Times a'flyin

I can't believe how fast everything seems to be going. I just realized that Vegas is next weekend already. Which means that it'll be march already. I need to start preparing to pack my stuff soon, and start getting rid of the stuff that I don't need. At least I still have some time left before that.
We've been having a lot of fun at the bagelshop today though. It's been crazy busy so were all a little weird today and it's been showing. I made an awesome playlist though, with a bunch of 90's throw backs. It's funny though because as soon as N'Sync came on and we all started singing Bye, Bye, Bye my mom went running to take my iPod off the docking system. All the other girls love it though. We've all been singing and dancing around and having an all around good time. I'm super tired though and I'm looking forward to bed tonight, thouh that's still quite a ways off yet. And I do have the symphony to go to still tonight. But it will be fantastic so I really have no room to complain.


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"wacky" surely not wasted Wednesdays

So I was at work at FK last night and this group of guys comes in that was super nice. Turns out they are a rock band from Detroit called the Hounds Below and it is their first time on the West Coast. We were hanging out, trying to find them some jackets and a wolf pendant when they invited me to their gig at the Boulevard that night. Put me on the guest list and everything so I didn't have to pay a cover which was pretty sweet, so I asked my friend Shane to come with. We had so much fun! The band was awesome, and it was really fun to talk to Ben (their guitarist) after the show. Their heading to Portland right now, which should be a lot of fun for them. I also found an awesome bit of writing on the bathroom stall. Another "diamond in the rough" so to say. It was among all the cussing and call for a good times. If we had one night, to make this right, I'd give you everything.

After the concert, Shane and I decided we weren't ready to head back home quite yet. I mean, it was only 11 and I don't work until 4 today. So we headed out to Irv's instead for the Wednesday Night Drag Show. It was pretty incredible. Ran into my friend Danny there who I haven't seen in quite awhile, met some awesome people, and learned that if you get enough alcohol in Shane, he will climb the pole.
We ended up shutting the bar down, as in they got on the mic and were saying things like, "That means you have to leave now." It was quite an evening. Tonight should be a lot of fun as well, Dave Hannon's back in town and put my mom and I on the guest list at the knitting factory. It'll be good to see him, its been ages. He's singing with Kristen Marlo too and the two of them are awesome together. So here's looking forward to another amazing night!

Making Jewelry.

I'm attempting to get creative with my leather bracelets today. I fixed the one for the couple at Whitestone Winery and then went to Rings and Things and got some suede cording and am beading a stringing some new bracelets. It's taking quite awhile though, and while I'm sure this is partly because I'm just trying to figure it out, gosh darn it's time consuming. But hopefully they'll be super cute when I'm done and I'll get some selling again.
This one's my first attempt. Came out super short because I didn't leave enough space for the knots but I think it's kind of fun! I have different inspirational words and other charms to dangle from the middle area and several different colors of cording, including a moss green which I'm really excited to try out. It'll be neat to see what I can make happen!

where to begin...

This last week has been quite a doozy. I've meant to write so many times, and just haven't been able to get everything into words. Just too much to really be able to think about it and sort it out in my mind.

Started off rather nicely actually. Stacy Hollister took me to the symphony last Saturday for Mozart's Requiem and it was incredible! We had so much fun and I ran into so many people I knew there, including my high school chem. teacher and his wife. It's wonderful to go to the symphony with someone who really loves it too (Stacy works for the symphony during the busy seasons and often gets free tickets which she has lately been sharing with me).

The next day I worked all day, and when I checked my phone around 5 in the afternoon, realized I had a line of texts and voicemails from the FK girls saying to call as soon as possible, that it was an emergency. Turns out that at 3 am on Valentine's Day, Jacoby (one of my coworkers) was killed in a car accident. They'd been drinking and were racing their cars and she was slammed into a tree at a high rate of speed. It as horrible. They also found Meth. in the girl who was driving's purse and all three of the survivers are getting charged with vehicular homicide. Jacoby was the oldest and she was only 19. All of their lives were ruined that morning. Much to say that set the tone for most of my week.

We started the next day with a Krem news reporter-he was very nice about it, but lets be honest, that was one of the last things we needed, a girl with a resume who heard we might be hiring now-baaaaaaad timing girl, and a nasty lady who lived by the accident and came in scooping for gossip by asking us rather blatently, "So, how'd you know the dead girl?" I wanted to just kick her out of the store. How rude can you possibly be?

Everyone at the bagelshop was great though, offered to take my shifts so I could pick up extra at FK, even offered to work for Deena a little bit if she needed an extra hand to get through. I think it helped a lot that all the FK girls were going through it together. We even went to the funeral as a large group and all say together for moral support through the whole memorial. Deena gave us all custom made necklaces in the style that Jacoby had last been admiring and were talking about getting them engraved with her name.

Morgan and I went out for dinner halfway through the week, partially cause we hadn't done that in awhile and partially because I couldn't go sit at home alone yet, and we had a blast. She'd never seen the Davenport so we wandered around and then got drinks in the Peacock Lounge before heading to the Steamplant Grill for an early dinner. We ended up ordering the exact same thing and it was delicious. Another night Jenn came by and we made mac n' cheese and watched the whole season of GLEE. Heather came by the bagelshop the day after too and it was really good to see her after all that. I really love my friends sometimes. They always seem to know what I need. It's always nice to know I have people I can call when I need them.

Last night I went to the symphony again with my roommate Jen, and Laura from the bagelshop. They were doing the Wizard of Oz and dropped a screen about the orchestra and played the movie while they performed the soundtrack with it. It was incredible and we had so much fun. I hadn't realized how much of it's music had been taken from other works though. Four or five times I recognised songs from Beethoven and other more classical composers tucked within the music. We also quoted Wicked regularly and interjected it within the movie which made it even better. Next week is Mother Russia and they will be playing music by Rachmoninov who is one of my favorite piano composers. Well, except for Debussy that is.

All in all, it was an emotional roller coster of a week. Reinforced to me that you have to love what your doing, and love the people around you while you can. So to all my friends, I love you all, and thanks for being you.

Testing 123

Just trying out my new blogger application on my iPod to see how well it works. :)

- Posted using BlogPress from my iTouch

Guitar

Just had my first guitar lesson and it was amazing! Learned the start of a bunch of chords and was given Alison Kraus' Don't say a thing to practice this week. I love it! Bill was teasing me though because he could tell I've been formally trained on instruments all these years since I kept asking questions about posture, positioning, and what's considered proper form. Oops, I guess it's better to have been taught too much structure all these years than too little. And he says their keeping an eye out for a case for me too. Only downside is that my fingertips are a little bit sore, but that'll pass as soon as I build up some half-way decent calluses.
Learned some new words in French from translating songs. Compter-to count, Rever-to dream, impregner-to penetrate, libre-free.

Take the Leap

I think I have become addicted to French pop music, which is funny because I still can't understand what they're saying. But that's only a matter of time. I'm loving Couer de Pirate though, and I looked up the translation to some of her songs and they're beautiful. Her CD was definitely a worthwhile investment.

I'm currently working on an information slide show too. I figured I'd make one for Morgan's parents on why they should allow her to come to Europe with me. Don't know that it'll work, but at the least it'll show my determination to them.

I'm also trying to get my blog set up more how I want it to be. I found a list tool, but it's unfortunately not quite how I was hoping it would appear. I also need to work out the photo ideas I have more...it would probably help if I knew what it was I wanted exactly.
Last week Jen and I finished season 5 of How I Met Your Mother, and it was incredible. My favorite line was Lily's

Sometimes you have to listen to what the world is telling you. And then take the leap.

Well, I think the world spoke to me this week. The day after hearing that line and thinking it was something special, I was working at the bagelshop, and a regular customer of ours for years came in. Bill's a really nice guy from NY, loves his everything bagels, and happens to work in a string shop in the valley called Apela's. I've talked to him before about bringing my guitar in to have it's tuning knobs replaced, but never really followed through. So Bill comes in, and we get to talking and I finally decide-hey, I just need to get this done-and ask Bill when he normally works so I can drop by because I can't really make the effort to learn guitar without it in working condition.

(Mind you, I've been trying to think for weeks how I'm going to busk across Europe because my metal instruments are too heavy to bring across. I've been wishing I could play guitar because I could easily pick one up over there and if I could only sing it would be perfect. I have also been thinking about bringing my harmonica cause it's small and I could easily mess around with it as I traveled though I can't really play it.)

Bill's response is that he works Mon, Tues, and Thursdays, and that if I'm interested he gives guitar lessons. This really excited me and I asked, "Really!? I'm completely interested." He then informed me, "Yeah, I give guitar, voice, and harmonica lessons." I just stared at him and said, "I think the world just spoke to me, and if I don't listen to something being yelled at me so blatently I must be stupid."

So, Tuesday is my first guitar/voice/harmonica lesson. And to make it even better, he's not going to teach me formally because I already know all the music theory and structure and techniques. Rather, he's gonna teach me methods of playing, help me memorize fun songs from all different genre's and give me tools for imrpovising to help me busk. And he's going to teach me to play my awesome old vintage harmonicas. I'm so excited I can't even begin to tell you.