Income Taxes

This spring I have been participating in a volunteer activity: preparing income tax returns for seniors and others as part of an AARP program. The IRS is a major sponsor of this AARP program, supplying computer equipment and training materials. Because of the IRS sponsorship, we will help anyone that walks in the door. I would guess that seniors are slightly less than half our clients. Many are middle class working people and students from foreign countries that are baffled by our extremely complex income tax system.

This has been a very rewarding activity for me. The clients are polite, appreciative, and they really need help.

You can not see Swan Lake too many times

Last night we went to the Tchaikovsky Perm Ballet production of "Swan Lake" at Zellerbach Hall. This ballet company comes from Perm, Russia and, as you might expect, specializes in Tchaikovsky. Their orchestra came with them.

It was a delightful evening. The corps de ballet had the traditional Russian discipline and Natalia Moiseeva was an outstanding Odette/Odile. Comparing this to the Bolshoi Ballet production that came to Zellerbach about two years ago, I would say that the choreography of the Bolshoi was more difficult and hence more exciting but this was a more emotional and romantic interpretation.

I could easily see this ballet once a year for the rest of my life without tiring of it.

Culture Clash's Zorro in Hell

This week we went to one of the funniest plays we have ever seen. It was a farce, a satire, and (as a reviewer would say) a romp all rolled into one. It reminded me of Paul Sill's "Story Theater" from the late 60s and also a review with Betty White, the name of which I can not remember, that played in a small theater in Encino, CA in about 1958.

This play manages to poke fun at everything imaginable - from real estate developers to governor Schwrtzenegger. Along the way it references sources ranging from old B movies to Nietzsche and Carlos Castanega. The comedy alternates between pratfalls and satire. Time passed so quickly that it seemed we had been in the theater for 20 minutes instead of two hours.

If you can get to Berkeley this month, see it. If not, the same group (Culture Clash) will be presenting "Water and Power" at the Mark Taper Forum in late July, August, and early September in Los Angeles. Then they will do "Zorro on Hell" again at the La Jolla Playhouse. Go!