logicbutton

Sorry in advance for the spam, but I've got things to say, and...more things to say. First on my list of things to say is that my birthday is this coming Friday, and my mom gave me a choice of birthday gifts: Guitar Hero III, or a new digital camera. So I guess I'll be buying Guitar Hero myself.

My new camera is a Canon PowerShot A560. I chose it because it was rated a Consumer Reports Best Buy--I don't really care about features too much, as long as I'm getting a decent camera and a good value, and my only non-negotiable criterion was that it had to use SD memory cards, so that I could use it with the Wii Photo Channel. I'm going to set a goal for myself of one new trick a day. My trick for today: black-and-white and sepia-toned pictures. Oh, man. I am never going to take a picture in color again, let me tell you. Every single picture I take from now on will have that old-timey flair.

Also, I alluded to this earlier, but OMG you guys, Guitar Hero is awesome. Make all the jokes you want about people who buy games for systems they don't even own, but I am so glad a member of my flist who shall remain nameless did.

Another item of note: My employer's headquarters is run by monkeys. I thought I'd make sure everyone was aware of this now, because I will be making many, many references to it during the holiday season.

Trials & Tribulations reaction post forthcoming. :DDDDDD

I'd say this was a GIP, but I actually have stuff to talk about too. After my math modeling class last week in which we all presented our own graph theory models and were required to involve monkeys in our presentations in some way*, I was reminded of myrtlelarson's and my noble crusade to see monkeys roaming wedding receptions and looking so cute with their little bar mops. So I thought I'd be a little more proactive in spreading the love on LJ. By the way, support monkeys catering weddings.

I decided while making the icon that this was a good weekend to make all those other icons I mentioned wanting to have awhile back, so I was looking around for stock photos of flutes, preferably ones with easily-croppable watermarks, and among the pages and pages of photos of champagne flutes I found a flute fingering chart. So I forgot about the icons entirely and went to look at fingering charts, because for the first time in years, I need one. Apparently there's this local musician who composes for harp and occasionally violin and flute. My teacher saw one of her compositions being performed on TV and foolishly assumed that the piece for solo violin and interpretive dancer was satire, and only found out that it wasn't while he was calling up all his musician friends to let them in on the joke. Anyway, she or somebody associated with her sent him one of her newer pieces to have one of his students perform, which he was happy to ignore until somebody contacted him to follow up on it.

So he decided to give it to me. Now, he's not actually the music snob that those last couple sentences have sort of made him out to be. He's normally very willing to try new pieces, it's just that he was unable to take this one seriously, seeing as the title is Puddlicious*. Well, Puddlicious turns out to have a fourth-octave F. Also the other fourth-octave notes leading up to F. The only reason I know anything above C is the fourth movement of the flute arrangement of Fantasia para un gentilhombre, which kicks copious ass OMG. So here's the fingering chart I eventually found--you'll notice that some of those notes really can't be written legibly without the 8va. Think of the highest note you can possibly imagine a flute playing, and go up an octave. I am really not looking forward to this piece; I mean, there's the ludicrously high notes, and I don't even think I get interpretive dancers for it.

Anyway, I eventually remembered the icon and went back to looking for photos. My google-fu managed to yield a bit of nostalgia--my history day project in 9th grade was the evolution of the flute, and I remembered that a lot of the pictures I used for it came from the same website. Apparently it was like the only place to find pictures of flutes at the time. How things change. The project sucked, much like my grasp of history in general, but whatever. The reason the site stuck out in my mind was that it had this amazing picture of a green glass flute, and as soon as I remembered it I decided that it had to be the one I used for the icon. And I found it. I would totally give both my arms to own an instrument like this, if it wouldn't completely negate the point. I mean, I wish I could even hope to begin to think I could possibly try to convey just how awesome it would never not be. By the way, check this out. Dude, that's a lot of flutes. They look like twigs or something.

I feel like I should say something about FMA 49 here. Wow, I can't believe it's almost over. Every time ( I watch this one thing happen, I have this spoilery thought. Why am I cutting this, again? ) The hell, Ed. Also, I didn't notice this when I was watching the first time through because it was all at once, but the Big-Ass Thing From the Beginning of 50 that made my jaw drop open and stay that way is actually rather clearly implied in 49. So when the Big-Ass Thing is revealed, it's really less of a spoiler and more of a way to confirm that even the most oblivious of us who couldn't have figured it out even when given a week between episodes to ponder it would be in the know. Oh well. Still a lovely episode. Suitably eerie. I did notice that Ed/Rose seemed to be explicitly shot down here--was it always like that? I'd check my subs, but I've loaned my DVDs out to someone being indoctrinated (so at least it's for a good cause). I wonder how far she's gotten and if she likes it, by the by.

Oh, and finally...

( Q and A )

*I am not making this up.