Senioritis

I knew it was gonna hit me sooner or later, but I'm definitely starting to get senioritis. For all of you high school seniors out there, I know how you feel since this is my second time going through it. It is starting to show itself by the fact that I've been more and more time on http://www.addictinggames.com/, which is something I haven't done for several months. I even have a new favorite game.

Don't get me wrong, I don't hate school. I actually really like it- I'm just not real big on the academic part of it at the moment. After spending pretty much my entire life that I remember in school, I am just struggling to stay focused. It will be really tough leaving all my friends and professors when I graduate, but I think it will be awhile before I miss the studying. I think Christmas break will be a good thing for me. Only one more week of classes followed by finals week (which, incidentally, is probably my favorite week of the semester)- it can't come soon enough.

I am really looking forward to this weekend. Tomorrow night I'm going to a Dayton Bombers (hockey) game with MCB. Several of my friends are going, which will be a lot of fun. Sounds like a good time for pictures, which I will try and post next time. And then on Sunday I am planning a Christmas date for Mary. She loves Christmas and so we're going to do all kinds of Christmasy type things including, but not limited to: baking cookies, drinking hot chocolate, and listening to Christmas music. (You're probably thinking that's kind of lame, but Mary sometimes reads my blog, so I'm trying to keep parts of it a surprise.) I'll let you know how it goes.

Tonight I'm just kind of relaxing and watching "Man vs. Wild". (If you haven't seen this show, do yourself a favor and watch it) Me and some of my friends (see my last entry) really don't have a lot of energy, which might have something to do with the fact that we went to a Chinese buffet earlier. Good food though.

I just realized how many links I put throughout my post tonight. Check them out if you have time. Or if you just have senioritis.

Until next time,

Scott

Special Edition

Alright, first off I want to apologize for being a couple days late on my post- there's been a decent amount of stuff going on for me. However, I will try to make it up to you by making a special edition video blog. You even get to meet some of my friends and see my Christmas lights. Enjoy!

Until next time,

Scott

Time flies when you're having fun...

One more day before Thanksgiving break. Very nice. I'm excited to spend some time with my family since I haven't really been able to do that much lately. I'll also be spending a couple days with Mary's family, which will be a lot of fun as well.

So this past week has been pretty sweet. I had several classes cancelled which gave me a lot more free time with which to be somewhat productive. I definately did my share of relaxing, but I've been presently surprised with all I've got done as well. Right now I'm working on a presentation for my Sales class that I'm really excited about actually. We can sell anything we want to, so I'm being a recruiter for Notre Dame football. (Which, by the way, Notre Dame winning was also a nice part of a great weekend.)

Yesterday (Sunday) was a really good day with several high points. One of my friends that graduated last year, Dan, was visiting and I spent part of the afternoon watching football with him after Sunday Morning Worship and lunch. Then at 6:00 I had the annual LDP Christmas Dinner. It's always a lot of fun, and it gave me an excuse to wear a suit and take a couple pictures. For more details on that event, check out Mary's blog.

Then, starting at 11:00 pm, the doors opened for Midnight Madness! This is always a favorite event on campus and it serves as the opening of our Women and Men's basketball seasons. It normally happens earlier in the year, but it was still fun. People start lining up outside the gym an hour or so ahead of time because they give out free shirts for the first 100 or so people to show up. They also had free hamburgers from McDonald's and free tacos from Taco Bell to give out as well. There were all kinds of games from a three point contest to knockout to a dunk contest and more. To be honest, I was thinking the dunk contest would be kind of lame, but it turned out to be really cool. It was only a 7 foot goal, but there were some pretty sweet dunks and the crowd of students was going crazy. I'm was impressed

Our mascot, Bucky the Beaver, made an appearance as well (Mary got to do it and she was really excited!). Since McDonald's donated several hundred hamburgers, the Hamburglar made an appearance as well. They competed in a couple events, including my favorite, the dance off. (See below)

So now I only have three classes standing between me and Thanksgiving break. This semester has gone so fast, and it's crazy to think we will only have a couple weeks after we back before Christmas break. This is nuts.

Alright, that's all for the night. Have a great Thanksgiving!

Until next time,

Scott

A much needed break

This week has been really relaxed, which is something I've neeeded. There hasn't been too much going on with most of my assignments and group projects coming due in the past couple weeks. It's actually been a polar opposite- I've had six classes cancelled this week. That doesn't happen very often (or ever, really), but it actually has given me a full week of classes off. I haven't had class since Tuesday, and I won't again until next Tuesday. Life is good like that sometimes.

It has been a struggle making the most of my new found freedom. I've been working a lot on getting my resume and everything for my job search, which I'm planning on starting around the beginning of the year. I still can't get over the fact that I'm going to be graduating in a few more months. I'm excited and sad at the same time because it will be nice to be done with classes, but I'm gonna miss all my friends.

(I've also been doing some thinking about what to get Mary for Christmas. If you have any ideas, let me know.)

But other than that, I've been doing a lot of relaxing- watching scrubs, sleeping in, and hanging out with my friends a little more. Like I said, it's been a much needed relaxing week. Tonight I'm actually hanging out with some high school students who are spending the night in my room. They are here for an event called "For Seniors Only", which is a chance for students to come and check Bluffton out. I'd encourage you to check it out if you're interested. Besides getting pizza, you'll get a chance to take a tour, spend the night in a residence hall, and even attend a class.

This weekend shouldn't be too crazy because a lot of my friends are gone at a conference in Atlanta. So hopefully I will be somewhat productive with some random things I need to get done, but who knows. Chances are I'll watch a lot of football.

Alright, this is kind of random and scattered, but there hasn't been a whole lot going on lately. I'll catch you up on the weekend in a few days.

Until next time,

Scott

Incredible

I'm a little upset because I totally posted a blog Friday night telling all about how excited I was for the weekend. Or so I thought, anyway. I was really tired because it had been a long and busy, but good day. I must have just been really out of it and not saved it or published it. Bummer.

But that's really the only thing I have to be upset about, because this weekend was AWESOME!!! I've said it before, I'll say it again- I have the best girlfriend ever! She took me to the Notre Dame game in South Bend, Indiana. It was great because I am a huge fan and I have never been to one of their football games before. And even though they are 1-9 this season and it feels like my heart is being ripped out of my chest every Saturday afternoon, I still love them so it was great to see in person. Since I missed the second post last week, and because I'm still so excited about it, I'll give you a play-by-play of the weekend.

Friday Mary and I got to her house in Fort Wayne around 7pm. Her brother and his wife, and her brother's friend and his wife met us and we went out for dinner. The six of us went to Flanigan's, which is kind of an Irish-themed restaurant close by. If you ever get the chance to go, get the ribs, because I did and they were great. After we ate we went and bought groceries for the next day to tailgate with. Then we went back to Mary's house and watched "Rudy" to get ready for the next day's happenings.

After about 4-5 hours of sleep, we got up early and drove to South Bend for the game. It was less than a 2 hour drive from Mary's house, so it wasn't too bad. We grilled and listened to music and talked to other Irish fans close by. It was a lot of fun to see all the other die-hard Notre Dame fans from literally all over the country and even Canada. From where we were parked, we couldn't find a single Indiana license plate, which I thought was pretty amazing.



Around 11:45, Mary and I left the spot where we parked and walked to campus. Where we parked was about a mile from the stadium because it was completely on the other side of campus. It was a really nice walk though because it was almost perfect weather and the campus is beautiful. As we were walking around admiring everything, we saw a group of people standing around so we walked over to see what was going on. As we walked up we realized that the whole team was leaving mass, so we got to see them and the head coach Charlie Weis as they left. It was a really cool experience.


After walking around a little more, we decided to head over to the stadium. We got in about an hour before kickoff because I was just so excited. The ushers were really nice and even took a couple pictures for us. Since there wasn't many people in the stadium yet, I got to get pretty close to the field to take pictures, too. After we got to our seats (which, even though they were two rows from the top, were excellent seats) we were able to sit and talk for a little while. (It's probably good to note that I probably didn't stop smiling the entire time we were in South Bend, except for when we started losing.) It was just so cool to see all the history and tradition that Notre Dame has. Incredible.


After the game (which we lost), we headed back to Mary's house for the night. It was nice to just relax after a long but incredible day. We talked a lot about a lot of things, and this was probably one of the highlights of the weekend. It was just really good. Then on Sunday we met two of my friends for lunch who were in Fort Wayne. One of them I hadn't seen for several months, so that was really good. Then after that I got to meet one of Mary's friends and we went out for ice-cream. Mary's parents, who had been gone for the weekend, got back in the afternoon and we talked with them for a little bit before heading back to Bluffton.

So yeah, just one of the most incredible weekends of my life. I feel so blessed with everyone in my life and everything that I have been given.

And then, as an added bonus, my 8:00 am and 1:00 pm classes are cancelled tomorrow. My professor, who teaches both, e-mailed and said he has the worst cold of his life and lost his voice. It's not good that he's sick, but it's good that I get to sleep in. Plus the same professor will be gone at a conference this weekend, so those classes on Thursday are cancelled too. It's nice to be able to sleep in on days like that... :)

Alright, well I should get to bed since I still do have a 9:30 class tomorrow. I hope you have a great week!

Until next time,

Scott

P.S. Lots of pictures today: first is me enjoying a bratwurst during our pre-game tailgating, next is a picture of Larry (Mary's brother) and Scott (Larry's friend) grilling, next is Mary and I at the stadium an hour before the game started, next is the Notre Dame football team running out of the tunnel before the game, and last is a video of a cheer during the game- if you listen closely you can hear our side of the stadium yelling "Go!" and the other side yelling "Irish!"

Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right...

So the only relevance the title of my blog has to anything is in the next line of that song it says "Here I am, stuck in the middle with you." I just feel like I'm in the middle of two awesome weekends with a week that is just a bit rough. A loose reference at best, but I'm a dork and I'm running on not a whole lot of sleep. Plus that song is in my head.

But yeah, this past weekend was great. Saturday I was able to spend some time with Mary and her family, which was pretty cool since I don't get to see them all that often. It was family day, so her parents brought up their RV and tailgated and then watched the Bluffton game. I came too late for the food, but it was still a lot of fun.

Sunday was really cool because I went to the Cleveland Browns game with MCB (the campus activity board). About 30 people went and it was a lot of fun. We stopped at Hannah's (one of the people who planned it, she lives close to Cleveland) for lunch before getting to the stadium. The Brownies ended up winning in overtime over Seattle, so the stadium atmosphere was great.

I should take this time to mention that there was a low point to the weekend in which Notre Dame lost to Navy in triple overtime. Now you see, I have dealt with 7 other losses this year, so I've been able to deal with it somewhat. But the last time we lost to Navy JFK was still President, and we've played them every year since them. For those of you keeping score at home, that put us at 43 straight wins against them. Oh boy. Ok, I'm done writing about Notre Dame football. Well almost.

The reason next weekend is going to be so awesome is because I am going to see the Notre Dame vs. Air Force game! I have the best girlfriend ever who bought tickets to go see it! So I guess you could say I'm pretty excited about it.

But until then school is definately keeping me busy. It will get better after this week, but I had a test this morning at 8:00 and a group project for Corporate Strategy due Thursday. For some reason both of these are just kind of big psychologolical road blocks, so once they're done I'll be feeling better. Also tonight Student Senate is hosting our 2nd annual Feedback Night where students can come and get free coffee from Common Grounds (the local coffee shop uptown), hear what we as a Senate have been up to, and give us ideas on what else they would like to see happen this year. It'll be a long night from the time we set up at 8:45 to tear down around 11:00 or so, but it should be worth it.

Wow, I just realized this is pretty long. I'll stop now. Have a great day!

Until next time,

Scott

P.S. The picture is all of us in front of the stadium in Cleveland.

I love this place

First off, my bad for not getting this up Thursday night. I know you were all worried that something happened to me, but I was just really tired and didn't have the energy. And then yesterday I forgot. So now, since I have free time and I remembered, I figured I should put something up to make sure you know I haven't forgotten about you. (Yes, I'm talking to you, reader of my blog.)

This week has been kind of up and down, but good overall. It was definately draining (that's for sure) which is evident in the fact that I didn't even have the energy to even type up a blog entry.

First of all, the not so fun stuff. Every semester there is at least a week or two when it seems like EVERYTHING is happening at once. In my case, I have a big project for my Corporate Strategy class due next week, but since it is a group project we have to work on it together. The only time we can do that is this coming Monday night. This is fine, except that also on Monday night I have class, Student Senate, and I have to study for my Money and Banking exam for the next morning at 8:00. And Money and Banking exams are usually pretty rough, requiring you to study for at least a couple hours. I would rather not be up super late that night (seeing as how the actual exam is at 8:00 am), but I know I will be. I would maybe study tomorrow, but I am going to a Cleveland Browns game with MCB (the activities board on campus, it's pretty sweet). We aren't going to get back until some point at night, after which I'm doing a floor activity until probably after midnight. And today will be busy because I'm giving a couple tours today and Mary's family is coming for Family Day, so I will be spending time with them as well. Plus it's Saturday, and it is probably the hardest day of the week to get motivated to study.

Ok, so if you take all that I talked about up above, add in the fact that I haven't had a whole lot of sleep for the past couple weeks, plus the fact that I'm starting to get a cold, it just seems like a lot.

The good news? I love it. I mean, it's college. I'm going to a Browns game tomorrow along with a bunch of my friends, next week I'm gone for the weekend in South Bend, IN for the Notre Dame vs. Air Force game (which is seriously one of the coolest things ever!!!), and Thanksgiving is just a few weeks away. Plus, after this week I'll have a lot of homework and projects out of the way for the semester. I get to spend time with my friends and just put off being responsible for a little while as we watch a movie or Scrubs or play Eurorails (the best board game ever). No matter how many things I have going on here, I love it, because I know that everyone else here is experiencing the same feelings. There's a sense of accomplishment in knowing you can get through it.

Man, I'm gonna miss this place next year.

Until next time,

Scott