Dumping my thoughts here, hence this not being front paged. This might not make too much sense, feel free not to read it. I was rushed to write this because I have class soon, plus I'm hardly getting any sleep anymore.

So I’ve had fun here at Baylor and stuff, but this blog isn’t about me. (crap, it kinda ended up being about me. Whatever)

I’ve noticed that since I’ve left, my three closest friend’s lives have all kinda started to suck. I’m not at all saying it’s because I left, this is just coincidence. It’s just weird that all kinds of bad crap keeps happening to them. These were happy people a while ago. Normally whenever one of my friends is sad, I'll talk to them and just try my best to make them feel better, and I was actually pretty good at it. I was almost like a counselor to a lot of my friends. that's changed though. The stories I hear now leave me speechless. One of the friends I've mentioned is pretty sick and might have to miss going to an incredibly important, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity marching contest that most bands don't get the opportunity to go to. She also had to miss homecoming, quite a bit of school, and another competition, all while being sick. Normally I can comfort people but nothing I can say helps. In a way, this all actually hurts me. I'm fine over here, but the people I care about aren't, and I feel really helpless. Maybe I'm too sympathetic, but that's one of my traits I like most. Another of my friends I found out is on parole. He wasn't the best kid, but certainly not someone who would do something like... Whatever he did. He won't even tell me. All I've heard about him is from my other friend. I feel so distant out here. Here at Baylor I'm more surrounded by people than ever, and yet I feel much lonelier than I ever have. The people back at home who promised that we'd Skype weekly don't. The people who said they'd keep in touch don't. I've essentially lost mostly every friend I have.

Thing is, I'd be happy if they were happy.

Update(8-17-12):

So preseason week is almost over now. I've been here since Monday and this is the first time I've been in my dorm during the day. Band has us doing stuff from 7:30AM to 11PM this week, but after that it's just 2 hours for 3 days a week, plus football games and etc. Band's actually been a ton of fun. It's exhausting, my back hurts, and I'm allergic to the field we march on (I'll talk more of this later). Unlike Highschool, everyone here actually wants to be here so everyone tries and is really good. Somehow, I'm already one of the better marchers. As for playing, I can't really tell because we're ridiculously loud, but I think I'm one of the loudest in my section of 17. It's weird being a freshman again.

Class starts Monday. I'm not looking forward to this because while I'll be less busy, band is a lot more fun than physics. I almost never studied in HS so this will be a huge change for me I'd imagine. I shouldn't be too busy to have to leave here though, so I guess I'll stay.

My suite somehow became the hangout room for the other engineers in our building. I came back from practice one day and there were around 20 kids just hanging out here. It's pretty cool, except when I need sleep like I do now (Somehow, I've been running on less than 6 hours of sleep this whole week).

I'm allergic to something here, I'd just assume it's the grass field we march on. I've just been getting normal allergy symptoms, but my second night here I woke up at 5:30AM because I could hardly breathe at all. Fortunately I got better, because I had no way to get medication for it. Since then my symptoms have gotten better, thank God, so I guess I'm getting immune or something.

Picture time!



And here's the original blog (8-13-12):

Finally.

Anyway before the actual blog, here's a quick question: Should I start doing game reviews? They wouldn't be amazing or funny like Cesque's shenanigans, but just basically be me ranting on about what's good and bad about a game. Should I do that?

Actual blog:

First up, here's what I got for my birthday:

$90 (I got some for graduation though)
Ocarina of Time 3D
Ghost Recon: Shadow Wars
$20 3DS card
New strings for my guitar (One broke, but I don't play too often)
Arm weights for when I march (So I can get more muscle, a 6 and a half pound instrument isn't enough anymore :P )

Also I'm going to get a laptop for college soon. Not sure what to do with all the money I have. I was considering getting the air fixed on my car (No AC in Texas = fun!) but I'm not taking that to college so that would be pointless. I'm going to buy another kick pedal for my Guitar Hero drum set since it's annoying to play on expert with only one.

Speaking of college, I graduated High School this year, and I've been taking an english class at a community college, since I suck at writing and Baylor supposedly has really hard english classes. It's only one class, but it takes up time and I haven't had much of a summer yet, but it ends on the 5th (Like a half cadence) so that'll be nice. I'm going to leave on August 13th to go to Baylor University in Waco- Mechanical Engineering major with a minor in math. I'm also going to be in the marching band and I'll still be playing music, so I'll be pretty busy. If I don't like engineering, I'll probably change and be a music major, but then I won't have a career. Oh well.

Warning: Most of the rest of this blog is just me rambling on about music.

I started composing music a couple months ago, because I wanted to make an unaccompanied solo to play for the Solo Contest. There aren't many euphonium solos, and the one I was playing was actually for trombone so I couldn't quite play it like it was meant to be played, so I started writing my own. I also wrote it without a piano part, so that I could save money AND not have to go through the hassle of practicing with a pianist. That was a pretty good move, since most people who had accompanists got this lady that wasn't too great at piano and it hurt they're performance.

It started out as me just improvving in D major/b minor but I started writing down the parts of it I liked and based my improv off of that, so there wasn't too much theory or structure used to make it- I don't like having restrictions. Rather than have a main melody, I decided to just embody an emotion: sorrow. Eventually I was just going to have a couple "mood changes" and have the entire piece be maybe 10 minutes, but I decided it was best to cut it into movements. I took out the transitions and added endings. Eventually, it became a learning experience, which is why each movement is a different mode. Here's a list of the movements, hidden because it's not too interesting:



Without the 8th movement, I think it's about 22 minutes long. I only have 3 and 4 typed up because it's a pain to type these up, the rest are on paper. I would provide some recordings, but the acoustics in my room suck, so I'll need a room with good acoustics and a good quality mic. I played movements 3 and 4 for Solo contest, and I was going to play 7 for my marching band audition, but decided against it. I'm not sure if I'll compose anything after that. If I do, it'll probably have structure and make more sense theory-wise.

I've been playing mostly just TF2 and Guitar Hero lately. I can only drum since I hurt one of my fingers (it's almost healed!) and I've actually gotten pretty good at it. I wish TF2 didn't have a limit for items per week, I'd play more otherwise. If you wanna play either TF2 or Guitar Hero(360), I'm down for that.

I dunno, I don't feel like much worth mentioning has happened lately, guess that's all I have to say.

EDIT: Forgot something!

I've been learning a lot of new music lately. Here's a quick list of some of the things I can play on the euphonium:

Lord of the Rings theme (and a couple other LotR songs)
Some Zelda music
Mario theme song
YYZ by Rush (I've learned most of it)
Carry On Wayward Son by Kansas (most of it)
Black Dog by Led Zeppelin
I arranged Kashmir by Led Zeppelin, but it has 3 parts.
Bare Necessities from Jungle Book
Star Trek theme (I might've forgotten it though)
Universal Studios theme
Part of Schism by Tool
And more!

I have a large list of things to learn, such as the theme from Up, Bohemian Rhapsody, Hyrule Field from Ocarina of Time, and Spanish Flea. If you want to request anything, go ahead! I'll put up recordings once I'm able to record.

One of the few days where I actually have something to blog about!

What I got:
Skullcandy headphones (These things are AMAZING)
Golden Sun: Dark Dawn (From Kabob)
Batman: Arkham City (360)
Gears of War 3
Battery backup surge protector
3DS!
Gold plated mouthpiece for my euphonium. Real gold:3
and money and some other small things, woo.

So Christmas was pretty awesome this year.
I also recently bought some games:
Morrowind GOTY (Steam)
Oblivion GOTY Deluxe (Steam)
Skyrim (Steam)
Section 8
Army of Two: The 40th Day
Transformers: War for Cybertron
And I plan on buying Halo Anniversary

Plus I'm finally getting a new computer. I'll put up the specs once I have it put together and running. The one I'm using now is 7 years old with some small upgrades since. It struggles to run Minecraft on Short view distance, even with Optifine, so I'm limited on what games I can actually play on it. The processor's a 1.8GHZ SINGLE core >_>

Senior year of HS has been really cool so far. Besides Physics and Calculus, all of my classes are jokingly easy, so if I'm ever tired, I can get plenty of sleep during the school day. I can finally drive so my Social Life has levelled up quite a bit (Minecraft just opened itself, wtf?). The car I drive, which technically is my parents but is basically mine, is a 1993 Saturn without any air conditioning, so it sucks to drive in the summer. Plus it's kind of falling apart anyway.

I've decided I want to go to Baylor University and major in Mechanical Engineering. It was a tough choice since music is my passion, but since I play euphonium, I wouldn't be able to get a job at all... So I had to choose being able to have a job, instead of doing what I love. I'm still going to be in the marching band and stuff though. I want to start recording myself playing some video game/movie music on my euphonium to post here, so I can actually do something productive for once. Oh, and I managed to get a 34 on the ACT, so that covers up my not-so-great GPA. Taking that test really saved me.

Over the fall, I only played 2 games: TF2 and Minecraft. School, friends, and music kept me busy enough. Now that break's started, I'm playing my 360 some more. Feels great. If you don't have me added on Steam/Xbox live, add me; Kamira929. We should have some more 64D TF2 days :D

It's weird, Minecraft just isn't any fun to me at all. Maybe it's because the server's full blown creative, or just all the time I've put into it. I still have a bit of fun doing single player, but I doubt I'll be on the server much anymore.

I don't think I'll ever open up GM again. Programming just isn't my thing. I kinda wish it was.

Tried to condense this blog to avoid making a giant wall of text that gets tl;dr'd like I normally do. Also, Ross is a jerk.

Edit: Forgot to mention, I met Pounce4ever at a band competition a couple months ago. She's pretty cool.