"Nice load!"

This country is soooo ovah. Well, at least the circus' run in this country is. We had our last two shows yesterday, and starting promptly at 6:35PM, the insanity that can only be known as Tear Down Madness started with a bang.

And only 3.5 action-packed hours later, our part was done. Holy hell, Batman! We expected to be working until midnight (a conservative estimate), but instead we had already enjoyed a few glasses of wine in the kitchen by that time. Halleliujia!

• donning of "Earl the Pearl" vest, hardhat and steel-toes: check
• hauling, pulling, dragging, and pushing of road cases: absolutely
• driving of a forklift: only had to do a bit
• farewelling of local temp staff: yup
• crawling over, climbing on, and lifting of various other things: oh ya
• rolling of carpet: left to other people this time!!
• closing of our sea container: done

You never know the extent of the Tear Down Fitness plan until the next day, when your legs are sore, your back aches, and your shoulders feel like they've been carrying a midget on them for a few hours. Today, remarkably, I don't have any of those signs. Instead I only have bruised knees and shins, a result of squeezing myself into small spaces in order to get everything completely packed into the sea container as efficiently as possible.

Loading our road cases and other assorted paraphernalia into the sea container is like putting together a jigsaw puzzle: fitting everything together as neatly and orderly and tightly as possible seems to be the way you earn your Tear Down stripes. The best compliment anyone can pay you -- and I kid you not -- is taking a look into your sea container and uttering those words you long to hear: "nice load!"

It's over and I'm on holidays for a couple of weeks. How freakin' good does that feel?!