The One Where I Sing

The One With Spizzerinctum

So, last night I had one of my favorite nights ever! Last night was Global Night Commute



But I didn't go. Baylor got a hold of it and set up a committee with activities and rules and instructions.....and somehow I think they missed the point, so I went to dinner with my college group instead. The women's group at church wanted to cook us dinner so we all went over to a very nice house in Robinson (i think? Too many small towns...) and had a blast! We started out by playing volleyball with a ball designed for King Kong. That was...interesting. Did you know that I am okay at volleyball? Yeah, me neither. I kinda figured it would end up something like me and football. You know, 'Jason, go long!" "How long?" "REALLY long." "Really long?" "Until we start to look VERY small." Meanwhile I go for Starbucks. (Quick, name the show!!)

But, nope. Didn't happen. Anyway, so that was fun. It might have had something to do with the ball that was two feet wide...or maybe that's just me. After that, we had delicious hamburgers and Queso (made by Jesus himself) and a chocolate fountain. A CHOCOLATE FOUNTAIN!!!! Seriously, I moved in. In fact, I moved in after that. I am not in my own house anymore - I now live in the land of queso and chocolate fountians. I finally had to lock the door because these people keep trying to drag me out of their computer chair. Sheesh, so rude! Wait your turn! They were so nice last night with the queso and chocolate fountain.



Whoops, looks like I digress. The rest of the evening was spent playing games like Catchphrase, which was psycho. Here's an example. "Okay...um....it's Chinese....it means trouble!!!!!" And the answer? Chop Suey. Hahahahahaha. We also played Pit, which is the LOUDEST game I have ever encountered. I am not even going to describe it, just try it sometime. And lastly, there was a very long round of Balderdash. Have you ever played that? It's great. They give you a weird word or an acronym and you have to make up what it means. The goal is to get the rest of the group to vote for yours as the real definition, but it quickly became apparent that we just weren't smart enough for the game. Case in point ***MINOR INAPPROPRIATENESS WARNING*** My word? Spizzerinctum. Actual meaning? Cheap, tacky decorations. Options from the rest of the table (which consisted of a mother, a high schooler, and two middle schoolers)? HELLo, very large spit balls, the hole at which a fart comes out, the space in between the back and butt-crack, and wasted slut.


'Nuff said.

Anyway, just wanted to update you a little. Soon I will have a HUGE post coming with more pictures than you can possible imagine. It will be some kind of record. Seriously, call Guiness. Okay, bye.

The One With Me

The first real Digital Audio Post! Enjoy!

The One With the Ringtones

So, I learned something extremely interesting today. Something that I really should have guessed by now, I mean it makes sense. I have come to the conclusion that music ringtones are not good.

In most of the world, music ringtones are subjects of joy and entertainment. In the music school, they are like pitch pipes.

I am series. In a music classroom, when someone inadvertently leaves their sound on, it illicits an unconcious choral response. It happened twice today. First in Diction and then at lunch. Both times, we all started jamming out, to the bemusement of both Dr. Williamson and the normal students of the SUB. *sigh* we are a sad bunch. On the other hand, it is funny just how many of my fellow students can rock out to the lyrics, "Coach said to fake right and break left. Watch out for the pick and keep your eye on defense. Gotta run the give and go, take the ball to the hole, and don't be afraid to shoot the outside 'J.'" Hee hee hee. YEAH FOR MUSIC SCHOOL! Today I only half hate it.

Anyway, just wanted to say hello to everyone. I am working on some new music to put up, so keep your eye on the music player at the top. Adios!

The One With the Women's Choir

Current Mood: Tired
Currently Watching: Friends

So.....Fixed the blog, as you can see. I am SOOOOOOOOOOOOOO WIPED OUT! And it is only day 1 of this week. Many more killer days to come. Therefore this post will be a short one. I went to the Women's Choir concert tongiht and it was AWESOME!!! I was so impressed with their ability and the songs in their concert. Of course, they have the same director that I do..... ;-) Anyway, I knew it was going to be a great evening when I saw the first song in the program, "O Aula Nobilis." The women sang this song the only year I went to competition in high school and I have loved it ever since. Haven't heard it since though. Anyway, I thought I would share it with you. Let me know what you think!

The One From ACD

So...something obviously went a little wonky with the blog this weekend. It seems that the Easterr stuff caused a bit of a template crash. Stinker. Anyway, I will try to fix it before the end of the week. At the moment, I am sitting in American Constitutional Development (gag) trying to focus on freedom of the press. You can see how well that's going. Oh well, back to the grindstone. Have a great week, everyone!

The One From Religion

Alrighty, so right now I am sitting my Religion class and I do not feel like paying attention at all (Sorry, Chad). Anyway, I thought I would post a little update for you. I know that it's been a while, but I am trying to be more consistent, I promise! *cough*Amber*cough* ;-)

Let me fill you in a little bit on the structure of the choirs here at Baylor. In theory, they move in order of skill like this Women's Choir/Men's Choir--->Concert Choir--->A Capella Choir--->Chamber Singers

I was perfectly content in this. I accepted that A Capella wwould be better, I mean they sing a capella! And they have the division head for their director! However........I went to their spring concert last week, and I have to say - I was bored out of my mind (my apologies to anyone in A Capella out there)! Nearly all of their music was olf-fashioned sacred and in another language. Much of it was non-melodic and though I am sure it took work to be able to produce such dissonant tones, it did not sound like something worth my time. Then, on top of that, THEY DON'T SING A CAPELLA! Now that's just cheating!

So, to sum up, I now understand why everyone in Concert hates A Capella. Totally justified.

Here's the kicker. Somehow, I punched my way into Concert this semester without an audition...that's obviously not going to fly in the fall. What makes this worse is that I get NO SAY in which choir gets me next semester. Turns out that the director of A Capella as the diviision head, gets to take everyone he wants to fill his choir and Concert gets the leftovers. I DON'T WANT TO BE IN A CAPELLA!!!!! IN addition to unbelievably monotonous music, the A Capella director has been driving me nuts. He has been directing us for the last two weeks while we get ready for the president's inauguration and every day is a struggle not to walk out.

Really. It's that bad. And now, if I sing my best in my audition, I may be stuck in his choir. I was talking about this to the Concert director after rehearsal today and he looked at me and said, "But do your best at the audition. Don't throw it." Oooooh...psychic. However, being in Concert over A Capella next semester is important enough to me to blow the audition. Grrrrrrr... Boooo! Not fun!

The One With Diadeloso

Current Mood: Normal
Current Music: "She Mov'd Thro' the Fair" from Celtic Woman


Hooo WEEEE!!! Wasuup, everybody? You know, I don't think we use the phrase "hoowee" nearly enough. I mean come on...there is little else that can as quickly identify you with Texas than a good loud "HOOOOO WEEEEE!". Hahahahaha. Don't read this paragraph, it's dumb. So, what's bee going on.....I have to say that nothing big is happening, so I think I will just ramble about a bunch of little things until I get bored. Read as you please. Yesterday was Diadeloso here at Baylor University. Diadeloso, for those of you less linguistically blessed than I, is Spanish for "Day off of school." I swung (swang? swinged? did swinged?) by in the afternoon with my sister, just to see what it was all about. I mean, it's been a tradition for something like 70 years, so I figured that it must be good. That's sensible, right? Well, you would be wrong, thanks for playing. There were three booths with food, a section of those big bounce house looking things, a stage for the cloggers (I think it's actually called stepping...but clogging more accurately relays my distaste), and the snow truck. Oh yes, we had a snow truck. All the way from Wisconsin. So, yesterday, Baylor had snow. Weeeelllllll....more precisely, by the time we got there, Baylor had mud. Lots and lots of mud. It was all kinds of gross. But of couse Texans, being the pinnacle of intelligent society that we are, were chunking it all over the place. Mudman contests, mudball fights, mud angels. Needless to say.....we left. I want to be in charge of Diadeloso next year, because SURELY I can put together something better than that. I mean, they have a whole committee for the event, and I would be willing to bet that I could put on a more impressive show all by my lonesome. Alas, I don't care enough. ;-)


But since I am talking about Baylor - Yesterday was voting day for student government positions too. Now, they took over chapel earlier this week to let all of the candidates make their pitches, so I took a vested interest in this semester's elections (last year I fortuitously skipped that particular chapel). Only one guy impressed me with his speech, the others were either too well rehearsed or too un-organized. Either way, they were all mocked mercilessly by Jonathan and me. So, voting time rolled around and I dutifully logged into the information network and cast my votes. One for Travis Plummer (the guy with a good speech) for External Vice President (and what's that about? This guy's only president on the OUTSIDE? The other gets to be VP on the inside where it matters....). For the other six positions open, I voted for....

...
...

MEEEEEEEEEEE!!!! Hee hee hee. Oh come on, stop looking at me like that. Don't tell me that every time you get to a write-in vote on a ballot you don't want to write your own name in. Well, I did what normal collegiate students do not. I voted for ME! I am the AMERICAN DREAM! (Oops, sorry Canadian Emily....I am the NORTH AMERICAN DREAM!) Hahahahaha. Gee, I hope I win.


Um, next topic. Does anyone else get frustrated with lukewarm Christians? Hmmmm, probably should have prefaced this paragraph with a hypocrisy warning, but eh..... I hate seeing people, close people, change into people that I don't think they want to be. It also makes me wonder how I'VE changed over the years. Have I slacked off where I should have remained strong? U qiusl (Woops, had my fingers lined up on the wrong keys). I would like to think that I have grown into a better person since I left home - someone closer to God and someone people would be proud to say they knew. Unfortunately, this could all be my own idle dreaming. Someone a long time ago told me to pay attention to my friends, they are a reflection of myself. Much wisdom resides in that last sentence (which is how you KNOW it didn't come from me). But within it also lies cause for worry. These friends of mine who are beginning to shy away from many of the things that made me trust them in the first place....Am I the same way? Worry, worry, worry. Do you ever feel like all-out, die hard Christians no longer exist? Where is everyone?! What is it about this age that seems to be the cut off point for growth? Cursed be to all those in their early twenties!!! :-) I hope someboday would say something to me. In fact, this is YOUR job! Pay attention! If you see me mess up, SAY SOMETHING! Tell me! Call me up and say, "Senor Hunt, das not coo." I don't want to end up the way my friends did.


Today I was walking around the music building because I had some time to kill, so I recorded an awesome audio post as I strolled past each occupied practice room. There were flutes, percussionists, mirambas, and all kinds of other musical genres floating around.

Then I forgot to push pound. I was mildly frustrated. I was going to re-record it, but this goober with a shirt that was tighter than ANY guy should EVER be wearing starting giving me the evil eye. What. Like I was going to STEAL their music with my magical sound sucker-upper. Anyway, sorry. No audio post today.


Okay, I think I am all writed out. I hope you each have a SPLENDIFEROUS weekend. Adios!

The One With God's Sense of Humor

Golly gee, it's late. And I am UBER tired. And I have to be up insanely early tomorrow morning. But I don't want to go to bed! Instead, I thought I would pass on this little physics lesson that I found fascinating! And that's saying something, because I HATE physics! It is things like this that reassure me of God's sens of humor. I love the fact that no matter how far we advance, we never understand it all...and the stuff that eludes us is astronomical. So here we go...

*****Begin Physics Lesson*****

So, in an effort to determine whether the nature of matter conformed to that of particles or waves, physicists set up a simple little experiment. Picture this, if you will...an electron-emitter (think pitching machine at the batting cages) directly across from a screen capable of detecting the impact of electrons. In between these two devices, the scientists placed a metal plate with a slit cut vertically into the middle of it. Now imagine that the emitter fired one electron at a time toward the opposite side of the room (the slit plate and detector screen), but without aiming for the slit directly. You would expect to have a number of the electrons miss the slit in the middle of the plate, bounce off, and disappear, while a thin line appears in the middle of the detector screen as some of the electrons make it through the slit unimpeded.

And that's exactly what happened, thus proving that electrons (the smallest detectable units of matter) behave like particles.

If the electrons had behaved like waves (think if the same set up was used, but on the surface of a wave pool. Instead of firing electron particles, the emitter sends out a wave), then the wave emitted would hit the slit and the central part of the wave would make it through and radiate out on the other side, eventually hitting the screen. The detector screen would register an area of high intensity directly behind the slit, with a gradual decrease in intensity further from the center.

But the electrons didn't do that.

So, to further test their hypothesis, the physicists replaced the metal plate with one that had TWO slits cut in it, neither of them directly in line with the emitter. In our hypothetical wave-pool example, the new configuration would form an Interference Pattern on the detector screen. As the wave from the emitter hit each of the two slits, a new smaller wave would make it past and continue on toward the detector screen. Where the crests of these two smaller waves meet, a high intensity line appears on the detector screen. Where the waves cancel each other out, a low intensity area appears, essentially painting the screen in zebra stripes of electron hits.

But, again, that's not what happened. As expected with particles, the electrons fired individually from the emitter toward the two slits appeared randomly distributed across the detector screen......for the first few minutes. After that, scientists began to notice a pattern in the arrangement of the electron hits. Can you guess what the pattern was? Why yes, yes it WAS an interference pattern.

Imagine their shocked faces. When only one slit was present, the electrons behaved like particles. When they were fired through two slits, the electrons behaved like waves.

Oh wait....it gets better.......

So the scientists left the experiment sitting exactly like it was and ran off to get their hyper-sensitive electron measuring equipment, specially designed to render accurate detection of electrons without hindering them or altering results. They aimed the device at one of the slits so they would know how many electrons were going through each slit and how they were creating an interference pattern if they were fired one at a time (remember that a single wave cannot create the pattern, only went it interacts with another wave). Anyway, they turned their little measuring device on and then started the same experiment again...




And the interference pattern disappeared. Only two lines showed up on the detector screen, exactly as expected from matter particles. The fact that the electrons were being observed caused them to once again act like particles.

And God laughed.

*****End Physics Lesson*****

The One From History Class

Wow, so it's been an exceptionally long time since my last post. Sorry about that? I really wish I had more time to put more fun things on here for everyone, alas life is psycho-crazy! At the moment, I am sitting in the worst class I have ever taken. It's 3 hours long. 3 HOURS LONG! It's okay thoughh, I only have 2 hours and 39 minutes left.

Dang it.

And, knowing this professor, he will not pass back our tests until the end. That frustratets me. My success in this couruse depends on the red number at the top of that test. If it goes as poorly as the first one did, then I can safely walk out of class whenever I want to because there will be NOTHING I can do to salvage my grade. Grrrrrr...I HATE THIS CLASS!

So, let's talk about something nice, shall we? Like last weekend for example! I know that you are all wondering about my celebrity weekend, so let me fill you in. On Friday, I went down to College Station and had dinner with some friends, then we sat around and talked for a while. On Saturday morning, Suzy and I went over to Diana's school for the Paw Prints Festival. Lots of fun for little kids. Notsomuch for us. At noon, we all went back to the Saylak's house to await the LIMOSINE (I don't think that is spelled correctly. I don't care.) arranged to take us to Houston. It was so much fun! I have pictures to put up when I get a chance. We then took a grand trip down to Houston to see Riverdance and let me tell you, we all popped into new trendy clothes, and tore up Hard Rock beforehand. Have I told you how much I LOVE Riverdance? I love Riverdance. I LOVE RIVERDANCE!!! It is one of my favorite shows of all time. I danced, I sang, I fiddled and piped..... ;-) I got to spend that night in a nice hotel with a room all to myself (sorry, girls!) and the next morning, the limo took us back. Can you say awesome? Allow me to teach you...AWESOME! :-)

Anyway, last weekend was great. School stinks. I think that just about sums it up.