I have a concert tonight...

...and that just makes this that much more apropos. Not to mention, it's utterly hysterical.

I am not a scholar.

Clearly, as what I was deeming a "kickass" paper just got ripped to shreds and didn't even get a passing grade (Yeah, sad story- I'm going to talk to the prof tomorrow). In trying to figure out how I could possibly have so grossly misjudged my paper and its worthiness, I have sort of stumbled onto this truth:


I am not a scholar.


This is not really news to me, but it hasn't been so apparent (and annoying) until recently. Lots of my prof's comments on my not-so-"kickass" paper are things like "why?" and it's sort of been like that (though much less) before. Also, my presentation sort of went down that way, too, with everyone asking why things were like that or why they did it that way. Here's the thing... for me, personally, I don't care why most anything is anything else. Most of my beliefs about... well, most things (most, most, most) are that way. I don't feel the need to know why, why it is the way it is, where it came from, about.... anything. Basically, I'm of the opinion that if it works, it works and that's all I need to know. Honestly, the way my brain processes things is a lot of the problem with regard to this specific class. I simply do not approach the information in this class the way I'm supposed to, and I don't think I can, either. Not without hand holding and lots of help because, I have never been trained to think about anything like this and probably even less helpful for the purposes of this class, since I have no desire to be good at this, it's impossible for me to even try to figure it out. Call it lazy if you want. I can only view it as an intense waste of energy, as I just have a really hard time with it and it will be of little (if any) use to me in the future.

It's sort of like me and subtlety. My whole world is basically the opposite of subtle. So when, in art of any kind (music, film, visual art), the point, the part I'm supposed to "get," is subtle... count me out. If you tell me what the point is, I can go, "Oh, yeah. Cool," and I will understand it, but I will rarely, if EVER, get it on my own. That's just the way it is. I have accepted this and it doesn't bother me. I just know this about myself. This concept feels like this class, where when he explains it to me, I understand it and know why it was wrong, but I would NEVER have seen that initially, which is why I turned whatever assignment it was in at all. If I had known that it was terrible, why would I have turned it in, or generated it in the first place?

The moral of this story is that if I'd wanted to be a scholar, I would have gone to a different school. I want to be a performer, and that is something they teach here pretty effectively.

Sad paperclip here

This was kind of lengthy. Sorry. However...

I'm about to watch a movie with someone a timezone away, which always makes life feel better.

ACK!

I don't know what the deal is, but stuff that usually doesn't bother me is just going all OVER me today! I'm just feeling weirdly off kilter or something (yet, somehow Clive down there does make it a little more OK...)

Either way, I'm going to .... FRAK! I just remembered homework. And right when I wanted to listen to some opera (mood doesn't exactly strike me often).


I wish people weren't so "unreachable". They usually always make me feel better.


hahaha... but, seriously.

Woof.

Ok, I found this (via this) and damn.

Good list.¹ I'll take one, thanks. Just tell me where to send my shipping address.

(As for her picks of older men, I can't really argue with any of the choices. I feel I should add Clive Owen to this list, as he is only a year younger than Clooney.)




1. I feel like a comment along the lines of "I'll be in my bunk" should go here, but I didn't want to break up the flow of that sentence with a totally unrelated thought that may or may not make sense to the majority of people reading this. Kudos if you get the reference!

My Cakies!

(Which is what translators pop out when you want them to translate "Mio dolci!" into English.)




I ate half of this because:

• Kelly wanted the other half


• I just felt like a little cake


• It was just a Bonnie Raitt kind of day today, I think.

Oh, Bonnie. Maybe someday I'll tell my little bloggingness about you and that night a few months ago...

Gah. Soooo pitiful.


You always hit where it hurts the worst, Bonnie, you cold, cold bitch.

I'm hungry...

I think I want me one of them little cakes.





I'll be right back.... (pictures forthcoming.)

A Cautionary Tale

Be careful when opening one of these to not squeeze the packet prematurely and puff the powder everywhere, or you may end up inadvertently tasting the Wild Strawberry with your sinuses.

Story Time!

OK, I do not have the energy right now to talk about the competition two days ago (I didn't advance to finals, in case you were wondering, but it's totally alright) so I'm going to tell a story, albeit belatedly, in honor of 4/20. This is the story of the time my sister and I got high.


Ok, those of you that are freaking out can calm down. We didn't do it on purpose, and it was only through examination years later that we decided that was what actually happened.


We were youngish, probably high school. I get this strange cosmotological urge to do a manicure and tell Seester that if she'd let me, I'd do her nails. She's game, so we get a set at Walgreen's or someplace and go in her room (or was it our room? Depends on how young we were) and start playing beauty shop.

The way you used the particular type of acrylic nail set we got was that there was a gel you put on the fingernail, and then poured this powdery stuff on it to "activate" it. I'm pretty sure (read: it was all over the box) that the room was supposed to be well ventilated. I don't remember why we needed to shut her door (loud music, perhaps? Probably so we wouldn't kill the parrot in the living room) but we did and since the whole process was centered around a powder, we couldn't really turn a fan on, either. Basically, we were huffing and had no idea. Some rebels, eh?

I don't remember much about the whole experience except that we were listening to Cake and at one point, the lyrics are "Fawn, Jo and Tootsie are out on a wire" (OH MY GOSH! I never actually knew what the lyrics were there! Ha!) and we, at the time (and me up until about literally five seconds ago), thought it was "Fonzo and Tootsie," which, admittedly, makes no sense. We, at the same time, realized that we had both occasionally gotten mixed up at that part and said "Fonzie" (like Happy Days) but then remembered "Tootso" isn't anything, so that was obviously wrong. We laughed really hard about that, but only after we were done being slightly weirded out that we had been thinking the exact same thing about this goofy song.


Oh, that and we did a trial run of the acrylic stuff on a Sharpie, so for a while this Sharpie in our house had a creepy fingernail on the end of it. We painted it red, which just made it weirder. Damn, I wish I had a photo of that marker. Instead, a photo of weirded out.

Holy moly that is the funniest

THIS was hilarious. I took a tiny break from WoW to read this....



I am so glad I did.


Guild is calling. Nerdiness can't wait.

Are you there, voce?

It's me, Courtney.


Listen, sweetpie, I really need you to step up your game by tomorrow because, I'm not gonna lie, I don't actually feel so hot about the whole competition thing. What's that? Well, yeah, I should have started working on those Italian songs before this morning at 4am. And you're right; that Barber piece really ISN'T going to count itself. Still, voce, I'm going to go ahead and say that despite my inability to prepare adequately for anything, you still manage to take care of crap. I don't know how you do it, but I'm not going to question you now, baby. I'm going to go work on these songs, now, so you think about what I said, alright?

Kisses!
-C

p.s. If I don't advance, I totally called it.


p.p.s. Let it be known that I almost posted a pic of my vocal folds! They look kind of awkward though, so I decided against it.

I'm addicted.

Delicious. And only 10 calories.


Crystal Light
Wild Strawberry
energy drink mix

:)

Ugh.

problem #1: I am not an expert on this topic

problem #2: I have zero desire to be

problem #3: I think this class is a joke

problem #4: I have other CRAP TO DO.




Solution:

I'm pretty sure I can BS this.

Rümmi's thoughts

She told me that she's sad her boyfriend (lead singer of Eyes Made Ready fame) isn't with her in New York. She said: It sucks because I think, "ohhh! He would love this! He would so want to be here!"


And me? She said this:

And then when I go to some places to eat I think, "Oh man, Courtney would HATE this food!"


Haha! Love you, Rümmi! Have a blast in NYC!!

Nothing else will do...

(I wasn't going to blog any more today, but this song... so very yes.)

Gotta Have You - The Weepies

No amount of coffee, no amount of crying
No amount of whiskey, no amount of wine
No, nothing else will do
I've gotta have you, I've gotta have you.

Things on my mind

In no particular order:

-I waste an inordinate amount of time at work just putting off stuff I know I can do later.

-Wheat Thins are so good. Even the Reduced Fat kind.

-My life the next week or so is going to be greatly determined by a friend of mine: Jeremiah. He should be calling me this evening sometime to let me know whether he wants to switch presentation days with me in our Vocal Pedagogy class. If he does:

I can take all of the next 3 days to prepare for the Naftzger Competition I have this weekend

I will have an entire week to prepare MY presentation for said Vocal Ped. class

I will have to give that man a bottle of booze of his choice for saving my butt, and likely my sanity.

-I am glad for this guy and his recordings of the early Italian songs I need to get memorized for said competition. I am listening to them on repeat to hopefully ingrain, at very least, the melody in my subconscious. Watch one of his videos. They're quite good; easily the best recordings of the songs I needed.

-Somehow I missed the "Kelli O'Hara is giving a benefit concert in OKC" memo. She sang someplace here on the 18th and I had no idea. She is so fantastic live, and I have only gotten to see her once. Color me irritated.

-I want to quit biting my nails. I have tried before, but I cannot kick the habit. I know all the tricks and suggestions and helpful tips, too. I guess too much of my wayward energy goes into that for it to be ok to let go of it. That can be added to my Summer Self Improvement Regime (more on that later).


Ok, it's time for me to order some toilets (and faucets, bidets, toilet seats, sinks... if it is a fixture in a bathroom, I'm ordering it (did I mention I work at a plumbing rep company? Haha))Nested parentheses! Agh!

But I can't post without media of some kind, so here is the Richard Strauss I'm also trying to memorize (Wiegenlied, sung by Renee Fleming; sorry the recording is so quiet):






Poetry by Dehmel:

Träume, träume, du mein süßes Leben,
Von dem Himmel, der die Blumen bringt.
Blüten schimmern da, die leben
Von dem Lied, das deine Mutter singt.

Träume, träume, Knospe meiner Sorgen,
Von dem Tage, da die Blume sproß;
Von dem hellen Blütenmorgen,
Da dein Seelchen sich der Welt erschloß.

Träume, träume, Blüte meiner Liebe,
Von der stillen, von der heilgen Nacht,
Da die Blume seiner Liebe
Diese Welt zum Himmel mir gemacht.


English trans. by Emily Ezust:

Dream, dream, my sweet life,
of the heaven that brings flowers.
Shimmering there are blossoms that live on
the song that your mother is singing.

Dream, dream, bud of my worries,
of the day the flower bloomed;
of the bright morning of blossoming,
when your little soul opened up to the world.

Dream, dream, blossom of my love,
of the quiet, of the holy night
when the flower of his love
made this world a heaven for me.

Google Reader has changed my life.

Yesterday, an amazing thing happened.

I have been following a few blogs here and there for a while, but mainly just people who say things I like to read about (Wild and Wily ways of a Brunette Bombshell and (NO) sex and the city, for example). I don't know why I hadn't thought of this before, but it finally occurred to me yesterday to follow all the random webcomics I love so much (but am too lazy to keep up with actively) in Google Reader. Because I want everyone to share in my joy at these funny daily or weekly web postings, here they are:

www.marriedtothesea.com
www.nataliedee.com
www.superpoop.com
These are all maintained by a husband and wife. For more info on these go here.

also:
www.xkcd.com
and
www.qwantz.com

I must thank my friend Brent for introducing me to... all of these, at one point or another, I believe. Basically, they are all things I like to read, but I don't like to go find them all the time. So, for making my work nonexistent and allowing me to be entertained daily without effort:



Google Reader, I salute you!!


To round off this post, here is a webcomic from www.qwantz.com that I found just today. (hehe)

Thanks again, Google Reader.

I don't really like coffee

So I'm not a huge advocate of Starbucks. But:


Y'all, those Strawberries and Cream Frappuccinos are SOO good...



Anyway, I'm not really in a spending money sort of life-place right now, so I won't be having any more of those for a bit (as that was the last of my gift card). Not much to report these days. Rümmi is on her way to NYC for a fabulous vacation. I will be working on competition stuff and trying to write a paper (no not that paper, a different paper) before Thursday. I'm sort of feeling like a beautiful, on purpose nap, but I don't know. I think laying in bed with music and music books. Sleeping will likely be a part of this.


I shall return...


Sleepy little girl here along with a link to to this, a super useful and succinct guide to naps! Wow!

Happy Birthday, Rümmi!!

Today, in honor of my Rümmi on the day of her birth, I present:


The Many Faces of Kari




Love you, Rümmi!!




p.s.

Isn't it amazing how
those late night
PhotoBooth sessions
come in handy?

Running out of internet...

...usually happens about this time in the evening before a paper is due.

I cannot wait to sleep all day Saturday... and heck, most of the day tomorrow.



This is so sweet:


Somebody Loved - The Weepies

I AM an Opera Singer.

Opera singers sing.


If I had to describe myself in a word, it would probably be loud. I am one of the loudest people I know, as far as sheer volume of sound produced, and while I know that it is mostly just obnoxious, I choose to believe it is endearing on some level. And professionally, it's very useful. I have lived in 3 different apartment complexes and a duplex and have never had anyone say anything negative at all about me making a LOT of noise practicing or what have you.



Until about half an hour ago.


My neighbors next door (not upstairs, ironically) were actually knocking on the wall as if to say, "Hey! You in there singing. SHUT THE #@$% UP!"



It is not late. I am not bad. I will probably only sing for 15 or 20 minutes before I get bored. This is my house. This is what I do.





Please don't throw a rock though my window....... :'-(


Tallulah Carter in Hotel Casablanca







Two Cake themed titles in a row in honor of Cakefest 2009! Wooo!!

Wheels keep on spinning 'round and 'round

So tonight, I am going to finish this paper. No other goals or To-do's.


focus



Paper.




Huge THANK YOU to Rümmi's brother Jason (of Eyes Made Ready fame) for giving me all of the Cake he had. It's more Cake than I've ever had at one time and it's all fabulous. In fact, it may be all the Cake in the world. Nom nom... Cake. :)

Don't Worry, Be Happy

I just saw this article predicting the success of one's marriage based on how much or strongly they smiled in photos when they were as young as 10.

Interesting read. Makes me want to look at everybody's old photos.



Smile!!

Technology makes things possible

For example, right now I am playing Hangman with someone a time zone away.




On my phone.

Just like old times.
Nothing beats wasting time at work playing Hangman

Let it be known

I had a really emo blog written out about how stupid and disappointed I feel sometimes, but after being ridiculous and listening to "Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps" by, of all things, the Pussycat Dolls, I have decided to just let it be known that I was going to be all Debbie Downer, but didn't want to sully the other very delightful entry this evening about my wonderful friends (who are, of course, incredible).

The Essentials

This could not be more amazing



Delicious Dinner: check
Easter Candy: check
Laptops: check
Cell Phones: check


Fabulous Girlfriends: double check



Did we get our papers written? Nope.
Does that matter?


not at all

The Tale of the Toaster

Confession:

I kind of wish I had named my url something besides "toasterxors" because while it does express (too much, I daresay) my true inner nerd, I feel like something more poetic or cute or generally less ending in "xors" would have been wiser. But, we live with the choices we make, I guess, and it's WAY beyond the point that I could change it now. I would have just used "lifesatoaster" but, inexplicably, someone else already has that one... It's random enough that I want it. It's even weirder than someone already has it. I was not so versed in the ways of blogging to realize that I could just separate with hyphens, but I digress. The "Life's a Toaster." story must be told.


So the saga of the Toaster began as many things do between Seester and myself: as ridiculous and outlandish sarcasm.

My sister Whitney (who will generally be referred to as "Seester") and I were sitting at the dining room table and she was working on her high school graduation announcements. "I need a quote to go on these. What should I use?" she asks me. She is very into quotes, so it wasn't so much that she didn't have a quote, she just couldn't decide what to use. I look at her, and with utmost sincerity, say, "I've got it-

"Life's.... a toaster."

She just looked at me, waiting for the rest of it. Then she asked, "Life's a toaster.... what? Life's a toaster, it's got lots of crumbs... Life's a toaster, it's burned on the edges... what's the rest?" I just tell her, "Nope. That's it. 'Life's a toaster.' End." She didn't end up using it, but the whole thing was endlessly funny to us, and it was added to the already extensive list of inside jokes that no one else gets.

This quote resurfaces about two years later when she is filling out her application to go to school in Oklahoma City. They want her to write an entrance essay about a quote from "a movie, a book or a song that is meaningful to you." Again, we sat across from each other at the dining room table, she asked me,

"What quote should I use for my essay?"
"Life's a toaster."
She laughed, "I totally should. But they said it has to be from a song or book or something."
"I promise you, they don't care what source you get your quote from. They want you to be able to string words together into sentences and say something interesting. You can BS something about how 'Life's a toaster.' came to be and how your relationship with your sister is very meaningful, blah blah."

{pause}

"Say all that slower and let me write it down."

My sister wrote her college entrance essay on the endlessly deep and meaningful quotation "Life's a toaster."


This is getting lengthy, but I can't talk about the toaster quote without mentioning the toaster lamp.

Yes.
Toaster lamp.



My sister is, and has been for quite some time, very involved in theatrical lighting. That was actually what she was in school for in Oklahoma. One of her classes had an assignment to turn some object into a lamp that isn't supposed to be a lamp, but still looks like what it is supposed to be. She said that lots of people put light bulbs into books and flower pots and things that are pretty easy to wire (whatever that means). Well, as is Seester's tendency, she waited until the night before she was supposed to have parts and pieces to even think about what she was going to lampify. She was literally walking around our apartment poking things and trying to find something that would a) work as a lamp and b) be relatively cheap to replace, since she would be destroying it. She said of the final choice, "Well, it was between the toaster and the coffee maker. The coffee maker was like twenty bucks. The toaster was six. Toaster it is." The pictures are the result of her taking OUR toaster right out of our kitchen and making it into a lamp. With a dimmer.


Sidebar: Seester is a total badass. Always.


So, there it is! The Tale of the Toaster. Doesn't it feel good to be in on the joke? Also, it's so interesting to me which of the seemingly insignificant things I have said sometimes stick around forever!

Creepy widget

I am not sure how I feel about this thing...

It literally tracks who's visiting whatever site it's active on in real-time.

This is a screenshot from www.feedjit.com. You can see where I am "Oklahoma City"
Creepy.

I mean, it's kind of cool, but it just seems very Big Brother to me. If you go to the "Watch in Real-Time" link, it can also tell you what operating system you're using, what site you came from if you're arriving and where you went if you're leaving.

Another screenshot. I apparently left Feedjit.com to go to livefeedjit.com on Safari on an Apple operating system... This isn't creepy?

Anyway, what do you think?

In, 1,2,3, Out, 1,2,3, In,1,2,3....

...Out,1,2,3....


This is to keep me from hyperventilating, in case you were wondering. I just talked to my theory professor about my thesis paper and I am suddenly panicking a little. This paper isn't due until way next year, but it makes me freak out just thinking about it. His response to my question, "Is this a viable paper topic?" was "It depends on what you're talking about. You can't just rehash what he's already done."

...uh oh.

That was actually kind of my plan. *epiphany* This may be why I have trouble writing papers sometimes: I never actually say anything. I just put together what everyone else has already said (obviously crediting everyone I reference). Um.... so now what? I don't know anything! Especially about this stuff...

Ugh. I have a coaching in 10 minutes that I have no music for (because I have been writing my paper instead of learning new music).




And my eyebrow is twitching. That is SO aggravating.....

For Kelly

Because I know you will love this so much:


They say, best men are moulded out of faults;
And, for the most, become much more the better
For being a little bad.

- William Shakespeare,
"Measure for Measure", Act 5, scene i

Room to breathe!

So apparently, I DID like the way my blog looked, I just wanted a little space to wiggle around. A little monkeying with the html codes and Voila! I really like it this way! Ok, just enough time for some laziness before Observe and Report with Peyton. I hope this movie doesn't turn out to be a waste of time (because I'd almost rather write my paper... and yet, popcorn is SO delicious).



Ahhh...

Blog Facelift: part deux

As I'm looking at my little space here, I don't think I like the way it looks.


I'm keeping the header, for sure, but be aware, both of you readers, this blog, it is a-changin'.

About that header... maybe I'll tell the story of that later. It is such a fun one, and it involves my Seester, whom I have yet to talk about (how did that even happen?)


Seester is on the left, that's me on the right.


Later, later. Now, church. Happy Risen Savior Day!

Rainy days and Mondays

I'm feeling all smushy (I'm aware it's not a word. Use context clues, folks) this morning. Could be because I'm listening to The Carpenters, could be because I read blogs all night that were all sweet or just because this morning, I woke up super early, let the dogs out (I was housesitting), and just wanted to come home and be in my apartment.

So anyway, I don't know if it's because I'm feeling so smushy or because it's a holiday that I usually spend with a significant other and his family, but a vivid mental image came to me this morning while I was making breakfast (since I was up early enough to actually do so):


I'm doing dishes, or scrambling eggs or something standing next to a counter in the kitchen and he comes in. Clad in a white undershirt, blue boxers and black dress socks, he is totally adorable. He comes up behind me, puts his arms around me and just stands there with his chin on my shoulder while I do whatever it is I'm doing, and it is the most glorious thing ever.

This daydream has been around for a while (I'm talking years, here), and even though the "he" changes, the image itself only changes when I consciously will it to. It's more about the feeling of my charming and doofy man-person being both very sweet and completely ridiculous at the same time. So, in the vein of this delightful blogger:




Dear husband-to-be,


Please wear black socks and boxers in the mornings. It will never fail to make me smile.

Love,

your doting and affectionate wifey-to-be

And I said I wasn't going to blog again...

I just wanted to update the world on my paper. I finally got started actually assembling it, and it's going really well so far. In its very earliest of drafts (as in, I just copied and pasted from sources and I will paraphrase like I'm supposed to do later) it is already 3 and a half pages!!! AND I haven't even turned the double spacing on! I feel pretty good about this paper! Yay for doing crap earlier than is absolutely necessary! I haven't ever done this before...


it's incredible!

*Also: I have discovered the way to making myself do the paper is to just turn on the recordings on repeat. I have three of them, but I only listen to two of them because the other one sucks. My favorite is the one where Bernstein (the composer) conducts the New York Phil. Anyhow, more paper!

Hineh mah tov,
Umah nayim,
Shevet achim
Gam yachad.

On a day I should have blogged very little...

...I blog 3 times (or more, who knows? The day is young...)


I must say that my Rümmi is srsly teh best evar. See Exhibit A:



My Easter Basket!!


Thanks, Rümmi!!!

Addendum*

Joel wins again. He usually does.


How cute is this song?



Heart of Mine - Peter Salett

Restless

I felt weird and restless last night, and I still feel that way to a degree this morning. I have paper and memorizing crap to get finished today, as usual, but I wanted to put something here about happiness and love and sweetness and beauty and all kinds of other nice wonderful things just because I feel like being uplifted today. So here are happy/pretty/lovely/wonderful things:


I love this artist's work. This one is "Dance Under the Rain." It's so vibrant! And so happy! And romantic! And *sigh*...


This is Delphinus, my very favorite constellation. I can't wait for summer to get here for a lot of reasons, and one of them is my knowledge of the Summer Sky, as it were. I took Astronomy during a summer semester in college and, though I just love constellations in general, I am much more familiar with the ones in the summer.


Sometimes images change the way you think about things. This one did. :)


Ok, I have to say now that I have been trying to find happy or fun or wonderful or whatever songs for like 3 hours and while I recognize that I should probably dedicate an entire blog to them, I am not going to. So here is the music portion of this happiness blog (I'll be sure and indicate contributors):




Saturday Nite - Blitzen Trapper
This is on one of those new albums that Rümmi gave me. It's a lot of fun and very catchy. I actually was going to put this on here even before I looked at the lyrics and realized that they're super cute.



Sing - Travis
This band good pretty much any time I hear them, but this song is particularly happy. Yay for singing!



Istanbul (Not Constantinople) - They Might Be Giants
I have to give Joel credit for this one. What a great song! Seester and I have our own parts we always sing when we hear this. I am probably the alto, because that's what always happens. Love it.



Closer to Mercury - Wheat
Another band with a TON of really happy cute songs. Another one I accidentally thought was really sweet sounding and then looked up the lyrics and it was. Happens less often than you'd think.



When A Man Loves A Woman - Percy Sledge
This takes me back to my days working retail in a department store because it would come on the cheesy radio they played over the speakers. I still think it's delightfully, swooningly romantic. So slow dance-able.



It Only Takes A Moment - Originally by Michael Crawford in Hello Dolly, but included here as part of the WALL•E Soundtrack
*SIGH* I love this movie, and this song, and it's so wonderful and pretty and simple and sweet and perfect... This came up on in the Shuffle search earlier and immediately made the list. SO good (movie, song, all of it)


Well, after many hours of research and hyperlinks, there you have it. A blog about happiness!! All because I woke up this morning feeling restless.

All day paper writing marathon

That isn't so much happening today. I have been jacking with the scanner and trying to get all the settings right for a 10 page PDF that my co-worker needs to send. Wouldn't be so time consuming if I hadn't scanned it wrong (as far as settings) 3 times and spent way too much time trying to manually adjust the size and scale, when I should have just fixed the settings for real and scanned it again. Anyway, I still have to watch the new Office since last night was all about the wildfires. So I plan to do that while I'm eating, or immediately when I get back and then it's Chichester Psalms for the rest of the day. Hopefully I can get something ready to actually send to my professor EARLY and he can give me suggestions on how to not fail his class.

Tee hee

I was having a conversation with a friend of mine about wanting to tell someone that you love them, but either thinking the time wasn't right or that it wasn't appropriate or whatever, so it wasn't said. I told them, "Just say it really loud in your head when you look at them. That's about all you can do at this point anyhow." I got this text last night:


"I am loving {person} really really really really loudly with my eyes"


So cute.

I cannot stop listening to this song.

It is so beautiful. I have posted some Kelli O'Hara before (see here), but this is just so incredibly gorgeous, I seriously have listened to it continuously since I got home from church. I was totally unfamiliar with Light in the Piazza until about 2 days ago, but if you enjoy this song and don't know the show, it's totally worth it to go look it up and then listen again. And again, and again...




Also, all both of you who read this, go look at my Facebook note about kisses. :-*

Television!

Oh man!! There is SO much television that I want to watch! Thank goodness it's all online :)


Shows I want to see (but haven't yet):

Cupid


Better off Ted


In the Motherhood (What? It looks amusing)


The Unusuals (Ok, for some reason, this show strikes me as a rip-off of Castle; which is weird, since Castle hasn't been out very long. It's another funny crime show, but if I have to pick, Castle is going to get my vote.)



Shows that I like OK:

Dollhouse (I'm sticking with you, Joss, but know that this is SERIOUSLY falling short of my expectations)



New shows that I LOOOVE:

Castle (nom nom Nathan Fillion, but the show is very cute. It's a snarky and very funny Law and Order)



Shows that I have watched for a while and keep up with; some without reason at all (I'm talking to you, Grey's):

Grey's Anatomy


The Office



Shows that have been around, but I haven't watched yet:

Arrested Development (I hear so many good things about this show, but just haven't watched it yet.)




At any rate, I say all of this to say that Castle is SO good!!! I mean, yeah, Nathan Fillion, but I really like the show outside of the hot male lead; which is always a big plus, (hello Battlestar... yes, yes and very yes)



So watch Castle. It's good, y'all.

Losing my mind

...looks like this.





Ok. Back to homework.

To do list

...was a massive failure.

Other than attend 2 recitals and get a rock thrown through the window, nothing got done today. Actually, that's a lie. I finally mailed my tax stuff to Wichita Falls so it can get all taxed (more importantly, so I can get refunded). I am now officially sleepy and so I'm going to read in bed until I fall asleep. I hope there won't be any more rock incidents.

Holy SHIT

So I was in the middle of looking for pictures for a happy blog dedicated to my Alyssa friend (I love you!) and I got distracted looking for something in my room. I then heard what sounded like something hitting a window and the blinds moving around in what I thought was the living room. It wasn't.... the living room. It was Rümmi's room.



That's a quarter.



Where it landed.


The damage from inside.



And now I get to try to do some homework. Yeah. Right. What's probably worse is that the first instinct that ALL of us had was that someone was mad that I was singing all the time. :'-( It did go through the window right where I was sitting to practice: at the damn piano. FABULOUS!

Today's goals:

I was going to call this "Today and Tomorrow" but I think it's better for me to think in shorter term for this. As in, I am way to distraction-prone to put goal lists into too much for my little brain to handle, or I'll just play WoW all day and say forget the whole thing. Anyway, here is today's list:

1. Homework for 20th Century
2. Homework for Vocal Ped
3. Do research for Vocal Ped paper
4. Work on memorizing songs for competition (old ones today, probably the Strauss and the Barber)
5. Work more on the "Ernani, involami" recitative
6. Unpack 1 box (Gotta start somewhere, right?)

Optional:

6. Research for 20th Century Paper
7. Run? (Pfft. Like I'll have time for that with the retarded amount of recitals tonight.)

I'll let you know how it goes.

A Scholarly Pace - Norman Rockwell

Couldn't have said it better myself

What a thing to say:



"You know, I should probably quit complaining so much about all the stuff I wish he did and just revel in all the stuff that he does do."

Alley By The Lake by Leonid Afremov.
His website here and it's ALL gorgeous!

Clichéd Mosiac

Ok... playing on Flickr is way fun. And/or/also playing on that mosaic maker. So here is another one! Theme for the "answers" was just cliché descriptors of pretty things.

1. Passion: Passion flower
2. Love: Let there be light
3. Awe: I Got The Blues... in Bordeaux
4. Beauty: Beauty
5. Desire: Opera in a dream
6. Wonder: SMGallery Vertorama Tutorial (CDMVerto)
7. Gorgeous: City of Niagara Falls
8. Breath Taking: Dream City Red Color Lights
9. Amazing: ~ Duck Dance ~

2 completely unrelated thoughts

Thought #1:

Eyes Made Ready is sounding sublime these days! For those of you who don't know, my Rümmi's brother is part of a band called Eyes Made Ready. Coincidentally, so is her boyfriend. He's the lead singer. So dreamy.... ;-) Anywho, I have been partaking of the fruits of their recording labors, and let me just say, they are delicious. Tasty, tasty labors to be feasted upon as loudly as can be personally tolerated. I'll check with them and see if they'd mind me linking their songs on this, my little corner of the internet. During the interim, I'll point you here to their Myspace page. The old recordings are good, but the newest ones I have been listening to are SO excellent. You'll love it.

**Edit: The new songs ARE on their Myspace page! Go and listen!!**

Thought #2:

What is wrong with people? I hear about the stupid crap that people do to each other and it just totally confuses me. I am speaking specifically of people who are "in a relationship" with each other. Even if it's not a "we are officially dating each other" kind of relationship, I just can't see how people who are supposed to care about each other are so dang hateful.

Example: Person A and Person B have been dating for a while; living together, I think. Person A is being very strongly considered for a job that will employ them for a good portion of the summer. Person B doesn't think it's a good idea and thinks their relationship won't survive the time apart. So what does Person B do? Person B BREAKS INTO PERSON A'S EMAIL and emails the company to tell them that "No, I won't be able to work for you this summer."

Who does that?!? I mean, trying to badger, guilt or manipulate your significant other into doing what you want them to is one thing (not good, mind you, but at least reasonably acceptable), but to email a prospective employer?! Am I just too nice that I would NEVER in a million, Brazillion years even THINK of that, let alone execute it?

Don't misunderstand me; I feel like I have a reasonable expectation for what a relationship should be able to take in the way of disagreement. As in, I wouldn't expect sunshine and sparkles and rainbows all the time, but seriously. Being nice. This seems like such a no brainer to me, I can't even think of anything else to say about it; in jest or otherwise.


Ok, people, let's get back to the good old days, shall we? Days when you do nice things for people you care about and think about what effects your idiot actions may have on people outside your own dumb self.


LIFE photo archive hosted by Google found here.

Quick post

Rest well, everyone. My computer is safe and sound and back in my arms! I'll be back to post something with substance later. Until then, enjoy this:





By the Way That They Dance - Jump Little Children


And the one step and he's sliding
And the two steps and she's gliding
3 and the 1 and the 2
And then they float in the air

Side to side and she shows him
Back and forth 'cause she knows him
Round and round again
All that see them can't help but stare

[...]

Cheek to cheek 'cause he needs her
Hand in hand as he leads her
Face to face 'cause they know
They'll never dance alone

[...]

By the way she moves in circles
Ever so sweetly she wins him completly
By the way he holds her so gracefully
The hand that he lends her is able and tender
Never a step to chance
'Cause everyone knows they're in love
By the way they dance

'Cause everyone knows they're in love
Everyone knows they're in love
Yes and everyone knows they're in love
By the way they dance