Country Night

Last semester, my friend Ally was lamenting to me that she never got to go out and take advantage of the fabulous live music scene here in Austin. Deciding it was a good idea to climb out of our dark little university holes, Ally found us a show and out we went!

We went to Antone's, which is a venue on 5th street, and somewhere I had never been before. It was pretty much everything a music venue could be - stage, dance floor, and two very long bars with booze aplenty.

The Turnpike Troubadours opened, and had some really fun, catchy songs. Ally knew some of them, I just pretended I did.

While we were dancing and enjoying the music, my love of fiddlers was rekindled. String instruments fascinate me... violins and fiddles are so expressive and I wish I knew how to play. Anyway, any man with a fiddle is my new best friend, (since it's not exactly cool to be a groupie of the fiddler in the band...)

After the Turnpike Troubadours, Jason Boland took the stage with the only song I knew of his ("Blowing through the hills", which is super catchy and highlights my new favorite instrument!) and the rest of the night was filled with more dancing and singing.

I think my new favorite thing about going to live shows is the way that people raise their drinks more frequently toward the end of the show. The more they drink, the more they toast.

(FYI the Lone Star wasn't mine. I was "classy" and drank Dos Equis instead.)

(Also, let the record stand that for the first time in my life I was bought a drink by someone who was neither related to me NOR my friend prior to the concert. Momentous moments, indeed.)

An update long overdue

Hello, darling readers!

This update has been long overdue. I haven't been interested in blogging recently because I guess I've been more interested in living my life than writing about it. It's not to say that I haven't thought about it, just that I haven't been able to draw the words up out of me and pour them onto the page. I've long been considering what I want this blog to be, but every time I try and change it, it does not happen. Perhaps because of my readers, perhaps because of me.

The fall semester ended catastrophically, (to be a little dramatic - in reality, it only ended catastrophically to me, having began with high hopes). I didn't fail anything, but I sure didn't get the grades I wanted to get. I could have done better, perhaps if I had sacrificed sleep and entirely replaced my blood supply with coffee. I'm pretty sure I was running on caffeine by the time finals ended.

My friend Danny (from Las Vegas) came to visit after finals ended. It was the first time we'd met face to face ever... in the nine years that we've been speaking on the phone and on the internet, I never expected things to head south so fast. We haven't talked in more than a month; I don't think our friendship is going to ever be the same again. He, as a person, disappointed me, but that was bound to happen, as we had both built the other up over so many years of communication. The odd thing was that the things I found endearing and interesting about him over the internet (like that he is incredibly creative and inquisitive about anything and everything) I found annoying and abrasive when he was here. He hurt me and I hurt him. C'est la vie, I suppose. I hope he is doing well.

Christmas was awesome. Super awesome. Beyond awesome. I loved everything about it: being home with my family, the gifts I received, being away from the city... It was exactly the reset button I needed.

I went with Mom and Duncan to visit Gramma for her birthday on the 14th. We came back the 17th, and I found it ironic (and a little disappointing) that it began to snow as we were literally getting on the plane. Mom was glad that it didn't snow... I was hoping that I could dance around in it at least a little bit. Seeing Gramma was awesome - I didn't realize how much I missed her in the last three or four years since I was last in Maryland.

School resumed on the 18th (so, a week ago) and is already in full swing. No easing in for my professors, it would seem. I'm taking twelve hours this semester (Shakespeare, Children's Literature, English Grammar, and a theology course called "The Bible and its Interpreters") and so far I am really enjoying the classes and staying on top of everything. At the moment, I'm taking a break from reading the Bible to write this blog. I figured I'd take advantage of the desire to blog while I could.

On a completely different note (and one I just have to write down to sort out my thoughts on the subject... So sorry if none of this makes no sense at all), Ally and I have been anticipating the release of the latest Karen Marie Moning book for quite some time now. Moning is a fantasy/romance author who wrote one of my favorite series of romance novels (about Scottish highlanders... cliche, I know.) The thing that drew me to her books was the way that all seven of those books were interconnected. There was a larger reigning plot to those books that had to do with some Irish mythology about the Tuatha De Danann, supposed faeries and settlers of Ireland long ago. Each book layered upon the other the framework for this second series, the Fever series. Instead of what I expected (more romance), it turned out to be so much better. In these books, the darker race of Tuatha De Danann faeries (the Unseelie) had escaped their prisons when the magical wall (erected by the Seelie, to protect mankind) between man and faerie fell, and had designs on ruling the world. The main character, MacKayla (Mac) began the series as this sweet young woman from Georgia, all rainbows and sunshine, and finishes the series as the complete opposite, getting progressively darker and more jaded as the books go on.

So Ally and I have been hypothesizing and guessing and attempting to figure out the fifth book, Shadowfever, for ages. Last Friday, we finally got to sit down and read the darned book (in one sitting - 600 pages took us 8 1/2 hours to read), and I have to say it was simultaneously one of the most enjoyable and frustrating experiences of my life to read this book with her. We both had our own copy of it and read it on opposite ends of my couch. We read at about the same speed (very fast), so it wasn't so hard to keep up with each other. Moning blew me away with the plot twists and reveals. I, usually a quiet reader, exclaimed aloud, screamed profanities, and nearly threw it across the room a few times (Mac made some really dumb decisions throughout the book, to put it mildly). In the end, I think it ended exactly as it should have - although I spent the entire book wondering how it could not end in disaster. It certainly looked like there would not be anything good for her ever again. It kept me guessing until (quite literally) the last few chapters, when everything - or most things - were revealed and explained.

I can't wait to see what Moning has up her sleeves next. In the meantime, I'm going to dream of the day when I can reread the books and go back to catch everything that I didn't get the first time around. (A lot, I would imagine!)

For now, I will leave you to return to my studies. I have the book of Deuteronomy, two acts of Midsummer Night's Dream, and a book called Sign of the Beaver to read tonight.

I promise another update soon. Possibly with more specifics about my classes.