13 January 2004 I just auditioned for the symphony ensemble nearby. It's a nonprofit group, which means that it's for amateurs. I don't mean amateurs in the sense that they don't play well, because I'm nearly certain that they play very well indeed (though I haven't heard them), rather that it is for those who perform because they enjoy it and don't mind not earning money from it. At any rate, I knew the address that the building was at, so I just followed the street in the correct direction. The problem was that I lacked money for a parking meter, and as all the roads within 50 yards of the main city street require that one pay to park along them, and I wished not to risk receiving a parking ticket, I had to park several blocks away from the street, and then I walked along it until I found the building. I dropped my book of music on the way there and didn't realize it until a minute or two later, and panicked slightly because wondered if I left it in my car and wished not to backtrack that far in the cold weather, when I was probably late already... but as it turned out I had dropped the book only a block back, and I wasn't late at all, as I determined after hurrying up a few flights of stairs to the top. Then I met the people who organized and performed in and led the ensemble, and they gave me a music stand and offered that I warm up upstairs. I did so, enjoying the building's beautiful acoustics. Then they called for me to return downstairs, after a few minutes, which gave me enough time to play through most of my first song, and after a few questions I auditioned... I played parts of two songs from my book. I wonder if I will be accepted.. if I'm not, then I'll seek other ensembles to play in. But I think that I would quite enjoy playing with them. The director seemed nice, as did everyone else that I met. I was somewhat nervous, at any rate. For my birthday, Sara gave me a very nice CD of Beethoven and Mozart, and she even found one that had woodwind instruments playing on it, as I especially delight in classical music that has oboes, clarinets, bassoons, flutes, and brass instruments, instead of just strings. She also gave me a very entertaining book by TS Eliot about cats, which I read in its entirety the first day that she gave it to me (which wasn't difficult, as the book is short) and even read a few poems from for my French classes, even though the poems are in English. She gave me a book about all the aircraft that were flown in WWII, even lesserknown aircraft from nations such as Poland, France, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia and China. Now I wish that all the flight simulators would include aircraft from nations Besides the USA, Britain, Germany, and Russia (though the Spitfires are still my favourites -- maneuverable, certainly not slow, easy to fly, and with plenty of guns). Today I received two more presents from her: 256MB of RAM (she bought exactly the right kind!) and a silly song by Captain Zoom, about how he tried to find my birthday present among the various species indigenous to the moon and Mars, but in the end decided to sing me a song. My parents gave me a new clarinet mouthpiece and some picture frames. I didn't play my new clarinet mouthpiece for my audition because I'm hardly accustomed to it yet, but I'll try playing it more and deciding in what situations I enjoy playing it more than my current web page. 26 January My students recently took their midterm examinations, which I often mistakenly call 'final examinations.' It's probably because in university classes last one semester, so the examination at the end, even if it's only the one before winter break, is the final examination for the class. Actually, my high school holds classes in two semesters per school year, and simply average the two quarter grades together to make a semester grade. Anyways, I had to write some final examinations for my students. My students complained and said that they were very difficult, but that's probably what all students say: they complain in class that all the assignments are too difficult, and then after class they brag to their friends about how easy the class is. Well, that's not entirely true, and a somewhat cynical assumption to hold. Of course, to me my tests are easy, but that's because I already know the answers. Every day when I drive to school I can see the sunset, because the sun appears as though it is just a few inches above the horizon. Fortunately it's following its parabolic path to become higher and higher in the sky from day to day, so whereas it used to be directly in my line of vision sometimes, hence blinding me, now it's just high enough that I can enjoy watching it and seeing the spreading colours, but am not blinded by it. Sara and I joined a Bible study, at least tentatively. The people in it seem kind and interesting, but so far the lessons are mostly introductory: the group is trying a short six-session curriculum/plan, and after that we'll find something more involved to study. It's quite nice to have found a Bible study, since I want to study the Bible more, though we can do that alone, and do, but also because we know very few people here, and have even fewer friends. Maybe that's a faux pas, like Bilbo saying 'I don't know half of you half as well as I should like, and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve.' But fortunately with a web page no-one really knows for certain whom I'm talking about. Being married is very nice, and sometimes I remember very humorous things that happened in my old life. The sounds of screaming, and madness, and lunacy, and horrific booms and loud noises and dire shock of seismic blasts: those were the hallmarks of living in a male dormitory at university, especially when the males had CD players. The silent despair of desperation of final examinations (ok, I'm being a bit redundant), the horror of dreadful anticipation in wondering if one would receive for a roommate the one who never took a bath (or a shower)... Being married is very different indeed. In university, one can survive a semester of having nary a meaningful conversation with ones roommates. But in marriage, while that is still possibly, it is very detrimental to the happiness of both involved. But then, that's why one marries someone that one can talk with very comfortably in the first place... or at least type to, as it was for a long time in my case. I have a nice black keyboard that my father in law gave to me. It has lots of interesting function keys, and it has a backward slash key in the place that I'm not accustomed to, which is beneath the 'Enter' key. It even has play/pause/stop/next song/previous song/New Song (no, that's a Christian song), and volume buttons. It's quite neat. The keys are all curved, too. Once when I was in university I received an extra keyboard and decided to transform it from a QWERTY keyboard into a Dvorak keyboard, by pulling off all the keys and replacing them in the Dvorak order. It actually worked, and I found the setting in Windows to use a Dvorak keyboard, but unfortunately I had chosen to perform this project the night before I had a long essay due for one of my classes, and after hunting and pecking for a long time, I switched back to my QWERTY keyboard and hardly used the other one again. Thoughts and Events