So You Think You Can Dance, dance, dance...

SO excited for this season of So You Think You Can Dance. But first - weren't there supposed to be Salt Lake City auditions last night? I'm confused. I'm also confused as to why Cat Deeley is the host. Still.

What a face.



Lovely smile.

Special shout-out to our DVR. Without it, these pictures would never have been possible.

Anyway, the new search for America's Favorite Dancer is on, and for the next couple of months, I get to tune in twice a week and feel the physical pain that comes with watching amazing dancers and wishing I could move like them. As it is, my dance experience is limited strictly to a year on the Douglas High School dance team, "Danceline" (11th grade), and an hour-and-a-half jazz class every other day my senior year. Oh, and I was in a musical theater class in 10th grade, but I don't count that, because A) it was gay, and B) the teacher was really ugly and always talked about her womanly cycle. I did wear a glittery top hat and dance in a chorus line to "One" in front of an audience of about fifteen parents, though. Yes, 10th grade. Not kindergarten.

Anyway - Danceline. So, I decided I wanted to try out despite the fact that, other than 'fake-dancing' around my house for 80% of my life, I really had no clue how to move. But it wasn't for lack of soliciting my mom to put me in classes. Anyway, I ended up trying out and actually making it...I'm convinced though, that it was mostly because of the fact that the girl I got teamed up with for the audition was a really awful dancer (completely clueless, and..just...really terrible), so I automatically looked good by comparison. Either way, I made the team, and I've got a picture to prove it.

Here we are at a game, dancing a hip-hop number to "Jenny From the Block".



(That's me in the red circle. Luckily we're in our "modest" outfits here. We alternated between this outfit and another - and you should have SEEN how short the skirts were. I actually got in trouble for wearing tiny little black boy-short briefs underneath it to conceal what the leotard didn't. You could SEE the boy shorts, even when I wasn't dancing. THAT'S how short the skirt was.)

Why are half of us on the next move? Group A...



And Group B. Hm. Maybe we needed more practice.

And here's Heather.



She was HUGE. Seriously, like twelve feet tall, and SO heavy on her feet. The entire floor moved when she danced, I'm not even exaggerating - you could FEEL Heather dancing through the floor. She was a total Amazon, and really ungraceful, which was kind of too bad, because she'd been dancing for like ten years by this point. But I couldn't feel too sorry for her lack of grace, because she was really really mean to everyone on the team. No one ever wanted to be around her, and what goes around comes around, because at a performance later in the season, Heather hit the ground. She had been walking - LITERALLY walking across the floor during an 8 count, when she rolled her ankle, and all I remember was feeling the reverberations throughout my toes when she splatted face-down on the basketball court. We danced around her for a few moments until she pulled herself up and hobbled away. And the best part is that she really, actually, truly had hurt herself. She was off the team and on crutches for two months. Oh my. I might be going to hell, but this story brings me so much joy. She was such a mean person.

Anyway, I survived the basketball season and earned my letter, which has been sitting in a hat box in my closet ever since.


Every once in a while, when I'm searching for ugly pictures of myself, I come across it. And I become instantly grateful that I didn't buy a letterman's jacket JUST because I technically "lettered" in an extra-curricular activity. Some of the girls on the team did, but I would have felt stupid wearing a jacket with ONE letter on it, and no other decorations whatsoever. Plus, those things are expensive.

Abrupt change of subject - Jon's still in Madeira (til Sunday night) and I've got this weekend to myself. Again. And beyond laundry and dishes, I've got no clue what I'm going to do. He's been entertaining me with his stories from this trip, though. Apparently, his luggage with ALL of his display items is stuck at customs in Lisbon until MONDAY, because it was mislabeled. Luckily he carried all his brochures and paperwork and everything with him on the airplane, so he can still somewhat function, but he's been on the phone pretty much nonstop with his shipping department, trying to get this thing figured out. Something I learned two days ago - there's a branch of the US Embassy that you can solicit for help if your stuff gets confiscated like this, so Jon hit them up. But the conversation only lasted a few seconds.

Them: US Embassy...
Jon: I need help getting some stuff released from customs.
Them: Are you a US citizen?
Jon: .........sort of.........

He had to get someone else from his office to give them a call after that, and it must not have panned out all too well, since he's not going to be receiving his luggage in time for his convention.

Just another one of those stories that Jon would put on his own blog, if he had one.

Okay, I really need to wrap this thing up. Have a great weekend! Come visit me in Tucson if you want.