Bands, Details, and Burn!

First off, I hereby remember those who died on an otherwise ordinary Tuesday morning six years ago, 11 September 2001. I observed a moment of silence at 08:46 ET on Tuesday, even though I was in class and probably wouldn't have been talking anyway. I felt safe taking time out to close my eyes and say a short silent prayer simply because the problem the professor was working was super easy.

Anyway, it was really rainy Tuesday morning, and I felt bad because I had to borrow a friend's umbrella just to go from Benedum Hall to my room to Benedum Hall again. Apparently I'd forgotten things when I got up in the morning.

Speaking of which, I decided that the number of the day was 734, because when I rolled out of bed, my atomic clock read 07:34 with an indoor temperature of 73.4°F. Being who I am, I obviously found that too interesting to not take note of.

Backing up to Friday night, though, band practice was pushed back an hour because we had a performance at the Petersen Events Center immediately afterwards. Apparently, because the Grambling State University Band was coming to Pittsburgh (for the football game on Saturday), they sold tickets for a "Battle of the Bands" show. It was actually a "battle" between competing local high school bands that simply featured Pitt and Grambling at the end, but whatever. They sold tickets. They made money. They're happy.

I actually found a ticket to the event lying on the ground outside the next day, so I picked it up and kept it as a memento. The litterer was sitting in section 120, row L, seat 5! But that's not the point.

The point is that we were dressed in our practice uniforms for this performance. As usual, I put all of my important belongings, such as my wallet, phone, and student identification, into a plastic baggie which would stay in the knapsack we are given to hold music and other things.

After the event, I checked into my dorm room, and out of habit, put my ID in my right pocket. Then I changed clothes, transferred everything (except the ID) into my new pants pockets, and left for the trumpet party.

Needless to say, I found myself in Panther Central at about 01:30 answering numerous questions (such as my street, ID number, birthdate, etc.) so that I could get a Verification of Resident Status form and an emergency unlock code for my door. And about five minutes after I got into my room, I realized what I had done.

Grrr. This kind of stuff makes me mad. Which is why I'm usually a very "details-oriented" person. Apparently, I had had an off-day.

Saturday brought a good game, but some considerable rain, and that was another problem. All of my band music got soaked. So I went to practice Tuesday and had to peel apart the flimsy papers in order to hold them flimsily (with a great deal of trouble) so that I could attempt play... until a gust of wind "flimsified" the music once more, at which point it would often stick to itself. I later was able to make fresh photocopies of everything (literally everything) from the music the section leaders kept, but I still felt bad about it.

Especially because I had, only four hours prior, mildly burned myself in OChem lab. I was wearing a heat-resistant glove, but they're not waterproof. So a few milliliters of nearly boiling water (on the order of 90°C or 195°F) was pretty much poured straight onto my right pointer finger before I could even realize what was happening, at which point I simply dropped the flask into the sink. Luckily, it didn't break.

My finger hurt for a few hours as I self-treated it with cool water, because that's what you're supposed to do. It's much better now (about 9 hours since)... almost like nothing even happened, except there's a tiny bit of stiffness. I can even write without much discomfort, which is good, because tomorrow's OChem lecture is going over just about every nomenclature convention for organic compounds known to man... or rather, devised by man. And there are a lot of them to write down.

I'd write more, but it's rather late, and I've got to be rolling out of bed at 07:34 again. Ugh. Hopefully this bad stretch won't extend itself to a full week; I've got important things coming up soon.

Random tangent: There are going to be some Greek letters in my next post, but which ones? Maybe I'll write out the entire Greek alphabet, just to make you wince. Unless, of course, you're not intimidated by such things.

Term 2081 Schedule

Time to start year two! And so, as usual, here is my schedule for the fall term:

Class Titles and Credit Values
ChE 0100	Foundations of Chemical Engineering	6 cr.
ChE 0101	Foundations of Chemical Engineering Lab	1 cr.
ChE 1085	Departmental Seminar	0 cr.
CHEM 0310	Organic Chemistry 1	3 cr.
CHEM 0330	Organic Chemistry Lab 1	1 cr.
MATH 0290	Differential Equations	3 cr.
MUSIC 0612	Heinz Chapel Choir	1 cr.
MUSIC 0630	Marching Band	1 cr.
		16 cr.

Classes begin 27 August 2007; final exams are 10-15 December 2007. No classes 03 September for Labor Day, or 21-25 November for Thanksgiving Recess.

The first thing that sticks out like a sore thumb is that my Organic Chemistry (OChem) lab cuts into choir. Oh, well; that's life. I already talked to the choir director and he (very cautiously) said that I'm a fast enough learner that he can spare me for one hour a week. And that leads right into marching band, too.

Last year, the procedure was to leave choir around 17:35 (15 minutes early) to be able to be on the practice field for band by 18:15 (15 minutes late). Since I'll be an hour late to choir on Tuesdays, that doesn't work. So I'll end up getting to band around 18:35 or so on Tuesdays, which isn't great, but at least I can afford it. And it's a doubly good thing that choir doesn't start until Thursday 30 August, so I won't have to use this technique until 04 September.

Moving on to my actual classes. It seems I get off-track like this every time I go over a schedule...

Oh, 08:00 classes. I think Foundations (ChE 0100) will be okay, though; since I managed to get up today and get to the room in under seven minutes, something I could never have done living on upper campus. The elevators in Benedum are, surprisingly enough, not so busy at 07:55 as they are at, say, 09:55 or 10:55.

My professor is fluent in English, which is good, and he has a bit of a sense of humor. After going over some basic examples in class today, he said, "we could go on all day listing more examples, but instead we'll go on all semester... just in more detail." So for an 08:00 class, at least the guy's trying to make it fun. Plus, since it's two hours long, we got a break in the middle. I don't know if that will become standard, but it was nice nonetheless.

I was able to grab a bagel between Foundations and OChem (CHEM 0310). Not that that matters, because I should have eaten breakfast before my first class. Stupid alarm clocks. Anyway, this just shows that I'm slowly adapting to the new meal plan; it's really weird. But that shall be another post.

The OChem professor, George, likes to be referred to by his first name because "that's the name [his] parents gave him." So there you go, my dear friends. With very little fluff, we just jumped right into business, and started the usual "review" of past material which begins a new term. He did, however, mention that he is the slowest in the department when it comes to teaching organic chemistry, and so toward the end of the term, he'll ask us to come in on some Sunday afternoons. At least he admits it upfront, you know?

George had a good analogy up his sleeve for chemical bonding, too. He said that he was a helium atom, and he pointed out another student (again, atomic helium). He waved his right arm around, called it his electron, and had the student do the same. He mentioned that because both arms were extended outwards, there was a mutual attraction between them, so they got closer and closer until they formed a bond (a handshake). But, he added, if he were to get too close to the other atom, the internuclear forces would cause it (or the other student) to become repulsed!

So if I've got to get up for three hours of classes from 08:00 to 11:00 thrice a week, at least these people have senses of humor, right?

My Diff. Eq. (MATH 0290) professor took a similar approach to jumping right in. He's very soft spoken (i.e., hard to hear), and he has a thicker accent, although it is, for the most part, decipherable. He did, however, lose just about everybody in the class in the first step of the second example, where he did the following in one step:


I thought that's what we were taking that class to learn. I'm going to thoroughly read the assigned section to see if that's in there... and if not, I will definitely consider looking at other options as far as Diff. Eq. professors go.

That's about all; this is long enough as it is. Besides, I've got to be up for class at 08:00 again! All in all, it was a good day.

Random tangent: The left window in my room is stuck. Stuck slightly open. Facing Fifth Avenue. Ugh.

Restless

At this point, I am utterly restless.

But firstly, with regard to the zucchini sneaking I mentioned in my last post, it didn't happen. We simply didn't have enough to go around. Plus, a full-page article on the front page of the local newspaper's Food section robbed us of the stealth aspect. Oh, well. Next year, right after we watch the opening ceremony for the Beijing Olympics, we can try again.

Good; now that's out of the way.

My brother and both of my parents are at band camp for the GHS Marching Band overnight, leaving me alone in the house doing laundry, packing for college and my band camp, and wondering why the tax bill from the school district sitting next to me wasn't opened sooner (good thing it's not past due!). Sure, I could've been doing all of these things during the daytime, but that's not how I operate, you silly goose! I often catch a "second wind" around 01:00 or so, and I've been using that energy to actually be productive (and to blog just a tiny bit as well).

And I've gotten quite a lot done. Mind you, I have a heck of a lot more to go, but at least I'm getting there.

I mentioned earlier that I'm leaving for Pittsburgh second thing Thursday morning. I say "second thing" because of the follow-up appointment for my wisdom teeth in Erie at 08:00 on Thursday. The plan is that I'll be all ready by late Wednesday afternoon to pack up the van, then I'll head out to Alumni Night at the GHSMB band camp for the evening. First thing in the morning, we head out to Erie, I "open wide," and then we jump on the Interstate, getting to Pitt by noon, ready to move into my new place of residence. It's "Big Move #3" because #1 was moving to Pitt last year, and #2 was coming back home. Although I guess if you count the family moving to my current residence back in 1992, it would be #4. Nah.

Meanwhile, the freshmen will be at their mini-camp learning the ins and outs of Pitt Band. If my move-in goes quickly, I may stop by for the last few hours to help. Then it's a traditional "meet-'n-greet" dinner for the trumpets, where I'll get to meet all 15 freshmen, and try to learn their names as fast as possible. That's right: fifteen newbies. So as long as nothing happens, we'll have a grand total of 40 in our horn line, up significantly from 31 last year. I'm excited!

In fact, I'm restless.

One thing that hasn't been contributing to my restlessness, though, is my mouth. It seems that as far as the pain from my surgery has gone, someone finally flipped a switch Monday morning. I took a dose of ibuprofen before bed Sunday night and didn't have to take another until 21:00 Monday. I'm actually able to eat pretty much anything again, and even sneeze without hurting myself! You don't know how it feels knowing you aren't allowed to sneeze even though you need to until you've experienced it. It's hard. You need the relief, but those things are so fast everything could pop right out. So you half sneeze, half stifle, but you still feel weird afterwards.

Does anyone else share my pain? Probably not.

The point is that my recovery has gone splendidly. Another kid at my church, however, who went to a different surgeon the day after me, isn't doing so well. Apparently his bottom teeth were so difficult that they took 90 minutes to remove, and they gave up on the upper teeth until later. Nevertheless, oozing and bleeding and lots of pain are still in his life. I'm blessed that they're not in mine.

Now, I don't know if his complications had more to do with the actual teeth or the competency of the oral surgeon, but I feel that I need to give a shout-out (and pitifully minimal free advertising) to him who helped make sure that I wouldn't have to go through anything like that: Thank you, Dr. Alonge!

I think that's just about it. I also think my last load of laundry is done. I've got quite the day or two ahead of me; Pittsburgh is just 56 hours away.

And I'm so restless I just can't wait.

Random tangent: Happy 17th birthday to Alec, my friend from Music Camp. I don't know if he ever reads this, but whatever; it's the thought that counts.

VRD, or Not

I'm writing today because it's technically Visit Randomness Day, and it would be a shame if I didn't celebrate it. I know, I said I was going to scrap that holiday and come up with something different, but I didn't get around to it; maybe next year.

The thing is, because of all the emails I sent out last night to my family and friends regarding my recovery from my wisdom tooth surgery, I've had 40 visitors on Randomness today.

I'm still quite surprised at how well I've been doing. Today was the first time I could "legally" brush my teeth since the surgery, and despite my being afraid that I would "break" something, I was able to be careful enough that it didn't hurt at all. I only had to take two doses of ibuprofen today, too! I'm quite amazed!

Other than that, all is going well here. The plumber came and finished installing our sinks which finally arrived for the new bathroom. My brother actually started reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. It's been raining a lot today, too. Oh, well. It looks like the weather will be pretty decent tomorrow night for zucchini sneaking!