Updates!

So, I haven’t blogged in a while. I can’t think of anything to write about, and I really really hate posting something just for the sake of posting. But I have to write. On account of stupid Language Arts. So tomorrow I’ll be going through and getting some ideas for next week’s post. In the meantime, here’s a few updates on life in Milford:

The Family: Dad took Ben and Sophie to South Dakota this weekend, to see Gram. I did not go, obviously. They are having an excellent time, although they picked possibly the worst weekend to go to South Dakota, weather-wise. They call us every few hours. Mom and I have been enjoying the time at home, but it’s insanely quiet. Also, there are pretty much no dishes to wash, it’s amazing. We went to the library and Netflix and got a whole bunch of movies that Sophie and Ben wouldn’t or couldn’t watch, and spent the weekend watching them. Calendar Girls was the best. The one we saw last night was called Mixed Nuts, and had virtually no plot whatsoever.

Facebook: It’s where I’ve been spending all my computer time. I’m sorry.

Music: Is actually pretty good! French horn is on the upswing, which means violin is not, but hey, I’ll take what I can get. I am pleased to announce that I can lipslur arpeggios in 8 keys, most of the time. And I think I actually found all the winter concert music, which is a small miracle inasmuch as my band teacher doesn’t like me and I skip band half the time. I have a SOLO!!! A GOOD solo, no less, in the Overture to Candide, which is by Leonard Bernstein, who is a fantasic composer. So I’m happy. Violin is good too…. Districts is in less than a month *bites fingers* so I have a lot of work to do for that. The cantata is all right, except that the rehearsals all last at least 2 hours and the choir keeps coming in wrong. On the bright side, I know their entrances really well! And in orchestra we’ve been playing Christmas music all week.

School: Blah. It’s OK. I’m passing. I finally finished reading Paradise Lost last week. I hate this year.

Other Stuff: What other stuff?

The “Facebook Face”

my mother needed a photo for her avatar on various websites. also, i had found that the only pictures i had of her were these really hideous ones from when i was thirteen. and if, god forbid, she should die, i would have to put the ugly picture on the funeral program. not to mention that i wouldn’t have anything to remember her by.

sooo we did a little photo shoot!

pensive mother.

“just what do you think you’re up to, young lady?” mother. she was not actually saying this but by jove that is what she was thinking. trust me.

um. the facebook face! is somehow not so hilarious on your mother.

jk lol!

Randomness

The Friar Chuck Update: Friar Chuck versions 1,2, and 3 have been dispatched. Dad finally bought a Havahart trap to catch them. They promptly figured out how to lift up the trap and get the bait. It’s a constant battle.

In other news, Mom is in the process of staining the armoire, which is a long hard slog. Our kitchen is stain central, and the fumes are going to everybody’s heads.

Last weekend Mom took me to see Mamma Mia, which is a musical based on the songs of ABBA. Mom and Dad went to see it for their anniversary this year, and she liked it so much she took me too. It’s actually a really cute movie. Plus, it has Meryl Streep, and Peirce Brosnan, and Colin Firth* and Julie Walters, so how can you NOT see it? Dad got Mom the soundtrack, so now we are all listening to ABBA nonstop. Mom has even decreed that it’s unamerican not to like ABBA.Take a chance on meeeee….

I have gotten Facebook and become addicted.

I have also started school. Grr. BUT, hopefully I will be able to take December off the way I did last year! A&P is going super so far, and so is Latin. Math is just really really annoying, especially today’s lesson where all Dr. Shorman is was yak on and on about the area of transversal laterals or something. Brit Lit is OK, but Sonlight, so involved. I’m done with Beowulf and onto Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. I just started Logic, and I haven’t begun French yet, although I have a new resolution to work harder at it after being to Taize. It comes easily to me but I haven’t been studying it the way I should. Orchestra and whatever band I end up with starts next week.

More on Taize tomorrow.

Um, that’s all the news from here I guess…boring boring end of summer…

*Incidentally, he has a really high voice. Like in Manly Men, the first verse, only actually very true.

Junk

I went to tidy up the organizer cubbies in my room and this is what I found:

• 1 hairband
• 1 necklace
• 1 pair of earrings, despite the fact that my ears aren’t pierced
• 1 bracelet
• 1 clipboard
• a flashlight, in case there is a reading emergency in the middle of the night and my bedside lamp doesn’t work.
• 34 assorted books, including my Bible, Latin crossword puzzles, and The End by Lemony Snicket (I just realized the other day that the entire plot of that is taken from Shakespeare…I’m slow!)
• 1 box of rosin, complete with booklet describing the process Maestro Andrea Bang went through to make it (seventeen secret ingredients!), and an empty paper packet that one of my strings came in
• 1 meditative rock (don’t ask)
• 22 odd CDs, mostly classical, and my CD player
• the program from last week’s orchestra concert
• a Hot Wheels Watch that I got out of a Rice Krispie box free of charge
• a pair of nail clippers
• my glasses
• another hairband
• the card that comes with your passport and says “this is very important do not lose and carry in a separate place from your passport”
• 87 religious pencils (guess we know what the acolytes are getting next Christmas!)
• 2 piggy banks and 4 stuffed pigs
• 2 birthday cards- one wishing me happy birthday and one from Ben asking if by any chance I was colorblind, and….
• another hairband.

 

I should clean out more often.

music is my entire life…

From about three weeks ago until mid-June, at least. School has been sort of on a break….in the last week i have: practiced (of course!), done occasional chemistry and French, and managed to do quite a bit of Latin during downtime in the orchestra room.

My band concert was last night, the climax of months and months of rehearsals, and, as predicted, astoundingly mediocre! Actually, mr. swinehart said it was one of the best concerts he’s ever heard this band do, so either it was better than i thought or the band is usually worse. Apparently all three groups are on an upswing this year (according to the teacher, who might be a little bit biased….) and that rarely happens. Dad got numerous photos, in most of which I’m either looking away or talking, plus i am sooo pale that under the stage lights i look ill, so i won’t share them right now. mom has decreed that i will be wearing makeup to the orchestra concert next week, because “Ryan is no tanned person himself, but you made him look like he just spent a week in Florida!”. i personally would rather just make Casie and Joe look tanned, but i already have to wear a cummerbund, so…..

If anyone is curious, the hat this year was Mickey Mouse.

Speaking of which (actually, we weren’t speaking of this, but i want to share it and “speaking of which” is a nice segway, don’t you think?) i got my audition results back, and I’m fifth out of twenty, which is not great but not bad either (top 25%!), and better than i expected considering that i had to start one song over and my cumulative score was 160/200. I’m the highest freshman.

This week is insanely filled with my concert, Ben’s concert, practicing for the concerts, half-day rehearsals for the concerts, on-stage rehearsals for the concerts, possibly school, and on and on. then once the concerts are over we have the recital to prepare for and I’m filling in for the school quartet.

So, i guess that this post is just a really long excuse for not blogging as often as i want to.

 

Blog Post Number 89

In which Olivia amuses herself with search terms, in honor of breaking 3000 views this week.

117 people have found this site by searching “strange questions”.

241 people have searched some variant of “strange questions”, such as “weird questions” or “strange questions for friends”.

274 have searched for “cool words” or a variation thereof.

4 people have searched “round and brown olivia”. Huh?

6 people have searched “weird” (probably weirdos! ha-ha) and

6 people have searched “weird kid”. What do these people expect to come up with?

 

A couple other of my favorites:

Some poor obsessive soul searched “How to tell if you’re obsessed with someone”.

“Seasons in the sun violin notes”. Who on earth would want to learn Seasons in the Sun? It’s about death, people.

“Graffiti”. What do these people want, how-to instructions?

There were a LOT of people searching on how to get squirrels out of garages, basements, etc, including someone who spelled it “squriel”.

“Olivia very cool”. I’m flattered.

“delicious smells”

“dwight shrute doll”. I didn’t think anyone but Ben would ever want to make a Dwight Shrute doll.

“four sepulchers music” which sounds intriguing, doesn’t it?

 

I would also like to take this opportunity to mention that I have now received 294 offers for very cheap insurance.

 

Auf weidersein!

 

 

Widgets!

My sidebar may look a little different: I’ve discovered new widget capabilities! With the new WordPress template, you can make virtually anything into virtually anything!

I am lacking in my blogging. I know. I’ll catch up in a little bit: after all, concerts, confirmation, Ben’s going camping, May Day, pre-concert auditions, Mother’s Day, Cinco de Mayo, braces….there should be plenty of photo/blogging opportunities this month. *evil laugh*

On the other hand, the concerts, ect, are taking up my life so I don’t get around to blogging.

Hmm. Catch-22!

In other news….They are redoing our road today, finally! Nice new asphalt! School is boring; music is time-consuming; Seinfeld is on rent from NetFlix and is quite funny. When we watch that and I laugh Dad keeps looking at me and telling me I’m an Easterner. Yup. I am. Not quite sure what he thought I was?

Anyway, off to watch Seinfeld.

 

 

Music Musings

You know you’re a music geek when:

• Your stand partner tells you he plays the psaltery. You say, “plucked or bowed?”.

 

• You spend valuable time arguing essentially worthless points, such as where to shift, whether to use a fourth finger or an open in measure 135, and the merits of French bow versus German bow…

 

• …and you enjoy it.

 

• You know which composer was the bridge between the Classical and Romantic Eras

 

• And you know the distinct differences in style between those eras and the Baroque Era, as well as which came first.

 

• No matter how sensitive and mature of a musician you pretend to be, you know, deep in your heart, that faster is more fun.

 

• You own your own soprano sax.

 

• You can play the harp

 

• You regularly ask and answer questions such as “do you have perfect pitch?” and “do you have a guitar pick?”

 

• You know all the verses and the violin riff to “Braes of Killiecrankie“, despite not being Scottish and therefore not having any idea what the words actually mean.

 

• When you’re bored, you practice.

 

• You know that in beginner books, they call the William Tell Overture “Go Tell Bill”, and this bothers you deeply.

 

• You know La Folia by heart, even though it’s the most boring repetitive song that ever was, and you know who it was written by and which number sonata it is.

 

• Speaking of violin sonatas, you know the difference between Handel’s Third, Fourth, and Fifth, and you will never admit that yes, they all sound sort of alike.

 

• Your high school ambition is to learn “The Devil’s Trill”.

 

• You can transpose by sight and yet you are NOT a French Horn player

 

• Rachmaninoff and Rimsky-Korsakov? Similar names, yet totally different.

 

• REAL orchestras tune to an oboe.

 

• You find Fiocco Allegro “fun”.

 

• You LOVE the Bach Double.

 

• You can tell viola jokes.

 

• When you screw up, you become mildly obsessed and play the offending section 50 times a day until it’s perfect.

 

• You feel that the portrayal of Mozart in Amadeus was disappointing.

 

• You actually watched Amadeus?

 

• You can sing Psalm 133 in Hebrew at the age of 12

 

• Bedrich Smetana: good or bad?

 

• Pachabel’s Canon? Three violins, one cello, a piano if you’re feeling reckless. That’s it.

 

• You’re sitting with twenty other people just like you; all holding small wooden boxes in the same manner; all watching a middle-aged guy wave a stick; all looking at a page full of little black dots with tails; and you all know exactly what to do. Enough said.

 

I am actually guilty of an astonishing number of these.

 

 

 

 

Ethel the Singing Cow Redux

This is a video I took of Ethel, the Singing Cow. Yesterday, I posted pictures, but apparently that is not enough to capture the true essence of the Singing Cow.

Taking a video is a long, involved process. I had to find the camera. And then I had to find my brother, because he has the best voice. And then I had to drag my brother away from the all-important task of peeling boiled eggs to help me find the right setting for video on our new camera. And then I had to send my sister to fetch Ethel from the basement, where she was learning to play dress-up. Then I told my brother what I would prefer for him to sing.

• Nothing in a foreign language
• Nothing that he made up involving everyday tasks such as passing the ketchup or applying conditioner
• And NOT It’s a Small World

He of course began humming It’s a Small World. And then he queried me as to why he couldn’t sing Psalm 33 in Hebrew. Who even knew he could sing Psalm 33 in Hebrew? So I said he could sing that if he wanted. And he asked if he could sing in Jamaican. I pointed out that he doesn’t know any songs in Jamaican so it was moot. So we decided on a chorus song. But of course he couldn’t find his folder! So we took a break and I ate a cracker.

I have food issues.

We filmed three or four different songs. This one is my favorite, but I might post the other one later, and the rest were scrapped because of technical difficulties. Orchestra people will reconize this as the extremely uneventful opening to “By Loch and Mountain”.

 

 

 

And I didn’t even mention how long it took me to upload.

Olivia’s Amazing New Word For The Day….

are you ready?

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Here we go….

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It’s coming…

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walloon.

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*laughs hysterically*