Thursday, April 26, 2007

Boxes and smatterings of other such notables



Ah, moving.
How I love the grey stained fingers from endless wrapping of breakables in newspaper, how quickly and masterfully I am now able to construct a box, the random odds and ends I have discovered and discarded (how many bloody candles do I own? and why do I keep all the address labels that charities continually send me?), and the horrible piercing stench of oven cleaner.

I am very very eager for this week to be done. Unfortunately, further box-ing (not the fun kind!), cleaning (I am seriously petrified of under my stove- I swear a mutant band of spiders is probably waiting for me), and dealing with my building manager stand in the way of that.

Between that and the study-fest that proceeded my ethics orals (and, okay, a few fun sojourns, too), there's been little time for blogging, unfortunately. As such, I bring you the highlights and lowlights (I don't know if that counts as the opposite of highlight except in hairdresser speak, but I'm rolling with it) of my week:

Highlights:

Chasing ducks across the street. As we were on our way to dinner Friday night, the Duke and I came across a random duo of ducks clearly out of place on a relatively busy street. They were precariously waddling in and out of traffic, and a woman on a cell phone was frantically trying to save the ducks, with others walking by, oblivious. We put forth a joint effort, and we chased them across the street from different angles until they reached the safety of the parking lot (where, I'm assuming, the mallard put his mack on... the lady duck was surely turned on by his risky behaviour).

With hindsight, they probably would've flown away if they were in too great of danger.

Random sibling adventures!. My little sis is currently on a solo figuring-out-her-life road trip. She happened to come into the city a day later than planned, meaning that she was leaving for a small town a few hours away the day I finished my massive exam. She convinced me to come along for a day of the road trip with her, rather than celebrating the test completion by, yes, packing more boxes.

We ended up having a fantastic time. Her and I, who share the tendency of being a tad bit overcontrolling of our surroundings, decided to just completely play things by ear, and venture down some random roads in the hopes of finding something worthwhile (she was actually on a desperate search for tidepools, being a current prairie resident). Sometimes this turned out better (we saw enormous sunstars at a little pier in a small town), others not so much (driving over 30 min down a twisty road trying to find a park, only to find a sign telling us we were at the wrong spot-- apparently we weren't the first to make this mistake-- then finding the park entrance, only to discover we needed to hike several kilometres to get to the ocean!). I headed back to real life early afternoon the next day, but it was nice to get a quick escape with my sis, who I miss very much most days.

Concerts! This week I had the immense pleasure of seeing both Regina Spektor and Damien Rice in concert. Regina has an incredible voice that holds up amazingly well live, and is utterly adorable on stage-- she seems very much at ease. I was extremely impressed.
Words can't even express how amazing Damien was, though. I had goosebumps for most of the show. It was one of those shows where I still feel on air when I think back to it. There's something about live music like that which gets me to a place like nothing else-- hard to explain to those who don't have that same connection with it.

***

Lowlights

People who talk during concerts. I really want to know who the hell pays to go to a concert, and then holds on a conversation through the whole thing. How is it in such obvious poor taste to talk through a movie, yet, during a show that people have paid several times the cost of a movie ticket, reasonable to chat about how drunk you were last weekend when the artists is playing *gasp* not their single, or, heaven forbid, a b-side?
Almost as bad are the amateur vocalists. For those of you not familiar with the stylings of Regina Spektor, she tends to be quite, um, vocally flexible, and will do odd things with her voice, like singing ridiculously fast, hitting very high notes, or interjecting some odd noises. She is, generally, the only person in the venue who can get away with this-- hence why she is up on stage, and you are not. So, please please, do not attempt to croon along to her every note at the top of your lungs while standing directly behind me. I shouldn't be laughing hysterically during a serious song.

Ethics oral exams. I know it is of vital importance for me, as a future-psychologist, to be impeccably ethical in my professional behaviours. It is still just plain mean to make me sit before a table of three alternatively unblinking staring or frantically writing professors and answer how I would resolve ethical dilemmas for an hour.

Lettuce-less salads? Since when did lettuce become an optional component of salad? Is it really an unfair assumption of me to make that my ten dollar salad will contain something other than ten cherry tomatoes and ten half-pieces of boconcinni drizzled with vinegar and accompanied by a little pile of pesto? I bet the chefs seriously laugh at whatever poor fool orders the salad, knowing that no one wants to look so uncouth as to have assumed a pile of greens in their salad dish, and watching me ogle my companion's burger of the same price.

8 comments:

Ant said...

I like the picture, the chasing of the ducks, the mini road-trip and the thought of hearing Damian Rice live.

But...

I sing at concerts. I know it annoys so many people but I do attempt to play the "endearing enthusiasm" card. The alternative is to just stand there - I gotta dance, sing or do something. Especially if I'm really loving the music...

Princess Pointful said...

Don't get me wrong- I sometimes sing, too-- but I don't try to hit the high notes in someone's ear, especially when it is a small venue with just a woman and a piano, rather than the chorus of a song at a big stadium.

L said...

Haha, there's nothing like a good duck chase!

Good luck with the move!!!

Airam said...

I had a vision of someone who was tone deaf singing behind you!! Hilarious (ok I guess not for you but it was for me)!!! I probably shouldn't laugh at that or I'll jinx myself for the next concert I attend!

Ultra Toast Mosha God said...

I have heard great things about the live show of Mr Rice.

Yeah, the having a conversation during a show thing really annoys me.

SMARTBuddy said...

Mutant spiders hiding under your stove? Brrrrrrr that is a terrible thought...

eric1313 said...

Most concerts I've been too you can't have a conversation longer than "DID YOU BRING A JOINT?" or "WHEN THE FUCK ARE THEY GOING TO PLAY _____".

But that's me.

Actually, out door concerts seem to always involve lots of kibitzing... If me and my sister go to one, which we have a few times when we used to get free tickets to the local amphitheaters, we would talk and smoke joints the whole time...

But not standing by people, usually off in the back by the trees and hills.

Now don't get the above wrong--I once quit smoking pot for a year, and Kristen got me back into it! Influence goes both ways, you know!

I'm laughing my ass off at the idea and memories. Oh god, how I just made myself look terrible...

And I hope your new round of responsibilities don't take you too far away from us. I like your presence and words too much and would miss you a lot.

And thanks about the poem--the vultures were for the dead relationship, though, but I guess it worked for the 'me' in the poem. Just like the word wastes at the end was a direct play off of waste in the sense that a wonderful thing was wasted, as well as the desolate feelings. That was one of my favorite poems yet.

I'm getting pretty good! (toot! toot!) Hop by the butterfly some time, too, unless of course you already have. And remember, if you are ever board and the timing is right for you, you can porch party with us. Lots of people say yes then never show and then tell us they don't want to be in the way. But we like fresh ideas in the mix. And you would not be in the way. we just go back and forth, sometimes short verse, sometimes long verse. You should've seen the other night! After I wrote the first kiss poem, we went krazy! and filled in sixty responses with poems back and forth punctuated by little greetings and questions and whatnot. It's so much fun. And so much poetic growth.

Singleton is like a bootcamp drill sergeant for writers! I was just a child playing with words until we started writing together. Craziness to think...

Anyway, I bet you are off to bed... Or maybe not. It's really effin' late here, but not so bad there. Glad you dropped by. So, did I have like fifteen entries on your google reader? That's me, I'm the editing perfectionist. Sing gets annoyed with my snippity snip antics some times, but I can't help it, if I see one thing wrong or one thing that could be said better, it bothers me to no end. That's why Michelle used to employ me as her editor when I was just a lowly student with a few credits. She saw a tremendous dynamo of conscientious perfectionism and took advantage of it--a dynamo like a black hole in the center of the galaxy keeping millions of stars in perfect rotation! And she paid cash--and very well, I might add. Her novel in progress (still hoing...), hundred of her poems, a few dozen short stories (almost all published in top journals)... Some of the edits tonight were just to resize the picture of Titan's surface! I'm extra baaaaaad.......

Alright, here's the letter of the night. Always glad to chat/rant/blabber with you. I hope you acclimate well to any and all new responsibilities. If you ever want to write me, go ahead, my email's on my profile. ( i just checked it and edited something... told ya I'm bad!) Or if not, that's all good too.

Sweet dreams--that is if the alcohol spike coffee lets you sleep!

PS--Why do we blame alcohol enhanced caffeinated beverages on the Irish and Spanish? Don't they have enough problems???

eric1313 said...

OMG, this letter is rife with bad typos and poor usage...

*sigh*

See?

Of course you did not need this to see that--you have a dozen reposts of all my poems to show you that!