Me and My Hand

Today (Wednesday) was all about getting in touch with inner parts of me I don't access very often.

1. My inner empowered computer geek

I watched the 1am-2am episode of 24 (Season 4). It's the one where Chloe (one of my new heroes) gets shoved into field work, decidedly against her will and better judgment.

Skip ahead if you don't want to read a spoiler from 18 months ago.

If you watch the show, you know it's the paragon of the cliffhanger. So Chloe's in a bad way and about to be killed by a very very bad man and there's less than a minute to go. Perfect cliffhanger. We've even gone to split screens, so you know it's about to be "thanks for watching, see you next week."

Final seconds, Chloe gets the combination to unlock the rifle, rolls out of her CTU car and blasts the shit out of the bad guy. All she needed was some black paint under her eyes and she'd be Rambo. Totally unexpected, totally fantastic.

I could do nothing but cheer, laugh and applaud. All alone in the flat, the cats looking at me like I’d gone mad.

Then it was a quick shower and off to the Duke of York's Theatre, where I got in touch with ...

2. My inner Communist sympathizer

I was in Starbucks last weekend, and sitting next to me was Rufus Sewel. A celebrity sighting for me, as I wanted to whisper, "I saw something nasty in the woodshed."

I actually wouldn't have minded a trip to the woodshed with him. He's much better looking in person than in the IMDB photos.

Turns out he's playing in Rock 'n' Roll, which I'd been meaning to see. It's the best straight play (that's a non-musical, for those of you snickering at the back of the class) I'd seen in quite a long time. Very Stoppard , but also very accessible, even for dolts like me who don't know too much about the Communist occupation of Czechoslovakia.

Rufus' portrayal of Jan was mesmerizing. Sinead Cusack was brilliant in the first act, but I couldn't get past how old (at least for her character, who was supposed to be a good decade younger than the gray-wigged Sewell) she looked in the second. Even Margo Channing had to draw the line somewhere.

I'm sure it will have a B'way transfer in the next season or two, but if you can see it with this cast, I heartily recommend. There’ll be heaps of awards heading its way.

By then it was dinner time (it's a 3-hour show), so I met Derek for a quick Joe Allen dinner. Then it was off to Wembley Arena to visit ...

3. My inner lesbian

Pink put on quite the show. She’s near the top of the “I want to go out drinking with her” list, and I haven't seen so many girl-loving-girls since the last time I was at Women’s' Week in Provincetown. Only thing missing was a case of Bud and a football. And maybe Chloe with a semi-automatic to prevent the dad in the row behind us from marching his three pre-teen daughters out at exactly 10:15 pm. They were adorable. Knew all the words to every song, were really well behaved, and were having a total blast.

Then, all of a sudden, they're walking down the steps toward the exit. Seemed Dad had said "time to go" and off they went, missing a good five or six songs at the end. Bless.

All in all, I couldn't have asked for a better 24 hours.