Here's the video clip that I've always heard about. A doctor hooked a tenor play from Star of Indiana up to heart and oxygen moniters, and then monitered him while he marched their 1993 show. The doctor says that the readings that he gets are what he would expect to see from a marathon runner who was in peak physical condition. Way to go drum corps kids!!

And again Jeff Gorring reminds me of why I love him, and why I thank him like every time I see him.

Hello everyone. I hope all of you are doing well and looking forward to April camp. I have a little story to share so here goes:

I work at the Olive Garden as a line cook:( Its a frown face because in December I graduated from Eastern Michigan with a Music Ed degree. I thought i would be able to find a job teaching, but with it in the middle of the year, there were no jobs open. So I had to go back to the job that helped me get through 5 years of college. The Olive Garden.
With that said, that is not what I want to do with my life forever. However, I do realize that there are people who that works for and I appreciate that so much, its just not for me.
There are people who work there who do not appreciate the other things that people do outside of work because it is not work related or its not what they do so it is not valued. I encountered this tonight.
I need a lot of days off within the next few months for this... I play in Carnegie Hall next week, I have SW camp, I get married, I have my Honeymoon, and I have the summer. A guy today gave me a really hard time about that and I think he slipped up and told me today how he really felt about me. I thought he was a good friend but he thinks different apparently.
So I did what I thought would be a good thing to do. I THanked him. He didn't understand, but I did. I thanked him because he taught me that I don't want to be like that. I took a negative experience and made it a positive one. He made me think of SW.
You will, in life and in the summer, encounter these types of situations. You need to realize that you know the right thing to do, its just really hard to see it all the time. All of you are so lucky to be around the SW family. You are learning so much already and there is no one I would rather spend my summer with than with all of you. You will teach each other things that will be life long. Today, try to start to notice the things around you better. Its really neat. Its makes you smile more. Thank friends for being friends. Notice that the sun shines really bright if you let it. The rain is really wet, the grass green and when you smile at someone notice their smile. Its genuine. I know this may sound corny to some and make sense to some, but its true. Start to notice and take take part in your development with SW and the others around you because it will be over fast. Practice hard and enjoy its rewards.
A friend of mine is from West Afica and he told me once that there was a saying in the village he lived in. "THe great people in life do great things when no one else is looking. Thats what makes them great."
Think about that one.
I want to end this by saying this:

To do the right thing is so unbelievably simple, yet so incredibly hard to do.

Enjoy the Sun
Jeff Gorring
SW 00-02
SW Visual Staff 04

Today was an all right day. I did see something that was rather ironic. I was walking by this place on campus where people usually hang out and smoke, and saw this particular girl smoking. Now usually I don't notice the individual smokers, but this girl caught my eye. Why you might ask, well that's simple. It's because she was wearing a Race for the Cure t-shirt. Down with Breast cancer, who cares about my lungs!

In other news, my recital is two weeks away! Come to it please. I'm starting to freak out about it a little. I had a lesson with Mr. Waymire, which was great. Hopefully I can do that again this week. Don't get me wrong, I love Dr. Zirk (who doesn't?!) but it's just nice to get a very different approach, and new opinions every now and again. I'm trying to decide if next year I want to take lessons with Dr. Z again, or with someone else. Hmmm... tough decision.

Tomorrow's my reading 311 tradebook project, and Thursday is my 15 minute lesson. I hope all goes well!! After that, I think I'm done for that class. I am beginning to think that these next two weeks are going to kill me. Good thing I work better under pressure. I might not be nicer, but I get more done!

Anyway, good night ya'll!

"He just lives across the lake."

Way to put things into perspective Jeff Gorring. Thanks man.

"Those truly linked don't need correspondence, when they meet again after many years apart, their friendship is as true as ever."

-Deng Ming-Dao

There was a butt in Ryan W.'s How-to book for our Reading 311 class courtesy of one of the bad mothers on bus 149. Way to go kids, you just made my week! It was excellent checking out the photo and then laughing histarically while the whole class tried to figure out what was up. I love it!!

So I was really careful to get everything together last night so that there was no way I could forget anything or be late this morning. That is everything except my alarm clock. I'm gonna have to go to the next section of the class and look like I was up way too late yesterday doing this book, but really I was done last week!! Oh well... Thanks to Amanda. If it weren't for her, I wouldn't be there at all.

The EMU Tradition Continues

Way to go Carl and Erin on making the S-dub contra line!! That's right 6 years in a row that an EMU kid (or 7) have been on the field with Southwind. Way to go.

Sorry to everyone that's not all about drum corps, it's that time of the year. When you can start to smell the busses, see the green grass and feel the sun on your skin. Where everything reminds me of my corps, and I've just got it on the brain all the time. I'm probably gonna annoy the crap out of a few people. I love my corps!!

Oh and eek, 21 days until my senior recital!! April 13 is the big day, at 8 p.m. If you're not doing anything, it'd be really great to see you there! (This previous statement, which is ultra-reseved really means, please I'm begging you to come and see me so that it doesn't seem like I'm playing to an empty Pease. Please. Pretty Please. Pretty Please with sugar on top. OH PLEASE COME SEE ME!! begging done.)

I can't wait for it to warm up. I'm really getting sick of this cold weather. I even like cold weather and I want it to go. And you know what, the warmer it gets the closer we get to May 1! (you thought I was going to say Southwind didn't you! Well, actually, that comes right after May 1)

Wow...
Time stood still.
Amazing.
This is one happy girl.



Now it's off to Kentucky for the weekend!

You know you've been on Winds Tour when...

You're wearing a green sweatshirt in your first class.
You're eyes are slightly closed, and your mouth is hanging slightly open.

and my personal favorite...

You begin to get irrational morning anger at 8:45 p.m. the day after tour when your roommate does not know what time Winds is playing it's next gig.

And the tour fun continues...

The Van is the place to be on tour, fo shizzle!!

Members of the Wind Symphony Tour Van, way to rock out! That was great, not only did we escape the bus driver from Hades, we had a blast!

Some highlights of varying suitability for children:

"Rock out at the stop light!!!"
"Pray for a pot luck."
"Dr. Kimberly Cole.... Luevaneeownxzhao."
"I have the biggest dick in the band." "Maybe in the flute section!"
"That guy is a huge douche."
Chris turning 21!
One woman bachlor party!
"... but there's an extra trumpet!"
"Why do you have to be so hetero?"
"I'd talk to you, but Future Corps is too loud."
The best meal ever from the Troy H.S. band boosters.
Getting to play at my high school!
"The creepy bus driver..."
I can't fight this feeling.
Dancing in Alex's parking lot!!!
Playing Awayday a few more times.
Not having to play March Op. 99 a few more times.
The sunglasses.
Irrational beginning of tour anger.
"Sorry, I'm an ass."
Dolan's terrible jokes. (they were really awful.)
"Let's just say that if the Director of Bands finds you laying on the floor of the elevator, cause you thought it would be a good idea, it's a bad thing."
"I've never seen anyone get out of bed that fast ever."

Oh, so many memories. Thanks for the good times!

There are times in your life where you look back and wonder, what if? And then there's the times that you get the chance to figure it out.

Why does it have to be so darn cold? It was so nice just a few days ago!

The Ypsi pub crawl in honor of Dave is over! It's been an interesting few days to say the least. Very interesting.

Found this in Cyn's blog, so I figured, what the heck.


Heart of Gold


What is Your Heart REALLY Made of?
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I love Southwind

I just wanted to say that I love my drum corps. I love all of the people that are associated with my corps. Southwind people are most definately the best kind of people. See, I'm even up too late for S-dub people. (Dave Hurlburt is here!!) I'm so excited right now, Dave is here and Aaron comes up on Thursday!!! I LOVE DRUM CORPS!!!

I also love sleep, so good night ya'll!

It's about that time again...

Well, I've been trying to grow out my hair, but I'm not really sure that I like it grown out, so I've once again decided to cut it. Now here's where I need a little help. Go here and look at Julia Stiles hair and tell me what you think of it. Can I pull that off. There's lots of other pictures, so look around and tell me what you think of it. Please tell me!! Leave comments!!! Please!

Beautiful day

It was so beautiful out today that I (and my buddy, Ryan M. Lewis) rollerbladed to the Ypsi post office. I sent Cade his shirt, and bought stamps. While this may not seem like anything worth writing about in here, I beg to differ. I've decided that I want to bring back the dead art of writing letters. They'll probably be more like little notes in my case, but that's not the point. I love going to the mail box and getting a letter that no computer addressed. It's like a little bit of Christmas! I began with my wonderful friend Cyn in New York. Who knows who will be next! (well, actually it was my horn teacher from high school, but after that!) I'm so excited about this! I don't really know why either, but I really am!

And a little something political...

*hoping up onto soapbox*

All right, so no matter everyone thinks of gay marriage, how can it be right to put anything into the framework of our "free" country that keeps one certian group of people all across the country from doing something that everyone else can? Please let me know if you think you have an answer, cause I can't find a time when this country did anything like that and got a good result. Let's see, African-American's can't own land, women can't vote, no one can drink. All of these specifically stated limits have been overturned. To my knowledge (and I'm very serious when I say that I may be wrong) there is nothing in there right now that says you cannot (except if it's saying you cannot limit another person's freedoms, hmmm..). I guess I just don't think it's right to put anything into our country's most powerful, most highly-regarded document that excludes just one group from doing something. And I don't get why the government thinks it's so wrong anyway. Isn't that a church-type issue? (Again, if you have a differing opinon, please tell me, cause I really want to hear them. I haven't heard enough of them to understand it I guess.)

All right, there may be more about this later, and please feel free to inform me of your view, no matter what you think of what I have to say.

*stepping down*

Kinda Weird

Since the ice has been broken about it here, I guess I can say something. It's weird. You know, you've got somebody, for good or not so good always there. It becomes like a security blanket. You know that everytime they walk up, they're probably coming to talk to you. And then it ends, and no matter what you really think of the end, they're not there, and when they walk up, they're probably not there to talk to you. Tension ensues. Not drama. Tension. What do you do when after two years, you've never really just been friends with someone and suddenly, you're expected to? You get weirded out that's what. Not cause you want that again, but cause it's new and you don't know what to do with it. I guess that's all I've got about that.

Well, great...

Well, that's wonderful. Steve Wilson, the fat, pushy, truth-stretching "investigative" reporter for channel 7 is beginning to report on the university house. Ok, I don't like the house any more than the next student that is dealing with the constant tuition hikes and budget cuts, but the last thing we need is this guy. He likes to take that one sheet of paper out of 20,000 that might be a little questionable, and make it seem like it's so shady Al Cappone must have had something to do with it. This guy's reporting techniques are simply this, badger the person until they get mad. Badger them about something so insignifigant that it actually has very little to do with the original story. I don't like the house at all, but (in case you didn't notice) I think I like this guy less.