the sound of silence isn’t so sweet sometimes.

Four weeks is way too long between blog posts. When it comes to something that you’re used to doing once every two to three days, four weeks is an eternity.

Sorry I haven’t been around to post my life to you people. Sorry I haven’t been able to tell you about how not one, but two important people in my life left me frustrated, shocked, disheartened, saddened. Sorry I haven’t been able to tell you how I’ve come to terms with both people and am, hopefully, on a right track with both of them once again. Sorry I haven’t been able to tell you about how classes are going for me, how one class is really getting to me, how the other two have been fairly easy. Sorry I haven’t been able to tell you about the start of my formal marathon training, how I’m running longer distances with each passing week to run the 26.2 in February here in Gainesville.

Sorry I haven’t been around to tell you about the wonderful musical things that I’ve been doing in the past 4 weeks. I apologize for not blogging from Barbershop Convention in Jacksonville, where my quartet took home 8th place in the state. I haven’t spilled my feelings on my last time singing on the Contest stage with Duane, my tenor, my director, and my friend. I further apologize for not blogging about the amazing University Choir concert coming up in 2 days (October 30, 7:30pm, University Auditorium. Be there!) or the CSF Music Team practices that have gone down or the retreats that I’ve done or anything.

I haven’t blogged to you anything in the last 4 weeks about my beloved Red Sox or my beloved Gators. I never said anything about how my favorite baseball team played so well against the Angels, so poorly against the Rays, and so unbelievably in that Game 5 miracle. Sorry I haven’t been able to tell you about how my school’s football team has come back from an excruciatingly painful loss and played so much better than billed against LSU and Kentucky. Sorry I haven’t told you about the softball team making the playoffs and winning our first round playoff game to make the round of 16 next week.

I promise you it won’t be 4 weeks until the next posting on this blog. But, knowing my schedule, knowing I need 28 hours in a day as opposed to 24, I can bet that it won’t be 2 or 3 days before the next post either.

–jl–

TGIO.

Thank God It’s October. The days start getting shorter; the nights start getting longer. It starts getting cooler, though there’s no sign of that today; there’s pumpkins, campfires, homecomings, and all sorts of wonderful times planned.

Thank God it’s October. It is during the tenth month of the year that the seventh month, and second season, starts. It starts in Philadelphia this afternoon when the Brewers and Phillies kick off their NLDS. Tonight, it personally starts when the Red Sox begin their set with the Angels. And tomorrow, I can expect baseball fever around me when the Rays begin their ALDS with the White Sox. These are intense times for those who love our national pastime: there’s drama, heartbreak, elation, and stories upon stories upon stories that will be told and retold and re-retold.

I don’t dress up for Halloween anymore. Those who know me and those who live with me know that I am dressed up as a baseball fanatic, soaking in the swirl of emotions of the postseason, for the next 4 weeks, especially with my beloved Red Sox. This year, though, when the end of the month comes around, that just might change… I just might be in jacksonville that weekend for Florida-Georgia. And you’ve got to figure that at the World’s Largest Cocktail Party, on Halloween night (Friday), that there’s going to be plenty of people to keep me entertained without any sort of beverage in my hands.

This month is also the start of the formal training program for the marathon, which, by my math, will start October 20th… the fall state championship for Barbershop, held next weekend… the Alpha retreat put on by the Catholic Student Center, the weekend after that… homecoming weekend, which will, as always, figure to be a fun time… and, on top of all of this, school, work, music, baseball, and everything else October brings. I’m looking forward to a good month.

–jl–