Our Saturday Matinee at “A Christmas Carol” Live

My wife Anne wearing a blue Christmas sweatshirt and a red afghan scarf, smiling and standing in front of a theater stage covered in fake snow. It's mostly dark but with select house on, including a few replica London street lights.

My wife Anne amid the reimagined snowscape of Victorian London.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: we don’t patronize live theater nearly often enough. Sure, we’ve visited New York City twice and strolled among those bright Broadway lights to catch popular favorites like The Lion King and Wicked. As for local theater here in Indianapolis…we’ve been shamefully negligent. My high school English classes took the occasional field trip to the Indiana Repertory Theatre — our most celebrated performance venue, but hardly our only stage — where my poor teenage self (whose family otherwise could never afford such extravagances) had the permission-slipped privilege to see productions of Macbeth (in minimalist postmodern with translucent walls), Richard Brinsley Sheridan’s comedy The Rivals (original source of “malapropism”, a useful word to fans of The Office), and Julius Caesar (starring no less an American celebrity than Family Ties‘ Michael Gross). My last engagement was thirty-three years ago.

Fast-forward to today: Anne and I had been discussing our omissions of local cultural experiences when an opportunity came up this holiday season: free tickets to the IRT’s annual performance of A Christmas Carol, courtesy of my employer (one of their nonprofit organization’s longtime sponsors). We kept our calendar clear, took advantage of the offer, and enjoyed a Christmas activity that for once had nothing to do with crowded family gatherings or big-screen movies with snow in them.

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Return to the Christmas Tree Forest: Indy’s Festival of Trees 2023

Christmas tree with stuffed polar bears climbing up one side on a tiny ladder, then suspended on wires to look as if they're taking turns diving off the other side into a "pool" made of blue ribbon.

Diving polar bears represent for the Special Olympics “Polar Plunge” charity challenge.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: every year the Indiana Historical Society in downtown Indianapolis hosts a special Christmas exhibit called the Festival of Trees, for which dozens of local businesses and charities festoon a tree or tree-shaped object with decorations befitting their interests and colors. Last year I checked out the festival for my first time along with my coworkers as we sauntered over on our lunch break. We had so much fun that my boss decided our team should make it an annual tradition.

Last time I created not one, but two separate MCC galleries for the occasion. My wife Anne still doesn’t work downtown or at my company and was therefore once again sadly not included in our field trip, but I took photos to share with her and with You, The Viewers at Home. Trees are identified by their trimmers and/or donors. Enjoy!

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Basil Fawlty Begs No Pardon: A Night in Indianapolis with John Cleese

Neon-lit marquee at the Old National Centre welcoming

6:30 p.m. Sunday night, total darkness thanks to Daylight Savings ending that very day.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: in October my wife Anne and I traveled from Indianapolis to Cincinnati for a live Q&A with TV’s Admiral Picard himself, Sir Patrick Stewart. The 83-year-old Shakespearean thespian and erstwhile starship captain had a new book to sell and thousands of fans to enthrall.

Speaking of American stage appearances by octogenarian Englishmen who costarred in a few landmark TV shows and some notable films, whose tours forbid the taking of photos or video, who’ve been married a few times and whose current wives are over thirty years younger than they are…now for something completely different!

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Halloween Stats 2023: Extra Helpings for the Brave and the Bold

Our kitchen table covered with over 300 pieces of candy in ten different piles. Possibly as many as 400. I lost count.

Yes, we overprepared. Fortunately candy never lasts long enough for us to worry about expiration dates. Assuming candy even has those.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: each year since 2008 I’ve kept statistics on the number of trick-or-treaters brave enough to approach our suburban Indianapolis doorstep during the Halloween celebration of neighborhood unity and no-strings-attached strangers with candy. I began tracking our numbers partly for future candy inventory purposes and partly out of curiosity, so now it’s a tradition for me. Like many bloggers I’m a stats fiend who thrives on taking head counts, even when we’re expecting discouraging results.

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The October 2023 Birthday Trip, Part 4 of 6: Antiquing Practice

A framed old Star Wars poster by Drew Struzan and Charlie White III (possibly a reprint) stands on a shelf along with a couple dozen loose Star Wars figures and some unrelated Hot Wheels.

Star Wars, age 46, is now a kind of antique. Sigh.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover:

In addition to our annual road trips, my wife Anne and I have a twice-yearly tradition of spending our birthdays together, usually traveling to some new place or attraction as a short-term road trip — partly as an excuse to spend time together on those most wondrous days, partly to explore areas we’ve never experienced before. That’s every May for me and every October for her. We’re the Goldens. It’s who we are and what we do.

Anne knew what she wanted to do for this year’s birthday outing way back in July: see Patrick Stewart live on stage in Cincinnati. As previously recounted, we landed fourth-row seats and had a wonderful time. But Admiral Shakespeare’s grand tour wasn’t the only thing we did that weekend. Friday on our way from Indianapolis to Cincy we spent the afternoon in the Hoosier town of Oldenburg, where German roots run deep and our curiosity abounded…

Other than the Brau Haus, the Oldenburg business that held our attention the longest was Carriage House Antiques. We don’t officially collect antiques per se just yet, but I can feel the urge coming as we age. I’ve bought the occasional objet d’art here and there, like that one time in Paducah when I picked up a stack of random issues of Marvel’s Quasar from an antique shop, not in the 3-for-$1 clearance boxes at the comic shop down the block. I could feel that same tug as we wandered this year’s Indiana State Fair, though their antique assortment was a competition, not a bazaar. Will we ever give in to the full antiquing urge and begin hoarding stuff we find that’s older than us, or are we okay with merely window-shopping and pointing at random items while telling each other, “Hey, I remember when this was a thing”?

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The October 2023 Birthday Trip, Part 3 of 6: The Hydrants of Oldenburg

Fire hydrant painted like a nun. The convent is across the street in the background.

Franciscan nun hydrant across the street from the Convent and Academy of the Immaculate Conception,

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover:

In addition to our annual road trips, my wife Anne and I have a twice-yearly tradition of spending our birthdays together, usually traveling to some new place or attraction as a short-term road trip — partly as an excuse to spend time together on those most wondrous days, partly to explore areas we’ve never experienced before. That’s every May for me and every October for her. We’re the Goldens. It’s who we are and what we do.

Anne knew what she wanted to do for this year’s birthday outing way back in July: see Patrick Stewart live on stage in Cincinnati. As previously recounted, we landed fourth-row seats and had a wonderful time. But Admiral Shakespeare’s grand tour wasn’t the only thing we did that weekend. Friday on our way from Indianapolis to Cincy we spent the afternoon in the Hoosier town of Oldenburg, where German roots run deep and our curiosity abounded…

Throughout our road trips one of our favorite art categories is Municipal Objects That Aren’t Normally Painted Unless Someone Realizes They Totally Can. During our Oldenburg walkabout it took us a few minutes to notice each of their fire hydrants benefited from an artist’s touch. It’s been eight years since the last time we saw such a collection, which dotted the landscape of Chicago’s Navy Pier. Oldenburg’s hydrants are smaller, yet nonetheless decorative and presumably practical. We’re pretty sure we spotted merely a fraction of their total hydrants, but those we saw were cute.

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The October 2023 Birthday Trip, Part 2 of 6: Welcome to Oldenburg

A large convent that looks like two 19th-century churches in a row.

The Convent and Academy of the Immaculate Conception, built in the 1890s. Tours available only by appointment, which we didn’t have.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover:

In addition to our annual road trips, my wife Anne and I have a twice-yearly tradition of spending our birthdays together, usually traveling to some new place or attraction as a short-term road trip — partly as an excuse to spend time together on those most wondrous days, partly to explore areas we’ve never experienced before. That’s every May for me and every October for her. We’re the Goldens. It’s who we are and what we do.

Anne knew what she wanted to do for this year’s birthday outing way back in July: see Patrick Stewart live on stage in Cincinnati. As previously recounted, we landed fourth-row seats and had a wonderful time. But Admiral Shakespeare’s grand tour wasn’t the only thing we did that weekend. Friday on our way from Indianapolis to Cincy we spent the afternoon in the Hoosier town of Oldenburg, where German roots run deep and our curiosity abounded. The two of us met in 1987 in high school German class. We can get sentimental sometimes when we’re reminded of that…

The town’s origins date back to 1837, when two speculators from the original Oldenburg in Germany bought land from a Virginia farmer who’d gotten there first. The duo drew up plans for a small community; other German immigrants joined them and founded its earliest establishments — its first church, a post office, a monastery, a convent, et al. Over time this new Oldenburg would amass a higher-than-average number of spires compared to the average Hoosier town, as expressed in their official three-spired crest that popped up here and there throughout our walk. The map that the Brat Haus waitress gave us was an unexpected and rather detailed surprise in annotating the various features and flourishes hither and yon. We’re not quite architecture geeks, but the brochure was a useful guide for our stroll around this pleasant autumn day.

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The October 2023 Birthday Trip, Part 1 of 6: Two Lunches at Brau Haus

Anne smiling at me across the table inside a restaurant with green and brown decor. Sunlight pours in a window at left.

The lovely birthday gal who refuses to age.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: in addition to our annual road trips, my wife Anne and I have a twice-yearly tradition of spending our birthdays together, usually traveling to some new place or attraction as a short-term road trip — partly as an excuse to spend time together on those most wondrous days, partly to explore areas we’ve never experienced before. That’s every May for me and every October for her. We’re the Goldens. It’s who we are and what we do.

Anne knew what she wanted to do for this year’s birthday outing way back in July: see Patrick Stewart live on stage in Cincinnati. As previously recounted, we landed fourth-row seats and had a wonderful time. But Admiral Shakespeare’s grand tour wasn’t the only thing we did that weekend. Friday on our way from Indianapolis to Cincy we spent the afternoon in the Hoosier town of Oldenburg, where German roots run deep and our curiosity abounded. The two of us met in 1987 in high school German class. We can get sentimental sometimes when we’re reminded of that.

The Oldenburg prelude to the Stewart event wasn’t part of our original travel plan. Two weeks earlier, we’d stopped for lunch on the way to Cincinnati Comic Expo at a German diner my boss had strongly recommended. The Brau Haus is housed in the Stuerwald Building, which was built in 1860 as a general store and is one of eighty 19th-century places still standing to this day in their historic district. We loved the food and hospitality so much that we decided a Brau Haus encore would go great with our Cincinnati encore. That gave us two lunches’ worth of highlights to share, taken two weeks apart.

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Indiana State Fair 2023 Photos, Part 9 of 9: The Year in Miscellany

Anne curled up inside a yellow wheel on a giant green tractor.

Anne all ready to nap inside a tractor big enough to hold her.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover:

It’s that time again! The Indiana State Fair is an annual celebration of Hoosier pride, farming, food, and 4-H, with amusement park rides, cooking demos, concerts by musicians either nearly or formerly popular, and farm animals competing for cash prizes without their knowledge. My wife Anne and I attend each year as a date-day to seek new forms of creativity and imagination within a local context…

It all comes down to this: all the other photos we took that were fit to share but didn’t lend themselves to themed galleries. Enjoy!

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Indiana State Fair 2023 Photos, Part 8 of 9: The Year in Antiques

three old comics in a vitrine.

Blasts from comics’ past: Gold Key’s Dark Shadows , dated November 1969, with a photo cover; Dell’s Four Color Comics #510 from 1953, art by Sam Savitt; and, the only one I own a reprint of, Amazing Spider-Man #11, dated April 1964, with art of course by Steve Ditko.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover:

It’s that time again! The Indiana State Fair is an annual celebration of Hoosier pride, farming, food, and 4-H, with amusement park rides, cooking demos, concerts by musicians either nearly or formerly popular, and farm animals competing for cash prizes without their knowledge. My wife Anne and I attend each year as a date-day to seek new forms of creativity and imagination within a local context…

One of the fair’s regular features is the antiques competition, displayed on the second floor of the Indiana Arts Building. I’ve never understood how it works, as there’s no “roadshow” involved per se. Step One: contestants bring in ancient items they unearthed somewhere. Step Three: prize ribbons are placed next to some of them. Nothing on display anywhere in the building explains Step Two. IYKYK, I suppose.

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