My Thesis Concert!

I'm Singng with The Velvet Lillies 9/19/08 !

For those of you that missed me at Monday's show, you still have another chance! I'll be singing with the Velvet Lillies, as well as some other surprises at the upcoming Hubba Hubba Revue!

Hallelujah! It's time for...


Hubba Hubba Revue: THAT OLDE TIME RELIGION!


*Baptismal Burlesque!
*Amazing Acts of Contrition!
*Holy-Rolling Comedy!


Friday, September 19th, 9PM at DNA Lounge!


AMEN, BROTHERS & SISTERS, AMEN!! The Honorable Kingfish T. Love, and The That-Boy-Ain't-Right
Reverend Eddie Dane, invite All Sinners & The Saved to an Ol' Timey Revival
Meeting loaded with laughs, thrills and the Best Burlesque this side of The Pearly
Gates!


It's a night of Evangelical Entertainment, with enough grinding, bumping and
Bible-Thumping to Banish Temptation and Heal the Sober!


COMEDY, BURLESQUE and SALVATION!! with:


Harlem Shake!
Alotta Boutte'!
The Vicar of Liquor!
Room for Cream!
The Velvet Lilies!
The Diamond Daggers!
Miss Balla Fire!
Madam Chartreuse!
Lady Satan!
Citty Rich!
Professor Shimmy!
Ariyana LeFay!
Kiss Me Kate!
Honey Lawless!
Your Little Chernobyl!
Riff Ditties!
Bunny Pistol!
Rubenesque Burlesque!
Gorilla X!

...and the Holy Hubba Dancers!



Live! On-Stage! Hymns of Sin & Whisky with THE GOMORRAN SOCIAL AID & PLEASURE
CLUB!


APOSTATE DISCOUNT! From 9PM to 9:30PM, only at the box office night-of-show, tickets
are just $10!


Free dance lessons upstairs, 9:30 - 10:00PM, by the Ministry of Swing Goth!


Hubba Hubba Revue: THAT OL' TIME RELIGION!
Friday, September 19th, 9PM
DNA Lounge, 375 Eleventh Street, SF
$15, 21 & Up w/valid ID
($12 advance tickets at www.dnalounge.com )



See more at www.hubbahubbarevue.com



HELP SPREAD THE GOOD WORD, Y'ALL!



HUBBA HUBBA REVUE is brought to you by:


Effen Vodka! Fernet Branca! Anheuser-Busch! Costume Party! Dark Garden Corsetry!

Mad Gardening Skillz

Look What I did!!! These are my first tomatoes (there was one more, but the squirrels ate it). They are super sweet!

I am totally loving work; and especially the yoga and pilates classes. Who knew? I think I enjoy most the actual act of teaching in those classes; I get to give lots of individual feedback, and feel excited about new challenges that are presented by having different levels, genders and bodies in my classes.

Last week, I auditioned for the fitness club in town, which wanted me to not actually teach dance, but instead to nearly-abusively boot-camp people to a beat, and call it Cardio Dance. Yowch. Cardio is not supposed to be violent on the body, and that's what they wanted. I'm glad to pass.

The hip hop class hasn't started yet, and so I'll be going to the high school on Friday morning to meed the students in the hopes that seeing my face will make it more appealing/inviting to them.

As for performances, this month I'll be singing twice as part of the Velvet Lilies, with Djinnaya, Whitney & our awesome saw player, Amy Zing. Special guest Nathan will help us with our act, and we'll be performing at the Uptown in Oakland (probably around 11:00pm) on September 8th and at the DNA Lounge at Hubba Hubba on September 19th (after midnight).

It's shaping up to be a fun month!

Pet Peeves.

Kati just sent me a meme, and since she's special, I filled it out.

One of the questions was, "What characteristic do you hate the most?"

My answer: self-destructive behavior masquerading as piety.
It makes me stabby.

How about you?

Lactase... fickle bastard allele

Dear Mrs. Intarweb-Science;

Prior to the domestication of cattle about 8,000 years ago, humans had access to lactose only when they were young and nursing. As a result, the gene that allows us to digest lactose (called lactase) typically gets shut off during childhood, and stays off for the rest of human life.

I hear people say sometimes that they have become lactose intolerant.

This is apparently what happens after nursing, if you don't have the magic "lactase allele" of the white people who bred cows.

Oh; wait... or you could have this new lactase allele that the Tanzanians & Kenyans have recently developed... in fact; you probably recently starved to death if you didn't, because everyone who does have this allele has a huge amount of genetic similarity.

OH oH; no wait... there are other people in the universe who don't have either, and yet aren't lactose intolerant. (Science isn't just the truth of white folks?? gee!)

So; I'm a believer in evolution, and I think it's really exciting that there might be a really strong example of the process of selection happening in humans. But here's where I'm confused. If an ability/disability to eat something is not so much based on what is going on in your gut (I know folks who stopped eating milk for two years and then developed lactose intolerance), how does that mesh with the genetic description? I have trouble understanding how genes suddenly "turn off" -- or is it just an aging thing?

How have these discoveries not disproved the relationship between lactose and a billion different factors? If having one of many lactase alleles can keep your lactose intolerance from "turning on" after nursing, how does this happen at a random time later in one's life? And what the hell does "turning off/turning on" mean? If a bunch of different alleles can cause lactose tolerance to remain active, why do they think it's a gene and not the state of one's intestines? How do some people become lactose tolerant again by re-populating their guts with the right enzymes? Can you turn the gene back once it has flipped?

LIVING DEAD GIRLZ PERFORM THIS FRIDAY 8/15/08!

Hubba Hubba Revue: CREEPSHOW PEEPSHOW!







*Blood-Curdling Burlesque!
*Shocking Act of Comedy!
*Terror, Madness & Gore!

Friday, August 15th, 9PM at DNA Lounge!

Hubba Hubba Revue's murder-lovin', chainsaw-totin', no-account country-cousins,
CREEPSHOW PEEPSHOW, are back for another spine-chilling night of TERROR-RIFFIC burlesque, KILLER comedy, and all the fun you can have locked-up in a backwoods insane-asylum swarming with BLOODTHIRSTY FREAKS!



COMEDY! BURLESQUE! VARIETY & HORROR! with:

The Living Dead Girlz!
Calamity Lulu & Comrade Tang!
The Twilight Vixen Revue!
The Cheese Puffs!
Bunny Pistol!
Roxy Shocks & Jonny Angelhorn!
Meka La Creme!
Sparkly Devil & Ruby White!
Citty Rich!
Sahara Dunes!
Your Little Chernobyl!
The Flying Fox!
Dark Garden Corsetry!
Sister Kate!
Josie Starre!
Dottie Lux!
Professor Shimmy!
Gorilla X!
...and the CREEPSHOW PEEPSHOW Dancers!

Live! On-Stage! Sultry Songs from Satan's Siren, DEVIL DOLL!

..

..


CITYSLICKER DISCOUNT! From 9PM to 9:30PM, only at the box office night-of-show,
tickets are just $10!

Free (EVIL!) dance lessons upstairs, 9:30 - 10:00PM by (EVIL!) Brian from Swing Goth!

Special 10PM screening of VAL KILLMORE's horror-comedy masterpiece: THE TERROR OF TITTY TOWN!! (@ 15 min)



Hubba Hubba Revue: CREEPSHOW PEEPSHOW!
Friday, August 15th, 9PM
DNA Lounge, 375 Eleventh Street, SF
$15, 21 & Up w/valid ID
($12 advance tickets at dnalounge. com)

See more at hubbahubbarevue. com!

HELP SPREAD THE WORD, Y'ALL! (Alllllways room for one more! Heh heh heh heh hehhhhh... )

HUBBA HUBBA REVUE is brought to you by: Effen Vodka! Fernet Branca! Anheuser-Busch! Costume Party! Dark Garden Corsetry!

Feb 13th is Love is the Movement Day!

Tomorrow, I will be writing the word LOVE on my arm to help

spread awareness about depression and self-harm in young women.



So many women I have known in my life have suffered so much, and

used self-harm as a coping mechanism. I want people to better

understand what these women have experienced, and to show them

support and love by writing LOVE on my arm. Self-harm is often

glamorized or glossed over in the media today. In my opinion,

Eating Disorders are another form of self-harm as a coping

mechanism. I don't want to be part of the problem of ignoring

women's suffering. Every woman deserves love and support, and

to not have to feel so alone.



You are important, and you are loved.



LOVE IS THE MOVEMENT

During the time of year that suicide rates are at their highest,

we chose February 13, the day before Valentine's Day, as our

opportunity to start showing people how much they are loved.

We will physically write the word LOVE on our arms (with a sharpie,

or whatever other ink suits you best). If someone asks you what it’s

for, tell them about TWLOHA. Tell them they are loved, that they are

important. And ask if you can write LOVE on their arm as a symbol of

that. Don't be afraid to reach out to those who need love, those who

you often walk right by every day. They need our care.



There is NO set time, there is NO set location. Where you are,

when you are there, speak out.



Stop the bleeding. Rescue is possible.


The truth is that according to the World Health Organization,

depression is one of the leading causes of disability, with

approximately 121 million people suffering with depression

worldwide. The National Institute of Mental Health states that

approximately 18 million people suffer from depression in America

alone. Depression does not discriminate across age, race, gender,

or class. Among teenagers it is estimated that 20 percent will suffer

from depression at some point by the time they reach adulthood. There

are also as many as 8.3 percent of teens suffering from depression for

at least a year at a time, compared to 5.3 percent of the general

population.



Insprired by the work of TWLOHA (To Write Love On Her Arms),

an organization created to spread awareness for teen depression,

self-injury, and suicide, we are coming together to make sure the

whole world knows. We are not directly affiliated with TWOLHA, but

are in great support of their work To find out more about TWLOHA

visit their Facebook Group here:


http://www.facebook.com/pages/To-Write-Love-On-Her-Arms/8529136956

More info on self-injury: http://www.twloha.com/facts.php

Referrals, information, support: http://www.selfinjury.com/index.html

Valid Self Endorsement

I am proud of myself.

It's 2:46 in the morning. I went out to celebrate my year since quitting (no puffs, no serious reconsiderations, only some nostalgia that in no way stood up to emotional or rational logic). I danced with the lovely Jess, I saw an old friend whom I met in '95. I re-met a lovely lady whom I suspected was quite cool, and we re-connected, clearing up some assumptions and re-affirming other assumptions about her being smart and a pleasure to talk with.


And then I came home to manfriend, who was brushing his teeth after falling asleep with our kittonz on the couch. He's in bed right now, warming our snuggletown.
And I am eating a quesadilla and feeling proud.
I am proud of myself.
I am proud to be the kind of person that, 13 years later, someone can re-meet and have an enjoyable conversation with.
I am proud to be a nonsmoker.
I am proud to be a good dancer.
I am proud to be a friend of a wonderful PhD psychologist who is funny, brilliant, dedicated, caring, kind, and has morals that I also feel passionate about.
I am proud to be happy with my body.
I am proud to have worked through my issues to the point where I can say and feel and be clear with myself about my emotional needs.
I am proud to admit that I want to be loved, and I am proud to be able to not settle for affection that requires me to humiliate or degrade myself.
I am proud to be loved in a way that makes me feel like I can demand respect.
I am proud that I can unify this feeling with my desire to please people -- so that both can work in harmony to help me be a happier person.
I am proud to understand, integrally, that I deserve to be HAPPY and LOVED.
I a incredibly, humble-ly greatful to be engaged to a man who gives me love, humor, respect, tenderness, and passionate appreciation for being who I am.
I am proud to see the difference between a sexy woman and a desperate teenager. (FINALLY)
I am proud to wait at crosswalks because my dad told me that he never J-walks when I was 18.
I am proud to be appreciated by my peers for being funny and goofy and lighthearted.
I am VERY proud to be appreciated by my peers for being a woman of my word.
I am proud to be sought out by my peers who, years ago, were put off by my loud personality, and now trust me for my longstanding presence, reliability and accomplishments.
I am proud to be able to create choreography super-quickly.
I am proud to be at the "just needs a wee bit of polishing" stage in my thesis writing.
I am proud to be completely confident that I will be graduating in 3 months and 17 days with my MFA.
I am proud to be who I am.
I am proud to be loved by such a talented, gracious, kind and brilliant man.
I am proud to have raised such amazing kittons with Steev.
I am proud to have friendships over ten years old, despite having moved so much in my youth.
I am proud that my mother is proud of me.
I am proud to have written the longest thesis in my class.
I am proud to create the work that I create; even when I am not sure that I am proud of the work.
I am proud to have an audacious and refreshingly unusual sense of humor.
I am proud that I sing songs that I make up, often by covering another song with invented lyrics.
I am proud of my singing abilities.
I am proud of my listening abilities.
I am proud of my emotional boundaries (even when it is hard/disappointing to enforce them.)
I am proud of my newfound cooking skills -- REALLY. I am impresing myself! WHOOT!
I am proud to make friends with folks of all types.
I am proud to enjoy the company of my wonderful carpool, Ann, whose cheeriness is inspiring.
I am proud to be honest with myself about my shortcomings.
I am proud to have grasped the idea that privacy is valuable.
I am proud to be able to write a list of appreciation for myself.
I am proud to be smart.
I am proud to know better than to listen to people's opinions about me when they are in the process of feeling scared or hurt -- not without a grain of salt.
I am proud to be capable of recognizing people who -- even when they are scared or hurt -- reflect their point of view to me in a constructive manner.
I a proud to be with someone who communicates at least as well as I do.
I am proud to be with a man who is greatful for the mental/emotional work that I have accomplished.
I am proud to have a wonderful bed to go home to...
RIGHT NOW.
THANK you, all you wonderful thing couldn't help.
I am proud to be with a man who smiles when he sees me at the end of the day; a man who tells m me what his wants and needs are, and who does a whole buncha buncha buncha what he can to help me acheive my goals.
I am proud to have found and founded a home for my family life.
I am proud to be at a place in my life where I feel totally secure in not going through any severe hardgsips to that you se coming....

It's My FIRST NONSMOKING BIRTHDAY!!!!

Yup.
Today is it.
I quit smoking a year ago.
I did it. I made it a whole year. And it wasn't too bad.

And I know that I can never ever have just one puff. I know that I can never be a casual smoker or a social smoker or a once in a while smoker. I used to smoke near a pack a day for about ... 12-14 years.... And now I am a nonsmoker.

And it's totally rad. I smell good. That's the big thing. I don't have a habit that is semi-embarrassing in public (not that I approve of the current moral demonization of smoking). I don't feel like I breathe better (I was already in good shape), but I do enjoy not having a gross-sounding cough. Mostly, though, it's my vanity on the good smell that makes me the happiest. :) I am totally okay with being a non-smoker for vanity's sake. Whatever it takes to get me here.

Ironically, this morning I realized that my hair smelled like cigarettes from being around it yesterday, and when I got home there was a very fancy advertisement package from Camel in the mail.

Hee hee.
All that extra munies. (It all goes to clothes).
Hee hee!
WHOOT! CONGRATULATIONS ME!!!

The Smarts of the Interwebs

Wow. I am sitting here at my desk, NOT working on my thesis, and it's OKAY. It's okay because last night I finished and turned in my reworked draft to my second reader; much of which had undergone two rewrites.
This means that I have one more rewrite to do, plus fancy formatting stuffs. Like... I am kinda done doing the bulk of my written thesis. Which means that I might have the Brain to make a cool concert thesis. And I will only be taking about.. oh... say 60% of the load that I had last semester. JESUS. Holy Crap. The horizon is visible.





From the intardwebs, articles that appeal to my skeptical inner hippy, thanks to many lj buddies:

Morality, as I see it and science now is confirming



exersize mostly just makes you feel better, unless you're sedentary.



Freaking Bionic eyes. Can I has PLZ??

Dance-A-Thon on Saturday! Whoot!

DANCE-A-THON for ShoeBox Studio & CARE.org!
Saturday, January 12, 2008
On January 12th, from 10AM-8PM, every ShoeBox class will be offered in a 30-45 minute sample format. Classes will run back to back as a "marathon".

This is a great opportunity to try out a bunch of different teachers and mini-classes (my class is at 12:30), as well as supporting your community! See you there!
http://www.shoeboxsf.com/

Dancers who would like to dance but not collect pledges may still participate by simply making a $12-20 sliding scale donation at the door.

The schedule as it stands so far:
(please check here for updated schedule )

10-10:30 - Warm Up Pilates w/ Christopher
10:30-11 - Contemporary w/ Sara Templeton
11-11:45 - Dark Fusion Bellydance w/ Ariellah
12-12:30 - Funk Fusion Bellydance w/ Cera
12:30-1 - Street Jazz w/ Amber
1-1:30 - Yoga Conditioning for Dancers w/ Ariellah (?)
1:30-2:15 - Afro-Samba w/ Dandara
2:15-3 EITHER Afro-Caribbean w/ Virginia or Tribal Fusion Drills & Basics w/ Gibson Pearl
3-3:45 - Modenco w/ Carole
3:45-4:15 - Pilates w/ Michelle
4:15 - 5 - Hip Hop Fusion w/ Sarah
5-5:30 - Contemporary w/ Sara Templeton
5:30-6:15 - Flamenco w/ Carolina
6:15-7 - Afro-Caribbean w/ Virginia
7-7:30 - Tribal Fusion Drills & Basics w/ Gibson Pearl
7:30-8:15 - Funk Fusion w/ Cera
8:15-8:30 - Cool Down

Christmas! Dancing! Kittons! cookies!

I took my first ODC class today, with Mary Carbonara; it was super fun and nice, and I did a good job on my first day there (second day of combo). Sonya made a good recommendation by suggesting I take from her. hoo-rah. And... WTF? pregnant! hmm... something about dance teachers being preggo these days; I best be careful!
kitties are plenty!

In other news: my friend Kati saw her little jelly-bean with arms and legs' heartbeat yesterday. Wow! I get to be an aunty!!! I hope hope hope I get to be there for the birth.... I know it's hard to plan these things, but I totally wanna see it, and hold her hand and give her hugs, and scream for her. heee

So... christmas plans for you? We got tree #2 last night; it needed to be re-drilled, otherwise it was about 40 degrees from straight. hee hee. it smells lovely. I wanna bake cookies!

Performance Tomorrow night!

Thanks to Jess for the initial posting!

We get to perform in the very first Shoebox Studio's student showcase coming up this Friday!

Our own darling Cera is the owner and operator of this awesome dance studio, and it's a great place to shake or stretch it.

I am dancing with Jess and another student (or more?) in the culmination of my Street Jazz Performance Workshop, which was the most fun to teach evarr. I had so many great students who worked super hard and made me squeal with appreciative joy!! YAY HOT LADIES DANCIN'!!

Lovely Miss Sheila is dancing with Cera in the Funk Fusion Bellydance group!


Here's the site's copy:

Shoebox's First Student Showcase!

Friday, December 14, 2007

Join us for our first Student Showcase, where you will get a chance to see what your friends have been working on in all of our Winter Performance Workshops!

There will be performances in: Afro-Samba, Bellydance, Hip Hop Fusion, Turkish Roman, Street Jazz

WHERE: The Garage,
975 Howard St. between 5th and 6th
WHEN: December 14th, 8pm
Cost: $10

There are 50 seats available. PLEASE click below to buy your tickets now! Please list your first and last name in the "comments" section of your purchase. Thanks! (If we have an overwhelming response for tickets, we will do our best to add a 9pm show. As soon as we sell out, we will stop ticket sales on the website.)
You can get tickets on the site here.

I am super excited to be performing NOT in zombie makeup, and for the sheer joy of it. BOO YA!! Come and join us!

Kitten Karma

Please forward my kitten karma by helping with a click...


This is pretty simple.. Please tell ten friends to tell ten more today! The Animal Rescue Site is having trouble getting enough people to click on it daily to meet their quota of getting free food donated every day to abused and neglected animals. It takes less than a minute to go to their site and click on "feed an animal in need" for free. It's in a purple box in the middle of the page. This doesn't cost you a thing. Their corporate sponsors/advertisers use the number of daily visits to donate food to abandoned/neglected animals in exchange for advertising.

Here's the web site! Pass it along to people you know.
http://www.theanimalrescuesite.com/clickToGive/home.faces?siteId=3

Thanks for caring!!

Newfound friends at Comic Con & Warren Ellis Shows Love!!

So, while Living Dead Girlz were at Comic Con, we were hanging out with some awesome folks, including George Romero himself, his super cool Director of Photography for the 30th Anniversary of Night of the Living Dead Documentary, Robert, Chris, Romero's manager, the wonderful William Christensen, Editor in Chief of Avatar Press, Dheeraj Verma, an amazing artist for Avatar, and more wonderful peeps, including Mikey, who drove a bunch of our stuff home; YAY Mikey!!

We befriended some amazing people, including:

Brian Pulido, the author of the Lady Death comic book series (as well as many others, film festival and movie director... wow.. I just found his bio and it speaks for itself, really. He's an excellent guy, lovely to have dinner with; especially when he and Jacen talk about their future comic book idea... let's just say that it's tentatively called "WRONG." Imagine the dinner-inappropriate conversation, and how at home we zombie girlz felt! <3 <3

Jacen Burrows, is our new favorite illustrator, he's awesome at zombies and is gonna draw us! Jacen was totally wonderful, cheery, hilarious and a pleasure to hang out with all weekend. We're threatening to all come over to his house in the midwest and hide when the apocalypse happens. He illustrates for our host Avatar Press, (we love you, William!) doing work on Chronicles of Wormwood with Garth Ennis and drawing covers for George A. Romero's Night of the Living Dead prequel series as well as John Russo's Escape of the Living Dead and Black Gas 2 with writer Warren Ellis. Holy CRAP. I just was poking around his website and saw that he did some of the illustrations for Grand Theft Auto San Andreas & Vice City. And he's our fan. And he drawz us good... eeeeeeep! **brain explodes**

and Warren Ellis, who loves choco ginger nut biscuits like I do. I must admit, I didn't realize that Warren Ellis was going to be at the table with us for most of the weekend. When I first walked up, my little undead heart skipped a starstruck beat. (And that is RARE; undead hearts not beating and all.) For those of you who don't recognize the name; he's the author of ( among other books & graphic novels,) TRANSMETROPOLITAN, the graphic novel that inspired my love of Hunter S. Thompson and thereby inspired my blog writings for the first year. He's lovely, and I had loads of fun hanging out with him for the day and chatting about British cookies. He is, however, doomed to letting us drag him out for drinks in the future, since we didn't get to this time.

And then, as if he weren't totally awesome enough, he went and posted our demo reel in his blog. Now I've got to buy him a drink!
YAY WARREN!! <3

There was lots of mayhem, as you'd imagine, but I'll leave those stories and pictures for S.W.A.T. Zombie's more amusing writing skillz... The gallery is a-growing!!!

All in all, it was an exhausting (even for the reanimated) but fun weekend. Much love for the Avatar Press folks, and especially to our dear Doctor Zombie, who splurged on the hotel room that we couldn't afford ourselves (convention prices; OUCH!), thereby saving us from covering Cowgirl Zombie's Aunt's house in zombie gore.
Not performing and not having space for our own merch did permit some misunderstandings, unfortunately... folks seemed to mistake us for hired models who were just there to be pretty instead of guests with talent and products of our own. Sometimes that causes mistreatment of zombies by the masses. As I said in an email recently, we prefer to be treated like LADIES.

Stay Tuned for the pictures!!!

YoLaLa fills me with GLEE!!!

I love yolala.org!

*BLUSH*
HOORAY FOR THOMAS!!!

A while back, I posted about finding the French hip hop song that I loved, and Thomas of yolala.org found my post and invited me to listen to his podcast. About 30 hours of pure listening joy later, I listened to this month's yolala podcast, which made me squeal and blush with glee!

THANK YOU, THOMAS!!!

And check out YoLaLa!
It's a webcast about French Hip Hop for Anglophones; Thomas explains, in English, what the French hip hop scene is about; what the lyrics mean, what the historical context is, both in terms of the rap scene and current events... it is fascinating, and great music.

I just realized...

... I am booked for the next YEAR.

We're leaving for ComiCon (San Diego) tomorrow, then we come home and I go back to full time work and we shoot our music video parody for the next two weekends, then I stop working on August 10th and fly to do Maid of Honor stuff in Maryland, then I return and have a week and a half before school starts to do the first chapter of my thesis, an outline, and 5 minutes of choreography for my thesis project.

Then full time school starts, and my carpool was posting for a room in Oakland, which could add 2+ hours of commuting to my days... she hasn't said anything about it, though, so who knows what that means. ****waves hands in air frantically****

Plus LDG shows on 9/28 (San Francisco), 10/4 (Oakland), 10/25 (Milwaukee), and helping Kati with wedding stuff...

**HEAD EXPLODES**

eep.

Have I mentioned?

How much I love and appreciate the lovely people in my life?

Jessica, Me & My Perfect Man

You make me all warm and fuzzy inside.
Thank you!!

How could I not totally adore this man?