Continual State of Becoming

One of the nice things about working from home is that I really dont have to do much driving anymore. Right now I'm really appreciating that because of the outrageous gas prices. I used to have to fill my car about every 5 or 6 days (I had a long school commute my Senior year), but now I probably only have to get gas once every 2 or 3 weeks (depending on how social I am). I had to get gas this weekend, and nearly fainted when I saw the price... $2.12 for regular!! That's insane. I spent well over $20 to fill my car. Thank goodness I dont have to do that very often, I just couldnt afford it anymore. One of the things I miss about driving is listening to music. I almost always listen to classical music in the car. But at home I usually listen to pop stuff (one day I'm going to have an entry about the terms "classical" and "pop") because I need words to sing along with while I'm working around the house. I mean I do listen to classical stuff oc

Ah, my bedroom is clean again. No more clutter, no more mounds of clothes scattered all over the place, no more layers of dust on the furniture, no more layers of dog hair on the carpet... just complete sanitization. (I'm not sure if sanitization is a word, but I remember from high school that Shakespeare used to create his own words by changing verbs to nouns and nouns to verbs, so I figure it's okay for me to do it too) What a great feeling. I just dont function in clutter. When I see piles of books on a desk, I have to clear them off before I can sit down to do my work. This was especially true in college. I'd have to clean my entire dorm room before I could begin working on a paper (I'm not sure if that's procrastination or obsessive behavior). This doesnt mean that I live in a completely spotless house and freak everytime someone drops a crumb on the floor; though I wish I did live in a house like that. It's just not feasible. I mean, a person would never b

My husband and I watched The Amazing Race last night. We havent watched any of the other seasons, but decided to watch this time because of Boston Rob and Amber. I have to say, we've been cheering for them to win, mostly I think because of Boston Rob (we like all things Boston around here). I was concerned that they would get kicked off because they dropped to last place for a moment yesterday. And if they are eliminated, I dont think I'd be as eager to watch. I was glad to see the Mean Guy and the girl he's been "Dating On and Off" (seriously, they couldnt come up with a better description for these two??) finish last. Not because I wanted them to lose, but I dont think I could take another week of his verbal abuse towards her. Seriously, encouragement is a much better motivator than negativity. I hope she's able to stand up for herself and find a guy who will treat her better. So today's plans call for a lot of cleaning. A LOT. i've kinda slacked on

Currently Listening to: Jars of Clay Redemption Songs Jars of Clay just came out with a new CD on Tuesday. I actually pre-ordered it like a month ago because then you could have early access to some of the songs online. Jars of Clay release dates are a big deal to me. They usually go on my calendar so I can rush out and buy the CD the day it drops. It's like a holiday for me. I dont do anything even close to that obsessed with any other band. This CD is pretty different from stuff they've done before because it's more hymn based. Any of the CDs they produced themselves are good though. And this CD has 2 tracks that feature the Blind Boys of Alabama, so how couldnt it be good? www.jarsofclay.com Changing topics: I just took my dog out for a walk. It's so nice out today, probably the warmest it's been in a while, but there's still a cool breeze so it's not too warm yet. I did notice that the grass is getting really green again. Probably because it's been r

Yesterday in the mail I got the Winter 2005 catalogue from the MoMA (Musuem of Modern Art) Store. I read it cover to cover immediately. www.MoMAStore.org The MoMA store has some of my favorite things in it. I love the unique and modern designs, especially of their kitchen items. Whenever my husband and I go to an art museum half of the fun for me is going to the museum store and picking out cool little trinkets to add to our house. Most of it is WAY to expensive for us, but I can usually find a small thing here or there for a good deal. Luckily for me, you dont just ahve to go to MoMA (in NYC) to get their pieces; which is good since I still havent been there yet. Most museums carry some of their stuff. For instance on our honeymoon we got a salt and pepper shaker, Mondrian tumbler, and very cool clock (which hangs in my piano studio) from the art museum in Philadelphia. The salt and pepper shaker are so cute, they are just little round ceramic balls, one says "NaCl" and the

I just got back from the dentist. I've never really cared for going to the dentist, but my experiences there lately have caused me to really hate it. Weekend highlights: 1- Pianos . Definately excited about that. Now I just have to figure out how they will all fit. 2- Quickbooks . Or in my case Not-So-Quick-Books. I got it 8 months ago when I first started my business. I really tried to use it (making up my own rules), and it didnt work. So instead I established my own bookkeeping system which works pretty well (though probably not the quickest method). Finally i was convinced into trying again. This time i put effort into learning the system their way, and... after several long hours of number crunching and many trips to the Help Index... everything is caught up and working fine. If I can do it, anyone can. 3- Work ... or lack thereof. Since schools were on spring break I didnt teach a whole lot. 4- Church . I spent 5:00 am to 12:00 pm at church on sunday morning singing for the

I dont like the word blog... it reminds me of blob.

I am finally replacing my grand piano. Not that I dont love it. I did right up until the soundboard cracked (it was less than a year old). That happened about 3 months ago. Ever since then the keys having been buzzing and clicking and making all kinds of weird noises pianos arent supposed to make. I have especially been having problems with Middle C. I dont know how many people teach piano, but I can safely say that Middle C is the most commonly played key by beginning students. So 4 hours of a broken Middle C a day is just enough to make me want to rip the key out of the piano and stomp on it until it turns into a fine piano paste. But fortunately, I wont have to deal with that much longer. I decided to replace the grand with 2 (very nice) Boston uprights. I just picked them out this afternoon and can't wait until they are delivered. I figure I can hold out for a while before I get the grand of my dreams. Yesterday morning my husband told me that i woke him up in the middle of th

Current on the BebePod: Video Killed the Radio Star by the Bugles. What an awesome song Day 2 for Quickbooks. Hopefully I will get everything in order today, I have a feeling this will take a while. Tonight is Maundy Thursday at church. I'm singing in the choir for it. I dont think I've ever been to Maundy Thursdays service before. I know I've been to Good Friday a couple times. So this should be interesting. I'm looking forward to it tonight. I think we are singing some great music that will really move people. I'm glad to be a part of it. I think I'm liking this whole blogging thing. Not that I plan on publishing my entire life story online or anything. But it's fun to have an excuse to write again. I dont really get to do much of that since I graduated from college. I was one of those weird kids who really enjoyed taking notes, studying, writing papers, taking test, etc (I think we're technically referred to as "nerds"-- which

I feel like I spent all day on the computer. First I started out by organizing a few files. Then I decided to use Quickbooks; a program I purchased, oh, about 8 months ago. I tried to learn it then, but it was so complicated for me. I know nothing about accounting. But now I decided to give it another shot. My husband got me a Quickbooks for Dummies from the library, so i think having a guidebook somewhere along my level will be helpful. And actually a lot more of it did makes sense this go-around. Not that I'm some kind of expert now, but at least i have a clue as to what i'm doing. I didn't really make it too far because I kept getting interrupted. Not bad interruptions, the good kind; phone call from a friend, quick walk with the dog (in the rain, yuck), and the likes. I checked out Fr Rob's blog, he had a little question type thingie posted on his that I thought I would carry over into mine: What's next to you? Your mission, should you choose to accept

Just sitting down with my morning cup of coffee, which I have to drink black because I think the milk is starting to spoil. I've become somewhat of a milk snob after all my years working at starbucks. As soon as I can detect any sort of "milk smell" it's undrinkable. Though other people dont seem to be as sensitive. I seem to have made the coffee unusually strong today. I'll probably spend the first half of the day cleaning the house and organizing clutter, as usual. I never realized how much time cleaning consumes. I'm just glad we havent reached Mow-the-Lawn season yet. Our yard is small enough that we didnt think it was necessary to buy a lawn mower. Instead my dad gave us an old fashioned mower (you push it and the blades rotate), which really just pushes the grass down more than it cuts anything. Then we got a weed wacker, which does most of the work for us. But man, I cant stand yard work. We went into DC last weekend to go to the Hirschhorn (one of