Based in the Illinois-Iowa border community known as the Quad-Cities, rubynancy.com connects and promotes the various interests and enterprises of writer-educator-minister-activist Ruby Nancy.

At one time this site existed only to publish theater reviews:

Ruby Nancy wrote independent reviews of Quad-City theater, musical theater, ballet and other selected performing arts events -- including the Iowa City theater scene -- from late 2007 until early 2009.  Click on the "Archived Reviews" tab (at left) to read any of those reviews.

All reviews published without a byline are the work of Ruby Nancy.  Reviews by other writers will carry their byline, and all work published on this site is the property of rubynancy.com.

Other content on the site may range from proper essays and opinion pieces all the way to unqualified rants -- and will generally be labeled in such a way that you can easily tell which is which.

Language: 

At rubynancy.com, which often discusses all things wedding-related, the terms "same-gender" and "opposite-gender" are used rather than the more common "same-sex" or "opposite-sex" descriptors. 

This is to emphasize that relationships -- most especially marriages -- are not simply about sex.  Since it is not required to be married to someone to have sex with them (and sex between unmarried people, regardless of gender, is not even illegal ), marriages between two people of the same (or the opposite) gender is not about having sex.  It is clearly about commitment: choosing to build a life together, creating a family of two adults (and possibly existing or future offspring), though I certainly hope that most couples will choose to enrich and deepen the connections in their relationship through sexuality as well as other important ways. 

At rubynancy.com, we use the Americanized term "theater" rather than "theatre" as a publication standard, and we use all caps (which, in the digital world is akin to shouting) to delineate the title of a play, musical or show.  Other standards exist, and are perfectly acceptable, but this combination has been chosen as a nod to theater itself, which is an ever-evolving combination of the everyday and the exclamatory.

At no time will we use the term "actress" to refer to a female performer -- just as we would never refer to others as lawyeress, doctoress, farmeress, technicianess, danceress or chefess (just to give a few examples).

We use an individual's full name on their first reference within a story, and their surname(s) for any subsequent reference(s).  For the sake of clarity, we may override this rule when more than one individual within a story has the same surname(s).  The use of honorifics or titles (such as Ms., Mr., Mrs., Rev., Dr. and so on) is not part of our publication standard, and will not be used unless germane to the story or absolutely necessary for clarity.

Copyright: 

All the reviews, essays and other material published on this site are under the exclusive copyright of rubynancy.com, and may not be reproduced for distribution or be published elsewhere. 

Performing arts organizations and individual artists are granted permission to print a single copy of the page containing a specific review for their archives, scrapbooks, portfolios or bulletin boards; theaters and performers are also welcome to put a link on their website that will direct readers to rubynancy.com to read a review.

If you are a bride or groom with a website/Facebook page/MySpace page related to your wedding, you are welcome to put a link on your page, directing your friends and families to this site's home page.