according to weather.com, it feels like -15 *F in boston right now. brr.

The pressure is on. Well, more than before... Basically, a postdoc in Tom Steitz's lab is working on the very project that I am. Supposedly - though this was stated very ambiguously - he already got a crystal of this complex (I have not been able to get this yet). His crystal didn't diffract well though, which means the current crystal he has doesn't mean much. But this really blows :( My stress level has gone up exponentially in the past few days, if that was even possible.

Yay! I'm starting the crystallization screening process. Here's to hoping I get something pretty.

------------------

On a completely different note, Hilary Hahn's bow control is top notch. Really! In the 3rd movt of her Sibelius, the opening bow stroke (which... I have to say is very difficult) is incredible. I feel like I can actually hear the bow gripping on the violin strings and producing a "sticky" sound, while still being rhythmically sharp. But when it comes to melodic passages, I think her playing is the epitome of the "endless bow" notion. In her latest Bach album, sure, people say that you shouldn't play Bach that way, but I think it's beautiful! All the notes are crystal clear, her intonation is perfect as always, and I can't hear her bow change at all, whether it's in the midst of crazy 16th notes or long, melodious, slurred notes. Everything is so continuous, and shaped beautifully.

Nikolaj Znaider, playing with the BSO led by Sir Colin Davis, playing the hour long Elgar violin concerto = tonight. Though... I have to admit: this is one of the violin concertos I'm really unfamiliar with. Because it's an hour long piece (double the usual length), it always seemed too daunting to get through.

I bought 3 CD's today! I usually buy used CD's on amazon because they are soooo much cheaper, but I bought CD's at B&N today... (1) physical purchasing at stores = stress relief, and (2) Hilary Hahn CD's don't seem to get too cheap online anyway. So, I bought:

• Hilary Hahn's Schoenberg & Sibelius
• Hilary Hahn's Bach: Violin & Voice
• Ashkenazy's Rachmaninov selections

The outer movements to the Sibelius are... fantastic. Mindblowing. The second movement, not so much, for me anyway. I can't really stand the Schoenberg yet. It's just... :-/ Ick.

The Violin & Voice album is interesting. The compositional style is all very Baroque, of course, but the sound I'm hearing... not so much. Well. The presence of a harpsichord/organ makes it feel very baroque-ish... but the very continuous, "sticky" sound that's really typical of Hilary adds an interesting twist. I guess I've gotten really used to hearing solo Bach in a romanticized manner, but not as much in this category (arias and duets from mostly cantatas). I'm not surprised though :)

---------------

I wish life would slow down a little! 

Ana: okay, not to stress you out, but have you thought about what you're gonna apply to?

 me: ANAAAAAA

lskjdflksjkfldjlsdkfjkfs x-(

 Ana: hahaha

  ok ok

  NVMMMM

 me: that's like asking a girl how much she weighs

 Ana: HAHAHAHA

Hm. Okay. So that was that. It's creepy how fast time is going by though. Holy crap, it's already past mid-January 2010!! I don't know where time goes anymore.

Concert Review time :)

So... I was crazy and went to both the dress rehearsal and the concert. Let me start with the dress rehearsal:

It was supposed to start at 7:30pm. There was a pre-concert lecture starting at 6:45pm. Of course, running late from lab, I made it there by 6:50pm. The entire Symphony Hall was 80% full at that point... already. So I had to sit in the back. The conductor (Koopman) didn't wear a microphone, so I could barely hear anything he said during the rehearsal, but the great majority of the rehearsal was a full-run through of the piece, followed by ~10-20 minutes of rehearsing particular spots. It was pretty cool; it reminds you that even BSO-caliber musicians are mortal beings who wear jeans and t-shirts outside of a concert setting :P But at the same time, it felt weird: it's kinda like... having an orchestra rehearsal, and having hundreds of people in the audience observing you at work, like animals in a zoo. It's a funny concept.

Anyhow, this program consisted of:

1. Haydn's Symphony No. 98

2. Haydn Cello Concerto No. 1

3. CPE Bach's Symphony in G

4. Schubert's "Unfinished" Symphony.

Soloist: Yo Yo Ma

Conductor:  Ton Koopman

The pre-concert lecture was very cool. They played snippets of each piece/movement, while explaining some of the musical motifs and analysis, historical background, info about the composer, time period, etc. It's funny because for the Haydn Concerto, they played segments of Jacqueline du Pre's recording of the Haydn... and as you might imagine (or not), Yo Yo Ma has a completely different interpretation of the piece, so it made me laugh that they picked Jackie's recording as an example.

------------------------------

Haydn's Symphony No. 98: I am not well-educated in symphonic repertoire... and I've never heard this piece before. And all I could think was, jesus, Haydn wrote how many symphonies?! But... it was well performed :) Pretty light and full of character. And I found it amusing that the harpsichord has a big solo in the 4th movement, which lasts about 3 lines on the score. So for the entire Symphony (first on the program), Koopman conducted with the harpsichord in front of him, and when it was time for the solo, he sat down and played crazy stuff for about <30 seconds, and immediately got up to resume conducting. And of course, before the cello concerto, they took away the harpsichord and put up a podium instead. And the poor harpsichord tuner had to tune the harpsichord during intermission before the CPE Bach's Symphony (both during the dress rehearsal and the concert).

For the first three pieces of the program, only the reduced version of the BSO strings section performed. That is, about 14 violinists, maybe 6 violists, 3 cellists, and 2 bassists. For the Schubert, a couple of more people joined in each strings section, but still it wasn't the complete BSO. Interestingly, none of the usual section leaders were in this program, including Malcolm Lowe.

Haydn's Cello Concerto: So... I think Yo Yo Ma deserves another section dedicated to him. But I'll just say... his performance was just what I expected from what I've seen of his performances on youtube, and I hate the way he plays. Haha :) But... he's undeniably good, of course. His interpretation was very skewed to the side of "historically accurate" performance, which I hate. But it was interesting because it wasn't completely faithful to that. It actually incorporated the aspects of "historically accurate" interpretation that I hate... but with an addition of the harshness of what I'd consider a more "modern" interpretation. By that, I mean, he had all the old-fashioned aspects: extremely swift bows, [too much] swelling of notes, some rhythmic modifications on 16th notes, and most of all, playing with the orchestra when it's marked "tutti." But... his playing was so harsh and rough-edged at some points, that it was a little weird.

Yo Yo Ma: He makes grunting noises when he plays. Actually, it's kind of a cross between grunting and snoring sound, I can't quite describe it accurately. But... I could tell that the people in the first few rows were a little disturbed by it. Hahaha. One thing I have to say is, everything he does on the cello feels so vertical. The way he bows, the way he puts a bow down on the string to start a note, how he plays chords, and most significantly, how he moves when he plays. I don't know if anyone's noticed, but sometimes his cello goes so vertical, almost like that of a bass player. Also, his left fingers always collapse so much, which is usually categorized as "bad cello playing." Of course, Rostropovich did that to some extent, too. But they both somehow manage to play extremely well... so, whatever works I guess :)

Conclusion: I'm not the biggest fan of Yo Yo Ma, mostly interpretation wise, but he was interesting to watch, nonetheless.

Encore Encore! Yo Yo Ma played Bach Cell Suite No. 6 Sarabande as the encore. It was quite beautiful, actually. Very difficult... very well played :)

The Davidov Stradivarius: Yo Yo Ma currently plays on the Davidov Stradivarius (ie. the first of the TWO Strads that were gifted to Jacqueline du Pre). Jackie switched to another Strad after playing with the Davidov for a few years because of it's "unpredictability." To that, Yo Yo Ma said: "Jackie's unbridled dark qualities went against the Davydov. You have to coax the instrument. The more you attack it, the less it returns". Well, I think Yo Yo Ma attacked the Davidov plenty of times in the Haydn! But anyway, this cello... is such a work of art. It was *beautiful*. It made me want to drool just looking at it :)

Okay, I think I am going to stop the concert review here. The CPE Bach piece, I wasn't familiar with, and I didn't think it was particularly memorable. The Schubert was... the Schubert :) It's a beautiful piece, mesmerizing!

Yo Yo Ma decided to join in at the back of the cello section during the Schubert, it was funny :) But I guess he really loves the orchestra!

I'm too tired to write an actual entry, but here are some random notes:
--> It is getting too cold in Boston :( I feel like my face is about to fall off.
--> I squirted some e.coli cell lysate on myself today. It was disgusting.
--> me: ahh lunch was excellent
      now i cannot wait for dinner
      haha
      Ana: hahahha
      we think way too much alike, it scares me sometimes

Haha, apparently, every year Tom tells everyone "Successful and Happy New Year! and in that order :)"

At our group meeting today, we had a new postdoc candidate come present his stuff as part of his interview day. He's from Germany, and he's currently a grad student with a PI who was one of Tom's "star students" from many years ago! Haha, pretty cool, all these connections! His presentation was really very good, and to imagine that came from a 4th year grad student (or maybe starting his 5th year this January, I think?) was pretty crazy. So much clean data, so much knowledge on his own project and all the publications in the field, what he wants to try next, what's questionable, etc.

His presentation was also very entertaining =):

"This protein structure, however, doesn't have the supercoiled helix motif as we imagined, and actually looks like a piece of tortellini."

"Here's a sausage diagram of the protein structure."

"It seems that the probability of getting a protein to crystalize is inversely proportional to our interest in their biological function!"    (how true!)

"... [trying to say "specifically" in the middle of a sentence towards the end of the presentation, getting tongue-tied]... speciFIca... speCIficity-ally... er, speciFIcality... erm, [reading off of the slide syllable-by-syllable] s-pe-ci-fi-cal-li-t... huh? ...you know what I mean! Anyway!..."

Haha, but as a non-native English speaker, I can attest to the fact that saying "specifically" vs "specificity" are very difficult!

Happy 2010!

I head back to Boston tomorrow (or today...) evening :(
Saturday 6pm train, arriving in Boston on Sunday  ~7:30am.


Today, I watched more footage of the famous Trout quintet performed by one of the most powerful compilation of soloists (or at least one of the most fantastic combinations):
- Itzhak Perlman, violin
- Pinchas Zuckerman, viola
- Jacqueline du Pre, cello
- Zubin Mehta, bass
- Daniel Baremboim, piano
There was such, such, incredible talent and energy in that room/stage, it was ridiculous.

I wonder who reads my posts.

Anyway... On reflection, 2009 was quite a year:

The oh-god-last-semester-of-undergrad + med school craze --> DMP recital where I played some crazy stuff (did I really do that?!) --> graduation (holy crap, 2009 always seemed so far in the future) --> the awful summer of 2009 where... wow, don't let me get started on those brats again --> getting a "job" (sigh, the "real world"?) and getting my first real "salary" (or, pity pay) --> being in *Boston* --> finally getting to playing the cello.

All of this, mixed in with plenty of crappy situations with too many people and a truly, truly strange turn of events with a few. Hm, better luck next year?

My posts are so scattered! Often it's because I don't update enough (or maybe that's a lie), so I have little bits of multiple thoughts I end up writing about. All in one post. But here it goes...

String Review, Continued: As of today, the two sets of strings are getting closer to each other. The Larsens are getting a little more lively while the Spirocores are getting darker. The C string is getting a little too dark already for my taste, too "grr." However, the G & C strings still have their metallic edge. Sigh. I'll give them a few more days of hardcore playing :)

According to Benjamin, my Korean-ness sometimes shows in my English! Who knew that "fiction" cannot be pluralized! Heh, don't answer that. This reminds me how one of my high school friends was really bothered whenever I said "yesterday night" and told me that it's common practice in English to say "last night" although it's fine to say "yesterday morning" or "tomorrow night." But of course, it's abnormal to say "last morning" or "next night." What a strange language.

Cello Strings Trial #1: Larsen Medium A & D + Thomastik-Infeld Spirocore Tungsten G & C.

Ok, let me begin by saying that I don't think these trials will go far, seeing as how ridiculously expensive cello strings are. But these -- I purchased these strings ~3 years ago for some reason. I'm sure the prices have gone up since then, but currently, they cost: $248.60. But since they've just been sitting on my shelf, I figured why not try it now.

It's mainly the tungsten strings that cost nearly a $100 per string. But I hear that they don't need to be chanced for... ever. As in, they're good for a few years without the sound getting weak and muddy (as opposed to, well, at least on the violin the general rule of thumb is to change strings every 120 hours of playing). The tungsten-core strings have great longevity, but I think they are a hit or a miss as far as the sound-quality.

Review at Time 0: The Larsens have such a warm, rounded sound... the Spirocores have a borderline aggressive, strong, kinda metalic (though this might go away with time?) sound, but really resonant too. At the moment, there is way too much contrast between the 2 lower strings and the 2 upper strings. This better go away soon, or I may have to switch to something else, because it's that noticeable. I never quite noticed such differences when I tried violin strings -- everything seemed so subtle. I wonder if all this is because the tonal qualities among different strings/brands are amplified on the cello.

Well, anyway, Merry Christmas Eve!

BY THE WAY, wow, Boston = dry. No snow whatsoever. I swear, Charlottesville got so much more snow than here this year, it's unfair. I love snow, too. I've been snow-deprived for years and years, and the first year I'm out of VA, the big snow storm hits VA?! ::steam coming out of my ears::

The new renter in the unit downstairs had a holiday gathering today. Apparently, she moved from two blocks away 2 months ago, and she's lived in Boston forever, so she has a lot of family and neighbors around. There was tons of food and she even had us take the leftovers. And she still had a ton of leftovers for herself, after serving 30+ people. That's how much food she had. And being the poor graduate I am, I stuffed down so much food, it was gross.

But it was really funny, apparently, I'm the "cellist upstairs."

For the whole six hours, as I talked with different people:
"where do you live?"
"right upstairs in the studio unit"
"ohhhh you're the cellist that Emilie told us about! She told us, man, thank god she's a good cellist! We figured out that we can hear you best from our TV room over there!"
"haha.... oh..."
"so, I hear you're working on the Elgar cello concerto! boy, what a beautiful piece, you should play that for us next time!"


The pressure is on. Apparently, I'm fully audible from the downstairs TV room when I practice. And they want to hear me play the Elgar. Ha ha ha!

Something I found online:

"Hello Amtrak here."
"Hi. May I purchase a child seat for my cello?"
"Is the cello over 15 years of age?"
"No. It's only 4."
"Well...you should be fine, then. Does the cello have a name?"
"It's Llew."
"That's really good. I'm trying to figure out what to put here."
"Llew Chelo?"
"No...I want them to be able to realize that it is a cello. We'll put __ Cello."
"Wow! Thank you so much!"
"Just make sure Llew Behaves."
"Of course."

"I asume if the cello is over 15, then it's an adult fare?"

"And antiques get a senior discount then?"

Hahaha :) Looks like I will also be Amtrak-ing (an overnight one) back to VA with the cello! Except I didn't buy a seat for it.

Some of my more recent Youtube obsessions:

• Bach Cello Suites -- I've been listening to these on loop all week on my ipod. Each suite has such a distinct character! But all beautiful...
• Suite 1, Sarabande (Mischa Maisky): Such a gorgeous sound... A bit on the heavy side of interpretation, but I love it!
• Suite 2, Sarabande (Micha Maisky): Haha, what a depressing movement... almost too dampening, but it's so beautiful. There's something so melancholy about the double stop 5ths. I also love how it looks on the cello, haha...
• Suite 3, Prelude (Mischa Maisky): I'm loving all these Mischa Maisky videos for the Bach Suites on YT... more so than Yo-Yo Ma or Rostropovich! Such smooth yet powerful (and romantic) interpretation! Anyway, this movement is currently at the top of my chart. So many unexpected harmonic progressions and funky moments! Aww I love it! :)
• Suite 3, Gigue (Janos Starker): What a sharp and crisp performance. And what a movement! Looove the part from 0:27-ish and on! Oh Bach... <3.
• What's so incredible about Suite 3 is that all of the openings sound so plain, scale-like, and etude-like. And all in C major, I mean, really :) But soon enough, it progresses into something so complex and intense! Not plain at all...
  
• Suite 4, Prelude (Mischa Maisky): Bach to Mischa... what can I say, I guess I like my Bach heavy. But this thought-provoking prelude, whose "rhythm" is almost entirely in just 8th notes, captures so much with its harmonic progression. Amazing how Bach does that... (and I just noticed, holy crap, Mischa's endpin is soooo long...)
•  Suite 6, Prelude (Mstislav Rostropovich): Besides the minute-long introduction, I think Rostropovich's is my favorite rendition of this movement! It's very dymanic and I think he captures the essence of this movement :) 

The Bach Suites are so incredible... Not to mention all the other amazing movements I didn't list above. But moving on!

• Bach, Arioso from Cantata No. 156 arranged for the cello (Julian Lloyd Webber): Yes, Andrew Lloyd Webber's little brother! Again, a heavily romanticized performance of a Bach piece, but who cares! Also, it's very reminescent of cheesy wedding music, but I still like it :) :) I can play this now too!! The whole package, with vibrato and all :)
• Saint-Saens, Allegro Appassionato (Jacqueline du Pre): You all knew that Jackie had to show up on my list at some point. Honestly, I've never heard of this piece until I started working on it. Apparently it's a really popular encore piece for cellists! I wouldn't call this my all-time-favorite piece any time soon, but it's a cool piece nonetheless. Very fiery!
• Mark Summer, Julie-O (Martin Nocedal; Char Prescott): Now a change of pace... Julie-O! I fell in love with the original version written for a solo cello, but I'm starting to love this duet rendition more. Haha, when I first heard this a couple of years ago, there was another surge of "I want to learn the cello!" It's suuuch a fun piece! I heard the violin rendition too, but it's just not the same.
• Kodaly, Sonata for Solo Cello Movement 3 (Alisa Weilerstein): I'm not big on ridiculously dissonant modern compositions, but... woah. Haha, first of all, what an insane piece. Secondly, what a crazy performance of it. I loveeeeee it! So much passion and fire!
• Haydn, Cello Concerto in C Major, Movement 1 (Han Na Chang): I find Han Na's interpretations pretty radical -- very different from the standard interpretations, and usually I don't like them very much because they get sooo temperamental. But for this piece -- I do like it! What an enthralling performance!
  
• Haydn, Cello Concerto in C Major, Movement 3 (Han Na Chang): So playful! Looking very nonchalant with this beast :)
  

I read that most people who pursue cello seriously during and/or beyond college typically own a cello worth ~$15,000 as a minimum. Craziness... But then again, that will only sustain me in this Boston apartment for slightly over a year.

Ugh I'm getting sick. I haven't had coffee in a few days... because I didn't want any! Also, the last time I stepped into Starbucks was when the new barista who screwed up my drinks many times in a row was working again. I stepped right back out. Meh.

It snowed very little in Boston last night... so I didn't really get to see it. There are still some piled on top of cars and stuff but most of the snow on the road/sidewalk has been shoveled as soon as the sun rose this morning. Seriously?!?! I guess people here are just well trained to shovel whenever they see snow. But I also haven't really felt like going outside. But the next time it snows more, I shall make a snow figurine of the RNC complex (and if I'm confident enough, the channel). Unfortunately, I left my camera back in VA over thanksgiving break, so I can't take a picture of it now anyway!

Oh, and I forgot to mention -- Thursday evening was Brookline's 1st "Light Festival." Strangely, there were no lights (and I mean, besides the normal level of traffic lights and store signs). I guess I expected something like UVA's Lighting of the Lawn, but I'd imagine that lighting up the whole town like that would be a bit tough.

I think my big project until I leave for Christmas break is to finish the food in my apartment, especailly after I bought the bagel pack from Panera's yesterday. Now things fall out of my freezer every time I open the door. I also noticed that I have two bottles of soy sauce, two bottles of sesame oil (same brand, might I add!), and two bottles of maple syrup. Apparently, I don't grocery shop very rationally. No wonder my food expenses were worse when I grocery shopped and cooked versus when I ate out a whole lot.

I am 22 now. Sigh, from this point on, I can only get older without the additional excitement as with turning 16, 18, or 21.

Being back in VA was good! Visiting Charlottesville was great! I wish I could have stayed longer :( And I have to say, all of you folks with a car -- enjoy it! The hour long drive on 64 West/East has never felt so liberating :). Having to depend on public transportation 24/7 can feel so restricted.

The weekend is here!

First, I have to do laundry.

Second, I have to figure out my life. Or at least figure out how to prepare for Plan A, Plan B, and Plan C.

Third, I shall practice.

Yay.

Happy Thanksgiving! Since I have another hour of wait at Logan Airport and not so much to do, I thought this would be perfect time to update my blog while watching Gilmore Girls.

Yesterday, we had a birthday pie + ice cream in the lab for Mirco and myself. Mirco is one of the post docs whose birthday is today. Apple pie and vanilla ice cream! Delicious :) Several traditions for these lab birthday gatherings were enforced, as usual:

• The birthday person has to do all the work: I sliced and distributed the pie for the 13 of us (harder than it sounds with all the apples falling out) and Mirco scooped the ice cream. And we also cleaned everything up afterwards. Haha, yay, birthday work!
• The most senior German in the lab counts down to the birthday song so everyone starts singing at the same time... in German (the countdown, not the song; the latter would be incredibly difficult): usually it's Tom (of course, he's German; hence this tradition :D)  But yesterday it was Daniel, one of the German post docs. And the lab sang the most pathetic birthday song up to date. I think it keeps getting worse very time; there were at least 10 different keys. Hahaha it was so bad that everyone started laughing in the middle of the song and commented on the group's lack of musicality. That's okay. As long as they excel in science.
• We have a discussion about how we're all getting old. Mirco is turning 30, and most of the post docs were like: oh, sigh... turning 31 was the hardest, so don't worry yet; when you're 30, you're still on the "borderline," juuuuust getting out of the 20s, but when you're 31 years old, you're clearly in the new 31-40 age range. Hahaha so then a couple of visiting professors in their 40s were like: anyone else wanna complain about turning 40?? Man, 30s is so young! And a post doc was like "well, when you hit 40s, you're so old that you have alzheimers and don't even remember to worry about such things!" 

Tom walked in when we were almost done wih the pie/ice-cream (he literally flew back in to Boson like an hour before; the typical Tom move), and everyone insisted he sings the birthday song alone since he was late. Hahaha, he actually did sing part of the song: "Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you... hahaha um, ok."

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A while back, I lost the combination to my lock on the basement storage unit. A few days ago, I kinda realized that I needed the suitcase that's in there. Yesterday, I spent about an hour cracking the combo to my lock after learning how to do it from google :) And I got it!!!!!!! It was a little concerning how easy it was once you understood the instructions and had some time/patience. If done correctly, you have to just go through 80-100 combination possibilities before finding the correct one. Thank goodness there's nothing but empty boxes and my my suitcase that I have to store down there.

My first BSO Experience: woah... :) Long concert review coming up.

The people:

• Yan Pascal Tortelier: Instead of the official BSO Conductor James Levine OR Sir Andrew Davis (who was supposed to conduct this particular concert), Tortelier (son of the famous cellist Paul Tortelier) stepped up to the podium. Unfortunately, I wasn't a big fan. Hah, actually ended up avoiding looking at him because he made me crack up. My biggest pet peeve about his conducting was the fact that he was so robotic... literally -- robot arms: his arms going up and down vertically, where each of his arms was in opposite directions. And just... some riDIculous poses that were very unfitting of the moment. And I was really surprised (or maybe not...) that the orchestra stayed sooo together because his "beats" were impossible to tell. Oh well...
• BSO: the concertmaster, Malcolm Lowe, was incredible. BSO's concertmaster since 1984 (before I was born!! no wonder making it in the music world is hard; one good person steps in, and you're out of luck for the next 20+ years), and BSO's (only) tenth concertmaster ever, and the THIRD concertmaster since 1920 (wow...). He had such great bow control -- fierce attacks; really continuous lines that never ended; and soooo much gravity gluing his bow to the strings, and yet, such lightness and controlled bounciness when the music called for it. Anyway... the rest of the orchestra -- they were mostly all very good (of course!), but I did notice a few musicians that made me wonder how they ever made it to BSO... very unmotivated people playing with like an inch of their bow in the intense parts of Stravinsky's Firebird Suite... sigh. Perhaps they got tired of playing the Firebird for the gajillionth time in the past 5 years of their careers or the fact that they only had like 2 days to prepare for this entire concert since their last concert. But really, on the whole, they were fantastic. The woodwind players were awesome. Great tone... and greatly in tune, which always helps.
• Joshua Bell: I went through different phases about Joshua Bell. In high school, a few of my friends and I got into him because he was one of the more good looking violinists. Actually, he kinda looks like Tom Cruise. Then we started  obsessing over how "musical" he was (because he moved around a lot...) and about his sex face (perhaps one of his most well-recognized pictures). And I really got into his romantic concerto recordings (Tchaik, Wieniawski, Sibelius, etc). I still love his Tchaik and Sibelius over most others! :) But then I started hating the way he performed because he moved around so much in a weird/detracting way, his bow always seemed to slide around, and the combo of the two weakened the quality of his sound. And then I got into the Hilary Hahn phase for her clarity and piercing tone quality. But... it's Joshua Bell. And in a live performance, he really made it work. SO much energy and power in his performance. 

The Pieces:

• Debussy's Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun: I didn't find this too remarkable or memorable... but of course it was a typical atmospheric and Impressionistic piece. Beautiful woodwind solos and a good opening piece :) But again, Tortelier's obscure conducting really detracted me... 
• Stravinsky's The Firebird Suite (1945): Originally on the program was Stravinsky's Symphony in Three Movements, but with the change in the conductor (Sir Andrew Davis' family illness), the program changed slightly as well. But this performance was incredible. All ranges of sound effects, atmospheres, and emotions -- portrayed really very effectively. When the Infernal Dance began (after a really, really quiet ending to the previous section), a lot of people in front of me nearly jumped out of their seats, haha. And seriously, their piano was so effective, and the beginning chord of the Infernal Dance was so intense, that every time they hit that note with the timpani, it sounded like there was an explosion in the building. It was fantastic. And the epic moments in the Finale... wow. It is suuuch a demanding piece (even just technically) on the musicians, and of course everyone played it like it was nothing. It was great :)
• Brahms' Violin Concerto: Joshua Bell came up with his own cadenza... a noble goal, but about half of his cadenza seemed to have nothing to do with the rest of the concerto (other than the fact that he obviously has fluent techniques)... it was a little odd (and random). And it was a bit unfitting stylistically... hm. But otherwise, really well-executed, of course! Such fluidity and freedom in his playing! Like he can do whatever he wants to with the piece, because he can handle it. The second movement with the oboe solo was beautifully done, and the big moment at the end of this movement was breathtaking! And the final movement was really exciting. So much energy coming from him, even at this point in the performance!

The event:

• Symphony Hall: the inside is beautiful (from the outside, it looks like any other Bostonian building)!! The seats aren't thoughtfully built out, but it is a gorgeous hall. I can't comment much on the acoustics (not very knowledgeable on that one...), but it was good enough for me! I got a really good seat, 6th row center, which means I had a great view of everyone in the inner circle of the strings section and Joshua Bell (and the back of Tortelier) -- no one in the woodwinds, brass, or percussion. But that was totally okay with me!
• Being in the audience is sooo different from playing in the orchestra. But I really, really enjoyed it. I always hated accompanying in solo pieces because I've always wanted to watch the soloist and not have to focus on my part... getting to watch Joshua Bell was pretty awesome, and I wasn't so jealous of the BSO members this time ;)
• CD Signing: There was a CD signing session after the concert! Unfortunately, he couldn't pose for photographs with anyone, though passive picture-taking was allowed. I managed to get a shot with both him and I in the same frame, though it's blurry and from a bit of a distance. But that's something, right?! (Now, I will do anything to get a picture with Hilary Hahn next March. Seriously.) And I got my CD signed. And when I told him he sounded incredible, he said thanks and shook hands with me! Haha, I was really psyched.

This completely made me forget that my science in the lab isn't working :)

Bought a sudoku book on sale. The previous one I bought (called: "Absolutely Nasty Sudoku, Level 4") is way too hard. It leaves me feeling sad, actually. I actually counted. Of the 50 sudoku's I've tried:

• Completed: 13
  
• Screwed up: 3
  
• Left incomplete out of frustration after hours: 34

26% success rate. Ridiculous. So I bought a book which I think should be slightly easier.

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"You know you've worked too long in a lab when:"

-- Accident reports are a badge of honor
-- You've wondered why you can't drink distilled water in the lab - It should be clean?
         I do wonder about this...
-- You have to check the web to find out what the weather is outside
-- Although all cooking is a glorified chemistry experiment you just still can't seem to get it right
-- Safety equipment is optional unless it makes you look cool
-- Warning labels invoke curiosity rather than caution
-- You've used dry ice to cool beer down
-- You have made some kind of puppet out of a nitrile glove and kept it as a pet (Putting dry ice in makes for a rapidly expanding if short lived pet)
        Aww, a latex glove puppy :-)
-- You still get amusement out of "freezing" things in liquid nitrogen!
-- When you rejoice when grabbing a handful of eppendorfs/anything and it turns outs to be the exact number you needed.
       This is SO true. Makes my day.
-- You actually threaten your cells whilst waving a bottle of virkon.
-- When you start making patterns in your pipette tip box as you take the tips out. I made a beautiful spiral today.
        Must try. Will photograph and post if successful :-D
-- The fire alarm ceases to bug you. You only evacuate when you see the fire.
-- When you organise your kitchen cupboard contents the way you would your chemicals... all labeled in alphabetical order.
-- You have a callus on your thumb.
-- You have a callus on the side of your thumb from opening PCR tubes.
-- You open the toothpaste with one hand.
        Haha, I'm gaining so much left hand dexterity these days... because using 2 hands for opening bottles are just so inefficient. Of course.
-- You wash your hands before and after using to the washroom.
-- When you hear tween, you think of the surfactant not the age group.
-- You use the word "aliquot" in regular sentences.
-- Sometimes you momentarily vanish from social activities because of a time point.
-- Showing up at 10AM and having a coffee is a productive day.
-- You can't stand god-like physicians, while secretly wishing you had their job.
-- You're very good at diluting things.
-- You're also very good at transferring small amounts of liquid between containers.
-- You say “conjugation” instead of “sex”, and "pili" sounds dirty.
-- SOB is not an insult; it's what you grow your bugs in.
-- You say "mills" and "megs".
-- No one in your family has any idea what you do.
-- You own invitrogen t-shirts and actually wear them.
-- You've suffered carpal tunnel from the pipetman.
-- You've used Kimwipes as Kleenex.
          They ARE softer :P
-- A timer clipped to the hip is not only practical, but dead sexy.
-- You've played Battleship using tip boxes.
          What a clever idea!!
-- The front page of Science is your light reading.
-- You think the following is a quality insult: "I've seen cells more competent than you!".
-- The scent of latex reminds you of work, not play.

I've gotten into this bad habit of checking my mailbox daily, but if all I see are ads and worthless brochures, I just shove them back into my mailbox because I don't feel like dealing with them... Until I see an important mail (something from home, bills, paycheck, etc). Such as today. I got a paycheck in the mail, plus a bunch of other crap. So I took all the junk out, and on my walk to the T stop, I went through them, and threw out the worthless stuff every time I walked by a trash can. At least I have a system.

-------

I miss the Charlottesville/Mechanicsville Starbucks or B&N Cafes where I can actually sit at a table. In Boston, I have yet to successfully find an empty table the countless number of times I entered such establishments. I'm pretty sure I have to go in before 9am to find a place to sit. Uncool.

By the way, trip #4 to the same Starbucks this morning: I ordered a grande americano, and received two grande americanos. Paid for 1. But I figured 6 espresso shots was too much for one day and just took 1.

Their new caramel brulee latte sounds dangerously good...

Haha, remark from our conductor:

The Dvorak Concerto: great job under "combat conditions."  I advised you Bobby could be mercurial; he was...and then some.  He played great, but I expect his focus was somewhat diluted from having just been through the finals of his competion earlier in the day.  You did as well as any orchestra could have keeping up with his ever changing approach to the piece, and the orchestral tuttis were quite beautiful and powerful.

The exciting happenings in November!!!!:

• Ada Yonath is coming here next Monday for a seminar! It's like meeting celebrities in science :)
• Professor Columbus is also coming to Boston next week!!
• Joshua Bell (with the BSO... ahh!)'s performance of the Brahms VC is the Wednesday after that... I'm pretty psyched!
  
• closely followed by my trip back to VA for Thanksgiving (that Thurs-Mon)!
• which also happens to include my birthday (time for the double 2; getting old...?!!).

Once this is all over, there will be only 4-5 weeks left of year 2009. Holy crap.

Sup, SP?

Doesn't quite have the same ring to it as Sup, LL!

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Went to the dorky scrabble club meeting. Won all three games :D The first one, I lucked out and played 2 bingo's in a row. The second game, I played the word "JIVE" for 60+ points... and then here's the real hit of the day: on the third game, I played a 113 point bingo with the word "STARTLES", with both S's landing on 3W (i.e. making it a 9W word... plus the +50 points from the bingo). Heh, this was exciting :) Yes -- 113 points in one turn :D I think it's my personal record.

--------

Eh, not so fond of orchestra these days. The Suk sounds not-so-awesome, and I keep feeling weirder about some of the conductor's borderline inappropriate comments. There are great performers in the group, but the conductor's a bit off. I think whether I return for the rest of the season in February/March is a mystery (after this concert, we have a big winter hiatus until next year).

But! Today we practiced with Bobby Chen, our cello soloist on the Dvorak, and wow... wow :) Apparently he won the NSO Concerto Competition when he was in middle school, and then again in his freshman year in the high school division. Then at age 17 now, he won some other competition (I forget what it's called) that got him to play the Dvorak with us. And apparently he's playing at another concerto competition next Saturday. This kid is insane. And he sounded really, very, very good. His octave double stops at the end of movement 1 -- perfect. I was mesmerized for the whole hour and a half of rehearsal... Not only because he was great technically, but his musicality was pretty powerful. Aaaaaand... I love the cello. The end.

My violinist-ness is starting to show on subtle aspects of my cello playing, week 3. Or perhaps it's not so subtle. Okay okay, so my left hand position and my bow hold looks just fine, like an average cellist. But for instance, my bowing is completely violinistic. When I'm extending my right arm out to play at the tip of the bow, my wrist bends drastically (on the violin, this is what kept my arm and the bow straight so that my elbow doesn't swing backwards). However... it seems that on the cello, my wrist should stay straight -- always, at any point on the bow. Instead, my elbow location/angle should change to compensate. Argh, it's so frustrating. Habits habits habits. I'm still not 100% understanding the physics of bowing straight on the cello while maximizing control at the tip (so that the bow AND my wrist stays flat/straight at any given point). And the wideness of the cello vibrato (and the fact that it originates from the back/shoulder/upper-arm) took such a big effort to achieve... and it's still not all the way there, but getting there, I think.

I'm perhaps stating the obvious here, but playing the cello is such an opposite of the violin:

Cello: The further away my left hand gets from me, the higher the note gets.
Violin: The closer my left hand gets to me, the higher the note gets.
Cello: The higher up my right elbow is, the higher the string I'm playing on (i.e. the A string is the hardest to reach).
VIolin: The higher up my right elbow is, the lower the string I'm playing on (i.e. the G string).

Unfortunately, the latter point (especially) still confuses me. The last few lines of the Bach's first prelude -- it drives my brain crazy because the string crossing is exactly opposite of what I'm used to. i.e. My elbow is further away from me when I'm playing a higher-note string. Grr.

Winter holiday themed cups and winter holiday themed drinks are back at Starbucks (already!)... as of this morning, they were serving hot drinks in their red holiday theme decorated cups... in that spirit, I got the peppermint mocha (tall double no-whip non-fat peppermint mocha... or something like that. I love Starbucks' naming system. So... organized). Even more nostalgic for my college days now though...

I'm officially considering MD/PhD as a future path... I need to do some research on that, however, and talk to more people about it. There are some serious pros and cons. And of course the even-more-than-MD-admissions competitiveness is a discouraging thought.

Tom recently started doing some bench-work with one of the post-docs. But because he's dressed so nicely in lab, people thought he looked funny holding pipets and making buffers. So. At group meeting today, we presented him with a t-shirt that some people designed and said he should wear (on top of his nice shirts) whenever he's doing bench-work. On the back of the shirt, below the picture of a pipet, it says "Sec's forever" :)


I can do vibrato on the cello! I can play the Swan! I can play Nina by Pergolesi! I'm very excited! The Dvorak that we're playing in NSO and listening to Jackie play the Elgar still work me up like no other. I love the cello! Even the etudes are beautiful... I want to be able to play Bruch's Kol Nidrei within the next few months... Did I mention that I love the cello??

Apparently, Newton is one of the more rich neighborhoods of MA. It has great funding for artistic and musical education. Our symphony had a concerto competition last weekend. The winners:

• Elementary school division: a 5th grader blowing away the judges with a great Carmen Fantasy (Sarasate)
• Middle school division: a 7th (?) grader who apparently rocked on the Saint Saens cello concerto
• High school division: co-winners who sounded incredible on Ravel's Tzigane + the Tchaik violin concerto 1st movement.

Sigh. Makes me really wish I had practice more when I was younger. Carmen Fantasy by a 5th grader? Seriously?! I can't even play that piece now! It's so hard. This is insane.

Everyone is such a ... dork :) Yesterday at lunch, we started talking about the free Halloween deal at Chipotle... which led to talking about the quality of meat they serve at Chipotle... which led to talking about free-range chickens and cows... which led to talking about the usage of antibiotics in this country... which led to a discussion of how these antibiotics lower the pH in cows' intestines, etc.

Chipotle to the science of antibiotics in 60 seconds. :)

I was hoping that over time, the little tiny piece of paper with the lock combination will re-appear before my eyes by chance. But it has not! :( Big boxes are piling up in my miniscule studio, and I can't open the basement storage unit door because I lost the lock combo... I suppose I should send the lock company the request form, although they say that due to heightened security issues, it will take them 4-6 weeks to process the request (arghhh!?).

My place was such a big mess that I didn't have an option of not cleaning it this weekend. But instead I decided to go shop for underbed storage units, a baking dish, and clothes. After trying out 17 pairs of jeans, I found (only) 2 that I liked and actually fit. Why is it so hard to find the perfect pair of jeans?!

Ok, onto the actual business of cleaning up the place...

:)

The oboe must be the most humbling of all instruments--it's not possible to maintain your dignity and look attractive while pinching your lips around a piece of wood the size of a squashed straw and blowing your brains out, which causes your face to go red, and weird veins to pop out on your forehead.

TGIF! There's this flyer in our hallway that says "TGIF (Thank god it's final!)" with a picture of Bush waving goodbye, while holding a "Presidency for Dummies" book in his other hand. In fact, this was another Happy Hour flyers from the past. There are some hilarious ones here :)

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Leaving you with this image for the day, which is another flyer in our hallway (one day, I should just take a picture of a bunch of these because they're all pretty good!):

If you want to even make it rhyme, substitute the word "masses" for the word "herd."

There are some interesting (and/or crazy) people out there on the Boston streets, though I can't really say it's specific to Boston, and in fact, it's probably not. But in any case...

First encounter of course was from about a month ago - the delirious girl who randomly talked to me on my way back from Bed Bath and Beyond with two ginormous bags of heavy stuff. She stops me, and blurts out "hey, do you have a boyfriend?" "Er, no...?" "Good! I don't either anymore. He has herpes, he cheated on me!" ::pointing at the guy in front of her, presumably her ex-boyfriend, looking all flustered::

I kinda just walked away on that one.

This morning, in broad daylight, I'm walking to the bus stop, and there's this girl on the other side of the street, looking gothic with all-black outfits and whatnot. She's completely flushed, walking funny, and screaming something the whole time she was within my visibility. It was very strange to say the least...

Then just now, on my way back from work in the dark (this is Beacon street, I figured it's not such a sketchy street), and this old lady says "Excuse me, I was just wondering if you knew..." and I thought she was going to ask me a legitimate question, so I stopped walking. Then she says "... I need to get into this temple [points at the building next to us]. Do you know how to get in or how I can talk to the priest or something?? I just... [hyperventilates] I really need to talk to someone in there... I believe in God, I have faith, and... I just really need to get in there; they're killing my son out there... there was this talk about psychiatry over at Harvard Square... [or something... I can't remember]... there were like 4000 people out on the streets who came to listen and the psych experiments they do in this country... not even in other countries! the experiments the government does to the people in THIS COUNTRY RIGHT HERE.... it's terrible, oh gosh [hyperventilates more], and they're doing it to my SON! they're killing him! you see things like this on the news and you think: this can't happen to me... but this is happening to my SON and ... [etc]." I told her: sorry, I have to go but... I hope you find someone to talk to (?!). Not sure what I can make out of this one, really...

And then I got hi'ed by a random group of men 10 minutes later. I need to stop walking alone in the dark.

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I got my Starbucks Gold card in the maaaaaiiillll! Awww it's so pretty :) And how kind, they gave me a free balance of $0.01 to start out with.

-----------------

Severe nostalgia for being at UVA/Charlottesville and being a student continues... :( I even miss the Lawn, which is really just a field of grass! Gah.

Email #1 from HMS Office of Communications:

Regular seasonal flu vaccinations will be made available to students, faculty and staff in September, October and November, free of charge. ... Harvard University Health Services has ordered 19,000 doses of seasonal flu vaccine, up from 12,000 from previous years.

They had 6 offering dates. After the 2nd date, we get another email.

Email #2:

Due to a large demand for seasonal flu immunizations amid a national vaccine shortage, Harvard University has already distributed most of its vaccine stock. As a result, the last seasonal flu clinic will be held on Tuesday, Oct. 20, 2009 from 3 pm to 6 pm ... The clinic will remain open until all 300 doses have been administered, which might occur before 6 pm.

I head over at 2:45pm, and they were already turning people away at the door because there were over 300 people in line inside.

Ughh... I'm too pissed off at too many things already. If I get the flu this year, it's all HMS's fault.

I went to Starbucks today, saw Espresso Truffle on the menu, and all of a sudden started missing UVA/Charlottesville/being-a-college-student. Haha, I have no idea why. But it reminded me of my daily trips to Starbucks in the wintertime, where I grabbed hot coffee on the corner, walked over to OCH, and either practiced or libraried. Sigh. I miss stressing out in a library before an exam, looking forward to pulling an all-nighter... grading... practicing for juries... procrastinating on facebook on the library computer... needlessly browsing the sheet music collection in the music library for the thousandth time...

PS: the drink at Starbucks with the most calories = Double Chocolaty Chip Frappuccino with whipped cream (660 calories).

PPS: Our lab calls our journal club meetings "OO Club." Anyone have any ideas what that means?! The Raps are hosting Happy Hour this upcoming Friday. Excited for the flyer :) Will explain later.

I need boots. Preferably cute and fashionable ones, but at the very least something that allows me to wear skirts or leggings in the wintertime. I walked into a local shoe store, saw the price tags, and walked right out. Ugh how does a pair of shoes cost $300?!

The cello strings are here, actually. I called the store yesterday, and the strings got here today! Stringing the cello was a challenge. I know I'm stating the obvious, but since the instrument is significantly bigger, it was harder to hold still during the process. Oh well. But the real problem was that the pegs were slipping... they drove me insane. I still couldn't get them to tune to A440, but maybe A430ish. Since I don't have perfect pitch, it's totally fine for now, as long as all the strings are relatively flat altogether. I'll try again later when I've regained my patience.

My life is always full of dilemmas -- mainly because I can't make up my mind. But I think I am going to go for this one: Starbucks Gold card. A couple of my friends told me about it before, and I felt like the $25 membership fee was too much, but now that I give it serious thought, perhaps not. The main deal is that it gives me 10% discount on drink/food purchases (among others). I did the math:

With the card, I get a free drink on my birthday (say... $4). --> Net cost of this card = $21.00

To make this deal worth it, I have to spend at least $210 on drinks/food at Starbucks in the next year.

Not very difficult.

If I buy a bag of ground coffee (~$10) once every 3 months (i.e. $40), I'm already down to $170.

If I buy a decent sized/flavored espresso drink once a week, each one costing ~$4 on average (i.e. ~$200), I've already "saved" money by getting this card. I suppose quitting Starbucks altogether would be a real way of saving money, but...

While talking to Ana earlier, I noticed a sad pattern in my food inventory at home. Here are some of the representative items from each location (ignoring some of the boring stuff I have, like my Brita bottle, ice trays, some meat, ... and actually, that's it):

Refrigerator:
- brownies
- yogurt (flavored...)
- apples
- an onion
- a 90% empty (small) bottle of kimchi

Freezer:
- a few bags of TJ's prepared frozen entrees
- a few bags of pre-made/frozen chicken... stuff...
- two boxes of frozen pizza
- a box of cheesecake
- two different kinds of ice cream
- lots of donuts (don't judge)
- one bag of frozen vegetables (ooh, healthy)
- a third of a loaf of bread that expired 3 weeks ago...

Cabinet:
- lots of sauces (about half of them unopened... so far)
- boxes and boxes of pastaroni and other similar products
- countless bags of ramen noodles
- at least 5-6 boxes of various cookie/cake/brownie mixes


Clearly, I need to go grocery shopping soon so I don't die of sugar overload or malnutrition.

I keep checking the VA weather to see whether I'm legitimately complaining about the New England cold or if it's just as cold in VA. I think my complaints are mainly illegitimate. But! on the whole, I will say that Boston is a very windy city, and the wind makes it feel much colder than the actual temperature (which, on average, is lower than VA by just a few degrees... so far). Today's wind speed... 20 mph. Brr.

How dare you, weather! You're not supposed to get cold until I am fully equipped with cute boots and other pretty winterwear...

-----

Speaking of the weather, maybe I placed my cello too near the heating unit (I didn't think so, but it's possible I guess) -- it was really out of tune this morning, and while trying to tune it, I broke the A string, meh. The C string is also on the verge of breaking near the nut-ish area. I asked them to mail me replacement strings, but it's going to take a few days :(

-----

I keep noticing the lack of quantitative-ness in the experiments/results. For me, it'd be more satisfying to have something more solid to grab onto than "this band on the western blot looks... a little fatter than the other one." Today the grad student said it's crucial that we load exact amounts of sample in the gel wells because we need to get some quantitative information out of the gel. I got excited, asked what kind of quantitative information, and he said: "oh, just comparing the relative intensity of the bands for the amount present." I think this really just means: "this band looks about... eh, three times more intense than the other one... maybe four times." Heh.

Life is too unremarkable at the moment. This week has conformed to the following schedule:

From whenever-I-get-to-lab until 6pm, work; Go straight to rehearsal, which goes till 10pm; By the time I get home, I'm too fried to do anything and so I crash; Repeat cycle.

But this morning, I realized that I still have no idea what I want to do with my life. But once I figure whatever-it-is out, I still need to take the relevant standardized exams. I should also look into the relevant set of resume-building activities. But... when?! Thinking of all this makes me feel like I need to decide really soon so that I can prepare for the application season accordingly. Heck, if I'm going through the medical school application struggle again, I have to have a good MCAT score and enough clinical experience by next May/June, which is coming up in 8 months or so. That is really not that much time. Holy crap.

Arghhh, this is how I always go from "my life is getting boring" to "oh my god, I need a paper bag" in 60 seconds and maintain my cortisol level gloriously high.

Now that I finally got around to signing up for a Zipcar account, I decided to look for driving tips in a city like Boston. I found this book that says:

Have you honked your horn in the last hour? Do you relish finding fire hydrant parking spots? Do you think a left turn from the right lane is perfectly acceptable? Does a red light make you speed up? If you answered no to any of these questions, be forewarned: You'll never survive Boston's wild streets.

Awesome. I've noticed that a yellow light here means "go" and the first 5 seconds of a red light means "go faster." This means there are residual vehicles in the middle of an intersection when some cars get the green light signal. But of course, you get honked if you don't anticipate this change to the green light and zoom off a couple of seconds prior to the change. But if you'll remember, you can't take off because of the cars stuck in the middle of the intersection. So you get honked at anyway, and really, it seems like a lose-lose situation. Maybe Zipcar was a bad idea for me...

I bought one of those magnet sets with composers' portraits/pictures on each piece. Sadly, I correctly guessed the names to only 5 of the 32 composer magnets; for 4 of them, I had no idea what time period they were from. I didn't even recognize Mr. Brahms! Fail.

All Bostonians seem to be regular Dunkin Donuts fans (and Red Sox fans). That explains why in Boston, there is a Dunkin Donuts store every three blocks while there's a Starbucks every five blocks (on average; or so says the rumor anyway). In fact, one of the "101 ways you know you're from Boston" is:

Paranoia sets in if you can't see a Dunkin Donuts or CVS within eyeshot at all times.

Well... I finally stopped by Dunkin Donuts tonight and bought a dozen donuts -- probably not the smartest idea, since they're probably a thousand calories per piece, and I am the sole occupant in my apt responsible for finishing this box. But oh well. I got so stressed out with work stuff by last night that I think I got a little delirious, but now with this box of donuts, things should look up soon.

I walked around Harvard Square a bit today (it's a really pretty area!). Then Emily showed me where the Box Office and the Stage Door is at Symphony Hall (where the BSO performs!!). And from there, within a few block radius (I think), we also walked by the Berkelee school of music, the New England Conservatory, the Boston Conservatory, and a bunch of music stores. And of course the BU Music school wasn't too far off either. It is soooo crazy. Such a concentrated region of music-related stuff. And I splurged at the Symphony Hall Giftshop, and now, I think my credit card needs a few days off to recover.

There's a sheet music store called Music Espresso (I totally approve of this name), and it's fairly near lab. But I really do think I must postpone this visit before splurging once again.

Last note of the day: Oh Brahms...

Honestly, I've never been a big fan of Jascha Heifetz... until I heard his Brahms, which is incredible! A simultaneous realization is that Hilary Hahn's recording of this sounds a bit flat -- not intonation wise, she's almost painfully in tune (always!), but her Brahms is a little boring. She has the amazing, almost piercing, tone that soars, but listening to that for 30 minutes of Brahms can be a little dull.

On a completely different note, the Shostakovich String Quartet No. 11 is so grotesque. Not that I didn't know this before, but wow. It sounds much more gross than any of his other quartets (not in a bad way; in fact, I love his string quartets!). I wonder what could possibly have been going through little Shosty's mind when he wrote something like this.

Back to the Brahms Violin Concerto -- I am mesmerized by the middle movement. I always had the bad habit of skipping the slow movement when listening to concerto recordings, but not anymore! I think that the opening few minutes (notably, the oboe solo) represent one of the most beautiful musical moments; the unwritten, but generally played (I think?), breathmark at the peak of this melody is one of the most incredible musical commas I've ever heard (though sadly not written in by Brahms, as far as I know), and when Heifetz makes the epic shift at the end of the movement, it leaves me in awe...

My walk to work:

When I make my first turn onto Harvard St, there's a Jewish bookstore (or a giftshop? not sure!). One of the books on display:

Harvard Street!

Passing by a playground... pretty autumn trees:

My new favorite place (self-ban from a few days ago has been removed), their coffee is just too good!:

This is still along Harvard Street. There are too many stores and restaurants on both sides of this street. Such a tempting street to walk down before and after work! Even the Walgreen building looks pretty:

Finally off of Harvard, and onto Beacon where the T runs (but I usually don't take). This is the clock/thermometer screen that either tells me how late I am to work or how freezing it is outside:

Some pretty gated community I pass by. There are pretty buildings around here; mostly apt buildings all along Beacon street:

Some other buildings...

Still on Beacon... which, by the way, looks like this!:

Yay Boston street signs:

Now onto Longwood Ave; More pretty sights:

Entering Longwood Medical Area; no more pretty sights...:

Pretty buildings though! The Children's Hospital:

And here is the med school! Though my lab is actually in an uglier, worn-down building behind all of this beauty:

That's roughly a 1.5 mile hike to lab...

Sooooo excited :D The cello I rented!!

Heat is on in my apartment!! I felt it yesterday morning and this morning again (but it gets turned off during the day). Since heat is included in rent, I unfortunately don't have control over the thermostat. But the little heat I felt (only when I'm standing really really near the heating unit) was great. And this is better than having control over the thermostat and having to pay for heat myself, I suppose. I hear that in wintertime, it easily costs $200+ per month to keep the apartment above the lawful temperature, not even warm (there's a minimum temperature required by law in order to not have pipes crack due to the cold).

I have a rejuvenated love for Brahms. Rehearsal this morning was great, and I'm actually starting to love his first Symphony. The soloist for the Violin Concerto was amazing. Very energetic, great techniques, and amazing musicality. Fluid melodic lines, and yet such intensity! His shifts were perfect... rich :)

Speaking of this... I received my Southwest Strings order today!!! Now I have a music stand, 2 sets of new strings (I'm giving Larsen Tzigane another try; though the usual set of Dominant was ordered of course), AND sheet music -- full orchestral score to Bruch's violin concerto and the Scottish Fantasy, the sheet music to the Brahms Violin Concerto (I gave in), and that of the Brahms Piano Trio (eeeeeep! :D).

Life is good :)

I am banning myself from entering the following establishments until further notice:

1. Peet's Coffee & Tea

2. Starbucks

3. Panera Breads

4. Trader Joe's

First gig opportunity in Boston!! A performance of Haydn's "The Creation." The pay isn't amazing, and the schedule is a little tight, but even little cash is extremely welcome these days, and this could be fun :)

This weekend is gonna be... interesting. Orchestra rehearsal on both mornings until 1pm and then a concert Sunday night. This sucks only because everything's in Newton, which means that I need to take into account 1-1.5 hour commute time to/from Newton (not because it's far distance-wise, but because I have to rely on the buses...). I will also need to learn both pieces on the program in the next 48 hours. Brahms - here I come!

Lots of random notes:

1. Email response from AMCAS:

"Since a letter of evaluation requirement has not been satisfied in your 2009 AMCAS application you are receiving an automatically generated letter notification status e-mail. You will continue to receive the e-mail until either the requirement has been satisfied or the application closes. The 2009 application is anticipated to close sometime during October 2009."

Well, thankfully, it's already October.

2. It's already October?? Holy cow. How is that possible? Sadly, this reminder came to me this morning, around 9:15am, after I had been waiting for the bus for at least 15 minutes. I actually entered the bus, and shit, I realized I forgot to buy a monthly pass for October, which I meant to do before today. So... being a cheap skate, I decided that I was gonna power-walk in the 49-degree weather to work (I could see my breath this morning; it's getting a little too cold a little too early for me). So I made it to work by 9:45am, although I really meant to come earlier. Sigh...

3. Yesterday was an 11-hour day. What's even more sad is that I *seriously* planned a trip to the cello rental store for yesterday (they're open till 8pm on only Wednesdays, which is as late as they go), which would have required me to leave work at 6 or 6:30pm. Obviously I could not.

4. My check for October's rent went out yesterday. Amusingly enough, my biweekly paycheck that I got yesterday almost entirely balanced out the rent. Actually, not so amusing...

I am fairly certain I got hit on by the taxi driver. The adventure to the UPS Center started off frustrating; but the taxi driver situation started amusing me; and it all ended a little creepily.

I wanted to pick up my package (from parents) *today* before UPS closes at 6pm, so being the determined person I am, I call the cab company at 5:25, and ask for a taxi. Public transportation would have taken me over an hour. So a taxi comes around 5:35. I tell the guy that I need to be at the Watertown post office before 6pm, and he tells me that's gonna be tough. And then began the crazy drive, where I'm pretty sure the guy was going like 20 mph over the speed limit, but then hitting the brakes hard because there are soooo many traffic lights and heavy traffic due to rush hour.

As this is taking place, I watch the meter go up. I count how much cash I have ($19...), we still have 5 more minutes to go according to the GPS, and the meter is already at $18.30 (after just 10 minutes of drive...). Craaap, so I ask the guy if he can take my credit card; he says no, but since I'm in a rush, he'll take me to the store anyway and we'll figure something out. I say okay, and we get to the store at like 5:55. I get my package, and ask him to drive me to the nearest ATM. He then asks where I live and how I plan on going back with the big box (though it was just bulky, not heavy). At this point, the meter was already at $27. I couldn't afford to pay $50+ just for a round-trip cab ride. So I told him I live in Brookline but that I'll just take the bus back. He then stops the meter, and makes this long drive to an ATM. I cash some money, get back to the car, and he's like, where do you live because I can just take you home. And I'm like uh well, how much extra is that gonna cost because I really can't afford too much. Then he tells me he'll just take me home for free and that he's turned off the meter anyway so it doesn't matter.

So then ok. After some small talk that took place, he asks me if I have a boyfriend back in Virginia, and doesn't accept my "no, I don't." He's like what, no, was it the long distance thing because I don't see how you don't have one. I turn the topic around (though not soon enough), and somehow it got to how he thinks I should explore downtown Boston and I can meet nice guys there -- and this somehow gets to how he hopes I can find nice guys soon -- and this gets to how if I'm going to bars or wine places, I should make him my designated driver, and how he hopes that he'll see me again, etc. It was getting weird. Finally we move onto talking about Brookline, and he mentions a couple of cool places around. I respond with "oh cool, I didn't know that before," and this prompted him to ask me if I wanted him to take me there right now ("you want to drive over there? I can drive you back afterwards" [we were a block away from my apt at this time, so almost home]). I managed to refuse.

He drops me off in front of my building, and at this point, I figure ok, he doesn't know which apt # I live in, so that's ok. You need a key to get into the building anyway. But he voluntarily carried my package from the trunk for me, and of course mom had to print out my full address in like a size 72 font to tape to the box. But right in front of the locked building door, I told the taxi guy "it's really ok, you can just leave the box right here, I can take it up from here!!" and he left after a couple of "hope to see you again, enjoy the rest of your day" line.

Wow. At least... I got to and back from the post office in one piece, with my package, and for (only) $30?!

Whenever I miss a USPS shipment (because, of course, everything gets delivered when I'm in lab), I have to go to the nearest USPS store and pick it up myself with a valid ID. Last time I did this, I ran into the problem of my ID information not matching up with my shipping information, thereby defeating the purpose of showing an ID.

On my ID: Legal name + Mechanicsville address.

Shipped package: Nickname + Brookline address.

The guy was nice enough last time (though hesitant, understandably), but I need to figure something out soon, especially for some recent online purchases I made under "Lauren Lee" before I realized this was a problem. Eh...

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Over a year after I dealt with the AMCAS craze, I am *still* getting reminder emails from AMCAS stating that I did not assign a recommendation letter packet to University of Illinois (for the 2008-2009 application cycle, by the way). It's annoying the hell out of me but I have no idea how to stop getting these emails.

I have to confess: with the exception of the 4th movement (which is quite amazing, beautiful... very Brahmsy :)), I'm not a big fan of Brahms 1. I really don't want to say that it's boring, but... I liked Brahms 4 much better. But that's no excuse for the fact that we have the first concert in a week, and I just sight-read the inner movements of the Brahms Symphony in rehearsal tonight. Bah.

Peet's Coffee & Tea is my new favorite place. Their drinks are not only delicious, but pretty strong... wow. Not just today, but the last couple of times I went there as well. I liiiiike it :)