Life is almost awesome

After Wednesday I shouldn't have too much to worry about. You know... just the rest of my finals. That will include Music Civ 202 (which is online), Book of Mormon (as long as I do the review... I should be good), CS 235 (which shouldn't be too bad), Music Theory (which is take home... shouldn't be too bad), and Dictation. As long as it's a good day for Dictation, it should be alright. If I get an 85 or so, I'll get a B in the class. Let's hope for that. It's much better than a C-, that's for sure. :) Last semester I was hoping to pass, this semester my goals are a little higher. Yay! :) So, those other finals shouldn't be too bad. It's just that and working. Just grading CS 142 finals. I'm all for getting more money. I wasn't counting on getting money for working during the finals week. So, yay for more money! I suddenly have realized that I have a good amount of money. Well, a good amount considering I was basically out at the beginning of the semester. Good thing I got that job. :) I think this'll be the only semester that I'll be able to pull off working 17 hours a week, though. I just don't think I'll have the time otherwise. Either way, I should be able to make enough money to go through college without debt. That's my goal. I think we'll get there. w00tness!

What else? Oh, so I am capable of making good reeds. I ended up making a pretty good reed on Tuesday, that worked okay at Master Classes. It just wasn't quite broken in enough. Geralyn did make a comment after I played about how the reed wasn't good enough for me. Eh, it's a lot better now. It's not perfect (I don't think the perfect reed actually exists) but I think it's pretty good. I'm trying to make some other good reeds... but so far it's not working too well. We'll see where that goes. Oh, I need to call my accompanist and run through my jury again with her. We really need to work out a couple parts in the Hummel. I thought we got it worked out before Master Class on Wednesday, but then at the performance, it wasn't together. Ugh. Hopefully that doesn't happen this Wednesday. I guess we'll see. Even if it does... whatever. I'm not going to fail my jury. I'm just hoping to end up with an overall A.

Wow, this semester is actually ending. I've pretty much survived one whole year at BYU. I had a really hard time seeing this in August last year. I was so intimidated by college. I didn't know if I could handle it and be able to practice and whatever. It's been fun! Yeah, I get busy at times, but it's mostly fun. I enjoy pretty much all of my classes, I have my own computer, and I get to completely manage my own time and schedule. It's lovely to have freedom like this. Though, of course, as much as I love it, I'm excited to go back home for this summer. Just to be back with my family and not stress about school. I think overall I'm less stressed here at college than I was in high school. Eh... that might be a lie. I think I'm just overall happier here. Yes, I think that's it. There isn't the politics in band like there was in high school, and I just love the fact that the church is mixed in with learning. Almost everyone is Mormon! It's crazy!

Okay, well I still need to read about 60 pages of the Book of Mormon in about 2 days, so I'll get on that. :) I love it, it's just time consuming.

End of semester, here I come!

One week left...

A week from today is the last day of classes. Then we have "reading days" which are supposed to be days for studying for our finals. For music majors, though, it means jury time. A week from tomorrow is my jury... and I'm in need of a good reed. I made a good reed about 2 or 3 weeks ago, but guess what? Yeah, it's dying. That's what happens to reeds. I'm surprised how long it lasted, actually. It still plays... okay... I guess, but I really need another one. Just now in the past hour I attempted three. They all have the same problem: FLAT. I would love them if they weren't 50 cents flat on every note. There's something that I'm doing wrong... consistently. I thought I had it figured out with the last good reed I made, but I keep doing something wrong. I don't get it. I'll probably just come begging to our grad student for help and get something good for Master Class tomorrow. Yeah, I'm playing AGAIN. I played the past two weeks, and I get to play again. And guess what I'm playing? My jury. I'm playing two movements from Telemann and the Hummel. Not only need I need to practice them to make sure I still know them (which, I do, but... whatever) but I need to have a good reed. My good reed that was working so well, suddenly didn't work well last week when I played. I definitely can't use it again. And I need to rehearse with my accompanist and make sure we have some parts that are hard to get together...

Basically, it's be nice for it to be a week from Thursday. :)

Anyway, in other news I finished sight singing today. I turned in my last two assignments, had my last pace test, and was told I had an A for the semester. So the optional last pace test that could replace the lowest score... I'm definitely not taking. So, that's one class down. Well, actually two classes down. My Music 176 class ended back in February. Anyway, I just have the rest to worry about. :P If I just get an A on my final in cs 235, I'll have an A in the class. I turned in my last lab on Monday. I just have one more homework assignment due on Friday (which I'll try to actually turn in on Friday this time) and then the final. So... hopefully I can pull that off. I deserve an A in that class. I understand everything, go to lecture, and turn in my labs on time. It's just my homework I kind of slack off on. But, I slack off in a way that still gives me credit for it. :p

What else? Oh, I made a video of Allison Mack's challenge on allisonmack.com. She challenged her fans to make videos of their favorite scene from a TV show, movie, book, or whatever, and recreate it! So, I did. :) I remade the scene from the episode "Justice" from Smallville. The scene between Bart and Lex. Ashley was gone at work, and I didn't feel like working on homework or reeds or practicing (which I should have done... but whatever) so I used my lovely camera and filmed myself playing both Lex and Bart. Then I just quickly edited it using Windows Movie Maker and picked a song. Voila! I have a nice scene of me playing Bart and Lex from "Justice." I'll go ahead and post it here for your viewing pleasure. :) Yay!



It was a lot of fun to make. :)

I can feel it now

There's just under two weeks of classes left now. The end really is coming. Two weeks from yesterday is the last day of classes, two weeks from today is my jury, and then after that I just have my finals... and then sweet freedom! I'm really looking forward to this summer. I'll have my own computer in my own room with my own internet. Well, it's my parents internet... but it's not blocked or anything! I'll finally go to myspace, youtube, and any other streaming video site at my own free will! This should be the last year to worry about it, too, because I'm definitely not planning on living on campus for the rest of my college career. Yay!

Some other good news is that I finished my AVL tree lab for cs 235. It was rumored to be the hardest lab of the semester, and I finished it early! So, I got a 102 on it. :) Yay! Though, it did pretty much consume my entire weekend. (Mostly Saturday) There's just one more project, and 2 more homeworks. Though, the homeworks always turn out to be really easy. It's actually really funny. There was a homework due last Friday, and I turned it in Monday morning before the TAs got there. Oh yeah, and on their website they have in bold that there's NO LATE HOMEWORK ACCEPTED! Yeah... I turned in homework due on Friday on Monday morning... full credit. Well, actually I missed two points on it because apparently I thought that 7 was greater than 9. Whatever.

I'm not sure if I'll be able to maintain my GPA this semester, but at least my Dictation grade is significantly better! I have about a B in the class so far. Yay! I had barely a C- last semester. That is really good news. Though, I'm basically guaranteed to not get an A in Music Civ 202. I can hopefully pull of an A-. Book of Mormon, surprisingly, I'm really hoping for another A-, but it's probably going to be a B+. Burn. I thought religion classes were supposed to be easy. Oh well. At least I'm learning a lot from it. :)

Oh, and it's official. I'm going to Fan Fair (or CMA fest... whatever) this summer! My mom and I bought tickets and booked a hotel yesterday and the day before. If I didn't go now, it would be a drastic waste of money. It's looking like it will cost me about 700 dollars. It seems like a lot of money... well, it is a lot of money, but I was expecting to pay about 1000 dollars, if not more. So, I'm pretty excited. It should be so much fun. :) YAY! This summer is going to rock.

And since I'm sucking at life at posting in this blog, I'll go ahead and post another video. Yay for videos!



I just turned on the camera, and apparently the room spun around me. It was all rather thrilling.

The End is Coming...

So, I haven't been that great at updating this. Maybe I'll try to be better from now on. Or something.

So, the end of the semester is coming. I shouldn't be thinking that the end is coming, though, because then it makes me think of the summer and not having to worry about school and everything. So, then... I'll stop worrying about school now. :p So, the end isn't near as far as I'm concerned!

Right now I'm working on a CS 235 lab. XML Parser. They give me XML code (a lot like HTML code) and I'm supposed to parse it into a tree linking the different tags and stuff. It seems to be going pretty well so far. You can put stuff into it and print it out, but it just doesn't quite work how they want it to yet. Hopefully I can finish it tonight so I can turn it in tomorrow for one point extra credit. I'm looking forward to it.

The good news is that this weekend I finally made a good reed. It's not perfect (if that even exists), but it mostly plays in tune and plays soft and loud! It's response is pretty good too. I'm proud of myself. Now I should try to make the other blank a good reed. Then I'll have two good reeds at once both made by me! Oh wow... that'd be incredible. We'll see if that happens.

Today I also broke my flash drive. Sad day. I just had it in my computer and then my leg bumped it and... it broke.
It looks like it might still read, and yet... no. The good thing is that there isn't really anything on there that I really need. With the last lab I had actually done my work on the flash drive and just brought it back and forth between TA-ing and being at home. This time I worked on it on my hard drive, and then copied it on the flash drive to work on at work. So, I didn't lose any work. I'm just going to buy another one. In fact, I already have. I bought a 4 GB one for about 9 dollars. w00t w00t! It was actually like 19 dollars, but I got 10 dollars off for being a first time customer. I'll take it. :)

So, since it's been so long since and entry, I'll include a nice video.

Another Day

So, another day has come and gone. I was able to finish my lab for CS 235 this weekend and turn it in today for a 100. I had it finished yesterday, but the TAs leave early on Mondays for FHE, so I turned it in today for a 100 instead of a 101. It turns out when you try to turn in a lab fairly late at night (pretty much the only time that I could today) on the day that it's due, it's kind of busy. So, when I got there I had to wait in line for the one and only TA to help some other students before passing me off. That's okay, I didn't have to wait too long. As long as I was able to pass it off today I was happy. Yay. :)

I also didn't have sight singing today. Last week we decided to change the way we have class. Before, our class was split up into two groups. One group met for the first 25 minutes, and the other group met for the second 25 minutes. I'm in the second group. So, usually I would just do some other homework for 25 minutes while the other sight singing class was going on, or take a small nap. The other group also decided that they would do the "fast track." Basically, they went twice as fast as us so they could finish the class half way through the semester. So, they just finished last week. We decided that we would meet for an hour on Thursdays and turn in two assignments, and then not meet on Tuesdays! Good plan. So, now I only have Dictation on Tuesdays. Good times! It gives me some more time to get homework done/practice/make reeds/whatever. Yay. Today in this time I was able to buy a new plaque (for oboe reed making) so I can finally give Becka her plaque back since I lost mine last semester. It cost a little under 2 dollars; I can deal with that.

I also finally did my wash. In fact, that's what I finishing up right now. I'm waiting for my clothes to finish drying, and then I'll put them away. I basically have to put them away because it's either that or they end up on the floor. I don't have an extra basket to keep them in like I did at home. It's a good habit to get into anyhow. Then, following that I hope to start and finish my CS 235 homework that's due tomorrow by like... 9 PM-ish and do my 30 minutes of reading. So far it's look like I'll get somewhere around 5 hours of sleep. Not too shabby, I'm thinking. It's better than say... 3... or 2. Yeah, that's not such good times when I get 5 hours of sleep in a 48 hour time period. I'll try to avoid that.

In other good news, my sister and her husband were able to bring home little Kayla last Friday night! Yay! Also, my mom is going to come up here to visit her sister, and so she'll be able to come visit me too! I'm excited. :) We'll probably end up doing something fun, and maybe go out to eat somewhere and see a movie or something. Aww... such good times. Apparently Ashley's mom is also coming in town this weekend. Kind of odd. Though, her mom is coming to visit/take care of Ashley's... grandmother? Something like that. I don't quite remember. So, Ashley is probably going to just leave and spend the weekend at some relative's house. We'll see how that goes. There's even a small possibility of me being able to finally launch Gavin Mikhail Fans this weekend. I've made 3 wallpapers for it in the past couple of days. Aww... they make me so happy. I'm excited for this website. Finally, a website that has a good focus that hasn't been done over and over again by someone else. I haven't found any other actual Gavin Mikhail fan website. I've seen one forum for him, and that's it. So, hopefully this'll be able to be something successful. I'm hoping.

Alright, I'll go ahead and end with another weird video from that one night a week or so ago...


Yeah, I'm kind of a freak.

Survival

So, I got through today. I swear today has felt like a week. It just wouldn't end. In fact, it still hasn't quite ended. There's still a whole 4 more minutes of Monday. Though, by the time I finish this entry, it will be Tuesday. Good times.

So, I was able to start and finish my theory homework in Music Civ without too much sweat, and I finished my silent dictation in the 20 minutes I had between Orchestra and CS 235. Luckily we got out a little early today. Then, I started to get nervous about teaching a musical concept tonight. I had a plan of teaching different rhythms, or just different subdivisions of the beat using different fruit names. It sounded like it could be fun. Though, I was terrified that these college students that I would be teaching would think that it's really childish and not want to go along with it. But, it was actually the opposite! They got so into it! They loved it! We had all 8 of them saying different fruits with different rhythms... oh, it was great. I hope it was what they were looking for in teaching a musical concept. Either way, I had a blast doing it. :) Maybe Music Education is a good major for me. :p Now all that's left in the application is writing two papers, making a portfolio type thing, and record myself (ideally accompanied) playing the oboe. All by Friday. It can and will be done. I'm looking forward to Friday being over.

Tomorrow I have my second Dictation pace test. I'm hoping to get some sort of B on it. In fact, I'm hoping to get some sort of B in the class. That would be much better than a C-. It would be unrealistic to hope for an A, so I won't set myself up for disappointment. :p We'll just see. I seem to be on or off with Dictation. I just question myself so much during the pace tests. Whatever. I guess we'll just have to wait and see! :)

It turns out the program that I thought was finished wasn't quite finished. I fixed it (at least I'm almost positive that I did), but the TAs were already gone. So, I guess I'll just have to turn it in tomorrow for 2 points extra credit. I'll deal with it.

I'm going to be really tired this weekend. Though, at least the first night shouldn't be too bad. In fact, it'll be fun! :) I've done my share of all-nighters that it doesn't seem to be that big of a deal anymore. It's the second night that I've never completely gotten through... I don't want to imagine what the third night is going to be like. Blech. Whatever. It'll be fun when it's over and I'm sleeping... mmm... sleep...

Okay, this closes this entry. I'll not post a video this time, just to make it that much more exciting the next time that I post a video. ;)

Preparing for this weekend

Yes, it's currently 2:49 AM Sunday night and I've yet to go to sleep. Though, I did finish my Boggle project for CS 235. That's a plus. I can get extra credit to make up for my late LZW lab. I suppose this way I'm preparing more for my sleepless weekend. Man...it's going to be so hard. But... fun. Yes, it will be FUN!

Umm... today was good. I got to eat Kix for breakfast. Usually I don't get breakfast on Sundays because the cafeteria doesn't open until noon, which is when church starts. Very inconvenient. So, we have to wait until after church, at 3, to eat. But, we bought some Kix and milk and finally got some breakfast. Yay! I love having breakfast, and it was cool to have it in our dorm. It was a taste of what it'd be like next semester when we'll be in an apartment and all the food that we'll eat we'll buy from the grocery store. Odd... but it should be good. And cheaper. I'm looking forward to that. Though, I imagine it'll be a pain to have to go to the grocery store to buy the food, but that's okay. I'm sure I'll get over it.

What else? This week is going to be pretty hectic. I've got to finish a project for Music 176, do homework for CS 235 (not the project), a Book of Mormon quiz, a Dictation pace test... oh cravitz. I just remembered something else I was going to finish tonight. My silent dictation. If I turn it in by tomorrow at 5, I can get an extra point on my pace test. Which, since this is the class that I got a C- in last semester, it seems like a good idea to get as many points as I can. I'll see if I can do it tomorrow morning or something... I can just whip it up really quick. Or something. We'll just see. Anyhow, yes. This week should be busy. It'll be good when it's over and I won't be sleeping all weekend. Mwhahaha!

Okay, I think I should go to bed/work on silent dictation/work on theory due tomorrow/do my Book of Mormon reading. So, I'll end this post with yet another fantastical video:


Don't get too scared.

Creepy Phone Calls

Today was a good day. All last month Wednesdays sucked because I was basically swamped with stuff to do and things to go to all day long. I had a class from 7:30 to 9:00 PM that only met four times, and now it's over! Well, we aren't meeting anymore, anyway. We have a final project due by the 15th, which is basically just our application to get into the Music Education program. I'm hoping to make it in... it doesn't seem like I should have too much trouble, but you never know. But, even if I don't it's not like I don't have enough classes to take to fill the void. It'd just throw off my schedule a bit.

Anyhow, about today. I didn't have Music Theory! I just went to Music Civ, and then finished my Theory homework, turned it in at my Professor's door and took a nice 20 minute nap on a bench. I met Ashley and we went to Book of Mormon. It was a fun class, too. Today our personal application papers were due, so it was nice to know that it's done with. Not that it was very hard, at all, but it's nice to be done with it all the same. After that Ashley went to class and I had lunch. Mmmm... they had such delicious choices for lunch. Chicken Fajitas Wraps and Navajo Tacos. Those are two of my favorite lunches ever.

Orchestra was pretty much the same as always, and CS 235 was thrilling as ever. Actually, it was interesting. I normally find that class interesting... I guess that's why it's one of my majors. :p Anyhow, we talked about "Big Oh." It's basically estimating how fast an algorithm runs. It reminded me a lot of limits. It was like being back in a math class. Aww... math, how I miss thee. No worries, I won't miss it much next semester and the semester after that when I'm taking Calculus 1 and 2. It'll be hard, that's for sure, but I'll be glad that I took them in the long run. I like knowing Calculus. It's actually a lot of fun once I get it. If I don't understand the concept... then it's just confusion to the max.

I'm really looking forward to tomorrow. There's a new Smallville, there'll most likely be Hawaiian Haystacks for dinner, and I don't have a TA meeting at 6:30! We usually have TA meetings from 6:30 to 7:30 on Thursdays... which very inconveniently conflicts with Smallville. Though, I've just been finding streaming links and watching them online. Though, it's just that much more fun to watch it on a TV right when it first airs. It's just cool to know that you're watching it for the first time with so many other people. So, yeah. Tomorrow = good times.

In other news, I've been getting creepy phone calls. The caller ID just says "Unknown Number" and they just call and leave a silent message. They called on Monday at about 11:00 (I believe), and then twice on Tuesday at 11:00 and 3:33, and then three times today at 11:00, 3:41, and 5:48. All at times that I'm not at the dorm. A couple times I can hear something in the background, like faint voices, but it's so quiet I can't make it out. So, I'm suspecting they'll call again tomorrow at 11:00, and I'll be there this time. I'm going to answer it this time and figure out who it freakin' is. I was asking some other oboists at master classes tonight about it, and one figured that it was just telemarketers. Which, that makes a lot of sense... but why not leave a message? That'd be very disappointing if that was it. Though, I'm not sure what to expect otherwise. What if it was something "exciting?" What if it was some creepy stalker guy? Yeah, right. It's probably something dumb. I guess I'll just have to find out! :)