First, the quote of the day, which is actually going to be a conversation from yesterday:  (obviously, due to length, much of this is paraphrased)

Me: So, all of the works on my programme so far are fairly standard. The Chopin études are very common, the Bach Fantasy is very common, the Liszt is very well known too. I was thinking that it could be a good idea to include a lesser known work or composer--preferably something challenging, but not too difficult. Would you have any ideas?

Professor (of Music History) Nora Beck: Oh! Well, there is Ned Rorem, and also Reger, and Godowsky is becoming increasingly popular...(followed by interesting (to me) explanation, and then...) Gorecki's piano works (blah blah) and of course there's Philip Glass' études (blah blah) Byrd (blah blah) Zwilich (blah blah) D'Indy (blah blah) Sessions (blah blah) Rzewski (blah blah) Szymanowski (blah blah) Joplin (blah blah) Smetana (blah blah) Tippett (blah blah) [a good five minutes later] So, does that give you some ideas?

Me: Yes, Definitely. Thank you. Now, Denise had also suggested a work by a Canadian composer, like Jean Coulthard or somebody. Are there any works that...

Prof. Beck: ...OOOH!  That would be a great idea!

Me: Really? Who would you recommend?

Prof. Beck: Hmmm.... well.  Let's see...  ... [awkward pause] ...  ...actually I think Jean Coulthard's probably a good choice. [full stop]
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Now, the only problem with more obscure works is that they are, obviously, really hard to find.  Not a single store in Portland, nor any of the libraries in the Summit inter-library loan system had a copy of Philip Glass' études, which are probably the least obscure of the list, besides Rorem or perhaps Byrd.  I'm also not really willing to scour the internet in order to find them.  I guess I'll just stick with what I have.

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I saw Laurel today, which was pretty exciting, but it reminded me that I completely missed seeing Clay when he came down to Portland about a week ago.  In any event, she's here for intern training, and I will soon be going into NSO training, which sounds exciting.  I'm not totally sure what we're going to do, but apparently we get cool shirts, so it can't possibly be a bad thing, right?

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I was going to do a little spiel on trying to define art music as opposed to popular music, but perhaps next post.  I'm tired.  I practiced for five hours today, and that's a bit much for anyone.  Hopefully, it will be a little more low-key tomorrow.

Long time, no post.  In fact, it's been at least two months since I've even visited this page.  I had told Jessica that I would try to post while she was gone in Chile, however, and Chris and Clay will also soon be gone on exchange trips, leaving me alone to cry myself to sleep every night.   No, actually, I look forward to next semester.  I've almost completely made ammends with a certain music Professor, and over the next week I will help design the curriculum for a course that I'll be taking!  How cool is that!?  I guess it's actually really nerdy and completely uncool, (almost as uncool as the word "uncool") but I'm still excited about it.  Before I get into the post though, at least one quote is necessary:

AP: "Ah! Just try to keep your pants down!"
        "Nice shirt.  Very Menudo."

Natalie: "You know, if you weren't my cousin, or if we were in Alabama, this would look really sketchy."

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My other little bonus section for this post will be a list of firsts--things I did this summer that I had never done before:

1) Taken a University Physics course
   1b) Written a physics lab report
   1c) Held uranium in my hand
   1d) Flipped ten coins 100 times in a row to calculate standard deviations (which is more like torture than I can even begin to explain)
   1e) Bored friends in Portland and Kamloops with descriptions (given in a surprisingly enthusiastic tone) of what I had learned in said course
2) Discussed US Foreign Policy with Arabs (highly recommended, as long as you have a long fuse and a lot of time ) (and they call themselves "Arabs." I was going to come up with some PC term for them, but I don't think it's necessary.)
3) Purchased something off of Amazon.com (my first purchase: a CD entitled "Martha Argerich: Début Recital")
4) Eaten at a Lebanese restaurant (Ya Hala in Portland. Excellent reviews)
5) Been given the key to the office of the Chair of the Music Department for personal use
   5b) Used said key
6) Used the word "concatenate" and, on a separate occasion, the quasi-legitimate word "ridonculous." Twice
7) Played the computer game "Shogun: Total War," which is my new favourite game ever
8) Karaoke
9) Rode an ATV (more on this later)
   9a) Flipped an ATV (more on this later)
10) Had a footrace with Amanda Pinchin...
11) Saw the movie "Requiem for a Dream," which, truly, merits being its own number. I liked Batman, Wedding Crashers, Haute Tension, Spiderman 2, Get Shorty, and some of the other films I saw this summer too, but truly, none of them compare
12) Made a dinner for myself, the recipe for which I found on foodtv.ca.  I've made dinner for myself plenty of times, but I've never made anything that either my mom or my French host family hadn't made while I was there before.  Basically, I experimented.  The recipe: Potato-crusted scallops with avocado and pepper salad.  Very tasty
13) Played a drinking game (and although Amanda Hoy has her doubts, I maintain that I was not truly drunk.)  (and honestly, if anyone was in the condition to tell if I was drunk or not, it certainly wasn't Manda. )
14) Laid on the beach with the goal of tanning (I ended up burning pretty badly with Amanda P)
15) Climbed Mt. Peter! (a peak that overlooks Kamloops)

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In sum, it was a good summer, and a relaxing summer.  I have my Senior Recital date (April 22nd), and I know what pieces I'll be playing, although one or two might change.  I've started work on my senior thesis, and will hopefully be one my way writing by October.  I wasn't able to catch up with some friends like I wanted to, (Zoe and Chris I only saw twice, Nick and Shaela I didn't see at all) but I did do a lot more than I thought I would, and that's encouraging.

ATV story, and then I'll close:

I went up to visit my uncle's family at their cabin on East Barriere Lake, about 175km (115m) away from Kamloops and truly, in the boonies.  There are logging roads and what-not, but for the most part, the largest "city" is a good 30 minutes away by car, and that "city" is populated by no more than 5,000 people.   When I arrived, the neighbours, who must have been stupidly wealthy, very generously invited us to go on their ATVs with them.  Naturally, we accepted, offering profuse thanks.

Now, when I say "stupidly wealthy," I refer to the fact that not only were these people building a ridiculously huge cabin, complete with underground parking for eight cars, and had a floating trampoline and Malibu speedboat with wakeboarding rack, wedge, and floodable compartments hooked up near the dock, but they also happened to have four state-of-the-art ATVs and yet a fifth child-sized ATV for their 5-year-old daughter.  I kid you not.

Our two hosts, of course, were equipped with brand new gear, including chest protectors, boots with fiberglass shin guards, and matching bike jerseys, the kind you see on the X-games.  In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if it was exactly the same ensemble you see bikers wear on the X-games.  Dave (my uncle) and I, on the other hand, had...well...slightly different apparel.  Dave had on plain black sweatpants and his golfing jacket along with a football helmet that was clearly to small for him and aviator sunglasses in lieu of goggles or a visor.  I had brought my Lu`au hoodie, so I had a long sleeve shirt, but I had no long sleeve pants, so I had to borrow Natalie's (my 17-year-old cousin) old pair of grey sweatpants she had gotten for the volleyball team at her high school.  These pants had JAGS (short for jaguars) written in huge green letters accross the ass, and one leg was, due to a manufacturing error, several inches shorter than the other leg, which already was too short for me.  I'm surprised they even let us be seen with them!  Suffice to say, you could tell who the experienced ATVers were.

Once we actually got started though, I had a blast!  I never thought that ATVing would be so much fun.  After all, when we went on Jet-Skis at Penticton, I was pretty bored after a short time, but these things were awesome.  You can go over anything on them, and they go surprisingly fast.  It's a huge adrenaline rush, and I enthusiastically recommend it to anyone that has the opportunity.

For a while I was actually doing pretty well, taking small jumps, and keeping up for the most part with our gung-ho hosts.  My ATV, though, was very large, and occasionally I would have trouble fitting through some of the narrower openings.  On one such occasion, I fell a little behind when I got stuck, and had to speed to catch up.  The path was a long narrow logging road with saplings on both sides, probably from reforestation projects.  I saw Dave in the distance, so I sped around the bend when, out of the woods, as if by magic, this huge bull stepped out of the left embankment and stopped in the middle of the path, staring me and my ATV down as I slammed on the brakes, stopping maybe 10 feet in front of its horns.  My first thought, oddly enough, was to see if I could blow the horn, but I couldn't find one, and I didn't really want to let my eyes off of the bull for that long in order to look.  So, I reversed about 20 feet or so, hoping that it would continue crossing the road.  After an extremely awkward minute, it finally did, and I continued on to catch up to the others.

When I did finally meet up with them, they had stopped at a fork in the road, and were taking a jump there.  I don't think they believed my story about the bull, probably because that little "encounter" spiked my adrenaline so much that my speech was garbled and even louder than usual.  In any event, they got me to try the jump too, and, thinking that good air would make up for my tardiness, quickly turned around and headed for the jump.  In retrospect, I turned too quickly, because when I hit the bottom of the jump, my back wheels were still to the left, and I hit a large rock on the path, forcing the front end of my ATV up in the air.  I tried to hit the throttle to pull the ATV over the rock, but hit the throttle way too hard, and instead shot the ATV upwards with me flying off onto my back as the ATV somehow ended up propped vertically on a log.  The end scene was pretty impressive.  Somehow the ATV was standing straight up and down, me beneath it, laying on top of the rock that had "broken my fall."

In total, we were out on these old abandoned logging roads for about 2 1/2 hours, and I couldn't have had a better time.  I wasn't the only one to bail, although my fall was the most public, but even the fall added to the experience rather than taking away from it.

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Now, I'm back in Portland, staying at Marnie's house, and going up to Lewis & Clark to practice piano, meet up with some friends, and get some exercise.  I can't believe summer's going to be over so soon!!!  I wish that this could last for longer.  My one consolation is that, in a few days, I'll be helping new freshman get into Lewis & Clark for orientation.  I'm looking forward to it!