Sunday, March 13, 2005
Perfect Dark
Yay new blog entry! I wonder how long it will take for people to notice that I wrote in this thing again. Probably a pretty long time...that's what I get, I guess.
So tomorrow starts finals week. On Monday: Basic Circuits Analysis. On Tuesday: Chemistry and Fundamentals of Comp Sci. On Wednesday through Friday: diddly squat. Hooray. I find it amusing that the one weekend I pick to finally write to you all is the weekend I should be busiest. But hey, my strategy is to do well before the finals. I try to come into this week shooting to keep the grades I already have, rather than recovering from slacking off all quarter. And I've been doing pretty well. I've A's in all of my classes -- including comp sci (I've finally clawed my way back up to an A from that failed quiz taken during the first week of school). I'm especially proud of chemistry, which is the class that everyone said was the toughest class EVER, which I was taking with the teacher that everyone said was the worst teacher EVER. But I've managed to keep a solid 97% in the class, and that makes me feel pretty good. Woot. While we're on the subject of my accomplishments, I'll mention that my speech class voted me "speaker of the quarter." I got a nice little trophy that my teacher made by supergluing a miniature globe into a plastic trophy and sticking a couple of fake palm trees and Gumby with angel wings into the top of it. Hey, it's the thought that counts...
So that's school. On the band side of things, marching band has come to an end. Oh no! What am I going to do with myself?! I truly will miss MB...I can't wait until next fall. There will, however, be a few scattered performances during spring quarter, including open house weekend (which is apparently a big deal 'round these parts). So that makes me a little happier. WindO has been going fine. We had our concert last night without any major screw-ups. After my performance I was able to listen to the wind ensemble (whom I had never heard perform before) and I have since decided that they truly are a superb band, especially considering that Cal Poly is not known in the slightest for its music program. So, for as much as J gets on my nerves from time to time, I think I will probably have to stick with windO (schedule allowing, of course).
In other trumpet news...I'm now a paid trumpeter! Oh, that's right. Atascadero High School is doing a production of West Side Story, and their orchestra is short a trumpet player. The director contacted Cal Poly with a request for a decent player a month or two ago, and I ended up emailing him. Long story short, he found someone he thought was more suited for the part. Golly gee darn. But two days ago the director (whose name, by the way, is Johnny Johnson...who names their kid John Johnson?) sent me an email to tell me that the trumpeter he had found was now unable to play the show and to ask if I was still interested in doing it. And the best part? He was prepared to pay me $300. Naturally I couldn't resist. So he got the music to me that day and I looked over it for an hour or two. I was exceptionally nervous when I went to my first rehearsal on Saturday (which, unfortunately for me, was everyone else's fourth or fifth rehearsal) but it turned out okay. I have never seen West Side Story, but now that I've played the music once and listened to the CD recording Johnny made me, I can play through it all just fine. So there you go. On a side note, there's another rehearsal this Saturday that I need to go to, so now I'm staying here in SLO until then. A few of my friends will still be around here between Tuesday and Saturday so I'm pretty sure I won't get too bored...I think...
On the social side of my life...well...it gets a little complicated here. I'll try to summarize it here as best as I can. Courtney and I have been getting very...er..."close" over the past few weeks. We've been spending a night or two a week alone together, watching movies or killing time playing Yahoo! games or just sitting and talking. Now we all know that I've had a slight crush on her pretty much since I met her, and naturally now that we've gotten closer this has grown into something that I think could turn into a relationship. (Please note the use of the word "think.") And that's all well and good.
But here's where it gets hairy: there's this flautist in windO named Jamie. I don't really know her all that well but she seems exceptionally friendly and sweet. (And hey, we know how I feel about flautists...) (By the way, is it "flutist" or "flautist?" Dictionary.com says "flutist" but I thought "flautist." Googling either one give hundreds of websites about flutes. Sigh.) Anyway, I've recently come to the opinion that my perception of dating is somewhat immature. I've always thought of "dating" as referring to a lasting, committed relationship. I think, though, that a date is what you go on with someone you don't really know but would like to, and all that it means is that you think you might be interested in them. And if all goes well, then you can move into a lasting committed relationship. Does that make sense? It's hard to put into words...the point is, I'm trying to get over "asking someone out" being such a big deal. And hooray for me! I called Jamie today and asked if she wanted to go to dinner. She said she was too busy because she had to write an essay...*cough*...but that's not the point. I don't know her nearly well enough to fall madly in love with her, but I have seen enough to know that I might be interested. And that seems to not be such a big deal to me anymore. So I'm going to explore that possibility. (Oh, and I ought to mention that Jamie and I are planning on doing something later this week, after we have some of our finals behind us.) And that's all well and good.
So I've kind of been hovering between the two of them, and this doesn't seem like such a bad place to be. I'm not...you know...hitting on both of them or something. I'm just spending time with them to see where things go. (I'm pretty sure that doesn't make me a horrible person...but then my definition of "horrible" has changed considerably since I've been in SLO. Feel free to advise me against all this if that's what needs to be done.)
And that's it...kind of. (I know, I know. I suck at summarizing.) A few nights ago, Courtney and I had a conversation that got everything out in the open. Evidently we're both interested in a relationship, but we're not quite ready to start one yet. So that's where we left it. Sigh.
I'm in the position now of still wanting to get to know Jamie, but really not wanting to hurt Courtney. So hooray for struggling with that.
Gah...there's so much to say! Well, I'll save all the rest (you'd think I would have exhausted the issue from the above five paragraphs...but no) for another time. If you're that interested, you can call me.
Okay, well I'm going to go to sleep so I can get up around 7:30 and study a little for my first final. Good night.
Cheers,
Josh
PS - I hope to continue updating this blog on a regular basis. I plan on doing this by giving only a brief outline of what I've done over three- or four-day periods. This entry is a poor example of this due to the outrageous amount of women troubles that needed to be discussed. But hey, the first two paragraphs summarized the rest of my life for the last month and a half. See? I can abbreviate some things...
Quoted Randomness:
[The following quotes probably aren't entirely accurate considering I'm trying to remember them from a month ago. But they're close...ish.]
[In response to Nick's complaining about the petting-zoo animals]
"Nick, you're ugly...and you smell bad. But we still bring you places and take pictures of you."
--Stacie Townsend
[In response to the Wgasa tour guide's pitch for donating to the Wild Animal Park]
"The more you spend, the more you save...the animals."
--Nick Brown
So tomorrow starts finals week. On Monday: Basic Circuits Analysis. On Tuesday: Chemistry and Fundamentals of Comp Sci. On Wednesday through Friday: diddly squat. Hooray. I find it amusing that the one weekend I pick to finally write to you all is the weekend I should be busiest. But hey, my strategy is to do well before the finals. I try to come into this week shooting to keep the grades I already have, rather than recovering from slacking off all quarter. And I've been doing pretty well. I've A's in all of my classes -- including comp sci (I've finally clawed my way back up to an A from that failed quiz taken during the first week of school). I'm especially proud of chemistry, which is the class that everyone said was the toughest class EVER, which I was taking with the teacher that everyone said was the worst teacher EVER. But I've managed to keep a solid 97% in the class, and that makes me feel pretty good. Woot. While we're on the subject of my accomplishments, I'll mention that my speech class voted me "speaker of the quarter." I got a nice little trophy that my teacher made by supergluing a miniature globe into a plastic trophy and sticking a couple of fake palm trees and Gumby with angel wings into the top of it. Hey, it's the thought that counts...
So that's school. On the band side of things, marching band has come to an end. Oh no! What am I going to do with myself?! I truly will miss MB...I can't wait until next fall. There will, however, be a few scattered performances during spring quarter, including open house weekend (which is apparently a big deal 'round these parts). So that makes me a little happier. WindO has been going fine. We had our concert last night without any major screw-ups. After my performance I was able to listen to the wind ensemble (whom I had never heard perform before) and I have since decided that they truly are a superb band, especially considering that Cal Poly is not known in the slightest for its music program. So, for as much as J gets on my nerves from time to time, I think I will probably have to stick with windO (schedule allowing, of course).
In other trumpet news...I'm now a paid trumpeter! Oh, that's right. Atascadero High School is doing a production of West Side Story, and their orchestra is short a trumpet player. The director contacted Cal Poly with a request for a decent player a month or two ago, and I ended up emailing him. Long story short, he found someone he thought was more suited for the part. Golly gee darn. But two days ago the director (whose name, by the way, is Johnny Johnson...who names their kid John Johnson?) sent me an email to tell me that the trumpeter he had found was now unable to play the show and to ask if I was still interested in doing it. And the best part? He was prepared to pay me $300. Naturally I couldn't resist. So he got the music to me that day and I looked over it for an hour or two. I was exceptionally nervous when I went to my first rehearsal on Saturday (which, unfortunately for me, was everyone else's fourth or fifth rehearsal) but it turned out okay. I have never seen West Side Story, but now that I've played the music once and listened to the CD recording Johnny made me, I can play through it all just fine. So there you go. On a side note, there's another rehearsal this Saturday that I need to go to, so now I'm staying here in SLO until then. A few of my friends will still be around here between Tuesday and Saturday so I'm pretty sure I won't get too bored...I think...
On the social side of my life...well...it gets a little complicated here. I'll try to summarize it here as best as I can. Courtney and I have been getting very...er..."close" over the past few weeks. We've been spending a night or two a week alone together, watching movies or killing time playing Yahoo! games or just sitting and talking. Now we all know that I've had a slight crush on her pretty much since I met her, and naturally now that we've gotten closer this has grown into something that I think could turn into a relationship. (Please note the use of the word "think.") And that's all well and good.
But here's where it gets hairy: there's this flautist in windO named Jamie. I don't really know her all that well but she seems exceptionally friendly and sweet. (And hey, we know how I feel about flautists...) (By the way, is it "flutist" or "flautist?" Dictionary.com says "flutist" but I thought "flautist." Googling either one give hundreds of websites about flutes. Sigh.) Anyway, I've recently come to the opinion that my perception of dating is somewhat immature. I've always thought of "dating" as referring to a lasting, committed relationship. I think, though, that a date is what you go on with someone you don't really know but would like to, and all that it means is that you think you might be interested in them. And if all goes well, then you can move into a lasting committed relationship. Does that make sense? It's hard to put into words...the point is, I'm trying to get over "asking someone out" being such a big deal. And hooray for me! I called Jamie today and asked if she wanted to go to dinner. She said she was too busy because she had to write an essay...*cough*...but that's not the point. I don't know her nearly well enough to fall madly in love with her, but I have seen enough to know that I might be interested. And that seems to not be such a big deal to me anymore. So I'm going to explore that possibility. (Oh, and I ought to mention that Jamie and I are planning on doing something later this week, after we have some of our finals behind us.) And that's all well and good.
So I've kind of been hovering between the two of them, and this doesn't seem like such a bad place to be. I'm not...you know...hitting on both of them or something. I'm just spending time with them to see where things go. (I'm pretty sure that doesn't make me a horrible person...but then my definition of "horrible" has changed considerably since I've been in SLO. Feel free to advise me against all this if that's what needs to be done.)
And that's it...kind of. (I know, I know. I suck at summarizing.) A few nights ago, Courtney and I had a conversation that got everything out in the open. Evidently we're both interested in a relationship, but we're not quite ready to start one yet. So that's where we left it. Sigh.
I'm in the position now of still wanting to get to know Jamie, but really not wanting to hurt Courtney. So hooray for struggling with that.
Gah...there's so much to say! Well, I'll save all the rest (you'd think I would have exhausted the issue from the above five paragraphs...but no) for another time. If you're that interested, you can call me.
Okay, well I'm going to go to sleep so I can get up around 7:30 and study a little for my first final. Good night.
Cheers,
Josh
PS - I hope to continue updating this blog on a regular basis. I plan on doing this by giving only a brief outline of what I've done over three- or four-day periods. This entry is a poor example of this due to the outrageous amount of women troubles that needed to be discussed. But hey, the first two paragraphs summarized the rest of my life for the last month and a half. See? I can abbreviate some things...
Quoted Randomness:
[The following quotes probably aren't entirely accurate considering I'm trying to remember them from a month ago. But they're close...ish.]
[In response to Nick's complaining about the petting-zoo animals]
"Nick, you're ugly...and you smell bad. But we still bring you places and take pictures of you."
--Stacie Townsend
[In response to the Wgasa tour guide's pitch for donating to the Wild Animal Park]
"The more you spend, the more you save...the animals."
--Nick Brown
