*sigh* Why now?!

Okay, so I just spent two hours at a car dealership in Cedar Falls...

I was driving to my field experience in Waterloo when I noticed that Leah's car no longer was blowing any heat, even though I had it set on high. I tried the different heat settings and nothing was coming out of the vents at all. I looked at the console and noticed that the engine temperature gage was all the way to the right, past the red "critical" section. Leah has lots of notifications on her car's dashboard that light up, but really don't mean anything... Like the "check engine light".... So I wasn't sure if this meant anything.

As I continued to drive along I noticed that the steering wheel had become really hard to turn, which was bad, because I was getting into the part of Waterloo/Cedar Falls where the highway has a lot of alternating curves. The engine gage was still all the way to the right, so I took an exit off the highway and pulled over to the side of the road. I turned the car off to let the engine cool down.

I called Leah and left a message and then I called Rachel V. who told me to call Margie in the FAC to see if Leah was around. I got a hold of Leah, through Margie's phone. Leah suggested adding coolant, but I didn't want to get out of the car, unless I had to... Because there were still vehicles driving by. Because it had happened to our old van when I was little, I knew that the power-steering had gone out at the very least.

Halfway through the phone conversation with Leah, I looked out the window and the county sheriff is parked beside me. I promise to call Leah back and I explained to the officer my problems. We opened the hood and he pointed out that the alternator belt had come off.

I didn't want to call a tow truck, because those are freaking expensive, so the sheriff led me to the closest car service place, which happened to be a dealership in Cedar Falls. I followed him and he helped me get my car to the garage.

It was really scary driving the car on the highway, because it had started to snow and I had no power-steering and no heat and I was scared that the car was going to blow up because of the temperature gage.

So it turns out that the power-steering pulley shattered and damaged the alternator belt. I had to wait for the mechanics to fix the car and I didn't get to go to field experience. It was really awkward to sit in the lobby and try not to cry and fail.

...I have two major papers due tomorrow. ...

Plus the bill for fixing the car was almost $200. Leah's paying me back, but still. Holy smokes. What a stupid piece of machinery.

Crazy weather...

LUCY: And when it's cold and winter is upon us, the snow comes up, Just like the flowers.

CHARLIE BROWN: I know that's wrong. Snow doesn't come up,it comes down.

LUCY: After it comes up, the wind blows it around so it looks like it's coming down but actually it comes upout of the ground- like grass. It comes up, Charlie Brown, snow comes up! -Little Known Facts, from You're a Good Man Charlie Brown

-That's exactly what it looks like outside right now...

S-A-D

Dear God,

Please bring back the sun. I hate the clouds. Do you realize how hard you are making it to get out of bed and just get through the day in general?

Along those same lines, please stop making it snow. I need to get to my field experience in Waterloo and I can't when the roads are bad. I can deal with the cold, but not the snow and ice. So just make it stop. Send it to Canada or something. I'm sure they wouldn't notice.

And please help me pass my Ed Psych test on Wednesday.

Some love,
Sarah

It's almost the weekend...

Sooooooo I just realized that I will be able to watch Doctor Who in ENGLAND on the real BBC! Not illegally on the internet! Another super bonus for the England Literary Tour! :-D

In other news:

Using paper tests to evaluate a class of 25 first graders = mass chaos. If it was not part of a requirement for one of my Ed Psych papers I wouldn't have done it at all. 7-year-olds do not like to sit still. (Although I knew this... Haha... Stephen.....) ;-) But it's over with and I survived. About 3 of the students I taught told me I was pretty while I was handing out the tests. It was cute. :-) (If they were any older, I would have thought they were trying to butter me up so that I would give them a better grade on the test.)

I have consumed more coffee/mountain dew/caffine in general this week than the whole school year combined. I just drank a cup of it now and I'm still fighting sleepyness. I need to go to bed! Buuuuut I can't. :-P Lame.

Busy life...

My life is not my own...

I have an oboe playing test tomorrow, and I really hope I don't throw up and/or pass out. THAT'S how much trouble I have playing the oboe.

I teach my lesson to a class of 1st grade general music students. Am I nervous? Oh, yes I am. But I like kids and I'm excited about my lesson. I will survive.

I have two 50 point papers due next Friday, both which, according to the teacher, could end up being eight pages long.

I have an Ed Psych test on Wednesday that I absolutely MUST do well on, or my future life a Wartburg is literally at stake. Good grief, this class is hard, and it is kicking my butt.

I have I *heart* Music Day this Saturday Morning and then Band Run Out the rest of Saturday and Sunday. (The Wartburg Symphonic band is going to play in Des Moines, so if you are in the area and would like to go, tell me!)

It's Rachel V.'s Birthday on Saturday, and I'm not going to be here. :-(

I've only been able to get about 6 hours of sleep a night with all the stuff I have to do.




Sometimes I think I am going insane. I want it to be break, but the stuff I have to do to get TO break.... AHHHHH!!!!



I just want to platonically cuddle. That's it. And watch warm-fuzzy movies.

Weekend list...

1. Write test for 1st grade classroom for Educational Psychology.

2. Write journal Review for Ed Psych.

3. Article review for Conducting.

4. Read for 20th Century Music.

5. Type up Oboe/Bassoon notes.

6. Practice oboe and flute.

7. Complete Oboe/Bassoon take-home test.

8. Write questions to research Lou Henry assessment methods, for Ed Psych.

9. Wash bed sheets.

10. Practice conducting.

11. Read for Ed Psych.


AND, I just got a letter from Wartburg's Education Department saying that they have accepted my student teaching application and I am cleared to student teach next fall! w00t! :-D

Two things... One very funny, the other kind of funny in a sad, sickening sort of way...

Behold the music major glee that is this weekend's FoxTrot comic! :-D


















This makes me lauuuuuuuuuuuuugh! :-D I would totally play this, if it really did exist!




Here's the other thing. My friend Oliver from NZ sent it to me. I hope you all are able to read it. You can click to make it bigger.















That's just one of those things that make you go.... "Oooooooh man... SUCKS to be youuuuuuu!" But still.... To have that happen.... It makes me feel a little sick inside...

A note to myself...

Tonight I went to the Fainting Goat for a bit with some friends. We ordered mozzarella sticks and "onion blades" (which are like onion rings, but sliced differently) and we sat there and chatted. It was kind of random but fun. Good food. We also analyzed the music that the bar was playing and talked about some of the selections played over the sound system and talked about how old we were when they first came out.

This is the first time I've been in a bar since I turned 21 back in September. AND the first time I ever went up to the bar and ordered something alcoholic to drink. What I really wanted was a mojito, buuuut evidentially they don't make them at the Goat. (Lame.) So the only drink I could think of was a Cosmo. (Which is vodka, cranberry juice, and triple-sec... --I looked it up.) And so I ordered one.

Which was stupid.

Because I don't like Cosmos!

I don't like cranberry, and I definitely don't like feeling the burn of alcohol. Yes, I'm a wimp. But I don't care. I like sweet things.

And I still don't know why I ordered a Cosmo! I didn't even think that it would taste any different!

Never again!


Bleeeh.


I'm going to make a list of what needs to be done tomorrow and then go to bed. Oh, my gosh, it's the weekend. Life is good. Or at least, better.

Getting through life...

First of all, I just went and saw the new VeggieTales movie. It was really cute. :-) I had no car so I walked, by myself, in the 16 degree weather. But I enjoyed myself.



Second of all I read this really awesome limerick-like rhyme in a book about the history of farting while I stopped in the campus bookstore today:

There once was a man from Sparta,
Who really was an excellent farter,
On the strength of one bean,
He'd expel "God Save the Queen"
And Beethoven's "Moonlight Sonata." -Anonymous

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA! :-D

Okay, so I'm really childish, because I think that rhyme is HILARIOUS!



Third, I learned a lot in conducting today. Mainly how to conduct measures that are written in simple time, but are really meant to be in compound time.

Fourth, we sightread a new piece in band today and it was hard, but a good time. Doc came over at one point to show me something interesting in his conducting score, and that was cool. :-)

Fifth, I had a pretty good flute lesson today even though I had hardly practiced at all.

Sixth, Brach's Conversation Hearts equal love! On my way home from the movie I stopped at our local grocery store and bought their last 4 bags. :-)

Seventh, I have a test in Ed Psych on Friday. Lame.

4, 3, 12

Today in conducting Doc told us to figure out where exactly a half-note triplet figure lies within a 4/4 meter in a Holsinger score that we're studying for the next class time. As he was talking and restating the assignment and a lot of people were figuratively scratching their heads my brain clicked and I figured it out and scribbled out a couple subdivisions in my score which basically answered the assignment right there. And as I looked back up Doc caught my eye and winked at me as he asked if there were any questions about the assignment.

I win, I win, I win! :-D



I love being a music major.




In other news:

Company, the Stephen Sondheim musical I saw in New York last May has been filmed by Great Performances and will be aired on Iowa Public Television next Wednesday! Check your local listings! It's a great show! Raul Esparza is pretty much made of awesome!

The wind chill is WHAT now?!

This is Margie and me returning from the FAC at about 7pm tonight. In case you don't know, it's incredibly cold outside here in Iowa! There was a wind chill of -24F at noon today! (And you can't really tell, but both Margie and I are wearing two scarves.)

Brrr!

Excerpt...

____
A small voice constantly reminds her,
That there is someone out there waiting.
But she wishes other people would stop telling her so.
She’s tired of the sympathetic looks,
The quiet nights alone,
And the books with the happy endings.
She wants the guy to get the girl,
But the fiction drags on,
And creates a reverse frustration.
Reality makes her cynical,
And she laughs at the world as she spreads her sarcasm,
Hiding inside are the echoes of her loneliness.

..Because alone is alone. Not alive...

(c) Sarah Schnoebelen 11-22-07
_____________

My roommate is never here on the weekends. She always, always goes and spends it with her fiancé.


Sometimes I think it would be nice to run away just to have a time where I'm not surrounded by people who are in relationships.

I've gotten really good at pretending I care, when sometimes I really don't.


I need a break from life.