Weekly Highlight: Savion Glover

When we have extra time at SAI meetings (which sadly doesn't happen nearly often enough) we each share our "Highlight of the Week" with everyone.  I decided to bring this concept to my blog, so that if nothing else, I blog once a week :)

This week my highlight was: Savion Glover

http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Savion_Glover

A group of us from tap club decided we'd go over to Cornell to see him because, well, do we really need a reason?  He turned out to be amazing.  I expected him to be really good, but he definitely surpassed any expectation I had formulated in my head prior to seeing him.  The show was exactly 2 hours.  Savion Glover tapped for about 1 hour and 58 minutes. No joke.  Even as he was drinking water his feet were moving, doing some paradiddles, some toes and heels.  Then he'd slowly get more intense until his feet were in the air more than on the ground and sounds were coming from no where (we later speculated that perhaps he had someone back stage adding in some sounds... his feet were moving that fast.)

I have to say his incredible show made my feet insist on doing their own moves for the next 24 hours or so, though my own feet just wouldn't move that fast.  He really inspired me to move, make up some sounds, and use my feet as an instrument.

A couple days after I saw Savion, my dad e-mailed me a link to a Stomp video (see below), stating "Stomp really blurs the lines between dance and playing music." which I thought was a good theme to go with Savion Glover as well.

Superheroes

"...And now we do Soulja Boy, what versions do you all know?"

Blank stares.

There are versions?

We were learning the newest dance in our Tap Club repertoire: a Superhero mezcla in honor of Ithaca Relay for Life's 2011 theme of... you guessed it: Superheroes!!  We had just learned about 30 seconds of a dance, and our choreographer asks us to do a "Soulja boy"... well, of the 12 people present, only 4 of us including the choreographer knew the Soulja boy dance, we're tappers, not hip hoppers!

But now, after learning the dance that so many people already know, we are more like the rest of the world, except we make sounds when we hop to the sides with our arms lagging behind "cranking" to the beat.  Clink. Clink. Clink. Clink.  We may look silly doing it, our overall look almost as far from hip hop as could be (only a ballerina could be further) but it was fun to learn something a bit simpler than the more complex numbers we've been learning lately.  

As we walked out into the cold after rehearsal, I realized that something about tonight reminded me of why I love Tap Club so much.  I love the other members and how we laugh about everything, I love the dancing and I love having a few hours a week during which nothing matters but the neurological connection between my brain and my feet.

Joy of cooking?

I've unfortunately discovered that I don't really enjoy cooking.  I'm not sure if this is a temporary thing stemming from the fact that campus apartments have less than ideal kitchens that must be shared (in my case) with 5 others on a daily basis.  Who really wants to make some extravagant thing they've never tried before that takes up every dish in the house, when your room mate is going to be hungry and need that burner on which you are creating your sauce?  Or maybe it is more because I'm not very experienced so every minute in the kitchen is one of constant tension as I try to dice the onions without scalding the milk.   I really think the reason I haven't been enjoying cooking is because what I enjoy about cooking is the company that comes along with it.  Growing up I would help my mom or dad in the kitchen, taking on bigger roles as I got older.  I loved helping out to create the family meal.  Now I love baking and cooking for Zach and for my family and friends because when I'm done I get to socialize and share my creation.  If I'm left to cook it's some variation of mac and cheese, or spaghetti with whatever veggies I picked up at Wegman's that week.  When Zach cooks: it's a masterpiece.

Zach actually cooks most often now: he's much better at it and he really enjoys it.  He has a couple cookbooks of Jamie Oliver's and everything we have made from them are delicious! While he's cooking I'll sit out of the way and talk to him, or do homework, or knit, ready to lend him a hand when he needs to grab something from the fridge, or just needs a third one. Then my favorite part comes: sharing the wonderful meal :)

Thursday Nights

I used to avoid the small man-made path up the side of the hill upon which "The 30s" sat.  I avoided it during the day for fear of mud and ice (depending on season) and I avoided it at night because it is not particularly well lit.  The woods is off to the left and apartments are up above as you practically scale a small cliff.  It was creepy. 

Then a week ago I was walking home around 8 o'clock chatting on my cell with Dad who says "If you're still outside, look for Orion and to his left is Sirius, a brilliantly bright star."  I had my doubts of seeing Sirius or Orion as Ithaca's campus is the brightest place outside of NYC (though I'm not complaining. The well-lit campus makes me feel safe especially when I have late classes).   As I neared the end of the path I was on I noticed the thin path through the snow going up the hill.  I decided to try out the path and I looked up at the sky.  The stars were brilliant!  Orion was standing right in front of me in all his mightiness and off to the left... well, off to the left I saw lots of stars, but I picked out the brightest one and named it Sirius. 

Tonight as I walked home with the melodic tones of "Dide Ta Deo" in my mind I once again took that path up the side of the hill and looked at the stars.  They once again shone down with vibrancy and made me smile in awe of the vast galaxy beyond us.

A run, a barbeque and rain

Our Greek Life Picnic was scheduled for today at 3 pm.   I decided I would run down - It's 4.5 miles and the first 1.5 miles are down hill, so I figured it would be doable.  I did it and I never had a better run prior to that.  The weather was questionable the entire way down and it started to rain the last 5 minutes of it, but prior to that it was sunny with a breeze that cooled me off as I went.  It didn't feel like 4.5 miles and I'm sure its because of the initial down hill part.  It's difficult not to run down hill for a mile and half for a run that leaves campus since campus is on a hill.  I felt a bit of accomplishment though because normally unless I'm in a race I can't run for longer than half an hour or a couple of miles.  Maybe next time I'll have to try running back up the hill :-/

When I got there hamburgers and hot dogs were grilling so I patiently waited for my refueling. After receiving my hamburger, it promptly started to downpour again and people dispersed. 

I came back with the intent to study.  I instead showered and slept for a couple hours, ate and procrastinated a bit until I've found myself here at 8:30 no further into my studying than I was at 2 o'clock this afternoon.  Well, I should probably get to work. Anatomy - here I come!

Last time I'm trusting the box...

I planned on doing 2 things this evening:

1. Back up my computer
2. Clean my room

I only got one of them done.

I asked for an external hard drive for my birthday after hearing one too many stories of people's computers dying on them after 3 or 4 years of use right after they had finished a huge paper.  Having bought my computer right after graduation from high school I'm nearing my third year of use and I don't want to take any chances - especially with the 5000 plus photos I currently have on it.  Today I went to set it up and it took over 2 hours or so to figure out how to do it after the box advertised  easy, straight-forward installation.  I probably used up many minutes on my phone talking to my dad trying to figure out what I did wrong.  It turns out it would have been much simpler if I had done things in the correct order and hadn't skipped steps (something I didn't realize I was doing as I thought it had already done it automatically when I plugged it in... I never claimed to be computer savvy), but once things were straightened out it was in fact quite easy. 

Now almost 5 hours later I have a backed up computer... but an equally messy room - though most things did move location.  I guess you can't do everything in one day.  The room will have to wait until tomorrow.

-KE

Photo of the day:

Uncle Sean and Emma at Grandma's 80th birthday party

Wednesday, the 21st

So I have a few minutes before class starts at 4.  I haven't written in weeks, well, let's not lie... it's been months since I've had a moment where I felt clear minded enough to sit down and type something out. 

The big news from this semester is: I got engaged!  Zach and I got engaged on the 4th of April.  We couldn't be happier though at this point, with the wedding date (undecided) so far away, nothing has really changed - which is exactly the way I wanted it. We'd had a debate about this for a while - what difference does it make if we're dating for 5 years and engaged for one or dating for 2.5 and engaged for 3?  Obviously we decided it really didn't make a difference and since I have 3 more years of school, we'll be doing the latter.  He hasn't gotten a ring yet so I'm wearing my great-grandmother's engagement ring that I received from my mother on my 18th birthday.  I really like it, but it's not really "me"... so Zach is getting me the real one when he can afford it.

Less exciting happenings in my life: I'm taking a triathlon gym class at school which for the first half of the semester was basically work out (run or bike) in the gym 2 days a week and you get credit.  Then our teacher left and we've had real workouts this semester.  We had swimming for 3 weeks, and now we're on the track with the track coach, who so far has been great and really helpful in keeping me motivated.  Swimming was very tough for me - I've never been a great swimmer as much as I enjoy being in the water.  It didn't help I was the slowest one there and everyone was always waiting for me to finish.  Physically swimming felt great, but psychologically it didn't make me feel great about myself.  Now that we're on the track I'm enjoying it a lot more though I'm still probably slowest.  We did some Fartleks today which was fun to finally understand how exactly to do a work out and not just run until I'm tired.  I'll just need to keep up the workouts I learn in this class.

Well, it's class time.  Hopefully I'll be back to write soon.

-KE