A bad case of Click and Clack

In two weeks Isaac Hayes will perform a free concert on the plaza south of the Dallas Museum of Art. Starbucks is sponsoring the concert, to celebrate the DMA's exhibit of Gordon Park's photographs.

My high school friend, Fuss, and I used to listen to Isaac Hayes's Shaft LP. We would drink sodas and devour Valentino's pizzas down in her basement. We would also watch tennis on t.v., Billy Jean King vs. Bobby Riggs, Jimmy Connors, Martina, Bjorn, Ilie, McEnroe, Pam Shriver, Tracy Austin, Chris Evert.

I heard on the radio that Bjorn Borg turned forty-nine today. How can that be?

Who's the dude ah doo dah doo? Drive SHAFT. What's the story on his gears? Stick SHIFT! Can you dig it? Who's the cat that won't cop out When transmission fluid's leaking out? SHAFT! Right On!

APB out for Maureen

Every morning I wake up, wipe the goo out of my eyes, start a pot of coffee, bring in the Dallas Morning News, and sit down at the computer to get my email while the coffee brews. Then, satisfied that the world is still more or less revolving and rotating the same as yesterday with Dallas under an orange Ozone Alert, I scroll through the New York Times online headlines all the way down to the op-eds at the bottom. If I'm lucky, there's a column by Maureen Dowd. When I don't know what to think about the outrageous state of the country, I appreciate Maureen's take on things. If I know exactly what I think, and am wondering why-I'm-not-in-charge-of-the-world [???], it's nice to see that Maureen backs me up.

That's why I'm so worried. Maureen has gone AWOL for several weeks now.

WANTED
Reward Offered

Come back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean...
Come back to the New York Times, Dowd Maureen, Dowd Maureen!

AARP Shock

I was a tad stunned to see an AARP magazine in MY mailbox this week. Yes, I had answered the AARP membership letter, but I hadn't really made the mental connection. Stuffed the mail into my tote bag, and went on home. Flopped all the mail out on the kitchen table for my son to sort through. Seventy-five per cent of our mail is for him, or else from the Marines still trying to snare his brothers. The few, the proud, the wasted effort!

Good grief. Don't those AARP folks know some of us still have impressionable children at home? (Of course some of those impressionable children could be over thirty years old.) The cover story is "SEX 2005: Landmark Study". Steven shuddered when he saw the cover. Old people, sex, sex, old people, parents, sex, ewwwww! Too much information. Fifty seems very old from his perspective.

Fifty seems like the entry to middle age to me, but I still haven't read the cover story. Like all the guys who used to say they subscribed to Playboy for the stories, I may just take AARP for the crossword puzzle. It's a pretty interesting one, and there's a new puzzle everyday at the AARP Magazine website. Go ahead, take a peek!

My life in theatres, part one

This is the Joyo Theatre on Havelock Avenue in northeast Lincoln. It used to have special student discount movie prices on school nights in the Sixties. We didn't go to many movies there, since it was a long drive from our house. Guess that's why it stands out in my memory that we saw "Namu, the Killer Whale" there. We had waffles for an early supper, then got bundled into our parkas. Mom drove the '54 Chevy on the snowy streets over to the Joyo.

"Namu" didn't change my life, or anything. I didn't become a marine biologist. Years later, when I took some of my sons to see "Free Willy", I wondered why family movies had become so much more unfriendly to families and often inappropriate for children.

The Joyo is still open for business. It is the home of the Nebraska Independent Film Projects organization's "Middle of Nowhere Short Film Festival".

Theatre-in-the-Red

Waiting for the presentation of the schematics for the Winspear Opera House to begin, I chatted with the retired architect sitting next to me in the Horchow Auditorium of the Dallas Museum of Art. "What is your interest in the opera house design?," he asked, after explaining that he was very fond of opera "all except for the singing".

I said I was a recent opera convert, the daughter of two engineers, an art teacher, a Nebraskan, and a fan of the High Five construction project. Some of my fondest early memories are of visiting construction sites with my dad, I told this stranger. Then I explained that my goals as an art teacher include getting kids to look at the forms of buildings and bridges, to notice steps in a construction process, to get them more visually curious and aware about the world outside their car window, and to relate class projects to our city surroundings.


Proposed Winspear Opera House
Do you think George Jetson might be flying around this building on his way to work at Spacely Sprockets??

My students are interested in theaters and stages because our program includes both creative drama and art. One of our goals is to encourage kids to continue "playing" the stories at home once class or camp ends. I love creating art projects to help kids meet that goal. In some ways, that seems to be the "calling" of my life, the theme that runs through my childhood, education, parenting, hobbies, library storytime lady, and teaching art--making things for or with kids to extend their play.

On vacation in Santa Fe last August, I was entranced by Alexander Girard's collection of miniature theatres at the Museum of International Folk Art. Then I was stunned, much like a baby seal, by David Zinn's "blood and passion" set design for the Santa Fe Opera's production of "Don Giovanni".



Our first class effort at making a Theatre-in-the-Red* intrigued the students, but wasn't as aesthetically pleasing as I hoped. I needed to rethink the project before using it again. Luckily, the popular and amazing Olivia the Pig has her own red theatre now. Olivia inspired a Flying Pig Circus art project and installation a few years back. Now Ian Falconer's Olivia is giving me ideas again! Pigs on stage! Pink pigs, burgundy curtains, and every red in between. Pigs in tutus or royal robes. Pigs in Romeo bicolor tights and poofy shorts. It has to be more fun than Miss Langley's introduction to monochromatic color schemes in my seventh grade art class. It's time for monochromatic to go dramatic.


*Theatre-in-the-red has no connection with either communist propaganda/dramatic productions, or with financing difficulties of many performing arts companies.

Blondes get consumption, too.

Listened to "La Boheme" while driving to the nature preserve for a walk this Memorial Day morning. As a former cold and starving (well, not really starving, but definitely cold) art student, I love this opera of young artists living hand-to-mouth. As the mother of teen boys, I appreciate the jokes and horsing around of Rodolfo and Marcello. As a sweet, tragic, brunette embroidery seamstress who once suffered from pleurisy, I identify with Mimi.

A dearly demented friend has loaned me "La Boheme" with Jose Carreras and Katia Ricciarelli. The music is wondrous, but something is horribly wrong! Ricciarelli is blonde. Right there on the cd case, I can see that she is sweet and tragic, BUT she is blonde. That really ticks me off. Everybody knows that tragic sopranos with consumption are brunette, especially if they embroider and are poor.

Cough...cough, cough....

In the dozen years I've been teaching art with children, I've taught beautiful young ladies of many races and colorings. It makes me sad when they almost invariably draw a princess as a blonde with blue eyes. Do only blondes with blue eyes live happily ever after? Maybe my ideas about the tragic brunettes stem from early Disney indoctrination just like theirs.

Three picture books with beautiful, generous, and wise princesses of color are listed below. They are best for students six to nine years old, as they are a bit long for reading aloud to younger children. I look forward to reading them to my students each summer.

The Gifts of Wali Dad:
A Tale of India and Pakistan
Retold by Aaron Shepard
Illustrated by Daniel San Souci


The Unicorn and the Dragon
Written and illustrated by Lynne Cherry


One Riddle, One Answer
Written by Lauren Thompson
Illustrated by Linda S. Wingerten

Winspear Opera House

Now that I have some grown-up clothes, I like to do the occasional grown-up outing. I like the outing to be free to the public, but reservations requested. It was quite splendid that the schematic designs for the Winspear Opera House in the Dallas Center for the Performing Arts were being unveiled in the Horchow Auditorium of the Dallas Museum of Art on Friday morning during my break before summer sessions begin. Have chartreuse dressy sandals, will travel! Since I bought these sandals to wear to a wedding, I have to wear them A LOT to justify the purchase.



The Dallas Arts District already includes the Dallas Museum of Art, the Nasher Sculpture Garden, the Crow Collection of Asian Art, the Meyerson Symphony Center, the Annette Strauss Artists' Square outdoor festival area, and the Booker T. Washington Magnet School for the Performing Arts. Before this decade is out, it will add the Winspear Opera House, the Wyly Theatre Center, a completely renovated Magnet School campus, and the City Performance Hall. If I visit all of them wearing my chartreuse and black sandals, the purchase will be justified. Never mind that the sandals aren't really very comfortable, or that chartreuse will soon fade as the accent color of the moment.

I loved getting up close to ponder the architect's models for the Arts District, the Flora Street area, and the Opera House. The models were made with natural wooden geometric forms, like the blocks we had growing up.

I thoroughly enjoyed Spencer de Grey's presentation about the proposed and amended Opera House design, its energy efficient aspects, historical inspirations, acoustic considerations, CAD simulations, and other Foster and Partners' projects with solar canopies.


The traffic and pedestrian flow aspects of the design need some serious reworking. I'm suggesting that a mom who has spent eighteen years in the Pickov Andropov lanes at public schools could give the folks at Foster & Partners some practical advice.

My consulting fees are quite reasonable, and my sandals are up for the task!

Sponge Mom Square Tops

Spring is sprung.
The grass is ris.
Wonder what shape your t-top is.

At the end of last summer the washable knit t-tops from Kohls, Mervyns, Penneys, and even Dillards were rectangular. What happens in the deep dark recesses of the closet over the winter months that transforms them into squares? I don't want my midriff to show! It's not a good look, but my shirts have all gone short and wide. Can I stretch them on The Rack?

NOBODY expects the Spanish Inquisition! Our chief weapon is surprise...surprise and fear...fear and surprise.... Our two weapons are fear and surprise...and ruthless efficiency.... Our *three* weapons are fear, surprise, and ruthless efficiency...and an almost fanatical devotion to the Pope.... Our *four*...no... *Amongst* our weapons.... Amongst our weaponry...are such elements as fear, surprise....

What would Monty Python do about my shirts? WWMPD?

Fat-armed and dangerous

Women of my thermostatically-challenged age group often worry that they will start looking like their mothers. This is wasted worry time, because they WILL start looking like their mothers and even grandmothers. It's a done deal.

My sister and I have a much more frightening concern. We might start having swinging arm flab like our elementary school music teacher! First thing in the morning, when other women are staring into the bathroom mirror looking for gray hair and eye wrinkles, Mary Jane and I pretend to direct the sixth grade SSA chorus. Does our arm flab swing back and forth more today than yesterday, than last month, or last year? Does it swing back and forth enough to hypnotize a sixth-grader??? Does the flab look so bad a sixth-grader will lock his/her knees, faint, and fall off the risers during the choral concert?

I don't remember much about the choral concert, except that a kid named Steve had the lead role of the duck. As a second soprano, I sang mostly, "He swam round and around and around and around..." I had a pretty voile dress in Monet cool colors and my first pair of nylons. Voile is back in this year. Fainting on the risers is not, and neither is swinging arm flab.

I had a better role in the sixth-grade dramatic presentation of "Julius Caesar by Shakespeare Adapted for Young Performers". I got to be Caesar's wife, Calpurnia. Caesar was played by the sixth-grade heart throb, Clint Dudley, with his tight jeans, million dollar smile, Roger Staubach passing arm, and Beatle boots. Still, it was tempting to lock my knees, faint, and fall off the stage, strangling myself in my bedsheet tunic ala Isadora Duncan.

If I could stay up late enough, I might find an infomercial for the Amazing Ginsu KTel Swinging Arm Flab Reducer, starring Rosie O'Donnell. Trouble is, I fall asleep singing, "He swam round and around and around and around."

No one ever tells me what's cool until it's too late!

My son is off on a trip. He spent more time dressing his iPod than packing his duffel bag. I hope he has a toothbrush. He forgot his razor, but that might have been on purpose. Last year he only packed two days worth of clothes for a four day trip. New Orleans is not a place where you want to put on the same sweat-drenched clothes you wore the day before. Even if you put them on top of the a/c vent overnight they won't have dried out.

His iPod is dressed in an elegant but understated black glove with the fingers cut off. I did not know electronic devices needed clothes! Nobody ever tells me this stuff. I can't take a picture of the iPod attire, because it is off in the French Quarter or visiting the D-Day Museum. I think it is going to be too warm on the swamp airboat tour and the visit to the Metairie cemetery.

This seems to be commercial iPod outfit, but my son is going for a more indie look:


I'm trying to catch up, but I might be too late. In the summer iPod's and other electronic devices may go to nudist camps. This is my oldest son's first Speedo from the Baby & Me swim class we took in Omaha in 1983. I can't believe it is too large for dual VCR and DVD remote controls:


These outfits for all occasions date to my ex's mid-1960's G.I. Joe doll. G.I. Joe has a fuzzy blond buzz cut, bends, and is slightly larger than Ken. I especially like the Dubya look for the t.v. remote--flight suit and cowboy boots:


Size-wise, Ken's wardrobe may fit better, but the choices are limited. Here we see what the fashion savvy Samsung will be wearing to prom, while Nokia takes the field with its drum major look:



Maybe I should get the Sousa ringtones, but I still think electronics should definitely not wear clothing:

Abducted by the Pod People

Actually, it was iPod people, male teens speaking their alien tongue, who abducted my computer. True, they didn't actually take it away. They more took it over, and my studio/office/bedroom, too, for three days.

"What are you doing?" I asked. The iPod people mumbled unintelligible phrases in their low voices. "Please give it back. Please, please," I pleaded. I was too sad and afraid to look into the eyes of my little mouse as she was forced to do their bidding.

At times during the long days, they would go off in search of large quantities of spicy provisions, letting me know from their growls, glares, and gestures that I was not to touch anything. Other times they would call me from their handheld communicator devices demanding that I perform ghastly technological chores that I could not understand beyond the words, "Click on".

It's over now. I have my computer and mouse back. The iPod people created their LAN, downloaded and copied (or vice versa) over two thousand songs into the iPod. How long these songs will sustain them, I don't know. Be on the lookout. Next time they may need YOUR computer.

Make a new plan, Stan!

Hop on the bus, Gus!*

My brother-in-law has an expression about being ready to gnaw off his left arm if he doesn't get out of a church service or meeting soon. I certainly felt ready to gnaw off my left arm during the graduation ceremony for the 1112 members of the high school class of 2005 yesterday afternoon.

The ceremony was held at Reunion Arena in downtown Dallas where the Mavericks and Stars used to play. Graduation for my middle son two years ago was held there also. My oldest graduated in the sweltering Texas Stadium (where the Cowboys still play) with the class of 2000, one of the largest graduating classes ever in Texas. That "graduation from hell" is legendary in these parts, as is the incredible traffic jam that followed the ceremony. After that hours long jam, I vowed I would never drive to a graduation again.



We went down to Reunion Arena on the bus from the senior high, which was fine. Riding the bus to and from Reunion in 2003 went fine. This time it took two full hours to get back to the senior high after the mind-numbing ceremony. Big wreck under the High Five at rush hour, but our bus driver didn't know any other way back to Plano. We finally got off "Central" 75 with the help of another bus driver herding our bus along like a stubborn dogey, but by then the alternate routes were also big jams. It was exhausting. The air conditioner wasn't cooling, passengers were sweating, fanning themselves, snoring, talking loudly, or listening to all the stomachs growl as we inched along. Worst, the situation was out of our control. In our own cars, we could battle the frustration by taking action, pitting our wits against the Evil Traffic Beast. On the bus we were just starving passengers in pinching dress shoes who hadn't eaten since breakfast. In a moment of supreme maternal sacrifice, I gave my graduate the only Starburst in the bottom of my purse. That's all the pomp I could muster under the circumstances.



I work near the High Five construction for the 75-635 Interchange. I am really quite fond of driving through the interchange and noting the progress. I'm still the structural engineer's daughter! I am amazed that such an enormous and complex undertaking is proceding as smoothly as it is, and ahead of schedule, too. I just discovered that I can view webcams facing each direction of the interchange. Take a look. Squint hard and you can see the bus. I'm the one waving out the window!

Slip out the back Jack
Make a new plan Stan
Don't need to be coy Roy
Just get yourself free
Hop on the bus Gus
Don't need to discuss much
Just drop of the key Lee
And get yourself free

*Paul Simon's Fifty Ways to Leave Your Lover

Olive the other reindeer

...used to laugh and call him names. They never let my Howie join in any reindeer games...


My dad is one lucky dude. My brother brought an assortment of taste delights from the olive bar at the HyVee in Sioux City when he visited Dad last weekend. Dad is grooving on green olives stuffed with bleu cheese, black olives stuffed with red peppers, red peppers stuffed with green olives, a blue dog over a yellow tree, a yellow dog under a blue tree, and many other gourmet Go, Dog, Go! delicacies.


My favorite part of Snapshots From the Wedding is the kids wearing pitted olives on their fingers. Nothing says "special occasion" like wearing black olives on your fingers! I really think Olive the Other Reindeer should wear olives on her antlers.

Family black sheep

I've tried to keep it secret for many, many years, but my dad learned the truth when he visited here last month. I am a crumpler.

"My ex-husband divided people into two groups, the crumplers and the folders. He was obviously a folder..." —Name Withheld, from "The Woman Who Irons the News: In Quest of the Quintessential Quirk", by Judy Reiser, in the May 2005 AARP Bulletin.

My poor father. He wonders where two parents who are both such precise folders could have gone wrong to produce a crumpling daughter. I don't crumple everything. I fold paper bags neatly. I fold clothes nicely in suitcases. I refold newspaper sections, even after I've done the crossword puzzle. I fold much of the clean laundry, although I started crumpling the teen son's underwear since it all gets heaped on the floor of his room right next to the dirty heap.

What upsets my dad is my treatment of plastic grocery bags. I wad them into the tiniest crumple possible, then stuff them into a woven container to keep squishing them further. The woven container looks like a Baltimore oriole nest, and it makes me happy to have a use for it.
No, those aren't my ankles.
This is how my parents save plastic grocery bags.

Consider becoming a member today!

I hope you have enjoyed your visit to the newest attraction in the greater Dallas Standard Metropolitan Statistical Area Arts District, the fabulous KoozMuseum of Art. Please consider becoming a member at one of the generous or merely affordable levels of support.

Sincerely,

CollageMama
Curator, Founder, and Executive Director

Zphinx Level:

Annual contributors at the Zphinx Level of $1,000,000 support the research mission of the Museum which seeks to understand the proliferation of Koozies in the late Bush Dynasty. Members at this level receive invitations to the official ceremonial unveilings of all KoozMuseum archaeological discoveries; commemoration of their support written in Sharpie on a cool beverage can of their choice; their own signed and numbered designer insulated beverage suit; and voting privileges on the Museum Beverage Acquisition Committee.


Koozhuna Level:

Generous support of the KoozMuseum's artistic outreach mission at the $100,000 level of annual giving brings the finest of contemporary performing Koozinart into area schools. The Koozoff Ballet will be this year's featured company. Koozhuna level contributors will receive their very own silver spray-painted replica of the famous Koozitiki, and a downloaded version of the Hawaii Five-O theme song.

Sustaining Level:

Contributing at the $1000 annual level, supporters enjoy the special exhibits and fine koozine in the tearoom of the KoozMuseum, also known as bean dip and banana smoothies at the curator's kondominium. This facility, featuring a rotating display of the finest known examples of Koozinian busts, is available for contributor's private parties and corporate functions. Sustaining members also receive the monthly museum e-newsletter with information about special discounts and upcoming events.

Friends and Family Level:

Contributors at the $100 level fund the actual preservation and display of the permanent collection. They enjoy reduced admission prices for all special exhibits, free admission during regular KoozMuseum hours, a 10% discount in the gift shop, and a hot glue burn named in their honor.