The girl had a plucking awesome day

The girl's orchestra teacher uses the word "plucking" as one would use another famous verb-cum-adverb, e.g., "you better believe I am dead plucking serious." Clever man--tip of the cap.

Anyhoo, the County Honors Orchestra proved a new experience and challenge for the middle schoolers. After auditioning singly with music previously handed out, the kids come from various middle schools and play together for the first time in a strenuous day and a half rehearsal session before this afternoon's concert. On top of that, even the conductor is a guest conductor who has never worked with any of these kids before. The guest conductor was a Honduran native currently pursuing a DMA in Orchestral Conducting here at USC. Apparently the high expectations he had threw some of the kids for a loop, especially when he reassigned a boy to a lower chair in the orchestra that morning, but it all came together beautifully:


Unfortunately for the girl, I had frugally glossed over the black and white dress requirement and pulled stuff from my closet rather than buy new clothes that she'd outgrow too soon. Until I saw her in the first chair I realized that the black skirt I lent her looked so much shorter on her longer legs and well, among a bunch of kids in black pants.


But overall, it was a great experience for the girl:


Afterward, she went to a birthday sleepover that featured a campout in their backyard. I lent our tent and they built a campfire and had s'mores:

Plucking lucky girl.