Currently Listening At War with the Mystics see related

- Free Radicals

Chicago/Lolla Review? Ok...

concoction of cereal goodness. We revisited the Bean and the Crown Fountains in Millenium park and from there headed to The Art Institute.  We saw stuff like American Gothic, vanGogh self-portrait, and Nighthawks.

I was very sad...

Josh tried to lighten the mood by creating fun hair styles...?

Currently Listening The Ugly Organ By Cursive see related

hello?

Currently Listening Descended Like Vultures By Rogue Wave see related

Hey kids.

2 more weeks of school. Yet I have about 589 papers to write. And by 589 I mean 7…but still.  Over the summer I have to take another class and go back to work, but Allie and I are going to take another Chicago trip…and I get to work some camps and such, so it could be fun. Holy crap, I actually miss Plano a lot…and a lot of people that live there.  I want to see all of you when I get home. And I know how excited you all must be to see my face as well. 

Well, not too much crap has been going on lately. Just lots of schoolwork and stress. This is the first weekend I've been in Norman since march 3-5. Weird.  There was spring break, then I was a leader for the dnow back home, then went down to hpu to visit frisco+friends for HPUfest, then went to see the phantom of the opera, and then last weekend was Easter…so yeah.  I tried catching up on some work this weekend and went to the library to do research.  Okay, that place already creeped me out…but holy crap – it's too freaking huge. First, some chick that worked there yelled at me because I asked if she could help me find something in the stacks…but apparently what everyone calls the stacks is actually the decks…and the stacks are just the regular floors? I don't know. Anyway, I got lost on the 4^th floor, and…wait, what the crap am I doing? I'm writing an entry about the library.

I think I'm done.

Oh wait - Norman people - come to the BYX Island Party on Friday…Allie and I scheduled the bands. It's Sanctus Real, The Afters (Blisse), and Mainstay…I don't really care for the other bands, but at least come watch our friends play (the afters) and hang out with us.  It's in the Walker-Adams Mall (outside in between the dorms) around 5 or 6 I think.  Call me if you come out.  Oh, and does anyone want to go see John Vanderslice at the Opolis with me on May 4? No? Okay, it's cool…I'll go alone and still be awesome.

Currently Listening Keep Guessin' By Hockey Night see related

South by Southwest + some

So it’s Sunday…meaning spring break is over.

That sucks.

But – this spring break was definitely a great one…maybe the best one I’ve had yet. It was full of music and friends and such.  I’ll sum up the beginning of the break in a few sentences.  I saw Mates of State and Midlake at the Gypsy Team Room w/ Laura on Friday, don’t remember Saturday…don’t remember Sunday, on Monday, 3^rd Eye Blind played a free show down the street so me, burger, Robby, and Ethan went…it was cold. Yes.  On Tuesday I turned 20. I spent time with my fam and went to dinner with Danielle. Good times.

Okay, on to South by Southwest.
Hell yes.

Wednesday
Allie and I had lots of good luck on this day. It was weird. We woke up early and drove to Austin. It only took us 3 hours and we didn’t hit any traffic.  We exited on 6^th street and managed to find a parking spot on the side of the street about a block away from the venue we wanted to go to (believe me, this was amazing…there were so many people on the street).  We saw Chris from Troubled Hubble…it was kind of awkward because we hadn’t really talked to him since we went to Chicago. Well, around 3:30 or so we drove out of downtown to Lake Travis where we would be staying the night w/ our friend, Esther.

Thursday
Well. Hmm. Weird day. We made it downtown around 2 and saw a lot of our friends play (Taylor, Joshua, Lang, porterdavis, + some) at a coffee shop called The Hideout.  We stayed there for about 3 hours and made a new friend named Todd. After they were finished we walked over to the Red 7 and saw Midlake play a few songs, and then Taylor called and we left to go eat w/ Taylor, Joshua, Todd, and 7 other people that I had never met at some small Mexican restaurant that I can’t remember the name of… Pretty sure we played 20 questions…and the answer to Taylor’s was ‘the spirit of freedom.’ Right. When we were done eating we went to Tambeleo and saw Mat Kearney and Glen Philips? Allie and I knew nothing about them, but the guys we were with seemed pretty excited. Hell, our new friend Todd even gave Allie his jacket to keep because she took a picture of Todd and Glen Philips together. We stayed there for a couple of hours until the bands started to get awful, and Allie, Joshua, and I drove back to 6^th street. Ooooh 6^th street.  Joshua tried desperately to get into the nada surf/mates of state/starlight mints/john vanderslice show, but it didn’t work out….so then he tried to convince some wasted girl to give him her wristband to get into another club.  Basically, the conversation between the 2 of them ended like this: girl- “I live about 5 mins from here. Do you want to go have sex?” Haha. Poor guy.  Allie and I left him there to ponder that question. Apparently he said no and went into the club where Taylor and Lang were. Lame. kidding… Then Allie and I went to UT (boooo) to meet up with Whit and get some sleep.

Friday
Holy crap. Crazy freaking day. It was probably my favorite.  Since the point of Allie and I going to SXSW was to see good shows, we hadn’t done a good job of it….so we made it a point to see some good crap that day.  We started at noon and saw Ted Leo + The Pharmacists. That man wore very short shorts. It was enjoyable, though.  After their set, we stopped by Urban Outfitters (yes they had shows there, too) and caught Rogue Wave’s set.  But I was a bit sad because Of Montreal played before them and I missed it.  Anyway, then Allie and I went back to 6^th street and started walking around looking for the Crown and Anchor Pub. As we were on our search, a guy (looked like a leprechaun) ran up behind us and asked where we were going.  We told him what we were looking for and he told us that he would help us look for it. Little did we know, his apartment was on that block and he kept insisting that we go into his apartment to help him look for the place online. Hell no. We told him we’d wait outside while he looked and he got frustrated….and magically he all of a sudden remembered where the place was and gave us directions.  Apparently the place was about 10 mins from there and we were nowhere close.  We got the hell out of there before we got raped and never found what we were looking for.  But it’s okay! Because we went to Trophy’s and saw Hockey Night play.  It was hands down my favorite show of the festival.  They have so much energy and are ridiculously entertaining to watch.  I mean, they have 2 drummers… can’t beat that.  After the show, we met up with Esther again, and then with Whit and ate at a place called Kirby Lane.  Eh. Then, Allie, Esther, and I met up with Taylor and watched Lang’s band play.  Went back to 6^th street around 1:30AM and had scary guys sprint down the street after us (pepper spray works wonders even when you don’t spray it, by the way).  I’ve never seen so many desperate guys congregated in one place.  It was pretty entertaining.  Then, it was back to Whit’s for some sleep.

Saturday
Met Esther for some Chinese food and then went to the party at Pok-E-Jo’s where John Vanderslice, The Long Winters, and Andrew Kenny from The American Analog Set were playing.  They were running way behind, so we didn’t get to stick around for JV, but we did get to talk to him and have him take pictures in Todd’s jacket…actually, we had many people take pics in Todd’s jacket. He’s going to hate us.  Umm, I love John Vanderslice. A lot.  Anyway, we drove home after that and yeah. Gay. I hate Austin, but I want to go back.

And today as I was driving back to OU, there was a van in front of me with Minnesota liscence plates…and I was getting really angry because they were driving so slow, but when I was able to see inside, I saw Hockey Night! They were on their way to Kansas to play a show. When I got back to the apartment, I found a flooded kitchen due to massive dripage from the ceiling. Yay.

Currently Reading Ordinary Resurrections: Children in the Years of Hope By Jonathan Kozol see related

This will be a rant. It could be fun?

So, I can't stand stupid people...at all. Seriously, how can people be so stupid and still make it in college?  Not to mention, I'm pretty much "the baby" in most of my classes...being at least a year younger than the rest of them.  I never thought I'd say this, but I'm so thankful that I got the education in High School that I did...this goes for Clark HS (9th and 10th) and Plano East (11th & 12th).  Plano East was ridiculously huge (for those of you that aren't from Plano...huge meaning a graduating class of around 1,250...people here in OK seem to think that a class size of 700 is too big. ha), but they had things together.  I mean, today I got back a paper that I was positive that I would have gotten a C on.  It was no more than a B- paper. I got it back, and holy crap it was a 100.  It sounds lame, but sometimes I want to earn what I'm given. If I would have turned that same paper into my 11th grade English teacher, she would have laughed at it, written a fat "F" on it, and then given me a long speech about how I wasn't applying myself... and that if I was going to continue that same work, then I needed to switch into the lower level courses.  That teacher was by far the best teacher I've ever had...because basically (excuse my language), she could read through the bullshit. It's so irritating to me when some chick in my math classes doesn't understand why 2+2=4 (okay, so that's an exaggeration...but it doesn't hit too far from the mark). *Don’t get me wrong, I encountered some awful teachers at East along the way…such as Satan (Ms. Williams) – my 11^th grade physics teacher.*
And yes, I fully understand that some people didn't have the option of going to good High Schools, but hell, if you're in college and taking upper level classes - you need to raise the freaking bar.  It's like the first time in one of my English classes here, a girl argued with my professor about how she didn't understand why we would write a paper and not use the 5-paragraph format. Are you kidding? That method was Elementary and Middle School work. The girl was almost in tears because she was so frustrated with the idea of being creative in her writing and not sticking to the structured and banal method that she was accustomed to.
I hope this doesn't come across that I think I'm better than anyone, because I definitely am not. This stuff just frustrates me...almost as much as people that complain about how bad life is when they have so much.  Seriously, stop using depression to get attention.  But that's a whole different rant for another time.