double whammy for facebook folks!

25 Things About Me. by Shannon Hoag-Hamman-Hoag

1. I am the wife of a wonderful man. His name is Kyle and he is my soulmate, best friend, love of my life and nemesis all in one. We met while rehearsing a show almost seven years ago. Our life together is not a show but is very dramatic. He loves banana laffy taffy. I most certainly do not. I told you it was dramatic.

2. I suffer from delusions of cleanliness. I like to imagine my house to be a palace of all things neat and orderly. I crave an entire room of my home devoted to the proper cataloging and storage of holiday decorations and various assundry bric-a-brac. Then I look at the reality of my hectic life and I wince at the improbability of it all. Order is for the birds. Seriously, just look how they migrate South. Orderly.

3. I love Sunday Spaghetti Dinner. This is how I knew Number 1 was NUMBER ONE. I want to have Sunday Spaghetti Dinner**with him for at least fifty years.

4. I love $20 dresses*. A dress, in my opinion, is the economic garment of the future. It is one piece, one look, not a bunch of separates. If you’re smart, you can pair several $20 dresses with one simple pair of black pumps. If you hate the dress next season, oh well, it was only $20.

5. I love Christmas Movies. Get over it. My favorite is Albert Finney in “Scrooge”- a 1970’s musical retelling of ‘A Christmas Carol’- Also starring Sir Alec Guinness and Dame Edith Evans. This is from my Father.

6. Along with Number 1, we have a goal of seeing all 50 states together. In our seven years as a couple we have seen 19 states.

7. I am working on turning my black thumbs into green thumbs. I love to grow basil every Spring. I always plant that and then go on a planting rampage when I go into my annual ‘I AM Mother Earth’ manic episode. Then I usually start rehearsal for a play in late summer resulting in total twisted-up, dried-out vegetation carnage in early November.

8. I love Nina Simone. I was lucky enough to see her perform once before she passed. I love Nina Simone.

9. I have no favorite play. I am an actor and I feel guilty about this. I am a bit of an experience junky, therefore every play I am in turns into my favorite play. Until the next one…

10. I love to cook for my family and friends. I love it. I love to experiment and whip stuff up. It strangely relaxes me.

11. I love Brussells Sprouts and I don’t care who knows it.

12. My Grandpa Lee is the biggest influence on my life.

13. Favorite Pizza= Green Olives and Mushrooms

14. My Favorite Books are The Dud Avocado by, Elaine Dundy and Middlesex by, Jeffrey Eugenides

15. I love sliced tomatoes with Sea Salt and Cracked Pepper. * See Simple Pleasures in Life. **See also Sunday Spaghetti Dinner.

16. I am an Olfactory person. I love the sense of smell. The smell of Cover Girl Pressed Powder and Estee Lauder Bright Red Lipstick are my favorite smells of Comfort. This is from my Grandma Betty. I recently smelled a perfume that was Grapefruit and Vanilla and this smelled like infant spit-up. I still love the sense of smell.

17. My favorite piece of music in the whole world in ‘The Swan’ by, Saint Saens, played on Cello.

18. I am a Sigma Kappa. My Mother, Aunt Debbie and I were all Sigma Kappas at Illinois Wesleyan University.

19. I am full of hope. It is party because of this year as a voting adult. It has a good deal to do with our new administration, but also has a great deal to with my recent adoption of a No More Excuses mindset. I need to be hopeful- the alternative is terrible.

20. My First Wedding Dance (with Number 1) - ‘Night and Day’ written by, Cole Porter-sung by, Ella Fitzgerald. This was a nod to our lives in the theatre- paycheck jobs by day- rehearsals or performances at night.

21. I want to go to Paris. Now.

22. I love the Rocky Mountains. I went there almost every summer as a kid and continue to envy the landscape to this day. I am jealous of people that live there. How do you have any problems? Look outside.

23. My brother Matt is the nicest person that I have ever met. He is and you should meet him.

24. I am somewhat embracing the experience of my own thoughts and ideas surging throughout my mind and then hearing my Mother’s voice coming out of my mouth. This was bound to happen.

25. I am a member of Strawdog Theatre Company. Become a fan on our Facebook page!

The Green Bird

It was the week before we opened (I think) and Michelle Caplan, John Ferrick and I were Hugen Hall working on production elements for The Green Bird.

Caplan was not happy.

I had my guitar.

I played a song to try and cheer her up.

I recorded it yesterday (seven years later) and put it to some pics from the production taken by Dave Brennan. Enjoy.



or you can check it out on my youtube channel here.

COLD.

First of all, they lost. I know. I don't want to talk about it.

Moving on...

It's COLD!!! Along with a good part of the rest of the country, Chicago is COLD right now. When the actual high for the day is NEGATIVE ONE then you know it's a cold one. With the wind chill and all that I think it got to negative thirty or something.

It's supposed to warm up tomorrow to the mid 2o's and I plan on going into the front lawn and sunbathing.

I've begun to blame everything on the cold. It's debilitating.

anywho...i'm off to to do some painting at the theatre.

boomer sooner.

I'm very excited today. Today the Sooners will play in the BCS National Championship. I've been a sooner fan since I was wee because my dad went to school there. and because they are awesome.

When I was in Sixth grade i dressed up as a Sooner Fan for Halloween. I wore Sooner pants, Sooner shirts, Sooner coat, Sooner hat, and anything else I could carry that said OU on it. Being that I was in Arkansas, I didn't win the costume contest.

We (my mom, dad, brother and I) went to the Orange Bowl on January 1st 1987 when we trounced the Arkansas Razorbacks. I believe I wore my shirt to school the first day back.

I think the BCS is a mess and I would have loved to play Texas again in the Big 12 championship but that's not the way it works. Oh well.

Oddly enough, last summer, before the football season began, I was joking with a friend about using the calendar on my centro and we "scheduled" the date of January 8th with the title "Good Things."

Good things, indeed.

Just write something...

I didn't really make a formal resolution but i'd like to do more blogging in the new year.
So I guess I'll just relay some interesting stuff happening with the Hamman-Hoags.

I'm working on getting the basement finished out and have made a little progress but have a long way to go.

For one, i was interrupted by a burst pipe in the laundry room. What would have taken a plumber two hours ended up taking me two days but now I know how to do it the next time.

Then, while I was working on that, we discovered a leak in the ceiling in the kitchen which required a replacement of the upstairs p-trap (it was rotted out and basically the sink was just pouring into the base, the floor, our ceiling, and then our floor...gravity at work) and the sink base floor that had rotted out. good times.

I also was able to finish the install of the basement bar sink so now we have a working sink down there which is nice.

Also, Shannon started rehearsal for Cherry Orchard which is exciting.

also.....while i'm working on my basement, i'm working on Kyle's Basement. which is my podcast that will be arriving soon. keep your eyes and ears open!

to really overload you with stuff i'll also be launching ihaveanger.com in the very near future. we just have a couple of tweaks we need to do on that one and then it's all set.

so...all in all there's lots happening. most of it plumbing related in the last couple of weeks.

and like i said i'm going to do my best to blog more. stay tuned.
kyle