I just finished my last official day as a student, since this is the last day of finals and commencement is tomorrow. There are a lot of things that I could feel down about, but I refuse to! I've spent a long, long time in school. Although my path has been long and meandering, I feel that every step that I've made in my college education has helped to shape my identity and to bring me to where I am right now.

My time at Potsdam will probably be the only time in my life when I could focus so intensely on playing my flute. I don't think that I fully appreciated while I was there how important that was, and how much I'd miss playing when it ceased to be my top priority and I'd be forced to leave the flute in the closet for months on end. Potsdam also gave me the chance to get some distance from the skeletons in my closet and helped me to realize that my past didn't have to define me. It's also where I met the people that I still consider to be my best friends, even if I don't talk to them as often as I'd like to. Despite the stress and periodic frustrations, this was possibly the best time in my life.

At Washington, my focus was on my musicological research. I also had the opportunity to teach, which I found simultaneously rewarding and frustrating. I fell in love with Seattle and the Pacific Northwest, became helplessly addicted to coffee, and became so spoiled eating the local, wild salmon that I can no longer eat fish purchased at the grocery store. My time at the UW was certainly stressful, but I loved the opportunity to delve so deeply into my research. It helped me to grow substantially as an individual, as an educator, and as a scholar.

Finally, Indiana gave me the first taste of what a career in librarianship would really be like. Unlike my other degrees, this was a professional program which prepared me for a specific career in a relatively small field. I have learned more in the last two years than I can begin to summarize, and realized that this is definitely the path that I want to take with my life. I have met some remarkable people while I've been here. I have had incredible work experiences, including handling a copy of Finnegans Wake signed by James Joyce, assisting scholars and major performers with musical research, and contributing catalog records to international databases.

Do I have concerns about the future? Of course! In this climate, anyone in their right mind would. Still, I have to trust that my experiences have prepared me for my career. Over the last 9 years that I've been in college, I have grown enormously, and I am excited to get started on the next stage of my life!

So, I got to go home for a few hours in the middle of the day today, and that was nice. Then, I went back to campus.

First, at 5:30 I went to a meeting for which no one other than other members of the exec board showed up for. Then I went to class (where I am now), which was scheduled to begin 10 minutes ago. We're only starting now, because the PhD student who teaches it decided to use 10 minutes to demonstrate something arcane to one of the students in the class.

Clearly, I had nothing better to do tonight!

If you haven't voted yet, don't forget that tomorrow's the last day!

VOTE!

AAAAAAAAAAAUUUUUUUUUUUUGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH!

That's all.

In honor of their tenth birthday, Google has brought back their earliest available index from January 2001. So, you can run a search and it will only search websites that were available at that time. Fun, and interesting from the perspective of internet history. Searching my name on old Google, for example, only yielded 46 hits. Now, over 57,000. Check it out!

Google 2001

I think that my upstairs neighbors are doing DDR. I hope they stop soon.

I've noticed a common tendency amongst US citizens to assume that the fact that we live in a free country to mean that you should have the freedom to do whatever the hell you want, no matter how stupid. In many cases, I'll say, sure. You want to do something stupid to yourself in the privacy of your own home where others won't be affected, that's your call. That right should stop when your actions could harm others. And to that end, I feel the need to ask:

do we really need a law to ban texting while driving?

I mean, come on, people.

Washington was the first state to pass that law, which went into effect while I was still living there. People were pissed that the government was infringing on their rights in such an aggregious manner, but this is driving a car. You're propelling a 3+ ton contraption at speeds averaging 60 miles per hour, weaving in and out of similar contraption moving at similar speeds while also watching for pedastrians and other things that you probably don't want to collide with. What about this scenario makes you think "must pull out cell phone and type a message NOW!" Personally, I find it annoying when I'm walking behind someone and they start texting. Their pace slows, and they start meandering around the sidewalk, suddenly unable to walk in a straight line, which makes walking passed them a difficult exercise. I have more than once nearly been pushed out into traffic by texting undergrads. Now, take this same effect, and apply it to people driving cars. See a problem?

So, yes, you're entitled to tons of rights in this country, and amen. However, I myself value, oh, living, and I have the right to continue to do so, as do all the other innocent people on the road. So, I beg of you all, please save the texting until you're at home.

bleh another school year begins TOMORROW :(

(Clearly, I'm elated about this)

Oh so tired.

I just finished day 6 of what I can only call a 19 day week. This included getting up before 7, going to class from 8-5:15 (yes, on a Saturday and in July) and doing work of some sort almost every minute since then.

Old Beth would have stayed up longer trying to complete more, even if the quality was poor. Current Beth has a better understanding of her limits and thinks that it's time to give it up.

Goodnight!

Okay, this is weird. Me, of all people, blogging about sports teams other than the Red Sox? It's literally unheard of, but here goes:

After living in Seattle for two years, I'm not sure why, as a city, they care about their sports teams so much. Frankly, they suck. In 2006, the Seahawks did make it to the Superbowl, which they lost. The Mariners are still waiting to play in the World Series for the first time. Yet tons of Seattlite tax dollars go into funding these fiascoes and the arenas in which they play.

A little background:

In 1976, a comparatively small sports arena, known as the Kingdome, opened south of the Pioneer Square district of downtown Seattle. For 24 years, it faithfully housed all three of Seattle's sports team. In early 2000, the city assassinated the Kingdome:
.

Following the Kingdome's destruction, two new venues were built in the same area: Qwest Field for the Hawks



and Safeco Field for the Mariners.



But what about the Sonics? Where's their shiny new arena?

For a while, the team drifted around the area to the Tacoma Dome and Key Arena in Seattle Center (near the Space Needle). For years, the SuperSonics have talked about leaving the city. Often, these discussions centered around other Northwestern cities, but now it's definite: they are going to Oklahoma City. The locals? Well, I don't live there anymore, but I'd imagine they're not very happy. To paraphrase Roz of Frasier, in a city where it rains eight months a year, we take our indoor sports very seriously. And yet the Sonics rarely got any love from the city. And now they're gone.

So, will the NBA ever return to Seattle? I answer the question thus: will there ever be a good basketball venue in the city? For that to happen, they'd need to spend the money to make it happen, and that's not too likely when the Alaskan Way viaduct is in dire need of repairs or (as is now a near guarantee) replacement, recent costly repairs were made to the metro tunnel running through downtown, and a brand new Lightrail system is going in. Frankly, with the abominable conditions of traffic in the city, those things seem more important regardless. And, of course, money is still being sunk into our athletic underdogs in SoDo.

Until these situations change, my assumption is no, the NBA will not be back anytime soon.