2 weeks

Just a heads up, the next 2 weeks are going to be crazy for me with lots of finals and term papers, so I won't have much time to update this page. See you at Christmas!

I'm Coming Home

Wow. This past week has probably been one of the most exciting and memorable times in my life.

I got to be involved in the biggest bonfire west of the Mississippi in a time honored tradition known as "Freshman More Wood," where we stoke the flames of the fire as it starts to die out. I got the privilage of doing this with one of my best friends up at Cal, in front of a crowd 9000 strong. The next day, I got to fire the cannon shot to start off The Big Game, in which Cal triumphed over Stanfurd 37-16 to win back The Axe.

But probably the most important thing that happened to me this week, was on Sunday night, when my best friend Kayla gave birth to a beautiful, healthy, baby boy. His name is Jaron Benjamin Trees, and he was 8 lbs 12 oz. Both Mom and baby are doing well, and I couldn't be more proud to be a part of this child's life. I'm so excited to meet him, because I'm going to spoil him rotten!

Can you believe it? I'm an auntie!

Father Jason and baby Jaron 1 hr after birth

Big Game Week @ Cal!

So it's Big Game Week here at Cal, which means that things are absolutely CRAZY! The campus is pretty much bleeding blue and gold in preparation for the 111th Big Game against Stanfurd on Saturday. Last year we lost the axe to them after holding onto it for a good amount of time, so this weekend is going to be all about revenge. Activities for this week have included:

Cable Car Rally in San Francisco
Night Rally
Tree Chopping Rally (because not all trees deserve a hug)
Stanfurd v. Cal Sing-Off
The Biggest Bonfire west of the Mississippi (no joke, it's 3 stories)

Now combine all of this with mass amounts of publicity and what you end up with is one VERY exhausted Rally Committee. Some of the folks I'm working with haven't slept for 3 days. Now THAT'S dedication. Meanwhile, over at Stanfurd, the students are crying about how their school hasn't advertised the date of the Big Game well enough. Well I say, "Man up yo!" Figure it out for yourself if you're so smart! Or are your grades so inflated that you forgot how to use your brain?

May the Cardinal be damned!

Dunkel Zigeuner Lieb... Say Whaaaat?

Ok so I know it's been forever and a day since I posted anything on here, but I've been insanely busy with midterms and such. I'm not even going to try to update you all on everything I've been up to since October 16th, but honestly... it hasn't been that exciting.

I have a show tomorrow night performing Brahms Zigeunerlieder (Gypsy Songs) with the University Chorus, which should be a lot of fun... even though I'm bitter because it prevented me from going on roadtrip. Oh well, if I can get out of this dress rehearsal that I'm currently at before 10:00 I'll be grateful for that.

Peace.

Sweet Nuggets!

Yaaaaaaaaaaaay, I pulled my first all nighter last night writing a midterm paper for ESPM 6. It only took 4 hrs but I didn't start until 12 am.

Rollin' on 3 hrs of sleep right now. Rock on. Rock on.

Material World

Last night I underwent an amazing experience with the University of California Rally Committee that I wouldn't trade for anything. The only thing that to blemish the night is the fact that I lost the one material item that I value more than anything else I own: my high school ring.

Luckily, I have it insured so I can pay a fraction of the price of the original (let me just say, that shit was expensive!) to get a new one, but it still really sucks. I love that ring more than anything else I own, but last night was worth it. It really was. I have no hard feelings toward the experience, only a strong sense of loss that now accompanies the pride I feel.

The irony is that I never lose anything, I really don't. I lost the ring I bought at the Del Mar Fair for $8 in the bushes in the rain, and went back 10 hours later and still found it. Not to mention the fact that last night I was talking to a friend about how much I value the ring, and how I would be so upset if I lost it.... It's also pretty sad because the only reason I took it off was so that it didn't get ruined by paint. As I was taking it off, I remember thinking, maybe I should put this in a plastic bag before I throw it into my pillow case. But then I decided it would be fine and I should stop being paranoid... Everything was fine until I got back to my dorm room and discovered that there was a hole in the corner of the pillow case. The same exact corner I had tossed the ring into, thinking it would be safe. The only reason I didn't lose my other ring is because a plastic bag (the same one I was going to put the rings in) was blocking the hole.

The good news is that the ring was fading anyway, and I was going to send it in to be refinished. Also, my initials weren't centered on the inside of the ring. As soon as I get this new one, I'm going to have it re sized so that I NEVER lose it.

In the end, it seems only fitting that I lost my high school ring on the same night that I became an official member of a college spirit organization. My only regret is that the ring, with all it's sentiments, is lying somewhere in the dirt.

Lesson learned. C'est la vie.

Worst Day Ever

So this morning I realized that I can't go on the UCRC roadtrip to Disneyland and the USC game on November 8th. Instead I will be having a dress rehearsal/performance of Brahms Zigeunerlieder in Hertz Hall.

This is why musicians are emo.

Since U Been Gone

So ya... it's been a while since I posted anything here. The world is kind of collapsing around me, but in a good way. Well, actually it kind of sucks right now but I'm pretty sure it'll all turn out for the best. So I'm gonna try to keep this to a short reprise of what I've been up to lately, but I'm feeling pretty philosophical, so I don't know how well that will work out. My best attempt at this will be to direct you to the photos that I've posted to the slide show and ask you to read the captions to see what I've been up to. I'll also provide a short bullet point synopsis here:

Haas Lock In - Rally Committee spent the night in the volleyball gymnasium. I stayed up until 6:30 AM, until I fell asleep for 20 minutes and got taped into a twister mat.

Homecoming Week - I was on the Homecoming subcommittee for UCRC. We planned a Cal gear fashion show, in which I dressed up as the ASU Sun Devil, and Oski kicked my ass. I also got attacked by a cotton candy machine. I have gained much respect for the people at Seaworld that make it.

ASU Football Game - I got to wave the Cal flag on the field during the 3rd quarter, which we won! I also got to guard the California banner during the 4th quarter.

Photoshoot - Michael and I had a crazy late night run through campus and took a bunch of random photos.


And now, a bit of insight, because I couldn't resist including this somewhere...

"Maybe we're not supposed to be happy. Maybe gratitude has nothing to do with joy. Maybe being grateful means recognizing what you have for what it is. Appreciating small victories. Admiring the struggle it takes simply to be human. Maybe we're thankful for the familiar things we know. And maybe we're thankful for the things we'll never know. At the end of the day, the fact that we have the courage to still be standing is reason enough to celebrate."

Very Busy

Gonna update this page tonight hopefully... midterms are coming up so I've been beyond busy with studying and pretending to study. So I'll just leave you with one thought... It sucks to be a CSU Ram!

La Pucelle

"Take everything peacefully; have no care for thy martyrdom; in the end thou shalt come to the Kingdom of Paradise."
- Recounted by Joan of Arc at her trial, as told to her by St. Catherine in a vision

Instant Karma

Okay, so I'm still really sick. But I went to the Oakland Zoo this Saturday with Rally Comm which was a lot of fun. Obviously it wasn't nearly as kick-ass as our zoo, but it was still a lot of fun regardless. Especially since all of the animals were acting really inappropriately, which was absolutely hilarious...

On Sunday I volunteered with Rally Comm for the Campaign for Berkeley event, which was basically a fundraiser. They were trying to raise 1.5 billion dollars for the school, so it was a really big deal. The people who attended this event could easily write you a check for 2 million dollars and not even miss a beat. Harrison Ford even attended one year. These are the people our buildings are named after, so you can understand why I volunteered for the event, and why I was willing to go all the way into Emeryville to buy a pair of pants for the night.

Basically, it was our job to make these people feel really welcome from the moment they stepped out of their cars, where we greeted them with a March to Victory filled with smiles and cheering. Later on we led them in cheers while the band played and the Chancellor kicked a football held up by our star quarterback, Kevin Riley. The victory cannon was fired, Oski was there, and the library was decorated to look like a 5-star hotel. So, after all our hard work we were allowed to mingle with the donors/alumni while enjoying drinks, desserts, and live music. So I was enjoying the multitude of delicious desserts, when this lady walks up to me and asks me if I want to drive a golf cart to pick up the valets and bring them back to the parking structure where they parked the cars. Excited for the opportunity to get behind the wheel again, I enthusiastically agreed.

Three hours later and the rush of people leaving the party started to wind down, and I was relieved of my duty. As I was exciting the golf cart, I looked behind me and realized that some elderly lady whom I had given a ride to had left her purse in the cart. As I picked it up and started walking toward the security table, I realized that my wallet was gone from my back pocket. With tears in my eyes, I returned the purse and started searching desperately for my wallet. I had been so many different places that night it seemed impossible that I would ever find it. I was devastated, because credit cards aside, the contents of the wallet would have cost me over $100 to replace: not a fun situation for a college student to be in. Well, I told the woman who had asked me to help drive that I had lost my wallet, and about 5 minutes later I was talking to the Sergeant of the Berkeley Police Department and had around 10 other people helping me look for my wallet. Still, it seemed hopeless because the most likely spot that I had lost my wallet was somewhere along the path that I had been driving the cart.

Desperate to check every possible location, I hopped back in one of the golf carts with another lady who was helping me, and started backtracking my way down the various paths I had driven. I was searching for a tiny black wallet on black asphalt at 11:00 at night. But the lady I was with assured me that we would find it: karma would play its part. I told her if I hadn't built up enough karma during the past 3 hrs while voluntarily driving in the freezing cold with the flu, and returning the purse of a millionaire, I wouldn't ever have enough.

After driving down the route that I had taken for most of the night, I decided to check the original path that I had taken. I had only driven this way twice, because it required me to make an illegal U-turn, and the golf cart had no turn signals, no horn, and no headlights, and that had been over 2 hours ago. Plus, I had already gotten yelled at once by a security cop at the event, and I didn't want to push my luck. As we rounded the corner and I got ready to make one last U-turn, there it was sitting in the middle of the street, untouched. I couldn't believe it. I had always been a believer of Karma, but if I had had any doubts before, they were gone now.

Needless to say, it was a great way to end the night. We got pulled over by a cop who heard us yelling in disbelief, but he let us go after we told him the story. But not before telling me not to drive without headlights... I parked the golf cart and was handed a hardcover book that the guests had received as a parting gift as a reward for my hard work, and the valet company even offered me a job as a driver.

So to those of you who doubted me when I told you I have instantaneous Karma... HAZAAH!

Flu Shot Plz

DISCLAIMER: I am currently on massive amounts of NyQuil so this post may not make any sense.

I want the flu shot. Living in proximity with a bunch of other teenagers in a very small amount of space has resulted in my first cold of the season. Which sucks because tomorrow I am going to the zoo. Everyone is awake and going out for the night and here I am stuck in my room high as a kite on cold medicine. I can barely type this letter and would absolutely love to go to bed, but one of my roommates has her light on and it's not quiet hours until 12 or 2 so it's really loud on my floor. I've spent the past 20 minutes looking for something to tie over my eyes so it's not as bright, but to no avail. So I'm kind of stuck in this zombie mode, where I go out into the hall and talk to people about random crap.

Like this post. Random crap.

I went to the mall today and got a pair of pants, which was totally awesome. But I'll save that story for a time when I can form coherent sentences. Until then, I'm off to wander the halls until I pass out.

Big Brother's Watching

So my Music in American Cultures class is basically the most boring class I have ever taken. I would rather take Math, or Econ, or pretty much anything else out there before signing up for this class again. But alas, I have to take it to satisfy my American Culture requirement.

So for the past 3 weeks, for 1.5 hrs every Tuesday and Thursday, I have had to sit and listen to him ramble on about the importance of Appalachian folk music. He spent an entire lecture explaining rhythm. RHYTHM. It's where the down beats are placed guys, IT'S NOT HARD. I don't care if you're not a musician, you can't possibly be ignorant enough to need a 1.5 hr lecture explaining that. In addition, we have listened to the song Barbara Allan about 300 times. If you don't know that song, go listen to it on iTunes once and I promise that you will never want to hear it again. Now play it 299 more times.

So anyway today he finally switched to talking about the importance of African-American music. Joy of joys! I don't care how culturally significant the stylistic renditions of these songs are, because every single recording we have listened to has featured a terrible singer. I don't care if that's the original version, it still sucks. So now I have 2 more weeks of that to look forward to. For those of you reading this who know Ms. Lomax, you know that she taught us about African-American spirituals every year in chorus. It's not a concept I feel I need to review.

So today in class, I whip out my Mac and start playing a video game. Now, this is a lecture of about 500 students, and I'm sitting in the very back. I am making no noise, and disrupting no one. The kid next to me is asleep. About 1 hr later, some furious GSI comes and taps me on the shoulder and says, "DO NOT PLAY VIDEO GAMES!"

I was stunned to say the least. I couldn't believe I had seriously received a reprimand in a college lecture. Most teachers stop caring if you pay attention your Senior year of high school, so why the hell should this grad student care? I'm 18, you can't force me to pay attention. Regardless, I guess I had missed the professor's entire speech about not doing things on our computer during class other than taking notes. But seriously, why the hell does he care either?! He has his GSI's sit amongst us and watch what we are doing during class which is seriously creepy and controlling. He needs to get over the fact that his class is boring and STOP WATCHING ME. If I want to go on Facebook because I can ace the class without doing any of the reading, or taking any notes on the stupid lecture, that's my prerogative. Until I start disrupting the learning process of other students, no one should care what I'm doing during class.

Oh and by the way, the kid next to me slept through the entire class.

UC Rally Committee

The UCRC (also known as the Rally Committee or Rally Comm) is one of the oldest and largest student organizations on the UC Berkeley campus. Established in 1901, the Rally Committee members are the Official Guardians of California Spirit and Traditions. The Rally Committee comprises hundreds of student members and is founded on its motto: Stand nineteen feet tall! Be united! Be tough! Be proud!

Our responsibilities consist of:

• Guardians of California Spirit and Traditions
• Custodians of The Stanford Axe
  
• Caretakers of The Big "C"
  
• Keepers of the California Banner, the Walking Banner, and Cal Flags
• Bonfire Rally
• California Victory Cannon
• Card stunts
  
• Big Game Week, Homecoming Week, and Charter Week
• Other Rallies

The Rugby is the official uniform of the University of California Rally Committee. It is our identifying feature and is recognized by Cal students, alumni, and fans of other schools throughout the Pac-10. The Rugby can be worn one of two ways. It can be worn as a shirt or tied around the waist.

So most of you have probably seen the pictures of me with a giant O painted on my chest and a Rugby tied around my waist. These pictures were taken at a Women's Volleyball game, where me and 9 other students participated in a CALIFORNIA spell out. Running around campus in a sports bra with a crowd of 2000 people at 12:00 at night is an experience that was made possible through my membership in the University of California Rally Committee.

There are plenty of other places to hit up at Cal if you're looking for the typical social scene, so it's nice to be able to hang out with a group of people on a Friday night with the sole intent of joining together in the spirit of Cal sports.

FINALLY!

The first season of Xena is available for download on iTunes!!!1 Can you say marathon on my floor?!

Donkeys & Elephants

So everyone knows that Berkeley is completely overrun by Democrats right? Wrong. Turns out 40% of the student population is actually registered as Republican. This lays the groundwork for an extremely volatile environment and allows for confrontations like the one I mentioned between the Traditional Family Property supporters and the Student Coalition for Marriage Equality. Now that's not to say that all Republicans are crazy conservatives; I know I'm not. In fact, most people I know assume that I'm a Democrat because my views are so moderate, especially when it comes to social issues.

But I regress, as the topic of this post is supposed to be about the 2 guys on my floor who embody this political struggle in its entirety. Their names are Matthew and Alex, and they've known each other since high school. Matthew is an avid Democrat who identifies as Agnostic, while Alex is registered as Republican and attends First Presbyterian Church every Sunday. Now they are rooming together, which creates an environment with the potential for enough animosity to start a 3rd World War. The interesting thing is that it doesn't. In fact, their friendship seems to flourish in the differences that separate them. Sure, they get into arguments every now and then, but each one respects the others' opinion. Watching them is usually quite amusing, and friends and family seem to get a kick out of listening to them bicker about the upcoming Presidential election.

In the end, I think that politicians today could learn a thing or two from these guys. Politics have become so focused on party differences that we seem to have forgotten that everyone is united by a single goal. We all are striving for a better, safer world to live in, we just have different means for attaining that end. And if you eliminate extremist groups, we all pretty much have similar definitions of what a "better" world consists of. Thus, the reason this post is not titled, "Donkeys vs. Elephants."

Democrats and Republicans are necessary to one another and to the progression of society. If we didn't have Democrats pushing for social change, we wouldn't be able to change the some of the misguided views that have been established by our ancestors. But if we didn't have Republicans keeping society in check, we'd all eventually live in a communist society where we hold hands while singing Kumbaya. Okay maybe that last bit was a little biased, but you get the point.

Unfortunately, my moderate beliefs place me directly between Alex and Matthew, and most of our time spent together consists of each of them trying to pull me further to one side of the political spectrum.

Does anyone else smell a sitcom?

Sayonara!

As of this morning, both the tree-sitters and the tree in which they sat are gone! You can read about it here, but basically they got tricked out of the tree.

Tree-Sitters

So for those of you who are aware of the current predicament with the tree-sitters up here at Berkeley, they've finally given them a court mandated order to get the hell out of the tree. A lot of the surrounding oaks have already been cut down, and they've also cut down all the branches leading up to the 5-story redwood tree that they're camped out it. They told them they aren't feeding them anymore, so if they want to eat they'll have to ask for help to get down. There are 2 helicopters that are constantly flying around the area, and news reporters from every station are surrounding the tree, hoping for something interesting to happen.

Honestly, they've been up there for 2 years now and as much as I support environmental conservation, they need to get their asses back on solid ground. But they're more concerned with saving this one tree than they are with allowing the University to stabilize the neighboring stadium which is located on a fault line. It's not as if Berkeley doesn't already put a lot of funding toward eco-friendly projects, such as the compost bins that are in every single cafeteria. Plus, they've said that they'll replant new trees in the area. In the end, I think it's going to come down to force, because there has got to be at least one hippie up in that tree who is willing to die for the cause.

It's like war, man. Peace out.

It's like living on another planet...

Okay so today on my way to class I was greeted by the lovely sound of bagpipes. Yes, bagpipes. Turns out the Traditional Family Property supporters had shown up on the middle of campus for a demonstration. As intrigued as I was, I had a Psychology lecture to attend and I was sure that they would still be there when I got out of class. Sure enough, there they were, playing God Bless America on the bagpipes. Only this time, the gay rights activists were there in full force, with giant rainbow flags to combat the medieval style flag that the other group had brought out. So these two groups were competing for people's attention in the middle of campus, and were attracting quite a crowd, when all of a sudden a homeless man showed up and started yelling at both of them about how they had stolen the land from the Indians.

That's Berkeley for you.

CCA Shoutout!

Greetings from Berkeley!

Having survived the unbearable heat, sketchy streets, and first 2 weeks of classes here at Cal, I've decided to create a blog to keep you all updated on my experiences. I'll be trying to update this site at least once a week, hopefully a bit more. I miss you guys so much and I can't wait to visit you in December! If you want to drop me a line, send me a message and I'll give you either my cell # or email address.

Jackie


P.S. - Give me something to write about! If you have any questions about the crazy Cal experience, let me know and I'll do my best to answer them!