weekend almost up. time to recap before it's too late. lots of parteeying. in reverse order, for a change:

hannah's guerrila b-day in paces: we brought salami and boursin, sparkling cider and orange jell-o shots in ice cube trays, balloons and crêpe paper (which we wrapped around each other, lacking anything better). we bought out all the brownies in the place (and even paid for them.) nobody was drunk, but everyone regressed to juvenilia anyway. happy day! tomorrow (or today now) marks the second time i've ever gone out with anyone my own age. the first time was in october.

arriving to that on time meant missing the end (the last two pieces and "extra-special reception") of tony's splendid "student pianists" concert. i was second on the bill - olive eye-matching pants and shirt, tux jacket and blank tie for my chopin. i didn't play as well as i otter have, considering how long i've had it in my repertoire (for instance, i added a repeat), but it was not bad. not many noticeable mistakes i think, and plenty expressive. i was perfectly capable of putting a happy face on it. but still, it's irksome.

it brings up all the bittersweet bother of this thing. i've been playing piano for longer than anything else that i still do - over two-thirds of my life - and in a way, sometimes, it still is my first passion. i resent it when ben suggests that i'm one of the 'least advanced' of the students there - i've been playing long enough to be pretty freaking advanced, okay. but it takes so so much, and i just don't have the time and energy so often these days. conservatory life is intensely, monolithically focused, and with reason. i do wish i had a whole nother lifetime to devote to playing the piano. but, obviously, there is so much else in my life, for which, of course, i'm glad. but, like, as i was saying to ben the other day: those times when i've spent time and time and energy and focus working on a passage, to get it smooth and perfect, only to return to it a few days later, in lesson, or just on my own, and find myself right back where i started. and, more so lately (not that i perform much these days), performing also seems to take something out of my playing. i still never get nervous, but i end up making some mistakes. oh oh. and then there's the question of the future: can i keep studying after i graduate? what happens next?

the new rule: if i'm unusually snappily dressed, it's probably because i need to laundry, and all i have left are formal clothes.

this morning was crisp and calm; i woke up at a :thirty (turned out to be nine) and my mom called :fifteen later. the calm after the inundation last night, which had me asleep in clothes on the couch until i got up and brushed and returned it to bed form a few hours later; the room and hall neat and tidy in that deeply pleasing way, except for the discrete mess of wine-stained plastic cups and some cracker crumbs. i took the time for some firewater and thorough cleaning, let the morning slip by, and almost the afternoon too (in pitt - i did get a pittance of french done). unwinding.

i'm reading nietzsche [say: neechee(?)], and it's surprisingly good. really really good. here's my favorite so far (from human, all too human):

The sleep of virtue. When virtue has slept, she will get up more refreshed.

~

wine and cheese: treated me just fine. a very nice party. it was spread out among six rooms, which meant that i kept running into folks i had no idea were there (and there were some that i never even saw.) not the best party space perhaps, but fine for what it was. a lot of people - 50? i think there were as many as 20 out in the hall at one point, up and down the staircases. hannah's friends and ester's friends accumulated in my room, and i was in and out.

five cups (not full) of wine, and less cheese, got me more successfully drunk than i've been in a while. meaning, i actively enjoyed it, which is not usually true. i really wasn't all that intoxicated, but i was incapacitated enough to allow rabi to cream me at jacks (at least, that's what i'm going to maintain was the reason - we'll have to have a sober rematch soon). so we gave up and danced to tuesday weld instead. the party lasted well past midnight - i was over in L at the end, playing with full lotus and nori's digicam; sonam taking shots, sleatter-kinney and giggling. best musical discovery of the evening: the breakfast at tiffany's soundtrack is at least as effective when played at 45 rpm.

and backwards still: grapes of that evening were prefigured by the movement/goofiness exercise in liza's rehearsal (what do i call this thing?) - she had us walking around boyer in pairs, taking turns eating grapes according to directions: "eat a grape slowly," "…noisily," "…with precision," "…like you want everyone to see," etc. like julian and my adverb drinking game those many yrs ago in barcelona. my favorites were "sensually" and "messily," although the latter left juice and pulp all over my hands and chin. good old liza.

and that's the weekend update. oh, okay; scroll down for more parties.

if we sleep together would that make it better?
if we sleep together would you be my friend forever?