What a Feeling

At the age of 40 I took part in my first “Flash mob” type event. This is when people get texts/emails telling them to show up at a certain place at a certain time and then do something (pillow fight, lay down, water fight, etc). This one was called ‘mobile clubbing’ or as I’ve dubbed it “Flash Dance.”

My friend Neena decided to do this event for her birthday party last Friday. It was beyond cool. The event was in the main Turbine Hall of the Tate Modern museum. We were instructed to bring our iPods, headphones, what have you, and stake out a space by 7 p.m. on the floor. Then at 7:01 we turned our own personal music on and started dancing up a storm. There were a few hundred people there of all ages, races, etc and it was so fun to see everyone boogie-ing to their own beat. Even better was when you found someone who was dancing totally in rhythm to the music you were playing. I went with a compilations of dance tunes from Dance Mix USA and Dance Party 2000 (b/c I’m old school and that’s how I roll..lol) and all of a sudden I’d look over and see someone and think “Oh my god, are they listening to Black Box’s Strike it Up too?”

What made it even more bizarre was the new installation in the Turbine Hall – The Crack in the Floor. It runs the entire length of the hall and gets quite wide at times so you had to be careful dancing around it. And of course some who didn’t know about wore expressions of “Oh my god, did we do that?” when they looked down and spotted it. The staff at Tate was great as they let us stay for nearly 2 hours.

Our party then moved from the Tate to the tunnels under London Bridge where there is this amazing club, Shunt. When anyone comes to visit, we are so going back there! Tons of cavernous spaces, like something out of a film set, plus great music and cheap drinks.

In other culture news, I’m raving about the film “Once.” I think I’m a bit late to the party on this one as it was in the States last spring/summer after winning the audience award at Sundance. But for those who haven’t seen it, add it to your Netflix queue asap! The London Film Festival also pens this week and have snagged tix to a few screenings (but alas, did not get into the Q&A with Laura Linney, grr..arrgh). I am also hoping to see my thesis case study Christian Slater in the stage version of Swimming with Sharks. It’s been listed on the half-price TKTS board (which is a bonus when one is still unemployed)!

Speaking of...the job search goes slowly. I’m now pounding the pavement for any kind of editing/comms/web temporary job for the next two months before I head home for Christmas. Any and all suggestions welcome! I then head back to States for the first time in a year and a half and I can’t wait. I'll be in the DC area Dec 17-29, so hope to see many of you. In January I will then re-assess my visa/work situation and go from there.

Hope all are well!