I forgot to mention last weekend that I took my dog to the park with the Zoo and, while he’s not allowed in the Zoo, the Zoo mini train that goes around the park lake was running and they let me take him as long as I promised to keep him on my lap. Poop had such a good time and all these kids were screaming, “PUPPY!” whenever we rolled past.

Then I met mum for lunch after her hair appointment at Grimaldi’s Pizza Parlour and they have a patio but it was only accessible from the inside since a party of 12 was sitting in front of the gate so I spent about seven minutes trying to flag down a waiter to see if I could carry Poop inside and was ignored so….I just tucked him under my arm and walked through the restaurant with him to get to the patio. TURNS OUT EVERYTHING WAS OK THOUGH. They brought him some water and he had pizza and salad with us.

Posted 1 month ago | 2 comments

So today I was invited to the first part of the Pascua Yaqui Indian Easter ceremonies (Palm Sunday Version) and while I’m not really much of a religious person I have to say I really enjoyed myself.

My family was one of the few honkeys in attendance (the others looked like Anthropologists or old hippies) so I felt like it was a big honour to be invited.

The ceremonies start with these ‘Judas’ devils coming into the center stage. They all are anonymous, dressed in big scary masks and they all have swords and daggers (though some had variations on the theme—there was an evil Cardinal (bird) and it had one short ‘dagger’ bird claw and one long ‘sword’ bird claw/leg. There were also a few costumes of evil looking white people, monsters, Indian Scouts (‘traitors’), and some evil masks that looked suspiciously Apache in nature (they have a bit of a history those two tribes). There were also some more Aztec-y looking masks which hark back to that part of the Pascua Yaqui heritage. These monsters come at the audience (which is protected by a barrier of some holy plants of some kind) and threaten them and try to steal things that cross this barrier (they got a folding chair, a blanket and a popcorn ball, from what I could see.) They are generally nasty.

Then comes a procession of “good guys,” lead by a traditional Deer Dancer (who was amazing) and followed by a palanquin (kind of like the Mikoshi of Japan) of a statue of Jesus carried by some people in Catholic dress and that is followed by another palanquin of the Virgin Mary carried by some ladies dressed all in purple (of every age.) Then, from another direction, there came a bunch of dancers with a modern mariachi-esque band playing cheerful music.

The Goodies all gather at the front of a wall designated as the “Church” and they repeatedly try to bless everyone—INCLUDING the Baddies (who make yucky faces or..er mime them since they have masks) and when the Church Bells ring the Baddies put their fingers in their ears and make another ruckus. After a few failed attempts at blessing the baddies these boys/men with palm fronds wrestle the baddies en-masse and stuff these Blessed Palm fronds into their belts. It was quite a struggle but in the end all the Baddies are blessed and have palm fronts sticking out their backsides and the Goodies bless everyone a few more times and le fin.

I’m not allowed to take pictures or else I would have cause I’d have loved to share them with everyone but it was amazing. Every mask is handmade and, next ceremony (Easter Saturday) I hear they burn all the masks they worked so hard on as a sort of purging of the evil. I’ll write up a part 2 then if anybody is interested.

Anyway, all day in the Arizona sun and I’m bushed.

Posted 2 months ago | 5 comments

aesthetic-dissonance:

sagihairius:

My mom just informed me that my first word was “quote” so I’m going to make sure my last word before I die will be “unquote”

you have been blessed with a rare and epic opportunity

My first word was “peckerhead.”

Posted 2 months ago | 196070 comments

Ode to my hair. #NaturalColor

Posted 2 months ago | 1 comments