It's a beautiful weekend! Just what I needed after a stressful week. Kyle, Sara, Sara's friend Adriana, and I went out on a hike in Brown County State Park yesterday, and it was gorgeous. I really like the cool weather, even when it's too cold: at least for now, the cold is made bearable (and even refreshing) by the knowledge that later in the day it's going to get warm again.

Crazy story--this morning in church, I got there late and sat in a side pew: someone else got there even later and moved in with me. At a lull in the service he leaned over and said:
"You have a really nice voice. Are you a music major?"
"Thanks! Yes."
"We need to talk."
After the service and the postlude he introduced himself as Vance George, the Emmy and Grammy winning former conductor of the San Francisco Symphony Chorus. (I couldn't quite hear, so I asked, "Vince?" "Vance--past tense.") Pretty cool! He went up to see who had built the church's organ and I left, but then when he saw me sitting outside with the student group after the service, he come over and invited me to his presentation for a conducting class tomorrow. I'm definitely planning to go.

Slight disaster recently--somehow I got to talking to Sara about the Beatles (or, really, more blathering/rambling on and on--as I tend to do when talking about something I like). I decided my favorite album was Abbey Road. So when I got home I wanted to listen to it. To my horror, my CD case was empty! I searched for it on my computer to burn a new copy, but it wasn't there either! It didn't occur to me at the moment, but once when I was visiting Sara I thought to check our university's streaming audio system. It was there! But in the middle of the third track, it started breaking up, and nothing I could do could fix it. So I tried on my own computer when I got home, and the system denied me access! Turns out there's a four-hour period each week when they do maintenance to it, and that just happened to be that period. Clearly, I am not meant to listen to this album ever again. But in defiance of all odds, I am finally listening happily to Polythene Pam....

Finally, Nate, you're right that our respective Nerd Scores clear up who's the superior brother. I invite you to simply look at the statistic at the bottom of the chart. In the meantime, I'm waiting for Claire to take the test and, even more intriguing, Mom and Dad...