President Hinckley, we love you

The pits

Today I had a dream come true. No, some hot guy did not propose to me. No, I did not acquire omniscience. I was still judged by the color of my skin and not by the content of my character (well, maybe not) and I did not suddenly become independently wealthy.

But, the most realistic of my dreams came true when the Utah Symphony called me up and asked me to play for the opera in January: Tosca by Puccini, my favorite opera composer. For those of you who may not know, I absolutely love playing for operas. It's a perfect mix of music, drama and spectacle, topped off by the wonderful feeling of anonymity that comes from playing in an orchestra pit. There's something so relieving about people not being able to see me when I'm playing. It seems kind of silly, since the reason people usually go to concerts is to hear a performance not see it. But I usually like feeling invisible so pit playing is perfect for me.

So instead of having to wear a silly costume and wear pounds of makeup like this:

Or be uber dramatic like this:

I get to sit in a dark, cold pit like this:





I'd imagine that a professional orchestra opera pit would be a little less relaxed than the ones I experienced in my college days. Those usually included lots of snacks and goofing off. You never know, though. Musicians of any caliber can be kind of strange.



And here's a picture that came up when I did a Google image search for "opera diva". I don't understand it but it sure is interesting.

I have a great body

This is hardly new information for any of you, but I work a lot of hours. My bank account is happy, but my soul is suffering. I've been having a couple of especially bad weeks--weeks which include 14-16 hour days and staying up all night staring at a flickering computer screen. I HATE those kind of weeks. A lot. And every time I pull out of those weeks I'm amazed that I'm still physically functioning.

I don't have a particularly nice-looking body, but it sure does its job well. I find it hard to believe that I can have days where my major source of calories comes from Smarties (thank you, Springville Public Library), or Pepsi and crackers, or whatever else I can lay my hands on, and not come away with some kind of serious illness. Maybe someday all those artificial flavorings and dyes and preservatives and partially hydrogenated whatevers will conglomerate in some nasty mass in my liver or kidney and then I'll rue the day I was so abusive to my body, but for now it's still trudging along and I'm sure grateful for it.

More funny titles

Maybe this is getting old for all of you, but there's really not much more I can do to entertain myself at work.

Favorite titles:

• The common sense book of drinking
• Hopes and fears: scenes from the life of a spinster
• Metric units to unite the world
• The evolution of the snob
• The mule on the minaret
• Festal postlude (which isn't that funny, except that I first read it as "Fetal postlude")
• The sacred and profane love machine
• The naked bishop
• Single and human
• A short history of fingers
• Faith, love and seaweed
• St. Anne's gut
• The sacred circle of the hula hoop
• Homework and sweating

And my very favorite:

• The golden rules of gynecology

For some fiction books, the digital record gives a short plot summary. Reading some of them leads me to think that maybe it would be better to not try to summarize the plot and let the reader be surprised.

• While a school group is visiting the great temple at Nara, one young Japanese boy becomes separated from the Group, and, while finding his way back to the bus, helps a lost deer and two lost North Americans.
• A little boy of India, who loves his pet kid too well to let his father sell him, becomes a successful flute accompanist to the small goat's dancing.
• A twelve-year-old girl and two unusual friends conspire to prevent a retired sea captain from being sent to a home.
• A moose-child goes north looking for other moose-children, but on the way he finds other playmates right in his own forest.

If this post makes you jealous of my job, the company is hiring in December.

If you squint your eyes, my job can be seen as entertaining

To keep myself entertained at work, I keep a list of out-of-the-ordinary titles and authors that I see while going through the card catalogs. Here are a few of my top picks.

Interesting author names:

• Alphonso Elkin Cumberbatch
• Sir George Dancer
• Hugh Huger
• George Newt Best
• Hugh Playfair
• Alois Alzheimer
• Charles Edwin Heartstill
• Jesse W. Peebles
• D.S. Rumph
• Someone with the last name of Boobyer

Interesting/weird/funny titles of books or articles:

• Know your Oklahoma fishes
• The world of the wild turkey
• New ways with partridges
• A ruffian in feathers: the English sparrow
• The house sparrow: the avian rat
• Canary culture for amateurs
• Monthly hints to canary fanciers
• Giddiness of cloven-hoofed game
• Pheasants and their enemies
• How to live with a parakeet

Funniest publisher:

• Kinki University

Apologies

I'm very sorry for taking so long to post, which I almost spelled "poast". It's hard to feel like writing on a computer when that's all I do at my job, but that's a sorry excuse. I posted two new, very wordy entries with no pictures today (three, I guess, including this one) and have some more in mind for another day. I'll try to do better in the future.

And for those who don't know already, I got another job at the Springville Library. It's ultra part-time so it won't interfere with my other job, and will give me a source of library work with human interaction. Imagine that! I haven't started yet because I got hired right before my surgery and have obviously been out of commission, but hopefully I can start this coming week.

One book a week.....ish

When I first started my job in mid-July I was thrilled to have extra time to read. I suppose I had plenty of "extra" time to read when I was unemployed and sitting at home all day, but I was somehow more motivated by having a schedule to use my time off to broaden (aka use) my mind.

I've amassed quite a collection of books from various book sales and used book stores, always buying books with the most genuine of interest but rarely actually reading them. Mostly this was due to time constraints, but it's really easy to get out of the habit of reading--out of the habit of viewing reading as a top priority leisure activity and not one that you get around to when there's nothing good to watch on TV or your computer is out of commission.

All my books were packed in boxes (and most still are...) so I decided to unpack just one box and read something from that. The first book I read was Animal Dreams by Barbara Kingsolver, an author I had heard so much about (which was why I bought the book in the first place) but had never read anything she wrote. I usually don't read stuff by contemporary authors, but I enjoyed her writing style and the story itself. The most basic of summaries: a woman in her late 20s returns to her hometown in northern Arizona for one year to teach at her old high school and look after her ailing father. Mostly it was a phychological reconciliation of her adult perception of her childhood experiences and ideas with the truth of how things really were. Mostly. It's really hard to give the basic premise of a book in a couple of sentences. Anyway, it was good.

Next came A Room With a View by E.M. Forester, which I will not try to summarize but will say that I enjoyed it immensely, especially because I've been on an Italy kick lately. After that, or in the middle of that, came Harry Potter 7, which I read in about 12 hours. I'm sure I have nothing to say about it which has not been said already, but I was impressed with the thoroughness with which Rowling tied everything up. She really did know how she was going to end the series when she started it. I am in no way any kind of Harry Potter fanatic. I've read all the books but I have not memorized characters' lines, I have difficulties even remembering who all the characters are when they're referred to later, and I can only remember a few of the most important spells/charms, and most of the credit for that knowledge can go to my dear nephews. So I don't really feel like I'm in a place to give any kind of informed critique of the book. Like I need to.

This was all followed by The Mayor of Casterbridge by Thomas Hardy, who has a special kind of depressing bleakness all his own. I started out this book disliking it intensely, mostly due to the title character and his idiocy, which seemed contagious. I grudgingly slogged through the first half and then, wonder of wonders, I began to like it. I liked it in the way that you like someone who maybe doesn't have a lot of likable traits, but you begin to understand them and appreciate them over time.

I foolishly tried to follow that book with For Whom the Bell Tolls by Hemingway, but that didn't work. I just couldn't get into it. So now I'm happily reading The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan, a very interesting and heartbreaking read. I've never thought so much about how lucky I am to have such a wonderful family and privileged upbringing.