So I have a post sitting in semagic that I've been working on for a couple days. It is a Very Important Post, all about TV. But it is not done yet, and I can't even remember the last time I updated LJ, so. Here I am with this one.

I'm finally trying to figure out what Tumblr is all about. I'm here.I still don't really get it. HELP ME LJ. I'm not really sure what I'm supposed to put up there. I need someone to tell me what it's FOR. Cause right now the only thing I have is a half-assed bio. What blogs should I be following over there? Where can I find YOU on tumblr? LINKS PLEASE. kthx.

I'm working on trying to overhaul my icons, since I bought the extra icon space and I now have SO MUCH MORE ROOM. If anyone can't point me to some awesome Star Trek icons, that would be awesome.

Spent the weekend at my aunt's reading her books. (Super quick BOOK REC: Grass, by Sheri S Tepper. Phenomenal sci fi, very thought provoking. A bit dense and difficult to get into, but well worth it.) She's got shelves and shelves of books I want to read, and so far I'm only on my third. (Book, not shelf.) We've got virtually identical taste in books, so I can pick almost anything off her shelf and know it'll be something I'll probably enjoy. Good, laid back weekend.

LJ, when did you get so hard? This seems to be something 90% of my f list has been saying lately. Living 140 characters at a time is so much easier, amirite?

You know what's hilarious? I didn't do this earlier because I thought, "Oh, I just posted, I should probably give it a few days before I post again." WHAT. THERE WAS A TIME WHEN I POSTED LIKE, 3+ TIMES A DAY.

Anyway. So. CHALLENGE COMMS. A week ago, I only had a peripheral awareness of these communities. And after last weekend I am in THREE OF THEM. OMG SO MUCH FUN. Probably you should join one ALL of these. All the cool kids are doing it.

themiddleearth

(We're the prettiest.)



disneyverse




sanctuaryland




Ahem: DO IT DO IT DO IT.

tyfyt.

I have been completely bogged down in, not homework, but choir concert prep for the last week or two. The SFU choir has suffered dwindling numbers the last few years (a bunch of different reasons I won't get into now) and as a result haven't had a particularly great turnout at any of our concerts. BUT, this semester we're doing a selection of the nerdiest music ever. Duel of the Fates, from Star Wars Episode One, the Spiderman theme song, Double Trouble from the Prisoner of Azkaban movie, John Williams is the Man, aaaand a medley of songs from Dr Horrible, arranged by Melissa, our conductor.

AKA BEST CONCERT EVAR.

Basically, we're hoping to attract a much bigger crowd to this show than usual. Not that many people on campus will see a poster for a choir concert and think, "hey, cool, a choir concert, I should totally check that out!" but we're hoping DR HORRIBLE and other nerdy music will attract, well, a particular type of crowd. Usually the only people under attending on the facebook event page are people in the choir, but this time, as of this morning, there are 101 people listed as attending. FAR high numbers than usual.

So basically, before the winter concert, I stupidly volunteered the information that my roommates were art students doing graphic design...so I got elected to do the posters. For that concert, I had ONE night to whip something up, but this time, I've had a few weeks. Basically, it would look like crap without bifocals.

After I finished up the poster, I had to make black and white handout versions, and then the program, which turned into a WAY bigger project then the posters. I'm also in charge of getting everything printed, etc etc.

Anyways. Doing all this, I feel like I've been living and breathing this concert for the last few weeks. We've never been this intense about a concert before. We're really expecting to draw a lot of attention, so we've set up stuff like a facebook fan page, brand new website, etc. I just hope we actually get the turn out and interest we're hoping for. SO much work has gone into this from so many people.



Anyways, as for the concert itself, it should be awesome. I hope. Rehearsal last night went really well. It was a really good HARD WORK kind of practice, which I LOVE. Dr Horrible did NOT feel ready to perfom next week though, which I'm worried about. I’m also starting to get a little...concerned about my solo.* Not in the stage fright sense, but just...worried. At rehearsal last night I just COULDN’T GET IT LOUD ENOUGH. No matter how hard I tried. It’s not a big solo, (Groupie number 1, it’s just three or four lines spread out through Perfect Story) but basically I’ll have a line, and then the other groupies come in for half a line-ish...if you know Dr Horrible, you know what I mean. I can’t get my solo line loud enough, but I CAN get the soli part. I think there are a few possible causes:

1. My voice was shot. We ran Duel of the Fates at least twice, and I was singing HARD. It’s a seriously belty song. I spend pretty much the whole song in the high D-high A range, and there are a LOT of long, sustained, fortissimo, CRESCENDOING high F’s. And I LOVE SINGING IT, so I might be overdoing it a bit. This would do anybody’s voice in.
2. It’s not quite in my comfy range. My lines are G-low B, aka LOW for a first soprano. When I’m doing the harmony with the other groupies (the part I CAN get loud enough, I’m up around a D-B. (Though, now that I think about it, this can’t be it, cause that is exactly where my break is, so those notes are MUCH harder to sing.))
3. I’m subconsciously nervous. I don’t FEEL nervous, but that would make sense why I could sing the part with the others.

I really hope it’s just that my voice was shot. That is easily fixable. The subconscious-nervousness is a LOT harder to fix, especially because it would probably be WAY worse in the actual concert.

At any rate, I’m going to work on my breathing a LOT this week. (anyone know any good breathing exercises???) I’m hoping that should help.

(*Yeah, if you didn't hear about it on twitter, I was peer pressured into auditioning for a solo. I auditioned for a groupie part (I knew I wouldn't be able to get Penny; ever single other girl auditioned for her, LOL!) and I was SHOCKED when I actually got it. ( soloist announcement ))

NOTE: Those of you who go to SFU, please let me know if you see this poster up around campus! I'm really curious. I've already seen THREE at Surrey today, and I only handed out the posters to people last night!

liliofthevaley posted about this the other day, and I mean really, how could I turn it down? These are honestly some of my favourite books in the whole world. They have made such an enormous impact on my life. The got me through some of the toughest times of my life. I probably had each of them taken away from me multiple times for reading in class in grade 7. And I will always maintain the the reason I am such a romantic is because of too much L.M. Montgomery at an early age.

So:



The Anne of Green Gables Reread Challenge. Sign up here!

I'm excited to get my boxed set back when my parents come over next week!

Things I will miss about the Olympics:
1) Going out any night of the week for an awesome party on the streets of downtown.
2) In a large crowd of people, one person randomly yells, "CANADA!" and everyone around them cheers.
3) Random high fives...people walking down the streets with their hands out and everyone high fives as they go by.
4) Drunken choruses of Oh Canada on the skytrain EVERY NIGHT.
5) Hockey.
6) Random conversations with people.
7) How genuinely happy everyone was...except that one night.
8) The amazing opportunities I had...working in the media centre, even if it was boring, and attending an evening event, shmoozing with CEO's etc from BC's digital media industry (okay, so I didn't do that much shmoozing) on the top of the art gallery.
9) Time off to hang out with my roommates and friends.
10) The high(er) potential of celebrity sightings.
11) The way our house sorta turned into a hostel at times.
12) Awesome free concerts.
13) Skytrains running on rush hour service all day.
14) Seeing red mittens everywhere.
15) The spirit.

I want to do a proper post about the Olympics. But for now, this will have to do. It was definitely two of the greatest weeks of my life, and I really wish it wasn't over.

Okay, I'm officially excited for the Olympics. I've been more dreading it for a couple of months, and don't get me wrong, the fact that I'm going to have to leave 2 hours to get downtown next week is TERRIFYING, (it usually takes me 25 minutes tops) and oh god, the crowds are ridiculous, but...really. It's happening, and I can either be cranky about it, or be excited, and I'd rather be excited, cause there's so much to be excited about.

Excited. How many more times can I say that?

Anyways, I think a lot of it is because Lisa is really enthusiastic about it and that's rubbing off on me. She's got a job working for Ziptrek, which is the Whistler company running the zip line downtown. (If you're not from around here/haven't heard, there's a zip line running two blocks over what is sure to be one of the busiest parts of downtown. And it's FREE.) It's going to be super cool and I can't wait to try it out.

I'm going to be volunteering in the International Media Centre downtown. I'm working for DigiBC, which is an association of all different kinds of Digital Media companies in the province. VXperience is the showcase of these companies, and I'm going to be sitting at a booth in the IMC telling the international media about the services and everything DigiBC has available for them. I start on Wednesday, and I'm pretty excited.

(On a related subject...I'm maybe considering changing career paths. Whoops. I might lean away from publishing and go more into new/digital media. I'm still going to get the publishing minor I've started, but...IDK. We'll see.)

Spent a bit of time downtown this weekend. There is a definite feeling of excitement. Coming downtown on the skytrain, you can feel it once you hit Main St. That's one of the things I felt was missing in Torino last winter olympics, but it might be different when it's my own city. Granville St is cool; it's closed to traffic, and there are all these art installations up. I'm looking forward to spending a lot of time down there. There are tons of free concerts and stuff to, which I want to try and get to.

Anyways. I have so much homework and a midterm due before the break, and I totally wasted my weekend, so I guess I'd better get down to it. This is the last week of classes for the rest of the month. CRAZY.

Ugh, so I've been sick pretty much since Saturday. I toughed it out for my choir retreat thing on Sunday, and fortunately it hadn't hit my chest/throat yet so I could still sing, which was great, cause the day was awesome. I say "retreat" but it was really just a day long rehearsal in our usual rehearsal space. Not that many people were able to make it so it was a really fun, chill little group. We actually had more men then women. Now, let me tell you, THAT NEVER HAPPENS. EVER. AND we had only two sopranos for most of the day. Against five altos. Also, NEVER HAPPENS. But me and Keira (...I think her name is? I feel awful for not knowing...) totally held the section on our own. We even started with Duel of the Fates which is entirely huge chords and it was AWESOME. Anyway, I think I was just running on adrenaline the whole day cause every time we stopped or were doing a song I don't like *cough*DoubleTrouble*cough* I felt like crap. But we ran Dr Horrible for the first time and it was AWESOME. I seriously wish I could have recorded it some way to share with you guys.

Wow, I did not intend for that to be so long.

Anyway. IMPORTANT QUESTION. Do I continue with my BSG rewatch, or do I catch up on Lost???

(Sidebar: Oh god, don't watch a lot of BSG when you're sick. You'll have TERRIFYING CYLON DREAMS.)

Okay, on the book thing, It's currently a tie between Hitchhikers Guide and Stardust. I think I'm going to start with Stardust, cause one book is less intimidating that five. Thaaaaanks for voting everyone! <3

Now I must go catch up on all the massive amounts of school stuff I've fallen behind on...OLYMPICS BREAK WILL SURE BE WELCOME.(Nine days, whaaaat?)

Okay, to technically I'm doing homework right now, but I had this idea a few days ago and I'm thinking about it instead of doing my homework and I need to get it out of my head so I can concentrate.

Basically, I need to read more. I hate that I never get time for reading when I'm at school. The number of books on my bookshelf that I haven't read, or haven't finished is embarrassing. pipsi_pirate is reading 52 books this year and posting reviews. But I have school work to do, so I've accepted that I won't be able to read a book a week. So I'm not setting any specific number I want to read, just a goal to read. I'll post reviews here, and hopefully that'll keep me more motivated.

So, here are all the books on my bookshelf that I have either never read, or never finished. Some of these I bought on a whim, some were given to me, others I had EVERY INTENTION of reading, I was just never able to. So I want you guys to VOTE for what you think I should read.

Poll #1517979
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 13

What should Jennifer read first?

or...

None of this crap. Go to the library and get...

OH GOD. THAT TOOK FOUR TRIES. I sure hope people actually vote after all that...

Wait, what happened to me not abandoning LJ? It just takes so much ~effort. Life is easier in 140 characters.

Anyway, some updates:

1. I've got my new hard drive installed on my computer and am working on rebuilding. I swiped half of 's hard drive when she was in town this weekend, so at least my Star Trek macro collection is closer to complete. Next order of business will be icons. I think I'm really only going to concentrate on the Sanctuary ones cause if I try and do all my other fandoms as well, it'll just be too overwhelming.

2. The roommate situation: Lisa is staying in town for now...she's applying for jobs and stuff. She'll stay if she gets one. I was going to say more about it, but now I don't think I will. She's staying for the short term anyway, so that's good.

3. I finally got into the class I was waitlisted for! It's CMNS 372: The Publishing Process. FINALLY I'm taking publishing courses. The reason I'm at SFU. I'm really enjoying the stuff I've read so far. It's also really cool cause the last unit is on careers in publishing. I'm really looking forward to this course!

4. As they said on the radio, 23 days till the world shows up. The city is going crazy. Actually, I don't think I can say that. Pretty sure next month is going to COMPLETELY REDEFINE CRAZY. Before Vancouver even got the Olympics I thought it was awesome and exciting, but the closer we get, the more I'm looking for an ESCAPE PLAN.

Okay. Back to writing my reaction assignment for world lit...

SO SCHOOL, EH? My schedule is so messed up right now. I have one class each on Monday and Tuesday after noon...and that's all. I'm waitlisted in two others, (of course, the ones actually in my department) one that I've accepted I'm not going to get into because even though I've moved over 60 places on the waitlist, I'm still at 62, and the other which I REALLY need, where I'm on spot 8 on the waitlist, and have been since I registered. I was SO SURE I was going to get in, first of all because there's usually more movement on the waitlist, so I expected to be at least around spot 3-5 by now, and secondly because they're usually pretty good about getting CMNS students into CMNS courses. But the biggest issue is that it's a distance course, which means there is no first lecture to go to, no way that I can see to contact the prof...I can't even access the course on webct. FAIL. Also, Even if I get into that, I'll only have three courses, which puts me behind from where I wanted to be now, but whateverrrr.

Okay, let me get the rest of my complaining over with, and then I can get over it and move on to the good stuff: I don't have class till 2:30 this afternoon, but I got here at 9:30, one because it is a Good Habit, and two, to get into the bookstore early before it got crazy. YEAH RIGHT. When I got there I could see the line was already up the stairs, which is normal for this time of year, but the other end extended all the way down the hallway the other way. I couldn't even see where it ended. So I said fuck that. I'll go after my class. It goes till 4:30 and the bookstore is calmer right before it closes anyway. Now I sorta wish I had just stuck it out though. I have Star Trek and Sanctuary and Glee on my ipod that I could have watched while I waited. (And really, if you have those three things, what more do you need in life? NOTHING.) OH WELL.

So after that, I came up to the library because there really isn't anywhere else on campus to go, and all the way up to my usual spot on the sixth floor, to find my usual carrel NOT THERE. Along with ALL the other carrels. FAIL. So I'm at a place at the corner of the floor where there are a few tables and comfy seats and bar/table things that face the window. Except for the fact I have no plug, it's pretty nice. I've got a good view of the mountains. I might twitpic a picture of them later cause they're coming above the clouds and it's pretty!

Oh good segueway out of not complaining! :D Good things: The class I had yesterday looks like it's going to be pretty good. It's a World Lit class, and the reading list is pretty good, and the prof seems great. She's a great lecturer, a self-admittedly easy marker, seems really nice, really excited about the material, and knows her stuff. Bonuses: She's pretty hot, got excellent fashion sense, and is a Star Trek fan. YES.

OKAY CREEPY. It's really quiet in the library right now and someone's phone/computer/something just started making weird noise and words I couldn't understand, until "...your total, complete, annihilation." OH GOD WHAT. *hides*

Anways.

Other good things: My roommates. <3 I missed them. I haven't seen much of Mika cause he was trying to finish a painting or something for school, but uh...it was good to get back to his Star Trek on his computer in the living room? And it was so good to see Emily again. I feel like we've just been talking non-stop since we got back, which isn't necessarily unusual, but usually Lisa is around and she talks so much more than either of us, so our conversations tend to be group ones instead of just one on one. It's nice just the two of us, but the house is NOT the same without Lisa, which brings me to upsetting news: Lisa is probably moving out, and I'm so sad about it. She's one of my favourite people ever, and is one of the best things about living there. She just makes everything so much fun. It's a long story as to why she's moving out, and while I understand and support her reasons...I really hope she'll change her mind. She gets beck from Mexico on Saturday, so I guess we'll see what's up then.

I woke up on time today! (Yesterday I slept in...) And I even left before Emily and Mika! I was really impressed with myself too, because I was definitely up till 3 am. No idea how that happened, seriously. I'm SURE I went to bed early, but then there I was re-reading THAT STUPID FIC. And by stupid fic I obviously mean my favourite fic everrrrr.* (Srsly guys. Switch. Kirk/McCoy, which I TOTALLY DON'T SHIP BUT I'M IN LOVE WITH THEM ANYWAY. It's a WIP which dskafhladgsjdfkds I NEVER READ, but worth it. Love ittttt.)

TL;DR, TL;DR, TL;DR.

Sorry. I'm done now.


*ATM, anyway.