Very fun and productive day!

Today was a really great day- I got a lot accomplished and feel almost back to normal!

I had planned on getting up at 9am so I could shower and have breakfast, so when I woke up at 12:15pm it was a mad scramble to make it to my 1pm class on time. But I made it, and the class (Intro to the Contemporary Middle East) seems like it will be a lot of fun! The class is made up of three sections of lectures each with a seminar at the end, so it will be broken up into thirds. The professors seem very interesting and informed on the current situations throughout the Middle East. The class ended early and I went to a little coffee shop near the music building for lunch. While having lunch, I saw a perfect twin of my friend Kevin Gonyo- exactly like him, but Swedish... it was pretty odd.

After lunch, I went to the music building to practice. It was so good to have the whole afternoon to work on music. I practiced my concerto as well as the two orchestral pieces my new teacher wants me to learn: Brahms Symphony #1 and Mozart Symphony #35. I love learning new music, figuring out the complicated sections and working up the tempos. My schedule is free enough this semester that I'll be able to devote a lot of time to my personal practice. My teacher is also very organized and wants to set out musical and technical goals for the semester, which is great.

When I finished practicing I walked home through the snow and made myself a cup of tea and relaxed on my couch, reading the letter from Jenae that came in the mail today. It was pretty close to my ideal day...