Time for some hymns

I haven't posted in a few days, I haven't spent much time online at all really. Other than typing out chord sheets for an upcoming DNow and church, I've been trying to spend as little time on my computer as possible. I've been doing a lot more reading (see list below, and The Bible) and it's been a nice change. For my next few posts, I am going to post some of my favorite hymns. Sounds lazy?- maybe a little bit. But, with the past few decades of the praise and worship movement, good, solid, biblically-sound lyrics are sometimes hard to find. I'm sure most of you know a lot of these by heart, and I'm sure I'll post some that hardly any of you have ever seen. I pray that God will use these hymns to reveal Himself.

Blog Title

As you may know, I've gone back and forth with different titles ever since the creation of this blog. It started out as musings of a reformed bassist, transformed into chronic congnitions of my consciousness, then I had a few random titles for a few days before settling on Derek's blog... which morphed into derekhughes. After I grew tired of that I added (musings of a reformed bassist) to derekhughes and that's where I've been the past few days. Now, notice the top of the page and you'll see I've changed it once again to read derekhughes (student). When trying to choose a blog title, I wanted something that would accurately describe me and the nature of this blog.
First off, I've decided to change it from musings of a reformed bassist because many, many people use the word musing in blog titles and using it in mine makes me feel like a big ol' copycat. Second, although I do hold to the five solas of reformed theology and the five points of Calvinism, I don't want that to define my blog, or me for that matter. There are many blogs out there devoted to these doctrines of grace, and that isn't the kind of blog that I want to claim as my own. I have absolutley nothing against any of these blogs, in fact, most blogs that I visit deal with reformed theology, I just want to maintain a different kind of blog. Thirdly, sometimes I feel restricted whenever I think of myself as a bassist. I do play bass and it is probably the instrument that I enjoy playing the most, but sometimes I feel as if I shut myself off from the rest of the musical world and try to focus too much on the bass. I forget that I still need to keep up my piano chops and that if I don't practice singing, Dr. Lugo will shoot me. I'm not exaggerating. Ok, maybe slightly, but she would still be very angry. But the point is, I need to stop thinking of myself as purely a bass player, because it has started to hinder my growth as a musician... wow, I'm a huge geek.
So my new title, derekhughes (student) describes my current state. I am a student of theology, not formally (at the moment) but, in my spare time, I try to soak up the word as much as possible. I'm a student of music, currently notating my way through UK's theory department and trying to keep up in my intense voice lessons. And, I'm also a student of whatever else they force me to take at UK, right now it's Psychology and this class called Dinosaurs and Disasters (all about prehistoric times and the extinction of Dinosaurs... Bert, I'm sure I'll have a lot of questions about this one).
So, there you have it- my blog's new title. I hope that I haven't lost any readers in the process, but if so that's quite alright. I don't blog to gain popularity- this is more or less my online journal. If you want to read it, feel free. My mother says it makes it possible for her to keep up with my everyday life. Thanks for all of your dedication and continued faithfulness. Until next time...

Tagged?

I've been tagged. Now we come to the part of the conversation where you ask, "What the heck does that mean, Derek?" Did you say it outloud or did you just read my dictation? You just read along in your head but didn't really ask me, didn't you? You don't really care that I was tagged and you don't ever care to find out what that means. But, since you're still reading this post that means that you're obviously still remotely interested so I'm going to go on and explain my current situation. Apparently there is some kind of game going on right now in the blogging world where someone gets tagged. That person has to write a post telling... wait, I'm just going to post what someone else wrote about the subject. I had to go back a couple of layers into this game to find this, the author doesn't know me at all.
“People who get tagged need to write a blog post of 6 weird things about them as well as state this rule clearly. In the end, you need to choose 6 people to be tagged and list their names. Don’t forget to leave a comment that says ‘you are tagged’ in their comments and tell them to read your blog.”
I was tagged by Adam Bishop, new music minister at Buck Run. Now normally, I wouldn't respond to anything like this because I hate chain letters of any kind, they annoy the crap out of me. So, why am I playing along? I'm bored and I have nothing better to write about. So here it goes- a few weird things about Derek Hughes.
1) I am an avid air-drummer. Although I've only played drums on a few occasions and definitely don't mention them in my list of instruments, I love to air-drum. (Is that a verb?) It's weird, I hardly ever play air-bass, air-guitar, or air-piano. No no, my area of expertise is restricted to the air-drums, usually in the car. And yes, I get odd looks often.
2) I've never seen the Sound of music. This may not sound too odd, perhaps you've never seen it either. But, I love musicals more than any man should and to have not seen this classic is inconceivable.
3) Oh, I hate the feel/sound of cotton balls. I'm getting goosebumps and chills as I type these words, no lie. When you rub them between your fingers and they produce that small, squeeky noise accompanied by a tiny amount of friction, just enough to grate on my spine. I'm not sure if this one made much sense, but if you feel the same way about cotton balls as I do, you understood oh too well.
4) I'm a teribble speller. Whenever typing anything on this blog, I always have dictionary.com pulled up and check many words- even in this particular post. I've looked up 3 words so far. (Try and guess which ones).
5) Here's another movie one- I've never seen The Goonies. For older readers out there, this may not sound too odd, but apparently this was a movie that defined my generation and my friends never cease to sing it praises. But, I have no desire to see it... so there.
6) I hate the fact that I own greatest hits cds but at the same time I can't get rid of them. I love the concept of the album so much and have a hard time listening to songs out of their original context. So it's odd that I would own so many greatest hits, that are a collection of pupular songs put together by the record company. I feel cheap whenever I listen to them, but I can't stop. Someone help me!
So there you have it. I've been tagged, I've listed 6 weird things about myself, and now I think it's my turn to tag someone else, actually 6 other people. But, I think I'm just going to tag Andrew. So now I've fulfilled my duties and passed off the torch. Andrew, if you're reading this, know that I don't want you to feel obligated to reply. In fact, feel free to ignore this game and end this small branch that I've created- my feelings won't be hurt at all. But, if you're like me, and always looking for stuff to post, go ahead and share your weirdness with the rest of the world.

oops

Youtube has been acting really funny recently whenever I try to post videos on my blog. A few days ago I blogged about Coldplay's "Fix You" and tried to post the music video so you all could see what I was talking about and experience the great moment with me (complete with fist pumping). When one video didn't work, I went and tried to post another. I tried this for a couple of days and then finally gave up. Much to my surprise, I signed into my blog a few minutes ago and discovered that youtube had finally posted all of the videos- I think 6 in all! I took care of them and left only one for you to enjoy. I guess I'll have to start planning my video posts ahead of time so they show up when I want them too.
Oh, I picked up a few new cds yesterday- Fleetwood Mac's "Rumours" and "The Dance" and The Beach Boys "Pet Sounds". I haven't gotten a chance to listen to any Fleetwood Mac yet because I'm so blown away by Pet Sounds. I highly suggest that you give it a shot. It just may be the most perfect album I've ever heard, no exaggeration.

New Year's Resolutions

I normally don't have them simply because I don't like disappointing myself. I know, I know, it's a terrible attitude to have and that's why I've decided to make some new year's resolutions. While I realize that I don't need to tell everyone to give them some sort of validity, I do know that I'll feel a greater sense of accountability if I post them on my blog. So, faithful readers, here are my resolutions for 2007.
1) Study the Old Testament- I read the bible this past year but at many times it became more of a chore, just one more little box to check off everyday, and I sped through much of the Old Testament without much thought. I want to read it again, but this time seeing it as one huge story that perfectly sets up the birth of a savior. I especially want to pay attention to each gospel reference as I read.
2) Journal- This is something I've tried a few times, but it's never really stuck. Hopefully I can make a habit of this.
3) Study more- I didn't do too bad last semester, but I really want to study a lot more so I don't have to cram before the tests.
4) Read more books- I got a lot of books for Christmas.
5) Drive more slowly- It was only a matter of time before I got my first speeding ticket and now that I've joined the club, I don't care to get any more.
6) Blog more- I tended to slack off a lot with this blog and then go through a nice blogging spurt, only to slack off a week later. I want to stay more consistent and allow people to get a closer look into my head, no matter how scary it may be.

Sure, there are a lot more areas that I'd love to improve, but these are just a few that I wanted to share with everyone. And, just for the record, I've already started on all of these so I'm off to a good start.

Blogging Bliss

As you may be able to tell, my blog is no longer on the fritz and is now working with new Blogger Beta. I don't really understand what all of this new stuff means, but I do know that it is incredibly easy to edit my blog now. I have control over fonts, colors, and even the layout. The old format was all in HTML (which I know nothing about) so I love that I can actually change my blog now with the greatest of ease.
It's finals week here at ol' U of K and today is our day off. I don't think anyone has any finals today so we're all supposed to use this day for reading and studying... so I'm messing with my blog! I'm a terrible student, I know. Actually, I'm going to go right now and write 1 of 2 papers due on Friday of this week. I should be able to write each of them in about a 2-3 hour time span, so if I split them up and do one today and then maybe one tomorrow or wednesday, I shouldn't be stressed too much. Besides the papers, I have a Geology final tomorrow morning and then a math final tomorrow night, then a Aural theory final wednesday morning, and finally, a Written theory final on thursday morning. I'll keep you posted as I go... wish me luck!

Frustrations and the DVD

I'm a little frustrated right now at blogger because of this format change. They are in the process of switching all of the blogs to a new format that will make publishing posts and editing your blog much easier. However, I suppose they're still getting all of the bugs worked out and I am currently unable to make the switch. I went through all of the steps and set up this new account through google but whenever I go to my dashboard (list of my blogs) my blog doesn't show up. They said once I made the switch, I would be unable to log in the way I usually do and would have to go through the new google account everytime. But, as you can see, I am still very capable of logging in and I can still post through the old format. I hope they get this fixed soon- I was getting excited about the easiness of new blogger beta.
JMB had a meeting last night at Johnny Carinos (thanks for dinner, Cedarmore) to talk about our plans to produce our first live dvd. It will be filmed at Cedarmore on March 31 (as of this moment) and I expect all of you to come. It's going to be a lot of work trying to put everything together and solidifying a set list (which we've never really done before) but I'm really excited about this project. We're hoping that all of our churches will make a good showing (Master's, Buck Run... are you writing this on your calendar? BRING YOUTH GROUPS!) and we're also hoping that the different churches we've played at in this area will come to the show. I'll keep you all posted as more develops.