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ventaDo you live in Oxford? Do you have a passing familiarity with city centre pubs? Are you free on March 5th? Would you like to give up your entire Saturday for no money?
Some of you may already know this: my sword-dancing team is organising the national, annual rapper competition this year. In Oxford.
Details here.
Extensive experimentation in previous years' competitions has shown that the only way to get a gaggle of sword-dancers from one pub to the next is to put them in the care of a reasonably responsible, reasonably sober human. Said human will then shepherd them lovingly from one pub to the next, making sure everyone gets to the correct place at the correct time.
In fact, it's best to have two of these humans. (You know, one to stay with the body and one to go for help).
My team is quite small, and various of us are doing other things - organising judges, calculating scores, clearing up after breakfast, extracting badgers from dishwashers (don't ask). Accordingly, we find ourselves a little short of humans.
To be a suitable human, you must be:
If that sounds unappealing, it is of course possible just to show up in one of the pubs for half an hour and watch the dancing, whilst being as drunken and irresponsible as you please. You're actively encouraged to do that, in fact.
If it does sound appealing to anyone, let me know. There is no remuneration available. There may be the prospect of a hot evening meal and free entrance to the evening showcase performance, I'm not 100% sure on the details as yet. The showcase does, of course, contain more sword dancing so you might be totally sick of the stuff by then anyway.
Some of you may already know this: my sword-dancing team is organising the national, annual rapper competition this year. In Oxford.
Details here.
Extensive experimentation in previous years' competitions has shown that the only way to get a gaggle of sword-dancers from one pub to the next is to put them in the care of a reasonably responsible, reasonably sober human. Said human will then shepherd them lovingly from one pub to the next, making sure everyone gets to the correct place at the correct time.
In fact, it's best to have two of these humans. (You know, one to stay with the body and one to go for help).
My team is quite small, and various of us are doing other things - organising judges, calculating scores, clearing up after breakfast, extracting badgers from dishwashers (don't ask). Accordingly, we find ourselves a little short of humans.
To be a suitable human, you must be:
- able to pass as human
- willing to make a firm commitment to show up in the city centre on March 5th at 10:30 for a briefing, and stick with your gaggle of sword-dancers until about 4ish
- willing to sit through a certain amount of sword-dancing, some of which might be bad
- reasonably responsible
- reasonably sober (even after a day spent in pubs)
- in possession of own sense of direction, and familiar with Oxford
- have own teeth
- lots of teeth
If that sounds unappealing, it is of course possible just to show up in one of the pubs for half an hour and watch the dancing, whilst being as drunken and irresponsible as you please. You're actively encouraged to do that, in fact.
If it does sound appealing to anyone, let me know. There is no remuneration available. There may be the prospect of a hot evening meal and free entrance to the evening showcase performance, I'm not 100% sure on the details as yet. The showcase does, of course, contain more sword dancing so you might be totally sick of the stuff by then anyway.
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no subject
Date: 2011-02-03 06:07 pm (UTC)Anyway yes, please do - I'll post more details nearer the time. We need audiences just as much as we need guides :)
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Date: 2011-02-03 06:15 pm (UTC)messiermerrier!no subject
Date: 2011-02-03 06:09 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-03 06:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-03 06:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-03 06:19 pm (UTC)More bodies may be needed later, so will get back to you on people like Joanne... familiarity with Oxford more important than numbers, at present :)
no subject
Date: 2011-02-03 06:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-03 06:32 pm (UTC)OK. The problem really arises when you get people saying "we're in Pub A and we need to be at Pub B in half an hour, which means we can stop off at hypothetical Pub C and squeeze in an extra-curricular dance on the way"... then you have to find a suitable C! Googling for "high-ceilinged wooden-floored pub with friendly landlord" doesn't always work out so well :)
Sitting at tables answering exactly those sort of questions is very useful, though, so we may co-opt you for that too :)
no subject
Date: 2011-02-03 06:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-03 06:30 pm (UTC)Weeeeee! Something to look forward to!!!
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Date: 2011-02-03 07:18 pm (UTC)Don't know that track. I saw them last year at Koko, and it was one of my gigs of the year. A complete luck in, from friends who could not use a ticket.
The Greatest hits CD is on my regular play list.
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Date: 2011-02-03 09:12 pm (UTC)oh damn, a quick trip to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Life_Story indicates not.
Ho hum, I shall have a look for the post-Golden Mile stuff. And re-play Sparkle in my head.
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Date: 2011-02-03 09:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-04 10:13 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-04 10:13 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-04 11:20 pm (UTC)There was some indication they would do another for another anniversary.
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Date: 2011-02-04 10:18 am (UTC)At the time of posting, I was actually listening to Emerald Green. Although due to the peculiar nature of that particular song-writing experiment[*], that's true for a large percentage of the CD.
[*] In the days when bands were expected to provide different b-sides for each format, Jake Shillingford complained that it meant you had to write about an albumsworth of material just to put out a single. One attempt to get round this was constantly re-using a set of lyrics, but changing the melody/style/arrangement. The result is Emerald Green, The Return of Emerald Green, Emerald Green Strikes Back, Paint it Emerald Green, Emerald Green Blah Blah Blah...
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Date: 2011-02-03 07:45 pm (UTC)OTOH I can certainly come and applaud.
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Date: 2011-02-04 10:12 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-03 07:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-03 08:28 pm (UTC)Mmm, cake.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-04 10:11 am (UTC)Bah! A snare and a delusion.
I remember, when I was quite small, the mother explaining to me that most of the photos of food in magazines are not made of actual food. Whipped cream melts fast under studio lights, she said, so the gorgeous cream cake I was looking at was probably filled with shaving foam or somesuch.
This is a disappointment from which I've never really recovered.
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Date: 2011-02-04 10:10 am (UTC)On account of not very many people really growing leeks these days, there were a number of supermarket entries, not to mention a large and vaguely terrifying leek made of cardboard. We don't want none of that sort of stuff.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-03 11:13 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-04 12:36 am (UTC)(and if you recognise the origin of that line, you'll know that the preceding line is particularly apt!)
Besides, I do a poor imitation of a crocodile
no subject
Date: 2011-02-04 10:09 am (UTC)Beautiful Mabel!
I think you've slightly lost me with the crocodile, though.
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Date: 2011-02-04 11:53 am (UTC)You did specify "lots of teeth"...
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Date: 2011-02-04 06:18 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-04 06:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-04 06:18 pm (UTC)Assuming we can find any who'll take the job!
Sadly can't volunteer
Date: 2011-02-08 07:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-03 11:32 am (UTC)There's lots of details here: http://www.dert2011.co.uk/itinerary.html
The short version is: choose one of the KA, the Blenheim, the 'Madding Crowd, the Duke's Cut or Freud's, insert self at some point betwee 11:30 and 4:30. The 1-2pm region will be a lunchbreak, but other than that there should be groups of teams wandering in and out all day.