well rain has turned to snow, but prokofiev is still amazing.

what a marvelous sequence of events this morning. Okay, maybe only two, but they make me happy.

The first one is: It's raining!! And it smells so good outside. Walking out of Humanities, it was sprinkling a little, when I came out Exclusive it was pouring!! So I'm soaked and happy because I love rain!!!
The other: I finally found a recording of Love for Three Oranges!!! Hurray...I knew I was destined to do something great today, and this will be it, just listening to my favorite composer's coolest opera.

Practicing is not happening today. I think I need a mental break. I think it's marvelous. ;)
Off to Prokofiev!!!

arrgh
blogger was down yesterday and so I apologize for the lack of random thoughts eminating from this direction. It's probably a good thing because yesterday was a BAD DAY. It started out bad, middle was kind of depressing, and well, I guess it ended alright but I still went to bed too late (and despite the fact that my 8:50 was cancelled I still got up too early), super tired and ready to chuck school and trombone and responsibility out the window (my trombone and I had a little spat yesterday. We talked today, though, and it's going to be okay)

But, today is friday!! And it should be an entertaining night. I know for sure Davis and Chris are coming, along with various members of the Tuba-Euph ensemble. When they get here, I'm firing up the wok for some good Lauren-style stir fry. That's going to be a lot of food. But it'll be fun! I should have told Ian to bring wine, when he asked if I need anything. Arrrgh. Oh well...should probably be sober for the Wisconsin Brass Quintet recital ;)
One of the greatest natural highs is playing bass trombone or tuba, man. I played bass for about two hours today. In quintet we did Promise of Living twice through the really loud part, and right in the middle of the trombone-tuba melody everything started spinning and I think my body and my consciousness were trying very hard to go opposite directions from each other. Unfortunately both of those directions involved the floor and I had to do some serious breath control in order to get back with it. Sweet. I'm still feeling the effects of oxygen overdose.

Man, having Megan in history class today would have been fun. Even though she claims (hmm) that she can't do the goat noise anymore, there was some serious sheep discussion revolving around the Strauss tone poem Don Quixote. mmmaaa!!! So, Megan, what do you say? ;)
anyway, I'd better prepare for the stir fry herd. More later!

I have to remember that, despite how busy I am, despite how tired and frazzled I get, there are people who love me. Here's a basic list of good things:

Basically, I spent 15 hours in and around humanities today. Brief breaks for lunch and dinner were taken, but no home-going was accomplished. Wind ensemble was actually amusing for once, since we had a guy auditioning for conducting and he was pretty dorky, but still good, anyway, Collin jabbed me hard in the side because he thought I was falling asleep, and i nearly jumped out of my chair I was so shocked, and plus I had to pee big time, so that was not so amusing. But he gave me a hug afterward and said I was a good sport. I got up to move chairs in the lounge and Ian asked if I was leaving and when I said no, he said, "good!" Mikey got a haircut. (it looks good) Davis wrote about me in her blog (and we should sit and have some in depth chat sometime, hun. ;), Ben sent me another email that summed up very well how I feel about soulmates and certain people, I got an email from Tara which was awesome! (i miss you too!) Terry gave me some hope today about making it through stressful times. Having someone tell you that "you can do it" is so awesome. So a lot of people have told me I'm on the right track with common sense or whatever. I feel good about that. It doesn't matter that I spent all day in a concrete building trying to take another step toward proficiency with my instrument and mostly just being frustrated. It doesn't matter that I argued with my dad or anything like that.

I'm listening to the recording from my recital. Our balalaika duet was really cool. Gosh, I'm so witty. hehe..just kidding. It's weird to hear your own voice on recording. I remember growing up I hated it because it sounded so little and highpitched. But it doesn't sound so bad now. Funny, I really should be analyzing my trombone playing, not my voice. ;) Bethany sounds good! I'm a little afraid to hear the Larsson because I know the first mvt wasn't so good. But it's always worse in your mind than it really is. So, It'll be good to hear. It'll be good to go to bed, too...story of my life!!

Today's advice: schmu!

did my last blog make any sense? I really don't even remember writing it. You know, today wasn't a bad day, but the more tired I get the later it gets in the day, the more I can't remember anything or think complete thoughts or anything. I just end up getting lonely and dejected. Weird, huh? Lonely in the sense that it's been way too long since my last physical encounter with the opposite sex. Sad. Way sad since the last physical encounter was Dave and man, that's three and a half years. Dejected because, why can't I just get over myself and my hangups? Argh. I've decided I can't compete with people in social situations. I will always seek to be the retiring voice (unless of course it's an easily won battle, then i just talk too much) or come up with something entirely stupid and non-related to say. Hmm. My mind is just spinning around in circles searching for something to attach to. It's not having much luck. You know what my first thought was? I should call Ryan. Whoa...bad idea. I shouldn't call him until I have something for us to do together. You know what? I'll probably do it anyway. Like I said before, I already know what I'm going to do, I just have to argue with myself for a while before I can accept it. I argue with myself A LOT. And yes, sometimes I do lose.

the main problem with my rant on living life is that it's totally incoherent. I apologize. Now, if I'm going to do what I'd said I'd do, I need to get offline.

good grief I have no common sense whatsoever

Well, hello.

Ben warned me about the email he had sent me today regarding my blog, so I looked forward all today to getting it and reading it (I also had a few qualms about what exactly he would say), and I did indeed enjoy it. So my topic upon which I will expound today is: life. most importantly what I have come to understand about it. Disclaimer: nothing I can actually put in writing will explain even basically how my brain is working. My brain travels in different orbits from everything else. When I speak of brain I mean that part of my mind devoted to figuring those deep thoughtful things out and processing the information so I can live life better. Unfortunately it takes light years for it all to get to the right planet. Ben, thank you much for your congratulations on being a human being and understanding my experiences. And I'm glad that I've instilled a sense of hope in you for thinking in similar circles. The whole Ryan situation is at a point where I'm starting to separate myself from emotion (it's still there) and look at it from a highly logical and probably overanalyzed perspective. Underneath is that layer of emotion that gets in the way and mucks everything up, yet to give it up would completely destroy everything I fight for. See, most of my growing up has been done by me. Sounds like a pretty obvious statement, huh? Well, what I mean is, a lot of people have someone or some people they can go to and talk about everything. And in high school (which i consider the place that really "made" me...college is making me grow up, but my stream of consciousness is born in high school, when I figured out how to think for myself and solve my own problems) I always felt a little separated from even my good friends because I couldn't always articulate my thoughts. I'm not saying that I could go talk to anyone, I'm saying that something held me back. If I have a serious problem, chances are I've probably already figured it out for myself before I got talk to someone about it. I'm also just realizing right now that this probably doesn't make me any different from anyone else but still, I've always felt different in that any serious conclusion I come to I already know. I have a theory: we already know everything we need to know, but it's just hidden from us. I tried this metaphor out on Bethany once (but I'm not sure she fell for it): growing up (perhaps I should define: meaning attaining levels of realization, or just becoming your own person, i guess) is like having the curtains opened in a dark room. It doesn't happen all at once; light creeps in, you learn a little more, some more comes in, until someday (and far away at that) you're enlightened. Poof!! Does this make any sense? Basically what I'm saying is that my life up to this point and continuing past it is just one big opening of curtains. It's a step process. Perhaps that isn't the best metaphor. Maybe I can come up with a better one later, but now I have to go. Thanks Ben, for inspiring me to try to explain myself.

Upon reflection, I think I'd make a damn fine Buddhist. Well, maybe next life. :)

ppbbt. blogger's being stupid, and it just erased my whole long neato message about birthdays and shadow puppets. That was a once in a lifetime rant. Grr.

Woo. What a day. What a long interesting day.
So, unless you're from RB and were in CYO, you'll probably not be interested in what I have to say next.

What's so exciting, fellow CYOers? Well, we had our trombone studio departmental tonight, and afterwards this guy was talking to Bill whom struck me as sooo familiar. I went to go tell Sean and Miah that they rocked (because they did) when Bill called me over and said, hey, you should talk to this guy, he's from San Diego. So I'm thinking, ok, so I'm getting closer to recognizing him. Introductions, hi, I'm Lauren, Hi, I'm Mark. WHOA! You were in CYO!!! I sat next to you!! Hey! How's it going? Meanwhile, Bill's like, ooooookay...so he left and we talked about Mike Muna and Melissa Pina and Aaron Westfall, which was soooo weird because I'm the middle of WISCONSIN...I'm not supposed to know anyone who knows anyone I know from home which is halfway across the country....my mind was boggled. Anyway, he was in town because he goes to Oberlin and his gf lives in Deforest, WI, so they just decided to stop by and hear some trombone playing. He said to me, and this was an awesome thing to say but I'm not so sure how true it was: "If i remember your playing correctly, you could have made it into Oberlin piece of cake." !!!!!!!! wow. That's a nice nice nice thing to say. So, We exchanged email and phone and the essentials...It's so weird. It's SOOOO weird. I'm still in complete shock. Yipes.

Anyway, that's my major news. Everything else is the same: I'm tired, I've got lots of Buddhism reading (but actually not that much because I got semi-caught up this past weekend). Finally had Inspector Gadget rehearsal, made a rhythmic fool of myself in quintet, tbone 4tet is wednesday morning and i'm looking forward to it. I should go get my laundry. I might have more to say later. I might not. Don't wait up. ;)

I got three good compliments on my blog today. From Davis, Chris, and Jon (via email) saying they enjoyed reading it. So, hurray for me! By the way, Jon....GOOD LUCK! Music is a hard thing to study, but you have to remember, never be too dificult or harsh with yourself. Musicians have the best parties. ;)

Do I have anything else to say? Hardly. Here's a favorite quote of mine:

"That's the worst of girls," said Edmund to Peter and the Dwarf. "They never can carry a map in their heads."

"That's because our heads have something inside them," said Lucy
--from Prince Caspian by CS Lewis

Hey Chris...your dinosaur has no teeth, and you're a Sorry bitch. (evil laughter)

all hail lazy sundays. i haven't left the house yet, except to go grocery shopping. it was just way too nice to sit on my bed and sort through pictures and read buddhism and not think about practicing for a while. I have to spend enough time at humanities tonight, i want to make it a one-time thing. Yes, I got a good night of sleep for the first time in about a week, i'm still tired but that's alright, at least i'm refreshed. I just ate a lot of rice. I'd love to take a nap....hmm, survey: should I take a nap or practice? I should practice. As much as I don't want to go out in the 20 degree weather, napping might just end up being superficial right now, and besides, I promised myself I'd work tuning on the bass EVERY day. So. here I go....no really, i am going....

It's always so cool to see Brandon again. He rocks, man, I mean it. I feel bad but I wish I could have hung out with them after Jon's recital tonight. Alas, I'm the resident hairdying specialist, so my talents were called upon. But that's alright, because I still had a good time.

Now I'm just wondering what the hell is going on upstairs, there's a lot of dropping noise going on. Hmm. You know what else is evil? It's snowing. For cryin' out loud. That's just cruel. I put away the longjohns and the winter coat. Don't make me do this Wisconsin, it's not going to be pretty.

Anyway, I'm tired, but happy. And have the room to myself tonight...finally, a night of sleep that's worth it!! Roomates and boyfriends...maybe it's a good thing I can't get any, because it's annoying to have to sleep on the sofa or be awakened by arguing at 2 in the morning. Needless to say I don't want to reciprocate.

G'night. ;)

swimming is wonderful. the only problem is you have too much time to just let your mind wander. my mind wanders very easily. I would not be very good at meditation. ;) Maybe you can guess where my mind was wandering to....

well, anyway, I'd love to go out and be a wild child tonight, but the party scene has just been pretty dismal lately. Next weekend, thankfully, Jason is having a shindig, so maybe I can save my #1-party-school-in-the-nation-attendee instincts for then.
Instead it's hair dying night...first Bea and then Bethany. And hopefully I'll have time to catch Best in Show at the Union. Good grief... my spring fever is bad this year. It's cold again today. Listen, Wisconsin, it's almost April. Get your butt in gear and bring me some 70 degree weather.

grr...

My mission: to overcome feelings of jealousy and learn to let people be their own people.

I'm getting better at this, but there are still some people...it's just hard for me to think that they can, not quite ignore me, but at least expand upon other friendships and such when I want to be the closest to them. Hans told me once (and many thanks to him for it) that he thought I was a jealous friend...and the more I thought about it, the more I saw he was right. So slowly, I'm learning, but I've reached a road block with Ryan. So here's what I'm thinking: B and I show up to see his band, and they are not on yet, so we sit and talk to him for a while, he's talking to a friend as well. And somehow I feel that in the time that I haven't seen him, this girl has somehow taken my place. Not just in becoming his friend, but in becoming the sort of friend that I am to him, in my mind. "In my mind" is the key here, I'm at the same time feeling like a total psychobitch for thinking these crazy thoughts. But they are there, and only invalid if i can work around them. But anyway, she flirts with him just the same as I do, he pays attention to her, and yet it's one of those messed up Ryan-leading-people-astray sort of things. You can kind of tell she's got something for him. So now I'm jealous, mad at myself for being psycho, and furious with Ryan for messing with someone else's emotions the same way he did with mine, all at the same time.
So, after they played, what's going through my head? "Get out of here as soon as possible or everything's going to go to hell..." Waited only as long as they could tear down their set, and grabbed Ryan, thanked him for inviting me, and posed the question on my mind: "So, are you still superbusy or do you want to hang out some time?" Answer is, yes. So he says, "call me" and I give him my best don't-pull-that-shit-on-me look. But he says, "Well, I just called you..." and I'm thinking, "what a complete boy. He's just a frustrating, stupid boy.." at the same time as "why the hell I am so weak around this character?" but instead I say, "alright, I'll call you." And hightail it out of there. There might have been a trail of smoke behind me, I don't know because I didn't stop to look. And poor B, having to listen to me analyze every last drop of my psyche devoted to relationship-self-esteem, probably just wanted to shoot me and remind me that she's heard it ten million times before (which would not be an exaggeration).

Ok, here's my deal: All I really want is just to hang out with him, because I miss it. We can be friends or lovers, it doesn't matter. Everyone has at least a handful of people that are absolutely essential to their existence, and he is one of mine. In fact he may very well be near the top of the list. What kills me is that I don't think this sort of existential soul-mate crap is mutual. Or if it is, he's fighting it for some reason, and this "i'm busy" charade is just a way of escaping...something. I've got to have it be all or nothing; I can't spend two months not talking to him and then talk to him, because then I'll never break free of this situation. I don't want to give him up completely because then there would be a huge hole. I suppose it would scab over in time, but never really heal. But my solution is obviously not his solution.

what the hell am i supposed to do?

schmu

going to see ryan's band tonight...survey: is this a good thing or a bad thing?
Saw him on wed night and had really no reaction, bad or good. it was more of a "i've moved beyond you and you can't seduce me with your sparkling wit anymore" type of thing. Except maybe not so much sparkling wit. So why, when I heard his phone message tonight, did I listen to it twice? And why did I immediately say I wanted to go?
He's still a punk boy and I'm still a silly too-quick-to-emotion girl.
I'm still going to go. I have to prove to myself that I can get him out from under my skin. Six months is far too long to be under someone's spell and not get anything for it. All hail the triumph of Lauren's logical side...Rah! Rah!
Wish me luck...

je suis tres fatiguee. bonne nuit.

If nothing in the world is ulitmately real, than anything is possible.

Wow...talk about a power lecture today in buddhism. holy flying hippopotami. I think I understood it...but...i guess if all you do is sit around and meditate you have time to figure out that we are all in Buddha's paradise basically because he's using us to make sure that he will ultimately be "blissed out" as Prof. Dunne calls it. A buddha's compassion is only a means to an end in his search to obtain his own ultimate happiness. Why doesn't it seem like we are in paradise? Because we are ignorant and the ignorance in our mind creates delusion and karma and karma leaves an imprint (even after it is expended) that clouds our vision of the world. Therefore, when we break free of the samsara prison and see without ignorance, we will know Buddha's paradise. BUT!! If you are a bodhisattva, you must create your own paradise before you become enlightened because otherwise you will exist in a negative state of meditation in which you can neither hurt NOR help anyone. And you can remain like that for billions of aeons before you wake up and then what happens? i have no idea. But anyway, before you are a buddha, you have intention, and through that intention you can create your own paradise. Anything is possible!! A buddha has no intention, therefore you must do it before. So, my question is: If we're all in Sakyamuni Buddha's paradise right now, what happens when someone finishes creating their paradise and POOF becomes enlightened? Do we all move to his paradise because otherwise he can't be truly happy. Sure, he's enlightened, but his final goal is bliss. So he needs everyone else to be happy too. What's going on here? So we all have to become Buddhas, but we all must have our own paradise. hmm

so, ignorance is NOT bliss?

my friend Jennii has a blog, I'll link it when I figure out how, but anyway: www.littlegiraffe.blogspot.com
Hi Jennii!!!

welcome to the week of long-ass days. wednesdays are not supposed to be long-ass for me, but today was. mostly because practicing tenor today was freaking me out because of this ringing sound in my tone..sounded like it was the bell reverberating at certain pitches...well, i was worried that it might be my embouchure from switching bass to tenor, bea was getting the same thing but terry (who is a cool cat, many thanks to terry for assuaging bea's annoyance and my fears) suggested that it was just something in the practice rooms that was responding to the pitches because they were especially in tune. so, a bad thing is really a good thing! the buzz is not permanent and it means o'm playing in tune. go me...now if i could only do that on bass...

As you may have noticed, i've decided to make capital letters as rare as possible today. captial letters are just another plot set up by the institution to bring you down, man! heh. well anyway, i'm too lazy for them. at least i have the house to myself for once this week!! maybe i can take a nap....yay naps. now i can take naps on my bed because it no longer takes two years to get into it and sort out the sheets and MR. FISH (he gets caps because that's his name, caps are essential) and pillows and such. nice. i wonder how long i have before my next commitment. I should check that out. women's composer's concert tonight, then the dodectet for brass bash. organizing the trombone 4tet is appearing to be more work than finding a decent time for octet. how does that work? the number of people involved is doubled, yet it's easier? hmm..maybe because i seldom see jason and erin long enough to work out a time. felicia, well she's part of the locker gang (or sean's "harem") so it's easier. still..never all at once! i have to run about like crazy and i feel like a goat...bleating out times at people and eating their clothing. well, not so much on that last part. maybe a little nibble once and again.

that being said, i'm going to play a little jaaazz trumpet for y'all.

Alright...I'm excited...first rehearsal for Felicia's fine arrangement of Inspector Gadget for brass octet and percussion. Hoping that everything goes well, since I don't know if we have a percussionist or even access to the auxilliary stuff we need. Argh. But..if that all works out, it'll be cool! Organizing this stuff is a headache though...I know I can be scatterbrained sometimes but dealing with nine other busy people all at once can lead to issues.

Speaking of issues, I think I've developed a complex. It's a very very very silly complex. You see, this one stall in the humanities bathroom had a toilet paper roll holder that didn't exactly hold the toilet paper: When you pulled on the paper, the shell covering it would come loose and fall on your head. This happened to me a couple times. Most of these times it scared the heebeejeebies out of me. It also was rather painful. Anyway, they fixed it over break I guess. But I was getting some toilet paper today and I swear....I swear that the toilet paper holder moved in threat to fall upon my head!! But I looked again, and it was stable. I verified; yup, still stuck fast to the stall wall. So great, now I've got a complex. About toilet paper holders. Thanks a lot, life.

Well, off to spend eight million more hours at the concrete palace.

I'm done!! Hurrah! (lauren does a little dance celebrating doneness and buddha wisdom)
Well, yay. It's actually not too bad. I like it when it's not too hard to do a good job. Goes against everything my parents told me about working hard and the satisfaction of accomplishment...yah, well, so I'm on some basic level unmotivated. ah well. ;)
My computer is freaking out...I should shut the poor thing down...I left it on last night and today trying to defrag and it wasn't even past 30% when i got home around 8:30 tonight. arrgh. Fine, be that way, computer! Create your own world of self-destruction!!!
Pbbbt. I'm going to bed now. Really. G'night.

taking a buddha break! Yay midterms...well, i'm almost done at least, just one more two page essay. Shouldn't be too bad, eh? Well, since it's the only thing going to our grade in this class, it'd better be good. Hmph.

Long day, eh? four hours straight of rehearsal (first wind ensemble and then brass quintet). BQ was fun though...we're going to have to learn to stay on task or we'll never get anything done..well, that's not true. I need to sit down with the bass and focus on intonation because that thing's a beast!!! The bell's a little shorter than my tenor bell, so it throws of my conception of where each position is. I felt kind of bad in rehearsal, since I was having trouble finding some of the lower slide positions arrgh. But, I think it'll be good (yeehaw optimism) since it's already better than it was last week. Anyway, looks like it's time to get cracking on good ol' Buddha wisdom again...wish me luck!!!

Hey, look at me! *shows muscles* I'm the bomb! I just fixed our vacuum cleaner, that we continued to use even though it had no bag inside of it to collect the crap from our floor..and then the zipper was stuck...Well, anyway, I dragged that sucker outside, fixed the zipper, installed a dustbag (that actually took me a while, since I kept messing up the bags and had to use two before I finally got it right), zipped it back up and proceeded to vacuum our carpets. Pretty proud of myself. So, I always seem to be productive with cleaning things when I'm trying to avoid something else (ahem...buddhism?), I think that's a pretty good way to be non-productive. yay.

Hello, I'm alive!! (but just barely) I've decided that travelling alone is the worst. At least when things go wrong and you have someone there to laugh about it with, you don't go as insane. So, if someone were to give me a match, right now, you know what I'd do? I'd take that bus right back down to O'Hare and set it on fire. That's right. POOF, up in flames. Goodbye, United Airlines! waHAHAHAHAhahaha!!!!!!!!!

anyway, let's not talk about that. I've decided I'm becoming a strange person. Not only have I started to actually like getting up before 10 am, I gave up carbonated beverages and drinking (well, maybe not so much "give up"...)It's weird. I'm supposed to be a college student. Pizza and beer and sleeping until 1 or 2. Ah well...whatever makes you happy, eh?

It's nice and sunny outside, and listening to sublime makes me feel like I'm still at home, but guess what?!?!? It's kind of cold outside. Poopy Wisconsin and it's poopy winters. Ah well, it's time to get cleaned up and face the world (or rather, the Humanities building).

i'm stuffed...remind me not to eat for a while. Good thing tomorrow is back to school and the return of ramen noodles. Mm...shrink-wrapped soup...

Two situationally funny stories. First, on the subject of tourists in La Jolla:
An elderly lady, walking past the mexican restaurant Jose's (ho-seh's), comments, "Oh, Joe-seh's! That looks interesting..."
Second, on bathroom capers and things you don't see too often:
Waiting for the bathroom at Tamarindo's, I'm watching as a man walks up and opens the door to the men's room, but closes it quickly; there's someone in there. Ten seconds later, not one but two (2) guys shuffle out of the bathroom. One of them gives a baleful grin at the waiting man and says, "no harm done, eh mate?"

well, gotta jet and wish Megan Mango a happy birthday. Goodbye San Diego! this shall be my last post in thy fair mediterranean clime...

hola Hans!

Davis is cool. Go to her page (i think i'm mentioned a few times) or mutinous purple dinosaurs will throw kumquats at your front door!
www.stickbus.com/davis/

i love my fishes cuz they're sooo delicious,
gone gold fishin'

sitting
sitting and humming commecial jingles
pondering snack food
working up the inspiration to do something productive

my friend sean in hs used to sing this song:
I like trafficlights
I like trafficlights
I like trafficlights
but not when they are red.
crazy boy-the only person i've ever known who loves the movie Flight of Dragons as much as I do. Dropped off the face of the planet...or rather, he fell into Provo, Utah and had a hard time getting out. I wonder if being Mormon is harder for the person or the person's friends.

hmm
Salma Llarabia.
Jon, we never did take over Europe, but you know I think it's okay. We didn't have enough salmon hats and octopus jello anyhow. Pfft!

it's time to go be productive. productive=napping.

Lunch and being a tourist in Balboa Park today! How exciting...I love San Diego. NO....don't send me back to cold weather!! *whimper*

Cadillacs were designed by the devil. Ours in particular has reached a certain level of hellishness that is seldom matched. Drives like a cow, parks like a cow, smells like golf....that will need some explaining. All my dad's golf stuff is in the back and in the trunk and it's become one big cloud of sweat and grass and dirt that settles upon the nose and tenaciously refuses to let go until you've opened the window and stuck your head out of it several times. One of the reasons I despise the sport of golf. It's that bad. On top of all this, I can barely see over the steering wheel no matter how I adjust the damn seat; I think it was designed specifically for little old grannies who like to drive 15 mph with their heads barely clearing the dash. Anyway, it takes me nearly five minutes to park (plus another five if you count the amount of time it takes me to find a spot big enough), and ten minutes to get out of the parking spot and then I have to make sure I don't scrape the sides of any other cars when I'm trying to turn right because the things so DAMN HUGE...sigh...well, end my rant on cadillacs.

Man, Sean, my private teacher from high school, is awesome. He just rocks. We spent an hour and a half tonight just playing duets and for once I think I actually did him credit. I saw Mr. Grant (and he raved about Doug Hill for awhile), and my Boys, Brian, Ben, Brandon and Nick (one of these things is not like the other..well, Nick missed being under my proverbial "wing" by a year). I miss those kids...
so...i just got back from an interesting evening with Katie and Alan Grant and the infamous Blake. Katie and I went and hung out at their bq rehearsal and got invited to join them at TGI Friday's...I listened to Katie mercilously torment Blake on the subject of relationships, and Alan not so overtly criticize the quintet and its current politics...so much shit has been going down with chamber groups lately, it's kind of depressing. Hope hope hope that everything will work out with Brasso Continuo...It should. I found out also that Brian took an audition in New England with Doug Yeo and before he even left the chair they offered him a full ride. That kid's so amazing..I wish I had talent like that. Man...but that's okay, as Jeff always said, you do the best that you yourself can do. It's so weird, I get home and everything starts to center around high school again. Basically, it's all you can talk about with your old friends...or it's all your old friends can talk about, or something, but it always returns. I realized the other night that part of my struggle in high school was just to be as recognized as all the high talent in the band...Katie, Mike, Negrete, Jeff, they all had it easy...second trombone just doesn't get as much attention. Coming on the heels of this is Alan's comment: "It's so nice to see that that timid little girl has disappeared." Yeah that's true..I have grown a lot. Most of it is college, or just growing up, but part of me takes offense. Not too much of me. Just a little bit of pride rearing its ugly head. Katie kept turning the conversation back to her, or her and Blake. I wonder how often anyone in high school really thought I had anything to say?

Silly me...being upset about this now. Sometimes it haunts me though...this first half of the semester I felt pretty alienated. I don't even remember why, probably something about being nervous about my recital and still coming off the low of my winter break-long examination of self (in which I managed to dredge up every embarrassing and stupid thing I've ever done and analyze every last inch of my poor beleaguered psyche). I do remember freaking out after the Splinters concert, wanting to talk to Ryan but feeling stupid and pushy and shy all at the same time..and Emily not helping at all, or not understanding, or maybe just thinking I needed to get over it all. So I went home feeling flustered and wishing I had just gone and talked to him. After all, he called me afterwards and apologized for not saying anything to me. You know...nobody ever really listens to anyone else. It's just one big mess of miscommunication. That's all society's problem is..miscommunication. All stemming from ignorance which is the root of suffering..ah, hell, I still have my buddhism midterm to do. Sigh.
g'night, sleep tight, don't let the manahoonies bite!

Hi Jessie!

hmm...can i post pictures on this thing?

Ok, so what's new? General excitement: I would like to send out a warm and hearty congratulations to my dear friend Brandon for being promoted. Instead of just doing education work for the Florentine Opera in Milwaukee, he's now in charge of Public Relations! Next stop, top of the world. ;) He also sent me a neat picture from when he was in Falstaff.

Anyhoo, recovery from my minor emotional setback of last night is progressing nicely. There's just some people you can't forget, no matter how hard you try. To quote a popular 80s song: "there is always something there to remind me." Well, shit...that really blows! Sometimes, you don't want to remember, you just want to be angry at the person because anger will fade, whilst sad little achings of the heart take longer. It just does absolutely nothing for my self-esteem. I mean..well, what do I mean anyway? Maybe I should just get a grip.

Well, well, well, I got sucked into the world wide web and the habit of posting my silly little thoughts so the rest of the world can see them. I'm so excited!! hehe. maybe not really. Go me.