Skin Like Winter

Some of you who read this might know that I write for AMP Magazine. Lately this has been extremely lucrative. At the end of November I interviewed Ben Weinman, from Dillinger Escape Plan, who is one of my absolute guitar idols, and he was an awesome guy. We even talked for a while post interview and (maybe he was just being polite) said we should hang out next time they're in LA or SD, because we got along really well and got giddy talking about the same bands.

So I received an email a couple days ago from AMP's editor saying that she loved the Dillinger Interview, and asking which one of the list of available bands I wanted to do an article on next. I asked, and just got an email back to tell me that the next band I get to meet with is....drumroll....MARS VOLTA.

And I am excited.





Oh yes, and classes started today, and start for me tomorrow (I only have Tues/Thur). Here's the list:

Mus 132 - Guitar
Mus 103E - Honors Composition
Mus 95B - Guitar Ensemble
Poli 104B - Civil Liberties/Fundamental Rights
Poli 110B - Sovereigns, Subjects, and the Modern State
Poli 133 - Postwar US/Japanese Relations

I just spent my amazon and barnes and noble giftcards from christmas and I'm excited to report on what cool stuff I got.

Books:
Italo Calvino - Cosmicomics
Arnold Schoenberg - Style and Idea (Collected Writings)
Arnold Schoenberg - Structural Functions of Harmony
Lewis Porter - John Coltrane: His Life and Music
Mick Goodrick - The Advancing Guitarist


Sheet Music:
Stravinsky - Le Sacre Du Printemps
Debussy - La Mer, Nocturnes, Prelude A L'Apres-Midi D'Un Faune



I'm really looking forward to the Stravinsky and Debussy scores, to see how those guys pulled some of that stuff off. And apparently of all the Coltrane books this is the only one that gets into analyzing his music as opposed to just telling his life story. There's going to be some good readin' time this quarter :)

Because he's awesome, and I thought he'd get excited about that. There'll be a full length one later, I'm going to go find exciting things to do now.



Although after yesterday not a whole lot is going to seem very exciting for a couple of days I think.

Things that happened in 2007:

Favorite records that came out this year:
1. Radiohead - In Rainbows
1. Bright Eyes - Cassadaga (tied for first place)
2. Liars - Self Titled
3. Animal Collective - Strawberry Jam
4. Dillinger Escape Plan - Ire Works
5. Amon Tobin - Foley Room


Favorite movies that came out this year:
1. Michael Clayton
2. American Gangster
3. No Country for Old Men
4. Superbad


Good television:
1. It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia
2. Planet Earth
3. The Universe
4. Man vs. Wild


Favorite places to hang out:
1. Porter's Pub after jazz class
2. The third A frame (Emerald Bay)
3. La Jolla Shores
4. My house
5. Matt and Sarah's apartment
6. Perks


Best concerts:
1. Bright Eyes at the Disney Concert Hall, LA
2. Charlie McBride at the Blue Note, New York
3. The Weakerthans at The Casbah, San Diego
4. l'Orchestre symphonique de Montreal doing Mahler's first and Ravel's L'enfant, in (you guessed it) Montreal
5. Matthew Burtner and Morris Palter at the APA, San Diego


Books I loved:
1. Miles: The Autobiography
2. A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson
3. The Crying of Lot 49 by Thomas Pynchon
4. Exile and the Kingdom by Albert Camus

Notable things about school:
1. Took 28 units this quarter and had a breakdown
2. Got into honors composition, and the faculty calls me the "favorite undergraduate"
3. Applied to a ton of graduate programs, visited some cool campuses and met people
4. Started hanging out off campus with professors and going to event type things


Interesting things in the love life:
1. Friended, as expected
2. Got two phone numbers (maybe three)
3. Went on a really fun date (see number 1, but not the same girl)
4. Can't think of a number 4


Massive accomplishments:
1. Ranger director
2. Played the Che Cafe
3. Kayaked across the channel
4. Had some of my pieces performed
5. Played my first show outside of the US
6. Got a song on an actual cd


New things:
1. Short hair
2. Noise rock
3. Recreational drugs (in moderation, and being smart about it)
4. Handmade European classical guitar


Travel:
1. San Francisco
2. New York
3. Montreal
4. Connecticut
5. Mexico


Next year:
1. Graduate school
2. Paris
3. Girl
4. Gym

Today was awesome. I woke up around 10AM, checked the email and facebook and all that stuff, and went back to sleep immediately. At some point after that I woke up again and turned on the Discovery Channel. I went between being asleep and awake until 1:45 or so, then drove to Chipotle for lunch, then the mall for a chocolate shake, which was glorious. Then Ryan called to borrow something for recording, so I swung by his place for a bit, then came home. I read a little more in the books I'm reading, then practiced music stuff for a while. That was followed by giving a guitar lesson, then heating up and eating some soup. The night was capped off by seeing No Country for Old Men with some friends, and that was great. Stopped at Ralph's to pick up a snack en route to my house, and "Naima" by Coltrane was on, and it was totally perfect. I listened to the whole thing before getting out of my car, then, after having bought a thing of string cheese, sat in the car listening to it two more times.

There was one night a couple of months ago when Jack and I were at the park when the sprinklers were crossing an orange street light in the fog in a way that no choreographer could have conceived. There was another time when I was driving across the bridge over the 5 on Gennessee and the way the cars' headlights curved into the distance in relation to the line of the window struck me the same way. Tonight listening to Naima on repeat while eating string cheese, parked in front of my house, worked much the same too.

People say music is different from most other forms of art because it is the only one in which time itself is manipulated, or at least used to the advantage of the composer. Film is the same way in a sense. I've always liked that idea, and it's part of why I'm so drawn to music, and probably one of the reasons that I usually begin new pieces with structure. I've been simultaneously reading up on the neuroscience of music perception and the experimental movement in the sixties, with guys like John Cage and Christian Wolff. Structure, in the most literal sense, is a construct that our minds impose on the world, both in hearing pieces of music and otherwise. Though I am a fan of structure, I am beginning to see how the experimental tradition takes advantage of the fact that it's a psychological construct, that is basically artificial. The dogma that those composers lived by is that music is a way of listening to sounds, not a way of arranging them to be listened to.

I don't agree with that, in the same way that I don't think that "found art" is art. Although either objects of found art or the naturally occurring soundscape can be quite pleasing to look at or listen to, no one should be taking credit for them. Maybe they can be used in some greater context with meaning, but on their own, any association or assigned meaning is arbitrary. This doesn't mean that it can't be enjoyable though.

I'm not sure where this is going, and I was actually planning on making a little list of good movies I've seen this year and current favorite songs, but I can save that for another entry. I suppose the point I've reached on my own (and I'm not sure if that came across) is that while taking credit for natural circumstances is total bullshit, taking the time to slow down and just listen or look around is really nice, and I found it somehow rewarding tonight. I think that's what Cage and his amigos were trying to turn people on to, and it came off far more radical than they had intended. At least a part of it did.

I am really close to done with graduate applications and it is really exciting. There are only 4 left to click submit on, and then I have to put postage on a few of them that only accept paper letters of recommendation, and I'll be done. I did, however, make a boneheaded move and send in McGill's application without the statement of purpose attached, so I've got to mail that too and look kind of like an idiot. Oh well, Montreal gets cold anyhow.

I restrung the new classical two days ago and it sounds awesome! I say that every time I do it and tell myself I should do it once every two weeks (which I should) and then wait forever. I think I'll say it again though, and see if it happens.

Also, I somehow managed to break 3 nails on my right hand in the past week, one of them while performing, but it somehow made it seem impressive that I pulled something off, so I'm okay with that even though I would have rather had it sound better. Anyhow this led me to get a manicure at a little vietnamese nail place yesterday, and man those women are crazy. She kept trying to pull my watch off of my left hand, while I was saying "no, don't touch the left hand, just the right" and then offered me a back room massage, saying I looked tense. Long story short that's the last time I do that, but at least my nails are shaped properly now.

Alec came down yesterday and we saw that UCSD Chamber Orchestra. It was rad to see him, and the orchestra put on a pretty good show, including some recontextualization of themes from Carmen, and that was really cool.

Iago show last week went really well, Thanksgiving was fun, and it's back to practice and classes as usual. I've added up some grades and percentages and things for some of my general ed sciences, and as it stands, I can skip the rest of the homework and the rest of the quizzes and get a 55% on the final in chemistry and be okay, and I can skip the rest of physics/astronomy: The Solar System and get a 14% on the final and be fine too. That is at least a relaxing thought.


Okay time to get out of bed.

So I'm not sure how I timed driving up so poorly, because in past years Thursday morning has been way better than Wednesday night. Matt and Sarah left SD at 6 AM and said it was no problem getting here. Other Sara left around 1 PM and said the same thing. I left at 10 AM and didn't get here until 5 PM.

2 hours in, when I wasn't quite into San Clemente yet (that usually takes 35 to 40 minutes) I got off of the freeway, walked into a Wal Mart and bought a Garmin GPS, then took surface streets all the way to Long Beach. Which was way faster.

I'm going to return the GPS on the drive back on Sunday. But I do feel clever :)

Alright, I was expecting to spend about $1200 on graduate applications, but this is getting ridiculous.

$6 per transcript sent to 13 schools, with some requiring two.

$12 per GRE score sent, which is only through a phone menu system that takes forever, and there's a maximum number of schools per call, and they CHARGE YOU FOR THE PHONE CALL

$65 to $110 for each application



That's what I expected, the one that cost a little more than I perceived is:

$140 in photocopying and binding scores to send out! Plus postage! And this while the British schools accept them as .pdfs online? Seriously? Did I just spend that much at imprints? I'm going to go drink.







But partially in celebration that the PORTFOLIO IS DONE.


Happy thanksgiving everyone!

GRE scores are all sent in to the schools, and transcripts will be by the end of tonight (note accidental band reference). Getting letters is going well, and putting portfolios together is tiring but somewhat enjoyable. The only thing left is the personal statement, which is getting really hard. Anyhow here's the list, in some non definitive order of preference:

Princeton
Columbia
Kings College London
Stanford
The Hague
UC Berkeley
U Virginia
McGill
UCSD
U Michigan
SF Conservatory of Music
Cincinnati Conservatory of Music






And also, Michael Clayton was amazing. Back to work!

Today (yesterday now) is Beaujolais Day in France, the day that Beaujolais Nouveau is released for the year, my favorite wine which is only available for a week or two, starting now. I picked up bottles from 5 vineyards, but 2 were for other people. We killed off one of them already, and I was happy to share it because I think people liked it, and I am a fan of sharing things I like.

The previous series of ups and downs is seeming to continue, even on a microscopic scale. Today was mostly an up, and I had a great meeting with a professor who is going to write a letter for me, and that felt good, and got to hang out and catch up with April, which was nice because I always like her company. And after that watching It's Always Sunny with the guys was great, and Jill came over too, which added to the fun, but that is still a bit tough. Getting better though, or at least I'm saying it is. In bad news I broke a nail. That doesn't sound bad at all, but I was in a master class with David Tanenbaum earlier in the week to work on La Espiral Eterna by Brouwer and got it sounding really good, and was very excited to play it for Colin, and that all pretty much went out the window and will stay there for at least a week. At least David gave me some really encouraging compliments, and he is one of my favorite guitarists anywhere.

We (Colin and some other students and I) tried to go back to Mexico last night for a concert but they closed the border, and we sat on the freeway just half a mile north of it for hours and missed the show. That was kind of a bummer but maybe it'll be a good story later.

I got an email from Jake, one of my closest friends who I haven't talked to in a couple of months, and that was really nice, so hopefully we'll get back in touch again before he comes back out here. It's been almost 2 years and I miss him, but he'll be back in April or thereabouts so we are both excited.

Applications are going well, except I am having a bit of writer's block for personal statements. I did, however, submit my piece Under a Neon Sky to a couple of contests, so we will see if that gets any attention. Also Colin said that he would like to do it with the guitar ensemble next quarter, and that is a great compliment and will be very cool to hear.

The new Dillinger record is sold out everywhere, and that makes me really happy for them. I'm going to write Ben a note to say congrats and such tomorrow.

Picked classes for next quarter today:

Political Thought from Machiavelli to Rousseau: Rise of the Modern State
Mass Media and Politics
Civil Liberties and Fundamental Rights
Honors Composition
Guitar Performance
Guitar Ensemble




Should be a fun quarter.




I am getting sick of this lonely thing, but fuck it I've been saying that for a couple years now so I might as well just not worry about it. Anyway I've got some episodes of It's Always Sunny to catch up on, I think I'll go do that now.

It's yet again been a little while since I've written, but I kind of like that because for some reason the entries feel more substantial. Let's see what's new.

Classes are somewhere between okay and awesome. The sciences aren't bad (today in chem the professor blew up a balloon filled with hydrogen, that was killer), but they are such a waste of time that could be spent doing something productive that going to class is a drag. The music is going great though, I'm studying guitar with Colin again and a couple of weekends ago we drove up to LA for some concerts, and in two weeks he has me playing in a master class with David Tanenbaum in Mexico, and we're going to some concerts there too. I'm studying composition now with Lei Liang, from Harvard, who is great and has been very helpful, especially with all of the application processes for grad school. I am also taking jazz composition from Anthony Davis, a great player, but he is hard to follow because he flies through material, and I've never had much jazz training.

The said I'm getting very into jazz right now, especially John Coltrane and Miles Davis. It's making me want to pick up my sax again, and I transcribed Mr. P.C. by Coltrane for guitar last week and it is a lot of fun to play, as is the line from Au Privave by Charlie Parker. Charles Mingus is also regularly blowing my mind, and I just picked up a best of Thelonious Monk cd that is killer.

There was some serious love/lack of love drama last week that was really hard to get through, and I don't really want to get into it other than to say that I am at least happy that it seems to have made us a lot closer as friends and established a trust and openness that is really nice. Still hurts a lot though, but maybe some good music will come out of it.

I'm hanging out with the guys a lot more this year, and that makes me really happy. I was used to getting ditched in high school, and think I have some deep seated apprehension about it with having been left by my dad as a kid, but am getting over it for the first time with these guys, Jack and the Matts and Craig and Niru and Steve and Sara and Jill and the whole rest of the gang. I had to have my appendix out last Monday and waking up with all of them there at the hospital was about the best feeling I've ever had. There was a rumor about tension here that I heard through someone and I made sure to clear it up quick, and I think we are closer than I've ever been with a group of friends.

I suppose the quote unquote composition/music career is going really well too right now. My piano piece received a premiere in New York last month from a well known group, and some people liked it enough to find me online and write me about it. Also, when I began writing reviews of cds and interviewing bands at the beginning of college, the thought behind it was basically "maybe someday I'll get to meet Dillinger Escape Plan." Well I'm interviewing them on Thursday, and just received an email that said "Here's Ben's phone number." Ben Weinman is one of my musical heroes, so I am both excited and nervous for this one, and I don't normally get nervous for interviews at all. Also I think some of the establishment may have begun to take a little notice of me. Rand Steiger, the head of the music department, just sent me an email saying "Philip Glass and I will be hanging out at Roger Reynolds' house tomorrow afternoon before his concert, would you like to come?" So tomorrow I'll be hanging out with Phil Glass, Roger Reynolds, and Rand Steiger for the afternoon. I'm betting Phillipe Manoury and Lei and Harvey and Chinary will be there too, the latter being my own teachers, so this shoud be a very enjoyable time. And wow, how the hell did Rand decide to call me to hang out with Phil Glass? Jesus man.

Typing this has been nice. The love life thing has put a depressing kind of haze over just about everything in my life for the last week or so, but with all the other stuff said so plainly I'm actually feeling like I've got a lot going for me right now, and that's a good thing. I have realized, however, that I hate being alone, because I dwell on negative stuff and get myself down, so let's get some coffee yeah? I'm going to make this a good year regardless of being lonely I think.

Anyway off to practice.

So I haven't written in here since June, and that felt very good to be disconnected from the grid for as long as I was, but now I've got a few minutes to kill, so here goes.

Summer:

Awesome. 10 weeks island-bound, minus one weekend on the mainland, and we kayaked the channel to get there! Lots of friends, lots of stories, and it was very nice to be trusted with some of the real responsibilities at work and see long term impacts. Kirk and I got a lot closer, as did a lot of other people, which was great, because the people make the place. Finally scuba dived (childhood dream) and that may have been a highlight of life thus far. The 21st birthday was fun too, as were Jill's visit to the island, hiking Silver Peak before sunrise, and the deer.

After the island (literally, the next day) I flew to New York for the first time because my mom had a hotel room there for an event she was running. New York is amazing, in how there is constantly something going on in every field you could imagine. The massive change of scenery was a bit of a system shock, but I liked it. Interviewed at Columbia, Princeton, and NYU for grad school, saw Wicked on broadway, had some amazing food, rode the subway, and went to the Blue Note and saw Christian McBride and Ron Carter (!!!).

My mom and I then rented a car and drove to New Haven, Connecticuit to visit her friend who is a professor at Yale (head of the film department) and his son who is my age and a music major there, named Liam. I stayed in the dorm with him, and basically chilled in New Haven with him and his friends, and it was sweet. There was a place with Watermelon beer and mashed potatoe and bacon pizza which was reality-bendingly good. Also we sat on the roof over some 300 year old courtyard and smoked and looked up at a massive stone clocktower...one of those uber-cliche but really memorably awesome experiences.

We then drove to Montreal, Quebec for a few days, which was really cool. I had met a guy names Louis in New York who was a viola player and into post and noise rock, and he gave me the number of a friend of his there. We got dinner with her, and she mentioned that the Montreal Symphony Orchestra was doing L'enfante by Ravel with crazy video art, and Mahler's Symphony No. 1, and man can you say mind-blowing? I got some cool ideas from the Ravel thing I think I'd like to work on next year as well, as I've already got enough stuff to keep me busy right now.

The arts districts in Montreal were cool, as was the shopping, and we went to a jazz club called the Upstairs that was pretty cool.

Flew back to NP, had a week there, in which I basically hung out with Maffoo and those kids and studied for the GRE.

Came back to San Diego, hung out with everyone, played pool, took the GRE (750Q 590V), classes started, school is good, and I'll write more later, I think it's time we watched some It's Always Sunny downstairs.

Anyone have a cure for groggy? I just woke up, and maybe that wasn't the best idea I've had all day. Oh well.

Anyhow. Crazy few weeks. Had the junior guitar recital, the year end guitar ensemble concert, and the composition juries. All of these things went well, the juries especially, and we find out who made honors for next year at the end of the week. There's a new member on the composition faculty who seems like a really good guy, so hopefully I'll get to work with him too. And the department chair really wants to get me into a good grad school, so things are generally looking up there.

2 weeks from today I'll be on Catalina for the next 11, then in New York for one after that. Summer is going to fly right by, but should be amazing. Come visit the island! Or if for some reason you can't, and are someone who enjoys hanging out, let's hang out before then eh?


Oh yes last night one of my professors came over for drinks with my roommates and it was totally magical, and then he and I went to a high school party for one of his virtuoso students, got called old by a drunk girl, and left, but the whole experience was downright hysterical. I do enjoy hanging out with the professorial type, that was a good time.

Clearing space to go nuts studying for my last three finals...hold it...hold it....NOW

Okay so when I saw Iron Maiden a while back one of the coolest things was how Bruce Dickinson, their frontman, just looked like he was totally enjoying where he was. Almost like he walked onstage and was surprised to see that he was the singer in the greatest NWOBHM band of all time, and said "oh okay, I can do this, sounds like fun." Anyhow, I was just thinking it'd be nice to be able to do what you want and enjoy it all the time, so I checked out his wikipedia entry just now. Check it yo:

Dickinson's interests include literature, writing, fencing (at which he has competed internationally, and he also founded a fencing equipment company under the brand name "Duellist"), train technology and flying Boeing 757 charter jets for the UK charter airline Astraeus where he is employed as a First Officer. He was taught to fly by British Airways commercial pilot Captain Phil Dales.

On 12 February 2007, Dickinson was given permission to fly Rangers to Israel for their UEFA cup game against Hapoel Tel Aviv. Dickinson asked if he could pilot this flight as soon as he found Astraeus had the contract for it.

He is sometimes called "Conan the Librarian" after a character in the "Weird Al" Yankovic movie UHF, and has been nicknamed 'The Air Raid Siren'. He is also an accomplished guitarist and drummer.

A member of the Conservative Party while at university, Dickinson is known to have supported New Labour in recent years, describing the Conservatives as 'dangerous'. He is not to be confused with the rock producer (in reality a sound engineer, played by Christopher Walken) for Blue Öyster Cult in the famous Saturday Night Live "More cowbell" skit.

Dickinson currently presents the Saturday evening "rock show" on BBC radio station 6 Music. He has recently taken the helm of BBC Radio 2 Serial 'Masters of Rock'. He also presented the 5-part historical TV series about aviation; Flying Heavy Metal was shown on the Discovery Channel in the UK. He was also a guest on a Discovery Channel show where he shared his enthusiasm for trains. The most recent television programme he has presented was a show on spontaneous combustion for Sky One called "Inside Spontaneous Human Combustion with Bruce Dickinson", in which he investigates the phenomenon of this occurrence by enlisting the help of several experts and performing various experiments to determine its possible cause.








INSIDE SPONTANEOUS HUMAN COMBUSTION WITH BRUCE DICKINSON?


With some I'm be appalled, but this just makes me feel good.

I'm just taking a moment off from writing, and it seems like posting next quarter's classes up here is a good idea.


So!


Music 103D - Honors Composition
Music 128 - Principles and Practice of Conducting
Music 132 - Guitar
Political Science 110EA - American Political Thought, Revolution to Civil War
Visual Arts 22 - Formations of Modern Art, 1850 - present
Physics 5 - The Universe
Physics 9 - The Solar System
Chemistry 11 - The Periodic Table




I'm knocking out the last of my GE's that I skipped, and would regret not taking a visual arts class, so that one is just for fun. And Alan Houston is teaching Poli 110ea, and he remains my favorite professor to work with, and hasn't taught since my freshman year. Score!


Back to work!

I am totally overloaded, in every sense of the word. I have to drop something from my life, but everything I do seems necessary, and even if it isn't, I'll feel like a cop out, which really gets to me more than one would expect.

Hopefully I won't cross the line into one of those incapacitating emotional breakdown stages. I don't expect to, and rarely do, but I am seriously like right there.

Fuckin' a man.

Weird weekend. Began with my stubbing my toe in the shower Friday, ended with me coming getting more acquainted with some razor sharp underwater rocks than I'd like, and now I can barely walk or close my hands without searing pain. There was lots of other stuff too, but I'm glad the good somehow managed to outweigh the bad.


And Hot Fuzz was hysterical.

I'm glad I've got my friends.

Well that was the best show we've ever played, or at least it felt like it, so I'm heading to bed in a very very good mood.

A band called Tin-Cagayat opened, and they were freakkin amazing, so everyone check them out at www.myspace.com/tincagayat.


And work tomorrow earns a woo, and school work this quarter is looking pretty awesome.

To dream world I go!

Music Theory and Analysis: B+
Composition: A+
Music of Brazil: A+
Guitar: A
Guitar Ensemble: A
New Music Performance: A+
Physics: A+



Now that feels nice.

I realize how full of myself the following entries must make me sound. I'm quite humbled by all of this, and am using this to share because 1) people who read this tend to be friends and will hopefully enjoy the good news, 2) I prefer not to walk around talking about myself, so this is a good way to do that, and, most importantly, 3) fuck it, it's livejournal.




A. We (Iago) are going on a mini-tour/rock 'n' road trip for 4 days in June.

B. I just transcribed Day Tripper and Come Together for classical guitar duet, and Corinne from the ensemble and I are going to perform them at the end of the year guitar ensemble show, and at my junior recital, which I am splitting with her. There's a chance of "Hello, Goodbye," "From Me to You," and "Yesterday" in the forecast, it just depends how hard the individual parts look, because we don't have much time to prepare and are both pretty busy. Anyhow it feels like an accomplishment.

C. Harvey Sollberger (whose entry on wikipedia calls him THE preeminent flutist in contemporary music) recorded my piece "An Everchanging House," last week, and said he really liked it. I could only fit the second movement on myspace (the first is more interesting to listen to as a recording), and you can listen to that here: www.myspace.com/nicknortonexperience.

D. That session was recorded at Warren Studio A, which is exclusively for the use of grad students and faculty. I felt honored just to be in there, and even more when the engineer, Joe Kucera, offered to record more of my pieces later in the year and early next year. I'm writing a piece for twelve instruments called "Under a Neon Sky" and a guitar quartet called "Fountain," and hopefully I can get good recordings of both of those and get into one of those "grad school" type things.

E. That same day I turned in a final project/analysis for my music theory class. Upon talking to other students, I realized I'd done something good, as of everyone I asked, the longer analysis was 4 pages. Mine was 15, and done in what I considered to be a superficial way. The professor recommended I submit it for a department award and try to get it published. Woooooo!

F. The soundscape that Derek and I created for our new music performance class was performed at the end of week ten, and people encouraged us to turn it into an ongoing project and make more of them. Thus we are announcing the creation of Operation Hennessey. More info/links to music as soon as we record something other than the inside of the engine of Derek's car or the electric generator on campus.

G. I have 2 tickets to see Mars Volta tomorrow night at my favorite venue anywhere, the Majestic Ventura Theater, and got them for less that they would have cost on ticketmaster before they sold out. And I am taking my mom.

H. Is what the note B flat is referred to in Germany. Therefore, hahahahaha denotes a trill. I find this completely hilarious.