a bus in the sun without airconditioning??? ** and then at a quarter past six I was at the train station again, I bought my ticket and at 6.40 I could take my train and after that I had to go to work -________-