A Little Piece of Owie: May 2009

Monday, May 25, 2009

A Rumpus in the Rainforest

There's a rumpus in the rainforest today...

First full day back from a long year of school (also first day with my mother away as she parties away in Chicago, IL), I was given the pleasure of watching a play called "A Rumpus in the Rainforest." Andre, my seven-year-old nephew was given the honor to play an adorable monkey and sing, "Up in the Canopy," with two other classmates (also monkeys).

What is "A Rumpus in the Rainforest" all about you say?

Frog in the rain forest desperately wants to get off the jungle floor and see the sky---but who will help him climb above the canopy? The Jaguar loves the jungle floor, the Sloth family keeps falling asleep, and the Howler Monkeys have gone nuts. The Boas offer to slither up a tree, but can you really ever trust a boa? Meanwhile, two bungling Explorers stumble by in search of the Lost Ancient City of Choco- late. No wonder the jungle is going crazy. And have you ever seen so many ants? Rumpus in the Rain Forest gives students a musical tour of the various levels of the jungle and reinforces in fun fashion the importance of the rain forests.

My sister said that they were given the opportunity to pick which part they wanted to be. Frog, of course, was the protagonist of the play... but who wants to be the lead anyway?

Sister: Why didn't you pick to be the Toucan or the Frog? You would've been able to memorize the lines easily!
Andre: Well... I like monkeys because they can swing from tree to tree... and the Toucan and the Frog aren't very important parts anyway.

Well played, little man, well played. As the monkeys say:

We can sing and play
Go bananas all day
Up in the canopy

Saturday, May 16, 2009

Failed...

Put your seatbelt on, Nica. We have to get outta here.

So I went to a cafe with a friend to grab some drinks to keep us awake for the night. While he waits for his order to arrive, I realized that another friend told me earlier today she would be studying in the same cafe, so I decided to plunge into the sea of chairs and scour the cafe grounds for her.

But instead of finding her, I see a different familiar face, a face belonging to someone who, God bless him, needs to calm the fudgecicles down. For all intents and purposes, we will call this person "John Doe." I knew that if I start speaking to John Doe, I'm gonna have an overly-enthusiastic, and overwhelming existentialist conversation with him; something I definitely cannot afford at a time of academic crisis. I'm already going crazy enough as it is.

As big as the Grand Canyon, my eyes grew WIDE and on sheer impulse, my hand pushed the joystick to its leftmost position, turning my chair a full 180 degrees, and started zooming in the opposite direction as John Doe.

Not even a millisecond has passed when all of a sudden, a loud "OLIVIA!" filled the room. I frustratingly facepalmed and aggressively stomped my foot on my footrest three times, after which I attempted to clear my face of any sign of annoyance and turned around to approach him.

As expected, I wasted about 16.73 minutes of my time listening to him talk about philosophical matters. I could tell you what he talked about but that's gonna give away who he is... Actually, to be honest, every word kinda just went in one ear and out the other, so I wouldn't even be able to tell you had I wanted to. But in any event, that was surely an FML right there...