Saturday, October 31, 2009
Chris Pureka with Lyndell Montgomery at Local 506, Chapel Hill
I saw Chris Pureka Thursday night, and as always she was fantastic. Lyndell was playing with her again, and it's so fun to watch them feed off of each other. Here's one of the videos I took of one of Chris' new songs. I don't know the name of it, but it's fab of course. She played other new songs too, all great, coming out on her new CD in April. So long to wait!
Happy Halloween
I found the perfect accessory for my 'Merikan costume at the ABC store. (That's the liquor store for you non-North Carolinians out there)
Friday, October 30, 2009
Another entry on my professional lesbian resume
The much-truncated version of my thesis paper has been published online, check it out-
http://aad.uoregon.edu/culturework/culturework46a.html
http://aad.uoregon.edu/culturework/culturework46a.html
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
A counter to the oyster bar
So, I've found out where the African-American population hangs out- at these ECU alum parties. My roommate (my black male roommate, naturally) found out about them through a coworker and helped out at a mas "que" rade ball for an ECU fraternity. I thought, frat party? No way. But, it was actually a ton of fun, way more fun than anything else I've been to around here. (Granted, that isn't saying a whole lot, but I'll take what I can get.) There were some people in their 20s and 30s, but the majority of the crowd appeared to be in their 40s, 50s, and 60s though with all the masks it could be hard to tell. Groups of women came in with elaborate masks with feathers and sparkles, and we assume they are sorority alum groups (and will be crashing their parties too).
My roommate I'm pictured with, and myself, were the only white people there. We were wondering how that would be given the tendency of people to stay with their groups, but everyone was very welcoming and friendly. We picked a table with three other people to sit at, and quickly became friends. Our new pals told us that different groups have these parties every few months, and that people come from all over our county and some of the neighboring ones. As one woman said, there are things to do here you just have to know where to look. Well, now we know and we'll be attending these shindigs from now on. It's funny, because though the back porch crowd is very welcoming and friendly too, I always find myself exhausted from the social strain after half an hour. The roomie and I had anticipated this in the new crowd as well and only planned on staying an hour at the party, but we were having so much fun and felt so relaxed we stayed a lot longer. There was dancing, which I was excited about, but perhaps since it was a bit of an older generation, it was just in couples unless they played some type of line dance number (Cupid Shuffle anyone? Is this just popular in the south? A few of my NW friends I've mentioned it to have had no idea what I'm talking about). But even though it was more couples dancing, it was in a chill, everyone having fun kind of way, and I loved it.
Monday, October 26, 2009
Saturday, October 24, 2009
Beautiful Fall pics of the Cashie river and wetlands
I just can't stop documenting this area- it's gorgeous. I'd forgotten what a real fall looks like. Sigh. You're getting to me, North Carolina.
Carol and Neil's bachelor-lorette party
Carol & Neil had a joint party at Frankie's Fun Park (or something like that) in Raleigh. It was good fun: mini-golf, laser tag (which kind of scared me a little), go-carts, skee-ball and air hockey. The picture of Elizabeth losing to me in air hockey made me laugh so hard I cried and went hysterical. Stay tuned in a few weeks for pictures from the wedding, where yours truly will be ushering. I have requested a special sash and/or headdress designating me as head usher, so we'll see if Carol can follow through.
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
State Fair trip with the kiddos
Ready to head back to school. Almost all of our students came- so cool being part of a new school.
A-mazing
mmm, roast corn
goat race!
pig race!
Yep, definitely a Southern-specific food booth. Total foodways!
I rode the ferris wheel with a few kiddos
ew
ew again
making some kids pose with us teachers
Monday, October 19, 2009
Home for the holidays- who will be around?
I'll be in the Portland area from Dec. 22-30th. I'd love to see everyone who'll be around, so I know it's crazy advance notice, but pencil me in if you're going to be in town. And all you Eugene folk- will anyone be there in this time frame? I'd love to come down for a day or 2, I miss y'all! (Notice how y'all has become a normal part of my vocabulary again? I love it.)
Sunday, October 18, 2009
I want a kayak
I'm becoming more like my dad every day. I keep turning down the heat in our house after my roomies turn it up to 75 (granted, I'm turning it down to 65 or 60 while my dad would turn it down to 55 if he were here), and now I find myself longing for a boat of my own so I can go on the Cashie whenever I want to. Here are a few pictures from the river and the wetlands walk I took while taking a work break.
Saturday, October 17, 2009
culture shock at the bar- a folkloric study in progress
On Thursday night, I and one of my roomies went to the oyster bar in our little town. It is also the only bar, and is only open from the fall through the spring. Since we live "downtown," it is a convenient walk- perhaps 2 blocks. And by blocks, I mean small ones- even the streets are small here.
The bar has 3 rooms, a front one with tables, a side room with the "bar," and a back room connected to the kitchen. This is where most of the action is, where people sit at the U-shaped counter to eat oysters, scallops, and other seafood items. They also have cheese which you can order in 2 different sizes. This confused me- just cheese? Do people just eat it plain? Perhaps they eat it with the saltines that are placed on the bar, next to the bowls of cocktail sauce where people dip their seafood. The "bar" is in quotation marks because it is the saddest bar I've ever seen. There is no liquor license in this town (and I could've really used a cran-vodka, let me tell you), so I didn't expect much. But they didn't even have draft beer- everything is in bottles. And by everything, I mean the best you can get is Corona. They also have what they call "wine coolers," malt drinks like Schmirnoff Ice. No thank you, I don't think I've had one of those since.... perhaps I was 20?
The "movers and shakers" crowd from the back porch were there, they migrate once the oyster bar opens. They are all very nice and welcoming to us new teachers, so it was nice to see them, though I feel like I have to keep my game face on the whole time which can be tiring. I'm still getting used to walking into a place and people just introducing themselves. It didn't happen as much at this bar, since there were maybe 20-30 people there instead of 8, but it's still funny to me that I could walk into a bar for the first time and see about 8 people I know whom I've met once or twice. Oh, small towns.
The other patrons were mostly dudes, which didn't surprise me, though I was a bit intimidated to walk in there. What was a little strange is that all of the customers- except my roomie, who is black- were white. This is only strange because I'm pretty sure there are more black people living in this area than white people, but clearly they don't hang out there. And by white, I mean mostly country rednecks. We're talking full on camo gear, just got finished hunting and stopped by for beer and food. We went around 9- apparently it can get crazy late at night when some of the rougher rednecks from the even smaller out-lying communities show up. A guy we were talking to, who was cool and I wouldn't mind chatting to him again, told us that he used to work there in high school (is that ok? Maybe he just didn't serve alcohol) and there could be fights sometimes. He told us if we start hearing thick dialects hooping and hollering and yelling yee-haw to get the heck out of dodge. Noted.
There were also a few younger women there on dates, who were more dressed up, which just looked so out of place. I normally have a no-hoodie policy when I go out, but I didn't bother following it that night, and even the hoodie I was wearing seemed nice compared to the camo gear and trucker hats. The roomie and I were getting some looks, but they didn't seem hostile, just curious. Though I'm not sure if they were curious because they didn't know us, because he was black, or because he was black and sitting next to me, a white woman. Any and all of these reasons are probably true. The only other black people were 2 of the workers in the kitchen- so, so weird.
So, we were bringing the tokenism to the bar, though I don't think anyone's picked up on queerness yet. I mean, I seem to either ping people's gaydar the instant they see me, or not at all. And given the fact that I have yet to see any openly gay locals (though I've heard there is a gay minister at one of the churches) I'm going to assume that the locals' gaydar is not highly tuned. Knock on wood that no one has asked me a direct question that would force me to closet myself or come up with an awkward answer. So far, the only one has been with the janitor at school. She asked me if I had a boyfriend back in Oregon, and when I said no, asked if I'd seen anyone who had caught my eye, or if I was looking. No, and no. Simple, no more information, and when I didn't volunteer she didn't ask. I'm usually very (maybe too much, sometimes) open with people, so this is a new experience. Normally if anyone said are there any guys you've seen that you like, I'd say well no but I'm not interested anyway, or if I'd seen a cute girl I might say that. But here, especially in a bar like that, I would not feel safe. On the back porch, in a smaller supportive crowd, I think it would be ok, but in a bar full of very macho guys, I wouldn't have the guts.
That's not to say that I feel I'd be beaten up or anything, but as a new person in town, I'm going to try to keep a low profile for awhile. Maybe hanging out with my black male roommate will start rumors that we're dating- which would cramp his style, but might give me a nice beard for awhile. And yes, it depresses me that I just said that, but here you have to move slow. When I was making the difficult decision to take the job in NC, I had a great conversation with a guy who helps run NC pride. He told me that in many southern small towns, the people may be homophobic but that it's mostly out of ignorance, and they will rarely be rude or openly hostile. He advised to keep a low profile at first. And, that's also a good idea because small town southerners can be suspicious of any outsider, which I can completely understand. So we'll just see what happens. Maybe someone will stumble upon my blog- that might make for an exciting scandal.
But the best part of the night was when one of the back porch guys, who owns or co-owns a BBQ sandwich shop next door, went and got me a 1/2 pint of their coleslaw. Vinegar based and delicious. Sometimes small towns can be pretty awesome.
The bar has 3 rooms, a front one with tables, a side room with the "bar," and a back room connected to the kitchen. This is where most of the action is, where people sit at the U-shaped counter to eat oysters, scallops, and other seafood items. They also have cheese which you can order in 2 different sizes. This confused me- just cheese? Do people just eat it plain? Perhaps they eat it with the saltines that are placed on the bar, next to the bowls of cocktail sauce where people dip their seafood. The "bar" is in quotation marks because it is the saddest bar I've ever seen. There is no liquor license in this town (and I could've really used a cran-vodka, let me tell you), so I didn't expect much. But they didn't even have draft beer- everything is in bottles. And by everything, I mean the best you can get is Corona. They also have what they call "wine coolers," malt drinks like Schmirnoff Ice. No thank you, I don't think I've had one of those since.... perhaps I was 20?
The "movers and shakers" crowd from the back porch were there, they migrate once the oyster bar opens. They are all very nice and welcoming to us new teachers, so it was nice to see them, though I feel like I have to keep my game face on the whole time which can be tiring. I'm still getting used to walking into a place and people just introducing themselves. It didn't happen as much at this bar, since there were maybe 20-30 people there instead of 8, but it's still funny to me that I could walk into a bar for the first time and see about 8 people I know whom I've met once or twice. Oh, small towns.
The other patrons were mostly dudes, which didn't surprise me, though I was a bit intimidated to walk in there. What was a little strange is that all of the customers- except my roomie, who is black- were white. This is only strange because I'm pretty sure there are more black people living in this area than white people, but clearly they don't hang out there. And by white, I mean mostly country rednecks. We're talking full on camo gear, just got finished hunting and stopped by for beer and food. We went around 9- apparently it can get crazy late at night when some of the rougher rednecks from the even smaller out-lying communities show up. A guy we were talking to, who was cool and I wouldn't mind chatting to him again, told us that he used to work there in high school (is that ok? Maybe he just didn't serve alcohol) and there could be fights sometimes. He told us if we start hearing thick dialects hooping and hollering and yelling yee-haw to get the heck out of dodge. Noted.
There were also a few younger women there on dates, who were more dressed up, which just looked so out of place. I normally have a no-hoodie policy when I go out, but I didn't bother following it that night, and even the hoodie I was wearing seemed nice compared to the camo gear and trucker hats. The roomie and I were getting some looks, but they didn't seem hostile, just curious. Though I'm not sure if they were curious because they didn't know us, because he was black, or because he was black and sitting next to me, a white woman. Any and all of these reasons are probably true. The only other black people were 2 of the workers in the kitchen- so, so weird.
So, we were bringing the tokenism to the bar, though I don't think anyone's picked up on queerness yet. I mean, I seem to either ping people's gaydar the instant they see me, or not at all. And given the fact that I have yet to see any openly gay locals (though I've heard there is a gay minister at one of the churches) I'm going to assume that the locals' gaydar is not highly tuned. Knock on wood that no one has asked me a direct question that would force me to closet myself or come up with an awkward answer. So far, the only one has been with the janitor at school. She asked me if I had a boyfriend back in Oregon, and when I said no, asked if I'd seen anyone who had caught my eye, or if I was looking. No, and no. Simple, no more information, and when I didn't volunteer she didn't ask. I'm usually very (maybe too much, sometimes) open with people, so this is a new experience. Normally if anyone said are there any guys you've seen that you like, I'd say well no but I'm not interested anyway, or if I'd seen a cute girl I might say that. But here, especially in a bar like that, I would not feel safe. On the back porch, in a smaller supportive crowd, I think it would be ok, but in a bar full of very macho guys, I wouldn't have the guts.
That's not to say that I feel I'd be beaten up or anything, but as a new person in town, I'm going to try to keep a low profile for awhile. Maybe hanging out with my black male roommate will start rumors that we're dating- which would cramp his style, but might give me a nice beard for awhile. And yes, it depresses me that I just said that, but here you have to move slow. When I was making the difficult decision to take the job in NC, I had a great conversation with a guy who helps run NC pride. He told me that in many southern small towns, the people may be homophobic but that it's mostly out of ignorance, and they will rarely be rude or openly hostile. He advised to keep a low profile at first. And, that's also a good idea because small town southerners can be suspicious of any outsider, which I can completely understand. So we'll just see what happens. Maybe someone will stumble upon my blog- that might make for an exciting scandal.
But the best part of the night was when one of the back porch guys, who owns or co-owns a BBQ sandwich shop next door, went and got me a 1/2 pint of their coleslaw. Vinegar based and delicious. Sometimes small towns can be pretty awesome.
Friday, October 16, 2009
Rachel, I could watch you do this all day. <3
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
I think the wolf dead
Today we took the PSAT, so I only had part of one class to teach all day. Since their brains were fried, I decided I'd have them rewrite the ending to one of the short stories we've read and act it out. We'd done it before and they loved it, and keep asking when we'll do it again, so here was the perfect opportunity. This group chose "The Interlopers" by Saki. In the original, the head men of 2 families who've been feuding for generations over a piece of land get stuck under a tree branch when it is struck by lightning. They realize the folly of their quarrel, just in time to be eaten by wolves. My students took a different tactic, and were creative with the props, considering they prepared all this in 30 minutes. I don't know if anyone else will think it's as hilarious as me, but I thought I'd share anyway.
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
I <3 my students, they are hilarious
Weekly, my students have a list of 6 SAT words to define and write sentences with. Dwayne, one of my faves, wrote all of his sentences about himself. He never fails to crack me up. Here are my favorites:
1) Dwayne's abbs are blatant. (yes, he spelled abs with two bs)
2) Dwayne is very tangible.
3) The nuance of the girl's smile brought joy to Dwayne's heart.
By girl, I'm sure he means Keyonna. He is so in love with her, I think he'd walk off a cliff if she asked him to. Hilarious.
Also, Jackiel today asked if I was going to the homecoming game on Friday. When I said yes, he asked I was going to wear skinny jeans. I gave him a look of WTF? and ignored the question. I don't even want to think about the many reasons he may have for asking that.
Last week, in the middle of explaining something, Chantel said "Ms. Pennell, I have a question. Why, when you shake the bottle of white out, does it make that clicking noise?" As you can see, we discuss very important topics in English class.
<3
1) Dwayne's abbs are blatant. (yes, he spelled abs with two bs)
2) Dwayne is very tangible.
3) The nuance of the girl's smile brought joy to Dwayne's heart.
By girl, I'm sure he means Keyonna. He is so in love with her, I think he'd walk off a cliff if she asked him to. Hilarious.
Also, Jackiel today asked if I was going to the homecoming game on Friday. When I said yes, he asked I was going to wear skinny jeans. I gave him a look of WTF? and ignored the question. I don't even want to think about the many reasons he may have for asking that.
Last week, in the middle of explaining something, Chantel said "Ms. Pennell, I have a question. Why, when you shake the bottle of white out, does it make that clicking noise?" As you can see, we discuss very important topics in English class.
<3
Monday, October 05, 2009
I have a real room now- sweet!
My walk in closet- I couldn't get it all into the picture
How awesome is this bedroom?
One of the roomies moved out, which means a real bedroom for me! It's the master bedroom so I'll be paying a little more, but as you can see, it's totally worth it.
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