Next week, finals week, is going to be interesting.  I don’t have anything planned for Monday, but Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday are exam days.  Then I have two papers, one long and one short, due Friday afternoon.  Hopefully, even with all the movie-watching I’m doing, I’ll be able to do a sufficient amount of studying.

            Lucian says about finals week, “I’m not lookin’ forward to it.”  Aaron says, “Dead week, even for an art major, is difficult.  They should call it rush-to-finish-all-your-stuff-before-you-get-destroyed-by-finals week.”  Well, I’m done quoting people, because they don’t have anything cool to say. 

            I think I’m going to walk around campus tomorrow and take some pictures.  Everything looks pretty cool now that spring has finally shown its face.  There are pretty flowers.  I’ll show you later.        

            I did relieve some stress yesterday, though, when I went to see A Flea in Her Ear, a play.  It was a farce, so it was funny.  Seth and Jorge and Clay were in it, and Cody and Aaron were backstage.  They all did a great job; I laughed a couple times.

            Some time last week—I don’t remember which day—some went over to some little information session about studying abroad.  I want to go to New Zealand, or Australia.  Having the opportunity to go to some other country is neat.  I’m excited.  Hopefully I’m able to go.

            I should probably go to sleep.  I stayed up all night Thursday night again, and I haven’t quite recovered yet.  I’m just sitting here watching Lucian play some game.  It’s a huge waste of time.  I think I’m just going to drink an orange soda, take a shower, get a bit of sleep, and then try to make myself do some homework.  I’ll run too.  And end the day at some pizza place.  That’ll be good.

            Aaron Cantu, my roommate, had this to say about the year: “It’s been a fun and stressful time, but it’s about time it dies.”  I guess that’s all we’re going to get from an Art major.  Wait, he has more to say: “I really enjoyed the pool thing, Mike.  I don’t know what else to say.”  Hmm.  He’s talking about sitting out in our courtyard, in a baby pool, eating burgers and hanging out last Friday.  That’s his fondest memory from this year.  Great.  I wasn’t at the house Friday afternoon.  I’m sorry I missed this wonderful thing, this pool party.

            This is a horrible retrospective entry.  I’ll write something more inspiring a couple weeks from now.                   

            The weather was really nice when I got there; it was sunny and warm and kind of breezy, and I was really pleased with my decision to wear shorts and sandals.  As the night went on people pointed out to me that it was going to get cold, and that maybe I should have worn jeans and a jacket or sweatshirt.  They were right.  The temperature dropped quite a bit, and the breezes turned to gusts, and I was sorry.  

            When I got home last night there wasn’t anything to do.  I went on a run and then sat in my room talking to people for several hours—it seems that’s all I do here sometimes, talk to people.  I stayed up a lot later than I wanted to.  I wanted to get to bed early so I could wake early and go to a college track meet in Indianapolis.  Wabash was running.  I woke up at two today and figured it too late to go.  It was also cold and rainy, too.  Nasty day.  There will be other meets.    

            I’m going to do my best to keep from having to pull another all-nighter.  They are no fun, and they kind of ruin the next day.  For anyone going to college this fall, you should get your work done ahead of time so you don’t have to experience watching the sun both set and rise in the same sitting.   

            But Michael, why aren’t you sleeping?  That’s you, my dear reader, in the italicized interrogative.  Answer to your query: I don’t know.  I was up all night last night because of my Political Science and Biology exams I had this morning.  I have no idea why I was up so late (early) all nights (mornings) prior to last.  Weird. 

            But I’ll sleep this weekend, so don’t worry. 

            Also, never purchase Redline.  Redline is an energy drink that has enough caffeine and other crap to ruin your life.  No joke.  Mine is ruined.  But seriously, you have to be eighteen to buy it.  I only had half a bottle—along with two other energy drinks—and I was done.  No, done isn't right.  How about hyper-animated?  Yeah, only this caffeine induced hyper-animation was bad, bad, bad.   I couldn’t write legibly during my first exam because I was shaking so bad, and I was sweating like I was on a run.  Horrible.  I let Cody drink the rest of it: he hasn’t slept yet, either.  It won't let Cody and I sleep.        

            I did go to the bed race yesterday, though.  Every fraternity is supposed to build some sort of cart out of a mattress, and they’re supposed to organize a team of people fast enough, strong enough, and brave enough to push the things around the mall.  It’s exciting.  Most people use shopping carts for their vehicles, and they shove their mattress down inside their cart, and then they put the driver in the cart with the mattress.  We cut the basket portion off our cart, so ours was different.

            I didn’t run in the first two heats because I didn’t want to; I was tired and kind of sick and didn’t want to get hurt.  I ran the third one, though, because Jorge got really tired and couldn’t run another one.  It was a lot of fun.  It was tiring.  We did pretty well, winning the first two heats and losing the third.  I think we would have won the third had we run it relay style, like the other team did.  We’ll do that next year—if we have enough people. 

            While in Chicago we visited a not-for-profit organization called GRIP (Gospel, Relationships, Immersion, Prayer and Preparation) Outreach for Youth.  Their aim is to help at-risk youths learn and grow and become good citizens.  They do this through a variety of programs, including a weekly meeting during which high school kids get together to partake in teambuilding activities and basketball games.  All of the kids get mentors who keep in touch with them for their entire time with the organization.  All of the people there were very nice and seemed passionate about what they were doing. 

            Later the same day we went on a boat tour of Chicago.  The topic of the tour was architectural history.  It was awesome.  It was a bit chilly outside, but other than that the weather was beautiful.  Our tour guide was awesome, too, and he spoke at length about differences in architecture among the buildings, and he also gave some pretty good anecdotal history lessons.  It was informative and entertaining, and there was free coffee and cookies. 

            The trip was free as well.  I think I took a dollar with me.  This wasn’t something this class does every year, either; this is something that just came up in conversation one day.  One guy was just like, “Hey, we should go to Chicago.”  Our professor told us to ask the powers that be.  Someone did, and Wabash gave us a bunch of money.  Wabash is cool like that.  Application is an integral part of the learning experience, so being able to do things like this, like immersion trips, is good for me.  Hooray for learning!

            And can you believe I forgot to take my camera with me?

            Tuesday night there was a screening of a documentary called Indoctrinate-U.  It was about diversity issues at universities in America.  The focus of the film dealt with diversity of thought, with discussion centering on the imbalance between conservatism and liberalism in academia.  The argument was that conservative thought is not as well represented or respected as liberal thought in universities.  There was some pretty good discussion after the film. 

            I didn’t go to sleep Tuesday night: I had to stay up to finish a lab report for Biology.  Lucian and I moved down to the dining room to do our work at around three in the morning.  The first thing we did was watch thirty minutes of 80’s cartoon introductions on YouTube.  While Lucian worked on his abstract algebra homework, I searched the internet for video clips of an awesome movie called Rescuers Down Under, as well as information on a series of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles books Lucian and I read and loved when we were younger.  I started to work on my lab report at about six in the morning.  I finished at around 12:30 in the afternoon.  Then I went to lab.  Then I came back to the house and slept for eight hours.

            I get to go with my English class to Chicago in about seventeen hours.  I’m excited.  I’ll charge the battery in my camera so I can take some pictures.

            I went with Jorge, Nathan, and Keegan to a little Chinese buffet place for Easter dinner.  Chinese food isn’t the standard Easter meal, but it tastes decent and is filling.  My fortune cookie told me I would soon be reunited with an old friend; I’ve had that one before.  Getting a fortune you’ve already had is a lame and disappointing experience.  Wouldn’t it be scary if you ate your fortune cookie and then read this on the little piece of paper: The cookie you just ate had potassium cyanide in it?  I don’t know that I’d eat any more fortune cookies—because I’d either be too scared or too dead.

            Over at the library there’s this little display called the Human Race Machine.  It takes a picture of your face and morphs it so you can see how you would look if you were a member of another race.  It can also age your face so you can see how you will look at 45 or whenever.  I wasn’t impressed with the race change, but the aging thing was cool.  There was also a program that lets you pick a disorder so you can see what you’d look like with the disorder.  Disorder D gave me a huge chin; disorder A gave me squinty, crossed eyes; disorder C gave me a bloated appearance.  Interesting.  I guess.      

            After the meeting and the awesome movie I went on a run.  It was dark, and I couldn’t help but imagine there were zombies out wandering Crawfordsville.  I mistook a trashcan in the road for a zombie.  I heard a dog bark and thought it was a zombie.  It’s a good thing I know how to avoid and, if the situation calls for it, kill them.  Hopefully by the end of the semester my newfound fear of the undead will be dead itself.  

            Don’t forget to introduce yourself.  I’d really like to see how many comments I can get.  Seth wants more, too.  Do it for Seth.  But I don’t mean to be pushy.  But seriously, leave a comment.  

            It was really cool to be on the inside during the weekend.  Watching all of the kids run around from house to house was funny, because I remember doing that, and I remember how weird it was.  I’d go to one house and meet some guys, start to feel at home, and then I would leave and start it all over again.  Rushing is an interesting experience.  I hope you guys enjoyed yourselves. 

            I played a game of IM soccer earlier.  We only had five guys who played.  It was me, Josh, Joe, Cory, and Keith.  We did pretty well the first half, scoring one point and only letting the faculty score three, but the second half wasn’t as good.  They scored four the second half.  I was the goalie two of the times they scored.  The ball went right between my legs.  My soccer skills are sorry: I had a perfect chance to score, the ball being right at my feet, right in front of the goal, but for some reason I missed it with two kicks.  The ball just kind of rolled away from me.  It was kind of fun, though, and playing was a decent substitute for running, I guess, even though I didn’t get very tired.  I might play next time—if the guys let me.   

            Also, Seth thinks it would be pretty cool if everyone who reads this would leave a comment.  Introduce yourself or something.  Don’t be shy.

            Saturday was pretty cool, though.  I went to DePauw (oh no!) to stay with a friend.  The fraternity he’s pledging had a party.  The party was fun.  Those DePauw people aren’t as bad as everyone says.  I don’t know why we all can’t just get along.  I guess fraternization with DePauw would make Monon Bell a little less exciting.  Fine, fine, fine: to hell with ‘em.

            I said in a previous blog I was going to think of some cool stories from Honor Scholarship Weekend last year.  I couldn’t think of any.  Not because cool stuff didn’t happen, though.  Cool stuff did happen; I just have a horrible memory.  I’ll count on Seth, my dedicated reader and fellow Kappa Sigma freshman, to recount his Honor Scholarship experiences in a comment on this blog. 

When I got home I didn’t feel like going to sleep, so I watched a movie.  I watched Gone, Baby, Gone.  I recommend it.  When that was over I took a nap.  After my nap I did some homework.  After the homework I went back to the high school to watch some friends play IM basketball.  I think it’s funny how the faculty team is the best team out there.  There are all these athletic, spry teenagers who are supposedly in the best shape of their lives out there getting stomped on by some middle-aged teachers and coaches.  That makes me happy.  The faculty won their game 50-19.

            I watched American Gangster the other day, and Michael Clayton today.  I recommend both: they are very good films.  I was going to start reading a new novel today, but I couldn’t decide which I wanted to read.  It was either going to be Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M. Pirsig or The Razor’s Edge by W. Somerset Maugham.  While I was contemplating which book to read I started a Su Doku puzzle from the book of Su Doku puzzles my mom bought for me a few weeks ago.  The puzzles are platinum—platinum is the greatest difficulty level, ranking above gold, silver, and bronze, respectively—and the one I was doing ended up taking me longer than thirty minutes to finish.  By the time I was done I had a headache and didn’t feel like reading either of the aforementioned novels.

            I just got back from working with my dad.  He’s a contractor, so I got to do contractor-like stuff.  It was a good time.  On the way home I stopped at Walgreens to pick up some lip balm.  I walked through the candy aisle while I was there and couldn’t help but let the shiny packages and my sweet tooth inveigle me into picking up something on my way through.  I bought Whoppers.  Then I stopped at Wendy’s after that and bought a half chocolate, half vanilla Frosty.  I mixed the candy in with my Frosty, but I didn’t like it, and I stopped at a gas station on my way home to throw the whole thing away.  The chocolate ice cream tasted like cigarettes smell.