Ragtime

Ragtime Ball last night was fun. I think I ended up watching more performances and contests than actually dancing myself, but that's okay. I particularly enjoyed watching the Cardinal Whirlwinds. They did one square dance and then another group of them came out and did some clogging, with Caitlin fiddling for them. I had known Caitlin was a fiddler, but I hadn't realized that she was one of those fiddling-clogging wonders who do both at the same time. Very cool.

One thing I was really happy about last night was the dancers' appreciation of the band (The Back Swing Orchestra). At a lot of Stanford dances, you can really tell that people are used to canned music, and when they finally get a live band the applause can be sort of half-hearted, which makes me feel really bad for the musicians. But last night was a lot better. The band ended up playing for an extra 20 minutes after their last song just because everyone was so enthusiastic about it. So that made me glad.

It was also nice just to be back at a Stanford dance again. It felt like it had been a while, since I hadn't been dancing quite as much recently, and I had been doing more contra than anything else. I guess it was probably only a month, though, since the last Jammix. I didn't get to dance with quite everybody I would have liked to, but I did get to see a number of people I hadn't seen for a bit. I hope there's another Jammix before Winter Break, too.