Thousands of dancers covered in glitter, feathers, sequins (and little else) take to Rio [tr]

Thousands of dancers from Rio de Janeiro's elite samba schools rolled out their traditional parades of feathers and sequins as the main business of the giant annual Carnival got under way last night.

In total, 14 samba schools from the elite so-called 'special group' will be taking part in the parades last night and on Monday evening at the packed purpose-built stadium known as the Sambadrome, to compete for the prestigious Carnival title.

Each school, featuring up to 4,000 shimmering dancers, elaborate giant floats and deafening percussion, will take 75 minutes to parade down the 700 yards long Sambadrome track.

The Carnival formally kicked off Friday with the traditional symbolic passing of a key to the city to the festival's 'King' - unleashing giant street parties known as 'blocos' in Rio, Sao Paulo and across Brazil.

Heh, I did find a phrase that spoke of him in the present tense (he IS a lefty...) but that is all it takes to fully bring someone into the present tense!

I really enjoy that book...I read it once every few years, partly because there is interesting historical context for things in there, but also simply because his stories are fun to hear!

He reminds me so much of a Petty Officer I knew in the Navy who was in his thirties and I was in my late teens...his home was about a five hour drive from the base, so he didn’t get to go home all the time, so we hung out. He was a real oddball, hilariously to me!

I remember just walking through a mall because there was nothing else to do, and he walked up to a young woman working the register in a shoe store, and asked if he could buy a single shoe. The young girl said no, you have to buy them in a pair. He said “What if I only had one leg?” and she thought about it, and said he would have to buy both and find someone missing the other leg and give or sell them the shoe...you get the idea.

Another thing he did that made me laugh was we went on an elevator one time, and you know how everyone walks to the back of an elevator, turns around and looks at the door? He just walked in and stood at the front of the elevator looking towards everyone at the back...holy smokes, people immediately started bugging out, looking away, looking at the floor, nobody wanted to make eye contact with him!

But the thing that really stuck with me is we were at sea one time, and on the bulkheads of a lot of Navy ships, there is heavy padding with buttons that kind of pucker it in place, like the back of some big leather chair. We were at sea, and couldn’t fly because the weather was too rough, so everyone had nothing to do but sit in the shop staring at each other. He began to hit his head against the padding on the wall over and over again saying “I’m not crazy...I’m not crazy!” and one of the buttons must have fallen or broken off, and the little metal clip that held it on was still there, and it sliced his forehead open when he hit it! When he went to sick bay to get it stitched up, they asked him how it happened, and he said he was hitting his head against the bulkhead while saying he wasn’t crazy...!

For some reason, when I read Richard Feynman’s book...there was some oddness in his character that reminded me of that Petty Officer...:) A screwball, to be sure, but...a fun one!

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