Catching Up: Everything of Importance Since Mid-Novemeber

As this title might lead you to believe, this is going to be quite the post.

End of Fall Semester

I finished the fall semester with a 3.243 GPA, by far the highest I've had. It brought my cumulative up to 2.795. Everything went well.
On a less academic front, as I mentioned in my previous post, I am an understudy in Alpha Psi Omega, the National Theatre Honors Society, which has been a goal since freshman year. This was only made better when the big/little reveals were made, and it is one of my best friends, Brian, who is currently studying abroad in India.

Winter Break

This winter break was absolutely fantastic. I got to work with Broadway Training Center (where I was a student from 2007-12) on their Gala production of Boeing Boeing. It was a huge learning experience for me. I assisted with the building and painting of the set and ran the lights during the show, as well as some other odds and ends. It was so wonderful to be able to work with some of my favourite people.

jTerm

This jTerm, I did a directed study in set design. We have normally-offered courses called "Fundamentals of Theatrical Design" (which I took last spring) and "Advanced Lighting and Design" (which I will take a year from now). There is nothing in between, so my advisor and I decided to call the course "Intermediate Design". I worked independently on a total of four designs for M. Butterfly by David Henry Hwang. You can read more about what I did here.
Also as part of the course, I attended the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival, Region 1. (KCACTF1, or just ACTF). I attended all the set and lighting design workshops that I could, and made a presentation on what I learned as well. I earned and A in the course, bringing my GPA to 2.836. The biggest thing I took away from the design work and ACTF is that scenic design is what I really want to do.

Side note: Why do I care so much about GPA?

Well, I think I have a pretty good reason. To be inducted to the national for APO, I need at 3 by the last semester of my senior year. Also, I'd like to be in Sigma Tau Delta (English honours) as well, for which I need a 3.0 cumulative and a 3.4 in my English courses. All of that seems like it is on track to happen.

Also jTerm: I designed the costumes for our production of "The Actors Nightmare" by Christopher Durang. What I learned there is that I am not...cut out...to be a costume designer.

Spring Term, so far.

Week five of the semester has just passed, and things are going great. I'm taking a geology lab (#LiberalArtsCollegeStudentProblems), as well as Intro to Literature, the last English course I need for the minor which isn't involved in the theatre major (the theatre major requires 4 dramatic literature courses, and the English minor needs 5 English courses plus Intro). I'm also taking Contemporary American Drama, which is greaat. The last play we covered was actually M. Butterfly. We've also looked at Clyborne Park and a few other cool plays. We will do The Laramie Project and Hedwig and the Angry Inch later in the semester, which I really look forward to.
Also in Noah's world is #Concussion2k15. By the title, you can assume that I have a concussion and every thing is horrible. It happened 5 March and is just starting to clear up. Obviously, I'm well enough to write this. But what this also means is that I've been out of class since the 9th, aside from going to contemporary because we were doing Butterfly that day. I should be back in class on Tuesday. I'll have a lot of catching up to do over spring break.
Another really cool thing? I'm a design assistant on the main stage production of The Liar by Pierre Corneille, translated by David Ives. I'm working on making a library of images to use on the set. Even cooler is that I've been given a Freedman Prize for this. What that means is that I have a certain amount of money to put toward the project and will have a contingency prize at the end. What this also means is that I will be presenting my work at the scholar showcase on 8 May. Yes, on  my birthday. My 21st birthday. What can you do.

I think that's really it, and you can look forward to a redesign of the blog soon! 

Weeks 4-7: Many Things, and Yet, Nothing

Well, recently there has not been anything really to mention. Hence why I have not mentioned much. I'm still doing quite well with grades and such, but an expense of it has been some stress. Thankfully, I have solidified my friendships enough that I have the right people to talk to.

Living at the lake has still been fantastic. It is pretty great to be able to go home from campus.

Speaking of home, that is where I am presently. It is the end of October Break, and I go home tomorrow at noon. The highlight of being home was getting to see my friend Kevin in The Fantasticks. Picture to the left.

In other theatre-y news, it is all but official that I will be doing the costumes for this January's production of "The Actor's Nightmare" by Christopher Durang. It is a great little play. It has about 13 costumes for five actors and 22 pages. It should prove to be quite the...experience.

Rehearsals for Caucasian Chalk Circle have long been in full swing. After this Friday. we will have reached the milestone of no longer being permitted to call for line. I won't say that it concerns me...but I will say I am not as prepared as I'd like to be.

Oh, and my Doctor Who/Fandom Blog just hit 70,000 views :3

NEXT WEEK

Well, this week is already underway. I have a huge essay that I may or may not have started due Sunday. It really is a may-or-may-not situation: I've only sort of started it. Regardless, hopefully it will pan out. Oh, and it is officially the second half of the semester. Wooooh! Friday and Saturday are the Haunted Pine Lake thing, which I so enjoyed doing last year. I think that because of rehearsals I will only be able to do Saturday. It is basically like being in a Haunted House except outside. Saturday also is the APO interest meeting.... Sunday (26 Oct) I'll go into the city with school to see Cabaret which should be amazing as not only have I really wanted to see it for a while now (#AlanCumming!) but my friends will be there with me :)

Why Herro Dere!

Hi! I'm so horrible about the upkeep of this blog. Meh. Well, it is what it is and I suppose that something is better than nothing.

I can't believe it's November already! Tomorrow, the 7th is the anniversary of my last discharge from the Cooperstown Psych Unit! That was my most recent hospitalization in a series of five. That's right! Tomorrow, it will have been a year since my last stay. I have not had a year outside of the hospital since my first hospitalization in Feburay 2011. So yay! It may not sound like a big acheivement, but for me it most definitly is.

Other News:
I've come to the realization that the Dual Degree wasn't going to happen. In case you don't know, Dual Degree would mean graduating with two BAs (or I guess two BSs or a BA and a BS...). It means taking 30 extra credits outside the two majors, which were Theatre Arts and Psychology. I've kept the Theatre Arts major and now am going for minors in both Psychology and French. So I should be graduating, hopefully, in 2016. Which is nice, financially!

I don't remember if I announced this here already, but whatever:
The Breakfast Players (the group I did Hamlet with) has gotten the rights for "Waiting for Godot" for August 2014. This production will benefit the Lustgarten Foundation. In addition, we will be presenting a collection of original monologues, one acts, and a short play. These productions will benifit the charity To Write Love on Her Arms.

And...I think that's about it. I will try to have some more upkeep on the blog!

Fall Fears

By this time next week, the letter asking Hartwick to allow me back as a student for the fall semester will have been sent. With that comes multitudes of emotions-the principal of which are joy and fear.
I know I have not written about what happened that made me leave the school of my dreams in January, and don't hold your breath for a post about that. You'll die. Those of you who know me well know what happened and those of you who don't, well, have fun speculating.

The joys thinking about returning to school brings me fill me with bubbles. Yes, bubbles. I feel like fizzy soda, which is a sharp contrast to how I have felt lately. Without Hartwick, I feel like I just brushed my teeth and then drank orange juice which I proceed to spill. But the next week or two of not knowing, I think, will result in me doing my hamster impression. The equations are quite simple, really:

and 

but

A quick thanks to Jenna Lowry for assuring me the ± meant what I thought it means.

See? that's not too hard is it? It can't be; I (mostly) figured it out and I didn't even finish Algebra 2/Trig (usually second [but sometimes third] year of high school math)
The proofs behind the first two are so easy, I won't do them. But allow me to explain the third equation. That's what this whole post is about!

First, there are the fears that all people in my place would have regardless of major.

1. Will my friends have replaced me in my social group?
2. It's not my first year, so I'm not a freshman, but I also don't have the academic credits to be a sophmore. What does that make me? A freshmore? That sounds like a bad brand of deodorant. A sophman? No, that's not good either; it makes me sound like a guy who can't get it up. There is a poll to the left-should I say Sophman or Freshmore when people ask what year I am? Vote :3 <3
3. Do people think I died? Are they gonna look at me like I'm a ghost? In my defence, this has happened to me before. After I came back from a month and half of being in a hospital in 2011, some of the people in my school actually thought I had killed myself. Yes, I killed myself and there was no funeral or anything. True story, bro.
4. Does everyone know what happened? Are all the returning students gonna think I'm psycho or something? Were there rumours after I left?
5. What to do if people ask what happened and I don't want to tell them. Well, that's not a worry. I'm going to tell people that I went travelling with the Doctor and he messed up the return date.

Then, there are the questions unique to being a psychology major:

1. Will my peers in the major try to analyse what happened to me?
2. I declared my psych major at the end of the fall 2012 term, and haven't taken the basic level psych classes (psych 110 and 111) yet. What will my peers think of a [enter class name here] in their freshman level psych class?

Lastly, (and my biggest concern) there are worries unique to the theatre arts major.

1. When I left, I had to drop out of the play. Am I ever going to get cast in a mainstage again, or will the directors worry that I'll have to leave again?
2. I failed my Intro to Theatre class last fall (a fluke) and wasn't there to take it in the fall, so I will probably be taking it this fall, and last time I checked the department head was teaching the class this time. Will he judge me? I don't want to mess up what is pretty much my first impression with him.
3. In jTerm, I gave my all to the class I was in. I wanted to prove to people that I am serious about being in theatre and the like. I fear that may have been my last chance to show that I'm not a joke and I may have ruined it.

~Conclusion~

Many of these may sound irrational, and maybe they are but, they are real and legitimate concerns I have. They may all revolve around what other people think of me, but let's face it: no matter how much we may say that we don't care what everyone else thinks of us, it does change the way we think of ourselves and our cognition in general. I had a high-level idea of how things were going to be when I came to Hartwick last fall, because no one knew really anything about me. But now I may be about to enter an environment where my reputation proceeds me, and that reputation may be based on he-said-she-said things that went around seven and a half months ago. It may be true that I can't wait to prove my rep wrong, but what if I prove it right not even knowing it. I really have no idea at all what lies ahead of me, and that scares me more than AMC's The Walking Dead, which really scared me. But it probably was not the best idea to watch it at night home alone in a large-ish house right before bed. At least I had the lights on.