If you don’t happen to be from Indiana or have never lived in the state for some extent of time you might not understand the weather here.  Basically, it acts like a bipolar kitten that’s quickly to purr for affection one minute and then scratch your eyes out the next.  Even if our weather predictions are improving, they still never make any sense to me.

You see, Tuesday had a high somewhere between 40 and 50 degrees.  It was nice to go without even a jacket for once.  As I was eating dinner, there came a downpour and I quickly made my way to another building to work on my homework.  After being inside for about an hour, I noticed that other students where coming in, short of breath, with red faces, and almost shivering to death.  After I left to head back to my room I felt like I had just stepped into Narnia.  Everything was iced over, and there was a frigid and piercing wind that was blowing snow all over the place while also taking the salt off the sidewalks along with it.  I looked up the temperature when I got back to find the wind-chill had dropped to -11!  So if you heading to campus for a visit, you might as well bring a few extra layers just in case this “kitten” freaks out on us here in Indiana.

Posted by Philip Towne at 11:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

As you may have seen from the web site, Dr. Lawrence Krauss was welcomed to campus Monday and Tuesday and shared with us a bit of his vast array of knowledge.  As a very esteemed and established physicist, his lectures seemed to be quite popular in attracting many students, faculty, and staff.

Fortunately, I had the opportunity to converse with Dr. Krauss frequently throughout the day.  To my surprise, Dr. Krauss accepted an invitation from my C&T professor, Dr. Feller, to join us in class Monday morning.  The interesting thing was that our reading and discussion for that day covered the conversation between religion and science…which just happened to be one of the main themes of Dr. Krauss’ research.  When I got the chance to ask him about his conversation with the Pope about the Catholic Church’s viewpoint of evolution he told me that, for the most part, they talked past each other.  I think I was inspired to hear from someone who was relaxed yet very opinionated.  He simply looked at our readings, chose his agreements and disagreements, and analyzed the literature without trying to be “nice” towards the author.

Through the physics department I was then scheduled to have lunch with Dr. Krauss among my other physics peers.  It was here that I then saw more of the confident yet laid-back side of him.  I think I was inspired to hear from someone who was relaxed yet very opinionated.  We actually didn’t even talk about physics but more about Wabash and its campus in general.

Later that evening Krauss gave his lecture which covered a variety of issues.  I believe that for the first time I really understood that I don’t have to agree with a person one bit to appreciate them or enjoy learning from them.  There were a lot of things Dr. Krauss said that I could agree and disagree with but the fact that he made me think is what I found to be most important.  We definitely need more opportunities like this where we can have someone or something challenge us to think critically, and the “Fake Arch” and Dr. Krauss are a great place to start.   

Posted by Philip Towne at 02:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

You can always feel the excitement of the end of the swim and dive season and the Conference championship to come at the last home meet.  We were all reminded of how another has almost come and gone as we honored our seniors Saturday in our meet against the University of Indianapolis.  Coach shared with those in attendance some admirable words about each of our seniors while introducing them:  John Kasey, Aaron Spolarich, and Kyle O’Keefe.  These guys have just been such a trademark of the team that it’s hard to think about the group without them.  We will really be missing them next year, but I hope that their senior experience at the conference championships is enough for them to feel proud of having committed to the team throughout the years.

Aside from my respect of these men I couldn’t help but bring up a bit of a situation we had at the meet Saturday.  Now, I’m assuming the strange fans that showed up to the meet were those of U of I because I know for sure they weren’t ours.  From taking a look at my second picture you can see what only two of them looked like.  Just think what a whole twenty or so of these girls/women(?) would have looked like in the stands at our last home meet (you don’t have to imagine on the fact that I understand it could be too disturbing).  It is appreciable that the women’s team came to support the men’s team against us, but when they’re dressed like such it appears that it’s just embarrassing to whoever they’re supporting, especially when at an all male school.  Hopefully you’ll find some humor in this as well.  I would have included a better picture of these hooligans but I wanted to keep it modest.  

Posted by Philip Towne at 02:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This last Friday afternoon classes were suspended in order to honor those students who have devoted countless hours to various types of research on and off of campus.  Presentations were given in Detchon hall with food, fellowship, and a lot of concepts and ideas that had never crossed my mind.  Given a directory of the all the different presentations, I could satisfied any curiosity in my mind that ranged from Indian’s Amish community to microwave reactions.

Although I may have walked into presentations that went right over my head, I still felt esteemed in attending a school in which there is real research going on behind everything among the students.  I really don’t know any many schools, if any at all, that give credit to the students for such work.  It actually reminds me of those science fairs that everyone had to do in middle school, except that the students here actually know what they’re talking about and really wanted to do the work.  Not only that, but you get to see a real importance in the discoveries being made.  Even so, I still would have enjoyed getting to see one of those home-made volcanoes.   

Posted by Philip Towne at 05:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So this weekend I was making a trip up to Michigan, this happened to be on Saturday, the coldest day we’ve had all winter.  After waking up at about 4:30 that morning I was just thankful that my mini-van had heat.  The funny thing is once the van was filled with all seven passengers my defrost just decided to stop working.  We had a “fun” ride up to Grand Rapids but it was pretty intense.

With so many people, all the windows became fogged in a matter of seconds, but since it was a whopping seven degrees outside the moisture quickly froze glazing my windows, inside and out, with ice.  So now try to imagine me sitting over the steering wheel with an ice scraper in one hand constantly scrapping a visible window to see through the ice on the windshield.  At many times you’d hear me shout to the back, “Blind spot right,” or, “Blind spot left,” so that someone in the back could check through the frosted glass if I was clear to make a lane change.  I also had to pull a couple of “Ace Ventura’s,” sticking my head out of the door window so that I could get a clear view of where I might be turning.  Also, I couldn’t really use wiper fluid to clean the windows from the dirt and mud from the road because that would also just freeze.  I even bought some of that spray that instantly melts ice on the windows except when I used it inside we had to put down the windows because of the toxic fumes.

The funniest part of it all was when we stopped at a gas station and everyone in the van began scrapping the ice off the inside of the windows.  People that were walking by to go inside the station gave us puzzled looks like we didn’t know that you were supposed to use ice scrapers on the outside of the car.

Eventually, we came up with the idea of using the heat on AC hoping that it would take a lot of the moisture out of the air that was being drawn into the van.  Thank heavens for that!  I’d like to point out thought that just after I got home my dad restarted the van to find the defrost working just fine. 

Posted by Philip Towne at 02:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I’d like to give a big shout out to my fellow teammate, sophomore Elijah Sanders.  As you may have read or see in other articles, he broke the Wabash 1000 yard freestyle record just this last Saturday at our meet against Wash. U.  The record was previously held by Nick Collins ’03.  The details of Elijah’s times can be read on the swimming and diving link from the Wabash homepage.

What many people may not realize is that in addition to Elijah’s 1000 yd. race he also swam the 500 yd. freestyle, the next longest event in dual meets, and the 400 yd. individual medley.  It’s just a grueling amount to endure when putting everything you’ve got into each of those races all within a couple hours time.  Consider this.  The 1000 could be the equivalent of running a 5K, the 500 equivalent to the mile run, and the 400 IM like an 800 meter race in track.  Don’t think I haven’t swam those races myself….I have but just never all together and maybe each only a handful of times.  As a sprinter, I usually race a total meet yardage that doesn’t exceed 300 yards.

If you think that’s a lot of racing to endure for a distance swimmer like Elijah, just try and contemplate what each practice is like for them… and then multiply that by eight for all the practices for one week!  I can tell you it looks like pure insanity from my end of the pool.  But even then, there is little complaint from this group and a lot of self-determination.  Elijah would be the last to brag about his record and hard work so I will be one of the first.  There are some great men here on campus; they are just too busy with committing themselves for anyone to notice.  If you’re here long enough though, you will get to know them and find there are real Wabash men all around you.

Posted by Philip Towne at 02:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This winter break the swim team took their annual training trip down south.  However, this time was a first as we planned to fly down to Florida.  I almost think I was more excited for my first flight than the trip itself.  I’d never really been on a flight before but through the perks of being a Wabash student and a member of the swim team, I got my chance.

I didn’t want to look like a fool in the airport so I ask anyone I knew an endless amount of questions about what was aloud and what would put me in an interrogation room.  It’s funny to think that as calm as you’d like to think you are, you can’t help but get a little nervous when walking through the metal detectors.  You’ll try to act innocent, but once that buzzer goes off you feel ridiculed by those waiting behind you and the security that stares at you with a very irritated look.  Luckily I came out clean to the other side ready to board, but I couldn’t help cracking up at one of our freshman that had to through away about five or so bottles of toiletries from his carry-on all while trying to smuggle an eight pound medicine ball under his arm.  For those who don’t know, each freshman had to bring a medicine ball with them on the trip so that we could use them at practices.  A few freshmen almost tried to abandon their poor “babies”, our reference to the med. balls, and were met with coach’s “fatherly” love.

The flight was thrilling!  I never knew something that was supposed to be so safe could feel so unsafe.  Either way I loved the rush.  As I was practically jumping in my seat at liftoff, other veteran fliers were relaxing, reading newspapers, and wondering if I was sane.  I wasn’t the only first-flier on the team though.  The seats did get quite uncomfortable after some time but it was still very enjoyable.  I just make sure to go first class every time from now on.

Posted by Philip Towne at 11:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Now that everything is out in the clear, I’m relieved to know that the new arch is not permanent.  I’m not saying that I despised it or writhed in pain every time I saw it, but it just didn’t appeal to me.  However, it did cause me to consider a lot of things.

After reading the website’s front page article of Nick Roudebush’s ’09 and Kevin Wasie’s ’09 art project, which included the construction and placement of the “new” arch, I realized the success of their project in causing a domino effect of reactions throughout the campus.  I was also taken back by the fact that they built their structure within a month’s time.  Though its crisp and new look made it look unnatural compared with the weathered, traditional arch on campus, they did a good job in duplicating it.

I hope that in the new issue of The Bachelor for this week questions such as why they placed it where they did and why they chose the arch will be answered.  Overall, I’m quite impressed.  I don’t believe anyone could have known about this new addition to campus without having developed an opinion about it.  I believe that projects like this and the initiation of such reactions keeps our minds fresh and our reasoning exercised.

Posted by Philip Towne at 01:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Over break I was surprised by girlfriend and her family when I was “forced” to ride along on some sort of random road trip.  Being as lazy as I was I couldn’t help but fall asleep during the ride that cool morning.  I awoke, lifting my face from the passenger’s side widow to find a snow covered mountain in front of me.  So maybe it wasn’t a mountain, but it had lifts on it and looked good enough to ski on. 

As excited as I was I almost became upset when I realized I had no ski gear to wear.  Everyone else just laughed at the fact that they had somehow previously managed to sneak all my ski clothes from my own bedroom without me noticing a thing.

Our first stop….the bunny slopes.  Now, of course I couldn’t risk the bigger stuff with working out some rust first.  Actually, I was going to help Sarah learn to ski for the first time.  She was very cool and calm until she’d take off on a straightaway to the bottom, going too fast to know what to do.  I probably should have shown her how to stop first.  Eventually, we made our way up to bigger slopes and Sarah was getting the hang of it at an amazing pace.  One of my favorite parts of this was when she had uncontrollably taken off straight down one of the larger runs when I caught her and stopped us to realize that her skis had fallen off.  It was a bit of a rush but we could help from laughing afterwards.

It was a fun day, and skiing once that sun was down topped it off.  We then headed back home through some incredibly thick fog.  Though it took at least twice as long to get back it was sure worth it.  That was a Christmas gift that I will remember for quite some time.   

Posted by Philip Towne at 12:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)