18. eat sea urchin

This turned into a slight debacle.

I was prepared to go eat Uni sushi last week, and while on the phone with James realized that I am allergic to sea urchin. Now, I am all for a 30 in 30 list, which some people seem to mistake as a "bucket list," but the point of the whole deal is to embrace living. My allergy would not kill me, but it might kill those around me. In the spirit of the living embrace, and not the death embrace, I decided to change the particular type of food, but kept in the vein of strange foods. I looked up sea urchin online and found a list where it was included, I then chose a different plate from that list... and came up with wild boar!

This Saturday, Matt & Mart, my mom, my little sister, and I all went to Dino, an Italian restaurant in Cleveland Park WDC on the recommendation of Bettina from my office. So amazingly delicious. We ate wild boar pate, wild boar sausage, wild boar ragu, mahi mahi, suckling pig, and gelato with aged balsamic. Bettina gave the run down on Dino this morning, apparently it was known for the wine list, which the man in the Hawaiian shirt (Dean, the owner) has articulated deftly; and a couple of years ago, they got a chef to produce the edible accoutrement.

4. see Mission of Burma Live

OH MY AWESOME! I heart them. It's so interesting to think that they lived through so much, their first album was released about the time I was born! which means they are in their prime as well.

Originally, I was going to see them at the Black Cat, but then my dad said he was coming to town so I made the trek down to Richmond for the show. They said that they have never played in Richmond... or in Virginia for that matter and I can't blame them, there isn't too much punk left in the state. The show was at the University of Richmond and Ameoba Men opened for them. My buddy Michael said that Ameoba Men reminded him of early 2000 Baltimore experimental music, but I think they sound like the love child of the Dead Kennedys and Primus. Also present at the show were the doppelgangers of Penelope, Apple, Simon, and Emma from a non-published comic book, Strange Girls. The whole experience was slightly surreal, as Michael too said that it was a ghosts of new york girlfriends past.
Mission of Burma started the set with Donna Summeria which I love to drive and sing to simultaneously. They played 1,001 Pleasant Dreams and that makes me pleasantly dreamy. They also played Nancy Reagan crazy song and of course the revolver song. Thank you Mission of Burma for being so engaged and not dead so I could see you.

8. Finish ONE Tom Robbin's book.

I finished Still Life with Woodpecker. On the fence. Don't know if I want to buy into everything in the philosophy because the whole thing is just so flippant... i feel like the literature in my life lately has me in a bit of a tailspin. maybe it's just the general discontent with my job and void of hope for getting a better job because of this economy.

my favorite part:

"love is not a harpsichord concert in a genteel drawing room. and it sure as hell isn't Social Security, Laetrile, the Irish Sweepstakes, or roller disco. Love is private and primitive and a bit on the funky and frightening side. i think of the Luna card in the Tarot deck: some strange, huge crustacean, its armor glistening and its pinchers wiggling, clatters out of a pool while wild dogs howl at a bulging moon. underneath the hearts and flowers, love is loony like that. attempts to housebreak it, to refine it, to dress the crabs up like doves and make them sing soprano always result in thin blood. you end up with a parody. there're lots of pretty sounds that describe 'like,' but 'love' is more on the order of barking."

new words:

adventitious: adj. 1. Not inherent but added extrinsically.

gelid: arctic: extremely cold; "an arctic climate"; "a frigid day"; "gelid waters of the North Atlantic"; "glacial winds"; "icy hands"; "polar weather"

onanistic: Of or pertaining to masturbation (onanism); In a manner which suggests masturbation; hence, fruitless, self-congratulatory, self-absorbed, pointless

panatela: a long slender cigar

chiaroscuro: a monochrome picture made by using several different shades of the same color

osculation: (mathematics) a contact of two curves (or two surfaces) at which they have a common tangent

aspic: savory jelly based on fish or meat stock used as a mold for meats or vegetables

diadem: crown: an ornamental jeweled headdress signifying sovereignty

caroming: a. A shot in billiards in which the cue ball successively strikes two other balls. Also called billiard.

shamanic: Shamanism comprises a range of traditional beliefs and practices concerned with communication with the spirit world. It is a prominent term in anthropological research. A practitioner of shamanism is known as a shaman

25. join a professional association

I just joined the American Evaluation Association (http://www.eval.org/). I figured since I've already been published by them, that it'd be a good place to start. I also tried to join the Society for Community Research and Action (http://www.scra27.org/), but something is wrong with their online registration process.

I also just joined the Young Nonprofit Professional Network ! Hurray!

23. 3 sisters

Check. Alley Scott plays Natasha beautifully. She commands the stage.

Three Sisters is a naturalistic play about the decay of the privileged class in Russia and the search for meaning in the modern world. It describes the lives and aspirations of the Prozorov family, the three sisters (Olga, Masha, and Irena) and their brother Andrey. They are a family dissatisfied and frustrated with their present existence. The sisters are refined and cultured young women who grew up in urban Moscow; however for the past eleven years they have been living in a small provincial town.

Chekhov's initial inspiration was the general life-story of the three Brontë sisters, i.e., their refinement in the midst of provincial isolation and their disappointment in the expectations they had of their brother Branwell.

Moscow is a major symbolic element: the sisters are always dreaming of it and constantly express their desire to return. They identify Moscow with their happiness, and thus to them it represents the perfect life. However as the play develops Moscow never materializes and they all see their dreams recede further and further. Meaning never presents itself and they are forced to seek it out for themselves. Considered a classic, this play is periodically revived to suit extraordinary stage actresses, but the breadth and scope of the roles require that the entire company be extraordinary. Although the play's rise and fall seem to follow the arc of Irena's story, the star role, for her passion and her humour, is usually Masha. However, as with all of Chekhov's plays, any one of the characters, in the right actor's hands, can blaze with uncommon humanity, and the simplest moment can become a sudden revelation.

It is important to understand that Chekhov originally sought to showcase his plays as tragicomedies, depicting the ridiculousness of the upper class. He wanted to show how they talked at and not to each other, acting like children and thus, allowing for little or no progress. Chekhov felt it important to allow realism to sink in, stating that he would not relent on the Russia public until they realized their faults and worked on improving their characters. Unfortunately, most people view Chekhov's plays as being more like tragedies. The characters are taken too seriously which creates a feeling of incompleteness in regards to the endings.

11. yossarin lives!

I finished reading Catch-22. I love it. I can believe that whole entire parts were stolen from a british guy. The whole book played like a movie, that's how I imagined everything happening. It would be a really long movie.

and now i will go watch the movie...
http://www.imdb.com/video/imdblink/vi2827355417/