Harmony Rule #1: Contrary motion is best, oblique motion is net best, similar motion is worst.

Let contrary motion be the bass moving opposite the melody.
Let oblique motion be a movement in the bass or melody while the other stays on the same note.
Let similar motion be everything moving the same direction.

Bottom line: please don’t use parallel motion except in unusual, purposeful places. If the melody is going up, you want the bass going down. If the melody is going down, you want the bass going up. There’s nothing that says “bad arrangement” like a parallel fifth of octave.

I’m racking my brain. The Thanksgiving program went well I thought. It’s going to be fun the rest of the year. I talked to Rosie afterward and she started teaching me how to teach. Very valuable resource is she to me.

Eagles, power. Eagles, power, shout a little louder. EAGLES, POWER. EAGLES, POWER, SHOUT A LITTLE LOUDER. EAGLES!! POWER!! EAGLES!! POWER!! SHOUT A LITTLE LOUDER!! I played basketball for the Eagles when I was little.

Thanksgiving, the day seems like one in which I have coasted. Slept in, saw family (though not that many of them), left early. Not much happened. My Grandpa is funny though. Actually, both of my grandpas are.

Ok, Jessica’s bored stiff, I’ve got to go liven up her day.

A friend told me and another friend about the "hair on his jacket" today. He hasn't asked her out yet, but he's close. And she is someone he could see himself spending the rest of his life in ministry with. He’s very excited, and to tell you the truth, he sounds a lot like Kon did in the fact that he says the thing that’s so attractive about her is her heart for God and her heart for others to know him. Go man.

Goals that I have as a Christian:

1. Grow in fellowship with Jesus Christ. I want to go deep, I want to be passionate. I will do this by spending time with Him in His Word and in prayer. I will do this by fellowshipping closely with others who share these ideals.
2. Involve myself in other people’s life. Be open, be real, don’t shy away from baring my soul to trustworthy people. Because when I do it, they’ll learn to trust me and we can help each other and encourage each other and grow.
3. Share my faith. Learn when to speak up in defense of the truth and when to be a friend. This goes back to goal number one. The vertical relationship must be thriving for goal number three to be effected. And I want this so bad. I want to be living so people will ask me questions. I want to seize the opportunities when they’re there. But I don’t want to push when it will turn people off. And I want to learn to speak up when people are blatantly stomping on God’s truth and purity.

Psalm 19:7a: the law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul.

Today I passed a pickup who had a license plate that read: "I lead." Ironically, it was being pulled by a truck.

Not much of a thanksgiving week. I wish dead week was really dead. Let's rename it "swamp week."

The school Thanksgiving program is tonight.

I'm happy because maybe my songwriting drought is over. I've got one or two that I'm sort of excited about.

Byran and people, test results, and this weekend

I bless you, Randy, for jogging my memory tonight.

I can handle non-extreme isolation. House-sitting by myself doesn’t bother my sense of sociability in the least. Sitting in an office seeing only truck drivers for a summer doesn’t make me want talk anyone’s head off.

However, when I am around people, I need to connect with them. It’s an empty feeling not to, and a warm one when it happens. For instance, let’s take my SPC class. Often in classes you quickly find a place that you always sit, but in this one, I’ve been bouncing around in different places. But I’ve sort of settled on a general area, and it’s led me to sit by this guy several times. He’s the quiet sort, his expression and demeanor not one that would invite an initial conversation. However, as usual, appearances were deceiving. I’d never talked to him before today, but today I did, and we got to talking a little bit. It feels very good.

Let’s review my forecasted test scores. Facilities (IE 368): 94. Production Planning and Control (IE 367): 88.

In 368 I didn’t do quite as well as I thought, though when you take into consideration the class statistics on this particular test, I am quite happy and thankful. I got a 90.5. The class didn’t do very well overall, with an average of 76 or so. High score was 91, so I was very pleased. I figured I would miss a T/F, and get a few points off here and there on the quantitative portion. I ended up missing two T/F, one other qualitative question, and 3 points on the last quantitative question.

In 367 I did better than I figured, with a 91. This usually happens when I leave a test and find out that I missed something for sure. I extrapolate and imagine the worst.

In a manufacturing setting, inventory is a very negative concept, so you obviously want to minimize this. On one of the questions, we were given a Master Production Schedule. This MPS gives the expected demand of a certain product over the next number of weeks. We were given additional information and were supposed to use three methods developed in class to determine how and when to order this product most cost-effectively. For instance, the Economic Order Quantity (EOQ) method allows you to order the amount that will be the most economical, balancing the cost of the order and the cost of the product. But this may result in inventory. The Production Order Quantity (POQ) method allows you to calculate the most…forget this, it’s too hard to explain. Suffice it to say I messed it up and I was afraid it would bite me hard. But it didn’t, he only took off 3 points for the conceptual error itself, and didn’t carry it through.

The weekend. In short. It humors me, the strict protocol involved in church business meetings. I made report not knowing about what I was reporting. Also made report where I did know what I was reporting. Missionary reported as trying not to get too involved in mechanic business so he could do church-work. Me wonders why this attitude not adopted by more people state-side. Be encouraging. Grandpa reports that when he decided it was time to marry, he had problems. The girls he liked didn’t like him, and the ones that liked him he didn’t like. Finally found my Grandma. Ducks win Civil War. Quack, quack. CROSS singing He Is Able touched me. Made me long for something I hadn’t felt for awhile.

I am of the opinion that it’s generally not good practice to demean yourself in public. I mean, realize your deficiencies, but don’t trash yourself to other people. Excuse me, though, as I step away from that practice for a minute.

I am an idiot. We were wondering around like lost souls trying to make our way home from Sheridan last night. I thought I knew the name of the road to turn on, but it was different than I thought. This missage of the road put me in a very negative frame of mind. C’mon, Byran, it’s not that hard, really. It’s not like directions are rocket science or brain surgery, but you’d almost think so with how hard I make them.

No matter this negativity, plenty of positive things happened this weekend, which I will get into at some point I suppose.