As I mentioned…Halloween is Christy’s favorite holiday.
Why?

Well…it can’t be because of the evilness…or the ghosts and goblins. It can’t be that it is the night of the dead or the zombies and dracula-types or the gross movies that everyone watches around this time of the year…so it must be the pumpkins.

Don’t ask me to explain it.

However, it’s been like 90 degrees every day here in The Valley…and it DOES NOT FEEL LIKE FALL.
Stupid global warming.

Nonetheless, we have gotten into the spirit of the season by carving our pumpkin. That’s right, we did not carve pumpkins, but we carved A pumpkin. I mean, who needs to waste more than one pumpkin?

We gave the kids each a side…they drew a face on their side of a pumpkin, and they scooped out the pumpkin guts, but we did the carving. While Nathaniel was drawing his face on the pumpkin, I told Noah to draw a picture on the paper bag-place-mat I had created. So he drew Batman and Robin…

Not bad, eh?

AAaaaaaaand here is the result of our masterful carving…

Nathaniel’s is pretty standard and jolly:

and Noah told us he was drawing Indiana Jones on the pumpkin, complete with a shirt (that big box at the bottom) and a WHIP!!!
He was very excited…

Noah and Kindergarten:

So it’s been almost a month now that Noah has been in Kindergarten–in a general education classroom–five days a week–with a Lovaas aid.

He’s doing really well! He operates on a token system throughout the day-meaning that for the good things he does (obeying the teacher, interacting appropriately with other students, etc…) he earns a token; every time he does NOT do one of those things, a token is taken away. His aid and teacher partner in the token system and use it consistently in the classroom. If he earns enough tokens in the school day, he gets to do his absolute favorite thing in the universe…play video games (PS2-usually Lego Indiana Jones, Lego Batman, or Lego Star Wars).

**side note** Many thanks to Heidi for loaning us her PS2!!!

A short story:
So last week must have been drug awareness week at school because Noah came home one day with a red-ribbon bookmark and a red-ribbon paper-handout-thingy that said “Say NO to drugs”.

Christy and I asked him what they did at school that day and he said “We tied up the tree,” (referring to a big red-ribbon that apparently got tied around a tree at school…)

then he continued….

“…because we don’t drug. NooooooOOOOOOOOOOO DRUGGIN!”

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAA!!!!

I am a musician.

If you’ve hung around here at all you’ve probably gathered that…

But let’s get something straight. I am a commercial musician.

As much as I know about and have respect for classical music, it just isn’t my cup of tea. If you want to talk music with me, let’s talk about film music or pop & rock. I know a thing or two about those topics…as I have committed a great deal of my life to “the great study and pursuit.” (I also know my way around choir and worship music…so we can talk about those things as well. Like such as.) But I am just not a huge classical music-type.

As a commercial musician, I want to work on film and TV. I would love to write one of those arrangements they need every week for American Idol. I would just die to work on a thing like High School Musical 3. I mean, for a commercial musician, there is no cooler gig, right? So why turn up your nose at HSM3? Is it juvenile? Sure. Is it not a depiction of (or anything close) of a real high school experience? No, it is not even close. Is it singing and dancing lead by an incredibly talented team of writers, performers, choreographers, and musicians? YES. Is it fun for the whole family? TOTALLY. Is it even rated G? For General Audiences? YES!!!

Would it be a freaking awesome gig? YOU BETCHA.

So, we went to see it today as a family. The two kids and Christy and I.
And it.
Was.
Great.

I’m telling you. I’m a sucker for amazing musical experiences, and this was one of them. (My all-time favorite musical experience though is still watching the LA PHIL perform Stravinksy’s “Rite of Spring” in 2001.)

I’m just saying. Don’t knock it. Troy and Gabriella forever.

and yes.

I cried.

So shutup.

If you want goosebumps, watch from 1:25-1:45 on this video. The way they did that little interlude is way cool, and the passion you see in Zac Efron’s face is exaclty the reason why he will be a huge star and around Hollywood forever and ever, amen.

My brain hurts.

I’ve been doing HARD creative-type work all day…and my brain is mush.

Sometimes there are music-writing related tasks I’ve done so much in the past that the process becomes more rote than creative…which…could be a sad thing in and of itself…

But there are some days where I reeeeeeeally have to stretch myself creatively to try and write something that isn’t a complete rip-off of someone else (although it may have “someone else elements”) and also has my musical stamp on it and sounds great…not an easy feat…

Not to mention that one’s brain will operate less effectively the less sleep you get…or at least my brain will. And I haven’t been getting a ton of sleep lately.
–SIDE NOTE: Sleep is for the brain, not the body! (Did you know this little tidbit???)

Anywho…I’m off to collapse.

Yay for The Office.

If anyone wants to do this…count me in.

I’ll do the music…

Anyone?

I think Christy and I are going to be Star Trek again…and they kids change their minds every day…sheesh…just pick already! Batman or Darth Vader…pick one and that’s IT!

I just answered this Featured Question; you can answer it too!

Is anyone else bored with Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles?

It seems to be severely lacking this season…anyone else feeling it?

So Nathaniel is reading the original Hardy Boys books.
He is 7 years old.
These books are aimed at 10-14 year-olds.

Um. Yeah. He’s awesome.

He has read three of the books (they’re over a hundred pages each) in the past month or so and likes them a lot…buuuuuuuuuuut he’s not so good at math. He’s behind in his class in that area, but kicks all of their butts at reading.
We’re working on it…we’ve got his math flash cards and I’m making him play math computer games to build up his speed and stuff. Let me know if you know of any great math game websites for second graders…

SIDE NOTE: We have a bunch of the original Hardy Boys books–the hardback ones–but are also missing a bunch of them. They’re all numbered and in order, so if you happen to have any that you want to dump off somewhere, let me know. We have sporadic numbers ranging 1-50 or so…for instance, we own # 1, 2, 6, 8, and 9…but don’t have 3, 4, 5 or 7…and this goes on and on. Just drop me a line if you gots some!!!

Noah is also doing well in school. We do his homework with him and he is just adorable to watch while doing it…I wish I could video tape it and put it here…he is just a little angel from heaven.

Awww….I love my family.

Tired of this theme yet?

This is the main titles (opening credits) of the wolf movie–the one from which I posted the opening scene music last week.

Well, before you write music for a film, you have to screen it. The WHOLE thing. I had not done so before writing the opening scene (last week) and it turns out that the tone of the film at the beginning is quite different than the rest of the film.

Yeah…

So I watched the rest of the movie, and it’s more of a scary flick…not that yucky gore stuff (Saw, Hostel, etc…) but more like 90′s kitchy-scary (Scream? I don’t know…). Regardless, the tone of the opening titles is much different than the opening scene from last week.

If I get industrious, I will try to put my music with the movie and post it…but I’m not sure if I can.

But here’s the next clip for your listening pleasure!

Don’t let the title of this blog fool you…I did not compose the music for this movie–BUT–I did some orchestration for it…

And I JUST found out that it will be airing tomorrow night on the Sci-Fi Channel at 9PM

SET YOUR TIVOS to STUN!

or don’t…no biggie…

SNL’s ratings are up 50% this year so far.

Usually they start airing new episodes in late October, but this year Lorne Michaels made an EXCELLENT choice by starting the season in early September so SNL could cash in on the political satire opportunities that are abundant this year. Things like…Joe the Plumber