Halloween Show

So for the half-time show at the football game today (which we won!) the band played "Time Warp" from the Rocky Horror Picture Show and we played "Thriller" by MJ. It was soooooo cool, we did the dances for both songs and it was so much fun! At the end of Time Warp we all just fell to the ground, so that when we started Thriller we could all get up like zombies! We all did our hair all messy and put on zombie make-up, so it was like the funnest (i know that's not a word) show we have done all year. I think the audience really enjoyed it too, they all started to cheer really loud when we did the Thriller dance, so I'm hoping that means we did a good job! A fun start to Halloween~Happy Halloween everyone!

Halloween

I'm really excited for Halloween! I'm so happy its on a weekend that way i wont have to worry about homework that night or anything. I still don't know what I'm going to dress up as though. The band is having a party after rehearsal on Friday so i need to come up with one quick. We were going to try and do a group thing but that's a bit hard because there are 13 of us in our section. We thought maybe going as characters from Snow White would be fun. We could do one person as snow white, one as the prince, one as the queen, and the others as the seven dwarfs, and the other three people already had their costumes picked out. Great idea right?! But after we talked more about it we figured it would be too hard to try and get all the costumes together by Friday, since the only nearby place for costumes is Rite-Aid and they seem to specialize only in gory masks. So that idea is out i think. Hopefully someone will have a good idea..i know i don't. Oh well, if worst comes to worst ill just buy one of the horridly gory masks from Rite-Aid and wear that. YAY for Halloween!

On Belay

On Belay is an organization that helps kids dealing with a parent or loved one that is or has suffered from cancer or some other life changing illness. Every year they look for UNH volunteers to help at the one day program that is usually hosted at an indoor climbing facility or a camp. Its the job of the volunteers to be there for the kids while they're climbing and throughout the day supporting them and helping them have a fun day and forget the stress of dealing with cancer (even if indirectly). I volunteered at the program this past Sunday and it was an absolute blast despite the horrid weather! We were at Camp Lincoln in Kingston NH and it was a really pretty camp, and it had a great ropes course and lots of fun team building structure for us and the kids to learn and play on. All the kids were so amazing, they were all a bit shy at first, as many came alone for the first time, but immediately all the volunteers started laughing and joking with them and playing games to make them feel welcome. By the end of the day everyone had a huge smile on their face and we were all sad to say goodbye. I had an amazing day supporting the kids and i really think they all had a fun day! It is so worth giving up a Sunday to help these kids forget about the stress in their lives and let them know that there are other kids out there going through the same things and that there is always someone out there willing to help! If you want to learn more about the organization or how you can get involved you can visit the following website:

http://www.on-belay.org/

80's Music

For some reason today i was really interested in listening to 80's music. I have no idea what got me started but before i knew it i was on YouTube watching clips of glam rock bands like The Sweet and T-Rex and then i just started watching other 80's artists like Annie Lennox and Duran Duran and The Smiths. A lot of that music was just so cheesy, and the hair and outfits they wore were hilarious! I remember now though that i had been listening to Tears for Fears and that's why i went on YouTube, to watch some of their music videos, and that just lead to other videos and so on, ensnaring me in front of the computer for a long while. It would have been really interesting to be a teenager in the 80's, get to grow up going to these awesome concerts where the lead singers of groups wear wigs and glittery outfits (and yea, i am talking about the men) all while wailing on guitars to a screaming crowd. Must have been pretty epic. I guess ill just have to settle for what YouTube has to offer.

Gerard Butler

I am so happy that we get HBO here! Its really the best thing ever, there are like six movie channels and all WITHOUT commercials! I just watched P.S. I Love You. I had to pick between that and Marley and Me, which i have really wanted to see but i didn't really feel like crying, and i already know that its really sad. P.S. I Love You was really cute though. A chick flick, if you hadn't already guessed that, with Gerard Butler AKA super-Irish-hottie! His accent is so adorable and he is just so charming! I think i will go to see the Ugly Truth on Sunday. I had no real desire to see it before, it looks like a typical love story/chick flick movie, but now I'm on a Gerard Butler kick, so i really want to see it now. In P.S. I Love You he dies early on in the movie, but you still see quite a bit of him when his wife is reminded of memories they shared and just thinks of him. It is kinda sad but has a really sweet ending. Harry Connick Jr. is in it as well, and in this he has a disease where he just speaks his mind (its not like turrets though) and he is so hilarious, he just says the most inappropriate things! Like when he asks Holly (Gerard's wife) how her husbands died, she says a brain tumor and he smiles and goes "NICE!" He adds a bit of comic relief when things get heavy. Its a great movie for those who enjoy a chick flick in all its essence!

Home

I was very happy to go home this weekend. I had a hectic week and it was nice to just be able to go home and be away from the stress of school, have a home-cooked meal, and sleep in my own bed! A very nice feeling. I did see something rather strange this weekend though. Well at least i think its strange. I live on a lake and Sunday morning i looked out one of our windows and saw a a head poking out of the water. Not a human one, although that would make a good story. No, it was some kind of animal, but i couldn't tell what it was. As it swam closer i could see ears and so i thought it was a moose maybe. Then, right before it came on shore, i was able to tell that it was a female deer. I didn't know deer could swim! I know that sounds dumb but honestly can anyone think of a time when they have seen a deer swim? It was just so weird to see this skinny, hoofed animal doing the doggie paddle. I cant imagine they are very efficient swimmers, their hooves wouldn't really be able to propel them far..perhaps that's why i have never seen one swim before. So i thought that was weird, maybe I'm just being silly though But it made me chuckle!

PLEASE READ THIS!! I BEG YOU!!

I thank you if you are reading this now because the topic i want to address deserves so much more attention than it is getting. I just went to see an extraordinary documentary called The Cove. Its about illegal whaling/slaughter of dolphins in Japan. Whaling was banned in Japan in 1986 by the International Whaling Commission but still the small town of Taiji, Japan engages in the mass slaughter of them, killing around 23,000 a year. Many of the dolphins caught are also sent around the world to aquariums and "swim with the dolphin" programs where they spend their lives in captivity. Some of them are killed and sold in Japanese markets, labeled as other fish because of the toxic rate of mercury they contain. What's worse is even most of the Japanese people do not know what they're eating. Check out the below preview and please go check out this movie its truly unbelievable and makes you want to take action. Or if you just love dolphins and want to help anyways here's a link you can follow to learn how to get involved!

http://www.takepart.com/thecove/



Thanks for watching and please take action!!

Sleep Deprivation

This weekend was an absolute blast for the most part..you know despite the uncomfortable bus ride and the fact that i am now suffering from major lack of sleep. I didn't get to bed until 12 on Friday and had to get up at 4. We rode down on a coach bus, which you would think would be super comfy but it really wasn't. The overhead storage was really tiny, and nothing fit in it, so i ended up with most of my stuff either under my feet or in my lap. For 8 hours. I also have this thing where i cant sleep in any kind of moving vehicle, whether a car, train or bus, no matter how tired i am. So basically the whole ride down i just listened to music and watched movies in this weird semi-delusional state. Maryland was really hot when we got down there. Most of the way down, through to New York, had been rainy and humid, but in Maryland it was really sunny and 80 degrees. Which was great until we had to put our uniforms on. The game was fun though, we crushed Towson, 57 to 7!! Thank god because if we drove 8 hours to get our butts kicked i think i would have cried. The next day we headed to Allentown PA for the band expo. That was a lot of fun!! We got to watch some of the other bands preform for about an hour before we had to change and warm up. All of the bands were really good and this one band had a color guard and dance team, it was really entertaining to watch! So then we got up and did our show which went really well, the crowd cheered really loud for us and our director cried because she was so proud (awww!) So the trip was definitely worth it and I'm just glad we have the whole show memorized and now we can just work out the kinks and put on a great show for homecoming next weekend!

So Earlyyyyy

Wow i really wish i had done this earlier so i could go to bed now. I have to be up at 4 am tomorrow to be at the PCAC at 5 so we can leave for Towson. I'm excited. Really. Seriously, i am PUMPED but i am going to be so tired tomorrow and i just hope i don't sleep through my alarm..because that has happened to people before and the band has left them behind. And that would be awful, not to mention my grade would go down. Which would be really lame since i get an A just for playing and showing up, easiest class ever, so if i blew that it would be pretty bad. Yup so Baltimore tomorrow for the football game and then we get to do whatever we want for the night in the Inner Harbor. That should be fun, I'm told there are some good restaurants and shops, so I'm really excited for that. Then after we head to Allentown PA to play in a band expo for like 15 minutes and then we go home. Both ways its like an 8 hour drive so I'm really hoping i can get some homework done..and maybe finish the book I'm reading. Gonna be a fun weekend!!

Jaed Coffin Reading

Today's reading with Jaed Coffin was very interesting. I really wish i had known more about him and the book before i read the excerpt for class because i was kinda confused as to what it was about. I mean obviously i understood he was in Thailand with a monk but i didn't really get why or what he was expecting to gain from it. I bought the book today though after the seminar, i really like the way he writes and i think the excerpt was really interesting and I'm sure the rest of the book will be too. I immensely enjoyed the preface to his new book about the fighting ring in Alaska and will definitely be buying that when it comes out! The essay about his mom was really good too. It was interesting to hear about the differences in culture, and how even though Jaed was involved in Thai culture, there were still some big differences between him and his mom. So I'm very glad we went to the reading today and hope to hear more from Jaed in the future!