Dear Diary,

I hate my music class! Today in section we were doing rhythm dictation and I just felt so stupid and the class didn't even get through half of what the teacher wanted to. I hate it when everyone else gets something that I don't. Greek was fun today though. We were reading about this guy Simon, and he was like in love with this boy that the defendant was also in love with (like, major ew!) and Simon got drunk and came to this other guy's house and broke down the door and went into the women's rooms with a bunch of his friends. OMG, Diary, can you imagine? Last night Shanah and I were at rehearsal with Testimony. OMG, he is so cute! Shanah likes him, she told me. She wants me to ask him out for her, but I don't know. I kind of like him too. What should I do? Sigh.

- Danielle

Well, that was amusing. Those of you at rehearsal last night probably know where that came from; if you weren't there last night just accept it as a manifestation of my secret longing to be acting again and my deep-seated fascination with the female psyche.

I don't actually hate my music class, although section seems very much more difficult than lecture. There's an obvious reason for that, of course: in lecture we learn music in English; in section we learn music in music. Now, I suppose that's the intended structure of the course, but I don't speak music, which makes it a little daunting at times. I'm sure that I'll pick it up just as I would pick up Spanish if you put me in Mexico for long enough, and I think that's probably the best way to learn a language. But it's still a little frustrating sometimes. I could pronounce any text in Greek after like my first week of class, and everything after that has been extracting meaning from the sound. I know that there is plenty of meaning behind the sound in music, but not only can I not get at it, I can't even pronounce the "words." That's a very frustrating feeling.

Testimony is not a new blogname for a person, by the way, and I wouldn't have a crush on him even if he was. However, we do look darn good in our casual costumes. Yeah. The question of formalwear remains unsolved, but that's okay for now I guess. I think that the ladies look very good personally in their black and gray, but I still agree with the costume designers in my family that gray makes a bad costume.

The question of whether or not I'll be coming back to Testimony next year has come up again. I am not truly concerned - I'll come back if I feel like God tells me he has a place for me there still; if he tells me he doesn't then I won't - but it has raised the issue of what I would do here if I didn't do Testimony. Theatre? It would be fun to be back on stage. .I'm just scared of auditioning - well, actually, I'm scared of two things. One is monologues. I don't have a problem delivering monologues, but I don't have any. Stupid objection; I know. I could find more monologues than I could shake a stick at if I bothered to look; I am sitting on top of several million books. I'm also scared of dancing. That is, dance routines. Not that that would come up all the time, of course. And Stand and Deliver proved to myself that I really do like acting, not just musical theatre.

I've also decided to take fencing next year. I discovered something in my research for Phoenix Earth about the difference between foil and epee. The practical differences are that foil puts a lot more rules on the fencers as far as when they can do something and where they can strike. The reason for this is that foil developed between 1670 and 1680 (or so I'm told) as a method for Renaissance fencing masters to teach folks how to survive and win a duel, whereas epee developed as a sport because as fencing lessons became more common people realized how fun it could be. All the rules in foil therefore break down to one of two principles:

1). Don't attack somebody where you can't kill them (hence only chest and head hits count in foil)
2). Your first priority is to not get hit, not to hit the other person

Hence the basic foil principle that you aren't even allowed to attack your opponent if he is attacking you - the point is to teach you how to think so you'll stay alive! This is a very attractive idea to me. So I'm going to give Beginning Fencing a try, which is conveniently enough focusing on foil technique. I've been wanting to try a martial art for some time, and sword work appeals to me more than a hand-to-hand style or competitive shooting. And since there's nobody around here who can teach me how to use a broadsword, small sword\\foil technique will have to do.

My twenty-first birthday is coming up in sixteen days. Shanah asked me what I was going to do for it. I don't know, really. I'm certainly not going to do any of the things that I'm suddenly allowed to do by virtue of being twenty-one. I won't cry if dinner alcohol becomes part of my lifestyle, but I see no reason to hurry the process any more than I see any reason to become a coffee drinker if it doesn't happen naturally.

What I'd really like to do, I think, is go back home to the Twilight Zone to hang out, roleplay, and smash. Maybe we'd even play some Illuminati, although I think Trent's disconnection from the crew has sort of closed that door. But I can't do that, since Testimony's spring show is the day before my birthday and that would leave me insufficient time to be home for the weekend. I'd also like to go to dinner and a movie with somebody, except that that would be more a birthday gift than a celebration. It's been a long time since I smiled as big or as long as I used to smile after a date with Princess or Thea. A movie night might be cool. I dunno. On the plus side, I will hopefully be able to go home sometime after my birthday.

This week in dance we learned redowas (or just redowa?) and canter pivots, which means - that's right! - we were back to waltz! That was quite a bit of fun, and I got to dance with someone I hadn't danced with in a long time and don't have a blogname for but is one of my favorite waltz partners. Ah, the waltz. Charming.