Moments from my day:

There's no way to begin a lesson like warming up with harmonics... and not realizing that harmonics are your new instructor's pet peeve. Ouch. The first 15 minutes of my lesson was a diatribe against using harmonics as a warmup, after my last flute instructor specifically suggested I use them to promote flexibility of embouchure... um, yeah. Off to a great start. But Prof Woodward's quite nice otherwise - it'll be fun taking lessons from him.

Oh... and to increase the worry of the wisdom teeth ordeal - when he asked why I'd be gone that one week, and I replied I was having my wisdom teeth out, he nearly flipped.
"Is he a good dentist??" he demands.
"Um... he's an excellent oral surgeon. Best in the region, as far as I know. Why?"
"Are you sure?"
"Yes... why?"
"Make CERTAIN you tell him you're a flutist"
"Why??"
"Well... there's a nerve that runs close to the roots of the wisdom teeth in the upper jaw, which controls fine muscle movements of the upper lip. In normal people, of course, it wouldn't matter... but if it's damaged, you won't play flute again."

ARGH. As soon as I reassure myself that everything will be fine, that I really shouldn't worry about orchestra auditions and just enjoy flute, something like this crops up. Perhaps this was one of the reasons why orchestra rehearsal tonight was so precious to me - if something goes wrong during surgery, I'll lose something that's been one of the best parts of my life for the last 10 years... and that scares me. Sure, it's probably not something to worry about - but all the same, I think I'll be doing a lot of practicing during the next 12 days.

Those damn colonies didn't grow for the fifth time, after making new LB agar plates, new LB medium, changing my plating technique, and the burnt offering (kidding). Transformed a new set of bacteria tonight - if these don't work, I won't know what to do. There just isn't time left to go back and start from scratch with this, along with getting the Delta in situs to work. At least it isn't a major part of my SURF.

And on a happy note: I didn't realize how much I'd missed orchestra until tonight, when I sat in as second flute. There's nothing like being right in the middle of the creation of the music, and being able to contribute to the whole symphony. I was wrong when I thought that being knocked down a peg from principal would be a little sad - on the contrary, it means that a) it's not nearly as much stress, and b) I don't have to play in the modern piece (YES!! :). Not being able to perform with the orchestra would be saddening; playing harmony on second flute is actually rather fun. It's been years since I haven't been first... I'd forgotten how interesting harmony could be. It's good to have perspective changes like this from time to time - makes you realize that the world won't end if things aren't quite the same anymore.

Ah geez, I should sleep so I can take Andrea K to have HER wisdom teeth out tomorrow at 8. Night all.