Weekly Update

Good times had by all,
This week I had the opportunity to visit the Country Fair with Autumn and her family.
It was a perfect day, with plenty of sunshine and events to fill the afternoon.
Autumn and I got into the fair with work passes before all the crowds showed up. It is a totally different experience to be behind the scenes and see the whole event for what it is, without the huge groups of people.
The first event we hit up was a poetry slam group from Eugene. There were about 8 acts that went in turn sharing their work. The highlights included a man who did a Shakespearian rendition of a tale of love lost on account of Ninja Chipmunks and zombie crows, complete with theatrical death scene.
He was the best part for me...
And on a side note, there happened to be a pair of signers who joined the event to translate the poetry as the presenters went along.
I learned that one of the longest words to sign is Jellyfish...
I heard about how Jason Webley had messed with the poor signers during earlier fairs, by ending every statement with the word jellyfish... just to slow them down.

On another note about signers... God love them...
I had one unusual observation while watching the poetry slam events...
During one poet's contribution, one the female form, I noticed the signer doing overtly obscene gestures, licking her lips, and flicking her tongue in a seductive manner at the other signer...
I only looked at the signer in the first place to avoid looking directly at the speaker who was telling such a graphic story in the first place...
This lead me to wonder if there is a second component to signing that helps to portray the speaker's tone and intent...
I guess understanding how a story is meant to be interpreted is just as important as the content, I just found the additional flurishes were definitely off putting and a little on the strange side...
I wondered how the 10 year olds in the front row next to the signer felt about the whole scene...
That and it seemed as though the only people in the audience who could interpret the signals where the signers themselves... Who is to know what they were actually talking about...
Like Star Wars, translated into Japanese and then back into English again.

After the fair, our crew headed back out to the car, hoping to beat the rush of people making their exits in a similar fashion, only to realize that the battery was dead and wouldn't start.

The brilliant group of young adults that I was with put their heads together and quickly came up with many fantastic plans to remedy the situation... Ending with me finally flagging down a fair worker with a radio and getting a OCF van to show up and jump the car.

Initially, as I went out on my mission to flag down strangers and enlist the assistance of others I assumed that the rest of the kids in my party were doing the very same thing. I thought of the embarrassment I would experience upon eliciting assistance and finding that the car had already been revived and that my team had just been waiting for me so we could leave... This was not the case...
I walk over to the car to inform them that help is on the way, only to discover all of my comrades lying on the ground almost under the car in search of shade from the sun overhead. They had pretty much given up and just accepted their fates....

Glad to know that in the case of emergencies, my team is a solid crew that bands together when things get tough and really applies themselves when it counts...
Or at least they were smart enough to stay with the car and not wander off into traffic...
After seeing the display of heroism I am just surprised they didn't manage to get run over by a horse while wandering around aimlessly.

So disaster averted, and back on our way.