The Arizona Burlesque Festival

I went all the way to the other side of the world and haven't said anything about it yet.  But we just got photos back from the Arizona Burlesque Festival so I'm sharing.
The AZBF was amazing!!
Tucson is amazing in itself. Hot, dry, sunny, gorgeous vistas of desert and those giant cacti, friendly people - and I have good friends there I stayed with in luxury, with a pool!
I spent a fair bit of my time there hunting down pink feather boas to repair this gown, which after so many wears looked like it had some kind of bird mange.
My darling Stevie patiently drove me all over town until we found what I needed at Jo-Ann, and SAS Fabrics. The latter was amazing. If I didn't already have enough sequin fabric to last me three lifetimes, and an already full suitcase, I'd have dropped some serious currency there.
Anyway it was worth it. As you can see I'm all pink and fluffed up! I performed Perhaps on Saturday night, which meant I could watch the rest of the show. Great show.

Someone called me Ursula that night. I was a bit miffed but after seeing this photo, I think it's a fair call.

Talk to the Hand!!!

What was happening? Maybe the microphone was giving me an electric shock, not sure. LOVE the lighting and the haze.

Thanks so much to Matt Finish and his team for putting on such a great festival. And to Tiffany at 48th and Pixel for the great photos!

Run up to December

After the Tease on Tour show in Queenstown last Monday, we experienced an unprecedented amount of audience curiosity and fandom! Over several hours around a fire pit, I got asked a lot of questions and got given a LOT of amazing compliments, which was lovely. It was an amazing way to round out a fantastic night and it got me thinking about what I will have achieved by the end of this year.
This includes:

• performing and hosting about 40 times in seven New Zealand locations! - Queenstown, Dunedin, Christchurch, Hamilton, Te Mata, Tauranga and Wellington;
• four countries: New Zealand, Canada, US and Australia (next week!);
• hosting 20 events from shows to a conference dinner, a carol service, some private corporate events;
• hosting in venues from an intimate 45 to a sold out 400 seat theatre, 400 dinner delegates, and everything in between;
• winning the Golden Garter Award 2019 for Favourite Emcee for the second time of three consecutive nominations;
• increasing my musicianship considerably from three guitar chords to 11 in a whole new type of performing for me;
• being invited to perform in the Menagerie in 2020 with my precious partners in crime, Leo and Clever.

One of the things I am proudest of is that Debbie and my DIY Burleskiwi show has jumped the ditch to Australia! To be known there as DIY Burleskoala, the inaugural show is on Thursday 5 December. Debbie and I are going to judge and host respectively. Jack is going to kitten, Artem his lovely boyfriend is going to be generally useful and amazing. A family busman's holiday! This year's DIY Burleskiwi winner Amourous Ava is also coming over.

Random encounter in a bar in Queenstown at 1am with Jason, it turns out we know lots of the same people! "Only in NZ"

 One of the cutest things that has come out of the stats is this. In 1983 I went on a tour of NZ with a show we would now call burlesque. I had made the costumes and was operating the spotlight. The show went to Queenstown and Dunedin among other cities and having hosted Tease on Tour in those towns I realised it was the first time since that tour I'd been to either of them! And two of the cast of that show now live in Sydney and I get to hang out with them next week when I am there.
How's that for a full circle.

I'm actually Back. Fact.

Hamming it up in Dunedin on 26 October.

I got home from Tucson on Thursday 16 October, and started a new contract on the following Tuesday, given Monday was a stat holiday. Since then I've done:

• two out of town gigs, one flying and one driving
• an at home gig last minute
• most of my Christmas costume
• a round trip in one day to Napier (4.5 hours each way) to pick up shop stock
• bought 23kg of dried fruits to make 23 Christmas Cakes
• worked full time

And now I have a two year contract which is like a proper permanent job really, working on a massive project that will make my CV look very impressive. I start in a week.
So there you go, I just glossed over my entire adventure because I can't face scribing it all a yet. I will, it's not like the news changes for waiting, not really!