I Am the Wind: A Performance Piece Featuring Interpretive Baton with Djembe Accompaniment

(Because this thing definitely needs to be recorded somewhere, in the annals of something-or-other. And this blog certainly fits that description. Or something very close to it.)


I am the wind.
I am the breeze in the trees.
I do not know where I will blow
Next.

Will it be through your hair?
Hey: you over there!
Will you even be aware?
I don't care.
Don't you dare
Stare.
You can't see me!
I am the WIND!

You think I'm weak.
I'm not so meek.
I'll show you my power is true.
If you were a kite,
You would fear my might.
If you were a canoe,
You wouldn't know what t'DO!
If you were a weathervane,
I bet you'd go INSANE!
If you were a locomotive train ...
Well, let's face it. I wouldn't do much.
O, but if you were anything a lot smaller that weighed a lot less,
I'd give you a new address!

Here I go!
O, I'm a-gonna blow!!

(*BATON INTERLUDE*)

Now my job is done.
Look! Here comes the sun!

(the end)

(copyright 2006, by Shannon and Kari then-Buck-now-Byrd)

Poker? You Brought Her.

Today's blog entry (or should I say the latter-half-of-2007 blog entry) is brought to you courtesy of Joe, Sarge's best friend and the only male ever allowed to attend a Ladies' Poker Night. Ever. The following words and photos are taken from his personal blog, which you can view at hippiegay.blogspot.com. But please don't share this info with any of the fellas. They like to think we play strip poker while smoking cigars and drinking whiskey. Who are we to ruin it for them?

Merry Christmas, and here's to 2008. --Guinness



In honor of Julie's birthday which was Saturday she hosted ladies poker at her house. Now this is usually pretty exclusive, women only. Several of Julie's male friends, and the significant others of some of the guests have always tried to weasel their way in, but to no avail.

Until yesterday. Since it was her birthday, Julie decided that she could invite anyone she wanted, so I was allowed into the sanctum of Ladies Poker. Now, I was there mostly to help host and to be kind of a guide/advisor since I was told that some of the finer points of poker have still eluded the players.

Never. Again.

There were highlights of course. The nick names were fun: Sarge, Guinness, Preach, Money, Sunshine. The food was good.

But good lord almighty. They take more breaks, interrupt play more often than anyone I've seen. I'm not a hard-core poker player, but I just about lost my head when after 6 hands they realized there had been two cards on the floor. While they claimed to be playing No Limit, bets rarely exceeded a dime. The turning point for me was when they ceased play to discuss one of the player's latest dating drama and then ended the 10 minute discussion by toasting her because she was feeling down about it. It's the first time I've experienced such a thing at a poker game.

After all my bitching and moaning about not being invited to Ladies Poker ...

Be careful what you wish for.

Update (2:55pm):

The comment left below by "Money" is a perfect example of why they were right not to let guys into their game. The Killer instinct is lost on them.

3 comments:
Money said...
See, boys do things like raise the bet to 50 cents before the flop. How are you supposed to help your friends stay in the game as long as possible if you try to get so much money out of them early on?

December 17, 2007 2:35 PM
Guinness said...
That's right, Money! I only lost $1.75, but I came away with a lovely lipstick, nail polish and very practical banana holder, which are worth at least half that.

December 17, 2007 10:23 PM
julie1215 said...
Ahhh...Good times, good times. And I think Joe's poker name should be Girl Friday, since he served us so well.

Chelsea 1992-2007

She has been the one constant in my life since October 31, 1992. You will be missed, sweet girl.

How Not To Do Some Things: A Guide.

HOW NOT TO HAVE A BUSINESS LUNCH IN NEW YORK CITY:
Whenever your work calls for you to meet someone over lunch to talk about business-y things, and when the restaurant where you're eating is so loud you can't hear what they're saying very well, and when the conversation turns to your lunch guest's past work experiences, and when they name an organization that they used to work with that you've never ever heard of, something like "Hezelbop".....and when your brain for whatever reason tries to find SOMETHING to recognize in that word -- and in a split second, your brain absolutely tells you that yes! you recognize it from somewhere, and that you should respond!! You know this strange sounding word from your past!! Yes, yes, your friends Russ & Cheryl started a non-profit by this name -- didn't they? When all of these things happen, whatever you do, do not respond with a huge smile of recognition and intelligence on your face as you reply, "OH YES! HEZBOLLAH!! I KNOW THEM!!" Because if you do that, time will stand still as they stare at you blankly .... then all at once, you'll realize what you just said. And you'll be so horrified and tickled at the same time, with no one to laugh with about it. Plus, you might get fired. Or blown up.

HOW NOT TO EXIT THE GYM:
After a good workout, when you're dressed and ready to leave the gym, and when your journey to the exit door involves a long walk from the locker room through the free weights room, the cardio room, the stretching area and the front desk area, and when you're exiting during rush hour, when the gym is packed with extremely attractive and minimally dressed people, don't leave the locker room without first checking to make sure the bottom portion of your scarf isn't accidentally tucked into your crotchal area. Because if that happens, each stride you take will drive that thing further and further in (obviously, because of the multiple layers of clothing you are wearing, and not at ALL because your thighs come anywhere near each other). And yes, before you reach the exit you may notice a strange sensation (not to mention an ever-decreasing ability to breathe), but you're certainly not going to stop and check out what's going on down in your business in the middle of rush hour at the gym. Especially since you really just want to think that all those stares from the cute guys means you're just lookin' FIIINE.

HOW NOT TO RIDE THE SUBWAY IN NEW YORK CITY:
See blog entry from May 19, 2006, below.

HOW NOT TO BEFRIEND YOUR NEW ROOMMATE WHO JUST HAPPENS TO BE ASIAN AND PETITE:
This "How Not To" available upon request only and will never ever be posted on this or any other blog.

A Subacromial Decompression for the Holidays

In honor of the holiday season: I got surgery!!


An "enormous, enormous" bone spur that was "fraying" my tendon "like a hemp rope" was removed from my shoulder -- and everything was done through two teeny tiny holes!!! As the medical team fought to save my life, my dear friend Michael waited patiently in the waiting room for hours and hours and hours watching a marathon of People's Court. THAT'S A REAL FRIEND, FOLKS.


Merry Christmas, everyone!!

Pahdon me, suh...

I'm going to let you in on my little New York City secret. Several months ago, I was about to enter a store, and a nice man held the door open for me as I walked past. I said, "Thank you," but for some strange reason, it came out sounding perfectly British. My first thought was oh no, how embarrassing! But after just a moment, that turned to wait a sec, that guy thinks I'm British! That's AWESOME!! I mean, it wasn't like I was ever gonna SEE the guy again! It was just a very typical anonymous exchange in the typical life of a typical New Yorker - one we all experience on a daily basis: "Thank you," "Oh, excuse me," "Up yours."

But see, here's the thing: after that first episode, it just kept happening. Quite accidentally, mind you. My thank-you's and excuse-me's simply came out sounding British. And I'd always walk away feeling just a little bit cooler.

And yes, each time there was always a tad bit of fear about possibly getting caught. But then: even if I DO get caught red-handed, what in the world would the other person say? Something like, "HEY WAIT A SECOND, LADY! YOU'RE NOT BRITISH!!" Well, then here's what I would do: I would act confused and quite innocent, and then respond in my regular boring Tex-ish dialect and convince them that they just heard wrong! And then we'd both get a really good laugh! "Oh my gosh, you thought I was talking British?! That's HILARIOUS! Have a great day!!" See? Not only is it foolproof, but it actually has the potential to bring people TOGETHER. Okay now maybe I'm taking this a step too far here, but perhaps--just PERHAPS--if we all spoke with a dialect to a stranger even just once a day, well, maybe there would be less wars. And more recycling.

If you're reading this (Jeremy, maybe Megan, maybe Jonny), the next time you're having a down day, just TRY it. It doesn't have to be British, either! Jonny, you could easily get away with a Spanish accent, and Jeremy, obviously your first choice would be Mandarin Chinese, but I would encourage you to look at the traditional Hollandic-Dutch dialect of the Afrikaans. If somebody does bork, bork, bork!, I will make you a really nice mix CD.

Sexy in LA

So I'm leaving this coming Saturday to go to the LA Film Festival. They're telling me I should kind of "dress up" for some of these events that I'm going to be attending -- which has made me a tad nervous, I'll be honest. I am HORRIBLE at stuff like this! I'm not good at choosing clothes, and worse than that, I'm AWFUL at doing ANYTHING more complicated with my hair than sticking it in a ponytail. So in an attempt to find the right hairdo for my LA "debut," I was determined to at least TRY.

So: I decided to go for my very favorite hair "look," the head full of romantic tendrils -- you know what I'm talking about. Looks something like this:



So I asked friends who know something about hair, I consulted websites, and I did everything STEP by STEP. I think it turned out pretty good! Tell me what you think:

Regarding my blog title...

So just FYI, for all of you who have asked.

...all right, one of you.

...well, okay nobody actually asked, like out loud, per se, but I think one of you might be wondering, probably, about my blog title, "Half-Warmed Fishes." Well, it's a spoonerism. That's right: a spoonerism.

(THINK about it: clearly, Half-Warmed Fishes = Walf-Farmed Hishes. Not really. Keep thinking. But not too long 'cause we've both got stuff to do and I'm bored already.)

After a lot of snortatious laughter with a few very close friends tonight, I'm thinking of renaming it "Snacks and the City." (Forget the Sex! Pass the Chex Mix!!)

How Not To Ride the Subway in New York City

So I just cleaned out my e-mail in-box, which can be quite entertaining, depending on what you find. I was reminded of yet another embarrassing experience that I had written about to a friend (that's YOU, Jeremy!! I WROTE YOU!!!), and had since totally forgotten. One ought not to forget experiences like this. It keeps one humble when one is tempted to think of oneself as somewhat cooler than one ought:

So after I left you guys, I put on my iPod and waited for the train. I was listening to some good song--don't even remember what it was, but I was into it. Had my two huge, clunky bags hanging from my shoulders. Got on the train. Went quickly for a couple of seats that other people beat me to before I could get there -- then spotted a lone empty seat in between two people, the seat right in front of the pole - you know the one. So I quickly made my way over there, and JUST as I was about to sit down, my butt aimed toward the seat--remember I had my iPod on so I didn't hear the doors close, and was completely unaware of stuff around me--the train jerked forward. SOMEHOW--I seriously don't remember the next few seconds in detail--but somehow I grabbed the pole with both hands, I still had my two huge bags hanging off of my shoulders, and with the jerk of the train, all at once I kind of bent my knees to get my balance, and was THROWN in a FULL 360-degree circle AROUND THE POLE with my bags slamming with great force into everybody in my path!! It was a very surreal moment, because I continued to hear NOTHING but my sweet, sweet music while seeing people's faces, equally confused and horrified, as they dropped like dominoes. After knocking I don't know how many people down, I stopped literally right where I started: standing in front of my original seat, ready to sit, as if the previous 3 seconds had never happened. So I took a moment--then slowly, deliberately and verrry carefully sat down, at which point the sweet elderly man next to me said (loudly), "YOU NEED TO TAKE SUBWAY 101!" I agreed, and then spent the rest of the ride trying desperately NOT to laugh--which of course guaranteed that I was laughing out loud, by myself, for the remainder of the longest subway ride of my life...

Happy Valentine's Day!!

So today is Valentine's Day. I am single. Mercifully, so are many of my friends. If we were still living in our hometowns, we would be total freaks of nature. I cling to the belief that living in the city somehow diminishes my pariah status -- but as I stand in crowded subways, surrounded by the cliche bouquets and whispering couples, I sense complete strangers easily calling my bluff: today is Valentine's Day. You are single. You are incomplete.

To protest this injustice, a group of my single girl friends and I are getting together tonight to celebrate President's Day instead. We all picked a president, and we're going to present reports to the group over dinner. I've always hated history -- by far my worst subject throughout school. My knowledge of our past Presidents is embarrassingly limited. So I looked at the list, and picked some guy named Franklin Pierce -- for the very logical reason that when I was 15, I had a devastating crush on an adorable red-headed boy named Pierce.

Turns out Franklin Pierce was an interesting dude. Not in his politics--which were, by most accounts, largely unremarkable--but in his personal life. As a Congressman, apparently he was a big-time drunkard who loved to gossip. But at the age of 30, he chose to marry his total opposite to help improve his declining reputation in Washington. Jane Means Appleton was painfully shy, extremely religious, and absolutely HATED politics -- in particular, the social duties required of a politician's wife. She was also a staunch supporter of the temperance movement. Ah, so the seeds of co-dependency are buried deep in our country's history....

Their marriage sucked, it seems. Crazy as it sounds, Washington was all about hob-nobbing, rubbing elbows, requisite dinners, and the like. Well, Jane would have none of it, even refusing to live in Washington with her husband for months at a time. For a large portion of Franklin's presidency, she employed the help of her sweet Aunt Abigail to take over the official "hostess" duties required by Franklin's social calendar.

It gets worse. They had 3 sons. The first died after living 3 days, the second died at age 4 of typhus -- and little Bennie, who lived until age 11, was killed in a train accident witnessed by both of his parents. Bennie was killed just a couple of months before Pierce's inauguration. His Presidency was thus marred by intense sorrow. Jane spent most of her time in bed, writing letters of apology to her dead son. She was convinced God took Bennie from her so Franklin could tend to his political duties without distraction. Their marriage, not a good one to begin with, steadily spiraled dowwwwnward...

Over the past little while, I have been continually exposed to marriages that have followed a similar path. Marriages that were full of unbelievable joy and hope in the beginning -- way ahead of the game, compared to poor Franklin and Jane -- but faced with life's inevitable trials, things just imploded. How are these folks celebrating today? Are they giving it their all, for the purpose of reviving a dying hope? Are they going through the motions, both aware of the truth, but neither willing to acknowledge it? Or have they given up entirely, defending themselves with words like "consumerism," "Hallmark" and "profits?" How did Franklin and Jane celebrate that first Valentine's Day just weeks after the tragic death of their third son, I wonder?

Today, I am single. And today, I'm okay with that. And I am so thankful that I have a full year in front of me before another President's Day...