The Real Final UK Post of 2008

December 21, 2008

As I was driving down Hills Road, I realized that I was still wearing my glasses. Hmm. I wasn’t in such a hurry that I could not have put my contact lens on. Now where is it? Right pocket. No. Left pocket. No. Hmm. I checked again after parking the car. They are nowhere to be seen. Uh oh. Do I still go? Should I stay or should I go?

I’m not sure if I had gone dancing without them. I must have. There was one time when I was going somewhere and realized that I had contact lens in only one of my eyes. Or was it for football? I don’t know. If it happened before, it was a long time ago. What the heck. I’ll do without them and see what happens. A big surprise, no?

I think one of the bigger issues was spotting potential partners. Dancing and leading was not much of a problem especially after a dance or two. Possibly the first few were made worse by me telling my partners that I was not fully competent in the vision department. I think Steph’s vision is worse than mine, and she seems to do okay flying blind.

It turned out to be a rather weak night – quite thin in the middle and very short on follower’s side. Robin was there, and he asked if this was typical. My answer was that the crowding on the dance floor seemed about normal but that there were not as many people milling around on the carpet. I should have added that the shortage of followers was a little unusual.

Amir and Helen were both there. Amir said he was now done as DJ. When pressed further, he elaborated that he’s moving to New Zealand (for one year?). He says he probably will teach there. Oh well. He was one of maybe half dozen regular SOS guys I was friendly with – in fact he was one of the nicer ones even among them. Another one goes before me. Dang. I just realized that I did not even wish him good luck in person.

In the end I would rate this one at just around 50th percentile – maybe a little lower. On1 to On2 split was about half and half. On2 followers were slightly better on average, but I wouldn’t say that the On1/On2 split really affects how I rate the night. Dancing mood was often on the silly side. I think I confused at least one follower with some irregular movements rather than amusing her – which is the more common effect.

A minor concern comes to my mind. I’m finding I often have difficulty having mutually satisfactory dances on consistent basis with infrequent repeat partners, which is vast majority of people at SOS (and less of a problem with Cambridge regulars). Perhaps only about dozen followers are consistently reliable even if not necessarily spectacular. With many, it’s hit or miss. This seems to be less of a problem with first-time partners because there’s a built-in excuse with those. However, I seem to derive better hitting average with the very first dances rather than repeat ones. Usually good second and third dances follow the first good dance. The problem is keeping it up after two or three. After more than half dozen dances, I sometimes can keep it consistent with some of the people. I wonder if a big part of the problem is that I often try to change how I dance all the time. Sometimes I’m making things a lot more complex with familiar partners when they are not ready and perhaps will never be ready for it. Sometimes I may err on the side of not making things challenging enough for the follower (whether I think it is warranted or not). It’s a conundrum. If someone likes the thrill of extra spin or difficulty, etc too much, it often leads to a war of escalation. It’s nice to see people react positively to something new I try, but the novelty will fade quickly. At some point, it all becomes too much and my threshold high frequency or intensity of difficult moves is not that high – never mind that my intense is too much for a large number of followers anyway. Striking a balance is difficult. Reading follower’s mind to see what she prefers is difficult. Even if you can read minds, having the ability or the will to execute whatever is needed to satisfy may not be there. Blah blah blah.

Hmm. How did I get into such a lengthy digression? That’s because I missed the 11:15 train back to Cambridge. I didn’t dance to the last song, but I took a too leisurely pace back to Kings Cross. When I realized that the time was 11:14 as I neared the end of the underground pass leading to Kings Cross and started running, I knew that I was in trouble. The train door closed with me but 10 meters away. That means an extra hour added to the return trip. Heck. We’re just getting past Hertford North station right now!

On a slightly different but related topic, how many people would I feel comfortable asking for more than three dances night after night without fear of boredom or exhaustion? Right now, maybe three or possibly four. Perhaps add two more from the years past. By the way, I usually don’t ask them too many times nowadays because I don’t want to get too used dependent on them; especially since both they and I are transients. I’m all for trying to expand that list, but I don’t think that is likely to happen among Londoners anytime soon.

For those who might have been working on their arithmetic, this is indeed one more post than promised last week. The answer is that I had forgotten about the Moe Flex event. Amusing – because that one probably turned out to be the most remarkable of the last set of 2008 UK posts.