Catching Up

I seem to have nothing to write that even I am interested in reading these days! But my schedule has been otherwise full, so perhaps that's why.

The TEFL certificate is progressing more slowly than I would like. It's boring! And the site contains grammatical errors and ambiguous instructions (interesting, given they're trying to teach me to teach English). I'm still plugging away at French and German on Livemocha, too, where ahtapot has been correcting my homework. I'm grateful he found me, because he gives much better feedback than anyone else so far. Unfortunately, I am at a plateau with vocabulary. I can't seem to retain new words as well as I did before, and I still screw up the prepositions. Arrgh.

Other than that, in the past week, I've:

- Watched my cousin's husband perform standup. He had been doing more corporate gigs, but they're cutting down on the live entertainment these days, so he's back in the clubs.

- Listened to my dad's golfing buddy play the drums. He plays jazz fusion, which has complex jazz rhythms combined with asian melodies, or asian rhythms combined with jazz melodies, and a considerable amount of contrasting counterpoint, plus some traditional instrumentation... not always easy to follow. All the musicians playing that night were incredible, though.

- Visited with an aunt and uncle who came up from So Cal last weekend. My aunt was giving one of my cousins a hard time about his sister not holding her own financially and sponging off him when I arrived with Piglet. I let Piglet loose, and she created enough excitement that my aunt let my cousin off the hook for awhile.

- Watched Harold and Maude at the Castro Theater. Bud Cort was there and did a Q&A after the show. There was also a heckler who made a few rude comments and let out some annoying whistles. He shut up when people yelled at him, though. As soon as the lights came up, the SFPD hauled him out, which was a complete overreaction on the part of the management. First, no one from the theater came in to intervene first, they just sent the police in right away. Second, he'd already calmed down by the time they showed up. Third, you couldn't hear a word Bud Cort said, because they were still dealing with the guy several minutes later. I lost a lot of respect for the Castro Theater management.

- Watched my Fuji finePix 6800Zoom die when I whipped it out the other day. I polled a few friends about replacement possibilities, then headed to Circuit City. I bought a Canon PowerShot SX110 IS, which is smaller, lighter, allows more control, and takes standard AA batteries. It is also made of cheap plastic -- I predict it won't last nearly as long as the old Fuji. I should return my dad's D50 now...

More activity in one week than I've had the last month. No wonder I'm a little sick tonight! I'm trying to keep up with everyone, though.