commas and ampersands

Well, I'm back. My little blog-cation has served its purpose, and it's time to re-enter the world of the communicative. It's been a full few weeks, with Esther's visit, more hours at work, the semester gearing up to the end and winding down at the same time, and the various and sundry day-to-day things that happen.

There were a thousand little things that I thought of to write about while I was away from lj-land (at least, away from the posting side; I kept up with everyone else's journals), but, of course, I didn't write them down, so they're lost in the netherworld of the space in between my brain and my keyboard, never to be recovered. Most of them. Some of the ideas will likely resurface at some point--I find that I mull over certain entries for quite some time before writing them--but many of the trivial, fleeting ideas are gone.

That's okay, though. Not everything that passes through my head needs to find a voice on the internet.

So, what's new? Well, my laptop's keyboard is pink now. I have pictures of my own computer, but they're still on my camera, so in the meantime, you can look at that and envision. My favorite is that the backspace key is now a magic wand. The stickers are removable, so the fun won't last forever, but in the meantime, it's very exciting. ;o)

Mariah and I are discussing our options for our apartment, the summer, and the fall. We need to come to a decision in the next few days, and suffice to say, I may be having to make different arrangements than I'd originally planned for.

I leave for a weekend in Calgary tomorrow morning. I'll get to see the show that Colin composed the orchestrations for (and which numerous other people that I know are in, but that's all kind of secondary for me). I'm ridiculously proud of him, and having heard the various pieces in their electronic incarnations as demos, I'm excited to hear them as done by real instruments played by real instrumentalists. It's the biggest project he's ever done, and he's certainly put the work into it and should be very, very proud of what he's done. I know I am. :)

We'll have the usual kind of holiday weekend. Colin has both Friday and Monday off work, which is absolutely fantastic, so I don't have my usual dilemma of having time while he's at work. Usually, when that happens, I try to schedule coffee with my girlfriends, but I'm completely okay with not having time for that. We'll have Easter dinners with both our families (Saturday brunch with mine, Sunday dinner with his), two performances of the Easter show, Easter Sunday morning service, and Monday to just chill and hang out. I fly out on Tuesday, but not until early evening, so since Colin's back at work, that's when I've scheduled my meetings and things to get done. Bank meeting, internship meeting, and probably coffee with my mom (y'know, since my parents paid for this flight...).

Today--my birthday!--has been pretty normal. It's a regular Thursday, with school, work, more school, more work. The girls in the Public Affairs office made me cupcakes, but that's about it. I work tonight, and I still have some packing and cleaning to do when I get home, so it'll be a short night before I head to the airport in the morning.

I'm very excited. Since our visit last month got cut short by about 6 days, I really need this weekend.

Anyway. Hopefully there'll be lots of pictures. Lori promised to have her camera on hand. :)

Goodness. I haven't posted a real summary of the weekend yet. I was too busy getting over the cold that I caught from Colin that he caught from Jakob.

It was a busy weekend (surprise, surprise), but a really good way to officially kick off the Christmas season. Thursday night, we went to Rocky Mountain College's Christmas concert (you know, with the whole "small world" thing with the director, who was the director at my church in California last year), and Friday and Saturday, Colin, Mom, and Dad sang in Ambrose's production of Messiah. Saturday afternoon, we went to a baby shower for Scott, Heather, and Martin; Sunday, we went to church in the morning, and then had two rehearsals in the afternoon before heading off to the airport. And somewhere in there (mostly after midnight), we still managed to find time to finish watching the first season of Arrested Development, which we'd started at Canadian Thanksgiving but not finished.

And, of course, there was the time with Kat, Aaron, and the kids, but that's already been well-photographed and posted about. :)

( A review of sorts of AUC's production of 'Messiah' )



Sunday, there was a rehearsal after church for Colin's cantata, which I'm going to sing in, despite only having one rehearsal with them. I've had the music longer than anyone else in the choir (I helped pick it), and I've been working on it on my own, so it'll be fine. After that, there was another rehearsal for the Christmas show at Foothills Alliance, which was my only chance to hear any of that show, since it'll close a few days before I get into town.


By Sunday afternoon, we were both well on our way to catching colds. Jakob, who was coming down with something, was all over Colin on Thursday, and then I think I got it from Colin by about Saturday. I stayed home Monday and slept, and that was helpful--it seems to be running its course really quickly.

And now, we're well into the home stretch of the pre-Christmas rush. I have five written assignments and two presentations to do in the next week, but fortunately, the presentations each correspond with a written assignment, so really, it's only five assignments. Also, a) some of them are already partially done and I just need to finish them up, and b) they're not all full-length papers. I don't think I have anything that will end up being longer than about 8 pages, which isn't bad at all.

Emmanuel Church's Christmas concerts are on the 13th and 14th, so we have our dress rehearsal next Wednesday. Colin has more in the way of rehearsals than I do (although I need to be in on some Borkman rehearsals in the next week, as well). He's finished with Messiah, obviously, but Foothills Lutheran's cantata only has a few rehearsals left, he's heading into tech for Foothills Alliance's show, and he has to finish the design for Steel Mags, which apparently is kind of a train-wreck of a show, in some ways.

I was going to try and keep this entry from being too epic, so I'll post pictures later, as well as a story about Amazon.com. In the meantime, my homework and my pillow are both calling me. The sooner I get to one, the sooner I can get to the other.

I was browsing through some random websites earlier this week, and I came across a site was full of "evidence" of how evil Walt Disney was (and Disney as a corporation is). It had some of the more common stories, but the one I found most amusing is that "Walt Disney was evil because he chose music by dead composers for Fantasia so that he wouldn't have to pay for the music."

While it's true that Disney (as a company) has an incredibly powerful legal team that understands the inner workings of copyright law better than just about anyone else anywhere, it makes me laugh that using public domain music is evidence of evil. How is it not an artist's prerogative to choose to either have new work commissioned, support currently established composers, or reintroduce the public to classical works? Any of those three options, especially with the scope of Disney's influence, had the potential for significant ramifications within the artists' careers (if new work had been commissioned or contemporary work used) and the public consciousness and awareness of the music scene, even though the film was originally not as well-received as hoped.

Most artists have at least some understanding of public domain, even if they don't understand copyright law as a whole. In general, with written works, at least, once the author has been dead for 70 years, the work passes into public domain, meaning that royalties are not paid. Therefore, royalties are not paid on a Shakespeare play, for instance (unless it's an adaptation or translation, in which case, royalties are paid to the publisher of the translator).

I have no doubt that fiscal choices informed part of Disney's choice of music for Fantasia, but the fact remains that by using classical music as the score for the movie, a younger generation was introduced to music that they may not have listened to otherwise, especially when the scope of the work is taken in the context of 60 years. Much of the music used may be the most popular classical music, but the fact remains that it's classical music, and anyone with any sort of musical interest and/or training should have a working knowledge and recognition of those pieces. There's merit in perpetuating the knowledge of the roots of modern music history and style, and in using public domain music, Disney allowed that.

This website (and I really can't remember the address) was obviously out to prove that Disney is eeeeevvvviiillll and is out to destroy the world. Eh. I like Disney. I also like emerging, independent art. The two are not mutually exclusive.

However, if they really wanted to talk about Disney and copyright law, they should have mentioned this: Copyright laws are radically changing with digital technology. The entire art world works differently and sources material in different ways than it used to, and that radically changes the way copyright is viewed. While it may seem that a "hard" copyright law is best for artists, in many ways, that's not the case. However, every few years, the parameters for work in the public domain changes. One of the reasons why? It's revisited (with pressure from Disney's legal team) every time Mickey Mouse and Steamboat Willie are about to enter the public domain.

In my opinion, if the author of that website was looking to tie Disney into copyright law, this is a much more compelling "Disney is evil!" argument than the fact that Fantasia uses public domain music.

(Also, this is one reason why many support a dual-layered approach to copyright. The challenge is finding a middle ground where independent artists who are hampered by a hard copyright law are allowed freedom and protected within the flexibility of such a stance, and yet the large corporations with instantly recognizable symbols [like Mickey Mouse] are protected from the soft copyright that many artists are pushing for.)

I have much to do this evening, and instead, I'm watching the Emmys red carpet coverage and wishing I was taking a nap instead.

So, let's see. This afternoon's plan? I'm planning to get a first draft of the narration for Colin's cantata written, since I've got a pretty solid idea of where it's going now. This should give him enough time to give me edit requests and tweak it all, and still have time to properly rehearse and integrate the narration into the program.

(Also, we got our cantata music yesterday, and I'm kind of disappointed. It's a weak-ish program, in my opinion--I like the Foothills Lutheran program better, although I may be kind of biased, and I wish I was singing in that one instead. So, I need to work on it and remind myself that I'm still involved in it, even though I'm not singing in it.)

I want to get around to burning DVDs of seasons 2-4 of Everwood. It's not crucial or critical, but it's something I want to get around to.

I also have to run to Target at some point this evening, but that'll be a pretty quick trip.

I think I'm going to order a workbook compatible with RCM's Grade 3 Harmony. I never did finish all my history and harmony, and even though I'm not looking to actually get my grade 10 certificate, since by this point, I'd need to retake my practical exam, which would be at least 2 years of work, in addition to doing the grade 3, 4, and 5 history, harmony, counterpoint, and analysis. That's a lot of work and a lot of exams, but I want to brush up on my theory. Even though I don't have a piano and I'm not really working on any pieces (although if I'm going to really work on my theory, I really do need to at least have a keyboard), I still want to keep my skills much sharper than they've been lately. Because, you know, I have so much extra time on my hands

Now I'm looking at keyboards on craigslist, and I just found an 88-key, weighted, almost-new keyboard for $225, which is a great price, but which we still can't really afford. Boo. It's not as nice as what we'll want someday, and it's not a real piano, which we'll also want someday, but for now, it'd be perfect for me to have something at home. Right now, I need a keyboard, rather than a piano, because of the whole apartment-living (and space, and cost of piano movers and tuners) thing. For the moment, a digital piano that's as real as possible is what I need. Eventually, we'll need to get a better one so that Colin has the tools to record soundtracks and so on, and we'll definitely want to have a real piano, as well, but right now, this would be so perfect, and I wish I could get away with not paying this month's tuition payment so I had the money for a keyboard instead. ;)

And, of course, there's always reading to be done. Nothing due for tomorrow, thankfully, but hopefully I'm going to have dinner with Jenny tomorrow evening, so I don't want to leave too much to do afterward.

I need a piano.

Every now and then, I start desperately missing having one in my house, and every now and then I feel like I'm not just missing the fact that I have one, but I actually start needing one.

Now is one of the "needing" times.

I want a real piano, but that'll come eventually. I hate the thought of having a keyboard that's less than a full 88-key, but I'd even take that right now. It's hard to be in choir without at least being able to pick out the melodies enough to practice at home. Besides that, though, I'm also taking voice lessons this semester (again--needing to be able to practice at home) and I'm also taking a Bach music history class. Part of the class is a keyboard section, which I'd love to participate in, but if I can't find the music and practice it, that becomes a bit difficult. The keyboard part is optional, and since I'm just taking the class as an elective, if I don't have the time, it's fine, but I'd rather have the deciding factor be my schedule or desire rather than my lack of a piano.

However, I'd like to at least have the option. Of course, the school has many, many pianos, but since I'm not a student in the music school, I don't have access to the practice rooms, and any of the pianos in the theatre school are in classrooms.

So... I'm not sure how I'm going to deal with this, especially since classes have started and I really do need to find one soon.

A whole bunch of Christmas music for jennywren and anyone else who wants to take it... :)

Trans-Siberian Orchestra:

Appalachian Snowfall
O Come All Ye Faithful/O Holy Night
Wish Liszt (Toy Shop Madness)
Silent Night
Wizards in Winter
Nutcracker Suite
Midnight Christmas Eve
Siberian Sleighride
Jingle Bells
Christmas Canon in D
Who-Ville Medley
O Christmas Tree
Deck the Halls

Sarah McLachlan:

The First Noel/Mary Mary
Song for a Winter's Night
I'll Be Home For Christmas
Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas
Christmastime Is Here

City on a Hill:

It's Christmastime

Josh Groban:

Angels We Have Heard On High
The First Noel
It Came Upon a Midnight Clear
Silent Night
The Christmas Song

Jars of Clay:

Little Drummer Boy
Wonderful Christmastime

Troy Andrews (Studio 60's Christmas episode last year):
O Holy Night

robyn_migratori tagged me with the letter C. So... here we go, with my top 10 songs beginning with the C (in alphabetical order, because I'm too undecided to rank them from 10 to 1).

1. California by Rufus Wainwright. I think I picked this one up during audiography's "Los Angeles" theme week, which means that there are about five songs in my playlist entitled "California." Appropriate for my life right now, no? This one is my favorite of all of them, though.
   
   
2. Calling You by Blue October. I really like Blue October (although I find that I like their earlier stuff and I'm not a big fan of "Hate Me," which was the first one to get major radio play), and this song is an interesting one. It's a catchy little tune, and I always find myself singing along, but the lyrics have an interesting undertone of desperation and a slight mistrust to them. They were playing on the Stampede Coke Stage on Sunday night, and I'd wanted to go, but we were in Drumheller. Boo.
   
   
3. Camera One by Josh Joplin. Another song that I first heard on TV--this one was on Scrubs, although I can't remember the episode right now. I think it was in one of the early seasons. With this one, I think I was struck more by the lyrics than by the music.
   
   
4. Can't Take it In by Imogen Heap. I loved The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (and thought that they were remarkably true to the book), and I love the compilation album, too--it's not technically the soundtrack, but it's a cool compilation. I just love the imagery of this song describing the first view of Narnia and the awe and wonder that the kids felt. I sometimes feel like this should be my theme song, that I should play it when I start to get too blasé about life in general.
   
   
5. Cathedrals by Jump, Little Children. I've loved this song since the moment I first heard it at the end of the season one finale of Everwood. It's an amazing song, and the imagery is so evocative and poignant. I can hear it now without always seeing the montage in my head, but every time I re-watch that scene, I still cry.
   
   
6. Chocolate by Snow Patrol. Another band that I like more than their radio play, although "Chasing Cars" did get me interested in them. I like so much of their music, though. They've got some really interesting songs, and this is one of them that ends up playing in the background and I don't realize it until I get halfway through.
   
   
7. Cinderella Story by Plain White T's. I'm absolutely in love with "Hey There, Delilah," and I thought I'd see what some of their other music sounds like... some of it, I'm not a huge fan of, but this song a good one. I haven't listened to it enough to be able to sing along, but so far, I like it.
   
   
8. Close Every Door, from Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. Despite a rather horrendous experience with this show in my third year of college, I still like it. Or maybe I should say, I like it again. It's been four years, and I could probably watch it now without cringing. :o) This song is one of my favorites, and I'll always remember making up our own backstage ballet with Jen and Chelsea.
   
   
9. Comfort by Deb Talan. Her voice is so intriguing to me. It's kind of raw, and sometimes, I want to listen to something smoother and more refined, but there are days when I just love the way she sounds. This song in particular is an interesting mix--it's this raw, kind of harsh voice combined with lyrics about finding comfort, and something about that really draws me in.
   
   
10. Complainte de la Butte by Rufus Wainwright. This one from the Moulin Rouge soundtrack, which has to rank up there as one of my all-time favorite movies and soundtracks. Most of it is just so silly and pokes fun at itself ("Elephant Love Medley," anyone?), but this song fits the undertones of the movie so well.

If you want your own letter, comment!

And here are the answers to the music meme, with most of the songs available. Let me know what you take! (And links for the rest of the songs are still coming.)

( Let's make music )

Ganked from absolutely everyone on my flist:

Step 1. Put your playlist on random.
Step 2. Post the first line from the first 25 songs that play, no matter how embarrassing.
Step 3. Strike out the songs when someone guesses correctly. NO GOOGLING

( Bring on the clowns )

As per everyone else, comments are screened. Some of them are ridiculously easy; some will be harder. I'll update with any answers tomorrow!

For bookie85 and anyone else who wants them... lots of Weepies songs.

Keep it There
All That I Want
Happiness
Stars
Gotta Have You
Somebody Loved
Simple Life
Love Doesn't Last Too Long
Living in Twilight
Jolene
Take it From Me

And four Deb Talan songs:
Vincent
Lullaby
Forgiven
Comfort

For seffina, and anyone else who wants them... a few songs I'm loving this week:

"Camera One," Josh Joplin

"Pacific Street," Hem

"Unsingable Name," Mike Doughty

"Painting By Chagall," The Weepies

"Amazing," Blue October

_standingstill, that song is fantastic.  Freakin' amazing!!!!  I'm listening to it on repeat, and just not getting tired of it.  Every time I listen to it, I get the giggles, just because it's so great.

Just had to get that off my chest.

I watched the Disney version of A Wrinkle in Time last night, finally, which was a double treat, becase a) Madeleine L'Engle is my favorite author of all time, and b) Gregory Smith played Calvin O'Keefe.  Wrinkle isn't necessarily my favorite of her books, but as far as I know, it's the only that's been made into a movie, so I'll take what I can get.

(Although why more of her books haven't been made into movies yet, I'll never understand.  They're so perfect for that.)



Seriously!!  Dude!  Loving this song!!

I have mosquito bites, and I hate them.

I have to pack and I don't want to.