Right now my fireplace is filling up with water. I think this might constitute a call to the landlord. Oh wait he is in Korea. It could be a long rainy season. Maybe that is why the ceiling looks like a saggy old man above the fireplace. Oh got to love renting using all the new fabulous technologies of the world.
On a brighter note I just made our first weekly meal menu of our Arkansas lives. Unfortunately the Asian and Mexican food sections at the local Kroger are much smaller than in Utah and are full of a lot of “Old El Paso”. They had to make room for the frog legs and pigs feet. Jamie is dying to try them. Would masaman curry be the same with frog legs? Hmmm…
We are diving right into our school work which is fun, and for me, somewhat scary. Painting whatever I want and organizing community art projects is a far cry from sitting for 3 hours and listening to people talk and talking. Yes I do talk, and it is possible that I will get a first report card much like Kindergarten that says I don’t talk to my teacher but I promise to work on it. I have discovered my idea of learning is a bit different than what this first week was like. I might have to readjust my idea of academics or ask my professors for more independent work. We shall see. The second week might just rock my little brain and world. One thing I loved about art school was the constant challenge to the way I thought and my attempts to grapple with and form new ways of thinking and being. I hope that happens here.
Drumroll please….
And now the funny Arkansas story for the day. There are so many to choose from, I think my favorite is what I am going to call as opposed to the California Roll, the Southern Stop. If you have a better name please let me know. As it is commonly known the west coast folks are pretty laid back and the east coast folks are a bit higher strung. There is a lot of beach bumming and surfing, lollygagging and such the farther west you get. The farther east you get the more uptight, and workaholicish it gets. I guess the midsouth fits somewhere in the middle. Just in case people are getting offended I am very much stereotyping here and not in a mean way, more like a kidding/half serious way. So anywho, where I come from people are very quick about 4 way stops, 3 way stops, basically any stop in general. It has repeatedly been brought to my attention that Arkansans take stopping very seriously. Maybe I should start with the definition of a California roll= slowing to almost a stop but not quite and then quickly proceeding driving. In Arkansas they come to a sloooow complete stop and then after at least 15 seconds, continue to slowly drive. I am sure glad there aren’t round-a-bouts here. Can you imagine the chaos??? I have witnessed much more than a 15 second stop but I think 15 is about the average. Maybe we will become more Zen.
Jamie asked Zada if she wanted to go to Utah and she went straight to the front door. Sad puppy
In the next issue we will learn about uncle mike the cat.
Oh fun stuff. I'm excited to talk about Mike. This is a silly, strange, and somewhat ridiculous responsibility of ours. I'm planning some kind of execution. Hahaha.
ReplyDeleteIn Portland, people stop all the time, even when they're not supposed to. They're dangerously over courteous. It's bizarre.
ReplyDeleteYour stories are very interesting, but also convince me I never want to live in the south. I guess it's better to know that before trying it out myself, eh?
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteI think I need to tell Stephen about your post, being from Alabama, he misses the South and would probably love to hear your stories :)
ReplyDeleteI would also like to add that Utah drivers are in my opinion some of the worst drivers in the country, so I'm not surprised that you aren't used to actually stopping when it says too j/k in Utah a red light mean that 3 or 4 more people are allowed to go through as long as you are going as fast as possible without regard for anyone but yourself.