Kaleidoscopes

One area in my life that I'm not any good at is ending friendships. I'm used to folks moving away, changing shcools, or me moving away, and then gradually losing contact with them and everyone just moving forward. Until the last two years, I've never had to consciously end relationships. While I'm not a pro at it, by any stretch of the imagination, I am getting better. I suspect I'll have another round of cuts in the next few months as I'm sick and cranky and there's only so much time and energy I can devote to people I don't care for while I'm entering the second half of my degree.

I've been thinking about this for a few weeks now and feeling blah about it. The other night, though, I had a dream that was actually pretty helpful. I was describing to that faceless someone in my dreams (funny how many anonymous dream characters there are, actually) that life is a lot like a kaleidoscope. It's always twisting and changing and while you can enjoy the green sparkles or purple confetti that float, you can't hold on to that view. It happens and then it's gone to be replaced by something just as lovely. It makes no more sense being bitter about insisting on keeping the gold flecks you saw four days ago, than actively trying to control the next view of the kaleidoscope. All you can do is enjoy what beauty you see and wait excitedly for the next twist will bring.

This dream sounded like a message from the old, pre-emo Erin I was a few years ago. I liked the message. After I woke up from that dream, I heard a fuel truck reversing outside my window. I live across the street from a gas station, which is actually pretty handy: at any point, I know what a good price for gas is, just by looking through my blinds. It then occurred to me, in all my post-kaleidoscope dream fuzziness, that if the gas station were to explode, my happy curtains would get hurt...among other parts of the Vault.

This was something my inner worrier was thrilled to realize. The inner worrier is the same one who wonders just how safe it is to pee in a thunderstorm (what if lightning strikes at just the exact wrong moment?), how it is that airplanes fly (because bumblebees aren't areodynamic!), and does stapling your finger really hurt (absolutely!).

So now, I will sometimes have the very brief subconscious wonder about just how safe Bubbles is should the gas station explode. Fabulous. This is one of those times I'd very much like to retwist the kaleidoscope and go back to when I wasn't worried about my yellow curtains. Ah, well. It's much better than worrying about black holes...

Moral of today's story: I am a napping monster.

An Erinku:
Oh, Pink Floyd
You make me happy
Even your songs
about bad friendships

Homeward Bound

Dear mutant germs in my body-

It's been over a week. I haven't had my voice working for five days now. Including naps, I've already slept 14 hours today and still haven't had the energy to get out of my pjs. I've cancelled many adventures and rehearsals for you. I have had a diet consisting of cough syrup, ibuprofen,and orange juice. I hope you've had your fun, but since it's been over a week now, you are a very unwelcome visitor and it's time for you to leave. The end.

An Erinku (in sickness):
Bubbles
swims happily
towards me
when I'm near

Not a Magpie

This time of year, I simplify all commercials down to the basic needs or assumptions being made about consumers and announce them over the voice of the narrator. The easiest, and funniest, of commercials are the jewelry ones. They all boil down to, “women like sparkly things.” Which is what magpies like. So, when these commercials come on, I holler out, “CAW, CAW Magpie! Magpie!”

Most other commercials boil down to, “You're special! Spend money!” This actually works for all of them. Hmm. It could be that I've been sick for a few days now and in between fever and coughing fits, I get way more amusement out of this than is really there. Either way, it's kept me very happy while I slowly meld with the couch cushions here. Being sick is blarg.

An Erinku:
cough, cough
sniff, ACHOO
orange juice
aspirin and tissue
(Disneyland was TOTALLY worth it!!)

Smells Like Vacation

As I've gotten older, I've become just a tich afraid of flying. It started on a trip I took to Hawaii, approximately 100 years ago. That trip involves a seven or eight hour flight over ocean...nothing but ocean and the plane is expected to land on some tiny little island (which is minute in comparison to the enormous vastness of ocean). About four hours in, I realized, goodly and truly, that if we were to crash, we would be screwed and would have at least several hours of floating in ocean until we could be rescued, male dolphins and all.

And so, now that I'm older and have flown over many more oceans in different directions and in different countries, I still get nervous. I'm reminded that while flying is incredibly awesome, we haven't quite adapted to it all the way, considering how few generations ago it was that we, collectively, were driving goat-drawn carts.

My family has helped address this creeping, cumulative nervousness by plying me with beer before a flight. It very much works and makes it all a fun adventure instead of a terrifying act of defying gravity. I'm also fond of pointing out that in any type of crash, those folks least damaged are usually asleep (relaxed) or drunk (relaxed, and absolutely not to be driving). And if I'm going to be in a plane crash, I'm going to be one or the other...and especially not driving the plane.

Part of the problem is that Denver always has turbulence, and Reno does about 90% of the time. As every trip of mine in the last 10 years has involved flying out of and back to Denver, that means every trip has turbulence, and many have turbulence on both ends.

Tonight, I hunted down the New Belgium brewery at the Denver airport. Their beers are a tad on the expensive side, but they are 20 oz. beers that are strong enough to make you submit to ALL kinds of TSA screening. Hmm. They should consider getting folks drunk pre-screening. (As a side note, Denver has the old-school metal detectors and the naked scanners are reserved for folks who can't seem to remember to remove their belt buckles/cell phones/glasses/four pounds of quarters from their pockets. To keep yourself modest, remove the metal, stupid!) Right. Beer. So I ate some awesome french fries and had a mega beer pre-flight.

I have recently appeased the flight gods, as every flight for the last however many years has me showing up to the gate exactly when my group is getting first call to board. Tonight was no exception. I boarded, noted that the folks in the safety video had very fake smiles, admired the moon and stars coming out, and gripped the armrests in a hold that would a WWF wrestler weep. The entire ascent, I was very impressed to note, my internal dialog continued to repeat, “Bumble bees aren't supposed to fly, it's an aerodynamic impossibility! Bumble bees aren't supposed to fly...”

I have often noticed that when I've got a beer powering me, my logic is impeccable and my vocabulary vast. And that is why the next time I fly, I'm having two mega beers. Screw this. Adrenaline is an old friend of mine and has, theoretically, kept me alive this far, in spite of me never staring down a sabre-tooth tiger or a t-rex. But give it a chance to scream in my ear about spiders, being over 10 feet above ground, or sitting on a stage holding a cello while everyone stares, and my adrenaline is all about flooding my system with “help.” Stupid evolution. Yes, I got thumbs out of it, but some days I'd rather just be oblivious.

Moral of today's story: the world is always beautiful from a different perspective.

An Erinku (powered by beer-tinged adrenaline):
though I tip
my little laptop
my seatmate continues
to read over my shoulder

Decency, or, Why Bach Matters

While I was at the Denver Mountain Sun (an expansion of my very favoritest pub, ever, based in Boulder), I was thinking about the enormous pile of cello homework I've been given for winter break...which starts after my juries on Saturday morning. A significant chunk of this large pile o' homework is an entire Bach sonata that is due January 3rd. That's a lot to ask, as Bach is a bit temper/mental (snort, music major dork joke). ANYWAY! While I was drinking another free beer at the Denver Mountain Sun (they keep sending me coupons and I keep going, it's a symbiotic relationship), I started to think about whether or not Bach is still relevant today.

I think he is. While he wrote a lot for church, was very religious, and was overly excited about counterpoint, which are all things I'm not into at all, I've found that playing his music means you have to be calm, collected, and thoughtful. To play his music well, seems to include the requirement of being a decent human being.

I think decency is very much missing from a lot of folks (including a small subset of my circle) in general. And by decency, I don't mean dressing modestly. Nakedity happens and is natural, and naked dancing to Bach would make for a fun show, actually. What I mean is having the ability to see the world beyond where our natural selfishness ends. Having the ability to empathize with others and making the conscious decision to be helpful and caring. And having Bach be an inspiration for this is exactly why his music still matters today.

Hmm. I see a pattern in my last few blogs as I wrestle with how to deal with some people I know! Anyway, I don't belive in an afterlife, although I do flirt with the idea of reincarnation. If this is the only life I've got, I'm going to make it as great as I can. To quote a random quote I read somewhere, "I can't think of a single instance where being an asshole helped me get ahead." I try to be as decent as I can, with the typical Erin screw-ups. So if I'm wrong about the afterlife and reincarnation, I can at least be glad I tried to be a decent human, naked Bach dancing and all.

An Erinku:
Mountain Sun
has hoppy beer
I love to drink it
anyways

Bad Role Models

We aren't as removed from cavemen days as we might like to think we are. It goes beyond the fact that when something is broken, (like the t.v., toaster, or lock on the window) out first instinct is to smack it. What is extra amusing to me is how often hitting things actually makes them work again. Besides this spectacular display of bashing things with our caveman clubs are a bunch of more disturbing examples.

I was out and about (or, if I'm channeling my inner Canadian, "oot and aboot") recently and found myself with a gaggle of women drinking cheap beer. As the pitchers flowed, we shared stories both awesome and sad. It turns out that every single one of them had been abused (sexually, emotionally, or physically) at some point by a partner or by an adult, almost exclusively male. Sadly, this is not the first time I've been out with a group of random women and found out about this common thread.

I think of this as I've lately been in a lot of arguments with multiple men that are of the opinion that it's natural and healthy to follow their "animalistic" instincts, especially when it comes to sex. The argument is that society expects a standard of sexual conduct and this is oppressive to women, especially when it comes to marriage. (By the way, the marriage contract predates the Middle Ages with the earliest one dating back to around 176 BCE. It was written to protect the WIFE financially in case of widowhood or divorce. It's called the Ketubah.) This suggests to me there is now a trend of incredible sexism in the name of free loving. Calling it feminism while making the case that "screwing around is a way of rebelling against society" is a new twist on forever-long interaction...or not so new if you heard, at all, of the 60's.

Anyway, having come from a pretty feminist background, I continue to argue that what makes us human, as opposed to being merely animals that learned to walk upright and develop opposable thumbs, is the ability to reflect on our desires and to act on them -- or not. To be aware (again) that we all share this little planet and that only focusing on our primitive urges, while fun, can have long-lasting repercussions on anyone not strong enough, physically or emotionally, to say no. While women may not often come with enough testosterone to bench press a slug bug, there are other strengths we've got.

Abuse is abuse is abuse. Sexual abuse is like the caveman dragging the unconscious victim back to the cave. Emotional and physical abuse is the smacking someone upside the head with a club until they either agree or until they are unconscious...at which point they are dragged back to the cave.

The whole "I'm just following my natural instincts" argument doesn't impress me much. It just makes me lose hope that we, as a species, are interested in moving forward. If humans didn't have more potential, it wouldn't take us so long to mature; we'd be out on our own by a year old...as are the other species that solely operate on instinct. Since we have big brains and the ability to use other parts of it to think, it takes significantly longer to develop.

When sticking your hand on a hot stove burner, it immediately retracts without conscious though. Living purely by instinct is the same way. It means you celebrate the body by partying hard and by screwing around. It feels good. It's not intellectual; it's not enlightened, nor is it the way of the future. It's just thoughtless.

An Erinku:
Thursdays' seriousness
always
catches me
by surprise

Swarm of Words

Words are my weapon. As long as I can remember, I've swam in a sea of words and feel their different weights and their different colors. I use them like a chef uses all manner of spices (knowing full well I'm a terrible cook and that this analogy won't require me to make anyone dinner). Growing up, I never bought into the reassurement that "Sticks and stones will break my bones, but words will never hurt me." I know better. I have made people cry and even had a few folks hate me because of just a few well-placed words.

Everyone has a weapon. Most folks uses actions. Some are back-stabby or are passive-aggressive (a particularly unhelpful type of action). When I first realized the power I had with words, I abused that power. I've got a good-girl aura about me and pairing that with my vocabulary lead me to being a bit of a problem-causer at elementary school. I remember falsely accusing a kid of something stupid to see if I could get him in trouble, just to see if I could. I could.

When you first discover your weapon, it's a bit of a power rush. And you use your powers for evil. Ideally, not for too long. When you hurt someone, you know. And that's when you have a choice. You can join the light side, with occasional jaunts over to the dark side (they do promise cookies, routinely). Or you can continue doing what you're doing because that power rush feels good. However. We all share this little planet and no matter how much you try to avoid folks, you will continue to bump into them. Irony is the force that powers the universe, after all.

So. If you continue on your merry little power-tripping way, you will continue to run into those you hurt. And if you don't take any time to self-reflect or try to learn from past experiences, you will continue to use your weapon in the way that elementary school kids do. As a grown-up, this makes you (at best) very selfish and (at worst) a terrible human being.

I learned my lesson, repeatedly, since elementary school. The things that run through my mind at any given time are pretty funny and fairly often are unnecessarily mean. As I've gotten older, I'll get ready to speak, only to pause and say, "Yeah" instead of what was really happening internally. I know my weapon. I use it on special occasions and often on myself...since I don't make myself cry.

I've been thinking about this for the past few days as I've had a streak of running into folks I typically avoid. I'm up to four this far for the weekend and I plan on spending the rest of the evening in to avoid the other two I know of. I was wondering if there was some common thread between them all that I dislike their company and I came up with weapons. Each of these six knows their weapons well and each of them takes pleasure in hurting others. Each of them are not folks I want to be around, in spite of the fact they are all very grown-up (some are in the elderly category, even).

Everyone has a weapon: the trick is only using it when necessary. If you are using it to feel better about yourself or to feel a sense of power/control, you aren't contributing to the human race in a meaningful way. When you figure out how to play nicely with others (something you should have figured out by third grade or so), feel free to join the rest of us. Until then, keep to yourself. Bah!

An Erinku:
weekend of roughness
right before finals
of course
I have my cranky pants on!

Paperclips

My internal dialog often will reassure me that I'm "quirky" or "eccentric" as opposed to "neurotic" when it comes to my various opinions. However, my dialog is still trying to put a helpful spin on my passionate dislike of large paperclips. You have your regular sized paperclips, which are very useful. You then have multiple sizes of binder clips, also very useful. What is pointless are large paperclips. They don't hold things together very well and are awkwardly big.

I have been in charge of purchasing office supplies for my last three jobs and I have never, ever gotten large paperclips. In the last eight years, I think one person requested them and I assured them that a binder clip would be more appropriate for their task.

I'm not sure where this comes from, other than (perhaps) hating that little paperclip guy on the old-school Office Word. Him and all his smuggery as you grump about margins. He shows up all smirky and says something like, "It looks like you are stupid and can't figure out the most simplest thing in the world. Can I humble you?"

Or perhaps I always hated him because he is a large paperclip. Hmm. Chicken or the egg? Right. This came to my attention last night when I found a large paperclip mixed in with regular paperclips in my desk and I got very indignant. My internal dialog said, "Dude, I've got nothing. This is just weird."

An Erinku:
droopy
yellow flower
dripping petals
on my floor

Taking a Peek

On my adventures this evening, I took my car into its doctor's office to deal with its case of leprosy (losing antenna, windshield wiper, etc). Before heading home, I went to the library and left with a stack of sappy books. I find when I'm in the middle of stressy school, I get sappy books and movies to fill my late evenings. Since this degree doesn't call for much reading at all (as opposed to, say, and master's degree in writing), I actually enjoy reading for fun.

One of my new habits, though, has me a bit annoyed with myself: I've starting peeking ahead in books I'm reading. It's not even conscious. As soon as I get involved with the story line and caring about the main character, I suddenly find myself looking at page 155 and then sneaking a peek at page 274. I guess it makes sense.

I read a book a few months ago where the chapters switched between the two main characters. Suddenly, the guy was describing all the wonderfulness of his feelings for his girlfriend and going off about the lamity of his wife. I didn't finish that book. Callous ass-holery doesn't interest me, it turns out. And since that book, I've started to peek ahead. I just want to make sure there are happy endings (hence the sappy books, as opposed to the good, edgy books out there).

As I was thinking about this after my lightrail ride home (having peeked ahead to page 182 and seen that there are dramas ahead for the character, but a very happy ending), I noticed that there were quite a few Cat Women about on campus. It's near Halloween time and the parties are starting up. The costume this year seems to be spandex (everywhere) leopard print body suits, with a fuzzy tail and cat ears. I know this is not a costume I can pull off. Somewhere along the line, my body finished maturing. I have big girl hips, a big girl bottom, and full-blown big girl chest. I am shaped like a woman, and women don't pull off full-body spandex leopard prints.

As I walked up-stream through a variety of Cat Women and their boys (who never seem to dress up, by the way) one of the drunker Cheetah Girls asked me, "So...are you dressed up as a librarian? I said, "Yep, exactly! Books and all!" and kept walking. Sigh. It's time to go clothes shopping again, which I hate. Whenever I'm mistaken for a librarian or for a kindergarten teacher, it means I've run out of normal person clothes again. Alas.

An Erinku:
Bubbles
zooming in circles
happy fish
almost eleven years old

Fifteen Authors

Don't take too long to think about it. Fifteen authors (poets included) who've influenced you and that will always stick with you. List the first fifteen you can recall in no more than fifteen minutes.

1. Christopher Moore (awesomely funny)
2. Douglas Adams (again, awesomely funny)
3. Jane Austen (don't act surprised)
4. Agatha Christie (has taught me to look at everyone as possible murderer)
5. Hanna Weiner (wrote a whole big thesis on her and everything!)
6. Billy Collins (awesomely funny)
7. Henry David Thoreau (great at describing the beauty of life)
8. Sor Juana Inez de la Cruz (my main chica!)
9. Bill Bryson (awesomely funny)
10. Joseph Campbell (insightful stuff)
11. J.R.R. Tolkien (I did live in the Hobbit Hole)
12. Charles Dickens (though I routinely hate his endings)
13. Richard Froude (awesomely funny)
14. Kristen Andersen (again with showing the beauty in life is always there)
15. Funk & Wagnalls (fun to say and I have a serious love affair with dictionaries, seriously. I do.)

An Erinku:
candy bar
after dinner
and trash t.v.
brilliant!

String Education

While I mostly go off about stupid things or regularly chronicle my mundane adventures, there are some topics that I'm very much wrestling with. One of them is an education class I'm currently in that I need in order to graduate. This class is disrupting my life because I find I am absolutely opposed to many of the basic, unspoken assumptions being taught. It's a two-part class, so I have another quarter to go, and I'm having to give myself pep talks
.
The biggest crisis facing string players is that the music we are immersed in is generally seen as obsolete and boring. Classical music concerts don't sell out stadiums and plenty of fabulous classically-trained musicians don't have places to play. I firmly believe it's because of the elitist culture that goes along with classical music. You can trace the increasing snobbery over the past few centuries. You don't see audience members at rock concerts looking over the tab sheet and pointing out mistakes to other audience members...but you can see that at a classical concert. So the ticket prices rise, and fewer and fewer people are willing to spend $60 for “obsolete” music.

Add to the mix that playing a stringed instrument is not a cheap hobby. Low-quality cellos usually start at $800, a set of decent strings costs about $150 (and you're ideally supposed to change them twice a year), plus when you ding the instrument, it costs big money to fix.

When I started the education class on how to teach the Suzuki method, the very first thing that came to mind is that this method is designed with a very specific client in mind. And from my years at Naropa, I learned that specific client has a lot of baggage (and a lot to answer for). The specific client is called privilege.

When a parent spends $75 each week for a half hour lesson and $300 for bi-monthly group lessons for their pre-school kid to learn a stringed instrument, and has enough time to sit in all the lessons, learn the instrument as well!, and practice sessions with that kid, this is privilege. Single parents, and/or people who work multiple jobs each week don't have the monetary or time resources available to get Suzuki lessons for their three-year-old. And in the Suzuki world, that makes you a shitty parent and your child will be forever doomed to being a second-tier musician at best.

This would be all fine and dandy and just a footnote in history except that a lot of people are teaching this method as the only way to teach strings. A lot of other types of pedagogy classes aren't offered regularly because there simply is no demand for them from students. And so we are moving forward with a method of string education that makes an already elitist type of music even more inaccessible to the average person.

It could be that I'm misunderstanding the basic concepts, but these are the unspoken assumptions that are not being discussed. Or it could be a generational thing. I'm at the butt-end of Generation X. I'm part of the herd that went through school budget cuts and basically being encouraged from all sides that if I wanted to learn something, I should figure out how to learn it since it probably wasn't going to be offered through school. Now there's helicopter parents who plan out every minute of the day with an eye towards college applications, and yes, to me it is creepy (not inspiring) to watch a three-year-old play violin. I question the parent's motives. It's one thing if little Timmy honestly loves playing...that's awesome and I'm glad there are teachers out there for him. But for the others, I worry. And I know there are folks who would disagree with me.

All I know is that there are students out there who love to play cello and already can't afford regular, let alone Suzuki, lessons. I've participated in giving free lessons to middle-school cellists whose parents couldn't pay and who seriously didn't have the time to be present at the lesson. Instead of giving up the case, I treated the 12-year-old public school trained cellist (which is NOT the “greatest tragedy ever,” by the way) like an adult and expected her to work on her own on the things we covered in lessons...and she did.

I agree that anyone can learn to play music, but I really have a problem with excluding people based on their level of finances. The more diversity that can be brought to the string player world, the better off we'll be in the long run. So for the next quarter and a half, I'll be picking up the tricks to amuse 3-5 year olds and will take them with me when I work with students who are older and whose parents are more like the parents that I know.
/end rant

An Erinku:
ranting
it's what's for dinner
after the
pasta's gone

Some of the Primary Colors

Last week sometime, I went on a nice, long walk and enjoyed the sunshine and the turning of the fall leaves. At one point, a leaf fell from a tree and, as the breeze was perfect, accompanied my walk for about half a block as it slowly drifted down. I was very impressed with how long of a flight it managed and picked it up to look at it.

As I continued to walk, I realized that this little leaf had budded in the spring, collected sunshine all summer long, and made its one and only flight just then. I felt a little sad for the leaf that after all that work, it only got to fly once. Granted, it was a spectacular flight, but I thought that after the effort it took to grow and be all aerodynamic, it deserved another chance to play on the breeze. So I tossed it up high and watched it float away through the park in a very satisfying way.

While continuing my walk, I worried that perhaps other people don't feel sad for leaves. I quickly stopped this train of thought because I figured it would only make me feel more awkward in life than I already do. I also figured there was probably an analogy in there somewhere that I was too lazy (a.k.a. enjoying the sunshine) to work out.

My walk today was longer, but not as fun. The leaves were still firmly attached to their trees and were showing a brilliant display of primary colors, but my internal dialog was much more grim. I finally walked myself out of it and simply enjoyed moving my body (while checking out the half-naked runners) and loving a sunny fall day.

An Erinku:
hot sake
MarioKart
home pants
Saturday night

Retirement Plans

This week, it occurred to me that I have plans for world domination. I knew they were always brewing somewhere in the back of my mind, but this week was the week that steps were taken to actually achieve world domination. This was the week I got my very own work-study student.

Before she started (or even before we knew which student it would be), I was internally debating whether to call them my helper monkey or my minion. I decided that having a minion sounded much more appropriate for world domination. And so, it began.

I've started her on small, simple tasks for her first week: packet making, map folding, kung fu. Next week will be a massive mailing and stealth training. The third week, I suspect we'll storm a castle (I found out very recently that there is a castle here in town!). I plan for total Denver domination just after mid-terms. With my minion, I will be unstoppable!

The first major change I'll make will be to have decent coffee shops around. Next will be an expansion of public transit that isn't out-of-control expensive. Then will come the shopping around for a tiara that doesn't get tangled in my hair, which is currently a serious problem. I have big, big plans and I'm very glad the day job has provided me with the help I'll need both to collate packets and to take over the world!

An Erinku:
The tequila bar
across the street
has high drama
this evening

Living Alone

One of my most recent adventures (with much subtext and footnotes) has me living alone for the first time in my life, not counting Bubbles the fish. I've been working my living-alone mojo and realized, again, this morning that I LOVE sleeping diagonally in my bed. It's been a trend for many weeks now and I still wake up worried that I need to scoot over...and then I don't.

Today is my last day of summer break before grad school starts up all over again. I slept in (diagonally), made at least four espresso shots that I didn't have to share (this apartment has a shortage of plugs and my coffee pot moved to the day job), practiced for a few hours, and then came home to watch cheesey chick flicks.

Again, since I'm living alone, I had neither cooing roommates nor hesitant males in the same room as I watched a very predictable happy-ending movie. I was able to squeal at the cutesy parts, "AW" at the big love scenes, and get a wee bit teary at the finale all without any eye-witnesses.

I still think the suckiest part of living alone is that dishes don't washed on a regular basis (I will one day live with either a dishwasher or a bigger sink) and the dirty laundry hangs out longer that I like (laundry is a boy's job). I also find I talk to Bubbles quite a bit, which either points to me being a bit of an extrovert, or some wierd chick living alone who talks to her fish. I'm not sure which...

An Erinku!
M&Ms
in my fridge
make me happy
I like Bob Ross
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Ross

On Insanity

There are times when I dive right in to insane projects. Take, for instance, the 3-Day-Novel contest. You spend your entire Labor Day weekend sitting around writing a novel. You end up eating strange foods, not showering regularly, and have a (short) book by the end. I started this project at 12:00 a.m. on Saturday and am still going. Sadly, I ended up scrapping the first attempt and am now on the second one. I needed a break from writing and decided a blog would be a good idea while I wait for my espresso to brew and my breakfast to cook.

I routinely say yes to doing insane things. The next big one is that I said yes to, and am now making a public commitment, is doing a 10k in the spring in Oregon. That is a bit insane from my end, but a good kind of insane, I think. One could argue that going to music school is insane and another person could argue that having a purple bookshelf is insane. All I know is that I have a lot of energy and when I get bored, big projects are planned and completed in a very short amount of time.

I watched the movie "Julie and Julia" and thought that was a cool idea. I'm a pretty terrible cook and much more vegetarian than Julia Childs, so I decided to very slowly work my way through my jumbo Moosewood Cookbook. It's slow going but kind of fun to expand the dishes I can make. I don't like potato pancakes, however, and I have a few more of those recipes in there. I really don't understand the point of potato pancakes. Just make hashbrowns; they're easier. Hmm. I've been ranting about potato pancakes in my book, too. This seems to be a topic.

Anyway, I've been staying up until 3 or 4 each morning, getting up in the double-digits, writing for a good 8-9 hours, practicing for 2 hours, and then watching a bit of Netflix before falling asleep. It feels good and natural. Now if I can only get paid to live like this...

Moral of today's pancake: hashbrown.

An Erinku:
there is a thing
called the sun
I'll see you
soon

Say Hello to my Little Fishy Friend....

I have a fish named Bubbles who is 10 years old. This may sound like the begining to a poem, but is really a description of my real life. He is called Bubbles not as a sterotypical fish name, but because anytime I pour water into his tank he zooms over to ride in the bubbles. I suspect it's exciting and fun and akin to a roller coaster for a fish.

As I'm about to embark on several days away from Colorado to visit one of my favorite cities for a big birthday bash, I've started to worry about feeding Bubbles. Since I'm no longer in the Hobbit Hole, I don't have wonderful neighbors who can pop down and feed him. Instead I have scary neighbors who might sell him to the drug dealer upstairs for a fix...although, it'd likely be a tiny little fix. So. I've been looking into the exotic world of vacation feeders for fish.

Every so often, I'll have a pajama day and do absolutely nothing except nap and google David Boreanaz. By night-time, I start to feel guilty that I've got too much time on my hands. Not true. It turns out that writing highly opinionated, snide reviews of various vacation fish feeders is the real test of having too much free time. I've been highly amused at the passionate reviews given on any example of said feeders. It seems there is enough drama boiling in the vacation fish feeder market to rival any crappy 90's tv show.

So. As I want the best for my fabulous fishy friend, I'll be popping over to a pet supply store of unspecified name to spend exactly $2.37. Alas. It seems you can put a price on love.

An Erinku:
Bubbles
you zoom
around saying, in fish-ese,
"OH LOOK!!! A CASTLE!!!!"

On Competition

There is a someone who I've been repeatedly compared to over the past while. Though we do have external things in common, this person makes me cringe whenever I'm around her. I have heard enough comparisons between us,in fact, that some subconscious part of me started taking these seriously.

I'm not sure when this happened. What I do know is that while enjoying some cranky Pandora music, I noticed the quickly-passing thought of, "I can't like this because so-and-so likes this kind of music." That made me pause for a second. I like to think that people are who they are, only; not that they are who they are as a specific reaction to one person. Right. Since I live by myself without finals currently, I've had time to think through and notice all the different life aspects where these comparisons have infiltrated. There are a lot. Alas.

So I'm in the process of reclaiming bits of me. These bits like cranky music, ice cream, walking, my circle of friends, and believing that emotional intelligence is just as important as regular intelligence. So I'm thinking I'm done with the competition bit. I have a lot of awesomeness on my side. It sucks knowing some people, unfortunately, but if life was always easy it wouldn't have terribly dramatic bad t.v. from the 90's.

Moral of today's story: surprise! It's orange-pineapple juice!

An Erinku:
I like the idea
that a certain
musical chord
holds up the clouds

In Which Procrastination Plays a Large Part

Tonight, orchestra rehearsals started up for the new season. We've moved to downtown Boulder, so the after-rehearsal-obligatory-beer can be held at many fun, new locations. Over the course of the evening, I got to sight-read a solo (since I'm pretending to be principal cello for a few weeks), drink some fabulous beer, catch up with friends, got invited to a big bash in March in Las Vegas, and got asked to be a part of a curling team. As I can't even stand on two bare feet without randomly tipping over, my answer, of course, was "Hell yeah!" It turns out the only correct answer to, "Do you want to be on my curling team?" is "yes."

This has been a week of fabulous invitations. I, sadly, had to turn down a trip to Drag Queen Bingo Friday night as I'd already made plans to dance and drink weak margaritas at an outdoor concert. This week has been a very good week. I wonder what adventures will visit me next week? And instead of playing on the internet, I really should be working on my final final for summer quarter. Less than 24 hours to go!!

An Erinku:
I have a
stash of M&M's
in the bottom
of my fridge

Living the Good Life

I must confess I have a big addiction that has gotten worse with my big move to the city: taking baths. The Hobbit Hole didn't have a tub and for six years whenever I was presented with a bath opportunity, I would jump right in, literally.

I was thinking about my bath addiction this morning while sitting in the tub. And how I took a bath last night with a cup of wine. And how I'd had a bath the day before, and yet another the day before that. I've got a fairly large hippie streak in me and I know about the wastefulness of bath water, but...baths are awesome! I recycle and walk/ride the bus most places, and I eat like a sea otter (vegetarian with all the tasty fish of the sea). And I can stop taking baths anytime. Really. And I'm not just saying that because my feet are all wrinkly from my several hour stint this morning.

But now that I AM out of the tub, it seems to be time for my other long-lived addiction: my espresso machine. I've only had one shot today and that is not nearly enough to get me through the next four hours of homework. And then who knows? I'll probably need a nice long bath to relax afterward...

Moral of today's story: kicking the edge of the bed hurts and that's why I've wrapped blankets around the dumb, pokey edge.

An Erinku:
thinking about
relocating this
homework camp
to a coffee shop

TV and Real Life

Today, during a long (so long) bout of homework, I had my favorite trashy tv Netflix playing in the background. They were dealing with the usual stupidly sincere dramas while running around in tiny bathing suits. But then, one of the girls started getting yelled at by her boyfriend for wearing a tiny bathing suit. This escalated as he pushed her down the stairs.

He's been a recurring character in the series this season and I've found myself muttering derisively about him whenever he's been on screen. And it turns out that I've not been enjoying my favorite trashy tv so much when there is a character transitioning from emotional abuser to physical abuser.

See, I've been on the end of emotional abuse in relationships a few times over the years. The first time, the relationship lasted for about two years before I finally escaped. The second time was a while ago and lasted only a few months, but that is still longer than it should have been. I was very grateful for several very wonderful women in my life who pointed out that what I was going through was not o.k. Being screamed at constantly is not ok. Being afraid to be who I am is not o.k. Being afraid for my physical well-being is not o.k. Walking around afraid to say or do something "unacceptable" is, itself, absolutely unacceptable. Contrast this with two people who discuss me and one who fairly recently told me, to my face, that they thought I chosen that relationship just to be dramatic and cause difficulties.

This all came up today as I watched Ms. Bikini Top on tv lie to all her friends about how her arm got broke after being pushed down the stairs. Yes, it's tv. But people don't actively choose to go into abusive relationships. I'm still pissed about the accusation and I hope my trashy tv can get back to the good old days when the bikinis being worried about having enough guys in trunks around before starting a beach bonfire was the big drama of the hour.

An Erinku (written as the ice cream truck goes by):
melting
heat and
homework
don't mix

Onomonopia, Naked Toes, and Pancakes

For my online art class this summer, I've been reading a lot of different articles, books, etc. This week's reading involved an article by Carl Jung about “Psychology and Literature.” Things were going all right until I got to the section where he said, “the lives of artists are as a rule so highly unsatisfactory—not to say tragic—because of their inferiority on the human and personal side.” And so another person tries to enforce the “tortured/starving artist” mythology.

I hate this mythology for a number of reasons, besides the obvious one that there are happy artists and there are tortured/starving mechanics, accountants, waiters, etc. Misery does not belong to one subset of the population alone; it visits people without any discrimination.

This was a huge issue for me at Naropa for my writing degree because there was this unspoken, even unconscious competitive thing where the more tortured you were, that made you (somehow) that much better of a writer/artist. I thought it was bunch of crap and so my happy little poems confused all manner of workshop participants. I was accused of being repressed and not in touch with how I was really feeling (which, actually, was happy. It was a good time in my life!). I accused right back that they were oppressing my happiness and thus were the oppressors, which should jolt their picture of themselves trying to be a permanent victim of life. It was a very odd time and has provided much to laugh at over the years since I graduated.

So to read about Jung believing artistic types to have sad, little lives irked me. Having a deficiency of caffeine also leads to this same irked feeling. I shouldn't always blame Jung, but it might be fun to start doing just that. It'll sound something like, “Grump, grump, grump, RAWR! Jung always does that to me on Tuesday mornings.”

Hmm. If a psychologist were to base their whole conception of artists on my life, it would probably look like, “the lives of artists are, as a rule, so highly powered by caffeine, onomonopia, and mismatched socks—not to mention sarcasm—that one should treat them as you would a cranky spring-time bear: placate them with blueberries and honey and for gods' sake let them sleep in because of their inferiority of having a normal napping schedule.”

Moral of today's story: pancake.

An Erinku:
my naked toes
peer at me
from behind
my little laptop

Billboard Zombies

Having moved to the big city in Colorado (after nearly a decade bouncing from small town to suburb) I've noticed there are many billboards about. I see them from the bus, on the bus, on the lightrail, and everywhere. After much consideration, I've concluded that all the people shown on billboards are actually zombies.

This is especially true of the people on the "Meth is Bad" billboard campaign. These ads are particularly disturbing with said zombies bleeding into sinks and having sex on toilets. I expect the next round with have them moaning about brains and losing fingers in inappropriate places.

Zombies would also explain the hollow stares from the people in ads by everything from Abercrombie (rhymes with zombie) to the Water Conservation guy mindlessly using the hose to water his driveway (probably in the hopes of it growing into a parking lot). And it could just be coincidence that there are a lot more zombie jokes recently, or it just could be the secret is getting out in an obscure, jokey fashion.

Hmm. I wonder about zombie modeling. How the modeling companies find new help, how they are paid (through an endless supply of interns?), and exactly how long did the billboard companies expect the general public not to notice the billboard zombies? Or it could be that I need some caffeine to clear out my cobwebby brain. Which, coincidentally, would be an absolutely un-tasty brain. I'm just saying.

An Erinku:
few things are sadder
than having a Japanese song stuck in your head
when you don't
speak Japanese.

Bus Is to Avocado as Art is to Lightpole

I volunteer for an hour or so on Thursday nights. Tonight, since my car is having self-esteem issues, I rode the bus. I left my volunteer place at 7:20 pm and a mere five hours later, I made it back to the Vault. It's actually not that far from home: 28.8 miles. I am very accurate when I'm cranky, it seems. My commute involved three different buses and two separate light rails. It was overly complicated due to a car crash on the light rails that (rightly so) stopped all the trains.

After getting to the light rail station near the Vault at 12:20 am, I was muttering under my breath about how I could almost have walked home in that same amount of time. I then looked up and saw the Ominous Avocado of Mysterious Intent on a hill in the middle of campus. I first spotted this...enormous half of an avocado (not a euphemism) about a week ago. It is large, made of cardboard? paper mache? something?

My first sighting was while walking across campus with my friend. This Ominous Avocado was being carried on a bright orange crate by several people, complete with movie camera to document its migration. I slowed down and pondered this, because it was wierd. I saw it yesterday, floating in the pond. Today, it was on the hill. I wonder very much about this Ominous Avocado of Mysterious Intent and I especially wonder about where exactly it will appear next. Sometimes life is odd.

This happened about a week after the fenced off lightpole. I know it was fenced off because they put down new grass seed, but the stuff they used for a fence looked like those velvet ropes you see at art museums that are supposed to keep you from licking the lead-based paint. And the lightpole it surrounded was actually kinda new. I had a vision of typing up (and posting on the pole) something like this:

"LIGHTPOLE"
Artist Unknown, circa 2010
Mixed media: metal, glass, light bulb, maroon lacquer
from private collection at University of Denver
Please don't lick the paint

The fencing, sadly, came down before I got to my printer. I'm very glad the Ominous Avocado of Mysterious Intent appeared to fill the void. Thursdays are odd.

An Erinku:
brrrrrrrrrrrrrr
my toes
happy for blankets
on this cold night

Monday Dreams

Today was a sad day. I slept in super-super late and realized that every time I do this, my dreams always end the same way: in a series of very bad puns. Puns are my Achilles heel. They hurt and make me twitch. This series was especially terrible. In my dream, I was plugging my ears and running. It ruined a perfectly good 10-hour nap. Ugh. Puns.

To top this off, I am terrible at making pancakes. Pancakes were my only food option for breakfast as I've not been grocery shopping in a while. It seems that, pre-coffee, I can't do the basic math needed to halve an entire recipe. I only halved half. And I still managed to burn them even though they were mostly water. I was most pleased that my espresso machine was repeatedly kind to me during this very difficult time.

As are most of my stories after a long weekend, this one has no high drama. I slept, I dreamt of puns, I need another espresso, and I'm off to an art festival.

An Erinku (something like decaf coffee, but not):
books unpacked
art hung
fish fed
The Vault is official

Realizations Under the Tent

Yesterday, I met with some friends at the Louisville Street Faire (here in Colorado, we pronounce the “s” in Louisville, because we are not Kentuckians) for talking, drinking, and live music. The fair happens each Friday through the summer with a different live band each week. While dancing around to a southern-rock band that had a very slight touch of country thrown in, it occurred to me that I've lived here long enough that I consider myself to be a bit of a local. I know about the local little events in the various towns I've lived in, as opposed to only knowing the huge tourist events, even though it's been a few years since I lived in Louisville.

The Street Faire is full of vendor tents, weak margaritas, overly-tanned women in short shorts and Birkenstocks, and men wearing Hawaiian shirts and cowboy hats. I'm always secretly amused by cowboy hats because Colorado does still have a streak of “westerner” going on while wearing Birkenstocks. I guess I think of most Coloradoans as a Cowboy-Hippie hybrid...which means most of them look like normal people who wear strange accessories from time to time, depending on where they are on the Cowboy-Hippie spectrum.

There was the stereotypical “Yee-HAW!” from various parts of the audience whenever the band started a new song, which also greatly added to my amusement. This happened even when the band played Grateful Dead covers. Yee-haw, indeed! In spite of all this, people were very much enjoying themselves, as opposed to the self-conscious enjoyment that can happen in a bigger city when folks go to “one of those quaint little festivals.”

And as a large of chunk of Louisville was out together drinking margaritas, dancing (some even swing dancing) to loud music in the open air, I was reminded that sometimes community events actually do build a sense of belonging, even if it involves cowboy hats.

An Erinku:
lounging
on couch
putting off
paper writing

Tales From the Vault

Tonight, in between practice sessions, I popped over to my new place. I was accosted in the hallway by one of my many middle-aged, toothless, male neighbors (I assume something is wrong with the water here. I've had friends promise that if I start looking like a midddle-aged, toothless male, due to showering in/drinking the water here, they will make me move).

Accost is a strong word. He saw that I was bringing in a box of my exceedingly cheap wine and offered to buy me a drink at the local dive bar. I was taken aback and mumbled something about cello-playing across the street. The problem with mumbling an excuse is it sounds completely fake and rude even if it's 100% true. So. Now. I'm still many months away from the end of my lease and I have one neighbor a few doors down that promises months of awkward encounters. Alas.

It is a good thing that I practice across the street until bizarre hours (last night I was there until 1:30 a.m.). And while I'm currently listening to the concerto I have to learn this summer, I realize I have at least 60 pages of articles to read, a three page paper to write by this weekend, and that it's time to put my new couch to use as a place to hold my butt while I do homework. Sigh. School...

An Erinku:
couches
as butt-holders
it's funny
every time

One Word

USING ONLY ONE WORD! It's not as easy as you might think! Copy and change the answers to suit you and pass it on. It's really hard to only use one word answers.

1. Where is your cell phone? floor

2. Your significant other? cello

3. Your hair? annoying

4. Your mother? awesome

5. Your father? interesting

6. Your favorite? books

7. Your dream last night? running

8. Your favorite drink? coffee

9. Your dream/goal? creativity

10. What room you are in? front

11. Your hobby? writing

12. Your fear? black-hole (the hyphen makes it one word)

13. Where do you want to be in 6 years? invigorated

14. Where were you last night? homework

15. Something that you aren't? certain

16. Muffins? yes!

17. Wish list item? muffins (dammit question 16)

18. Where you grew up? unconscious-beauty

19. Last thing you did? read

20. What are you wearing? toga (are you doubting me?)

21. Your TV? off

22. Your pets? fish

23. Friends? inappropriatelyawesome (sometimes I talk fast. It counts as one word)

24. Your life? adventurous

25. Your mood? sassy

26. Missing someone? Skype!

27. Car? feet

28. Something you're not wearing? shoulder-pads

29. Your favorite store? local

30. Your favorite color? all

33. When is the last time you laughed? today

34. Last time you cried? days (sad books are sad)

35. One place that I go to over and over? Reno

36. One person who emails me regularly? K.

37. My favorite place to eat? your house (two words and a self-invite for food, it doesn’t get more efficient than that!)


An Erinku:
Steve Miller Band
others like you
I have four words:
get off my Pandora!

The Great Cheese Crisis of 2010

Today, the world had its weird on. There were a variety of bizarre occurrences in the last little while that, somehow, culminated in my sort-of saving the day with American sliced cheese. There was a BBQ in need of rescuing, me hiking up my skirt so I could take big-girl steps, and a little old lady wandering over the rocky parking lot landscaping with her cane. I wish I could make more sense of these images, but sometimes life isn’t a cohesive story.

A few weeks ago, I had to go to court due to my rear-ending a trailer hitch. I was aiming for the bumper, I guess, but got the hitch instead. Since the police showed up, instead of a ticket, I got a summons to court to pay my fine. At court, I stood in the long line of folks who all received tickets/summons that same day. When I got to the front of the line, I was able to move to another line to pay the fee instead of seeing the judge. The lady behind me, however, had to go to court. She was very upset by the fact she couldn’t just pay the fine. She was getting louder and crankier and as she walked past, she bellowed, “I should be able to just pay the fine like everyone else! I only hit a pedestrian!”

I thought of this while the little old lady in the parking lot from paragraph 1 (above) was slowly walking behind a variety of cars. And how I didn’t want to hit her, since later I would feel the need to defend myself in a loud fashion about only hitting pedestrians. And then, with the savior cheese in my front seat, a pack of 15 bike-riding police officers rode past in the opposite direction. I thought, “It would only take a semi-truck with brake problems to wreck the local police force; they should spread out.” After counting the number of them in the pack, I looked up and saw a semi-truck heading in the same direction as they were. The world had its weird on today.

An Erinku (in slight confusion):
the best dessert
in the world
appears at all
potlucks here

Title is Unrelated.

Tonight, after my weekly volunteer stint, I smelled the most lovely thing in the world: cheap Chinese food. There was nothing I could do to resist. After noodles and a tummy full of hot mustard, I got my fortune cookie. As I was breaking it open, I realized that I always open my fortune cookies the same way.

And that lead to thinking about how I usually actively cultivate doing things always in the same way to offset the chaotic adventure force that swirls about me. And how I was tightly clinging to these same habits through the bumpy rough patch of life that began one fateful January day in 2009 and seemed to be grind to a halt one fateful Sunday in May 2010.

And how I am now to a point that when a situation arrives that would trigger my old habits...say being at the Hobbit Hole after a week of moving while preparing for finals and wanting to just veg out instead of filling yet another round of boxes. My old habit would have been to power through and fill my trunk with yet more books. My new habit says, "Hey, you're kicking ass at school and work and life and a beer while typing up a blog is totally justified." Yep. I'll get to the boxes soon enough. And, just to spice things up, I finished my fortune cookie routine in a completely different order. The fortune was still silly, but I did learn how to say "Christmas" in Chinese. Which I then promptly forgot.

Moral of today's story: flower.

An Erinku!
Oh, leftover Chinese food
in my fridge
I will love you again
tomorrow for breakfast

Further Adventures in Bussing

Every morning I ride the bus, I see the same people. They tend to stand in line for the bus in the same order, take their same seats, and say the same thing to the driver each day. The other day, more folks than usual were riding the bus and finding a seat became difficult. Everyone had to share, but some folks don't like it and will be as passive-aggressively against it as they can. This usually shows up in someone sitting on the aisle seat (and blocking the window seat), or stashing their bag on the seat next to them.

This day in particular was full of folks not wanting to share. In return, I saw one guy deliberately sit down on someone else's bag and two people “accidentally” bumping into folks who took up aisle seats. As I was exiting the bus, the guy in front of me paused dramatically, whirled around to the driver and nicely-loudly asked, “So, do people who take up two seats with their bags have to pay twice? If not, they should!!” Then whirled off the bus.

I thought it was brilliant. Never underestimate the power of annoying folks first thing in the morning by not sharing your bus seat! As I exited the bus behind him, he turned to me and apologetically said, “I probably shouldn't have said anything.” I replied, “No, you were fine. It is annoying when folks won't share seats.” Sometimes being human means saying silly things loudly and then feeling very embarrassed. Humanity is always one bus-ride adventure away from being too serious.

An Erinku:
blue stripey sock
angled on floor
pointing towards
laundry basket and door

Sometimes Smart

Recently, I was part of the winning team at a trivia night. I'm pretty sure that I really didn't need positive reinforcement that my random knowledge is useful. Instead, I will soon be on the winner's picture on their website. And I figured out that I know absolutely nothing about hockey and the finer points of baseball.

On the other hand, I kick ass at music, arts, literature, and sometimes at geography. Woo-hoo for liberal arts degrees!! Buh. After weeks of not writing regularly (but practicing an amazingly large amount), my topics are a bit lame. So it goes.

An Erinku:
cold toes
missing blanket
brrr
cold toes

Shameful Cheese

Right. There comes a time in every life where you take a breath and manage a minute to look around. These minutes can have long-lasting repercussions when you realize, finally, that you like shameful cheese.

This is worse than sliced American cheese. This is the pure, unwholesome enjoyment of bowling-alley-nacho cheese. It's the same magical cheese which is served with the curly fries at Hooters. Shameful cheese is wrong and is unnaturally orange, but that doesn't stop the longing; it just makes the longing more covert. Covert Shameful Cheese would be a fantastic band name.

Similar to recognizing this unholy love of fake cheese is the realization...of...well, nothing really comes to mind. Right. I unapologetically enjoy fake, plasticky cheese. The end.

Today's fortune: a junkie will practice cello on their lunch break. I am that junkie.

An Erinku:
lime
perched
on edge
happy tummy!

Being a Grown-Up

This past weekend, I went to a kegger. I've not been to one in a while. The good news was that this kegger had a bunch of folks around my age, so I didn't feel like an old lady moaning about the good old days in the early naughties and late nineties. As I sipped my microbrew (speaking of the perks of grown-up keggers: good beer!!), I started thinking about all the other grown-up things I've got on my list of things to do.

This past year has been the first time I've ever lived by myself, which shocked not only me, but a large circle of people. I've always had a variety of folks living in the same space as me, and living on my own, while awkward at times, is still TOTALLY AWESOME!!

My next to-do is to get my own apartment in Denver. A year after starting school, my daily two (or more) hours on a bus commuting has gotten a bit stale. So. I'm starting to look around the big city for a place for me, my 10-year-old fish "Bubbles," my two cellos, and my piano to land. Why this is scary is that I've never ever been the person to get a place to live. I've always had housemates find a spot, and I'd join in with all my crap.

When I start to freak out, I remind myself that not only do thousands of people do this every day, but that they do it and enjoy where they land. In the meantime, I'm going through all my stuff (which isn't too much, actually, after the great clean-out in Fall 2009) and donating a few last rounds before starting my big packing adventure. It's going to be wierd to leave the Hobbit Hole as I've been in this garage for six years now. Being a grown-up is scary at times. But the beer is good and having a whole new adventure will rock.

Moral of today's story: eek, it's one in the morning on a school/work night!!

An Erinku:
four weeks
til summer break
I can do it
I can do it

Something New

Yep. I am trying something new. I'm trying to herd all the various locations of my blog into one place...so I'm thinking it will be here. I'm a bit daft with technology, so this might take a bit of time. I'm Erin, I'm not fully caffeinated, and it seems all my friends have blogs here already.

Two for the price of one blog!

Right. I grew up in the 80's. I believe that children are our future. I still refuse to understand why our future hangs out in bars with their parents. This drives me more insane than having my sock on upside down. ..and few things are more annoying than the heel of your sock rubbing against the top of your foot. When I'm in a bar, I expect to drink. My time there is not to be a babysitter. This is an ongoing rant, and I really, really wish it wasn't. Bars are for drinking, not for babies.

So I settled the bill and ran off to another bar. And I'm here being socially deviant by typing on a laptop during happy hour. Perhaps the parents who tote their tots (see what I did there?) to the bar are feeling smugly rebellious, perhaps even slightly deviant. But. My typing in a bar, which is possibly annoying, holds no candle, flame, or lighter to the folks who bring their hyperactive brood to a bar.

My typing is contained to my table. My typing does not impose itself on other people at the bar, who are there to be grown-ups at a bar. I'll say it again: if you have to ask a bartender if they have milk and he doesn't know...it's not a place for your precious poopy-kins.

And as I type this rant, there is a man and lady walking with their three-year-old and seven-year-old to the FRICKING BAR!!! And there they go running amok (the kids, not the parents. Parents running amok would be a somewhat good band name). Sigh. There is a restaurant portion of this place. Alas. If this is a Colorado thing, it really needs to not be. If this is a national thing: IT'S CALLED A BABYSITTER!!! CALL ONE!!

Moral of today's story: bars are called bars because they serve alcohol and perhaps nachos. Not milk and G-rated language. Hell damn shit.

An Erinku (in crankiness):
two straws
for my happy drink
they stole my chairs
for their progeny. Punks.

Adventures in Lap-Topping

One of the many differences between my current going to school and my previous going to school I (I am a grad school junkie) is that my previous degree was mostly completed on bus rides. I read all the books while keeping slight track of the many twists and turns of the route. I wrote many assignments while sitting in metal boxes of different shapes, sizes, and speeds. It's creepy to think about.

However, this time around, the bus isn't helping so much. I can barely fit my cello on board, let alone set up and run through some random bit of Prokofiev over and over again for an hour. So. I'm bringing my wee little laptop along to help fill those various hours zooming along the face of the planet. The problem is that my wee little laptop is so cute that any female who sits in a bus-seat radius squeals and asks about it. This wee little laptop is better than using a puppy to pick up chicks. Alas, when I'm pre-coffee, squealing women are a bit grating.

So. Each birthday I try and make some sort of goal for the year. A few years ago, I went to an average of one concert per week. 52 concerts in a year. Last I did...something. I like to think I'd had “complain bitterly once a week” as my goal. That way I can feel accomplished. This year, I plan on writing a bit each day. My little rants (a.k.a. Bloggity-blogs) are how I blow out the stagnant water from my hose of writing. And with that image, I think it's coffee time.

An Erinku:
yes, I know
it's cute
yes, I know
it's Linux
(everyone squeals)

Pre-Birthday Snow Day

Dear Birthday Santa-
I REALLY appreciate the snow day as a pre-birthday present. You know what would be even more awesome? A snow day ON my birthday, too! I love to wear my tiara on my birthday and since I'm a bit shy around some folks, it makes me a little uncomfortable to go to work and/or school with it on. So that's a tension that could easily be resolved by, say, another two feet of snow. However, I'm not afraid to wear it to parties or to the bar, so I'll need the bus to be running tomorrow while I make my social butterfly celebration rounds.

I will be 32 in a few short hours and am looking for a year of ease. And for a year where I can handle more than ten minutes on an elliptical. But I'm not too picky. Just send a few lattes my way and I'll be a happy little sea otter. And on that note, this sea otter needs to practice some more music since I've got a lesson on my birthday.

Moral of today's story: snow days rock!

An Erinku:
favorite coffee cup
spoon tilted
jaunty angle
(jaunty sounds like a pirate verb)

Irish Heritage

Just now, as I was savoring a nice rum and coke in the sunshine, it occurred to me that I expect from the universe a bit of leniency while I'm on vacation. As I was wandering about with my drink, I realized that since I was outside in a public area, I was technically wandering about with an open container. Instead of being worried about this, I planned on announcing I'm Irish and that's it's St. Patrick's Day in Reno. Turns out that open containers in Reno on a traditional Irish holiday isn't likely to be a problem.

Morale: we are leaving my family's company in 20 minutes for further adventures.

An Erinku for my heritage:
rum is a
problem
like typing while rummed
is a problem

Magic Pockets

Near the Hobbit Hole are a variety of churches. One is called something like the Holy Comforter. This is not to be confused with a blanket, even though it’s spelled the same way and even though I really think it should be confused with a blanket. Oddly enough, the billboard outside of the blanket church is usually filled with very angry hellfire and brimstone messages (which aren’t exactly comforting) to off-set the nice, happy, hopeful billboard down the street at a different church.

As I passed the blanket church today, the billboard said something along the lines of, “HOLY EUCHARIST AT THE HOLY COMFORTER.” I, of course, mentally added “BATMAN!” to the end of their announcement. I went through a long phase of watching old-school campy Batman. My Batman is the one who carries a spray-can of Shark Repellent on his yellow belt; not the Batman who broods in the dark and talks with a gravelly, tortured voice.

This got me to wondering if one could get a hold of a can of Shark Repellent and then somehow find a church-like official to bless the can, if it would be a more effective product. Holy Shark Repellent, Batman! At this point, wondering if I had any brilliant items in my coat pockets (like mittens) I found my phone. These are the same pockets I checked three times last night for said phone. These pockets also have a few small holes…which obviously leads to: HOLEY MAGIC POCKETS, BATMAN!

An Erinku (Batman!)
My boxed wine
expired in February;
I drink it
anyways

Finals

Saturday was the first perfect Colorado day of the year. When it's a sunny Saturday near 70 degress, all Coloradans have the same idea at 1:30 in the afternoon: beer on a patio. I, too, had this idea and 41 ounces of beer later was a content, slightly sunburned Coloradan. Like a kitty, I sat in the sun and absorbed heat. Like myself, I absorbed good beer while wearing my sarcastic Budweiser t-shirt.

I'm basically done with my quarter (only one lesson left) and due to my sort-of kicking ass on my finals and having to work a bit on a Saturday, I celebrated with some Colorado beer before returning to the music building to practice in sun-less rooms. Coffee, cello, beer, cello. It's a typical day in my weekend life.

Moral of today's story: if I place the condensation rings from my beer glass into the Olympic symbol, I wonder if NBC will...oh. I just found out. They will sue.

An Erinku:
toes
escaping nylons
through holes
(now bigger) near toes.

Musing on my birthday

Dear Birthday Santa-
I was finally able to sit in sunshine for a few minutes today after work, since the sun hadn't set yet. It was awesome and got me to thinking about the obvious: my 32nd birthday is coming. Santa, I've been smacked around pretty hard by life these last two years and I think I've been pretty good, considering. And since I've been told I'm difficult to shop for, I'm making a list:

1. awesome socks. My grandma who passed away recently had been my top supplier in awesome, ugly, or just plain "what the hell?" socks for years. I don't think she meant to feed my sarcastic clothing style, but she did. I walk a lot and socks only have so many miles in them. My sarcastic sock supply is running low!!

2. mid-level to fancy tequilla. I didn't mean to become that one girl who is snotty about tequila; it turns out, though, that my taste buds have different life goals than I do. In spite of working two jobs, I am brutally poor (which leads to #3 on my list) and haven't had my own bottle of tequilla in months.

3. groceries. How the tuition taxation works at the day job is that each of my paychecks looks like I make about seven times as much as I really do (even though I'm taking only two or three credits each quarter!!!) which puts me in (approximately) the same tax bracket as a third-tier movie star. I'm grateful for my second job, since in the current economy, there are many people far worse off than I am. And I've been fortunate enough to have two grocery sponsors each month (thank you, thank you, thank you), but I'm starting to feel the moochy label coming on. I know I probably should've put off school for another year, but I'd waited for almost a decade and was feeling a bit antsy, and I didn't think the whole world economy would fall apart like it has. I'm just thinking a little bit of groceries would give me a different option from the bizarre dinners that I've been living on for the past while. Not that it's bad; I'm just saying options are nice.

4. a latte. I had the realization yesterday that I've not had a latte in at least six weeks. This needs to be remedied.

All in all, Santa, life is going all right. I sleep a bit, I work out a bit, I eat peanuts to a probably unhealthy degree, and I play cello to a definitely unhealthy degree. I just know I've been trying to take care of myself on my own for the last six + months and have been thinking about what would be nice to have around as I transition into another year in my thirties. The latte though...I'm really feeling it. I used to go through phases of a latte a day. What would be the best gift to me currently, Santa, is a coffee shop of my own. Hmm. I think I just drooled a little bit.

Birthday Santa, I know you have a few other billion birthdays to attend to, so thanks for reading my wish list. In the past you've brought me awesome adventures and unexpected gifts; I just thought I'd help out a bit, you know? Anyway, my sponsored rice is done cooking in the next room and I've got some music to practice tonight.

Moral of today's story: sometimes John Denver did know what he was singing about. Sunshine on my shoulders makes me happy, too.

An Erinku:
hair
finally long enough
for an
80's pony tail.

Pirouettes in Snow

After days and days of feeling sickly, I started to feel a bit better yesterday. Better enough to be sassy and to want to watch t.v. Due to vicious irony, my bunny-ear-converter box broke and no longer connects my t.v. to the wider world around it. So. I discovered the evil of cable while working out at the local gym. You plug in your headphones and suddenly you’ve walked on a treadmill for two hours and seen a variety of commercials.

Gyms are strange little worlds that I’ve only marginally visited in the past. They smell of sock and sound of lowest-common-denominator rock. I have been amused by various on-line postings about how folks can’t wait for February for the “phony resolution people to leave and us REAL regulars get to have our gym back.” Such rants make me think that perhaps the resolution people felt pretty unwelcome by the regulars and that the regulars could offer to show how to use machines instead of sitting scornfully atop their lofty spinning machine. But I digress. I joined in February and go in the middle of the night, so that must make me some sort of regular. Or some sort of phony who currently can’t walk my usual three+ miles due to snow and having all my daylight hours scheduled solidly. Hmm.

Anyway, I was excited to feel good enough to finally want to watch t.v. At the gym, there was the typical guy doing speed lunge laps which is basically where you very quickly walk like a kitty stretching out its back leg over and over again in straight line around the gym. It seems to be very prevalent here in spite of the fact that it’s very silly-looking. Sometimes when I arrive, there are groups of six or so people doing these laps. It’s like performance art.

However, since the one other person was doing his laps, this meant the cable-powered machines were quite open. I decided to try something new, something scary, and something much taller than my usual treadmill or bicycle. I tried the elliptical. I got my ass kicked in just under eight minutes. I sheepishly walked back over to my treadmill and walked several miles in a short amount of time. I watched that “Clean House” show which always makes me feel better about the fact that I’ve not done my dishes for a day or two.

My story is boring. On my walk home in the snow, I noticed footprints heading in the same direction. Someone had been walking a dog and from the looks of it, the dog was large. Every time the doggie footprints went aways from the person, there was a little pirouette in the person’s footsteps. Sometimes even proof of sliding. I think the dog was having a good time.

My goal next time is to get my ass kicked by the elliptical in just under ten minutes. I am a woman with goals, who smells like sock in the middle of the night, and who likes to imagine people dancing with dogs in a snow storm.

An Erinku:
I will not rest
until I have
a scarf longer
than Tom Baker’s

Self-awareness and how to have a bus seat to yourself

During the past year or so, I’ve taken to listening to much angrier music than I have in the past. I’m not talking about angsty-Beethoven angry, I’m talking about loud guitars with folks screaming lyrics angry. Today on my commute, I had my radio going pretty loud when I wondered what I was doing. Was I singing along? Screaming along? Some sort of hybrid? Scringing? Sireaming? I’m sure there is a word for that.

All I know is that hooting along with loud music while drinking my coffee concoction isn’t something I can do comfortably on the bus. Hmm. Although that’s exactly the sort of behavior that guarantees no one would sit next to me. It would also guarantee that the people in neighboring seats would exchange nervous looks. Hmm. Options…

Moral of today’s story: Dear toes, thank you for waking up in the middle of the night because you were chilly under flannel sheets and two comforters while the heater was on. In the future, toes, try and be like the rest of my body and just admit that there is absolutely no reason to be chilly in these conditions.

An Erinku:
My big sneeze
answered
by silence.
I bless myself.

Words can't quite capture the epic-ness

Right. I've gone off before about my spectactular lack of coordination. Today, I topped my own personal best. My story starts off...at a gym. Contrary to expectations, I did not faceplant on the cycling machine. Nor on the treadmill. I got through my little routine just fine. I did, however, stay a bit too long after sleeping in a bit too late. This, in turn, makes me zoom a little more quickly to the bus station.

In keeping with the irony that powers the universe, since I was running late, I was following the world's slowest driver. I waited through two rotations at one stoplight because he was overly cautious as well. My grumblings increased with each light rotation.

Finally, I zip into the parking lot. The last express bus is getting ready to leave, so I frantically grab my coat and purse, lock my doors and run full speed. For five steps. I tripped on a root in the little garden area. If I had my hands out, I could have done a cartwheel-like motion. Alas. My head is lucky enough to smack the soft dirt and return all my momentum back to the earth. I felt my feet tower above me before flumping back down. The momentum of that pops my upper body off the ground until gravity grabs me back. My shoe was flung.

I stood up and was grateful to realize that not only was my intended bus full of people staring, but there was another full bus pulling in to let folks off, and a third going in the other direction was parked in front of my bus. I, being full of reason and completely covered in dirt and decorative bark, quickly gathered my scattered things and trotted (not ran) back to my car as if I forgot something important.

Today, I'll drive to work because I really couldn't handle:
A) getting on that bus after the most spectactular 10 seconds of my life, and
B) I am still pulling bark pieces out of my pockets.

Moral of today's story: I'm going to avoid FailBlog for the next few days, on the off-chance that someone figured out a good place to tape running fails is at a bus station.

An Erinku (irony still powers the universe):
a sign at the bus station:
"Do not run after buses,
trip and fall conditions
may exist."

Tire of Good Sense

There is a glob of time called the past, a glob of time called the future, and I’m walking on the sidewalk of now. At some point in the glob of past, I started listening to Pandora radio on my computer. It has introduced me to some excellent new bands. As I spend many waking hours with some sort of music on in the background, it’s nice to change the source every now and then.

Today, I had my usual cup of coffee with breakfast. I started on the travel mug ‘o coffee goodness while waiting in the typical traffic jam. I had a local radio station on which was playing the typical good music. We inched forward. More good music. And onward. Until this one seriously annoying, way overplayed song came on.

I grumped. I sipped coffee. And still the drum machine and auto-tuned music came through my speakers. I realized I was super annoyed because I’d told Pandora, probably repeatedly, that I hated this band, that I didn’t want to hear this song, and my pre-coffee-saturated brain blamed the local radio station for not respecting my mouse click. One day soon, I know it’s coming, you’ll be able to connect your favorite real-life radio station with Pandora with your iPod. It’ll probably just be easier to insert a USB port into your arm. Hmmm. My pre-coffee thoughts are a bit disturbing today.

Moral of today’s story: tires belong on cars. They should not fly off and hit the windshield of the car behind you during rush hour. I saw the aftermath: folks were looking somewhat stunned and the car was looking a little tippy.

An Erinku:
stripey socks
under boring pants
layers
I dress in sarcastic layers

Where I Wear My Grumpy Pants

This past year, I've gotten more than my fair share of upsetting phone calls. This is just one of many reasons I only use a cell phone now. The odds are that since I never answer my phone (due to the bizarreness of my waking hours), and since it would be just too awkward to leave an upsetting message, I should be avoiding upset. I thought of this again today after I got an upsetting phone call. So. I'm listening to my new favorite band, drinking my favorite boxed wine, and am planning to read a book from my new favorite genre (one that I have mercilessly made fun of for years).

As I feel the only two things I've done for the last 18 months is bitch bitterly about my life exploding into spectacularly festive flames and making myself laugh occasionally, I'm looking for new adventures. Ones that specifically don't have phone access. And ones that specifically involve drama that doesn't revolve around me. And if these adventures were to involve Hornsby's® Hard Cider, then that would be just peachy. Or apple-ly. Or something.

The worst part of all this is that I'm finding fewer things funny. I seriously doubt that humanity has had a collective epiphany and is no longer silly; I think I'm just wrapped up in super-stupid drama and it collects most of my attention. But I digress, and complain, and drink bad wine from a box. I'm going to ask the universe for a dose of funny tomorrow because I'm annoying myself intensely. Bah.

An Erinku:
chair dancing
wearing a blanket cape
and cow slippers
I am that girl

Dammit, Quit Calling Me That!

I'm 31, almost 32. I have a few gray hairs. I have grown-up-girl hips. I'm almost (ALMOST) twice as old as the freshmen at the university. Fine. I realize they were born in 1991 (and I twitch a little bit here). And I realize they are all prodigies and can smack me around. Fine.

What I don't like is that one of my teachers routinely introduces me, as "Erin, the Old Lady." This makes me twitch just a little bit more. For playing purposes, I was matched with another old person in my class, but he's not quite as old as me. He's 27. I suppose since we both managed to live through the 80's, we should reminisce about the good ol' days of jelly shoes, hair bands, and neon pink leg-warmers.

This is not gymnastics. This isn't ice skating or being a math whiz (is it true that once they hit 20, they are done?). This is music. I've already been warned that it's harder for older people to train their muscles to do new things. Right. Since I'm so old, my arthritis will kick in any moment. I'm already past my prime, so why bother?

Just because I've gotten my ass kicked by ever composer I come by, doesn't mean I'm a lost cause. Just because I suck at roughly half my instrument, doesn't mean I'm giving up. And just because I'm drinking a whole pot of decaf coffee tonight, doesn't mean I won't be fiesty. Dammit. I think another hair just turned gray.

Moral of today's story: it is possible to melt part of the inside of a microwave in less than four minutes. DAMMIT, another hair turned gray!

An Erinku:
pink and green kite
waiting patiently
for spring
to fly

Language Run Amok!

On my fabulous two-week trip to Oregon, I saw the sights, drank the coffee, sampled the beer, and enjoyed all the live music that happens in a state that enjoys the complex beasts known as musicians. I even put in my fabulous nose ring during my stay to show that I am more hip than my Colorado address would indicate (I did live in Portland for a little while, after all).

My trip home involved many, many hours of waiting in a variety of airports. I ate more than one airport meal and drank more than one airport latte. I also got to go through more than one security check-point. I've been through the air-puffer machine, the whole body scanner, the regular scanner, and one time they swabbed my shoes with some sort of clear liquid.

Right after one of my security adventures, the guy looked up and excited said, "OOOOH, I like your nose ring!" I thanked him and he then continued on to say, "You look all homely, but then there's that nose ring!" Classy. I am the homely girl with a nose ring.

Moral of today's story: homely (adj) 1. lacking in physical attractiveness; not beautiful; unattractive. I know what words mean. I can only hope that the security guy meant a different word. Although it was a funny moment to ease the tension of failing to get on eight different flights.

An Erinku:
spicy nachos
boxed wine
Cuong Vu recording
Thursday