It's over!

I didn't want to write about finishing up school-related things until they were all finished. And now they are all finished! These last few weeks have been insane, but I am now all graduated. My thesis and papers are all finished and my award ceremonies are all over, as is graduation. I feel like all the stuff I've had to do over the past couple of weeks has all led up to a really anticlimactic conclusion. This past weekend, however, was really terrific. My parents had a little get-together for me out at their house on Friday. Then graduation was on Saturday, followed by more time at my parents' house and then to another party. That night a few friends and I went to Trader Dick's, which is this silly sorta-tiki bar and got trashed on colorful drinks. Sunday was my bassoon teacher's going-away party, which was also fun times with lots of food.

Graduation was extremely silly because as we all marched into the Quad, I had to carry this goofy banner and that was so big I couldn't see out from behind it. At least I got to sit with Jen and Amy, and we got to sit in the stage. I was the first person from my college to walk, and I sort of led everyone in the wrong direction. It was really funny and only mildly embarrassing. All in all, graduation only lasted like 2.5 hours, which isn't too bad at all.

I leave for Germany in around... I don't know... 28 hours? I haven't even begun to pack. Oops!

Major life decisions made easy.

I finally heard back from Duke and I did not get in there either. That sure makes my decision easy! UT it is. Especially because they have decided to give me some money. I'm excited. I think of all the programs to which I applied, with the possible exception of UCLA, UT has the best program for what I want to do.

Here are some fun little facts about how far away from home I am going:

Distance between Austin, Texas and Reno, Nevada
2251.115 kilometers; 1398.778 miles

Distance between Austin, Texas and Havana, Cuba
1718.924 kilometers; 1068.090 miles

Distance between Austin, Texas and Tegucigalpa, Honduras
2084.967 kilometers; 1295.539 miles

I have never lived outside of the greater Reno area, with the possible exception of the study abroad trip to Ireland, but I don't think I was technically living there. This is exciting! Also, scary. Of all the states I thought I would ever move to, Texas was certainly not among them.

Also, I just found out I'm getting the Dean's Award for Outstanding Graduate for the School of the Arts. Pretty neat. All this sudden recognition is pretty cool, but it's honestly making me a little uncomfortable.

grumble.

More good news from UT. They're giving me in-state tuition plus $6000/year. So, that means instead of paying around $20,000/year I'll be paying $3000. Cheap!

My computer died last night, which is really devastating for me. The hard drive completely crapped out, which is unfortunate because I never backed anything up, because I'm an idiot. Mostly I'm upset about having lost around 3 years worth of pictures. Most of them I won't miss, but many I will. I called my mom as soon as I left the Apple store, and she consoled me by telling me that her uncle accidentally threw away the 17 rolls of film she took when living in Holland for a year in high school. She says she still gets upset about it, but it's not the end of the world. I figure it's just a good exercise in letting things go. People are too attached to objects, anyway.

Hopefully the hard drive will be replaced by tomorrow, but I have to pay $300 because my computer is kind of old and not even close to still being under warranty.

I just got back from a week in Olympia. I would like to show people my pictures, but oh wait I can't.

Giftschisser.

More news from the grad school front. I've been wait-listed at Duke and rejected from the University of Michigan. However, I find myself not really upset by any of this news, especially because I think UT will be a really good fit for me. Now I just need to figure out how to pay for this whole grad school thing. I must say all these rejections (and the one waiting list) have made my decision very easy. Furthermore, I'm really delighted that the one school I did get into is a really good one.

I'm very excited for graduation now, because my grandmother is buying me a ticket to Germany as a graduation present. I will probably head up to Holland as well, because my family has a lot of friends there. This also potentially frees up some cash for me to take another trip this summer before I move down to Austin. But where to?

I might also have a new tattoo in the works. I'm very excited! I have this random alto clarinet in my closet and I think I'm going to try to sell it for tattoo money, because what the heck am I even doing with an alto clarinet in the first place?

Good news, part 2.

I have more good news! In the last letter I received from UT, it said that I had been accepted to the musicology program. Today I got a letter saying that I have been accepted to the graduate school. I had already been celebrating the fact that I'd gotten it, but I was still a teeny bit concerned. Not anymore, though! Although I don't know what my other options are yet, I'm still leaning pretty strongly toward Texas right now.

I also got a letter from my university saying that I'm the top graduating senior in the College of Liberal Arts and that I get some kind of award for that. I'm so surprised! Maybe it's just a lean year for liberal arts graduates. Nevertheless, I am very surprised because I spent so much of college not really trying that hard. There is some kind of function that I must attend now. I'm supposed to invite the faculty member who has been most influential on me. I think I'll ask Louis, but I feel like I should maybe ask Christy. It's hard because I'm so close with both of them. I'm also supposed to "say a few words" upon receiving this award. What the heck am I going to say? Anyway, I'm very excited about this because the College of Liberal Arts is rather huge so I must be better than a lot of people, and not all of them can be total losers.

yesssss

Good news, everyone!

I accepted to the musicology program at the University of Texas! Although I am wary of moving to Texas, I don't think Austin actually qualifies as a part of Texas. I told my musicology professor yesterday and I think he was even more excited than I am. Though I still have yet to hear from Duke or the University of Michigan, Louis says that he would pick UT over either of them. He also said that UT is pretty good about giving TA positions, so hopefully I can snag me one o' them. They want my response by mid-March which seems ridiculous, but I have until mid-April if I take that long to decide. My concern is that doesn't really give me time to go check out the school (especially because I already have plans to go to Olympia for spring break) so I might end up going to a school I've never a seen in a town I've never been to in a state I've never been to.

I had not really expected to get into UT because not only was I not certain that they had received my reference letters and GRE scores, but I really threw my personal statement together and sent in my supplemental materials after the deadline. Nevertheless, they still accepted me, and I am quite delighted.

Baby skull update:
I talked to my sister who is in med school here and she tells me that the creepy baby skull and the collection of forceps are now in the anatomy lab. I'm glad they found a new home, even if I no longer get to see them every day when I come to work.

Screwed us yet again...

As it seems relevent to the original purpose of this blog (which has been abandoned to some degree) I should probably share that I have received my first grad school rejection. UCLA informed me in the middle of Wednesday night (or, I suppose, Thursday morning) via a rather condescending and generic letter that I have not been accepted. This did not come as a surprise, but it was a bit of a disappointment. However, on Friday I spoke with my musicology professor/advisor/life coach/personal hero (who got his PhD at UCLA maybe 9 or so years ago) and he reassured me by saying that I don't want to go there right now anyway. In addition to the horrible financial situation California is in right now, evidently UCLA's musicology department is kind of a mess. So this may be a blessing. However, this also means that if I go to any of my other grad schools, I will be moving at least halfway across the country. By which I mean continent. I like the latter, it sounds scarier. Now I just have to continue to wait and hope. Hell, it's not like I would have wanted to break my streak of never having gotten into a UC school, anyway.

On a lighter note, here is an hilarious quote from DS-9, which I have been watching a lot of lately:

"We're going to have to go down there and blow it manually!"

Poor, poor Mr. Quick

I have basically ceased to accomplish anything in these past few days. The semester is not quite over, but I'm sure acting like it is. My Duke application is due next Monday and I have yet to finish that, and I have a paper to write, 6 bassoon reeds to finish, a group project to finish and a history final to take. Yuck.

I was recently reunited with an old acquaintance who consumed a lot of my time this weekend (not in a bad way...it was a weekend of my two favorite deadly sins: sloth and lust) but now I really need to make up for it. However, I seem to be incapable of doing anything useful these days. Alas.

inspiration

I was getting really nervous about my thesis topic because I wasn't actually sure if I liked it or not. When I was doing some reading for it last night, however, I got really interested again! Good.

I have submitted my first two grad school applications. And I apparently made a mistake on one of them! However, I'm hoping that since that took the time to contact me and correct me, there are hopefully looking at me with some interest. Maybe not.

Also, I quit one of my jobs yesterday. At the bookstore. I just couldn't deal with the monotony anymore, and they keep making all sorts of really absurd rules. Most recently, we are not allowed to hug anyone or to tell anyone 'I love you.' I think the only thing I'm really going to miss, other than the money, is one of my coworkers. I don't know if I want her or if I want to be her. I will just need to go watch/listen to her spin more often.

yo-ho-ho

Does anyone else think it's terribly cool that pirates are making world headlines? I've never really been on the pirate-obsessed bandwagon, but I just think this is neat. I'm also not really a violence enthusiast, but these pirates don't really seem out to kill people, they just want to make a few [million] bucks. Also, I basically live in a cave so international crises tend to not have a large impact on my life, so I have the luxury of simply observing things like Somalian pirates and economic disasters without much fear. I think the reason I like this pirate situation is that it proves that no one is in control because people exist who refuse to be controlled. I can respect that, on some level, even if I don't necessarily think that piracy is the way to go.

Half of my grad school applications are due Monday and I am not prepared to submit them. I am extremely stressed out. Also, next week I have 32 pages of papers due. As soon as this semester ends I think I'll go on a pretty serious bender. It'll be great.

money money money money

A few weeks ago I had to submit a grant proposal to fund my thesis. I aimed pretty low, honestly, because I didn't really expect to get any money from it. I didn't work very hard on it and I didn't ask for much money. Anyway, I just received an email saying that they are going to fund me in the full amount I requested. Which means I'm going to probably buy about $300 or more in music in the coming weeks. It's going to be great.

Also. German slang is one of the most hilarious things I can think of:
cocaine = Nuttendiesel = hooker fuel.

Lavender Menace

Quickly:

Grant proposals are horrible. I don't look forward to a future in which I have to write a lot of them.

My GRE percentiles came in: my verbal score is in the 96^th percentile and my writing score is in the 97^th percentile. My math score was not quite so great, but I don't suppose that matters a lot.

Today is my birthday. YESSSS

(Hopefully I will have something more cerebral to say someday soon.)

Oh. I can now get a class M endorsement on my driver's license. Finally, I can legally ride my motorcycle.

phantom stripper

I've been thinking a lot about language lately, probably because I spend such a huge amount of time doing German homework, and also because one of my history professors brought something to my attention: dictionaries don't instruct us on how to use language, they catalogue and describe how we use language from other preexisting examples. This began to bother me a lot when I was studying for the GRE because they ask you to identify a lot of little nuances associated with certain words, but that implies that words have concrete and permanent definitions, and I don't think that's true.

Additionally, I was talking with one of my coworkers about grammar and which grammatical errors people use all the time bother us the most. In thinking about it later, though, how do languages evolve other than through the changing grammar and word use patterns of their users? So I say maybe we should be a little less resistant to change, especially if change lets us express ourselves more clearly.

Also: the GRE is over, but I'm not really sure how to interpret my scores. Anyway, that's one small step toward completing my grad school applications, and that's a bit of a relief.

On a personal note: assuming the person I'm dating is dating multiple people (which I assume is true) is it a promotion or a demotion to have been moved from Saturday to Friday this week? I don't know.

Lesson learned

I thought I was supposed to take the GRE on Saturday, but it turns out my registration didn't go through, so I had to reschedule for next Thursday. At least that means I have a few extra days in which not to study.

Today is the first meeting of my honors thesis class, which I suppose basically means milling around with some assholes and trying to convince the honors program director to let me go to faculty recitals instead of lectures.

Something I've been thinking about a little:

Was there any kind of music being produced in colonial Latin America? I mean, of course there must have been, but I would like to know what it was like and how it related to the contemporary classical music being produced in Europe and how it evolved and presumably diverged from European music.