Lofty art-ness....

Today, I had lunch once again with my flamenco teacher from Saskatchewan but this time she brought her husband along. After an enjoyable lunch (amazingly enough, at the same place we ate at last time) we went to this gallery where they were displaying artwork done by animals. They had paintings done by chimps, elephants, turtles, dogs and probably a few more different types of animals. I definitely enjoyed the paintings by the elephants and turtle. One of the paintings by the elephant even looked like a tree branch with leaves on it. So today's favourite thing is seeing artwork done by animals.

I so thought I could dance....

Tonight, I watched most of "So you think you can dance". I don't watch it often for a variety of reasons, but since I was home tonight and they were finally through the awkward pre-top 20 stage, I decided to watch. Those dancers are amazing. After watching them and seeing performance of Flamenco and amazing tribal dancers in various places, it really puts my own dancing in perspective. Specifically, the fact that I will never be at that level. It is a fact that I am perfectly okay with but it is still humbling to watch. So today's favourite thing is watching incredible dance performances.

Tra-la-la

Today, I got to work for my shift at 2 but they asked if I could start at 3 instead. I said I would and than walked over to the drug store to kill some time. I only needed one thing but I saw some CD's in one of those cases where you can sample them. Anyway, one of them was of New Flamenco. I couldn't resist. New Flamenco is much easier to listen to than real Flamenco. Real Flamenco, while it is authentic and what Flamenco dancers dance to, is a bit harsher. I enjoy the authentic music as well, but I have to concentrate more on it because I am focused on finding the compas or rhythm. New Flamenco is basically only guitar and I don't think it follows the compas quite as rigidly - which does not make it good for flamenco dancing but it is excellent if you like listening to Spanish Guitar music.

"A life lived in fear is a life half lived"

If you know where the title quote comes from, you already know the topic of today's post. A couple of weeks ago, with new paycheque in the bank, I bought some of the things I had been wanting but couldn't afford seeing as how I was basically an unemployed bum. One of the things I bought was Baz Luhrman's Red Curtain trilogy. It contains the movies "Strictly Ballroom", "Romeo and Juliet", and "Moulin Rouge". Tonight I watched "Strictly Ballroom" for probably the 7th or 15th time and my sister partially watched it for the first time (she doesn't pay attention so good). I love that movie. It can been overly dramatic and melodramatic and cheesy at time but it is also very entertaining. I think it is where I got my first glimpse of flamenco before I knew what flamenco was. I hadn't seen the movie in a few years so it was nice to watch it again.

Here's one of my favourite scenes from the movie:

Reconnecting...

Today I had lunch with my flamenco teacher from Saskatchewan. She was visiting Ottawa for a couple weeks and I hadn't seen her in basically two years. It was really nice to see her and catch up on what was happening back home. We had a lot to catch up on. So today's favourite thing is reconnecting with people.

Captured motion...

My flamenco teacher from back in Saskatchewan posted this video on Facebook and I really enjoyed watching. It took a while to load for me because my internet was being slow but it is a pretty cool video. Odd seeing a rhinocerous dance flamenco and odder still seeing a male rhinocerous do moves that I associate with female dancers but it is pretty cool. Although the thought that I will never be as good of a flamenco dancer as a rhinocerous is rather depressing, it is worth a watch.

So today's favourite thing is Motion Capture Flamenco.

Happy New Year!

I hope everyone had a good 2008. I should totally be asleep right now as I am leaving for the airport at 4:30AM but I decided to do this before I actually go to sleep. For today's post, I am going to write about some of my favourite things of 2008. Some of them have or will have their own posts but for now it's just a list. In no particular order,...

• Panera Bread (American restaurant, really good sandwiches and soup. One of the things I miss most about Boston)
• Joss Whedon TV shows (I discovered Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, and Firefly this year. Also, Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog was awesome)
• The Sims 2 (for PC)
• Television Without Pity (Snarky recaps of your favourite shows, what more could you want?)
• Tina Fey as Sarah Palin
• Neil Patrick Harris
• I discovered some new and amusing websites this year. See my blog roll. I also enjoy www.tvtropes.org
• Twitter (I don't use it often but I like reading what other people are saying)
• Hulu (although I can't use it in Canada)
• Flamenco (That's not a new favourite, but I saw some amazing flamenco performances in '08)
• Living with my sister (It's been an adventure, especially with her doing a new thing everyday. It kept me on my toes)
• Using acronyms for phrases even if it's shorter to say the actual phrase (ex. btw for "by the way")
• Quoting random TV quotes in casual conversation (It's a sickness)
• Having an actual TV and using a DVR to record certain shows. (Awesomeness)
• TV Shows that are online (How I caught up on TV when I didn't have one)
• TV on DVD

I probably have a few more favourites but I am getting tired. I hope everyone has a great 2009!

"Listen to the rhythm, don't be scared"

Today was my last Flamenco class of the year. I really like flamenco, although lately I have been having trouble getting my feet, hands, head and torso coordinated so as not to look like I am having trouble getting my feet, hands, head and torso coordinated. The frustration with the moves was getting me down but today I was reminded why I like the class. I still had trouble with the moves but my teacher brought in a guitarist to accompany us. There is just something about dancing to live music that makes things so much better. There is just this energy that is involved that reminds me why I love dancing. The first belly dance show I saw after I started taking classes was one that only had live musicians and drumming. It continues to be one of the best shows I've seen. After the main show, the drummers continued drumming and audience members were allowed to dance. I remember doing the same move over and over and over because I didn't know many others but I was just so wrapped up in the music and the rhythms that it really didn't matter. I am more likely to dance if there are other people dancing as well, but once I am up there I have the best time and time flys.