Live from Bridger Bowl!

Over a month ago, I was up at Bridger and decided to record a little video on my iPod. Unfortunately, due to the fact that I've been pretty busy and had some technology issues, I never posted it. Finally, I got it on YouTube and now you can watch it! It's short and sweet and it speaks for itself, so enjoy!

Some Academic Poetry

Although it's Spring Break, I haven't been completely vegetative. Since I've had so much free time on my hands, I decided to work on an assignment I have for my British Literature 2 class. We've read a lot of different works by different authors, and for this assignment we are supposed to pick a poem and model our own poem from it, with a different spin. So, I decided to take the intro from William Blake's "The Marriage of Heaven and Hell" and model my poem on it. The gist of Blake's introduction is that organized religion came along and ruined everything. My poem is not so complex. It's still a work in progress, but I'll let it speak for itself.

Here's Blake's introduction:

THE MARRIAGE OF HEAVEN AND HELL

THE ARGUMENT

Rintrah roars & shakes his fires in the burden'd air:

Hungry clouds swag on the deep.

Once meek, and in a perilous path,

The just man kept his course along

The vale of death.

Roses are planted where thorns grow,

And on the barren heath

Sing the honey bees.

Then the perilous path was planted,

And a river and a spring

On every cliff and tomb,

And on the bleached bones

Red clay brought forth;

Till the villain left the paths of ease,

To walk in perilous paths, and drive

The just man into barren climes.

Now the sneaking serpent walks

In mild humility,

And the just man rages in the wilds

Where lions roam.

Rintrah roars & shakes his fires in the burden'd air;

Hungry clouds swag on the deep.

Here's my poem:

THE MARRIAGE OF MUSIC AND DANCE

THE TRANSFORMATION

The crowd roars and waves its limbs in impatient angst:

Behind stage the wanted waits.

Once meek, and apprehensive to dance,

The shy girl nodded and swayed while

Learning language.

In time she bloomed and bolder grew,

Without humility

She freed her body.

Then the spell was cast upon her,

And the music spoke to her

Through intertwined harmony,

The melody and beat

Her only need;

Now she roams the crowd unpinned and smiles,

Her movement opens space, she holds

A conversation of sound and mime.

The free girl lets herself go

With the music’s flowy beat,

Motion is natural to her now, she

Dances fluently.

The crowd roars and waves its limbs in harmonious glee;

The music has set it free.

Hiking the M

A couple of weeks ago, one of my friends invited me to hike the M with her. It was Friday afternoon and I had been debating whether I should go to Bridger or not, but as it was getting a bit late for Bridger to be worth it, I decided to hike with her.

The M is Bozeman's iconic hike; chances are if you've visited you've seen the giant white MSU "M" on the side of the Bridger mountains. It's visible from pretty much anywhere in town. It's fairly short, it took us probably an hour and a half total with breaks. My friend brought her dog, so we stopped at the top to throw a stick for him and take a little break.

There are a couple of different routes up, one which is easier and has a lot of switchbacks, and another which leads basically straight up. On the way up the easier trail are several "shortcuts" which lead up steeper trails. We took the easy way up and the direct way down. Overall, it was a fun hike, and it was nice to get outside a do something other than go snowboarding. The trail was still kind of slushy and muddy in places, but was definitely in good condition.

Here's me at the top of the M. The picture at the top is the view from the top. If you visit Bozeman, I would recommend it for a short excursion. The view from the top is beautiful and all of Bozeman is visible. It's good to get outside!

Spring Break!

Spring Break is finally here, and I couldn't be more relieved. It's been a hectic week in school; I had two mid-terms and a paper due and Friday was our last MSU Friday (which had a record 1,020 attendees—crazy). Naturally, I am ready to relax.

Today I drove from Bozeman to Fort Collins, Colorado, to meet up with my mom and my sister. My sister goes to school here and we are driving to Vail in the morning for a week of skiing. I'm excited because I've never been to Vail and my mom is paying for everything. Plus, I haven't been snowboarding since last Saturday due to the crazy weekend and week I had, so I'm pretty much going through withdrawals at this point. We're waking up early tomorrow to get at least a half day in, thankfully.

Another thing: The Wailers came to Bozeman Wednesday night with Passafire and played a show at the Emerson Cultural Center. I originally wasn't going to go in favor of studying, but I made a last-minute decision to go. It was awesome!

Rail Jam 2010

Last Friday and Saturday, the Chamberlin Rail Jam was at the Gallatin County Fairgrounds in Bozeman. Both nights included skiing, snowboarding, and live music, and tickets were only $5 for both nights for students! On Friday, the preliminary skiing and snowboarding took place, and the GZA from the Wu-Tang Clan headlined the concert. Saturday was the finals for the rail jam, and Bassnectar headlined.

The setup for the rail jam consisted of three side-by-side rails—one box, one rail, and one double-kink rail. The stage was directly across from the rails with booths in between and separate beer gardens, one in a barn and one close to the stage.

I went both nights, and as you might be able to guess from my previous blogs, Bassnectar was my favorite part. One of my friends, Jess, brought her hula hoop to the concert and hooped all night. There is a video of her on Facebook, but I am unable to post it directly here (although I have her permission). Try clicking this link to check it out.

I did find a video of it on YouTube, although the sound quality is terrible. All in all, it was a good weekend.

ASMSU Elections

ASMSU, or the Associated Students of Montana State University, is basically MSU's student government. It is election season for ASMSU — on Monday there was a primary Presidential candidate debate, and on Tuesday we had the primary election to choose which two candidates would progress to the final election.

In addition to an elected President and Vice President and an appointed Business Manager, ASMSU consists of a senate. The seats on the ASMSU senate are divided by where the students live. It consists of three on-campus senators, four off-campus senators, a Greek senator, a Family/Grad Housing senator, and three "At-Large" senators. So, similar to districts in a city, students who live on campus choose from candidates in the on-campus district. The At-Large senators are selected by the entire student body.

ASMSU is basically the representative of the students of MSU that the administration sees; if the administration wants to know how students feel about an issue, they ask ASMSU. In addition to communicating with MSU's administration, ASMSU decides how to spend the students' money. Every student taking seven or more credits pays a $151 fee towards ASMSU. Some of the money is earmarked for various student services, and $89 per student is left for ASMSU to decide how to spend.

So, the main reason to get involved in ASMSU, or at least be informed about it, is that they decide how to spend your money on programs for you.

If you want to watch Monday's Presidential debate, click this link.

For the record, the Exponent (our student newspaper) had a great article about ASMSU in their February 18 issue, which was of great assistance to me in writing this blog.

Get involved!