long post but very interesting and well-written so you'd better read it all.

I've had another series of busy weeks that don't translate into interesting posts.
I've been working regularly at my little flower shop and about once a week at poppie. and I'm in a show this weekend so rehearsals tend to occupy my evenings. it's an interesting piece in which the choreographer is collaborating with the poor tree typewriter band so while we're dancing there are typewriters typing and then at the end they read what they've been writing - sort of spoken word poetry-ish. it's neat. except that we haven't had much time to put the piece together and it feels a little less than ready to be performed. we tried a run in the theatre yesterday and it was slightly disastrous. but it will come together I'm sure... i hope...

top five other things worth mentioning:

1. THE GRAD:
Christie and I had our graduation ceremony from continuing education's apparel design I. It was primarily/almost entirely middle aged people graduating and all the speeches were talking about how brave we were for going back to school and balancing our careers and family and going for it, even though we're older. so that was nice... the best part of the grad was that i found a corsage in the fridge at work that was too old to sell (and in my opinion, too hideous to sell -ooh speaking of ugly corsages... I've another good story to tell in a second...) so i made Christie wear the ugly corsage the whole night to celebrate our graduation. it was huge and full or daisies and wax flower (current day baby's breath) and big organza bows. it was quite lovely on her skinny little wrist.

2. THE UGLY CORSAGE:
The other day I got a call from this lady who wanted to order a corsage for I guess her daughter's grad. And she wanted something unique so she decided she wanted 3 big orchids (we usually put 2 which is already too huge for my liking, so 3 is mammoth) and then she wanted a vine attached to it that could wrap all the way up her arm... plus a big chocolate brown bow at the base and two strands of chocolate brown ribbon at the top that could criss cross all the way up the arm like a ballet slipper. PLUS she wanted us to add rhinestones all throughout the corsage... and then when she came to pick it up she decided it wasn't big enough and added a fourth orchid and more rhinestones. it was rather challenging to respond to this lady and keep my voice at a friendly and helpful tone. hopefully the poor grad wasn't too surprised by this not-so-subtle addition to her outfit...

3. I HAVE CONQUERED MY FEAR OF BICYCLES:
I have been riding my bike to work recently. for those of you who know me I have a not-entirely-secret fear of bicycles, which is funny considering my boyfriend is on a bike more often that he isn't these days. I like riding the tandem bike because I don't have to steer (or pedal if I don't want to) because I tend to run into things like trees and curbs. But I have conquered and it turns out it isn't nearly as bad as I thought it was. I think I had a couple of bad experiences lined up and it turned into a bit of a complex. As it turns out, trees aren't that hard to avoid after all...

4. MONDAY MALL MARATHON MADNESS AND MIDNIGHT MEETING
On Monday Christie and I went out for breakfast and then went to the mall for the first time in ages. (we tend to not be mall shoppers) But we had a lot of fun and got a lot of cheap things. The mall is a bit of a strange culture. There are many hilarious people there that make me glad I'm not a teenager anymore. After the mall had tired us out I had a rehearsal but then I picked up Christie again and we eventually ended up at the airport to meet Lindsey's flight. We had this whole plan figured out where we would give Lindsey's parents a card that told her to follow balloons and then we attached a trail of balloons around the airport that lead her up the stairs to one of the last black and white photo booths that remains in the city. and one of us would be holding the last balloon sticking out of the booth. but we didn't want to sit there forever with our arm out at a 90 degree angle so I was trying to spy over the balcony so I could see when she was coming but there were a bunch of things blocking my view. And Christie was taking pictures of the balloons when she noticed a girl coming up the stairs and kind of running. She thought that she was just trying to get out of the picture but then she realized it was Lindsey and screamed NOOOOO and Christie and I jumped up and sprinted down the hallway and launched ourselves into the photo booth and jabbed out the balloon. So it didn't end up being very smooth in the end but it was still a fun memory. And we got good reunion photos...

5. AND IN RECENT NEWS....
I was at work yesterday cutting rose stems when my dad called and said that there was a message saying to call Faye at the studio and it was urgent. Faye is the co-director of my program so after I finished my roses I called her and she told me I had been offered a professional job working on a duet with a choreographer named Christina Medina. It takes place from mid October until mid November... in Austria. My airfare and accommodation is taken care of plus I get a fairly reasonable honorarium and I get to go to Austria for a month and perform in a show there. So that was overwhelming and exciting news. I had from yesterday afternoon until this morning to make my decision, but really, how do you say no to an experience like that? Made me feel a little crazy afterwards though. Rosie was worried I was going to break all the Gerber stems because I was a little spaced out and they break easily when you put those little tubes on them... But I didn't break any because I'm a good little florist.