Oh, you're crying...dID i SoUND ThaT Bad?!?!?!

Something happened the other day that has literally never happened to me before... I made a woman cry. Okay, left at just that statement alone I sound like a horrible guy. Especially for putting it in a blog, but let me start at the beginning.

Since the summer started I've not really done much with myself. My first week of the break I didn't really leave the couch or my bed. In fact, I watched all the episodes of How I Met Your Mother on Netflix, which is 6 seasons long. To be honest, I didn't really want to do much with myself but come the second week of summer I actually had something to look forward to... my piano lesson.

My piano teacher is excited about teaching, which is awesome. That's actually her JOB! Not a side thing that she does to get extra money, but teaching is how she gets by and she's really good at it. To be honest, I was a little surprised at how good she was at it when I showed up. After a fiasco with three of her other students trying to figure out parking, I finally arrived. I started by playing a single scale for her (my best friend, the C major scale) and she quickly noted several ways to improve my playing and we got to work. Those first two lessons were brutal. Playing scale after scale at painfully slow speeds to make sure my posture and technique were just right, and after the scales we moved on to other tedious exercises. But by the third lesson I had made the corrections she was looking for and we began to actually work on music. I was excited about something again for my summer.


The difference between that first and second week of summer were significant. For instance, the first thing I did when I woke up this morning was pull out the MIDI Controller (still working on a name for her and she's really upset it's taking this long) and started writing music for my upcoming wedding gig in two weeks. I'm practicing my old audition pieces, but I'm also writing my own arrangements of music for performances. Staying up every morning till 3:00 am writing music and trying to make something that's worth listening to has been awesome!


But that brings me back to where I started; the crying lady. I met with a singer that I perform with a lot and we chose music for a wedding we are playing in two weeks and then a couple of days later we met with the couple that's to be married and we showed them what it is that we would like to play for them. We finally worked out what they'd like to have played during the wedding and then we started discussing pre-ceremony music to set the mood. I played two pieces for them; Holy Holy Holy arranged by Jim Brickman, and Hymne written by Vangelus. I've played Holy Holy Holy literally dozens of times and I've played Hymne a bunch as well so they were easy for me, but something odd happened. While I was playing the second piece I got the feeling that the couple didn't like what I was playing. Enough so, actually, that they wanted me to stop. I'm not sure where this came from, but I decided that it would be best if I kept playing anyways and tried to play the piece better than I ever have before. When I finished playing I looked up and the bride-to-be was in tears. She said it was beautiful and that it was the one piece she most looked forward to hearing on her big wedding day. WELL HOT DANG! I didn't see that one coming.


I guess it just goes to show how far just a little bit of effort can get you. I got tears out of the deal. Maybe with just a little bit more effort I can get into a music program?!?! Who knows...

"You're too blessed to be stressed." "YOU'RE TOO FEMININE TO BE OUT OF THE KITCHEN!"

Today, I sign up for classes. I realize now how close I am, exactly, to graduating and I have to say that I'm remarkably unmoved. This is how little I care about my major. If someone were to take my comm studies diploma from my hand, throw it on the ground, and pee on it, I probably wouldn't care. I don't even know what I'd DO with this freaking degree.

People are so freaking stressed about classes and people have been sharing some very specific sentiments. First of all, when we discover that a fellow classmate is registering for classes the appropriate response is now "may the odds be ever in your favor". Second, I think we all agree that if we are going to spend so much money going to school, we should change the name of our college to Hogwarts and make our Quidditch team the central focus of our sports teams, not football. Also, we should import British people to sit in our classes and speak every so often so we start to really feel like we are at Hogwarts.

What breaks your bones is not the weight you're carrying but all in how you carry it

I came to the conclusion that I suck at writing. Seriously. This blog is three sentences long and I'll bet you anything that if a college English professor were to read this he would flip out and pee on whatever device it is that he's reading this blog from. You may say it's crazy, but I've seen it done many a time before with my essays and papers I've turned in.

I'm not very good at speaking either. Relationships are not my forte, if I'm going to be completely honest. I have some great people in my life right now, don't get me wrong, but when things go wrong in a friendship they seem to go REALLY wrong. I'm really more of a listener than a speaker. It's when I try to talk that things blow up. Strange how I haven't learned my lesson yet, no?

I suck at math.

Physics is the devil.

Why the heck does physics end with an 's' if it's not plural?

Would Physic sound weird in regular conversation?

Why were the first two guys who thought Superman was a bird and a plane so freaking excited to see a bird and a plane?

I am not exactly the most athletic (although I REALLY want to play soccer).

I love music. If you've read my blog, you'd know this to be true. If you've ever met me, you'd know this to be true. So why haven't I auditioned for the school of music before? I am almost convinced that if being a music major was what God meant to happen, things are happening right as he intended them. These past three years have not been a waste of time. In fact, I'm quite certain that God has been putting me in situations to help me in the school of music. To help me grow as a musician. I've accompanied so many different people, had to rely on myself to learn theory, played in so many different sorts of situations, and been given the opportunity to play my instrument for Him. If I started out my college career as a music major, I don't think I would have this desire to give back to God whatever it is that I learn from a music degree. Regardless of whether or not I get into the school of music, I know that God's had a hand in my college career and I'm slowly learning to trust Him. This year has been rough, but this year has taught me to give it all to Him.

Why WERE those two guys so excited to see a plane and a bird?

I'M SO NERVOUS I'M SHAKING MORE THAN A CONSTIPATED CHIHUAHUA!!!

I have to play for the piano professor tomorrow, and I don't feel ready because I don't really have anything fully prepared. However, tonight has been a good night, in terms of accomplishing stuff. I finished learning and memorizing the whole Fugue (the left handed part, anyways) and I didn't waste so much time on my Ray Charles impression, as usual.

I'm going to get back to work now, I was just excited and had to share my success. Also, I found a CD of Debussy that has my favorite piano suite ever on it, so I'm kind of pumped. Usually I can only find CD's with part of the suite, but never all four pieces together so that was a win.

My goodness, I ramble and don't make sense when I'm tired. There was no transition from point to point at all. Goat milk is far superior to Cow milk. I'm watching a silent film currently, and it's freaking me out. I think Isaac Zavalak or Zkalalskjdjf, or however you say his name (the Science Fiction writer) was clearly inspired by this monstrosity of a movie. It's storming...I've had too much sugar.

CLAP IF YOU BELIEVE! SAVE THE FAIRIES!!! AAAAAGH!!!!!

DO YOU KNOW HOW TO DANCE A WALTZ?!?!?!?!

Today is Sunday. Yesterday was Saturday. I didn't do a single thing with my Saturday...except practice piano. And guitar for a little bit, but mostly I just practiced piano. We're talking piano practicing to a degree that I've never done before. Here's a short list of what I accomplished;

1. I found a song online that I've wanted to learn for a long time
2. I learned the song
3. I memorized the entire song
4. I played scales
5. I worked through rough spots on the waltz and Fugue
6. I discovered that the third piece I haven't really started on yet is actually partially memorized
7. I put on Sunglasses and smiled and pretended to be Ray Charles

I have to perform for the head of the piano department on Wednesday at 4:30 PM (I hope it's PM), and I think I'm going to play the waltz rather than the fugue. I'm going to work on both, but I just feel like the waltz is already almost completely re-memorized so I might as well play that one. Hopefully by the end of January I'll have both pieces memorized anyways and I can spend February on the last piece.

One thing that's a bit exciting is that I'm feeling a huge difference in my hands development. My left hand has really come along in a short amount of time, and I can even type these blogs faster. Wouldn't it be something if I became left handed? lol.

...but seriously. Being ambidextrous would be far superior to being left or right handed. Bach is helping me to get there too, funny enough. I started playing one of my favorite piano pieces (that's actually for Clavichord, but whatever) called Invention #13 by Bach, and it was actually just a piano exercise written to help Bach's students develop their dexterity. He has some that have only two melodies playing at once, which is relatively easy to accomplish with two hands. The tough part is playing pieces that have three or more melodies playing at once with only two hands. Bach was a winner. A real "go-getter", if you will.

TWO DAYS IN AND I'M GONNA BLOW MY BRAINS OUT WITH A NERF GUN!!!

I haven't played piano as much as I'd like to this past week, but I'm finally getting back into it and I'm not suffering from it as much as I thought. I totally figured that my hands would need more time to get back into shape, but they seem to be doing all right. But I need them to be better. Fast. By next wednesday, to be exact.

I emailed the head piano professor at Texas State last night, and he asked me to come in and talked to him. So I did. I'm not really sure what it is that he wants to talk about, but we scheduled a meeting next week and he wants me to prepare a piece for him. Yeah, in six days. I'm freaking out like crazy right now about this. This is the first time he gets to hear me play before my audition and I really want to make a good impression. So my goal for this week is simple; completely prepare and memorize the fugue. I have have of it memorized in a months time and I'm pushing myself to memorize the other half in less than a week. Oh my goodness, I'm gonna die.

Why I hate toasters but love poptarts.

I've kept this a secret for years but I have never put my poptart in the toaster, but for on a very few occasions. Is this healthy? Probably. Is it still delicious. Yes!

You see, the toaster isn't necessarily bad in itself, but it just takes so much freaking time to cook the pastry! And why go through the toaster when I can go straight to the pastry!?!? But the toaster still has it's uses. Like making toast or the frozen waffles! Mhmm. Boy, do I love me some waffles.

And can we agree on one thing? Cherry poptarts, even if they aren't your FAVORITE poptarts, are definitely the universal poptart. If you don't know what kind of poptarts your roommate gets but it's your day to buy groceries, get the cherry. Even if you're wrong, the chances are they still can appreciate the cherry ones, too.

If you clicked on my link thinking I'm going to discuss the "Why I Hate Religion but Love Jesus" video, you're wrong. I'm talking about poptarts and toasters. Seriously. Old Tyler would have made a post trying to be clever and use toasters and poptarts as some sort of obscure analogy to discuss the rediculousness of the video. But new Tyler will discuss toasters and poptarts because he likes them, and then straight up tell you the new video on Religion and Jesus is dumb. Most of my Christian friends are too polite and Christian to say it, but it is. I hear a lot of people sugar coat it with statements like, "He makes some valid points but I don't agree with everything he says", and "I can definitely see how he could come to that conclusion, but he is missing some major points." No. Just...no.

"What if I told you Christ came to abolish religion?" I'd say you were wrong! What if I told you Christ said the smores poptarts were the best? I'd be lying too!

I'm frustrated and not making sense. It's time to play piano and eat poptarts. Good day, all.