<a href="http://www.tashadoestulsa.com/2012/10/about-saturday-night/photo-6/" rel="attachment wp-att-12234"><img class="aligncenter size-large wp-image-12234" title="Tulsa Opera Tulsa Performing Arts Center" src="http://www.tashadoestulsa.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/photo-500x500.jpg" alt="Tulsa Opera Tulsa Performing Arts Center" width="500" height="500" /></a>

<a href="http://www.tulsaopera.com/" target="_blank">Tulsa Opera</a> and I have been seeing lots of each other lately.

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First, this:

<a href="http://www.tashadoestulsa.com/2012/10/about-saturday-night/picture-1-33/" rel="attachment wp-att-12235"><img class="aligncenter size-large wp-image-12235" title="Tulsa Opera Natasha Ball Tasha Does Tulsa" src="http://www.tashadoestulsa.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/Picture-1-500x364.png" alt="Tulsa Opera Natasha Ball Tasha Does Tulsa" width="500" height="364" /></a>

Which was followed by this:

<a href="http://www.tashadoestulsa.com/2012/10/about-saturday-night/operalearning/" rel="attachment wp-att-12236"><img class="aligncenter size-large wp-image-12236" title="Tulsa Opera Natasha Ball Tasha Does Tulsa" src="http://www.tashadoestulsa.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/operalearning-500x375.jpg" alt="Tulsa Opera Natasha Ball Tasha Does Tulsa" width="500" height="375" /></a>

On the left is Elizabeth Fischborn. She's part of the studio artist program at Tulsa Opera. She's nice. Her smile brightens an entire room. And she sings beautifully.

That on the right is, well, me.

Elizabeth spent more than an hour showing me the ropes of opera. She taught me a few phrases from The Daughter of the Regiment (more about that in a sec), and she even got me started on a song (the words were in <em>Italian</em>, y'all). She event wrote me a Tasha Does Tulsa theme song.

I've been on cloud nine ever since.

My poor husband and son? I've had to stock up on cotton balls. An ear can hold more blood more than you think, apparently. 

<a href="http://www.tashadoestulsa.com/2012/10/about-saturday-night/photo-6/" rel="attachment wp-att-12234"><img class="aligncenter size-large wp-image-12234" title="Tulsa Opera Tulsa Performing Arts Center" src="http://www.tashadoestulsa.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/photo-500x500.jpg" alt="Tulsa Opera Tulsa Performing Arts Center" width="500" height="500" /></a>

Let's go back to The Daughter of the Regiment. I'm signed up for emails from Tulsa Opera, and in one of their recent mailings was a note about how <strong>Tulsa students are eligible for discounted opera tickets</strong>. It had "date night" written all over it. So I took my graduate-student husband down to the box office at the Performing Arts Center on Saturday evening, two hours before curtain time on opening night, and pushed him out of the car and into the pouring rain. 

He came back with impossible tickets. Row K, seats 1 and 2—dead center, and the perfect distance from the stage for opera. 

And only $30 lighter. As in, two tickets for a price that's less than a single ticket in our seating area would have cost. 

Being married to a graduate student has its drawbacks. But then again, it definitely has its perks. And one of them is being mere yards from <a href="http://imgartists.com/artist/sarahcoburn" target="_blank">Sarah freaking Coburn</a>. And the rest of the fabulous cast of La Fille. 

Cloud nine. I wonder if this place has extended-stay rates. 

If you're a student, you have absolutely no reason not to check out <a href="http://tulsaopera.com/our-season/the-daughter-of-the-regiment/" target="_blank">one of the two remaining performances of The Daughter of the Regiment</a>. You get two tickets for the discounted rate. Better, you get best-available seating. 

GO. (And then come back to tell me about it.)