The Other Side...

Well, I've kind of been avoiding writing this post because it will mean that the drum corps season really is over.  It also means that my drum corps career is also over.  I am officially too old to march in DCI.

This season marching with the 7th Regiment Drum and Bugle Corps was a total rush.  From the very beginning we knew big things were going to happen for us and I was so proud.  I've been with the corps for 5 years, and every year just shows more and more progress.  Every year pushed us in a different way, pushed me in a different way.  This year was no different.

Our show this year was titled 24601-7R.

The 24601 refers to the prisoner Jean Valjean, though the show has no real ties to Les Misérables.  The 7R is simply a referral to the corps name 7th Regiment.  The show itself was "a unique, creative vision that battled with themes of oppression and conformity" (taken from the 7th Regiment Press Release written by Kathleen Schassler). In a recent newsletter, Reporter Ken Mason, Drum Corps World staff, had this to say:

"7th Regiment continues to exceed expectations, not just improving, but doing so at a faster rate than their competition.  This corps uses everything from head to toe in performing visuals.

While not one of the larger units in this contest (21B/14FP/8PP/14G/2DM), their field musicians projected a stronger sound than the groups that preceded them. Brass has been bowling people over all year. The battery plays with a very wide dynamic range, from the stickless hand strokes on the snares in the ballad to the highly exposed -visually and musically- full-arm accents, climaxing drum features."

We competed in Open Class World Finals on August 8, 2012.  We placed 5th out of 14 total corps with a score of 86.35. 

In addition to all of that, it was fun.  I had a wonderful colorguard made up of 14 amazing people.

We had an amazing seven person guard staff (six pictured below) who really pushed us past personal limits, making us better every day.

Happy One Hundred!

Hey everybody, guess what?!  It's my 100th post!  Woo hoo!

When I started this blog I didn't have very high expectations for it.  I just wanted to chronicle my trip to New Zealand, occasionally writing the odd post about whatever I wanted.  But once I started, the more I wanted to keep going.  Lately I haven't posted anything and that's due to a combination of reasons, primarily being I haven't been home too much.  But the more time I spent without blogging, the more I really wanted to!  Now that I have the time, however, I need to find good topics!  My new goal for the next little while is to try and post at least once a week.  It is my 100 post resolution!  So let's see how this goes...

Call Me, Maybe?

Hey, you just got here, and this is crazy, but here's my blog, so subscribe to me maybe?

That's right folks, this post is about the entertaining and utterly catchy song 'Call Me Maybe' by Carly Rae Jepson.  Now, before you turn away, this isn't about how much I love this song or how amazing it is.  It is, instead about just how many other recreations it has spawned.

I don't believe that the lyrics are the best ever written, but the tune itself is outrageously catchy and the song is just fun.  Not to mention the cute video that goes along with it.

The song was originally released in Canada in September 2011.  It's major popularity began when fellow Canadian star, Justin Bieber, uploaded a video of himself and a few other celebs dubbing the song. 

Soon after this was when the mayhem began.  Parodies appeared everywhere, videos of fans dubbing the song began appearing at an alarming rate!  It was madness!

And then came the memes.  For those of you who don't know what a meme is, according to Urban Dictionary, a meme is "A pervasive idea within a given culture. The idea may be spread through all channels of communication (word of mouth, photography, ad campaigns, television, &c.). The goal of the meme is to change the thought patterns of the populace."  The ones I usually find most amusing are in picture form.  Take the following examples:

And even after all that awesomeness, I still like this video the best...

Now that you have had an obscene dosage of Call Me Maybe, it is time for you to go forth into the world and sing it ALL DAY LONG!!  Have fun!



P.S.  If some of you out there have never seen Labyrinth with David Bowie, it is officially time to do so.

Sublime Summer

Man I really get boring in the summer, don't I?  Well this summer is a special case as of right now.  I am currently interning four days (M-TH) a week at the Buttonwood Park Zoo in New Bedford, MA (social media rules pending, I'll get back to you on that).   I am also spending the weekends in CT with the 7th Regiment as part of my age-out season with them.  That leaves me evenings and Friday morning to myself.  Not much time to get stuff done, especially when I have a summer class and homework for my internship to be completed!  So I apologize to anyone who has been avidly awaiting my next post... for the past two months.


I really don't have much to say, or any time to say it in.  I'll post some fun zoo stories before the summer is over.  As of right now, I have a weekend rehearsal with 7th, and Monday thru Wednesday at the zoo.  After that it's drum corps full time until August 11.  So you will again not be seeing any posts from me for quite a while.  Hope all of you are having sublime summers!

Stats

So as part of having a blog through blogger (possibly all websites?)  I get a breakdown of all the traffic on my page.  The main thing I look at is simply how much traffic I'm getting:

As you can see, this was a pretty slow week.  In addition to that overview I can also break it down into posts, traffic sources, and audience:

Just like that.  So I can tell what my readers are reading, where they're linking from, and where they are in the world.  Each category breaks it down just a little more.  The one that I really enjoy looking at is the Traffic Sources category.  I like knowing how people found my blog.  Was it through a link I posted or an e-mail or something they searched for?  So this right here is also a little warning to all of you out there.  The Internet tracks everything.  And it probably gives away more information than you realize.  You might be saying, 'Yeah, yeah we know that already, what does it have to do with this post?'  Well I'll show you.  Because  looking at the search keywords is my favorite part of the stats bar.  Check it out: