Grease, Hoops, and Zombies, oh my!

Well, the second day of Paideia was a roaring success. I dismantled various parts of 3 dollar bikes and put them back together again in considerably better condition. You should've seen me, wielding a wrench and a grease rag. I had fun, plus now I can claim to know slightly more than nothing about bike mechanics. Yay!
A bit later I went to Peter (the fire-eater)'s class on contact juggling. He taught us some fun 'crystal' ball tricks (go check out YouTube, search for contact juggling) and I met a super-cool Portland punk named Dustin. He's a whiz with hoops, and taught me some of his blindingly awesome tricks. I can't say I'm ready for performance yet, though.
And finally, the piece de resistance - Zombie Self Defense. This was amazing. A bunch of people showed up and clamored for spots on the couches around the demonstration table. The teacher, Nick, was all set for battle with zombies in army fatigues and running shoes. He had a full array of weapons that one might use against the undead, such as a machete, which we will get back to a bit later. He began with a scientific explanation of what happens when a person gets infected by the Solon virus, which will turn humans into zombies within 24 hours, complete with an explanation of the effect it has on the frontal lobe - the site of the zombification. He went on to explain the capacities of zombies, such as the ability to survive underwater, in order to better arm us when the time comes. It is very important to know the abilities of your enemy when planning your strategy. And if you're prepared for your enemy, you must take your own state into consideration as well. You must remove all loose clothing and long hair. And this is just what he did. Nick actually sawed off his own shoulder-length curls in front of an audience - now that's devotion. We gave him a round of applause. He then moved on to the demonstration portion, and oh my - Gallagher revisited. He brought out two coconuts, two honeydew melons, and a cantaloupe, and proceeded to destroy them with: a kitchen knife, a hatchet, both ends of a hammer, a crowbar, and the machete. We passed around the shards afterwards, though if they had been real zombie heads, we wouldn't have eaten them because zombie flesh is fatally toxic (though, as we ascertained during the Q&A session, we don't know the LD50 for zombie flesh).
So, yes. That was pretty nuts. And today, if I ever get out of bed, I'm going to review some theatre tech stuff, do some more bike maintenance, learn to twirl an umbrella with grace and style, knit, make paper cranes out of Starburst wrappers, dye my own wrapping paper, and get a course on how to deal with cops from two old Reedies who are now lawyers. Oooh... Or, at least, I could do all those things.

Oh, P.S. - IT'S SNOWING LiKE CraZy!


(Note the excited Reedies snowball fighting in the bottom right)