Microwave Cake, take 3

Each time I attempt microwave cake, it gets a little better. This time definitely surpassed the previous two, possibly because I added six tablespoons of sugar rather than the four that were called for. Nevertheless, recipe experimentation always yields a good learning experience, even if it is at the expense of some of your dishes. In my case, I learned that not every teacup, though to all appearances made out of reliable material, can be microwaved. Also, I learned that you should always, ALWAYS read the information on the bottom of the dish you're trying to heat, as evidenced by my mistake:


Also, the chocolate chips I was trying to melt may or may not have caught on fire.

However, once I figured out the aforementioned information, the cake itself turned out quite well:

Analogies

I like chemistry. I like knowing that if I combine four molecules of aluminum and three molecules oxygen, I will without fail get two molecules of aluminum oxide. It's exact and predictable. I also like 3x3 Rubik's cubes, because I know that if I use all the right algorithms, the cube practically solves itself. I know all the right moves, and I know the order in which to perform them, and it works out right every time.

Right now life sort of feels like a chemical equation with too many molecules - no arrangement of numbers I throw at it will balance both sides. Or maybe it feels like a 10x10 Rubik's cube - I don't know any of the algorithms, and I'm just turning it randomly, hoping that at some point I'll figure out a move that will align the colors correctly.

...I guess this means I'm stressed out. I didn't think that was possible.

This is really depressing. Probably if I sleep, try to get rid of some of the items from my to-do list and fix some of the problems that I unwittingly created, life will return to it's normal chemistry/3x3 phase.

A dilemma...

I'm frustrated. Here's why: in my opinion (and yes, I realize it is strictly my opinion, nothing more), the music at our church is absolutely spectacular Sunday after Sunday, and yet the response from various people is negative over and over again. I have talked to several attendees who have no complaints about the music, and they have expressed that the general church population really loves it. However, another group of church goers is very vocal about the fact that we don't have a church band during the fall, winter, and spring. Now, I know without a doubt that our music director does the best job he possibly can to play high quality music for every service, often taking the time to painstakingly arrange hymns for ensembles that he assembles and choosing music that coincides with both sermons and the liturgical calendar. Moreover, he frequently tries to incorporate a "praise song" chorus as a musical response, and we have a praise band all summer long that does contemporary music (again arranged by the music director for our misfit instrumental group - piano, bass, drum set, guitar, French horn, violin(s), and oboe/EH).

Maybe I'm biased. I'm a music major and I am therefore familiar with more of the older church music than some, and my mom occasionally calls me a "music snob" if I am mildly critical of things. But the way I see it, singing hymns and having high quality music connects us to a long course of church history that will be neglected and eventually forgotten if we only sing contemporary music. Don't get me wrong - I think there is a time and a place that is entirely appropriate for contemporary worship. I love the praise band we have during the summer, and I'm all for stuff like Tenth Avenue North, Stephen Curtis Chapman, and David Crowder. But I also love the tradition of the liturgy, the simplicity and yet the depth of hymns and their ancient texts, the complexity of Bach's sacred music, and the concept of singing music that has been sung through countless generations and in multiple countries.

All of this brings me to the conclusion that it's sad to see a monumental effort given to the church for the best possible worship experience that encompasses music both new and old, meant not only to please but also to educate, and to know that it's under-appreciated and even complained about. I know that it stems from the common debate over the style of worship, and that the issue sometimes gets so heated that churches are divided over it. I also know that the problem with the music in our church goes beyond just deciding which style of music is better. Nevertheless, it would be nice to see Christians be able to respect a balance and to strive to understand the other point of view. Finally, I don't think that my little expostulation does any justice to the topic, nor does it fully explain my point of view....

So here's to you, Music Director Extraordinaire. We (the royal or otherwise) hereby recognize the amazing amount of time and energy you put into making the music at church the most phenomenal that it could be, and we are incredibly grateful for both your impressive giftedness and your hard work.

We're coming to the church meeting next Sunday.











And we're making t-shirts.

Symphony No. 5

This evening when I left the home of the people I babysit for, I happened to turn on the radio at the exact moment that the live broadcast of the BSO playing Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 5 started. Actually, I turned it on when the orchestra was tuning, but close enough. The time in which it took the orchestra to tune was enough time for me to decide that I was going to drive around the North Shore until the piece was over. It was possibly the best decision I've ever made.

Almost every piece of Tchaikovsky's music has made a deep impression on me, starting with the 4th Symphony when the VYO played it in 2006. Furthermore, I "connect" the best with music that I've played, because instead of just hearing the piece and enjoying it, I know where the nuances are, where the phrases are going, and which parts speak to me the most. We played Tchaik 5 in orchestra last semester, and the second movement with its glorious opening horn solo followed by the oboe interruption and the cello melody (all in the first section!) literally fills my soul with joy. Maybe I use that phrase both too often and too flippantly. But it's true.



(This is only the beginning section, but it's the best orchestra in the world, so I think it's ok.)

So I drove around on 128 for a full 45 minutes, reveling in the glory that is Tchaik 5. Hot dang. Every movement is practically faultless, and each one is different. Thus, I pretty much went to the BSO for free, although I got some additional static as part of the deal and by the time I got back I needed gas.

Optimism...

Truth be told, I am scared to death of student teaching next semester. As in...I'M TERRIFIED. Hopefully it'll all turn out ok. But in the meantime while I wait to find out if it will be or not, there are a number of things I'm really looking forward to that make the prospect of next semester much better.

1. Christmas. As I discussed last year on Christmas Eve, Christmas really happens before the actual 25th of December. This year, the spirit of Christmas has already been brought up. The Christmas Gala at Gordon is featuring two performances instead of the customary one, and we'll begin rehearsing for that immediately following our October 31st concert. On November 13th, we start rehearsals for the lessons and carols service at a nearby church. On December something or other, we start rehearsals for the lessons and carols service at FCCH. Following the performances of the Christmas Gala, we have the lesson and carols services for both churches, and then I'm going on a road trip to PA with some of my favorite people where there is yet another lessons and carols service, rumored to be the best in the world. Score. By that time, I'm expecting to feel like Christmas was the most amazing holiday in the world, and that I can't wait until next year...but Christmas itself hasn't even happened yet. This Christmas extension brings new meaning to the term "Christmas season."

2. All-State. I guess by now I've come to grips with the fact that I will be extraordinarily exhausted and probably sick by the time All-State is over, but it was a lot of fun last year, and it will be again this year if everything goes as planned. Regardless of the fact that we end up getting around four hours of sleep per night, and that we are on our feet or organizing things for the entire day, it's fascinating to see the inner workings of a conference like this from an administrative point of view. I don't think that the VT All-State festival includes workshops for teachers too, so it's a much bigger enterprise than I witnessed in high school. Granted, high school was awhile ago now, but All-State was something that stood out.

3. Student teaching is only 15 or 16 weeks long...so life continues after it. So I get to plan what happens next summer! Right now I'm considering going to Masterworks, which means that I need to come up with a lot of money...but it would be SO good. I mean, with an orchestra repertoire of Stravinsky, Mussorgsky, Tchaikovsky, Brahms, Beethoven, Rimsky-Korsakov, and Sibelius, you can't go wrong. It's not possible. And it's Christian! What could be better than that?!??

4. I'm convinced there is life post-graduation. Maybe once everything is said and done, life will settle down a bit. As of right now, it's a little insane...but as one professor likes to repeat, "It will all be OOOOOOO-K." I may have to just take her word for it right now though.

I don't think this is an exhaustive list, but that's what I can come up with right now.

A rainy evening

I was originally intending to meet some friends from high school in Boston this evening, which would have been great since I haven't seen them in probably over two years. However, it was raining and I wasn't feeling particularly fantastic, so I ended up canceling that plan and doing this instead:


I am a pretty terrible horn player, but perhaps compared to an average fifth-grade beginning band student, I'm doing ok. I'm well aware that my posture is utterly horrible and that I could have been sitting in a chair. Furthermore, I know that my air flow and diaphragm were undoubtedly affected, but hey, I'm on par with a fifth-grade band student, and I am conscious of the poor form. That's a step in the right direction, anyway. Today my babysitting kids came over and tried out all the instruments I have sitting in my room thanks to Instrumental Methods. These included the horn, a trumpet, trombone, drum pad, xylophone (perhaps not the best instrument to give a five and a three year old...), flute, and violin. They had a great time, and I had fun watching them try to get some notes out. It was, of course, very loud and to anyone listening it was probably extraordinarily obnoxious. Nevertheless, it was definitely a highlight of the day.

In any case, in order to continue the low-key rainy evening fun, Diana and I are going to watch a Redbox movie whilst sitting in our newly-redecorated living room. Yay quad break.

The Continuing Adventures of Diana and Jillian

Over the past three years, Diana and I have done many fantastic things including, but not limited to:

Photo shoots in the dorm room hallways:


Building forts:



Traveling to both Vermont and Maine:




And living in an apartment.


But today we had a grand adventure right here around Gordon. It started as an errand run with both of us because we were stranded together at Gordon for quad break. Diana needed to go to the tailor to get a dress altered, and I had to find a cobbler to get a pair of shoes mended. We tried a cobbler in Hamilton first, but it was closed, so to appease our disappointment we stopped by Winfrey's Fudge and Chocolate shop (right down the street). After sampling some chocolate and deciding it was good, we bought some malted milk balls. They were wonderful.


Then it was on to the tailor, which turned out to be more of an experience than expected. The shop was tiny, and the friendly elderly man sitting at the sewing machine came up and greeted us immediately with an unplaceable accent. While I waited for Diana, I found a magazine on a table titled "Istanbul Life." Eureka! Zeke must be Turkish! Soon another man came in the shop. He seemed friendly enough, informing me that he was an engineer and (after some small talk) asking what instrument I played. He told me he was an artist, and then Zeke brought out the shirt that the man had had altered. It was white with a rainbow-colored balloon print. I didn't say anything until he mentioned he was a balloon artist. I then commented on how the shirt was appropriate....thinking to myself that it was perhaps ONLY appropriate for that purpose.

After the tailor, we went on to a second cobbler. This man might have been related to Zeke the tailor, because we'd seen an advertisement for the cobbler in Zeke's shop, and the cobbler also had an accent and a wife named Olga who apparently cleaned houses, according to the handwritten poster taped to the counter. Maybe the accent was unrelated. Maybe Olga was unrelated. Unknown.


Post-cobbler, we resolved to stop at the Wenham Tea House for some tea before heading to Target and then home to boeuf bourguignon for dinner, but we stumbled across Henry's, a grocery store that had fantastic baked goods, according to Diana. We weren't disappointed:


Nevertheless, we didn't buy anything because we were trying to save as much money as possible, and there was a free wine tasting next door. This free wine tasting led to - dun dun dun - DIANA'S FIRST DRINK! Mind you, Diana turned 22 four days ago. This was clearly a monumental event.


As it turns out, Diana doesn't really like wine. We cleansed our palates with the free cheese that went with the free wine. Oddly, they didn't card us; the lady asked, "You're over 21, right?" We must have looked honest.

After the wine tasting, we continued to the Wenham Tea House. They weren't serving tea anymore, because it was 4:30 and afternoon tea only spans from 2:30 until 4:15. To make up for this tragic tragedy (yes, I know that's redundant...but it's alliterative!), we explored the shop attached to the Tea House, and then headed to the playground behind the building. Babysitting has taught me a great many things, including where to find the best playgrounds in the Hamilton/Wenham area. The dad with two little boys and the two moms each with little girls probably thought we were a little weird, but we enjoyed the swings.



Between the wine tasting and the swings, we definitely have abstract perceptions of maturity. Finally, we went to Target to pick out some things to decorate our apartment living room.



I think it was successful.

Before:


After:


Finally, we had boeuf bourguignon for dinner. It was pretty darn tasty!

All in all, it was a great day, and it will forever hold a very lovely place in our hearts. We were so entertained that we thought we should immortalize the day here. It has subsequently turned into the longest blog post of all time...but I think it's worth it.

Microwave Cake, take 2

My second attempt at microwave cake turned out far better than the first. At the suggestion of a friend (the instigator of the microwave cake mission), I tried this recipe: http://thenondairyqueen.blogspot.com/2010/02/cake-in-cup.html. It turned out much, much better than the first one!


(This time the white on top is homemade whipped cream.)

It was made in a large mug, and I think the only alteration I would make is to add more sugar. So maybe the answer is to combine the two recipes, since this was decidedly more chocolate-y than the first one. I do believe that microwaveable cake is entirely possible, albeit not quite as good as real cake. But I'm a college student, and fast, sweet, snack-like things are usually appreciated, even if the quality isn't superb.

Culinary Redemption

I seem to have been cooking more than usual the past few days. Therefore, I think it's necessary to document this here: I cut down the time it took to make boeuf bourguignon from seven hours to FOUR! AND I made mashed potatoes. And it tasted really, really good. And I modified the recipe. It was the best dinner I've had in a long, long time, and it will last me a forever because there's a lot of it. Either that, or I have to invite a lot of people over for dinner in the next few days. That could be an issue, because it's quad break and everyone is leaving! Although it might still be around by the time everyone gets back...

Church Experimentation

This Sunday, a good friend and I went to a to-remain-nameless Episcopal church in Boston, mainly because it was rumored that they performed a Bach Cantata every Sunday. This turned out to be true! But I have gotten ahead of myself. We were aware that the church's doctrine varied quite a bit from our own, but we were willing to check it out anyway. The service included glorious music during every aspect of worship. The hymns were all good, and it seemed like we had sung most of them recently in our own church. This could have been due to the fact that the music directors of both churches are very in tune with the liturgical calendar...but it could also be attributed to mere coincidence. Either way, they were familiar, they were some of the great hymns of the faith, the organ/organist was talented, and the congregation sang reasonably loudly considering the small congregation in such a large space. The choir was magnificent, singing works by Thomas Tallis among other composers, and after the sermon, the church orchestra had its own processional. This orchestra included a full string section, a bassoon, and two oboe d'amores, which was especially exciting for me. I've heard recordings of oboe d'amores before, but I'd never seen one or heard one played in person. And here there was not only one, but two!

This is a small part of the Bach Cantata they performed:



So all in all, the musical experience of the service was very meaningful and uplifting. Nevertheless, I don't think I would go to the church again, solely because of the theology. I have no right to judge what is correct or not correct, of course, but there are certain doctrinal elements that I do have opinions about. This particular church had very different viewpoints on those elements specifically, and since those are things upon which I cannot compromise, I suppose I will have to let the cons outweigh the pros in this situation. As another friend pointed out, it is not normal, but rather remarkable that this church holds such incredibly high standards for the musical worship, but I think that the teaching a church presents to its congregation should hold equivalent credibility.

After church, we went shopping on Newbury Street, ate some Chipotle-like amazing burritos and Ben & Jerry's ice cream, and then headed for home. It was so much fun that we're hoping to try another Boston church in the near future...

A Potentially Redeemable Culinary Disaster

After orchestra this evening, I had nothing to do. This is shocking, because normally I would have reading to do for the following morning's English class. (The topic of said English class could be expounded upon for a good long time, but that is not for today.) In any case, I had finished the reading a full two days before it was due, so that wasn't on the to-do list for the night. Instead, I came up with the brilliant idea of trying to find a recipe for microwavable chocolate cake. Who doesn't like the idea of instacake? So I sat at my computer and googled "making a microwavable chocolate cake," and came up with this one:


Now, I knew that it had the potential for being disgusting, but the picture looked good and it seemed like an easy project to undertake at 10:30 at night. I did take into account the modifications suggested by other people who tried it (add extra sugar, put in some melted chocolate chips), but as my college kitchen supply is minimal, I made substitutions for the substitutions. Not a good idea, but hopefully understandable considering the limitations.

Mine failed.



(The white covering is frosting that I poured on top; it looked even worse without it.)

However, I think that there is a possibility that it could be significantly improved for a number of reasons: 1) the consistency was really quite nice and cake-like; 2) the sweetness was acceptable - it didn't taste like bread; and 3) the only reason it didn't taste too much like chocolate was that I had to use hot chocolate mix and M+Ms when I should have been using baking cocoa and melted chocolate chips, neither of which were attainable. All things considered, the taste wasn't too bad, even though everyone agreed the best part was the store-bought frosting.

So the morals of the cake are as follows: be forever wary of deceptively simple recipes found online; try those deceptive recipes anyway, because you might be able to tweak them enough to be great; and never substitute ingredients that you know beforehand will not be beneficial to the overall taste. I think I'll try this recipe again once I have the proper ingredients.

New Music

Lately I've been on an iTunes purchasing spree. Yesterday I finally bought the "24 Hours of Classical Music" album, which is probably the best deal ever. I mean...how often do you get 316 tracks for $9.99?!? And for the most part, they're good recordings too. Major win. Then this evening I bought an album of Bruckner's sacred choral music. The first time I listened to it, I almost cried. That doesn't happen often, so I figured that it belonged in my music library. Since I've been buying so much music, I thought I should make a list of all the things I want to buy. Music, that is, not everything....

-Mahler's Symphony No. 2
-Schubert's Symphony No. 8 (the oboe has the main theme; it's a must-have)
-Saint-Saens' Organ Symphony
-Brahms' Symphony No. 3
-Mahler's Symphony No. 7
-Rachmaninoff's Symphonies No. 2 and 3
-Haydn's Symphony No. 96 (we're playing this in orchestra; also has a nice oboe part in the third movement)
-Haydn's Creation
-Dvorak's Symphony No. 8 (played this in orchestra last year)

The list could go on and on, but this is just what I came up with tonight. In some ways, I feel like my familiarity with the major works from the entirety of the musical repertoire is like my limited experience with fruits and vegetables. I know what I like, and I listen to the things I like all the time, but there are a large number of major works that I am unfamiliar with. For example, I couldn't have sung any of the themes from any of the Brahms symphonies until very recently, and even now I would probably have a hard time coming up with them immediately. Maybe it's because I don't really remember much of music that I haven't played unless it has a very singable melody. I don't know why that is; it's probably a skill that I could cultivate if I practiced it often enough. Maybe the "24 Hours of Classical Music" album will help me with that.

In other news, I'm going to a wedding tomorrow in Rhode Island. I've never been to RI, as far as I can recall. I can't imagine it's too much different from other northern east coast states, but we'll see if there are any huge culture shocks. Highly doubtful. Also, this will probably be the fanciest wedding I have ever attended and will probably ever attend, unless I suddenly acquire a multitude of very rich and engaged friends. That seems unlikely. I hope that I know all the rules for proper etiquette and common civility. If I do, everything will be fine. If I don't...well...I guess it could be awkward.