My first day of vacation

Starting at about 2:30 yesterday, I became a free woman. One more month until school begins! What am I going to do with all my free time? As little as humanly possible, since this is my last chance to do so for the next lord knows how many months. Some running, some dancing, some massive obsessing over my music collection, some lingering over coffee/breakfast with pleasant company, but no trips or extravagent goals.

But I started vacation with a bang -> 6 a.m. to 6 a.m. of action packed fun and craziness strewn across The Pacific Northwest from Bellevue to Vancouver (B.C.) and many spots in between.

My big day began more with a sploosh than a bang actually, as my eggs, tofu and "buttered" (because that adjective works much better than "vegan-alternative-whipped-spread-ed") toast schlupped themselves onto the floor; and then the tinkle of metal, as I left my keys in the trunk of my car for the first two or three hours of work. Things kind of went uphill from there (and for the most part not in the running sense, where hills are cause for cursing, crying and despair), but with some stops and starts.There was lunch and an early release from my last day of work and then traffic... oh so much traffic. I will so incredibly not miss the sitting in the car at a dead stop on the freeway aspect of my summer internship. I shudder to count the hours I've spent sitting in my car mouthing obscenities and making the odd shrieking noise as traffic once again inexplicably slows and starts.

In the evening, I met up with my Dad and we tried to acquire the promised shoe-gifts, but were thwarted on all fronts: my Asics are on severe back order and tango shoes don't exist in this town/I have yet to find something online that calls to me. On the bright side, I did get one of those belts that runners wear to carry water with them! I'm pretty pumped about this, since the long runs are getting long enough that not hydrating is pretty awful and sloshing around with a huge water bottle is agonizing and because the belt is black and techno-lime-green. W tried to have an easy dinner, but were equally thwarted by an inscrutably long wait, resulting in an awful lot of rushing to make it to the Blue Moon.

The turn-out was a touch dissapointing. The Seattle people were at Pablo Veron workshops or couldn't get rides or... whatever. Many of the Bellingham people were off at some thing at Harrison Hot Springs. An email that was supposedly sent out by the resident BMB teacher apparently did not actually break loose into cyberspace and most of the students themselves didn't know about it. Aside from the small percentage of facebook invitees/random assortment of my friends who don't really tango and don't know each other, most of the attendees were tipped off by an email from *another* teacher in town whom I'd invited. All I can say is thank goodness for 'the competition' or it may have been a very dismal evening indeed.

C'est la vie, it turned out to be a lot of fun. I think I did my best set ever last night. It hit the perfect balance between traditional and modern; between stuff-I-love and stuff-that-makes-people dance. I think the best balance between being true to one's voice but accessible to the crowd is when every song is the sort that would make you whisper "I love this song" before a dance, and many are also met with requests from other dancers for the name of the song just played.

I had to find a number for an impromptu birthday dance insisted upon by David. I was against it at first, but it turned out to be at least colorful! My dress was a one strap - a startlingly classy little Versace number from Labels that is regrettably just a little too big and thus not a "twist-proof top," as one of my partners enjoys to put it. So much of my personal style is "impending wardrobe malfunction" but this took it a step further. Combined with the fact that I handle like a Porsche and all my partners were inevitably showing off a bit for the crowd with big and very open moves (see, the joy of close embrace is that your shirt doesn't have to stay on!), the twisty top twisted enough for me to be deeply grateful for the crepuscular tango-mood lighting, because I'm pretty sure I went all National Geographic on the audience at least two or three times during my seven minute ...performance. Consider it a promo for the oft discussed Blue Moon Topless Tango Tuesdays...


-- begin tango geek moment -- (just smile and nod)

Since I wanted to dance with everyone, I picked Gotan's Vuelvo Al Sur. I usually avoid Gotan, because it is so ubiquitous, so it actually had a nice spell of novelty to it, but I let let bleed into a new electrotango set:

Una Noche en "La Viruta" (just happened to be after Vuelvo Al Sur in the list I pulled it from) - Otros Aires

Postales - Federico Aubele

Trampa Del Alma - San Telmo Lounge

After which I finally premiered my Medialuna tanda, which kept getting shorn off the too-long lists for fear that people wouldn't enjoy it, but which is also one of my absolute favorites:

Una Flor Y Dos Corazones

Fragilidad

Chromotango

(I took out their Vuelvo Al Sur, since I just danced to the Gotan version, which actually worked pretty well time wise anyways and made for a nicely cohesive set )

Needless to say, it was heaven to dance to!

I finished out the night, with another new Esteban Morgado set from Patio de Tango, thus ending the evening with Lidia Borda's beautiful and lulling rendition of Sueño de Juventud - yes, technically a vals, but so slow that it losses any rhythmic imperative that would set it apart from the rest of the tangos. This had been the source of some distress earlier, when I realized that somehow iTunes had jumbled the track names for this entire cd, necessitating a hurried journey through the track to find the actual songs I wanted instead of the songs that were named what I thought I wanted. Thanks so much iTunes for giving my evening some excitement! My cumparsita was also a vals version, although I doubt anyone appreciated this, but we all need our little comments.

--- end music-geek moment --

After the party there wound down, I hopped a car-pool to Vancouver for some after-tango blues, which absolutely hit the spot. I haven't been up there for a long time and delighted at going incognito - in my running clothes, glasses, and a ponytail. Nobody recognized me, even some of my favorite dance partners reintroduced themselves to me and were very confused when I told them my name. I think unrecognizability is one of my super powers. Even more likely, those 80's movies were right and taking off your glasses while simultaneously pulling down your hair is the most magnificent transformative makeover a girl can have (the reverse apparently also applies)!

Many long drives down, I'm ready to crash. Particularly because I didn't really get that much sleep this week in anticipation of vacation.

But in sum, I played a great set, saw some friends I hadn't seen in months, and potentially managed to flash a large audience of people (always a favorite) and flummox a few others.