I'm expanding my horizons

Actually, this is part of my sister's and my plot for world domination. We're expanding our influence over the internet by the means of our fine home cookin'. We decided to start a recipe blog for the friends, family, and random strangers that keep asking us how we make such amazing food: Snozzcumber Soup and Other Assorted Meals. Feel free to stop by and try out some of our concoctions (and then comment and stroke our egos with lavish compliments about how amazing the recipes are). Bon appetite!

P.S.-- Gold star for those who recognize the literary reference. :)

Ouch.

"Time is what we want most, but what we use worst." --William Penn

I've just been guilt-tripped by a man who has been dead for three centuries. Feel the burn.....

“Mark, I’m glad I picked up what you dropped.”

As if my life wasn’t fraught with enough ridiculous situations, I decided to cash in on more by joining pep band. You’ve all heard about my flying folder, which provided my section with vast amounts of entertainment. I guess that dose of hilarity finally wore off, because tonight, this happened:

With about 5 minutes of play left, Devri, Brian’s wife, showed up. Because we are nice friends we let Brian sit on the edge of the band section and talk to Devri while Jared and I scooted over to fill up Brian’s spot. This put me between Mark and Jared. I didn’t think anything of it, but I have since learned the advantages of having a married guy on one side of me--whatever else he’s done, he hasn’t tried to pull anything like this. Anyway, we were sitting down during a pause in the game. I looked over at Brian and Devri and noticed that Brian was trying to sign something to Mark. Considering that Brian and Devri were cuddling as newly-weds will, and that I’m the only girl in a section full of boys, I had the nagging feeling that their signed conversation was probably about me. I turned my head just in time to see Mark ostentatiously reaching out to put his arm around me. I shrieked and scooted away as fast as I could--right into Jared. Jared promptly put his arm around me, I promptly screamed again and turned bright red, and everyone else promptly burst out laughing. I tried to put as much distance as I could between me and the boys on either side, buried my crimson face in my lap, and laughed so hard I almost started crying. Jared patted me on the back and said to Mark, “Mark, I’m glad I picked up what you dropped.”

Somehow, I don’t think pep band was quite this entertaining before I came along.

Swim little fishy, oh swim if you can...

Have you ever listened to the layers in music? I’ve picked up the habit this year and I find it fascinating. It requires a different approach to listening to music than you would normally use. First, think of music like a pond. There’s the pond surface, the bottom, and all the space in between. You can look at it as a whole, or you can look at different spots in the water. You can focus on the play of light off the surface of the water. Or you can peer at the stones littering the bottom of the pool, and how the light touches them. Or you can watch the little fishes swimming around in the middle regions of their watery world.

In music, the melody might be the light on the surface of the pool. The stones on the bottom might be the base line, or the chord structure, or the constant pulse of the rhythm section. The fishes could be the countermelody, the harmony, the accompaniment.

When I slip into the mindset of listening for the individual components of my music pond, I feel like I’m one of the fish swimming around. I feel like I’m in a fluid open space, bounded by melody above and chordal structure beneath, surrounded by all the interlocking bits that make music full and rich and vibrant. I can choose which little piece to swim with and examine closely, or I can choose to hover in the midst of the song and take in the whole panorama. It’s like floating in the middle depths of a swimming pool and watching all the activity that takes place between the watery ceiling and pebble-tech floor.

I don’t know if I’m making any sense, but this was the best metaphor I could come up with. I’m reminded of something my professor said in my World Music Cultures class. He talked about how strange it is to write about something that is purely auditory, and quoted someone as saying, “Writing about music is like dancing about architecture.” Or in this case, scuba diving.