No estoy estresada, pero estoy muy ocupada. Todas mis clases son interesantes. Saco buenas notas, y necesito estudiar mucho. ¡Tengo dos exámenes esta semana!

Sí, sí, duermo seis horas como minimo cada día. Los sábados, trabajo y después voy a bailar en la discoteca con amigas. Los domingos descanso todo el día con mi gatita nueva MeiMei. ¡Holgazana, yo sé! Hace dos días que no hago ejercicio, pero corro regularmente. Como muy bien, te lo juro. ¡El hecho es que yo engordo! En mi próxima visita, ¿puedes preparar tu ensalada de espinaca? Yo la ansio.

De verdad, Marcos tiene novia, ¡ya era hora! ¿Ella va a preparar la cena para tí y papi? Estoy un poco celosa, hay una influencia nueva en mi sensible hermano. Y Mariela, ¿cómo van sus clases? ¿A papá le gusta mucho el retiro? ¿Tiene unas actividades, o no sale de la casa el pobre?

Mamá, no te preocupes por mí. ¡Yo te llamo este fin de semana, lo prometo!

Cariñosamente, tu hija, Kim

Mis cuatro primas y yo estamos en Venezuela, en la ciudad de Caracas. ¡En la noche, es muy bonita! Hay pequeñas luces a miilares en la neblina. Hay también unos grandes escarabajos que cantan todas las noches. La música es espeluznante y preciosa.

Vamos todos los días a la playa, tomamos el sol y nadamos. Comemos en varios restaurantes, y compramos unas baratijas. Viajamos de un pueblecito a otro.

Hay muchos lugares interesantes en el norte de Venezuela. Me gustan los museos y las galerías de artes. Mi artista favorito es Jesús Soto; su enorme esfera naranja está en Caracas.

No hay muchos turistas en Venezuela, por eso no hay nucho inglés. ¡Qué bien! Los habitantes son muy majos y trabajadores. La gente vende comida en la calle. ¿Qué comida me gusta más? Pienso … para el desayuno, yo como arepas con huevos y queso, y muchas veces como también los plátanos fritos. ¡Disponibles en todas partes son los grandes mangos y aguacates frescos! ¡Deliciosos!

Pasado mañana, vamos a celebrar el 5 de julio, su día de Independencia. Vamos a bailar, cantar y beber toda la noche en la plaza con todo el mundo.

Te echo de menos, Kim

Respondo a tu anuncio del periódico personal: me gustan mucho los museos y decorar las casas, ¡sobre todo la mía! Soy canadiense, pero mi familia es originaria de Noruega. Tengo treinta y ocho años, soy activa, dinámica, dedicada y muy sociable. Trabajo en una grande biblioteca en la universidad de Alberta en Canadá. Todos los fines de semana, juego o arbitro los juegos de rugby – así es que estoy desmasiado ocupada. Descanso los domingos con las películas y muchas palomitas. ¡Quiero una vida más artistica! Necesito trambién un cambio en mi mundo.

¿Necesitas tal vez un nuevo punto de vista de una fotógrafa, y una nueva amiga? Deseo ser tu amiga. Por favor, escríbeme un correo electrónico a mi dirección. Hasta pronto, Kim

Me gusta el campus de la universidad de Alberta. De hecho, la universidad tiene 100 años este septiembre. Llego a la universidad a las ocho de la mañana, ¡casi la madrugata! Este semestre tengo solo tres clases porque cinco es desmasiado dificil. Matemáticas y español son muy interesantes, pero estadistica es aburrida! Trabajo en la biblioteca como siempe, y miro la televisión.

¿Cuándo visitas el Canada? ¡Vamos de tapas!
¡Hasta luego amiga! Kim

  I like my meat real thick:

you know,

like one-and-a-half or two inches thick. Mmm.

  And I like it pink:

you know, oh yeah,

seared goodness on the outside,

but rare, raw and tender on the inside,

there, you know, right in the middle.

  Oh, and I like it hot:

you know,

flaming hot, ooo,

with all those juices running down!

  And I like it really spicy:

fiery flavour, oh yeah,

tasty tasty tasty!

gimme some of that salt-and-pepper,

if you know what I mean.

  But, you know,

I especially like my meat jerked,

oh yeah,

and some of those other rubs are real nice too.

  I do love my meat. Mmm, mmm!

facehook – a Social Utility that connects you with the people around you, for cash. You could set up events, make a list of “friends”… I checked on the web and no-one has come up with it yet.

Sorry sorry, let’s forget the whole thing, forget I mentioned it; we’re all having a good time and of course someone had to wreck it. I think someone is putting thoughts into my head while I am sleeping… must check my wall-to-wall.

I think that it is actually a front for the FBI collecting all of our personal data and especially the tagging photos … what better way to get face shots of every one who knows so and so, they can now scan faces in surveillance capture film more thoroughly… And those applications! So fun, I am a big fan of the horoscopes app!

I am going to come up with an application that compares facial features of people on facebook to animals. People can tag their eyes, nose, mouth in different photos and run it (like CSI & fingerprints) through a db of tagged animal photos from National Geographic or something like that. There may be a problem of copy right, gotta re-think that. Ah! How cool would that be though? Now, if only I knew how to write the code …

NO stealing my ideas…

Anyway, I won’t ruin the magic by telling you in detail what we did all week in order to create, but it was a great week. Pick a theme, do some prompts, learn about others’ poetry, get inspired by each other, sharing our works of art, talk about what makes it soooo gooooood, and take it farther. The poem which I posted on June 8 is something I wrote from one of Sheri-D’s prompts using Anne Waldman’s “Fast Speaking Woman” poem. The next generation of poems you find posted here will be the product of the seeds of the vision that was planted in my brain (S&G) during this course led by Sheri-D through the Faculty of Extension.

Further to the poetry in Edmonton, I was always aware of the Stroll of Poet’s Society , the Stroll (October), and the 12 Days of Poetry (January). Then later I find out that I know Jocelyn Verret-Chiasson, the former President, who put on an enjoyably intimate suite of Monday night readings at the Upper Crust for $5 – and let me tell you, best entertainment a five spot can buy you. A great evening of poetry, socializing, and dessert with coffee!! I recommend this series of events to everyone.

This winter, again, I found out too late about the Raving Poet’s Society who were having readings as well on Wednesday nights at the Casbar (basement of Yianni’s on Whyte). Ah! Next season, I am there!

Merle Haggard tab chords If anyone ought to know

There were several dancer-singers, the Doo-Wops, that really looked the part of troubled teens with nothing better to do than hang-out and gossip. Hmmm. Looked frightningly believable!! LOL They sat and sang on the main set, and as well, up in the balconies and up in the up-right and up-left stage. There was song surrounding us. BTW, the music was awesome. Really sets the mood, the music that is. I think that moving the singers around, especially up in the balconies made the people upstairs feel included as well, instead of being a person just sitting there looking down on all of the action. The singers must have had to boogy to get around, and get changed. Great job.

As for the Doo-Wops, I thought that the three song-trio leaders, Courtney, Gianna, and especially Merran, were excellent leaders. It must have been a challenge not only for the Doo-Wops to get their troops organized physically and with the timing of the singing, but a special hats-off to the choreographers getting all those people on such a tiny stage to look well spaced-out and organized at the same time. Good use of space and timing. There was a feast for the eyes and ears!

Lead roles, Mr. Mushnik (Stefan), Audrey (Breanna), and Seymour (Matt D), were done very well. I especially liked the “will you be my son” part – the two young men really played well against each other. Could have had a bit more clear enunciation of the words while singing, but the whole scene seemed natural and believable – which is most important. Audrey was a fantastic singer, simply put.

OK, the puppet Audery II. How cool was that? I just wanted to run up and touch it, especially the baby one. Just wanted to cuddle it. And what was with the three flower-pot-girl-ballerinas. That was hilarious! They were so over the top, and worth every minute watching them. I liked the setting up of the “Someplace Green” song, with the indoor-outdoor carpet and chain link fence, and sombre lighting, while over to my right are three bizarre dancers who were super-happy prancing around. Interesting juxtaposition.

Great costumes. Great set, very well thought out. I hear that Eastglen gave the original set to Scona, and Scona spruced it up. So good to share and improve. Cool. I really liked how the one brick wall literally “turns” into the Dentist’s office. And the Dentist, I don’t even remember the Dentist’s name, but he did a good job of being baaaaaad. And somehow the crowd loves him best it seems. I find that fairly interesting as well. He is supposed to be a complete and inhumane bastard, yet everyone loves him. Cheers for him. Weird. So fun to get to play the bad guy.

The lighting was well done. Hardly anyone remembers the lighting crew. Lighting is so natural that we don’t usually notice how the colour and timing prepare the feeling for the scene. You know that its well done when you hardly notice the changes.

I loved every minute of it. Well done and thanks so much to Anne and Merran for having invited us. It was indeed and unforgetable evening of theatre. And I say to myself again: this was a High School play? My expectations blown out of the water…