It's not an impulse buy because it's educational....!

Marshall earlier. Now that he's gotten more comfortable here he's less cuddly than he used to be but gets on his hind legs much more than most cats I've seen. I've now had him for two weeks.

Well here it is, almost freaking 1 in the morning. 

Staying up this late isn't good for me, though it's excusable enough when I'm doing it to spend my time productively. Like this evening I played guitar for an hour (I've been working on that piece by Mozart, but haven't completely abandoned Metallica as planned after all, more on this later...), studied Chapter 5, cleaned up the kitchen a little bit, and worked out for about 15 minutes. 

I should probably start going to the gym. My stomach has gotten a little rounder from not working out as much... Or at least it seems like that in the evening. Like after a whole day of drinking a lot of water, coffee, energy drinks, milk with cereal, whatever... I can expand my stomach to make it look 6 months pregnant, it's funny. In the morning that bloating is pretty significantly reduced but I feel like it'd be less noticeable if my core was more toned. 

So I did send a rather frantic email to Jacob last night. Here's the gist of it, italics:

--I told him about how unmotivated I felt lately. He told me that I've improved significantly as a guitarist and that alone should be really all the motivation I need. 

- I wasn't getting the practice time in that I wanted. He said that the reduced practice time was probably more attributed to school than anything; though I somewhat disagree because it was easy to work on Mozart for an hour today and would have for way longer if I'd had more time... 

-He said I shouldn't dump pieces before they're completed, and to be working on two or three at a time instead of having just one song and a list of other ones that I'd someday like to play. <- THIS is what I need to work on this week. 

-Unfortunately for my somewhat delusional earlier plans of learning Mozart's piece to perfect speed in 3 weeks (....with finals coming up, what was I smoking), I will continue to learn the Metallica solo, which Jake is going to make an instructional video on.. 

So there you go. Problem solved. I will play that god damn Metallica solo in that recital in a few weeks, my blog as my witness!!! 

On a somewhat related but not really sidenote....

Yes, yes, yes..! 

I am super excited to buy this... Unfortunately I'm down to my last $100 until Thanksgiving after spending about 2/3rds of my last paycheck earlier, my mom just paid for my lessons in advance so I'd feel selfish asking my parents for money again... So yeah I'm really going to make an effort to live on the cheap until the 27th. But Luke posted this tonight annnnd I'm already dying to have it so more than likely I'll be buying it tomorrow.

peace. 

OHH!! Jeez I almost forgot, funniest ass thing today... So as you guys know I MADE MY GOAL, woohoo! Got a rough draft to get pointers on.Why was this a goal? Sipic mentioned like 3 times that students have the option to turn in a first draft to get pointers on but "Rarely does anyone actually take advantage of this." So as you guys know I got my "rough draft" done last night... Rough like literally, I wrote that thing two sided on lined paper in my notebook. Again what was I smoking, I don't know, I should have at least used separate pages if I was going to hand write the damn thing. 

I showed it to Sipic after class and was like "Here, I have this rough draft!" and he's like "Good, good!" then looking at this messy ass stack of notebook pages, "....Wow you're one of the rare ones that actually handwrites things..." Suddenly I'd realized how stupid this was and that  I really should have typed it beforehand but he actually proceeded to offer to make copies of the damn things to read over tonight. I'm like ehh yeah that's okay. 

I'm sure it's fine. And again I'll be going to the writing center to get help on it so it'll all work out

Suicide girls (....and more Luke, lmfao)

Evening everyone.

Today's been pretty productive. Today I went to the library and printed out Ghosh's sort of insane looking 16-page handwritten notes meant to help us with an article we have to write about by the 15th. I originally went to the library to print Carbaugh's handouts for money and banking but wasn't able to log in because of a caps issue in the username. I feel like a moron because I sent him a message about it but then I figured out what I did wrong and I'm like, "uh duh..." ha ha.... third quarter of this professor's class, you think I'd be able to get this shit right.

Anyway, I plan on getting up earlier than usual tomorrow to go print out those handouts in the library before his class at 10.

Today I also read about half of Chapter 2 in my Managerial book, which for some reason I find the most difficult to read. It's funny, because all of my classes are economics I'm having difficulty distinguishing whether or not I'm unknowingly giving one class more time than another. The material is really fascinating though and I know my listening skills have improved a lot since last year.

Thinking back to this time last year, I was taking accounting with that kind of senile guy, pre-calculus and that law class with the New Yorker that called me "Miss Wilson." Ha ha ha, yeah I definitely remember feeling my eyelids feeling heavy in all three of those classes at one time or another.. I also remember doodling pointless stuff in the margins and counting down the minutes left in class. In these classes I couldn't imagine doing that because I feel like I need to remember as much as this stuff as possible for my own benefit in the future.


Oh!! weirdest a$$ thing happened today!! 

  

pictured: Kelsey R., Jake's girlfriend (left), who's also friends with Rachelle, my friend Samantha's sister in law (right). 
Because I've followed Rachelle's posts on facebook for a long time I've seen Kelsey's comments but we've never talked. 

Kelsey added me on facebook. Ha ha this was completely out of left field for me because from what I'd heard she didn't like me much. Yesterday was her 24th birthday and she posted a picture of a purse from Megan that I worked with at JCpennies. Finding out that they were friends didn't come as a surprise to me because I remember Megan telling me that she'd gone to a lot of local metal shows. Kelsey is also friends with Rachelle, as well as Brandon C. and a bunch of other music people Jake knows that have been in that scene. 

Anyway yeah she sent me a message saying that "Jacob said you wanted to be friends : )" and of course I was stoked because yes, I'd wanted to actually get in contact with her for awhile. I want her to form her own judgement of me but also see most importantly that even though Jacob means a lot to me-- and has made more impact on my life than anyone I've ever encountered, it is not a romantic or sexual attraction what so ever. Lol and I'm thankful I'm not into him that because theoretically if I was and would have made any passes at him he would have inevitably harshly rejected them, gotten angry at me for violating the professionalism of his business, and asked me to leave. Yeah not something that I have ever wanted at all. 

But yea it'd be pretty sick to actually get to know her as a person. From what I've seen we have a lot in common so I have never seen why not. 

In other news Luke's not mad. I think. 

He commented on a status I'd posted last night: "Why is it so hard for me to have people in my life here....... —" which is pretty much what was ringing through my head all night last night. He said "Join the club." because I'm pretty sure this is what he's feeling living in Seattle right now. Like he's considering moving to San Diego to continue his music career but is at a crossroads about it.  Probably not gonna send him any more messages directly though unless he gets ahold of me first because I still don't know what that "failed to send" shit was all about.. lol.

It's still awesome to me that we're communicating on facebook because I really look up to him as a musician. He's got hands like no other and is probably one of the greatest living guitarists in the world. 

So yeah that's it for my weekend. Just studying a lot, practicing, BSing with people on facebook, then studying more. Ha ha, lame. Looking forward to school this week though. My birthday is in two days and I don't have anything planned but maybe I'll try to figure out something for the upcoming weekend if I decide to make time for it.

peace.

Hmm.. very uneventful first weekend. Not feeling great.

Of course I didn't make any plans really so I only have myself to blame.

Yesterday I talked to Allie briefly about what she was up to that night and she said she was going to a party and her friend from back home is coming. I didn't really ask anything about it but figured she'd hit me up about it later. I ended up meditating and falling asleep yesterday then waking up at like 9 pm.. She hadn't texted me again so I figured I'd just leave it alone because they were probably on their way out the door and I didn't feel like getting ready. Plus she didn't invite me earlier.

My parents came into town yesterday to assist me with my broken car. This week I'm planning on riding my bike to Shaw because the bus is inconvenient and my car likes to die on me in the middle of the road. Of course my Dad called me yesterday telling me I'm going to have to open the hood and "make some adjustments..." Uh okay I thought the mechanic took care of that. My Dad blames me for my car not working too, like it's my fault because I don't get it serviced enough or something....

Terry was asking me in class on Friday what I was up to this weekend but I haven't heard from him so who knows. I'm having a feeling he's out partying or something like most normal people in college. I honestly remember hating weekends last year because I never really did anything and I want to avoid that this year. It's going to take conscious effort for me to open up to people in order to make friends. I really don't feel like I have any friends here right now and I want that to change but I have a tendency to just mind my own business and get wrapped up in my routines.... Then on the weekends feeling isolated like this.

I need to try to understand what it is that prevents me from making friends here.... When my parents come here I always get depressed because they will point out places and I haven't been to any of them. Like I feel like I don't do anything here but eat, sleep, smoke, practice and study. Part of it is laziness because I never put the effort forward to find anything to do here because in my time off I just want to practice guitar. I feel like my interests right now are on tunnel vision so it's hard for me to relate to people that aren't into music... and a lot of people that are into guitar are cold

I lost my ability to communicate with Luke J. which makes me so freaking sad because I really wanted the chance to get to know him... I think I pissed him off because I was being nosey about something he was posting (about a sensitive subject so I should have known) and now when I try to send him a message it "fails to send" which I'm pretty sure is the nice way Facebook's trying to say he's not accepting messages from me.

It's just been a bad day, I just feel super lonely and insecure about where my life is socially and I'd like that to change. Here's to a better day tomorrow.

peace. 

Wired as Hell.

Man I've been so ADD about my practice habits lately... like I just want to learn everything and keep finding new songs that I want to play. For lessons sake I've decided to learn Master of Puppets because it's going to allow Jake and I to work very well together. He knows every measure of that song and will be a lot more effective at teaching it than Anastasia, even if I still love the guitar part in that and want to learn it. Slash might actually be a little too difficult for me right now.... I relistened to that song and it sounds like a massive challenge. Of course Master of Puppets will be too, but I've grown more and more used to Kirk Hammit's style so it will probably be easier to learn than Anastasia.

Here's a picture of Kirk Hammett when he was about my age-- maybe a little younger. 

It's funny to listen to some of Metallica's interviews because Hetfield says that during their first important performances and even subsequent performances for years to come their minds were more set on "Don't mess up, don't mess up...." than the actual music (which I can totally relate too with my recent recitals) and now that they are more experienced musicians today they can fully enjoy it without the stress of messing up. 

It takes years and years of intensive practice to get to this point. I don't have any long term goals of trying to be some famous musician because that's a pipe dream. I just want to get good enough to experience the complete euphoria of having THAT degree of freedom and clarity while playing... The kind Luke Jaeger has, John Petrucci, Steve Vai, Joe Satrianni, Dimebag, etc etc etc....

Speaking of Luke, he's moving back to San Diego. I don't know if Jake and him ever talked again about coming to the tri cities to do a pro lesson but he's been in California. If he comes to the tri cities when I'm in ellensburg out of the blue and gives a lesson to jake's other students I'd be so pissed.... lmfao. 

Okay enough guitar bullshit for now.. I know some of you that read this blog don't care about any of that.

I've been trying to make progress on my roommate search... though unsuccessfully thus far, and hope that my two ads-- both the index card one and the online ad, will get me a few calls and then I'll pick who
I want to live with next year. The girl I tried texting yesterday didn't get back to me and I haven't really gone through the ads on the page today but should. 

School starts on the 25th... I move out on the 22nd. That's abouuuut... 2 weeks before I'm out of here. Wow the end is definitely in sight. My Mom mentioned this morning that it was hard to believe that our birthdays are coming up again and I'm going to be turning 22. Dun dun dun.... 

Haven't thought about what I want for my birthday yet... A new guitar that I can actually tune without having that stupid locked bridge would be nice. I've really wanted to play some coheed and cambria but half of their songs are tuned down. I realize that Keeping Secrets Silent Earth is actually in Standard though so I'm chugging this energy drink and gonna have a blast learning this tonight. 

peace. 

To be the hero is all I ask.....

I've loved this song for years.... Literally I remember listening to this album back in 2008 in highschool when I'd have to run for miles on end at soccer practice. I adore Coheed and Cambria and always will. This will be soo fun to learn too. Like I said, ADD I've got stacks of paper everywhere and it annoys the shit out of Jake. He says I need to get a box to file everything in and I totally agree with him.. I just haven't gotten around to doing it cause I'm too damn lazy. 

Metallica is in my soul

Hello.

Well it's 10:25. I had a pretty good day at work and came home and got in some really solid practice time. My practice sessions have become more structured like they were last summer and I am able to fully focus on what I'm working on. Unfortunately there are a lot of songs that I want to play around with but
I should really be focusing on Master of Puppets. I don't know when that recital is but I hope not any time too soon... It's been super fun to learn so far.

Today work was rather tedious and slow paced but it gave me a better chance to get a hang of the register. I got two credit card apps today so I'm pumped. There's incentive for me to do well because it gets me more hours. More hours = more money. My Dad likes to buy his t-shirts at jcpenny anyways so I'm going to have him do a "Findmore" and have it shipped to the store... lol so silly. The way I see it the company doesn't care who's buying the stuff and he'd buy the damn things anyway.

Here's me looking goofy this morning before work. dur dur dur... 

Anyway went into work this morning at like 11'. There's nothing up saying where I need to be so I went to Kids because that's where I was hired originally. I met a couple of the ladies that also worked in kids who honestly weren't as talkative to me as my previous coworkers I've met which is kind of nice. 

No hating though, seriously!! I want to go back to working downstairs in Women's dresses. But being upstairs has let me get used to the register. So that was a good choice today I feel even if I did miss working with my buddy Kevin, ha ha ha.

Lmfao, I need to tell you guys about Kevin.

He's this kid that got hired at the same time that I did. I added him on facebook and this is the picture that stood out to me the most... ha ha ha. Yeah he was a male cheerleader back in the day. That's intense though, that's a real sport. I mean check that girl out on top, that takes major athleticism. Anyway he's 17 and just graduated highschool. Very sweet person and apparently really smart. He's kind of goofy though and we crack eachother up.

ANYWAY. We both showed up to work kind of early so we were just chatting about whatever for about 20 minutes. I told him a little about myself and my hobby and tried to guess what he was into. He told me that he Didn't really have any hobbies because he was always sort of shadowed. I was like seriously? Idk, I guess I was sort of in the same boat. I immediately told him that he should take up an instrument with A sharp and went on about a schpeel about how it's helped everything in my life and yadda yadda yadda...

Seriously when I'm talking about where I get guitar lessons I think people might get the impression I'm trying to get them to join a cult. I'm just so serious about what people like Jake have openned my eyes too. I feel like musicians like Luke Jaeger, John Petrucci, Kirk Hammitt, chimp spanner, John Satriani, Michael Romeo, etc etc the list goes on and on.. All these guitarists have metal running through their blood and it brings together souls that know real pain. And even if it's not metal-- I mean most great guitarists play loads of genres just for the Hell of it.... guitar is just something magical. It's complete euphoria for me to be able to just be able to practice all day lately.

Luke actually lives in Seattle, so there could be a possibility of getting in touch with him.

I don't actually know him aside from through Jake. He's an outrageous guitar player. like Insanely blow your f*cking head off good. I want to know all about his story and how he got to this point and eventually would like to get some lessons from him if I move up that direction. It's not likely that he's going to stick around Seattle for that long though. He gives Skype lessons like Jake but he probably charges higher because I'm sure he doesn't even like teaching.

No, okay lemme back up... I'm not saying he wouldn't be a crazy good teacher. I'm just saying a lot of guitar players actually don't like teaching the basics. I've only been playing for two years and Jake has taught me a ton and still has a lot to teach me. Like before I stop taking lessons with Jake I need to know all the notes on the fretboard like the back of my hand, know way more scales, go back to working on arpeggios, different types of chords... There's still a ton of stuff that we haven't covered that I know Luke would probably be bored with. Luke teaches only other professionals. Jake enjoys teaching students that are more experienced as well. 

I've just been consumed by guitar and work lately. That's it guys. 

peace. 

3rd day and The wheels are already in motion

Damn, today was interesting. Definitely more interesting than what I had to tell you yesterday so excuse me if I go on.

Econ today was different because we had a professor from a different class. There's an older lady in my class that I sit next to in my statistics class as well that's very eager and raises her hand continually to either ask questions or answer about something... which usually only people do if they know the answer. Usually in Carbaugh's class I will just respond answers when he does the call and response thing. I like when teachers do that a lot because it keeps me paying attention.

Anyway she continued to do that again today. I noticed this morning that a guy that I sit next to in my Statistics class also sits directly across from me in economics. We had caught eachothers eyes this morning and I'm like, huh, wonder if I'll sit next to him again today. Sometimes people rearrange themselves in class. I'm pretty happy with my seating this quarter because I got my spot in economics again that I was in last quarter, it's really easy to see there and keeps me from looking at other people.

She would wear rings that look like this, except daintier looking and silver. I'm not going to lie I think this ring is really cool. Even if this girl's voice used to bother me she has good taste.

That girl that sat next to be kind of in econ last quarter with the blonde hair and really perfectly coordinated clothes last quarter-- she's in two of my classes this quarter. I'm starting to really recognize more people in the business program which is cool though I don't know how consistent it'll remain when I get into my major next year. Anyway that girl used to distract me because she'd wear this ring that looked like two hands crossing over your finger, it was the weirdest looking ring and my eyes always ended up drawn to it. Not anymore though, she doesn't sit next to me anymore.

Continuing on here.. went back to my apartment for two hours, ate and relaxed. I have to say I'm liking my schedule with the two hour breaks. It gives me a chance to recharge before my classes and I've been absorbing so much information because I've been studying throughout the day instead of globbed up in the morning. Maybe as much as I try I am not a morning person after all, maybe this is better for me. We'll see.

Then Statistics. I sat in my regular seat. This is the first time I actually looked at this guy (his name is Terry) who I sat next to yesterday and felt awkward because he kept on looking at my notes. First thing I notice is a tattoo of a scroll on his arm. I also noticed that his arms are huge. He's tall and clearly very dedicated to his body because it'd take so much work to get like that.

I then looked at his hands, which stood out to me more than anything because I noticed that he had really big hand muscles under his pinky (these muscles grow as you play guitar, or I suppose work out too. Guys tend to get more prominant hand muscles like that-- I remember Jack's hands were similar) and I started wondering if he played guitar.

At this point we'd made eye contact a solid number of times. Yesterday he tried to kind of get my attention by asking me what the histogram on my paper was for and I said "...Yesterday's questions on page 5." Lol. If he was trying to make small talk there I didn't take a hint. I decided to ask him a few minutes before class started if he's in my economics class, and he said that he was and we started talking a little from there.

He does play guitar. I don't know how rigorously now that I know more about him because I can't imagine he has time.

Fire alarm goes off in my Stats class. My teacher was like, "What the Hell? Okay see you all tomorrow..." Lol I like Sipic, I was actually kind of looking forward to lecture today which is almost painful to admit because I can't believe i'd ever want to listen about studying datapoints....

I followed Terry out of Shaw outside where people were standing around. I introduced myself and Terry told me he was done for the day and we started to walk around and get to know eachother a little bit. He seems like a pretty level headed guy, he's majoring in business administration too.

I was really surprised that Terry invited to give me a ride back after class. I told him he really didn't have to because I have a bike but he said he had a truck that we could load it into. Again, cool to get to talk to him. He likes tennis so that's a plus too, I want to play so badly.

Then my public speaking class, which was also fun today. We did self introductions followed by an "interesting fact, for example how you get to school every day." Well, almost everyone in the class said how they get to school... on a bike, in their car, yadda yadda. Some people were more creative on what they said. I'd actually rehearsed mine a little in the mirror at home because I know that I have a tendency to talk really fast when I'm even a little nervous.

Here's the average speech: "Hi my name is "    " and how I get to class is I drive my car... any questions?"

This was my speech: "Hello, my name is Emily and one of my favorite highlights of the day is cranking up my music and speed-biking to class. I'd like to open up for questions."(this was funny, lol)

There's a really attractive, egotistical (okay, maybe "cocky" seems like a better word here. He seems like a nice guy, but during his speech you can just tell he was loving the squeels of the girls in the audience) guy in my class that shot his hand up immediately and asked what my favorite band is that sends me flying.


I responded "Dream Theater" and he's like "WHAT! Are you serious?! They're amazing, what do you think of their new drummer?" I just said "I can't think of their drummer right now, but John Petrucci is a huge inspiration to me."

He went on asking a stream of questions. I actually cut him off and said "Okay then! Is there any more questions?" That was just meant to be a joke so hopefully I don't get docked for being rude or something


I should have said their old drummer was better. At least that's what Jacob says.

Well to be honest I'm glad I didn't act like I knew, it wouldn't be fair because I haven't paid much attention to either drummers. For future reference the drummer for Dream theater currently is Mike Mangini. He doesn't have as many flashy pictures as if you look up Petrucci or Labrie with their wild locks everywhere, ha ha ha. 

Wow, okay here's Mark Portnoy. Now  if this were simply a LOOKS competition yes I could tell you who fits better in Dream theater from these two pictures. But how do their skills compare? Couldn't tell you. 

Anyway it was a good day. Had a lesson with Jacob today and mentioned that I'd subscribed to Luke Jaeger's page. He's like "So when's you guy's date?" I'm like wowwww. He jokes about it because apparently this guy never dates anyone, like he's apparently got the highest standards in the entire world and never has found anyone that suits him... or maybe he does and just acts like he doesn't have contact with anyone. That's interesting to me too. Jake told me that whenever Luke thinks a girl is interested in him he backs off bad so I have to make sure that if I do meet him I do not come off flirtatious what so ever. 

Just look how f*cking perfect that is though. It's insane. I would love to get lessons from him someday, he's a master. Lol I think of it like Jacob is my sensei and this guy is HIS sensei. I still have.... mass amounts to learn from Jacob. Actually getting to where Jacob is today will take years, and I'll be lucky if I half as good as Luke in 10,000 hours. 

I love the guitar so much, my soul sometimes feels so engrossed that  when I play the neck feels like part of my body. 

peace

Last night at home. Guitarist luke jaeger

Evening everyone.

Well this is my last night at home for my spring break. Today was a pretty great day and I have no complaints about being here. I plan to be here until tomorrow evening after I hang out with a friend of mine. We were originally going to hang out this evening but he had some work to do.

Today started out with a bath. For some reason the hot water heater hasn't been working very well in our  house and I've found I'd rather sit in a half full hot bath than take a 2 minute shower. My hair has felt kind of dry lately, I should probably get a trim when I get back to Ellensburg. That's definately on my to-do list for the next week. That and studying the basics of Statistics before that class via youtube videos. I feel like I've taken a long enough vacation to get some work done now.

Guitar went well. The student that was scheduled to go after me was MIA again so I was able to spend some extra time with Jacob. He showed me one of the guitarists that taught him named Luke Jaeger and showed me a bunch of his youtube videos. I remember Jacob telling me about Night Terror in Seattle and Luke is the main guitarist. He's one of Jacob's top three favorite guitarists that have inspired him to get to the level that he is-- Luke Jaeger, John Petrucci and... someone else. I can't remember the third.

Check out a video of this beast.

What's even more astounding is that he's had jaw dropping ability for nearly all his life. Jacob also showed me a couple videos from his performances in a 7th grade talent show. It's so hilarious when the  camera pans  around the room to see the kid's faces as chunky kid throws down this incredible work.

As you can see in this video he's not chunky anymore. Actually he's more ripped than you can see in this video. He does a couple videos shirtless. He's clearly very driven on self perfection. I sort of wonder if part of what inspired him to be like this is that he got picked on.... or not, or maybe he had all the confidence in the world from day one.

Anyway I wonder if I know Jacob long enough if I will ever come into contact with this person. He seems like an interesting character and he's incredibly talented, it'd be cool to see what his story was growing up.

Invention No. 8 in F major is going well. I really want to step up my practice to a couple hours a day when I move back to Ellensburg. Maybe I'll even go out on a limb and try to do three hours like when I first started. Playing three hours now is much harder than it seemed back then when this was all new to me. I'm a much better player now so you think this would be more enjoyable...

I can feel my hands pulsating when I close my fists. I'm going to bed.

peace.