http://www.bitburners.com/Software/Download/Audio_Software_and_Encoders/Nero_Audio_Plugins/

I finally tracked down a working plug-in that allows Nero to burn Ogg files to CD. Previous to this, it’s either been trying to find a site from which to download a plug-in that’s known to work, or downloading an abundance of plug-ins that don’t work. Now I have the best of both - a site to download a working plug-in. Good stuff.

Palindrome (păl’Ä­n-drÅ?m’): A word, phrase, verse, or sentence that reads the same backward or forward.

Today’s palindrome is brought to you by Ryno Zone, home of Ryan Berg (no relation to that Berg family), who is the 121st addition to the list.

I think Halloween brings out the strangest of our breed. This evening I found myself craving strawberries, and I miraculously appeared in downtown Greenville at Port City Java, contendedly sipping a strawberry smoothie. There’s some very strange music playing…I think I’d call it ambient jazz. Ambient because you don’t really notice it until you listen for it, and jazz because the predominant chords seem to skip around the minor seventh/ninth/thirteenth varieties. Don’t get me wrong - minor seventh chords (sit down at the piano and play D-F-A-C in that order) are some of the most relaxing chords. Ninth chords add shimmer, and thirteenth chords perk up the ears. I even used a thirteenth chord in a recent composition (though it looked more like a tone cluster). But back to the weirdness. One piece ended - ENDED!!! - on a dominant seventh chord. Another sounded like a Carribbean band on powerful depressants. Not altogether unpleasant, but still a little on the fringe.

Walking here from the parking garage was another strange experience. Okay, there’s a marathon going on, which would explain why some 65-year-old guys were wearing numbers and shorts that would have embarrassed most girls to wear. But that didn’t explain why Goldilocks and Eric the Red were walking arm-in-arm down the street. I expected to see all three pigs escorting Cinderella next, but that must have been the next block over. I truly thought for a minute (longer than fleeting) that the town of Greenville had finally and completely flipped its collective lid. But I found out that Halloween is Monday, explaining why Mother Goose had made a stop on Main Street. See how sheltered we are at BJ? Except for the holidays that we get off, we don’t know when holidays hit. (Gah! Ending on a half-diminished vii chord!)

So it’s a bit weird. I take some comfort in the fact that I’ll be sleeping in a good bit tomorrow. White Glove? What White Glove?

[fade to black as I laugh at all the undergrads who will spend all day cleaning tomorrow]

I’ve added three more bloggers to the list. Two are friends of Capabayan and one is an independent submission:

Rosie’s Ladybugs
My thoughtful spot.

The independent submission is Pastor Jeff Voegtlin of You Think Too Much!. Pastor Voegtlin has a somewhat storied past in his stand for Christian education, which you can read about at his church’s website. He’s been in our doctoral program from the summer of 1999 through spring 2004. He’s now working on his prospectus and dissertation in hopes of receiving an Ed.D. in Educational Administration. He’s currently pastoring in Chesterton, IN.

I hope you’ll take the time to drop by these folks’ sites.

I really had to laugh the past few days. First, Sunday night in Greenville, NC, the almost-weekly comment - “This here’s Tom, he’s 23, he’s a…grad student? right? at Bob Jones, and, oh yeah, he’s single.” - was made, followed by the usual grandmotherly hookup attempts after the service. (How bad can it get? Let’s just say that one grandmother tried setting me up…at my grandmother’s funeral.) This weekend it was, “Oh, do you know So-and-so? She was a student last year at BJ, but she sat out this year. I haven’t seen her…I was wondering if maybe she came by the [tape] table.” That was followed, not two minutes later, by another older lady: “Do you know so-and-so? [This is a different so-and-so.]” Me: “Hmmm…is she the daughter of Mrs. So-and-so?” Her: “Yup. You should say hi to her…mom…for me. She’s [I think/hope referring to the daugher] a really nice girl…and she’s single…<wink><wink>.” Click for more…

A while back I reported that Dan Forrest had snatched several prestigious choral writing awards, among them the John Ness Beck Foundation award, given to the composer of what that particular group thinks should be the model for sacred choral music. I also noted that Dan beat out John Rutter (who needs no introduction, at least to choral people) for that prize. Well, today in Chorale we read through Dan’s prize-winning piece, dedicated to none other than our own Dr. Warren Cook. It’s a cool piece, very easy to sing and yet rich with great harmonies throughout. It’s an arrangement of ST. COLUMBA, which hymnology students will recognize as the tune commonly wedded with, among other things, “The King of Love my Shepherd Is” (which is the text for this piece). Well, to introduce it, Dr. Cook said, “This is the piece that beat out John Rutter for the John Ness Beck Foundation award. Rutter dedicated his piece to the Queen of England, and look who this is dedicated to.”

Yes, we here are proud of Dan’s accomplishments. Come to our concert in two weeks to hear even more of his works. You won’t be disappointed.

This week’s quartet trip took us up the road a ways to Fayetteville, NC (next door to Fort Bragg, for you military buffs), then way up to Greenville, NC (which I was surprised to find out just now isn’t terribly far from the Outer Banks). In keeping with one of my original justifications for travelling, I have learned an important tidbit from this weekend. Click for more…

Broke out the tux for the first time this year. I think they’re made for the two extremes of the human form - either excessively thin and excessively fat guys can wear them without hassle; anyone in the middle (like most of Chorale) has to constantly adjust various articles, mostly relating to the cumberbund and/or shirt tails. Doesn’t help that most tux slacks are meant for use with suspenders, not belts. It was kinda funny, actually, to see the same stream of guys going in and out of the restroom constantly to check themselves in a mirror. Got to be sort of a reunion in there after a while.

The concert itself went well. We performed a pretty demanding program - Lux Aurumque by Eric Whitacre; Hallelujah and Amen from Words from Paradise and the Basque Lullaby, all by Dan Forrest; and All this Night and Simple Gifts, both by Rene Clausen. The other two performing choirs were the Southern Wesleyan University Concert Choir under the direction of Dr. Don Campbell and the College of Charleston Concert Choir under the direction of Dr. Robert Taylor. Both choirs did an outstanding job in interpreting and performing their works. It was a delightful evening of music as sung by some of the best college choirs in the state. Notably absent, though, were representatives from both USC and Clemson; both of those choirs were at last year’s ACDA convention. On the whole the attendance was rather uninspiring - for a room the size of Stratton Hall (for you BJ people) it was only about 1/5 full. I think the choristers outnumbered the spectators. Last year’s concert was packed out with six or seven featured choirs. Kind of disappointing, but we still had fun anyway. Also props to one of our basses, Eric Rea, who filled in at piano on one day’s notice for All this Night after our regular accompanist landed in the hospital. No word on what’s wrong with him, but he’s pretty weak.

And we get to do it again in two weeks. Yeah. So this time, come and listen. We’ll be doing everything we did tonight and then some.

Another BJ person has been added to the list - Melissa Johnson, otherwise known as pianistforChrist. She’s a freshman here at BJ this semester.

In other news, there is no other news.

mounty’s corner is still partying, now because of the one year anniversary we recently celebrated! Last week!

Yeah, okay, so things have been a little hectic. I have multiple probably-unrepeatable stories from Quartet trips involving beans, newspapers, hoses, and forests, but since they’re probably-uprepeatable (yes, I like hyphenating words for the sheer-pleasure of it) they probably-won’t-be-repeated. Let’s just say you’d've had to’ve been there. I will say, though, that I’ll never sing “Wonderful Peace” the same again. Some songs have little stories behind them that cause one to chuckle every time through. Take “Come Thou Fount.” Perfectly normal pentatonic American folk melody whose true pentatonicity (?) was ruined by whoever harmonized it on an 8-tone scale. I’m perfectly fine until the line, “Praise the mount / I’m fixed upon it,” mostly because some guy decided to start bowing down to me when he heard that. (If you still don’t get it, think the name of this site. Why would I call it MOUNTy’s corner?) Anyway, there’s a Quartet connection. One of our number has a habit of slurring the sibilants in “peace” making it sound more like “peas.” All was well until our baritone, possibly without thinking about it, sang (in a rehearsal, thankfully) “Peas, peas, carrots and peas / Coming down from the farmer above.”

Which brings me to another topic - the divide between spoken and written language. I understand different spellings and all, but who says “you would have had to have been there”? A three-part main verb, plus a state-of-past-being infinitive comprising another another three words. Six words that can be reduced to “‘d’ve had to’ve” pronounced “duhv-HAD-too-uhv.” We lost two syllables, so I say it’s a good change. Who says you can’t have more than one contraction per word? (Note that I didn’t write “can’t've.” That only works in situations like “I can’t've cheated on that grammar test!”)

Finally, a word to all those readers not trapped in Boje-land and who want to hear some cool music. Friday night the University Chorale will be singing at Anderson College for the annual SC ACDA concert. (ACDA = American Choral Director’s Association; national site here, absolutely eye-wateringly hideous color schemed local SC chapter site here if you want to burn your eyes out; Rule #1 of Web Design states “Thou shalt not place maroon text on a royal blue background unless your site is meant for the surfing enjoyment of the blind,” but no one told these guys.) Details aren’t anywhere that I could see, so let me spell it out - concert starts at 7 and features the Southern Weslyan Concert Choir, the College of Charleston Concert Choir, and the BJU Chorale. I seem to remember there being more, but that’s all the info I have. Last year was a blast in Columbia, so this should be as good. Anyway, that’s at 7 in Anderson this Friday. Tuesday, Nov. 1, is another date to mark, especially for on-campus folks. We’re singing a short concert for the High School Festival at 7p. Later that week we have our official concerts (Friday, Nov. 4, 6:30p and 8p) which will be comprised entirely of 20th century compositions, many of which are from BJ’s own Dan Forrest, faculty-on-leave at Kansas University getting his doctorate.

Yes, things are busy. But who needs sleep? As the coffee t-shirt says, “You can sleep when you’re dead.”

Jon Hanneman, BJ grad living in the Seattle area, used his head and submitted his site, epiphany to the list. He’s got some good and different thoughts on life stemming from the fact that he appears very well-traveled. Should offer a good read, so head over and read up!

Since he asked (I’d think a geek should be able to figure it out), a Xanger is one who has a site on Xanga. Actually I just like typing Xanga. Xanga Xanga Xanga Xanga Xanga Xanga Xanga Xanga.

The Xanger of the night (Xanger Xanger Xanger…this is too much fun!) is Leslie Bowman, the SuperShortyChik. She’s on the list so go ahead and drop in. Meanwhile I’m going to quietly go crazy…calmly, cooly…entirely without incident.

I spent waaaay too long last night trying to figure out the true identity of two Xangers. They might just find themselves added next week if I can’t get anywhere. Not that that’s a bad thing…

Added to the list this morning were The Carolina McCarnans, Josh and JoyBeth, from a recommendation from his sister Joy. I think.

Need…more…coffee… BTW, Mom, thanks for the Wawa coffee. Made my day yesterday when I finally brewed it. Always good to have a taste of home.

AP Wire | 10/12/2005 | Venezuela’s Chavez orders U.S. missionary group to leave country

If you’re too lazy to read the article, Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez gave all the New Tribes (website) missionaries their marching orders today, and those marching orders are orders to march straight out of Venezuela. Granted, Pat Robertson called for Chavez’ assassination a few weeks ago, so I suppose he has a right and a reason to do what he did.

I have to wonder if this is religious persecution (as I’m sure some will immediately see it as) or a result of Patty’s pie hole. I didn’t see anything in Chavez’ latest rant that said he hated the fact that they were Christians. He’s more concerned that they’re CIA spies. So I would tend not to view this as religious persecution. Seems to me this is a corporate version of I Peter 2:20 - “For what credit is it if, when you sin and are beaten for it, you endure? But if when you do good and suffer for it you endure, this is a gracious thing in the sight of God.” Short version: Pat Robertson sinned, and missionaries are being beaten for it.

Next time keep your mouth shut, Mr. Robertson. There are enough people in Christian camps that shoot their mouth from their hip without you making things worse. In this case, paranoid as he is, I think I sympathize with Chavez’ position. Courtesy of his instability and your tongue a good number of the misisonaries in Venezuela are being ordered out. Congratulations.

Oh, and quote of the day: “they take away sensitive, strategic information.” Yes, sensitive and strategic information. About Venezuela. And about Chavez’ secret mystery cabinet made up of men from Mars. So our military doesn’t get its collective behind kicked when we invade. From outer space. HELLO!!!! Remote mountaintop villages? What - are they reporting on the movements of parrots? How much sensitive information is there to be spied upon when you’re 8,000 feet above sea level, covered in a thick canopy of clouds, and miles away from the capital?? Get this man some Valium and a nice comfortable padded room!

Enter the popular Xanga hangout. Got two with (hopefully) another four soon to come; I’ll just edit this post when that happens. First two up added to the list are Jon Crisan (who reminds us that datsjon13) and Kara Kuntzelman (of Lancaster, PA, and more importantly, happychic31 fame). More updates to come, so stay glued to your monitor, refreshing every 30 seconds. Or not.

UPDATE: Stephen Strong, otherwise known as Child of Jehovah, has also just been added.

Bear with us as we work out some server kinks. I got a few reports earlier today of the site being down, but by the time I was able to check it was back up. It was down again for a few hours this evening. Hopefully it’ll stay up, but if it doesn’t, that’s why.

These are late in coming, because I was debating putting them up in the first place. They aren’t particularly accurate, because the site was effectively down for a few days halfway through the month. But hey, whatever. Click for more…

First it was www.bensfriends.com. Now the big mother lode of BJ Bloggers seems to be DelightInHim.org. With that in mind, Steve Caturan has been sifting through blogs left and right. He was the one that passed along Ramon and Jessica Contreras (ramonandjessica.delightinhim.org) and Deborah Kwan (taryanouba.delightinhim.org). He’s also passed along two more: Katrina Caturan (kcaturan.delightinhim.org) and Faith Manzo (fcmanzo.delightinhim.org). They’ve both been added to the list.

There’s another big source that appears to be pretty popular among the students, and for the life of me I can’t understand why. I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised because all the ones I’ve been getting from this site are currently freshmen. The site is the ever-popular Xanga…which is blocked on campus, which means dorm students can’t update them very regularly, especially freshmen. I’ve got six waiting in my moderation queue, so it’ll be at least tonight before I can get off to Port City or some other downtown hotspot to check them out and validate them. I suppose they could all be town students…

Finally, a word of wisdom borne from administrative frustrations. Twice this month, people have made pretty big deals about things that could have been easily caught by checking the official records for their questions. One involved someone spending about an hour sifting through records to answer a question I answered for him the previous month. Another involved a person calling in a huff because he thought I missed an appointment; if he had checked the sign-in list on his desk he would have immediately seen that I was at that appointment. The word of wisdom is this: If you have a question about something, check the obvious places before you get bent out of shape.

“Some people don’t believe…[long pause]…that the reason you’re not old is because you look stupid.”

Brain…melting…!!! This piece of Socratean wisdom was imparted by an old guy who took it upon himself to educate me and some friends while we ate at Joy Food this evening. One other nugget of wisdom - “Two things will never let you down in life: the Bible, and a .45. If one doesn’t work, you try the other.”

I’ve got two more to report: Deb over at taryanouba and Ramon and Jessica have both been added to the list. I’m still waiting to hear back from them as to what their lot in life is, but you can sneak a peek at their sites anyway.