speech! speech!

today was the dreaded Informative Speech Day for Suzin and Sarah. once again class started with an EXCELLENT first speech. this time instead of fish gutting with Camo Boy, we enjoyed "how to wrestle an alligator" with Laura Cross. she's very expressive. she even brought in a friend wearing an alligator costume to demonstrate upon.

next was "tink" who showed us...how to put on a harness? i think so. something climbing related and completely predictable and verging on boring, except that i knew she has a crush on a man-friend of mine which made it all more ironic and fun.

then--DIGNAL.
and her beautiful power-point presentation on metrosexuality, complete with pictures of guy's bathrooms, color suggestions, fashion tips, and a walk through home decor. most of the guys in the class giggled through the entire FOURTEEN MINUTE (wait, don't mention it to her, she's really ish about it) speech. it was brill. and then during q & a time i asked the first question, "who are some of the more prominent metrosexuals on this campus?" (and no, we didn't plan this out ahead of time). she was reluctant to answer due to maintaining privacy or some crap like that, but she did throw out ryan (the guy from her SGO cabinet last year) and spencer lloyd. there were some other great questions. and then Camo Boy asked her how she felt about guys wearing camo and she referred back to her quote about pirate shirts, loud patterns, and zippers being for circus performers and boy bands, basically saying that camo should be avoided by any metro-hopeful.

and then ME. EMOME.

it was a lesson in procrastination -- sometimes it really does pay off. i'm a living testimony to such. i waited til 4 a.m. to write the danged speech (i'd tried...honestly, i'd been trying since about 11 p.m. and NOTHING was coming, i was too nervous thinking about it). but it gets to a point where i realize that if i'm going to sleep before class, i'm going to have to hunker down and get SOMETHING done. so i did.

and i slept, and i woke up on time and everything.

i was unable to figure out a printing situ for the "metro vs. emo" pictures i was originally planning on using, and i don't have power point, so....i was my own visual aid. i have enough passable emo-fashion to pull it off. i was too enthralled with the first three speeches to be very nervous with my own. and when it came my time i faced the battlelines and charged.

i gave a brief history of emo music (emocore, emo, hardcore emo, and post-emo indie rock). i explained that today's version of emo is actually "post-emo indie rock" (chew on that, jon). i then moved on to emo fashion, and covered each gender down to the plastic bracelets and buttons on their vintage track jackets (speaking of which, aaron did get this site from me originally). my third point, of course, was emo etiquette. i gave my audience a list of things to avoid (other music styles, happiness, meat, etc), physical being tips (sulk, avoid eye contact, etc), and habits of the typical emo kid (pacifist behavior, poetry to alleviate anger and other emotions, poetry is put to music, only buy vinyl, etc).

somehow i delivered all this much better than i ever anticipated, and i "built a rappor with the audience." i got many questions, some about scene kids, some about whether or not the male emo kid can wear girl pants --YES-- and one gem from a rather preppy/trendy girl who asked if it was a bad thing if one's boyfriend looks much better in one's girl pants than oneself does. i suggested she review her criteria for picking a mate. after making a "sucks to be you" face.

i've never been so happy about a speech in my life.

this is revolutionary.

mark this day down, boys. it's a doozy.