Monday, March 22, 2010

SPRING BREAK: DAY ONE

Since I work as a dance teacher my breaks are the same as the school breaks. This week happens to be SPRING BREAK. So, even thought I'm not in school I get the same excitement and recklessness that traditionally goes along with SPRING BREAK. I really shouldn't be excited about it. I am forced to take a week off and I don't get paid, yet the studio still charges the clients for that week. Dance teachers get a raw deal sometimes.

Every SPRING BREAK I come up with some goals that I want to accomplish during my time off. I usually aim too high. In my mind I was going to lock myself in my room and write a screenplay during this spring break, but I don't see that happening. So I decided to go not worry about goals and just sort of float along, day to day, and see what happens, realizing fully that this is what I kind of do all the time anyway.

So far today I have worked out and gone to see if I could get my glasses fixed. My glasses are 1960's style black frames. They broke last night when I accidentally used them to help myself get out of bed. I only paid $16.99 for the frames (actually Dane bought them for me for Christmas when I pointed them out in a shop at the mall), so it's not too surprising they broke easily. I paid nearly $200 to get the lenses put in though and I really don't want to have to buy new glasses. The new lady at the glasses shop suggested I go to the store at the mall and buy as many pairs of these frames as possible so I can just pop the lenses out of the broken pair and into a new pair whenever they break. Great Idea! So I went to Lloyd Center, not the mall where Dane bought me the frames but the closest mall to me and they have the same store, Lids. Aren't all malls basically the same? I think Lloyd Center has a little more character because of it's location.

For my birthday one year my dear friend Billy agreed to get his ear pierced. I got to pick the earring--I chose this little gold cross. We went to the Piercing Pagoda at the Lloyd Center. Billy was surprised that it hurt so much. I had a great photo of his face right as that gun was pushing the metal through his lobe. He let the hole close and I think he might hold it against me that I made him mutilate his body. While on this birthday trip I was riding the escalator, licking a cone of frozen yogurt when the young man behind me observed, "Damn! You are fucking that ice cream cone up!" I informed him that it wasn't ice cream, it was frozen yogurt. So, I always look forward to going to Lloyd Center because you just never know what it going to happen, though usually, nothing does.

The mall was more crowded than usually because it was the first day of SPRING BREAK. The ice was being cleaned and kids were eagerly awaiting to go in circles, around and around, on the rink. I went to the store where Dane purchased my glasses and they didn't have the frames. The sales attendant informed me that they might get some in a week, and that their store was the only Lids store to be getting them. I was pretty sure he was lying. There was a Dianetics booth set up that was advertising free stress tests. As I walked by on my way to Lids I noticed an old man sitting with a young man and nodding. I guess he was getting a stress test. A lady asked me if I wanted one and I thought about it and how it would be something fun to do on SPRING BREAK, but I didn't want to have to wiggle my way out of becoming a Scientologist. The stress test looked like they made you hold on to metal jump rope handles while a needles bounced up and down on a machine. Beyond the Dianetics booth there was a Pirate Store, a store that specifically sold things for looking like a pirate, and all the sales people were dressed like pirates. The mall is such a bizarre place, it's like visiting another world, a future world. I feel like if people from the past came back and walked around Lloyd Center they would be so baffled, speechless. On the way back by the Dianetics booth the old man was sitting, eating a sandwich and watching the kids skate. Another man was grabbing the metal handles and I heard him say, "This really works, huh?" On the way out of the mall I noticed there as a vending machine for Nestle's Quick. I thought, how strange, a chocolate milk vending machine. The future is a crazy place. Luckily, I get to go back there tonight because Paul and I are going to see a movie there. Lloyd Center twice in one day? Spring Break really does rule.

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