Giant song profile sheet

"Professor" Harold Hill is the main character of the play "The Music Man". He is a famous con artist known by the traveling salesmen. They talk about him all of the time. He goes to cities promising that he will teach the children music and form a band, but he doesn't do that at all. Once the uniforms and instruments are paid for, he leaves the city with the money before anyone can catch him. Harold Hill is one of those guys who can work well with the crowd. Well, he has to! He can sway a crowd at the snap of his fingers with his smooth talking. And if that doesn't work, then he can always woo the one woman who is usually against the whole idea, in this case, Marian Paroo the librarian. He can also seem to make any bad situation a very good one (for him of course). Take this example: on independence day, when the bad boy tommy shoots off a firecracker during the town meeting, professor hill hooks him up the with mayors daughter, sways that that new pool table caused this behavior and that making a band would fix all of this, and while the school board tries to get his credentials, he quickly gets them to form a barber shop quartet. But why did he avoid his credentials. Oh yeah, he doesn't have any. He was never a music teacher. To avoid this, he said he went to Gary Conservatory in his home town of Gary Indiana. he said the was the gold medalist class of '05, but they town wasnt even build till '06! Ho boy it looks like he is in trouble now. No he didnt get caught, he fell in love. We truely believe that he is now a normal guy who really likes Marian, until Charlie comes and tell marian he has a girl "every county in Illinois, and he's taken it from every one of them – and that's 102 counties!". Now we see the true side of him, until he actually does fall in love with Marian the librarian. And it ends with him being the good guy we all wanted him to be.

Here is a list of the main characters

Charlie Cowell (traveling salesman)

Professor Harold Hill (the music man)

Marcellus (old friend of harold)

Marian Parloo (the librarian)

Amaryllis (student of Marian)

Mrs. Parloo (mother of marian)

Winthrop (younger brother of marian)

Mayor Shinn (mayor of River City)

Eulalie Mackakiene Shinn (husband of mayor)

Tommy Djilles (boy from "wrong side of town")

Zaneeta (oldest daughter of the mayor)

The play starts of in a train car and its 1912. The car is in Iowa and traveling salesman are talking about the famous con artist "professor harold hill". He goes to towns promising them a band, but once they pay him for uniforms and instruments, he leaves with the money and they never find him. A man stands up and says "Nice talking to you, I might have to give Iowa a shot." As he grabs his suitcase, it clearly says Harold Hill on it. When he arrives to the city, he meets an old friend marcus. Marcus tells him about a new pool table they got. Well, harold hill tells the people of the town how "you've got trouble, right here in river city, and begins with t which rhymes with p which stands for pool." He lerans about the only woman who knows about music, marian the librarian and he tries to woo her. she ignores him. The next day (independence day)f, when the rowdy boy Tommy sets off a firecracker during the social, harold hill gets to work. He tells the town that a band could solve all of this. As he is about to leave, the ladies of the town warn him that marian is a bad woman and you shouldn't go after her. Harold Hill continues to hit on marian and she continues to ignore him. She learns about some evidence that could go against his credentials, but once she sees the excitement in her little brothers eyes about the new instruments coming to town, she tears up the book before anyone can see it.

The next day, Marian asks Harold that he hasnt taught the boys any of the notes and doesnt deem this important. why is that? he explains that he uses the think system and that you just need to think about the correct notes, then they will happen. That night, the school board tries to get harold's credentials, but he distracts them with a quartet, and slips away. Charlie Cowell comes in town to show the mayor the evidence against professor hill. Marian distracts him (kisses him) and makes him get on the train where he yells that Harold Hill has been with hundreds of women, and you are just like all of them. Harold comes by and tells her the untrue rumors he heard about her, and she believes that things charlie said must be untrue too. (HUGE, this is the part before my song!!!!) They agree to meet later that night on the footbridge. Marian tells him about how big of a difference he has made in her life. Then they sing til there was you. Marcellus interupts them and warns Harold to leave, but Harold says he can't just leave. Marian tells him that she knows he is a fraud, but she doesnt care, she loves him. The next day Charlie comes back and tells the evidence against Mr. Hill. Marian tries to tell the town that he has done exactly what he said he would do, but no one will listen. The constable cuff him, and lead him off to jail for the night. The next day, when they are trying to determine what to do with him, tommy (the drum major) leads the "marching band" of the town. Even thought they are horrible, the town loves it to death. It ends with Harold Hill and Marian embracing.

The End!

Black is the color of my true loves hair review

On December 10th, I had the "honor" of listening to Kaelen Baldwin sing the song "Black is the color of my true love's hair". Well where to begin. I guess the beginning. As soon as he walked on the stage, I knew he was nervous. He walked while he was slunched over and his bow was quick and his eyes were jumpy. I could tell this guy was nervous as can be, and it was affecting him in the negative life. Once he was ready to sing, he was clearly not properly aligned. He had his chest down, his hair down, and he kept moving his hair out of his eyes. He looked very scared on that stage as he started singing. He kept looking down in the uncomfortable way and his eye contact with the audience was not too good. Also, during the song I noticed his knee started shaking, and I think this could have been fixed by being more confident. All in all, I think we have learned a lesson. When it comes to music, you need to go big or go home. Don't sing timidly. If you sing confidently and wrong, you look better than correct and timid. So, go big or go home!

Cloudburst Review

For the fall choir concert, I had the fortune to listen the the Tennessee Tech Chorale. They were the best of the best when it came to singing. I saw on the program that they were going to sing Cloudburst by Eric Whitacre. Now, Eric Whitacre is my favorite composer, so at first I was ashamed. I didn't think that they could pull off this incredible hard work of music. But then they came on the stage. From the very beginning, they had a presence about them. They walked onto that stage like they were destined to sing in front of us at that very moment, and they were going to blow us away. They knew it, and thus the audience knew something great was about to happen. They started singing the song, and my heart just melted. People in the auditorium didn't know what was really going on because they were singing in spanish. The words wrapped around me and music soothed me as I listened to them do a wonderful job. But then, my favorite part of the song came up. It was the part when the storm comes and washes away all of the problems of the world and the world is born anew with a cloudburst. They turned off the lights in the auditorium and the they would flash on lights randomly to show lightning. They had percussionist play a bass drum, thunder sheet and some wind chimes to make it sound like the rain and thunder. The chorus would randomly snap their fingers as if the rain was falling on the sidewalk. It was the best song of the concert by far. They were just amazing when they sang. Their postures were great, you could see them relaxed, but confident when they sang. They kept their chests high, and their heads not so high. They just stood there and you knew they knew what they were doing. There was no fear in their eyes, and they looked like professionals (and sang like them too). All in all, I was simply blown away by our choir on that day.

The debate for marijuana has been a tough on. It's a simple question: Should marijuana (pot) be legal or not? Well the answer to me is quite obviously that it should not be legal. Marijuana is the most commonly used illicit drug in the United States. Well, that in and of itself is pretty darn scary. Marijuana contains more than 400 chemicals, including most of the harmful substances found in tobacco smoke. Smoking one marijuana cigarette deposits about four times more tar into the lungs than a filtered tobacco cigarette. You know how everyone talks about how smoking will kill you, but in actuality pot will kill you faster. Harvard University researchers report the risk of a heart attack is five times higher than usual in the hour after smoking marijuana. That means that you are likely to die when your smoking pot, not like everyone who just says "I smoke pot to have a good time." Well, you might also smoke pot and die. Just keep that in mind. The risk of using cocaine is estimated to be more than 104 times greater for those who have tried marijuana than for those who have never tried it. Now we all know that cocaine is a very dangerous drug, and therefor, who would want any part of that. Marijuana itself is still somewhat dangerous, but the most deadly part of pot is the fact that its a gateway drug to other drugs, which are far worse. NOw lets get deeper into why marijuana was first made illegal.

Marijuana is percieved as addictive. Obvious statement right? Well there's a story to it. Under the Controlled Substances Act of 1970, marijuana is classified as a Schedule I drug on the basis that is has "a high potential for abuse." This means the perception is that people get on marijuana, they get hooked and become "potheads," and it begins to dominate their lives. This unquestionably happens in some cases. But it also happens in the case of alcohol, and alcohol as we all know is perfectly legal.

Marijuana has "no accepted medical use". Wait! That contradicts everything I have heard from activists about this drug. Whose right? Well, Marijuana seems to yield considerable medical benefits for many Americans with ailments ranging from glaucoma to cancer, but these benefits have not been accepted well enough on a national level. Medical use of marijuana remains a serious national controversy.

Marijuana has also been historically linked with narcotics (such as heroin). The first piece of federal legislation to formally regulate marijuana was the Narcotics Act of 1914, which regulated marijuana, heroin, and cocaine. The only trouble is that cocaine and marijuana are not technically narcotics. The word narcotic has historically referred to opium derivatives such as heroin and morphine. And because of this, people believed the substance was bad, and thus it was banned.

On a personal note, marijuana is associated with unfashionable lifestyles. To but it nicely, marijuana is often thought of as a drug for hippies and losers. Since it's hard to feel enthusiastic about the prospects of enabling people to become hippies and losers, imposing criminal sanctions for marijuana possession functions as a form of communal "tough love." Therefore, these people can get on with there life instead of looking at a world "controlled by the man, dude."

Pot was also once associated with oppressed ethnic groups. The intense anti-marijuana movement of the 1930s dovetailed nicely with the intense anti-Chicano movement of the 1930s. Marijuana was associated with Mexican Americans, and a ban on marijuana was seen as a way of discouraging Mexican-American subcultures from developing. And thus instead of pressuring the people like we do today, they simply pressured the drug. Today, thanks in large part to the very public popularity of marijuana among whites during the 1960s and 1970s, marijuana is no longer seen as what one might call an ethnic drug, but the groundwork for the anti-marijuana movement was laid down at a time when marijuana was seen as an encroachment on the U.S. majority-white culture.

So as we can see, there are many reasons pot became illegal, but the facts in the first paragraph are enough to keep it illegal. Pot destroys lives without people realizing it, but I have seen first hand one of my friends become a slave to the drug. She worked to get money for the drug, then she bought other drugs, and before you know it, she got caught. She got lucky and only had to go to rehab, but she realizes along with me, she will never fully recover from what she did. Marijuana is addictive, and it will hurt you. Thats why marijuana should remain illegal.

We are Hungery

Meet Anna. Anna is a 13 year old girl who is normal. She wakes up, goes to school, has friends, and her life is normal. But sad truth is her life looks normal. Actually, when Anna goes home, she is never sure if there will be food on the table, because her mom is poor, and her dad is dead. Tonight, mom decided to go have a drink instead of feed her children. Looks like Anna will go to bed on an empty stomach tonight. Maybe tomorrow, she tells herself, maybe tomorrow I will have some food.

Stories like this are not unheard of. As a matter of fact, they are pretty understandable. Here are some stone cold facts about hunger in America. There are 36.2 million americans live in a home that is considered to be food insecure. That is more than four times the population of New York City, and we all know, thats a very big city. Out of those 36.2 million, 23.8 million are adults. Therefore, hunger affects more than 10.6% of the adults in the United States. If you think about that for a second, if you look at 10 adults in one day, one of them is not getting enough food. Children on the other hand, is a different story. 12.4 million children in the United States are affected by hunger. That statistic means that almost 17% of children are in need of food. Those are the simple facts about hunger in the United States. But what exactly is hunger?

Hunger is defined as a feeling experienced when one has a desire to eat. Unfortunatly, those statistics I just shared with you is not talking about this uncomfortable feeling. I am talking about the kind of hunger when you are in serious pain. Your stomach feels like it is a black hole with absolutly nothing in it, but the sad feeling that maybe nothing will ever fill that void. Hunger like this is a very serious issue, and is more commonly associated with the term malnutrition. Malnutritionis the insufficient, excessive or imbalanced consumption of nutrients. Basically, that means, that you are not getting enough fuel for your body to perform the way it needs to. That sounds like a bunch of random facts, so why should I care. I mean besides the fact that humans are in pain, what is so bad about hunger?

Hunger can be a serious health issue when it gets out of hand. The World Health Organization cites hunger as the gravest single threat to the world's public health. Thats right, its not cancer, AIDS, its hunger that causes the biggest threat, its hunger. Malnutrition is, by far, the biggest contributor to death in children, present in half of all cases. Malnutrition is the most common preventable cause of mental impairment. Because of all of these incredible facts about how hunger is causing all of these problems, many health officials believe that improving nutrition is the most effective form of aid.

http://www.frac.org/html/hunger_index.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunger

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malnutrition

http://www.bread.org/learn/hunger-basics/hunger-facts-domestic.html

http://www.bread.org/learn/hunger-basics/hunger-facts-international.html

http://sowhatcanido.blogspot.com/2005/01/fight-hunger-in-united-states.html

Chrome

The question of the night came to me during an intense game of Wii tennis on the wings of technology. The phone in my pants vibrated harshly in a way that made me miss my forearm shot that put my friends in the lead. "Damn it, why now?" I thought to myself. I look at the beat up broken brown phone as my friend was performing his victory dance. "Oh, Jill texted me." As I look at the partially scratched screen I could barely make the text as Jill's voice floats in my head: "Do you want to go clubbing tonight?". I could see Jill asking that, being that friend who likes to party. I chuckled at myself while imagining me at a club. I would be the shy, socially awkward, scrawny boy that looks like he is 16 in the corner. "I can't dance and I don't have a way with the women" I replied back, "Why should I go?" I thought I got out of it, the for sure crazy night that would be too adventurous too dangerous to me. I thought I escaped, but being the top honor student she was, she came back with an unbeatable retort. "Where else are you going to learn those skills Chris?" Checkmate. I admitted defeat and lost a bit of my ego. "Fine I will go."



I sat the family owned hole-in-the-wall restaurant wondering what was in store for this night. All of the different possibilities ran through my head, and a lot of them worried me. Questions ran as quickly through my mind as Usain Bolt: "What music will they play? Are there going to be a lot of people there? Am I under dressed?" They flew around my mind as if a swarm of bumble bees had decided my brain cavity would be a great place for their hive. Bobby (one of my guy friends) was sitting at the table with me drinking Dr Pepper and video chatting with his friends. All of sudden, we hear a loud ring tone that makes Bobby almost spilled his glass of Dr Pepper on his $2000 apple laptop. It was his phone receiving a text, but not just any text. This was the text that hammered the final nail of my coffin. The message was simple "Tundercats are a Go!" It was time to hit the club.



The closest club was about a 20 minute drive south of where we lived. Bobby, however, decided we were going to make it illegally there in 10 minutes. As I loosen my grip on the door handle and stumble my way out of the car, I saw the club. The place was called Chrome, and it looked like a drunken man designed the place and decided to build it in a day. There was still a line of about 150, outside, so I guess people liked it. We meet a few of our high school friends who smelled like a mixture of pot, alcohol, and Axe to try to cover up the smell. One of the girls in line decided to exclaim out to the world in her high pitch voice "I'm so drunk!" and make out with the male next to her. "What have I gotten myself into" said the one scared voice in my mind. Little did I know things were only going to get worse.


One I got inside, I almost passed out. First of all, it must have been 95 degrees because of the summer heat and all of the body heat from trying to fit 500 people in a 25o person room. The women were wearing outfits that came with questions like "Is that all you are wearing?" and "When are you expecting to get laid?" Alcohol was being passed around like pot at Woodstock. the beer was coming forth from the bartenders like a waterfall of inebriation. All of the drunk, horny young adults staggered their way to the dance floor where the biggest shock of all came. The dancing looked like an ancient roman orgy, but with clothes on . It was way too crowded in there and instead of grinding on your girl, you would accidentally grind on four other people as well. The girls clearly didn't care if the males were invading their private lady parts and the guys didn't care that they did it in public. I opted out out of the dancing and instead went to the seating area.


The seating area was arranged so that you could see the dance floor from an elevated level. The tables there were covered with alcohol containers, so I simply moved the alcohol to the other side of the table so I could see what was going on. The club scene help me see that these "adults" were really just sex crazed, drunk buffoons. As I was sitting there thinking about how stupid this idea was, I felt a tap on my shoulder. I almost jumped out of my seat when I saw that it was Josh. Now, Josh is the definition of the word alpha male; he is strong, handsome, a volunteer fireman, and bursting at the seems with self confidence. "Now why in the hell are you at a club sitting all by yourself?" he asked with his slightly southern drawl. "well, I don't have a date and I'm not going into that meess to try to find on" I said as I pointed to the dance flor. "yeah you are" he said and before I knew it, I was being drug by the wrist through the chaos. Hw weaved through the crowd as if he was controlling them and moving them at his will. He spotted two pretty women with his eagle eyesight, and directed me to them. He brought me right in front of them and started the conversation. As he started talking, I got a little bit more confident and started talking quite a bit and then, on a daring whim, I asked one of them if she would like to dance. She looked at me and gave me a sympathetic smile while saying "I'm sorry, but I'm with her" as she pointed to her (apparently) girlfriend. At that time, Jill walked sluggishly over to me and commented "I'm tired, lets go home." "No complaints here."


As we drove home in her father's red jaguar, we were listening to the radio to assess how the night went and I came to the conclusion of not so hot. It was 3 am, I was tired, and I didn't hook up with anyone. I felt like an innocent freshman in high school who walked into highschool on the first day of school. I told myself, "your just no tready, maybe a few year from now, the club will be more fun." At that instant moment in time, life decided to play me the irony card. Jill looked at me with her sky blue eyes and said


"So, you coming back next week?"

Why?

Well, after a terrible day, I just had to make it worse.  Reading these reports was just awful, just awful.  Why must we read about these.  Wait, I know why, we are suppose to broaden our knowledge of literature.  We are suppose to think outside of the box.  But maybe its just me, I would much, MUCH rather read literary fiction and poetry.  Fiction can be anything.  ANYTHING!  It is amazing to see what these authors can come up with and their great sense of imagination.  You use imagination when you read these styles of books, and isn't that the first reason we started to read in the first place?  Our teachers in elementary school telling us that when we read a book, it takes us to other places.  Poetry takes us to the actual mind of the poet, where we can see his romantic or dark mind.  We can be soothed or frightened by the words on the page, as we read with the beat like a drum.  We feel our souls tremble as we read these inevitable truths.  That's what writing should be.  The crap we have to read is not writing whatsoever.  When I was reading about the blog, I was taken to a place where the author had no enthusiasm and just told me about blogging.  On a scale of excitement, turtle races demolished this paper.  And then we had a tear jerk-er, the homeless in college.  Don't get me wrong, I don't hate homeless people, I just hate people who try to make me feel bad and fail.  What every happened to the Keep It Simple Stupid method?  Why must everyone that I have to read feel like elaborating on and on and on over a bunch of bullshit that no one cares about.  I wrote this blog to boycott these stupid pieces of work.  Until I find a work that moves me, I believe that this "writing" shall not be deemed writing in my mind.  So bring it on writers.  Bring it on.

The Teacher

The names that describe him are endless: The Percussion Teacher, The Captioin Head, Percussion Professor, and The Big Man In Percussion.  His name is Eric Willie, and he is in charge of Tennessee Tech's Percussion Studio.  He is the man with a plan, but what was he before he was a teacher.  Eric was just another percussion student who by shear chance, had the opportunity to teach at an early age.  "I started teaching marching band camps during my junior year in high school and I enjoyed seeing what approaches worked and didn't work" says Eric.  He also had a private student whom he taught his senior year.  When his student made the top honor band in the western part of the state, the event gave Eric "hope that I might be able to pursue teaching."  Another, mare close to home influence though was his father.  Eric's father was a rock and roll drummer who was actually the first to introduce percussion into Eric's life.  "He introduced me to Wipeout, Let There Be Drums, and In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" Eric recollects.

But even the teacher had to learn from someone.  Eric believes he has been blessed with many good teachers in his life (even though at the time he hated some of them, now he understands what he taught them secretly).  For instance, his high school band director would extend his work day for no extra money every single day and give the students lessons.  This taught Eric that "to be a musician it takes time." Every teacher he had just built a new level of musicality just like a building.  Even now, he knows that the building is still not complete as he said "(guys like) Mark Ford, Christopher Deane, Ed Soph, Ed Smith, and Paul Rennick,  

All of my DMA teachers (have) taught me that I had a lot to learn!"

"Why does he do this though?" is a question that wandered through my mind as I left his

office after my lesson with him. "How can he sit there day after day listening to kids that are

not nearly as talent as he his, and he patiently holds their hand (not literally) and walks them

through the study of music?" Most people would explode and yell something along the lines of

"Why can't you play anything!" and break a drumstick and walk out of the room. Instead, Eric

sits there right beside you on his stool listening intensely for the sound of you drum as you

make music out of thin air. His favorite part about teaching: "I love seeing the students

performance ability improve." He feeds on the students accomplishments because deep down,

he knows none of this could have been possible without his guidance.

What a lot of people don't know about Eric is that he (like many of the faculty here at

Tennessee Tech) is a world class performer. Eric is sponsored by many percussion companies

who want people the know that he uses their products and nothing else. He has many videos

on the internet of him performing a variety of percussion instruments. Eric has an unusual

view of the performance because unlike most people, he likes the preparation of the piece more

than the piece its self. "I really enjoying breaking out the metronome and breaking things down"

Eric commented during one of our afternoon chats.

Overall, I can tell that I have become a better musician in these past 4 weeks and most of it

is thanks to Eric Willie. The Big Man lives on, and will be loved by his students or anyone who

has ever heard him perform.

PROFILES

Profiles seem really dull after writing memoirs. Maybe thats just me. I can't see how you could get an exciting angle on writing about something like that. Maybe I just dont understand it just yet. but to me, it seems like a pain in the butt to write too. I mean, the memoir was pretty easy once you got the creative juices flowing, but with profiles, you got to do some dirth work before hand as well. Well lets start talking about the memoirs I read.

The first profile was about a woman who was a mechanic for a car that is no longer manufactured. that was basically the jist of the whole thing. I liked how the writer gave good details, and even though its a lazy approach. She kept it simple and short. And I liked that

The other profile was about Johnny Depp. and I'm not going to lie, I didn't like it at all. There was not really a cool angle that made me want to keep reading. The only reason I kept reading it was because I had to. It was boring, and it kinda makes me worried that I will write one equally as bad or even worse. But I guess I got to be fine with writing the worst crap in the world.

CLUBIN NIGHT

"Hey chris, you want to go to chrome tonight?"  That would be the question of the night.  Jill, one of my best friends had texted me this during an intense wii game of tennis.  "Chrome, i thought, why did that ring a bell.  Then i got another vibration from my best up cell phone.  Its that club in johnson city, remember.  Ohh, she wants me to go clubbin'.  Well this should prove interesting i told myself.  I agreed only because i had this new policy where i would say yes to anything that was brought to my attention.  I excused myself from my friends, and called some people to see if they wanted to go as well.  We got a total of 5 people.  So, then i brought my "gay but not really gay" friends over to help me decide what i should wear.  After we figured out what was going down, we decided to chill at Perkins, a local restaurnant that is open 24 hours a day.  Well, we got a booth and waited slowly for one....two.....and started drawing close to three hours when we got the text.  It was time for us to go to the club.

The club was approximatly 20 miles away, so we had a drive, once we got to the club (which was at about midnight), we had to wait in the 100 person line.  As we were waiting in line with our college id's and drivers licenses, we could smell only three things: beer, pot, and sex.  Now until that point i didnt know sex had a smell, but that day, i learned exacley what it smelled. like.  My friend looks at me and says "Oh i cant wait".  I lied to myself "neither can i"

Once we got in, it was like a zoo.  Only the cages were too small, we didnt get food for free, and there were drunk people dancing to hip hop.  We are just sitting there awestruck, looking at the outfits like, "is that it, she has got to be missing something" and wondering is that her or his... nope its his hand...in her.. yep in her"  things of that source.  beer was going around like beach bals at nickelback concerts.  Then as i was passing  a group on the dance floor, all i heard was the girl say in a sexy, seductive voice "i can't wait for you to stick your dick into my pussy"except she drew out the end of the word while wispering into his ear.  That is exactly when i told my friends that i was going to sit for a while. 

From about 2 till 2:30, all me and the "gay" friend did was watch the dance floor from an elevated seating area asking the same questions from the beginning"Is she really doing that in public?"  "Yep"  "Wow" I felt like a lonely freshman walking down the big scary hall of high school but instead of the illegal activity being hidden behind the teachers backs, it was just right in front of us.  Now once we were about to get up, one of our older friends spotted us.

"what are you two sitting down for.  can you not find any women to grind up on"  we both honestly replied.  "nope"  he told us to follow him, and we combed through the jungle of people that smelt like alcohol and sweat from the body heat of the dance floor.  He found us two girls, who we thought we might get a chance to dance with, until they told us that they were dating each other "Oh!, awkward" went through my mind.  

And that is when the party ended, and that was my day clubing.

FIRST DAY

This is not real.

thats all i could tell myself on that dreadful day.  the day that grabbed me and took me to a completly new world.  A world so scary, exciting, and holds drama for everyone.  tday was my first day of high school.

As i walked through the entrance, i looked around at the old school.  It was made of two main building materials: brick and duct tape.  It seemed like the duct tape went on for miles and miles and that wsa all the school was made of.  ironically, our school colors were blue and grey.   but anyways.  i saw the humongous beasts that were called the senior football players give me the evil glare.  As soon as i wsa caught in their line of sight, i ran to the only place they couldnt catch me, the library.  The library at the high school was exponentially larger than the one at the middle school.  It was two leveled with more than 4 computers in there (i learned later, there were actually 45!)  As i was chilling in there, i saw her.  Oh God, not now said the voice inside my head, but sure enough, my middle school stalker was sitting there, her pig like nose buried into a book about dragons or faries, or something along those lines.  get out of here yelled the scared part of mind, who then replied right back, but what about the scary seniors.  that is when i would chose my doom.  how was i to die as a highschooler: as a bloody pulp in the middle of the floor because i happened to look in the direction of one of their girl friends, or was i to be in a closet, shot up with ectasy and ruphilin.  then the desicion was made for me when i saw her start to close the book.  I turned around, walked very briskly toward the library doors out unto the pit.

you think im kidding, but we had a pit in our high school.  sure it was only 4 feet deep, but it was called The Pit.  It had stairs so it reminded me of an ampitheater,  but that is where all of the cool kids would hang.  and i was the farthest thing from cool.  The only way i would have a chance was if being 5 foot 3, 90 pounds and being in band became cool.  and was that really going to happen in my lifetime.  no.  I was wondering what to do.  I started to sweat because i started seeing everybody looking at me like i was an idiot.  actually that was my imagination.  no one was looking at me, who cared about this kid.  but i was still scared.  I literally jumped out of my skin when i felt a tap on my shoulder.  i dont want to turn around.  what do i say to her?  just say it.  Say get away from me freak.  just do it!  As i turn and i opened my mouth, it just stayed open and then let out a sigh.

hey chris, follow me said my drum captain, and in my opinion, the coolest senior band person in the world.  he led me through the labyrnth of hallways as we ended up in the band hall.  there is where i saw all of the band kids chillin before school started.  he said "this is where we chill. you know where it is now?"  yeah, thanks dude.  

We were interupted by the bell.

time for school he said.  

and i honestly dont remember the rest of the day.

the Girl

When i first entered high school i was awestruck by 3 things:the size of the school, the band, and the ladies.  I mean it blew my mind how beautiful the girls (now women) were, even in the band.  especially in the band.  There was an issue though.  See, mother nature decided that i wasnt going to hit my growth spurt until my junior year.  so as a freshman, i was just "the cute kid drummer"  They would look at my small frail body and on windy days, keep checking to see if i was firmly on the ground or if i was swept up in the air.  Girls would see me like a celebrity would see a dog:  get a small one because its cute and keep it as a pet.  If i was associated with a woman, it was being their friend and them going, your just soooooo cute.  So when the issue came that i liked one of the girls who thought i was cute, i felt that there was no possible way for victory.  I kept my distance, but then i think i started getting paranoid.  I started seeing signals.  hers were very subtile, like telling people to be careful when they attempted to bench press me.  Mine were, no matter how much i tried, blantenly obvious.  By day 4, 50% of the band knew that i liked this girl even though i didnt tell anybody.  by day 5, everybody except she knew.  One day, one of our biggest bass drummers comes up to me and tells me he wants to talk to me after practice.  alright i said, he probably wants money for the drumline t-shirts is what i said.  During the break i go over and talk to him.  "Whats up".  he is like, "your doing it tonight"  "doing what"  Your asking her out"  "no, i dont want to.  she doesnt even like me"  "bull shit.  she likes you, and your doing it after the game"  "I dont feel like it"  "Hey, grow a pair, and do it or i will..."the next part is so explicit, i dont think i can say it in text.  so i agreed, and walked away contiplating what he said.  i groaned and cover my manhood as i walked away.

During the game, josh (the bass drummer)  told me to do it during 3rd quarter.(we got 3rd quarter as a break)  I saw here, looking beautiful even in the band uniform.  a million things went through my mind as i approached her.  first let me lay down a few things about this situation that made this scary:a. she was an upperclassman b.  i was a freshman. c.  this was the first time i had asked a girl out d.  she never had a boyfriend before and e. she was surrounded by her 3 very close friends.  i knew they would not leave, so i though "well its just 3 of them, i can do this in front of them.  I approached this woman, and started feeling happy even when i was just standing next to her.  "Hey kim (her name), can i talk to you?"  "sure.  whats up?"  Immediatly, with the imfamous woman ESP, one of her friends caled the women of the band.  the message was simple: he is doing it now.  withing 3 seconds, the crowd of 3 turned to 20, and i noticed that i was enclosed in a circle of upperclassman girls watching the cute freshman ask out the hot junior clarinet.  what came out of my mouth next could have been easily the most complicated asking out question ever composed.  i dont remember all of it, but it was about 100 words long.  and at the end, everyone (now up to 40) was confused along with kim.  But kim just laughed and said, are you asking me out.  "Yeah, i attempted to"  she goes "Your cute, why not."  I was on cloud 9, it was fantastic.  we lasted for only 3 months.

sad day

The Review

I have just read two memoirs from my english book(The Norton Feil Guide to Writing) and now its time for me to give my imput. I will start from the begininng and move on from there.

The frist memoir I read was by David Sedaris titled "Us and Them". I really liked the story line. I thought it was very interesting, and I liked watching David talk about how interested he was that these people don't own a television. Sure, I know it is a little weird, but he acted lie they were from another planet instead. Reading about him wtching these people and trying to figure them out is what kept me reading the story. I thought in the end he would either get caught or his family would throw out their television or something like that, but no. Instead it ends with just a simply request from the Tomkey family. They simply want some candy on the day after Halloween. Now I don't think it is such a big deal, but clearly David did and he turned into an animal. Suffing his face with the candy to not let them have any really makes you wonder "Why David? Just let them have some candy." I thought the ending was nice, but it could have been better. And on my last note for this book, the only thing I had against it was it was a little slow to start off, but in the end it all worked out.

The second memoir was by Susan Jane Bilman titled "Mick Jagger Wants Me". Now when you first hear that title, you ssume, no, expect it to be about a girl meeting Mick Jagger. First of all, who would want to meet him, he is disgusting. Well, I guess that is what you get for being a rock star. Back to the memoir. Instead it is about these two girls who are crazed fans who want to meet him after learning that he is recording near their home town. They wait all day (I could never do that, I would get bored) to meet him with no avail from what I got. Then it goes off wome wild tanget about them going to parties where they do drugs, alcohol, and make out. Now that sounds like a party from the 70's. And then it skips back to the present where they see the guitarist and then she gets the idea they are going to wait for mick jagger. But Susan then realizes, that she wants mick jagger to find her, not vice versa. So she doesnt want to be some crazed fan, she wants to be more. Then again, doesnt everyone want to be more than a fan. Don't we all want to be special to that celebrity we love. Thats why we are the crazed fans, so that they can recognize us. And we believe once we are recognized, we can truely win them over. So her whole epiphany was actually just hypocracy. But I still love the memoir. It had great imaging and it was captivating. I think the only issue with it was it could have been better with staying on topic, but other than that, fantastic.

Well, I just finished reading my english book, so its time to write.  My history of w riting is like a bad drama movie:  it tries to be cool, but in the end, its just lame and poorly made.  So lets get striaght to the story.

It all started in elementary school.  I was in an Outreach program for the kids in the school that were super smart (I still to this day question why i was in that class).  Every year, we would always enter an amusment parks writing contest.  The park would print out the topic in the newspaper, and kids would write about it and whoever won in their division would take their classroom on a field trip to the park.  It was always great because you got to miss school and the park was basically empty.  In my class, everyone had to write an essay, so I gave it a shot.  My first topic was to make up a fiction story that takes place in the Appalacian Mountains.  I got so into the story, and my teacher thought it was great.  I didn't win the contest, but one of my classmates did, so it all worked out.  

I kept writing up.  I would continue my fiction story in my journal I had all the way into my 8th grade year.  My teachers kept asking me to write papers, but these were not creative writing projects, so if I did bad, I would use the excuss that I couldn't express my self while I was talking about the different temperate zones.  So in my 8th grade year, I had to take a writing exam.  It was a state wide (or national, i am not sure) writing exam.  They would give us a topic and we would have about 45 minutes to write on the subject.  Well I wrote (in my opinion) one of the best papers i have ever done.  I was on top of the world.  Our teacher told us that the results would be given to us at the end of the year.  I kept imagining whether they were going to give us a 6, or maybe they would invinte a 7 just for me (they graded you on a scale from 1 to 6, so getting a 6 is a big deal).  The end of the year came, and our grades came out.  My teacher let us come up to her folder where she had the scores.  When she called my name, i was thinking "Give me a 6 baby!".  I got up there, and i saw the number that changed my writing career

4

"Four!" I yelled in my head, "How did I get a 4!?".  It didn't help that the people around me were getting fives and sixes.  I was one of two kids in my class that got a 4.  It absolutly killed me.  

When i got home I thought to myself "The judges clearly don't think I am good at writing, so I am just going to give it up".  I got my book I was working on (it was about 150 pages now) and i threw it away.  I wanted to give it up forever.  Ever since that moment, I no longer write for fun.  I just write if my english teacher asks me to (don't worry english teachers, i am not mad at you).  So that in a nutshell, is the history of my writing.  Hope I didn't depress you too much.