Mary Bellamy

If you haven't heard, we are moving! We found a great house about 8 miles from the university, situated on the oh-so-lovely Chena Ridge. For those of you who actually know us (as opposed to those of you who just cyberstalk us. You know who you are!), our phone number will remain the same. For those of you who send us bills, keep sending them to the old address. For those of you who send us gifts, we'll get you the new address.

We're not fully moved in, and we won't be having our housewarming for a while, so for now I leave you with some shaky video.



The cat has made the move and is suitably both freaked out by the new place and overcome by the desire to roll in all the spots that apparently still smell like dog.

Summer in Alaska produces a lot of pests. Everyone's heard about our mosquitoes. Last year we had a bad yellow jacket year. And I've currently got a couple of wasp nests around the property that I'm keeping an eye on. But my big annoyance this year is the ever-persistent spruce bud worm.


They don't sting. They don't bite. They just hang in midair from a bit of webbing like a perverted, squirming Christmas ornament. Walking through the trees to get to our cabin has become a delicate art of dodging and weaving through the dangling pests.

I was only mildly annoyed by them until I walked into one full on the other day people. I'm usually not a girl about crawly things on me, but this one made eyeball contact. Eyeball, people. The only thing going in my eye should be my contacts.

Do you hear that sound? No, it's not me screaming about turning the big 3-0. It's me shrieking with joy as I download the Adobe Creative Suite 3. Yes indeed, as I type this my computer is currently installing Photoshop CS3, InDesign CS3 and Illustrator CS3. Oh, and why not add Dreamweaver CS3 to the mix to boot?

I tell you, sometimes it's great being a UAF employee. And it's cool if you don't understand why I'm so amped about this. I'm totally understanding that not everyone cares about design programs and nifty new features and the like. Just like some people are happy with Times New Roman. Luddites.

Sorry it's been a long time since an actual post of substance. I'm afraid it will all be quotes and light-hearted blather for a bit longer. Summer is finally here and I'm busy with about a billion things.

I'm sorry, Tom. I wasn't trying to sneeze on you. But I was trying to not sneeze on the cat. In retrospect, I guess the two actions were related.

Have I mentioned that my boyfriend is a Smarty McSmartPants? And an über-goober, but that's a story best saved for another time. When the Jeopardy! bus rolled into town this week, Tom was there. After kicking ass at the preliminaries, he went on to kick ass and take names at the second round.

Out of 800 people who showed up to try their luck, only 10 were selected for the contestant pool. And as you can obviously tell, Tom was one of them. He's now in their pool and has a 40% chance of being called to the show. Should he be selected, I plan to accompany him. And hopefully convince him to go to the Price is Right as well. I've got a way with the Plinko™.

Tis true, tis true....one of our beloved Hillbillies is moving on. Well, not moving too much, but he has purchased a house down the road. Last night was the official "I own it" party. Beer, champagne and an indoor toilet. He is moving up!

Now we have to begin the long process of looking for a new resident for the commune. There are already three possibilities, but we'll have to figure out if any current residents want to move to the empty cabin, then invite potential residents over to see the place and have dinner, then discuss the potential Hillbillies, then take our recommendation to the board.

Have I scared anyone off yet?

Fucking squirrels ate my hammock chair last year. But then Jay and Nancy gave us a slingshot. Tom has collected a small tub of rocks, and my aim is improving. The new hammock chair is on its way, and I am ready to defend it!

I was poking around Esty today and found myself perusing the hand-printed cards. One artist, Heatherjeany, does some lovely custom work, and as I was clicking through the items for sale, I came across one listing which was a save-the-date card for someone in my high school class. It feels weird to know something so personal about Pilar Vahey, who I haven't seen in more than 12 years.

This is the part where I should apologize for the pun. Please note the silence. And now for an explanation: After years of suffering the injustices of womanhood in silence, I have decided to rise up against the oppression and take matters into my own hand. Literally.

I am sick of Tom getting to use his favorite pee tree while I have to practically disrobe in our tiny outhouse in order to relieve myself. And so, after doing some research (thank you Internet, although you did steer me to some nasty stuff during my research), I have decided that I shouId order a female urination device. But I'm not quite sure which one is right for me, and so I turn to my gentle readers for votes.

Now, right off the bat I dismissed the Urinelle, LaFemme and P-Mate because they were all disposable. I don't want to add to the environmental stress on our planet simply to fulfill my desire to write my name in the snow. After further research, I narrowed the field to three contenders:


TravelMate
Pros: Narrow tip is ideal for perfecting my snow signature!
Cons: It's just so clinical looking.

PStyle
Pros: Please. Have you seen the color range?
Cons: Yeah, that's an open top, which just seems ripe for some accidents.

WhizPlus
Pros: Barbie-doll pink, with a fun name to boot! Flexible material.
Cons: More expensive, must order from Australia.

What? Don't most people blog about this stuff?

The weekend is over, and we survived. Cold Fusion has been working for months now on what just may be the penultimate level of geekdom. I speak, of course, of our now-infamous Borg bellydance. Yes, this was at the gaming convention. How did you know?

The Borg, for those of you who do not know (and you are officially no longer my friends), are a race of cyborgs known for assimilating other cultures and stealing their technology to further their borgifest destiny. In true geek style, we decided to perform a Star Trek bellydance in which I would get to don a bald cap and leather clothes and we could use a little stage combat. Unlike in Star Trek, this time the Borg won. Allow me a few observations:

1. I am way, way hot in a bald cap. In a sexy kind of way.
2. I am way, way hot in leather pants. In a temperature kind of way.
3. It is not easy to quickly remove a bald cap for a costume change.
4. If we wanted to, Cold Fusion could rule the dorks. Because, baby, they loved us! Who would have thought bellydancers would be so popular among the gaming crowd?
   

Did an Amazon reviewer really just compare the nonstick coating on a Calphalon hard-anodized pan to the one ring? Yes, I think he did....

I was passing the time in the main cabin and chatting with Jennie when she noticed that I had received the alumni magazine from my high school. Yes, my high school. It's one of those fancy, full-color, glossy affairs that you'd expect from, say, a private and horrifically expensive college. Well, I went to a private and horrifically expensive high school (but I was a scholarship kid - ha!). When Jennie expressed her surprise, I began regaling her with tidbits from it.

• So-and-so is taking a year off from college and travelling the world. Here are pictures of him in the Galpagos Islands!
• Rich Kid X has started a business importing Ecuadorean woven rugs in Manhattan. Anyone in the area should drop by! It would be great to catch up with other alumnae!
  
• Spoiled Girl is proud to announce that she has given birth to yet another child with a yuppie name. She has left the law firm to stay at home with her children while her husband is continuing his career as a surgeon in Sweden.
• Pretty Boy was recently featured on ABC's The Bachelor, where the girls all obsessed over the fact that he's a prince. (Oh, wait, that one is actually true. Shoot me now.)
  

Do these people all lie? Or are they truly the glitterati? I should have totally married one of those rich bastards, but since I couldn't stand most of them, I'm left with only one recourse: Lies. In the past, I've sent the alumni magazine my version of the truth.

• Mary has left college to pursue a career in dance.
• Mary is finishing her degree and working at the Hartford Courant.
• Mary has moved to Alaska and lives in a dry cabin in a Quaker commune. She is happy to shit outdoors in the winter.

But the gloves are off, baby. No more semblance of the truth. If they can live exciting and wonderful lives, so can I! Thanks to Photoshop, I can travel anywhere! Thanks to my relative anonymity, I can have any job! Thanks to my loose moral compass, I can tell all these things to my former classmates.

So, if anyone asks, I was recently outed as a spy while working undercover in the former Yugoslavia. Fortunately, the United States was able to trade one of their political prisoners to gain my sweet, sweet freedom. I'm recovering from the experience at my ranch in Montana while I ponder new career options. This just might be the time to finish that PhD thesis on Native American female landscape architects working Paris from 1954-62.

But if that seems too outlandish, Jennie has agreed to pose for "commitment ceremony" pictures that I can send in!

Things have been getting a little hectic with the dance scene lately, which is my roundabout way of saying I haven't posted in a while.

Cold Fusion is getting busy. We had a photo shoot, I designed promotional postcards, and they were just shipped to me today. Whee!!


We've got an hour-long time slot for the Ester Library Lallapalooza on Sunday. Hopefully we've got enough material to fill it. Next Saturday is a big one: The Arcticon show. Yes, we will be performing at a gaming convention. What? We're nerds. We even came up with a very special choreography. Here's a hint: You will be assimilated. I also get to be the special guest judge at the convention's masquerade ball costume contest. I'll have a week or two after that to work on our new Web site (which I won't even link because there's literally nothing there yet). At the end of April we head down to Anchorage, where Nomadia is hosting an urban tribal workshop with Heather Stants. We may also be performing at the Dance Together Alaska Festival while we're down there, but our time is starting to get very crunched.

And rumor has it that the Fleurs du Mal burlesque troupe is planning on making a comeback this summer in a big way. The possibility of a 12-show run is out there.....

The group that has been holding a conference in our building all day just finished up and kindly offered the rest of their food to us. Or rather, all we could eat until catering got there to clean it out (at which point it gets thrown away).

I now have all the crackers, a plate full of cheese and a grocery bag with the rest of the crudites on my desk. Did I mention that it's my night to serve dinner at the commune?

After much discussion, I went ahead and purchased tickets for Tom and I today. Sure, it's months in advance, but I doubt we'll find a better deal than this: $1,200 each for round-trip from Los Angeles to Auckland. New Zealand, here we come!