Thoughts on teching

I can't sleep, but I have to drive my dad to an appointment at 7:00am.... so I'm going to talk about my first two days teching a marching band.

Well, first off, it is MUCH harder than I expected it to be. Trying to figure out what information or fix to give when there's SO much that can be improved is really difficult... and trying to verbalize how they should look instead of just showing (how do get someone to have good posture: show them, but they just think they're doing the right thing and don't fix anything?)

Fixing drill is a unique challenge for this program too because of the way we learn the drill. I have my own opinions on how it should be done, and even the way it's done now I think is too fast, so I don't get a lot of time to give fixes from the field. I'll be trying to fix forms and spacing and all of a sudden I hear "Next set, go!" I don't really want to yell "WAIT UP!" because then it would be perceived as slowing down the rehearsal. Plus, the rehearsal technique is generally AWFUL. We teach too fast, the students goof around too much and miss instructions and information, and that leads to awful retention. I don't know what to do about that; if I were running rehearsal, well, we'd probably do more running than rehearsing.

I'm also dealing with dot nazis and junior techs a lot. The dot nazis I want to kill (possibly could be resolved if everyone had big drill and knew what was going on), but junior teching... this might be a unique case since during the school year there are no field techs, so section leaders trying to fix what they can might have to be the way to go.

Oh and NAMES! I don't know names, so when I'm fixing a cover down, I try to eye people and get them to move, but then the wrong people move! D'oh, I need to spend some time on Facebook or something!

So what we did today was I got to teach the Factory that we did at Crown. Apparently I'm not so good at explaining things and giving directions, but I think most people got the gist of it. Hopefully they'll remember enough that we can do reps of it. I thought of it because there's a move that has a forward to backward slide change in it. If it weren't there, I would've probably taught circle drill and made people cry bloody murder!

We ended up reviewing what we taught yesterday (what a mess), and we got rained out. I asked to take the brass into the hall and did Bob Medworth's game where you do forwards and backwards direction changes to the set counts, and the front row goes back and does pushups for every mistake they made. Hopefully that actually did something and people will know what the direction changes are! We did a little bit of music with the winds and brass together, and I hung around the trombones getting them to move their feet and telling them where to breathe and stuff (breathe-dah for life!).

As for what I would change, I think we should be doing more reps, and not the forwards-backwards stuff that we do. Old-fashioned run back to set and do it again. If you think about it, we would get almost twice as many reps in that way. Plus, the way it is now, I would give a fix to someone, and they don't get a chance to redeem themselves right away.

My game plan for tomorrow: there's a 30-minute layover between the end of student-run sectionals and stretch. I'll suggest to the hornline that they get down to the field early and work on something: the Factory, memorizing music, moving to music, direction changes, ANYTHING! Thirty minutes is too valuable to throw away! Motivation: you have a performance on Friday evening, we lost half a block yesterday because of rain, I will beat your ass in rehearsal with pushups, whatever it takes.

I want to finish teaching the Factory tomorrow and do some "burns" with it: crank it to 180. They've got to get stronger and they've got to figure out what it will take to perform the show at a high level. I've got to make sure they're getting enough WATER or they'll just bag out for the rest of rehearsal when they get a little bit faint. Something to discuss with the volunteers.

I'll arrange with our vis caption head to mention something about the rehearsal technique: we miss too many directions, I can't set drill when people have their feet apart and they're squirting water on each other.

I also want to see if Hunter will let me take the brass Thursday for sectionals to put music on the field. The section leaders generall seem competent, but we need to work on what matters: getting music to feet, and putting a performance on the field for Friday, instead of just doing music runthroughs with no feet and no fixes.

This group needs to work smarter. I feel like there are a few changes that could be made that would make the group points better. We'll see what happens tomorrow. Hopefully now I can sleep now that I've tried to write down all the things going through my head. Will probably think of more tomorrow morning in the waiting room.

Carolina Crown should be 5th

Semifinals was last night. How much have I missed drum corps? Let's just say I got really really excited for 17th place Pacific Crest :)

I miss everything about drum corps and I especially miss Crown. As soon as I got to my seat, I hear "Hey Daniel what's up" and it's Preston, an ageout last year who did trailer crew with me.

I skipped BK and SCV to meet the corps. So many emotions seeing the corps march up all game face, and I wanted SO BAD to be there again. Staff members that I thought would have forgotten me came up, and I assured them I'd be marching my ageout next summer. I got the Jim Coates talk on my camera + Carolina in my Mind, I nearly lost it when they started to sing!

As for the rest of the show, I think Bluecoats are getting hosed, and SCV doesn't belong in 5th. I am OVER the Santa Clara Vanguard! And Cadets should win, I don't like the Blue Devils' show.

All other scores this season will be thrown out tonight. Who cares if you beat PR, or the Cavies and Blue Devils earlier in the season: no one remembers anything but Finals.

Here are some vids I took, my favorites of the night. Cadets and Bluecoats were up there:

In LA for Semifinals

I am not at work today, I am in LA and going to Semifinals this evening! I had my camera because I wanted to take some videos of corps in the lot, but apparently the warmup lot is a 10-minute DRIVE from the stadium! So much for that... at least I can take video of the Cadets coming on and the booing from the crowd!

A review after the show.

The home stretch

July is almost over, and I've got three weeks left in Seattle. Feels like less, since my roommate will be leaving this week, and it'll probably fly by after that with Finals week in Pasadena the following weekend, and then last week of work which will be a joke.

It's really sucked following Crown because I'm not a part of it this summer and they're doing so well. I can't wait to finally see the show at Semis, and I don't even want to think about how high that corps can get by the end of the week.

After I'm home, it's a week of working at band camp in the evening. Since it's my first time doing anything like it, and all I have to draw from is what the techs at Crown did during my summer, I'm a little worried I might expect too much or push too hard. I'll probably be the good guy rather than the bad guy that week just to play it safe. As for what I'll be telling them, probably nothing more than "Get your feet in time", "Look at this form", and "Why aren't you playing, why isn't the horn on your chops". I'm sure there's more I could help out with, but I think just being on the field fixing small sections would be points of help.

That's all I've got. Three weeks!

McLovin

My friend's girlfriend got a couple of passes to a sneak preview of Superbad (by the 40 Year-Old Virgin people). This friend Jabbers me at work about it, and after IMDB'ing it, I decide that the movie's premise on IMDB is really stupid: Two high school best friends (Jonah Hill, Michael Cera) go on a mission to provide alcohol for a graduation party in hopes of losing their virginity.

And yet I still make the trip to Bellevue after work for the movie. And the plot was indeed as silly as it seems: these two high school seniors need to get girlfriends so that they can have two solid months of sex before leaving for college (so they won't be such noobs when they get there). Think American Pie meets Girl Next Door meets Super Troopers, but WAY less mature.

The highlight of the film for us, though, were the two cops (Seth Rogen and Bill Hader) and "McLovin", the "25-year old Hawaiian organ donor". Seriously, I'm going to be making reservations for McLovin for a while.

So if you like dirty and crude humor (you'd better, that's basically all they've got), then go download this movie. I can't see it being as popular as 40 Year-Old Virigin (haven't seen it), and it runs a little long. I'd probably watch it again if I didn't have to pay money for it.

HARRY POTTER

So yesterday I played paintball for the first time with a group of interns. As much fun as it was to yell Halo quotes and crouch and slide and shit, paintballs REALLY fucking hurt! Got shot in the knee once that really hurt, once in the wrist, once in the chest, and one right in the goggles when I stood up to take a peek. While it was really fun and really challenging once I figured out how to move around correctly, I don't think it'd be something I'd want to take seriously. I'd play again in the future though.

And when I came home, HARRY POTTER WAS WAITING FOR ME. Just finished about thirty minutes ago. I can't believe it's all over. Almost feels like the emotional crash after coming home from tour.

Speaking of tour, OH MY GOD CAROLINA CROWN! Fifth place, beating the Phantom Phucking
Regiment! Next on this apparent drum corps hitlist is the Bluecoats, but I almost don't want them to pass them because I would like the pleasure myself to do that next season and stick it right back in their face.

So now I guess it's back to playing video games and reading the BK Lounge book.

License to Wed

So I saw License to Wed tonight with a couple of friends I've met here. It was okay, for a romantic comedy. I mean, Robin Williams can do no wrong, and Mandy Moore is, well, Mandy Moore. The girl from Dodgeball and Zoolander, or the girl who was Melody on Hey Dude, (apparently Christine Taylor, but you will always be Melody in my heart) was really fucking skinny and really fucking orange. Gross...

Santa Clara beat Crown tonight. Saw an ad for the Quarterfinals broadcast... got sad because I'm not helping Crown get better. :[

Drum corps literature

So since Amazon is paying me buttloads of money this summer to not do drum corps, I decided to give back and purchase the two drum corps books on the site.

The first book I started to read was On the field from Denver, Colorado...The Blue Knights! It reads pretty much like someone's journal or blog, and I've only read about 30 pages. Personally, it's not that interesting since it goes into a lot of detail and I already know exactly what's going on ("Ohhhh my god it's so hot" and "Ohhhhh my god I'm in so much pain"), and talks a little too much about grab-ass time for my tastes. Most of the reviews on Amazon are from older former marching members, so they're much more nostalgic and enjoyed it more, but being only a year removed from the experience, it's nothing thrilling. Maybe I'm STILL bitter about being 8th... but I doubt that's it. I'll probably like it more in a few years once I've been in real life for a while.

What I read today in about 2-3 hours was The Lorin Solo, which is the "BD" book, but it stands much better on its own as a novel. I guess I could relate to the main character, the 20-year old hopeless romantic (me much more hopeless than romantic, but obviously I'm not exactly going to be looking out here in Seattle), and I enjoyed it much more than what I read of the BK Lounge book because it doesn't really go into the gory details that I'm not interested in anymore and focuses more on telling a good story. It's a little weird that they talk about marching members that are married... maybe just because the people in Crown are much younger than most of the big boys. But like someone on Amazon said, if someone wants to make a movie about drum corps, they should do something like this, especially the part about a fine for saying "band" instead of "corps".

So I think I'd recommend the BK book for people who want to know what it's like to do drum corps or for the nostalgic FMMs, and I'd recommend the BD book for everyone else who'd like something to read on a plane and who think drum corps is kind of cool but who would be bored to tears by me going on about it.

I wish there were a book that could capture the essence of what it's like to march but not have be as long-winded as the Blue Knights book, and not really technical so that it just sounds like band camp. Maybe like a collection of vignettes, picking out the highs and lows and skipping the days where the same thing happened as before. The kind of things Matt and Klesch would talk about when we ask them to tell us a Star story or a Cadets story. Next summer I'm definitely keeping a journal on tour for something like this.

This is me trying to stave off real life, but I really wish I were marching right now.

Apparently I'm really good at poker

So every Wednesday we have an intern poker game, usually $0.10/0.20 no limit game, max $10 buy-in. I lost $20 the first week, won a $5 tournament w/ buy-ins the next week for $36 (net 26, +6 for the year), and then last week won about $62 because I got really hot. So I'm thinking this week I'll be pretty lucky to break even by the end of the night...

Well, there were a few bad plays, but let me give you a sample of some of the ridiculousness:
Preflop someone goes all in after my reraise and also gets a call, it only costs me about $6 more (my raise was about $5 with 66). Of course I run into AA and 88. Flop gives an 8, but then the turn gives me an open ended straight draw, and of course I draw out. +$20 there.

And then after that, I get 99 on the big-blind and raise and get two callers. Flop comes 223, so I'm pretty sure no one hits. I bet $10, and the guy to my left absolutely flips out, so I'm figuring he doesn't have a big hand, but I know he doesn't think I hit it because I've garnered a reputation for only playing "quality cards', so he probably doesn't have high pair. He goes all in for about $10 more, guy folds and I call. Turns over AK. He hits an A on the turn, and then.... a 9 comes out. Geez...

I'm obviously REALLY talented at poker since I knew I would win those hands in the end.

+60 for the night. Paid for the groceries I just bought. +118 for the year in four sessions.

Week 1

I've been in Seattle for a week now, and the rumors about the weather have been greatly exaggerated; it's been 80 and sunny the entire week. I'm living smack in the middle of downtown and the environment's, let's say not as busy as somewhere like New York but not even close to as shitty as somewhere like Pittsburgh.

As for work, I feel like that crappy intern on Scrubs who works in the morgue: I don't know what I'm supposed to be doing, none of my computers work, and when I do try to do something I completely blow it or something just breaks again. Software dev suuuuuucks so far... but hopefully very soon I can start being productive. At least everyone on my team's pretty chill, but right now the voice in the back of my head is starting to whisper "You're blowing it, you're blowing it...", even though people have told me it might even take two weeks for new SDE's to make any real contributions.

In other news, I am a witness to the King.

"Death to all rapists"

So I read this on the N&O online about an editorial in the NCCU slamming the dismal of the Duke lacrosse case, calling for physical retaliation. Here's an excerpt:

"I am not surprised at the outcome of this case. As a son of Africa, I know that American law is not worth the paper it is written on," he wrote, adding later in the column: "White people still murder us with impunity. White people still beat us with impunity. White people still rape us and get away with it."

I was not suprised by the outcome either, especially after DNA tests all came out negative and the girl didn't know what she was talking about. And I mean, this guy couldn't possibly be biased:

In 2000 and 2001, he served a 13-month prison sentence after pleading no contest to charges of robbing two Duke students at gunpoint and then violating the terms of his probation.

I can't believe the editor of this paper ran this. If you don't want his opinion to reflect the views of your paper and university, let him find his own forum, especially when calling for violence against others. That's not so intellectual, is it? Maybe you, writer, should go somewhere else if you're not so big on how things are done here, somewhere you're free to mug people, and where everyone should just police each other on a whim? I can't imagine what that would be like.

The push

My weekend was quite good. Now it's time for the push, the home stretch.

Physics exam tonight that I don't really know what's going on for, but I think an 80 will be good.

Opti exam Friday that I'm pretty sure will be ownage machine because it's a joke.

Algo hw presentation tomorrow which hopefully I won't blow (but I'm not worried most about me).

213 lab next week due, and then we're HOME FREE to the most electrifying two weeks of the semester:

Tu May 8 1-4 36-226 final (stats)
Tu May 8 5:30-8:30 15-451 final (algo)
Th May 10 1-4 15-213 final
Fr May 11 1-4 21-257 final (opti)

Tu May 15 8:30-11:30 33-114 final (physics)

I am an OWNAGE MACHINE.

I still <3 Gilbert Arenas

I was reading about how the Wizards suck, and then I decided to check in on my boy Gilbert Arenas's blog. STILL MONEY! He gripes how he can't do shit with his kids, how all he does is play video games, and how he couldn't go see his Halo 2 team Final Boss win MLG Charlotte.

Here's a piece of gold from shortly after he got hurt:
I told them to cut the leg off a couple times. You know, cut it off and then bring it back to me when it was all healed. Because, you know, Heather Mills on Dancing with the Stars, she had that leg. I was saying I could borrow one of those and finish out the season. But they wasn’t going for that.

Btw, WHO THE HELL IS HEATHER MILLS?! Why are there so many shitheads on that show and Shandi Finnessey is NOT on that show? Even if she apparently has two left feet (I have not seen her dance, I catch only bits and pieces), but she's looks sooooo much better than that the Achey Breaky Heart dude.

Get well soon, Agent Zero. Win the East next year.

"But we were on a break!"

Today I'm supposed to give a trombone demo in my Physics of Musical Sound class. The only thing is that I haven't played trombone since November and haven't actually PRACTICED trombone since maaaybe about August (don't remember if I played much after tour, I was pretty burnt out).

So last night I decided to lug the axe over to a practice room and give it a go. Luckily the thing kind of still functions (the trigger is kind of borked...), but man was I bad. I thought I'd maybe still have a little bit of the edge I used to have when I played it, but response was killing me, and the range (which was already bad) was not there. And it started to hurt to play after about 30 minutes.

Dammit, I miss having the time to practice a lot so that actually playing trombone would be FUN. Junior year I practiced a lot and thus played really well and had a lot of fun.

Senior year I practiced about half of what I did junior year and didn't have as much fun because I'd really really be hurting after rehearsals.

Last November when I was preparing for drum corps auditions I practiced trombone a lot and thought I was nearly as good as I used to be, and luckily it was good enough for me to keep going with drum corps. The summer rolls along and while it still hurt to play, I think I just learned to forget about it (sort of like what you do with the physical pain of doing the show: forget about it and just enjoy yourself).

Then this fall I don't practice at all and I end up hurting a lot in Kiltie Band... and not really having a lot of fun playing. Of course I don't play in anything this semester because Kiltie Band is NOT something worth getting good for, because no one else will, but I'm sure I've already expressed my feelings about it to many, but basically if you're not trying to get better, why are you trying? Sometimes I wish I could be like some people who just have fun playing the horn without caring how it sounds, but then I realize they really really suck at playing their horn and would rather not play than be satisfied with shit.

Not so sure when I'll pick up the horn again... definitely will have to next Fall for Crown auditions (not sure where I'll stand, so I'm pretty much looking at myself as a rookie trying to grab a spot). Then I practice baritone a lot for camps, then the summer tour, and then I'm not sure.

I like how I have Physics homework due Wednesday, the last day of school before Carnival (assigned today, no less), and then an exam the next day after Carnival. That makes a whole lot of sense, especially when you generally want people to do well. And I'll probably also have to grade programs over this break. So much for a relaxing week at home.