Saturday, 19th of May, 2001
The Youth Symphony had a run-out concert and rehearsal beforehand at Principia College this afternoon. I had to leave early to set up sound for the Stroll tonight, so I was only able to attend the rehearsal. Driving out there is so much fun! It felt like a nice long distance drive, and the traffic was light enough to make for a fast drive, especially on the Great River Road along the Mississippi... that's fun! The river was really high today, practically a foot lower than the road, so it was running right by the road like that. Most of the houses by the river were submerged. But yes, this drive is now my favourite place to drive, totally. There's a place near Alton where there's a big barge loading/unloading dock, and the road kinda runs right through and under all the big machinery... reminds me of something I'd see in Need for Speed! Historic Alton is also very tight, all these old buildings gives a really nice feeling when driving through, though I was looking for some fast food, and the only thing I could find was McDonalds. But still, Alton is like a totally calm semi-rural area that is not too far from St. Louis... it's pretty awesome.
But anyway, I left early to go to the Ritz and do a sound setup for tonight's stroll. It's really cool, we got there, and requested that they separate the tables more so we have room to stroll, and the people at the Ritz just gladly rearranged all those tables in the main ballroom for us. That's impressive service. The stroll itself was pretty nice, it was for the Sub-Contractor's Association. Afterwards, we went to Il Vicino for pizza and then to Maggie Moo's for dessert... but by Maggie Moo's, I had already filled up my stomach for the day, so I had to pass on that one.
Friday, 18th of May, 2001
Beth gave me the coolest birthday gift! She put together "Charlie's Book of Angelicy," an awesome collection of photos, quotes, thoughts, phrases, everything that has meant a lot to me since November, when the Charlie-Angel relationship was established. It must have taken forever for her to make it too! It's so sweet, it must be the most thoughtful gift I've ever received. And Hannah also gave me a book, "The Story About Ping." Ping, the Ducki, hehe.
We had a stroll for the Wash U '56 reunion at the Algonquin Country Club. They didn't have a great turnout, only about 40 people, so we also had to trim down a little, which conveniently coincided with a stroll that 3/5 first violins were unable to attend. So we had 2 1st violins, 3 2nd violins, a couple violas, a couple cellos, and a bass. The view of the country club was nice today, being all misty and cold air that we love. Since there weren't many people there, we were able to interact a little more, which was interesting.
Afterwards, Eric, Beth, Andrea, Amie, Kevin, Hannah, and I went to Fitz's and kinda ate and hung out. I brought in a big birthday cookie to share with people, and I don't know what posessed me to feed Kevin a piece with a bunch of icing on it, but he did walk around with green teeth for the rest of the night. Afterwards, we went over to Amie's house and watched Veggietales, King George and his Ducky. I love that one!
Thursday, 17th of May, 2001
I tried to bail out of taking the AP Statistics test today, but my teacher didn't like that too much, so I took it anyways. Well, I'm glad I took it. It was actually all easy statistics, nothing like the stuff we were seeing on the practice tests. Those practice tests are scary. In fact, it made me dissapointed, cause to think that if I had only 2 nights to study for this test, I would do soooo much better. But I really didn't have those 2 nights, I've been busy with that orchestra concert and stuff. Doh. I really wish all that didn't have to run together, but owell, it's all almost over now.
Wednesday, 16th of May, 2001
During AC Lab and part of lunch I helped Ms. Fleming a bit with setting up the "stage" in the gym. We managed to cram in the 31 stands of violins in the space we had, and we though we were all cool in being able to do that... and then Ms. Fleming realized she forgot to include the elementary kids in there too... there are 55 elementary violins. Oh wow. It looks like we're going to have to put some in the bleachers. Whatever works.
The AP Physics exam was today, and it was a lot easier than the previous years. I thought I did very well, and I had a pretty good chance of getting a 4 or 5 on the test based on previous years, so I feel good about it. The questions were sometimes so easy it was scary... maybe I'm missing something hard about it? But that's ok, it was actually a fun and low-stress test, only 90 minutes because we only did the Mechanics section.
Tonight we had our orchestra concert in that gym, and it's a good thing my heat tolerance is pretty good as of lately, cause it was pretty hot in there. But I played all 3 movements of Bach's Concerto for Violin in E Major (with a small cut near the end of the 1st movement), and we played an arrangement of Holst's Jupiter with full orchestra. It started to get really hot and we needed to end that concert soon, so we only played a measly 3 lines of the movement of the Mahler Symphony we were working on, and then the St. Paul Suite, minus the Ostinato for time sake again. And then we had the mega-orchestra of all the strings players in the school district playing Pachabell's Canon.
The concert went really well, I was watching the video of it later, and actually satisfied with my solo. It's such an awesome piece, definitely my favourite, and I actually didn't feel nervous at all, which was unusual and good. It made me really happy. And we did the typical end-of-the-year stuff, saying good-bye to the seniors (it's so sad!!!), and then we had the Lois Percival Award. I feel soooo honoured to receive that award... the entire thing, receiving an award with Mrs. P's name on it, the whole name engraved on the plaque thing... it's such a nice way to end this year and all... and it's also the first big wake-up call for me so far telling me, "Jey! You're a senior! Time to wrap things up!" It will give me so many memories for years to come... Jr. High orchestra, Spring Tours, Strolling, Tan-tar-a, Europe, Disney World, High School orchestra with Ms. Fleming, All-State orchestra, YPSO, All-Suburban, Solo-ensemble... that's all that comes to my mind right now... wow... I'm going to miss all that!!! It's so sad, yet so happy reflecting back on it.
Tuesday, 15th of May, 2001
We had our dress rehearsal for tomorrow's school orchestra concert this afternoon. The acoustics in the gym aren't that bad for a gym, actually, I was expecting the worst. We have to have it in the gym this year because we have 175 elementary school kids from the Madison County, IL school district coming to see us! It's really sweet, and it's going to be fun playing for them.
Monday, 14th of May, 2001
Well, here's an article about how a 13-year old student, very bright (plays violin, hehe) and quite a hacker, got suspended for 10 days for breaking into some school computer, and then committing suicide shortly after, leaving a suicide note that pointed towards the suspension and intimidation that the administrators gave him about his actions. Quite interesting.
Sunday, 13th of May, 2001
We took Mom out to the Macaroni Grill for Mother's Day today. Then, while doing some Physics and Statistics work, I educated myself on police radars, lasers, speedtrap technology, and radar detectors and stuff. My conclusions: cheap radar detectors are not worth anything, and only a couple like the Escort Passport 8500 and the BEL 980, which are around $300, are worth it. Cheap models are only good for finding the nearest Burger King microwave, as radartest.com puts it. And on the interstate in rural areas, you are even more screwed, cause 38 states now use VASCAR, which is not radar technology at all. That is when police scanners come in handy. So my practical conclusion right now is that there aren't enough hidden speedtraps in St. Louis to deem it worthy of a $300 detector, and I don't go outside of St. Louis too often to make any investment in rural detection either. But the technology is very very interesting... that was my education topic for the day.