Living the SLO Life

So, as some of you may have guessed, the reason that I was handcuffed and put in the trunk of a police car is not because I was actually being arrested. I was, in fact, on a scavenger hunt sponsored by KKY, the band fraternity. It was very much fun. Some of the highlights were:

--Being handcuffed and placed in the trunk of a police car (obviously). One of the things we had to get was "being arrested," and we happened to pass a campus police car sitting in front of the PAC, so we knocked on their window and asked if they would be so kind as to arrest me. There were surprisingly good sports about it - it must have been a slow night that night. But it was kind of embarrassing for the cop, though, because he had so much trouble with getting the handcuffs on me. He even dropped his keys at one point. And it was a video scavenger hunt so we were filming the whole thing. I didn't want to humiliate the guy because he was being so great about it all...oh well, we all had a big laugh about it afterward.

--Filming the clock tower while it was chiming. We were a couple buildings away from a good shot of the tower when the bells first started to ring, so we ran like heck so we could capture it on film. Quite the excitement. We got there with only a couple of chimes left. Courtney was manning the camera, but she was having some trouble with focusing the camera. We got it right in the end.

--Highstepping down Bubblegum Alley. This one requires some background: the Mustang Band always highsteps onto the field before a show, so that was one of the things we had to do on camera to get some points. There's also a narrow walkway between two buildings downtown where someone decided long ago to stick his chewed gum on the wall and years and years worth of people did the same thing, so now the walls are covered with ABC gum. Naturally we had to film that, too. So, to maximize efficiency, we highstepped down Bubblegum Alley, much to the amusement of all the nearby people.

--Dropping in on the juggling club that happened to be meeting in the university union when we went through. We had them each sing a line of the fight song as they juggled. For the last "FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT!" we arranged ourselves in one big group. We screamed the line and then all the band people ran out of the group and out the door. Brian ripped his pants as we did this. We got that on film, too.

--Walking into Cold Stone Creamery downtown to film their bathroom. The poor people working there that night had at least six camera crews walk in there to film the bathroom. But that's the kind of stuff that happens when you open up a business in a college town.

--Singing "I Feel Pretty" with Brian in the Madonna Inn's bathroom. We had to film "a waterfall," and if you've ever been to the Madonna Inn you'd know that the men's room has no urinals but instead has a six-foot-wide waterfall, ceiling to floor, that you can use just like a toilet. I challenge you all to find a more interesting waterfall! The "I Feel Pretty" was just for added hilarity.

We did some other stuff too, but none that warrants mentioning. I will say that all the political nutjobs were out that night because it was the last farmers' market before election day. I had about five Kerry/Edwards stickers and eight Bush/Cheney stickers before we left, and not because I asked for them but because they come up to you and stick them on you whether you want them or not. They're all currently wadded up into a ball, sitting in my trash can.

As for the rest of Thursday and Friday, it was all pretty much par. We marched enough on Thursday for me to learn my spots for the show today, which I have to leave for in a couple of hours. On Friday we had another rehearsal so we could practice some tunes to use in the band-off against Davis. After that a bunch of us came back to my room and played Hoopla, Taboo, and Super Smash Brothers on Gamecube. Never a dull moment.

All right, that's all I feel like writing now. Good luck to RB at the Mt. Carmel Tournament of Bands today. Someone call me when you're done and let me know how you did.

Cheers,
Josh

mood: antsy
music: none
location: dorm

So tonight I was handcuffed by a cop and placed in the trunk of his car. Why, you ask? It's somewhat of a long story, and unfortunately I'm far too exhausted to try to get it all out tonight. Tomorrow is my long day, so I'm going to go to bed. But tune in soon to find out why I'm building such a criminal record.

Cheers,
Josh

mood: sore and completely exhausted
music: none
location: so close to my bed...

I went to bed at 11 last night so that I'd get enough sleep before getting up for my 8:00 class. My hope was that I'd be sufficiently awake to avoid having to take a nap today. Unfortunately, Kevin was up until about 1:00 or 1:30...I don't remember because I was trying to sleep. I can't blame him; if I was staying up I couldn't have been much quieter. Nonetheless, I came home after music theory today and crashed for two hours. So much for my plan.

Music theory today was actually very interesting. We've finally finished rhythm and meter and have moved on to intervals, a topic I don't know as much about. We talked about perfect, imperfect, and dissonant intervals, and how to diminish and augment them, and how two identical intervals that are spelled differently are actually different intervals, etc. I like this topic quite a bit, although I don't know why. But who cares?! Intervals are fun!

I went to the Sandwich Factory for lunch (after my nap), and I decided to go a little crazy. Instead of my usual roast beef with swiss I got roast beef with cheddar, and instead of mayo and mustard I got italian dressing. And you know what? It was pretty darn good. (Can you tell that not a whole lot happened today? I'm fishing for stories...)

OH! I know what was interesting! I voted today. When the creepy guy registered me last month he signed me up for permanent absent voter status, so I've had my ballot pinned to my wall for a couple of weeks now. Last night I went to both the California Democrats' and California Republicans' web pages to research the issues, and surprisingly they seemed to agree on a lot of them (except for presidential candidates, of course). Although, I was completely shocked by the websites. Instead of the voting guides, news, platform summaries, and the like that I would expect to find, the websites were filled with stabs at the other side. This was most noticeable on the Democratic website (which I suspect is due a Republican being in the white house). Everywhere you looked you saw political cartoons making fun of Bush, pages of jokes making fun of Bush...and not much else. The daily poll was, and I quote, "Do you think the Boston Red Sox being in the World Series is a premonition of Kerry winning?" 70% of people think so. This is why I don't like politics: everybody's full of crap. Honestly, I don't really trust anybody in power. Anyway, I somehow managed to formulate my own opinions on the issues currently being decided. I filled in all the right bubbles (in my humble opinion) and mailed my ballot away today. So that's that...I'm done for a year.

After that I finished this week's physics homework in the common room. While I was there, Phil from the room next door came and sat down at the same table brining his lunch with him. And it was at this point that I discovered what I believe to be my biggest pet peeve. I don't know why it is, but I can't stand the sound of people chewing with their mouths open. The common room happened to be completely empty except for the two of us at that point - there was no noise at all but the chewing. It was driving me absolutely crazy...I wanted to reach across the table and slap him with his own frickin' burrito. Ugh, it aggravates me now just thinking about it. Phil's a great guy, though. It's really more amusing than anything that this particular display of improper manners gets to me so much. But really? Driving me crazy.

I had dinner at Light House...I was supposed to meet my band friends there but the people with my tower went earlier than the band people did and I had to finish in time for wind orchestra, so I went with the people from my tower. Such drama! But dinner was pretty tasty: pork roast and mashed potatoes. Over dinner we got to the subject of the Davis game Saturday and how we're having a battle of the marching bands, and how after the battle both bands are going to get together for another "social gathering" with "refreshments." Naturally I wasn't planning to go but all the people from my tower decided that this is the perfect opportunity for me to get totally drunk. So now they're all looking forward to Saturday night when I'll walk back into the common room totally smashed. Hooray for peer pressure. Obviously I'm not going to go to the party...er..."social gathering," but I think it'll all be okay because all the people form my tower will probably all be too drunk Saturday night to remember anything anyway. See? Beer has some advantages...

Wind orchestra went well, although J (conductor man) was in a pretty bad mood for some reason unapparent to the rest of us. But that's okay because we're starting to sound pretty good. Hey, in case any of you will be in the SLO area a week from Saturday, stop by for our concert on November 6 at 8:00 PM. It should be a pretty good show.

After band I called Alena and we talked for a little while. While I was on the phone a bunch of people were going to Bali's - the local frozen yogurt shop - so I went along too. And that was tasty.

And then I came home and watched the band video - which is...uh...not the best this year - and did some other stuff and wrote in my blog. And now I'm going to bed because I'm tired. So good night. Woot.

Cheers,
Josh

mood: I'm in an okay mood but I don't feel physically the best
music: Swan Lake still
location: dorm

I planned last night on getting an extra hour and a half of sleep this morning, as I don't have class until 10. But for some reason I could not sleep as well through Kevin's getting up at a quarter to 7 for his 8:00 class. I was pretty groggy all day until I came home after lunch for a nap in the brief time before Kevin's class ended and he came back to the room. I'm still kind of tired, and now that I think about it I'm pretty anxious to go to bed tonight. My sheets are so soft! Sleeping is good...

Anywho, I left earlier than I usually do on Tuesdays so that I could go to my physics professor's office hour, which ends at 9:30. I got there with time to spare and asked him about the lecture I missed on Friday. He dug out his notes and I copied them, and long story short I'm all caught up. The chapter that we're currently working on is not too difficult; we finished it in class on Monday. With the notes I got from Dr. Poling this morning I was able to do all of the questions/problems for the chapter. (I said I was able to do them...I'll get around to actually doing them tomorrow. Hey, I did half of them...that's pretty good.) Just in case any of you are interested, we're learning about light waves and why they produce certain patterns when you shine them through narrow openings. Well I'm interested in it.

After calculus I went to my EE lab professor's office hour to ask him some questions about the parts of last week's lab that I didn't understand. I don't really like this class. The subject matter is interesting to me but the manner in which it is presented keeps me from learning anything really valuable. I think the point of the class is to show me how to use equipment rather than to understand what the equipment actually does. Every week there's some new element to a circuit that I have to connect to an oscilloscope and take some readings. You'd think that by building a circuit I'd learn what all the components do, but really I'm just taking the circuit diagram they give me and building the actual thing. I push the buttons they tell me to push, and if I get the readings they say I should get then I'm done. I really don't like just blindly building things without understanding them; I wish we could slow down and actually learn about what we're seeing. But, again, I guess that's not the point of this class. Oh well...Dr. Gerfen says that we'll "go into more detail" about most of these things in EE 112. I guess we'll see.

From Dr. Gerfen's office hour I went to the Vista Grande Restaurant. (The Vista Grande Restaurant is NOT to be confused with the VG Cafe. They may be in the same building, but one is an actual restaurant with actual waiters and waitresses who serve actual food, and one is...well...we all know how I feel about VG's.) Anywho, it was Sandra's birthday so we wanted to take her to a nice lunch. I don't know Sandra that well, but she plays piccolo in the band and so a lot of people I know were going. The lunch was good, albeit a bit lengthy. I had "the engineering club sandwich," which, despite its name, was very good. All in all the meal cost me $10, which is relatively cheap for what I got. I realized as I paid with my meal plan plus dollars that I have about 60% of them remaining, and we're halfway through the quarter. I'm going on a major shopping spree just before winter break. At least, as I'm going on as much of a spree as I can in the campus food establishments.

After lunch I came home and tried to nap, but it wasn't too long before Kevin came home. So I got up and did physics. Then I went to marching band rehearsal, which was rained out. "Hooray!" you may be thinking, but I really do need these rehearsals. I'm marching a show on Saturday that I've marched only once before, and that was with someone marching the same spot as me, telling me where to go next. So yeah, I need some practice. Oh well...we played four about ninety minutes before the orchestra came in and kicked us out. Oh, and I asked Tyson, our librarian, if he could get me the music for "Sell Out," but he thinks that's against some sort of copyright law. Sorry, Jenna. I'll try to get it from our director but it doesn't look good.

From there I came home and did a little more homework, and then went and had dinner by myself at Back Stage Pizza. From there I had to go to a meeting with my intro to music theory composition group. This week we were all supposed to bring the instruments we wanted to play for the piece, but I was the only one who brought anything. (I brought two screwdrivers and a metal L-bracket. I can produce about five completely different sounds with them. Aren't I the talented one?) After 45 minutes of sitting around (waiting for all six people to show up), we decided that our next step in this project was to go to Home Depot next week to get everyone's instruments. We haven't made much progress, but some of the people in this group do seem a little motivated, so I'm sure we'll pull through in the end.

On the way home from that I ran into Singh (pronounced "sing"), who writes the drill for the marching band. He pulled me into the drill-writing meeting that was going on. I stayed for a few minutes, listening to "Everybody's Everything" and making a few suggestions of where we should move and where we should halt. This wasn't a huge part of my day, but it was something new, to say the least.

And then I came home and wrote in my blog, as I tend to do when I come home at night. All glory told, it was a slightly more interesting day than usual.

For those of you who don't know, or who didn't think about it, the Cedar Fire broke out and burned so much of San Diego county a year ago today. (Actually, it broke out a year ago late yesterday.) I know everyone who reads this blog on a regular basis already knows this, but just in case there are new people out there reading my musings, I'll go ahead and tell you all that my dad and I lost the house we had been building in Ramona. It was about 95% complete at the time it burned down; we had just moved into it a few weeks before the fire. As somewhat of a memorial to the original house (which has since been rebuilt on the same lot), I'd like to share with you all some of the pictures taken of the house a year ago:





Josh

mood: reflective
music: stuff from Swan Lake that Kevin's listening to
location: dorm

I got my calculus midterm back today. Perfect 100. Only one in the class. What's that Stanford? Oh, that's right. You can eat my shorts. I'll stop this paragraph before I jinx it.

I also received my poly progress audit, which is this thingy that the school emails me every quarter showing which requirements I've met for my degree, and which requirements I still need to complete. Apparently, after I complete my classes for this quarter, I will have achieved sophomore standing. Woot! That doesn't really get me anything, but it sounds nifty! That's my academic news for the day.

Aside from that, this day was pretty much par for Mondays around here. I do have a couple of things I forgot to bring up yesterday, though, so I'll go ahead and talk about those.

Yesterday, when I got to Orange County to pick up Danny, Jake, and Ashley, they were waiting for me in Jake's driveway. In no time at all we had crammed all of our luggage in my trunk. We were getting ready to go when Ashley produced a "person-sized" (according to Danny) bag of groceries from her boyfriend's car, and asked where she could put them in my car. I didn't know what exactly to say...I thought it must be a joke or something. But she was serious! We all knew how tiny my car is; we spent five hours in it on the way down. But Ashley wanted to bring her groceries. And do you know why she wanted to shop at home instead of buying her groceries in SLO, which she very well could have done? She didn't want to ride the bus to Albertson's. Sigh. So we put her person-sized bag in the backseat with her and Danny. On a side note, Ashley is the only one who has not yet paid me for gas...

So do you all want to know what goes on in this dorm on the weekends? Here's the story as I understand it: Two of the girls from my floor went to a party on Saturday and brought home to drunk guys with them. These two girls then decide that they don't want the guys around so the girls go and hide from them. You know, the mature thing to do. The guys, drunk as they were, became seething angry and started yelling and punching things. Somehow someone managed to lock them out of the second floor and into the stairwell. While they were in there, they broke the glass to the fire hose case just outside the door to the common room. And now we have a damage charge. Supposedly we won't have to pay it because we know who the two guys are...still, though, the whole situation could have been avoided if people were a little more mature. Or sober. But then that's a lot to ask of most of the people around here.

And that's the rest of what happened yesterday. One more spot of good news for today: I took my faulty laundry card to the front desk, and they had me send it back to the laundry card company. Evidently they know how to figure out how much money I had put on the card and they'll send me a refund, which I'll probably receive in six to eight weeks. In the meantime I have a new card, so I can still do laundry. Hooray for clean socks.

All right...it's not too late at night right now but I think I'm going to sign off anyway. I'm going to get up slightly earlier than usual to go to my physics professor's office hour. I need to catch up on what I missed on Friday. (On a lighter note, I'm pretty sure that we resumed intro to music theory right where we left off on Wednesday...I swear we don't do anything in that class...) So good night for now.

Cheers,
Josh

PS- How many Americans does it take to screw in a lightbulb? THAT'S NOT FUNNY!! WE'RE SUING!!

mood: not really any specific mood, but pretty good, I suppose
music: none
location: dorm

Well, I'm back. The drive coming back seemed longer than the ride going home, probably due to the fact that I'm going back to school rather than on a break. That, and the fact that we did hit some traffic trying to merge on the 101 from the 405. There was some huge accident on southbound 101 that blocked three lanes, so all the cars trying to merge onto the 101 were backed up onto the 405. We lost twenty or thirty minutes...but I'm home now, so it's just water under the bridge. All in all it was a six-hour trip, including the stops to pick up passengers and to eat dinner. And you know what? My trip home was worth every second of driving. I didn't write last night because I didn't get home until 2:30, so I'll go ahead and give you a summary of Saturday's events:

I got up and went to the Original Pancake House with Dad. That restaurant and P.F. Chang's are the only two places I really miss in SLO; sadly I never did get a chance to visit the latter. Oh well...some other time. After that I met Stacie and Jenna at Jenna's house for a trip down to Balboa Park. Both Stacie and I were in the mood for something San Diegan, and Balboa Park seemed just the place. Plus, the weather was beautiful. I got lots of pictures...here are a few of my favorites (click to enlarge):




From Balboa Park the three of us went back to Jenna's house, but not before dropping by the CMR Cold Stone Creamery for a dose of much-needed ice cream. (We had been searching for it downtown but we couldn't find any.) I had mud pie. I knew I should have ordered a small but I decided to go for the next size up, and thus I ruined my dinner. Hooray. Oh well, I was on vacation.

From there I went over to Alena's house. She was my homecoming date, except that neither of us wanted to go to the dance. So we stayed home, and that was fun. We played Apples to Apples with her family, and we sat around and talked for a few hours. And I had a delicious home-cooked meal. I haven't had many of those lately, so that was one of the highlights of my trip. Have I mentioned that I really don't like VG's?

After the homecoming dance ended a bunch of people went over to Emily's to watch Moulin Rouge, so Alena and I headed over there. And then I went home to get some much-needed sleep. I had originally planned to drive home to Ramona that night, but I was so tired I elected to take the five-minute route to my bed at Mom's. I'm sure Dad understood...I need to not be driving up highway 67 when I'm that tired.

This morning I woke up, showered, and went to breakfast at Denny's with Lauren. Hooray for $4.99 fruit-filled pancake breakfasts! I then went up to Ramona (dropping Les's trumpet back off at his house on the way) to spend the rest of my time with Dad, whom I hadn't seen much of since I got home. Then I had a nap so I could drive safely home.

On the way home we stopped in Ventura for dinner at Chipotle. Have you ever heard of it? It's this modern fast-food Mexican place, and it's very good. We stopped there on the way down to San Diego, and we liked it so much that we stopped there on the way back, too. Jake and Danny are both quite fond of it, and I guess now I am too. So if any of you ever have a chance to eat at one of these, I suggest you take it.

Okay, we'll I'm exceptionally tired, and my bed is looking really comfortable right now. So I'm going to go sleep now. But I had a very good time in San Diego; I hope I can continue to stay in touch with you all.

Four weeks until I come home again! (Unless we have to go to an NCAA playoff game...Cal Poly's 7-0 now...)

Cheers,
Josh

mood: no mood...just tired
music: Ralph Vaughan Williams -"The Wasps Overture" (played by RB High! We sound magnificent on last year's CD, which I obtained this weekend)
location: dorm

I really enjoyed myself today. For starters, I was able to go to bed when the heck I wanted. And this morning I got up when the heck I wanted. It was nice. Mom made me a nice big breakfast, which was made even more delicious be my home cooking deprivation at Cal Poly. After that I went and picked up my tux at the cleaners, and then went over to good old RB High to talk to Mr. Cole about playing with the band at the homecoming game. I got there at about 11:50, thinking lunch had just started. But nobody was around...it was a little eerie. But it finally occurred to me that there was a homecoming assembly today, so hooray for altered school schedules. Mr. Cole said I could play with the band; I was very excited. Since I was at school at lunch time I decided to go and have lunch with the "lunch group," which was a good trip down memory lane. (You know, because that was so long ago.)

After lunch Mom and I drove out to Dad's house to see Dad and also to see the house. It has a deck now! It's a really nice house...I'm kind of sad that Dad's eventually going to sell it. Oh well, it's all about the memories...and I'll always have those.

I could only stay at Dad's for about a half an hour because I wanted to go visit my old teachers and I didn't know how long they'd stay around after school. So back to RB I went. Carp had to leave right after school - as he tends to do on Fridays - so I didn't get to see him. But I did see Dr. Englund between book conferences, and it was good to see her again. (I know you all think I hate English and everything I have to do with it, but Dr. Englund's class was actually very influential in my life. I felt bad, though, because Dr. Englund asked me what classes I was taking and the only thing I have that isn't math and science was music theory. You could tell she was checking me for English...and I failed. Oh well. I told her about the fictional writing class I want to take for one of my GE requirements...that's almost as good...kind of...somewhat.) I also went to see Mrs. Evans, my seventh grade teacher. I showed her the picture of Renee and me in front of the White Tower in London, which she appreciated. (Mrs. Evans's curriculum includes building a paper model of the White Tower.) So that all was fun.

I went to Ashley's for about an hour after that. I told her all about the band at Cal Poly in an effort to get her to come there and join. I'm not sure that the Mustang Band marches clarinets, though. Ashley said that if they didn't then she would just switch to trumpet. Fifty cool points to Ashley.

After that I ran over to Les Kepics's house to borrow a trumpet from him. Les's lessons were annoying sometimes but he's a really good guy; it was good to see him again. And he was very nice to lend me one of his trumpets for the night. (I needed one for the game because mine wouldn't fit in my car with three other people and their luggage.) Someone please remind me to take that trumpet back to him tomorrow between 11 and 1.

I made my way back home to get changed for the game, and then it was back to RBHS! It was a busy night: ride in a convertible (a 1928 Mercedes...Cruella DeVil's car!), change into band uniform to play with the band for the first half, change back into tux to crown the next homecoming king, change back into band uniform to finish the game with the band. It was all fun! In the convertible parade they announced that I'm an electronical engineer at Cal Poly. Whoops. It sounds like something George W. Bush might say. Playing with the band was very much fun...I miss playing our fight song. It was neat, though. I hadn't told anyone that I planned to play with them. When I went up into the stands I took off my Cal Poly sweatshirt to reveal my RB band polo shirt underneath, and I grabbed my trumpet that was lying conveniently nearby. Very superhero-ish. Oh, I also got to listen to the band play their field show before the game. (They didn't march because of all of the rain this week. This was my only change to see them! Boo hoo...) RB really does have a fantastic music program. I know everyone at RB hears this all the time but you really don't appreciate it until you go and play with an average ensemble. Seriously, RB plays magnificently. At halftime I crowned the new homecoming king. Hooray! I didn't know who he was...it would have been fun to crown another bando...oh well, you can't win them all.

So all in all, the whole thing was fun. Fun, fun, fun. After the game a bunch of us went to Denny's. I had some good conversations with the people that I've missed for so long. I think that if I keep saying how much fun I'm having at Cal Poly I can convince some of you to go there. Seriously...nothing but fun at Cal Poly.

All right...I'm extremely tired, so I'm going to go to bed. I'll see you all tomorrow.

Cheers,
Josh

mood: tired but content
music: The Mask is on in the background
location: Mom's house, San Diego, CA

I'm home!! After six hours of driving (well...five hours of driving and one hour of eating and dropping people off) I made it back to good ol' Rancho Bernardo. Strangely, it's not as awesome as I thought it might be. My bedroom and bathroom are quite empty and you could tell that no one has been using them (there was a dead moth floating in the toilet). San Diego is my home, but all of my stuff has been moved up to SLO. And everything that needs to be done is up in SLO. It almost feels like I don't belong anywhere. But I'm sure that I'll feel better tomorrow when I see all of my favorite people, because they're what defines my home.

Anyway, sorry for not writing yesterday. I have a pretty good - and pretty interesting - reason. Last night I figured I'd try to get to bed at an earlier hour because I knew I'd be doing a lot of driving tonight and I didn't want to be tired. But I wanted to do my laundry, because I usually do it on Wednesdays. So I went down to our laundry room on the first floor. It just so happened that Liz, from my floor, had been there three minutes before and started her laundry in all three washers. Grr. But, being the resourceful engineering student that I am, I went down to tower zero to use their laundry room. And all three washers were available. So, thinking very highly of myself and my master plan, I loaded my whites into one washer and my colors into another washer. Forty minutes later I returned, Bounce in hand, to move my clothes into the dryers. First the whites, then the colors. But when I opened the colors washer, I found to my great disappointment that the washer had failed to spin and drain properly: my clothes were completely soaked. Sigh. I had to wring out every garment individually. By the time I had everything loaded into dryers the laundry room floor was completely covered in water. But...whatever, I thought to myself. I lost twenty minutes, but at least the laundry's done, right? No, not exactly. One dryer cycle gets you sixty minutes, and, if you can't see where I'm going with this, it wasn't enough to dry my clothes. So I had to spend the money and the sixty minutes on another cycle. Sigh. I got to bed before 1, at least. What's even more annoying, though, is that my laundry card stopped working. (We don't put coins or cash into the machines. Instead, we deposit money in a machine and it credits our laundry card, which the laundry machines then read. Supposedly it makes cleaning easier. Read on to see whether the system works or not.) Long story short, the machines stopped reading my card somewhere between loading the washer and loading the dryer. I had to borrow a friend's card to finish my laundry. I'm pretty annoyed about this because I'm pretty sure I'm not going to get the $16 I had stored on my card back. Stupid laundry system.

So anyway, that was how last night went. Fun, huh? Yeah. Hey, you know what else is fun? Learning an entire field show in ninety minutes! Seriously, though...it was fun. We're marching the first halftime show that everybody learned before I joined band at next week's game, so I have to learn it. It turns out that one of the girls in my section has some test to take so she won't be able to march the Davis game. (Oh, that's right Stacie.) So I get to march her hole. So all I had to do today was shadow her, and that wasn't so hard. It was interesting, though, because she was always in the form and I was always slightly behind it. Yeah, it was totally against my marching band instincts. Oh well. I kind of know it now...somewhat...mostly.

Oh, Stacie, I have to tell you: the Davis band is coming to SLO next Saturday for the game. And we're having a band-off! Apparently that's where the bands stay after the game and play songs back and forth until one of them can't play a new one. And the competition seems to be pretty strong. I guess last year the Mustang Band went up to Davis and beat the Davis band on their home turf, maybe because they were better and maybe because it was raining and Davis was the only band in full uniform. I'm not sure...I wasn't there. But it should be fun. Tune in next week for the outcome!

Okay, well, I want to not stay up too late tonight. I have so many things I want to do and people I want to see this weekend. So I'll talk to you all later. I'm going to go watch The Apprentice with Mom.

Cheers,
Josh

mood: some weird mix of really tired and really wired
music: no music...the Apprentice!
location: Mom's house, San Diego, CA

It's still raining around here. I've had to put on a new pair of pants and a new pair of socks every time I've gone outside. I can certainly see how rain can become pretty inconvenient if it happens often enough or long enough. Oh well, I still think it's peaceful...at least, when I'm not in the middle of it. The weather here is clearly a lot more unpredictable than San Diego's is. It was really hot last week, and now it's cold and rainy. Hey, it's more interesting, right?

Marching band was cancelled today, obviously, because of the rain. Instead, we stayed inside and played for a little over an hour, practicing all of the different songs we have. We have quite a few, and some of them are pretty cool. And most of them have little dance moves that go with them, so I was having fun learning those.

After band the usuals and I went up to Dave's room and watched Dodgeball, which I hadn't seen. We only got halfway through it before we decided to go to dinner at VG Cafe. Man, I am so sick of VG Cafe. I'm cool with all of the other campus dining places, but VG's is bad. And we go there all the time. UGH!

After dinner I had to go meet the group I'm in for music theory. We didn't do much other than agree to bring makeshift instruments to our meeting next week. (Did I tell you about this project? We have to compose a musical piece that's at least two and a half minutes long and that has six parts, but we have to create our own instruments.) One of the group members brought us cake, though. Hoo-ray.

By the time I got back from that everyone had finished Dodgeball. I just caught the end of it. It seems to be an interesting movie...more or less. After that we sat around and talked for a while. A lot of these people seem pretty preoccupied with sex; I'll spare you all of the details. But long story short I was getting pretty uncomfortable. I left a few minutes after they started watching South Park. People in college are fairly open to the whole sex thing...guys like to rate girls on a scale of one to ten, girls like to flash people randomly, etc. I miss all of my friends at home. Where are those kinds of people here?! Two of the people I've met in band - Ben and Courtney - seem to have a lot in common with me. Hopefully I can get to know them better...still not sure, though.

Anyway, nothing else of any interest happened today. Time goes by pretty quickly around here. I can't believe we're this far into October. I'm halfway through the quarter already!

I'm having a bit of writer's block right now. You wouldn't believe how long this entry has taken me to write. As a result, this entry has no good conclusion.

Josh

mood: homesick
music: none
location: dorm

It's raining again here in SLO. I just got back from taking my calculus midterm, which went well. It was misty when I left for class, but it was pouring as I walked back. Have I ever said how much I love the rain? It's peaceful. Anyway, as I was walking back with my trusty umbrella I was observing all of the people running by who were completely unprepared for the inclement weather, and it made me think of the essay I had to write in 11th grade in the style of Ernest Hemingway. This essay is one of my five favorite things I've ever written. So, for your enjoyment, I've decided to reproduce this essay for you below. If you've ever read A Farewell to Arms, you'll appreciate this tale of a typical rainy day at Rancho Bernardo High.

------------------------------

Outside it was raining. It came down in sheets and mixed with the light fog so that you could not see the top of the library through the haze. It could not reach the bandos in the sanctuary of the band room where their clarinet reeds and valve oil would stay moist and warm and dry. Under the covered halls it was fine, but the small quad could not protect the boys with their pants below their butts and the smart girls in sweatshirts and the not-so-smart ones dressed like hoes in the cold. Inside Room 202 the tap tap tap of the drops added to the dullness of the morning announcements. If you have heard the announcements then you know how it is. Sometimes trivia and the dance and sports. Sometimes free Oscar’s breadsticks, while the APUSH students talk mindlessly through Mr. O’Connor’s pleas for them to listen. And the quiet flutter of turning pages as they try frantically to study for the chapter 28 test. Outside the rain smacked against the windows.

“All right, take out a half-sheet of paper and number from one to forty,” he said. He held a stack of papers that looked fresh and warm and stapled. At the sight of them my stomach went hollow and empty. I took out a bottle of vermouth and two glasses.

“Mr. O’Connor, we haven’t had enough time to read the chapter,” I told him, and the class nodded their heads in agreement. I tried to tell about our math and science and English homework. If I could explain that we needed more time to study then we could pass the course. I could not explain. He was crying. It was no good.

“I thought students always wanted to be taught,” he said.

“They do, but darling, I am learning. I’m learning from you. Don’t I make a good student?”

“You’re a lovely student.”

“You know I don’t learn from anyone but you. You shouldn’t mind because someone else has taught me.”

“I do,” he said. “Now be quiet.” He passed out the tests. They were still warm from the copy machine. “I think I may go to Harry’s to grade these,” he mused. He went on about the linguini and the fettuccini and the chicken fingers, and how he could grade the tests twice as fast on the pink tablecloth with CNN on at the bar, and how splendid it was to share a drink with the bartender. He looked down at my desk and took a glass of the vermouth. “Good luck, darlings,” he said, and he took a drink.

Outside it continued to rain.

I wasn't as tired today as I thought I was going to be. I was up until midnight figuring out how to post those pictures to my blog, and I had an 8:00 class. But for some reason I wasn't tired. Usually on Mondays I come straight home after math ends at 11 so I can nap until Kevin gets home at noon, but today I wasn't tired enough to sleep. So I got an extra hour in my day. Hooray! I used it to watch The Apprentice, which I had taped last Thursday. I so called who was going to be fired.

I did a buttload of my homework today, and I'm in pretty good shape for the rest of this week. I've almost completely finished everything that's been assigned to me. The assignment for my EE lecture this week was to go down to the library and do this scavenger hunt-esque activity to learn about the resources the library has to offer. I noticed a guy in line behind me at the circulation desk who had the same worksheet I was filling out, and we ended up going through the whole thing together. It sounds like the thing would be a total pain in the rear, but it was actually kind of fun. We had to pick a book at random and then go and find it...and we have a pretty big honkin' library. Have any of you ever seen Supermarket Sweep on TV, where you're running through the aisles looking for the one product that the $10,000 is hidden behind? Well that's what it was like, sans the free cash. But we totally beat the clock on that one!

After band tonight a bunch of the trumpets from marching band went on a super-secret mission. I'm reluctant to talk about it here so all of you are going to have to promise to keep it on the DL. Okay? Good. I'm not sure if any of you are familiar with the geography of SLO, but for those of you who aren't, there's a big hill on the east side of campus, and on that hill is a big P for Poly. It's somewhat of a tradition for people to go up there and spell out things, using the existing P and adding to it with bedsheets. Well the trumpets went up there to spell out "chops," because that's what we're called in the Mustang Band. So at 9:30 we trekked up the hill, only to find that the sheets we expected to be at the top weren't there. So right now we're going to have to assume that "chops" is abbreviated by "P." That's right. The trip was fun anyway, although it was a little full of horse pucky, for my taste. (Actually, on the way back we passed a pen full of horses. They came out through the open gate and wondered around us for a little while. It was pretty cool.)

And that's how my day went. Days without marching band aren't as exciting, I know. But hey, the P story was good. So be happy for that.

Talk to you all later.

Cheers,
Josh

mood: tired, hungry
music: zip
location: dorm

I know, I know: it's been forever since I posted last. I have been ridiculously busy these last couple of days. But that's college for you. I guess I'll start from where we last left off...

Friday was a good day. I was up late on Thursday so I was very tired, but aside from that the day was great! I got the physics midterm that I took on Wednesday back, graded. (Hooray for not waiting a month to get grades back.) I got a 70/70. Boo yeah, grandma. I was the only one, too. I'll not dwell on this...you know, because I'm so humble and all...but it was a pretty big thing from me. I've heard all of those stories about how people who get all A's in high school sometimes completely fail in college, and up until now I haven't had any grades to speak of in any of my classes, so this was the first indicator of my progress. I'd also like to point out that I did the optional homework problems and read the optional reading, so I earned it, if I do say so myself. So anyway, that was that.

The rest of school went fine on Friday...not much to report there. At 6 I went down to the band room to meet for the volleyball game, where the pep band would be playing. I got my awesome pep band shirt, which is bright green with bright yellow vertical stripes. I think it makes me look like I'm on the Brazilian soccer team...but it's awesome anyway. So we warmed up in the band room and then marched down to Mott Gym. Our pep band brings along the entire drumline rather than just one drummer, so we can do cadences as we march through campus. One of these cadences is called George (don't ask me why) and whenever the drumline plays it, all of the winds do this awesome dance routine to it. It involves twirling instruments and raising the roof and doing the funky chicken. And shouting "woot woot." It's so much fun!! My experience in the RB band was totally different. The most movement I got to do was raising my instrument from carriage to playing position during the rolloff. Hey, it's all good...but I'm having more fun with this band than a person should be allowed to have.

The following paragraph is dedicated to Jenna Santy:

The volleyball game was fun, but short. They play a best-of-five match, and the Mustangs lost the first three, so that was the end of that. But we played a lot of cool music (although, some of the songs are the same ones I played in high school but different versions of them, and I miss the old ones!). One of the things we played was "Sell Out" by Reel Big Fish, and I couldn't help but think of Jenna and one of her favorite bands as we played it. It seems to be a really good arrangement of it...fun to play and all. So yeah, my first performance with the marching/pep band was a good one, despite the Mustangs' crushing defeat.

That night a bunch of us stayed up late watching Animal House, despite our better judgment. I had never seen it, which is apparently some sort of sin for college students. It was all right, I suppose. There wasn't much of a plot, though. Was it worth reducing my sleep that night from seven hours to five? I'm fine now, so sure. It's one more thing I can say I've done.

I was awakened by my alarm the next morning at 6 (ugh...) so I could get to the 7am band rehearsal. We marched and sang from 7-8 and then played from 8-9. (See? The marching band obeys quiet hours. People in my tower were complaining to me that the band plays too early in the morning. I responded that I was awakened by people having a relay race right outside of the door to my room at 2 that morning. You want to have a discussion about quiet hours with me? I'm all for that.) It was a foggy morning, and I was freezing. I'm so used to rehearse-a-thon attire: shorts and a white t-shirt. I certainly wished I had brought along my sweatshirt.

After the rehearsal we went downtown for the homecoming parade. Let me tell you, this was the saddest little parade you have ever seen. It was a block or two long, and somewhere in the neighborhood of 100 people came to see it. The only things in it were the band, the cheerleaders (excuse me, stunt team), the homecoming court riding in convertibles, and some fraternities and sororities that put together floats. I think it lasted about twenty minutes. We played "Wild Wild West" and "Mustang Sally," one time each. I spent more time getting to and from the parade than I did marching in it. But it was fun anyway. Here's a picture of the band Georging down Higuera Street (click on the picture for a larger version):

Don't mind the cowboy hats...those are just for the homecoming parade...

After the parade we went to a BBQ thrown for us by the band alumni, who marched after us in the parade and who would play with us in the stands at the football game. I was really hungry because I hadn't had much for breakfast, and when you couple that with the fact that the food was free you can imagine how much I ate. Yay BBQ!

I had enough time to go home for a nap - a brief nap - before I had to be back in the band room at 2. It's amazing how much rest you can get from a twenty-minute nap. I woke up with a splitting headache, though, which kind of stuck with me for the rest of the day. I drank a bottle of water to try to rehydrate myself, which seemed to help a little bit.

We met at the band room at 2 to get dressed and warm up. I managed to get into my uniform without much trouble, which for some reason was impressive to a few people. Apparently all freshman have issues with the Mustang Band uniforms...they're not much different than what I'm used to, though. I don't know what the hoopla was all about. Here's a picture of the band warming up, and you can get a pretty good idea of what our uniforms look like:


We left the band room at around 3 to march around campus. We stopped at every place where there was a large congregation of people and played for them. Some of them were pretty loaded - they were the ones who seemed to enjoy the performances the most. Most of the people who saw the band seemed pretty excited about it, so that was cool. It seemed to me from the first football game I went to that people didn't like the band all that much, but that apparently isn't the case.

When we got down to the stadium we marched onto the backfield for our pregame show. We came on to the field from the left hand side, and when everyone stopped at their spots I just kept on marching across to the other side and off of the field. (I don't know the pre-game show.) I got to watch from the stands, and the band looked pretty good, I guess. We have a pretty tiny stadium here at Poly so you can't really get high enough to see very well. But they sounded good, anyway. After the pre-game show the band came up to sit in the stands with me, and we played, danced, shouted cheers, etc. The halftime show went really well. We played "Jump in the Line," "You Dropped a Bomb on Me," a drumline solo written by one of the drummers called "Hummin' Along," and "You Shook Me All Night Long." I like our show a lot. We form actual pictures rather than just abstract angles and curves. For example, for "You Dropped a Bomb on Me" we squeeze together in a big blob in the middle of the field, and when we hit this big chord we all run like heck outwards, only to march into a shape of a mushroom cloud. (Get it? A bomb. Awesome.) That's the kind of stuff we do. And it's fun! The following is a picture of the band doing the jungle walk during "Hummin' Along":


And this is the point in my story where it all gets interesting. It's obvious that RB didn't have a tournament to go to last night, because Mr. Cole obviously wasn't controlling the weather. It started to rain like heck during third quarter, and it lasted the rest of the night (and Sunday, too). I know I don't have to tell you that the band stays at the game until the end, rain or shine. Some people - namely, the woodwinds and their moisture-intolerant instruments - got plastic bags to protect themselves. They didn't have enough for everyone though, and I was one of the lucky 20 or so who couldn't get one. It wasn't that bad, though. I was cold, but after you get wet in the first minute of rain it doesn't really matter that you're still getting wet for the next hour. And now it's one heck of a good memory, so it all works out. Here's a picture of me playing in the rain:


After the game ended at around 9, a bunch of us (or the bunch of us, if you will) went to Firestone Grill for dinner and then to the Mustang Lanes for bowling. We decided to ditch the band frat's "social gathering" that was serving "refreshments" because none of us wanted to go get really drunk. (Finally, some people I can relate to!) After the lot of us collectively set the record for the most gutter balls thrown in a night, most of us went home. I stayed with Courtney, Ben, and company (Courtney's brother and Ben's friends from high school were visiting) to watch The Girl Next Door, a romantic comedy about a stripper. (I remember George Himmel explaining to me that this movie was the most smartest movie ever made. Women get a romantic comedy, men get strippers. Everybody wins, as he put it.) Long story short, I got home to bed around 3 in the morning. Hooray for 21-hour days!

I slept in until 11 so I could go to the mission for mass at noon, which i won't do again if I can avoid it because half of the mass was performed in Spanish. From there I went to breakfast, then grocery shopping, then racquetball, then homework. And that's why I haven't written in the last couple of days. I'm sure you all understand.

For now, I must go to bed. This week will be a little busier than usual because I need to get everything done by Thursday afternoon so I can have a free weekend to come home. Good night to you all. I hope you all have a good week.

Cheers,
Josh

mood: happy
music: Something Corporate, a band that Courtney wanted me to listen to.
location: dark dorm, because Kevin has gone to bed

PS- the pictures included in this entry were taken by some member of the band unknown to me. I got them at the band website. Feel free to browse the other images if you like.

Today in my EE lab we had to build an electric motor out of a battery, a magnet, and some wire. I did this last year so I already knew how it worked, and my goal today was therefore to build the motor and get the data we needed as fast as possible so I could get some free time. Unfortunately, Dr. Gerfen decided that the team that built the fastest motor would get five extra-credit points. Now, I personally don't need any extra credit, but my lab partner decided that he did. So, long story short, we were there tweaking our motor for over two hours. Sigh.

I had marching band rehearsal again today. We have our homecoming game on Saturday, and we're still learning drill. I'm not too worried, though. We did two run-throughs of the show and we at least know when to stop and when to go and in what general direction we're supposed to march, so I'm sure we won't fall apart at the game. Not completely, anyway. It'll be fun.

After the rehearsal I was fitted for a uniform, so now I have one of those. I get to keep it in my room! The people on my floor wanted me to model it for them, so I put it on. They were all very amused...but hey, it's cool. Our uniforms are cool, but I like RB's better. Although, these come with one of those cape things that hangs off of one shoulder.

After that me and the gang went to Back Stage Pizza for dinner. Woot.

At 8 a bunch of people from the band frat met at the band room to play Sardines. It's like hide and seek, but kind of in reverse. You split up into pairs, then one of the pairs goes to hide. The other pairs walk around and try to find them, and when they do they hide with them in the same place, so by the end of the game you're all crammed in there, hence the name Sardines. The first people who find them are the ones who get to go hide in the next game, and in the first game, that was us! So we hid up on a hill in some bushes. Hooray for that. Midway through the game I gave Jen a piggyback ride, but we were out of balance so we toppled over, and I totally ate it on the concrete. My knees are bleeding a little now, but they don't hurt so much anymore...I'm sure the age at which I can't go up and down stairs has decreased by a year or two...

Oh, and I have some bad news. The Mustangs are 5-0 in football, and we're ranked 8th in the division. If we go to the NCAA playoffs, the band has to go. Not necessarily because the band wants to go, but because it's NCAA regulations. The good news is that because they make us go, they pay for us to go. But the bad news is that the playoff game is Thanksgiving weekend. I don't know if I'll come home on Wednesday and come back here Friday or if I'll just stay here for that week...but if the Mustangs continue to do well then I'm not going to have a whole lot of options. Stacie, go and tell the Davis team that they need to kick our butts. I miss being at home.

All right, well I've had an exceptionally busy day (band will do that to you), so I'm going to go to bed. I'll see you all in a week.

Josh

mood: tired and bruised a little
music: some weird Indian music or something that's coming in through our window
location: dorm

I have a perfectly decent reason for not posting yesterday. We were playing Mao again at 10 last night, and it occurred to me that I had my physics midterm this morning at 8. Whoops. Don't worry...you all know me well enough to know that if I wasn't already prepared for it I would have remembered it sooner. I've been doing my homework and reading the book - neither of which are required, might I add - and I have a good understanding of everything we've done so far. So there. I was even allowed to have a 3x5 card with equations and whatnot on it. The test went well, except that my instructor had written it the night before and we were the first class to take it, so we were the ones to discover all the errors. Towards the end of the hour he'd write something on the board along the lines of "#12 should read 'increased by 5 m/s' rather than 'decreased by 5 m/s'." And I'd have to redo the problem. Oh well, I'm pretty sure I did well.

Not much went on yesterday for me to discuss here other than the fact that all of the band people I met last weekend invited me to go to dinner with them after rehearsal. We went to Light House (again...ugh!), and then to the arcade in the university union, where we played DDR (which, to their surprise, I wan't horrible at). I had to go to VG's at 8 to meet with my intro to music theory group so we could discuss the piece we have to compose. We agreed that we would compose it later. I got home around 8:30, where it was suggested that we play Mao. And I already told you about what happened after that.

Okay, so I was pulled over by a cop for the first time today. But let me argue my defense. You can see me in my tiny little Honda Prelude, driving down the 101 going the speed limit (more or less). Not too difficult to imagine, right? Yeah, I was on my bike when it happened. I "rolled through" a stop sign. The cops were parked just around the corner, with a big stack of tickets in hand, to give out to every kid that went through there this morning. In the 45 seconds that the officer was writing me up, 4 more kids ran the stop sign. (And yes, I actually counted.) The cop also asked to see my driver's license...what is that about? I don't know...the whole situation is kind of annoying but I can't argue with it. I am only getting a warning though, so no fine. (Hooray!) But, really, the spot they had picked was a pretty trivial one to nail people on. I was turning onto a street that's not open to traffic - it's only for pedestrians and bikes. And it's not realistic to ask bikers to come to complete stops at all stop signs. If you come to a complete stop on a bike, you fall over. Grumble grumble grumble. So yeah, that's that.

One more story: I went to the university cashier today to drop of my housing payment that's due in a few days. I saw as I walked in a box marked "deposit fee payments here" but I wasn't sure if that was where they wanted me to put the check or not, so I decided to go up to the window and ask the lady working there what I should do. Now, my experience here has been that all questions like this annoy whoever you're asking because they get asked the same questions over and over again. If you look at it logically, a lot of people asking the same question probably means that the question is a perfectly valid one. And really, when I ask a question like that I'm just trying to save whoever I'm asking from having to correct my mistake. So anyway, I went up to the window and asked if I was supposed to put my check in the box. And she told me, quite cheerfully, that I could drop it in the box or I could give it to her if I wanted a receipt. I was shocked. The woman was in such a good mood and it was such a big change from what I expected that it put me in a good mood for most of the day. It's always a good feeling when you come across people who want to help you and who don't treat you, a freshman, as a helpless fool.

So that's what I've been up to the last couple of days. Oh, I did go to an informational meeting about study abroad programs. I can either pay an affordable amount of money to go to London for an entire year to take courses in my major that will count here at Poly, or I can pay more tuition to stay in London for a semester and take GE courses that I don't need for graduation. The former keeps me abroad for too long, the latter keeps me in college an extra quarter or two. So I'm not sure...we'll see I guess.

And that's what I've been up to. I think. Well, if I come up with anything else I'll be sure to let you all know.

Josh

mood: good
music: Alfred Reed's "Armenian Dances"
location: dorm

There are 10 kinds of people in this world: those who understand binary and those who don't.

Hello again. I realized there were a couple of things I meant to talk about that I didn't get to last night, so I figure I can write about them now in the few minutes I have before I go to calculus. The first thing is about this girl Kelly on my floor. She...how do I put this?...she likes to destroy things. For example, the little thing on the door to one of the stairways that keeps the door from slamming open and shut doesn't work, so if you put enough force into it you can slam the door against the cement wall. Kelly, for some reason, enjoys doing just that, over and over again. She's a little weird. (Dad, you met her. She was one of the girls in front of us in line when we checked into the dorm.) Anyway, yesterday there was a CD on the table in the common room and nobody could figure out who it belonged to. So Kelly decides that the solution to the problem is to put the CD in the microwave. Don't ask me why. So she puts it in there and turns the thing on, and of course it starts to produce blinding flashes of white light. What a surprise. The destroyed CD is now pinned to the bulletin board in the common room. If you ask me, Kelly is a little creepy.

The other thing is about this whole drama that has come up regarding this guy named Sky. Sky lives in Tower 6, but for whatever reason he always comes over to our tower and hangs out with us. I don't really know the guy, so I don't really care one way or the other if he's in our tower or not. But everyone else around here can't stand him; I'm not sure why. So they've been planning ways to get the message to Sky that he isn't wanted in Tower 2. You know, things like not letting him in when he knocks on the common room door (he doesn't have a key), not responding to him when he talks, or, simply, just telling him to get the heck out. I feel really bad for this guy. I'm sure there's some valid reason why he doesn't want to hang around his own tower, and he's just trying to make some new friends here. But everyone here is taking this "Tower 2 is the best" thing a little too far for my taste. I don't see why we can't let "an outsider" sit around our tower. And I sincerely believe Sky can't be as annoying as everyone says he is. So I don't know what the people around here are going to do to him, but I hope Sky does eventually find some friends who won't plot against him.

Anywho, I should probably get going...I wouldn't want to miss fun with infinite sequences and series! (All of you in Calc BC will know the joy of these pretty soon, I'm sure.) So, for now, I must cease to write. Talk to you tonight!

Josh

mood: excited to go to marching band today
music: there's some relaxation music or something being played outside
location: dorm

If any of you have read the comments from yesterday, you're probably wondering what all this fuss is about the end of the world. Well, it's a flash video that can be seen here. But please NOTE: this video is RATED "R" for strong language and some graphic violence. So for those of you who aren't too fond of the profanities, this video isn't really the thing for you. I know! For those of you who want a flash video that is suitable for all ages, you can view one of my favorites here. So there you go: entertainment for everyone.

For some reason last night I could not fall asleep. It was probably a combination of it being too hot in the room and of my drinking a Pepsi a couple of hours before going to bed. (I know, I know, soda is horrible for me...but it was my first one in six or seven days, so give me a break.) I had to get up at a quarter for seven for class...I was dead tired for all three classes I had today. I was done at 11:00, so I rushed home to get a nap in before Kevin came home at 12:00. I felt better after that.

I played a game of Monopoly with Shawn, Alan, and Liz today. Shawn has been wanting to play since we got to Poly, so that's why I've played two days in a row. The game went on for a couple of hours, but we had to quit because everyone was going for dinner at Light House and I had band afterwards. It was a good game though...lots of trades and whatnot...everyone with a monopoly. I think Shawn probably would have won, but then that's the beauty of Monopoly: you never know what will happen.

So dinner, band, killing time in the common room. And that's it. Kevin's watching Family Guy so I think I'm going to join him. Hope you all have a good week.

Josh

mood: thirsty
music: none, but I'm sure I wouldn't be able to hear it over all the noise around here anyway
location: dorm

Guten tag, my loyal readers! If you are one of the few who do still tune in every day to read my personal thoughts and descriptions of the days past, then I would like to extend my thanks to you. It means a lot to me that people back at home and elsewhere still remember me and care about me enough to take the time to read through my often lengthier-than-necessary entries.

That said, I have not much else about which to write. I slept in until a quarter to ten, at which point I got up to get ready for church. We had to take my car because Kevin's friend Katie wanted to come along and she didn't have a bike. Aside from having to find a place to park, driving was quite nice because I didn't have to pedal up the mountain that is Grand Avenue to get back to campus.

After church I finished my homework that's due tomorrow and did most of the homework I have for the rest of the week (all that has been assigned up to this point, at least). Danielle and I went to play racquetball, where we played a few games and then served over and over again to each other so we could practice the serves and returns. We didn't play as long as we usually do because I'm coming down with a cold or something, as are most of the people around here. I don't feel sick, but my throat is...uh...I don't really know what word to use to describe it, but it's not happy. My voice cracks a lot. But I feel fine so I'll be thankful for that.

Kevin and I went down to the Campus Market to do a little grocery shopping, and then I went to Back Stage Pizza for dinner. Upon return I played hearts with Fenton, Zack, and Phil, and lost miserably (At game's end I had more points than all the others combined. Stupid queen of spades!). We played mao after that, and that went on for so long that we had to quit because there were so many added rules that none of us could figure out what the heck was going on.

And now I'm here. Whoopee. Sorry nothing much else happened today. But that's how it goes.

Josh

mood: neutral
music: none
location: dorm

No post yesterday because got home late and was tired. Whoops. But I have a good reason! I'll get to it in a minute...

Yesterday (Friday) I checked with all of my instructors (you don't have teachers in college, you have instructors) about whether or not I could go to a different section of the same class. It turns out I can. So that means I can move all of my Friday classes and come home Thursday night for Homecoming! Woot! That makes the whole trip a little more sensible - a lower ratio of driving to being at home. So I get two and a half full days now. Mark your calendars.

Liz, Emma, and I decided to play a good game of San Diego Edition Monopoly in the afternoon for lack of something better to do (most of the people on the floor had gone somewhere unbeknownst to us). I got lucky and happend to land on all three oranges and built up a trio of hotels pretty early in the game. Liz chanced upon a monopoly in the yellows a little later on and gave me a run for my money. But she got bored and left the game, and everyone else around was too drunk to play because they had all just come back from some party. But it was fun anyway.

After dinner I went to a "movie mad-libs" party put on by the band frat, kappa kappa psi. (They're not a typical fraternity. They don't have a house, and they're school sponsored or something so they don't have the wild parties you think of when you think of frats.) The night was supposed to be all about turning down the sound on movies and then filling in what the characters are saying (a la Whose Line is it Anyway), but none of us could come up with anything great to say, so we ended up just watching the movies. We watched Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey and Terminator 2, neither of which had I seen before. Bill and Ted played battleship with Death in Bogus Journey (sorry, Alena, not your kind of battleship...), and I'm pretty sure Terminator is a lot better when we have the Governator in office. So yeah, that night was fun. It was the first thing I went to (of my own choice, anyway) where I knew absolutely no one. (It's a pretty scary feeling...no one to cling to...) But I made so many friends there. It's amazing how well I get along with band folk as opposed to the random mix of people that happen to be on my dorm floor. So hooray! I found a group of friends! Although, last night they were just people whose names I was able to remember...I wouldn't really have called them my friends until today.

--seamless transition to Saturday--

I got up, went to Light House for breakfast/lunch, came home and did calculus and physics.

Then 4:30 rolled around, and I walked down to 1324 Foothill, where the Mustang Maniacs (the school spirit club) were throwing a BBQ for all of the spirit organizations (cheer, dance, band). I saw most of the same people at the BBQ that I had met the night before, so I mostly hung around with them. There was free food! Good free food! So we ate and talked, etc. You can imagine...mingle, mingle, mingle.

At 7 the BBQ had pretty much wound down, but a bunch of us band froshies still wanted to do stuff. So the 8 of us - Jen, Steve, Ben, Courtney, Nate, Bloomie (Dave), a guy whose name I didn't catch, and me - came back to my room to watch (you guessed it) Family Guy. After a couple episodes of that someone discovered my board game stash and they all really wanted to play one. I love these people!!! So we played Hoopla, which is the Cranium spin off where you're all on the same team racing against the clock to get people to guess your cards. We played two games of that, which went a little something like this: I dealt three cards to everyone because there were so many of us we didn't think we could get through four cards each in the allotted fifteen minutes. But we kicked butt. So we decided to play again not only with four cards each but also with the timer constantly running instead of stopping it between turns. It came down to one card and we lost in the very end. But it was the most fun I have had here since I got here. Period. We were all so into the game and making a ton of noise...somewhere in the middle of it all the rest of the people from the floor - who had all gone to Fresh Choice for dinner - came back and observed the party in Josh's room. It has now been well established that I'm a member of the band cult. Whoo! Kevin came back after our second game, and since he had been hoping to get some homework done I and all the band folk cleared out of the room and went over to Ben and Nate's rooms over in Tower 5. There, we played Mao and other assorted games. (By the way, I have a suggested amendment to the Mao rules for those of you who still play it: allow talking during the game, but give a penalty if a question is asked. Any question. It's easy enough to not talk, but it's hard to speak normally while avoiding the question marks. I discovered how many questions you ask without even thinking about it. So yeah, try it...it's fun!) After a while Ben and Courtney, who happen to be dating, decided to...erm...get a little privacy in Ben's room, so the rest of us watched The Six String Samurai in Nate's room. I watched about a half an hour and could not for the life of me understand that movie, and since a few of the group had already gone home I decided to call it quits for the day. And that was fine with everyone (not that they wanted me to leave, but they weren't pressuring me to stay...know what I mean?).

And now I'm here, typing away. All in all, it has been a good couple of days. I'm so glad I've finally found a bunch of people I really want to spend time with rather than people who I'll go along with because I have nothing else to do and don't want to be a loner. So hooray. It looks like joining band is going to turn out to be the best decision I made in college, just like it was in high school.

And on that note (ha ha...that one never gets old) I'll leave you to your thoughts. Good night!

Josh

mood: energetic
music: "You Dropped a Bomb on Me" from our field show, playing in my head
location: dorm - it's hot in here

# posted by Josh : 11:20 PM
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I'm coming home for Homecoming. If this surprises you, see the preceding entry.

I had to learn an entire tune today in marching band. Everyone else knew it, and I didn't. That is, of course, what you would expect for joining in the middle of the season. The tune was "Jump in the Line." You may remember it from the Italy portion of Beyond the Sea. Anywho, you might be thinking that because of me the entire band had to go set by set so I could figure out what the heck I was supposed to do. But, alas, such was not the case. We just marched it, straight through. It was pretty hilarious. (I seem to be using that word frequently to describe marching band. See how fun it is? Good decision to join.) I was holding the drill up in front of me as I marched along, fumbling to turn the pages and trying figure out where I was supposed to be going and when I was supposed to be getting there. At one point, I marched past this one trombonist, and he exclaimed, "Oh crap! There's a person there now!" It was great. It turns out that I'm marching a tuba hole (I start out surrounded by the sousas), and this particular hole has an exceptionally easy spot to march. The entire band forms these three triangles, and I happen to be in the center of the center triangle. So I march up and back along the 50. Yes, I know, my learning the show in a run-through isn't much of an accomplishment, but it was something I'd never done before. And, again, it was hilarious. And fun. So there you go.

I watched The Apprentice tonight, and the task was to go on QVC live and sell a product. Now, for those of you who have never been over to my mom's and therefore don't know what QVC is, it's a home shopping network on TV (but better, in my humble opinion). It was so much fun to watch, because I knew Mom was at home watching too, just as excited as I was. We both watch Apprentice every week (everybody gets one horrible reality show to watch; this is ours) and every week I call her afterwards so we can discuss it. But this week was extra good because it was QVC and Mom loves QVC. So that was fun, too.

And you know what else is fun? Sleeping. So that's what I'm going to go do now.

Josh

PS - sleeping and napping, but not waking early

mood: slightly annoyed, but my day has been good so I'm still happy
music: Kevin's classical scat (people sing the classics...)
location: a darkened dorm

I'm coming home for Homecoming!! I thought I wasn't going to be able to, but I've had another tremendous streak of luck! The reason I wasn't going to be able to come home was because the Mustang Band was going to exhibition at the Arroyo Grande Tournament of Bands that weekend. But, as luck would have it, the show that they're performing is the one from the last football game. That's right, the one I don't know. So woot! I have class until 4 on Fridays though, so I'm going to have to ask my professors if I can go to the classes earlier in the week. If they say no, I'll just ditch them anyway. I'm so excited! Anywho, I'll write more later, but now I've got homework. So I'll talk to you (and see you!) soon.

Josh

mood: pleased
music: Yakkity Yak
location: dorm

PS- Yakkity Yak, but don't talk back

I did my laundry today. (I know you're thinking that if I'm leading with a story about laundry that this entry can't be very exciting. But really, in truth...no, it's not very exciting.) It was nice. I held out cleaning everything so I could do it on a weekday morning when everyone else would be either in class or asleep. And my plan worked perfectly! Perfectly, except for one flaw: the dryers didn't dry my clothes all the way through. Two loads with sixty-minute cycles each, and my clothes were damp. And yes, I cleaned the lint traps. So my room today was strewn with random shorts, shirts, and boxers, all laid out so that they could rid themselves of their moisture before I folded them away. But all is back in order now.

I had the best sandwich today! It was from the Sandwich Factory, which I think has become my favorite food establishment on campus. My sandwich was good for three reasons: one, I was exceptionally hungry. Two, I discovered that every sandwich includes a free bag of chips, a fact that earlier had escaped me. And, finally, my sandwich was a roast beef and swiss on wheat with lettuce, tomato, onion, mustard, and mayo, and it doesn't get much better than that, baby. Oh, and I tried Hostess Sno Balls for the first time. They're like those Hostess cupcakes except coated in marshmallow and coconut. I'd never had them before but I do enjoy my marshmallow and coconut so I figured I'd give them a go. They weren't that good, and it cost me about 60% of my recommended daily saturated fat limit. But what would you expect from Hostess?

I had wind orchestra tonight, which went fine. "Fanfare for the Common Man" sounded a whole lot better, in part because we had practiced it and in part because some of the people who couldn't play it sat it out. (I sat it out. I've been busy trying to memorize the three tunes that I'm supposed to know by tomorrow for marching band.) Aside from that, the only thing that came up was that the wind ensemble is going to Europe in 2006. They had us fill out a survey asking whether we thought we were going to go or not. I just went on a musical Europe tour! And how am I supposed to know whether I'm going to be able to go in 2006? I don't even know if I'm going to be doing wind ensemble then! But, hey, it is only $1600 for three weeks (we fundraise a lot), so maybe it's not such a bad deal after all.

Anywho, I really need to go to bed because I've been getting into the habit of staying up until midnight and getting up at quarter to seven. Not good times. So I'm off.

Josh

PS - Will but not Grace

mood: antsy...I feel a little cooped up in this room
music: the ringing silence (about as silent as it gets in the dorms)
location: duh, the dorms

I have quite a few things that occurred today that I'd like to talk about. Some of them are pretty major, and others are quite trivial. As such, this entry may seem relatively random. So it goes.

I noticed this morning that all the city buses have "SLO Transit" written on them. Ironic? It's amazing what cute puns you can come up with when the name of the town in which you live has an acronym that forms an actual word.

I got a locker in the music building! One that my trumpet actually fits in! Woot! I had to go bother the lady in the music department office twice to get it though, and I'm sure she's sick of me by now. I went in the first time with the information that I the locker she had assigned me was fine depth- and width-wise, but I needed a locker that was about an inch higher. She said she needed the actual dimensions of the case, and was annoyed that I didn't already have them. (She asked me the last time I was in there, but I honestly thought the information I had would have been sufficient.) I do feel pretty bad about bugging her so many times in the last week. Oh well. I have a locker!

I've heard three or four people around my dorm use the word "piccadilly" in a conversation with someone else. I told you all that it's going to catch on. And you're all my witnesses that I came up with it. So when I get the credit, it'll be just piccadilly.

I went to the first band rehearsal today. It was so much fun! All of you who are part of or have been part of the Royal Regiment would find this band to be a little different than what you're used to. I won't get into all of the specifics, but I'll cite one example: when we reset a move, nobody runs back to their spot. It's a leisurely stroll back to the top. So, yeah, the Mustang Band doesn't exactly strive for excellence, but let me tell you, it's still a heck of a lot of fun. You can talk in between sets. And not just about whether you're in the right spot or not, but about other things. (Every time I spoke I expected Mr. Cox to jump out at me screaming...) But we still accomplish a lot. We learned a tune and a half in the 90 minutes we were outside today. (Although, tunes tend to be between five and ten sets, not the twenty that RB folks are used to.) Anyway, it went really well. I wasn't way behind anyone else or anything, so that was good. We did not, however, march the one tune that everyone else already has learned...that should be interesting. But hey, it's all good.

I have a hilarious story for all you RB band people. You know how when the drum major calls you to attention by yelling "Band, ten, hut!" you all snap to attention and scream "HUT" back at him? And you know how by the time you're a senior in band you don't even have to think about what you're supposed to do when called to attention because it's such a reflex? Well, evidently some bands don't do this the same way. In fact, some bands, when called to attention, make no verbal acknowledgement at all. Can you see where I'm going with this? At the end of rehearsal, the drum major called us to attention to dismiss us. And I of course yelled "hut," and I was of course the only one. Everyone snickered at that, and the drum major sighs under his breath, "high schoolers..." You'd think I'd have been totally embarrassed, but it was so funny. I was trying so hard not to laugh. I'm laughing now just typing this. So hooray for already having college marching band memories.

And now for something completely different: Tower 2 has created an intramural basketball team, and their first game was tonight. (Tower 2 refers to the tower in Yosemite in which I reside. We've formed a tightly-knit group - we pretty much always do everything together. I'm pretty sure it's rare for an entire tower to get along with each other...and that's what makes us so awesome.) We went down to the rec center to cheer on our team. It was great because no one else was there (save for the players and refs). So there would be loud cheers and shouts when Tower 2 scored, and dead silence when the others scored. We totally kicked their butts!! So that was fun.

We had a fire drill tonight. We were told to take all fire alarms seriously because there are no drills, but we had a drill tonight. You can pretty much imagine how that went, so I won't get into the finer aspects of it. But I would like to tell you that the fire alarm itself is the most obnoxious sound you've ever heard. Imagine standing on the 50-yard line of a football field. Lauren is standing in one endzone, holding a note on her piccolo. Renee is standing in the other endzone. Now, let's just say for demonstrative purposes that they're out of tune, but only slightly (we'll chalk it up to the doppler effect). Slightly obnoxious, right? Well imagine that they decided it would be fun to run straight at you, one holding a ff high C and the other a fff high C sharp. The obnoxiousness grows and grows until they're basically on top of you, still holding their notes. But ffff now. And there's nothing you can do to stop them. That's what the fire alarm is like. But then I guess that's the point.

And now I'm shut in my room, typing. But I had a very good day today. (It helps that I had only one hour of class.) But all good things must end. So good night.

Josh

PS - Lauren and Renee are both phenomenal piccolo players.
PPS - engineers but no architects

mood: pleased
music: the theme from Hey Dude, that old-school Nickelodeon show
location: Tower 2! Woot!

I spent the greater part of the afternoon running little errands and such. I sent away the DMV change of address form, which enables to tell the San Diego Superior Court that I'm a resident of San Luis Obispo County and am therefore not eligible to serve on a San Diego jury. (They wanted me to report on November 2, which isn't going to happen. If I could conceivably make it there, I'd go. It is my civic duty, after all.) I also went to Julian's in the university union, which is this coffee and ice cream shop. I got a two scoop sundae, which ended up being a lot bigger than I had planned on (it came in one of those banana split boats!). So hooray for ice cream for lunch! I know it's not healthy, but I can afford that every once and a while. Besides, I came home and polished off those green beans I bought last week.

I went to wind orchestra rehearsal tonight, and it was great. I'm really liking everyone I meet there. Richard and I sit at the bottom of the wind orchestra, and he clues me in to all of the goings on. He and Mike (who's the section leader in the marching band) are hilarious. So yeah, band is great. They also seemed pretty happy that I joined the marching band in addition to wind orchestra. So hooray. Although it isn't all just peachy keen; I do have one complaint. We're playing Aaron Copland's "Fanfare for the Common Man," and I know many of you reading this (who aren't in band) might not recognize this piece by name, but if you heard it I'd guarantee you'd remember hearing it before. It's a solemn and majestic piece that revolves around a single theme which is introduced by the trumpets. When you hear a professional band play it, you can only hear one trumpet, because they're all perfectly in tune on every note. But, uh, the Cal Poly Wind Orchestra isn't quite so refined. And that's putting it mildly. "Fanfare for the Common Man" is one of those pieces you shouldn't be allowed to play if you can't play it perfectly. And it's my professional opinion that we probably can't. Fifteen trumpets in unison? Not going to happen.

But hey, I'm enjoying myself nonetheless.

Oh, and I have some good news. (By the way, there was an entry for yesterday that I don't believe was actually posted until this afternoon because Blogger was being fussy last night. This particular entry has some unfortunate news that you ought to read if you haven't yet. This paragraph is a follow-up of that news.) I was reading the band handbook and I came across the page that lists all of the dates and times for performances, and the Arroyo Grande Tournament of Bands wasn't listed there. That leaves the weekend of October 22 open. And that would mean I can come home for homecoming!! So at this point, I'm not sure whether we're doing this exhibition band thing or not, but I hopefully will find out tomorrow. Just don't get your hopes up.

And that's all I've got.

Josh

PS - bookkeepers but no librarians
PPS - Lauren and Renee need to come up here and show these people how the Stars and Stripes Forever piccolo solo is supposed to go.

mood: a little sore...I'm not sure why
music: Kevin's practicing viola
location: dorm (where else?)

It's already pretty late and I have 8:00 class tomorrow, so I need to keep this short.

A few people on the floor decided that it would be fun to all get up this morning and go to the Apple Farm Bed & Breakfast for breakfast at 10:30, so that's what the plan has been for a few days now. I normally go to the mission for mass at 10:30, but I got up for the earlier 9:00 mass so that I would be home in time to go with them. I got back by 10:20, and no one was awake. I later found out that they all stayed up so late last night that they knew no one was going to want to go in the morning, so they abandoned the plan. I was asleep by the time that decision was made, so I had no way of knowing. It was annoying, but I can't really blame them for it. I would have done the same thing. But by the time I got back from the mission Kevin was up (he decided not to go with me to mass this week), so we went to the Vista Grande Restaurant on campus for brunch. All glory told it was about $14, but I used my meal plan plus dollars, which I have plenty of, so it really was a good deal. And man, that food was good. They had made-to-order omelettes, croissants, bacon, sausage, made-to-order eggs, salmon, a variety of breakfast breads, and - my personal favorite - eggs benedict. It was all so good! And it was all-you-can-eat! So, yeah, the whole thing turned out all right in the end.

Aside from that not much happened today. I did my math and physics homework for a couple of hours, and I spent a lot of time on the phone today talking to various people, mainly my mom and dad. (My grandma from Wisconsin called me today, unexpectedly. I was sitting in the common room when it happened. My phone, which plays the theme from the Muppet Show when it rings, got everyone's attention, so they were listening to the conversation. And when I said "Hi Grandma" they all burst out laughing. It was hilarious. So after my short phone conversation with Grandma, I came back into the common room and people were asking me about her. So I told them how awesome she is, which is completely true. "My grandma plays Super Mario Kart and rides rollercoasters." A random story, I know, but interesting nonetheless.

Did I ever tell any of you that the RA for this tower is Katie Knoll, who went to RB and graduated in 2001? She played flute in the band, which means that all of my 2004 buddies marched in the Aaron Copland show with her. She's cool. Hooray for coincidences! Anyway, she threw a tower 2 dinner at the Light House (the all-you-can-eat buffet on campus). So that was fun.

And that was it for today. But I have one more thing I need to say here that probably isn't going to make you all happy. If you read my entry yesterday you know that I've joined the Cal Poly marching band, and that I'm very excited about this. But it turns out that the band's schedule is such that I have something going on every weekend until Thanksgiving. So that means two things: no coming home for homecoming and no driving to Arcadia for the tournament of bands. I'm sincerely sorry that I won't be able to join all of my friends for these two events that I've been looking forward to for so long. I actually was going to not join the band (I'm not actually committed yet, though I will be tomorrow) just so I could come home on those two weekends. It was a very difficult choice. But what would you do? The marching band always looks like they're having so much fun, and I want to be a part of that. And if you've been following Living the SLO Life at all you'd know that I'm still looking for the friends that can mean as much to me as you all do. And I think band might be the place to find them. So I know you'll understand why I'm still going to join the Mustang Band. I hate it more than you guys do, but I know this is the right choice. And I'm still very excited about renewing my bando membership. I'll be with you guys in spirit, though, if that's not too corny.

Okay, I've got to go because Kevin has gone to bed and I don't want to keep him up. So good night room, good night moon, good night cow jumping over the moon.

Josh

PS - cheese but no crackers (Is anyone playing this game anymore? It's fun for me to come up with examples...)

mood: confident that I'm doing the right thing
music: Kevin's smooth jazz playing faintly, and Family Guy that's being played in one of the neighboring rooms
location: dorm

Our WOW group went to Firestone Grill (off campus) for dinner. I had a cajun sausage sandwich, and it was delicious. It was fun because the Giants/Dodgers game was on, and we were watching when the Dodgers came back from losing 3 to 0 in the bottom of the 9th. They ended it with a grand slam, giving them their first division title in nine years and sending them to the playoffs. I'm not a Dodgers fan, but it was great to watch. And can't you just imagine Mr. Horimoto's delight at that 7-run rally?

After that we went to our first home football game. (Actually, the second, but the first took place before any of us were here at Poly.) We played the South Dakota State, and they weren't that good. But then, neither were we. There were fumbles and interceptions all over the place. But we scored two touchdowns, and one of them was a kickoff return from the 5 yardline. So that was exciting. We won 14-7. Go Mustangs!! The band's halftime show was pretty good, considering their size. Their lines weren't as straight as I would expect RB's to be, but then the Pride of the Pacific learns a new show for every game. So what would you expect? It was fun all the same. Most people in the crowd didn't seem to care too much about the band, though. I screamed for them, of course, and most people around me glared at me. And you know what? I wasn't really concerned with what a random bunch of strangers thought of me. GO BAND!! So, yeah, the football game was a lot of fun. (I can't even imagine what a football game with a couple of really good teams would be like...like Michigan versus Ohio or something...I need to go to one of those someday.)

I'm tired of typing so just one last thing before I go: I joined the marching band. Are any of you really surprised by this? I thought not. Monday is the last day to add a class so I'm still able to join. I'll be a little behind everyone but it should be fine because I have previous marching band experience. My first rehearsal is Tuesday...I'm pretty nervous about it because I won't know anything and everyone else will. But I'm sure I'll adjust. I can't even tell you how excited I am for this. I was watching the band tonight at the game (no, really?) and they all looked like they were having a lot of fun. So whoo!

I've spent way too much time typing today, so that's all folks.

Josh

PS- football, baseball, basketball, racquetball, tennis, soccer, and lacrosse, but not badminton

mood: excited
music: "The Cowboys Overture" by John Williams
location: dorm