SUUSI report - days 2 and 3.
Jul. 19th, 2006 03:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rivkaI stupidly made plans to have breakfast with my father at 7am Monday morning. I think I was thinking, "Alex always has breakfast at 7 - she'll be starving!" But of course, after her late night, that wasn't in the cards. She woke briefly and cried at 5:40, and by the time I got her back to sleep I was permanently awake. I slipped out to meet Dad and left Michael and Alex both fast asleep. It worked well, actually - we had a nice, peaceful breakfast together, and I was able to drink my tea without anyone pulling at my arm. I spent some time helping Dad make arrangments for his suitcase, which the airline lost, and then steered him to the Monday morning "Theme Talk," which is sort of an extended, worship-service-less sermon. I wish I could've gone myself, but I knew that Michael would need Alex help if he was to get to his 10am class on time.
Alex and I walked around the quad and then visited the nursery to play with their toys. It's set up in a dorm, so there are lots of little rooms with different toy setups - a quiet library, a play-doh room, a building toys room. Mattresses on the floor for climbing and flopping. We hung out there for a while, ate lunch in the dining hall, and then - I thought - went back to the dorm for a nap. I needed one as much as Alex did.
It took almost two hours to get her to sleep. She was exhausted - I was exhausted - but the newness and the excitement were just too much. Eventually she did drop off, and I got a brief nap myself. All too soon, we were up again... but that was all right, because I had my sushi class.
Sushi class! Taught, if you can believe it, in a college dorm, in one of the little floor kitchens. That's exactly as good a space for cooking as you're imagining that it is. But our teacher, who is also one of the week's featured musicians, was dauntless. He kept up a running commentary at a hundred miles a minute as he unpacked and directed the preparation of our sushi materials: fish cake, crab stick, white shrimp, tiger prawns, canned eel, pickled daikon, fresh daikon, cucumber, avocado, enoki mushrooms, deep-fried tofu, masago, and of course nori and rice. He cooked up an enormous pot of sushi rice on the lousy college electric stove and made a dozen eggs' worth of tamago. You could tell you were at a Southern sushi-making class, because there was iced green tea in a Tupperware pitcher, which we poured into Dixie cups.
He told us at the outset that he had ADD, and it showed. He'd start something - say, showing us how to season the sushi rice with mirin and rice vinegar - and then he'd get absorbed in something else and the rice would just sit there while he showed us how to make miso soup with kombu and bonito shavings. He had a kind of happy-go-lucky approach that was very freeing for those of us (like me) who were feeling intimidated by the sushi-making process. But at the same time his skill was obvious - when he made a caterpillar roll as a demonstration, the knifework was beautiful. At times I feared that we would never get to the part of the class where we would actually learn to make rolls ourselves, because he was just so damned digressive. But then, suddenly, with maybe only 40 minutes of class time left, he demonstrated the technique for making maki and turned us loose. I made three rolls, all of which turned out amazingly well - the second one even got pointed out by the teacher as especially pretty work. I can't believe how easy it was! I should have been doing this long ago.
I dashed from class to the worship service, still holding a paper plate with the last few pieces of my last roll, and met up with Michael and Alex there. The services are held in the "Hokie Grill," a food court sort of place, which they have done a surprisingly good job of transforming into worship space. The church banners people carried at Ingathering line the walls, with several quilts made up of twenty years' worth of SUUSI T-shirt designs at the front. There's a chalice with one of those "eternal flame" thingys that has a fan blowing flame-shaped bits of cloth up so that they flicker like a real flame. (It's not as tacky-looking as it sounds.) The professional folk musicians who perform at the evening concerts accompany the services.
Monday's service had a phenomenal preacher. Unfortunately, I spent most of the service following my restless toddler around, and felt as though I wasn't able to give him my full attention. Afterward, we spent some time singing on the quad with folks who had brought out their guitars, and then went through a long and arduous process of getting Alex to sleep. I was about done with the toddler by the time she finally went down.
Michael had childcare co-op duty Monday night. I wandered down to the concert and heard the last few songs by Amy Carol Webb, an absolutely phenomenal singer-songwriter. Afterward they had a cabaret, with various artists performing for 15-20 minute slots. I stayed for an act or two, wandered by the coffeehouse (nothing was happening), failed to find the dance, and finally went back to the room feeling tired and a bit frustrated.
Fortunately, things were about to change. On Tuesday, I really managed to get myself into the SUUSI groove, and Alex managed to get herself intno the sleeping groove.
Michael had to get up early for a winery tour - the van was leaving at 8. Alex and I had absolutely nothing on our schedule, and I felt good about that - I wanted to relax and let go of some of my "But I should be having dynamic fun!!" expectations. We ate a leisurely breakfast with some other SUUSIgoers, slathered ourselves with sunscreen, and wandered out into the quad.
Unexpected entertainment of the morning: another SUUSI family was just setting out for a bike ride together... on a tandem recumbent bike with two child seats. All four members of the family on one bike! The thing looked like a bobsled. Quite a crowd had gathered by the time they headed out. I'm sure they must get tired of being gawked at and being asked the same questions, but it was impossible not to gawk or ask questions.
The rest of the morning was spent not doing much. We wandered around, sat in the shade for quite a while drawing on the sidewalk with chalk, visited the nursery program for toy time and a snack. At other times, this kind of program might annoy me - I might've felt impatient to get up and do things. But I really enjoyed the relaxation. It's wonderful to be able to just let Alex wander, and not have to watch out for cars or other urban hazards.
After lunch, she went down for a nap. Michael came back from his winery tour and crawled into bed himself, and I went out to enjoy an afternoon of peace and quiet. I browsed in the SUUSI bookstore, hit the coffeehouse for a chocolate smoothie, and then settled into a lawn chair in a shady corner of the quad. I watched an epic water balloon battle between the teens (dressed as ninjas) and the young adults (dressed as pirates). I talked with people as they came by my shady corner - especially a young woman, just turned 18, who will be going to college a few blocks from our house this fall. I put a few lazy stitches into my needlework. My dad showed up eventually, and we sat in the shade together chatting.
Just before five, we met up with Michael and Alex. We had dinner, gave the baby a shower - about which, the less said the better - and headed off to church. The service was... fine. Not as original and inspiring as Monday's, but all right. Afterwards we hung out on the quad talking to people and watching Alex run around, occasionally bending to mark the sidewalk with chalk.
She was rubbing her eyes by 8:30 and went to bed easily. Then it was my childcare co-op shift. For two hours, I sat on a folding chair in the hallway, listening for crying babies and watching for children out of their rooms. When my shift was over at 11:15, I changed into my Hawaiian shirt and Michael and I went over to the SUUSI dance club. We drank tasty microbrews, danced ourselves into exhaustion, and sang along with the mostly-80s music until we were hoarse. It's comforting somehow to know that Unitarian-Universalists do the Time Warp at their dances with exactly the same verve as SF fans. Because I'm sadly out of shape, I was ready to go home and go to bed by 1:00, so that's what we did.
Alex and I walked around the quad and then visited the nursery to play with their toys. It's set up in a dorm, so there are lots of little rooms with different toy setups - a quiet library, a play-doh room, a building toys room. Mattresses on the floor for climbing and flopping. We hung out there for a while, ate lunch in the dining hall, and then - I thought - went back to the dorm for a nap. I needed one as much as Alex did.
It took almost two hours to get her to sleep. She was exhausted - I was exhausted - but the newness and the excitement were just too much. Eventually she did drop off, and I got a brief nap myself. All too soon, we were up again... but that was all right, because I had my sushi class.
Sushi class! Taught, if you can believe it, in a college dorm, in one of the little floor kitchens. That's exactly as good a space for cooking as you're imagining that it is. But our teacher, who is also one of the week's featured musicians, was dauntless. He kept up a running commentary at a hundred miles a minute as he unpacked and directed the preparation of our sushi materials: fish cake, crab stick, white shrimp, tiger prawns, canned eel, pickled daikon, fresh daikon, cucumber, avocado, enoki mushrooms, deep-fried tofu, masago, and of course nori and rice. He cooked up an enormous pot of sushi rice on the lousy college electric stove and made a dozen eggs' worth of tamago. You could tell you were at a Southern sushi-making class, because there was iced green tea in a Tupperware pitcher, which we poured into Dixie cups.
He told us at the outset that he had ADD, and it showed. He'd start something - say, showing us how to season the sushi rice with mirin and rice vinegar - and then he'd get absorbed in something else and the rice would just sit there while he showed us how to make miso soup with kombu and bonito shavings. He had a kind of happy-go-lucky approach that was very freeing for those of us (like me) who were feeling intimidated by the sushi-making process. But at the same time his skill was obvious - when he made a caterpillar roll as a demonstration, the knifework was beautiful. At times I feared that we would never get to the part of the class where we would actually learn to make rolls ourselves, because he was just so damned digressive. But then, suddenly, with maybe only 40 minutes of class time left, he demonstrated the technique for making maki and turned us loose. I made three rolls, all of which turned out amazingly well - the second one even got pointed out by the teacher as especially pretty work. I can't believe how easy it was! I should have been doing this long ago.
I dashed from class to the worship service, still holding a paper plate with the last few pieces of my last roll, and met up with Michael and Alex there. The services are held in the "Hokie Grill," a food court sort of place, which they have done a surprisingly good job of transforming into worship space. The church banners people carried at Ingathering line the walls, with several quilts made up of twenty years' worth of SUUSI T-shirt designs at the front. There's a chalice with one of those "eternal flame" thingys that has a fan blowing flame-shaped bits of cloth up so that they flicker like a real flame. (It's not as tacky-looking as it sounds.) The professional folk musicians who perform at the evening concerts accompany the services.
Monday's service had a phenomenal preacher. Unfortunately, I spent most of the service following my restless toddler around, and felt as though I wasn't able to give him my full attention. Afterward, we spent some time singing on the quad with folks who had brought out their guitars, and then went through a long and arduous process of getting Alex to sleep. I was about done with the toddler by the time she finally went down.
Michael had childcare co-op duty Monday night. I wandered down to the concert and heard the last few songs by Amy Carol Webb, an absolutely phenomenal singer-songwriter. Afterward they had a cabaret, with various artists performing for 15-20 minute slots. I stayed for an act or two, wandered by the coffeehouse (nothing was happening), failed to find the dance, and finally went back to the room feeling tired and a bit frustrated.
Fortunately, things were about to change. On Tuesday, I really managed to get myself into the SUUSI groove, and Alex managed to get herself intno the sleeping groove.
Michael had to get up early for a winery tour - the van was leaving at 8. Alex and I had absolutely nothing on our schedule, and I felt good about that - I wanted to relax and let go of some of my "But I should be having dynamic fun!!" expectations. We ate a leisurely breakfast with some other SUUSIgoers, slathered ourselves with sunscreen, and wandered out into the quad.
Unexpected entertainment of the morning: another SUUSI family was just setting out for a bike ride together... on a tandem recumbent bike with two child seats. All four members of the family on one bike! The thing looked like a bobsled. Quite a crowd had gathered by the time they headed out. I'm sure they must get tired of being gawked at and being asked the same questions, but it was impossible not to gawk or ask questions.
The rest of the morning was spent not doing much. We wandered around, sat in the shade for quite a while drawing on the sidewalk with chalk, visited the nursery program for toy time and a snack. At other times, this kind of program might annoy me - I might've felt impatient to get up and do things. But I really enjoyed the relaxation. It's wonderful to be able to just let Alex wander, and not have to watch out for cars or other urban hazards.
After lunch, she went down for a nap. Michael came back from his winery tour and crawled into bed himself, and I went out to enjoy an afternoon of peace and quiet. I browsed in the SUUSI bookstore, hit the coffeehouse for a chocolate smoothie, and then settled into a lawn chair in a shady corner of the quad. I watched an epic water balloon battle between the teens (dressed as ninjas) and the young adults (dressed as pirates). I talked with people as they came by my shady corner - especially a young woman, just turned 18, who will be going to college a few blocks from our house this fall. I put a few lazy stitches into my needlework. My dad showed up eventually, and we sat in the shade together chatting.
Just before five, we met up with Michael and Alex. We had dinner, gave the baby a shower - about which, the less said the better - and headed off to church. The service was... fine. Not as original and inspiring as Monday's, but all right. Afterwards we hung out on the quad talking to people and watching Alex run around, occasionally bending to mark the sidewalk with chalk.
She was rubbing her eyes by 8:30 and went to bed easily. Then it was my childcare co-op shift. For two hours, I sat on a folding chair in the hallway, listening for crying babies and watching for children out of their rooms. When my shift was over at 11:15, I changed into my Hawaiian shirt and Michael and I went over to the SUUSI dance club. We drank tasty microbrews, danced ourselves into exhaustion, and sang along with the mostly-80s music until we were hoarse. It's comforting somehow to know that Unitarian-Universalists do the Time Warp at their dances with exactly the same verve as SF fans. Because I'm sadly out of shape, I was ready to go home and go to bed by 1:00, so that's what we did.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2006-07-19 11:45 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-07-20 10:09 pm (UTC)-J