What an Early Strange Trip it's Been
Sunday, August 25th, 2002 08:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
flwydI haven't updated in a couple weeks. Bight me.
The week after Dragonfest was astoundingly unproductive, a perfect wrap-up to my summer of not doing anything. My friend Andy was camped out in our back yard between when his other friend moved out and when Andy could move in. The Stone family managed to corrupt his sleep cycle with several late night conversations. The week also featured my first trip to the Polar Bear Gallery in Longmont and a return trip for an event titled "An Egg is a Circle," which featured a brief talk about harmonics, architectural sketches based on eggs, how to draw an egg, a talk on Ukranian Easter Eggs by Annie Stone (no relation) who had some gorgeous eggs on display, and Barbara Stone (Polar Bear proprieter, also no relation) showing us all how to draw polar bears out of several circles. The evening concluded with a puppet show which alternated between a marionette, some elegantly constructed wooden puppes manipulated from below the table, and meticulously created and moved shadow puppets. Excellent craft work all around.
Then on Saturday I got up early to go Suburban Bargain Hunting, aka garage sale hopping. Picked up a wok (but forgot to grab the skirt for it), a toaster (which burned my Pop Tarts in its inaugural use), most of a box of 220 Otter Pops (several of which appear to have a lower freezing temperature than the others), a couple books, and a few other items. Sunday featured me driving around for a few hours in search of Sawhill Ponds (I always used to go there on the school bus) and extensive packing. Whereas Sawhill is usually 16 ponds, it's currently about 6 ponds, 8 mudflats, and 2 dry fields. So sad. When I went to college as a Freshman, I packed a couple boxes the night before, threw all the clothes I wanted to take into one bag and a basket, and collected them and a few other objects, plus computer and stereo system, and tossed them into the truck the morning I had to leave for school. Now returning for my fifth year, I have four bags of clothes plus two baskets, about 8 boxes of books and random objects, two computers and the same stereo system, and a bunch of kitchen items. And that's not including the two huge boxes and couple small boxes I had in storage at school. How did I accumulate this much stuff?
So I got up bright and early Monday morning to move in. A full week before school starts. I was a "Hall Raiser," helping folks to move in and helping to run some welcome week events. I was kinda going through RA withdrawl, and wanted to move in early. So of course I continued to get up early for the next several days, while my bedtimes stayed at their usual 1am and later. I managed to get the good word out about some student groups... over 40 people who can't even join yet signed up to hear about Tau Beta Pi events. 37 folks signed up for the Philosophy Club and 9 for the Pagan Student Alliance. Not bad. I also got several word-at-a-time stories told while folks were hanging out on Wednesday night. I love that game.
This Saturday morning I got up at 9:30 to attend the KGNU book and record sale. Picked up a couple books that looked interesting and a couple albums, including Industrial Monk (Latin chant with ambient industrial) and beautifulgarbage. Eight days a week of waking up before 9:30 had gotten to me, so I took a nap. You know that feeling when you get woken up, and you look at the clock, and it's 3:45, but it's light outside? Go go gadget dazed and confused.
That night I lead a Wiccan initiation. Meditation, banashing via piñata ass-kicking, mothering, and the secret ceremony, all under a beautiful amber moon at Sawhill Ponds. After hanging out with the newly annointed Witch, I walked up to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
neverireven's going-away party. Walking up University Ave. in a white cloak with a blue wizard hat produced guesses of my identity ranging from viking to Lord of the Rings cast member to Jesus to "It's wearing a cape! I don't know whether that's a dude or a chick, but it's wearing a cape!" The return trip through campus encountering a few drunk groups produced a few extended conversations... one girl was impressed that I would walk around like that. Another girl, upon being informed that I'd come from a Pagan ceremony, asked if I was Satanic and sacrificed people. After assuring her I didn't and that I didn't believe in any god metaphysically, just metaphorically, she asked what I thought spirit is. After I told her that spirit is bioelectric activity in the body she said "No, spirit is definitely non-physical" and insisted that she didn't want to argue about it. So, chalk one up for subverting the dominant paradigm.
I met my supposed roommate today. As of the beginning of the week I was supposed to room with one Michel Morandais. When Andy, a Ph.D. student in French Literature saw the sign on my door with the name "Michel" he got all excited at the prospect that I'd be rooming with someone from France. Poking around a bit I learned that he was majoring in International Affairs and hails from Guadalupe, which is in the French West Indies. His web page talks about the lap top and PDA he bought. Gadget geek from the Carribean? Could be fun! So when an unassuming black guy with a shaved head opened the door this morning while I was in bed, I wasn't surprised. He returned later with a 6'7" black guy and I learned that they're on the CU basketball team and wanted to room together. (In the intervening time, Michel, who is also on the team, had been moved to the College Inn and that my new roommate to-be was James Wright.) They offered me $215 to swap rooms with the big guy, sending me to Kitteredge. I politely declined. I'm friends with all the RAs in the Quad. Reed is perhaps the nicest place to live on campus - big room with my own kitchen and bathroom and an absence of annoying immature freshmen. I suggested James swap with the other guy's roommate (another black guy who I think is on the track team). This was okay with the two basketball players, but the track guy was hesitant -- said he liked where he was living. They were going to investigate some other possibilities and I haven't heard back from them yet. Regardless, this may be an interesting yin/yang room situation. I'm a white guy majoring/mastering in computer science, but with good linguistic skills. My only school athletics involvement has been tai chi and softball umpiring. I spend all my spare time on academics. I stay up late to program and surf the 'net. It seems that my roommate will be a black guy majoring in communications, but with poor linguistic skills. Strong school athletics involvement, but little time spent on academics. He gets up early to work out. The year might be really cool, might be really irritating. Should at least be interesting.
The week after Dragonfest was astoundingly unproductive, a perfect wrap-up to my summer of not doing anything. My friend Andy was camped out in our back yard between when his other friend moved out and when Andy could move in. The Stone family managed to corrupt his sleep cycle with several late night conversations. The week also featured my first trip to the Polar Bear Gallery in Longmont and a return trip for an event titled "An Egg is a Circle," which featured a brief talk about harmonics, architectural sketches based on eggs, how to draw an egg, a talk on Ukranian Easter Eggs by Annie Stone (no relation) who had some gorgeous eggs on display, and Barbara Stone (Polar Bear proprieter, also no relation) showing us all how to draw polar bears out of several circles. The evening concluded with a puppet show which alternated between a marionette, some elegantly constructed wooden puppes manipulated from below the table, and meticulously created and moved shadow puppets. Excellent craft work all around.
Then on Saturday I got up early to go Suburban Bargain Hunting, aka garage sale hopping. Picked up a wok (but forgot to grab the skirt for it), a toaster (which burned my Pop Tarts in its inaugural use), most of a box of 220 Otter Pops (several of which appear to have a lower freezing temperature than the others), a couple books, and a few other items. Sunday featured me driving around for a few hours in search of Sawhill Ponds (I always used to go there on the school bus) and extensive packing. Whereas Sawhill is usually 16 ponds, it's currently about 6 ponds, 8 mudflats, and 2 dry fields. So sad. When I went to college as a Freshman, I packed a couple boxes the night before, threw all the clothes I wanted to take into one bag and a basket, and collected them and a few other objects, plus computer and stereo system, and tossed them into the truck the morning I had to leave for school. Now returning for my fifth year, I have four bags of clothes plus two baskets, about 8 boxes of books and random objects, two computers and the same stereo system, and a bunch of kitchen items. And that's not including the two huge boxes and couple small boxes I had in storage at school. How did I accumulate this much stuff?
So I got up bright and early Monday morning to move in. A full week before school starts. I was a "Hall Raiser," helping folks to move in and helping to run some welcome week events. I was kinda going through RA withdrawl, and wanted to move in early. So of course I continued to get up early for the next several days, while my bedtimes stayed at their usual 1am and later. I managed to get the good word out about some student groups... over 40 people who can't even join yet signed up to hear about Tau Beta Pi events. 37 folks signed up for the Philosophy Club and 9 for the Pagan Student Alliance. Not bad. I also got several word-at-a-time stories told while folks were hanging out on Wednesday night. I love that game.
This Saturday morning I got up at 9:30 to attend the KGNU book and record sale. Picked up a couple books that looked interesting and a couple albums, including Industrial Monk (Latin chant with ambient industrial) and beautifulgarbage. Eight days a week of waking up before 9:30 had gotten to me, so I took a nap. You know that feeling when you get woken up, and you look at the clock, and it's 3:45, but it's light outside? Go go gadget dazed and confused.
That night I lead a Wiccan initiation. Meditation, banashing via piñata ass-kicking, mothering, and the secret ceremony, all under a beautiful amber moon at Sawhill Ponds. After hanging out with the newly annointed Witch, I walked up to
neverireven's going-away party. Walking up University Ave. in a white cloak with a blue wizard hat produced guesses of my identity ranging from viking to Lord of the Rings cast member to Jesus to "It's wearing a cape! I don't know whether that's a dude or a chick, but it's wearing a cape!" The return trip through campus encountering a few drunk groups produced a few extended conversations... one girl was impressed that I would walk around like that. Another girl, upon being informed that I'd come from a Pagan ceremony, asked if I was Satanic and sacrificed people. After assuring her I didn't and that I didn't believe in any god metaphysically, just metaphorically, she asked what I thought spirit is. After I told her that spirit is bioelectric activity in the body she said "No, spirit is definitely non-physical" and insisted that she didn't want to argue about it. So, chalk one up for subverting the dominant paradigm.I met my supposed roommate today. As of the beginning of the week I was supposed to room with one Michel Morandais. When Andy, a Ph.D. student in French Literature saw the sign on my door with the name "Michel" he got all excited at the prospect that I'd be rooming with someone from France. Poking around a bit I learned that he was majoring in International Affairs and hails from Guadalupe, which is in the French West Indies. His web page talks about the lap top and PDA he bought. Gadget geek from the Carribean? Could be fun! So when an unassuming black guy with a shaved head opened the door this morning while I was in bed, I wasn't surprised. He returned later with a 6'7" black guy and I learned that they're on the CU basketball team and wanted to room together. (In the intervening time, Michel, who is also on the team, had been moved to the College Inn and that my new roommate to-be was James Wright.) They offered me $215 to swap rooms with the big guy, sending me to Kitteredge. I politely declined. I'm friends with all the RAs in the Quad. Reed is perhaps the nicest place to live on campus - big room with my own kitchen and bathroom and an absence of annoying immature freshmen. I suggested James swap with the other guy's roommate (another black guy who I think is on the track team). This was okay with the two basketball players, but the track guy was hesitant -- said he liked where he was living. They were going to investigate some other possibilities and I haven't heard back from them yet. Regardless, this may be an interesting yin/yang room situation. I'm a white guy majoring/mastering in computer science, but with good linguistic skills. My only school athletics involvement has been tai chi and softball umpiring. I spend all my spare time on academics. I stay up late to program and surf the 'net. It seems that my roommate will be a black guy majoring in communications, but with poor linguistic skills. Strong school athletics involvement, but little time spent on academics. He gets up early to work out. The year might be really cool, might be really irritating. Should at least be interesting.
