Hi! It's been a while.

As you could maybe tell, grad school has been eating up all of my time. I didn't think about how much it possibly could until all of the sudden I checked my calendar and an entire month has gone by! It can really sneak up on you like that, huh?

Yeah, grad school has been really challenging to say the least. There are some classes that put me to sleep (especially the stupid remedials I'm forced to take), and others that are so hard even people who have more prior experience than me are struggling. However, despite that, it hasn't sucked! Like yeah some of my courses feel super painful to go through, but I really have been learning so much in a short amount of time that I actually feel really proud of myself! And everything is related to what I wanna do for my thesis, even the stuff that hurts my brain.

I know last time I talked about the people in my program. I've been meeting more of them through group projects, different events, and whatnot, and I like at least most of them! And it's nice to think that some of them also think I'm cool. There's this one guy who always says hi to me and asks to work together on assignments, and this other guy added me to a group chat to vent about that realy difficult class. I've also gotten the opportunity to showcase my compositions in different events through the school, and everyone seems to think what I do is super cool!

Speaking of compositions, I applied for a potential commission through a choral program near where I'm currently living! I know my recordings of the pieces I sent in are not the best, but I really hope I get it. I really want more opportunities to write more music, it's something I've been itching to do, but haven't had too many chances in this program so far. Plus, I'd get paid a decent amount to do it if I get accepted too!

I will say, I'm stoked for the next semester to come about. I thankfully only have to take remedial courses for one semester, so the next semester will be finishing my requirements (which will be all the cool music classes!) and also start taking elective courses. The electives have to be in relation to my thesis, which I have a vague idea of what I wanna do. I know that I wanna do stuff with synths and other electronic noisemakers, especially when it comes to building them. How I can make that into some sort of research topic is something I still have to figure out, but I think it'll lock in eventually.