Tap

There’s not much that I love as much as great pairs tap dancing.

I saw this next one on TCM last February- it’s Christopher Walken on Gene Kelly:

The scene with Gene Kelly and Donald O’Connor is here. It won’t embed. Go watch it, though. It’s great.

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Last Week Was Crazypants; This Week, More Traveling

In case you have been sitting in anticipation of a follow-up to my last post, I did not end up buying any shoes or boots.  I am sorry if I caused you any sleepless nights.

I guest blogged over at CoMO Whine and Dine today. I have been reading that blog for awhile. Long ago, I had the idea of writing a blog about being vegetarian in Columbia, but did not get it off the ground. Since they were looking for new participants over there, I decided I should be one of them as I have a different perspective as a vegetarian. I will submit a few more guest blogs in the next few weeks and see if it’s a good fit. Like I need a new place to write, right? I don’t have enough blogs already.

Last week was a long and crazy week. I started it off by seeing Winter’s Bone with a couple of friends. It’s been at Ragtag for weeks and weeks now, which goes to show that Columbia loves it some local films. It is set in the Ozarks of Missouri and was filmed near Springfield. It also has done pretty well with critics and festivals: a 95% Rotten Tomatoes rating, a score of 90 on Metacritic, and it won the Grand Jury Prize and the Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award at the Sundance Film Festival. I hate to say all that and then say that I didn’t love it, but… I didn’t love it. I thought it looked pretty authentic, but there were a lot of parts that didn’t ring true for me. It was okay. It was spectacular for a Missouri film, let’s put it that way.

On Tuesday, I volunteered at the Missouri River 340 race.  I really, really enjoyed myself.  I signed up for it on a lark.  I like to volunteer, and I don’t know anything about river races or kayaks or canoes or even boats.  It turned out to be a great time.  I learned a lot.  I volunteered in an overnight shift, and the weather was perfect on a night with a full moon.  The racers would appear around the bend of the river, only visible by their headlights or the small LED lamps on their boats.  I just thought it was the coolest thing ever, and I cannot wait to volunteer again next year.
I took the picture above on the river with the light of the full moon. I think it turned out really cool.

On Wednesday, I played my weekly trivia game and then went to see the Carolina Chocolate Drops in concert in front of the Blue Note.  The concert was free, so there were a lot of people there just hanging out with drinks, talking in circles.  I had to be pushy to get to the front where I could actually hear the music over the chatting.  That was particularly annoying, because CCD are exceptionally talented musicians and it was kind of wasted in that environment.  But once I was close enough to hear, most of the people around me were really into the music, and it was a good show.  I’m only disappointed that it took me awhile to push through to the front.

Here, you should listen to this.  This is awesome.  I actually, embarrassingly enough, don’t usually love instrumental songs, but there aren’t lyrics worthy of this tune, honestly.

I love the hell out of the CDs this group has put out, but they were fantastic live.  Really amazing.

On Thursday, I was heading home from work when I got rear-ended at a stoplight, pushing my car into the car in front of me.  It caused a bunch of damage to my car, some of which I suspect is mechanical, not just cosmetic.  So I get to haul it around town for appraisals and estimates and eventually have it actually fixed.  I had a rental car over the weekend, but I returned it last night and borrowed one of my dad’s cars.  I am much less fearful of doing something stupid in Dad’s car than in a rental.  That didn’t keep me from calling him in a panic today at lunch when I thought all of the oil had drained out of the car in the PetsMart parking lot.  (It hadn’t.)  Anyway, fun times are being had, car-wise, in my life at this time.

I spent the weekend mostly exhausted and hanging out with family.  Tracy was in town for the last time in a long time, so we partied appropriately.  I had to clean my house in a hurry on Sunday morning, but that’s for the best.

This is a short week because I leave on Thursday night to go to KC, and on Friday I will accompany Tracy and her three cats and her parents and their dog to Portland, Oregon, by car caravan.  I am ambivalent about this trip.  On one hand, I love road tripping and I like to help people move in a self-satisfied sort of way.  Tracy is particularly bad and I am particularly good about shoving her cats into cat carriers and dealing with their harmonized yowls of discontent on car trips, and I have scars to prove my skills.  I offered, long ago, to help with this move, though I think I was thinking more in terms of moving her to, say, Cleveland or Pittsburgh and not Portland, Oregon.  It is a very, very long car trip to make with three unhappy cats.  Not to mention the ex-wife and former in-laws and a dog who has never, ever liked me.  So that’s the other side of the coin.  I will get to drive through Utah and Idaho, which I am excited about, even though it will just be interstate highway.  And there will be roughly 36 hours in Portland next week, which is great in itself.  And, ambivalent or not, I am doing it.  I leave on Thursday.

It’s really been a summer of trips for me.  I am very happy about that.  13 states, and three of them new to me.  Very exciting.  I love to add states to my “States I’ve Visited” list.  I have a definite goal of seeing all of them.

So that is the plan for Labor Day.  And then it’s September.  Actually, it will be September tomorrow, right?  Where does the time go?  It will be September tomorrow, and I am busy every weekend in September and most of October and then it will be Halloween and then it’s the holiday season.  Ugh.  (My sister-in-law has already started Christmas shopping.)  I do not understand why it goes so quickly.

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Say Hey

I am shoe shopping online.  Something about the students flooding into Columbia this week has me thinking about my winter shoe selection.  I wish I had a better selection of winter shoes.  Shoes are the only kind of wearable thing I’m allowing myself to buy at the moment.  I have managed not to buy any new clothes since early March.  Which actually puts me on trend- there are people online doing “shopping diets“- and you know how I love to be on trend!  Anyway, I can buy shoes.  I want to buy boots, but they get so expensive and I can’t quite commit.  Even to whether I want black or brown!  Decisions.

Not that I’m really ready for fall.  I just get into shopping moods.

August is really not flying by.  I thought it would, and then I keep being surprised that I have had so many weekends with not much going on.  Not that I haven’t been able to fill the time adequately (I’m very pleased with what I’ve accomplished this summer), but the time isn’t flying by.  It’s just kind of moseying.

In two weeks, I leave to help Tracy move to Oregon.  That is creeping up pretty quickly, actually.  I am helping with the move, like I said before, and I’m looking forward to the trip.  It will be a nice Labor Day weekend on the road.  Then, after that, I have several busy weekends in September and October.  Those weekends tend to fill up.  I don’t know why.

Picture above is a Rose of Sharon blossom from the tree in my backyard.  I took it as part of my 365 project.

I’m not feeling too talky today, but here’s a nice summery music video for you:

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