My Review of: 2008

Let's see how much of 2008 I can remember.

January: I remember nothing.

February: I remember Jeff and I ordered pizza on Valentine's Day.

March: I remember nothing.

April: Yeah, I got nothing.

May: The weather got nicer? Did it really, though?

June: Aha! I graduated from the iSchool and became a Master of Information.

July: I turned 26!

August: Hm. It must've been pretty hot? Oh, yeah! Hawaii! That was great.

September: I worried that I hadn't found a real job yet, but I was subbing a lot for SPL.

October: I started my current job at the EngLib.

November: Kiera came home from Florida.

December: It snowed A LOT.

So my powers of monthly recognition are not strong. I do remember last year's resolution: REMEMBER TO BRING REUSABLE BAGS TO THE STORE!!!!! I think I did pretty well on the reusable bag tip, so let's make this year's resolution: KEEP REMEMBERING TO BRING REUSABLE BAGS TO THE STORE!!!!!!!111

D$ out.

My Review of 7 Brides for 7 Brothers at the 5th

Through his work, BJ got free tickets to this show so, even though I was never a big fan of the movie, I agreed to go.

Did I mention this Seattle production stars Mo Brady as youngest brother (and true romantic) Gideon Pontipee? It does! So of course I had to go.


In case you're not familiar, let me break down the plot of this little show: A mountain man goes into town to find himself a wife to take care of him and his six grown brothers. The lady he marries is not exactly thrilled to be taking care of seven slovenly dudes, so she helps the brothers shape up their act so they can go into town and find their own dern wives. Unfortunately, the other town girls are not so easily won, so the brothers take a cue from a story they read in a book (Plutarch's Sabine Women) and decide to just kidnap the girls and carry them back to the mountains. Just your standard romantic abduction plot, I guess.

The show's jokes pretty much revolve around how clueless and horny the brothers are (except for Mo's character, the youngest brother, who is clueless, yes, but more lovestruck than aching for any available warm body). You'd think that a bunch of jokes about dopey, sexually frustrated mountain men would be kind of one-note, and you'd be right, but I had a good time.

The misogyny in the book and lyrics runs pretty deep (to illustrate: at what is probably the emotional crescendo of the play, Mo and the female lead are singing about being deeply in love while the male lead is singing the musical theatre equivalent of "one bitch many faces"), but the whole thing is so lighthearted that it's hard to take it too seriously.

Besides, though the softer sex gets short shrift in the play, the male actors have to dance around in various degrees of undress, making them more the objectified than the the objectifiers (at least from where I was sitting). There is something icky about romanticizing the sexism of olden times, but if I'm watching a lot of hot, shirtless men do flips while it's happening, I get a little distracted.

My Review of: Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving was extraordinary this year for the following reasons:

1. It was marked by Kiera's (temporary) return to Seattle from Florida. Happy graduation, Kiera. You are now officially trained to do a real job.


2. The Sutton-Raineys had a joint Thanksgiving with my Mom's BFF's family, the Moores. There were like 20 people over at Carl and Marilyn's house, including an exchange student from Vietnam that Tristen brought through Highline Community College's Thanksgiving Adoption program. Her name was Anne and she was very nice. I hope we didn't scare her too much.


3. The Seahwaks lost spectacularly.


4. We got into a debate over whether Thanksgiving is a religious holiday. That was weird.


5. Amelia wore a super cute dress and learned to flap her arms like wings and say "Gobble gobble gobble."


6. I didn't spill anything!

The day kind of went by in a blur because there were so many people. We were about halfway through the meal when someone (I think it was Carl's brother) remembered to say Grace. We all stopped eating so he could thank Our Heavenly Father, and then we went back to eating. Normally, my mom makes us all take turns saying what we're thankful for during dinner, but we didn't do that this year. We did try to explain to Anne what Thanksgiving is about, but that led to the aforementioned disagreement over the religiosity of the holiday. (It's totally not, right? I think Abraham Lincoln made it a holiday because the woman who wrote "Mary Had a Little Lamb" wrote to him and suggested it.)

All in all, the day really affirmed something I've been thinking ever since Amelia was born: babies make family gatherings way better. She was pretty much the center of attention the entire day, and, when you think about it, she's probably the thing we're all most thankful for. I'll put up some pictures soon.

Standing cold and scared on top of some hill

So here you go, Nathan. This blog's for you! (Thanks to Facebook, I was able to find a picture of this momentous event courtesy of Emily Johnson.)

Christian thought we were going to see the current T-Tones until about two minutes before the show. When I told him this was just a reunion concert, he said, "You mean we're not seeing guys that have been practicing three times a week? We're seeing guys who haven't sung together in 4 years?" His face said "Oh crap..." but he stayed in his seat. Lesson: We are all powerless to deny the Testostertones attention.

Considering the fact that a lot of the guys up there didn't even know there was going to be a reunion show until the day before it happened, I think things went pretty well. There were some moments where I almost cringed, but those were outnumbered by the times I chuckled and thought, "That Jimmy is still socute."

In fact, the highlight of the show was, IMHO, Jimmy Maize's adorable onstage antics. He read the lyrics to "Tempted" off of his phone and he made eyes at his screaming fans at the right moments. Blake pretended to shoot arrows at him during "Cupid" and Jimmy pretended he was being hit in hilarious places. After the show, Jeff's only reaction to the whole thing (and keep in mind he completely despises a cappella in general) was, "Boy, people sure do love Jimmy."

Nate also had the idea to try to auction off Ben Shardlow (the Twin Cities' Most Eligible Bachelor) to earn some drinking money for the group (apparently, Ben did the same thing to someone else once, blah blah blah), and while the premise was funny, no one but Erin Roden actually bid on him and he later told me they didn't collect from her. But he did give her a hug. Those T-Tones are the sweetest!

In closing, I'd like to say that the T-Tones are nothing without Scotty the Body. Sigh.

Whitman Reunion: Part 1

Wow. This reunion has been so exciting, I haven't even been able to actually live blog it. Right now it's Sunday and I'm at one of the only public computers in the Penrose Library. Charlie and Jeff and I just checked to see if the same Rothko print is down the cafe, and it is. (We also saw David Beckley down there and kind of awkwardly said hi to him.) Remember when the trees outside that cafe were just little babies and Alden was making jokes about that yellow block sculpture? The trees are so big now! You can barely see the yellow block sculpture.

Jeff and I are about to go back home. We ended up picking Christian up at the rest stop and so we're going to take him home, too, I guess. I don't really want to drive all the way to Olympia, but I haven't figured out if I'm going to tell Christian that. Suggestions?

Before we go we're going to stop at the Iceberg and get milkshakes. Today I taught Darrell how to use Facebook so he could stalk the freshmen he knows who go here now. Libby and Darrell are having lunch with Parke right now and Jimmy is holding auditions for In One Room. As it turns out, one of the best people to catch up with is Claire Willett because she talks fast and makes a lot of jokes. Last night we saw a T-Tones reunion concert. I could probably write an entire blog post about that, so I'll save it. We went on a mini wine tour of Walla Walla. We crashed a college party on Friday night that was next door to the Haven. Alden and his Sidecar friends took their shirts off approximately 45 minutes into the party. Jeff tried to help an awkward freshman make friends at the party. I got drunk on 4 stolen beers and felt terrible all day Saturday. We saw Cullen's movie about D&D L.A.R.P.ers. We went to the green. We ate stinky cheese at the place where Grapefields used to be. We talked to Anna Batie. Darrell got sad that Joe Hickock (Heecock?) isn't going to be a doctor and is instead teaching SCUBA lessons in Kaua'i. Charlie says the best part of the reunion was seeing people who got fat and pregnant.

This is all very stream of consciousness because I'm in a hurry. In fact, we are leaving right now! A more thoughtful Part 2 may be coming your way soon.

Whitman Reunion: Prologue

Though I graduated just four short years ago, I'm already being called back to my undergraduate alma mater for a reunion. It's for the classes of '02, '03, and '04 (a so-called "cluster reunion") and at its root is probably some kind of scheme to get us to donate more money to the alumni fund. I'm actually pretty happy for an excuse to go back to Walla Walla. I want Jeff to see where I spent some of my most formative years, and it's such a nice little town. Also: Wine tour! Woo woo!

Jeff and I were supposed to leave at 4, but we're running behind. I just heard from Darrell, who's on his way to pick up Libby and then head out. I also heard from Christian this morning and his car apparently broke down somewhere on I-90. Oh noes! Hopefully he'll be picked up by Alden or whoever he can get ahold of. If he's still stranded by the time we come by, we'll save him (and Rose, who's travelling with him, I think).

Charlie has his own troubled story, which is that he thought he could stay with his 86-year-old aunt in Walla Walla, but he forgot (for three months) to call her and as of last night he still didn't know if it was cool for him and his friend to stay there. So Charlie may be forced to find shelter with some poor, unsuspecting freshman. Some things never change!!!!1 JK/LOL.

Hold on, my phone is ringing.

...

Ok, it was Christian. He said he got a tow truck to take his car back to Olympia and he talked to Libby and Darrel. So whoever gets to him first will pick him up, I guess. Gotta go. The race is on!

I Got a Job! Part Deux

So I had a difficult decision to make last week. My boss at the Engineering Library offered me a 9-month gig right after I found out that a Seattle children's librarian job will be opening up soon.

This triggered a debate between the two halves of my personality. One half says, "You are in no position to turn down a job, young lady. You have student loan payments to make and the economy is on the express train to Recession Town." The other half says, "Life is about taking chances! You will get the job of your dreams if you persevere! Just keep subbing and praying, girl!"

The debate raged on until my guilt complex convinced my idealistic notions that having health insurance is more important than holding out for the job of my dreams. To put it in terms of cliches, "Follow your bliss" lost out to "A bird in hand is worth two in the bush."

So this is where I'll be spending my 9-3 (I'm only .75 FTE) until June:

It kind of makes me think of Meg talking about "fuck you architecture."