Ill&Annoyed

Current mood: exhausted

La conferencia está terminada oficialmente.  Fue divertida, pues estoy muy cansada.  Yes, the conference is officially over; it was fun, but I'm really tired.  I made the best of not feeling my best, but I wish I could have been more energetic and engaged.  Actually, lots of people seemed to be feeling a little under the weather, plus we were informed that it's an especially dusty and allergy-prone time of year here with the corn harvest.  (Corn, corn, and more corn...)  So, no fun to be illin' in Illinois.

This morning, we split into four teams for outdoor service projects at a local lake and state park.  In spite of my less than optimal state of health, I worked hard and had fun with most of my co-workers.  However, the "leader" for our project was a slightly crazy character known as Captain Ron.  We were even forewarned by a local alderman and park volunteer that he was "a little off," but we had no idea until we saw him wielding his chainsaw in a rather, well, unwieldy manner.  He made great fanfare about having served on some safety committee for 10 years; safety for whom and for doing what remains uncertain.  No one was physically injured under his supervision and tutelage, but a small tree he was felling actually brushed one girl's bangs on its way down. 

Captain Ron was also a rather brusque taskmaster.  At one point he was yelling at a couple of people, saying, "Hey you two!  There's work to be done!  Quit talking to each other and come over here and get to work!"  Thus, he amply qualifies as what I refer to as an "Annoyingf*ck," which is best pronounced in as close to a single syllable as possible.  [Again, I am limited in my range of full cursing glory, but this is the last night, dear blahg viewer, that you will be so deprived.]

But Captain Ron only happened to be louder with his blatant disrespect for anyone perceived as an underling.  At one point when I was hauling brush, this other man took a limb right out of my hands and said, "I'll take this one because it's heavy."  Clearly I was already successfully carrying it, which failed to register with he who was shorter than I and whom I likely could have benchpressed if I didn't have this damn cold-yuck.  Then later on my way to bathroom, I overheard one (which one, I know not) of our illustrious crew leaders say something obnoxiously loud and depracating about women and fishing.  Alas, I got my fill of patriarchal men this morning.  On top of all the lackluster social dynamics, I was also pretty much morally opposed to the task at hand, which involved raking beautiful 20-year+ leaf mulch down into a ravine where it will later be burned, supposedly to prevent sediment from building up in the lake.

Okay, enough of ill and annoyed...  One of the highlights of my day was our afternoon trip to Springfield to visit the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Museum.  It included some incredible 3-D interactive movie presentations and a surprisingly diplomatic and honest representation of various interpretations of his life and work.  Overall, the museum was an impressive architectural and multi-media achievement.

On our way back from the museum, we had the pleasure of a totally bizarre and hilarious act of ... what would it even be called?  As we drove through the last little town before Carlinville, we stopped at a stop sign.  We were the last van in the caravan, and all of a sudden I saw a flash of red streak by between us and the van in front of us.  I heard a girl say, "There's ___!" and didn't quite catch what she said.  So I looked out the windsheild, and lo and behold, there's a guy in a full Santa suit riding a kid-sized dirt bike and popping wheelies in the street in front of us!  Everybody in the van started laughing hysterically, somewhat incredulous about what we were witnessing, and laughing harder each time he did a wheelie.  Finally, he pulled over to the side of the road and turned around to go back in the opposite direction. 

Don't misunderstand; in spite of some of the fundamental challenges I've mentioned, it was a beautiful, productive, and overall great day (and I even got to play me some good ol' hacky sack after the service project).  But the totally random sight of Santa doing wheelies was enough to overcome every feeling of ill and annoyed that clouded my day.

Now I just need to go to bed and overcome the challenge of leaving at 5 am tomorrow morning to go back to B'rear Beloved...

[Backposted from MySpace 9/30/06