The Final Countdown

Midterms came and went, the grades were posted and now we're on to picking our next classes. I was more than happy this past Friday to sit down and discuss my upcoming classes for the Spring 07 semester with my advisor.

These are my last four classes before I graduate!! I will be taking Intro to Experimental psychology, East Asian Art, Color and another independent study. I'm taking an independent study course this semester as well. I chose to study African art since I didn't know much about it. I've certainly learned a lot. My final paper will be on the notions of power and spirituality of the female as represented in African art. Next semesters study will be on either Renaissance or Baroque art.

Everyone, please pencil in the month of May. I will be having a huge party for graduation. Of course you are all invited!

Shakespeare in Love

Tonight is trick or treat night in my neighborhood. I already knew I wasn't going to be giving out any candy. I actually even forgot about the fact it was trick or treat until I got home from work and the cars began to line up along my street. Like from a Cheech and Chong movie, all the kids from within the overly stuffed minivan poured out onto the street with their various store purchased Halloween costumes. Then I remembered.

It was a somewhat warmish afternoon when I got home today and since the sun was still up I thought I'd leave my front door open. That wasn't going to last very long. Because at exactly 6:00.01 p.m. someone was knocking at my door. Then, 6:00.03, the doorbell rang. I ignored it. The character from Scream shuffled off my front porch to another neighbor. As soon as he left, I shut my front door and turned up the stereo. Again, the doorbell rang a few minutes later. Um, hullo....there is no porch light on. Isn't that the first rule of trick or treating???

I really love Halloween. But, I cannot stand the fact that greedy kids and/or parents have to truck their kids into my neighborhood for candy. And, did they even bother to eat dinner since the kids are knocking precisely at 6:00???

Whatever happened to creating a costume? My dad and I looked forward to making up some weird costume for me to wear. One year, way back in the 70's during the energy crisis, I dressed as a bum. My motto that I wore on my chest? "Save energy, become a bum." Yea, it won me a prize at a Halloween party! When I was older, I won another prize as part of the three headed huntsman from Monty Python and won most recently for my portrayal of Nancy Spungeon. You know, dead girl friend of Sid Vicious from the Sex Pistols? I remember what was probably the most creative costume my dad and I ever came up with. I dressed up as a hurricane. We tiedyed a dress of my mom's all brownish. I think I wore a hat too. Probably had leaves and sticks attached to it. I don't remember that part. I don't think that won me any prizes, but it was pretty clever!

I must finish up my costume for a party I am going to this weekend. The theme of the party is Shakespeare. I have no one particular character in mind, just dressing for the time period. Invariably someone will say to me "who are you supposed to be?" I hate that question. So, I'll prey on the fact they probably have no inkling about Shakespeare characters in the first place and just say I'm Desdemona. I love that name. And Jimmy Buffett wrote a song about Desdemona. Besides, she resourceful and imaginative and got to marry Othello.

One of my current classes at school has given me quite a bit of reference material for the Shakespeare time period. Well, the Shakespeare time period but only in Italy. You know those proverbial cone hats with the sheer material that hang out the point? Yea, not authentic at all.

The Corporation

As part of the colloquium series on Democracy at college, the university has been presenting movies that parallel the lectures on Democracy or the lack thereof in the United States.

I went to see the movie The Corporation this weekend. If you're in the mood for something scary for Halloween, I strongly urge you to rent the movie. This movie left me wondering now what. I'm still wondering now what.

Thanks ABWA

I had the pleasure of meeting some wonderful ladies tonight. I was invited to speak at an American Business Women's Association meeting. They invited me to talk about my photographs which is great fun for me. And they fed me, and made me feel very welcome. Actually, they made me feel like a celebrity. They all knew my name when I got there and even took out an ad in a local paper announcing that I would be giving a talk about "tombstones from all over the world." Really, I'm not worthy!!

One of the nice things about giving talks like this is that I get to relive the trips in which I took the pictures and tell some fun stories about investigating cemeteries on some of my vacations. The best part is that there are usually people there that know about cemeteries that I do not. So, I get the scoop on new places I can check out.

I gave my blog address out to the ladies, hopefully some will be stopping by the blog to see more of my pictures.

Hi ABWA ladies, thanks again for having me!

The End of an Era

I was so sad to hear that last night was the final concert to be held at CBGB's club in NYC. You may remember I wrote about the impending closing of this place several months ago. Apparently nothing was going to preserve CBGB's in the Bowery any longer.

From what I understand there will still be a store in NYC where you can get CBGB's gear etc. But, the new club will be located in LAS VEGAS. Excuse me while I hurl.

R.I.P. CBGB's

An Experiment

I was thinking that this would be a very convenient way for me to collect some much needed data for a class project I'm doing in my Sociology class.

If you wish to participate, please put your responses in the comments section, or you may email me them if you wish.

Please answer the following questions:

1. From time to time, most people discuss important matters with other people. Looking back over the last six months, who are the people with whom you discussed matters important to you? Just tell me their first names or initials. Provide me with 5 names or initials if you can.

2. Here is a list of some of the ways in which people are connected to each other. Some of the people can be connected to you in more than one way. For example, a man could be your brother and may belong to your church and be your lawyer.

Please choose from the list below and attach a description to the name you provided me in question 1.

spouse
friend
other family
parent
coworker
sibling
member of group
child
neighbor
advisor
other

Thank you so much for your participation in my experiment! When we gather the class evidence and probably do some mathematical equation (done by someone other than me), I will publish the results, probably in late November.

Have a Happy Day!

Simply because my brain is on overload lately, I'm giving you fluff, cheap laughs, nothingness.

I'm sure you've all seen by now the Happy Bunny stickers, t-shirts, etc. I find these particularly funny. They're sarcastic and somewhat mean. Pretty similar to me as a matter of fact. So, I thought I'd share two of my favorites with you, lucky you!

And, my all time favorite:




Though I know that all boys don't lie, I think pretty much all of them stink...at one time or another!

Do Not Disturb

It's already that time in the college school year for mid-terms!! I consider myself fortunate that out of my four classes, I have technically only one mid-term and that's in my Italian Renaissance class. The test is tomorrow, first thing in the a.m. Two of my classes have no tests or quizzes. And the third class has tests and quizzes just no official mid-term this week. We took our test in that class last week. Say hello to Miss 93%!!

I've taken some lessons from the other students and have learned to make up "flash cards" in order to study. That seems to work out well, but for this particular class, it's helpful to actually see the artwork aside from knowing the dates and titles of the works.

That's my agenda for the rest of the day, going through my text books and notes. The dates are gonna kill me!!

Behold the Power of Boobs!

Where I Live Part Deux

I wanted to share with you another favorite of mine in the city in which I live and ironically, this week began a 5-day celebration of the 100th anniversary of the capitol building in Harrisburg complete with a parade! The streets were blocked off which made it interesting for me to get to work yesterday morning and parking was next to non-existent. My job takes me directly in front of the capitol building on a daily basis. Some days I must walk a block or so to get to the office which usually allows me a breathtaking view of the capital building. I've seen it lit up at night, I've seen it during the day with the background of a clear blue sky and it is always beautiful.

The interior of the building was designed after the Paris Opera with its marble, sweeping double staircases. It has been undergoing some renovations lately. The dome was refurbished recently and the artwork inside the building and the sculptures outside have been cleaned and repaired over the last couple of years.

My father used to take me here as a child. And he'd take me into the Senate and House Chambers with the large murals and giant wooden desks with microphones. It was as if we were kids sneaking around in places we shouldn't have been. I loved to sit at those desks and wonder what in the heck did they talk about there anyway?

Then, when I got to high school, our choir often sang on the steps inside the capitol building during the holiday season. The high rotunda and spiraling ceilings just lifted our voices throughout the entire building. I haven't been in the capitol building in years. I think I may need a break from all my paper writing this afternoon. A field trip may be in order!!!

Interstellar Lass and her creative cast of blogger buddies have come up with a meme of sorts about where we live. Lass asked if I would post pics of the bridge I walk across to get to work which I wrote about earlier. I happen to have some pics of that very bridge from a fall walk I took last November. This particular bridge was a bridge that you could drive on until 1972 when we had a very bad flood and damaged the bridge enough that we were no longer allowed to drive on it. The span of the bridge that connects City Island (home of Senators baseball) and the West Shore no longer exists. Again, a flood in the winter of 1996 took out most of that part of the bridge.

The view of the other "camel back" bridges over the river is quite lovely as well. If you were a fan of One Life to Live back in the late 80's early 90's you may recognize these bridges from the opening scenes of that soap opera.