Ben Folds

Last night, Brian and I went to see Ben Folds on campus.  It was amazing! He is currently on tour in the U.S., mostly playing with symphony orchestras but last night, he was just solo on the piano.  Here's a clip I found on YouTube.  It's over 3 minutes so I wouldn't watch the whole thing.  It was quite entertaining to watch his fingers move along the piano live, but if you're just interested in the music, there's much better quality videos for that.

(A note:  I though it was funny that this particular YouTube user labeled this video "Zach and Sarah by Ben Folds." Any Ben Folds fans out there know the lyrics specifically start the song saying "Sara spelled without an 'h' was getting bored... Zak without a 'c' tried out some new guitars...")







So, I thought it was crazy because during the entire concert, college kids around me were holding up Blackberries, cell phones, etc actually recording the show.  I couldn't believe it.  I don't even know what I'd do with a video of something like that.  I suppose I do have the user 'beatlecats' to thank for uploading his or her mis-named recording on YouTube so that I could embed it in my blog just to make it more tech-savvy, but as you can see, the quality kind of sucks, and I can't see much of a purpose.

Some of my education and experience of working with college students tells me that this just another trait of Generation Y or Echo Boomers or the Millenials as generation theorists call it. The rise of instant communication technologies, peer to peer file-sharing, and the digital age all play apart.  Much of me wants to deny that I'm in the same generation as these current college freshmen, I vehemently rejected the idea of a camera phone until they stopped making them without.  Now, I love my iPhone.  I guess I'm just a little slow to warm to the trends.

I diverged somewhat today from the proposed blog topic, but I think if I hope to blog up to -what was it?  Two, three times a week, I may have to do this from time to time.  I don't think there's actually anyone reading this blog though so that probably doesn't matter to any of "you" anyway.

Ooops!

Okay, so maybe I'm not cut out for blogging. My last post was May 25th...Sheesh! That was almost exactly 4 months ago. However, I have always held a belief about myself that once I decide to do something, I stick with it to the end. I won't be blogging for all eternity, but for now, I'm not giving up.

So let's see here. As aforementioned, I have accomplished several of my thirty before thirty goals in the past year. Most recently, I finished my master's degree. I wish I could put a "Goal Number" in parentheses beside that statement. That way it would be easier for those of you keeping track. The problem with that method is that the list is pretty dynamic and it's never been written down in full form. I'm quite paradoxical in that I love lists (and apparently, goals), but I can't be that organized and "type A."

Nevertheless, my Master's degree is complete. I am a Master! I feel pretty good about it. This in particular was one of list items that it took quite a bit of time to accomplish. I was enrolled in school for the past years, and it all culminated with the completion of my master's research. I really learned some things about myself over the past two years, and one being, that I love research. Nerdy, right? I know. But I completed a qualitative study exploring bicycle commuting in my town. I learned a lot about the newer research concerning health and active living as well as sustainable practices. So maybe it doesn't sound that interesting, but it is to me.

Now, this blog is also something that I'm starting to accomplish. I have a feeling this is going to be another one of those items that takes a long time to complete. I can't fill that checkbox on this one just cause I started the blog. Seriously. It took me four months just to write a second post. But I will try to set a goal so that I blog more frequently. In an ideal world, I would blog around three times a week. But this is not an ideal world, and let's be honest, it would be difficult to go from one per four months to three per one week. Therefore, the plan is that I'll start small, and try to blog once a week. Hopefully, I'll work my way to three times a week. I think this post in and of itself is enough for one day, at least for someone who is not cut out for blogging.

So one and a half checkboxes are now filled, and only 28.5 left to go!