Titanic

Jello!

I'm back in 150% girl mode. I'm wearing my new pretty shirt and my wife’s Indian looking skirt, which works great with it. Turns out that in girl mode I have a pretty decent sense of fashion. Who knew?

I don't know why I take all this time to get dressed up when I have no where to go. I've been seeing steady improvement in my presentation though, which makes me happy. I'm still not ready to go out however. Once I have the laser resurfacing I plan to start going out regularly I'm really looking forward to it. Speaking of which, I finally called the office of the Dr. who I want to do the procedure on Friday and I will hopefully hear back from his staff no latter than Tuesday.

Today my wife, a friend and I went to the history museum and saw a traveling exhibit of Titanic artifacts. It was very cool, but my wife was tired and we had to leave early which sucked ass as I was having a really good time. Plus, there was an exhibit of skulls there which is right up my alley. (So I'm morbid.  What of it?)

Anyway. the exhibit starts off presenting you with basic historical information behind the construction of the Titanic, and the people who made it happen. Along the way there are various salvaged objects, such as mechanical parts and stuff. (Everything they had on display is remarkably well preserved; some of the artifacts were in climate controlled cases which occasionally sent off alarms when the humidity or temperature went out of bounds.)

There comes a point where you round a corner and there is a sign that says something like, “Ice Warning! April 14, 1912.” From there there are a series of warnings the Titanic received about the ice conditions and the room gets dark and so does the subject manner.

From a narrative stand point I thought they did a good job with the exhibit. They had a collection of random salvaged objects from the Titanic and they needed to present it in a way that was respectful to the painful legacy of the ship and the lives lost at sea.  They also needed to tell a coherent story that would take a person through an emotional experience that would bring said tragedy to life.   I though they did a good job telling the story of the Titanic utilizing the ecliptic collection of artifacts that they had at their disposal. They ended with the more personal artifacts, which was appropriate considering the calamity that occurred.

I didn’t feel an emotional connection with the exhibit until I saw an egg holder that was speculated to have been acquired by a passenger as a souvenir whilst they were visiting a town in England. Up to that point it was china that belonged to the ship, pots, pans, rusty rivets, tools and such. It reminded me of when my grandma used to make me and my little sisters soft boiled eggs when we were kids and we would dip our buttered toast in the yokes. Same little type of egg holder as they have never really changed, but suddenly there was a seance of loss there. Who did this belong too? Where where they going? Who were they?

It's silly, but that's what I love about history, especially when I'm exploring ancient architecture like the ruins of Chitzen Itza or the cliff cities of Mesa Verde. The artifacts and structures are awesome, but what fascinates me are the stories of the people who once lived there. Who were they? What were their dreams? Who did they love and what did they want out of life? What can we learn from them? I digress.

At the beginning of the exhibit they give each of us a card with the name and story behind a passenger who actually sailed on the Titanic. I got some old dude, but I was apparently in first class so my wife stole it from me so that I was downgraded to second. Her card said I was a 19 year old girl, which from me was an upgrade. =P Turns out I lived and she died, so I win the Titanic Game.

I had a lot of fun today and I'm kind of bummed that I didn’t get to hang out with my friend more as I had a lot of stuff to talk about. Leslie was pooped though so it would have been dickish to try to talk her into staying.

So all in all it was a pretty good day. Here's to more of those.