Knitting, belly dance, other stuff
Apr. 28th, 2005 11:47 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
thebratqueenIt's a bright and cheery day in TBQtown. People seem to have enjoyed the latest ep of ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
ats_nolimits, to which I say thank you =)
Tonight is belly dance class. I'm quite looking forward to it. I had to miss last week due to martian death flu. Here's hoping they haven't leapt ahead again with the choreography.
Having recently finished Snake Hips, which is a non-fiction book about a woman's experience as a beginning belly dancer, I find myself coming away from it with mixed emotions. I liked the beginning but felt it petered out at the end. The main problem being that the woman doesn't really seem to change at all. She starts out an insecure co-dependant mess and she ends up an insecure co-dependant mess. About the only difference is now she has costumes.
Though it must be admitted that I do read the book with a tiny bit of jealousy as she's down in Virginia and talking about this apparent wealth of belly dance culture to choose from, whereas I, who am 45 minutes outside of NYC, am in a cultural black hole. There's a few meager cabaret offerings in my home town, there's my tribal class which is 45 min away (not in the city) and another half Tribal half something else class about 50 min away in the other direction and that's it.
Sure there's virtual communities and such, but I find myself missing the chance to really connect with other belly dancers. There's an especial irony in this since I do tribal. We have but a wee tribe going in our class, but other than that we're a bit lonely. We can connect with other dancers sort-of kind-of but there's enough space between us and NYC that it's not quite the same thing. Kind of like the difference between the cousins you hang out with all the time and the cousins you make polite and stilted conversations with at wedding receptions.
I'm feeling the same way for knitting. I tried looking up SnB and Meetup groups in my area and yet again there's a void. There's stuff, sure. But it's two tiny little groups whose members seem fairly lackluster in their participation. I've tried sending feelers out to see if they're even alive and so far results are inconclusive.
And what's strange about all this to me is that I live in a fairly populated area. It's 'burbs, sure, but it's just the right distance and connection to NYC that we're basically a little offshoot. We get a lot of concerts and performances here that happen in the city, for instance.
Though maybe that's the problem. Maybe as an area we're too connected to the city and if it's happening there nobody sees a need to do it here. I dunno.
Anyway, that's my lonely lament of the day. I am a group of one! Wah!
Knitting-wise I am trying my hand at circular needles now. Lemme tell you, when they say mind the gap they're not kidding. I gotta go back and research all the tips and tricks I ignored previously for how to deal with the gap that comes up when you join one end of your knitting to another. I remember something about casting on more than you need and doing a k2together, but I'm not sure when you're supposed to do that.
(See? If I had a group I could ask somebody!)
ats_nolimits, to which I say thank you =)Tonight is belly dance class. I'm quite looking forward to it. I had to miss last week due to martian death flu. Here's hoping they haven't leapt ahead again with the choreography.
Having recently finished Snake Hips, which is a non-fiction book about a woman's experience as a beginning belly dancer, I find myself coming away from it with mixed emotions. I liked the beginning but felt it petered out at the end. The main problem being that the woman doesn't really seem to change at all. She starts out an insecure co-dependant mess and she ends up an insecure co-dependant mess. About the only difference is now she has costumes.
Though it must be admitted that I do read the book with a tiny bit of jealousy as she's down in Virginia and talking about this apparent wealth of belly dance culture to choose from, whereas I, who am 45 minutes outside of NYC, am in a cultural black hole. There's a few meager cabaret offerings in my home town, there's my tribal class which is 45 min away (not in the city) and another half Tribal half something else class about 50 min away in the other direction and that's it.
Sure there's virtual communities and such, but I find myself missing the chance to really connect with other belly dancers. There's an especial irony in this since I do tribal. We have but a wee tribe going in our class, but other than that we're a bit lonely. We can connect with other dancers sort-of kind-of but there's enough space between us and NYC that it's not quite the same thing. Kind of like the difference between the cousins you hang out with all the time and the cousins you make polite and stilted conversations with at wedding receptions.
I'm feeling the same way for knitting. I tried looking up SnB and Meetup groups in my area and yet again there's a void. There's stuff, sure. But it's two tiny little groups whose members seem fairly lackluster in their participation. I've tried sending feelers out to see if they're even alive and so far results are inconclusive.
And what's strange about all this to me is that I live in a fairly populated area. It's 'burbs, sure, but it's just the right distance and connection to NYC that we're basically a little offshoot. We get a lot of concerts and performances here that happen in the city, for instance.
Though maybe that's the problem. Maybe as an area we're too connected to the city and if it's happening there nobody sees a need to do it here. I dunno.
Anyway, that's my lonely lament of the day. I am a group of one! Wah!
Knitting-wise I am trying my hand at circular needles now. Lemme tell you, when they say mind the gap they're not kidding. I gotta go back and research all the tips and tricks I ignored previously for how to deal with the gap that comes up when you join one end of your knitting to another. I remember something about casting on more than you need and doing a k2together, but I'm not sure when you're supposed to do that.
(See? If I had a group I could ask somebody!)
