Yvette's Inner Geek Blog

On my drive up to Park City last Sunday (Jan. 20) for my second volunteer day at Sundance, I thought "Even a gray day in Utah has bits of blue peeking through the clouds."

I wrote it down once I arrived, along with other notes that will form this (late) post about my experience.  Here’s a photo of Highway 189 heading toward Heber, just past Deer Creek State Park.

 (That photo is from Saturday the 26th, because I didn’t have a camera on Sunday the 20th and it was a gray, cloudy day anyway)

It was an uneventful hour-long drive, though it did have some white-knuckle parts because driving through canyons with long drop-offs and looming cliffs with big "Falling Rock" signs have never been a particularly delightful thing for me. Chalk that up to my Midwestern upbringing with only occasional rolling hills and big lakes to worry about.

Once I got into Park City, though, it took me longer than expected to find parking and ride the (free!) bus to Main Street, where I had to walk uphill a ways to find the Egyptian Theatre. The bus stopped for a couple minutes because a tow truck was blocking the road… parking without permission is a serious offense at the festival.  Sundance encourages environmental friendliness at their festival, which ranges from riding free buses (that run in addition to the regular free buses in Park City, paid for by tourism taxes) to recycling stations set up all over the place.  A far cry from what I’ve seen around Utah otherwise, namely that people drive a half block to go to church. Yes, there are Mormon churches within a stone’s throw from each other all over the place, and somehow people still drive their SUVs a block or two, even a half block, every Sunday. What’s the point?

Anyway, back to SFF. I made it to the Egyptian about ten minutes after my scheduled 2:00 shift start, but it wasn’t a big deal. It was cool to walk past the line of people standing outside and show my shiny new volunteer badge at the door to be let in. I was directed to the volunteer supervisor (Shannon) and given the job of "Slasher" for the 3:00 movie. This entailed the easy task of  holding a clipboard and making hash marks to count the number of people entering the theater with passes instead of hard tickets. It was a little more challenging than I thought because of the pace that people were streaming into the theater and my lack of understanding the difference between the passes. I finally figured it out.

I still didn’t really know anyone, but was consumed with taking it all in. I had spent way too much time the day before playing Super Mario Galaxy because I was so excited about the festival… how geeky and fangirlish, I know.  

There’s more to come, but I think I have to split it into another blog entry.  

Working from home.

In the beginning stages of a cold. Already ate some pudding to help the sore throat.

Cat on lap.

Will write about Sundance on this blog TODAY. 

What’s weird is that a lot of other people whose blogs I read seemed to just come back from a blogging break. I feel better knowing that I’m not the only one. Not that I’ve gone as long this time as I have in the past.

Really, I’m just procrastinating checking my notes on how Sunday at the SFF went for me. Part of the problem may be that I already wrote it all down (by hand in a tiny little notebook that still lives in my Sundance coat pocket… so far away from where I am waking up right now). I’m at my desk sipping coffee and basking in the tentative anxiety of being on my computer. One hard drive failed and for some reason I’m expecting this one to go at any time. Like using it will cause it to fail. I’m not normally a superstitious person, but I done been spooked.

Speaking of ill grammar usage, I would just like to say for the record that I am sick and tired of people writing and saying the word "that" in place of the word "who." For example, this sentence is correct:

"There are many people who deserve an email reply from me today." 

This sentence irritates me:

"There are many people that deserve an email reply from me today." 

I’m not a grammar expert. I had to look up the defined reason why the two are different, but that doesn’t mean that I didn’t learn at some point in my life that the word "that" should not be used in conjunction with a person. There are subtle differences implied in the misuse of the word "that," mostly related to grammatically treating a person like an object instead of a subject.

Then again, I’m also known to throw the letter M on the end of the word "who" in certain scenarios, often with the one-two punch of not ending a sentence in a preposition ("with whom did you attend that bitchin’ party?").

"The woman with whom I slept with last night" clearly refers to someone (the woman)  whom you first took out to dinner and to the movies before boinking.

"The woman that I slept with last night" objectifies the subject and perhaps implies that she was paid for her services. Also note the double whammy of improper placement of the word "with."

Don’t get me wrong. I still appreciate slang and its intentional uses (you should know the rules before you break them). When the phone rings and Ben has a mysterious conversation, I sometimes ask my question with a brief "who dat?"

What have I been doing, and why haven’t I posted any additional stories about volunteering at the Sundance Film Festival?

Saturday: Played Super Mario Galaxy almost all day. I think it’s the best video game ever and am still seeing star bits even when the game it turned off. Did some laundry and waited for Sunday.

Sunday: Went to Park City for the SFF. Got home around 2am, finally went to sleep around 3am. More on that later.

Monday: Woke up at normal time to go to work. Computer told me it had a critical RAID array problem. Called Ben, who had the day off (my company doesn’t care about MLK or civil rights, apparently) and he said he would check it when he came home. Went to work, where I had to restart my computer twice to get it to boot correctly. Ben called me with "worst case scenario" that I’d lost everything. I was overcome with panic for an hour or so, when Ben (still casual in tone, which pissed me off and comforted me at the same time) called to say that there was a glimmer of hope. Still panicked. Ben finally called back to tell me that the one hard drive had failed, and the other still had my data. Relief, finally, as well as perpetual panic because I am way overdue for backing stuff up. I needed to prune my data that evening, so instead I came home and ate dinner and pretty much crashed for the night.

Tuesday (today): Computer is working with one hard drive. I’m making copies of the most important documents (I think) on my drive but I need to go to work. I will write more about the SFF later today.

My experience at Sundance was incredible. I already know that I will volunteer again next year if possible. And I can’t wait to go back this weekend! Or some evening after work this week to see a movie. 

Some days require more defragmentation than others. I wish that defragging my personal life was as easy as this was at work today:

Yeah, my work computer has been overdue for some file-smooshing and file-purging. I couldn’t work very much while it defragged because I wanted to watch the magic happen. And what’s wrong with taking a few minutes for that? Nothing, unless I have a deadline. Mmm, it was a flexible deadline anyway.

While I was driving into the mouth of Provo Canyon, I set my camera on top of my steering wheel and took a couple of blind shots. I didn’t get the coolest shots because I needed to put both hands on the wheel at certain times, but here’s a good one (as good as possible through a dirty windshield, anyway).

Beautiful views like these remind me that there are still plenty of good things about living in Utah. The first photo there is from a spot that is about a 20 minute drive from my house.  Here’s another shot on Highway 189 heading toward Heber City. If you look closely, you can see the winding road.

I didn’t really take any other photos, though I wish I’d brought my camera into the private volunteer party. The festival officially starts today, so I should get more action shots next time I go up there. I hear that Albertson’s grocery store is the place for star sightings, since it’s right next door to the ritzy Yarrow Resort where all of the higher-end filmmakers hang out.

But I did take a couple shots of the coat, hat and glove that I was given yesterday to wear as my volunteer uniform. There’s a closeup of the embroidered logo, as well as the secret zip-up panel on the right breast of the coat that will hold a cell phone, notepad, pen and other small stuff for easy access. I have a Canon Powershot camera that is unfortunately too bulky to fit there, but volunteers are discouraged from taking photos while dressed as volunteers, anyway. I’ll have to be a fangirl on my own time in my own coat.
 

 

It’s been an interesting 12 hours full of new experiences, and I’m going to try to record some of my thoughts before I tumble into slumber.

I drove up Highway 189 through Provo Canyon, past the original Sundance Resort (where some VIP stuff still happens) and through Heber City to Park City. The midday drive was beautiful, and I wish that I could have stopped to just take it all in. The temperature stayed in the teens, though, so if I’d stepped out of my car it wouldn’t have been for very long anyway.

I’ve been up to the Sundance Resort and also to Park City, but I haven’t driven through Provo Canyon before. The roads were good and it was a clear day… but on the way back I decided (with the input of some other volunteers) that I should go the slightly longer way home through Salt Lake City. There were still some white-knuckle areas of that drive down Parleys Canyon, but otherwise uneventful. Happy about that.

Once I arrived in Park City, I had to find the Marriott hotel to check in. My experience with Marriotts has been in downtown and suburban areas, not ski resort towns… so it took me a little while to find the non-highrise building. I got my packet of information and my uniform: a nice deep, bright blue Kenneth Cole coat with a removable inner vest, a black knit hat with blue piping, and a matching scarf with thin blue and black stripes. I didn’t get any photos of those today, but they’re cool. The only crappy thing is that the "unisex" coat wasn’t made for women with any semblance of an hourglass figure. I guess Kenneth Cole only designs for toothpicky New Yorkers and doesn’t have a clue that 65% of the Sundance Film Festival volunteers are females with hips. 

The first shift I’d signed up for–Environmental Graphics–didn’t work out. I was in touch with the coordinator who sent out an email to all of his volunteers asking us to call him before the shift started… so I did, and he basically decided that it wasn’t worth it for me to find the mysterious place where they were working on Main Street if I wasn’t familiar with Park City, and suggested that I ask the volunteer desk if I was needed anywhere else.

The volunteer desk was delighted to schedule me for a volunteer check-in position from 4-8, which left plenty of time for me to attend the hour-long orientation session. The orientation hit on a couple points worth remembering (they were reiterated from the guide that was sent out in the mail) but was otherwise not extraordinarily useful. But it’s my freshman year as a volunteer so I thought I should go. I still didn’t have any Festival friends.

That changed during my check-in shift. One of the nice things about working check-in is that I was able to have brief encounters with many people, some of whom I was bound to recognize later on. And I ended up going to the Volunteer Kick-off Party with two of my fellow shift workers, Lisa and Tim.  It was a weird experience for me to suddenly attach myself to these acquaintances, but it worked out better than I’d hoped.

Every time I’ve taken a personality test, I always come out on the fence between introvert and extrovert. I’m not necessarily scared to talk to strangers, and sometimes I find it invigorating. But at the same time, it’s a little nervewrecking to go to a party where the only person you know is someone whom you don’t really know. Yeah, can you tell that I don’t get out very much?

The party was at the Legacy Lodge at the base of the Park City Mountain Resort. It was for all 1400 or so volunteers, and the place was pretty packed (though I doubt the numbers were past a couple hundred). Still, I have never really been to a closed party or club environment like that.

I had to show my ticket and credentials to get in, then was given a wristband with three drink vouchers (which I gave away because I didn’t want to stay long, and I had a long drive home). I checked my coat (I made sure that I kept my wallet and my car key because coat checks make me nervous). Then I walked upstairs and headed straight for the free food line. There were amazing potstickers, a good fresh veggie selection, quesadillas with icky cilantro, penne pasta in a tomato-artichoke alfredo sauce, a massive hunk of meat carved on demand, and some other stuff. It was all good except for the cilantro taste that took a while to fade from my delicate taste buds. There were also cupcakes with custom frosting on each one to match the theme of the festival… and circle with "place" written inside. [graphic snagged from www.sundance.org/festival]

There were a ton of people at the party, and I basically knew two of them. At one point, with food in my hand, I realized that my new friends were nowhere in sight. My mind started sinking into a mild anxiety because I didn’t want to go sit alone and eat my food like a loser. Then I was amused by my thoughts. How did I even become "friends" with my new acquaintances? By talking to people, duh! Then I spotted Tim talking to someone and I dropped my esoterical thoughts for the reality of social graces and fumbles.

It turns out that Tim had worked the previous three festivals and knew a fair amount of people, even being the somewhat quiet guy he appeared to be. Through him I met a couple people whose names I don’t really remember, as well as Alberta from Nashville and Therese from Park Slope, Brooklyn (whom I realized lives on the same block as my aunt and her family–what a crazy small world). The four of us were having a conversation and suddenly I realized that the word "fuck" had been thrown about a few times, and it just made me giddy with excitement. I told them I was so happy to be around people who said fuck, because living in Happy Valley with all the Mormons has deprived me of hearing that word or really feeling comfortable enough to swear at work or around town. Alberta, an outgoing black woman whom I liked immediately, obliged me with a hug and then a second when she realized that I live in Utah County.  Tim hadn’t said much up to this point, but he blurted out the F-word in his next sentence to prove that the four of us were in fucking good company.

I also liked Therese right away, and not just because she’s originally from Toronto. Later on in the evening I caught up with her while she was talking to a smartly dressed black man (I feel weird calling out race, but keep in mind that I currently live in Utah where there are very few people of color and it made me happy to see a more diverse crowd. Hell, even the Italians with darker complexions helped alleviate the blinding whiteness of Utah). Anyway, the guy introduced himself and I couldn’t believe it… his name is Yves! He’s the first person I’ve ever met with the masculine version of my name. Am I a serious geek to get excited about that? I mean, how often do women named Nicole or Michelle (for example) meet men named Nicholas or Michael and never think about the fact that their names are basically the same? I’ve met a couple Yvettes in the course of my life, but never an Yves (pronounced "Eve"). He was a nice guy, and I was really miffed to realize that he and Tim were younger than me. I’m really used to being "young" and it’s really throwing me off to meet people who I assume are my age and it turns out they’re my younger sister’s age. I’m not an agist or anything–it’s just weird to me.

Okay, I’ve not talked about the actual festival much because the majority of it has been experiencing the festival through social functions. The real film festival starts tomorrow, but my next volunteer shift isn’t until Sunday. I’m starting to fade fast here, and I have to work tomorrow morning, so I’ll finish with a final musing.

Everyone I met tonight was a volunteer, so a fair question to ask them is what they do
in "real life" for a job. Most answered with typical things, like human resources or corporate telecom drone. But even though we were all volunteering at a film festival, I was still floored the first time I heard "I’m a film maker" as a response. For some reason, I wasn’t expecting to meet any "normal" people who were also film makers or in the film industry. Like, duh, of course there would be.

Also, nobody asked if I have kids, even though I shared that I was married. That’s pretty much the first thing that people ask me if I meet them in Utah County.

Overall, I felt like an overly excited n00b. But it was great, and awesome to both do something different in my life and to meet people from all over the world. 

I slept in a little this morning and now I’m ready to head out to Park City for my first day as a Sundance Film Festival Volunteer. I’m dressing in layers, even though the forecast now predicts a balmy high of 18, low of 7. And I confirmed that I will at least spend a portion of my day outside, hanging signs or flyers or something like that.

Frostbite, here I come!  I can’t wait!

I was about to set up my blog to import into Facebook, until I read the fine print next to the "Start Importing" box:

By entering a URL, you represent that you have the right to permit us to reproduce this content on the Facebook site and that the content is not obscene or illegal.

So what does "reproduce this content on the Facebook site" really mean? Am I being paranoid by worrying that it’s somewhat like YouTube (and Flickr?) and Facebook will slyly retain some level of rights to whatever I import and/or upload? Or is it really just an honest import of my RSS feed?

I am nervous about the honesty of social networking sites.  

Ben was making liquid bread this evening and had the windows open for ventilation.

“It’s FREEZING in here,” I said after coming home from grocery shopping after work. Ben rolled his eyes and kept on working. I played a little Mario Galaxy (I’m at 23 stars now) until my hands turned into icicles.

“It’s really, really cold in the house,” I said. Ben rolled his eyes again and told me to wait until he was finished. He eventually turned the heat back on and closed the windows. I checked the current temperature for our town on weather.com: 8 degrees. That’s -13.3 degrees Celsius.

“I told you it was cold in here,” I said with an icy stare (literally; I think my eyeballs are still coated with a sheet of ice).

“Oh hey,” I then said. “I should check to see what the weather forecast is for Park City on Wednesday when I’ll be there.”

A high of 13? Fuuuuuuuuck… At least I’ll get a free coat from the Sundance people. I can wear it over my other coat.