Monthly Archives: July 2014
More Terrible Places In Chicago
Dear People of the Internet,
I know many of you probably travel, and that many of you might even travel to Chicago.
In the interest of making your lives easier, here are a few more places that you should never, ever visit, because they are absolutely horrible.
Hotel Allegro, 171 W Randolph Street, 60601.
First, this place is right in the beating heart of the downtown theater district. Who wants to stay there, right? It’s busy, busy, busy all the time, with all those bright lights and taxis and every form of public transit known to man running day and night. Who wants to stay in the middle of that? Amirite?
Worse, it’s like three blocks from the Joffrey — so if you’re a dancer, you’re basically obligated to go*. Vacation is supposed to be about relaxing and eating too much pizza and pastry, not hoofing it to ballet class and letting them whip your sorry butt into shape for an hour and a half.
Moreover, really comfy beds make it likely that you’ll sleep in and miss the 9 AM Ballet Basics class, so then you’ll have to do some other, harder class, which you will regret even more.
Comfy. Modern. Oh, and they remembered our extra pillows.
To top it all off, the Allegro offers loaner bikes, so if you really, really want to ruin your relaxing vacation by being all healthified, you can totally do that without even having to break into the mysterious world of the Citibike.
To offset the calories you’ll burn on the bike, the Allegro also offers a nightly reception in the lobby with wine, sangria, and sometimes guests. Guests like tarantulas and box turtles from the Field museum. Who wants to have drinks with giant, hairy spiders?**
Courteous, efficient staff ensure success for the Allegro’s evil master plan to seduce you and all your friends into returning for another trip and handing over all your money. So if you know what’s good for you, you’ll stay far, far away. Like, maybe at the Budget Motel in Gary, IN. Assuming it’s still there.
The Allegro is also full of these cozy little niches — perfect for producing a false sense of security…
312 Chicago, 136 N LaSalle Street, Chicago, 60602.
To begin with, 312 Chicago pretends to be in another postal code entirely, but in fact it shares a building with the Allegro, so LIAR LIAR PANTS ON FIRE. Who cares if your doors are on another street entirely, 312 Chicago? We see what you’re trying to do!
Second, your smooth, professional serving staff is entirely too knowledgeable and courteous. How will people ever learn to make up their own minds if you keep suggesting perfect wine pairings and delicious desserts?
And the barkeeps! What are you thinking, letting them walk around making really amazing pomegranate cosmopolitans? I’ll have you know that I drank three of those and became quite chatty and sociable, which is entirely out of character for my superior, unsociable self. Come on, 312 Chicago, you’re messing up my mojo, here.
I should probably also mention the food. It’s not fair to raise people’s expectations like that, 312: delightful foccacia; perfectly-seared steaks; melt-in-your mouth fingerling potatoes; Caesar salad with just the right anchovy kick. Needless to say, last night’s Foreman-grilled sirloin and nuked potatoes were pretty disappointing after all that.
And now, here I am writing comments to a restaurant, like it can hear me and respond. You see what this place has done to me?
Avoid at all costs, especially if you like your bank account balance and your waistline***.
Ronny’s Original Chicago Steakhouse, 100 W. Randolph Street, Chicago, 60601.
Ronny’s Original Chicago Steakhouse: don’t get sucked in.
Two words here, guys: epic portions.
Must … keep … eating.
Three more words: rock-bottom prices.
While Ronny’s isn’t going to hit you too hard in the wallet, if you value that svelte dancer’s physique for which you have toiled so many long hours under the grinding tutelage of your sadistic ballet instructors, STAY. AWAY.
Because Ronny’s is all about value, and by “value,” I mean, “Putting enough food on a tray to feed an entire rugby team.”
For $8, my Ronny’s breakfast included some 8″ of Polish sausage (yeah, yeah, go ahead with the 8″ Sausage jokes, Internet), a pile of crisp and delicious home fries (billed as “hash browns,” because LIARS) that probably weighed a pound, two enormous eggs skillfully cooked over-easy, two gigantic slices of Texas toast, and a little slice of watermelon.
Now, that would be a perfectly reasonable meal if I was planning to spend the next 6 hours in the studio and not eat anything else — but for a mere mortal on a normal day, it seems like a bit much, doesn’t it? Like maybe the good folks at Ronny’s were hoping I’d die of a coronary (or maybe of a ruptured stomach) right there, right then?
They topped it off with a diet Coke large enough to refresh a racehorse. That much caffeine on top of that much food could kill a lesser person. Fortunately, I’m a cyclist and a dancer, so I know how to cram huge portions of food down my gullet (even so, I was not able to finish all of my potatoes).
I’m not sure whether Ronny’s is trying to kill us or maybe just put every other restaurant in Chicago out of business. Either way, given the portion sizes, delicious greasy-spoon style food, and prompt service, I’m pretty sure they just might succeed … if we let them.
In Conclusion
Chicago is a dangerous place, y’all. Chicago wants to take all your money while simultaneously making you super fit and eleven pounds heavier per day. Chicago wants to whisper its siren song into your ear and convince you that you love her like you love your own mother. Be strong! Don’t listen! Stop up your ears and visit some other place, like maybe Peoria, for example. Chicago will suck you into her warm and worldly embrace and feast on your soul … so you should probably just stay away.
But if you don’t, and you meet me in any one of these places … well, you know. My responsibilities as the Warning Klaxon of the Internet weigh heavy on my shoulders, and sometimes I have to go back more than once to find out whether or not a given threat has been neutralized.
Remember, people, I’m doing you a favor here.
So, You’re welcome.
And mum’s the word.
Notes
*I, however, did not make it to class this time because of an unexpected wedding-related engagement. I will go to Chicago many more times; my friends will only be getting married once, and they wanted to see us during the time we were going to do class. There are, in this world, a few valid excuses.
I practiced combinations in my room to make up for it.
**Yeah, so I totally do. These guys came with a curator from the Field Museum — I guess you could say they were on a Field trip? There were also some fascinating preserved specimens. You know, if you like that kind of thing 😉
***To be fair, I have no idea what 312’s prices look like. We were there for a wedding dinner. I have a feeling they’re probably fairly reasonable, all things considered. That said, Denis and I are used to blowing most of our entertainment budget on fine dining, which has really warped my sense of what “fair” restaurant prices look like. If you’re on a shoestring college budget, for example, 312 is probably a “once-a-year, when the parents are in town” kind of place.
Brief Monday Class Notes
We had a lovely class last night. Margie and I are both trying to convince Denis to try the advanced beginner class, and since there were no other students, Margie taught an advanced beginner class for us. I think Denis did well and I felt pretty great at the barre, though I was having some trouble remembering combinations for some reason.
At centre we did sautes and changements. Mine were pretty, but I sounded like an elephant, which is not usual.
We also worked on Polonnaise and mazurka. For some reason, my legs didn’t want to Polonnaise right. I got it sorted in a parking lot on the way home while refueling the truck. Life is funny that way.
Saturday is open house, so I am going to see what’s on the menu class-wise. Classes are free on open house days, so I plan to cram in as much as I can. Likewise, I hope to snag a Wednesday class this week, as I keep meaning to and my mood issues keep derailing my plans.
Guess that’s it for now. Charming illustrations to follow, maybe.
ChiTown Weekend
Quick disclaimer:
If it were up to me, we might very well relocate to Chicago*. As such, my opinions on the city in question are probably less than objective.
Anyway.
Here we are at the Hotel Allegro. Our room is fairly nice. The decor is rather in the style that Denis calls “Early Gay Bar,” which works for us, and we’re both enjoying the very strange and presumably retro light fixture above our bed, which looks like one of those little pincushions with a flat top and chenille balls all over the sides rendered in glass and upended on the ceiling.
That said, the marbled mirror tiles on the wall at the foot of the bed are a bit much. Likewise, the carpet. Wow. Um.
The bed itself, however, is rather delightfully comfortable.
Today’s plan is to hit up the Shedd and then either do class at the Joffrey or catch a play based on Terry Pratchett’s Discworld books. I’m leaning towards the former because it doesn’t involve an hour-long transit trip (two hours on the train is a long time on a really short vacation, y’all!) and also because ballet.
Right now, though, we’re on the hunt for breakfast.
Anyway, more to come. That’s it for now.
Notes
*We’d have to bring our friends Kelly and Jim with us, and my Mom-in-Law, Phyllis — but then we could all live together like some kind of giant hippie co-op, I guess? …Only with better hygiene. And doors. And not so much of that free-love thing.
Monday Non-Ballet Brain Dump
We’re going to Chicago this week for the long-time-coming finally-legal wedding of a couple of our dearest friends.
As such, I’m in Trying To Finish All The Things Before We Go mode, which is totally something I’ve caught from Denis*.
So today I have:
- done yet more laundry,
- completed the drawing part of a painting I need to finish before we depart (it’s a watercolor, so it’s entirely possible that I will be able to finish it),
- initiated the packing-for-the-trip process (which I never, ever do this far in advance),
- topped off the Tricross’ tires,
- ridden the Tricross to the grocery store,
- slayed the grocery run for the next three days (along with some extra food because I couldn’t pass up a really good bargain that I can freeze),
- ridden the tricross home,
- put away the groceries,
- and started dinner prep.
I also had a complex internal conversation with myself about why we still use gender-specific insults even though this is the 21st century and the perceived gender of an individual has no bearing either on that individual’s ability to be a total jerk or the qualities of that individual’s jerkitude**.
Later I will finish making tacos and maybe begin trying to figure out how to set up a rooting dish for my pineapple.
I don’t know why I’m so into growing this pineapple all of a sudden. Denis suggested it when I told him I brought home a pineapple, and it just seemed like a really awesome thing to do. Meanwhile, a friend of mine on G+ has decided to attempt to grow an avocado from an avocado pit, and suggested that perhaps her avocado and my pineapple could be pen-pals.
I think that idea is so ridiculously fun that I’m just going to have to give it a whirl. First, though, I will have to think about what a pineapple would even write to an avocado***.
I am writing this brain dump thing because I find that doing this helps me feel like I’ve actually done something on a given day, which makes it easier to see that my mood disorder has not, in fact, totally torpedoed my life. Sometimes that’s hard to see.
I get that, like schizophrenia (to which it is genetically linked), bipolar disorder involves cognitive deficits.
This means sometimes my brain works better than other times. Right now, it’s not at its best (though I did, for once, remember to buy cookies for Denis). I think this is why sometimes it’s hard for me to imagine what I’ve done all day, which can feel … I dunno. Weird. And less than great.
So I’m doing this thing to keep a handle on my brain. So far, it does seem to be working.
That’s it for now.
More to come some time soon from Pineapple Paradise.
Notes
*Did you know that traveling like a grown-up is, um, transmitted by AHEM close physical contact? Well, now you do. #TheMoreYouKnow
**That said, I have noticed that the use of historically gender-specific insults is at least somewhat more flexible than it used to be, so … um … I guess that’s maybe one small victory in the fight against sexism, if not in the fight against everyone being jerks to each-other in other ways?
***Here’s a possiblity:
“Dear Avocado,
I am finding life in a dish with some pebbles and water reasonably acceptable, though far less fun than life in the tropics might be.
How is life in the dirt?
I am really bored so if you have any suggestions of video clips that might be relevant to my interests, please send them my way. Thanks!
Your friend, Pineapple”
More Small Victories (Now with More Pineapple Picture!)
Today, I butchered a pineapple. I ate some of it (it was absolutely delicious; the best pineapple I’ve had in years, in fact) and chopped the rest up into little chunks. The chunks went into a freezer bag; the freezer bag (perhaps unsurprisingly) went into the freezer. Soon, we will have delicious frozen pineapple drinks.
While I was butchering the poor, innocent fruit, I saved the top of it so I can try to grow a new pineapple.
Apparently, growing a pineapple takes a couple of years: but I can be patient, and it sounds like fun to try. Fun, at least, for me — the last time someone presented us with the gift of a plant (an aloe that continues to limp along next to my sink), I immediately asked, “What has it done to deserve this?”
Except for a brief stint successfully training bonsai trees from seedlings in high school, I have generally been horrible about keeping plants alive. So it’s possible that I’m violating some UN accord by trying to raise a pineapple at all. My theory is that the bonsais did well because they lived outside, beyond the radius of my plant-killing aura, but I have also failed at growing garden plants, so who knows?
Anyway, attempting to grow a pineapple is kind of like saying “I will still be alive in two or three years to see if fruit happens,” so there’s that.
I also did a couple of iterations of laundry and continued updating the books.
Oh, and I made lunch, thereby using up a bag of Lipton noodly stuff that’s been hanging around uneaten in our food cabinet forever.
A little at a time, I move forward.
If I was in a better place, I guess all of this would probably seem pretty minor. Like, “Big deal, you washed your hair.” (Technically, that was last night.)
But I am where I am right now, so all of these feels like it matters.
 |
| It’s my pineapple and I’ll grow if I … you’re right, that doesn’t even make sense. Sorry. |
Tomorrow I'll add a picture of my pineapple-to-be. Right now, though, I'm going to bed.
Progress?
My husband has been obsessing about creating, for us, a giant Postmodern Hippie Bus. The idea is that we’ll live in it and roam around the country (or, at any rate, to roam sometimes — perhaps more to be able to roam).
I think it would be great if we could even roam beyond the country — roam to Canada, roam to Mexico. I guess we’d have to park it to roam to another continent, but there’s a contingency for that sort of thing in the works as well.
I call it a Postmodern Hippie Bus because the vision is a little more IKEA catalog than Mother Earth News. We are only quasi-hippies, but there’s room in the universe of traveling people for all kinds.
Anyway, up until now, the Postmodern Hippie Bus has been entirely theoretical — diagrams, research, lots of scoping out YouTube videos about tiny homes and living in buses.
But today, we bought the kitchen sink!
At least I assume it’s the kitchen sink. Maybe it’s the bathroom sink? I don’t know. I didn’t ask.
But it was at the Habitat Restore, and Denis had seen it before, and he said, “Oh, my bus sink is still here,” and I said, “You’re going to buy it, right?” and he said, “Oh — well, I didn’t know if you’d want me to.”
I figured, it’s a nice sink, it’s a good price, and we’re definitely doing the bus thing at some point — so buying it makes sense.
So we bought the sink.
Somehow, that makes the Bus seem like something that really is actually going to happen someday, maybe sooner than I was thinking.
And that seems pretty cool.
The other cool thing is the process of designing the interior living — of really thinking about how we live, how we use space, what we want in our space, and so forth.
This is something I’m kind of doing in my own life right now.
Living with bipolar disorder — finally being willing to look it in the eye and call it by its name and accept it for what it is — has forced me to sit down and really think about my plans, goals, and dreams, and what is and isn’t possible for me.
I has forced me to think about how I want to arrange the furniture of my own being; if you will.
For a long time, I felt like saying, “I am not able to do this thing or that thing” was like quitting, or admitting defeat, or whatever. I think I saw it — for myself, but not for anyone else — as a sign of weakness.
I’m starting to see that it takes a lot of strength to accept your own limitations, and that transcending them doesn’t always mean living as if they don’t exist (though sometimes it can).
Rather, it’s like working with (for example), watercolors. There are things you can do with watercolors and things you can’t — in other words, there are limitations inherent in the medium.
If you want to paint beautifully with watercolors, you learn to accept the limitations of the medium — which are, in fact, at least partly responsible for its beauty — and you work within those limits. Maybe (as, for example, Andrew Wyeth did) you push those limits as far as you can. Maybe you don’t.
But there’s no point in pretending the limitations of the medium don’t exist. Instead, you use them to shape your paintings; within their constraints, you create beauty.
So I am not going to medical school and I don’t think we’re going to raise kids — at least not from the tadpole phase, and definitely not for a while. Maybe not at all.
I am, at this juncture, okay with both of those things, though it was tough getting there — especially med school. That took a lot of internal struggle.
The funny thing is that it’s getting easier. I didn’t expect it to, somehow, but I guess letting go, accepting limitations, and redefining abilities is a skill like any other. The more you do it, the easier it gets.
Anyway, it’s late, and I should try to get to bed. So that’s it for now. We did class today, and it was lovely, but I’ll cover it later.
Keep the sunny side up.
“Productivity” is Relative
One time I saw a sketch from some old comedy show about a dating service called “Lowered Expectations*.” I’m guessing you can kind of get the gist of it from the name of the service.
To an extent, that’s kind of how I’m feeling about living with bipolar disorder right now. The secret to success at the moment (as opposed to overall, long-term success) is to lower my expectations a bit and celebrate small victories.
Really, really small victories.
So, basically, I am like, “Heck yeah! I put laundry in the washing machine!” or, “Right on! I managed to put the receipts in order by date! Woooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!”
Now, admittedly, between bipolar and ADHD, putting the receipts in order by date is kind of a huge thing for me. It also makes me feeling like I’m a step closer to disentangling the horrible Gordian knot I’ve made out of the bookkeeping (the finances, meanwhile, seem to be going along without crashing, mostly because we’ve grown rather paranoid about large purchases since the books are a huge mess right now).
I actually think this might be a good strategy. Yeah, it’s kind of ridiculous, but you know how it is. If “ridiculous” gets you from point A to point B when nothing else will, then you might as well embrace it, right?
This is particularly important because, frankly, doing stuff is hard right now, guys.
Like, I had no intention of writing this post. I paused in my laundry process, sat down on the sofa, and cracked open my lappy for some darned reason. Problem is I haven’t the faintest clue what that reason was — and, in fact, hadn’t the faintest idea by the time I was done logging in.
This happens to me a lot right now.
My mind is feeling clearer right now than it has in a while. I wish I could really explain this — mania kind of gives me mental tunnel vision (though often it feels deceptively like laser focus, which it isn’t); depression makes me feel like I’m walking around with a 2-meter thick wad of cotton wool wrapped around my brain.
That said, it’s still hard for me to maintain attention. I mean, harder than normal. Task-switching is particularly hard; I forget which task I’m switching to before I get through the switch (task-switching is never easy for me, for what it’s worth — like everything else, it’s just harder than usual right now).
Anyway, I’ve done some looking into things and discovered that, unfortunately, my schedule isn’t going to play nicely with the Honors program curriculum, so it looks like that’s out — but I probably will stay until May for reasons I might discuss later. I’ve added an intro-level exercise science class to my schedule because A) it looks interesting, B) it might actually prove useful to my future plans, and C)it’s an online class, so why not? It doesn’t add commute time or classroom time.
I also bought a plain black V-neck t-shirt for ballet class. Up until now I’ve been dancing in my bike race t-shirts, because my gynecomastia makes me shy about wearing plain t-shirts in general. I bought a green version of this t-shirt to go with another outfit and discovered that the fit works well, so I decided to try a black one. The black shirt looks pretty sharp on me. Looking forward to seeing how it performs in class — the fit is a bit more athletic than the average t-shirt I’d wear (go figure). An athletic fit is good because it gives your teacher a better sense of how you’re using your body.
Okay, gonna close here. Obviously I’m still a bit on the uptick. I’ll be going to see my psychiatrist on the 24th, so I’m hoping to maybe work out some kind of medication plan that works. I’m not sure how this is going to work, since Lithium and Risperdal are right fracking out (I was on both in high school, with disastrous results, including the gynecomastia that continues to be a big problem for me).
Keep the upside up!
Notes
*Googled it. Turns out it was on MadTV.
Resolved*
*Ha! At 3 AM, nothing is ever really resolved.
Point the first:
I am going to talk to the honors program folks. I’ve been nominated like four times. Might as well have a crack at it.
This will probably mean staying an undergrad til May. I am pretty okay with that.
Point the second:
I need to figure out how to pay for corrective surgery for my gynecomastia. I have waited long enough.
As ballet continues to grow into a more and more significant part of my life, I find that I would really like to be comfortable in the studio.
Believe it or not, tights and a t-shirt add up to a more revealing ensemble than bibs and a jersey. Also, nobody touches you in cycling unless you either crash and need help or grab the last Chimay.
In ballet class, people be handsy, yo.
So that’s one more huge reason in my list of reasons to just get it done, for goodness’ sake.
Point the third:
This might mean taking a year off before grad school (to rebuild financial stores that the surgery – which is rarely covered by insurance, which justly considers it cosmetic – will most assuredly deplete) .
I might end up doing that anyway, while I try to get my bipolar really stabilized and myself mostly functional before I traipse off to spend two or three years living alone in a strange city with only occasional visits from my husband.
Obviously, I am still somewhat manic. I didn’t take a sleep aid tonight, and so here I am, not sleeping.
Oh, one last resolution. I am finally going to get a driver’s license. Not that I expect to use it much, but health things have happened in my family that make Denis want me to be able to Get There Fast.
I’m hoping to go to grad school in Chicago, which is a long bike ride from here; he wants me to be able to come home on zero notice of necessary. The MegaBus and Southwest Air make that fairly possible without driving, but he’ll feel better if I can drive legally, so that seals it.
He is making a huge, huge sacrifice by potentially letting me go away for what could be the better part of three years – so I can make a much smaller one and get my Legal Driver card.
So that’s it for now. I will chat with the honors program folks this week, I guess, and see what I need to do.
Holy Calories, Pizza Man!
So I have not been having the best time eating.
Specifically, my appetite has evaporated, and nothing sounds terribly edible, so I am not eating much (I am trying).
Today, around lunch time, I made it all the way to the supermarket (feeling weak and whinge-ful the entire way) before realizing I hadn’t eaten since yesterday, and that yesterday I’d undereaten by something like six or seven hundred calories, minimum — so I stopped at Little Caesar’s to snag one of their Lunch Special deals.
Little Caesar’s lunch special, in case you’re wondering, comprises about half a pan pizza (along with a 20-oz bottled drink; I got diet Pepsi). Maybe it’s not quite that big. I’m not sure, because I’m not really into pan pizza so I’ve never ordered one of LC’s pan pizzas.
I seriously hope that I’m overestimating, because if I’m not, the “lunch” portion runs something like 1,590 Calories.
1,590 Calories, people!
That’s like, the vast majority of a day’s share for most people (unless you’re riding a century, in which case it’s just elevenses).
Fortunately, I put in about an hour on the bike, so if I have any desire to eat anything else at any point I can at least swing a reasonable meal without automagically gaining 15 pounds.
I’m not saying that’s, like, wrong and should be banned. Personally, I’m rather glad that I can cram 1,600 down my gullet in a sitting somehow, — there are times in every serious cyclist’s life when maximizing calories ingested per effort expended ingesting them is essential.
However, if I was someone who didn’t know much about how to keep track of my caloric intake, and worked near a Little Caesar’s, the Lunch Special could prove to be a huge stumbling block (of note, the nutrition facts for the Lunch Special are not yet posted on the LC website).
Just something to think about in America’s ongoing battle of the bulge. It would be awesome if LC made the nutritional information for the Lunch Special more readily available. I think people would still choose to buy it, but they might also choose to eat half the pizza (which is what I ate earlier today; I ate the second half for dinner) instead of the whole thing.
In other news, I’ve been kitting myself out for the upcoming wedding of two of our dearest friends, so here’s me looking … well, frankly, ready for the first day of 10th grade or something:
In case you’re wondering, I own maybe two of the shirts in our closet. The belts, on the other hand? Almost all mine.
But, anyway, I’m posting this because I really love this shirt, which is super-sharp, and which actually fits me (well, it’s a little roomy, but that’s fine).
I am short-coupled and I have short arms, and that makes finding dress shirts a huge pain. Recently, I discovered that clothes made for the Asian market tend to fit me (evidently I’m Korean on the inside?); that said, this shirt isn’t marketed as such.
So anyway, if you are a short-coupled, short-armed Velociraptor of a dude, and you find yourself in need of a dress shirt, you could do far worse than Stacy Adams’ “Rome“. It even comes with a set of basic cuff links, though I ordered a pair in purple because Fashion! (They match the tie I’m wearing in the terrible selfie above).
I’ve got some reviews pending for Levi’s 511 commuter-line trousers and shorts. Bottom line: BUY THEM, especially if you can find them on sale. I didn’t expect them to be all that, but found some on TheClymb.com for a ridiculous price, so I bought some anyway.
I have been pleasantly surprised with their fit and functionality, so consider me schooled.
Anyway, that’s it for now.
On Ballet! — Monday Class Notes. About Danged Time.
We missed class on Saturday, because I was woozy as heck (trazodone!) and Denis was out picking up our truck from our mechanic, whose wife is one of his oldest friends, and stopped to chat with the wife. An hour and change after I figured he’d be back, I called to make sure he was alive. By then it was too late to make it to class, so needless to say: no ballet.
As such, we high-tailed it to Margie’s class tonight after I wrestled with the incredibly delicious smoked duck our friend Kelly prepared for us (it did not want to reheat).
There were only four of us tonight, and we had a brand new dancer (who did, I think, a lovely job; I hope she’ll be back soon), so it was a slow and easy class — which is good, because slow-and-easy means you get to really focus on your technique.
Which meant my tendus looked kind of awesome, I found the connection between my leg and my back again (that probably only makes sense to you if you dance?), and I kept everything strung together so my grand battement wasn’t wiggly. At least, not on the right. The left was a little wiggly at first.
I also worked on making my arms do graceful things while doing adagio, and so forth. We honed our glissades (both with and without a change of foot). I got distracted and playful towards the end. That might actually be a good thing: I realized during the first bit of barre that I am often screwed down so tight at the beginning of class that I couldn’t dance* if you tossed me onto a hot skillet.
I’m still not sure if I’m really “back” yet. I won’t be doing Wednesday class because we’re taking our nephew to the opera. I’m considering hitting up the Wednesday morning Intermediate class, even though it would be a reach in terms of my abilities right now. But, hey, your reach should exceed your grasp, right?
I just don’t want to be the obnoxious, under-skilled interloper who screws up everyone else’s class. So we’ll see.
No awesome carefully rendered ballet graphics this time. I blew my creative energies this morning working up a poster for a totally imaginary movie for no good reason and I just can’t think of anything funny to present.
Besides, I was pretty much mostly not a spaz in class today, except for the part when Margie told us, “Don’t do this thing,” and I did it A) to demonstrate and B) because I was curious about what would happen. Apparently, I’m still that kid. You know. Every class has one.
So, anyway. More ballet soon. ‘Til then, keep it together. Sunny side up, rubber side down, etc.
Notes
*Doing Ballet Stuff is not necessarily the same as Dancing. You can execute a perfect pirouette, but if it has no musicality and no soul it’s not dancing.
danseur ignoble 