Archive for the 'General' Category

Short course cancelled

Sadly, this semester’s short course was cancelled due to low enrollment. The good news, however, is that I’ll be giving group lessons on weekends for anyone in the area who is preparing for springtime feisanna, especially the 28 May Emmitsburg Feis.

Things have been dull lately. With these dreary winter days, there hasn’t been much for me to practice my photography skills (or lack thereof) on. I’m in the middle of a web design project for MDC that’s progressing slowly. I’ve spent the past two weeks heavily involved in watching the 2006 Torino Games and doing a lot of Irish dancing practice for my own steps. I’m working on my new set dances, Piper Through the Meadow Strayin’ and Planxty Drury, both of which I composed myself based on hornpipe and treble jig steps I learned at various workshops.

St. Patrick’s Day is coming up and a group of us is trying to get permission to dance at O’Neil’s on The Corner. I’m also looking for a new apartment, with less than five months left in my current place.

Happy 2006

Happy New Year!

Here’s to improvements and moving forward, letting go of past, while living fully in the present. Here’s to health and moderation, music and dance, opening up and respecting oneself.

Merry Christmas

Who needs a star when you have a penguin to lead you to Bethlehem?

It was a quiet Christmas this year, just the four of us Kennedy/Spanos’. I was in Arlington on Friday afternoon and helped my dad pick out the perfect Christmas tree–it might really have been our best (healthiest) tree ever! My mom also decorated a “wire” tree with ornaments:

and we set up the cresche:

I saw some old friends, saw “The Polar Express” (not recommended), read my childhood Christmas books (all wonderful):

• A Christmas Memory by Truman Capote
• Father Christmas by Raymond Briggs
• Merry Christmas, Strega Nona by Tomie de Paola
• The Polar Express by Chris Van Allsburg
• Angelina’s Christmas by Katharine Holabird
• Madeline’s Christmas by Ludwig Bemelmans

We had our Christmas Eve tradition of watching “Scrooge” with Alastair Sim (great movie) and Christmas day was quiet.

The star gift this year was an iPod Nano, though my Lego angel came in a close second.

Snow day

It’s quite a winter that’s mixing up out there right now. Roads are icy and I can’t seem to get enough hot cups of tea.

Last weekend Martin and I went to New York City to celebrate his PhD. The train was delayed 9 hours, but we finally arrived, tired and cold. In fact, you might say that ‘tired’ and ‘cold’ were the buzzwords of the weekend. We walked to take photos from the Brooklyn Bridge, we had lunch at Gobo in Greenwich Village, stopped for many warm beverages, and did some unsuccessful shopping. We waited in line for bar seats at the Blue Note to see Chris Botti (eh, he was okay). We experienced the insanity that is Times Square pre-Christmas–somehow it seemed much worse than New Year’s Eve 2 years ago. People evidently get stressed out about holiday shopping.

In thekatespanos.com news, I’ve finally taught myself to use cookies so I’m databasing a detailed log which I have, of course, designed an elaborate display page for. Don’t ask me why I waste my time doing things that I already get for free. But I guess my answer would be that I really enjoy learning how this stuff works. In terms of design, I’m suddenly interested in bright, bold colors. My site is plagued with these fuzzy dreamy looking tans and pastels and wispy flowers and it’s starting to bother me. A re-design may be coming soon!

This weekend will be for Christmas shopping, Christmas baking, Christmas partying, Christmas caroling, and just all around Christmas goodness

Holidays Commence

Thanksgiving was a great kickoff to the holiday season. I was home with my family–running around baking pumpkin pies, stuffing turkey, and mashing potatoes.

The next day, Martin and I went downtown to do some museum wandering. It was freezing. So we ended up at the Botanical Gardens, where it was warm and tropical, and where we he could give me some digital camera lessons.

Martin took a really good photo of the (in)famous “stinky plant”

This weekend will be for car inspecting (repairing) and errand running and then next weekend it’s off to NYC by train to celebrate Martin’s Ph.D.!

Gone with the Wind

And winter comes rushing in…it’s eerily windy and overcast today. Mid-November, 11 months.

Last weekend I saw ‘Gone with the Wind’ for the first time at the Paramount Theater on the Downtown Mall. Overdramatic, yes, but it was so epic.

This weekend I’m going to Raleigh, NC to see my good friend Nick perform with Riverdance! He’s living his dream and, actually, he’s living mine too

All Hallows Eve, All Saints Day

Tomorrow is the opening for my uncle’s retrospective art exhibition, Ora Pro Nobis at WTU in Washington, DC. It will be good to see family and friends, and it will be awe-inspiring, as always, to see his work on display.

I carved a mini-pumpkin for Halloween this year. Mini- because all the big ones were already gone at Harris Teeter on Saturday. I have 3 Musketeers bars for the trick-or-treaters.

Martin defends his dissertation on Wednesday.

Ceili at Greenwood on Sunday. The short course is taking a field trip!

Weekend

Culturefest was a huge success! We did an awesome job, quite possibly the best Culturefest I’ve been involved in, and we got lots of gushing compliments afterwards. The light reel was energetic and kept very informal (lots of ‘whooping’) and the treble reel was loud and impressive, especially because of the a cappella effects of feet + bodhrán.

Saturday was a wholesome homemade dinner with Martin, followed by a visit to the Twisted Branch, where we shared a pot of organic roiboos.

Sunday I baked my annual pumpkin pie, made from real pumpkin, and the crust was made from scratch as well!

October is almost over. First week of November includes: (1) Uncle Di’s gallery opening, November 1, (2) Martin’s dissertation defense, November 2 (plus many days of celebration), (3) short course field trip to the ceili in Greenwood, November 6.

My life as a photographer now begins

This weekend my parents came to visit me to celebrate my birthday. They told me they were bringing me a surprise gift, and while I was really hoping it would be Anthony, it was almost as good: a brand new Canon Powershot A610! Now I’ll be able to do all things web design-related myself–the HTML, the CSS, the Javascript, the graphics, the photogrpahy, the MySQL, it’s awesome. Now I have to learn how to use it–there are so many settings, and I know next to nothing about taking good photos.

We went downtown to Monsoon for dinner, Thai/Southeastern cuisine. It was very nice, I would highly recommend it.

Tea Forté