Friday, April 29, 2011

Glimpses of Princes Part III

This Parade reminds me of the time KU won the championship and their triumphal return to Lawrence.

"Buckingham Palace has become the People's Palace" lol #thingsannouncerssay...Allen Fieldhouse is the People's Palace

I like all the capes
I bet Prince Bill is going to be late

Is the best man Prince Ted?

Is that Elton John on the Organ???

No dancing down the aisle? How do they ever hope to make this wedding a youtube sensation? The Royals are soo out of touch...

This doesn't sound like the King James version....

The Arch-Bishop could use some JustForMen

I think they based this on the Princess Bride.

I'm sure Elvis is looking down with pride.

I hope someone is repping a KU hat.

I'm surprised they got married on casualfriday.

I think i see SLUGGER in attendance! (for those non-sports fans, he is the mascot of the Kansas City Royals)

Sources say that Rev Joseph Lowery (of Obama's inauguration) will give the final benediction

The ending is kinda like the last scene of Star Wars: A New Hope....Prince Harry is kinda like Chewbacca

Glimpses of Princes

5:20--Woke up to the sound of trumpets in my head.

5:28--I've got a hankering for sausage #breakfast

5:32==There are some really tight shoulder epaulets at Westminster Abbey

5:40--Prince Chaz is on his way

5:43--It must be a special occassion--Camilla and Charles appear to have visited the dentist last week!

Prince Chaz has a weak handshake

There's just a wreck of pageantry!! Prince Chaz has 9 badges of merit! That's even more than Andrew WK!

The Crown Prince of Swaziland is here.

Here comes the Queeen! I hope she sings Bohemian Rhapsody at the reception.

I hope Prince Bill comes on a Royal Segway...that would show he's a 21st Century Prince.

The Queen kinda looks like the bumble bee lady from Blind Mellon No Rain video

There's even more pageantry than a miss america contest!

And it's Waitee Katiee! Soon to be Her Royal Waitress!

They have midget bridesmaids!! Oh wait, they're just kids.

More coming soon...

Sunday, April 10, 2011

The Hunchback of Mantua--A Review Of Verdi's Rigoletto

Given my tendency to move every 6 months, I tend to lose things, but so far I've kept my mind (though others may disagree lol). For this reason, I think that memories make better gifts than objects, so for Christmas last year I arranged a trip to the New York Metropolitan Opera for @alison. Since I'm classy, we took the train and stayed at a hotel next to Madison Square Garden (where I thought they'd have a good farmers market on Saturday morning!)

The train ride was tight, but the hotel left a bit to be desired. But, we didn't spent much time at the hotel, since we had an Opera to attend! This was my first time at the Met, and I can confirm that the chandeliers (sp?) rule. They're huge, intricate, and provide just the right lighting. They're on my home wish list (though I'd rather have a big screen tv...hint hint). There's also good people watching at the Met, and the women wear so much fur that its like a trip to the Natural History Museum at the same time! That's what I call a New York value!

So we get to our seats, the chandeliers dim, and the subtitles appear on the screens (the libretto is Italian, obvi). Rigelleto gets off to an awesome start. The first scene is at a ball hosted by the Duke of Mantua--the scene kinda reminded me of an 80s night at a happenin' club, cause there were just a wreck of people wearing goofy outfits drinking, dancing, and generally having a good time. But then the Duke comes out, and I think he's a bit insecure, because all he talks about is how he woos every non-dude in his dukedom. His first song is Questa o Quella, which means "this chick or that, they're all the same to me, and I want them all". The other noblemen aren't too keen on the Duke's philandering, but they don't really do anything about it. Now, I didn't think the duke was a great dancer, so my advice to the noblemen would be to get onstage and boogie, but they didn't have any confidence, so they let the Duke woo their wives.

The noblemen resent the duke for his suaveness, so they don't take too kindly to the titular Rigoletto, who is the hunchbacked court jester. Rigeletto's job is to hang out at parties and be amusing (kinda like me, except much less suave and jovial, and more biting and bitter). Rigoletto provides amusing commentary on the Duke's succesful attempts to mack on the Countess of Monterone, much to the chagrin of the Count of Monterone. The Count tells Rigoletto to shut it, which prompts Rigeletto to make some "your mamma" style jokes at the Count's expense. Rigoletto then convinces the Duke to arrest the Count, prompting the count to put a curse of Rigoletto.

All this drama puts a damper on the party, so Rigoletto makes moves home. On his way, he gets kinda freaked out about this curse, but what'er you gonna do? On his way home he bumps into some assassin named Sparafucile, which is a tight name for an assassin. They chit chat for a while, and then Rigoletto finally gets home.

The town knows Rigoletto as a hunchbacked dwark jester with an acid tongue, but he's also a loving and protective father--so protective, in fact, that no one knows that he has a daughter Gilda. The story takes place in the 16th centure, before Mendel invented genetics, so Rigoletto's daughter is quite the babe. She and Rigoletto are quite close, as the mother died some time ago, but Rigoletto is pretty extreme and doesn't let Gilda leave, except to go to Church. Gilda is in her late teens, and she's getting pretty antsy to escape her house (keep in mind, this is before the internet, so there's really nothing to do).

So Gilda's only outlet is at Church, where she develops a crush on a "student", who is actually the Duke out cruising for chicks (apparently Church back then was like band class in a contemporary high school--the place to meet sheltered chicks). As we know, the Duke is a bit of a creeper, and hangs around outside Gilda's window (he doesn't know that she's Rigoletto's daughter). When he hears Gilda confessing to her nurse that she loves a student, the Duke rolls up to the window and says that he loves Gilda too. They sing about this for a while, which is a bit boring.

Meanwhile, Rigoletto has gone out for some errands, probably to get aspirin for his back or something. While he's out, some noblemen come to his house seeking payback for all the smacktalking Rigoletto does as court jester. They notice Gilda in the house, but they think she's Rigoletto's mistress. They want to kidnap her, but as they're preparing their latter to the window, Rigoletto comes back. This next part doesn't really make any sense to me, but they somehow convince Rigoletto that they're kindapping some annoying countess and want his help, but that for some reason he needs to put on a blindfold to do the job. This doesn't make a bit of sense (why would a blindfold help with the kidnapping), but Rigoletto is a dipass and puts on the blindfold--the noblemen then kidnap Gilda and take her to the Duke's house.

At first Gilda is scared that she's being kidnapped, but when they take her to the Duke's bachelor pad, it's like she won the lottery. She discovers that her crush is not a poor student, but actually the Duke, and she didn't even have to write him an embarrassing note or otherwise ask him out. Score! The Duke is pretty pleased too, because he gets to "hang out" with Gilda and he won't even need to go to Church and pretend to be a poor student anymore. Everyone's happy, except Rigoletto.

So Gilda and the Duke spend the night together, but in the morning Rigoletto has gotten wise to the situation and comes to the palace demanding his daughter. The Duke doesn't particularly feel like making her breakfast, so he lets Rigoletto reclaim Gilda. Rigoletto is rightous pissed, and takes Gilda and leaves town. On their way out, he runs into Sparafucile, who happens to own an inn on the road from the palace. Rigoletto knows that the Duke will probably be out galavanting that night, so he pays Sparacule to lure the Duke to the inn, and then kill him. Sparafucile agrees--apparently his sister is quite the looker, so he has her woo the Duke.

So Sparafucile's sister gets the Duke back to the Inn. Sparafucile is about to kill the Duke, but then he and his sister have a pow-wow. The sister fancies the Duke, and suggests that Sparafucile just kills the next person who comes to the inn, and pass that body off as the Duke. Sparafucile doesn't want to argue, so he says that if someone else comes by before midnight, then he'll just kill that person. Gilda overhears this conversation and, even though she knows the Duke is hooking up with someone else, she still fancies him. So, she decides to sacrifice herself for the Duke, and so she knocks on the door. Sparafucile and his sister kill Gilda.

Rigoletto comes back later to collect the body of the Duke. Sparafucile gives him a body in a bag, but Rigoletto wants to confirm that it is the Duke's body. He opens it up and sees that Sparafucile took his money to kill his daughter. Rigoletto then remembers the curse of the Count of Monterone.

This is one screwed up Opera, but I guess a lot of tragedy is pretty crazy. It's weird because it starts off pretty funny, with the Duke's hijinks, Rigoletto's smacktalking, all at the expense of some lame noblemen. But it turns really dark at the end. The music is pretty good too. Overall I give it a B+.

Sunday, March 20, 2011

What Dreams May Come

Hey all you Robin Williams fans--I know you probably came to this blogpost as an accident after googling "Best Robin Williams besides Patch Adams," but like Dr. Christy Nielson, you'll be pleasantly surprised by what you find! Just like I often am when my eyes close and I drift off to sleep (which won't happen while you're reading this blog, lol!).

When @alison says "sleep tight", I interpret that to mean "have tight dreams", which is something I try to do every night. MY strategy is to read for a while and then think of cool stuff as I lay (sp?) in bed falling asleep. So, my last conscious thoughts usually involve ziplines, waterfalls, and burritos (i guess i think about these things all the time anyway, but I really concentrate on them at night :-) ).

I have varying degrees of success at controlling my dreams. Despite my persistant attempts to dream about cool things, I often have boring and/or scary dreams. I've dreampt (sp?) about work way too much (its like unpaid labor...call the union!). I've had a recurring scary dream in which bad guys are chasing me through a maze of underground tunnels (maybe they think i'm a mole!).

My "dream" dream is to fly like superman, but unfortunately this rarely happens. But, I often dream about flight-like activities, e.g., hang-gliding, skydiving, or jumping off a highdive. Last night I had an exhilarating dream in which I was in snorkling race. I was like a graceful manatee. I also dreamt that I was in a wingsuit over a beach, and had to land at the proper angle to avoid water burns. Obvi, i succeeded.

If you have bad dreams, I can suggest a few strategies for turning those nightmares into nighttights. First, indulge your senses, so that you're mind has a surplus of things to process. Before bed, you can light a scented candle, eat a burrito, and maybe take in a lazer light show. Try watching cool youtube videos or reading action-packed blogs (e.g., beinabarber). The goal is to overflow your mind with cool stuff so that it crowds out the scary things and gives you plenty of dream materials. Then, close your eyes, and viola! You'll "sleep tight".

Thursday, February 24, 2011

Getting things from here to there!

I'm thinking about auditioning to be the Green Bay mascot, since I think i am the Packing King (or did COLONEL Ghaddafi [sp?] take that title already?). Since I moved out of my mom's (old) house in 2003, I think i've moved at least a baker's dozen times (too bad there was no baker to give me cookies each time lol). @alison and I are moving again on March 5th, and with all this packing, you might as well start calling me A-Pack instead of Amac!

Moving to lawrence for the first time was really tight, but it got off to a feathery start. Me, @sager, and @steve borrowed some guy's pick up truck to move our stuff from OP to the promised land. Since we didn't have a whole lot, I accepted a couch from one of my mom's friends. So, we load the stuff into the truck and we're getting on the main road, when CRASH BANG BOOM, everything falls from the back of the truck. So we move it all back into the truck and get on our way, but then when we're moving the couch into the house, I notice a bunch of feathers all matted on the bottom of the truck. Upon further investigation, we realize that the couch must've hit a bird when it fell off the truck (or maybe landed on one). I used to tell chicks that that couch had goose feather pillows...

The hassle of moving all that stuff made me realize its better to pack light and/or leave unwanted stuff at your old place [lol the pinecone and the Manor ; ) ] I used to just roll like a refugee--a twin mattress on the floor, some garbage bags of clothes, and a shadeless lamp. I moved from the A3 to the Pinecone with just one trip in my old car, with the mattress hanging out the trunk. Then I got an actual bed at the pinecone, but I don't remember how i moved that.

When I came to DC, I just left most of my stuff at the Cone. Your welcome, Bricker. That made for an easy move because i just had a suitcase. I bought a used bed when I moved into my first place in DC (actually falls church VA), and then bought a blogging chair from goodwill. It suited me fine in my windowless basement room, but then I started entertaining @alison, so I needed another place to sit to class it up. That's why I bought the rose-colored beanbag.

Moving to the Manor was pretty easy too because Jon brought most of the stuff...same with moving in with @alison, because she already had the essentials, e.g. pots and pans. But then when we moved, it really sucked, because we had to put things in boxes, label things, rent a truck, use elevators, etc. I figured, "meh, i'm the Pack-Man, I've done this a zillion times, it'll be easy"...but let me tell you something--packing's no walk in the park when you have to clear out the apt, put things in boxes, and move from the 8th floor to the 11th floor...and in two weeks we're doing it again...but luckily our new place is closer to Chipotle.

Saturday, February 12, 2011

Lookin' Hip, or, Fashion Tips for the Modern Dude

Since Ion left ADF, there's been no clear winner of "Best Dressed in the Office (dude division)." I fancy myself a stylish dandy, but several non-dudes vociferously opposed my nomination for best dressed recognition. So, I hereby offer my fashion defense and, since "Tips for Living With a Non-Dude" has been my most popular post, I'll give some tips for other young men looking to turn heads.

First, a defintion: A stylish dandy is a dude who comfortably saunters in any environment with an aura of suaveness. Fashion is less about the clothes on your body then about the vibes you send. Whether I'm battling in the boardroom or dancing in the bar room, I always try to inspire others to think, "jiminny cricket, he looks tight".

As a general rule, it is important to ensure that others know what team is the best. This is why I try to incorporate a KU logo everyday. During the workweek, this means a KU hat on the Metro so that other riders know who is boss. Then, I prominately display the hat in my cubicle. On game days, it is important to wear a ku shirt. I typically pair the KU shirt with KU slippers, a KU windbreaker, and obviously a KU hat. I recently aquired a new accoutrement--its a ku lanyard that someone at my office gave me (i just learned that a laneyard is like a functional man-necklace).

In addition to a KU logo, I always try to incorporate a belt. I recommend a reversable belt so that you can keep things mixed up. I also recommend work pants of an ambigous color. This way you can wear them every day but switch your shoes so it looks like you have on different pants (the pants will look brown if you're wearing brown shoes, and black if you have black shoes). In terms of prep work, its important to keep it simple--just shave in the shower so you don't have to mess around with shaving cream, and keep your hair short so you don't have to use shampoo. Short hair is also key when you start to bald. Some people (e.g. @jon) think you need to lather up with moisterizer and essense of apricot skin cream, but that's really not necesarry if you're a badass.

My biggest fashion challenges are:
1) Keeping my shirt tucked in--it seems like whenever i get up from my desk, the back of my shirt becomes untucked. This is why it is important to always check yourself out in people's office windows, so that yo ucan catch this sort of thing. I'm working on inventing a button in the back, but until then, vigilence is the only solution.
2) Keeping soup and sauce off of my tie--the key here is to wear a tie that is the same color as your lunch. So, if you think you'll have guacomole, then wear a green tie, etc. Otherwise, just take off the tie at lunch.
3) Keeping away the wrinkles--I absolutely HATE ironing. I would rather wash nasty dishes than iron. It's boring, it's dangerous, and I'm awful at it. This is why its key to buy non-wrinkle shirts and put them in the dryer every morning.

Things have gotten a bit harder since the time I used a common pile of clothes, but if I can learn to be this suave, then anyone can...just follow the above tips!