Monday, April 17, 2006

Green Bean Casserole!

I don't really have time to post because there is so much other school stuff to do, but I'm going to do it anyway because I'm feeling bitchy. One thing I'd like to bitch about is the Easter vigil mass we went to on saturday night. It had been a few years since I've been to a vigil mass, and I forgot how insanely and ridiculously long they are. It started out very magically with the dark church, and everyone was holding a lit candle, and the choir director was singing a beautiful chant. Then, after the fifth reading of the Old Testament and fourth musical interlude we were wondering how many more readings there were and started passing notes to each other (we went with a couple friends of ours--2 of us were Catholic, the other 2 weren't) and getting the church giggles. After the seventh and final reading we thought we were getting close to the mass parts, but there were still baptisms and confirmations to be done. And the mass parts were super long--the choir director was singing every single saint name that ever existed: "St. Ann pray for us, St. Anthony pray for us, St. Francis, pray for us...." You'd think that after mentioning a few key saints they would sing, "and all the other holy men and women...pray for us....." But I think he sang about thirty saint names. Finally I dared to look at my watch. Almost three hours had passed. Well, at least the music and light show was good. The choir sang some great Renaissance polyphonic music, and also some more contemporary music involving an entire brass section with timpani (I was told later the brass people were Spokane Symphony members). Seriously, why can't they do baptisms and confirmations at a less jam-packed mass? I don't think I'll ever be able to go back to another vigil mass, which is too bad, because it really is lovely, minus baptisms/confirmations.

Also, school is again beginning to grate on me. I'm back to grading papers for the music history prof, who has the students write summaries of the chapters they had to read, to make sure they've read them. There are so many things wrong with this that I can't even begin to name them all (students are so sick of school by the time they reach college they don't give a shit; it's another way colleges are dumbing down, etc....don't get me started). Concurrently I'm reading a great book that in turn is making me feel very hopeless about higher education. It's called, Declining by Degrees, and I just finished reading one of the essays, which is basically all about how colleges throw students into huge lecture classes so the college can make more money, and they hire professors mainly to do research, with the teaching of undergraduates of little importance. Anyway, it's a great book and it will piss you off so you should read it. How can I possibly persevere to the end of grad school? I'm so drained from the week at school that by the time the weekend rolls around I want nothing to do with it, and so do everything but study and practice. On the weekends I finally feel like myself again, and all I want to do is go antiquing, go to the public library, read good books, and maybe do some crafty things.

Well, those were the two main things I've been bitchy about. On a lighter note I just read Kate DiCamillo's new book, "The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane." It's very good and it made me cry at certain parts. It was a good book to read on Easter, because it's about a china rabbit. Speaking of Easter, we had 14 people at our apartment for an afternoon feast. We managed to squeeze everyone at the gorgeous antique table that came with our apartment and everyone brought yummy side dishes. We provided the ham and I made an orange mango chiffon pie. A couple friends stayed late and we all drank more wine and had some good conversations, although I can't remember what about (did I drink that much wine)?

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