not quite a month....

since i've updated, so see, i am updating more often =) the jazz festival was amazing, as always. i think i am addicted to annual events. the jazz festival, burning man, artown, birthdays, annual celebrations of all the things that are important to us. each one seems to encapsulate a point in time, an event, a time in the history of this life. i always feel introspective about my birthday, can you tell?!? Just for random happy imaging, here's a photo from the latest fashion show:

i will be 42 in about a week and a half. my good friend lauren introduced me to this show that appears on showtime called "this american life". if you haven't seen this blog, it's totally worth it to check it out. it's introspective too. as the weather gets warmer, things start to speed up around here. this weekend, we go camping over night to a fire gathering with a bunch of groovy fire bugs i am friends with. before that i get to go to the university commencement ceremonies. my son's ex-girlfriend, still friend and his best friend from high school, calen, are graduating. i am proud of them, think if my son in afghanistan and am a tad sad, but my son tells me he's happy, so i deal with that my sadness that he's taking part in the war. in other big news concerning my life, my husband was non-retained in the national guard. after 22 years, he won't be serving his country anymore, thankyouverymuch. this is going to be a huge transition for him. i was very worried about him at first, but he is doing better these days. the same week dan found out that he was going to be retired from the national guard, we had to put our dog to sleep. mog was an awesome dog, but he was suffering. his back legs weren't working so good anymore, and i will always wonder if those strange lumps he had were cancer. he seemed happy until almost the end. this photo was taken the night before we put mog to sleep:

it's a dark picture, which i think is appropriate. i hadn't cried over him in awhile until just now =) mog was one of a kind and he will never be replaced.

now we have a bird. his name is fred:

Fred's a pretty goofy chicken. we heart him already. he was hand raised; and he's a cockatiel. we are already very attached to him. that's all i have for right now. upcoming activities:

• tonight i am going to get my bike tuned up and see how to work on it.
• this weekend is the fire thing i am excited about and unr graduation
• also working on a yard overhaul at the house, more documentation to come...
• end of may, black rock rendezvous, more camping on the black rock desert and testing camping with the fred, should be entertaining
• fire festival is just over two months away. yeeee haw

now, THIS weekend....

is going to be another adventure altogether. I really am trying to update this thing more often. I am debating whether or not i should link this blog to my other blog....jury's still out on that one...

I consider myself one of the luckiest persons in the entire world. I live in an amazing place, and I am gifted to get to do some of the coolest stuff EVER!

THIS thursday, I am participating in a fashion show. If you had asked me even a year ago if I thought Iwould ever be a model, I would have laughed at you. I am a big girl, and not what a lot of people would consider traditionally pretty. Then I started talking to my friend Lauren. Last Winter, at the beginning of December, she did a show called "Luscious Ladies: A Fat Girl Fashion Show". It was amazing. I'd never had hair and makeup done before like that. I felt like a diva, and the clothes Lauren made were amazing. They were made for ME and they were designed to make ME look awesome! I so appreciate her for that, she's cool like that. Here's a pic from that show:

Well she is doing it again, this Thursday, as part of a more mainstream fashion show. Here are details, I hope this pic is big enough to see details:

This is a great opportunity for folks to see what can be made from recycled stuff. See that awesome tuxedo coat above there in the first pic? That was made from a bedspread that was found at a thrift store. A-MAZING. Lauren is so amazingly talented when it comes to sewing. Really. She's one of my hero's. Then Friday begins another adventure. I work for the University. It's what I think is one of the coolest departments because we get to host and help produce many of the funky and cool events and programs on campus. This weekend will be the 48th annual Reno Jazz Festival. I have been lucky enough to get to volunteer for this amazing festival for the last ten years. The Jazz Festival has a special place in my heart because when I was a teenager, I got to participate in the Jazz Festival, and now I get to work it. I have met some of the coolest people one will ever know, and I have seen talent that cannot be believed. I am sure some day I will see someone I've heard sing at this festival on American Idol or other famous venue. I've also met some amazing artists and adjudicators. My role in this wild thing is varied....I am the site coordinator for Lawlor Events Center. This is what the outside of Lawlor looks like during the festival, but there's often more people milling about:

Once someone comes inside, they see our tables all setup:

Those are my coworkers Debbie and Julie. They work at Extended Studies with me year-round and also volunteer to work the Jazz Festival. We sell t-shirts, and we direct people where to go, sell wrist bands, and pretty much handle festival logistics for this venue. We handle only two different things at Lawlor. We do vocal groups or choirs and we do B & C bands, in the President's Room. We also post the scores for the choirs ONLY at Lawlor, here is someone checking them out:

Here is the sign outside Lawlor, advertising last years showcase concert:

These are all for last years festival, by the way. Last year, we had this really cool cat named Scott Barnett from UNR Insight Magazine who hung out with us and took all these pictures. He was way fun to talk to, and he got some great shots of the festival. Credit where credit is due an all that. This year, I will likely take my own pics =)

So, back to my day in the life... Here's what the inside of the President's Room looks like, with a band playing:

And here's a sound board. One really can't say enough about the technical staff that works this festival. These guys do amazing things several times a day trying to make all the groups happy with sound. Their days are at least as long as ours. At least we get to leave the rooms and walk around!

Here are the judges in the Presidents room, concentrating intently on having good comments for the performing group:

 

Here's inside the choir room, with Madeline Eastman teaching two girls during her clinic last year:

 

Saturday, after competition ends, we make a mad dash to get all the awards ready for the festival participants, while at the same time, trying to get the showcase groups situated based on who will play that night. Here's the awards, all layed out:

Here's my favorite shot from the one's taken of the showcase. The secret knowledge and expression on this guys face is priceless:

And finally, after months of preparation, hours of work, two days of long shifts, stiff competition, and all the drama that goes along with it, we are almost at the end, so here's a group shot with my compadres and me:

I'm going to have a great weekend! How about you?!?! Peace!

*whew* and so....

The lack of updating continues =) I have, however, been busy, and life is good for me.

We are going to do another Compression! Celebration of Fire and Performance Art,  so much time has been spent in figuring out logistics for that. This year we are closing down Virginia Street, which is one of the major streets in Reno, so there was a much larger meeting for my permit, and there are more logistics to deal with. Not that this is an excuse for not updating here, but it does let one know what's going on...

Above there are my lovely friends the Asha World Dancers at the Festival last year. They are doing super cool stuff this year, too. They are bringing a home town girl, Kami Liddle, who left Reno and became a belly dance superstar, back to Reno for a kick ass show and some workshops. I have kind of been helping with that, too.

I began this post in February, and here it is near the end of April and I am just getting back to it. I need to make it a priority to put more stuff here and catalog all the stuff I am doing. Some day, it will be important, if only to me so I can relive my glory days when I can no longer remember it as easily!

I've had an online journal for over nine years. I began that journal on February 15, 2001. SO much has happened in that amount of time, but I find that I also no longer update there, at least not often. Since I got this domain, it's mine, and it seems if I am going to do any sort of online journal thing, since I have access to making my own, it makes the most sense to do it here. So, I stopped paying for my subscription. I am sort of conflicted about that, but  not really. Time is too short and resources too scarce to spread one's self so thin that they don't have time to update every where they need to. I don't know if the domain name will stay the same, but for the time being, this is my home.

There's tons of stuff happening, as there always is with me. I have decided to not be so involved with my fire group, although I am still completely committed to the festival we produce. There are a lot of reasons, but I still care very much about the group and what happens, I think I just need a break for awhile.

The first part of April because I am a big fat (hey, no fat jokes!) nerd, I helped a bunch of my Burning Man friends celebrate Yuri's Night in Reno. My awesome friend Lauren made me a corset and we decided to be space twins. This is an awesome themed party that we hold each year to commemorate Yuri Gagarin's first manned space flight from 1961. Our local event, though, also raises funds for awesome Burning Man art. I am proud to participate in this event each year!

This is Lauren, our friend Lenae, and myself, sporting our space-wear. here's another one of Lauren and I, so you can sort of see the twin-ness:

In the middle of that one is our friend Kelley, also known as Pinktini. Damn, we had fun that night! It was a good night, and the next day, Lauren and I drove to Vegas to attend the International Lingerie Convention. Lauren owns an awesome store called "Prism Magic" and I got to help her shop for the store.  Boy was that fun....but that adventure should probably have it's own entry =)

I am still dancing, and we just had our Spring public performance, at an event called "Night of All Nations" that is inspired by the University where I work.

Here's our group pic from that performance...

I love dancing more than I can even express and now have gotten in to a tad bit of teaching, and a new endeavor, called the S.E.E.D.S program. It's a mentorship program that teaches young girls to connect positively with their bodies and also helps them learn life skills that will help them be empowered women. Our program is called daDima, which means "pomegranate" in Sanskrit. SEEDS is an acronym for "self-esteem, empowerment and education through dance".

That's just this month so far. See why I say *whew*?!?

In the near future, I am participating in a circus freak show, traveling to Scotland and Ireland in June of next year, continuing to work on the fire festival, do more fun web stuff, and see what other sort of interesting trouble I can get in to....but I will try to update more often. I still have the Paris posts pending. I need to write it all down before I forget. That might just be a project for next week....after the Jazz Festival!

Oh yeah, and my son is in Afghanistan. I will think good and safe thoughts for him each day. He is my baby!

Peace! A girl can hope....

eeep!

i look and can't believe it's been closer to a year than not, since i've posted. oh my...

2009 was an amazing year for me. i realized a dream in getting to travel to europe for the first time, visiting paris, normandy, and versaille in june.

here are pictures, for anyone that happens along to this site:

day one:



day two:



day three:



day four:



day five:



day six:



the france trip culminated in getting to spin fire in front of the eiffel tower. THAT was an amazing experience!

here's the video for that:



that was pretty much the highlight of my year, although i also produced an amazing celebration of fire and performance art, attended burning man, and survived the holidays!

now, as i look forward to 2010, this will not be an international travel year for me. i want to save and pay for a trip to ireland and scotland that's supposed to happen in 2011...so i am thinking perhaps a road trip or two to burning man regional events, perhaps ranger in some different places and see what else i can do...

peace, for now!

gah!

sheesh, and i thought my last entry was sort of upbeat. not so much with a title like "tis the season…of suck". heh. oh well…. 

 i really am doing pretty amazing, even though i have sad days. today is feeling like a pretty good day for the following reasons: 

1.  it’s friday 
2. my honey comes home today 
3. i have a three day weekend 
4. in 2011, i will go to ireland and scotland 
5. i am healthy 
6. i have managed to keep all my weight off and my clothes just keep getting more and more loose.

tis the season….of suck

this is a really bad time of the year for me.

i can’t believe my mom has been gone for three years. it seems like yesterday, and while at most times of the year the pain is a dull ache it seems to flair around this time of year into a red-hot poker that sears through my heart. i try to keep myself busy and try to stay upbeat, and most of the time i succeed. and then it hits me…

i have been trying to distract myself and that helps somewhat. i just read all four twilight books in about a week or less. that was entertaining. i wish there was more. escapism is an okay form of therapy =) i really am doing fine, but come here, as always, when i need an outlet for things i don’t feel comfortable expressing in other places. does this mean that my life has become so full most of the time that my need for open diary has decreased? that’s an interesting thought to ponder, but i think it’s more a time issue…

a few months ago, i went through a change at work. they decided that i needed to be more visible, so they took my nice, cozy, comfy office away from me and forced me in to a cubicle in the center of the noisiest, busiest office. it’s been quite the adjustment, and not always pleasant. 

also, i am on my way to writing the saga of paris. i want to include pictures, and i don’t want to forget any of it! i think i am on day two or three now, in my other diary, the one where i pay for hosting space. or will, once my initial year is up =) this od window is behaving strangely and i wonder if it’s because i am using google chrome? that’s my current theory. now, i will see if the entry saves…..

yep, it saved, so perhaps it’s just a weird display thing in the code. i need to stop thinking about stuff like that =)

anyway, i am still here, and feeling a bit blue today. i did see AVATAR last night, in 3D and it was pretty nifty. seeing it in 3D made me want to see it in IMAX. i think some of the 3D stuff is lost on me because i tend to see and view things very linearly. i don’t even know if that’s a word, but we’ll say for arguments sake that it is.

i can’t think of what else to say, right now. yesterday was the solstice and i am happy to welcome the sun back, it can hurry along now, any time. my town got a huge snowfall this year, almost two feet at my own personal house, and it’s still hanging around, which is rare for the high desert, usually there’s not enough or it gets too warm to stick around. we were supposed to get another storm last night and while we did, it looks like it was mostly rain. there was just a light dusting of snow out this morning, and the roads didn’t seem nearly as frozen as they have in the past.

if any of you like chill-loungy type instrumental-based music, you should check this out, it’s very beautiful:

auditory canvas

that’s all i have for right now, will try to get back sooner than i did last time =)

peace.

auditorycanvas.bandcamp.com/album/fabric-of-life

Confessions of a bad web mistress...

Photo by Caroline

Above is a shot of me getting zombie-fied for a recent belly dance gig. Good times, that.

I find that I am actually experiencing that which everyone says is true...the mechanics car sucks, the doctor is always sick, the plumbers pipes are always clogged, and the web persons website is kind of crappy =) Actually, it's not crappy, I love the theme, and I love what I've done with it thusfar, what I am NOT apparently good at, is updating it.

I am going to make a concerted effort to change that, though. I am actually working on a project that organizes many of the photos from Paris, and I want to post them here, in a day-to-day sort of way, and write everything down so I don't forget it.

Life is for living. Blogs are for remembering and recording so one doesn't forget. The issue is that I've been so busy living, the recording has been suffering a bit =)

Anyway, just a quick update as we approach this new year for this heathen soul, to say that I am still out here, have LOTS to update on, write about and do. I will update as I can, perhaps make it a larger priority for the immediate future.

Rest assured that I am well, living la vida loca, and looking forward to seeing what comes out of the Senate in the form of health care reform. This is conceivably one of the largest single issues of my lifetime, and I am excited to see what direction it takes.

Peace!