Corinne's Blog

I spent most of my day yesterday in my mom’s house sick. I’m still here now and I’ve noticed that being here makes me want to blog about things that are happening to me. When I am at Leo and Tom’s house or at my place in Brooklyn Park I have a very hard time thinking about anything but unpacking, and cleaning. When I’m alone in my mom’s house that is usually already spotless where I don’t have anything but the clothing on my back and the bags I carry daily around It is hard for me to find ways of entertaining myself.

My mom has internet but it is extremely slow and annoying and it is constantly losing it’s signal. My mom has movies but I’ve seen them all. Cooking here is pointless because food is usually left over in the fridge for me to eat. I find myself reading and wasting time of my life playing catch with my smart cats Emmy and Ambross while my old cat Snow watches. It’s a sad existence that I’m trying to get out of. Since just this past week  I finished the book i had been reading Skinny Dip By Carl Hiaasen (Which has a fantastic ending) and since I’m not in the mood to begin my next Hiaasen I took time today inquiring about jobs in the classifieds and practicing my violin.

It is hard to play violin by oneself when there is no music available to you. I kept trying to think of songs that I’d played in the past but without the music available to me I had a hard time creating them like the masterpieces that they are and were when I played them with an orchestra.

I got to a point where I was humming more of the song than I was actually playing. I tried thinking of my life goals for the violin to continue to play it and to join a community orchestra somewhere. To continue to play so I could someday play it for my children while we sat in the livingroom onfamily nights like Laura’s father did in the Little House on the Praire Series. Or to continue playing just to have something that I can do as a talent that may have died since the days when classical music was a primary and popular form of entertainment and not only found on a classical music Am Radio station or in orchestra hall. I thought of why I started…it was because of film I would listen to movie soundtracks and hear the classical instruments and I would go to my older sister’s concerts and see that they got to play really fun movie themes and I wanted to do that. So I thought to myself…what are you goals for playing today? I have played the movie themes and I loved them and I can check that off the list of things I’ve done. I would like to join a professional orchestra but I need more practice to become worthy of even auditioning. I can’t play for my children as for the fact that I have none so I can only play because I find the instrument itself a great release from the stresses of my everyday life.

I attempt something that I’d been wanting to for awhile… a new project to fill my ever growing free time. I am going to try to play the violin solos that I’ve always told myself that I’d like to learn someday. From Kansas’s Dust in the Wind to Brittany Spear’s Toxic.

So yesterday…which still feels like today since it is only 1am today…I spent most of my day practicing the violin solo from Dust in the wind. I’d wanted to play the solo ever since I was in Farming Minnesota at Leo’s family farm and he’d played it for me to sing along to on the guitar. I knew the song as sung but he informed me that there was an amazing violin solo that accompanied it which he later played for me from his Mp3 player back when we got to Minneapolis. I told myself that one day I would learn the solo so I could play it along with Leo on guitar. The easiest way to learn it for me would have been finding the music for it online because  I know how to read music and that would have been the best solution. I found different versions of the song but because of my lack of money and my lack of time to wait for the sheet music to be shipped in three to five business days I decided to take the harder route. I looked the solo up on Youtube and found two great videos that featured the solo.

I played the first video over and over again playing and pausing it in sections until I was able to imitate the same sounds with my violin. And slowly I could play along with the soloist as if I was the one in the recording. Then I went on to practice the ditty almost for what felt like one hundred times over and over again for about two hours until I could play the solo with my eyes closed while skipping about my mom’s house (dangerous).

I got it up to speed and my final test of it was to play it along with the original…I found a good recording of Kansas from the 70s or 80s and I played along with the recording…the first time I didn’t do very well because the recording got ahead of me but the second and third times I nailed it. I think I listened to Dust in the Wind twenty or thirty times in order to deem myself as having mastered the solo…it was a great feeling after having begun the day only have had heard the solo once or twice before. I taught myself how to play it by ear.

I’m going to post the three videos I used and later I’ll record myself and maybe Leo playing Dust in the Wind to post on here…Being home and without webcam I felt that this was an accomplishment worth blogging about and since it is quiet here and I have the time, why not?

The Violin Solo Video I used first

Kansas: Dust in the Wind (The Link to the Version of the Song I tested myself with second to see if I’d mastered it)

The Mixed up solo that I used last

A Spent the rest of the night Playing a Christmas Music book I’d found in a corner. When my mom got home I showed her what I’d learned and she told me that she’d always thought that the solo was played by two different violins…She was impressed and now I can’t wait to show Leo!

Last year Craig started the project of writing a novel that he would constantly update me on, got bored of and never finished. I think since then he’s given up on the novel and the amazing transcript sits in his computer for the one day when I believe a new wind will come over Craig and he will decide to finish it.

Well, I really enjoyed Craig’s novel and if I had the ability I would steal it off his computer and complete the work myself. I was standing in the kitchen of the Theta Chi house trying to pass time while I was making tea when an idea came to my head. I’m was trying to figure out something to fill my time for the week that Craig will be gone in Malta and I came up with this.

I am going to start writing short stories on my blog in order to encourage new readers and try something new and exciting. As I sat in the kitchen thinking of things to fill my time I also started thinking about getting some reading done in some of the romance novels that I had started at the beginning of the summer but never really got into…and that’s when the first part of this story came to me. Bare with me that I am a little rusty in writing stories, I didn’t want to type the story out at risk of the computer dying on me, so i wrote the whole thing in a notebook to type out later…please read, hopefully enjoy, and comment on what you think about the first part of this short story. I’ve thought of the first two parts already but I think that they both are a little long for me to include in one blog.
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SO HERE’S PART I of the short story that I have yet to have a name for:

Sury sat in the lobby of the old run down stone church reading her novel. Another glance at the clock and she would have confirmation that her mother never kept her promises regarding time and after church business. How long could the planning of the annual church picnic and outing actually take?…According to the clock; two and a half hours after when Sury’s mother should have had her back home.

She only wished she had the ability to drive herself home already. At fifteen she had begged her mother to allow her to register for drivers education for many months now in vain only to get the common default excuse which came to most things that needed money ‘there was none.’ So instead of being home doing something more productive with this beautiful Sunday afternoon, Sury finds herself in the lobby…reading.

This one though so far has been a good one…about two young children who discover the internet and through the internet each other. Creating characters and trying to make their alias’s seem better than the children are in reality the two children are growing to form a solid friendship. A friendship that is completely beyond the conventions and boundaries of theirs ages. The children are growing up and getting older and this story is bound to lead the pair into a loving and passionate relationship that knows no bounds outside of the thousands of miles that separate them. The traces and hints of love are already in the air for the two. The girl is already rushing home because she (as her alias never shares) has very little loyal friends outside of him.

Of course the story will lead to love it is technically a novel labeled ‘romance’ and it was technically in the ‘romance section’ of the bookstore that Sury and her mother had visited a couple of weeks ago, but so far its been the plot and character development that have been fueling this baby of a story…Yikes! Old ladies… Sury stirs and glances up at them as they walk into the room, three of them and all as out dated as the others.

“Good Afternoon Sury” the women say as they pass the novel engrossed young teen girl. They smile at each other as they take personal gratification from seeing a young lady preoccupying herself with a book….That is until they discover what kind of a book it actually is.

“What are you reading dear? We have completely lost your presence here in the ‘real world’” one of them asks

Half wishing that she was actually lost in the story and out of the way of nosy old ladies who interrupt and spy on her Sury reluctantly answers with a mumble “___________ of love”. The story title isn’t important all that is important is the conversation that continues to follow. Sury continues “…just a novel I got at the last bookstore sale my mom and I went to.”

Curious at the name of the novel the elderly women inquire about the content of such a mysterious novel.

“What is the story about?” they ask.

This is when Sury’s personality actually wakes from it’s  boredom with the questions and actually shines. She loves telling her classmates at school about the romance novels she’d read. She’d become to them somewhat of a sexual aficionado. She’d read so much and they all knew nothing about sex from experience so she was her classmates go to gal.

“Well,…” Sury begins “It’s about these two kids who meet each other online and fall in love.”

She goes on “and how they try their hardest to get together, At least that’s what I’ve read so far…”

The old woman don’t quite understand the technology of the new generation so they inquire even more about what they, this boy and girl will be doing when they finally meet for the first time. After confiding with each other the three women decide to have Sury elaborate on the book a little bit more.

“Are they planning on getting together to begin dating Sury?” They ask.

Sury who wants to break it down to them so that they can understand retorts with this “Well, I’m not to it yet but I ton’d think they are planning on getting together to just date. I think they might be getting together to…you know.”

She let them have it easy and she chose her words wisely…well done Sury.

As the elderly women think about what activity the characters of Sury’s novel may be wanting to meet up and do, they stand perplexed in the stone churches lobby in a small huddle which reminds Sury of a football game. Until one of the women comes up with it, with a small “oh my!” and whispers it into the ear of her other companions.

The bravest of the women ask their last question to the young eagerly entertained young teenager. “Are you saying that they were fornicating”

Sury who has never called sex fornication says “Well yeah, they want to get together to have sex.”

Once knowing that fornication is involved with this book the women automatically begin a consensus of scolding looks at Sury as they try to set her straight.

“Those kinds of novels are inappropriate to read in a dignified church like this one.”

They continue on to talk about how she should be ashamed of herself then they dismiss themselves in a righteous huff. So with the women now gone  and surprisingly not too phased by the whole thing, Sury begins to return to her book. Yet before she starts to find out more about how the characters develop love, she thinks and tries to sort out some of the thoughts that are now running through her head at the old woman’s response.

‘How is romance inappropriate in church?’ she thinks ‘…there is romance in real life and love stories in the Holy Bible, so why not in this innocent book? What does it have that makes those woman’s nosy noses stick up as they huff away? Is it the sex? Gosh in the Bible they talk about sex, and proper sex etiquette…there are even prostitutes and people who are many times more wild than Sury’s mother of anyone in her small town would ever allow her of her friends be.’

Sury glances at the clock only ten minutes have past since the last time…she continues to be bothered with questions.

‘Who were these woman to look down at her for her choice in literature, when their book of the month had a lot more ’sin’ and was actually true! Instead of scolding her they should be looking at the men and woman of the town cheating on each other. Or they should take notice of the old men of the church who make Sury’s spine crawl when they come up to her and pat the small of her back as they talk to her telling her all creepy like that she’d make a man a great wife someday. What about them?’

Mental rant over Sury gets back to her read. Sadly before she get once again truly invested in the written words the music for the second service begins to play in the chapel in whose lobby she sits. Sury was once again interrupted from her reading. Two minute after that her exhausted looking mother then walks in through the lobby doors and says “There you are I’ve been looking for you…hurry up we have things to do back home.” So after more than two and a half hours of waiting and her mother’s rushing her Sury dog-tags her book page closes her book, gets up and leaves the gospel music of the second service in the dust of the open parking lot as her mother pulls out to drive back home.

TO BE CONTINUED….

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So, tell me what you think of the first chapter but not before a sneak peak of Part II:

Part II Sneak Peak:

While in the car Sury asked her mother the question that she’d been dying to ask ever since the first time her mother had first rushed her out of the stone churches front wood doors before the beginning of Second service.

“Mama…” Sury began, “why are there mostly black people in second service with the gospel music when there are mostly white people in the early morning service with hymnals? Why don’t we stay for the second service? I’m half black.”

Wow today was so much fun!

I slept in till like 2pm because I’d been up almost all night chatting with Craig till 3am and surfing the net.
Then I went online and I looked at some of my old blogs to see if I had had many spelling errors after correcting them and looking for a few pictures for them I came across a new website that I’d like to feature on my blog…yet another photography website but this website also has a blog http://rootphotography.blogspot.com/.

After surfing the web and it getting really really hot in my attic room at Theta Chi I decided to take a shower to cool off.
While I was in the shower though I let one of the guys in to use the bathroom because I know that no one could see me on the other side of the curtain if I couldn’t see them. But strangely enough when I invited 1 person in others thought that it was alright to come in as well. I was in the shower for an extra half an hour because whenever I wanted to get out another boy came in.

I realize that I’ve lost all of my hair products
My curler’s cord was surprisingly cut in half while I was on the DT retreat and I left my straightener in the bathroom at Aldrich church one morning when I hadn’t had time to do my hair at home. the only things I had to do my hair after getting out of the shower where a blow dryer that I stole from home and some hair shine spray…but I made it work out.
After my shower I went downstairs to see what the guys were doing, they were watching something on Television but I got bored and decided to go over to the DT house…that was though after I had called my mom to see if we were going to try to sell my electronics again.

At the DT house Jamie was sitting on the couch watching Boyz in the hood and it made me think about being an african American in Minnesota with all its stereotypes and how life will hopefully become better when I get to Scotland.
My hope for when I headed to the DT house was to finish watching the rest of True Blood season 2 on demand because I hadn’t been able to finish it the other day because I’d been chatting with Craig at the time and he was more important to me.

After boys in the hood Jamie got bored of watching tv and ended up leaving…but I think she took the remote with her because when I tried to get to on demand it was no where to be found. While looking through all the couch cushions for it I found 51 cents and gave up on looking for the remote and decided to change the cable channels manually with the cable box…when I tried to get True Blood on demand it did the same thing that it always does to me…the HD didn’t work…it’s strange it works for everyone else but me! Not wanting to watch normal tv and wanting to watch a movie or something on demand I decided to check out some different options.

I went to the free movie section and found a movie call Chases Are…It was amazing when I read the description the information said that it was about a woman named Corrine…but I assumed that they had spelt it wrong and that it was actually about a woman with my same name named Corinne….AND I WAS RIGHT… spelled and pronounced the same way the movie chases are was about a woman who had lost her husband. And he ends up coming back to complete his finished business by being reborn in Robert Downey, Jr’s Body! Crazy enough the romance movie came out the SAME YEAR I WAS BORN and it was everything I love in a romance…wonderful..http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0097044/ Aubrey came in during the movie which made it all the more fun to watch.

After that I ended up going back to the theta chi house and I watched futurama with them. During that time Taylor came downstairs in nothing but a towel yelling that there was a bat in his room. Upstairs I ran with some others and Riley stood in the hallway also in a towel yelling that Baby Jesus had come down from heaven to punish him for being homosexual. It was really funny…we concluded that Riley would go take a shower and Taylor and I would get the bat out of the closet for which it flew…picture this: Taylor got dressed in nothing but his underwear and his leather jacket and armed himself with a walking stick…I had a half of a mountain dew box and a broom. After coaxing the bat out of the closet and much screaming from Taylor and chaos and laughing from me with a broom and a stick Taylor and I got the bat to the ground…I picked it up the bat clenched a towel with it’s teeth but i got it free from the towel and I threw the bat out the open window…I’d never picked a bat up before it was strange, but fun…then I went downstairs. It was SO FUNNY the whole thing…then I came up to my room to write about it and Riley came up fully dressed and asked if I would go to Super America down the street with him…I agreed and after finding Riley’s wallet which took 3 or 4 trips from Riley and Taylor’s cars to the room we were off…And I just got back and I realize that I’ve had a really fun day!