Pure Imagination

Today’s visit to Laguna Beach has been captured in photographs. Go take a look at the pictures. It was a beautiful day. I wish I could visit southern California more often. The plan is to visit a museum or two tomorrow (Monday) and to play at Disneyland on Tuesday. Wednesday night involves an Indigo Girls concert (with Shawn Mullins opening) at the new Walt Disney Concert Hall (designed by Frank Gehry) in Anaheim.

I had a dream last night that I was attending my old high school’s marching band practice. Some alumni showed up (some who weren’t even involved in the music program there) and were impressed with the band. At the end of the reheasal, Andy Kaufman showed up in the shadows. He wanted me to help spread the word that he is still alive. In order to do so, he printed up stickers depicting the nation of Lebanon. I don’t get it, but that’s Andy for you.

Here are some more things I would have said in my last weekend update if I hadn’t been so exhausted. Actually, I still am quite exhausted, having just come home from percussion and colorguard rehearsals. I need to wait until the very last student is picked up, and this time it was a colorguard student. Luckilly, the colorguard instructor was there to keep the two of us company… I’m not comfortable with the idea of being left alone with a student, especially a female student, especially considering the reasons behind the departure of the last five assistant band directors.

Anyway, back to what I wanted to say. My weekend in Texas was spent with the loveliest people. Stacey flew out and back with me, and we shared a hotel suite and rental SUV with Hoai. It was great to see Hoai… it’s been many years. We weren’t close friends in high school, but he’s such a cool, unique person. Now that he’s living in Philly, we’ll have to get together some.

The DFW crew is awesome. They are all so friendly and kind, and also so unique. Tina and Leia really helped to make me and the rest of the Jersey Contingent feel right comfortable, and Erica was such a gracious hostess. Alex was also cool to be around, as was Ru. Of course, I always look forward to seeing Becca and I would have been very disappointed if I hadn’t been able to see her for a few hours.

Everyone else I met was great as well, and I don’t mean to leave anyone out. If I could just transplant everyone up here to New Jersey… well, maybe that wouldn’t go over so well.

I have to go write some lesson plans and get some sleep already. Don’t forget to check out my photos from the weekend.

Every once in a while — or if you prefer, tonight for the first time — I look at the most frequently viewed photos from my online photo album, just to see what it is that people are viewing.

I still haven’t finished coming up with 100 things about me. Then again, I haven’t really put much effort into it. It’s not exactly a high priority.

It’s spring break, and I’m working at my old company. Security didn’t believe that I still worked there, so I had to get a new identification card. Everything has finally been squared away, except I should be getting paid more for the work that I’m doing (database application design, programming, user interface, reporting, etc.). I’ll probably work a little from home after school is back in session as well. It doesn’t hurt having one or two additional sources of income, even if they are infrequent.

I feel like I wrote several entries since my last post… but they’re not here. In fact, they were never actually finished. So here I am back at the drawing board.

I had an anxiety dream the other night. I was conducting and teaching in ony of my band classes, and the tuba section was acting up. In my dream, they sat on the opposite side of the room in relation to where they sit in reality. Anyway, I threw something and swore at them. So other than the bad dream, things are going very well. We’vee just started preparing for a concert taking place at the end of April. That’s a little nerve racking.

I wish I had more things to write about, but this is about it. I don’t really surf the web much anymore. I’ve started doing yoga with a video and walking outside now that the weather is nice. Maybe that has replaced surfing the internet for now.

Here’s a new poem by John Updike posted on err… published in The New Yorker.

Here’s a hypothetical situation for all my reader-thinkers, especially those who read and don’t comment often or at all. As population continues to increase exponentially, so will demand for energy in the form of oil. However, suppose the world will hit its peak in oil production in 2015, and after that the supply can only diminish. Oil fuels everything we do on this planet, but is a non-renewable resource — once it’s gone, it’s gone. Any alternative energy source (which, by the way, there are none feasible at the moment) depends on oil to an extent, as well. What would you start doing differently in your life now?

“When he treat a man as he is, we make him worse than he is; when we
treat him as if he were what he potentially coule be, we make him what he
should be.”
— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

I just found that quote as part of my .signature in a message I wrote two years ago. I still like it.

Are you addicted to workahol? Maybe you need a life coach. Make sure you get your company to pay the $1,000 per month fee, though.

Interesting quote seen today: “Ideas rot if you don’t do something with them” (source). I have probably a hundred various ideas formed or half-formed in my head, in various stages of development. I have many domain names registered, sort of in the hopes that my thoughts will eventually progress past the most basic stages.

You would think that with only two hours of sleep the night before, I’d be out as soon as my head hits the pillow. But no, that doesn’t seem to be how my body works lately. It seems to want to shuffle around in the bed for at least an hour, trying to find a comfortable position. Even worse is my mind as it shuffles around from thing to other thing, trying to find a comfortable topic to reduce my beta brain waves.