I know Kathleen made a post about this as well...but I really want to tell the story too.  So I am.  :)

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So in case any of you have been living under a rock since October...Morgan, Britt, Kathleen, and I went and saw Wicked in Cleveland this weekend.  On Friday, after Brittany finally made it to our apartment (Morgan got there WAY before Britt), we ordered some Padrone's pizza, made some sugar cookies, and watched Wizard of Oz (which was pretty hilarious with this group).  Then we put on the Wicked soundtrack and played Scatagories (or however you spell it) and then we did some facial masks.  I stayed up until about 3:30am before calling it a night, and Kathleen went to bed not too long after that as well.  Morgan and Britt, however, apparently stayed up until 6am before finally going to sleep.

We woke up on Saturday morning and made scrambled eggs and cinnamon rolls for breakfast.  Then we watched a bit of Rent, blared some Wicked again, and started getting ready to go to Cleveland.  We finally got the car packed, decorated it a bit, and then started to get on the road.  We stopped by Brookhart and NOM on our way out of town, and then we were finally on the highway.  We sang along to the entire Wicked soundtrack, then we listened to Rent, then Avenue Q, and finally Drew Carey (because it has "Cleveland Rocks" on it).  We got to Cleveland without a hitch, found a decently priced parking garage right across the street from our theatre, and we were still two hours early for the show starting (one hour early for when we wanted to be at the doors).  We found a Starbucks to use the bathroom and eat the sandwiches we'd packed for dinner, then we went to the Playhouse Square gift shop, and decided to start standing in line to get into the theatre fifteen minutes earlier than we had planned.  Once we finally got in, we went to the Ozdust Boutique stand and bought some stuff (Britt got a poster, I got a green "Defy Gravity" tshirt, and Kathleen got the regular black Wicked tshirt).  We finally got into the main seating area...our seats were DEAD CENTER in the mezzanine area...and they were AMAZING seats.  I didn't have to use the opera glasses once.  We had all the main people--Carmen Cusack as Elphaba, Katie Rose Clarke as Galinda, Cliffton Hall as Fiyero, DeeDee Hall as Nessarose (yes, she's married to Cliffton), Alma Cuervo as Morrible, Lee Wilkof as the Wizard, etc.  They were all FANTASTIC!

Then the show let out and the four of us headed to the back of the building where the State Theatre stage door is.  There was one other group of four there, but that was all. And so the four of us just kind of found a little spot to hang out and wait (we got there pretty fast after the show let out). After a few minutes this SUV-type car pulled up into the parking lot we were next to and this girl (she was probably about 13...we later found out her name was Kirsten) got out and asked us if anyone had come out yet and we said no, not yet and she got back into the car with her dad and they just kind of hung out there. A little bit later, the other group of four came over and started chatting with us and let us know that they had found out from some theatre workers that the cast was at a coktail party for patrons of the theatre or something and it may be a while before anyone came out. Brittany went over and told the girl and her dad what was going on. A bit later, the other group gave up and left and Kirsten got out of her car and said that they had four seats if we wanted to sit in their warm car and wait (and, as a bonus, they were listening to the soundtrack). So we joined her and her dad in their car and talked to them for, like, an hour.

After a while some ensemble members started coming out and we talked to a few of them. But at about 12:30 in the morning (an hour and a half after the show let out), this group of four or five ensemble members came out and Kirsten got out to ask them if Carmen and Katie were coming out any time soon. They said they didn't know, but one of the women took her souvenier program to run in and get them to sign. Britt, Morgan, Kathleen, and I got out of the car and decided we'd see if maybe someone would come out, but then we were going to leave once Kirsten got her program back (we had a 2.5 hour drive back to Ada, please recall). One of the ensemble women started talking on her phone and was asking Kirsten what her name was and then suddenly said, "Oh! They said they're on their way out!"

Less than a minute later, Carmen and Katie came RUNNING out of the stage door...no coats or anything...poor Carmen was in a t-shirt! They started giving us all hugs and saying things like, "We had no idea there were still people out here! You girls are so sweet! You're all so cold!" Kathleen and I had each made fan gifts (Kathleen had made a pink scarf for Katie and I had made a green scarf for Carmen) and they were over the moon about them!  They seemed to genuinely appreciate them and were amazed that we had hand-made the scarves ourselves. They kept hugging us and they personalized our programs and talked to us for a while. Then Carmen ran back inside (because she was really cold in just a tshirt), but Katie stood outside talking to us for a while longer and told us a funny story about how her shoes for the show have apparently been breaking a lot lately and falling off. Then DeeDee Hall and Cliffton Hall came out and talked to us for a while. And Deedee took my camera and took a picture of the four of us with Katie and Cliffton.

(picture above...Carmen and me)

After that, we said "bye" to them and walked back to the car.  We were all super jazzed and couldn't stop talking about the whole thing for, like, an hour and a half on the way home.  Britt and Morgan passed out in the backseat after that and Kathleen and I kept talking until we got back to Ada.  Basically, it was the BEST.  WEEKEND.  EVER!

(picture above...from left to right...Brittany, Me, Katie Clarke (Galinda), Kathleen, Morgan, Cliffton Hall (Fiyero))