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Thank You John Maclay and Mendelssohn

January 13, 2006

John Maclay, the director of the Grace Church Choral Society, agreed to let me sing in our Spring performance of Mendelssohn’s Elijah, even though I’m here in Durham and will miss most of the rehearsals. Yay! I love this piece. I brought my score with me and I’m working on the same choruses and in the same order that my choir is working on them in New York.

John is making this easier by sending us all the pieces with the dynamics he wants and other markings, before each rehearsal. Isn’t sheet music beautiful?

Working Out

January 11, 2006

Durham is not a walking city, and I’m used to walking a couple of miles each day. It’s my only exercise. I didn’t want to sit for three months so I went to this fitness place right near my hotel. Turns out I can go every day for free, it’s a deal they made with my hotel. Fabulous!

I also got one free session with a personal trainer, who asked all these questions and took all these measurements and determined I’m in “poor” shape. WHAT?? I completely expected to be pronounced in “great” shape. I sat back, waiting for the praise. “My, you must take such good care of yourself!” I mean my weight is right where it should be, I’m a vegetarian, I rarely get sick, I walk miles every day and because I live in a fifth floor walkup I go up and down stairs all day. Hello?

My friend Chris called my while I was on the treadmill and I was so freaked out about my pronouncement I had to call her back to discuss it. She’s started working out, too.

I’m here for three months and I need something to do every day besides research, so what the hell? I’m going to do what this guy says for three months. If I like the results I’ll continue when I get home. If I don’t, no harm done. I go back to “poor” shape. Poor?? POOR?? Seriously?? (That makes me think of Grey’s Anatomy now. Great show.)

My Days at Duke

January 7, 2006

Every morning I am dropped off here.

I walk up the path and over to here, the far end of the Perkins Library.

I walk through the door to the Special Collections Library.

And then I sit down to work in here, where I am watched with cameras the entire time. (I only brought two or three shirts with me, and I got all self-conscious about the fact that the librarians were going to see me in the same shirts every day, so I quick picked up a couple more at Target. One shirt says “Army” on the front. I’m basically living out of that Target right now. I get all my food and clothes there. It’s hard to explore without a car.)

The librarians who have been helping me don’t work on Saturdays, so I will have to bring my camera back to get more pictures.

But the real reason for my relative peace of mind — look who are out and about, sitting on what I have traveled all this way and spent all this $$$ to copy, like it’s nothing at all but apparently the most choice spot on the bed! The Perry Street Monster Furballs of Love, ready to wreak havoc on the South. They look like a couple of thugs, don’t they?