ParticleBlog!

I made all the "I'm not going to be there next year" calls today, which, quite frankly, sucked. One parent was nice enough to try and organize a last stand on my behalf, so I sent her phone number along with some people, but overall...I dunno, in some ways it's closure for the year, because it was the last task I had to do (Death putting the chairs on the tables and locking up before she left, as it were), on the other hand I worry about my kids. I want them to keep going, and keep playing, but I know full well how this goes. It's going to be a hard thing to keep them motivated, and I don't know that my replacement is up to the task.

I've been practicing a lot lately, to a level probably not seen since college. It's really been rather nice, and it's provided a nice outlet of sanity in the face of everything else going on with job and such. I got a bug up my ass a few days ago to play through the entire Vandercook etude book on trumpet, just sightreading the whole thing, in one sitting. I didn't quite get it one, but I got through it in three sessions over as many days. It's not quite the same sense of accomplishment as playing the entire Charlier book or the entire Arban's, but I really did feel a great sense of accomplishment afterwards. The etudes were also difficult enough to make me realize that "oh, I really can play trumpet", which also feels really good. I'm now taking on the Voxman collection for trombone, which of course is much harder :P But it really is nice to have the horns on my face again.

I applied for available jobs today, I practiced, and I emailed some potential dating types, one of which resulted in a good conversation with a Faire folk who seems cool. I'm still on the sludgy side, but I'm eating better, and...in general I think I'm done moping, which is good. I'm actually ready to go forward.

My grandma and my mom share a birthday, which happens to be yesterday, so we all gathered at my parents' place to celebrate today. My poor mom wound up cooking her own birthday dinner :P That said, a good time was had by all-my uncle was still in town, so it was my two uncles, my parents and grandmother, and the brother that isn't travelling the world, along with myself. It was nice to be out of the house for the first time in a week or so, but at the same time, I remembered why I refuse to live with smokers ever again-stupid allergies :P

In this case, practicing and cooking. Not much, perhaps, but better than it has been. I also finished all of Half Life Episode 2, which...

DAMNIT VALVE, WHERE'S EPISODE 3?!?!?!?

I finished Half-Life 2, Lost Coast, and Episode 1, and I'm...halfish way through Episode 2.

Yes, it's that good. Also, it takes my mind off the crap.

Tomorrow though...Tomorrow this all changes.

It's official. After an incredible ride, 5 awesome concerts, and amazing kids, my tenure at my two schools is officially no more. I talked to our area superintendent today, and while she said that I would be the first choice to come back, thanks to contraction and state budget woes they simply can't afford to have me back. One of my predecessors will take over my schools, and the other directors will each pick up an additional school.

I should be pissed, but I'm not...having seen very directly what a district does when they want to crap on someone, this was precisely the opposite. This district, at least in terms of how it treated its employees, and me specifically, acted with nothing but honor and transparency, and everyone that could support me did. Their honor doesn't pay my bills as such, but it certainly doesn't warrant anger.

I've met my replacement a few times...I'm a little suspicious. She says a lot of the right things, but based on her returning players and what I heard from parents, I was a whole different ballgame. On the other hand, I've never seen her teach, and she does seem to care about what she does. I'll be supportive, and make sure to encourage all of my kids to keep going with it and give her a shot, and I'll make sure to contact her and give her as much info as I can. I'm not looking forward to calling everyone though...tomorrow is going to be a sad day.

In a related bit of happenings, once again I got unexpectedly prescient advice from an unlikely source-my mother. Much like the last time she gave me good advice, it came as a bit of a shock, but she and my dad pointed out something very clear-it's not a good time to be a music teacher right now, at least not in California. They asked yet again if I was thinking about becoming a math teacher, and I finally answered no-it's band director or nothing for me. I care about teaching band, not teaching kids in general (or rather I care about teaching band a whole lot more than teaching in the general sense. I still rather like the squiddies, generally speaking :P ). Which may leave me with a choice-the job I love or the home I love. Am I prepared to leave SoCal in pursuit of a teaching gig?

I'd say hell no as a first reaction, but the point is well made. Eventually I'm going to run out of options, and hell, I haven't even gotten called for an interview yet from any of the jobs I've applied for. I'm comfortable now, with a fat load of savings in the bank and private students providing a sustaining trickle of incoming cash, but before too long that will run out. When that happens, if another director gig somewhere between Ventura and San Diego hasn't come to me and "Here's your band room, don't blow it", I don't know what I'm going to do.

She also suggested I file for unemployment, which I just feel dirty about...although my understanding seems to be that it's money you've actually paid into the system, rather than just a flat welfare handout. That would make me feel slightly better.

So yeah...today sucked, and it leads to some distinct confusion as to the future.

Sleep beckons. Lessons went well though.

I spent most of the day writing today, for the first time in a good long while. I'm working on my next big story, and it was slow going for a while after I got the outline done...like mental constipation basically.

I have officially taken a metaphorical laxative.

I don't know how much of what I'm writing will survive until the end-this is a long story, and I know already that it's going to take several major revisions before I'm really happy with it. I'm also worried that I'm taking 60 pages to tell a 10 page story. On the other hand, I'm getting it told, and that makes me feel good.

I should be more melancholy than I am, and I do look rather somberly at the state of our country and liberty in general. That said, it was nice to be with the family, and watch the fireworks, and forget it all. It even made up for being told (yet again) that a girl I was chatting with online recently acquired a boyfriend. Some things, alas, never change :P

Yesterday I got some crap news: the new principal at the big school called me and said that despite his desire to have me back as band director, despite all the wonderful things he heard from parents about me, the decision had been made at the district level to shuffle people around and fill the position from within. How all this will work, given that no other music teacher lost their job and how far out my 2 little schools are, I don't know, but that's what was handed down. It's not set in stone yet, but it's close enough...

This fucking sucks.

It sucks even more because there's no one to be pissed at. My district, for the problems it has, has done a ton to try and save people's jobs and cut spending. The principals have played it straight with me. The kids and parents were nothing but supportive.

I'm not looking forward to telling the kids. I'll wait until I talk to a few people at the district level to confirm, but...yeah. After everything we accomplished this year, and how excited they were-I had kids bugging me the last day of school to practice-I really don't want to have to tell them that it's all going to tank. It's not fair to them, and quite frankly I really wanted to come back. I never said I would for sure, but I said I'd do my very best. I feel like I'm letting them down, the year prior standing on its own or no.

On the other hand, I'm farther along in Half Life 2, which is spectacular in every way, I've been writing a lot, and I finally saw my grandmother today. My uncle was visiting from Arizona...he looks like shit, I'm sorry to say. He's tired, he's worn down, and his liver continues to betray him. That part sucks too.

I did close the eve by seeing halleffect though, so I suppose there was some win in all of it. It's still kind of a downer few days though.

Let's just get that one out of the way. That, folks, is the most awesome wedding invitation ever.
Jay-Z, who I consider a mediocre rapper at best, did a song recently bashing the constant use of Auto-Tune. So what did the smartasses out there do? Someone autotuned it (and if that doesn't work, there's myspace.
Lizard Men? Really?
Coolest optical illusion you'll see all day
fiendish_thiny is a Guy Gardner fangirl in a similar, though not exactly identical way I'm a Hawkgirl fanboy. Maybe more like how I'm a Question fanboy. Anyway, this pic is pretty damned awesome.
This site shows some of the most ridiculous MacGuyvering EVER, and it's...well it's win, despite all sanity being against any win to be found.
Some caterpillars are just cool
I know many people who would eat this soup of the day
People are eating children in this area!
Here's a one legged Little League player. What impressed me wasn't so much the tenacity or the aww factor of it all, but rather the logistics of how they got it all to work so he can bat, run, etc. Catcher was a good choice for him too.
Kind of like my uncle, this guy was amazing.
What if Bludgeon were on Animated? (Transformers stuffs)

By the time most of you read this I will be finished with American Gods. I started at about 5:30 this evening. I haven't gone this intensely nuts over a book since World War Z.

It's that good.

Today...was, and it was pretty good. I fell asleep reading last night, I woke up, read some more, and napped some more, then took care of a few minor projects (cleaning bedroom, organizing extra computer stuff, filing away a couple months worth of comics, and I finally got my frontside audio ports working, which is awesome). Practicing is going well-my face is actually coming back with a vengeance, range, endurance, and tone. It's rather nice, especially given that the ska band has 2 instrumentals that are a)horn features and b)exercises in endurance. I got back on the writing kick, although I'm a bit bricked on the story I'm working on, and I played a bit more Red Alert 2 and Half Life 2, because hey, that's what this vacation is all about :P

I also put some time into thinking about what's important, which is a subject that's occupied a decent chunk of my mental energy lately. My great uncle died about a week ago. He went peacefully, at his own home, surrounded by a large chunk of the many people that loved him. He went quickly too, 6 weeks of leukemia and out. There's nothing wrong or unjust about it...he had an amazingly full life, much longer than expected, and he went with minimal suffering. He leaves an incredible legacy, and as for me...the only thing I'm pissed about is that I only got to meet him once. But in that one time meeting him...he's one of the most incredible people I've ever met, and that one meeting was one of the great honors of my life.

I haven't talked to my grandmother about it yet, and I'm going over there tomorrow to say hello and see how she's doing. I'm going to bring her a printout of the blog post I wrote about my uncle, and about her. It's not enough of course, but it's what I have to give.

I don't regret the time I've spent on video games and whatnot as such. I picked the good ones, and there are some really incredible stories that are very cool to be a part of (plus the pretty pictures :P ). That said, it's occurred to me a lot lately that in the end, am I really going to say that I should have spent _less_ time with my grandmother? With my parents? With my friends, and my brothers, and the people I care about? That's one aspect of things, I think, that could deal with a change.

Finally! The first book list of 2009...and it's pitifully short. *Sigh* But I've got 3 more in progress! *Ahem*

So...as always, single issues of comics, wikipedia articles, etc. don't count (otherwise this list would be MUCH longer), but graphic novels/trade paperbacks do.

• The Philosophy Of History In Our Time, ed. Hans Meyerhoff. Well not exactly our time anymore, as this anthology was published in 1959 (I picked it up a few years back at my college's used book sale, and only got around to finishing it in January). Ultimately for me historical philosophy isn't really that interesting, and I found most of the essays very thick and very academic. I much prefer actual history and actual historiography, assimilating the facts, and making up my own mind about how they all fit together.
  
• Quicksilver (The Baroque Cycle #1), by Neal Stephenson
  
• King Of The Vagabonds (The Baroque Cycle #2), by Neal Stephenson. On the other hand, I loved these books. Hilarious in places, marvelously written, and absolutely fascinating...I've never really had European history come alive for me before partaking of these books, and the excitement that Stephenson creates about the onset of both modern commerce and (especially) modern science is palpable...and wonderful. I preferred book 1 to book 2, but Half-Cocked Jack Shaftoe's story is bawdy and often hilarious, especially when the nickname is explained in rather public fashion.
  
• Quantum Gravity Book Two: Selling Out, by Justina Robson
  
• Quantum Gravity Book Three: Going Under, by Justina Robson. I came across Book One in this series a while back and reviewed it here, and was very excited when I finally found the next couple of books in the series...they were, generally speaking, a great improvement, and Robson has a lot of fun with her ridiculous mashup universe of cyberpunk, high fantasy, and grand spoof of everything including Paradise Lost and the general territory of Neil Gaiman. The ending of book 3 left me more than a bit WTF though, and I'm hoping it gets retconned in book 4.
  
• Narrative Of The Life Of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave. I defy anyone to read this and not be moved, in turn, to the depths of rage, sadness, and triumph. I also wish that I had a mere fraction of Mr. Douglass' linguistic gifts.
  
• Watchmen, by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons (reread). I reread this right before the movie came out, and while I thought it was brilliant when I first read it (in the mid 90s-thanks Dad!), the second time around was when I could really appreciate it. The bleakness of the story, all the subtleties in the art, the recurring details and motifs in the layouts...I could write pages about just about every page. I'm also reminded of this essay, published right about when the movie came out, about how Rorschach embodies perhaps the most realistic depiction of an uncompromising Objectivist.
  
• Oliver Twist, by Charles Dickens. Just finished this, which is why I finally felt like I could do a book post. My initial reaction seems to have been on the right track-it's very uneven in places, probably because of the serial nature in which it was written and published, and the characters are very static, but at the same time Dickens does whatever he wants to do at the moment-be it biting social satire, character drama, intrigue, or massive, Michael Bay level action-with great skill. Plus he's just such a master of language, of description and capturing speech patterns, that I was rather willing to forgive the flaws and contrivances just to read him telling it. I was also struck by how many modern cliches seem to have their roots in either this novel, or the literature of the age (I'm not familiar enough with Victorian fiction to know). The evil sibling, long denouements, lovable vagabonds...all in here, maybe for something like the first time.

So...8 books for the year, with 3 more currently in progress. Not great, but I do have a whole summer left, and a bunch more on the shelf, just waiting to be opened.

Although the apathy of no job and no students is starting to get to me a bit. On the other hand, rehearsal was good (when I finally got there), and I'm almost done with part of Red Alert 2.

I heard the siren song of Half Life 2. It is...amazing.

Ditto for Red Alert 2.

Ska In The Park tomorrow, which will actually be at Q-Bonkers.

$20 for a ton of bands, including all of the best ska bands in SoCal except Reel Big Fish.

Yeah, I'll be there :P

Via gsa_lj, How women will be hurt by gay marriage. Yeah, I went wtf too, and then I read the article.

And went "No really. What the fucking fuck is wrong with you, dude?"
On a similar, though much more amusing note, all the arguments about gay marriage in one handy bubble chart.
On a more pleasant note, this optical illusion
A very good summary of the reasons for the gold standard
Some iPhone user had WAY too much time on his hands
Pac-Man vs. Twitter
The life cycle of a videogame, which includes the all important step 2: guns are added to it.
What your facial hair really says about you. The soul patch one is hilarious and, sadly, the full beard one rings very true.
A couple from 11 Points-11 things the Bible bans, but you do anyway (most I already knew, but...round haircuts? Really?) and 11 Major League Feats That Only Happened Once
Holy crap someone built a lifesize Bumblebee in their yard. Out of a Volkswagen Beetle no less.
Buzz and Buzz!
I refuse to give this to my dad, for Father's Day or any other holiday.
James Blunt was a tank captain, and other secret badasses.
This dude was awesome, and his obituary reminds me of my favorite Penny Arcade strip.
Behold the power of science!
And finally...when you see it, well...

In bright news, the gig is probably going to go rather well. In less than bright news, allergies suck ass.