So much for an early night....!

So hopefully this is the turnaround of being a bad friend. Key point being hopefully. I will at least attempt it.
Been in virtual hiding for a bit, although my activity on Facebook might say otherwise.
Flew back to Melbourne, took the most ridiculous (and expensive) taxi ride due to the ineptitude driver. Was grumpy. Sunday pretty relaxed (although I was supposedly on a tight schedule...go figure..), met up with a friend to practice some German and ended up talking for a little while. Got to see his house though, it's very cool!
And thus began the three weeks of lockdown/craziness.

Orchestra
Was asked to play in orchestra two weeks before the concert. Stravinsky's Firebird suite. It's not easy. I got my music at noon on Monday, and was expected to be at the rehearsal, ready to go at 5.30pm that afternoon. I looked at it for 20mins and almost lost the plot. Thankfully, the conductor was forgiving as I explained to him the situation, apologising for my lack of preparation and promising that by the next week it'd be perfect. Orchestra took up Monday night, Tuesday night, Sunday afternoon, the following Monday night, Tuesday night and Thursday afternoon before the concert Thursday night. So, I could make those times, but those were actually the times I was supposed to be doing those assignments. Oh, I see why I got so time-deprived....
It was fun though. I really enjoy doing orchestra, particularly as most of my friends are orchestra players. The organisation of it was miserable (the fault of the top admin, I believe) but the actual playing was ok, and the learning experience good.
A few friends came to the concert, which was quite exciting - the message going around was that a lot of them couldn't make it, which I was getting a little sad about. P said it was a reflection of how many good friends I had, or moreso, which ones were actually the good ones! Haha. I was pleasantly surprised to see one friend, didn't think he was coming at all, so that was nice!
Went to the afterparty for a little longer than intended, but it was really nice to hang out with those friends as well as musos afterwards. The usual crowd, fun times :)

Birthdays
The celebration of three in one week. My actual birthday was a very busy day, so it didn't feel particularly celebratory except for the masses of FB love and text messages :) Couldn't really party big time though with lots of uni on, rehearsal to attend, and tests the next day to study for! But thanks to everybody who did send greetings and love, muchly appreciated :)
Two days later, we carried out the most unsurprising and awkward birthday surprise party. It was pretty funny in retrospect. So much effort had been put into the operation, I was very impressed. There was some behind-the-scenes communication on the inside, a decoy, and a nice turn-out. Amazing party food (woo!) and good company.
Actually celebrated my own birthday a little bit over two occasions: dinner at Thaila Thai (followed by the Comfy Chair afterwards, not planned, but the night was left open) and then brunch the following morning at Cicalata. Both were lovely occasions, it was good to hang out with friends for some time over the weekend, pretty blissful :) Thanks to those who did come to celebrate, and no worries to those who couldn't make it. It was fun, but not a huge deal frankly - still had much work and business to attend to that weekend, so it was some good relief and fun :)
The next party was the following night after church, felt a lot like a pizza party - it was awesome. Much fun, with the usual suspects again (whom I love very much!) - it was good to celebrate! I had fun, and a lovely time. :)
Just this last weekend, celebrated a 21st birthday with a champagne breakfast in South Yarra. It was truly beautiful, and much fun. And a great idea! L, you are an amazing girl - it's probably not so evident, but I truly love you to bits and admire and respect you so much.

Clothes
The church has recently been repainted as part of the restoration works. Now, to go with the forward looking Vision, the church has adopted and equally modern outlook on the walls. Ask me to show you sometime if you haven't already seen it. We were on music that weekend, so we thought it'd be a fantastic idea to dress according to the colours of the church. That is, some grey (and white if desired) with highlights of red, blue and lime green. Bright much? Yes, that's right, we matched the church. Right down to some bits of grey, me wearing a kid's blue jumper (so we didn't have so much red in the lineup), P wearing ALL three colours (and that's what she would NORMALLY wear....!), and S's shirt matching the lime green wall so much that it looked almost like Floating Head Dummer.
All Blacks. Much performing.

More performing
So, asides from the orchestra concert, there's been some repeated Concert Class appearances. As in, I'm playing in some form or another (trio, quintet, accompanying) every week. yes, that's six consecutive weeks. I hope I'm not boo-ed off for being so prominent haha. Well, the way I see it, I'm (we're) getting practice because we got our act together. It's all about efficiency......
And there was last Friday where Chamber Class was the J&G show. No kidding. Our quintet was first, then our trio. Just in case you know, hand't had enough Mozart. Or Eb Major. Again. Haha. It was wonderful though. Even though it wasn't performance do-or-die at that time, it was still pretty adrenalin-pumped to play well for the whole hour. Which left me EXHAUSTED at the end of the day! I see how playing an entire concert with that much concentration, adrenalin and pressure is a very difficult thing!


So, the group assignment is finished, as is the essay (although that was pretty much done three days in advance woo efficiency and nerdiness!) apart from a couple of final touch-ups the day before. All is finished with that today. And I thought I was going to go to bed early tonight, until I realised that I have a test tomorrow (not too nervous about it, thankfully - yet...) and some homework to do. And much admin to sort through. I like doing the admin, but maybe with not so much work that needs to be done, you know? So much for that early night...I'll catch up on the sleep next week - am not going to the ball so I can have me-time. Muchly needed. I'll get there.....

Am trying to do Organisation Freakism as I realise that I have exams in two weeks' time (eek!) and uni has to keep rolling in that time, and that there are other things to prepare for in that time. I wish I had the next two weeks to do intense chamber music for the whole time. Alas, that is not possible, how unfortunate. But I have drawn up a timeline for each group - there is much work to be done......so possibly will not be the best friend at the moment......sorry....I'll do it as best I can!

Exciting little snippets: some good comments about my playing, particularly from people who can do stuff and facilitate stuff. I just need to maintain standards. And I did admittedly say No this evening to something, plus only a fairly unlikely 'maybe' to something else. It feels a little sad because as a young musician, you take as many opportunities you get. But in my case, it's often to the detriment of my health or ever-so-slightly mental state (even though I love being busy). And that's where knowing that I over-commit has to kick in and be sensible.