Mascot

This is my mascot. I discovered it at Genki Sushi. It is my favourite thing in existence.

I just keep watching it... over and over and over... 

In other news, my name came up for starting work study at Velocity in March! So I start then and it will go for at least three months, and I will get discounted classes. It's super exciting!

This is what I do when I'm cooking... or not cooking...

Scratch that... this is what I do all the time...

Improv, anyone?

Hey, so the other day I came up with the idea of video recording any dance improvisation I do, for my own educational purposes. I want to be able to see what I did, in order for me to maybe incorporate parts into actual choreography. So I did a bit of improvisation last night, and tested it out. It was okay, except for I didn't pick out the optimum place to set my computer to record it so it's mostly upper body stuff, no floor work and I didn't get to go out of the range of the camera. But even if it's not great, it's not terrible, and I thought it might be interesting for people who don't have the ability to see me dance all the time.

This is the first video I took, it's to a song called "Hide and Seek" by Imogen Heap. I really want to choreograph something to it, so I'll probably be working with it a fair amount.
UPDATE- I watched this on here after I posted this, and the sound and visual are really not synced very well. I apologize, it's a lot cooler when it is.

I also wanted to put up a couple pictures I've taken over the past couple of days. 

Definition of perfection: Seattle dinosaurs at sunset! (:

More Adventures in Cooking, and Life.

Life is weird. Today, sad and strange things are happening elsewhere, things no one can begin to understand why they're happening. At the same time, it feels like something resembling summer in Seattle today! And the mountains are so wonderful!

So although life is weird, and although it might be hard sometimes, one has to try to see the happy and beautiful things in life as well. 

Like Betty! She is the perfect example of being at peace with the world.

Now to what's been going on with me-

While going on a walk to Caffe Ladro today, I was listening to the Decemberists, and it just felt good. I thought I'd try to share the experience with you to the best of my ability-

Also, last night I cooked again! I made vegetable chowder with carrots, mushrooms, broccoli, cauliflower, corn, and potatoes. Very yummy. I also made cookie bars!

(They all made very good leftovers today, too! Hurray!)

And to update you all in the dance life of Jordan Rahne MacIntosh-Hougham, I randomly got asked to be in Kelsey Murphy's Cornish College of the Arts Senior BFA Performance, which will be on the 16th and 17th of February. Wednesday I had my first rehearsal, and tonight is my second. Things are lining up! 

IN OTHER NEWS PINA 3D IS COMING TO CINERAMA FEBRUARY 10TH AND I AM SO EXCITED! It will be glorious.

AHHH EEEEEE YAYYYYY!

I HAVE EXCITING NEWS! BOOM! *EXPLOSION*

Now that I've captured your attention, I'm not going to tell you what it is. Yet. Because I have other things to talk about first which are probably just as equally exciting.

First, a picture. (On a napkin.)

Secondly, a cookie recipe! I cannot, sadly, take credit for the recipe, other than the fact that I chose to make them with coconut, chocolate chips, and oats, and I made them well. I got several compliments on them, including them being referred to as "a revelation," "the best cookies I've had in awhile," and "pretty good." (That last one is my favourite.) I have gotten asked for the recipe a bunch, (meaning once) and so I'm putting it up in case people want to try!

1 cup softened butter
1 1/4 cups brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
2 eggs
2 tablespoons milk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 cups rolled oats
2 cups semisweet chocolate chips
1 cup shredded (I used unsweetened) coconut

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F, unless your oven is incapable of doing anything correctly like mine, in which case just turn it on and it will gradually heat up to 500 degrees, then turn it off and the cookies will cook the way they're supposed to after it's off.
2. Mix butter, brown sugar and white sugar until creamy. Beat in the eggs, then stir in milk and vanilla. In a separate bowl, combine flour, baking soda and salt, and then slowly add the latter mixture into the former. Mix well. Add the oats, coconut, and chocolate chips! Fun stuff!
3. I'm sure you know the rest- put scoops of the dough onto an ungreased cookie sheet, bake until they look good! The recipe I used says 10-12 minutes, but if your oven is incapable, just eye it!
4. Voila! 30-ish "Revelation Cookies." (The recipe says 30, I got more than that out of it. Depends on what size cookie you want.)

Original recipe here.

Thirdly, things are getting rolling! Things are looking up! Things are happening in yours truly's life! Finally!

Within the past couple of days I have had visitations from my dear friend Adri Rainwater, and my dear mother. Adri and I basically bummed around Seattle and went to Oddfellows because apparently that's my home away from home now, and bought tea, which is one of my favourite pastimes. Mom took me with some of her friends from LIOS to Goodwill, and then she and I went to Blue C Sushi, (which I also had just been to with Adri, heh) and caught up. Niceness. Also Magda and I are still hanging out, still doing weird things together, and that is good. Vurry good. Things are good.

And I went and saw The Artist, which was stunning! Everyone needs to see that movie. It was so beautiful and clever! I cried, and I don't normally do that in movies, so see it! Really, probably one of the most excellent films I've ever seen.

One a different note, last night I volunteered at Velocity Dance Center because it was the last night of The Bridge Project, a workshop/performance they do every year where four up and coming choreographers are chose to do an intensive type thing and create a piece of their own, and then showcase it at the performance. I helped set up, usher, and take things down, and I got to see it for free! (Who calls that volunteering when you get to see it for free!?) It was breathtaking, and beautiful, and I highly recommend you all to keep on the lookout for the choreographers that got chosen for it. Their names are Rachel Grant, MaryAnn McGovern, Alice Gosti and Alicia Garcia. 

AND MY BIG NEWS! I AUDITIONED LAST SATURDAY FOR THE YOUNG CHOREOGRAPHER'S LAB AND TODAY I GOT AN EMAIL SAYING I GOT IN!!! YAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!!!!!!!

I will be working every saturday with one of four young choreographer's that participated in the lab, and some other young dancers that got in as well until May 5, when we perform at Velocity! Then, if the piece I'm in gets chosen, we would move on to perform in DANCE This, which will be July 12-14 at the Moore Theatre. So keep your calendars open, especially May 5!

Mmkay, I'm done now. That was my exciting news. 

Also, I just learned Andrew Bird (my favourite musician ever) is releasing a documentary February 17 which will be premiered with an intro short film by Fleet Foxes. Stoked!

http://nwfilmforum.org/live/page/calendar/1991

Then he's coming to perform in Seattle on April 9!! Eeeeeeee! So many exciting things!

http://stgpresents.org/artists/?artist=1804

Here's a couple videos of him, for your enjoyment. You may know him already as the artist who did "The Whistling Caruso" for the Muppet Movie. (The puppet Walter 'performed' it, but it was Andrew Bird who was whistling.)

Here he is with Yo Yo Ma!

A Take Away Show

All kinds of replacing names up in heaahhh...!

Guess who's back?
Back again...
Jordan's back...
tell a friend!

(I've been in a funk for the past while but I'm getting out of that now so hopefully we can really get this blog rolling. Also I'm ashamed to admit I wasn't the sole creator of that beautiful rhyme that is above these couple of sentences in brackets.)

This was my inspiration. (Click the hyperlink for the full video, 2:50 for the clip, if you don't know Mitchell Davis you probably won't find it funny. Sorry.) And sure, he got that from Eminem. But whatevs.



So I've been in a funk because I've been putting effort into relationships where the effort wasn't mutual. And I'm done with that now. I'm only going to be with people who want to be with me too. Which brings me to my next topic.

Magda Pendergrass and I have been hanging out lately because I go to Velocity Dance Center a bunch and she goes to Seattle University, so we're both in Capitol Hill, but also we're both just basically awesome. I thought I'd put up this picture to illustrate just how awesome we are.

Yepp... 

Plus we have mind stimulating conversations regarding circulation, psychopaths vs. sociopaths, and Serotonin. And now we have matching screen-printed shirts. Hurray!

Oh and I got my second ear piercings finally! They were long overdue. Probably most of you have seen them already via Facebook, but just in case:

On another note, I just got finished with the Danielle Agami Intensive at Velocity Dance Center. It was three days working with her, which was amazing and wonderful. She performed in the Batsheva Dance Company in Tel Aviv and is now teaching GAGA classes in the United States. GAGA is a dance technique created by Ohad Naharin, the director of Batsheva. 

One of my favourite videos:

I've watched their videos on youtube for awhile now, and working with Danielle was an incredible experience. I'm starting to get a lot more comfortable with improvisation, which is one of the more intriguing aspects of dance in my opinion. So I'm really happy I had this opportunity.

I also had my first dance audition the other day! I auditioned for Full Tilt, which is an annual dance performance that includes works by 6 different choreographers. I auditioned for all of them, so that was just about 6 hours worth of learning different combinations and trying to perform them well and with passion in front of the choreographer! Definitely a good experience to have. I think I'm going to audition this next weekend for the Young Choreographer's Lab. Apparently I wouldn't be auditioning to be a choreographer, that happened a really long time ago and I wasn't aware of it's existence, but I'd be auditioning to dance for one of the "young choreographers." I think I have a better chance of getting into that than I do of getting into Full Tilt. But we'll just have to see!!!

A couple of posts back I mentioned thinking about going to the casting for the T-Mobile ad. Didn't get any part, but I am going to be a production assistant on set, so that should be fun! That's tomorrow. Looking forward to earning some money and putting in some work. 

Still trying to find a job, but for the time being, I'm really happy with working on dancing. 

Definition of perfection: living to the fullest, in whatever way that means to you.

Thank you! Happy Holidays!

Hey. So yeah, it's been awhile. It's not like I'm not doing anything, though! Last weekend I had gingerbread weekend at my Grandma MacIntosh's, which is where we create a bunch of gingerbread and get obsessed about it all. That was really fun, and we also got a bunch of family pictures taken by some photographers that came. So I will post those pictures and pictures of the gingerbread as soon as I get them.
 Going backwards from there, I went to a dance class with someone from the Mark Morris Dance Company on Saturday morning. It was really fun because we did weird things with time signatures, which I haven't done a whole lot of in dance yet. We danced in 2, to a 3/4 time signature. For any band geeks that happen to read this, you already know that is called a Hemiola. I was stoked because I think I was the only one in the class who actually knew what he was talking about when he used the term. It was also cool because my dad and Jenny and I had seen the Mark Morris Dance Company at the Moore the previous night. The choreography was really clever, actually. That's the only way I can describe it.

Anyways, today, I'm working at my dad's work- doing some odd jobs etc. While folding their christmas cards, I saw the window washer outside on our window, in the rain/fog/mist- whatever you want to call it. Anyways, it looked like such a miserable day to be doing it, and an idea just jumped into my head. So I followed through with my impulse and wrote in my journal in big capital letters, "THANK YOU! HAPPY HOLIDAYS!" When I showed it to him, he waved and got a big grin on his face, and I got all warm and fuzzy inside. Hurray!

Definition of perfection: random acts of kindness
Also, probably Beecher's flagship grilled cheese sandwiches. Those are good too.