Wednesday, October 31, 2007

I'm on my air cell phone

A little known fact about Maura: I like to air guitar. I like to air sitar. I like to play air stringed instruments. Always have, and hopefully always will. Air guitar is a part of who I am.

We have hosted a few Dance Dance Revolution Programs at the library, and I have looked on with envy as teenagers bopped around, their feet reaching for the right pads. I would be awkward and self-conscious without proper liquid libations. Libraries are picking up Guitar Hero as well and I hope having air guitar programs, with teenagers shredding like they are at Madison Square in '82. (However, most of them probably weren't born in '82...)

I recently attended an air guitar event and it was nothing short of amazing. May I suggest a few titles for your collection?

I recommend Air Guitar Nation, a witty documentary about one man's path to airness. The same man also published a hilarious memoir, a quick satisfying read with diagrams to develop technique.

sticks to stacks.

I am from Massachusetts. I say wicked, love the Red Sox, fall is my favorite season, and I've been told I am a bad driver.

I've worked in libraries in Western Mass, at the tony library of Mount Holyoke and the quaint library of Northampton. I have always been dazzled and in love with cities, from the grittiness to the glamour, and all the little communities in between. My younger sister came down to spend a bit of time in the city with me. Our adventure started in Port Authority and quickly went to the Upper West Side, down to Brooklyn, up to Harlem, back down to Chelsea, SoHo via Chinatown, and then back to Port Authority. We even had Pinkberry.

I was catching up on my blogs this morning, and the always fabulous Jenny posted a shout out to us western mass girls. I laughed out loud, as the reference was timely. Yesterday, I watched my sister's face turn to sheer horror over the screeching subway, her nose crawl into a little acorn at the olfactory subway experience, and her wide eyes as a woman got into a shouting match with a perfect stranger in the subway for being "too old to be so rude". I got a kick out of watching her facial expressions and her face taking in the sites, sounds and smells of the city. We got to see Jenny today and meet her coworkers! (One of which told me she reads my blog, which made me realize maybe I should be more regular about updating this business...) And kudos to Jenny and her coworkers for their fantastic costumes!

From there, Maggie and I strolled down to Chinatown, so she could pick up an I Heart NY tee shirt. I haven't been down there in years, and since then the faux handbag market has grown. The marketing/harassment seems so much more intense. Small women would stand at the street corners, with small pieces of paper showing handbags whispering, fendi gucci coach chanel handbags miss. SO AGGRESSIVE. And this kept happening over and over again for a few blocks. And one woman practically had me cornered after I said no to her twice. I mused to my sister about being that aggressive for promoting new books. I would follow commuters whispering our latest new books and dvds, james patterson the new alice sebold steven colbert, handing out little informational flyers, enticing them to come back to our information lair to look at our books. I digress, I am much too literal. I need to work on this. (And because old habits die hard, I spent some time discussing the knock off industry and legislation surrounding counter fitting. Really, I just needed to lecture about something...)