Dancing

Nobody dances in this country - I mean, really dances. And when they do, it's always about something else - something else besides the pure notion of enjoying and moving your body to the music.

There's the awkward, "ironic" dancing, which many people do either because they want to make fun of the music or contain some belief that letting loose breaks their "cool" somehow. Most of the SAIC parties I attend consist of this kind of dancing, if any dancing occurs at all. Even then, it only seems to be a brief segment during the party, after which most of the attendees continue on drinking and chain-smoking.

That, and the ever-so-popular "grinding." All attention to the beat or the rhthym of the music is thrown out the window, all in exchange to see how long two people can rub up against each other fully clothed before the guy gets a boner. Basically, it's dry-humping in public, but with music in the background. It's not much of an annoyance after high school, but I wouldn't be surprised if there are people who still "grind" well into their 20's.

Lately, I've noticed that, when the rare occasion arises and people actually do begin dancing, I'll often try to dance for real along with them. However, since they're not into it, I always end up looking and feeling incredibly awkward and uncomfortable. So then that makes me an "ironic" dancer, which kind of, indeed, annoys me.

Two Insane, Comedic Performances and New Layout

In case you haven't seen my actual blog in some time, the layout, color scheme, and the banner have changed. No more obnoxiously large photo booth picture of me eating bread in a time warp.

Dressed as a beatnik for Halloween, since my Alex DeLarge costume fell through. (Note: Duct-taping two white belts to the inside of your pants and calling them suspenders isn't as easy as it seems.) We went trick-or-treating for, like, a half hour in Pilsen before we decided to head to this party over in Lakeview. Pretty good fun overall.

Tomorrow we're having another class shoot, this time with a dolly, inside a studio. Hopefully I didn't annoy anyone with my decision to switch from the "homemaker" role to the "pissed off worker" role. Actually, if I did, whatevah.

New favorite movie scene of the moment: Daniel Brühl's performance in 2 Days in Paris. Unfortunately, there is no clip on youtube I could gladly show you, so I'll leave you with a, no doubt, beautiful picture of him as "Lukas" in what was overall kind of a meh film in terms of story:

"I'm a fairy..."

Also saw Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971) for the first time on the big screen at the Gene Siskel Film Center. It's better and more appetizing than I remembered.

Two entertaining, comical performances of insane people.