Inauguration Day

What a thrill, to watch Barack Obama become the 44th president of the US. Our library played the MSNBC live coverage, so we all watched it. The address was amazing.

It was 20 degrees in DC today, which gives me great confidence in the weather when I go two weeks from now! People dealt with the cold to be a part of this historic day.

I am watching Jon Stewart. I have enjoyed his coverage of the election. It was so cool watching him live on election night and now he is covering the inauguration! I love his impression of Bush, and will miss that, but the optimism is palpable.

Aretha Franklin--what is up with that hat? I gotta give her bravery props, but man what a weird hat. What is the deal with senior Bush--completely hobbling into the ceremony. And Cheney, in a wheelchair. So many unanswered questions!

What a great day--so totally ready for the changes yet to come!

The Vagina Monologues meeting this week

Friends, our next meeting for the V-Day 2009 production of The Vagina Monologues will be this Wednesday at 6pm at the ATV office on Pine Street in Red Bluff. Message or respond for more information. We are having our first rehearsal prior to that, as well!

Youth Play Rehearsal

Our youth met for their weekly rehearsal for the new diabetes play this afternoon. They are split into two teams so that when we travel, we won't be taking the same group of kids out of school time and time again. This is being problematic, though as I have not had one full team here for the past 2 rehearsals, just a mix and match of the teams. Today neither of the actors playing one of the main characters was here, but we had two of the hero and two of the narrator in attendance. So frustrating.

I think the most fun part for them in this one is that they get to wear actual costumes in this one. Usually they are playing teenagers, so they wear regular street clothes. Otherwise our uniform is blue jeans and their black long sleeved theatre shirts. This play is a fairy tale, and we have an evil witch villain, a princess, a knight and medieval townspeople. However, this is more challenging for me, having to come up with, for the most part, two sets of medieval costuming. Our two knights are vastly different sizes, and the two mayors of the town are different genders, so it will be a challenge. The two witches and the two princesses are close in size, so that helps as theirs are the most specialized of costumes. Pictured is the princess dress.

A new grant

I submitted a new grant for my program yesterday. It is only$500-$1,000 but it will support our youth theatre program. We are focusing on diabetes education this spring, so we will need to pay for promotional items and other things to make the program even more dynamic. This grant is for obesity prevention, so this tied in perfectly!

Auditions for the Vagina Monologues

The auditions went great--we had some really talented and brave women come to try out. We have built most of the cast list, with just a few roles left, but our make-up auditions are Friday, so that should wrap that up.

The audtions were fairly hard, as the questions were a little personal: What would your vagina wear, what would it say, how familiar are you with your vagina...but everyone handled them with humor and did a really great job.

I look forward to the first read-thru next Wednesday, so that we can hear everyone's take on their character. Can't wait!

Tour via Google Maps

Talk about "stay-cation"--I have recently discovered the Street Level function of Google Maps and took a tour around the US. I started with my own town, because I wanted to see how close to my own house I could get. Turns out I can actually "stand" right in front of my house, look in my car, see my neighbor's houses...a little creepy. I tooled around town, checking out different areas. I spent a lot of time trying to pinpoint when the photos were taken, and decided, considering the banners across main street, fireworks booths being out and the river being full meant that it was in June, and the level of construction on the new Starbucks/Mr. Pickle building and the existence of our now gone van in front of my house, that it is most likely 2007.

Next, I checked out my grandparent's old house in Penngrove CA. They sold it back in 1993, and it is now a Montessori School. I went to New York City and toured Manhattan. I spent a good deal of time checking out Times Square, Rockefeller Center, and the Museum of Natural History building. I also went to Washington DC (in preparation for my real trip next month) and "stood" at the foot of the Washington Monument.

What an inexpensive and fun way to "tour" different places. I was a little bummed that Hawaii is not mapped yet. Soon, I am sure. Google Maps ROCKS!

Stupid but Fun Movie, and V-Day

I watched The House Bunny tonight, which I was all prepared to hate. How insulting, transforming smart and unique women into vapid, playboy bunny wanna-bes, right? But it turns out that everyone learns a valuable lesson about being themselves, plus they look cute...well, it's all in the perception, I guess.

I also met with a group of ladies to watch the movie of The Vagina Monologues. All of us are on the Red Bluff V-Day committee, and most plan to audition and be in the show. It is really great, the number of women interested in being involved in the production. It is for a great organization, Alternatives to Violence, plus it is something that hasn't come to Red Bluff before. It is sure to be an exciting experience!

We ate chicken, mashed potatoes and some wonderful baked goods while laughing along with the movie, then talked about how we envision the show. It was great.

French Bread Pizza

Dinner tonight:

2 large inexpensive french breads, cut in half lengthwise and topped with sliced mozzarella, canned pizza sauce, thick sliced pepperoni, shredded cheddar and a chunky sauce made of chopped tomatoes, sliced garlic, canned artichoke hearts, black olives, dried basil and oil.

So good. I am ready to eat it again!

Local Theatrical Activities

Our community will host a production of The Vagina Monologues--and I'm directing it! I am so excited and nervous. We are auditioning on Monday, and so far we are getting a lot of great support from different groups and agencies.

I'm going to Washington DC!!

I booked my hotel room today, the flight is set...we are going! I am really stoked. I have always had a fascination with the east coast but have never been further back east than Michigan (and I was a really little girl). We did go to Indianapolis back in July, which was great.

We are going for a new grantee conference, so I am not going to get much time to look around, but we will check out the monuments, capital and White House and I would so love to go to the Smithsonian Museum of American History. We may be going back in August, so if that happens, I will try to take some vacation days afterward and take the train to New York! I have always wanted to go there, and I would be so close, so I am going to really try for that.

I am also writing a new grant for my program, one centered around supporting youth to do a project geared toward the prevention of childhood obesity. Since our theatre program is already focusing this semester on Type 2 Diabetes awareness, this was a great fit. It is pretty neat; if I get this grant, I will have brought in more than $14,000 of grant money into our department.

Cold...

Well, I blew it Sunday. No post. I did watch some movies and did some grocery shopping, though.

Today was so cold...I worked and, as we are in an old brick building that was virtually uninhabited for 5 days, it was a tomb that took until around 2pm to warm up. We worked with the doors closed in order to keep in the heat.

This evening I began watching the episodes of Dead Like Me that I missed. What a great show! Still sucks that it was canceled way too early.

My dog and other things

I took this picture of my dog, Shilo this morning. She is a border collie, nearly 12 years old. She's a fence jumper, and I started out my day outside in the 40 degree weather catching her out front. I was not happy.

I watched two really weird movies today, Palindromes and The Secret. Let me tell you, I do not recommend either if you don't have a high threshold for weird stuff. Palindromes was about a girl so motivated, at the age of 13, to get pregnant that she sleeps with a variety of boys and men, which was highly uncomfortable to watch. What was particularly difficult to deal with was that the lead character Aviva was played by 5 or 6 different actors, younger, older, black, white, skinny, fat...I know it was an important plot device, but it was very unsettling. The movie dealt with pedophilia, abortion, religious fundamentalist attacks, and so on. The write up did not even scratch the surface of the plot.

The Secret was a twist on the Freaky Friday concept, with the mother and daughter trading places, except that, after an accident, the mother dies and her spirit inhabits her daughter. She manages to convince her husband (David Duchovny), and struggles with learning about her daughter's life, drug use and sexual activity. There are some very uncomfortable moments where the father/daughter get way too close...nothing inappropriate happens, but I was more than a little squeamish. Above all, not the greatest of movies.

It is insanely cold!

We had the option to take today off, and since I am coming down with the cold that my lovely baby neice has shared with the family, I opted not to go. It is really cold in the house, and so my bro built a fire. It smells smokey and woody in the house now, and even though it doesn't do much for the temp in the house, it sure does create the perception of warmth. My boss gave me a lovely fireplace insert which will significantly improve the usefulness of the fireplace but I can't talk the stupid boys into installing it--and the damn thing is SUPER heavy.

We watched some classic movies today--classically silly. The first was the Adam West Batman movie. Goofy! The other was one of my favorites as a kid, Ghostbusters. I do love that one--"There is no Dana, only Zool!" Love it!!

A Post A Day...

Here is my New Years Resolution...I plan to do a post a day. Not an easy feat, I know, but with 5/7 of my family about to be residents of the Big Island of Hawaii, while I am still here with my brother in California, I hope this can be a sort of daily update for them if they choose to view it. I hope to accompany each posting with a photo, but that is not as important as actually carving out the time to post each and every day.

I will start with what I got for Christmas. Besides a great trip to Hawaii courtesy of my parents early in December, my sister gave me a laptop desk, which I LOVE and use daily. I don't worry about my computer overheating any more. My brother and I also bought ourselves a subscription to Netflix. I was a member before, but wasn't using the service so I cancelled it. Now they have the instant watch feature--over 12000 movies that you can watch on your computer any time you want. We have totally gotten into the Showtime series Weeds, which is excellent.

I will see you tomorrow!

Caving, snorkling, stargazing...must be Hawaii!

I spent three weeks on the Big Island again this December. It was the first time I'd seen my mom in 2 months and my dad in 10 months, so this trip was far overdue!!

We spent most of the first week and a half in the water snorkling. The waters on the East side of the big island are not particularly known for their clear snorkle worthy water, but we do know some great places that rival any other spots I've seen in the rest of the islands. The Kapoho (Vacation Land) area, for instance, is a series of crystal clear tide pools. They are full of a kaleidascope of colorful corals and tropical fish. You need to be there when the tide is in, and be willing to swim in some areas only a couple of inches deep to travel from pool to pool, but it is so worth it! This area is a opehe preserve and fishing is strictly not allowed, but that makes it all the more wonderful.

Another great place to go, just up the road from Kapoho, is the warm ponds. While the selection of fish is less diverse than other areas, this natural warm spring was walled and resembles a swimming pool, but has a ocean inlet that feeds cool water in which is warmed by the geothermal springs. The water is rarely below 80 degrees.

We enjoy an area in Hilo called Richardson Center which is a cove protected by a sea wall a few miles from the Hilo bay and marina. This area is not a clear as others, but we have frequently swam with green sea turtles (honu) in this area. We saw several picasso triggerfish, also known as humuhumunukunkuapua'a, the Hawaiian state fish. There were Christmas wrass, a psychedelically colorful fish, yellow tangs, parrotfish, etc. This is a frequent stopover for tourists off of the cruise ships so there are often large groups visiting, and mom loves to talk to the newly visiting, sharing her island home with them. Someday, she will be a fulltime tour guide, I'm sure.

My dad and I went spelunking in a 2+ mile deep lava tube just outside of Hilo. The lava tube dates back about 100 years or so, and travels upward into the mountainside. It is about 15 feet wide, with a 25+ foot ceiling. After bouldering over a small cave in and ducking through an opening about 3 feet tall, we began the journey uphill, all the while imagining the 2500 degree lava that had once careened through this tube. We got about a quarter of a mile up and turned off our flashlights to truly experience the deep, inky blackness. There were no creatures that we saw, and no plant life, except the roots of plants far above us. There was some sort of powdery fungus on the walls, and it was very wet and drippy. It was a thrilling experience. I plan to explore more caves and lava tubes in the future. The photo is me just outside the opening of the tube.

We also took advantage of the 'Imiloa Astronomy Center, a fantastic museum and planetarium run by University of Hawaii-Hilo. We watched their presentations on Mauna Kea and Black Holes and enjoyed the children-centric hands on museum which had several areas dedicated to Hawaiian History. I love planetariums and this one was great. The young lady who was our host for the shows also walked us through what we might expect in the night sky over Hilo (if it weren't always raining!)