Reasons why I have the best job in the world
Recent projects I have been given:
1. Make an aluminum spider that fits together like a puzzle and hangs on a cord over the goat enclosure (high enough to avoid being eaten by the goats)
2. Research all of the equipment needed by a Field Biologist and replicate them out of PVC and wood for children's toys. These include spotting scopes, binoculars, a camera that can only be described as "big-ass", and night vision goggles.
3. Hang an ant that is three feet long off of support rods on a roof structure. Make it look as though he is climbing the roof upside down up the rod.
4. Build a leaf that is 12 feet long and 4 feet wide to shade the wallabies. Build a second leaf that is half of that size to add on there so it looks pretty.
5. Decide on a good place to put the giant stuffed monitor lizard.
I get paid for this.
Life is good.
My brief but illustrious career as a RAWK STAR
Drums are fun. I somehow managed to forget how much I liked them after my high school marimba/tom-tom solo stint until my friend Kris convinced me that samba dance lessons would be the next fun thing for us to explore. We went to classes for a couple of months and had a great time doing the odd barefoot hopping and shaking that constitutes sambafication, but I found myself messing up on dance steps that I knew I could do and getting constantly distracted.
The distractions were the three drummers that came along to accompany the dancers every week with their magician's-hat drum bags that kept spewing out a seemingly endless variety of instruments. Everything from miniature tambourines with no jingles that were hit with sticks to a giant staff that looked a bit like a bow with a small gourd and a stick to hit it all with (berimbaus for the curious). I'm still a little confused how that one ever came about. Like, one day, some guy is sitting on the side of the road with nothing but a stick, another bigger stick, a cord, a small dried gourd, and some musical inspiration? I wonder how many other configuations he went through before magic struck. Gourd on head, cord wrapped between his hands, sitting on the two sticks crossed at a 30 degree angle. One stick up his pant leg, the other stick whacking it while throwing the cord-tied gourd at cars passing by.
(No, it wasn't that the drummers were cute. They were the kind of white world music listening neo-hippie people that I see all the time playing hackeysack and talking about reggae without ever really knowing any black people. Nice folk, though. If you like pachouli.)
I watched them play their grab bag of percussive fun while my feet wandered off into a mix between a waltz and the running man, and decided there and then to drop the dancing and start drum lessons. I joined a samba drum class and immediately fell in love with the complex rhythms (SO much more difficult than any of the jazz or classical I'd played in the past - and that's saying a lot) and tried out every single instrument I could get my hands on. I played the tamborim (the mini-tambourine) and deafened myself (those little buggers are LOUD), I played the agogo (2-toned bells) with gusto and the tan tan (conga-ish), pandiero (larger tambourine type thing), and a million ones whose names have faded, but didn't find my true drum love until I strapped on the biggest, lowest, baddest drum that samba has to offer - the Surdo (pronounded "ser-doo"). It rocked. The larger ones can make a room vibrate when played at full volume and I rarely played it at less than an ear-popping pitch (hey, if you've got the power why not use it?).
I played it almost exclusively for a couple months in the class, and then was approached by the instructor to join a band that he was starting up. We were about 30-40 percussionists plus anywhere from 10-30 dancers and we started playing parades and festivals all around Seattle to high acclaim. There's something about that many people rocking out to a samba beat that makes onlookers move in time whether they want to or not! We started getting choreography amongst the drummers and I learned how to flip my mallets drumline-style as well as keep a beat while twirling (NOT EASY with that giant drum! I swear it was bigger than an end table). We had costumes for many of our events, anything from large headdresses akin to Carnival wear in Rio to bodysuits painted with skeletons for a giant citywide Halloween party. We played private parties, the solstice parade in Fremont, a church (they wanted to hear "I can see clearly now" so we developed a great samba version), professional soccer games, war protest marches, and the last year I was there they started a long-running gig with Bumbershoot (Seattle's big music festival) where we do two parades a day for the four days of the festival. THAT was interesting! I give it my all when performing, and even with gloves, padded straps and leg bumpers I was a wreck by the end of the second day. None of our other gigs had lasted more than 3-4 hours, and playing full-on for 3 hours twice a day killed me! By the end of the last day, I could no longer extend my fingers past the claw that I tried to use to hold my poor, abused mallet. It took two days of soaking my hand and stretching to get my fingers to unkink again. But I still have my performer's pass!
The group is still going, though I dropped out when I went back to college in 2002. I still see members of it, and hear all about how they're now playing gigs out of the country and still rocking local events. They've invited me to join again but I've since gotten some conga drums that are calling my name (hello, new adventure...)
The Cuteness
I took a ferry ride out to Bainbridge a couple days ago with the Monkey-dog to explore the possibility of a Monkey-buddy. The rain and low clouds made the trip somewhat less scenic than it could have been, but Monkey had a great ride thanks to the tendency of strangers to want to offer her treats at every opportunity. Maybe I should try drooling more and try and get my ears to perk up? I got no treats. I had to get my own dang treats.
Now I'm all mad again.
The place I was visiting is called Furrytale Farms (
) and has rescued horses and donkeys as well as a whole pack of dogs in various stages of health. Despite the corny name, it was a beautiful place with a gorgeous Craftsman-style house that is arranged so that the dogs have continuous indoor-outdoor access and many communal areas. Monkey got a very vocal welcome from the pack, and got to run around a bit on her own in a little garden by the side of the house before we brought in Cleo. Cleo was a stray, much like the Monk was, and skinny. She's all black with longer fur, and a total sweetheart with all people. When we put the two pups together they immediately started playing with each other and racing around the small garden. Monkey did just fine keeping up with the much-younger Cleo, but soon got distracted again by something that smelled good in the corner of the yard. Cleo didn't like that.
(cue ominous music)
She started barking. A high-pitched flinch-inducing cutting knife of a bark, that didn't stop for almost the entire duration of my stay there (Monkey hid). I learned that she's been doing that more and more lately, and that it kept another family from adopting her. I told the owner of the place (who is wonderful, if a bit lecture-y) that I live directly beneath my housemates and couldn't have a dog that barked all day, and she agreed but also mentioned that training could probably fix that and that Cleo was likely just trying to assert herself with a stronger dog and would stop after a while. She also said that they were getting another Kelpie/Australian Cattle Dog mix in from Oregon next weekend (nicknamed "Cutie pie")(cue "awwwwww!"), and that she sounded like a good fit for me also. Once the dog comes in and she gets to do an evaluation on it, I'm probably going to go back out there and see how that one works out. Cleo is still a possibility, but the barking is a big issue considering my current living arrangements (and my dislike of constant flinching). I don't know what I'd do about it, besides the electroshock collar (yikes) or spraying her with water or some other aversion training. I hate aversion training. I'd just give up and try with another dog, but Cleo's so darn adorable:
And of course I would change her name.
To what, I'm not telling yet...
Kenny's Eventful Evening
I went to bed last night fairly early (10ish) and fell immediately into blissful slumber, dreaming of ponies frolicking through fields of lollipops or maybe they were happy little puppies on sticks, when all of a sudden a metallic SLAM woke me from my happy place and made me sit up in bed (it was a little after midnight). For reference, my bedroom is in the front left corner of our house, and borders partially on the neighbor's driveway (though I never hear their cars or have had a problem with noise in the past). Then I heard what I initially thought was someone laughing, followed by another SLAM. I realized that the man was in fact crying - sobbing uncontrollably - and slapping his hands against the cars in the driveway right outside my window. I didn't peek, but tried to listen more closely and make some sort of sense out of his percussive ramblings. The best I got was "Ohhhh, God...." and "I can't...." and then heaving cries and more metal whapping.
I sat there for ten minutes, thinking that any moment his grief would lessen and he'd either get into the car he'd been abusing or go into the house, but he wailed at the same pitch the whole time and didn't even slow down when a family member came out of the house to try and talk to him. The poor kid sounded like he was only a teenager, and the conversation went like this:
Kid: "Kenny, you have to come in the house now. You're being loud."
Kenny: WHAM "I (WAAAAAA)... can't... (A-huuuuhhnnnhhh), Oh.... GOD!" WHAM WHAM
Kid: "Kenny, I'm going to call Mom. You have to come inside."
Kenny: "GOOOOOOODDDDD!!!" (various snorting noises) WHAM
The kid left, and Kenny kept on going with even a slight increase in the tempo of the car slaps and the pitch of the howling. The next round was with an adult male, maybe a brother or uncle, and went more or less the same - Mom threatening, come in the house - but with the addition of the threat of "Kenny, the neighbors are going to call the cops if you keep going on like this!" I sat very still and hoped that none of the neighbors would call the cops and pour more pain on poor Kenny's already troubled day, but then realized that I was probably the only neighbor he was concerned about. The brother/uncle/random guy got sick of it all and told Kenny he was locked out of the house, and slammed the door.
Kenny kept on for another fifteen minutes, it was getting close to 1 in the morning and he'd been howling for almost a half hour now. Then the reinforcements came in. Three (maybe four, I didn't peek and risk ruining the lovely imaginary scenario I was building in my head. Kenny in my brain was about 45 and in a pimp suit with a very large hat and rings on every finger (hence the nice SLAPs). I'm pretty sure that's not reality but it worked for me.) large adult men came out of the house and started insisting that Kenny come inside. You can guess how well that worked:
Guy 1: "Kenny! You HAVE to come inside or I'm-a gonna drag you in"
Kenny: "Gooooodddd! (sniffling, indistinct wailing) I can't.....I can't!!"
Guy 2 (this guy was my favorite): "Kenny, you're not acting like yourself. Get a hold of yourself and come inside."
Kenny: "WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!"
Guy 3: "I'm going to throw you in that house. Just watch me."
Kenny: "Can't..... GOD.... Nooooooooooo...."
Guy 2: "He's not himself. I think the Devil got in him."
Guy 1: "What?! Kenny get in the house right now."
Guy 2: "By the power of Christ's blood..."
Then it got messy. Kenny somehow managed to keep up an almost primal howl through the entire exorcism (which, from what I could tell, was only being performed or paid attention to by the one guy) and subsequent physical dragging into the house.
I reluctantly fell back to sleep, but kept an ear open in case he managed to escape the padded room again.
Close Encounters
My sister's kids are so cool!
I got the opportunity to babysit ALL THREE of them this past weekend (normally I just steal one away at a time but this was a special situation) and we had a grand old time playing Dance Dance Revolution, watching movies, eating horrible food, and hiding plastic bugs all over my house.
I stepped on a giant plastic cockroach this morning, it was fun.
The great thing about them all is that they are completely different personalities, with hardly any similar interests between them all. And by "great" I mean "hard to coordinate" and possibly "destined to bore/frustrate at least one of the three at any given time". I'm not sure how my sister does it - maybe a trained squadron of child-distractors? Themed sections of the house for each kid? The oldest boy is 12 now, and very bright. He loves to compete and his two little sisters have learned to just let him win at pretty much everything. He loved the DDR and wanted to go explore the other arcades in town, but the pained looks on his sisters' faces made me opt for other entertainment. He's definitely the boss of the group, and made sure to correct the girls while we were playing Apples to Apples and when the subject "odd" came up, they both screamed "Aunt Ja!" (my nickname). He cut in and said "no, she's not odd... remember? She's ECCENTRIC." The girls went "ohhh..." and I tried very hard not to laugh.
Side note: Apples to Apples, while a great game for adults, is a little challenging to play with children ages 6-12 who have been raised in a very sheltered environment. Whenever a historical figure came up or a pop culture person (Cher, for example. Try to explain Cher. I'll wait.), it took me a little while to tell them about the person and what they did. Andy Warhol was tough. Picasso was easier, I just pointed to the wall where one of his paintings is hung. Also, when the topic card came up with "Sensual" written on it I almost choked on my popcorn. They of course asked, and I told them that sensual means that it engages all of the senses. Also that it sometimes means romantic. They accepted this, which may cause problems a little later (sorry, sis) but made life a lot easier for be besides the blushing.
But anyways. The oldest girl is I think 9 now (hey, I can barely remember my OWN age) and artistic as all get out. She paints and draws, and when she came over handed me three sheets of paper, two with watercolor bands that melded into each other in a very Rothko-esque fashion (they're very pretty) and one with a floor plan for their ideal house, complete with furniture placement, doors, windows, and a flow plan! I used to do that when I was her age, though I spent most of my time laying out an octagonal house with an aquarium in the middle that was accessed from all sides (it took me a while to figure out the bathroom, since people could see into it unless the fish were continuously strategically placed) (my solution? I think I had fake fish in that part or something. Or really large, slow moving fish that were trained to hover there during nose-powdering times). She also loves dancing, and is learning hip-hop (she can do the worm) and cheerleading (she can kick her foot above her head). We had a yoga war last time I hung out down there, and it was very close! I've been doing yoga for about 5 years, and I finally trumped her with the good old-fashioned foot behind the head, but it was a nail-biter.
Her younger sister is 7ish (again, shush) and a total spitball. She hurts herself on everything and has ceased to really be bothered by it since she's had the tendency since toddlerhood. During their short visit, she slid through one of my chairs, dropped her snow cone (we cleaned it off), and I'm sure got a million unexplained bruises as we played dress-up and took thug pictures (her thug pose is priceless - "hang loose" hands, furrowed brow, pursed lips)(it helped that she was at the time wearing a turtleneck sweater with a belt on the outside, baseball cap turned backwards, and heels). She's also smart as a whip, as is her sister. She was offended by her sister and I mentioning that we hated something (I forget what exactly. Probably mean people or tangled hair or something in that vein.) and she piped up in her mini-Kathleen Turner voice, "You said a bad word. You said 'hate'. Wait, now I just said it. I'm a hypocrite. I'm a hypocrite!" And burst out laughing. Her voice is very low, so low that (this is my favorite story about her) once when she had a cold and it was even lower than normal, a telemarketer called and she answered the phone with a baritone "Hello?" Then she turned to my sister and said "Mama, am I head of househole?" The telemarketer had mistaken the 7-year-old LITTLE GIRL for her own father. hee.
But the visit was fun, things went very smoothly even though I was outnumbered. We watched Labyrinth on Friday night and I easily convinced them that the goblins were harmless but had a harder time explaining why David Bowie's pants were so tight. We went to the dog park on Saturday morning and took photos of their favorite dogs, and I taught them the wonders of the Chuck-It and the mystery of the Monkey "fetch" (luckily the youngest was more than happy to run after the ball too). We hung up my hammock in the backyard and played in the fort in the sunshine. It was great for a couple of days, but I still am amazed that my sister is able to do this day in and day out (the kids told me that I needed to have 3 babies, and I bartered them down to 1 baby and 2 dogs. I pushed for just 3 dogs ("really cute ones!") but they wouldn't let me drop the baby thing entirely. Negotiations are ongoing.)
ART!
I'm feeling better now. The worst wakeup in the universe, I think, is a collection of 30 emails from desperate men wanting to sleep with you. Feel free to differ, but try it sometime when you're not a morning person and see what I mean.
And now, random tack art!
I made this in a little niche in my last house, for no particular reason besides the vague need for something shiny.
Slight rant about that internet thing (beware)
There's one little thing I'd like to say to all of the men online looking to make new friends (using whatever definition of that phrase you choose, from booty to actual friendship):
HOW THE HELL DO YOU EXPECT TO GET ANY SORT OF POSITIVE RESPONSE WHEN YOU'RE THROWING THE SAME GAME THAT EVERY OTHER SINGLE MAN IN THE UNIVERSE HAS THROWN AT US EVER SINCE WE STARTED BEING NOTICED BY YOUR MISGUIDED GENDER?!
Sorry about the yelling.
I'm getting sick and tired of all of the idiotic game getting tossed around at me, and much less likely to respond in a positive manner when I get twenty different "I think you should see me naked" e-mails. The worst I've found (even beyond the inane "Hey let's have sex!" ones) are the ones that are attempting some sort of psychological manipulation and assuming that all women are meek little biddies whose overwhelming lack of self-esteem will lead them to prove themselves to whoever comes a-challenging. For example, "I think you're kinda cute, in a way.". "You look okay, but that pic kind of makes your arms look fat. Send me a better one." "I need to see a better pic of your boobs if you want me to say you're pretty." (These are a little misleading because they're all spelled properly.)
The truth is, any woman who is even marginally attractive has been getting hit on by a seemingly endless succession of men ever since she got her boobs. We've heard a wide variety of lines, humored a million bad jokes and attempts at clever introductions, and learned ways to kindly and not-so-kindly turn away men without overtly bruising their egos. I realize that it takes a measure of bravado to approach someone that you don't know and start talking to them, but the consideration I give to men who do this in real life (such as never turning down a dance invitation when salsa dancing, no matter who asks) is not extended to the internet, where saying "Hi" takes a few anonymous key strokes and a mouse click. What the men don't seem to realize is that we see through their lines and are sick of smiling and politely turning them away. I'm almost to the point of bringing out a full e-smackdown. grr.
And for the guys who want an actual friendship (which in the online terminology means that they want to go on one date before screwing - you know, because they care about getting to know you), I'm getting tired of only being asked what I do for a living. For one, it's kind of hard to explain without showing the actual website (which is more info than I'm comfortable to give for most people), and also it gives a handy-dandy stereotype for them to label me with. In a culture where most people work for money to support their hobbies, what does it really matter what the work is? Granted, I like my job but don't really often consider it to be the most interestng or important thing that I do.
Basically, if you're not comfortable enough with your own personality to come at me without any pretense or prefabricated "hey, aren't I original" line, don't come at all.
