Category: Chapel Hill

Be Like MLK, Give Back to the Community!

The arts non-profit for which I work is currently having an Indiegogo to help raise money for our Emerging Artists Grant program, and I would LOVE for you to contribute to it.  Money raised during the Indiegogo will go directly to the sixteen artists who received the award this year.  Here is a bit about the program:

“Durham Arts Council seeks your partnership and investment to help launch and develop the careers of highly skilled and promising artists who have mastered the basics of their discipline, and are at a critical development moment in their artistic lives where they need funding, encouragement, and recognition of their work.  The DAC’s Emerging Artist Program serves artists in visual, performing, literary, and media arts in five North Carolina counties in the central Piedmont area and has been a vital part of developing artist careers for 29 years.

Each year, 12-16 grants are awarded to artists selected from a highly competitive applicant pool of over 100 artists who apply from Durham, Chatham, Orange, Granville and Person counties.  Each grant of approximately $1,500 funds a project pivotal to the advancement of the artist’s work.”

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To learn more about the program, including this year’s winners and also PHOTOS and VIDEO and PERKS, please go to the Indiegogo site.  If you care about the arts AT ALL you’ll want to contribute to this program.  A city without art is not a city, and these artists make our cities awesome in so many ways.  Also, please spread the word around your own communities, we need all the help we can get!

And here is one more link to that Indiegogo site, please go check it out! 

 

15 Days to Dragon*Con: Band Profile, This Way to the Egress

 

First off–what a great band name.  This Way to the Egress, I can get behind that name.  This is another Steampunk band–or, according to their Dragon*Con profile, “an Ole Tymey Gypsypunk- Cabaret.”  The band is Philadelphia-based and is composed primarily of ‘Tyrant” Taylor Galassi, “Saddle Sarah Shown,” and Mischief M@ Verderosa.  The band also includes a rotating number of guest performers to supplement the main trio.

Here’s a little clip from their website bio:  “This Way to the Egress is an Ole Tymey – Gypsypunk- Cabaret. With a valiant effort to “bring the show back to the people” they are a revolving door of musical mayhem, sideshow, burlesque, and comedy leaving a modern twist on the good old days of Vaudeville. Like a renegade theater of sorts, they weave visual antics with eclectic sounds creating an experience unlike any other in their genre.”

So many Steampunk bands guys!  How on earth are we ever going to tell them apart?!  Oh well, let us listen to some music:

So that’s a video that shows lots of clips from their performances–yep, it looks like they have lots of live, circus-y act components to their shows, specifically components including attractive ladies during shimmy-ish things.

This video has a nine-year old kid in it!  Not entirely sure why.

Ack!  A Steampunk band in the daylight!

Oh hey, they played this one in Chapel Hill! Funsies.

Talking points:

–Steampunk band from Philadelphia

–Three main members

–Lots of circus-y components and shimmy-shimmy ladies.

Two thumbs up, because they sort of sound like aspects of the Decemberists that I like, and also like Beirut, and also who doesn’t love a fire-breather?

 

Birthday Recap!

My birthday was a pretty low-key affair.  Considering it fell on a Saturday, this is either awesome or just plain lame.  I’ll let you decide.

I got up in the morning, I went to the gym because it was Body Combat and because the instructor promised me she’d play techno BraveheartI went and fed a friend’s cats for her.  I came home and showered.  Jon and I went to lunch, we wanted to go to MinGa, this great Korean place by our house that I’ve been meaning to review here forever.  Unfortunately, MinGa was closed over Spring Break for kitchen renovations.   BUMMER.  We ended up going to Ming Garden, this Chinese place we used to frequent instead.  I had Dan Dan noodles, which are reliably good there:

And then, since it was my birthday, I ordered three scoops of ice cream:

The flavors were ginger (up front), red bean (pink), and mango.  And I ate most of it myself.

Don’t let that second spoon fool you; Jon only had one bite of ice cream.  I did most of this damage on my own.  This is either awesome or just plain lame.

I also had a fortune cookie.

And my fortune was pretty telling:

I guess that makes me three scoops of ice cream, and some lasagna, and some cake.

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HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Got a feelin’ 2012 is gonna be a good year.  Y’all.  What did you do last night?  Did you go out on Amateur Night and get sloppy drunkies?  Did you boycott the whole thing and stay in while covertly watching Dick Clark/Anderson Cooper?  Did you do what my parents did and ring in midnight while watching the credits of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (can’t think of a better way to welcome 2012 then with a movie about serial killing and anal rape, really)?

I went out on Amateur Night, because I am definitely an amateur who rarely goes out.  Jon and I had dinner here (good food, TERRIBLE service, but we’ll try them one more time on a non-holiday night because we did enjoy the food), and then we went to Motorco with some friends for their big end of the year bash.  So that was fun and it was hosted by one of those women who sort of looks like a drag queen because she was maybe in a costume and has a lot of makeup and maybe stuffed her boobs and had fake nipples and whatever I loved her.  Anyways, because throughout the night I had 1.5 glasses of champagne and a shot of tequila and because I am not good at going out or drinking, this morning I was feeling sleepies until I ate a giant breakfast and now maybe I will go for a run/walk OUTSIDE because it is like 65 degrees outside y’all and even though the gym is open it is probably full of resolutioners and they are terrible.

So anyways, a Happy New Year to each and every one of you and I hope you are having a lovely Sunday/New Year’s Day!

Oh hey, and checkout my awesome new background of a lady laughing alone while eating a salad.  That is so going to be me this month you guys, I promise!

The End of 2011

Heeeeeey friends.  How’ve you been?  Did you have a good holiday season?  I did, because I spent it with people I enjoy and also because my kitchen has gotten a few upgrades, namely this grill pan which I shamefully have not yet used y’all.  Operation get back to clean eating, however, starts on Sunday so I imagine the grill pan will come into play.  Also, speaking of clean eating, have you seen this great little Mark Bittman post where he gives lots of yummy, veggie-based, clean recipes?  Those will be delicious, especially since I am full steam ahead clean eating because I am going to a wedding in late January and I want to look bangin’.

So I’ve been acclimating to my new job, which I still like although this week, as you can imagine, was mega-slow.  I am resolving to go into 2012 with lots of optimism and enthusiasm, especially because I went into 2011 with a general sense of doom and a feeling of failure in regards to my career search.  New job, new attitude, old cliches!

This will be a sort of scattered-about, catch-up post since I have been VANISHED IN JOB LAND (sorry y’all).  I’ve been meaning to post about this trip I took home to Sarasota way back in November, but it clearly isn’t going to happen.  Instead I’ll just post a few pictures of the Siesta Key Crystal Classic, an international sand sculpture competition that was taking place the weekend I was in town.  If any of you watch Sand Masters, most of those folks were present.  The sculptures were only partially done when I saw them, but they were still 100% amazing.  Here are a few of my favorites:

If you look closely you can see a skull between the teeth, inside the fish.
This one was titled "The Five Senses."

So that’s awesome right?  PS if you didn’t already know, Siesta Key is an awesome beach in Sarasota that currently holds the #1 spot on Dr. Beach’s Best Beaches in America list.  Siesta is famous for its white, pure sand that has the consistency of sugar.  The beach is also incredibly wide.  It is an unbelievably beautiful spot.

Anyways, RESOLUTIONS!  Do y’all have any?  Mine are pretty vague:  MORE VEGETABLES, MORE BLOGGING, MORE SLEEP (I really need 8 hours guys I have to stop lying to myself), MORE GRATITUDE, LESS WHINING.   I think that about covers it.  What about you?

While you ponder your goals for next year, here are a few items with which I have been 100% obsessed lately:

1) Sand Cats.  I didn’t know these guys existed.  They are tiny, adorable cats that live in deserts in North Africa.  They are THE BEST and I want one so much y’all.

LOOK AT HOW CUTE THAT IS LOOK LOOK LOOK.

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