Pieces of October

Text goes here.

Nah, I should really throw a quick something to go with the images.

I put a stop to the whole “condensation” series because I no longer had to catch up. Only took me four posts and fifty-five photos to tell all that’s happened since the end of July and until the end of September. I hope I don’t lose track again, or at least not two months’ worth of track.

As is usual with the world, the Christmas ads came early. Not as early as July, as I think has been the case in the past, but starting this current month. October 31st is yet another day for us, as things such as Halloween and Samhain are generally not observed here, so all businesses go straight for the December holiday offers.

My nephew started school yesterday (Tuesday). Well, pre-school. Not sure what level he might fall into, as he is just one year of age. The point is that, with his being at that place for most of the day, not as many schedule adjustments are required in order to take care of him, and I get a bit more alone time, which is good. It’s good because it’s only when I’m alone that I feel like cleaning up (which I did the Sunday before last) or doing a bit of work and I’ll be able to do some things until college starts up again.

Speaking of college, it seems as though I just have to assume that my monograph request will be accepted and I’ll only be informed of anything if there’s something wrong with the request. I was told last month that I should call to check the status of my request and they said that they were still getting those and had not yet begun going through them. At the bottom of the form I had to fill, it says that a list of accepted requests will be published on the web site, so I’m checking it almost every day.

What else goes here … okay. To save me a bit of time, I’ve added most of the web sites that I check every day into Google Reader. I only had a handful of those before but, now that they’re all there and that I can see the number of unread articles, I realize how much time I wasted by visiting them separately, even when there was nothing new. Serious waste.

As I mentioned before, I cleaned up a bit. I was alone in the apartment, and my brother had organized his side of the closet (yeah, we share the room), so I decided to do my part and tidy up my site of the bookshelf. My mother came home as soon as I was about to start, so I gave up on it. She had brought this iced coffee thing that I hadn’t tried before and, besides being incredibly delicious (Droopy liked it, too), it seemed to have given me enough energy and motivation to clean up … one quarter of my side of the bookshelf. Surprisingly, that’s all it took to fill up that huge garbage bag. It was so full of old college work –drawings, paintings, illustrations, even old notebooks that I had recycled from school– that I had no use for that I couldn’t even tie it closed.

In addition to that, I’ve also begun deleting things from the computer’s hard drive. Not random things, because I’ve not gone crazy (yet), but I’m getting rid of things I’ve downloaded over the years and are just gathering digital dust. It’s surprising how much unnecessary junk has accumulated without me caring much, and how I don’t miss them once they’re gone (since I didn’t notice them much, anyway). One can never have enough free hard drive space, and …

Wait, I said I would write a quick something. How little do I know about the “quick somethings” that I write, after more than a hundred posts.

Here are some photographic highlights of my October.

That’s the end of October’s posts, I think, and it also happens to be the end of my photo folder, as that last image is also the newest one worth showing.

I don’t expect much else to happen for the remainder of the month, so I decided to publish this now and continue to sleep through what’s left of it.

Perhaps November will bring along something interesting …

Condensation, part three

August again.

The whole college thing ended, at least for the year, and I was home free. I was put in a situation where I had so little to do and so much time.

Yeah, sure. I updated my work for the graphic design class and e-mailed it to the teacher, but that was it. Nothing else to do. Nyet. Nada. Zilch.

I loved it. After much mental exhaustion caused by the constant worries about delivering works on time, and making sure they were perfect, I would get my much-deserved rest … but I didn’t stop worrying right away. I still had to wait for my grades to be published. I slept the weekend away and was met with the pleasant surprise of having aced all three subjects. The last three college subjects that I would ever have to take.

Speaking of surprises, we gave my mother a surprise birthday party on the 18th. The party was at her workplace. She works at a massage place. Not that kind of massage place, but one where blind people do massage therapy, run by a government board for the visually challenged. I had never been to her workplace before, and had little choice but to go, with her being my mother and all.

She was shocked, for sure, when she saw that friends and family quickly gathered and arranged everything while she had gone away on some errand. I have to admit that I don’t know many blind people, and I felt a bit uneasy at first, sitting across an entire row of them as they laughed and joked around with their friends and co-workers. As always, I was in charge of the camera and, again as always, took me a while to gather the confidence to stand up and randomly aim it at things. The distraction keeps my anxiety down.

The party was just a short-lived gathering and people started leaving shortly after having their appetizers (an odd mix of snack foods with some traditional stuff thrown in) and the cake-cutting part. In the end, I was put in charge of … the cake. There I was, at night, on the front seat of my brother-in-law’s car, with half a cake, still on its big tray. I’m a big fan of seatbelts, but this time I would only count on a few layers of dough covered with icing to break the impact in case of sudden stops.

Thankfully (and to the disappointment of those in the back seat), such a thing never happened. At one point, there was a public transport bus stopped next to us while the usual vehicular chaos gave us a chance. My window was rolled down, and I had a big cake on my lap. Paranoid as I am, I thought one of the passengers looking at me would say something, or spit in my general direction. Then, we started moving again.

That was it … and that’s pretty much it for August. Like I said before, I had little to do and far too much time. Most I did for the rest of the month was grab the camera and make a few shots that, to my eyes, are somewhat interesting.

All right. Run along, now. But, before you go, why not look at that SocialVibe thingy on the right? It’s not a fancy ornament, you know.

A longer night

Following from the previous post … the power company had told us that things would get back to normal at around 5:30 in the afternoon. After much waiting in the living room, I sat on the rocking chair in the balcony, a chair that’s probably much older than I am. Anyway, I waited, and just at the time when we’d get our power back, I heard a loud BOOM! which came from up the street. Some people who were passing by our building looked back to see what had happened, but I didn’t bother going out to check. After all, we get all the luck (not!).

So, Leoni left, my sister arrived and we (nephew included) sat in the balcony as we waited for others to get here. My sister called the power company so ask about our service. My mother did the same, and they both repeated this action every time we ran out of things to do, talk about or make fun of. Something had happened, and we were going be left in the dark for much longer than expected. Yay.

The only one who seemed very amused by the situation was my baby nephew, who is easily entertained. I still held on to the camera, and was looking for things to photograph. At the same time, my mother wanted me to make photos of the nephew laughing. Good thing they no longer ask me for that, as it’s more than enough to have an actual baby at home in addition to dozens, hundreds of photographs that no one looks at once they’re out of the camera.

As we had to save our backup power, we had to keep all the lights off. No one felt like cooking in the dark, so we ordered pizza. Delicious pizza, which we downed with Red Rock, a local brand of raspberry-flavored soda (or pop, for those who call it that). We didn’t have ice for it (everything melted!), so we ordered the coldest they had. The cold eventually went away, but we didn’t mind and gradually finished the two-liter bottle before midnight.

After dinner, most of us went back to the balcony for a while, and I was eventually left alone with the camera. I didn’t want to be anywhere else (in the apartment, of course) because I couldn’t bear the heat. Eventually, it started raining, with some thunder and lightning here and there. I tried my best get a good shot of the rain at night (using the flash) but I didn’t get much of a result. After a long while, and close to midnight, my mother told me that I shouldn’t be in the balcony at such an hour and I was forced to be inside.

I’m not sure how everyone else managed to sleep with the uncomfortable heat. We had to keep the fans off, of course, and having the windows open didn’t help much. I stayed in the living room for a bit, and took a picture or two. My sister came out and decided to sleep on the living room floor (on a blanket). Before I made the decision to go to bed, because I just didn’t want to sleep, I noticed that we had a bit of running water again, so I filled up every bucket and large container I could find, so others wouldn’t have to in the morning.

Thankfully (?), the power came back at about 9:30 in the morning. Turned out to be a 27-hour blackout, and some of our refrigerator food had spoiled.

Strangely, the power bill keeps coming higher and higher. More and more, it seems to me that they charge us extra for power outages. What a way for things to work! Wouldn’t you agree, reader(s)?

Two nights

First post of the year, yay!

The last two nights did not completely suck, so I guess I’ll just write about them. Fully illustrated, as usual (meaning there are photos to click on).

New Year’s Eve

Ah, the old year ends, the new year starts. Happy family time, usually. As with every past year for the last three or four, I was home with my family. I’d use bigger numbers, but there have been a few interruptions in that tradition. This one time, my brother and I stayed at home, each one in front of a TV set, while the rest of the family celebrated at some social club. Not as enjoyable as it usually is, but I didn’t want to start a new year at that place again because past experiences were dull (and I didn’t want to miss the countdown … we don’t seem to have good countdowns here!).

Anyway, as I said, I was with the family. Well, most of the family. For the first time ever, my sister wasn’t with us. She was at her in-laws’ place, with her husband. There were no guests this time, so it was just four of us, each one waiting for the new year in a different way. After a great dinner (lasagna, salad and some fancy icewine), my brother slept, my father watched TV, my mother was probably getting the drinks and the glasses ready, lighting all the candles and making some calls, while I watched the New Year show thing, hosted by Anderson Cooper and Kathy Griffin. I would’ve watched the New Year’s Rockin’ Eve show but, somewhat disappointed, found out that Dick Clark wasn’t going to be the host (although it seems he was there for the countdown, I must’ve have missed it). So, instead of going back and forth between the two shows as in past years, I stuck with just one.

As I watched the interviews, musical performances and footage of other countries’ new year celebrations, I also listened to Practical Lunacy and its special New Year’s Eve show. As both this show and the one on TV are New York-based, I’d receive the new year one hour ahead of them, so I would be watching the ball drop at 1:00.

Ten minutes before midnight, I got away from the TV and radio shows and went to the living room. As I mentioned before, we don’t have good countdowns here (the clocks on the local channels that have one seem to be minutes apart from each other!). So, we just relied on the neighbors. Not our next-door neighbors, but the whole building. As soon as we heard them cheering and yelling Happy New Year!, we hugged, made our usual toast with our glasses filled to the top with cider. A few minutes before midnight, my mother burned incense and coal in an old can. After midnight, she went around (and even outside), carrying said can, spreading the smell of incense all around the place. While she did that, I grabbed the camera and took the photos you see here. I also got a call from my sister, who wanted to congratulate us.  That makes up for her absence, I guess.

When the whole thing had passed, I went back to my room to resume the watching/listening of the shows. When the ball finally dropped, it seemed to me that there wasn’t as much confetti in the air on Times Square. There were the usual kisses and hugs, the four-mile marathon and, of course, the fireworks. A few minutes later, I heard the countdown on the radio show (which ended shortly afterwards). My neck had been killing me for the last few days, so I gave up on all that I was doing and went to bed.

Bingo night

The first day of 2009, less than six days before my vacation ends. I woke up with much of the neck pain gone, had some the previous night’s lasagna for lunch and watched TV during the whole afternoon. I was glad to see that Scrooged, one of my favorite holiday films, was on. I hadn’t watched it in a long time, and I must’ve missed any airings of it in December, so watched until the end.

Before the movie ended, some people came to visit: my aunt and my uncle. They were going to spend the rest of the evening here. I wasn’t feeling very sociable, so I waited for my movie to end before greeting them. Since everyone else was in the living room with them, I was left with little choice but to join them. Turns out that they were here for bingo night. We had been planning a bingo night for a while but this, of all nights, was finally it.

Shortly after I joined the visitors, my brother’s girlfriend came along. Counting the baby, there were nine of us in the living room. Droopy,the dog, was walking around, being Droopy. He’s the only one of the four who somewhat tolerates visitors, so we let him stay outside while the other dogs are kept away.

The game started, with each game getting a RD$5 bet from each player, three cards per player. As you can probably tell from the photos, we used beans for marking the numbers. We played five or six hands, one of which I called (the numbers, that is, and while still playing) and two of which I won. It was a fun time, because we were all making jokes about which numbers we were waiting for, what numbers represented (at some point, I said a number, followed by uh … someone’s age, which got a reaction from that someone), and our lousy choice of cards for each hand that we lost. The last hand was a double-bet hand, as the first two guests were about to leave (and, as they jokingly said, they needed some cab money).

In the end, I had more than what I started with and had an unexpectedly fun time. I hope my two wins are a sign of my luck changing, rather than just a good choice of bingo cards. As the end of my college time approaches, I really need things to change for the better. Luck is a good first step for that change. I’m counting on everything else to follow.

So ends this long first post of the year. Congratulations if you read it all. Now, go away.

A long-unexpected reunion

This past Friday was the annual family reunion for my father’s side of the family. I would’ve appreciated if my mother had let me know about it earlier in the day, or the day before, rather than three or so hours before said reunion would commence.

One of my aunts is a nun, and she has worked (and lived) at various schools, mainly those for underprivileged children. Anyway, it turns out that the reunion was to take place at the school she works at (and lives in) currently, as opposed to another aunt’s apartment where the previous two had taken place. It’s a Catholic school, naturally. I didn’t see it as that big a deal, as I was just going to be another attendee in a group of thirty-some-odd relatives.

The school seemed to be in another world. It was in a part of the city I had rarely (or never?) been to. The streets were initially very crowded, with people getting their end-of-year shopping done, or just looking for a place to hang out on a Friday night. After much turning around in the dark streets, we finally made it to the school. A dark, ominous place with no noticeable signs of life. We stopped at the front entrance, only to be redirected to a side-entrance where we would be able to park inside.

Once inside, I noticed that the place wasn’t as devoid of life as I thought. Several windows were fully lit, while the rest of the school remained dark. It’d be a great setting for a horror film, especially if a power outage followed. Fortunately, none of that happened, and the reunion took place on the ground floor, under some very dim fluorescent lights.

Now, most of the relatives I see at those yearly reunions, I only get to see then and there, meaning that each time I see them, a whole year has gone by. As usual, I was in charge of the camera, and had to go here and there taking the occasional photo. Heck, I even recorded some videos. There was a nice chapel there, with a few ornaments in it, where I was forced to take took a few pictures of relatives next to baby Jesus.

Judging by the talk and the whole prayer thing that has gone on in these reunions year after year, it seems that I’m the odd one out. The only non-religious person of the bunch (at least on my father’s side, but I’m sure the other side is very similar). It wouldn’t be a terrible loss to them but, if this were a war, I’d be on my own side against the rest of them, including my dear nun-aunt. Yikes!

The food was good. The music was so-so, and there was little dancing going on, so the whole thing ended quickly. Shortly after we had eaten, people started to leave. I wanted to go home because I hadn’t slept well the night before. I jumped at the first chance to do so, and seven of us all took off in my brother-in-law’s car. Once again, we took to the dark streets. This time, though, they were empty. Almost as if a plague had swept away all life in this dark neighborhood. The only lighting was provided by the small stores that were still open. The occasional shadow of a person would pass us by and, every so often, the headlight from the car would reveal an actual human being.

At one point, as we approached home,  I saw a shadow in the middle of the street. The headlamp was off, so I quickly told the brother-in-law to turn it on. Apparently, this man was feeling very confident, walking in the middle of the dark street late at night (accident wanting to happen). He quickly got on the sidewalk, where he should’ve been from the beginning,  as we drove by.

As soon as we got home, I jumped into bed. Not to sleep, but because I just missed it. I had been away for just a few hours, but the change of setting between home and that school –along with the neighborhood it was in– made it seem as if several days had gone by. I thought I had just avoided some great danger and I was finally home, safe and sound, in the comfort of my own bed.

So, the point I’d like to get to with this whole post is … could we please have the yearly reunion at some other place?

Please?

Pretty please?