I'm blogging at The Popculturedivas today

Join me at The Popculturedivas for Sometimes Reviewers Don't Always Get it Right, where I look back at the initial reaction to The Nutcracker.

Thursday Thirteen - 74 - 13 Things I Long To Do

Last week I listed 13 things I'll always take a pass on. But what do I long to do?


1 - Go to the home venues of all the great ballet companies of the world to see these elite artists perform.




Which ones? Oh, let's start with the Mariinsky Ballet Theatre in St. Petersburg, Russia.





Originally the Imperial Russian Ballet, and afterwards known as the Kirov Ballet, it's now been restored to its proper theatre-based name.





A Mariinsky production of Swan Lake.







Other companies I long to see:

The Royal Ballet at Covent Garden, London, England
American Ballet Theatre at the Metropolitan Opera House
Paris Opera Ballet at the Palais Garnier
Royal Danish Ballet in Copenhagen, Denmark
La Scala Ballet in Milan, Italy
The Australian Ballet at the Sydney Opera House


2 - Walk the red carpet as an Oscar nominee.










3 - Attend the Cannes Film Festival as a filmmaker.









4 - Direct my favorite actors and actresses in my films.










Gerard Butler











Richard Armitage















Ewan McGregor
















Hugh Jackman
















Scarlett Johansson
















Natalie Portman
















Shirley Henderson
















Emma Thompson







5 - Learn to stage-fight with swords.





6 - Go to a Romance Writers of America national convention as a published author and meet up with all my blog buddies.

These are two writers from my RWA Atlantic chapter at this year's San Francisco convention - my cousin Julianne MacLean and Stella MacLean.


7 - Drop into a book store and see all my books on the shelf. In the meantime I do that now with many friends' books.


Like this one by my chapter mate Cathryn Fox.










Or this one by my cousin, Julianne MacLean. That's my friend Lisa as my partner in crime.

Look at Julianne's shelf of books! Sweet.






8 - Have my engagement and wedding rings remade. If you put these two rings together, you'd get a close approximation of what they looked like. Losing them ranks up there with one of the worst things that has ever happened to me. I lost them when we moved from Toronto to Yarmouth, Nova Scotia.


I wasn't wearing them at the time because I'd lost a diamond out of the wedding ring and had them in a container, packed in a box of all my most precious things (including my diaries. I know.) Needless to say, this box did not get put on the truck.

At the moment I'm wearing a simple gold chevron ring with a small diamond which I bought on my trip to Toronto last October, with money my gram gave me. (Gram: "Come here, you. Take this, now. Don't spend it all in one place.")


9 - Drive a black Jag XJ6.











10 - Live in a restored Victorian mansion.

























11 - Attend a reenactment Victorian all-night ball.









12 - Visit historic gardens with exceptional rose displays.










13 - Go to Scotland.