sundries

[rm]

Patty heads off to Ohio to visit family today. She'll be back in two weeks and change, as yet to be determined. I am waaaahful already, but it's good time to be a workaholic and plan all the AWESOME stuff we are doing in June.

Best Barn Dance EVER last night with Pierre Chartrand who was very funny and a wonderful teacher and could modulate the mood the dancing he did in a really fascinating way. It felt so good to move. I've been sick, I've been busy, I've been stressed and my physical life has suffered for it lately. I really really really needed that and Patty and I grinned like idiots the whole time and the photographers seemed to really like us, so I suppose there will eventually be pictures.

As an aside though, lots of dance is related to lots of other dance. Modern contra, Scottish dancing, Regency and other historical dance, Appalachian step dancing, Cape Breton, Quebecois dancing, etc., all hit each other on the family tree at various points. So lots of stuff in one will look familiar to something in another. But when it's not exactly the same, OMG, do not bitch about how it's "wrong" and that the teacher who is a major leader in the field is "incorrect" because you can't do it. So rude.

Next Barn Dance is May 28 and features stuff from the North Carolina mountains apparently.

This weekend: a lot of work, a haircut, a bit of shopping, Dances of Vice (after which I will not be able to have steak, as I will be in the office covering the overnight).

Next weekend: a fundraiser for the 1920s event on Governors Island. Also that's the opening weekend of Governors Island, with, apparently, royals and polo. Er, yeah, I am so there.

Weekend after that: Patty's (immanent) return, Wit's End and hanging out with the ladies from Duchess. Speaking of Duchess, I have come to the conclusion that pinstripes, among other things, will in fact look the yum on me (the first suit did not have pinstripes because I didn't think I could pull it off).

Will drop paperwork for New York Diaries anthology in the mail this weekend.

Will do submissions for the LJ Idol anthology this weekend.

Should get on actually compiling fixing my bibliography more, but that can wait.

Should get on working on DW/SJA/TW essay thing for British journal that seems vaguely interested. I should at least begin the rewatch, since I won't really be able to write this until after the TW, series 3 airing.

Should sit down and read the OTW journal so I can decide if I want to try to do a thing for them.

Had a brilliant flash of a character idea for original fic yesterday. Why, why have I never written this character before. It's so obvious.

Figured out the hook/weaving for the non-fiction project I've wanted to do since forever. Can't figure out the opening; know it's all plutonium, but it's good, oh yeah.

Need to map out something for the Madonna anthology, but thankfully, I've already got an idea.

In the fanfic department, I think I should get the TW railway fic out this weekend.

Need to deal with D*C logistics re: shooting footage for my pilot pitch thingy. That can wait a week or two.

I am dressed in this super-cute WWI steampunky way today. Blue and white bustle skirt and cute grey and blue sweater with prop plans on it.

Comments

[wcg.livejournal.com]

I hear you about people who know one sort of folk dance tradition and decide to judge something "wrong" based on their limited experience. It puts me in mind of Geo. Bernard Shaw's Julius Caesar, where Caesar says, "Forgive him. He is a barbarian, and considers the customs of his tribe and island to be the laws of the universe."

[theotoky.livejournal.com]

ah! he's amazing. so glad you enjoyed him.

we do irish step dancing (sean nos style) which is similar to the quebecois step dancing he's doing there. it's so much damn fun and such hard work. i love it.

you and patty should come visit october 3rd. werner and i are teaching workshops in traditional french dance (as well as others) as part of a huge contra festival. fun! :-)

[rm.livejournal.com]

Heheheh, maybe. It's a hard year for travel, we are already doing so much (we just found out about family reunion and wedding stuff for her in August).

I've dabbled very vaguely in many, many different types of step dancing (including Irish -- we have Niall O'Leary coming back again (he did a dance last year) in a couple of weeks), but this is definitely the variation that has grabbed me the hardest, which surprised me, let me tell you.

[stardragonca.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I think of that one all the time. Best. Shaw. Quote. Ever.

[argentla.livejournal.com]

I am dressed in this super-cute WWI steampunky way today. Blue and white bustle skirt and cute grey and blue sweater with prop plans on it.

Have you ever read any G-8 and His Battle Aces pulps, or similar 30s WW1 pulp? Where heroic aviators and the like are still endlessly battling it out with the ghastly (and sometimes super-tech or supernatural) agents of the Kaiser? I'm tempted to coin the term "Kaiserpunk" for that sub-genre...

[stardragonca.livejournal.com]

Pinstripes,on you, OH YEAH. Don't forget to share the yum with the faithful.

[rm.livejournal.com]

No! Oh man, I think I must.

[brewsternorth.livejournal.com]

This.

(And good luck with your assorted creative works!)

"Why, why have I never written this character before? It's so obvious."

[stardragonca.livejournal.com]

Sure sign that the madness Muse is upon one!

[argentla.livejournal.com]

http://www.adventurehouse.com/shopping/en-us/dept_17.html

I have a couple of these...

[fmanalyst.livejournal.com]

I've spent more time with the music than the dancing (mainly because I'm a horrible klutz and can't dance at all), but I would have loved to have seen the dancing. Being from Kentucky, I'm more familiar with the clogging forms of Appalachian dancing, but when I came to this part of Virginia, I started seeing flat-foot dancing commonly at mountain jams, which is more of a soft-shoe shuffle type of dance.

[antelope-writes.livejournal.com]

Polo is awesome. If you don't go to that for the polo, go for the party afterwards.

[stardragonca.livejournal.com]

Friend who went to USC film school was captain of their women's polo team, assures me that polo is cavalry training. Swinging the mallet = decapitating foot soldiers.

[kessie.livejournal.com]

It was lovely to meet you! I was surprised at how sad I was to leave NYC as large cities and I don't always get along, but there you go. And on that note, I'm going to get a few hours sleep, jet lag be damned.