January

Let's start with something really vital. James discovers the broiler!

Most ovens have one, and much to his delight, so does theirs. He uses it to cook up some steaks and he and Tara enjoy a nice New Year's Eve dinner at home.

Technically, this was the tail end of 2007. Let it slide.

Tara books a McDonald's Dollar Menu voice-over spot. She plays an apple pie. It's weird but ...cha-ching!

Paul Boesing, their first roommate of the year and a friend from Omaha, moves in with them to work on a play in New York. Tara and James go to Disney World with Tara's family and, in Epcot Center's pretend Germany, they discover that they sell Spaten Optimator by the LITER. Danke, Disney.

Upon their return, Tara and James team up with the great group that is Project Theater and begin rehearsals for Shel's Shorts, a collection of hysterical vignettes by the surprisingly raunchy Shel Silverstein. The Giving Tree, it ain't folks.

All the while, Tara and James work their corporate temp jobs on Wall Street and Midtown, respectively, and they do their best to ignore the sights, smells and body slams that come with the rush hour commuting via subway.

Dinah lands a small part on "Guiding Light," playing a nurse who turns out to be a serial killer, later revealing that she's an undercover cop, only to discover that she is her own mother. The producers write her out of the script after three episodes, but it was nice while it lasted. She is still receiving fan mail almost a year later.

February

Ah, the bitter month of February. And wouldn't you know it, it held out to 29 days this year. Gross. However, good things happen. "Shel's Shorts" opens at the 78th Street Theatre Lab, receiving great reviews and much fun was had by performers and audience alike. Yay bawdy humor!

Brian Sell and Tara in the short, "Do Not Feed the Animal"

James leaves Citigroup and heads to Syracuse Stage, beginning rehearsals for Bomb-itty of Errors (an ad-rap-tation of Shakespeare's Comedy of Errors), in which four men play all the roles. The show is entirely rapped, a "hip hopera" if you will.

Tara takes James's place at Citigroup, and becomes immersed in Microsoft Word, Excel and Powerpoint (oh my!) Dinah, when not taking Tara for a walk every morning and evening, wonders where James is hiding. She cannot find him under the bed, in the bathroom or behind the television. She does find a bunch of loose change in the cushions of the couch and spends the rest of the month roaming the dollar stores of Bay Ridge. James is a distant memory after filling the void with unnecessary plastic objects.

March

James opens the show and realizes a few things:

1. It is a blast and it just so happens that he is not an awful rapper

2. It snows every day in Syracuse

3. He looks hideous in drag (see below. James is in the red dress)

Tara plugs away at Citigroup, a sometimes tedious, sometimes stressful job, but she loves the fact that she works alongside a good friend and that there is a CAFETERIA in the building. Tara, who didn't have a cafeteria in grade school and seldom utilized the one in high school, is enamored of the one in the Citigroup building. The curried chicken is a delight. She overdoses on it slightly.

However, no magical food court can take away the fact that Tara and James miss each other. It is decided that Tara will take a six-hour Amtrak train from Penn Station to Syracuse over Easter weekend. May they take a moment here to encourage those who want to make this journey in the future to FLY. FLY FLY FLY to Syracuse from New York. It is quick, probably devoid of some really bad smelling nachos, and not a whole heck of lot more expensive. Live and learn.

They have a great time, with Tara seeing the show twice on Saturday, and then spending the next couple of days tooling around Syracuse. They drink great beer, eat fantastic barbecue and swim in the pool at the Residence Inn where James is living.

Dinah declines the offer to visit Syracuse and stays in New York to workshop her autobiographical musical. Working titles in include but are not limited to:

• "Fetch! Poop! Eat! Sleep!"
• "Rolling With It!"
• "Beagle with Cream Cheese! My Life as a New York Mutt"

April

April. Sweet lovely April. The weather is warmer, which means Dinah gets muddy and can't take Tara for a walk without sniffing every inch of thawing ground.

Tara spends a weekend at Montclair State University in New Jersey, co-conducting a Suzuki Workshop for some of the undergraduate actors. It turns out to be an excellent time, not only because of the enthusiasm of the students, but also due to the fact that Tara has another opportunity to eat in a cafeteria.

James closes the show at Syracuse Stage and returns to Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. Tara and Dinah are glad to have him back even if it's only for a short time. There are real meals, another human to give in to Dinah's every whim, and they can finally catch up on the important stuff. Netflix.

Grand Army Arrows (James's rock band) plays a fantastic show at Arlene's Grocery in Manhattan.

Tara goes to the dentist. This may seem mundane, but if you are an actor, you know how extraordinary this is. This proves to be a somewhat terrifying experience, however, because it had been an unmentionable amount of time that Tara had been in hiding. They are gentle and sweet and after her knuckles turn back to a normal shade, Tara walks away with tidy teeth.

James leaves for Stockbridge, MA to begin rehearsals for Harold Pinter's The Caretaker at the Berkshire Theatre Festival. Dinah starts a cat-walking business in Queens. It's awkward at first, for a number of reasons. But she gains the respect of some fairly well-known daytime-drama stars and the clients start pouring in.

May

This month proves to be full of suspense, intrigue and mostly traveling. While James is in the Berkshires rehearsing, Tara is finishing out her stint at Citigroup, taking the 5:19 train to Wassaic every Friday afternoon to visit James on the weekends.

Grand Army Arrows plays a benefit show at Firefly in Lenox, MA. They rock the place, a lot of money is raised and everyone has an enormous amount of fun.






Dinah, meanwhile, hires a full-time staff for the booming business in Queens, and takes a month-long Mediterranean cruise. She becomes a shuffleboard shark and is asked to leave the ship after swindling all the passengers out of every drink ticket they have left.  Considering the humans she lives with, she comes by it honestly.

Tara leaves for Omaha for the second year in a row to begin rehearsals with the Nebraska Shakespeare Festival. James opens The Caretaker shortly after Tara takes off for the midwest.

June

Tara is busy in Nebraska, simultaneously rehearsing Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing and King Lear. While she is not in rehearsal, she is avoiding tornadoes. There isn't a lot of down time during this gig.

The Caretaker is enjoying its successful run at the Berkshire Theatre Festival. Tara never has the chance to see it in an actual performance, but those who do mention that James is almost unrecognizable as Mick, the less-than-desirable brother.

James, Johnny Epstein and Tommy Schreider

Johnny and James

James is mad and pointing

The end of the month is NUTS. Here's why...
Tara is scheduled to begin rehearsals for A Man For All Seasons at the Berkshire Theatre Festival on June 30th. What is awkward about this is the fact that her shows in Omaha don't close until July 6th. So...

Tara opens Much Ado About Nothing in Nebraska during the third week of June. She plays Beatrice and has a great time attempting to be funny to keep up with a very humorous cast.

Maria Vacha-Pittack (Hero), Tara (Beatrice) and Bryan Humphrey (Leonato) in Much Ado

Tara and Marcus Kyd (Benedick) in Much Ado

Tara and her umbrellas

Then she opens King Lear during the last week of June. Tara plays the middle sister, Regan, and is not as charming in this production (see facial expression below)

James closes his show on June 28th. During a few days off from production, Tara flies halfway across the county to attend the first couple of rehearsals for A Man For All Seasons. She realizes she is now doing three plays at once.  

July

Tara flies back to Nebraska on July 2nd to finish her run at the Shakespeare festival. James arrives later that same night, and Tara's mom, Michele, and her mom's fiance, John, fly out on the fourth to visit for closing weekend. Despite threatening weather, they are all able to see each show at least once. Below is a photo of the audience filling in the park.

While all of this traveling mayhem has been happening, Dinah is enjoying the relaxation of her country home with Tara's dad, Mark, and her Aunt Pepper. However, there is only so much eating, sleeping and unearthing cow carcasses that she can handle, so she marks off a plot of land behind the house, and, using her digging skills in a more productive way, she plants her first round of Christmas trees, capitalizing on her goods later in the year (see below)

Tara plunges full speed ahead into the second week of rehearsals for A Man For All Seasons at the Berkshire Theatre Festival, which opens at the end of the month. The cast is excellent and audiences enjoy the production. When she is not on stage, Tara spends a great deal of time changing in and out of extremely heavy garments.

Tara and James Lloyd Reynolds

Diane Prusha, Eric Hill, Tara and Gareth Saxe

Tara and Eric Hill

Gareth Saxe and Tara

James celebrates the last birthday of his twenties and he and Tara go out for momentous pizza at Baba Louie's in Great Barrington, MA. They recommend the fig and prosciutto variety. They also make the decision to go to Ireland in September. This is not a function of the mind-blowing pizza, although they were sort of mesmerized by the flavor.

August

Tara closes a successful run of  A Man For All Seasons  and she and James return to Brooklyn to prepare their apartment for their second roommate/subletter of the year, Bryan Humphrey (see Much Ado photos.) While in New York, James and his musical cohorts in Grand Army Arrows plays their last show before taking an indefinite hiatus from rock.  (No ugly Fleetwood Mac drama or ego clashes, just decisions to move out of state for higher education). The show was a complete blast, featuring many friends on backing vocals and some delightful animal costumes donned during a cover of ELO's "The Jungle."  So many folks came out of the woodwork to support us, that each band member made enough money to buy a round of celebratory drinks and take taxi cabs home.  Talk about going out on a high note!  

Dinah was kind enough to lend her talents to the last show by whipping up some choreography for the band.  She teaches them to shake, rattle and roll over (as well as rock and roll powerslide) their way to new stylistic heights.  Her pride overcomes her and she over-indulges in rawhide following the set.  This is a photo she's not proud of...

Having already made the decision to throw caution (and money) to the wind, Tara and James begin to plot their two-week whirlwind tour of Ireland.  Travel guides, online research and friends who either had been to Ireland or who had actually grown up there help them immensely in their planning.    

September

Before heading across the pond, Tara and James spend Labor Day weekend with family in Bridgeton, Maine. Tara swims and James wears a bathing suit and towel and stands on the dock and really pulls off the "I'm going swimming" look. They attend a Portland Sea Dogs baseball game and are quite impressed by the stadiums attention to detail in its attempt to re-create their mothership, Fenway Park.

Following the long weekend, Tara and James drive to Connecticut, offering Dinah a ride down to spend some time with her other aunt, Lily. She is tempted, but confesses that she has gotten herself into an unfortunate situation with the editor of the magazine, Dogue, who has named Dinah "Dog of the Year." Apparently, they have discovered buried photographs from Dinah's brief stint with the publication, Doghouse, and they want to take away her title. Below is one of the incriminating pieces of evidence. (Admittedly, this is in a frame at home)

From Connecticut, Tara and James head to New York's JFK airport and board their plane to IRELAND! They stay with friends in Dublin, tour the city and then hit the road in their little red Fiat to explore the south and west of the beautiful country. Tara drives the standard transmission on the wrong side of the car on the wrong side of the road for the entire trip. This translates to Tara never having to drive in the states again.   Ever. 

Here's a list of things they accomplish on their trip. They...

1. Drink their weight in Guinness

2. See a Pinter play at the Gate

3. Visit the Rock of Cashel and other Ancient Ruins

4. Don't kill each other when they get lost
5. Drive the Ring of Kerry
6. Hear (and in one case, James plays) excellent music

7. Walk 7 miles uphill to the Cliffs of Moher

8. Don't strangle each other when they reach the Cliffs of Moher
9. See a rainbow

10. Eat lots of chowder
11. Don't lose their chowder on the boat to the Aran Islands

12. Rent bikes on Inishmore and get sunburned faces

13. Get engaged
14. Visit Kylemore Abbey and the Connemara National Park

15. Chase sheep on the Hill of Tara

16. Meet superb people, residents and tourists alike
17. Pet a lot of cool dogs

18. Don't punch the Dan Dooley Car Rental associate
19. Have the trip of a lifetime

They return to the states glowing with happiness, although it could be the enormous amount of Kerry Gold butter glistening on their skin. Either way.

A few days after they get back, Tara and James are on the road (and water) again, traveling with Tara's dad to Montauk, New York for a family wedding. It turns out to be a beautiful weekend and the three of them have a great time catching up with family and friends. They particularly enjoy the three (six if you count the return trip) car ferries that take them to the island, as well as the GPS system that wows them with her knowledge at every turn.

Dad and Tara sing a few rounds of "I Will"

Dad and Tara enjoy the reception

October

October is big. Michele (Tara's mom) and John get married on the 4th at the Apple Tree Inn in Lenox, MA. Tara and James volunteer to do the baking and they make five different cheesecakes for the reception. They also play and sing for the ceremony (and a few numbers during the party later.) All in all, a lovely evening.

Group shot

Tara appears to be doing some form of the robot

Many cheesecakes

Tara and James go back to New York overlapping a few days with their subletter, who leaves at the end of the month. They decide to finally move in to their apartment after two years of paying rent by painting every room, putting up bookshelves and unpacking the twelve or so cardboard boxes that have been living in a closet since 2006.

Tara returns to the temporary staffing world while James is put in charge of the rest of the painting. The weather in the city is delightful this time of year, but Dinah refuses to return to the apartment until the renovation is complete. She is convinced that the second bedroom is being transformed into her personal home gym/greenhouse/bowling alley, and Tara and James don't have the heart to tell her that they need an office and she can shack up on the couch where she always does.