February Song. (Day 59)

Drizzle. It's been raining on and off today. I spent most of the day at home, and decided to go to Barnes & Noble to get the book I've been wanting called Shiver. :D

I took my mom and vicky, but after stopping to get gas, it started to rain hard so I didn't wanna risk driving all the way out to the bookstore. Instead, we went to Fry's cause I knew the book was here also and 25% off as well! It worked out, I got it and my mom did a bit of shopping too. Vicky bought The Last Song by Nicholas Sparks. Excited to read this tonight! Gonna get lost in this book for the next few days.

After I'm done, I plan on reading Hush, Hush.

Also, it's the last day of February so, in honor of today, I'm listening to Josh Groban's "February Song", The Last Song...of this month. ;) This song is love wrapped in melody. Here it is. Enjoy.

Oh and enjoy this sunset too. And photo of a bowl with water outside my house :)

Painted...Part Deux. (Day 58)

Sat-ah-day. Paint day part two. Got up at 7:30 and the painters/volunteers were already here, masking off the windows and preparing to paint. Maria cooked breakfast to take to the little picnic down the street for break and it was delish! she made ground beef and potato burritos for everyone, and the head volunteer made hot dogs. There were chips, macaroni and potato salads, water, beans, and oreos lol. All good stuff! I stayed away from the oreos though, it was hard but I did haha. 

Spent most of the day indoors and laughed when I saw this. :)

lol que cute. Anyway, maria spent the rest of the day cleaning her room, and boy did she CLEAN. It's gonna look good once she's finished! I'll also post a pic of the house once it's all painted :)

T.G.I.F. (Day 57)

It's Friday!! I'm not in love, but I sure am super happy at the fact that the weekend is here! :D

Had a quick lecture in Logic class today, enjoyed a muffin, and had lunch with my mom. I paid a bill and took my tia to my cousin's beauty salon also, and picked Vicky up from school. I'd say I'm excited for tomorrow, since normally I'd get to sleep in, but we're having our house painted since they didn't finish last week due to rain. Lol, it's okay though, it's still the weekend! What are your plans?

Busy! Busy! Busy! (Day 56)

Can one be as tired as I am right now??

What a day. Went to protools class and did a quick project where I had to remix David Guetta's "Sexy Chick" and add kick drum beats to the part where there were none, and compress it to make it sound exactly like that spot where I'm inserting them. It was fun and not boring at all because that song kept me energized! lol.

After I finished, I got a text from Maria asking if I wanted to go to lunch, of course I do! I was pretty starved haha. Since my car was still stuck at home without a tire, I was borrowing maria's and drove out to her work to pick her up. Her co-worker joined us, or I joined them to Outback Steakhouse and I ordered a burgah and Strawberry Lemonade :D

After I dropped them off, I headed home so my dad and I could check out some tires. We did, and they were all more than I could afford so we went to the local used tire shop and I got a decent one for 25 bucks. Still not super cheap, but I was desperate.

I then went to my tia's who called me asking to do some chores for her and pick up her medicines from the pharmacy. I did and I was feeling super tired by the time I got back. I still had to go get maria from work so I headed over there and had Maria drive us back because I was at the end of my rope lol. 

We stopped at Lowe's Garden Center real quick to check out the plants, and look! A blooming Strawberry! 

 

And some pretty Tulips :)

Definitely going to sleep without eating tonight. I'm that tired.

Give Me A Beat! (Day 55)

Went to school, and had percussion practice this evening as well. Ugh, I'm so tired today I didn't even feel like going, but I did and it wasn't so bad. Everyone else was tired too so at least I didn't feel like a downer! lol. Gotta get some rest soon!

Panclocks & Paul. (Day 54)

Today was free pancake day at IHOP, and since I didn't go in the morning, my mom, sisters, and bff went for dinner and got our pancakes :) haha they were good, but all the people in there were so loud. 

Oh and earlier, I got news from Maria, who got the news from her co-worker, who got an email saying that Paul McCartney is coming to Arizona!! Out of four shows in the entire USA, Glendale is one of them! I nearly shit myself when I heard. We need to get tickets! crossing our fingers!

Upload. (Day 53)

Spent my entire day uploading show videos to Youtube and man has it taken forever! I wish they didn't take so long to process. Anyway, most of them are up, just a few more to go!

I other news, I can't stop listening to Caitlin Crosby's music. :)

Decisions, Decisions. (Day 52)

Made breakfast at my tia's this morning, did some chores for her and went to walmart on my way home. After the store, I got a flat tire a block away from my house. Awesome.

I tried seeing if I'd make it home, but it wasn't happening so my dad and sister came to escort me home. Haha I looked ridiculous bouncing in my car. Oh well, gonna get it fixed!

Later on, my sisters and I went to the mall and I got a new shirt and tried on the Lights shirt I saw in tucson haha.

I couldn't help but keep thinking of the show at the Rhythm Room tonight! Jason Castro!

After the mall, we picked my mom up and couldn't decide on where to eat, so we finally decided on Panda Express. So good.

Once we were home, there was about a half hour until the doors were to open for the Jason Castro show tonight. Crap! I couldn't make up my mind whether to go or not because I had no one to go with, but finally Maria offered to take Vicky and I since they didn't want me to go alone hah, they're awesome.

Anyway, the show went great!! It was so relaxing being at a show with an older crowd because they know how to respect an artist and not to be obnoxious during performances. It also allowed me to get some awesome videos. I'l be posting those today as well so check em out! www.youtube.com/RockinxthexMelody

Caitlin Crosby was first to perform and she did real well, I loved her voice. Jason came on after and when he was done playing a great set, we got to meet him and took some photos as well as an autograph. It was a bit weird for me since I'm used to chillin after shows with the groups but this one went quick and there wasn't much time for talking. Ah well, still a great night!!

Painted. (Day 51)

I got home at 1:30am last night and didn't sleep until a little after 2, so to be awaken by a knock on the front door and ejected out of bed to move my car to allow the painting process to begin was a bit sudden. Today was the day to get my house's exterior painted! Though it's pretty cool, I wasn't in the right mindset to be up and at em quite yet.

A team of people were arriving and they immediately began work. The street was blocked off and the painting began.

Here's a shot of the wall:

Of course, the clouds gathered and it started to rain! bummer, now the job had to be rescheduled for next saturday. ay.

So tired, and I'm still going to stay the night at my aunt's so she won't be alone. Hope I can get some sleep.

Take Action!!! (Day 50)

Today is the day!!! I had so much to do before leaving for Tucson with Ash. Ran a bunch of errands, went to class, came home, got dressed and left for ashley's house. Once We left her place, it was onto the open road!

Here's a huge dust wall that we passed through:

After a loooong drive through some slow traffic, we reached Tucson at headed to the Park Mall to see if we could catch the acoustic show Mayday Parade was holding at Hot Topic.

We missed it, but it was alright. We drove down to the venue and found a long line of people waiting to get in. Great. We passed the buses and vans and parked nearby then stood in line. I forget how much I DON'T miss high school. Teenie Boppers are so annoying! Though I was never like that anyway, I knew people who were, and standing behind a few hyper girls brought back those memories of high school I like to forget lol. Anyway, annoyances aside, we went inside the venue and found a spot to take pics and record videos. So many people were piling in it was crazy!

Stereo Skyline opened up the show, and they were pretty good! There For Tomorrow was up next and ash and I were pumped! I got my flipcam out and started recording. The only thing that sucked was the Audio Tech!! so much feedback was coming through the monitors, I almost went back there and took over haha. The show must go on! it did and the guys were awesome.

Videos will be here soon! www.youtube.com/RockinxthexMelody

After they finished, we went to the back of the house and enjoyed the following bands from afar. Roxy was with us in spirit and we texted her throughout Mayday's show haha.

When they were done, we walked outside to hang with TFT for a bit and give them their stuff. Ash was hesitating so I just walked to the van and handed the notes to Maika, explaining what they were and ended up having a real good conversation about Audio Production and recording. Ash came over with the cookies and Jay got real excited lol, we talked to them for another 10 minutes or so, and as we were about to get going, Maika thanked me again for the notes and when he asked for my name I had to repeat it twice because it must've struck a chord. In fact, it did! He remembered I was on twitter, so that was a pretty cool thing since I didn't have to bring it up. :)

Despite the rough crowd, this night was awesome, and even more awesome for another reason I'll ommit until further notice! haha.

After the show, we drove to the nearest Jack In The Box for after-show tacos and took a quick pic.

We drove back home super happy and it turned out to be a kick ass night!!

Getting my house painted tomorrow at 7am, oiiii.

The King. (Day 49)

It's been Michael Jackson day in my ears all day haha. Such good music, it's so sad that he's gone. It makes me think though, this is one of the reasons why I love doing what I do. Recording music. I'm able to capture such amazing talent and great music and preserve it forever, to be enjoyed over and over again, and generations who aren't here to witness said artists' live performances, can still enjoy what it would sound like if they had been there. Live recordings can aso be made, either way I get to save the music. :) I thank everyone who was a part of the production of Michael's music/recordings. I wasn't alive yet to be able to go to one of his shows in that era, but thanks to tapes and cd's I can enjoy it.

Here's to technology and art. :)

Thrift! (Day 48)

Did some work outside my house this morning. I moved a bunch of heavy bricks so they wouldn't be in the way of the wall since my house is getting it's exterior painted this saturday. While moving the bricks, I found these little guys!

Also, went thrift store shopping with Ash today to see if we could find some clothes to cut up for the show this friday. Yay! 2 more days!

I found a nice green v-neck top in the guys section (fave section to find shirts) and a sweet 110 camera for only 1.99. Ash found a sweater and a top and we headed to Savers but didn't find anything else so we went to walmart for ash's cookie-baking supplies.

After percussion practice, I hand wrote all my Protools notes on nice paper to give to Maika of TFT who's also into audio production. My hand hoits.

Can't wait til friday!

Xbox Live (Day 47)

Tried hooking up vicky's xbox to the internet today, but it turned out to be a fail cause I didn't have an ethernet cable! haha Ruben should be bringing one by later in the week.

Snip! (Day 46)

Mondayyy. lol, didn't do much today, I went to class and tailored some shirts to keep my wardrobe a little fresh haha. Beats spending money! and they turned out pretty good. :)

Love Day. (Day 45)

Happy Valentine's Day!

Hope you all are having a good one, whether you're single or not. :)

I went to Blockbuster with the girls today and rented Whip It, Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs, Bride Wars, and Adventureland. :)

p.s Piercing still looks good!

Party! (Day 44)

Went to my aunt's birthday party today at the Golden Corral and had a nice time!
No one noticed my piercing yet....teehee.
by the way, it's coming along great! it's just a teensy bit sore, but lookin good. :)

Breathe In...Breathe..Ouch! :D

I thought I'd toss in an extra post for today since it's so special!

I GOT MY NOSE PIERCED!

Yes! I did it, finally after wanting to for 5 years.

Ta-Da!

I love it.

Debut! Life Rocks. (Day 43)

Guess what everyone!

I presented the song today and the class liked it! Personally, I felt a little unsure at first since it was like a classical/hip-hop/dance experiment done in a matter of hours, but for being a last minute kind of thing, it's not too bad. :)

Wanna hear? Click!

In my opinion, it still needs a lot done to it, but I'll keep it like that for a while, then I'll add the counter melody since it's only in the beginning. I need more bass lines, and have to mix the beat so it doesn't overpower the piano.

p.s. My Take Action Tour ticket came in! :D One week to go!

Aunt's party tomorrow, then going to a wedding reception to watch my dad's friends band play! It's been years since their last show so I'm super super excited for them to be back!

Robot. (Day 42)

Today was nonstop studio work. I was working for 7 hours, no breaks. no food. no water. That's how concentrated I was. Ridic!!

I managed to get a decent sounding track and built around the central piano melody. Finally at around 3:45 I was happy with the way it turned out so I decided to start mixing. After that, I mastered the song and bounced it. Finally!! I'm finished! All I need is to buy a few blank discs tomorrow morning and voila!

Here are some photos of the mix.

I did lose focus a little though and took this haha.

After I walked out of there, my mom offered we grab some panda express so I was totally for it, being completely famished and all. Oh and add "completely out of it" to the list, cause I was so not in-tune to my surroundings anymore, that I forgot where I parked my car. It was so scary I couldn't remember! I knew I had parked on the edge somewhere by a trash can and after a lot of the cars had left, only a few were still there and far from the campus. I got scared that someone might've stolen it, but alas I saw a car that looked like mine and started walking toward it. But as I got closer it didn't look like my car anymore so I turned around and walked toward campus again like a lost idiot. 

I didn't see my car anywhere and since the one I thought was mine seemed too far to be mine, I noticed it was parked near a trash can. Guess what, it was mine. How lame am I? not recognizing my own vehicle hahaha. I guess i was just dazed from staring at a computer all day.

Anyway, I ended up eating a panda bowl, and still had room for a quesadilla and taco at home. Can you say food baby?

Debuting the song tomorrow!

Starting Over. (Day 41)

I can't get my song to sound the way I want it! It would help if I could bring my acoustic in to record rather than making guitar strums on a keyboard controller, but I don't have time seeing as this song is due friday. Instead, I'm gonna start a whole new session and come up with something different. So far I have the piano down and I'll start messing with the Ultrabeat plug-in tomorrow. Wish me luck!

No-Show. (Day 40)

Ahh! I'm so bummed! I just remembered that Chris Botti is here tonight and as usual I didn't have money to order tickets ahead of time so I'm gonna have to miss out. It sucks, but I'll catch the next one. If you haven't heard of Chris, checkout his music! www.myspace.com/chrisbotti

On The Run! (Day 39)

Whew! ran a bunch of errands after class today. Drove my mom to the bank on her lunch hour and then went to my bank and then paid a few bills here and there. That's all for today! vegan tostacos for dinner tonight!

Making Up for the Weekend in a Day (Day 38)

Feeling much better today. After leaving my aunt's house at 11am, I came home and 15 minutes later was out the door with my sisters to go see Avatar. 

Hah, well on the way, we decided to go to Arizona Mills Mall in Tempe instead. The clouds looked awesome today! I took pictures and enjoyed the ride to tempe. 

We arrived and walked around for a while. Of course, maria had to stop at the Sanrio store, lol and we were there for like a half hour. Everything was so cute! I bought an adorable wallet and maria got a lunchbox, and stationary and vicky bought a cute pen.

We came across Rainforest Cafe, and while I only planned to look at its detailed decor and fish tanks, Maria decided we try it out! None of us had eaten there before and we had a lot of fun! It was like being on vacation for a few hours. There were fish tanks, and a "thunderstorm" every 22 minutes haha. All three of us ordered the Guacamole Burger and it was freaking Mondo!! 

awesome fish!

A super full stomach later, we walked back through the mall and to the car. When we were home, I realized there was an hour left until the Chocolate Affaire was over so we went as a spur of the moment thing lol. We all shared a dark chocolate covered cheescake slice and it was amazing! so good.

Today definitely made up for the crappy past couple days. Thanks to my awesome sisters. I can't imagine living without these girls. I shudder at the thought.

Zombie. (Day 37)

Headache. that's all I'm saying...and Stress.

I am so tired and cranky from the lack of sleep I got last night. This morning I made breakfast for my aunt and did the dishes and a lot of laundry. I didn't mind doing any of it, but I was really feeling bugged that I couldn't rest last night. Also, I had plans to go to the Chocolate Affaire (an annual chocolate festival downtown) today, but it doesn't look like that was gonna happen. My sister stopped by and brought some groceries my aunt needed and I left to go to the bank for my aunt. Welllll, the bank is downtown, and every street surrounding it was completely blocked off so I couldn't get to it. As my headache got worse, I made my way back toward her house and decided to stop at my place for a much needed shower. I don't live far from the area so cars were lined up almost to my house! I was at the corner of my street and almost got into an accident. I was inches away from the other car and finally got home. So ridiculous. With that, the stress finally broke through and I just started to cry. 

After the shower, I felt a little better, but I knew I still had to go back. Got to my aunts house and did a few more chores but I told her I wanted to go home for a little while at least. When I got home my sister had picked up lunch for us and man did it feel good to be home. I immediately knocked out afterward and slept for 3 hours. 

I awoke to my cell ringing. It was my aunt calling to ask when I was coming back.

My sisters had gone to the mall and I waited for them to get back before I left. I really didn't want to go for fear of not getting any sleep again. so torn. Finally I just decided to suck it up and go. I ended up falling asleep in the living room and got way more rest than the night before when I slept in her room.

Hopefully Sunday will be easier.

I'll Be Alright, Just Not Tonight. (Day 36)

Today I learned how to work a synth oscillator, and learned about patching different signals to create synth waves and electronic sounds, it was so awesome! I can't tell you how much we were all nerding out over frequency modulation!

In the evening I went to my aunt's house to spend the night and take on the role of "caretaker/housekeeper" since she recently got out of the hospital. It was alright at first, but by bed time I couldn't figure out how I would get some sleep. She woke up every half hour and so I had to as well to make sure she was okay and if she was in need of anything. Basically the whole night went like that and I got about a total of 2 hours of sleep.

One more day/night to go.

Success! (Day 35)

I finished! I finished this morning and presented my project to the class! phew. So relieved it's out of the way and everyone liked it! proud of myself. I rewarded myself with a donut from the assortment of sweet bread the teacher brought for the class. :) 

After class I went to put gas in my car and noticed something on the ground near the pump. It was an earring. hah I started laughing to myself because it reminded me of the movie The Hot Chick! if  you've seen it you know what I mean lol.

A good day, now I'm sleepy. Nite!

So Tired. (Day 34)

I need sleep. I worked on my project for 3 more hours today and I'm tired of hearing George's voice lol. The lab was closing at 3 so I ended with my project being 1:40 seconds. It sucks cause it's due tomorrow and I needed more time! hope I can finish!

Tick Tock. (Day 33)

I spent 5 whole hours in the studio today, editing my life away...haha just kidding that sounds emo, but I did spend 5 hours editing George Dubya's voice for a project that's due thursday. I kid you not I was cutting, chopping, crossfading words together to make new words and by the time I hit playback I only had 30 freaking seconds worth of material finished. The project has to be 2 minutes! I had to stay so I could at least get some more done and ended up leaving with about a minute and a half worth of speech. :)

I'm so ready to be finished with it so I can present it and put it behind me lol. Time is one of those weird fears of mine, I always either have to be racing against it, worrying about it like clockwork (no pun intended) or working with it every waking moment. Unfortunately, everyone has deadlines, and mine is thursday for this project. I think the more I think about what time it is, or how many minutes I have left to get this, or any project done is what makes me tick (pun intended hehe) because then I start to lose focus and end up concentrating more on the clock than the actual work, which ironically is also time-based (2 minute project). Whatever, I digress.

However, I know that somehow I'll end up finishing the job. I always do. Not sure how I make it happen but it happens haha, and most of the time I end up getting quite a few compliments on my work. :) Let's hope this is one of those times! I don't suck, I'm just slow. :p but alas, this is a fast world ad I must do my best to keep up with it!

In other news, I visited my tia again and went on an ice cream run before picking up the sis from school. Now I'm searching celebrity look-alikes for my facebook friends in honor of doppelganger week haha. Mine is vanessa hudgens. what's yours?

February Song. (Day 32)

It's February! I can't help but to wake up this morning and immediately think of Lights' song "February Air" and Josh Groban's "February Song" :)

Went to class today and worked some more on my new tune (yay!) and visited my tia again after school. I got home and played some guitar, trying to brush up on some of my previously written songs and ate some apples with peanut butter. That's about all for today!

Visit. (Day 31)

Saw The Lovely Bones this morning!! I finally got to see it after waiting so long! The movie, like the book, was absolutely beautiful! I LOVED the effects and how Susie's perfect world was conveyed. It reminded me much of my imagination; c o l o r f u l, big, scenic, beautiful and peaceful. Of course, being the sap I am, I cried in silence and got a bit of a headache afterward since I geld back a lot of tears haha. I loved it though, bittersweet.

Afterwards we stopped at my tia's house to visit her for a while and then stopped at the hospital to visit my cousin. Both are doing better and I went home after.