Progress on goals: a little here, a little there

I'm updating some of the to-do stuff at right.

I'm done fiddling with 43 Things for now, so crossing that off. I did add one of their widgets to the bottom of this blog.

I haven't spent as much time on the Messiah movements as I wanted to, been too busy learning the music for my regular choir, gotta get cracking on Messiah today. I still have a few days to cram!

I've been procrastinating on this, but it's time to buy a laptop, so I'm bumping that to the head of the list. I'd like to consult these websites before making the purchase: LaptopAdvisor.com, Conscious Consumer: Buy Cleaner Computers Now, and A Better Upgrade, Not a Faster Throw-Away (thanks B.! I remember getting the last link from you long ago.)

I did some stuff related to the Music Curriculum for Self-Study, namely: went to the library and checked out some recordings of Stravinsky and John Corigliano, as well as books on conducting (general and choral) and choral music performance practice. I'm not yet ready to delve into these subjects in detail; I'm just perusing them to satisfy my curiosity for now. I don't have any pretensions to becoming a conductor; I just want to understand in more detail how a conductor does what s/he does. Also, I think that if I can understand the music at the same level that a conductor does, and see the music through a conductor's eyes, I would be a better musician/performer for it. (Note to self: check out the Practica Musica software for music theory and ear training; that's what they have at the Stanford music library.)

This isn't on my to-do list at right, it's more of a general life goal, but one thing I would like to have more time for is nurturing relationships with family and friends. On that front, I met some friends who are former co-workers for a leisurely and highly-enjoyable lunch last Friday. We all used to work at the same company and I was the last one to depart the company, so now we are all alums! Note to self: at lunch, D. suggested that I get in touch with K. W. about his his volunteer work setting up a database during his sabbatical - it might be up my alley in terms of things I'd like to do for future work.