Theme from Rocky

I have just learned my song of the day, and I will take one further brief moment away from gorging myself, looking at clearance shoes online, and watching my nephews play in order to post this brief log. 

Theme from Rocky (or, How to Impress Your Nephews)
So far, in Japan, I have played legos, watched Star Wars, and eaten the tamales and cookies that are a holiday tradition in my family (props to my sister for making the tamales - I picked up corn husks, the one ingredient that's impossible to find in Japan, and the proprietors of the Mexican grocery near my apartment asked if I was making tamales.  My response was along the lines of, "hell no, but my sister is!"). 

Wow...
it's really loud in here right now - my nephews are playing with my brother-in-law and their new toys.  They are as brainy as they are loud...
I don't really feel like spending any more time writing this when I have family to hang out with and cookies to eat and shoes to find, so I'll just take notes:

WHY Rocky: it was playing in the car, and my nephews like this song, and I realized I'd never really learned a mostly-instrumental well-known song.  Also, it appeals to my oft-ascendant inner tomboy. 

HOW: ipod, keyboard, 2 sets of headphones (one to cancel out external sounds like excited nephews), one headphone/jack adapter we finally found yesterday at the third electronics store we tried.  Repetition.  Handwritten chart. 

THOUGHTS: would be fun to take more time to transcribe more specific horn/string lines and make a more detailed piano arrangement.  But my younger nephew looked suitably impressed when I took the headphones out of the keyboard and played it for general consumption. There are few parts that repeat exactly in this song - it's more through-composed than most pop songs with lyrics.  Usually it's only a small change - it sounds more repetitive than it is, because the fanfare thing keeps going and unifies it. 

Ok.  Back to family, food, and shoe-shopping, the Kat-on-Vacation Trifecta of Happiness.