Sunday, November 15, 2009

Longhorns defense take a snooze and then experience an Intifadah

This is the third and final post to part 1: Longhorns crush Denver & a Canuck learns the secret handshake & remains clueless re Football, unless associated with Taylor Kitsch & COACH ERIC TAYLOR and part 2: Americans throw the pig's skin around and HI! COACH ERIC TAYLOR! .

Intifadah: To awaken from slumber.

Before the game began, pomp and circumstance were the leading culprits on the field. Wherever one looked, there were sad little people wearing costumes which were likely sewn by Lou-Ellen in 1963. Take this gentlemen, as example, and the unfortunate reality of his long torso, as stuffed within his Cowboy Cartoon outfit. No doubt, on a regular day, he rocks his everyday clothes, and so it must be with great distress that he meets UT's insistence to dress as Woody from Toy Story, rather than the Marlboro Man...from my dreams.


Alongside the band was a crew of UT students flopping around next to and beneath the State of Texas flag. Among the more memorable points of the evening was when a few of them were caught beneath the flag. Uncertain as to whether or not they would ultimately survive, I overheard one gentleman cry out 'Oh ma Gawd, them kids is caught'eneath the flag. Fkn BIN LADEN!'

The audience watches as the team comes out on to the field, and as each player slaps the horns of a longhorn beefer hung on the wall. This ritual was not at all a surprise as I have learned from Friday Night Lights, each team has a very specific baptismal right of passage through which each player must enter and exit before hitting the field (e.g., before exiting the locker room, each Panther slaps the 'P' on the wall. PANTHERS SUCK! GO EAST DILLON!). What was wholly unexpected to me was the eruption from the fans; literally, as the images began to float across the Godzillatron, the audience erupted and kept erupting long past the point at which the entire team was on the field. I was so busy being shocked that I in fact missed the Longhorns' run out on to the green.

Before the game began, the Longhorns had a little chat with Jesus, because no one - and I mean no one - pays more attention to Longhorns football games than Jesus Christ (peace be upon him). When it's game night, there is no room for poverty or lepers, war, famine and disease for The Lord; no doubt, he changes from white robe to pumpkin orange robe on game day. (All snarky sarcasm aside, I think it's all kinds of awesome that they say a prayer before the game; I really do. GO LONGHORNS! I'll say a little prayer for you with Allah.)

For the first half of the game, it appeared as though the Longhorns defense were either asleep or drunk. Either way, I was surprised to watch them get their asses kicked all over the field by Denver (or Colorado). So much so that I expected, as COACH ERIC TAYLOR (HI!) would have done on Friday Night Lights, Mack Brown to be Angry Hair Yelling at the team. But he was not; instead, he was mostly squatting and watching and secret-talking into his headset. For those of you who watch Longhorns football, you will have seen the Official Mack Brown Squat, which is him, legs bent, hands on knees, looking like he is ready to go for a poop in a Vietnamese bathroom. My guess is that somewhere behind his bum and atop his hamstrings is an invisible $3M cushion which makes this comfy - the $3M being his annual salary.


Luckily, the Longhorns made a serious and amazing comeback and went on to win the game. I will not bore you with the details of the game itself, as you can find them on line, though I will say I would make an excellent football commentator as I was filled with gems such as "The hell?" "What?" "Are they drunk?" "Is that Billy Riggins?" "Do you know Taylor Kitsch?" "Oh! They're running really fast" "Is my hair ok?" & "Where can I buy a pretzel?".

I won't even tell you the final score since, honestly, I can't remember. I will, however, tell you that for every touchdown, there were cowboys in the corner of the stadium who would fire a cannon...a Longhorns game is not for the faint of heart..after which, this gentleman would run out on to the field and wave the giant Longhorns flag, followed by five others with a flag each, spelling out T E X A S because subtlety is key.

Overall, the experience was amazing and I found myself yelling loudly and with serious pain and excitement and anxiety during the fourth quarter. I had become invested without even knowing it. It helped that I was surrounded by a wonderful group of folks, two of whom are Connie (HI!) and Tams (OLA!). Connie very diligently and awesomely sends me Longhorns updates almost post every game. As of today, the Longhorns have ten wins and zero losses. These boys may just go all the way this year with Mack Brown, making it the Longhorns' second Championship under his coaching (he would only require one more to equal the championships under the leadership of Darrel Royal - whose son, incidentally, was named 'Mack'). If this happens to be the case, I plan on taking all of the credit.

In closing, please enjoy the near-religious-fervor overcoming the crowd after the win; this is a video of the Longhorns fan singing the UT anthem...under my breath, I was singing MC Hammer's Can't Touch This, in my small effort to sing-along.

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Friday, November 13, 2009

Hellos from Malibu

My camera battery died, shortly before we began our drive along California's Highway 1, and so this is the only video from our California Roadtripping. In fact, the entire photo set (to come) of the drive currently sits on disposable cameras, so I am excited to see their outcome.

Once stories from Austin are wrapped, I will write a few short pieces about California. Enjoy xox.

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Friday, August 28, 2009

Carnivàle Lune Bleue

I wish to travel with the carnivàle, any carnivàle. Only, unfortunately, I'm not talented, so this is not at all a possibility. Instead, I can live vicariously through trips to random carnivàles, the world over.

sign

L and I spent nearly six hours at the Carnivàle Lune Bleue, I coveting all who worked there and the undoubtedly sexy and hedonistic lives they (must!) live. Everything about this particular Carnivàle is sensual, seduction dripping off of every costume, southern accent, musical instrument, and constant sense of freak-show danger and threat.

The first three people we met were a belly dancer, a little person (their language, not mine) and a woman atop stilts. The music was burlesque in flavor and floating past our taste buds were clouds of popcorn, cotton candy and candied apple sticky sweetness. I was immediately stoned on happy and couldn't stop laughing the entire night through.

Our first stop was at Carnival Diablo, where we saw a woman jump over shards of glass, lay atop a bed of nails and be beheaded; where a man drank boiling water, pounded a nail through his nose, ran a hook through his (unusually large) tongue, hooked it to a mesh bucket of stones and raised the stones from the ground; where another man bent a steel rod with his teeth, had darts thrown at and tacked into his skin, sat in an electrical chair, placed his hand in a mousetrap, smashed a can of dog food over his finger (if ever there was a true fetishist, it is he...); and, where a third man swallowed swords (at which point, L started coughing in solidarity with) and fire.

Nikolai Diablo (the MC) was derangedly sweet, making me unsure as to whether I should cry or smile when he chose to focus on me while someone prepared something behind him. He pointed me out and then just stood at the edge of the stage and stared...and stared...and stared...before he stared a little more. He later came over and gave me the "head of the bottle" that he broke into pieces in preparation for the Countess who would walk through the glass. No surprise, he handed me the "head" from the crotch of his pants.

No matter that L and I laughed our way through that which didn't make her gag, this is not a show for children, but one which I highly recommend to the rest of you.

Running out of Diablo, we rode the carousel and the old-fashioned ferris wheel before we skipped into the Cirque Maroc tent. While on the Ferris Wheel, I took this for you, so that you might join us on the ride:



...and while on the carousel, we attempted to take pictures. Have you ever tried to do this? It is, to say the least, tricky as you are never at level, hence this wonderful photo of L and I looking as though she is two storeys beneath me:

l&I

Cirque Maroc is a visual and auditory feast, with two MCs, one of whom I wanted to bring home and make my best friend (the slightly pudgy funnier, softer, cuter MC). It was, much in the spirit of Cirque du Soleil, an absolute wonder, with two women of particular note: one who plays with / slides up and down / contorts around a hanging rope, and another woman who creates majic when her body collides with a hamster wheel for humans. I know it's not technically a 'hamster wheel', and it is in fact a 'german wheel', leave it to the Germans to come up with what is possibly a torture instrument or a fetishist's fantasy a rather massive rolling wheel made for people.

L had her fortune read as I made fun of the cards ("...are those refugees crossing a river? Is that a British 'bobby'? Is your fortune teller high? Do you believe this shit? I think he's high...awesome...") and sat in the bus. This bus. Which still runs. And is, in fact, the real bus from the Nightmare on Elm Street films:

bus

We ate dinner beneath the tent, at The Cookhouse, L feasting on thick orange soup and I on Moroccan chicken while listening to The Unsettlers, whose music reminded me of the genius that is Polish punk band Gogol Bordello. I was mesmerized by the combination of their music, the cool air, the spicy food, the woman on stilts, the man playing with fire, thinking to myself that these people must be having sex with one another randomly and everywhere and all at once and what a strange and free and unusual and extremely seductive world that is the Carnivàle.

I loved it.

And to perfectly illustrate the strange weather one walks into at the Carnivàle Lune Bleue, watch and listen carefully, with particular attention paid at around the 56 second mark:



Two special shout outs to two of the carnis, first to the woman wearing a hat and glasses ushering us into the Cirque Maroc tent, you are hilarious and brilliant with your stuttering naivete, and I can't help but wonder if you married your cousin who is also your mum's uncle and best friend, and to the young gentleman who runs the shooting game, you are simply perfect at your job.

Two further recommendations: (1) go immediately; and, (2) then come again next year. I most definitely will.

**********

Find the official Carnivàle Lune Bleue site here, please.
All photos from L & I's adventure found here.
Carnival Diablo
Cirque Maroc
The Unsettlers (they are brilliant and I can not stop listening to their cd)

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Wednesday, December 12, 2007

The Red Sea Dispatch (no.1)

Hi & sorry for not blogging sooner! I’ve discovered that I suck at blogging while on holiday…

Long story short, the longer of which I will eventually write about (within the coming couple of months, I’m certain): A part of this trip has been to snorkel in the Red Sea. If you really must, please visit this page, in order to locate me…on an atlas.

I’m not much in the mood for long entries, and so have decided to video blog instead. If, for some reason you can’t see the three videos I’ve posted below, you can see them on my spazzy femalecanuck youtube channel linked here.

Video no 1: The view from our hotel’s (Sofitel) gazebo that overlooks the Red Sea. Mama waving. French people being athletic.



Video no 2: Walking toward the Red Sea. A completely random and unrelated story to pictures of chicks? or chickadees? & Wearing a flip? flop?



Video no 3: Me: sun burnt and with yasmine in my hair. Waving away flies. Talking about scent. Making you listen to the waves.



I’m off to the Arabian Gulf for some scuba diving. I promise to post more videos and idiotic narration (with a lot of ‘uhm’s for good measure).

To those who have asked for photos, I’ve yet to post any, but I’ve taken around 200 already. They’ll be along within the coming little bit.

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