Burn To Shine: Portland

I finally got one!!!



Thanks and forever-grateful-ness go to Bucky Done Gun at sleater-kinney.net. He/she sent me an original DVD (not a copy of one) with the fantastic Carrie cover. I got it Thursday and watched it several times throughout the night. I absolutely love it.

Bucky also included a copy of Swan Island's new album, The Centre Will Hold. Awesome. Thank you!!!



Speaking of burning...

Yesterday, we visited H-Power (a facility owned by the City & County of Honolulu), which is where they burn our trash. They currently burn about 60% (or 65% ??) of the daily trash. They're looking at adding another boiler so that they can handle 80-90% percent of the trash. We went on a tour of the processing area, where they smash the garbage into manageable pieces and use magnets to remove the ferrous metals. Some sort of electromagnetic field was used to separate non-ferrous metals.

On the island, we produce an average of seven pounds of trash per person per day. This is much higher than the national average of 4.4 pounds. The tour guide explained to us that the reason for this is the fact that EVERYTHING we buy on the island is packaged in some way because we're so isolated and helpless that we require EVERYTHING to be shipped to us from elsewhere. Therefore, it ends up coming to us in extravagant packaging that other places don't usually have to deal with. Lucky us.

Drill 'em!

Professor Grace always used to tell me to find my weaknesses and then "drill 'em!!!"

Something about the way he said it always made me want to improve.



I've found my weakness. It's trigonometry. I understand it, but I just can't react to it as quickly as everyone else in my classes.

I didn't even know that e^xe^iy = e^x(cosy + isiny), but apparently everyone else did. I was taking notes in class and when the professor wrote that on the board, I stopped writing to stare at it. I had to ask the guy next to me what the deal was.

I have a hard time memorizing all of the rules and integrating tricks. My reluctance to memorize all these years (since high school) is really holding me back now. It's a cumulative weakness that isn't going to be fixed quickly.

*sighhh*

Self defense

I've signed up for a gun and knife defense class. I had to pay $30 for a yellow rubber gun and a red plastic knife. The class itself was $150. I've already learned some gun and knife defense from the regular taekwondo classes, but this is a special class dedicated to learning as much as possible about defending against these weapons.



Someone once attempted to rob my mom with a knife at the gas station. She's a quick thinker though, so she sent him running. A wonderful bassist that I was fortunate enough to play with several times was shot in the head (his wife also).

I'm not going to pretend that these things will only happen to other people and never to me.

I know that if I'm ever faced with a situation where I have to fight someone who is holding a gun or knife, I'm not going to get away unhurt. Chances are I won't get away alive, but that doesn't mean I shouldn't try. I've been taught to expect to get cut and to expect the gun to go off. Right. Easier said than done. Alright, Celeste, expect shit like this to happen.

I just hope I never never NEVER freeze up and let people do as they please with me.

Yearbook fun

Due to recent developments, I've dusted off my old eighth-grade yearbook and have taken a photo of my photo.

Carrie Brownstein, you are not alone.



My shirt was white with strange green splotches. Buttoning up all the way to the top was definitely the way to go. For some reason, I signed my picture.

Carrieisms, part 1

I've scrapped "Carrie word of the week" because I've been too busy to keep up with the reading. Instead, I'll just do "Carrie words, part (#)" as I get the time.

Today, though, it's the debut of another periodical special, focusing on our favorite socio-linguist. That's right, we all love the Carrieisms. Look for "Corinisms" and "Janetisms" in the near future. I realize I have been focusing on Carrie more than Corin and Janet, but the three share equal places as my musical heroes. Carrie just seems to be the one who does the most talking/writing when it comes to interviews and articles.


This Carrieism isn't particularly witty or poetic, but is rather personal for me.





Devil In The Woods, May 2005

We were looking for ways to wake up the audience and the listener and try to be more interactive, because things have gotten less interactive than they were 8 or 10 years ago. More passive audiences, people used to watching music, people who aren't used to going to shows and freaking out - we wanted that.

-Carrie Brownstein



My response:


Dear Carrie,

I am pleased to share with you that am I exactly that person you are talking about. At your most recent Portland shows (8/11 & 8/12), I absolutely freaked out while watching S-K play. If it were possible for you to ask anyone who knows me whether or not this is my typical behavior, they will surely tell you, "No." Thank you for giving me a chance to experience interactive music for the first time in my life.

-Celeste

Hawaiian Cement

The view from my parked car.



Here is the cool girl who is in all of my classes.



Rock crushers and sifting bins. By the way, we all had to wear hard hats.



Conveyor belts! The lights were not actually green. The light shades were green, which made for interesting effects in the photos.



We could see the conveyor belts beneath our feet.



More crushing and sifting.



More conveyor belts beneath our feet.



The dust from this bin blinded me and I pictured myself taking a wrong step and being crushed by the giant vibrating bin.



Here's the view from where we were. You can see the concrete ingredients in piles on the ground.



We walked from pile to pile to learn about the different sands and aggregates.



This is the building with the rock crushers that we had just toured.



Only in Hawaii will you find palm trees next to the rock crushers.



A loooooong conveyor belt.

The end!

PDX 3

I dreamt last night that I was back in Portland. S-K was putting on a third show. The same people were back again and we were waiting outside the door. It opened and we all ran up to the third floor (not the balcony). We lined up along the stage and waited for the ladies to come out. For some reason, the dream only consisted of the waiting, the rush up the stairs, and the standing along the stage.



The anticipation, waiting outside all day, then the adrenaline rush of running upstairs is what I remember best from the actual Portland experience. The first moment I realized Janet had walked past me with her drum throne will go down as one of the greatest shocks of my life. Seeing Corin beaming at us, walking a few yards from her car to the CB's front door, left me speechless. The insanity continued until Carrie showed up, walking briskly and bouncily down the line as if she was walking down a wall with gravity pulling her forward. As she passed, her 27 looked back at our stupefied faces. Awww, I miss it. I can still see these images in my mind. What a great trip.

I can't believe I'll never be able to do it again. After over a month, I'm beginning to remember more of it. It's strange that the moment each show ended, I was so overwhelmed that I couldn't remember what had just happened. It seemed like I was experiencing the impossible.

Death By Homework

Hot damn, giraffe! For the love of sugar-free Jello, I can't get this to work out:

Balance the chemical reaction:

FeSO₄ + K₂Cr₂O₇ + H₂SO₄ ---> Fe₂(SO₄)₃ + K₂SO₄ + H₂O

It's a little late to beg for help, so I'm just going to keep staring at it until it's time to go to school. I think I can smell my brain frying.

I do miss that beautiful thing called sleep.


Edit:
I was getting too frustrated to think so I ate some Jello. I came back and worked out an organized method for approaching the problem. Thirty minutes later, the solution showed itself. The feeling of getting a problem right after working on it for hours is like nothing else. Well...almost (S-K not included).

The magic answer:

6FeSO₄ + K₂Cr₂O₇ + 7H₂SO₄ ---> 3Fe₂(SO₄)₃ + K₂SO₄ + 7H₂O

It probably wasn't even supposed to be that hard. Brain decay. :(

Carrie-word of the week

This is the first installment in a new weekly vocabulary adventure.

The lovely Sana has uploaded a pile of old articles to the sk.net site. I'm slowly reading through them. As always, Carrie Brownstein is using words that I have never seen before.

In the solemn spirit of the fifth anniversary of 9/11, today we will explore Carrie's commentary on President Bush.





Venus - April 2004
View Article


Obfuscation -

"Ob-fus-cate: verb [trans.] render obscure, unclear, or unintelligible; bewilder (someone)"
-Oxford American Dictionary

Carrie's context:
"How can people tolerate a president who uses obfuscation to gain support?"

The obligatory "visceral":
"I just want people to think about their quality of life and how it actually feels, on a visceral level, to be alive under this president."

Thank you, Carrie, for never ceasing to expand our minds.

Rambling

I've been busy with school. Homework is insane. Some nights there is no such thing as sleep. On Thursday, we went to Hawaiian Cement and looked at the conveyor belts and sifting machines. We all wore hard hats. There were lots of rock piles, and the dust nearly blinded us as we walked up the inclined see-through floor. The sifting screens were in huge bins that rested on huge springs. They were constantly vibrating, and the bins were so massive that they vibrated the floor, which vibrated my legs, which made it difficult to walk straight. I took some pictures that'll show up here eventually.

Last night I had another weird dream. I was talking to this lady who resembled an older version Olivia Benson from Law & Order SVU. I kept calling her "Carrie." I knew Carrie didn't actually look like that, but it WAS her. She was playing a guitar and doing the Carrie jumps and kicks. Maybe it was the reunion tour. Judging from the physical appearance of "Carrie," my subconscious is not expecting this for quite some time.

Hawwwman, I'm already looking forward to it.

I don't buy clothes often, but when I do, I get most of it from American Eagle because their clothes actually fit me. Or, at least they used to. Last night I got a long sleeve shirt from AE, and it was late so they were trying to close. I just grabbed a medium because I usually fit into medium women's shirts.

Come home...try it on.

Whoaaaa, way too small. I remember the days when there used to be a noticeable size difference between small, medium, and large. I remember the days when I could grab anything medium and fit into it perfectly. :(

Was It A Lie??

I had a dermatologist appointment today. It turns out I am not suffering from acne, but some other sort of skin condition with a really long name. She prescribed me a special kind of shampoo and told me to put it on my skin ("but it's a really good shampoo so you can use it in your hair also, if you want...").

I'm tired of this.

I made the doctor write down the name so that I could Google it when I got home.

Weirded me out

Look at my e-mail inbox:



What's that?

*click e-mail*

HAHA. It's Sana telling me I'm in line for membership approval for the Carrie Brownstein fan club. I wonder how many people have already shit their pants after receiving the same e-mail from her.

Kalihi pumping station

On Friday, our environmental engineering class took a field trip to the Kalihi pumping station. I've got to write a page on it for homework. We sat through a not-so-short lecture about water pumping. I know that the boy sitting next to me was falling asleep because I could see his head falling back. The resulting spasm would wake him up for a little while, and then he'd go back to sleep, then his head would almost fall off again... The speaker told us he usually gives his speech to a younger audience, explaining to them the importance of shutting off the water while brushing one's teeth. He told us that by our age, we ought to know that.

Instead, at this age, we should conserve water by sharing showers.

Ha ha ha. Fun ny. Of course, all the STD-filled kids got a kick out of that one.

Am I the only 19-going-on-20 college student not smiling everything in sight?

This is a good one

This article has the best reporting I've read so far.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14612199/

Another article

This today:

http://www.honoluluadvertiser.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060901/NEWS13/609010323/1001/NEWS

This article is upsetting me even more because the police are covering their donkeys and trying to make it sound like they actually did something.

In fact, WE were the ones who yelled at the police the moment they approached us after the second fire, telling them that this is the same guy who set the fire on 7/22. The police never "ran a check" to find out about the first fire. They did not "determine" anything. We basically had to bash our story against their hollow heads to get our point across: HE SHOULD HAVE ALREADY BEEN ARRESTED.

Police Capt. Frank Fujii said Buckley was arrested for second-degree arson rather than first-degree arson because he "recklessly placed someone's life in danger." The more serious charge requires that someone "knowingly" endangers someone's life, he said.

Buckley left three matchbooks on the ground after the second fire. If he did not "knowingly" endanger the lives of everyone in the area, then could someone please explain to me what his bloody intentions were? How can you SET a fire at a gas station without KNOWINGLY endangering people??

Gas + fire = you die

Oh, please. Buckley must be either a friend of a police officer, or related to one of them. I'm sick of this biased crap.

Someone had conveniently lost the pictures that were taken immediately after the fire. Whatever damage these photos captured is nothing compared to the initial damage. These were taken after the melted hoses and nozzles had been replaced and the pump had been repaired as much as possible. The lower metal section of the pump had been cleaned and restored almost to its original condition. You can still see how some of the plastic melted off.