Belfast/Brunswick

Today was the first community day off...meaning, we all get the same day off. We all decided to go into a town called Belfast. It is in a direction that I haven't been before so everything was new. For whatever reason or reasons, I was a little pissy. I still am today, but I tried to shake it while we were there...usually unsuccessfully. I don't think I'm meant to hang on shopping trips with the ladies. The town was quaint. The town's specialty? Crappy things to get your picture taken by. It was one of the times I regretted having my camera. First we passed a crappy mini cooper car that Jen and Deanna wanted their picture taken in. I realized the sooner I took the picture the sooner I'd be past it.

We stopped in a game store and I bought a couple board games that I hope I'll play someday...they looked cool. If I remember correctly they're called Pirateer and Settlers of the Catan...oh, and new cards for PIT (cocoa, gas, platinum, etc. instead of wheat, oats, barley...).

Settlers has some expansions that I might get if I like the game. The whole reason I even looked at the game was because they had a super fancy version in a wooden box that was very spendy (TD!).

From there I went down to the docks to take pics (see photo blog) while Deanna and Jen shopped. While I was walking I saw another cut out thing and was glad I was by myself.

I met up with Deanna and Jen again and we walked to a foot bridge...unfortunately we passed more cut outs and Deanna wanted a picture with me. I don't know why I hate these things so much, but they drive me crazy and they should all be destroyed.

I'm no dead head, but I think these are those bears.

The thing that cheered me up the most while we were in town was going to eat...and not because of the food. We went into this bar/pub to eat. They had that trivia thing and each table had one box. I got boxes for all three of us and we started playing buzztime trivia. A couple of regulars had started playing too, but they were talking to each other. You get to enter a name for the game. Jen was "Mikos", Deanna was "Dee", and I was "Terd". I was winning and once I won the entire match, the screen said "Congradulations to the winner Terd!" This overweight lady who was with her husband (who was playing trivia) laughed hard when she read that. The husband said, "Alright! Who is that?! Who's Terd!?" I told him it was my initials.

Everytime I get on the computer I check people's blogs. Here are my Cheers and Jeers:

Cheers to : Eric for multiple updates; Arnie and Sarah for pics and frequency; Emily for mentioning me

Jeers to: Savedigger...it's almost been two months, lets get in the game!

There are a lot of books in this house and I noticed one on the 18th that I had been meaning to read: Guru by Jeff Griggs. Jeff was out here earlier in the season, and he was sort of my level 3 teacher at iO. I say sort of because I had a different teacher, had to sub for a class I missed and went to Jeff's class, I liked Jeff better as a teacher and just kept subbing.

Guru is about Jeff's experiences with Del Close. Del Close is pretty much the father of longform improv. Jeff was hired by Charna to sort of be Del's assistant...take him weekly to the bank, grocery store, where ever he needed to go. I couldn't put this book down and I actually cried at the end. Jeff, kudos! One of my regrets is that by the time I moved to Chicago, Del Close had already passed away. The nice thing about Jeff's book is that it told great stories, but also, I felt like I either learned more about improv, or was reminded of things I had forgotten.

If you're an improvisor, and you haven't read it, you should.