And the site is DOWN....... :-) Upgrades in progress. You know it's been two years since my website saw any significant improvements. Hopefully in a week or two, there will be some BRAND NEW FUNNESS on the web!!
In the meantime! Why don't you check out the newest contenders for the Inner Circle!
Howdy, howdy, howdy! Can you believe it? Christmas is already here again! Wow, this year has gone by quickly. Well, relatively so. Maybe not quickly enough at some points. Boo for school. :-) So, I am sitting here in the living room watching the Muppet Christmas Caol (one of my ALL TIME favorite movies) because I am a little under the weather today.
Where did we get that phrase? I mean, really. Random. Under the weather? What does weather have to do with my health? Anyway, I digress.
I have had a cold for the past few days and though I am feeling much better today, I am still not back at my best. Normally, I wouldn't mind since it isn't a big deal to have a cold, but it means that we had to postpone recording our fake Christmas album. THAT bums me out because I was really looking forward to singing "Silent Night." Grady's version is so good!! Oh well. That's life. Maybe we'll do a fake spring album or something. :-) Or maybe we'll have Christmas in February! YEAH!!!
Have any of you ever been over to NORAD's Santa tracking website? If you have kids at home, this is a GREAT one to watch as a family. NORAD tracks Santa's progress around the globe as he delivers his presents so that your kids know exactly when to go to bed. :-)
That was random, but it was on my mind today. Enjoy!!
I hope that you each have a WONDERFUL Christmas!!! I was trying to think of a Christmas gift to get for all of my faithful blog readers, but I was at a complete loss. I am afraid that you'll just have to make do with LOADS more Christmas music! If your browser doesn't load the music, clear your cache and sing along to some Christmas jams!!!!
The music player has been updated! You know, just in case you didn't get that from the title. :-) First off, a whole BUNCH of new songs have been added, so turn your speakers up and have a listen! Secondly, the new version should force your browser to download the new player, but if it doesn't, you will need to clear your browser cache. And if you are using Internet Explorer and it is still not working, PLEASE consider downloading a new browser. Firefox and Opera are both excellent alternatives and completely free. Finally, I have included a playlist on the left so that you can see what is in the player. Have fun!
Well, I am now officially on vacation!!! Is my apartment clean? No. Did I even finish all of my laundry before I left? No. Is it better than it was? Well, yes. But I choose not to dwell upon it! I will just have to head down the day before Truett moves in and REALLY clean it all up. I started with the best intentions yesterday; really I did. I was going to get the whole place cleaned up and rearranged so that my new roommate, Truett, could move in unhindered in January, but I am afraid that tragedy struck.
I found "The Office" online. Suddenly I was sucked into some kind of weird parallel universe where co-workers have arguments with fake artificially intelligent computer systems and others have dueling Christmas parties and others turn into vampires...
So, I didn't get much done. :-) TODAY, I actually DID get a lot accomplished. I mean, you can see the carpet now. What. That's a good thing. Of course, you can no longer see the countertops or the tables since everything from the floor is now on them, but that's just an insignificant detail. Stop dwelling on it. Sheesh, some people can NOT let stuff go!
I am now sitting at my parents house relishing the fact that Christmas is ALMOST here and I am officially out of school, away from Waco, and enjoying those two facts immensely. Tonight, we all played a little Texas Hold'em. And by all, I mean my mom, dad, sister, and Truett. It was Truett's first time and he might have won if we hadn't gotten bored and given up. But it got down to just the two of us and that's notsomuch with the fun. Oh, who am I kidding? HE WOUlD NEVER HAVE TAKEN ME! ;-) I am a sucker for a poker game, did you know? I don't gamble, so I won't play for real money, but I LOVE to see all those brightly colored chips sitting in front of me - especially when they came from someone else. Hee hee hee.
I did, however, have one downer moment in my day. I am putting it here after all that funness so that maybe no one will actually read this paragraph. Remember the two languages I am taking? Latin and Greek? Otherwise known as the languages spoken by torturers, demons, and the IRS? Well, I knew early on last semester that they were going to be a problem. As finals drew near, I knew that it was going to take an absolute miracle to pass these classes. I did have one ray of light when I found out that I only needed to pass the classes (D) to move on to the second level and didn't need a C like most progressive courses. Anyway, the finals definitely did NOT go very well, so I am sure you can see where this is going.....
I passed both classes. I can't believe you thought I failed. :-) I wasn't going to look until after New Year's so that I wouldn't have anything to dampen the holidays or my birthday, but, on a whim, I decided to take a gander tonight. And there you go!! Woo hoo! Go me!! I am TOTALLY multi-lingual. Hahahaha.
So, there you go. I have a worry free month ahead of me during which I hope to accomplish lots of things I've wanted to do for a while. Merry Christmas, all!
By the way, I heard lots of nice things from people who listened to the Candlelight Carol I put up in my last post. Everybody seems to like it lots and to be really surprised to hear me sing...which makes me a little hurt, now that I think about it. Come on? How could I NOT be a singer?? I look just like Pavoratti! Hahahaha. Okay, no. No, I don't. Anyway, thank you for all of the delightful e-mails you have been sending! For those of you who have not sent an e-mail...I'm just assuming you think I stink and that's fine but you can keep your e-mail!! :-D Anyway, if you are interested, I have one more song from the Christmas program that you may download. The song is one of my favorites, "One Small Child," but I do not like this recording as much. I don't really start to sound good until the last verse. So maybe you just listen to that verse, okay? Thanks, you're a doll. hahahahaha.
Hello, everybody!! Sorry for my prolonged absence, but let me make it up to you! Let's begin by telling you about my weekend...
The weekend actually began on Thursday as I hightailed it out of Waco to rehearse for the Christmas program on Sunday. Choir rehearsals are the highlight of my week. There were a great many sorry school weeks instantly remedied by a choir rehearsal. My fellow choir members are HYSTERICAL! And not to mention completely nuts. I mean, some of these people put ME to shame in the psycho department. I don't know why I don't share more stories with you...[insert introspective look here]
Did you get my introspective look? 'Cuz it was a good one.
ANYWAY, after rehearsal I headed over to the Saylaks and hanged (hahahha) out with Suzy and her parents for a while. The next day, I did a whole bunch of nothing but answer e-mail, watch television, and shop a bit with Suzy. Diana came in that night and we got ready for our Movie/Chocolate marathon. Our menu included chocolate pretzels, Whitman chocolates, chocolate-covered cherries, chocolate haystacks, chocolate pastries with Snickers and Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, Goobers, Ferrero Rocher chocolates, and loads of chocolate candies. MMMmmMmmMmmMmmmm.....so good!! We made it through Elf and half of the Polar Express before Diana realized that Sophie had gotten out and, well, you all know how that ended. Diana had to go home Sunday evening and face a house full of Sophie's toys and things - not a pretty prospect. Thankfully, one of her friends from school had already broken into her house and boxed it all up for her.
I've officially changed my mind. I know longer hate people. I love people.
Saturday, I had two Christmas parties to attend. The first was at the home of five of my FAVORITE people EVER!! Tracy, Bill, Chris, Brianna, and Angel. We had a gift exchange that awarded me a snazzy portable grinder thing...which I just realized sounds dorky, but I don't care! It's cool! I ground a hole straight through the walls from my room to Richard and Nick's room so we can tie a string to two cans and play the telephone game.
Okay, I made that up.
After we did the gift exchange bit, the guys headed outside to play laser tag. Yes, I know, we are all grown adults, but you know what? Turns out that laser tag is transcendent. It is fun at any age. :-)
Then we headed over to Victoria's house for the second party. This one was populated by Diana's closest group of friends from high school and was a blast as well! We made pizzas and had a few drinks then headed back to the Saylak's so that Diana and I could butcher the rest of the room in Guitar Hero. :-) Those in attendance who had their butts whooped were Lisa, Mark, Gje, Vic, Clint, Preston, Dianna, Eva, and Nathan Gay Day. Fun times.
Now, that brings us to Sunday morning. HELLO, FUN! Thank you for coming! Sunday morning was our Christmas program at Zion and it went really well! This is the first year in a while that we haven't done a Christmas cantata, but the a la carte approach worked really well. We sang through a bunch of old Christmas Carols that rarely see the light of day. Christmas Day. WOO HOOOOOO!!!!!
So, funny story... Last week, I mentioned to Annette that Diana's Divas and a Dude were singing and she asked if we recorded it. Wellllll, we DID record it, but the solo mics came through with wayyyy too much distortion. So, I sent her the recording of Candlelight Carol from the Christmas program because I have a solo in it. I am pretty sure she liked it because she put it up on the Haygoods message board.
And MySpace.
And in an e-mail.
Hahahahaha. So, Zion, meet Internet. Internet, meet Zion.
Now, for the funny stuff...In addition to the link at the top, you should check out these videos...
Hey, everybody! I had originally planned to tell you all about me amazing Christmas weekend, but I we had a sad day instead. Tonight, our movie marathon was cut short because my best friend's dog disappeared. It's a long story that I'll get into later but the short version is that she was hit by a car and did not make it. That said, I just am not feeling festive tonight. Please keep Diana in your prayers and I'll talk to you all tomorrow.
Hey, everybody! Just a quick note to say OH MY GOSH OH MY GOSH OH MY GOSH!!!!!!!
THE MUSIC PLAYER IS WORKING!!!
And I am in MMA and can't enjoy it!! But I know that YOU WILL!!!! I cannot even tell you how excited I am right now because I have some AMAZING new music to send your way!
P.S. If you are having problems using the music player, stop using Internet Explorer. Firefox, my friends. It's stable, it's powerful, it's easy to use, and it's FREE! Make the switch now!!
Bah. Four. Can you believe it??? Today I had two finals, African American Literature and American Folk Music. Allow me to tell you about them
AA Lit is an obnoxious class. I like it a lot and the teacher is great, but there are not many grades in the semester. I, being the terminally bad student that I am, have a pretty low daily averages (I HATE quizzes!) and a low paper grade because I forgot one of them, so I have to ACE this exam. And even then....not sure I can pass. As it stands, I need to bring my grade up 15 points to get a D. That ain't good, ma peeps. But I know that I did well on the exam this morning, so that makes me feel a little better (incidentally, I have had this professor for two semesters and this is the FIRST exam I have passed). I read two books yesterday in preparation for it. hahahaah. Even if I flunk this class, I can still take something else next semester to replace it and be okay. It's just frustrating. I am SOOOOOOOOOOOOO bad at school.
The second exam was awesome. I love me some American Folk Music. To start things off, a few weeks ago, the professor asked us in class what the topics of our research papers were going to be. Well, funny thing, I didn't HAVE a topic for my research paper. So, when she got to me, I said, "Uh.....is folk music dying?" So there I was with a truly difficult topic. The next week, we had to give a presentation over our research though the paper itself wasn't due until yesterday. I was second to the last to present and I just started rambling on about how my research indicated that folk music was not only dying, it would be dead in a few generations. Welllllllll, that got my classmates going. These are smart people, dear blog readers, FAR smarter than I am and they started asking all kinds of questions. In fact, the professor had to cut us off so that we could get to the last presentation, but she promised that we could have some time before the final to discuss it more.
Well, DANG IT! That meant I had to write a REAL paper. Anyway, we spent the first twenty minutes or so discussing my research and then the professor walked around the room and handed us each a Christmas card (there are only seven of us) in which she had written very nice notes and enclosed a Starbucks gift card. How AWESOME is that?? She told us how much she had enjoyed our class and that we were the best class she'd had in many years. It was actually a tearful day because it IS a fun class with some very interesting people and today was our last day together. In fact, one of our number is graduating. Actually, she's done now; that was her last exam. One of my classmates, Casey, is an accomplished folk musician and is playing at a local venue tonight so two of our number and the professor and her husband are going out to see him. I can't go, sadly, since I will be rehearsing in Kurten (singing on the NEXT TWO SUNDAYS!!!!), but it's nice just the same. They are also having a Christmas party on Sunday evening, but I will be in Dallas listening to MY MOM SING!!! That's right, I have a musical family. We rock it hardcore! ;-)
So, that was exam day 1. Tomorrow is the first of my TRULY hard exams, Latin, and I am not prepared for it yet. I am going to try to get loads of sleep tonight and wake up early to get some good studying in before I have lunch with Joel and the exam at 2. PRAY FOR MY LATIN SKILLS!
Hey, everybody! Just a quick note to let you know that there may some downtime in the next few days as the site is migrated to a new and improved server! Hopefully, all will go well and I will have more control over the MIME type settings that are preventing the music player from doing its thang. So if the site disappears, you know what happened!!
Howdy, everybody! Can you guess where I am?!?!?!?!?!??!?!?!?!
Did you guess ? Because if you did, you are way smart!! And if you didn't, do you not know me at all? :-)
Last week when I was trying like mad to get a research paper....researched...I bought a T-mobile day pass (why can't Starbucks just put in free wireless like every other worthwhile place on the planet?) so that I could upload information and e-mail while I was here. Today, when I walked in and turned my computer on, it magically logged on. SCORE!
Although it just occurred to me that it may automatically charge me. Dang it, gonna have to turn that off.
Anyway, that is NOT what I wanted to talk about. Today is my first "dead day" before exams start on Thursday. Would you like to know how I am taking advantage of that fact? Of course you would. Why else would you be here? Well, to kick things off...
I
SLEPT
IN!
Yessiree, I didn't even pretend to get up until noon. That meant I had to force myself to go back to sleep a few times, but I was easily convinced. I can be very manipulative. It's the first time I have had a full night's sleep in quite some time and it WERE NICE!!!
Yes, I know that ain't grammatically correct, Kim V. Go away. ;-)
Today is finish research paper on the death of folk music/African American Lit reading day. Tomorrow is African American Lit reading/Latin day. All day LATIN! WOO HOOOOOO!!!! Latin desperately needs a whole day. As does Greek. And African American Lit needs a whole day just to catch up on the reading. Those are the three classes whose exams I really need to Ace to pass. Ug.
Double Ug, in fact. Moving right along...
If you have been paying extremely close attention, you should have noticed that the music player looks a tiny bit different today. That's because it is SO CLOSE TO WORKING!!! Really. So close I can taste it. I sent in one more request to my webhost today that should fix all of my problems. Tomorrow, we just might have some Christmas music going on up in here!! It's gonna be good, you wait and see.
So I don't really have anything productive to say today. But perhaps I will bring back an old favorite, eh? Click the title of this post to go to today's VIDEO LINK! Enjoy!!
SHINE is the third in the prestigious line of Blogs committed to the intelligent ramblings on one Jim Hawkins. This one takes a slightly different (and definitely more mature) approach to the world of Blogging. Because Jim is a grown up now.
? Because if you did, you are way smart!! And if you didn't, do you not know me at all? :-)