TATERS!

my first harvest. MMMM tasty! We enjoyed a handful of them for dinner and they were just right--crisp and mud-scented before the pot, soft and flavourful on the plate. A few were afflicted with "scab" but I looked it up and its just a cosmetic thing from the soil going dry on occasion and does not affect their flavour or safety. So I've learned--keep 'em wet, silly girl, or they go a bit ugly.

My courgettes and spinach have officially failed. Well, a courgette plant is essentially alive, and I keep watering it, but I've given up hope. I composted the spinach after I realized it was more bolt than plant. I should take a class to learn the difference between "useful leafy plant" and "it is now a weed" and how to prevent this.

In other news, I've begun a course of Accutane, and am drying out like a dishcloth. I've also undertaken another lighting gig for classmates which should get started tomorrow at the People Show Studio, and have submitted proposals to several festivals and events for my own piece.

Ohmguh!

LOOK!

Flowers Flowers Flowers!

Particularly, tomato flowers. At the time of writing the tallest tomato plant grazes my chin, so I guesstimate that makes it 4'7". They're all bursting with buds, and many flowers have begun to emerge.



The fabulous blue flowers finished and have embarked upon their bulbous seed pod stage, which is just as fascinating as the flowers themselves. They are still putting out flowers lower down on the stems, but I didn't need to show those off again.



I'm not sure if I should show you this, as I may be jinxing myself, but my sole surviving courgette has decided to make...a courgette! Isn't it precious? It's about half the length of my little finger. I went out and checked a few minutes ago and the little fuzzy light green one lower down is bigger, slightly darker, and less fuzzy. I'm so proud. The plant is so far not exhibiting signs of cucumber mosaic, but I'm always on the lookout and the green flies are out in force.



Potato flowers! I just think they're the prettiest thing. For some reason I always assumed potato flowers were blue. No idea why, but these have been a pleasant surprise.



Even the hosta has decided to join the parade.



The first few times this pansy bloomed it was a deep, vibrant purple. The more it blooms, though, the more interesting its flowers get. I can't help but wonder if its DNA code is breaking down.



How about those rosebuds that surprised me last week? Well here they are, in all their splendour. The blossoms are about the size of a cabinet knob.



Any idea as to what this is? It is growing in my yard. It's pretty, whatever it is. Oh the joy of discovery in rental properties. Did I mention we recently found a blender in the kitchen? Win!



And this little beauty is a sweet rocket--inedible, but a lovely gift from Deirdre. (but all you're thinking is "why on earth did she crucify her plants?" regular stakes weren't holding them up effectively, so I innovated a way to hold the string in place up high. It didn't really occur to me that it looked so...symbolic until Issie asked if there was a dead animal at the bottom of the pot. But it works, so I'm not gonna fix it.)

More Plants (Yay!)

Today's update:

Discovered lovely rose-like flowers on assumed-dead plant. Very pretty, very surprising. No idea what it is, seems too small to be a rose.



Flower buds now visible on all potato and tomato plants.



Sole survivor of 3 courgettes is growing and looks happy. Have been keeping greenfly off and removing diseased-looking leaves. Next year I'll just grow them inside.



7 survivors of 15 sowed aubergines looking pretty battered, but a few have new growth. All very small. My neighbour Malcolm suggested that the soil may be too acidic for them, which would inhibit growth and reduce snail resistance. I'll leave them inside next year too.

All tomato plants sown are growing and happy. Most are 1m or taller and filling out nicely. (patio chair included for height comparison)



The hosta is happy and has no bites taken out of it, I believe thanks to a copper strip around the base of its pot. Neat innovation.



I pruned my forsythias, holly, and border shrubs. They look more tame, and we now have more space in the garden. I didn't have the nerve to cut the forsythia back to the ground, but it looks nice, I think (and a bit sacred).



I staked up my spinach plants to keep them out of the potatoes. Naughty spinach.



Herbs are lush and bountiful, and I appear to have everlasting pansies. Is it normal for them to keep blooming this long? They've been up to it since January. I still like them, but I can't help but wonder if they're confused.



And some inedible flowers, in my kitchen window-box. I grew them from seed too!

Men and Urine. Discuss

A couple of weeks ago my local leisure centre (my YMCA, run by the city) embarked upon some much-needed paint work. For some reason, while they were painting the ladies' changing room, they swapped us into the men's room. (Ben suspects it was because women might actually mind if we get paint on our clothes.) This was a little confusing for everyone, but we shuffled into each other's facilities and continued as usual.

This gave me an interesting opportunity to get a good whiff of the men's changing room.

It Smells Of Wee.

I went from changing-stall to changing-stall to try and find one that didn't smell like a diaper, but there wasn't one. They all smelled of stale urine. Cloyingly so. Thickly, disgustingly so. I didn't want to take my shoes off for fear I'd step in a puddle. It made my eyes red and my lunch try to escape.

I feel I should mention that the only unpleasant odour I tend to find in the ladies' room is mild dirty feet, but it is kept clean and people track pool water in there so it mostly smells of chlorine. The men's changing room backs onto the pool too, but any smell of pool chemicals is completely masked by the gag-inducing stench of piss.

I've had to use men's restrooms before, due to crowding, cleaning, plumbing, and my own impatience. I'm no stranger to the stink-wall, but I had no idea it extended to Every place reserved for exclusive use by men. This is a changing room. A big one--certainly a bigger floorspace than my entire house, with 20' ceilings and plenty of ventilation. It does have showers, and a restroom off to one side--with a clear separate entrance. There's no excuse for men to wee in the changing stalls.

The leisure centre's rules are pretty relaxed on boys changing in the ladies' room with their mothers. Boys under age 10 are generally let in, and most of the time I don't mind. They're noisy, but they're not nosy, and while they do hog the showers for hours on end they do not stink the place up. While I of course can't vouch for the behaviour of children who change with their fathers, boys in the girls' room aren't really a problem.

Except.

Except now that the changing rooms have swapped back, the ladies' room smells like pee. All of the stalls have a slight musk to them, as though a tramp slept in each one in turn a few months ago. While it's not nearly as bad as the gents', I'm disgusted and feel a bit violated.

OUR CHANGING ROOM. OUR RULES. NO PEE ON THE FLOOR.

Come On Males, it's the 21st century. There's no excuse to mark your territory like this any more--you do that with lease agreements and fiscal exchange. You stand erect and have a fairly smooth brow. I know you all can't help the body hair issue, but that is not an indication that you should behave like lemurs. Your woman will be attracted to you even if you don't scent your tail and wave it at her--indeed, she'll probably be More attracted to you if you don't. Is this like the "money shot" thing? Why do you need to demonstrate your dominance over people or ownership of things by coating them with your DNA? Why does this dominance always have something to do with penises?

It is time for men to evolutionarily catch up to women. Because frankly...eew.

Thank You, Daily Show

The BP Cock-Up, the Korean Cock-Up, the Gaza Cock-Up... we're getting all the news here, but I've been having a hard time gathering what real people's opinions are about these events. It's hard to discern what sane people think when the only views you hear are the rantings of lunatics in "have your say" bits and the carefully chosen really extreme views of a few noisy morons on the tv and radio. I know what the defence ministers are saying, I know the President is angry, and I know that Julie Smith from Biloxi is annoyed at all the tree-huggers for rescuing birds when they should be putting that money into saving precious unborn babies, but do any people without a political agenda, a conspiracy theory or an IQ below that of a cabbage have any views?

The next time I come across someone saying "Stop it! Leave my gulf alone!" or "Bad Israel! Just free Palestine!" I think my heart will give out from the sheer futility of modern education. Have history and philosophy told us nothing? Do people genuinely think that Israel is peopled with evil automatons with no concept of the hardships that surround them, or that BP isn't currently trying to rectify the problems their negligence has caused? "Just stop leaking oil! What's wrong with these people that they can't put a stupid lid on the pump?" Believe it or not, scientists don't actually have that many opportunities to do research on the structural integrity of hastily-welded, purpose-built emergency blowout protector caps under a mile's worth of water pressure. Yes they've failed, but it's certainly not for want of trying.

BP is not actively seeking to ruin the ecosystem of the gulf coast, and neither is the President. What would you have Mr. Obama do? Throw money at it? Send out the National Guard? The rig companies have the know-how to repair it--yes they're out of their depth, but they're better prepared to tackle the problem than an armed SCUBA team. This isn't the kind of thing that people outside of the field have any competency in, and it's ludicrous to think that "if we all come together and put our collective minds to it" we'd have any more luck than people who have maintained and repaired ocean floor pumping equipment in the past. Do You know how to fix it? Do I? No. We will get in the way.

There Will be an inquiry into the decisions that led to the explosion and the deaths of the rig workers, and into what could have been done to ensure the pipeline failsafe actually activated. There Is an inquiry into why the aid ships were boarded by soldiers armed with paintball guns and real guns. People are trying to figure out what the hell is going wrong.

But it is important to remember that Israel is surrounded on most sides by countries who wish more than anything for them to be wiped off the map. While their military leaders have made numerous dangerous blunders, we can't refuse them the right to defend their borders from real threats to their people. Just as any aid to Israel is a threat to Palestine, any aid to Hamas is a threat to Israel. It's not a question of good and evil. And 1 in 6 pension plans in the UK is directly linked to BP's stock market value. "Kick them out, Shut them down, they're bad" is not the helpful suggestion in this case as millions of elderly people would then be put in harm's way. "Hold the responsible parties accountable" is more useful, and "have a contingency plan in place for the failure of any company or governing body that cannot be allowed to fail" is even better.

Companies, governments, religions, borders...none of these things are absolute. None of them are right or wrong--but they are inherent to our species. Most of them exist for or through greed and power-lust, but any attempt to detach or distance anyone's nature from greed is an act of naivety or a lie. The same area of the brain that seeks the key lime pie with extra meringue is accountable for encouraging inspectors to overlook half-assed safety equipment. You can call it evil, I'll call it typical. The only way to change the behaviour of governments and corporations is to change what it means to be human.

So thank you, Daily Show. Thank you Jon Stewart, for keeping in mind that truth is never unbiased and what is appropriate is not always what we want. Thank you for reminding me that we're not all simple, shouting apes with no long-term memory. Thanks for giving me hope for America.

Lautes Licht

Just to let any reader know, I have a show opening up on Thursday entitled "Lautes Licht" at the Shunt Lounge, London Bridge Station. (quite literally, it is directly under London Bridge Station, in these neat old vaults) It requires audience participation to work--you, the emancipated spectators you are, get to set the light levels, thereby telling the characters how to play! Make them run! Make them dance! Make them create beautiful music! You may have fun, you may feel cruel...you may step back and see that somehow all these separate performances seem to relate to each other, and tell you a very individual story. Take a moment to set the action and enjoy your show, then let another guest take a turn. Be sure to watch while your friends conduct their own pieces--you might see something new.

It runs Thursday through Saturday, May 27-29 and June 3-5. All shows start at 8pm but will have a variety of performance times and durations (at least 2 1-hour runs each night, as it relates to concurrent pieces in the space). Tickets to the Lounge are £10, £5 concession for students, the elderly, and the unemployed on Thursday and Friday. There will be loads of other performances, art installations, demonstrations, and opportunities to drink and be merry all through the night.

I acknowledge that most readers of this blog do not live in the UK. I won't be heartbroken if I don't see you.




----
As with most of the work I'm up to these days, Licht is a proposition. An experiment, both for me and for you. It is an opportunity for you to see exactly what you want to see, and an opportunity for me to see if you enjoy that. Does the power to control the action excite you? Scare you? Disappoint you? Why?

Lautes Licht (in English, Loud Light) is also a study of the musicality of language. Our multi-national cast will be speaking and singing in a variety of tongues, playing instruments, and communicating visually, each performer on his and her own. I'm excited to see if you find narrative and meaning emerging from the juxtaposition of their actions the way I have. The performers in the space will change regularly throughout the night, so be sure to come back often to try new configurations, new levels, and new stories!

4 Legged Poop Machines and other garden poems

I love cats.

I hate other people's cats.

My cat would never think of pooping in my vegetable garden.

As with other people's cats, my cat poops in other people's yards.

Because, hey, you don't shit where you eat.

----

I hate snails.

I hate other people's snails.

They hate snails too.

----

Greenfly, greenfly, scourge of courgettes

You gave the zucchini a disease.

My birds don't eat you.

I used insecticide.

A plant died.

Garden Update

Three of my aubergine plants have been eaten down to the stalks. There's still several more so I'm not too upset, but I can't imagine what ate them. Several of the stakes in that bed have been uprooted and some of the plants have been banged about, so I can't help but think it was one of my neighbors' vile cats. They use my backyard as a town square/toilet and no amount of shouting or chasing after them has convinced them that they're not welcome. I need a super-soaker.

My courgette plant looks sick. It is flowering prettily and regularly but the leaves are not in good shape. I keep popping off the ugly ones, and it keeps having fewer leaves. Oof. It might have a disease. I'll see what the fruit looks like, if it produces any. It lives in a pot and has garden-center soil, and it was really big and happy until I put it outside. But there was no room inside--it got so big it blocked the skylight from the seedlings.

Tomatoes are looking healthy but not getting bigger, but it has been stupidly cold out--apparently this is the coldest, grayest May in 20 years. We actually caved and put the heat on tonight. This is ludicrous. I am very, very unhappy with the weather.

Spinach plants are growing and happy. They were getting eaten by bugs so I sadly had to invest in some anti-bug, which I didn't want to do, but it was either that or not have any for me. I hate bugs. And British weather. And my neighbors' cats.

I'm not sure if I like gardening.

comment moderation: oh

Wow. I just found a 3-month long queue of comments waiting to be moderated. I may have forgotten I turned it on. And here I was thinking nobody read my blog or loved me. Whoops.

Thanks for the helpful tips regarding the garden: what I've been doing so far is starting seedlings in my study under a big skylight, then putting them outside when I (hope) think that they're big enough to fend for themselves. I've got several tomatoes and aubergines out in the ground, and so far I haven't exactly murdered anything.

Since the beginning of April I've noticed that the sun was reaching the ground over the fence in the morning and has been staying there at least half of the day. We had a good two weeks of warmth and sunshine in the middle of the month (I went out without a jacket one day!) and, hopeful and excited, I put a bunch of plants out. As of this past weekend, however, it's returned to early March conditions--cold, cloudy, and bleurgh--and the more delicate plants got a bit of a shock. I went out and apologised with tomato fertilizer and stakes and they're perking up a little.

I've been chasing caterpillars and snails away from my edible leaves--Lisa, I had no idea how much of a blight they are until I started gardening in this climate! Guh-Ross. At least snails come with handles. I've been keeping the concrete around my potted plants unappealingly salty and it seems to be keeping them at bay. I don't know if that's a tested method or not. Any recommendations for keeping munching bugs away? I don't have much money for fancy nets, chemicals, or laser beams, and want to be sure my spinach will still be edible for humans.

My soil is fairly penetrable for roots and spades and is pretty wormy, so I think the kids will be able to spread out and get comfortable. I have a beautiful burst of bluebells in bloom, but the minute their show ends I intend to pull them and leave more room for growth. They spread like wildfire and I'm sure I won't catch them all, so I'm not hugely bothered about preventing their performance next year.

The potato plants are huge. I should probably look and see what to do with them soon. They seem very happy both in their gro-bag and the ground, and seem to be about an inch taller and leafier every few minutes. No flowers yet, but awesome.

I've started some cilantro and basil in the study. My mom said she'll be impressed if I can get basil to succeed from seed. I'm not sure what will make it difficult, but they look like they're working hard at getting bigger. Aww.

----

I'm glad you don't remember the ring going missing. We tried to remain calm. I eventually found it in its little box, in its little muslin bag, in a black bodega bag filled mostly with crumpled receipts and snipped pricetags at the end of mom's bed. (Ben and Ben turned the house inside-out looking for it. Amusingly mine went up to the game room in search of it and found uncle Chet, hat-over-eyes, hiding out. He lifted the hat, asked, "what's gone wrong now?" and, informed of the ring, neatly replaced it.)

----

I've gone through the house and filled every mouse-sized hole and gap I've been able to find and cleaned up the poop. There's one area in the back of the closet-under-the-stairs where the floorboards miss the wall by about two inches all the way across, and i've been unsuccessful in my attempts to cover it, so I resorted to traps, and eventually poison--I don't think I've killed any (these mice have been around this house longer than I have and have defeated other occupants) but I think it may serve as an un-welcome-mat.

----

School has been insane. I'm not entirely sure what I'm studying anymore. I want to hide. More specifically, I want to hide in a prop shop and spend a month making fake trees and breakaway furniture and try to think about what I want out of my education.

----

Ben makes good corn bread...for a limey.

hurricane free

Ben and I attended his cousin's wedding yesterday, and, far from floodwaters, the Thames was actually at very low tide when the reception kicked off.

With a few pleasant surprises it was your standard wedding-in-a-box event: Catholic ceremony with a few hymns (and lots of giggling from the heathen congregation and bridal pair), a kindly if cynical priest ("For the past 37 years I've performed weddings on Saturdays, given Mass on Sundays, and sat on the parish annulment board on Monday mornings. I think I know more about marriage than most married people."), a creepy photographer straight out of the 1970's (complete with beige vest covered in big pockets) and a big beautiful white dress (with a fuzzy fur shrug that seemed a bit out of place given the day's unseasonably warm and bright conditions). They rented an old RouteMaster bus to haul the guests from the church to the reception hall (at a yacht club on the river) which was fun--mostly just for the dumbstruck faces of tourists in Greenwich) and we had drinks and group pictures out on the patio before sitting down to a wonderful dinner (start from the outside and work your way in with the cutlery, dear), followed by embarrassing speeches, champagne toasts, the cake-cutting photo op, and a brief dance party highlighted by--you guessed it--the Macarena and aunts doing the Electric Slide. Except it wasn't the Slide per se--just as bad, but it was some other awful 80's song with a correlating sequence of repeated kicks and turns that middle aged women seem to go gaga for. I stood by the door, ready to bolt, just in case the chicken dance or the hokey pokey came on, but the only other offensive dance-specific track was the Time Warp. There were disposable cameras on the tables, screaming children running amok, comprehensive seating arrangements, and white ribbons attached to every vertical surface. The vegetarian appetizer was to die for, and the dinner was fabulous. (I think I managed to be the only veggie, so I was fussed over a bit.)

As this was my first British wedding I wanted to do a quick breakdown of elements which were precisely like American package weddings, and those which varied, but honestly there were only about two things that I found different from any of the dozens of nuptials I've attended in the past few years: the cake, rather than being something inoffensive and crowd pleasing, was a traditional, industrial-strength fruit cake iced in marzipan, and there were no bridesmaids--not even kids, as I'd learned to expect. The ring bearer was a well-behaved French nephew who carefully brought them in on a white pillow, and after the kiss there was a flurry of confetti (not rice or birdseed) and snapshots.

The bride did not wear a veil, but I've only seen a couple of those lately in the States, and her dress had millions of tiny buttons up the back (and I did not see a zipper--you go girl!) and a dramatic seam across the front from the hip to the knee which offset the smooth fabric of the skirt from the attractively pleated and beaded upper half. I drunkenly commented on the genius of this seam, and how it cleverly provided movement by directing the eye to take in the entire dress in sequence, and was appropriately called a theatre dork. Her train was removable, and rather than bustling, the fullest point of her skirt was fitted with a wrist loop.

The assorted matriarchs of the clan all sported either big hats--complex polygonal affairs outfitted with feathers and flowers to match the wearer's dress--or other colourful, feathered hair accents which gave the feel somehow of a Southern Baptist church service combined with a subdued luau. Men wore suits, some for the first time in a long time, and enjoyed comparing linings among themselves.

All in all, it was exactly what I expected a wedding to be, which is not really what I expected. I actually found myself near tears when the newly married pair did their first dance while a ruddy-faced dj encouraged the guests to cheer them on in that energetically apathetic way they have. Everything was all right and nothing hurt. Stress levels remained at ceremony-normal. Everybody got drunk and taxis delivered us safely home. Plan A worked just fine--so fine, in fact, that nobody even needed a plan B. or C. or L. or plan "I got myself ordained to be your backup minister, just in case." How dare you have a normal wedding? An "oh that was nice" big day? An evening of lighthearted, forgettable speeches and Abba? This wasn't special, this wasn't a day to tell your kids about, or your national weather service... Why not have a big day worth remembering? What's wrong with a catastrophe? "and he lost his cufflinks!" is not a disaster, natural or otherwise. "My sister was out in the driveway with a meter stick trying to plot a track that was under less than two feet of water on the morning of the wedding--and then my ring went missing!" is a story worth mentioning at cocktail parties.

Oh sister of mine, you win. No other wedding will ever measure up, or mean so much. I'm sorry we had to go through it to make the memory, but I'm glad we have it.

more mouse

ew. we found another mouse-hole last night thanks to an ill-timed run for it by a furry squeaker. from the looks of it it's been there for years.

gross. gross. gross.

There's just something irresponsible about building a pantry with floorboards that don't quite reach the walls. it's like an invitation on the part of the house. "c'mon in, eat the people food!"

We had a chat last night about what animals would not want to live in a people-house and eat people-food. The only ones we could come up with were large herd-animals like cattle and gazelles. Bears in particular would love to live in people-houses, and eat people-food, and eat people.

On the up side, last night we avoided the rodents by heading uptown to the Luminaire where we enjoyed the folk musical stylings of Spiers and Boden, of Bellowhead. Who knew a fiddle, an accordion, and a couple of feet could create such complex and beautiful tunes? I always assumed on their albums that there were other instruments contributing, but nope. What I mistook for a bass was an accordion, and drumming was done by stamping on a box. Nice.

It would have been the perfect evening out if it hadn't been for the presence of the Maths Club Alumni* in the audience--five or six middle aged shut-ins wearing t-shirts printed with song lyrics shouting random comments, whooping and singing along in the perfectly tone-deaf style of the offensively loud. I'm always astonished when I see groups of people with no social skills--how did they get to be friends in the first place? This cluster also succeeded in clapping along with such poor rhythm as to confuse and exhaust the players, which I found frustrating.

To Misters Spiers and Boden, I wish to apologise for not elbowing them in the face. I'm just too nice. If they come along again please feel free to chuck a brick. We'll all applaud.

(After the show, as the performers were packing away their antique instruments and crew were coiling cable, Captain Awkward Obnoxious made a beeline for the stage and could be heard asking, "so when do I get to meet Les Artistes? You're not going to stop me!" I hope nothing was broken in the rush to get away from him.)

To any interested party, The Luminaire's webpage hosts the most enjoyable Frequently Asked Questions (and Seldom Asked Questions) of any business I've ever encountered. The walls of the venue, similarly, are a delight to read, both in the house and in the ladies' room. (I've heard the men's room is likewise enjoyable, but can't personally vouch for it.) The atria of the restrooms in particular boast a remarkable archive: white lx tape, crammed with sound configurations from past shows, peeled off of audio desks after gigs and re-stuck over the doors.

In other news, my practice group put on a piece of theatre on Wednesday evening.
That is all.


*I don't actually know if these people were ever in a maths club, but it seems likely. It also seems likely that several, if not all, express traits in the Autistic spectrum. While I do feel some pity for these people's lives and the difficulty of their mental states, it still pisses me off that they chose my concert to ruin. It also disappoints me that folk musicians are too nice and patient to ever chuck a bottle at them.

It wasn't Meditative

it was boring. You may attempt to reconcile these two very different emotions in an attempt to not appear a philistine, but I work in theatre and hold education and experience in this field and can confidently and helpfully state that Peter Brook's "11&12" at the Barbican was two of the most boring hours of my life. (and do you know how many hours I've spent in departure lounges?)

Helpfully? (you ask, eyebrow slightly raised) Yes, I'm helping you. I can think deep thoughts. Abysmally so. As a postgraduate I spend all day every day studying and developing ridiculously heavy theories, then rescinding them in recognition of their post-colonial viewpoints or Utopian ideologies. I have long-winded and delightfully deconstructivist discussions with my professors on a regular basis--debates which leave me red-cheeked and wild-eyed and feeling vaguely as though I've torn out a page of my practical knowledge and replaced it with excitingly useless philosophical nonsense. (a degree in philosophy and 75p can buy you a tiger loaf at Tesco. mmm) To the point--it's my job right now to think about, analyze, engage critically with, and discuss the ethics of everything that goes into theatrical production.

And I say it's boring. Therefore, you too can admit that you found it boring, and let that off your chest. There was nothing deeper for you to get, nothing you should be embarrassed for missing or not appreciating. It was dull, and even the woman across the aisle with the opera glass and the pensive frown thought so.

Its this insistence upon not admitting to oneself (I wasn't bored, I was entranced by the tone and smooth line delivery. no no, I must be smarter and more worldly than you because I was distinctly Not bored.) and one's friends that one was bored of his or her skull by a piece of theatre that allows bad theatre to continue to be made. I'm not suggesting we need every show to have explosions or song-and-dance numbers, but there is no excuse for boring theatre. Theatre, by definition, exists primarily (and in most cases, solely) to Entertain. If it is dull, it is not entertaining. Therefore it fails.

At my school we produce heaps of boring theatre. We justify making it by calling our pieces "artistic explorations" or "studies of the performer's inner struggle." but on the inside we all know (well, maybe not the performers themselves, who continue to insist upon doing these sorts of things) that it's just pointless navel-gazing that leads even the most pretentious audience member to crave the solitaire app on his phone. Performance is narcissism--if you are dating an actor you may want to keep that in mind next time you find yourself feeling small. While all humans have to some extent a "look at me!" need, most of us don't need 500 people 6 nights a week to do so to satiate it. (oof, sorry, bit of a tangent there.)

The biggest problem with making boring theatre, though, is that it is offensive. (jigga-wha?) It is not hugely difficult to make interesting theatre, but it is really, really easy to make it boring. If the eyelids of half the audience are drooping it shows you didn't put an ounce of effort into your piece--not just into writing it, but staging it so that it is visually and aurally engaging. This is doubly true for ethnically sensitive pieces, where you're making a show about a culture you aren't a member of and you're fairly confident your audience won't be. Making a show about the Other that is painfully dull tells the audience that you don't quite give enough of a shit about them to make your piece watchable. Which is a dual shame--one because it makes you look like just another arrogant Westerner, and two because you've just passed up an opportunity to give your audience some culture.

Yep--I wish to redefine the "cultural experience" right here, if you don't mind. If a night of culture is so dull, incomprehensible, or simply unwatchable that most of the audience exit the gallery thinking only "damn I want my money back" they have not had a cultural experience. They didn't get your point or moral and they didn't pay attention to your history lesson or showcase. They did not leave with more information, tolerance, social awareness, or interest than when they came in. You have not cultured them in any way.

So. I may appear a bit jaded, but honestly, this is my area of study--audience impact. I want my audience to want to be there to see my piece. I want them to take something away from it that isn't just boredom or a new appreciation for the glowing hands on their watches. I want the show to not need big-name actors in order to draw a crowd and I want theatre to go back to its roots--its real roots. Entertainment. Fun. Contrary to Dryden's views, I do not believe theatre's first obligation is to educate. No one who makes theatre is qualified to teach, and any attempt to do so by a theatre practitioner is a misguided effort at best, a dangerous and unethical display at worst. Most theatre types don't know if what they're presenting is ethnically or historically accurate, and really don't care either way. Theatre's first obligation is to entertain, but if someone is likely to learn something from it (Because it's interesting to watch) what you present needs to be right.

When I sat down to watch "11&12" the first thing I saw was a sparsely-decorated stage, yellow streaks under a big red blanket and a collection of carved tree trunks on dollies. Not a good start. While the play does take place in Mali, recreating a desert wasteland--even an abstract one--is not a good idea. The stage was eventually shown to be covered in sand. Most people in Mali do not live in the Sahara, and the piece takes place in the south-central Mopti region, which has a decent agricultural base. (e.g. your average villager does not desperately seek shade under petrified trees as the wind whips sand into his weathered face.) Yes the nation is poor, but presenting this barren landscape sets me as an audience member up for a story of people clinging to life in spite of everything--not a babbling, meandering discourse on religion. At one point a character is shown riding a boat down a river...in the desert. Right. As it is, the sparse, monochrome set does nothing to liven up the staging used--mostly people sitting around--and the unchanging amber wash likewise encourages the eyes to look elsewhere--but there's nothing else to see.

Most audience members chose to either look at the inside of their eyelids or at each other (one particularly meditative audience member to my left was so entranced by the play that he began to snore lightly) but not in a judgmental, "oh look at the world I live in, I should feel grateful that I do not face persecution for my religious beliefs." way, but in more of a "honey, that haircut really doesn't fit your face" manner. I've studied pieces which intentionally toy with audience attention and practical applications of boredom and I can confidently say this was not one of them.

The one active scene in the show is a depiction of violence. Now, in a show about French colonialism and interference in Islam and the wave of massacres linked to this instance you'd assume they'd have plenty to work with of oppression and torture, but the one display is, you guessed it, villager infighting. Great. Way to encourage the audience to empathize with the underdog. Colonial and modern France give you so much fodder--religious intolerance comes to mind--and yet in your piece they come out smelling like a bed of roses. Sheez--the French aren't even in the audience to defend themselves! You could say Anything! But no, instead we're treated to a view of anger within an oppressed community, just like the BBC chose to show the day after Haiti's catastrophic earthquake, reinforcing the subtle notion the West likes to tell itself--these people need us to come and save them, even from themselves.

Nanny-stating aside, scenographic probing aside, the staging was dull, the accents were all over the map, the costuming could have been less beige but I honestly haven't studied early 20th century Malian fashion so I can't reasonably comment, the music was interesting and well performed but had nothing to do with the time, place, or people, and the colourblind casting was nice but honestly why did you give the only line including the phrase "us black people" to the only white guy on stage? Come on. That's tacky.

Actually, that really about sums up my whole experience. I've been to worse theatre, certainly, but rarely by people as well-esteemed. Many of my classmates attempted to justify the piece's choices by quoting this and that theory about how by being dull and ethically dubious it provoked thought, research and argument, but I'd argue against that--most audience members don't watch theatre like theatre workers. They take it for what they see, and what they saw was dull.

Glass Attacks and Slippery Junk Mail

I just watched a short video on the Beeb regarding a product development firm who had been commissioned by the Home Office to invent shatter-proof pint glasses for pubs. The video included a brief demonstration of how they work and sounded like a genuine effort to improve safety when glasses are inadvertently dropped.

Then the 'related videos' menu started rolling, and I saw a quick glimpse into just how many news reports had been done recently about people getting attacked with broken glass in pub fights. Dozens.

It just goes to remind me. Brits may not have guns, but they're just as freaking violent as anyone else, they just don't have access to clean, purpose-built weapons. They stab, maul, batter, and smash their foes and victims with whatever they have on hand--glass, kitchen gadgets, paving slabs, the occasional car--which means they may have lower rates of specific "gun crime" and "knife crime" but just as much "violent crime" as anyone anywhere else.

----

I'm trying to make an effective sign to put on my letterbox (hole in the door, not mailbox) that will actually cause leafleters, menu distributors, charity bag shovers, "charity" bag shovers, and all the other garbage pushers actually stop, notice, and not put crap through my door that I slip on and hurt myself when I come home. "Royal Mail Only, all others use side door" (we don't have a side door) seems insulting enough that I might actually get even more junk on the floor. "NO" is a bit too blunt and may put off the postman. "If It Doesn't Have My Name On It, It Doesn't Go Here" is too wordy, and I'm sure leafleters are in too much of a hurry, are too illiterate, or are too arrogant to heed it. I've tripped slipped, and skidded on junk mail so much I'm getting the pelvis of a 90 year old woman.

That's the thing--if it was a mailbox I probably wouldn't care so much. But they don't do that here. The "letterbox" is a 1"x6" window into your house. Every time someone rattles the gate and shoves his "People are Starving in Africa--won't you give us your old clothes?" packet through the flap I feel a little more violated.

The problem is, menu-stuffing kids aside (who are utterly heedless of people's requests), most people who cram unsolicited crap through the door seem to think they're doing a good deed. Raising awareness, and all that rot. This stuff doesn't come in the postman's bundle--people go around distributing garbage one at a time. I've come home to ten or twelve items of spam on my floor per day.

I feel they all need to be addressed separately, so as to ensure that everyone knows, pointedly, that their solicitation is not "the good kind."

"This newsletter from the Labour party will keep you informed as to what we're doing to improve your area." (Sign: Foreigner Lives Here. Cannot Vote. Don't Waste Your Time.)

"Did you know that 1/3 of all deaths are from cardiovascular related diseases? Your small donation will help us save the world!" (Sign: Student Lives Here. Broke. And "Old Age" Is Considered a Cardiovascular Disease. Don't Waste Your Time.)

"Your street's home prices are on the rise! Have you been thinking of selling? Our real estate agency would love to appraise your property!" (Sign: Renters. Owners Live Overseas. And Do the Words "Fixer-Upper" Mean Anything to You? Don't Waste Your Time.)

"Jesus Jesus Jesus! Jesus Jesus! Jesus Jesus JEEEEEESUS (money) JESUS!" (Sign: We actually use Hellfire to power our boiler, and we stock it with this sort of pamphlet. You're just encouraging Satan's influence on this street. Have you no morals?)

"Please put your unwanted items in this bag and we'll ensure that they're collected and sold, at whatever price we deem valid, to whoever will buy, whether or not we're a registered charity." (Sign: I Have No More or Less Unwanted Stuff than Last Time I Tripped on One of These. Do You Think I Buy Shoes and Tire Of Them Weekly? You're A Moron And This Is Either a Profiteering Scheme or a Plain Scam. Fuck Off, Tripping Hazard Shover. If You Think You're Doing A Good Deed Working For This Company, Perhaps You Should Read Your Mission Statement.)

starter garden

Hey readers!

I've never gardened before. Well, I've dug holes for my mom, but that doesn't really count. She always did the thinking and planning and pruning and maintenance and she's always had the patience and memory to go out and actually take care of the things. I just dig holes, then go back inside and read.

But now I have this whole back garden and it's kinda mine (well, and Ben's, and it does belong to the people we're renting from but they've never really done much with it and said if I want to grow stuff in it, go ahead.) I really don't want it to go to waste, but there's a problem.

It's very, very shady. I think this photo describes what I'm dealing with:


That's right. No sun where the plants would start growing. (This was taken today, at 12:30pm, February 1, 2010. I'm not about to take out my garden fence, or the hedge pictured, as they're the privacy barriers between us and our neighbors, and really, I'm sure they want to see me in my jammies just as much as I want to see them.

There are some bulbs coming up along the bottom of the hedge. I don't know what they are, but they may be daffodils.

This is round the side, looking back at the house. This might get sun at high noon in July but at every other time of year it is shaded by two complete houses.


Whole garden, at noon. The upper parts of the plants on the one side get light for the second half of the day, but everything else is in the dark most of the time. The plants that are out here are happy and flourishing, mostly because they're hardy, cold-loving, shade-tolerant, completely-inedible decorative shrubs.

So, my question to you, dear reader, is: based on the information provided, and my answers to any inquiries you may have: is it worth it to try and raise fruits or vegetables in this dark den? I really want figs, spinach, and tomatoes, but if they're just gonna wilt I won't torture them. Do miniature fruit trees grow well indoors? I have some big pretty skylights in the study. Maybe in summer I could open them and let the plants get some "outdoors" during the day? I don't know. Is it even worth it to have a garden if its just in the dark all the time?

idle musing of the hour

How do you like your coffee? _____: like I like my men.

Potential answers: rich, tall, smooth, black, hot, dark, white, Colombian, Irish, Mexican, Ethiopian, strong, effective... "Iced" has no place in this list unless you're a professional widow, so "iced" is not an appropriate way to have your coffee. This goes too for bitter, gritty, weak, tepid, and artificially-sweetened.

Snow Fairy

The heaviest snowfalls southern England has seen in the past 10 years have been when I've been here. It is currently both the first time I've been in London for Christmas and the first time it has snowed at Christmas in over 25 years. This past January I visited London for a week and, lo and behold, there was snow. Canterbury was mounded in over a foot of snow during my erasmus year there. More to the point, there has not been significant snowfall recently in this area without me.

For a while I thought this phenomenon was somehow linked to my curse from Ralph, the God of Plumbing, but I'm willing to concede that this is just global warming and good timing as I have not, to my knowledge, affected snowfall in the US. Dieties of Disasters, Drainage, and Ductwork are not beholden to mankind's political boundaries.

----

I haven't updated much lately because I've been very busy and very happy. I tend to not feel moved to blog when I'm in a good mood, which I may have mentioned before probably gives an unfair impression of me to the unassuming reader.

Today I'm content but idle as I'm unwilling to brave the riot that is Christmas shopping again if I can help it. Yesterday I started at noon, when the mummies of fussy children were smiling and indulging their spawn's screeched demands for cake and entertainment. I eventually ran for home at 5, by which time the unrelenting screams had passed through the 'ignore the brat' phase and had finally caused even the sweetest of mummies to start shouting and throwing things. I hid my wallet in a high inner pocket and more than once had need to shoo little sticky probing hands away from my bags. I'm learning restraint though, I think--I merely murmured "smack your offspring unless you'd like me to do it for you" rather than grabbing the face of the breeder who's sprog I had just prised off of my purchases and shouting it at her. It wasn't easy, though.

----

Kristen's News of the Asinine: I won the video game Portal recently on Ben's x-box. It was difficult because i'm awful with buttons and joysticks--my character spent most of her time slamming headlong into walls and tended to crouch when I needed her to run, so she got vaporized and drowned a lot. I like the way the game saves though--no matter how many times you get killed, you can just go back to the most recent autosave and try again, no harm done. If it weren't for this feature I'd still be on level 4. Also fun with this game is the player's ability to go into disused spaces unworried about being pursued or running out of time, most of the time, so you can pick things up and toss them around and look at the details of the graphics. The last time I played a video game before this one it was Super Mario Brothers on a black and green game boy--I lost level 1 until the batteries died--so I'd kinda missed out on developing the hand/eye coordination needed to play these things with the finesse required to win. Thanks, Valve, for making a game for me to enjoy.

And the cake isn't really a lie.

----

Friday I get to be appraised and re-appraised by even more members of the Boy's extensive kinship group. Wish me luck.

Home Again

Our books are loaded into the shelves.

The plumbing is a mess.

We've washed the dishes and learned that the dryer does not get warm, so clothesline it is.

We've installed our computers into their semi-permanent homes and funneled the potful of deep-frying oil into a disposable container. We've removed the mothballs and air-stinkers. We're trying to figure out what is emitting the smell in the refrigerator.

I've tripped over the weird threshold into the kitchen twice and now have a home-shaped bruise.

We've eaten home-cooked meals at our real dining room table and listened to the Guy Garvey show on the sofa in our real living room. We've stood and looked out at late night London with our heads peeking out of the study's skylights.

We have yet to spend much time in the garden as it's been raining, but I did move a potted plant about 4 feet to open up the space a bit. (I then proceeded to dart back inside to dry off. Was it necessary to move the plant? Jeez yes.)

I've organized the toolbox and put the cds into alphabetical order. I've folded all the towels and sheets and put them in neat stacks according to what they are. I've claimed a desk and tidied the spice rack. I'm going to clean the grease off the stove vent soon and mop the kitchen. I cleaned the U-bend from the bathroom sink and Dad of Boy troubleshot the problems with the shower (i.e. it don't work, get a plumber.) In short, I'm working to make the space into something that functions with the inclinations of my brain.

I'm going to the doctor on Thursday to see about my face, which is a red-and-beige model of the night sky. Oh look, Mars is in retrograde.

Home

Last night we moved into our new house.

Sorta.

The entire place is in disarray and our stuff is still mostly in suitcases. It feels very alien.

The place is furnished. I've barely looked at most of the furniture, let alone sat on it.

I still feel like I'm in someone else's home, and they'll be back in just a minute.

All the shelves are empty aside from a few knicknacks and matchbooks that clearly weren't worth transporting. The owners didn't quite finish clearing out before they left so we came in to sheets and towels still in their places from the morning of their flight. Teacups still in the drying rack. Fridge full of food. I don't want to touch anything in case I put it back in the wrong place.

They're in Mexico. They'll be there at least a year. They want us to move in and take over the place. It's our home. We're renting, not house-sitting.

We have an office at the top of the stairs. We have a guest room. We're not guests. We're not guests. We need a rug in the living room. It echos.

We're going to go back for Boy's guitars and books on Saturday. There's heaps of both. I should empty out the suitcases so we can refill them with the acres of pages. I'm chicken. The books may help with the echo. And the sparse look of the place. Empty bookshelves are creepy.

I got to school today. I'm not entirely sure how to get back. I have a map.

Croatan Ridge

Thursday, 12 November 2009

Currently stateside. North Carolina. Cape Hatteras. The lighthouse's historic beam swings through our northern window every seven seconds throughout the night. Blink. Whoosh. Blink. I'm sipping a cold Fat Tire and tuning in and out of my extended family's conversations in the rental palace's olympic-sized kitchen. Blink. Whoosh. Blink. The sun has set and the 5-story tennis court on stilts is emitting a warm, cozy glow. The mother of the bride is panicking in a good-natured way. Blink. Whoosh. ... ...

Well, it does when the island has power.

It tends to lose this luxury when it's swept with gale-force winds for two days straight, accompanied by driving rain that pelts your windscreen with hailstone-like force. As burial of electric mains in flood-prone sand would result in little other than an established regimen of time-wasting for digging crews, the pole-strung power lines get a little wiggly and unreliable during hurricane season.

It would appear that we chose an inopportune moment to brave the barren, dune-covered emptiness of Highway 12, the sole route through the Outer Banks, as Hurricane Ida had decided to vent the last of her remaining fury somewhere between Kitty Hawk and Ocracoke. Pea Island, an untouched nature preserve, was a particularly hairy area to motor through at a crawl--I'm not sure if the head-on sideways rain, the headlight-deep puddles, the utter lack of visibility, the waves crashing over the dunes and onto the car, or the giant heaps of relocated sand dunes were the scariest bit. The roads and bridges were studded with the remains of shorebirds flung into traffic and trees by the relentless wind. For a while I thought it was snowing, but upon closer inspection--while fording a particularly deep road-river--I realized it was very fine, very rapidly moving white sand. Those lovely white-sand beaches. My shaking white-knuckled hands.

Friday, 13 November 2009

We really should have taken today's significant date into consideration when making plans for such an emotionally, spiritually charged event as a wedding. Today the bridge is closed and the rest of the road is periodically filled with crushing waves. The dunes, plasmodic and mobile while I was driving in two nights ago, completely broke, and the ocean is now hogging all lanes of traffic. The only route into and out of Cape Hatteras is under two feet of water, and the road surface itself is destroyed. The Chesapeake Bridge/Tunnel is closed, and all ferry service to the outer banks has been suspended until the storm surge subsides. We've been asked to sit tight, and that's precisely all we can do. My sister is remarkably calm.

Road crews can't get out to the missing areas to begin rebuilding--apparently work vehicles have been washed away and sunk into the sand. The wind is a sustained 50mph gust, coming from the west. All docks are underwater. The second guest house, Sushi, is standing in about 6" of seawater. The front yard has choppy waves.

Family and friends are doing amazing things in spite of or perhaps because of this. The food has been amazing and has come in copious quantities. Everyone is so helpful and selfless. The wedding has been officially moved to the pool house--the upstairs of which is a large, empty hall. We filled it with chairs--originally intended to go around tables outside just for the reception, as the wedding was supposed to be all-standing on the lawn. Instead it has an aisle--something my sister never really wanted to do--and we will have a processional. The bride and groom's friends couldn't have been better suited to make these changes--all the electricians, lighting designers, stage managers, and carpenters pulled out their skills and artistic eyes and made the space beautiful. The seating chart was re-drawn in VectorWorks to fit the dimensions of the hall.

We got our nails done--I have a French manicure. It's lovely.

50 guests, caterers, the musician, the photographer, the hairdresser, and the officiant are stranded on another island. There's no way in hell they're going to get here. Another guest, purely out of a sense of necessity, went and got himself ordained online this morning and can perform the ceremony if it comes to it. The guests are mostly family. We're seeing if we can set up video Skype and have that in a separate party location. The bride is holding it together, but tensions are high. The mother of the bride is starting to crack. The father of the bride is trying to pull a kite off the roof with a fishing pole. It's the most appropriate thing to do, really. My date for the wedding is dismantling my banjo to fit it in the suitcase.

The wedding rehearsal has been postponed until we have a better idea of which ceremony participants will be able to get here. The food for the rehearsal dinner is stuck with the caterers. The fresh fish was going to spoil even in the fridges that the hotel was kind enough to share, so they gave the ingredients to whichever hotel staff could use it. The North Carolina Department of Transportation is on a first-name basis with many of the bridal party and guests. All of the locals know about the wedding and have been hugely accommodating. Dad has the only truck with a high enough chassis to make it down the driveway--the water is 2' deep in places--so when we realized that there was no dinner he went to pick it up from a nice restaurant a few miles away. They're not really a take-out sort of place, but they'd heard about our crisis and made several of each main course on their menu for dad and my uncle to take back, as we couldn't get everyone to the restaurant. The owner gave them some beers and chatted with them while they waited. Happy campers.

I wore a pretty dress! My sister's was much prettier, but it was really fun to smarten up for a few hours after being damp and cold all day. The food was amazing and the mother of the groom made a beautiful toast--to the bride and groom, to our efforts, and even to Ida for bringing out the best in all of us. Then we all got good and drunk.

Throughout the evening phone photos filtered in of the other wedding guests having drinks and toasting the bride and groom from wherever they were--many of whom who had managed to bump into our other stranded friends and relatives and start getting to know one another.

Saturday, 14 November 2009

I'm still confused and jet lagged. I spent some time today stringing lights and lanterns outside while the wind attempted to upend the swimming pool on me. Then Ben and I put on neoprene sandals and shorts and walked around in the drive and road outside the house to see if we couldn't chart a course through the water that was less than a foot deep all the way along. We managed 14" if you hugged one side, then cut quickly to the other, and returned with this information to the drivers of SUVs. They were in the process of orchestrating a fleet of small boats to bring wedding guests from Manteo Island to the house for the ceremony. After several hours of discussion they managed to secure 3 boats with sufficient seats for 57 people and got all of the guests from 4 hotels and several rental properties to the dock and in the water. After that we fussed and futzed and got my sister all decorated--her hair was amazing!--until the first guests (and last bridesmaids and the minister and the caterers) began to arrive from the pier by uncle-powered shuttle. The groom's sister's car flooded and began misbehaving during this time, which left the best man stranded with it near the ferry terminal. An emergency uncle was called upon to collect him and throw him in a shower and a suit as quickly as possible.

We rehearsed the ceremony at 6pm and decided to hold the real thing at 8. After a few missteps when the non-theatre folk were confused by references to stage right and cue standbys, we managed a simple, no-frills procession. My sister and her then-fiance decided to walk down the aisle together after the moms and dads.

The ceremony was beautiful and brief. The musician played and sang some very pretty songs for the processional and seating. We all had some good laughs--particularly when the minister announced "We made it!" The bridal party all carried candles. The best man carried the vows, and I was hands-free to receive the bouquet of lavender. My teenage cousin and the groom's half-brother were on hand with rings--my new brother also wore an engagement ring--and in the time it took us to say "we recognize and bless your union" they were hitched.

Then dinner and drinks and a variety of toasts. The best man's was genuine--a well-prepared speech on the meaning of love that became more true and more relevant as the week went on. Then mine: "May the wind be always at your backs, but may it not blow a gale!" And thoughtful and grateful words from my father and the groom. The cupcakes--made onsite by a team of friends and cousins--were amazing. Salted caramel recessed in chocolate. Pumpkin and cinnamon. Sweet Revenge's Pure recipe. Chocolate raspberry. And the centerpiece--a really, really big cupcake--red velvet with cream cheese frosting. OMG. I kinda passed out shortly after all this. As I slept the uncle-shuttle zoomed back into action and got the guests back onto boats and back toward their cars before the break of day.

Sunday, 15 November 2009

We woke up this morning to find that the water has begun to recede and the wind has abated. Sushi house--with its glass block castle door and pagoda-style rear tower--lost its moat overnight. We found bits of dad's kite, which had been flying unmanned for three days off the upper deck of the house, in the road and up a tree. Dad climbed after it and scraped his leg.

The road was still closed--well, gone--and the first ferry didn't go out until after it was too late to make our flight. (The 2 ferries--one to Ocracoke, the other from there to Swan Quarter on the mainland, add at least 4 hours to the trip.) I called the airline and got redirected to Montréal where an AirFrance representative flatly failed to rebook my ticket, resulting in headaches and arguments later in the day.

As calls filtered in of missed and canceled flights from friends and family we pulled chairs out of the pool house and stacked and prepared rented dishes for pickup. We started coming across all the neat things we were going to use and do for the ceremony and reception--all the cute bar tables and stools that were going to go out around the pool. All the bamboo poles that were strung with fairy lights to go outside. All the beautiful driftwood that dad had carefully selected and mom had dried and decorated for centerpieces. All the green beans that went uneaten because a quarter of the guests couldn't make it onto the island. All the dancing we were going to do. All the playlists that had been compiled to create different soundscapes for each floor of the house. All the plans. All the arrangements. All the lightbulbs. All the beer. People were worried about waking up early so it was unintentionally one of the driest weddings I'd ever encountered. Dozens of wine bottles were packed into cars and 6 kegs of local beer are being returned to the brewery untapped. All the well-thought through plan A's, plan B's, plan R's...but when it came down to it, plan play-it-by-ear went pretty well too. And the end result is the same. They're married.

Monday-Tuesday, 16-17 November, 2009

Transit day. Woke up at 4am for 5:00 ferry. Missed 5:00 because of insufficient room as the city has demanded that the fleet of stinky garbage trucks which have been stranded here since Wednesday take priority on the outbound runs. Got the 6:00 in a convoy with dad, the short-notice bridesmaid, and the backup minister. Watched the sun rise while the iconic lighthouse did its last pass of the morning. Blink. Whoosh. Got to Ocracoke at 6:45. Missed the 7:00 ferry as it too was full. Got coffee and the 8:00 to the mainland. Phone died--the power cable didn't work with the adapter at the house so the calls to airlines and car rental agencies drained the battery. Lost track of dad and rest of convoy. Got lost because North Carolina doesn't seem to have laws preventing two roads of the same name from intersecting. Got to airport with a few hours to spare. Returned rental car only to discover that the natural disaster note that had been put on the account had been ignored. Charged late fee and for extra day. Rental desk less than useless. Checked in successfully for flight 1 of 2. Told to check in for flight 2 in Atlanta because it's technically a bulk Air France ticket and we can't process it here, but they'll take care of it there no problem. Smooth flight south. Try to check in for flight 2 to Heathrow. Wind up spending an hour waiting while bitchy service desk person tries and fails to transfer ticket, which was issued, in spite of everything, for the previous day's flight. She tries to blame it on us, but we flatly point out to her that it was botched by a representative of her company, and as she works for them too, it's her job to fix it. She mumbled about it being Air France's fault, but as Delta is in bed with them, and the flight is operated by Delta, she can kiss my lilywhite ass. She winds up printing us boarding passes--which had been reserved, but not tickets--and stapling them to the previous day's tickets. We board, we sleep fitfully. We get through customs and are astonished to find that our luggage came home too. Thank you, Atlanta Baggage Handlers--that was amazing.

----
We told joy and horror stories when the rest of the family got in. Their terror when it came to the driving conditions was mitigated by the fact that we were telling it, in one piece, in the kitchen. Their oohs and aahs at the suitcase-rumpled formal clothing, the reassembled party lanterns, and pretty mom-made silk stoles sounded slightly sad that they'd missed it, though slightly relieved too. We did some laundry. We fell aslee

schoolmates, drinking mates

I've registered for classes. The registration process was a little strange, and as with everything I've done lately, what I was told to have was not what was required, but thankfully I had what they wanted anyway.

"I need to see your qualifications."
"What qualifications?"
"The ones we required for your acceptance."
"Er...I was accepted based on my performance at interview. Do you need to see my portfolio?"
"No, your qualifications from other schools."
"Like the original copy of my university transcript that I submitted with my application packet? The piece of paper you already have?"
"Yes, we need to see that again."
"So take it out. You have it."
"I need to see another original."

I punched him in the ear.

Actually, luck would have it that when I purchased--yes, purchased, they're $10 a copy--official copies of my transcript from USC back in December I sprung for 5 and only wound up using 4. So I had a spare, and was miraculously able to pull it out of my notebook. But seriously? That's retarded. Especially figuring I didn't have to submit that for my visa application--you have to send the border agency all your supporting documents that the school said your acceptance was based on in the official letter they write for you. Mine said "Code 014X: Student was accepted based upon performance at audition or interview." No documents required.

Other registrants encountered similar confusions and problems. Most did not have official copies of their undergraduate records tucked away in their asses so they received a tongue lashing. In that "how dare you not have something we didn't ask for!" way.

It was wonderful to talk to other students and hear just how shitty their processes were in getting over here. Some students' visa applications were rejected due to internal errors in the border agency. Others discovered, much like I did, that FAFSA and their loan agencies lied to them repeatedly, nearly ruining everything on numerous occasions. "I thought Central had my FAFSA until July, when I discovered that they'd never sent it because I asked the finance department what the hold-up was." "I was told my official financial aid letter was fraudulent because the letterhead was in black and white." "My daddy just has a lot of money--I didn't have to take out a loan so I've had a visa since June." "My school couldn't find a copy of my transcript because of a massive computer crash in 2007." "My visa was delivered in a timely fashion, but the FedEx employee was contractually obligated to step on my foot before he left."

We had a quick tour of the library from the cheery and funny head librarian who started her presentation with "I'm certain you'll all forget everything I said by the end of the day, but let me at least show you around. As students in the past have pointed out, "Central's library is exclusively my favorite section." We hope it also turns out to be useful to you."

The head of the IT department was equally bright and funny and got us logged into the intranet--which is available off campus! Holla!

And then it was off to the pub. For the rest of the day. Yes. Ms. Kristen was pleased. Most of my new classmates are hella interesting and smart, and I only say most because I didn't meet everyone. We're a diverse group of internationals and locals, and by my reckoning we number about 35. We all have different ideas of how the course is going to run, so hopefully on Monday we'll set the record firmly crooked. But I've really liked the people I've met.

There were 3 people including me from my interview group. A local girl said 8 people from hers registered. The school has apparently told last year's students that we're a smaller group than theirs, but a girl from the 09 class isn't really sure that's true.

I may have picked up the nickname "apple-tizer" but I'm not entirely sure how. We'll see how that plays out.

Anyway, the pub was fun, and everyone's excited to get started. I think I'm in good company.

Welcome to England. Here's your fee.

I've made it to London safely, and have been settling in for about a week in my temporary residence in Greenwich. The Boy and I visited Cambridge over the weekend and found it lovely, if a bit too familiar--neither of us had been there before, but thanks to its age and geographical similarity to Canterbury we both felt automatically as though we knew our way around.

The Cam narrows to a stream around the city and over the weekend it is completely rammed with puntfuls of happy tourists being shoved along by ropey-muscled puntsmen, which was quite pleasant to watch from the apexes of Cambridge's many bridges. We thought it likely that the puntsmen are on the school rowing teams during term-time and probably just do this for extra cash in the summer. The more experienced punters went unshod and wore thin, lightweight, and quite obviously old clothing in the style of a man who is quite confident that he'll fall in at least once today. Several had dapper, buoyant straw hats that they clearly wore in preparation for a comic plunge. While we never felt the urge to take a ride on the river, the boats, surrounded by massive weeping willows, ancient halls of academia, and acres of neatly trimmed lawn made for two beautiful days of relaxed sightseeing.

And then...tragedy struck in the form of a bank card. Visa, in a disgusting foray into additional extortion, has found a new way to painfully fuck every young person who crosses the Atlantic. It's called a transaction percentage fee, and it hurts.

Back in the US I went down to my local Wachovia branch and asked what the word was on international transactions. I was told, and I quote, "if you withdraw cash, you'll get a $5 loyalty fee from Wachovia, and an additional charge of 2% of every withdrawal from Visa. Your best bet is to use your card, which has no fee, and take out as much cash as you can from the outset in order to avoid paying out too much."

What that actually meant when I got here was, "yes, there's a $5 loyalty fee for using other banks' ATMs even though we're positive there's no Wachovias within 5,000 miles of you, and on top of that, Visa charges 3% on every transaction INCLUDING withdrawals. No matter what, every time I spend a cent, Visa takes a nibble. By the time I'd figured that out (because the fees didn't show up on my statement until about four days after the transactions) I'd given Visa $20 of my hard-earned low-value savings. (the pound is sitting at about $1.60--quite nice compared to my undergrad average of $1.97 but it still means my money is cheap).

Now, fun thing. When I found this out I ran to my nearest British bank and said "account me now" and they said "oh, actually, we need a letter from your school, written to our bank, saying that you're a student and confirming your address." "But I have two letters here from my school that the border agency accepted, and my passport, which has a shiny year and a half student entry clearance in it that even has my picture on it, and on your website this was all and exactly what was required for the type of account I want." "well, sorry, but these are the rules." "not according to your website. I would like to formally request that you update it to reflect your actual policy." "I'll see what can be done." "I'm positive you won't. But never mind. You want me to write a letter to my school telling them my address so they can write a letter to you with the same address on it." "Yes." "That's moronic."

So I went and got a letter written, then went up to school the following day to pick it up. It had been left at reception and the whole process of getting it took about eight seconds. Thank you Central. I then enjoyed a one-hour wait at the bank to be seen at all, then an additional chunk of waiting after I began my meeting with a bank representative who wasn't at all sure if the letter, the passport, the visa, and my presence in the bank were sufficient proofs of ID for their purposes.

Now I'd just like to establish that my first week of my undergraduate career put a foul taste in my mouth for banks and credit companies' student-geared promotional materials. Thousands of my classmates were roped into signing up for credit cards with eye-crushing interest rates by smiling, pretty girls who handed out free* t-shirts emblazoned with funny slogans, cell phones, pizza discounts, beer, bottle openers, beer coozies, and chances to win big! in raffles for cars, vacations, and cash prizes. Thousands of these ignorant kids then found themselves drowning in debt within months to companies that were suddenly short on smiling pretty girls after they failed to realize that credit is not free money, or even cheap money. After years of paying off one card with another and spiraling into alcoholism-inducing poverty many students dropped out of school, signed up for credit counseling, managed to consolidate and pay off their debts, only to find that their credit score was still so low they couldn't even find an apartment, much less a new student loan, and moved back in with their parents. All for free t-shirts that brandished cute sayings like "chick magnet" and "my other ride is your sister."

I don't trust free shit for students.

So imagine my distaste when I discovered that the only account for which I qualify is one that smells horribly of student rip-off. It has a fee, has no financial benefits, but it offers me great perks like 2 for 1 movie tickets! (i hate the movies), 25% off big shows! (like Madonna concerts...right. yeah, I'll use that. Willingly.) cell phone insurance! (why on earth are you offering that? Don't trust it.) Gadget cover! (yeah, I've gotten tech replacement policies before. The ones that end on "if technology has moved on since you bought it and it's obsolete by a month and it's not really easy for us to replace you can buy a new one for $700 and we'll give you $50 after a few years and consequently repeal our gadget cover policy." After reading the fine print I typically opt out.) and a variety of other pointless bells and whistles that have nothing whatsoever to do with banking!

So, can one opt out of the pay-for-play bells and whistles? No. And to add insult to injury, not only did I have to concede that I'd pay £6.95 a month for the honor of a UK bank investing my money as they see fit, but I had to go through a form with an accounts manager while we discussed which of the perks I would find most valuable. I said none, seriously dude, I don't want any of this, I just want a safe place to put my loan disbursements, and still he persisted. What about the mobile phone cover? You could lose it, break it, have it stolen, doesn't matter... I picked up my 6 year old green-screened torchphone that I've been borrowing from my boy. "There is no point in insuring an object that has no value." "Well if you get a new phone?" "I'm happy with it." "But if." "But if. Fine." "Great! See, for just 6.95 a month you'll get this and all these other features--2 for 1 cinema tickets--"i hate the cinema." "Oh come on, everyone loves the cinema!" "I hate it. I can't justify to myself paying $10 for 3 cents worth of popcorn just to sit in a sticky seat and watch a brainless sequence of explosions." "Naw, everyone loves the cinema! You can take your boyfriend!" "My boyfriend is too smart to drag me into an expensive, foul-smelling crowd." "See? That's worth £72 over the course of a year! So I'll just tick that off." "I said I didn't want it." "You'll want it." I then punched him in the ear.

Okay, well, maybe I didn't quite punch him in the ear. I did remind him that I'd looked through the perks online and did not find myself wanting any of them. He eventually lowered his voice and said "Look, I know, and I'm sorry, but I'm contractually obligated to go through this form with you and check off a few things that you value, for the marketing department." "That's dishonest." "It's just part of it. You have to pay for the account anyway because you're international. I'm not saying its right or fair, but every bank does it and this is among the cheaper ones. It's still cheaper than paying Visa every time you need money." Just now I pay you.

Defeated, I signed the forms. A tiny demon danced across the desk, giggling and gyrating its pelvis at me.

Looks like I'm sold. Alas. On a brighter note, my southern reserve and sweet tolerance when it comes to imbeciles and dishonesty have fallen off, the upshot of which is that I've been feeling better about myself after my encounters with bureaucracy. I've come to feel far more comfortable calling shenanigans, declaring the unacceptable, and standing my ground than ever before. I'm so tired of being taken advantage of and kicked around by the sweet-sounding mouthpieces of big business and big government. You ain't so innocent, sister--you work for these people, you know exactly what you represent, so when you lie, I'm going to call you on it. I am done being patient and courteous. That route has gotten me nowhere.

Asshole time it is.



*to qualified applicants (not first-time applicants with no credit rating) for the first 3 months, then 17% APR compounded monthly thereafter. Maximum credit begins at $2,000, with the option to extend after the first 3 months. Any balance of greater than $2,000 after the first 3 months will be considered an informal credit limit expansion request and the APR shall be raised to 19% . . . .