Tuesday, October 31, 2006

On my way to Dallas again...

So instead of enjoying Halloween in Austin with Mitch, or in Bastrop, handing out candy to the kids in my neighborhood, I'll be in Dallas, in a hotel room, because the second half of the Wardrip hearing starts up at 8:30 tomorrow morning. *sigh* We're ready to go as far as the case goes, which is good. I baked a sour cream spice cake with cream cheese frosting for my witnesses, and some banana bread too. Mitch took several slices with him to work this morning. I think we're going to meet for lunch, and then I'm off to the airport.

Yesterday Mitch and I made our travel plans for the holidays-- a week with his parents and extended family in Vegas, Dec 20-26, then a week with some family friends on the East Coast Dec 26-Jan 3.

I pulled out all my winter clothes this past weekend because I really enjoyed the brief cold snap we had (it got down to 50! whoohooo!) but sadly had to stack it next to my summer clothes, because it's going to keep warming up and getting chilly all the way through Christmas. Last year it was 82 when I was putting up Christmas lights... makes it a little hard to get into the spirit! But I have already started perusing my cookbooks and thinking about my recipes for the Thanksgiving dinner and the Christmas party. I always like to have a few old favorites especially for the Christmas party-- like spicy beef triangles, baked brie, molasses cookies, and my family-recipe eggnog... but I want to add some new things too.

Anyway I better get packing.

For those of you who would like to see what this salsa thing is all about, here's a link to a performance at the Bayou City Mambo. The couple dances with the Eddie Torres Dancers in NYC-- Eddie Torres being the Father of modern Mambo-- and are independently famous in their own rights. Adolfo used to live in Texas and has fantastic charisma; Melissa has been dancing with Eddie since she was a child. Of course, this is not how we dance on the social dancefloor-- this is performance, choreography-- but it's exciting to watch and so very musical.

Click
  • here
  • to see Adolfo and Melissa's performance.

    Friday, October 27, 2006

    More photos from Bayou City Mambo

    Here's some more pictures from the Bayou City Mambo event. Thanks Adriana!

    Magna looks like she's enjoying this dance with Kenny from the Valley...


    Oscar from New Orleans, dipping Adriana..


    Khoa and Cynthia from Houston opened up the performances...


    Kay and Adriana...


    Griselle Ponce, another superstar salsa diva, with Roy from Austin...


    Claudia from Houston got paired up with Manolo from Seattle for the Jack n Jill Competition...


    Azucena, our local Austin superstar, shows off her style...


    Adriana and Gabriel of Houston...

    Monday, October 23, 2006

    Bayou City Mambo

    Well I still don't have the photos from our trip to the Texas State Fair-- but here are a couple from this past weekend, in Houston. The Bayou City, as it's known, hosted the world's #1 salsa performance group "Tropical Gem" for the first time, and they put on two high-class performances and some very intense workshops. Unfortunately I didn't take one of their classes- was too busy working on my stuff for this execution Wednesday. I did get to dance a bit Friday, Saturday night and Sunday afternoon though. Anyway here's the pictures:

    This is me and Mitch with Dr. Jerome Carter, who organized and arranged the event. He's a good friend of ours and quite a dancer too.



    This is my friend Kay from Houston, dancing with Gerardo from Argentina. In the background, you can see Jerome dancing on the left with an unknown partner, and just part of Reyna dancing on the right.



    And this is Adriana, from Houston.

    Monday, October 09, 2006

    Houston Salsa Congress

    Sorry-- been super busy at work, so no time to post. The weekend before last (9/30-10/1) I was at the Houston Salsa Congress, and these photos are courtesy of Adriana again.

    Here's Azucena Perez, a phenomenal salsera from Austin, leading Reyna Vallejo, from Houston. Azucena's on the right.





    Here's Azucena and Carlos, her partner, performing at the congress.



    Then Monday 10/2 I had my good friend Frank over to celebrate his birthday with a little dinner. Also invited Reddy, a Chicagoan I met on the plane coming back from visiting Heather, who was in town for work. So the four of us (incl Mitch) had a nice evening-- we grilled chicken alla diavola and had an awesome homemade birthday cake, if I do say so myself.

    Tomorrow my colleague Kathy and I leave for Dallas for a hearing. Today I'm slammed, so this is it. :)