Riyadh (Monday, November 02, 2009)

This is the end of our fourth amazing day. Yesterday was an eighteen hour day so we had no computer time – little sleep time for that matter.

There is no way I can capture all that we have learned and seen in the ten or so minutes I have to do this.

Among activities for yesterday were touring the King Faisal Specialist and Research Hospital. They do a large amount of basic research as major critical care and transplant surgery. We did see a significant number of women medical professionals, some veiled and some not.

Riyadh (Saturday, October 31, 2009)

If I had not lived all that I have experienced the past two days I would have thought I was reading a make-believe story.

Late yesterday, after some sleep, we went about 70 kilometers, motorcade again, to the Al Musmak Palace which was a replica of a 300 years old palace, in the desert, which was captured 150 years ago and was the beginning of the founding of the modern Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in 1902.

Riyadh - Friday, Oct. 30, 2009
We're here! After fourteen hours of flight time and five hours sitting in airports, we arrived last night around 9:30. There are thirteen legislators, two NCSL staff and two Saudi men assigned to the Saudi Embassy in D.C. in our group.

The Riyadh Airport was magnificent! We were whisked away into big black cars with big black SUV escorts, lights flashing and sirens going. Quite intimidating for all of us!
We are staying in a government guest conference palace which is the equivalent of a very nice big hotel except there is no one in it except us!

Here a couple of off-beat destinations for this weekend:

Friday isn't quite Halloween, but it's still the weekend. Since trying to burn everything for Devil's Night is both dangerous and illegal, why not try --

Sunday, Oct. 25, 2009 (Greenfield)

This is the first of what I hope will be frequent blogs over the next two weeks about my trip to Saudi Arabia. Actually, this is the very first blog I have ever done and this entry is a dry run to see if I followed instructions correctly in setting it up.

The show that has been a phenomenon on Broadway, on tour, and even at the movies, "Mamma Mia," was back in Indy for live performances Friday through today (Sunday) at Clowes Hall.

For those who haven't seen this musical, it is a wonderful experience well worth the effort of seeing (unless you really hate the music of ABBA). It frames the pop hits of the 1970s-80s Swedish supergroup in a romantic comedy reminiscent of the goofy situations of a Shakespeare comedy.

I'm always up for a tall tale, as long as that tale is well-spun. And they rarely come better than the story of "Shipwrecked: An Entertainment" now on stage at the Phoenix Theatre in downtown Indy. Now, before you have the young'uns look away from the screen, I must note that unlike much of the Phoenix fare, this show is very much all-ages. I'd even recommended it for kids, and at 89 minutes long, it won't try their patience.

Edgar Allan Poe was the master of the macabre short story -- heck, he practically invented it -- and an excellent poet. But can such works be made into an interesting and entertaining musical? The answer is yes! Presenting "Cabaret Poe," the new musical with music and words (other than those supplied by E.A.P.) by Ben Asaykwee, playing Halloween in the Irvington Lodge (former Masonic Lodge No.666), 5515 E. Washington St. in Indianapolis.

Among the popular crowd pleasers that make the rounds of Indianapolis stages, it seems the number one show is Andrew Lloyd Weber's musical "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat." Now Beef & Boards Dinner Theatre in northwest Indianapolis is taking its turn, with performances daily except Mondays through Nov. 22.

The 20th anniversary Tenderness Tour to benefit the Indiana Coalition Against Domestic Violence comes to The Bread Ladies in downtown Greenfield, with live music by Luke Austin Daughterty and Ann McWilliams and sales of the benefit CD "Give a Girl a Chance."

Richard Propes has toured the state in his wheelchair year after year for the cause. This is is last tour, as he establishes the Tenderness Network. Click on the tour link above for details.