Dance Marathon 2011: It was the best of times, it was the worst of times; it was awesome, fun and incredible, it was painful, exhausting, and miserable; I was delirious, ecstatic and fidgety, every inch of my body was sore and I was living in a perpetual state of constant daydream, neither asleep nor awake. (open mic night subject will be continued eventually)

Have you ever actually read (the first two pages) of Tale of Two Cities?  That’s how Dickens actually does it; he makes his entire first page and a half into one long and painful paragraph/mega-sentence(IT’S THE AUSTRALIA OF SENTENCES/PARAGRAPHS)  /jumble of punctuated clauses.  (This is called anaphora!) (Not to mention hyperbole…)

(Australia is both a continent and a nation. This sentence was both a sentence and a paragraph. I apologize for any confusion.)

Imagine if my entire blog post consisted of four paragraphs with 120 words each, but each paragraph was just one sentence? (No, no, FIGHT THE URGE MICHAEL)  Maybe another time.   

Back to the “Australia of sentences/paragraphs” idea. (It merits a closer look) So Charles Dickens wrote the “Australia of sentences/paragraphs," but you could reverse it and say that Australia is the “Charles Dickens’ writing” of countries/continents.  What else does this imply? Is Charles Dickens’ writing made up of former British murderers, marginalized native people, and koala bears? (possibly.) Is Australia fueled by alcohol, vivid hallucinations, and raging anti-Semitism? (probably.) I think I might be making stuff up about Dickens. Luckily he’s not alive to press charges.

I don't remember any koala bears, but I've been wrong before.

  (Secondary thought about Dickens’ grammar: Charles was constantly fighting his English teachers as a child, pushing the limits of grammar and being shoved back down.  They said “Noooo, that doesn’t work”, “It can’t be done; those should be separate sentences”, “That’s not syntax, that’s horse$*!*”,etc. [Some of his teachers were more vulgar than others.] But Lil’ Charlie wouldn’t have it, he thought outside the box and couldn’t stand the teachers stifling him.  So Chuck won out in the end, and now the teachers have to teach HIS grammar to their new kids.  Let THEM make up terms to explain away Chuckie Dickens’ ridiculous contiguous run-on semicolon tirade) (These parentheses got a little extensive; figured I’d make them their own paragraph [Doesn’t that mean they shouldn’t even be in parentheses?])   (Maybe I should talk about Dance Marathon; goodbye for now Chaz.)

So if you don’t know what (UNC) Dance Marathon is, it’s essentially a huge fundraiser for the UNC Children’s Hospital that people raise money for throughout the school year, and it culminates with this huge dance marathon.  More than a thousand people stuff themselves into a couple of gymnasiums, and they refuse to sit down for 24 hours.  This includes hours and hours of dancing, many performances by random bands and acapella groups, an incredible glowstick rave, a few trips outside, and a lot of exhaustion.  This is the background information required to understand whatever I say after this. 

I've never felt more confused and lonely than I did in that huge crowd of people at 8 in the morning.

The general principle agreed upon by regular dancers at Dance Marathon(by which I mean me) is that one’s mood during the marathon gravitates towards one of two extremes.  You’re super excited and loopy and enjoying yourself dancing crazily, or you are tragically miserable and sore and you hate life.

The ‘hating-life’ extreme is a little more interesting to examine.  

It’s a weird experience, standing up for 24 hours, because you constantly have to battle your instincts.  Every time you enter a different room or go somewhere else, you immediately decide you want to sit down.  If you’re lucky, you catch yourself and remember that that’s not right.  If you don’t catch yourself, you get viciously attacked by the hundreds of other dancers. (people get rabid at 5 in the morning when they haven’t eaten since 1 and when the coffee people apparently had to go all the way to Colombia to find an open coffee shop [BECAUSE THEY COULDN’T JUST BUY BEANS IN BULK AND BREW IT HERE??])

We even danced when we were outside.

It would be especially unusual for anyone that stumbled upon us and didn’t know exactly what was going on. (People do the weirdest things to give their legs some relief. It's probably incredibly depressing to watch.)  I saw people sleeping face first on tables, attempting to crab-sit-in-place (like crab-walk but stationary), and I saw a huge number of people regularly leaning heavily on walls.  Sitting on your ankles was a common practice, and I even tried posting myself on a wall (in a sitting position against the wall even though there’s nothing beneath me) and holding a nearby table to give me extra support.

This is me being creative; I combined sitting on my ankles and crab-sitting-in-place.
If you look closely you'll notice that I have a baby mullet.

The most interesting part for me was near the end of the 24 hours.  This is when I’m literally delirious and fidgety and stuck in a half-conscious, half-dead state.  I would fall asleep standing up and topple over if I stood in one place for more than a minute.  I had to play it off as a random trust fall a couple times.  Some people are wandering around, some are watching the basketball game, some are dancing, and everyone is incapable of having a rational thought.

All in all: A traumatic and scarring experience.  I’d do it again.

Open mic nights: What they are and what makes them weird. Part 1? It’s not a story though? (Also: I need to make an executive decision about capitalization and punctuation and the use of brackets in my parenthesis. Then I need to stick to it.)

The open mic night is one of the strangest species of whatever it is.   An open mike (For the life of me, I can’t decide whether to use ‘mike’ or ‘mic’ [haha ‘for the life of me’{“For the car of me, I must find a way to win this game of blackjack.“ “For the English class of me, I must write regular blog posts.” “For the dog of me, I must go purchase food, preferably beneful.”}]). Lol/sigh.

An open microphone night is a gathering of odd people (musicians are the weirdest) who take turns putting their dignity on the line and submitting themselves for the judgment of others.  The others being the audience, which often consists of the staff, the other performers, and 30 other people who came only to see their arrogant, probably untalented friend perform later, so they’re just going to talk and be obnoxious until then. 

The audience depends on the venue, the area directly around the venue, and the area around that (Lol for vagueness). Although all the venue really affects in regards to the audience is the frequency with which drunk people appear and start singing or yelling, and the less worried about but slightly more disruptive frequency with which homeless people on hallucinogens begin playing harmonica on the stage. (That has the potential to be the most amazing awesome articulate antagonizing alliteration AEVER!) People always seem to leave out that particular frequency when they’re preparing for open mic nights and making their calculations(?).  I promise you they *always* regret that ‘error of omission’ (at least whenever that frequency rises above 0 [Wow, this sentence “contained” *three* different ‘ways’ of emphasizing words]That’s 7, although not all of them are legitimate [that’s what he said.] Get it? Like children?) 

When I google-image-search "harmonica" and "hallucinogen", I get the Rolling Stones.

I worry that I can be hard to keep up with.  I imagine attempts to track down and keep up with my train of thought to be a lot like The Italian Job, or at least the long scene with the smart cars.  Think about it.

visual aid

 The atmosphere of the venue can be generous and supportive of the performers or hateful and degrading. (The third option is just plain ignorant of them; they act like it’s a radio playing in the background [They pay zero attention to it except for one time when a cover of a popular song is played. Then they go “I love this song!” They sing loudly and painfully along until they eventually go back to their loud conversation about nothing in particular besides how loud it is in there.)

They're all rather short.

Another big variable that depends on the venue is the quality and quantity of equipment available.  Some places have tons of microphones, a drumset(one word or two?), a keyboard, and all kinds of amps and sound equipment.  Other venues might pretend to have more, but they’ll reveal at the last minute that all they have is two working microphones, (the 2^nd one is stuck at about a foot from the floor [Which begs the question: who or what was that for? Which house-elf or singing chipmunk performed here?]) one good guitar plug-in with no opportunity for sound distortion, and *one* broken bongo drum. (Not to mention some old, ratty [meaning they look and smell as if rats have been integrating them into their daily routine.  You can consider the implications if you so desire.]), and old guitar picks that you found in the podium you borrowed to use as a music stand because you’re too lazy or worn out by constant drug use to be able to remember your lyrics.

Next week I’ll talk about what seems to remain constant from open mic to open mic, and how I know about this! (If I have space; I tend towards the longwindedness.[not a word])

You never 'really' know what "surreal bathroom encounter" means until you get to college ("Sorry, I've never had to deal with this before; do you want me to call 911 or just get you some paper towels?")

So before I get to the real point of this post I'd like to give a quick facebook status(by this I mean random and brief(snicker snicker)) update: I was in the dining hall today and I realized there was a cappuccino(have you ever noticed how oddly that word is spelled? 2 'p's and 2 'c's) machine.  It took me a couple of minutes to regain my composure, but afterwards I knew I had to carefully consider my options.  Here is a list representing my thoughts on the matter

Magically delicious.

• Cappuccinos are delicious.
• "Swiss Mocha" and "French Vanilla" are two of the choices: super delicious.
• I need caffeine.
• I think I heard possibly from somewhere or read it or someone told me or I just decided it one day in my imagination that cappuccinos have less caffeine than other coffee drinks.
• There is also coffee in the dining hall.
• I like coffee.
• I will be sure that I have enough caffeine only if I drink coffee.
• QED: I will get coffee and a cappuccino.

(If you can't tell, I've been taking a class on propositional logic and valid arguments)
(This might be a horrible example of propositional logic)
(I'm really bad at keeping things short)
(I should really consider using footnotes)

So that was basically a really long-winded way of explaining and rationalizing why I consumed an inordinate amount of caffeine at lunch-time today.

Speaking of caffeine/regularly having to deal with extremely long-winded ways of explaining and rationalizing things I already know....
You know what would be really, really, really*(test footnote), really cool and useful?

Imagine going to your 8:00 class. You've had a late night and you're really tired, so you want to maximize the sleep you get.  You want to get up in the morning, get dressed, and immediately go to class.  This includes several assumed sacrifices: no shower***, no breakfast, and most important of all****:*****/******.

Sigh. I think the random thoughts are even more disorienting when they're footnotes(1) Most important of all: you would not get any caffeine. Even with the extra sleep you got, staying alert and awake in class might be a big problem. Making coffee/buying coffee and drinking it in your room/putting it in a to go cup is a big use of time.  My suggestion would fix all of this.

Incredibly convenient and magically delicious.

Chocolate covered espresso beans is already an invention, even though I'm not sure where you can find them on UNC campus.  If they're cheap and available in large supply, I want to buy a ton of them.  Then I can have a little ziplock baggie(2) full of caffeine with me at all times.  If I start getting sleepy after lunch during Religion lecture, I can just snack on a couple more!  They're delicious *and* useful!






Okay, done with caffeine tangent; what was I supposed to be talking about?

Oh, right.

Oops.

* be sure to read this as written, pronouncing** every comma
** can you pronounce a comma? Does that make sense?
*** or any other regular morning hygienic activities
**** Can a sentence include 2 colons? With one being inside the list started by the other?
***** Would I put the asterisks behind or before the colon?
****** I feel like these asterisks are just as disruptive as random parenthesis*******, especially when you have to count them to figure out where the footnote is and I have to go to a completely different part of the post to actually document my "footnote thought".  I'm now changing the footnote mark to make it so you don't have to count all the asterisks, this should be easier.
******* parentheses??? parenthesis???
(1) at least for me
(2) hahahahaha "baggie"


This footnote thing may or may not be continued...

Return to Chapel Hill Part 2: LEAVING CHAPEL HILL AGAIN

I think I'm finally satisfied with that title, even if it only vaguely makes sense.

In case you don't remember exactly what the first part of this story was about (or you didn't read it and don't want to waste all that time), here's a brief recap.

So I decided to go with Lutherans to Boone for a weekend retreat recently.  I annoyed the rest of the people in my particular vehicle (one out of like 5 or 6 cars going I think) by packing way too much and very slowly.  At this point in the story we've got into the car and I'm stuffed in the back seat, cramped behind and around my large, blocky guitar case.  For shout-out purposes, my fellow passengers were Katie (it was her car), Kendall, and Anna-Reid.

RETURN TO CHAPEL HILL PART 2 :
LEAVING CHAPEL HILL AGAIN!!! 
(I apologize, very little of the extremeness added to this title was necessary)

Uncomfortable or not, we were on our way, and the ride to Boone is just about 2.5-3 hours, so I was not too worried.  I bent my head and arms into a weird position and did a little homework, but then I gave up and started listening to music.  Then I realized I was dozing off and missing large chunks of songs, so I gave up on that too and went to sleep.

I woke up about an hour and 15 minutes later. (I needed the nap) We talked for a bit as we drove another 30 minutes or so before we stopped for dinner.  We got McDonalds, and got back on the road.  That's when I started to notice that things were not as perfect as they seemed.  I was still a little groggy, so the sight of the sign saying "I-85 S to Charlotte" as we drove under it  only gave me a vague feeling of uneasiness.  (If you are unaware of NC geography, go mapquest "Chapel Hill" "Charlotte" and "Boone")  (It's pretty bad)

We passed a sign saying "Charlotte: 20 mi",  and an uneasy quiet spread throughout the car.  A turn had been missed. (Notice the passive voice?  I think the whole "navigation" thing was supposed to be my job...)  No one said anything and we continued to drive.  I started to text people to verify that "yes, Charlotte is not on the way to Boone".

The next 20 minutes passed slowly, as we all realized that "yes, we are going the wrong way" and "no, the problem is not fixing itself", and "no, going back to sleep will not make it all better".  Then we turned off of the highway, and proceeded to spend another half hour without really making any progress as we tried to figure out what we were doing.  We called other Lutherans, attempting to downplay our situation so as to avoid embarrassment. (Which is a problem when you want them to give you directions) We also called Anna-Reid's mom. (Which was much more helpful; I don't think we were very concerned with saving face by that point (WE HAD NO IDEA WHERE WE WERE))  Through lots of phoned-in googlemaps help and some incredibly fortunate strokes of luck (weird term, "strokes"??), we eventually made it to a highway that was at least moving in the right direction, and began to prepare ourselves for a weekend of being "the car that went all the way to Charlotte".  On the plus side we only added an hour and a half to our trip!

As for Boone itself? It was cold. There was snow. I burnt my tongue on some coffee. We went hiking. It was cold.