Tag: fun

Mail!

So Kristen, she of the Good Wishes to Kristen Party, knows how much I love my birthday.  I think she also must know how much I love unexpected mail.  Because you will never guess what arrived today in the mail for me.

It’s a birthday scavenger hunt!  I get to find these twelve places around Portland, take a picture of myself with them and when I have sent her seven pictures I get gift #1.  When I send her ten pictures I get gift #2.  If I find all  twelve places I get unlimited bragging rights.  I know where six are right now.  You know I’m going for unlimited bragging rights, right?

Le Grand Continental

White Bird, a local dance company, celebrated 15 years by staging a free performance in Pioneer Square.   Le Grand Continental is a dance by Sylvain Emard.  In it, 160 non-professional dancers of all types come together in a 30 minute performance.  There was no way I was going to miss this.

I stopped at Elephants for a sandwich and headed to Pioneer Square.  This couple caught my eye.  They were very exotic, her with her long flowing scarf, him with his baguette in his bag.  I suspect we were headed in the same direction.
 

Despite the press coverage, I didn’t really realize that so many people would also want to see free dance.  The square was packed.  An usher helpfully pointed me to a spot on the ground and I started the line of people who settled in beside me.  We had front row seats.  That open space behind the woman in the red top would eventually fill with people too.
 
Children play in the dance space before the show begins.
 
Searching for a vantage point involved climbing for some.
 
The dancers emerge.
 
And take their places.
 
Images from the dance.  Oh, how I longed for a more powerful camera.
 
 
 
The man in the green shirt wrote, “Hey ladies, I’m single”
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
At one point, everyone fell down and the children emerged and attempted to wake everyone, with no success.
 
 
 
The congregated together…

…and began to dance.
 
The founders of White Bird came over, gave them a finger shaking.
 
The children danced in response, and the men followed.
 
Suddenly everyone began to wake.
 
 
 
I enjoyed this man’s shirt (Pluto. Never Forget) as well as the fact that he kept a towel handy to mop up the sweat.
 
 
 
 
It was great seeing so many people who did not look like dancers dancing.
 
The guy in the pink shirt was one of the assistants (or something) and he was fun to watch.
 
I could never get a good shot of the guy in the Hawaiian shirt.  He was delightful to watch too.  He was quite old, comparatively  quite out of shape, didn’t quite have all the steps and was so delighted to be there.
 
The dance ended with the dancers looking about.
 
And then there were the bows.
 
 
And then we were all invited to dance with them.
 
Thanks, White Bird, for a magical 30 minutes.
 

Non-Matt Muddy Buddy

The job of Athletic Supporter requires standing around with a camera ready to capture whatever action is happening with the athlete you are there to support. Because I have so few opportunities to capture the athlete and so many opportunities to capture everyone else, I inevitably come home with a lot of pictures of the athlete and then even more pictures without the athlete that I just like.  Here’s a tour of the Muddy Buddy, without Matt.

So the “buddy” aspect of the race means there are a lot of “twins” outfits.  This is fun.
 

The race itself had people walking around taking photos.
 
The “buddy” aspect of the race means two people are often doing the same thing at the same time.
 
Two of the photo people.
 
One of the better male outfits.  Way to embrace the chest hair!
 
This man doesn’t know it, but he’s an Athletic Supporter, too!
 
The blue line registers the athletes start when their chips cross over.
 
This guy reminded me a bit of Julie McCoy from Love Boat.
 
There were two other guys with Julie McCoy hyping up the crowd at the start, though it looks like there’s about to be a fight.
 
I think this lady is not an Athletic Supporter, because she was standing on the side where normal spectators weren’t.  I think she might have been with the male announcer.
 
She kind of looked a bit bored.
 
This photographer’s efforts to get the kids to cheer resulted in the kid in the red running back to his mother.   Which resulted in me laughing.
 
Fans!  Much more so than the woman checking her phone.
 
Waiting to start.
 
This blue mat is not quite right.
 
South Salem High School’s ROTC were the volunteers.  There were two guys who had to stop people from walking across the course when athletes were coming through.  It was a tough job and I was interested in the contrast between their ROTC role, their job stopping clueless people, and the demeanor they projected.  I faced this guy, so got more photos of him than the other one.  I tried my best to capture all of the above, but I don’t think I did.
 
 
 
These guys had the fun job of pulling people over the wall, which was sprayed in fabric softener to make it even more slippery.
 
A younger competitor waiting for his partner.
 
Both of these women wore shirts that said, “I will step on you to win.”  They were a bit scary, though less so, post shower.
 
Done showering.  Just wait!  These guys will appear again.
 
We were at Kruger’s Farm.  There were chickens.
 
First place already!
 
I loved this interaction between Kate, the owner of our gym, and her race partner.
 
Heh.  This team placed in the coed category.
 
Hey!  It’s the guys from before!  Being weighted as part of the “Beast” category (Over a combined 450 pounds). I liked the interplay between all these people.  This is my favorite picture I took.
 
They turned out to be the winners!
 

The best part of the job interview.

I had a job interview today, which was exciting and I think went well.  But I can tell you that the best part of the job interview was the Zipcar I rented.  The one that was closest to where I work was also a fancy car.  When I saw it I laughed.  This was going to be a fun drive.
 
In reserving the car, I allowed copious amounts of time for the interview itself and to get the Zipcar back in time.  This meant I had nearly two hours after the interview to drive around and I took advantage of that time.  I rarely get to drive cars that react so strongly when I press the gas pedal.
 

Rose Festival Parade 2012

Saving seats for the Rose Festival Parade.  I’m from the blue chair to the end of the blanket.
 
After much time saving seats, Mom and her friend Tanya arrived.  Then Rick arrived with S & K.  Kids at parades are much fun so there are many pictures of S & K and none of Mom and Tanya.
 
Trying to get both kids to look at the camera.
 
There’s a parade going on, but who needs parades when you have rocks behind you?
 
Because then you can take the rocks…
 
…and put them in the bike helmet!
 
Attempt at self-portrait with myself and K.  It captures neither of us, but does get a bit of my mother.
 
This weird yellow guy hung about, trying to excite the crowds.  He was a bit creepy and eventually moved on.  He seemed to not be actually affiliated with the parade, just a random all yellow guy looking to motivate people to cheer.
 
K had the eating thing down. 
 
S took a break from rock-moving to have a snack.
 
They lasted a long time, but eventually it was time to go.
 
In case you missed the Rose Festival Parade, here it is, in less than three minutes.

Wheel! Of! Fortune!

Mom, Aunt Carol and I got to see a taping of Wheel of Fortune at the Convention Center.  It was great fun.
 

Things you should know about going to a remote taping of Wheel of Fortune:

  • The information emphatically requires no cell phones and no cameras.  If you follow their instructions and do not bring your cell phones and cameras you will be annoyed because the vast majority of people DO bring their cell phones and cameras with no consequences.
  • There is a lot of waiting around.  First there is the waiting around to get in when you are herded, cattle-like, through a switchback of a line.  However, Wheel of Fortune knows their audience and there are chairs in which to sit all along the line, for those who aren’t able to stand the whole time.  
  • For those who can’t really stand long at all, they just get to go to a holding area to wait for the rest of their party.  This brings up unfortunate images of “culling the weak ones” in my mind, but rest assured that your loved one will still be waiting when you get to the front of the line.
  • When you are herded into a seat, you may not really like your seats.  That is okay, as they will be taping multiple shows and there are a lot of people who leave after the first show is done.  Then you can get much better seats.
  • They will want you to clap a lot.  So if you try and keep up with Vanna’s clapping as the Wheel is spinning, your hands will be quite tired by the end of the session.
  • It takes a very long time to tape three 20-minute shows. The taping itself lasted about 2.5 hours and that doesn’t include waiting in line.  So get ready to settle in.

Observations gleaned from my session:

  • Pat Sajak spends very little time on stage.  When they have finished the round he immediately leaves the stage, returning just as the next round is going to begin.  There is very little schmoozing
  • Vanna is the only one on stage who knows the answer to the puzzle.
  • When Vanna walks around answering questions, 30% will be interesting questions to which I want to know the answers, 65% will be the eye-roll inducing and grammatically incorrect “Can I have a hug?” and 5% will be people wanting to take their pictures with her.
  • Vanna does not get to keep the clothing she wears.  Given that she wore three different one-piece outfits that I found a bit ugly, I see this as a blessing.  She does, however, wear her own shoes with her outfits.  She reports that she has a lot of shoes.
  • It takes eight people to move the mini-Wheel used for the final puzzle on and off the stage:  four to push/hold up cables, and four more to place a rotation of press board on the floor for the mini wheel to roll over.
  • I find the TV industry to be incredibly inefficient in the realm of labor.
  • WOF has a “remote crew” out of Florida who do all the remote tapings.  The regular crew stays back in California.
  • There is only one Wheel and it is very heavy.  Watching the crew change the wheel between segments was my favorite part.
  • The reason the contestants tend to yell out their letters in a rather obnoxious fashion is that there are two people employed to make sure the candidates can spin the wheel and they hype them up as much as possible.
  • When Pat Sajak mishears a contestant’s letter choice the stage goes dark, the contestants are ordered to turn around, there is a general murmur of discussion on the stage and then they restart the round with a brand-new puzzle.  Also, Pat Sajak will tell you that it’s the first time it has happened in the history of the show.  Don’t believe him.
  • Because contestants are not allowed to name their actual employers, when a contestant identifies hers as a “local athletic apparel manufacturer” half the audience will lean to the other half of the audience and whisper “Nike.”
  • The “kissing cam” was a hilarious part of the experience, even if I felt dumb the whole time for laughing.  This was where they would show two members of the audience framed in a heart and the couple would laugh in recognition and kiss, to the audience’s approval.  Or, they would lean over a row and down three chairs to kiss their spouse who was not the person in the frame originally, or attempt to hide their eight-year old selves as their older sister attempted to kiss them, or sit uncomfortably as their wife moves in for the kiss.  Good clean fun.
  • When the productions likes us, they give us super cool Wheel of Fortune blinky pins that are very fun to wear at school the next day.