I think I'm going to not blog for a while. I won't say that I will never, ever again be too much of a girl, but right now I feel like the thing to do is be not blogging.

If you need to hear from me, please do e-mail me. Or write me a letter, I love letters!

Love, K

for the sake of irreplaceable persons, we'll dramatize a specially preserved extravagance

Wow. One week down... 103 to go. Good Lord. O.K., so there's lots to say about this whole situation, and not all of it good... some of it alarmingly bad. But I will refrain from discussing such matters on the information superhighway. And I will say that I am in some ways the luckiest person on Earth to have gotten into a program with some of these people. Some of my classmates are SO talented... both at the graduate and undergraduate level... and I can't wait to work with them. And I really like the directing recruits for this year. A bunch of us went out last night and talked and talked and it was just wonderful... so I think that my fellow students will be my saving grace. When everything else seems totally insane, we'll have each other.

I haven't really had any time to check out any churches or anything like that in town because I've been so busy (o.k., get this. Eight hours of callbacks. PER SHOW. SO I was like, well, I'm done reading the sides I was assigned, I'm going to leave and figure out all this crap I have to have ready for Monday, and they said NO. YOU HAVE TO STAY FOR THE WHOLE EIGHT HOURS. EVEN IF THEY'RE DONE WITH YOU! WHA????). But so I was driving by this huge Catholic church in town, on my way to the callbacks incidentally, and I saw all these Reverend Phelps protestors surrounding the place with their horrible placards and leering rictuses! So I leaned out my car window and yelled "Shame on you!" I'm sure to great effect. So I called the church and told them that I was sorry that they had attracted the attention of such bad people, and that I would like to know why it happened, if they were taking a stand on an issue, or something like that. Haven't heard back, though.

Hello! No Future. How is a feeling?

A huge electrical storm going on outside just knocked out the power and deleted the post I was working on... so poo! I only vaguely remember what I was blathering about. Hmm. I think I was ruminating on the fact that all of the Summit House people are having upheavals in their lives (I still include myself in their number). It seems that life is teaching all of us that nothing is what you expect it will be. Here's the thing, though, is that my genius friend Rian is thinking of heading off to Minneapolis and bringing Joseph and Miranda with her, and after this last week, I think I may need to run off and join the circus myself. They have good theatre going on up there, and a branch of Pearson that I could make money at, and girl, please. That's all I need in the world.

Mash Group Pinky Cut

O.K., the thing I wrote earlier about the delight and the horror still stands, and I'm afraid I have to report that there are times when I wonder if horror isn't going to win... the thing that I feel very blessed with is the fact that all of the incoming grads are really cool people and are feeling the same way I do. We're actually meeting today to plan strategies for dealing with our situation. So there is strength in numbers, right? I know I've heard that somewhere...

Positively speaking, I really like our movement class and I think I am going to take to it swimmingly. A lot of the philosophies that the instructor uses are things I actually explored in Religious Studies and that came up a lot over the summer for me, so I am really looking forward to starting.

full of dreams and full of hopes my everyday is american style and very funny day

There's lots to say, but no time to say it. I have almost completed the orientation and audition process for my first semester here. I have been alternately completely delighted and totally horrified so many times over the past few days that I just would never know where to begin. Well, to be honest I would probably just stick to the delightful stuff and save the whining for my fellow grads (who are so cool! I already know that I'm going to be best friends with this one girl, I just know it.). But oy, they do stuff differently than they do at UI. May I reiterate: oy.

OY.

The point of view of the thing which was different from the general person and the way of thinking

O.K. let's start with last night. First the simply amusing part of the evening: My fellow MFAs and I all decided to check out Tobin's Pizza, which is one of those classic pizza places that most good towns seem to always have. There were pictures on the walls of customers and family, and very large sections of the walls were covered with moss green shag carpeting (I loved this completely). The pizza looked good and the pasta was great, and I was excited to find out that the Royal Crown Cola Company produces a white soda that they call "Upper 10." This is the most charmingly unambitious soda name I have ever heard in my life. They should have just called it "meh". I had three glasses of it, by the way, and I say that they should not feel so bad about themselves. They could very reasonably change the name to "Top 4". Or "Pretty Much Just Like Sprite" or "No Worse Than Any of the Other White Sodas." Long-ish, yes, but informative.

Now for the amusing-though-disturbing part of the evening... well, maybe I'm just a prude, I've been accused of this many times before, but I think that everyone should wear pants when they go to pizza parlors. Not just shirts that are long enough to cover the bits, but in fact pants. Particularly, and perhaps I'm a prudish ageist, but I say particularly if you are a 90-year-old man, there should be a pants requirement in all food service facilities. This man had on NO PANTS, people. Just a nice long flannel shirt and some sandals with socks. Did I need to say with socks? If I say "sandals" and "90-year-old man" you probably would have guessed about the socks, right?

There's more, but it's so disturbing you have to e-mail me and ask.

the sun will come out to blind you dream!

Starved Rock was absolutely beautiful, even better than I remember from when I was little. I am so glad I went, I walked for miles and climbed into all sorts of places that may or may not have been on the trails, I don't know, I couldn't tell from the signage. There's one point on the trail (maybe) where you climb down into a den, and you're surrounded by limestone bluffs that are probably 60 or 70 feet high all around you, and it is so quiet and cool and beautiful... oh, I just loved it. Laura, we should do a family thing there, it's sort of equidistant from all of our houses and it's really fun.

Today was the first day of orientation and I think I'm really going to like it SO much that I am just feeling all happy and full of song. I really like my colleagues and the department is really cool and the people are really helpful and supportive. And I'm going out for dinner tonight with a bunch of the other MFAs, so my social dormancy is finally coming to an end, thank God.

One thing that I found kind of amazing is that they have so many productions going on here... I think there might even be more than at UI. There are the five shows per semester that are within the department (this is comprised of mainstage, gallery and freestage shows) and then they have all these peripheral programs that mount shows all year long. So it looks like nobody who wants to work gets shafted, which is a relief. Plus, there's a couple of professional theatres in town, which I did not know about and will have to check out at some point. And I met some people in the directing and design departments that I totally hit it off with, which is nice. I was just worried that the actors would be cloistered and we'd just be staring at each other... so that's good, too.

O.K., I have to go because we're meeting at 6. If you are waffling between e-mailing me or not e-mailing me, ALWAYS err on the side of e-mailing me. The End.

dangle: take the easy course!

So it's my last day of "freedom" before I start the next two years of solid theatre studies. What am I doing with it? Stuff...

Nothing. <looks down, kicks petulantly at floor>

O.K., well, not nothing. I'm getting some errands done and then I'm heading out to Starved Rock State Park. We used to visit there when I was a little kid, and I never knew quite where it was and then I saw signs for it on the way up to my mom's house. It's about 45 minutes from here.

So that's something.

You know, since moving here, I've read five books, ten plays and seen at least 40 movies. I think my program is starting just in time... I need to start getting out and meeting people or I will most likely go totally insane.

Au revoir, mes enfants!

...why am i doing this???...

So I went to the Beer-Serving Movie Theatre last night (though I did not partake of spirits because I was suffering from having really gross chinese food for dinner), and I saw Supersize Me, and I have enumerated below some complaints.

1-The fallacy in the argument of the moronski who said that he thought fat people should be harrassed about their eating the way that smokers are currently harrassed about their smoking was not pointed out. HELLO, last I checked I couldn't get YOU fat by eating NEAR YOU, D-BAG. That would be the point of the hectoring of smokers (not that I ever hector smokers, anyway), the fact that they exhale toxic crap all over otherwise healthy people. Just making sure everyone understands that if they start thinking it's o.k. to make fun of fat people, fat people are completely within rights as fat people to punch them in the face with their big fat hands.

2-There was a lot of photography depicting fat people as gross-lookingly as they possibly could be. There was a lot of derisive laughter and groaning coming from people in the audience in reaction to this depiction. I had to hit a lot of people, my big fat fists are tired. Get it straight, please, you're trying to victimize a corporate whore not fat people. Cheap shots blur your message.

3-If your'e going to talk about how people are fatter now than ever before and ignore the fact that people are leading more sedentary lifestyles than ever before, particularly children, who are McDonald's biggest market, well, then I don't know what's wrong with you. You must be dumb.

I don't mean to say that this wasn't a really good, really important documentary because it is. I really liked what the guy had to say for the most part, there were just some snotty things and one glaring oversight that I felt obligated to point out on my blog (which no one reads so it's fine, really). But you know, it's off my chest, so that's a good thing, right?

I also saw Home Movie, which is from the guy who made American Movie, and it's so cool! It started out as some television commercials and ended up being a really interesting documentary about five particularly eccentric families' attachment to their homesteads. AND, in the special features, there is an entire section devoted to weird pictures of cats. You just have to see it to believe it. It's beautiful.

There is a movie theatre here that serves beer.

There is a movie theatre here that serves beer. I know what you're thinking, you're thinking, Ms. Jackson, that's a mirage! There's no way that someone would rehab an old movie theatre two blocks away from your house and run art films and documentaries all the time and serve beer there! And then after you were done thinking it, you would say it, and after you were done saying it, you would slap me and shake me, and all the while I would be insisting, NO NO IT'S TRUE! GO SEE SUPERSIZE ME WITH ME AND I'LL PROVE IT TO YOU, with tears streaming down my face, I would grab you by the upper arm and I would drag you down the street, with you protesting and fighting me the whole way, and we would finally get to the door, and the ticket lady would hold you while I punched you in the stomach, and then she'd grab you by the back of your collar and the waist of your pants and throw you into the lobby and you'd see!!!

Then the ticket lady and I would do our secret handshake and I'd go inside and buy you a beer to show you there were no hard feelings.

You'll NEVER believe it...

You'll never believe it, but last night at The Wash House Laundromat in Normal, Illinois I met QUINCY JONES' COUSIN! I am not kidding you! He came right up to me and started talking to me like he was just folks! So down to earth, not like some other celebrities' cousins I could mention. AND... and this is the kicker... he confirmed for me the suspicion that I have had ever since I was a girl... that what I really ought to be doing is modeling. Modeling erotic lingerie, specifically. You know, I have felt for so long that there was something out there for me beyond Religious Studies. That I was somebody "special". Now, I know it's TRUE! I'm filled with a new sense of purpose. I think I was just waiting for a sign... or for Quincy Jones' cousin to just put my dream into words.

Well, you know, when speaking to Quincy Jones' cousin about my future career, I demurred initially, but only because I didn't want to seem too desperate (though, truly, I am!!!). Unfortunately, Quincy Jones' real live cousin took my coyness for lack of interest and left the Wash House with his lovely pregnant sister, and all his nieces and nephews in tow (isn't it so nice of him to insist on taking his sister and her family to the laundromat when he was so clearly falling-down drunk?).

I still have hope, though! Quincy Jones' cousin!!! If you're out there and you're reading this, CALL ME!!!

hope always sees beautiful things, and i want to record a moment in time

SO I'm reading the copy of Graham Greene's The Comedians, INTENT on my new goal of becoming a Graham Greene expert, this copy having been sent to me by one Mr. UPB as a gift item for the having, and I get to page 150, and THE COPY, FOR THE NEXT 30 PAGES, REPEATS PAGES FROM PART ONE UNTIL PAGE 186!!! Is that weird or what? How does a book like this stay in circulation? Even used? It's just crazy! I don't know what I'm going to do with this one, but I'm not going to try and play it off to some unsuspecting thrift store or used book dealer! Poor UPB. I've yet to check and see if they have a copy at the BPL, I hope hope hope they do.

They've actually got a really nice selection of movies! It's not huge, but what they have is very good. And better still, they always look for good suggestions! My friend who works at the ICPL said that I had generated good marks from the film librarian there for always suggesting good and unusual stuff. Oh, I'm so cool.

I am embarrassed at how loud my flip flops are in this library. I finally got a pair of flip flops. I don't know what possessed me, I used to hate these shoes. I kind of like this pair, though. I'm walking really deliberately. Maybe Iowa City was Birkenstocks and Bloomington is flip flops.

I had a bizarre dream a few days ago that I was talking to someone about good road songs, and then later today it came to me for some reason and I could almost not remember whether it was a dream or a real conversation I had with someone. I think the left side of my brain is certain it was a dream, but righty is still putting up a fight about the matter.

Yesterday, I filled my journal that I started in late June, and have started a new one (first entry: pros and cons of getting a technician-one ham radio license), and it just seems so serendipitous that it would start now, at the end of Iowa City and this insane/glorious summer and the beginning of whatever awaits me in this new place. Whoever you are that's reading this, wish me luck. And write me an e-mail, if you think of it!

:)K

6 mins left!

Oh, my God! I'm on the computer at the Bloomington Public Library and my time has almost expired! So much to say and so little time to properly express it! I will employ bullets:

-Contrary to what I'd heard, Bloomington is not cooler than Normal, they are about the same, with Normal edging itself a bit closer to cooler because I could actually walk places if I lived there.

-I am going to the movies tonight to see To Be and To Have.

-I am going to see a play tomorrow night by Lee Blessing, who is also Iowan.

-I miss Iowa, but am not stricken with the melancholy that I had expected prior to arriving.

-My friends Miranda and Joseph got married! Hooray!

-My friend Shaft's birthday is tomorrow! Hooray!

-I might get a cat. Oh, I might get my own little kitty!

-I read Moon for the Misbegotten and it is absolutely beautiful.

-I am now reading through all the Graham Greene novels that Philbob sent me. They are funny/not bad.

O.K., I have to go!
Meow!

Bloomington, You Are Not So Poopie

I'm HERE! It's really, really fun! I was totally prepared to be really sad about moving and all, but I for some reason am totally surprising myself on this front. I am having such a good time getting things settled. My apartment is cuter than I can even explain. I can walk from my place to a little organic grocery store, and the library is very close as well (I am there right now!).

Insert blockquote??? Since when can we do this???

The only thing I'm concerned about is my car, which started making this odd singing sound as I pulled off the highway and into Bloomington on my way to my apartment. I could just interpret this as a song of joy, but I think it is more likely to be the water pump, maybe...? So I'm going to get my bike soon, and maybe check out the bus schedules because I have a feeling that Sally's days are numbered.

I found an art house cinema place that does revivals and festivals all the time, so I will be frequenting this business. And I also really want to start a potluck thing with the other theatre students. These are my long term goals. Short term goals include fixing my address at the P.O., getting ice cube trays, and finding a phonebook.

While the Bloomington Public Library has a much more limited selection of materials, the number of "Library People" per square inch is roughly equivalent to that of the Iowa City Public Library.

For example, the guy who is sitting across from me is talking to himself. He seems pretty mad.

I think I'll go.