Jumbled Thoughts

I miss marching band...
Tonight was the night of the Baldwinsville Marching Band home show. Some of you may know that Baldwinsville is my hometown that I grew up in before graduating from there and starting college in Oswego, and some of the people who know that much might even know that I was in the marching band from eigth grade all the way up until graduation. I loved it, it was my life when the season was in session every year, I was the "section leader" of the low brass section (we didn't have actual section leaders, but the low brass instructor made me the unoffical leader of the section because of my dedication, skills, and hard work) for the last three years. In my last year, my brother started his first year of marching band. If you know our ages and do the math, then you will figure out that this will be his last year in the band as he's a high school senior. So of course I had to come to his final show, for the obvious reason already stated, and that they won't be coming to the Oswego marching band show (which is conviently in my backyard) this year because for whatever reason their director (we got a new one right after I left) decided to arrange for our band to go to a BOA show out of the state instead of during Columbus Day weekend like we always do, meaning I won't see them in my backyard next week.

So I go there with my mom, with my dad to come later when he got out of work. We got in, turned in our tickets, got the hands stamped, bought a program and 50/50 tickets, and found a seat. Looking through the program, there's 24 seniors, which is just amazing. It was so weird looking at their pics and all, since these people were all in 8th grade when I was a senior, they all look a bit older, but it just seems so wried that they're still in high school since it's been so long since I've seen any of them minus Jeff and a couple of our friends. As time progresses, Mom and I notice that the announcer is someone a couple classes below me named Steve. This guy is hyper, a big showoff, and highly annoying at times, especially with the spotlight on him. He's a good kid, just needs to learn some boundaries. It was not fun hearing him on the mic since he doesn't seem to understand silence and talked on the mic more than he should, and started telling some lame-ass jokes now and then too. If I had known he was going to be the announcer, I'd have seriously bought a box of baseballs or something, and would sell them for people to throw at him, and then donate my profits to the marching band. Everyone wins. ^_^

So back to the show itself, something that struck me odd was that with the exception of us, there were only four bands performing. I'm just not used to such short shows and they don't seem normal, especially for our shows since we usually have a few more bands. After our band did their performance, it was Westmoreland's turn. Normally this wouldn't merit a mention, and honestly I'm not going to mention the other bands since I'd only mention things that not anyone here would really care about. This band is in a class lower than ours, and to my recollection has never really done so well, but they are the first band who has done something that I have wanted to see be done all these years I've been in and watched marching bands. Their show theme was video games. Yes, video games. I damn near shit my pants right there in the stands. I have always wanted to see a band play video game themes, I've always thought if done right it can work out well. Their arrangement showed me that it can work, and hopefully more bands might try this in the future. The first movement was a collection of Mario themes, the second was the closing aria from Final Fantasy VI, and the last movement was the Zelda movement, with the Light World theme from a Link to the past being the first half, and the main Zelda theme being the second half of the movement. I'm telling you, I was practically orgasming every time a theme changed, it was great. I only wish that a better band was doing it so a trend could start since doing something like that would be a great success, and Westmoreland didn't march too well and didn't even have the drill to their show finished. I have to appluad them for taking a chance with it, and hopefully they'll recover the time for being behind and do well with it. I'm thinking of e-mailing their director to give positive comments for choosing the theme they did. In any case, this was awesome to see and hopefully will happen more often.

So Dad eventually came and we watched the rest of the show, then Mom and Dad went down for the senior recognition before retreat. After that dad left, and me and Mom weren't too far behind. It was an alright show, too short though, and not too many people that I know to hang out with. I was hoping there would be a few old friends there, but sadly no. Oh, almost forgot something worth mentioning. You know the 50/50 raffle tickets I mentioned before? Well, they were sold 1 for $1, 5 for $3, and an arm's length (measured to be 15 tickets) for $5, or something of that deal. Well, when the winning ticket was announced, it turned out to be a ticket that was sold within the next arm's length after mine. If I had bought $10 worth of tickets, I'd have come home with just over $300. >.< Talk about a kick in the balls. I swear, I keep getting THIS much closer to lucky shit happening but never quite make it. Oh well. Good night, just really wish it was longer.

And video game themes in marching band kick major ass. That made my night. ^_^

Current Mood: chipper