Here's my Uncle Oscar with his daughter Emily and my mom. Detail from a Santos clan portrait taken in 1993. Yesterday at 2:35PM, surrounded by his wife Perla, his daughter Emily, and lots of other family members including myself, my uncle Oscar Santos passed away. Oscar had been battling diabetes, heart problems and respiratory failure…
920 Special Open House Recap: Awesome Performances, Hundreds of New Dancers
Last Thursday was the "Open House" at the 9:20 Special dance in San Francisco. This is when the 9:20 organizers throw open the doors to the community and allow anyone to come in for a free swing dance lesson and enjoy dancing to the music in the huge dancehall of the Russian Center on…
Listen to Yehoodi Talk Show #127: The “Swingnick” Interview, Swingdancepro.com, dancing in heels & more
I really enjoyed doing this latest Yehoodi Talk Show episode #127 with my co-hosts Spuds and Letta. Spuds has been on a tear lately to find cool web content and bring in interesting perspectives. And it's been great having Letta around to give us the female take on current issues in lindy. I'm mostly there…
Compilation: Women Leading, Men Following in Lindy Hop
Check out this sweet compilation of videos of men following and women leading in lindy hop, put together by Sarah Carney. Lots of familiar faces and great great dancing there! Sarah asks if anyone has any links to videos of a woman leading a man, either socially or in a performance? I can't think of…
Seven Reasons Why Men Should Follow in Social Dancing
The Lindy Hop community has been having a "spirited discussion" about an essay written by a UK dancer called "Ten Reasons Why Men Lead and Women Follow." You can see much of the debate over on the Yehoodi.com forums. The issue got me thinking about why more men don't follow in this dance, or any…
When I’m Gone, Just Let Me Go: the Will to Not Live
So my family has been struggling with a series of health issues, most recently a very sick relative who is hanging on by a very thin thread and whose spouse is having difficulty deciding on what to do about it. Essentially all of his body functions have failed him and he is completely non-responsive to…
The Zeum: San Francisco’s Amazing Children’s Art & Tech Museum
Recently, I met up with a friend who works at the Zeum, the Children's Museum of San Francisco, in the lovely Yerba Buena Gardens. The Zeum is a "21st century multimedia arts and technology center for children," as the website states. But what it really is is a huge playground for kids to let…
Boston Tea Party 2011 Advanced Lindy Jack and Jill (video)
I just got back from the awesome Boston Tea Party dance weekend in Massachusetts. It was a really fun time watching the competitions, seeing lots of friends, and dancing to all hours to west coast swing,lindy hop, and soul music. One highlight was the advanced Jack and Jill lindy hop competition, which several of…
The Road to BC-One: Chronicling One B-boy’s Journey to the World Breaking Competition
I'm intrigued by this blog / video project called "Road to BC-One." It's a weekly chronicle of the preparation, training, and thoughts of one b-boy, Paranoid Android, as he gets closer to the BC-One world breaking competition in Russia on November 26. The filmmaking on these videos is gorgeous, and the posts are pretty interesting…
Work as Love: the Joyful Workweek
In a previous blog post, I described a lot of what I liked about the book The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss, particularly his emphasis on not deferring on your dreams and thinking creatively about how to structure your work / life balance. One of my major problems with The 4-Hour Workweek is that Ferriss…