monday blues for everyone (29/365b)

a monday with only a quarter of the things we could have scheduled was plenty full as it was.

exhuasted at the end of the day.
i think i read through 1/2 page of "Enlightenment NOW"

lindy hop class itself was excellent today, although everyone in the world seemed in a bad mood all day, just little things. lindy teacher's shirt even said "mondays no. summer yes" i wasn't in a bad mood, i was just tired by the end of the day. poor centa had felix at home with her, who was also in a bad mood. and theodore also in a bad mood. at least henry was calm and went to sleep without spitting and fighting....

unsteady on wheels (28/365b)

i have wanted to try inline skates for a while now, and today brian brought me back some from the flea-marked, only one size too big ( :) ! ) just in time for me to take them for a walk with manuela. it was pretty fabulous.

Theodore giving me skating lessons

it was manuela and my "traditional" strawberry cake baking day. after dinner and before cake we went for a nice long walk. not roller blading because, well, i'm pretty unstable still.

Boredom is for beginners.
Pros last longer

more skating after manuela went home, one time around the block with each kid. by the third time round i could keep up... except for near a curb.

new bikes(27/365b)

i could have taken some pictures of some new bikes today but nope.

brian took all the kids to the used bicycle exchange today, which is really just a big random everyone sells/buys whatever they want free for all. i got a new bike, the kids got new bikes, and since felix didn't need a new bike i went and picked up henry's old one that was being used at the foerster house last year.

while the big kids were out for a "real" bike ride, felix and i walked to pick up the bike, and then walked to the opening of lendwrbl, which was too loud for us. it was in volksgarten, which is the park that is basically covered in drug dealers and gang members 360 days a year. whenever theres a festival or an event it gets a little cleared out for a few hours and then the criminal activities take over again. it's a very strange little ecoclimate

me dancing for 0.4 seconds. felix and his "new bike" and jackie and zorah with us.
this photo (thank you andi!) does not at all show how packed this place was.

i cross ocean chatted with nick about sourdough bread and art, so i had to take some photos to share with him. i guess i'll go send them to him now, instead of just posting them publicly like this.

bread ready to be taken out

art by committee

chaperoning at the chatteau (26/365b)

there was a school excursion to the nearby schloss eggenburg to see a museum installation.

all 20 kids

theodore was very excited about his renaissance collar

and there, casually hanging out on a window ledge, was a peacock

i enjoyed the art, but i was also not very enthusiastic about having to tell kids to listen to the lady giving the tour. we got back with a very hangry 1st grade class. field trip success.

There was a concert today with Theodore and Henry's choir. It took all my effort to get Henry out the door no wearing inappropriate clothes, both for the weather and for the event. He claimed to have no pants, no shoes, no shirt that worked, fit him, was comfortable or that was "right" ... Theodore left on his own. Eventually I gave in and took him in blue pants with holes in the knees and some converse sneakers. guess what? it was fine. Concert was nice. Felix listened carefully the whole time. We walked to the bus stop and just missed both buses afterwards, which meant a long time waiting, but we were all happy and in a good mood.

Jazz and strings (25/365b)

late night with manuela's cell phone

in honor of Labeeby's birthday, I drank a drink at a jazz club with Manuela, and wrote this poem:

One light
before me.
i can be seen but cannot see

light behind me
i turn to a black shadow to others
and my way becomes clear

...

A trick of the light?
mere physics?
Should it move or should i?
Do you wait for the cloud to cover the sun?
Do you stare into the spotlight until there are black spots burned onto the backs of your eyelids?
Or do you hide your eyes with your hands andstare at the red linesbetween your fingersuntil the warmth fades away and you uncover your irises to the darkness?

-irma 3may2018

when i picked theodore up from singschule i noticed he had left with a pretty dirty face and dirty hands (like earth / garden dirt) and in an old ratty stained t-shirt. we went to pick up his broken violin from the shop but the guy wasn't there. instead i stopped at a second hand store and bought theodore a new shirt for 2.20 and we went on our merry way to his opera rehearsal, where i didn't let him check in until he had washed up a little bit.

Went to a lecture about Giraffe and Jackal language and found it lacking in content and context, but it inspired me to look up Marshal Rosenberg, and I was suitably impressed. It's worth searching online and watching him give a workshop with a giraffe puppet on one hand and a jackal puppet on the other hand.

there was so much to do today that there was no way that everyone got what they wanted. there were at least 5 scheduled things that brian wanted to do, but he chose to stay home so i could go to that lecture. in fact, for example,  i was supposed to pick up theodore from his rehearsal at the opera, but my jazz evening had just started when i got a text saying he was done a little more than an hour early, so i asked if brian could go get him, which he did, but poor centa had to find a way to comfort felix who was overtired and not happy about the new situation. :(

new violin at the end of the world (24/365b)

Met my new friend Markus who plays the cello, and we played at fixing the world's problems by starting a new not-school. We sight read some Otto Siegl and made lots of vague plans.

I met with Henry's teacher, and then made dinner for Markus & his kid. Nina came too. Andi and Ronja came too, after choir. I wanted to stay and be social, but I had already arranged to take Theodore out to Lobming for his "new" violin. A chinese made 3/4 violin far away from everywhere.

we tried it out as soon as we got home. it's alright!

Tag Der Arbeit (23/365b)

finished!

Good job everyone! Canvas finished just in time. Ran to the bus. Agnes and Felix took bus with me. Mary and other kids ran there. We all got there "in plenty of time". Braved the madness at the only grocery in town that is open today to get milk. How did we manage to overlook that we needed milk?

Socialist holiday today, so what did I do? lots of work! :)

Rehearsed long and hard with my quintet, and then we relaxed with prosecco and My Fair Lady, which Barbara was seeing for the first time.

the irma-s do snacks right