Check-In Day

Today is "D-Blog Check-In Day," a multi-hyphenate event proposed by Christopher of A Consequence Of Hypoglycemia. Basically, the idea is that the Diabetes Online Community is just that: a community! The goal of being a community is interaction; we all contribute, sharing our voices, but it's nice to know we're not just shouting into the wind. Check-In Day asks one simple thing of its participants: if you read a D-blog today, comment! I haven't had the chance to read blogs today, but I'll try for the last couple of hours. I think it's a great idea. 

I haven't had time to blog much lately because life has been so eventful! If anyone here has seen my other blog, Rhymes With Dramaturg, you'll know I'm a theatre person, and I recently had a small dream come true when I was selected to be a judge for the Best of Fringe; basically, our Fringe Festival presents 150+ unjuried shows over twelve days in twelve mainspace venues, a kids' venue, "Alley Plays" at the Fringe Club downtown, and many unique "Bring Your Own" venues such as bars, fields, back-alleys, stores, laundromats, and anything else the creative teams can think of. Shows are between 45-90 minutes, with most being one hour. I love the anarchic, creative, artsy and often brilliant work that results, but my favourite thing about Fringe is, just like the DOC, the community aspect. You talk to so many new people, theatre fans like you. Word of mouth is the most important marketing tool at Fringe, because there's so much of it. You run into the same people (your theatre friends) over and over, and make new friends to see next time. I met wonderful people on the jury. Our job was to, between us, see all the shows and narrow them down to eight of the best to be re-mounted at an uptown theatre - currently happening, so if you're in Toronto and missed the Fringe, check these shows out!

I saw 44 shows (for free!) in 12 days as a Fringe VIP (plus another one at Best of Fringe 3 days later), liked almost all of them, and had an amazing time. We had meetings after the last show of the night that lasted hours, so I was NEVER home. My parents came home from a trip midway through the festival and I did not see my dad for a week. Thankfully, my fiance's 30th birthday (I can't believe it; we've been together since I was 19 and he was 21) was the last day of Fringe, when I was already fairly burnt out and could slow down with an awesome dinner at a fancy restaurant and then drinks with friends at a pub as near to the Fringe tent as possible, and I could go a short way to showing him how grateful I am at what a wonderful T3 he's been; truly, in sickness and in health!

My swanky VIP pass. I loved it so.

The thing about Fringe is that, since all the theatres are located in a similar area of downtown, and you are often running from one theatre to the next, there is a LOT of walking/running involved. Because you're seeing as many as seven shows in a day, there is not a lot of eating involved (not that much time in between)! To tie this to diabetes, this is both a fantastic and a terrible combination. Constant sweatbetes (and I mean SWEAT - it was bloody hot most of the time, when there wasn't a monsoon shutting down power and flooding the city) and not much fuel meant that I consumed every single glucose tab I had in my possession over 12 days, and I had many. Of course, to me, this is yet another reason to involve myself in as much theatre as possible; it lowers my blood sugar!

Finally, I'd like to mention a second D-Blog I've started (okay, I know; I don't need to splinter this any further). I love the "What Should We Call Me" meme, which is a headline situation posted, and a GIF underneath to illustrate that situation. So, if you like hilarious animated GIFs and diabetes, please check out What Should We Call Diabetes. You don't even have to comment!