Hi Hudson,

First of all, the most important news of the week, the Sasquatch was updated again:

I don’t know who updates the Sasquatch, but THANK YOU!

I also don’t know who the Hudson Wail or the Greenport Wail is, but the Hudson Wail reminded me of the dollar sweet potato pie desserts from Kennedy Fried Chicken – a previous tenant of the Barnfox space (or was it Culture Cream?).

In two unrelated news topics, this building on Warren got a makeover, and the Tootsie rolls returned to Planet Fitness. I asked if Planet Fitness was going to bring back bagel mornings and pizza nights – they were not able to confirm.

Things change, or sometimes they stay the same.

The sidewalk sign outside of Hudson Bagels

I have an unofficial contest for the funniest sidewalk sign
This week, Hudson Bagels wins. Send me your fav.

Here’s some pictures of leaves on trees in case you don’t leave the house. Ha! Ha! Ha!

Have you ever been to the Ghent Playhouse? If you drive up Route 66, as you go over the hill (and the speed limit sharply decreases to 30), there’s a little water fountain. In front of the fountain, before you get to the Bartlett House, is the Ghent Playhouse.

I saw “Buyers and Cellar” last weekend, starring ONLY Sam Reilly – a one-man show. The show begins with a disclaimer that is it complete fiction. The premise of the play is a line or two from Barbra Streisand’s style book “My Passion for Style”. Barbra describes her house and her basement. The basement is a mock Main Street with little shoppes that store Barbra’s antiques, dolls, and other items including a yogurt and popcorn machine. The main character gets a job staffing one of the faux shoppes in Barbra Streisand’s basement. Barbra, the only client, visits maybe once a day to browse the items she already owns.

You have to just go with it, as the character does.

It’s a great show. Totally worth it. Click here for tickets and info. Tickets are a b o u t $25.

Sam Reilly does an amazing job, as multiple characters, including Barbra. He is the only person on stage for almost two hours – with an INSANE amount of lines to memorize!

The premise is completely bizarro-world, but at the same time, not unbelievable! I was transfixed the entire time (and I was up at 3:30am that day baking cookies).

This weekend is the last weekend, but there’s other great shows at the Ghent Playhouse coming soon.

A show like this is what you can talk about at an upcoming dinner or cocktail party! (Stay away from politics at the moment…) It’s a plot that your friends are not going to believe – and they are not going to believe that it happened in that quaint little theater house in Ghent.

Read the interview with Sam Reilly here.

Sam Reilly as Alex More in “Buyer and Cellars”

“Buyers and Cellars”: This outrageously funny and irresistible one-man play from the most peculiar of fictitious premises – a struggling L.A. actor takes a job working in Barbra Streisand’s Malibu, California basement – makes for some delicious wit and insight on the solitude of celebrity, the love-hate attraction between gay men and divas, and the melancholy that lurks beneath the narcissism.

Read about The Ghent Playhouse here.

What else did I do this week? I went to the new Mexican place on Fairview by the Staples, that used to be La Bella’s Pizza. It’s called Mi Rancho Alegre, which I looked up, and google translates tells me it means, “My Happy Ranch”. I’m going with that.

I was definitely happy there.

My “friends” told me, “Oh, you went there? We’ve been there twice already?”

What? Some friends!

The menu is huge, the drinks, and drink menu, is ridiculously huge. I ordered, as usual, the gayest drink on the menu (if I can’t get a Malibu-rum Seabreeze) – a strawberry daiquiri inside a pineapple – with the rum bottle insert upside down. My friend ordered the Beer-ita, a bottle of Corona upside down in a mug filled with a margherita.

The restaurant is as big as the menu. There’s a back room, study tables and chairs, horse paintings, and fun music.

We went on a Friday at 7pm, and there was a twenty minute wait for a table. The place was packed! My advice? Don’t go then. Try an off-hour.

As the neon sign says, “Feed me taco and tell me I’m pretty!”