How grammatically correct I am

You are a MASTER of the English language!


Huzzah. While your English is not exactly
perfect, you are still more grammatically
correct than just about every American. Others
admire the way you speak and could learn a lot
from listening to you. Still, there is always
room for improvement...


How grammatically correct are you? (Revised with answer key)
brought to you by Quizilla

Gazal research begins

Well, I've just spent a little time looking into the meaning of Gazal, that song I so desperately want to dance to. Looking at the liner notes of the Essam Rashad CD containing this song, I see that Gazal is explained as "Poetic Song." I have heard of Ghazals before, but don't really know much about them. I decided to look it up in Wikipedia. The article there is pretty much impossible to comprehend, but there are a couple of wonderful links at the end. I totally recommend them to anyone interested in poetry.

The Ghazal: An Inevitable Unity by Jenny Burdge
That Bastard Ghazal by Andy Weaver

It's a little odd how Ghazal means literally "speaking with women" in Arabic, and means "the last meloncholic cry of deer cornered by hunters" in Farsi and Urdu. I can't help but think that really says something about communication between the sexes!

It seems like such an interesting poetic form. It's sort of exciting to think of writing a poem that can have couplets so thematically different from one another. Is there a way to interpret this in dance form? Hmmmmmmmmm...

Brain Explosion

(Just to get this out of the way) Mmmmmmm, raspberry pie.

Now that that's over with . . .

I have had a lot of really good experiences lately. They weren't all happy, fun experiences, but I feel positively impacted by them.

Tonight I went to see the movie Sabah at the Broadway Theatre. It's a Canadian movie about an Arab-Canadian woman whose family became even more traditionally Muslim after they moved to Canada. Sabah turns 40 at the beginning of the movie and starts to take some risks. Some really wonderful changes happened in her life, and her family's as well. There was lots of belly dancing in it (along the line of Arab women's social dance, not belly dance club performances). There was dancing all through the end credits. It was really inspiring to see a woman take risks, and find love and a new identity and happiness. The movie was so good I almost cried! To read more about the story click here. It was interesting to see Roula Said mentioned in the credits. She was the belly dance instructor, wrote and performed some of the music, and acted as well. She is a singer in the group Doula.

Last weekend one of my favourite bands played at Lydia's - The Plaid Tongued Devils. They had a vehicle problem on Friday night, and we left at 1:00 and didn't get to see them perform. On Saturday a big bunch of friends went out and saw the show. It was a lot of fun. And a cute drunk guy hit on me all night! That was a treat! Usually I feel so invisible and uninteresting. It was really awesome to get some attention. We never hooked up (couldn't find him at the end of the night), but I like to think that somewhere out there in Saskatoon there's a guy talking about the hot girl he met at Lydia's, wondering if he'll ever see her again! Maybe this is a sign that non-drunk, young (as opposed to the drunk 40+ year olds who hit on me), cute guys could possibly be interested in me too. We'll have to see if I take any risks to meet someone new at the next show they play here . . .

A few weeks ago I went to watch DancEgypt perform at the Billy Tent (at Shakespeare on the Saskatchewan). Just as I was walking up to the tent and before I could see anything, I heard them playing one of my favourite songs, Gazal by Essam Rashad. For years I have been wanting to make a choreography to that song. It evokes so many strong emotions in me, and I think it could be a really powerful performance piece. In April I was telling my friend Debbie about this song, and how I had recently decided I probably wasn't a mature enough dancer to express what I wanted to with it. Fast forward to me walking up to the tent to see a much less experienced dancer performing to this song. My heart sank and I felt practically sick. I have been too intimidated by the song and the emotion of it all to even make this choreography, and here is someone dancing to my music!!! I can't even say if they danced well, because my attention was drawn so strongly inside of me. I've been thinking about this a lot ever since, contemplating what to do to make this happen. Some of the ideas I've had so far:

• Contact a modern dance choreographer and get them to help me map out the feeling and rough stage positioning for the song. This would be a framework for me to build a choreography off of. I'm thinking of taking this step because I want this to be a very expressive piece, and I'd like to take it a step up from what I've done with previously choreographed work.
• I've noticed that if I listen to the song over and over again, I sort of get paralyzed and can't plan. I was thinking that if I listened to the song once then videotaped myself dancing to it once, I would probably do some interesting interpretation while not being overwhelmed by it. Do this enough times over a couple of months and I would be sure to have several lovely moves ready to put into a choreography.
• Give myself some time. If this is such an important piece of music for me, then the creative process deserves some time to be savoured. Initially I was thinking of performing this at Medicomania, but that only gives me a couple months. I think that's why I didn't work on it last year.

This choreography obsession has gotten me thinking of working on a dance costume I've also wanted to make for years. I have pretty much all the materials to make it, and in the last week or so I've bought more beads and a bra for it. The fabric has such beautiful colours in it, but it has a striped pattern in it. I think I would like some help designing and cutting out the skirt, because I haven't worked with fabric with such a large pattern in it before.

So, as you can see, my brain has been pretty much been wanting to explode for a while. At least it's out now, and didn't make a big mess everywhere.

Selling . . . selling . . .

I've decided to sell some of my costuming and jewellery stuff. Here are some pictures of a necklace, bracelet, and earrings I would like to sell. I'm asking $15.

Ensemble
Necklace
Bracelet and pierced earrings

Fringe Busking

So, my dance group is planning on busking again this weekend - Friday and Saturday evening. We'll be meeting near the Living Room at 7 pm, and will probably put on 2-3 half hour busking sets. I can't guarantee definite performance times, because that sort of depends on when everyone shows up, other street performers, etc.

Hope you can come see us!

Family Reunion Article

Here's an article about a family reunion near Westby, Wisconsin that I wasn't able to go to this year. I have been to at least 4 of the reunions from this branch of my family tree. (My mom's, mom's, dad's dad was Anton Benrud.)

Benrud Family Reunion: A family reunion like no other in the region

The Fringe is coming! The Fringe is coming!

Another year, another Fringe festival. This year, as well as busking, my dance group will be back on the indoor stage (for the first time in a decade). We will be performing a half hour show in Venue 9, the Cosmo Senior Centre. Admission $3.

Our show times are:

Fri. Aug. 5, 9 pm
Sat. Aug. 6, 9 pm
Sun. Aug. 7, 7:30 pm
Wed. Aug. 10, 6 pm


Hope you can come!

Weekend progress

Been having a fabulous weekend so far. Yesterday I spent the afternoon in a friend's pool and had a really fun time. I spent most of the time just floating in the water, relaxing every muscle in my body. That was awesome! I've been carrying so much tension, so it was really nice to be able to let that go for good long periods of time. We also invented the game of pretzel death ball. At each end of the playing area floated a basket made of two pool noodles bent sort of like a pretzel. There were three balls involved: two smallish distractor balls, and a medium-sized happy face game ball. The object of the game was to get the game ball into the pool noodle basket. You could travel with the ball, and you could move the basket you were trying to score in, but you couldn't move the basket you were defending. Anyone who threw the ball out of the pool had to go to the penalty area for a count of 10 Mississippis. We had teams of three. Very fun!

Mini-golfing last night I saw a guy with a t-shirt slogan as follows:

You laugh at me
because I'm different.
I laugh because
you're all the same.

Quite like that one!

What to say... what to say...

I've been mostly too lazy to post anything lately . . . or too lazy to do anything worth posting about. Here's some things that I've enjoyed recently:

• Went to the opera on Friday to watch my friend Mike perform. The opera was Die Fledermaus, which sounds exactly like Deflator Mouse. I like to imagine some sort of mousy superhero who nibbles holes in balls, portable planetariums, balloon, etc. and thus saves the day for mousekind. I haven't yet figured out how that could be advantageous yet, but there you go. . . . Oh, and the opera was very enjoyable . . . quite funny and an adequate amount of eye candy.
• HMV had a coupon for DVDs (buy one get one free) on Saturday. I went and was finally able to find a couple of movies I'd been looking for for months - Mansfield Park and Les Triplettes de Belleville. Watched the latter last night with Joel and Sonya, and it was quirkily good and the music was very fun. I also bought Willow. Now I have most of my favourite movies of all time on either VHS or DVD, or can borrow them from friends. The last DVD set I know I'm pining for is I, Claudius (or I, CLAVDIVS to those who are either very Latin oriented or like to be silly like me!). It's a mini-series of intrigue and betrayal in ancient imperial Rome. History Television shows it every couple of years or so.
  
• I made a very lovely necklace yesterday. I had spent quite a bit of time on the weekend laying out the beads, then Tuesday one of my nephews knocked over my bead design board. Beads flew everywhere! Luckily I wasn't home so other people had to clean it up! Heh heh heh! I bought a few more beads today to make matching earrings.

So now I've got the weekend to look forward to! Early this summer some friends had considered a camping trip this weekend, but nothing ever was organized. Instead it's going to be a weekend of partying! Yee ha! ;-) A different party every day - and Monday to recover. I might be leaving on Monday for a quick shopping trip in Calgary. Will I finally be getting the drum I've been wanting for a couple years? Come back for news next week!

Lorianne in Saskatoon

. . . for over a week now. I did try writing a message from Edmonton on July 9, but it took me a while to write it while Brandi and I were chatting. By the time I went to submit it, Blogger had logged me out so I needed to log back in. And by having to do all that I lost the message. Grrrrrr. It was a good one too. I guess I'll just have to give a brief summary of what I remember:

• At the family reunion I won a light brown, sheep leather purse from India. It was a prize in a raffle they had to cover costs of the reunion. It was kinda funny though. My aunt who was sitting with me on the love seat had the first winning ticket (for Christmas decorations). Then the next name called was hers again! She didn't think it would be fair to win 2 of only 4 prizes, so they picked again and it was me! The funny thing is, though, that it was the next prize that I really had my eye on. If my aunt hadn't been so gracious, I might have won a nicely embroidered purple bag from Pakistan. Oh well. I still like the one I won.
• Coming home on July 9 we had quite a lot of difficulty finding a place to spend the night. We ended up driving all the way from Winfield to Edmonton that day, and my mom and I spent the night at Brandi's. I have never felt so weird from driving. It was like I was drunk! I had drunk vision (where my peripheral vision sucked) and my face even felt numb! It was a crazy experience.

Then last week was the last one at the research project I was working on at City Hospital. That means that I have been enjoying my summer for the last few days. I went for a walk, did some shopping, did some drawing, and visited a friend on Monday. Yesterday I updated my expenses, attempting to find the $10.51 that my computer tells me I spent on my credit card. I went through my credit card statements for the last year and a half and couldn't find the problem, so I just manually updated it. I also caught up on the e-mail I hadn't been checking at my U of S address. That was probably over 200 messages, mostly from the career centre on campus. Today I finished catching up on my primary e-mail, so now I feel pretty much caught up. However, I have a feeling that I've been doing some of this to procrastinate on writing up the two page report from my research project. I had planned to do that today, but now I'm updating my blog! Go me! Oh well, at least I'm being somewhat productive....

I've had something else on my mind today. Yesterday I got a bulk e-mail from the physio college saying that someone was offering a free 2 bedroom basement suite in exchange for overnight supervision of an elderly person. I've been thinking about it, and I think I'm going to contact them. I've been wanting to move out for so long . . . it's hard to pass up an opportunity like this. I'm going to try to contact them tonight, to see what the circumstances are and if it's still available. I've been thinking of and writing down some questions this afternoon. I'm curious about what the outcome of this will be.

Lorianne in Winfield

Hallo!

I am in a used book store in Winfield, B.C. Winfield is located between Kelowna and Vernon (but much closer to Kelowna).

Anyway, I arrived at Camp Arbuckle mid-afternoon Tuesday. That's a Girl Guide Camp that is only used in the winter, then they take bookings for the summer. I think that's a little weird because it's such a beautiful location, and they should have summer camps there too. We haven't had much planned activity - so far we've mostly just hung out or ate meals. This afternoon a group of people went for a tour to a local winery, but I ditched out to write postcards and hang out at the beach. The beach is very rocky, but the water is nice and clean. It's been fairly cloudy but pleasant since we got here. Yesterday I got sunburned from sitting at the beach all day.

I'm not sure how many of us are at this Dahl reunion - maybe 50. I had no idea I was related to so many doctors (at least four on this side of the family). One of them is very quick to give out medical advice - it's been interesting to listen to.

There are a lot of cute little kids here. I wish my nephews could be here to enjoy the water and good company. It would give me someone to play with too! All the kids here are either older or much younger than me. Funny how I never seem to completely fit in at these sorts of things.

Last night Uncle Roy (who is 98 years old) got a big group of people together for a singalong. There are some very musical families here. Tonight a couple of people are going to do a skit.

Anyway, I should probably get going. The store's supposed to close in a few minutes. I should go pay now. Take care all!

Lorianne in Golden

Tonight we're in Golden, BC. That's on the Trans-Canada highway, in the middle of all the curvy, winding roads. Very scenic place.

Driving today didn't go as well as planned. A serious accident occurred on the highway from Edmonton to Red Deer (I guess an RCMP officer was killed), and that delayed us for about an hour. Makes you feel pretty fortunate to get where you mean to go safely. We've been travelling in two separate vehicles, setting places to meet on the road ahead. That's been working pretty well for us.

We should be arriving in Vernon tomorrow afternoon. We don't check in at the reunion until supper time, so maybe we'll have some time to look around before then.

I've had a cold the last few days. It pretty much sucks. All the changes in elevation have given me headaches and made my ear canals feel all itchy.

Anyway, guess that's it. Ciao!

Lorianne in Edmonton

Lorianne in Edmonton . . . wow, that's like a completely different person.

Anywho, we got into Edmonton around 5:30 pm yesterday. Our trip was fairly uneventful. A crow with a death wish frightened us very early on. We must have come within inches of hitting it. I can't be certain because I was cringing! We visited with my uncle and aunt in the evening. I ended my day watching the movie "The Notebook." It's such a sad story . . . I even cried. I guess with all the deaths in my family I've been thinking a fair amount about what my parents and aunts and uncles must have been like when they hooked up. It sort of brought that all home again. Great movie, but don't watch it alone.

Today I had a very nice visit with Brandi. She came and picked me up from my uncle's place around 1 pm, then we drove around a while, she showed me where she works, and showed me some other neat places she'd found while exploring the city by car. Next we went to Whyte Ave (which is similar to Broadway Ave in Saskatoon, but much busier). We went into an antique store, a used book store, a bead store (but of course) and had a late lunch at a greasy burger place.

Then we drove back to her place, saw Michael, and hung out a bit. While I was there they had some furniture delivered from Ikea . . . by incompetent delivery people who damaged it. So next the three of us drove out to Ikea, where they complained and I looked around for a birthday gift for Jay. Once that was all straightened out, we went home.

Next Brandi and I went for a good walk on some newly formed trails close to the river. It was a really good opportunity to chat about how things were going in our lives... which basically meant we ended up talking about boys. I'm pleased to say that the mosquitos were almost absent from our little adventure: I killed two in her car on the way back to their place. We hung out a little bit more, then I had her take me back to my uncle's place for 9 pm. It sure didn't feel like 8 hours together. More like 2 or 3.

So yeah, it was a nice day and I was really glad to get out and do something active. I'll be sitting enough the next couple days as we drive on to the reunion.

I'm leaving. Bye-bye!

Yes, I am going on vacation. Tomorrow I drive off into the sunset, making for Edmonton. Then on Monday we'll be leaving, heading to the Okanagan for a family reunion. I'll see what I can do about keeping my blog updated while I'm gone, but I'm not sure if I'll have any internet access.

On Sunday I'm hoping to see my friends Brandi and Michael. They moved to Edmonton at the beginning of May. It made me sad, but now I get to see them and that will make me happy! Here's a picture of the three of us, taken on the weekend before they moved away.

So be sure to have fun and take care! That's an order.

Happy Canada Day!

Today Canada turn 138 years old. That's young for a country.

Next year Saskatoon celebrates 100 years since it became a city.

Four days ago my brother turned 40.

In ten days Jay turns 31.

... and time passes...