Dancing Through Life by Annette Benevento

The National Training Director for Fred Astaire Studios has written a book with pithy remarks in gray boxes. I didn't love them all. The first one is, "The dance floor is a fantasyland where everyone lives happily ever after," her feeling when she first was swept onto the dance floor.
I do like, "(In life) grace is to change as (in dance) balance is to movement" a set of analogy pairs like we get in the SAT.
She includes exercises for balance and self realization, concepts that are always useful to review.
I have it to lend out.

Providence Federation of Musicians

Cheapest ballroom night at the gorgeous Rhodes-on-the-Pawtuxcet, Cranston, $10 August 16, 6 to 10PM.
Featuring Ronnie Rose direct from Las Vegas.
No food, cash bar, two bands, one in the lobby.

Summer days

Thank goodness for dance classes! Otherwise, with the husband offshore fishing and the grandchildren visiting, I get to dance the Hokey Pokey.
For vicarious dance, SYTYCD has two fabulous women dancers ("girls" they call them) Melanie and Sasha.
The July 30 National Dance Day is DIY, or get your group moving and be on TV if you take a video.
Does my group want to be on TV? We can all do Mary Murphy's simple Salsa line dance for sure.

Everybody loves Salsa

The request I'm getting for all my classes, basic to advanced - Salsa dancing. This is a chance for me to listen to all the great music I've collected.

Usa Dance vs NDCA

Big fight there. NDCA threw USA Dance out. Dancesport is a bone of contention somehow, I guess. I am a member of both, but have no input at all.

Jacques (pronounced "Jakes")

Henry Jacques Modern Ballroom Dancing is back in print. Used copies are for sale for up to $1,550, so I guess it will sell for $75, but I haven't even made it through Walter Laird and Alex Moore, two venerable examples of scripting choreography for ballroom dancing.

Day off

My son's company, complete with three-year-olds, all went to the beach.
I had my private lesson, a really nice change.
Then I checked out Highfield's bluegrass concert, which was a terrific grassy space just downhill form the mansion, the slope forming a natural seating area to view the New England Bluegrass Band on a stage raised up by another steeper slope.
Pizza with cheerful little girls who had had naps after the beach.

Woods Hole Community Hall

A lovely venue next to the drawbridge, full moon, harbor lights. Flipside performed better than ever and we got a nice dancing crowd though only 3 couples, including us, who knew any steps. A few ladies could follow. The floor is big enough for foxtrot!
Then the trip to Yarmouth was daunting again after a day with visitors - too bad to miss the Beach party.

Summer 2011, so far

So I missed 2 free concerts, the 6 PM Thursday ones, at local downtown venues. Company with small children are happier just hanging out at Camp Brodsky, our home with afternoon sun at the pond.
Tonight - Woods Hole Community Hall for bluesy swing with Flipside.
Tomorrow - CCBD Beach Party in Yarmouth.
Sunday afternoon - Ron Gursky, then Bluegrass at Highfield Hall.

SYTYCD costuming

What is with the constant garter belt costuming on the women (girls)?
It made that disjointed dance to "Piece of my Heart" uglier. Joe said Janis Joplin was turning over in her grave, but it was just the dancers among us disheartened at the waste of talent.
The judges liked it.

2 Turkeys

"Good" news. The baby turkey recovered, so I will have 2 turkeys that my son's girlfriend named to make it more difficult for us to kill and eat.

Bistro 586

We took off once our company left and checked out Main Street Hyannis, Doug McHugh's Salsa Sundays.
A smallish space with a wood floor, fine for the number of people who showed up - just a few.
Teaching in a bar is not a great gig, but he and Kimberley seemed to enjoy it.
Joe and I liked his music, and it was a good break for me.
The 10:00 band, Highly Suspect, was eager to start. Not like most Salsa bands who are always late. In the fall, a Latin DJ will take over that time slot, they tell me.

Dance Day July 30 Salsa

Here it is in black and white, my notes.
Quick quick slow in place with "sunshine arms"
Salsa basic with arms in front, elbows bent, circling
Side breaks with head turns
Crawl to left then to right - grapevine and a swivel.
Paddle turn with 4 slows, left foot turns right, look where you were
then right foot turns left shrug one shoulder Arms have switched to 'tire boxing'
Bodofogo= forward place foot to side, hip lift Both sides. Arms alternately point forward
4 Side points= forward, point side. Timing 'and slow'. Arms slap the hips and travel up, men to waist, ladies framing body to arms overhead.
Music "Mas Que Nada" Sergio Mendes with Black Eyed Peas.

My pick of the July free concerts

Tonight, George Gritzbach at Mashpee Commons, 6 PM
Tomorrow 4 Guys in Tuxes downtown Falmouth 6 PM
Next Friday, 7/15, Flipside in the Woods Hole Community Hall 8 PM
Sunday 7/17 Bluegrass on Highfield lawn Falmouth
2PM New England Bluegrass Band
3PM Falmouth Fiddlers,
4PM 3 Cats and a Dog,
5 PM NEBgB

Books, books, books

Secretly, I am an English Major, so I made time for the Falmouth Library book sale.
I was late, in fact, they were packing up and any book left was free, so I filled a cloth grocery bag with 27 selections, 14 novels, several travel books, a French/English dictionary (back to Montreal?), a bit of natural history and memoir, etc.
The dance books, plant books and the children's books were already in a truck labeled "book-recycling.com".
The Brain, the Body, and Sport seemed promising, but was mostly about ayurvedic body types and Transcendental Meditation breathing.
The cowboy sketches included dancing, I thought, but it was just Our Hero at a bar edging in on a girl for a mating preliminary slow dance.
Good thing I didn't pay for those.
I will support the library with money another day.

Turkeys

I love the wild turkeys that are showing up everywhere, including a mother turkey Rte 195, crossing with 5 chicks following.
I am not fond of my own 2 turkeys, 2 weeks old tomorrow. One got sick but hasn't died, so I have to keep it separate from its brother and worry and get up in the middle of the night and give it more water and then wash my hands.
Keep it alive so I can have it killed in five months.

Sunday at the Conservatory with Ellen

So far so good with the summer Sundays.
A decent turnout for a busy weekend.
No newcomers except Joe's cousin and the boyfriend.
Sticky floor smoothed with baby powder. Seemingly, the AC at the Conservatory doesn't pull the humidity.
Nobody was hungry so I have a whole "flag cake" left for the 4th of July.

solo dancing

Connections are so cool. Holding hands while you do the horah in a circle, or two hands for an English country dance, square dancing with its number of choices, a country line dance crowd moving in unison. Ballroom Dance, the best.
I don't really like dancing by yourself opposite a friend while the band plays any more.

Dress Up

Working at our mother's house with my sister is good for the things she remembers, like the dressing up I used to do. That's another aspect of ballroom dance that we ladies love.
For my granddaughter I mended a satin and mesh flower-girl outfit. She is a vision in pale pink.
I do not remember a yellow flowered coronet, but Ann saw me wear it.
Doll clothes are the next phase, I expect, a substitute for helping dress her baby brudder, since babies hate trying on clothes.