Sure, I need to update. But in order to preserve some semblance of chronology, posting will be achingly hard to do until I tackle last weekend's convention. *Sigh* I may as well get this out of the way. Here we are then:
My activities as of March 8-9 (Saturday/Sunday)
A.k.a: The Illinois College Republican Federation Convention in Champaign-Urbana
There were only 4 delegates this year, a striking contrast to our numbers in previous years. This was due to
a) How totally lame Springfield was last year (nothing was open within walking distance of the Hilton)
b) The lack of dance (we had an 'ice cream social' cause the organizers were too cheap to hire a DJ, and
c) The flamboyant weirdness that occurred with inter-posse relations that led to all sorts of new threads in the CM Web of Dating and Shame (tm. nickd).
So no one came, and as it was there was only Katie, Matt, myself, and Tony. (note, this photo was Sunday morning--I wasn't even trying to look corporate at this point. Not shown: I am sporting Chucks.)
As is obvious from the above photo, the stunning Champagne party scene promised to us by Tom (who didn't go cause he wouldn'tve been able to booty shame A. House) was noticeably absent as we look out from our Holiday Inn room.
Matt and I hitched a ride down with Jason McCabe of the University of Chicago. I dig Jason. He's a Machiavellian s.o.b who knows what he wants, knows how to get it, and makes no illusions about who he is. He's a straight shooter: I admire that. He's wicked mean about things like loyalty, however, something that became clear to me later in the weekend. The ride was nice and sleepy, but we arrived at noon, and Katie/Tony weren't expected for another 4 hours. Since it was 60 degrees, Matt and I decided to 'check out the area', which consisted of one diner, one Harley Davidson shop, and one Speedway. I took Matt to the Harley Shop, cause if you know about my family, you know HD people are my people. Matt was amazed by the thick burly Aryan bikers with ponytails and gappy teeth. I was amazed that there are people in Middle America who are not thick burly Aryan bikers. We discovered there was such a thing as a “hair mitt”, a type of glove that one snaps over one’s ponytail to keep it from tangling in the wind. It was unisex. It was rad. Matt had to talk me out of buying a Harley biker shirt. It was like $40, but I would have looked hardcore.
Afterwards we hit the Speedway, where I introduced Matt to my love of the convenience store, something he would make fun of me for with the other delegates later in the evening. But all the cellophane is so shiny! What isn't to love? I bought my first of many Pepsis over the weekend. They were carbonatious.
We went back and hit the History Channel, since we had no batteries in our remote control and didn’t feel like channel surfing. Watched a segment about the Tommy gun, our nation's first heavy duty submachine gun which was sadly passed up by the government because of its price and so in desperation Thompson had to sell it to the public which is how it fell into the hands of gangsters and its deadly force became renowned during the Chicago Valentine's Day Massacre where 7 men or more were almost cut in half by bullets and the government then had to make the gun illegal and Matt told me that the wall the men died against in the Massacre is now a bathroom wall somewhere and I couldn't help but thinking thank heavens for the History Channel and cultural preservation!
And also, you're drunk.
Afterwards I read some of Eugen Egner's
Androids from Milk, which I would subsequently polish off in between speakers at the banquet.
Tony and Katie finally arrived and we went downstairs (after changing into our corporate get-up) for some awkward mingling. I read some more, but there was a draft in the 'atrium' (an oh-so-Latin sounding word for "lobby) so I headed into the musty arcade to heat up a bit. I was in there for no more than 2 seconds when the door opened and who should stroll in but some sixtys-ish pallid man with scraggly white hair and eyebrows with hairs akimbo like blades of crab grass. I assumed he wanted something from the vending machine so I headed to the back towards the pinball machine but he made a b-line toward me and trapped me in a corner between the pinball machine and the wall. Then with his face like 6 inches from mine he asks me why I'm in town and I tell him and he starts asking me about Iraq and I tell him I'm for war and I start doing that thing that i do where I’m talking but not conscious of what I’m saying as I desperately think of a polite way to get out of the situation and so I keep talking as I head for the door but he keeps blocking my way since the arcade is very narrow until finally I make it to the door and he asks me what I’m doing for dinner and I say I'm going to dinner and he asks me what about after dinner and I say I’m going out with friends and then before he can ask anything else I shake his hand and tell him it was nice meeting him but he won't let go of my hand until I tell him my name and so I say Mary and he tells me his is Lyle and he hopes to see me around. So I run into the banquet hall and sit down and of course Katie and Matt and Tony are horrified and offer to be my chaperones for the rest of the convention and then Jason McCabe overhears and says "Lyle? I was talking to him earlier. He's from Oklahoma, in town for business and he's been telling me about all the strip clubs he's been too" so I wipe my hand on the napkin for fear they had been encrusted with dried spunk.
Chris Foltz was campaigning for ICRF chairman. He doesn't handle stress well--as the night went on his face got redder and his hairline seemed to further recede. Paul remarked that he seemed to get more pimply as well, and the sweat poured from his body like steam on a car window in winter, fog, then drops of water that bead and shine. That was Chris. He did an excellent job of sucking up to me to get my vote, since as Vice-Chair of the NUCR's I had a vote in the ICRF elections, but my boys on the street told me he was a carpet bagger looking for easy votes, so I kept Chris guessing (I ended up voting for him, and he ended up winning in the end anyway). My boys on the street--Jason and Paul--were good about conspiring with me. Gave me a little taste of Washington, all those alliances.
Dinner was good, but dessert was rad. Apple pie--oh how fitting. With all of the American flag ties and W pins, "we support our troops" posters and elephant necklaces, there wasn't a more perfect, yet subtly ironic, show of after dinner sweets than that. Apple pie. Good heavens, its almost as if the Holiday Inn had
planned it that way!
This was our after-dinner speaker. I don't remember his name. Secretary general of something. He came over to our table beforehand to press the flesh, and Jason coyly asked, "You remember me don't you? We met at Congressman blah blah's blah-blah event. Jason McCabe, University of Chicago" knowing full well that the man had no recollection of him whatsoever, then just sat back smirking as our speaker said, "Yes of course! Jason, how great to see you again. We'll talk afterwards." Then Jason pulled me aside and said that he was a tool and a divider in the GOP and was all about power but at the expense of the voters and then someone else told me he was probably gay but I shouldn't quote him on that ‘cause he didn't know. And the Secretary General guy gave his speech and he was slick and his whole message was "it’s not being a hard worker or moral that gets you ahead, it’s who you know" and he delivered it with the precision of a telemarketer or maybe a televangelist because when one boy in the back spilled a pitcher of water the Secretary guy just rolled with it and ad-libed it right into his speech. Polished and precise like a diamond, and a total wanker. You could just tell. Not even a wankster--just a wanker.
So then I went back to Speedway because I had no more meetings to go to and also I wanted to show Tony the Muffin Tops.
You know in
Seinfeld how Elaine starts a business "Top of the Muffin to You" where all she does is sell muffin tops but she doesn't know what to do with the stumps and Newman has to eat them all? Well, someone has actually gone and produced Muffin Tops. There they were. They were out of blueberry, but they had a very pleasing-looking cheese strudel. I couldn't make myself eat them: for lunch I had taken advantage of Speedway's
2-hotdogs-4-2-$ deal, and then had a huge dinner, so I limited myself to Pepsi and some Chili Cheese Fritos so I could have a crunchy breakfast.
Marsha worked the register and she asked me what I was taking all these pictures for--where was I from?--and I said out of town and I had a website and also, I thought those muffin tops right there were funny and Marsha said--don't y'all have muffin tops where you’re from?--And I was all, no way I wish we did ‘cause those are slick and she sort of shook her head like I was crazy and asked for my web address to check the photos and Tony was like don't waste your time it’s really boring and then Phyllis, the other worker, said it sounded cool and so I took a picture of Phyllis, but only after she put her broom down. I liked those girls. They were straight-from-the-hip kind of women, and that's one of the things I really respect about Middle/Rural Americans.
And so after that I read some more and finished my book and then started Aristophanes
Lysistrata while watching
City of Angels which I love because I'm such a girl but somehow I liked it less this time. Somewhere between high school and now I lost my association of “dark-angels-bloody-lips-barb-wire” with “alternativebeauty-uniquelifeexperience.” It sort of seems a bit trite now. That said, I still find the idea of angels as black coated wanderers enormously appealing, so
City of Angels is still (somewhat) of an esthetic kick.
I went up to floor 5 for a little bit to check out Jason’s party. Stuck my feet in the whirlpool with Paul (see above photo.) (I took a lot of baths/bathed a lot of my body during the convention. If this weekend was a story, that would be symbolism. (Or at least a reoccurring image or motif (meant to symbolize the internal cleansing the weekend produced on my psyche.))) Paul was very drunk and, since we had no gin, poured cheap vodka into the tub and we bathed our feet and talked about who I should or should not vote for in Sunday's election. And I promised him if he'd run for treasurer I'd vote for him, because I liked the way he pronounces things--like an old radio personality from the 40's--he rolls and dances lackadaisically through his sentences with the weary grace of a man-of-the-world, even though he is only 21 and wears pastels and carries a cane. There we are. I stuck around the room for a bit, but there was a lot of drinking, and since the girl-to-guy ratio was about 1-to-10, and because I was tired, I headed backdownstairs to bed.
Lunch consisted of a very elaborately set meal which was in essence just a sandwich buffet--but they gave us special arrangements of cold cuts on our individual trays and nice centerpieces of bread at each table to make us think it was something better than it was. I introduced the CR's to the mayonnaise sandwich--this did not go over as well as I had anticipated. Apparently, outside of white trash, the mayonnaise sandwich "isn't done." But let me tell you something: If loving mayonnaise is wrong, then I don't want to be right.
Our speaker for Sunday lunch was much less flamboyant or interesting than our dinner one. He gave a large portion of his talk to the cause of women in the Republican Party--how we need to get out there and be leaders and prove that this party wasn't about angry white men. And this, actually, made me horribly vexed, because what I liked about being a Republican was the staunch Republican refusal to treat me as a quota: it didn't matter if I was a woman, it didn't matter what race I was, because the Republican party valued the rights of the individual and the rights of states. His entire speech succeeded in reducing me to a quota. Screw you.
Afterwards we went to the diner across the street to do some homework while some boring group meetings went on. The diner was fascinating for several reasons:
a) It was pink
b) There was a sign out front that simply commanded passing motorists "EAT"
c) There were an extraordinary amount of drinks brought to the table.
At first our waitress took our order, and we got 4 sodas. So there are 4 glasses on the table. Then, the water boy comes by and gives us each a small glass of water. We have 8. With each subsequent refill a new glass was brought to the table, until the amount of glasses became absurd. Witness the evolution:
By the end, we were having fun arranging the glasses into specific shapes.
We also had fun with the crackers, because they were brought to us krispy and from the Captain.
We tried to study, but the saga of the glasses kept us laughing to the point of tears. We left our poor waitress a big tip though--the little thing probably thought we were laughing at her. She had these great moon eyes that would well with tension every time she came over. Bratty college kids--think they know everything...
We went back to the Holiday Inn and I soaked my feet in the whirlpool (different one) and read Ivan Klima's
Love and Garbage, since I finished Aristophanes sometime during lunch. Some lady tried to talk to me because her husband was ignoring her. I felt like talking, I really did, but I get so few weekend to really sit down and read what I want that I hate having them interrupted. After an hour or so my skin was all silky below my knees and it was time for elections. Tony and I stole muffins and sat down, waiting for things to heat up
This calendar was part of the silent auction. It is a calendar of "College Republican Men" from different schools, all sporting J. Crew poses. I wanted it so much, as it was truly one of the best things I've ever seen.
My boys cornered me, especially Paul. The competition was fierce, and they needed to know if they could rely on my vote. They also had some other candidates they wanted to secure me for, but I had already made several secret alliances with other contestants and thus could not break my word. As Jason said, "A politician's word is his bond." We may lie to our public, we may lie in our speeches, but what goes on in the backrooms of Washington requires promises, honor, and keeping your word. If you don't, you get burned. And based on the way many delegates reversed their voting, I can tell a lot of delegates are going to be burned in the future—Jason took notes on who betrayed him, and Jason doesn’t forget. I did, however, manage to put my chips in exactly the right spaces on exactly the right colors, so I walked away well liked by everyone, with all the people I wanted being elected. I could be brilliant in politics if I wanted--I really could. Too bad I can't stand the pettiness, because I love the Machiavelliness.
Katie did get voted in as the state ICRF secretary. She didn't play as nicely with my boys as she should have, and she will end up paying for that in the future, but I don't think Katie plans a political career, so it might not matter. She gave a little acceptance speech which was supercute, and all of us NUCRs felt warm and fuzzy.
Finally, after much backslapping and contact information swapping, it was time to head out. I went home with Paul this time, talked a little shop, but mostly listened to Tracy Bonham's
Down Here. I forgot she was a classically trained violinist--in parts the record sounds like Rasputina, but her voice is more dangerous than Melora's Victorian pout, and slightly more voluptuous.
Down Here rocks much harder than
The Burdens of Being Upright, but the songs aren't as intensely personal. Still, some songs embrace Fiona Apple's bass-driven swagger on
When the Pawn...or some of Tori Amos' more percussion-based pieces on
Choirgirl. I hate to label this piece as "chick-rock" because most men avoid listening to albums by a female singer/songwriter because they consider it Lilith Fair man-hating material, but Bonham is a chick and she rocks, without being a sterotype. I like so many, but "Cold Day in Hell" and "Jumping Bean" are particularly fun. She isn't brilliant, but she's really good, and I forgot how much I missed her. (I was a huge “Mother, Mother” fan when I was 15). I should have caught this album when it dropped years ago, instead of waiting until now. But yeah, listened to
Down Here on repeat, then put on POE's
Hello, an album I also haven't listened to until last week, though I’ve been meaning to buy it since I was 14 and “Trigger Happy Jack” hit me like a fist. Both woman are excellent examples of why female vocalists are so brilliant juxtaposed with rock power chords. Exceptional.
I once went to summer school with a boy who never showed anyone his CD collection. If you guessed what was in his case, "Hey, Brian, can I borrow Sex Pistols?" he'd hand it over, and he would have no problem telling you what type of music he listened to, but he would never let anyone actually browse. He said his CD collection was like a diary--it was too personal, and it revealed too much about himself.
I don't really enjoy discussing who I'm listening to at the moment, or who I like outside of maybe my favorites. While favorites reveal something essential about me as a person, the other things I listen to reveal something smaller and more vulnerable. I'll have none of that.
On the way home we stopped by the sketchiest KFC I'd ever seen, complete with barefoot children and trash overflowing from the bin. Yet the employee working the register…odd. He was a well-spoken, obviously educated black man with shining, light-colored eyes. He had such a dignity in bearing and grace in his movements, and here he was working at a KFC/Taco Bell hybrid slopping food to a bunch of dirty, loud, and crass people all crowding about waiting for their food. I wonder how he got there, and where his life has taken him, or will take him.
Got to NU after 2 hours of driving. I left my phone in the car and had to run to 1800 Club to get it from Paul.
And that's all. Thank you for your patience. Finals week is going ok. I was told me I have become self-absorbed and self-indulgent. I apologize, and I mean that honestly. I work hard, and I'm often exhausted mentally, so sometimes--ok, most of the time--I need to be swept up, and I don’t need fighting or tension. It doesn't mean I don't love you all, or that I think my problems are in some way more important than yours. It means that under stress, I shift into private school autopilot, so it’s difficult for me to be social unless someone instigates it. Please accept my apology, and thanks for reading all of this.
