Wow, I've pretty much wasted the long part of this weekend. I don't even know how; I had such good intentions and the apartment to myself. I seem to be less productive when my roommate is out of town. Maybe I should rethink living on my own - having productive people around me is a good influence.
The highlight of this weekend was doing an interview with a composer for a course presentation. She was delightful and very helpful. It was almost like she was too articulate. I was anticipating her taking more time to answer, thus giving me more time to write down the gist of it. It was also that I was asking fairly specific questions. Long story short, it went very well and she affirmed that I was on the right track with how I am looking at/ analyzing her piece.
I asked her also some questions about being a pianist/composer. While I hadn't thought of it before, it appears I was looking for specific ideas, but I didn't get them. We come from very different places I guess. She is an incredibly gifted and accomplished Carnegie hall playing concert pianist in addition to being a talented composer - I am not.

On the 24'th it will be once year since my grad recital. I listened to parts of the recording today. Despite what some may think, it's obvious that I was not in a position to decide between a career as a performing pianist and as a composer. The reality of the situation is that My talent for composition brought itself out at the same time as I was realizing that I didn't have the aptitude for decent piano chops. All of this, I am fine with. The unfortunate thing is that, as much as I claimed that I would give both streams equal focus last year, I did not. Neither got the focus they deserved, and it was especially obvious that piano was not in any shape to be less than 100% of my life's devotion. It was not with fresh ears that I was listening today. I listened objectively and came to that conclusion.

Even with that said, I'm seriously looking into an improvisation workshop this summer that would have me back at the piano. It would also have me in Vancouver, I'm very interested. I'm just trying to find out to what extent it is a jazz improvisation thing. The website isn't completely clear, it could also be applicable to classical, either way, it could be good. I'm also going to apply to some composition focused programs, but I think I've missed most deadlines. Oopsie...

I had fallen in love with the comic Toothpaste for Dinner earlier this year and I've slowly made my way through all of the daily comics since 2002.... Now, I've caught up and I will only be able to read one a day. Anyway, I've read them all, and I highly recommend giving it a shot.

I've been working at the school more and more as time goes by. Tonight, I was reminded of just how productive it can be to work at a piano. I keep see-sawing on that issues, whether I should work at a piano or not - well, it's working for me currently, so I'll keep at it. I know things are getting near the end, but it seems that I have everything under control. I've done some good work on my presentation for Contemporary, and that's not for 2 weeks. I want to finish the ground work so I can just review what I did before presenting, I'm not intending to continue working on it right up until I present. I'll finish it so I can pick the topic for my paper as well as focus on the other things due by end of term.
I know that electro will be a last-minute hardcore workfest, and I've found out that my singer works the same way as I do, so she's fine with leaving things until last minute-ish. Obviously not totally last minute, but it's good to know I don't need to overly stress about it.
We've been informed that there will not be a second reading for our Orchestration class, which means I won't have to do parts for my orchestration, but I'm disappointed that it's not going to happen. I was also hoping to get a short composition read if it was going to happen, but I guess that's a no go.

Oy, it's 2am. Luckily only maybe have class tomorrow. It's either tomorrow or Friday and I'll find out which one tomorrow morning ish. This will be a good weekend for writing lots of music. I have an interview booked with the composer whose work I am doing my presentation on. I'm very excited to talk to her!

It hasn't really bothered me all year, but now I'm feeling like I'm missing out on stuff back home.
Many of my friends from music school are having their grad recitals around this time. I would love to be there both to hear them and support them, but it's just not going to happen.

Also, yesterday my sister got a puppy! It flew in from Texas, so my parents had the opportunity to play with it during its layover in Winnipeg. I know they live in Thompson, so it's not like I would be seeing it all the time even if I was in Winnipeg, but at least I would have some chances. I realized the other day that the soonest I might see the puppy is during the summer - then it will be bigger than little cutesy puppy size already, but at least it will still be little playful puppy sized. If I'm not able to make it up there in summer, I won't see it until Christmas, and it will be full grown by then, though still energetic with puppy vitality.
Anyway, I got to see the puppy with my brother in law on their webcam yesterday evening, so I'm happy about that, but I really wanted to be there to hug it and hold it like the baby Jesus. For those of you who have never experienced Michael with animals - all animals who can be held, love to be held like the baby Jesus and have Christmas and/or other Jesus themed songs sung to them. ie "Rock-a-bye Jesus, in the tree top...".

On the other hand, I've made some new friends here who are also having some spectacular recitals and there are lots of good things going on here. I have lots of work to do which is keeping me busy. 2 weeks until I give a presentation for one of my classes, 3 weeks until the electroacoustic concert ( wow that's not much time.. EEK) and then a paper due shortly thereafter for my contemporary composers class. I guess also on that 3 week timeline are my orchestration work and a new composition in general. In other words, there's lots to do in the next few weeks.
It's crunch time!

Ok, the plan for today is to make and eat a big lunch and then go to the school and do lots of work. I need to make it into the electro lab and get some work done before my next class. Other people needing the lab have started to sign up for time, so I need to make sure I sign up for a couple slots to ensure that I can get my work done.

The Student Composers Concert was last night.
It was wonderful. Every piece had something of value and the performances were of a high calibre, especially considering that the ensembles don't get graded. I was very impressed with everything.
I don't like the seating in that hall, it hurts my ass, but other than that, it was a very enjoyable evening.
Having heard many of the pieces at the dress rehearsal, I can also say that there was a significant improvement in every group made over this last week.
My piece was very well received by everyone I talked to, and my prof pulled me aside afterwards for some very reassuring words.
Most of the composers along with friends and some of the performers went out for drinks at the grad club afterwards. By the end, it had thinned out to 6 of us, I could finally hear the conversation as the music died down a bit, and we had a wonderful conversation about this that and the other.
I can't wait to get the recording and give it another more objective listen. I will also make the recording available on Facebook once I get a hold of it.

Now that piece has finished it's initial lifespan. It's eaten up a lot of this year, and I'm proud of it, but I will be happy to put it away for a while. Now it's on to the other work that lies ahead. This will be a productive weekend, I intend to get a lot of writing done!

Blogging seems to be getting pushed to the back burner lately, and I can't foresee any change in that for a while.
I think that I will have a handle on everything that I need to get done this year, although it will be busy.
Something I forgot to factor into the equation was recitals - there are a lot of them going on and I would like to go to more than I can. Nevertheless, I'm finding it easier to say no to them because of one key factor...
They don't do recital receptions here!!! No dainties, no beverages, no finger sandwiches... I remember basically spending every evening of recital season at the school - practising before, after and sometimes during the recitals and then socializing and eating thereafter; it was economical and delicious. It also made recitals into a social event, which is what Manitoba is known for.
Honestly, that doesn't really have any bearing on my decisions to go or not to recitals; it's just a little thing I miss about Manitoba.

I've been doing some phoning around about apartments, and it's not looking promising for a bachelor or 1-bedroom, but I know I'm looking too early. I need to just ignore this until I'm done school.

I sent an email to a prof and it's looking promising that there will be an improv ensemble next year. Once classes are over, I will meet with her and discuss what involvement I might have with the group. Best case scenario would be if I got to be a TA for the class instead of teaching sight singing.

Enough of that, back to work for me!

The weekend came and went.
I'm not really any less sick, but I'm feeling better about it because I'm used to it. The illness has settled into its runny nose/throat and general constant thirst phase - where it will stay for a while...

The dress rehearsal for this Friday's concert was on Sunday - it went fairly well and I feel very good about how my piece will sound at the concert. I'm very excited about the concert and I'm sure we'll go out for drinks afterwards which will be delightful!

Sunday was also daylights saving time. I dislike this whole process. I forgot about it upon waking until my roommate reminded me, and then again upon sleeping - realizing that I had stayed up an hour later than I thought...

I need to get some groceries tomorrow. I'm not in dire need of food, I could live at least a month on what I have, but I don't have any fresh vegetables/fruit/cheese. Also, we are dangerously close to running out of toilet paper, so a trip to the grocery store will be a good thing to do tomorrow. I need to try to spend very little at the store, this month, I need to tighten the budget significantly in order to make up for previous overspending... oopsie.

In terms of finances, this year hasn't been a complete failure... If I don't get a summer job, I won't quite make it through the summer, but that's silly, a job is certainly in the plans. In addition to paying rent/bills in summer, I need to save up for the following year. Anyway, to avoid any extra stress, I'm sending in the rest of the paperwork for student loans that I was hoping to avoid by thinking I didn't need the money.
The mixture of living on my own for the first time in my life + not working during the school year for the first time since having started work = Not the best financial outlook.
As it stands, I will be working next year, back to ballet accompaniment. More than likely, I will be moving and paying more in rent, so that should at least even things out, probably still profiting. I'm guaranteed the same funding from school, and if I get the OGS, that's even more.
Oi, I shouldn't talk so much about money, but that's the way it is. I'm glad for student loans not because I need it desperately, rather I know it is there for as much as I need. Even this year, I won't be taking as much as they are offering. Maybe I should and put it in savings, so as to not need as much next year, but I like to think of it as accurately depicting how much I needed during my time out here.

In terms of moving, I'm thinking of moving into the ghetto of London, then it will be cheap enough for me to have a place of my own, like a bachelor or 1 bedroom. Anyway, more about that as it comes!

A quick update for the millions of people out there worrying about me -
I'm feeling somewhat better. A bit of a lateral movement - I'm no longer fluey, just coldy, I guess that's what it is. My nose is runny, I'm thirsty and my voice is a little hoarse.

I dislike the whole process of my body emitting snot from my nasal cavities, especially when it happens so often that the nose starts burning from kleenex.

I have electro tomorrow, I wish I would have done more, but being sick prevented me from spending more time in the lab, and other people are also starting to spend more and more time there working on their own projects. Nevertheless, I got a nice chunk of stuff done to show how and what I'm going to do for my second piece. I took a survey of what I need to get done before the end of term and I think it will be manageable - intense, yet manageable.
Or maybe not, ah, who knows.

real sick...ick!

First off, bonus points to anyone who can identify where that title comes from...

As the title implies, I have some kind of stomach flu or something, I'm really hoping it's only one of those short lived ones, as I'm feeling no-where near as bad as I did last night. Let's just say that if the flu manifested itself in a more creative way, Mozart might have been jealous of the ease with which music spewed forth from me last night.
The worst part was that I felt the inevitability coming for the entire wait for bus, bus ride and subsequent walk home, totalling slightly under an hour.
This morning, I was convinced that I would go to class, case closed. I showered and even made my way to the bus stop. As I stood there, both shivering and sweating, my stomach queased- as if to dare me to try and make it through a 3-hour seminar class. I backed down from the dare and climbed back into bed.

Anyway, I shan't continue with such unpleasant matters.

I've been feeling better since waking up this afternoon. I decided since I wasn't in the mood to force myself to do something productive, I listened to an entire opera - score in hand.
Peter Grimes - It was wonderful! My intention with taking it out was to see how Britten writes for a large voice, as I will be doing the same in the summer. My impression with the soprano who sang Ellen in this recording was that she didn't have a terribly large voice, but then again, what the Fach do I know?!? (haha, sorry, terrible terrible pun)
I also asked my prof what considerations one should have when writing for large voice, and did some reading on Fachs online, but the general idea I'm getting is that there doesn't need to be a difference in how you approach it, rather just an awareness that the voice has more presence and therefore, can still be heard over thicker textures (orchestra).
I'm glad that I didn't only listen to the arias focusing on Ellen, the Opera was spectacular. I loved the economy of Britten's music. Themes and musical fragments reappear, creating a sense that the opera is a whole; everything is related. I also loved that it was in English. I understood the dramatic action throughout, but I think I missed out on any kind of moral statement. It seemed that the story/opera should have made one, but it wasn't openly apparent to me.

In general, I have been doing badly with listening lately. Earlier in the year, I was filling up all my spare time with listening to recordings from the library, score in hand - I seem to have faltered from that good habit. I will try to get back into that habit, but I'm not sure how much free time for listening I will be having before the end of term. Nevertheless, summer will be all about working and listening and writing.

Tomorrow morning, my piano trio is rehearsing and I need to go listen. Therefore, I need to be healthy. Fortunately, that's only a one-hour commitment in the morning; if needed, I can just come home to bed right afterwards.

While I had been feeling that I'd accomplished nothing over break, it was good to talk to some of the other comp students tonight and have it put into perspective - I'd certainly not done any less than my colleagues; if anything, I've done a little more. Anyway, the moral of this story is that I don't have to feel bad about only recently developing some sort of direction with my second piece.
As this piece won't be performed this year, there isn't as much pressure, it's purely a learning tool, which I need to use for preparation for my thesis next year... which will be my next and final composition of this degree....WOW! Quite a bit of a jump...

For electro, there is a lot of work I will need to do for my second piece. The performance date is at the beginning of April, so it has to be written and learnt by the performer by then...!

I'm rehearsing with my erhuist tomorrow. I'm excited.

The student composers' concert is in just over a week, and the dress rehearsal is on Sunday. I will hear it for the first time on thursday. I feel confident that they will do a good job, I'm very excited to hear it!
Ok, that's enough rambling for today.

I'm home...

The bus trip home was less than perfect - one bus leaving late and an accident holding us up somewhere in Ontario for at least half an hour meant I got into Toronto 20 minutes after the bus depot closed for the night... there were no more buses home to London.
At 1am, I took a chance and apologetically called my most favourite person in all of Torontonia - Charmeee!! Anyway, I got a good night's sleep and made it home early this afternoon.

Aside from travel concerns, the trip was just what I needed.
-It re-affirmed my love/desire/craving for big city life.
-Apparently, I don't dislike Toronto nearly as much as I thought I did.
-I got to do a lot of socializing and spent some really good quality time with some friends and family of whom I don't see nearly enough.

I got a teeny little bit of work done, but I will be making this shorter than I'd like because I neeeeeeed to get much done during the remainder of this weekend.
Mainly:
1) Orchestration for Monday - 2 short Schoenberg pieces.
B) Learn Erhu accompaniment solidly.
3) Compose something for my Lesson. I've decided that in preparation for my thesis, I will write a few short pieces - first as piano pieces, but with orchestration in mind while I am working on them as piano pieces, eventually orchestrating them fully.
d) Life-ish stuff - laundry, groceries, letters to mail, cleaning, financial organization etc.

Reactions to my trip:
My friends in Toronto and Montreal seem to be doing quite well - I'm jealous of their living conditions, but either living in an amazing city like Montreal, or paying ridiculous rent in TO will do that...
I've been struggling to maintain the motivation to keep walking from school and for errands here in London, but in a big city, you need far less of such motivation.

Oy, I've spent too much time here already, so much to get done.

Today, I've been doing a mix of packing and cleaning. Damn, there's a lot of cleaning to be done!
I am generally a stereotypical composer/musician in terms of my organizational method - stacks and piles of papers and things everywhere, while being strangely aware of where everything is amidst the apparent disorganization. In a word, I'm justifiably messy
I finally realized that while my suitcase was too tall to fit under the my bedframe, I could simply life the frame and the suitcase now fits comfortably under my bed. I've learnt that an accordian takes up twice as much space when it is stored out of its case.
These fits of cleaning/organizing don't happen too often, so I just figured I'd mention it. I've also been compiling printed out googlemaps of where my Montreal friends live in relation to the bus depot/university so I will not be too lost when I get there. As it stands, I'm completely organized for the Montreal segment of the trip, but there are people in Toronto that I want to see tomorrow - and the problem lies with not having contact with one of them, and not being sure of when and where I will be seeing them.
I will nail down those details tonight. Also, I need to transfer readings, PDFs, and sound files of some of the things I've been working on, just in case I get inspired while there.
At some point, I actually thought I would have been able to spend this evening catching up on work.... Nope, apparently there's too much to do in preparation for a trip.
Oooh, LAUNDRY NIGHT!
I probably will, but just in case I don't blog again before or during my trip, happy reading week everyone!

I have a feeling that that short bout of knitting will be the last for a while... Tomorrow is the last day before reading week; once we return to classes thereafter, it will be high-gear to the end of the year. I don't really want to think about that, so I won't.

Tonight there was a fairly informal performance of the student composers. I showed the film which I worked on earlier this year, and while technical difficulties prevented me from being able to show it on the projector, my laptop screen sufficed and I got some very positive feedback. Nevertheless, it was something completely different that gave me a gentle little ego-rub tonight.
While talking over beverages after the concert, it became clear that one of the profs had mentioned one of my pieces in his lecture as an example of successful treatment of an extramusical idea. The piece was my Alzheimer's Variations. It's always nice for someone to acknowledge that a piece of yours is successful, but for a prof to do that in front of a class, thats something special. Also, it's not like I wrote this piece for an assignment for him, or even while studying with him.. in fact the only time he would have seen this piece was in my audition portfolio. I wondered for a long time whether this piece was truly successful, or if it just rested on the title, but I think I'm now willing to accept that it is a success on its own merit.

So, reading week is starting soon. I am so unorganized, I need to figure out when I am actually leaving for Montreal. There's also a fair bit to get done over reading week... but without deadlines fast approaching, I'm setting myself free into the land of the French, haha! Anyway, even just being in a different city will make doing homework fun, if it comes to that... All of my friends in Montreal are university grad students, so I'll be around the university, and I'm sure I'll see a piano if I'm anywhere near the school of music.

Hello everyone, I'd like to introduce you to two of my newest friends.

I think I will name the pig Pigette in honour of my old friend Piggy. I'm not sure what I will name the penguin.
I didn't give them eyes; I'm not sure if I should buy some bobbly eyes, or just sew some eye-type thing on them... They're a little ragged because I only have a paring knife with which to cut the loose strings. I stuffed them with plastic bags. If I had gone with the fibrefill stuffing, they would be a lot smoother and softer, but I had so many damned plastic bags filling the cupboards - I figure this would be a good way to solve that problem.

It's been a long time since I had time to knit, so I made sure to spend some time doing my favourite pastime this weekend . These stuffed animals are a great project because they take relatively little time (a few hours, or an evening) and you have something very concrete to show what you've done. Bigger projects seem to take forever.

These are also a little more involved in terms of the pattern. You do something a little different each row, so you don't get stuck in a routine. That is both good and bad - when I work on scarves or thongs, or things that I don't need to think about too much, I can do something else, like talk or watch a movie, but because you're not as actively involved, it's easy to forget where you are in the pattern, or what you're doing. With these toys, I found it difficult to do while watching t.v.
This was the first time I brought out my knitting box since the trip out here... it reminded me that I had started a blanket, or something on the drive up, so now I'm going to continue it. There's something about knitting a big project in winter which just makes you feel warm and cozy.

Hmm, I guess that's it. It was a good weekend. I went to Toronto yesterday to see my friend's Opera shorts performed. It was very enjoyable and I'm glad to have actually made it to Toronto. Good times all around.

Last night was two events:

Accompanying - I played for my double bass friend. It went quite well. There was a rocky start at our first rehearsal, which was in the same hour as our first playing for his prof. The prof was quite apprehensive, suffice it to say, he was very happy with how things improved in a few days time.

Side note, I picked up some more accompanying work. I will be playing for a visiting Erhuist. The Erhu is the Chinese violin type instrument; it is a wonderful instrument and I'm excited to get to play for it!

I was most impressed with the Opera last night. From the very first notes, I was impressed with even the calibre of the orchestra. [Side note, a fairly large orchestra can fit in the pit, so I know that there will be no practical problems with that for my dance piece thesis.]
The calibre of singing was varied, but generally very high. My friend Judy was singing one of the leads - it was wonderful to hear her singing so beautifully!
Generally, the opera itself is delightful in a dark kind of way.
If I had to point out a weakness, it would be the acting element of the show. It's not a true opera, because lots of the dialogue was spoken, and it showed that the Opera specialists are just not used to delivering dialogue unless they are singing it. Nevertheless, I thought some of the smaller role characters did a spectacular job at bringing out the 'characters' even in non-spoken/sung aspects.
In the end, any weaknesses were overshadowed by the strength of the cast/musicians. I'm very glad to have gone.
For student-opera, I can't really compare this to anything, because I've only seen students doing opera either in the chorus of professional stuff, or in excerpts. While I might say that some scenes could have been tighter (in comparison to the calibre of some scenes I've seen), I have a great respect for the work that everyone did to bring a whole opera to the stage, and to life.

Tonight, I'm going to the school to work on Electroacoustic stuff. I've been putting it on the back burner for a while now, and it's time to get on top of it. I have a lot to get done tonight, I hope I can get to all of it.

Tomorrow, we're leaving early to get to Toronto in time to meet a friend for lunch before going to the Tapestry New Opera Works show.

OOh OOh
Newsflash!
I'm back to knitting.
I seem to have more time now that the piano trio is done. While I may not actually have as much time as I think, I've been taking that time to knit. I'll put pics up later, but I knit a pig that I shall name Pigette, and I'm knitting a Penguin! They are both stuffed toys, the pig turned out quite well. I am stuffing them with plastic bags, because we have acquired SO many of them, and this seems as good a use as any for them.

Yesterday evening, I handed my piece over to the ensemble and walked them through it and answered any questions they had. It was well received and got some good feedback, even from just a first glance. They are going to start to work on their own parts and then work on it as an ensemble over reading week and I will hear the first reading after reading week.

Now is the exciting time of the year, where I've finished my work and I start to get some feedback from the performers, and I get to hear the works actually performed.

This weekend will be full of opera - Street Scene (UWO Opera) on Friday and then Tapestry New Opera Works in Toronto on Sunday.

I need to get myself organized for Reading Week. I know I want to go to Toronto and Montreal and visit with people, but I need to find out how long I'll be in each place and where I can stay and whatnot.

I slept until 1pm today; it felt great! No big plans for today, and I'm going to ignore school a bit today. I should go out and get my mom something for her birthday coming up. Yes, that will be my plan.

Ballet piano is over for another while. The day was quite long - just after 8am until about 4:45ish, most of that sitting on a wooden chair which slanted backwards = bad for back in general, and super bad for any kind of decent piano posture. Nevertheless, I'm not terribly achy.
It was nice to be treated about on par with the examiner - we were both caffeinated and watered at breaks, fed at lunch and generally pampered.
Everything went well. There were no major catastrophes - at least none that I was responsible for. A few little girls seemed to have completely forgotten just about everything they were supposed to do for the exam, but that just happens sometimes (and from my view, it's delightfully cute and/or hilarious).
The most important part for me, is that I can now afford my plans for reading week (Toronto and Montreal)!

Oooh, in exactly 24 hours, I will be handing over and presenting my piece to my Piano Trio ensemble and answering any questions they might have so that I can officially release the reigns. I got a nice chunk of the work done yesterday and I will still get a lot done tonight. I will ignore the fact that this was supposed to be done for Friday, and I'll just feel good about my progress and accomplishment.

I'm not excited about having to, yet again, wake up early tomorrow to teach. That will be a 4 day stint of early mornings (Thurs-Mon), almost like I was in the working world... completely unacceptable! Luckily, I have no plans for Tuesday other than a whole lot of sleeping, haha!

Tomorrow is my Sister's One Year wedding anniversary, which means that one year ago, I was on a plane from Winnipeg to Las Vegas. I would love to go back... it was a spectacular little vacation.

And there I end my tales of pianism and jollity for the night.

Productive day in many a way:

Rehearsal this morning went well. I dislike the morning, and I was a few minutes late because I stopped to get a timmy ho cappuccino; as I predicted, they were running behind anyway.
We covered the remaining 2 grades of students today - this music was easier and while I was sightreading everything today, I concluded that there was nothing that I couldn't play well enough or fake my way through if need be.
Nevertheless, after my lesson today, I practised piano like I haven't practised in ages... wait - I haven't practised in ages! Anyway, a few hours of metronome practising and I think I'm good to go. I basically had to make a judgement call on my professionalism. My call was to not spend every waking hour of today at a piano - the result is that I spent enough time to learn things to about 80% - the remaining 20%, I will supply tomorrow!
That number is pretty made up, I don't know how I got it - the ones I was most worried about, I tried to learn as close to the tempo marking as possible. There is one piece that just isn't possible to learn accurately with the time an resources given: I practised it so I could play it PERFECTLY at maybe two-thirds tempo. With that as a basis to which I kept going back, I was also practising it up to full tempo using some tricks of the trade - aka faking it. I think I've finally gotten over some of my modesty (whether that be a good thing or bad) and realized that some of the things that I do - improvising, recomposing music at sight (usually to make it more playable) are skills that most other pianists can't or don't do. I'm still not convinced that others CAN'T do improv, but I'm accepting that it is one of my highly marketable skills and I need to treat it like that. I still embrace my altruistic goals of getting the whole classical world to improvise, but ya, I need to take advantage of my skills when I can.

Anyway, the exams are EARLY tomorrow, I have to be there for 8:15ish. Yuck. They run until the late afternoon!! = Long day.

My lesson today was good. He gave me a few more suggestions, therefore there's lots of work still remaining before Monday when I take the piece to the players. Tomorrow evening will be intense with finalizing the piece. Monday, I will have time to final edit, make sure formatting is perfect, then take it to get bound and printed and all that fun.

I am looking forward to this weekend being over.

Also, the chair I sit in at the studio is uncomfortable - I am going to have back pain tomorrow, I know it!

Thanks to my new diabetic friend reader, K2!
I don't blog nearly enough about my diabetes, so now I have a reason to include some of that on here.
I think my diabetes control has been getting consistently better over the past few years and currently it is pretty darned good. At the same time, stress and general disorganization are reeking occasional havoc. I woke up this morning and my sugar was relatively high, it didn't feel like I had an overnight low, and I was struck with the possible realization that I didn't take my long acting the night before. My sugars should have been higher if I went all night without insulin, but I don't know. Generally, I was unsure as to whether I should take the long acting right away... which I ended up doing. Knowing there was a slight chance I might have double dosed, I made different choices all day, tested more regularly and well- it was an odd day. In the end, I'm sure I didn't take it last night.
This all serves as a reminder to not be stressed and disorganized. Missing my long acting insulin is a bummer, cause the math is difficult to figure out - however many hours late you are... that becomes the overlap where the next day, you will have double your dose. I'm sure I could figure a way to juggle doses so I wouldn't have any extra drug, but that would take over a week... the solution is to run my sugars high tonight, I can calculate just how high or what food will cover the extra 12 units of insulin which will be in my blood overnight.

Rehearsal number one went alright today. My playing was QUITE as bad as I was expecting. As I expected, the teacher didn't seem worried about my playing at all, so that's a good thing. Nevertheless, there are 3 or 4 of the exercises that I absolutely have to just plain practice before the exam on Sunday.
Tomorrow morning, I have rehearsals for the other exams - yuck to 9am on a Saturday morning... Damn Ballet!!!! For the last 4 years, ballet has been the demon that ruins my Saturday mornings.
Tomorrow afternoon, I also have a final lesson with my prof for the Piano Trio - hopefully I will get the final blessing on the piece.

I had been thinking of going to Quebec for Carnival next weekend, but then I would have to miss out on both the Opera at Western and a friend's Short Opera premiere in Toronto. I will stay here and enjoy both of those events, save myself some money, and try and do some low key relaxing and socializing.
The following weekend is the start of Reading Week, and I'll be going to Toronto/Montreal during that time, so I won't be missing out on the travel.
AND with this work I'm doing this weekend, I might actually be able to afford some random fun for reading week!

Updates left and right

The little son-of-a-bitch is gone. Good riddance I say. I love dogs, but for the life of me, I can not justify that creature's existence as a dog. It remained afraid of me until my roommate took him home in his little dog carrying bag.
Tomorrow is Friday, the due date for my Piano Trio. On my prof's advisory, I got a short extension until Monday. I could be ready for tomorrow, but he wanted to see me again. This means I will have time this weekend to make it look good and pay attention to finalizing details - those things I might have glossed over if I needed to submit it by tomorrow.

I am working this weekend - I got work as a last minute accompanist for some Royal Academy of Dance exams this Sunday. It is probably not in my best interest to do this - 14 hours over the weekend will surely get in the way of the Piano Trio and school work, but not enough to have a negative effect on my school work. The reason it's not in my best interest is because it comes to about 80 pages of music which I will be damn close to sight-reading. Even if I had nothing else to do, that's a little much to try and polish over a weekend. RAD music is BAD - terrible music. I think it was written by random dance pianists. The music is weak, lacking compositional craft. Written in odd keys with awkward hand positions and whatnot - the kind of music on needs to practise = great for long time dance accompanists who are in need of something to involve themselves in their trade, but in the end - not good for the musicality of the dancers or the pianist.
Anyway, for each of the three exam sets I will be accompanying, I will get a few hours of rehearsal with the dancers = time to play through the pieces and make notes of which I need to practise before the exam. One thing I've learnt from accompanying dance is - while I will hear my mistakes and imperfections, the teacher and dancers will hear the musicality that live accompaniment brings. Still, I will be spending far too much time playing the piano this weekend.
I am also going to accompany my Double Bass playing friend for a concerto movement. Also fairly bad music- written by a bassist to display the instrument, not the musicality, but oh well. It's very Romantic and fun to play, so it works out!

I was planning on being done the trio and wasting away the weekend, but my how the tables have turned....

In response to Jon,
Thank you for your regular commentary. Perhaps I shouldn't paint such a picture of myself as a lazy unproductive jackass, jackass.
I think my comments are generally slanted with a bit of modesty, but they also give insight into my own creative process. Some people need to lock themselves away with their compositions and they are incredibly productive during that time. That is generally the type of student that profs are used to dealing with, from what I gather. As for myself, I point out the lack of productivity, because that is the most apparent comparison that I can make between myself and others around me. As it happens, the creative process has been running constantly, and it's a series of dry spells between the times that I can pull together that which develops itself sometimes consciously, sometimes unconsciously, in my head.
Tonight is one of those moments - and perfectly timed. My lesson is tomorrow, so I am pulling everything together tonight as it is finally making sense.
I was starting to get worried that I might not have a completed piece in time, but now I am confident that I will.

In regards to the dog, I forgot to mention the breed....
hold on to your panties....
it's a "Chinese Crested Powder Puff"
that's right, easily the most pathetic name for a breed ever!
I've concluded that it is also the most pathetic dog ever. It cowers constantly at noises it hears, and mostly me. Basically, it doesn't seem like the dog had been properly socialized and therefore has issues with dominance. Anyway, I'm losing patience quickly and quite frankly, I find myself reacting more emotionally than I should to the fact that it fears me.
Animals have odd affects on people, even those who don't overtly desire the acceptance of others, can be hurt by the lack of acceptance by a stupid little son-of-a-bitch!

My lesson is tomorrow, lessons are productive, therefore I will report back tomorrow about how PRODUCTIVE and NOTLAZY I will have been.... Happy Jon?!?

I have a puppy!

My roommate's parents are on vacation, so we get to look after their dog for a little while.
It's tiny... like not even the size of a house cat. Super scrawny and the most timid dog I've ever met, but that's ok, it's a dog!
It's only been here an hour, so it needs to get used to it's new surroundings anyway, but it will be nice to have around the apartment.
In conclusion, it's 10pm Sunday night and I did not get enough work done this weekend.
I'll work as much as I can up to about midnight, but I need to get sleep tonight especially after what happened on Friday...
Oh wait, I never mentioned - crazy - how could I not have mentioned it!
I slept in Friday morning - until 9:20-something. The problem was that I was teaching at 9:30, and I need to leave 30 minutes before I need to be at the school. I didn't waste a second, I called a cab and brushed my teeth and threw on some clothes, gathered my stuff in just enough time to see the cab outside my window. I was 10 minutes late for class, and I felt terrible about it.
This will sound bad, but it actually worked in my favour: Luckily, It was a test on that day, so the students were coming spaced out and not on time anyway. All of the students showed up and did their tests - I was worried about the odd chance that a student showed up in the first 10 minutes and then left before I got there, but luckily everything worked out.
I think I did get caught up on sleep this weekend, but it generally sucks staying up until 2am when I need to wake up for 7:30ish; it's just under my 6 hour comfort zone of sleep.
Ok, back to work!

Damnit, I'm TRYING to be super productive this weekend, but failing miserably.
The only project I have to work on is my piano trio. For the last few weeks, I've been able to go between projects and have a sense of being productive on something at any time. There seemed to be a natural flow to things.
That flow has slowed to a puddle.
I'm getting some stuff done, but I was hoping/needing the creative stuff to just be flowing out of me this weekend. Anyway, the good thing about staring at my sketches and the computer screen for hours without actually producing anything new is that I'm getting to know my own work quite well. I'm starting to see how it is all going to fit together. I'm not terribly worried because this is how it usually happens - I take an inordinate amount of time to piece things together internally and then I am able to sort that out in the real world (well, as real as the computer or manuscript is). The problem is that I can't rely on that time having elapsed early enough for me to get all my work done, so I'll just force myself to do what I can so that it will get finished by the weekend. My lesson is on Tuesday, but I do want to have some sense of finality going in there. My goal is to have it in some form of completion by tomorrow night so that I can just work on the finesse of the piece.

I am excited to think ahead to ... well anything other than this weekend. Next weekend, I will be done all of my immediately pressing projects - it's been a LONG time since I haven't had some kind of deadline looming over me... probably since November.
Also, the weekend after next weekend, I am going to Quebec for Carnival! I've been feeling stupid/lazy/uncultured lately - thinking about the fact that I live 2 hours from Toronto, yet I still haven't gone. This area of the country has a lot of opportunities available, so I need to take advantage of them. I think I'm also going with some grad student friends to see the TSO playing Mahler next weekend.

When I was deciding on grad schools, I convinced myself that it would be more advantageous to live somewhere(London) close to a big big city with lots of culture(Toronto) than to live in a moderately big city with moderate culture(Edmonton). I think I was wrong. The arts and cultural influence has to be right around you. I'm going to start forcing myself to go to Toronto more because, let's face it, London is not good for my artistic soul. School is great and I'm learning a lot and I love it, but there's also all of that stuff that people learn outside of class.
In conclusion, wherever I go after this degree, that choice will be driven by the desire to live within a strong artistic community.
I hope I don't sound too negative, the other side of that is my plan to make the most out of London. Once my piano trio is done, I will have time to start working with the choreographer on some kind of project for the end of this term as a precursor/ research into my thesis project for next year. I am also going to put efforts into starting that improvised music group at Western.

Ok, too much time typing on the computer... back to work!

YAY HAPPY HAPPY!

I spent today finishing and connecting the second song of the autumn cycle. I was almost ready to send it to the singer this afternoon, but I waited and printed it out at the university. Good thing, I managed to show it to a percussionist and got the blessing. Then I noticed that I had forgotten about dynamics - so I did that this evening! I treat dynamics as formal structure, so I use them to reinforce the structure, which is best done once everything else has been completed.
It took a fair bit of time, but tonight I integrated the addition of dynamics and the final edit!

I have now finished my commission! I had a great talk with the singer tonight and I explained everything to her and now it's basically in her hands! I'm certainly willing to make edits if needed, and answer any questions, but I've fulfilled my side of the project!

I feel really good - not just to be finished this project, but it really came together and over the last few days.
The celebration has to be short lived, in fact, it is now over. I will end this post and get back to work on my Piano Trio.
I hope that this week will be just as productive and rewarding as things have been wrapping up the song cycle!

Life is busy and intense!

2 more days to finish my song cycle. I will get it done on time. I have the two poems entered into the computer and they are put together, right now I am fixing them so that a)they make sense with each other and 2) they flow seamlessly from one into the other. I was at a block where they were both almost finished, but I couldn't quite seal the deal - now that they are together, the problems that they each faced are finding solutions in their new surroundings. The process is quite exciting, but I wish I had reached this place a little earlier.
In conclusion, I'm excited for Friday when I will send this piece to the singer and percussionist and be done with it, barring any problems.

One week and 2 days until I need to have my Piano Trio finished. I will get it done on time. I was feeling very frustrated about the process as I felt I had no idea of the direction in which to head. I thought I was going to need my prof to help me decide on what material to use and tell me what to do. Apparently I had almost everything in place. He helped me to see the architecture which I had already sculpted, without being blatantly aware of it. He only made one truly creative suggestion which I will take and then, in the interest of time running short, he recommended the order in which I should work on the tasks which remain. In other words, this weekend, I will be working a)to the deadline and 2)to my own personal limits and beyond.
Deadlines are such a different thing between piano and composition. I like it better in comp, because the deadline is hard and tangible, whereas, with learning music for a performance, the work has to be done more beforehand.

The rumour has not been hardcore verified, but the word on the street is that Ontario is covering pumps up to the age of 25. Therefore, I should be able to get a pump covered! That's the big thing, the thousands of dollars that they cost. The monthly costs of insulin and the needles for that will be covered by university insurance, and I know that they are covered in Manitoba so if the rumour proves true, I feel confident in that decision!
Nevertheless, I won't get excited yet. I need to get through the next week and a half!

I voiced some of my concerns in an email to a friend in the diabetes field here in Ontario and I received a response that said she wanted to talk to me, and that she might have some good news for me. Sometime after the weekend we will talk and, well I will shush up until then at least.

I realized today when I went to chop up my onion, that I had no onion. The grocery service forgot my onion. Brilliant on their part, but I'm not sure if I'll give them the satisfaction. I sent an email and they credited me with the cost of the onion. Somehow, their mistake costs me about a buck, but it almost guarantees them a repeat customer. I don't think it's worth it, I'll be going to the actual grocery store on my own.
My roommate seems really happy with the service. I guess there are lots of pros, but theres something too sterile about the process. If I continue to use it, I might find other ways to become a complete hermit, and while I don't mind hermiting over the weekends, I think it could damage me if it were a more permanent thing.

I've ignored commentary on my piano trio for a while - partially because no work was getting done, and partially because I wasn't sure what I would even say.
I had thought I was very close to a finished product before the break, but I was redirected to write a completely new piano trio. I brought the new version to my last lesson - now it is time to pick parts of both and mix them together. I knew I was going to be doing this in the end, but it hasn't made the process any easier.
And by 'easier' I don't mean in terms of general difficulty, I mean emotionally. Not that this is a huge thing, but I think we (or just me) get attached to the things we create-in the state that we created them. It's one thing to edit a piece and make changes here and there, even big changes are fine, but this is taking the elements of the original and tearing them apart. We lose that emotional attachment, not that we have to the music, but that the music has to it's own surroundings. If I think of my musical construction as a representation of how I relate to the world around me, as I sometimes do, then I am basically uprooting myself.
Anyway, I'm not so haughty to claim that the first version was the best and I'm going to ruin what I had; and I'm actually quite excited to go through this process, but it seems to have more weight than I would have imagined.
Once I finish inputting the newer version into the computer, I will print it out and then literally sit with the papers and cut them up into chunks and bits and then paste them together into something new and exciting!

Zippidy-doo, time just flies by at lightening speed these days.

I don't like Ontario's health coverage. Manitoba is great in comparison.

Let's take a look at the basic concepts of diabetes that have been around for a long long time. Diabetics need insulin and a method of getting that insulin into their body. In order to lessen the randomness of diabetes management, diabetics monitor their blood sugar levels.

For my entire life as a diabetic, these facts have been a given and the government of Manitoba has provided me with basic access to Insulin, Needles, and Testing Supplies. I understand that the higher end versions of any of these key elements or beyond are not base-definition:Necessary and I accept that there has to be a minimum standard of care taken as a baseline.

I had been excited about Ontario's health coverage because I know they subsidize, if not completely cover, the cost of insulin pumps for children under 18 - a forward pushing initiative which is far beyond the baseline standards of even Manitoba.
This is why I was surprised and not pleased to find out that needles are not included in Ontario's basic coverage. The pharmacist told me that according to the government, needles are not considered a 'drug'. Upon asking for the distinction of a drug and a non-drug, I was told that drugs are those things that are deemed necessary
That is RIDICULOUS!
Without needles, I die. There is no other way of getting the insulin into my body. Even if I could lather and douse myself with insulin to try to absorb it through osmosis, how would I even get the drug out of the bottle?!? Not without a needle, I couldn't!

Before the break, I actually went to the office to get my Ontario health card, but I didn't have a passport so I planned on doing it later. I'm glad I did - now I will do some more research and most likely conclude the the added paperwork will be worth it if I remain a Manitoba resident for Health Care.

It's been a busy week. This whole week, I have had classes or a meeting or something every morning- what a contrast to last term.
Orchestration is now out of the way, at least the first term project. The reading went fine and I learnt a fair deal from it. The conductor was good enough to make a bunch of markings in my score of some general things. Overall, the prof seemed quite pleased with the way our projects turned out.
This term, I have an academic course which involves prep time between classes as it is a seminar. Also, the weekly workload for Electro has increased as we learn a new program and need to do a bunch of tutorials for that program each week. In other words, NOW I am experiencing grad school.

Current Projects:
The Autumn Song Cycle is over 50% finished and submitted. I sent the first song to the singer last night and went over all the details so she can get started on learning it. I have pretty much exactly a week to get the other song (2 poems combined) finished.

The Piano Trio is coming along. I had a lesson the other day and I actually had stuff written and he looked the whole thing over. It was pretty much just a detailed sketch, but he felt it was much closer to completion than I thought. My task for this week is to pick and choose the elements from the two versions that I want to combine. My plan of attack is to do this with scissors! I need to input the second version into the computer first, then I'll print it out and then cut it up and decide which segments are worth using.

Tomorrow, I have a meeting with the other of the two available prospective thesis advisers. I haven't met him yet because he has been on sabbatical, so I have no idea how things will go. Nevertheless, I will stay optimistic until the end!

My roommate discovered one of these grocery delivery services. I looked it up and the delivery charge was only 6bucks and the prices seemed reasonable, so I'm giving it a try. I'm not sure how I feel about it. It's easier for me to be organized. I always forget something and the list is never complete, but at least here, I do the shopping in my house so I just run back and forth between the kitchen and the computer and I feel very organized. At the same time, I'm not going to be getting my PC points for groceries if I do this. Anyway, the groceries will come tomorrow evening and I'll see how satisfied with it. Then I'll see if I want to do it again then next time I need groceries.
Ok, bitch time - The damned Liquor Mart (LCBO) that I went to yesterday was only open til 6pm and I was there at 6:30. What the heck?!? I want to buy vodka and Kahlua so I can make paralysers- I need milk anyway, so I have to wait for tomorrow evening anyway, but still!

Inspection notice

I got a notice in my mailbox today letting me know that the cable is live in our apartment so we should call and pay them in order to avoid disconnection and reconnection fee.
Pish Posh!
If they disconnect it, then I'm sure we'll miss it, but we can watch most things online anyway and I'll be honest, I'll probably be more productive if there's no television here.

Update, I plugged the phone into the wall to see if there was still a dial tone... there sure is!

To clarify, if my roommate and I had been cheap and not paid for anything besides rent and hydro, we would had nearly half a year of free cable, borrowed wireless Internet from our neighbours who don't secure their networks, and a telephone line with a bill that goes to who-knows-where.

Now we just play the waiting game and watch our television until they disconnect us.

New Topic!
Last night, I dreamt of the piece I am writing for piano trio. Literally, I dreamt of the score, but nothing tangible. I don't 'hear' music unless I consciously hum it inside my head so it wasn't like I heard the final piece and I'm now madly writing it down; I can't even very well describe the experience as I had it. I just experienced the score from various perspectives.
I woke up and started writing. The dream didn't tell me new material to write, rather it allowed me to look at the material I had already written and continue along that path without all the painstaking thinking I was doing late last night. Perhaps the dream was a continuation of that line of thinking I was attempting last night.
My prof told me that he describes his way of composing as looking at an image through frosted glass; it thaws out slowly and you start to see more of the picture the longer you work on it.
My experience is similar, maybe I'll describe it as working on a jigsaw puzzle through frosted glass - I have a concept of the piece as a whole, but I can't put it into words or notes. I make conscious choices as I go along. With each decision I see, I see a little more of how it fits into the whole and that helps me to make further decisions.
Accordingly, last night, my puzzle thawed itself out quite a bit and I can now work more efficiently with the decisions I have made, which in turn will make the coming decisions make more sense.

Electro prof gave a quick look over our scores that we submitted today in class and he seemed quite pleased.
He was the same prof that I talked to yesterday about my thesis project; he is a potential adviser. We talked about some of the perceived concerns that I've had and he seems to think that there is nothing really that would stand in my way of doing the dance collaboration project. I have a meeting set up with the other potential adviser for next week and hopefully that will go just as well. It was really good to talk about some of the expectations of the thesis project and the process.

I'll be honest; I did not end up making the best use of my extra time that I had by finishing those projects somewhat early. I've had some creative spurts, but nothing too extravagant- I guess I'm at square one for the weekend. I hung out with some of the other composers today and it seems that everyone is in the same scenario. Orchestral readings are coming up, both for our class and the thesis pieces as well as any variety of other projects that people have on the go. It was really nice to sit and talk with my colleagues in the midst of the business; I got the impression that we were all happy to revel in the conglomerate stress of this time of year. The general plan for the weekend was to be hermits and only emerge victoriously on Monday morning.

And now, it's time to be a hermit.

Okedoke,
I took my orchestration scores to school today with plans of getting them bound and handing them in. I decided that I should wait and bind my Electro score at the same time. I came home to print it out in the early afternoon. It took me more time than I expected to tidy up the score, due to Photoshop battles, but I got it done. Then I convinced myself that I should do my parts photocopying while waiting for the binding.... that seriously took me HOURS to tidy up all the parts and print them out so I could take them to photocopy them onto big paper.
Long story short, it was after 8 before I got home. I had my first Kinko's experience and generally it went pretty well. The binding is KILLING me, so damned expensive.. to think that I was able to do it myself, and for free at the ballet....

ANYWAY, moral of this story is that I am finished with Electro and Orchestration, for now. I might be completely finished with Orchestration; we are meeting on Tuesday (a day before the reading) to edit and search for mistakes. If we find them, I'll have to reprint and whatnot to the effected parts.

For now, I'll assume that everything is perfect with everything, thus freeing myself up to working on my compositions!
My meeting with the singer was great. She helped me clear up one wishy-washy notation thing and gave me very good feedback, I was also able to show the piece to a percussionist. She pointed out that one thing was just impossible - I had misjudged the size and span of the Marimba.... it's freaking HUGE! Nevertheless, there is a simple suggestion - the singer will play the wind chimes in one tricky little area!
I'm going to ignore that piece for a few days because it's pretty much done - I'll come back in a few days and make edits and then send it off to the performers so they can get started on it.

I feel very good about my productivity lately! It's Wednesday evening and I'm all ready to start on the weekend I thought I would only be able to get to on Friday.

So, that weekend just flew by in the blink of an eye...
Here's the update on assignments for this week:

Orchestration is pretty much done, save the act of printing and organizing parts. Conclusion - I'm glad this isn't 30 years ago or whenever things all had to be done by hand, I wouldn't have the patience for it. I barely have the patience for it now... For Thurs/Friday, I need to have the score to the conductor - so all I need to do is buy 8.5*11 paper and then print it out and get it bound - that much I can handle. The rest of the printing and part prep work will take place over the weekend and into next week, I have a week tomorrow to get that all done. I think I can say that I have everything under control for that.

Electro - I need to finish up my score and get it printed/bound for Friday, I'll do that together with the Orchestration Score. I also need to do some reading for Max MSP and do some tutorials as part of my weekly course work - I'll try to do that tomorrow.

With those two major things out of the way, the weekend will still be just as busy, but even more focused on what remains:

Piano Trio - I really haven't written anything since before the break. I feel awful about it, so now is the time to make it up. My creative slump is now over, so it's time I apply that to this piece. My longstanding task was to write something completely new for trio - I have lots of ideas and pitch/melodic material that I've generated this past week, now I need to turn it into something. I'm thinking it is going to be contrapuntal in nature, which will most likely expose my weaknesses, haha! I've been trying to do little bits of work on it along with everything else, but I totally prioritize based on what is most urgent time-wise, so the trio is suffering. Nevertheless, over the weekend, it will rise sharply in the priority ranking.
[Now that I think of it, I should get the orchestral parts out of the way before the weekend so I can be focused.]

Autumn Song Cycle. The last poem is in a state of finality. I finished composing the vocal line to the percussion parts, which have been finished for a while now, and while changes are bound to take place, it is close enough to being finished that I can justify setting it aside while I work on the other 2 poems. One of the two remaining poems has the vocal line completely composed, waiting for the glockenspiel accompaniment to be finished, while the last poem needs a healthy dose of EVERYTHING! I am meeting with a singer friend with a very similar voice type to the singer friend for whom the pieces are being written tomorrow to go over some things. I know that everything is possible and singable; tomorrow will tell me if anything is awkward/unidiomatic. Moreso, it will give me something tangible to hear - and even try some things with. I can test out some accompaniment things for the poem which needs the glockenspiel accompaniment.

Over the break, I did a lot of fence sitting in regards to thoughts about my thesis - I got an email from the choreographer which helped put me in a more go-get'em mood about the whole thing. I will be seeing her tomorrow; I think she is having a rehearsal with the dancers who would be in my piece and I'm going to go watch / maybe play some piano for/with them. Also, I have a meeting with a potential thesis adviser later this week. Some of my worries were brought up by the department head, but I need to talk to profs in my area in order to either dispel or affirm those worries.

That is a brief glimpse into what I have going on for me these days. I'm very excited for Feb 8'th after my Trio is submitted, then all of these things (except the last paragraph) will be done and finished. Heck, even after Jan 22'nd, 2 of the things will be gone!

Talk about irony!

This afternoon, there was a major power outage at the university, the power was out for well over an hour and a half.
How do I know this? Because I was in class while it happened - all of a sudden, the lights went out and the speakers crackled as their life source was harshly wrought from them. After waiting a few minutes, we decided it was a lost cause and we huddled around my prof's laptop for the remains of the lecture (one of the benefits of small class size).
After the class, thinking of all the academic classes that were probably let go after a short waiting period, I thought it delightfully ironic that my class continued. If there was one class you would expect to be cancelled in the case of a power outage, it would be mine:
ELECTROacoustic music.
But no, we continued and learnt!
We learnt that even a Mac with only 40% power can last longer than my laptop when it has 100% of it's supposed battery-life.

Is the internet slowing down/thinning out, or is it just me?

I used to be able to procrastinate for hours with blogs and facebook, but it seems that when I am in need of some distraction, those sources are empty. It was once the case that I would have needed to visit facebook every quarter hour to keep on top of all the 'news'; now, half a day can go by and there still won't be anything new to update me on.
There are two possibilities: 1) that I have become hyper-efficient at checking everything so that it just seems like things are thinning out. or 2)People are actually being less active on the internet.
I think it is both. I am terribly efficient. I have my homepage set to Bloglines - a blog feed organizer that tells me when people have or haven't updated their blogs - this way I only have to load the pages of those who have updated. Before this, I regularly visited about 13 blogs a day. That still didn't take much time, as I would recognize that there was no change.
It could be that there is a lull in people's activity online - I have noticed that I'm getting fewer and fewer emails, more junk mail, but less actual email.
Most importantly, people have almost completely stopped commenting, except for my absolute favourite reader who comments SO regularly, she is also one of the few consistently updated blogs which I frequent - Thanks Mai!!!

Ok, now some posting with substance. Over the last few days, there's been a change. I've had some kind of writer's block for over a month, I think it was building over all of last term. Anyway, last night and today, I've been writing lots. It's not excessively nor simply pouring out of me, but it has a flow that I've been missing. I'm glad to have it back. I'm also interested to see if things have changed in other areas: For quite a while, improvising has been bland, if existent at all; also, I have not been emotionally moved by music in quite a while. Long story short, with all the symptoms I've listed in some form or another, I think I'm coming out of some sort of mild depression. I don't want to jinx this refound creative outburst, so I'll just say that I feel that things are on an upswing right now!
And what perfect timing...

Moderate Sadness

I got an email tonight saying that my SSHRC application was not sent on to the national level. Apparently the whole university can only send 53 (+5 alternatives) applications forward to the national level, so I'm not surprised that out of the thousands of Grad Students here, I am not one of those. Especially looking at those numbers, I'm really not surprised, but I'm still disappointed. That extra 5 grand would have been really nice...
Currently, I'm still in the running for the Ontario Graduate Scholarship, which would also be an improvement on funding for next year, though not quite as prestigious or lucrative. No matter what, I will still get the same funding from Western next year as I did for this year, I'm just hoping to get a little more.

Today I was officially back to classes. Teaching went well, I had a good first class back - not only was I on time, but I had time to do all my prepwork (photocopying) for the term. I hate photocopiers and I can't really use them!! My students only mildly mocked me for the packets whose pages faced different directions and had a blank cover page.... but I wasn't going to spend 10 minutes putting each packet back in proper order -they had all (most) of the information in them!

Orchestration was interesting and useful today, although we didn't look at either of our work that we've done over the break... We talked quite a bit about the practical side of score preparation - who needs which markings, what information is necessary, even what type/size of paper we should print on. It was incredibly useful information that we will put into good use. We've decided that we'll treat the performance as a presentation after which we will have a seminar/defence of our work. This means we will get to criticize each other, it will be fun!

Well, it's getting to be Sunday evening. I start back to school tomorrow. I teach bright and early at 9:30 am. I don't have a class list, so I don't know who I will be teaching. I'm also not completely sure of which room I am teaching in.. I was hoping to have that information on my class sheet, but I suppose they don't want me to know that either! I believe there are only 2 possibilities, but I should be able to find out in the morning anyway. I also need to make photocopies of the course outline for the students. Long story short, I have an early morning tomorrow and it will not be pretty. I only woke up before 10/11am twice over the break - once for a meeting with my filmmaker and once for the flight home, ok, also for the drives to and from Thompson, but the point still stands that I mostly slept late!

Now, as the break comes to its close tonight, I should tally things up with my productivity. Numbers-wise, things haven't changed much since the other night. I input my autumn song into the computer, which will save me a lot of time later, so that is good, but I ended up spending my time doing that instead of adding to my creative output.
As I type, I am taking a break from the addition of the text to the autumn song. The process is going well and I expect to be at least close to finished by the end of the evening, if not altogether finished. If I have time, I would like to do some work on my Piano Trio, but I need to make sure it is an early night. I will have all tomorrow afternoon and then more time Tuesday morning to get more work in.

Ok, back at it.

Quick status update

As you may remember, over the break I had 4 tasks/projects to do.

After leaving Winnipeg, the dance film commission was done - 25% complete.

As of a few minutes ago, I have finished what I needed to do for my orchestration assignment. I tidied up a whole lot of details and reevaluated many of the decisions I had previously made. Surprisingly, the time I took away from this assignment seems to have done me well. I was able to look at my work with a fresh perspective. I feel that I have not only retained what I learnt in the first term, but it seems to make more sense to me now than it did in early December.
That brings us to a 50% completion rate.

Last night I finished the instrumental / percussion score for one of the autumn songs. My task for tonight is to write the vocal line in conjunction with it. If I am successful, I will be working toward an approximate 60% completion rate.

Then comes the Piano Trio... Both of the commissions I was working on over the break really worked with the layering concept that my prof was talking about before the break. I don't think that I understood that before, but now I think I might. I know that my writers' block was not because I subconsciously didn't want to continue with that material - the block was effecting other areas of creativity... the reason why I didn't get anything done in the first bit of the break. I'll attribute it to the stress of the end of term.
Anyway, I want to continue with the concept of layering that I explored over the break, and I think that I'll be able to successfully use it in my piano trio piece. That will take place on Sunday and Monday.

Ok, no more blogging today... except to give a progress report on my completion rate later tonight...
On to productivity!

My jaw has been getting more and more tense over the past month. It could be one of two things:
A) I'm generally stressed
B) My final adult tooth is not happy where it is
In case I've never mentioned before, B) refers to the fact that on my upper right side of my mouth, one of my molars was a baby tooth until I was 18 years old. At that point, my dentist just ripped it out and told me that it would just come in on its own. He was partially right...
Over the past 6 years, that adult tooth has been moving its was into what I assume will eventually be it's proper resting place. At one point, I went to an orthodontist who told me that the tooth would never move unless I paid thousands of dollars to have my mouth reshaped and the tooth pulled down. While he too was incorrect, years later, if I could have afforded that then, I'd be much happier now.
I'm thinking the tension is due to B.
More recently I've also noticed that I'm having sensitivity in that area, so there is a possibility that either pressure is building on that tooth or one around it, or that tooth is suffering some decay. The tooth has been partially exposed now for at least 4 years and quite honestly, I'd be surprised if there wasn't at least some decay...
In conclusion, I need to get to a dentist... but it's going to be costly. Hopefully it will just show up as a cavity or something that can be easily rectified and then I can just continue letting the tooth shift around. If it turns out to be something more major, I'm very close to the point of just getting it yanked, but then what would I have to do to replace it - a spacer? braces?
Should I go to the University Dental School or to a regular dentist? My coverage through univ. dental plan is 70% of everything, up to $500.
Long story short, I hate teeth.

It's nearly midnight. Considering I will have to wake up for 5:30am tomorrow on account of my ridiculously early flight, I should get to bed soon, but instead I am packing.
So much stuff to pack. I stuffed my bag as full of clothes as I could when I left London, and now I am also taking back Christmas presents. To fit everything, I am taking an extra suitcase with me, but I am down one carry-on because I am taking my violin back with me to London. If my roommate didn't already have reason to hate me, he will now - haha!
Anyway, I don't mind stuffing and cramming my belongings into a suitcase as tight as possible - I love the efficiency of it.
I just wandered away and finished packing - it all fit without much fuss at all. I still have to put in my toiletries tomorrow morning, but that shouldn't be a problem. However, early in the morning, anything can be a problem!
I think I'm about ready for bed.
In conclusion, I had a great Christmas and a wonderful time in Winnipeg. It was great to spend time with so many friends. Now it's back to work. I need to get a LOT of work done before Monday, so wish me well!

Tonight, friends from high school and I finally had our Festivus dinner. It's been years in the making, but finally it happened!
There was a nice spread of food which we ate more as appetizers, never actually sitting and eating at the table.
There was no Festivus pole, and the house was incredibly decorated for Christmas, but we ignored those oversights in the true spirit of the season.
The airing of grievances was superb. We were toying with the idea of not doing it at all because... well, it could easily end badly. In the end, we did it and I'm glad we did. No one went overboard and even the serious ones were stated in an entertaining/lighthearted way. We decided that a true airing of the grievances would be ideal for a family setting, where they are forced by law to love you, regardless of what you say!
The Feats of Strength was not quite as it was described in Seinfeld. Kyle and Vince were the ones to battle, so about half of us went outside to watch - In the end, everyone who was outside ended up being tackled and in the snow!
All in all, Festivus was a resounding success.

Happy New Year!

Well, it's a new year today.
I drank last night.
It's been quite a while since I had been that inebriated. I always find it surprising that I never forget my nighttime insulin, no matter how much I drink. Knowing how nasty it would be to have no insulin in your system as well as lots of alcohol, I'm glad that I don't forget.
Still, last night was a little bit hazy and when I awoke this morning, I wasn't quite sure if I had or not, so I went to my bag to look; it wasn't there. Long story short, I left my bag at the party. Without my bag, I wouldn't be able to look at the amount of insulin left to see if I had taken the shot the night before. After a few hours, I could tell by the way my sugars reacted to my short-acting insulin that I had indeed taken my dose. Furthermore, I discovered that my insulin was in my jacket pocket - and it proved my case.
The other point of confusion this morning was my glasses... where were they? Upstairs. When I was living here, I always left them in the same place, on the little table upstairs, but since I've been back, I've always taken them downstairs with me. It's a small detail, I know, but it's closer to what I do in London, representing the fact that this is no longer my home -this is a good thing. It's not that I feel out-of-place here, it's just that things are different.
Anyhoozle, I'm only in Winnipeg for today and tomorrow, then I fly back on Thursday morning. The amount of visiting and socializing I've done has been amazing, but still I wasn't able to see everyone.
I did a big chunk of work on one of the Autumn songs yesterday and I'll do more this afternoon, things are looking promising!

Ok, finally, after a grueling set of edits and more edits, I am done with the dance film. On Wednesday, I am going to part of the tech run for the show where the film will be premiered(after I've gone back to London), so at least I will have a chance to see the film and music together.
I think that brings my total productivity for this break to 26%, or something like that.
Nevertheless, I still have just over a week before I am back to school, and I have every intention of completing that remaining 74%! Please, someone remind me of that when, in a week's time, I am making up excuses for not having met my quota.
As for my time in Winnipeg, I have something social to do every night from now until I leave. Fortunately, that gives me something of a schedule with which to work. I will work in the morning/afternoon and then socialize in the evening. I think it should be a matter of just not sleeping in too late. Sleeping the days away is really not so good.
Tonight is sushi. Maybe I should have something to eat first, there's only so much sushi I can handle, so I don't want to be hungry later on. Oooh, I have jellybellies!

Bright and early tomorrow morning, we head back to Winnipeg. It has been a spectacular Christmas. It was nice to spend a bit of time with sister and brother-in-law, dare I say we may have even overstayed our welcome by a day...
Nevertheless, it's been great.
Last night we all gathered into the hot tub with some drinks. Now for the fun part... the hot-tub was OUTSIDE! It was awesome! Gareth and I both dunked out heads completely under the water and within minutes we were sporting iced hair-dos! It was a little nippy on the wet shoulders, but I think we were in there for at least 45 minutes and no one had frostbite or pneumonia.
I'll see what we have planned for tonight, anyway, I won't mind staying up late to finish the Dance Film music, I can sleep for the first 4 hours of the drive tomorrow anyway! If I get it done tonight, GREAT! If I need more time to finish it tomorrow after we get home, that's fine too, I'll still have it done a few days early!
I was the only one to buy something today for boxing day, aside from my mother buying some chocolates from Giant Tiger. It was so different from our normal boxing day experiences. Firstly, we all slept in quite late and were in no rush. It's Thompson, so even though the stores might have been busy, they were nowhere near the madness of Winnipeg's boxing fiestas.
I bought some nice speakers that I can hook up to my laptop, or anything else for that matter. They are quite fancy, with a control interface ON the speaker. Rather than just changing the volume of the speaker, it communicates through USB to the computer or device and changes those settings - ie, it communicates and interacts with the controls in Sibelius!

Christmas in Thompson

Well, the weather actually isn't that bad here. I mean it's cold, but not as bad as I was expecting/fearing.
My sister and her brother have both been working opposite shifts since we got here, but now they're done working. It was nice today that we were finally all together for lunch.
Having the family all together for the holidays is very nice.
The schedule around here has been crazy, last night, my brotherinlaw went to work around 7pm, the rest of us stayed in and watched movies, sister went to bed around 11 cause she worked in the morning. I ended up staying awake until about 5am working on the Christmas music as well as trying to get a fire started. I was awoken by my sister on her way out the door for work. I must have slept through my brotherinlaw coming home, but was awoken again by sister calling the house. Anyway, by the early afternoon, everyone was awake and home from work.
Since people were working, I managed to steal some time away for my own work (ish). I was making the family a Christmas soundscape to make use of the 5.1 surround sound system my sister has up here. I finished that and played it for them today so now that's out of the way.
I had a meeting the other day with my filmmaker and we discussed timings and changes to the score for that. I am now working on those, and unless I run into some huge problem, I will have that done before we drive back to Winnipeg.
I should also try to knock back on of the autumn song cycle poems while I'm up here, that or do some work on the orchestration.
I'm finding that time up here in Thompson has been very relaxing, but at the same time, I can get a fair deal of work done. Good times all around!
It's Christmas Eve Day!!!
I think I actually got all of my shopping done. I tried to be subtle, but it's hard when you are shopping with the people you're shopping for. Anyway, I really hope my sister is surprised. I asked my mom what she wanted, she replied with the thing that I was holding in my hand so I replied "that would be a silly thing to buy for Christmas, you can get that for yourself when you get back to Winnipeg", I felt bad because she looked kinda sad, but I couldn't ruin the surprise! That's what surprises are all about, making people sad so they'll be even happier later on! haha

Uh Oh,
I sense that opportunities for productivity are dwindling; 2 of my friends arrived back in town in the last day or two, and I would like to see them both before I go to Thompson. Plus, one of my friends got a new puppy, so I have to go play with it this afternoon!
I also have to do my remaining Christmas shopping. I did a good chunk of it online, but I still need to get something for my dad and a few smaller things. My sister also called and asked me to pick something up for her husband's present - basically that's what's kicking my butt to go out and get stuff; my own shopping isn't enough motivation.
Anyway, I hate stores at this time of year, but I'm not organized enough to do the shopping before it gets crazy, so I'll live in my own hell-that's ok. Also, maybe going shopping and managing my time today will force me into productive mode, here's hoping!

Well, after my last post I DID try to be productive. I went to the university Saturday evening to get some work done. I got a tiny bit written. I just don't understand, it's like I have no creative juice lately. Anyway, I kept taking little breaks here and there wandering around the music building, reminiscing and reading lots of the postings people had outside their doors and whatnot. Long story short, I ended up accidentally setting off a security alarm during one of these wanderings, so I got kicked out of the building. It was late at night and I was done being productive, so it didn't bother me much, but it seemed so silly.
Regardless, I am continuing to try to force the creativity out of myself, little by little. Here's an account of my productivity so far during this break:
Orchestration- Nothing, haven't even opened the file.
Dance Commission - Nothing, waiting on instructions from the director
Voice Commission - I've set the first 2 lines of one of the poems, amounts to 1%
Piano Trio - Nothing
In conclusion, 1 % of one of my projects amounts to 0.25% completion of my December work. And I believe that 55% of the month has passed... Something doesn't quite add up, haha!

Damnit, socializing has been SUCH a bad influence on me over this break!
It hurts me on the inside to think that this month is already half over and I've done nothing towards my goals and what I need to get done during this break!
Even just Christmas shopping has been going slowly... I've only done a bit online. Anyway, I'm going to waste no more time [Famous last words] and I'm going to do some serious composition work for these Autumn Songs before I go to bed.
Autumn song cycle this weekend. I'll work on my new piano trio during next week because I'll have access to the piano. Also the Autumn cycle. While I'm in Thompson, I can do some of the sound editing as well as orchestration stuff. I'll set aside two hours a day to work on that and boom, there will be 10 hours! ish
Quick note, tonight and last night I hung out with the XIE ensemble people - I miss those people and that group. We had so much fun last year, I really want to get something like that started and going at Western, who knows...
Here I go, to see how much work I can do before passing out for the night.. it is already 2am...

I'm back in Winnipeg and it's surprising how much stuff there is to do which has tracked me down.
I know it's mostly the fact that it's the holiday season so there's lots going on anyway, but it makes me feel like this homecoming has been filled with love and friends and lots of good food and good company!
My sugars have not been in .... good control lately, which causes me to be irritable and I regret that that's been aimed at my parents because they're around at just those moments. The control is a mix of not having really done any walking since getting here and then the eating of holiday goodies- as much as I don't like bitching... you people with working pancreases don't know how good you have it. Most of the time, I eat foods of which I know how many carbs they contain, or generally, so I can get my dosing somewhat in the ballpark, but the holidays just kills that. And you know me, you know my belly... I lack the willpower to not jump into the deliciousness!
Surprise surprise I'm meeting with some friends for lunch today, but I'm going to walk there, so at least I'll have 20 minutes of walking.
Generally, I need to get my ass in gear. I've slipped into vacation mode, but I can't afford to do that. I've done no composing, and I have so much I need to do; I haven't started my shopping; I've generally been lazy. Bad Michael, haha. Oh well, I'll get on that starting today!

Ok, so the tone of yesterday's post was a wee little bit negative. Today, it's a completely different story.
I was up very late last night finishing my electro piece and getting it relatively well notated. We had our class at noon, so I still got a solid 6 hours of sleep! The hardcore work I did on the piece paid off, it was fairly well received by my prof and the other student. I got a few suggestions of how to improve the piece - unfortunately I don't have time to do those before I leave, so I'll basically just have to revisit the piece when I get back.
After our performances, we went to the grad club for some drinks and pretzels. It was nice to drink and socialize with the prof. I really like the grad student relationship with profs, governed by a strong sense of respect, but sprinkled with comradery; more of a mentorship through which they are welcoming us into the world of professionalism/academia.
Later tonight, I went for Thai food with some other music grad students. It was the most delicious thing I've eaten in quite a long time. Also, socialization is something I've been missing lately; more of that will come this next month.
I leave London tomorrow evening, I'm not excited about the fact that it is currently 26 degrees colder in Winnipeg than it is in London, but oh well. I grew up there, I should be used to it...

Just a bit stressed...

Mostly, I haven't been unreasonably stressed as the term has been winding up.
Today, I was.
I need to have my electro piece finished for tomorrow. The only available time was today from 12-5. I made myself a schedule of what to do in that time. After 2 hours, I had only done what I needed to do in the first. Anyway, things were coming along, I changed the piece altogether so that one of those hours just disappeared.
Skipping the boring parts - Just before 5, I had reached a point where I could be done in the lab, I needed to make it into an audio file so I could take it home and finish notation. At some point in the afternoon, I had renamed the file... apparently this cause the save function to not be usable, only 'save as'. When I went to save the audio file onto my flash drive, the program froze; I waited - nothing happened. Finally I force-quitted the program. When I re-opened the file, I was expecting to lose maybe 10 minutes of work which I could redo without too much guff. As it happens, everytime I hit apple-S or whatever, it did nothing and I had lost over an hours worth of work.
I was expecting the other guy booked in the room to show up any minute, but I was devastated, I literally threw myself off of the chair and onto the ground. Anticlimactic - I didn't burst into tears, I just thought, "Wow, that was overdramatic". Anyway, the next guy didn't show up til 6pm, so I managed to rectify things, but it was horrible. I couldn't recall what exactly I had done, in what order, or how exactly I did everything, so there are a few minor changes. I listened to it a few times, each time noticing another thing that I had forgotten.

Tonight - I have to fill in the gaps that not having given myself enough time has caused in my piece. I also need to notate it - I haven't decided whether or not I should do it in Sibelius. Maybe I'll start with the outer sections in there and see how easily that comes.
I'm not excited about how much work I need to do tonight, but I will do it and I will be a better person for it. And tomorrow, it will all be over, yay!!!

Damnit, I need an ice-tray.
Tonight was a long evening of class with a lot to digest, therefore I would love to drink something on the rocks. I have Rye, but no rocks. I wonder if it would work with frozen veggies.

I got in over an hour of walking today, I walked home in the late morning from my first part of the day. Then I walked about 20 minutes before I hopped on the bus that takes me very close to home.

I really have nothing new for my composition lesson tomorrow. My prof gave me one very specific task to do on the piece and I wasn't able to do it. I spent most of the week on orchestration. I sat down at a piano to do that task three times during the week and it just didn't come. I'm not sure if this is writer's block or what, but I feel guilty about it. I will try again tonight and tomorrow morning, otherwise I'm certain there will be something we can discuss in terms of composition in general, what I should focus on over the break, or some such thing.

As of right now, teaching and orchestration are done for the term. Tomorrow afternoon, I will have finished with comp lessons for the term, then all that remains to finish up is my electro piece.
Of course, I say all of this like the work will magically end once classes end... NOT!
this is going to be probably the busiest 'breaks' I've ever had. Let me list:
1)Orchestration - making yet more decisions and making the score and parts all pretty
B)Composition - ever developing, I'll have to force myself to do that task once I'm in a house with a piano.
iii)Commission 1- I need to edit the dance film soundtrack to better fit the timings of the film. I have a feeling this might be more work than I had anticipated on doing, but I think my work in the electro course has given me better ideas and tools to make things go more smoothly.
d)Commission 2- The Autumn song cycle; I've done a lot of the prep work and now I just need to write the music. Like B) I have a feeling that when I'm in a house with a piano, things should start to flow. Not having a piano in my apartment is a bad thing. I think I thrive on comfort - that of my own piano or the pianos at U of M. UWO doesn't have that for me. I think I need to invest in a good digital piano next year (eek money) which I can use both as an instrument as well as midi input for notation.

As well as that work element, I need to do lots of knitting and socializing while I'm in Winnipeg. As daunting as it may seem, I'm excited for the change of pace that December will bring. The pace will be changing in both directions, interesting...

Post number 601!

Wow, I don't regularly pay attention to how many posts I have made, but my eye caught the number this time... SIX HUNDRED posts!
How much time have I wasted on blogging?!? It's really unfathomable. I'm going to see if I can download all my blogging posts so that I can somehow do a word-count and see just how many novels I could have written.
Someday, I'll be able to save a biographer the trouble of even asking questions about this portion of my life, pretty much everything has been detailed online... or has it?!?
This blog has been with me through a lot of development over the past few years. I've learned the responsibilities of publicly posting information and it's resulted in a veil which separates the blog version of Michael from the real version.
Anyway, I shouldn't get so philosophical about this, this is a happy occasion!

Cue balloons and champagne!

Other happy news - I just finished my Orchestration assignment. 'Finished' is a very subjective term here; there will be much editing, but I have somehow translated all(ish) of the piano version into my orchestrated version. I have my class tomorrow during which I hope to learn what I've done wrong, what I've done well and what things I need to reconsider and fix.

I spent a LOT of time on this orchestration assignment this weekend and over the last week especially. Unfortunately, I feel that I have spent less time on my other work as a result of it. Composition especially - my piece seems to have reached a plateau, my prof had really amazing suggestions last lesson and I was excited about them and ... I just never did those things and I'm not sure how much I can do before my lesson on Tuesday. Regardless, I will spend my free time tomorrow working on that piece of my electro.

Calculations - Let's say that above is an average length for a Michael Post - I will now plug that into MS Word and get a word count:

315 words
times 600 posts
=
189,000 words.

According to random internet statistics, the average novel is from 60-100,000 words in length... that means, I've written between 2 and 3 novels through this blog!
Maybe over the break, I'll find a real word count.