Hello! It’s been a week since I last spoke to you. I miss you already! This week has been interesting. I received both exams taken last week and did well on them, which is a plus. I am finally starting to get into some sort of rhythm with college. My computer decided to be cantankerous last weekend as I was trying to bust out a paper, so that was really fun. The problem is fixed now and my technology is up and running again.
I wanted to take this week and talk a little about my academic experience. College classes are harder than those in high school, at least for me. Not because of the overwhelmingly difficult material, but because of the amount of it. I was fortunate not to have to do much homework in high school; that all changed in college. Professors expect you to come to class prepared having read the material they will cover. One thing I had to do at college was teach myself how to read effectively. I have a tendency to read things quickly thinking I am absorbing the information. As much as I hate to admit it, the required annotating I do for several of my classes helps in seeing the structure of a piece and the main concepts. The other change I have made while reading texts is to completely focus my attention on the reading and get in the zone. I write a lot of papers for classes and that is definitely a new experience for me. I wish I would have devoted more time in high school to familiarize myself with MLA format and other formal writing. The last thing college has shown me is you should have a reason for any claim you make. In all my papers in college, if I make an assertion, my teacher will ask me to point out specific details in the text that directly support my claim or cite those same details in parenthetical documentation. I know this sounds elementary, but as Russell Crowe says in the new Robin Hood, “If you're trying to build for the future, you must build its foundation strong.” Now that I have absolutely terrified you, let me assure you college is completely doable. These are things I think might help you in the transition from high school to college.
Now it’s time for me to tell you all about the shenanigans I find myself involved in here. I capitalized on a once in a lifetime opportunity at Georgetown. The Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games are being hosted in Lexington, KY this year. The next games will be hosted in France four years from now. Seeing an opportune moment to be a part of history, I jumped at the chance along with two of my friends. We journeyed to the famed Kentucky Horse Park. I parked my car in a field located about a mile from the side gate of the park. In great anticipation, my friends and I began the long and dusty trek to the ticket booth. At the booth, the lady awarded us with free tickets because we attend the most awesome college ever! (All college students receive free tickets, but I chose to believe ours had more to do with just how cool we happen to be.) It was not until after about two miles of walking that I began to fully appreciate just how big the park is. We reached the location where the Endurance event was being held and watched for a little while. The great thing about Endurance is everyone is just chilling there waiting for a horse to come past, so this seemed like a fitting time to ‘people watch’. After overhearing several animated conversations in various languages, the three of us set out to see the rest of the park. We journeyed approximately one more mile before reaching Rolex Stadium, the main stadium of the Kentucky Horse Park. It was here that we watched about thirty minutes of cantering. It was at this point I received a text from one of my fellow classmates who had also gone to the games. She and several of her friends had ridden the bus which the college provided for students wanting to attend the games. After conversing for a minute or two about our mutual vicinity, we decided to try to rendezvous at the midpoint of our two locations. This proved to be a much more difficult task than we had initially thought, as we both had no idea about the lay of the land. After approximately thirty minutes of bumbling around, we each came to the conclusion we were lost. Fortunately, we stumbled around enough to run into one another at Rolex Stadium. At this point, our group had grown to about ten strong. We began to trot around some of the foreign horse tents. Some of the tents, such as Dubai, were even giving away free merchandise! What could be better? We proceeded through the Equine Village but were instantly distracted by a strange sight. A girl about our age was standing on top of two horses and riding them in unison. We watched her riding skills about thirty minutes before deciding to walk through some of the booths again. After petting a giant horse that was there for the children, we decided Dippin’ Dots’ ice cream would be our next stop. A quick time check let me know I had about an hour and a half before cheer practice. Our groups parted ways and only then did my companions and I realize just how far we had travelled to the opposite side of the park. We then began our long journey back to my vehicle which was parked two stadiums, one tent, three roads, one bridge and two fields away from our current location. We finally emerged from the park and headed back to Georgetown. This concluded our historic day.
I’m signing off now. Once again, email me if you have any questions, confusions, comments or complaints. I wish you all a great week! Until next time…
Monday, September 27, 2010
Monday, September 20, 2010
I'm Thinking... I'm Thinking...
Hello,
Week four of college has come and gone. It really doesn’t feel like I have been here that long. This week caught me off guard a bit because the majority of my classes either had a paper due or a test, but I did study and work hard on my papers and hopefully all is well in the world of academics.
Academically, this has been a very stimulating week. During a study of Aristotle in Foundations 111, the idea was presented that thinking about thinking is the way to happiness. This was immediately followed by a reading from Saint Augustine’s Confessions. During all of these readings, I was writing an exploratory essay about the validity of the impiety charge against Socrates in Plato’s Apology. This was some pretty deep stuff to try and keep up with all at once. Studying the great minds throughout the ages has really helped me establish more firmly my own beliefs about life and concepts. If you ever get the opportunity to contemplate (think about thinking) sometime try it and see what you think. It is quite different from anything I’ve ever tried to do. This may sound like a lot of work, but I have found studying the concepts and theories of foundational knowledge to be very rewarding.
The second academic challenge I have met has been to attempt to understand the subtleties of human communication. In Communications 101 we have been studying nonverbal com- munication, such as personal space, body language, territorial behavior, etc. Some of the most interesting and subtle things are brought to your attention, such as the position of your hand in a hand shake, one’s posture in different situations, establishing dominance with a pat on the back or helping someone through a door, political tricks that make candidates seem more attractive and the “swag” of someone in a powerful position. This blows my mind in everyday interaction. I find myself overanalyzing so many things that I do on a daily basis, but I find I love studying this stuff and observing it in life. I think I am leaning toward a major in communications. I still don’t know what I want to do with my life, but as time goes on I am starting to get more of a feel for things I am interested in pursuing. The more and more I talk to my fellow freshman, the more I realize while some people have a concrete idea of what they want to do, the vast majority of us are trying to feel our way in a direction during the first few semesters.
This weekend was a nice breather. I took it easy for the majority of the weekend. I wrote a few papers, watched a few movies, hung out with friends and went to the football game on Saturday. Georgetown beat the University of the Cumberlands 58-40 by the way. Woop-Woop! My parents came to the game, so that was really nice. This was the first time I have seen them in a month. Zach, Tevin, John and I went to Fava’s with them which was just what I needed after the football game. I also made a few trips into Lexington with different people over the course of the weekend. On Sunday Zach, Tevin and I actually found Mt. Zion Baptist; we felt very accomplished with this achievement by the way. Sunday was also Tevin’s birthday so we all went out on the town and celebrated.
I can’t really think of anything else to say right now. I will try and post some more pictures pretty soon on the blog. Again if you have any questions, comments, suggestions, confusions or just want to talk either shoot me an email or post on the blog. Have a great week!
Week four of college has come and gone. It really doesn’t feel like I have been here that long. This week caught me off guard a bit because the majority of my classes either had a paper due or a test, but I did study and work hard on my papers and hopefully all is well in the world of academics.
Academically, this has been a very stimulating week. During a study of Aristotle in Foundations 111, the idea was presented that thinking about thinking is the way to happiness. This was immediately followed by a reading from Saint Augustine’s Confessions. During all of these readings, I was writing an exploratory essay about the validity of the impiety charge against Socrates in Plato’s Apology. This was some pretty deep stuff to try and keep up with all at once. Studying the great minds throughout the ages has really helped me establish more firmly my own beliefs about life and concepts. If you ever get the opportunity to contemplate (think about thinking) sometime try it and see what you think. It is quite different from anything I’ve ever tried to do. This may sound like a lot of work, but I have found studying the concepts and theories of foundational knowledge to be very rewarding.
The second academic challenge I have met has been to attempt to understand the subtleties of human communication. In Communications 101 we have been studying nonverbal com- munication, such as personal space, body language, territorial behavior, etc. Some of the most interesting and subtle things are brought to your attention, such as the position of your hand in a hand shake, one’s posture in different situations, establishing dominance with a pat on the back or helping someone through a door, political tricks that make candidates seem more attractive and the “swag” of someone in a powerful position. This blows my mind in everyday interaction. I find myself overanalyzing so many things that I do on a daily basis, but I find I love studying this stuff and observing it in life. I think I am leaning toward a major in communications. I still don’t know what I want to do with my life, but as time goes on I am starting to get more of a feel for things I am interested in pursuing. The more and more I talk to my fellow freshman, the more I realize while some people have a concrete idea of what they want to do, the vast majority of us are trying to feel our way in a direction during the first few semesters.
This weekend was a nice breather. I took it easy for the majority of the weekend. I wrote a few papers, watched a few movies, hung out with friends and went to the football game on Saturday. Georgetown beat the University of the Cumberlands 58-40 by the way. Woop-Woop! My parents came to the game, so that was really nice. This was the first time I have seen them in a month. Zach, Tevin, John and I went to Fava’s with them which was just what I needed after the football game. I also made a few trips into Lexington with different people over the course of the weekend. On Sunday Zach, Tevin and I actually found Mt. Zion Baptist; we felt very accomplished with this achievement by the way. Sunday was also Tevin’s birthday so we all went out on the town and celebrated.
I can’t really think of anything else to say right now. I will try and post some more pictures pretty soon on the blog. Again if you have any questions, comments, suggestions, confusions or just want to talk either shoot me an email or post on the blog. Have a great week!
Sunday, September 12, 2010
All Dressed Up and Nowhere to Go...
Hello,
This week has quite possibly been the most stressful and fun week since I have been here. I had more homework this week than the other weeks, but the majority of it was interesting. My goal for this weekend, after getting my immediate homework done, was to try to make a dent in my long term assignments. I am definitely getting there. I feel quite productive.
Even with the homework situation, I still had time to be involved on campus. This weekend I’ve been doing homework earlier, so after dinner I have time to do other things. Let me tell you a little about what I have been up to these days. I had class Friday until one and then spent a few hours working on assignments. I took a break after supper and went to the gym to lift. I had a great workout and left the REC feeling tired but good. Next I spent a few more hours doing homework in my room. Just as I was about to get done for the night, my roommate and a few other people came back to the dorm and watched a few movies and hung out for a while.
Saturday commenced at the crack of noon for me with brunch at the CAF. It had been a later night than I intended, but it was fun. That is another thing I have learned at college. Naps and sleep are a valuable commodity to a college student. Please don’t get the impression that I sleep all day as most mornings for me begin at seven or eight, but the occasional sleep-in day is sometimes needed to keep from experiencing exhaustion and insanity. After brunch I continued my quest for higher learning by working on several papers. Dinner came at five in the CAF for me. Zach and I had already decided earlier in the week that we were going to get a haircut and after the retreat seemed like the opportune time. Oh, that’s another thing that happens here in on campus through the student ministry. They have a retreat each year to begin several of the religious programs on campus, specifically FFG. FFG stands for Freshman Family Groups. It is basically a group who assigns two upper classmen who volunteer to be ‘parents’ and mentor freshman. They meet one to several times a week and have a Bible study and hang out. Sadly, I wasn’t able to attend the retreat this time, but hopefully I will be able to be involved next year.
Zach and I spent a good hour and a half in Wally-World trying to get our hair cut. Feeling less shaggy and much lighter, we made the drive back to campus. For those of you who like me use Wal-Mart for most of your shopping needs, there is one just a few minutes from campus. It is fairly easy to find as well. Upon arrival back at Anderson, I received a text from several of my friends wanting to hang out in my dorm room. Zach, Tevin, Allen, Moak and John came. These are friends who live on the second floor of Anderson with me. A few more began to trickle in and before I knew it, my room had reached capacity. Another note to incoming freshman, chairs and places to sit are a must in your dorm because you never know how many will show up for movie night and hang out in your dorm. My room has a futon which works quite nicely as an overflow seating section. After watching a movie on TV, we all decided to go to the mafia game in the chapel. That was a great decision. Instead of the usual card game we all expected in the chapel, there were two mafia and two cops. They turned out all the lights and the game began. It was so much fun. If there is a big game or event on campus over the weekend that is a great time to get to know new people and get out of your dorm room. The game went on for an hour, maybe two. People started to disperse at about midnight but about twenty of us decided we wanted to go hang out at the park. Scott County Park is a great place to hang out if you are with friends and want something pretty chill. We all stayed there for a while and then Zach, Tevin, Allen, and I decided we were hungry. There is nothing better than a two a.m. Waffle House run with the guys. We decided after eating, if we were going to be coherent at church in six hours, we probably needed to get some sleep.
Sunday, Sunday, Sunday. Zach, Tevin and I decided we were going to Zion Hill Baptist Church Sunday because Tevin knows the pastor. Oh, by the way, Tevin is a licensed minister which blows my mind with its awesomeness. This will come into play later. Anyway, we began our journey to church thinking it was going to be a simple matter of driving there, praising Jesus and driving home. Oh, how we were wrong! Our directions weren’t exactly clear, so after about fifteen minutes of driving we realized we were not where we should be. Upon realization of our predicament, we proceeded to stop at a gas station and ask for directions… then another. Following the instructions they gave us, we were on the road again. We didn’t exactly find the church by following those directions but we did get the scenic tour of our state’s capitol. We were definitely not supposed to be in Frankfort, so we decided to re-evaluate our decision making paradigm. We then used Tevin’s phone for directions. After following the information from the phone for another twenty minutes and passing the exit for Georgetown, we decided church was probably over now as it was twelve o’clock. Feeling somewhat defeated, lost and confused, we began to bumble our way back to Georgetown. Luckily for Zach and me, we had a minister in the car and a radio to play music. All of the essentials of a Sunday morning service right? We proceeded to have church in the car on the way back to GC. It was definitely an adventure.
So now you know a little bit about my week and a lot about my weekend. Sorry for the lengthiness, but I thought you might want some ideas on what to do on the weekend if you stay in Georgetown. I am going to work on more homework now. Have a great week!
This week has quite possibly been the most stressful and fun week since I have been here. I had more homework this week than the other weeks, but the majority of it was interesting. My goal for this weekend, after getting my immediate homework done, was to try to make a dent in my long term assignments. I am definitely getting there. I feel quite productive.
Even with the homework situation, I still had time to be involved on campus. This weekend I’ve been doing homework earlier, so after dinner I have time to do other things. Let me tell you a little about what I have been up to these days. I had class Friday until one and then spent a few hours working on assignments. I took a break after supper and went to the gym to lift. I had a great workout and left the REC feeling tired but good. Next I spent a few more hours doing homework in my room. Just as I was about to get done for the night, my roommate and a few other people came back to the dorm and watched a few movies and hung out for a while.
Saturday commenced at the crack of noon for me with brunch at the CAF. It had been a later night than I intended, but it was fun. That is another thing I have learned at college. Naps and sleep are a valuable commodity to a college student. Please don’t get the impression that I sleep all day as most mornings for me begin at seven or eight, but the occasional sleep-in day is sometimes needed to keep from experiencing exhaustion and insanity. After brunch I continued my quest for higher learning by working on several papers. Dinner came at five in the CAF for me. Zach and I had already decided earlier in the week that we were going to get a haircut and after the retreat seemed like the opportune time. Oh, that’s another thing that happens here in on campus through the student ministry. They have a retreat each year to begin several of the religious programs on campus, specifically FFG. FFG stands for Freshman Family Groups. It is basically a group who assigns two upper classmen who volunteer to be ‘parents’ and mentor freshman. They meet one to several times a week and have a Bible study and hang out. Sadly, I wasn’t able to attend the retreat this time, but hopefully I will be able to be involved next year.
Zach and I spent a good hour and a half in Wally-World trying to get our hair cut. Feeling less shaggy and much lighter, we made the drive back to campus. For those of you who like me use Wal-Mart for most of your shopping needs, there is one just a few minutes from campus. It is fairly easy to find as well. Upon arrival back at Anderson, I received a text from several of my friends wanting to hang out in my dorm room. Zach, Tevin, Allen, Moak and John came. These are friends who live on the second floor of Anderson with me. A few more began to trickle in and before I knew it, my room had reached capacity. Another note to incoming freshman, chairs and places to sit are a must in your dorm because you never know how many will show up for movie night and hang out in your dorm. My room has a futon which works quite nicely as an overflow seating section. After watching a movie on TV, we all decided to go to the mafia game in the chapel. That was a great decision. Instead of the usual card game we all expected in the chapel, there were two mafia and two cops. They turned out all the lights and the game began. It was so much fun. If there is a big game or event on campus over the weekend that is a great time to get to know new people and get out of your dorm room. The game went on for an hour, maybe two. People started to disperse at about midnight but about twenty of us decided we wanted to go hang out at the park. Scott County Park is a great place to hang out if you are with friends and want something pretty chill. We all stayed there for a while and then Zach, Tevin, Allen, and I decided we were hungry. There is nothing better than a two a.m. Waffle House run with the guys. We decided after eating, if we were going to be coherent at church in six hours, we probably needed to get some sleep.
Sunday, Sunday, Sunday. Zach, Tevin and I decided we were going to Zion Hill Baptist Church Sunday because Tevin knows the pastor. Oh, by the way, Tevin is a licensed minister which blows my mind with its awesomeness. This will come into play later. Anyway, we began our journey to church thinking it was going to be a simple matter of driving there, praising Jesus and driving home. Oh, how we were wrong! Our directions weren’t exactly clear, so after about fifteen minutes of driving we realized we were not where we should be. Upon realization of our predicament, we proceeded to stop at a gas station and ask for directions… then another. Following the instructions they gave us, we were on the road again. We didn’t exactly find the church by following those directions but we did get the scenic tour of our state’s capitol. We were definitely not supposed to be in Frankfort, so we decided to re-evaluate our decision making paradigm. We then used Tevin’s phone for directions. After following the information from the phone for another twenty minutes and passing the exit for Georgetown, we decided church was probably over now as it was twelve o’clock. Feeling somewhat defeated, lost and confused, we began to bumble our way back to Georgetown. Luckily for Zach and me, we had a minister in the car and a radio to play music. All of the essentials of a Sunday morning service right? We proceeded to have church in the car on the way back to GC. It was definitely an adventure.
So now you know a little bit about my week and a lot about my weekend. Sorry for the lengthiness, but I thought you might want some ideas on what to do on the weekend if you stay in Georgetown. I am going to work on more homework now. Have a great week!
Monday, September 6, 2010
Pictures
This is my family's restaunt, Harned's Drive In Inc. It has been open since 1955.
This is my first dorm room cooking creation.
This is my second creation, chicken fajita nachos. Both cooking endeavors turned out surprisingly well.
This is a picture of my communications' project in Dr. Sibal's office. He is the one standing.
This is a picture of Dale and me stunting with our flyers, Kylee and Lindsey.
P.S.- Sorry about the formatting. I couldn't get the pictures and the post to upload at the same time so this week's blog is in two parts.
And the beat goes on, and on, and on... Yea!
Hello again!
It has definitely been an adventure this week. My schedule is starting to become more routine making things much easier. Classes are still going well. I have a few long term papers that I am in the process of working on, one for English and the other for Foundations. I have a picture of the finished product of one of my class projects for Communications that I will post somewhere on the blog. Dr. Sibal had the class divide into groups, and each group had to draw and label an example of communication. Naturally this turned into a very creative assignment as you will see by the picture.
Cheerleading is starting to pick up now. We have three practices a week, and our first game is on the 18th of September. I am involved in the school newspaper as well, The Georgetonian. I have two articles coming out this week, so be on the lookout for those. One is about dorm room cooking and the other covers male cheerleaders here at GC. Georgetown’s school newspaper is online by the way if you ever want to check it out. The site is http://georgetonian.wordpress.com/
Classes went fairly smoothly this week. This weekend has given us a nice break. We have a three day weekend because of Labor Day. I went to the college sponsored free movie on Friday night. The college will sponsor events like free movies at the movie theater on occasion. Saturday night I believe it was free bowling, but I ended up missing that one. I showed up about an hour too late for the free movie. It’s alright though, because you still get a discount if you show them your G-Card.
With this being Labor Day weekend, a lot of people ended up going home. My hometown is about four and a half hours from GC so that really wasn’t an option for me. It has been fun this weekend though, quiet but still fun. I have seen a lot of movies either in the Grill or in someone’s dorm room. Oh, by the way, the Grill has a room with three big screen TVs in it and several video game consoles. It is a great place to hang out if you want to watch a movie or play video games with friends. The library rents out movies too. I didn’t know that until yesterday so you already have an edge. This weekend was a really good thing. The extra sleep was much appreciated.
I cannot stress enough the importance of getting involved and getting out of your dorm. That is one of the best things about Georgetown. It is small enough that if you go down to the Grill or over to the Mulberry Café you will probably see people you know or people that you should get to know. I walked into the TV room of the Grill to find four guys from my hall engaged in an epic ‘Call of Duty’ battle.
I am going to let you go for now so I can start on homework and get some sleep. Once again, if anyone has a question or anything else they would like to tell me, don’t hesitate to email.
It has definitely been an adventure this week. My schedule is starting to become more routine making things much easier. Classes are still going well. I have a few long term papers that I am in the process of working on, one for English and the other for Foundations. I have a picture of the finished product of one of my class projects for Communications that I will post somewhere on the blog. Dr. Sibal had the class divide into groups, and each group had to draw and label an example of communication. Naturally this turned into a very creative assignment as you will see by the picture.
Cheerleading is starting to pick up now. We have three practices a week, and our first game is on the 18th of September. I am involved in the school newspaper as well, The Georgetonian. I have two articles coming out this week, so be on the lookout for those. One is about dorm room cooking and the other covers male cheerleaders here at GC. Georgetown’s school newspaper is online by the way if you ever want to check it out. The site is http://georgetonian.wordpress.com/
Classes went fairly smoothly this week. This weekend has given us a nice break. We have a three day weekend because of Labor Day. I went to the college sponsored free movie on Friday night. The college will sponsor events like free movies at the movie theater on occasion. Saturday night I believe it was free bowling, but I ended up missing that one. I showed up about an hour too late for the free movie. It’s alright though, because you still get a discount if you show them your G-Card.
With this being Labor Day weekend, a lot of people ended up going home. My hometown is about four and a half hours from GC so that really wasn’t an option for me. It has been fun this weekend though, quiet but still fun. I have seen a lot of movies either in the Grill or in someone’s dorm room. Oh, by the way, the Grill has a room with three big screen TVs in it and several video game consoles. It is a great place to hang out if you want to watch a movie or play video games with friends. The library rents out movies too. I didn’t know that until yesterday so you already have an edge. This weekend was a really good thing. The extra sleep was much appreciated.
I cannot stress enough the importance of getting involved and getting out of your dorm. That is one of the best things about Georgetown. It is small enough that if you go down to the Grill or over to the Mulberry Café you will probably see people you know or people that you should get to know. I walked into the TV room of the Grill to find four guys from my hall engaged in an epic ‘Call of Duty’ battle.
I am going to let you go for now so I can start on homework and get some sleep. Once again, if anyone has a question or anything else they would like to tell me, don’t hesitate to email.
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