Thirsty Thursday

Thursdays are a night of ritual partying at CalArts. I've often remarked that if the kind of planning and foresight we collectively put into the Halloween Party, Graduation, and Thursday Nights® were invested in the day-to-day operation of the school, the place might just start functioning like an institution of higher learning. Going here makes me appreciate just how well the U of MN functioned during my time there, a bizarre appreciation I never would have thought to have (a high-functioning monstrosity is far more dangerous than an inept one; I knew that about people, and now I know it about institutions). Partying seldom interested me at the ol' U because it was so anonymous and mindless; living literally steps from the epicenter at a school 25 times smaller is hard to resist, though, even if it is still rather mindless.

Frequent readers know that I'm prone to find the cynical angle anywhere I can, and so I hasten to add that I've had a tremendously productive and valuable three semesters here so far and am anticipating one of the more exciting, if harrowing, times of my musical life over the next six months or so. And being that tonight is the last Thursday of the semester, a momentary setting aside of all things cynical is indeed in order. It's a useful diversion and a terrible raison d'etre.