Hey all
A brief review of recent things, and some things to come:
School is actually over for me at this point. I have no more finals, though I do have a final draft of a paper due tomorrow morning (I basically am finished). Seniors graduate this Sunday afternoon and I'm sticking around on campus to watch the fun and say goodbye to some friends I've made. The last few days were interesting: I got to see several capstone presentations by graduating seniors both in my major, biology, and several creative writing presentations. A capstone is a culmination of knowledge in a major study area that takes a whole bunch of time to complete, often including writing a 50-page paper and maybe a presentation. It really depends somewhat, such as for biology majors, because what you end up turning in depends on what you want to study intensively (presumably something that interests you deeply). Anyways, most of them were pretty interesting, covering a broad range of topics, from brownfields, to the migratory patterns of a bird that travels from New Zealand to Monterey Bay and back each year, to leatherback turtles in Trinidad, and the fire history of the boundary between prairie and forest on the Principia bluffs. Very cool stuff.
I saw Spiderman 3 a week or two ago, and was sadly disappointed. Lots of cheesy acting and plot summaries...in fact, the plot was overall pretty bad, all of it playing out as nothing more than "a week in the life of spiderman!" which isn't my idea of an interesting movie...usually.
Softball intramurals on campus finally came to end this past weekend. The postseason was set up as a bracket, so Lowrey played Freshman, Buck/Syl played Ferguson, and the winners played each other for the championship. Well, the freshman did not show up for the first game, so they forfeited, so Lowrey got into the playoffs by default. Oh yeah, I live in and played for Lowrey. So Ferguson won their game on a walk-off homerun...pretty dramatic and certainly uplifting for their cause. Wellsir, they had another thing coming in Lowrey. We scored 4 runs in the first inning, they came back with 1, then 1 more, then we got 2 more, then they got 1, then we got 3 more. So we were up 9-3. I drove in a few runs and had a 2 or 3 base hits total, so that was good. The best part, for me, however, was fielding. I played left field which is where most fly balls go, especially in this game. I made about 7 or 8 total catches, 4 of them while sprinting full speed, and another I caught that would have been a homerun. I also threw a guy out at home. So, I don't mean to brag about it, but it was a good time because everybody from Lowrey was screaming their heads off cheering for me specifically, which felt really cool, and I got tons of high-fives and all. We won the game 11-7, called due to lightning with 2 outs in the last inning, but we were going to win anyway. I was the unofficial MVP and the hero of the house for a day. Yippee! I don't know if anyone took pictures, I'll have to find out.
Academics have been great. I've been getting A's on almost everything, which is a nice new thing for me. My teachers are all fantastic, and it's a lot of fun talking with them basically every day and frequently in non-classroom settings. I'm friends with my professors, how cool is that?!
So I leave Principia for the summer in 4 or 5 days. I'll be home in chicago or in Iowa for 6 weeks, which definitely includes some time spent with new Prin friends who live nearby. I leave for Dancing Rabbit around July 15th and I'll stay at least through the end of August. I return to Principia on September 5th or 6th, not sure. It's going to be some fun times. I can't wait for cicadas!
WGM IV
Thursday, May 31, 2007
Tuesday, May 8, 2007
Everything, All the Time
Went on a fantastic journey last week from Sunday through Thursday at the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. We camped out every night, made our own meals (usually), hiked the 2nd highest peak in the park (highest elevation ~ 6500 ft.), talked with a graduate student who is doing some neat research on Black bears in the park, visited the Cherokee Indian Museum in Cherokee, North Carolina, and did some research for a tree biodiversity study. The hike was 5 miles in each direction and took us about 8 hours including a stop for lunch at the summit. The trip has inspired me to haphazardly (for now..) plan a camping trip for a week or two in June before I start my job at Dancing Rabbit on July 16th.
The concert I mentioned in my last post was fantastic. I may have mentioned it, but it's worth repeating that the Decemberists are easily my favorite band right now, so it's always a pleasure to see one's favorite of something. I bought 2 t-shirts, and I was with fun people, and everything was just great.
I just found out today that I have been awarded a Unit Scholarship, which means my teachers either from the classes I'm in now or from last quarter nominated me for it and now I'm getting $1,000 for next year's academic term. A nice surprise in my mail box.
Though I don't ever get a chance to watch them, the Cubs and Red Sox have been doing, recently anyway for the Cubs. I'm hoping to catch as many games as possible live in Chicago, again, before my job starts.
Later this week I'll be choosing my classes for the fall quarter...not sure what I shall take, I haven't spent much time looking at what's available yet, but there's plenty of time: I don't sign up until next week.
I'm officially going to off-season basketball practices. They have about 90 minutes of scrimmage on Sunday nights and 2 1-hour sessions of skills development on Mondays and Wednesdays. Nothing fancy really, and the coaches aren't there (NCAA rules), but it's still fun to be playing and learning.
Everything's great in school, and it's enjoyable. What's up with all of you out there reading this?...Lemme know!
The concert I mentioned in my last post was fantastic. I may have mentioned it, but it's worth repeating that the Decemberists are easily my favorite band right now, so it's always a pleasure to see one's favorite of something. I bought 2 t-shirts, and I was with fun people, and everything was just great.
I just found out today that I have been awarded a Unit Scholarship, which means my teachers either from the classes I'm in now or from last quarter nominated me for it and now I'm getting $1,000 for next year's academic term. A nice surprise in my mail box.
Though I don't ever get a chance to watch them, the Cubs and Red Sox have been doing, recently anyway for the Cubs. I'm hoping to catch as many games as possible live in Chicago, again, before my job starts.
Later this week I'll be choosing my classes for the fall quarter...not sure what I shall take, I haven't spent much time looking at what's available yet, but there's plenty of time: I don't sign up until next week.
I'm officially going to off-season basketball practices. They have about 90 minutes of scrimmage on Sunday nights and 2 1-hour sessions of skills development on Mondays and Wednesdays. Nothing fancy really, and the coaches aren't there (NCAA rules), but it's still fun to be playing and learning.
Everything's great in school, and it's enjoyable. What's up with all of you out there reading this?...Lemme know!
Saturday, April 14, 2007
weekend, etc.
I'm going to a concert in St. Louis tonight at a venue called "The Pageant". The band is The Decemberists, one of my favorites, so I'm very excited about it. I'm going with 4 other people from Prin who all like the band as well. It says "no cameras" on the tickets...we'll see about that. We're going to have dinner in the city too, so extra fun right there. The best part is I have to get up at 5:00 AM tomorrow to go on a field trip for my Bio-Block classes. We're driving to the southern tip of Illinois, where the Cache River meets the Ohio River. It's a rare combination of ecosystems, where 5 different physiogeographic regions meet. We're going canoeing in a swamp, meeting with an ornithologist to talk about warblers he studies that migrate to this park area in the summer and down to Venezuela in the winter. We're camping out Sunday night too, cooking our own food and sleeping in tents. Should be lots of fun. I'm loving my major and bio block a whole lot. The classes are super interesting, the teachers are really fun and engaging, and also very available outside of class, a new feature compared to U of Illinois. I've become very interested with the idea of pursuing post-undergraduate education, possibly jumping immediately into Ph.D. work after I graduate from Prin. We'll see!
Sunday, March 25, 2007
Spring time is definitely here
I'm back at Principia as of yesterday evening. I was in Iowa for one week then Chicago for the second week. Not a whole bunch happened, which is ok. Saw family and a couple friends, so it was nice. Classes begin anew tomorrow. All of them are for my major, and are organized together in what is called Bio Block. I'm excited about it.
The weather here is almost oppressive, yet it is still March. Humid too. I'm also in a new room in Lowrey and a new roommate. I'm currently waiting to be called for a phone interview, though the caller is an hour late in calling, and I have dinner to eat and a basketball game to watch downstairs...nervous feelings growing.
I'll be diving into more details later on, thanks for reading.
WGM IV
The weather here is almost oppressive, yet it is still March. Humid too. I'm also in a new room in Lowrey and a new roommate. I'm currently waiting to be called for a phone interview, though the caller is an hour late in calling, and I have dinner to eat and a basketball game to watch downstairs...nervous feelings growing.
I'll be diving into more details later on, thanks for reading.
WGM IV
Monday, March 5, 2007
Everything is Illuminated
Phooey to not posting for a month. And apologies to you all. I'm honestly not sure where to begin for what has happened in the last month, so here goes.
Every weekend for the last five or six months I've been playing Intramural basketball on campus. Each house has a team, though Lowrey has two because we can always generate more participation. It was a lot of fun, and it felt good to be exercising so hard. My team was mostly just six guys every week, but we won a good number of our games. Unfortunately, for me, we just had the playoffs yesterday. I was not able to participate because I was in Madison, Wisconsin for the Midwest Student Clean Energy Conference. It was worth missing for going to Wisconsin, but we UNexpectedly won the championship game in OVERTIME, and I didn't get to be there.
The Clean Energy Conference was pretty fun itself. I left on Friday to go with two other Prin students. Ironically, the school would not give us a car or van to take, so we had to rent one of their pick-up trucks. Oh well. The drive is about 6 hours each way with no delays, but there was heavy snow on Friday, so we were delayed about an hour. There were several very good keynote speakers. One woman from Ohio who lives on the border with West Virginia was very powerful, making many people cry. On the West Virginia side of the border where she lives, there are several coal-fired power plants that are causing all kinds of problems in her small town. They are fighting against them as well as mountain-top removal practices. Learn more here. I also participated in a workshop about coalition building for a campaign on one's campus or in the community and how to get groups to sign on to your campaign. Several smaller things too, but these were the highlights for me. Unfortunately, there was one other key event that going to Wisconsin forced me to miss.
He's a world-famous author and biographer. His voice is instantly recognizable, used for several PBS shows, including American Experience. He has won the Pulitzer twice. His name, of course, is David McCullough and he spoke at Principia on Friday night, March 2nd, and one William Moller was not in town to watch. Very disappointing. Someone said they video recorded the talk, so I'll be looking out for that. Still, would have been fun to see him talk and possibly meet him and get a book signed, which he supposedly did.
One additional thing about going to Wisconsin. It was my birthday yesterday, the day of our return trip which took about 7 hours. This is the second year in a row that my birthday was celebrated mostly in Madison, Wisconsin, of all places. On the drive back to school, we stopped at Cracker Barrel to celebrate. It was quite a bit of fun really, and they surprised me with a cake. One of the girls in the group is vegan, so it was an interesting meal to eat. Being 22 is fantastic and I'm glad to be part of its wonderful organization.
Classes have been going very well me all quarter. My American Biography class has been surprisingly interesting, and I'm doing very well in the class. I've gotten A's on all my papers, my graded discussions and quizzes have been surprisingly well too, and the teacher is really interesting and it's just a fun class. 6 students total in the class. My two environmental classes have been good too. I've gotten at least a perfect score on every quiz in my Global Environmental Issues class, and the teacher is pretty interesting still, though the majority of students are not interesting in being engaged in the class, with a few exceptions. I had to give a couple presentations in that class, one about pineapple fruit and the environmental, economic, and social contexts of the fruit, where it's grown, and onward. The other presentation was about hydro-electricity with similar contexts to talk about. Turns out I'm not a fan of hydro-power as a source of electricity.
There is still a lot of talk about Stuart Jenkins, George Moffett, and everything in between on campus, and it's really just getting ridiculous. There is a lot of negativity about all of it, and it's really a turn off for me and I would think reflects pretty poorly on the campus in general to the outside world. People are nominated for temporary fill-in positions, people go up-in-arms about the nomination, the nominee resigns, and repeat. No more shall be spoken on this subject.
I've had a new roommate for the last 4 weeks or so, can't remember how long exactly. He's from the Toronto area in Canada. He's pretty fun most of the time, and has a lot of good thoughts and ideas about life, christian science, and everything in between. He's a theatre major and has his capstone project performance tonight. Every major on campus does a capstone, usually your senior year, that is a culmination of your years in the major. Some majors require a 50-page paper, others, like theatre, have you write a 10-page paper then direct a one-act play that is about 30 minutes long.
I'm running low on things to write about. Next quarter, I'm in what's called "bio block" which means the three classes I'm taking are all designed to work together within my major, which I officially declared as Environmental Studies a couple weeks ago. The classes are Botany, Ecology, and Research and Writing Methods. At one point in the quarter, we go to Smokey Mountains National Park for a whole week of camping. Very exciting. We also go canoeing at some point in Shawnee National Forest, which is in southern Illinois.
School ends for spring break after this week, so I have finals this Friday and Saturday. Classes end tomorrow for me. I have to write two papers this week too. I'll be going to Iowa for my first week of break, then to the Chicago area, then back to school.
Well, that's all I got for now. No pictures to put up really, mostly because I forget to take pictures as often as I would like to...and I'm not a fan of my camera that much. Have a good month of March, though I do plan to be back on here well before the month ends. Thanks to all for your posts and hounding of me to post again. Love to you all.
WGM IV
Every weekend for the last five or six months I've been playing Intramural basketball on campus. Each house has a team, though Lowrey has two because we can always generate more participation. It was a lot of fun, and it felt good to be exercising so hard. My team was mostly just six guys every week, but we won a good number of our games. Unfortunately, for me, we just had the playoffs yesterday. I was not able to participate because I was in Madison, Wisconsin for the Midwest Student Clean Energy Conference. It was worth missing for going to Wisconsin, but we UNexpectedly won the championship game in OVERTIME, and I didn't get to be there.
The Clean Energy Conference was pretty fun itself. I left on Friday to go with two other Prin students. Ironically, the school would not give us a car or van to take, so we had to rent one of their pick-up trucks. Oh well. The drive is about 6 hours each way with no delays, but there was heavy snow on Friday, so we were delayed about an hour. There were several very good keynote speakers. One woman from Ohio who lives on the border with West Virginia was very powerful, making many people cry. On the West Virginia side of the border where she lives, there are several coal-fired power plants that are causing all kinds of problems in her small town. They are fighting against them as well as mountain-top removal practices. Learn more here. I also participated in a workshop about coalition building for a campaign on one's campus or in the community and how to get groups to sign on to your campaign. Several smaller things too, but these were the highlights for me. Unfortunately, there was one other key event that going to Wisconsin forced me to miss.
He's a world-famous author and biographer. His voice is instantly recognizable, used for several PBS shows, including American Experience. He has won the Pulitzer twice. His name, of course, is David McCullough and he spoke at Principia on Friday night, March 2nd, and one William Moller was not in town to watch. Very disappointing. Someone said they video recorded the talk, so I'll be looking out for that. Still, would have been fun to see him talk and possibly meet him and get a book signed, which he supposedly did.
One additional thing about going to Wisconsin. It was my birthday yesterday, the day of our return trip which took about 7 hours. This is the second year in a row that my birthday was celebrated mostly in Madison, Wisconsin, of all places. On the drive back to school, we stopped at Cracker Barrel to celebrate. It was quite a bit of fun really, and they surprised me with a cake. One of the girls in the group is vegan, so it was an interesting meal to eat. Being 22 is fantastic and I'm glad to be part of its wonderful organization.
Classes have been going very well me all quarter. My American Biography class has been surprisingly interesting, and I'm doing very well in the class. I've gotten A's on all my papers, my graded discussions and quizzes have been surprisingly well too, and the teacher is really interesting and it's just a fun class. 6 students total in the class. My two environmental classes have been good too. I've gotten at least a perfect score on every quiz in my Global Environmental Issues class, and the teacher is pretty interesting still, though the majority of students are not interesting in being engaged in the class, with a few exceptions. I had to give a couple presentations in that class, one about pineapple fruit and the environmental, economic, and social contexts of the fruit, where it's grown, and onward. The other presentation was about hydro-electricity with similar contexts to talk about. Turns out I'm not a fan of hydro-power as a source of electricity.
There is still a lot of talk about Stuart Jenkins, George Moffett, and everything in between on campus, and it's really just getting ridiculous. There is a lot of negativity about all of it, and it's really a turn off for me and I would think reflects pretty poorly on the campus in general to the outside world. People are nominated for temporary fill-in positions, people go up-in-arms about the nomination, the nominee resigns, and repeat. No more shall be spoken on this subject.
I've had a new roommate for the last 4 weeks or so, can't remember how long exactly. He's from the Toronto area in Canada. He's pretty fun most of the time, and has a lot of good thoughts and ideas about life, christian science, and everything in between. He's a theatre major and has his capstone project performance tonight. Every major on campus does a capstone, usually your senior year, that is a culmination of your years in the major. Some majors require a 50-page paper, others, like theatre, have you write a 10-page paper then direct a one-act play that is about 30 minutes long.
I'm running low on things to write about. Next quarter, I'm in what's called "bio block" which means the three classes I'm taking are all designed to work together within my major, which I officially declared as Environmental Studies a couple weeks ago. The classes are Botany, Ecology, and Research and Writing Methods. At one point in the quarter, we go to Smokey Mountains National Park for a whole week of camping. Very exciting. We also go canoeing at some point in Shawnee National Forest, which is in southern Illinois.
School ends for spring break after this week, so I have finals this Friday and Saturday. Classes end tomorrow for me. I have to write two papers this week too. I'll be going to Iowa for my first week of break, then to the Chicago area, then back to school.
Well, that's all I got for now. No pictures to put up really, mostly because I forget to take pictures as often as I would like to...and I'm not a fan of my camera that much. Have a good month of March, though I do plan to be back on here well before the month ends. Thanks to all for your posts and hounding of me to post again. Love to you all.
WGM IV
Tuesday, January 30, 2007
Realization is better than Anticipation
Sorry for the delay. I have had a few opportunities to write on here, but to be honest, I'm not entirely motivated to write stuff. Perhaps I'm mistaken, but as far as I can tell, the number of people who read this are counted on one hand, and I talk to a few of those relatively consistently. Nontheless, I don't suppose that's a legitimate reason for not writing a bit more frequently. So, in conclusion, give me some fodder in the form of responses to my posts to motivate further entries.
Now then, stuff that's going on. There has been a big flap on campus about the CEO's pay increase of 47% from last year. I'm not well informed on the issue, I'm not familiar with the context, and it doesn't really interest me anyway, but it sure is causing quite a stir on campus. There will be meetings and such open to students and faculty in the coming days, with rumors going about of resignations and so forth. It all seems a bit ridiculous to me, since the CEO requested his pay be returned to the previous level (once the information became a hot topic of course). But anyway, you all in the Christian Science community may be hearing things.
Personally, I've been working pretty hard in school, writing papers, lots of reading, researching for a couple presentations I have, and being pretty busy socially too. I'm doing well so far academically, but there is still a ways to go before the end. It is currently 5th week in the quarter (10th being the last week in the quarter), so it's crunch time right now. I'm reading a biography about Mary Baker Eddy written by Sibyl Wilbur. Briefly, I don't find the book very good as a book. Yes, the information within the book is itself interesting, but it is presented with a style of writting that just doesn't work for anything but the time period it was written in (published in 1907). The book was basically commissioned to be a response to the biography written by Georgine Milmine, a book that casts MBE rather negatively. The church asked Wilbur to write this book, and it definitely carries a positive bias towards MBE. Alas, everything is biased it seems.
We watched most of An Inconvenient Truth in class yesterday. 'Twas my first time watching it, and it was pretty strong I think. Yes, it too carries a bias, and one that I agree with, and he does indeed have a lot of fantastic information supporting his point, always from credible sources. However, I have to admit there are a few points where additional referencing or context would have either made his point stronger OR presented something not supporting him that would still at least give Gore more credibility in that it would not show him to be as biased as he obviously is. Hooray for long-winded sentences! I also have to write a paper and give a presentation in that class about pineapples: ecological/economic/social context, and facts about it like how it's grown, where it's native, etc.
This past Sunday I played in my 2nd Intramural basketball game. So, I live in Lowrey, we're the only house on campus that has TWO basketball teams, thus I can accurately say we played ourselves on Sunday. Team 1 v. Team 2. I'm on team 1. Team 1 won. It was a lot of fun really, we just played randomly a lot, not really calling fouls too much, taking ridiculous shots a lot, and Team 1 played at a man disadvantage of 6 to 8. 14 guys on the court at once sure makes it interesting. Lots of fun though. I scored a bunch, but we weren't really keeping track.
Saturday night I went to "Jo Down." It's hosted by Jo McNabb house in a barn building down in Elsah, and it's just several hours of fun dancing (mostly line dancing), free food/drinks from an establishment in Alton, and free bandanas for everyone! Of course, I had to dress as a cowboy. I had a black hat, plaid shirt, jeans, and I wore the FREE bandana in the manner of a cowboy bandit (covering the face). It was a lot of fun, there are pictures of me, but I didn't take them so I don't have them yet.
Oh yes! Last...Tuesday I believe...I went on an all-day field trip to the St. Louis Zoo for my Wildlife Conservation class. A rather appropriate venue for such a topic. We did have some work to do while we were there, but we finished it early and just enjoyed seeing everything there. It was sad to see many of the animals, spending their lives in glass enclosures. Some of them were almost certainly not there mentally. It had snowed days before we went, and you could tell the tiger had walked probably hundreds of times since the snow in the same pattern, with some change in the pattern once in a while too. The zoo does work hard to keep the animals engaged, to be sure. One of the easiest ways for the zoo to do this is to make the act of getting food a very time consuming process. They also interact with the animals too, knowing zoo animals will NEVER themselves be realeased into the wild (thus it's not too much of a big deal if they lose their fear of humans). I did take pictures, but most turned out pretty bad. Here's a few of the better ones:
Now then, stuff that's going on. There has been a big flap on campus about the CEO's pay increase of 47% from last year. I'm not well informed on the issue, I'm not familiar with the context, and it doesn't really interest me anyway, but it sure is causing quite a stir on campus. There will be meetings and such open to students and faculty in the coming days, with rumors going about of resignations and so forth. It all seems a bit ridiculous to me, since the CEO requested his pay be returned to the previous level (once the information became a hot topic of course). But anyway, you all in the Christian Science community may be hearing things.
Personally, I've been working pretty hard in school, writing papers, lots of reading, researching for a couple presentations I have, and being pretty busy socially too. I'm doing well so far academically, but there is still a ways to go before the end. It is currently 5th week in the quarter (10th being the last week in the quarter), so it's crunch time right now. I'm reading a biography about Mary Baker Eddy written by Sibyl Wilbur. Briefly, I don't find the book very good as a book. Yes, the information within the book is itself interesting, but it is presented with a style of writting that just doesn't work for anything but the time period it was written in (published in 1907). The book was basically commissioned to be a response to the biography written by Georgine Milmine, a book that casts MBE rather negatively. The church asked Wilbur to write this book, and it definitely carries a positive bias towards MBE. Alas, everything is biased it seems.
We watched most of An Inconvenient Truth in class yesterday. 'Twas my first time watching it, and it was pretty strong I think. Yes, it too carries a bias, and one that I agree with, and he does indeed have a lot of fantastic information supporting his point, always from credible sources. However, I have to admit there are a few points where additional referencing or context would have either made his point stronger OR presented something not supporting him that would still at least give Gore more credibility in that it would not show him to be as biased as he obviously is. Hooray for long-winded sentences! I also have to write a paper and give a presentation in that class about pineapples: ecological/economic/social context, and facts about it like how it's grown, where it's native, etc.
This past Sunday I played in my 2nd Intramural basketball game. So, I live in Lowrey, we're the only house on campus that has TWO basketball teams, thus I can accurately say we played ourselves on Sunday. Team 1 v. Team 2. I'm on team 1. Team 1 won. It was a lot of fun really, we just played randomly a lot, not really calling fouls too much, taking ridiculous shots a lot, and Team 1 played at a man disadvantage of 6 to 8. 14 guys on the court at once sure makes it interesting. Lots of fun though. I scored a bunch, but we weren't really keeping track.
Saturday night I went to "Jo Down." It's hosted by Jo McNabb house in a barn building down in Elsah, and it's just several hours of fun dancing (mostly line dancing), free food/drinks from an establishment in Alton, and free bandanas for everyone! Of course, I had to dress as a cowboy. I had a black hat, plaid shirt, jeans, and I wore the FREE bandana in the manner of a cowboy bandit (covering the face). It was a lot of fun, there are pictures of me, but I didn't take them so I don't have them yet.
Oh yes! Last...Tuesday I believe...I went on an all-day field trip to the St. Louis Zoo for my Wildlife Conservation class. A rather appropriate venue for such a topic. We did have some work to do while we were there, but we finished it early and just enjoyed seeing everything there. It was sad to see many of the animals, spending their lives in glass enclosures. Some of them were almost certainly not there mentally. It had snowed days before we went, and you could tell the tiger had walked probably hundreds of times since the snow in the same pattern, with some change in the pattern once in a while too. The zoo does work hard to keep the animals engaged, to be sure. One of the easiest ways for the zoo to do this is to make the act of getting food a very time consuming process. They also interact with the animals too, knowing zoo animals will NEVER themselves be realeased into the wild (thus it's not too much of a big deal if they lose their fear of humans). I did take pictures, but most turned out pretty bad. Here's a few of the better ones:
Saturday, January 20, 2007
This past week
Wowee, quite a busy week I had. Sorry for growing the anxiety of waiting to a fever pitch.
So I went to church on Sunday as usual. The service was nice, as always. Then the fun began. I think it was the Bears who played that night against the Seattle Seahawks. There were over a dozen of us watching in the RC's living room, with favoritism split pretty much down the middle. It was very exciting, with the Bears pulling it out in OVERTIME...with a 50-yard field goal, the longest of the kicker's career. A very exciting way to determine the fate of men who get paid millions to play a game.
Later that evening I went to my first hymn sing. That was really fun. We go to the Chapel and just sing hymns by request for half an hour. If you sit upstairs, it's a great view of the organist in action, pulling levers, pushing pedals, and playing two sets of keys at once. So that was a neat day.
On Monday I had a geography quiz on all of South America. We do a different region every week until we have done all of Earth. So I had to know the names of countries, their capitols, 4 main rivers, a few lakes, geologic featurse (Andes Mountains, Drake Passage, Tierra del Fuego, etc), as well as population levels in each country and each country's ecologic footprint. It's some number that represents the physical impact per capita on the environment, taking into effect consumption levels, cars, home sizes, and lots of other things. To measure YOUR footprint, click here. Mine's 18.
I finished a book for class titled Sickles the Incredible. I had a paper, graded discussion, and test on it all on Thursday. So that was a nice afternoon once I finished all of that. We are now starting a book about Mary Baker Eddy written by Sibyl Wilbur. It was published just about 100 years ago.
Friday (last night) I had class, work, then I watched Finding Forrester, went cosmic bowling for free (thank you Principia), then watched the Matrix. Quite a night. I slept in today and I have homework to do, then work from 6-730 in the dish room. Then the grand finale: Lowrey House Initiation. I have no idea what will happen. I've only been given these simple directions:
"Bedtime is 10:36, and DON'T ANSWER YOUR PHONE!"
So I went to church on Sunday as usual. The service was nice, as always. Then the fun began. I think it was the Bears who played that night against the Seattle Seahawks. There were over a dozen of us watching in the RC's living room, with favoritism split pretty much down the middle. It was very exciting, with the Bears pulling it out in OVERTIME...with a 50-yard field goal, the longest of the kicker's career. A very exciting way to determine the fate of men who get paid millions to play a game.
Later that evening I went to my first hymn sing. That was really fun. We go to the Chapel and just sing hymns by request for half an hour. If you sit upstairs, it's a great view of the organist in action, pulling levers, pushing pedals, and playing two sets of keys at once. So that was a neat day.
On Monday I had a geography quiz on all of South America. We do a different region every week until we have done all of Earth. So I had to know the names of countries, their capitols, 4 main rivers, a few lakes, geologic featurse (Andes Mountains, Drake Passage, Tierra del Fuego, etc), as well as population levels in each country and each country's ecologic footprint. It's some number that represents the physical impact per capita on the environment, taking into effect consumption levels, cars, home sizes, and lots of other things. To measure YOUR footprint, click here. Mine's 18.
I finished a book for class titled Sickles the Incredible. I had a paper, graded discussion, and test on it all on Thursday. So that was a nice afternoon once I finished all of that. We are now starting a book about Mary Baker Eddy written by Sibyl Wilbur. It was published just about 100 years ago.
Friday (last night) I had class, work, then I watched Finding Forrester, went cosmic bowling for free (thank you Principia), then watched the Matrix. Quite a night. I slept in today and I have homework to do, then work from 6-730 in the dish room. Then the grand finale: Lowrey House Initiation. I have no idea what will happen. I've only been given these simple directions:
"Bedtime is 10:36, and DON'T ANSWER YOUR PHONE!"
Saturday, January 13, 2007
Thursday, January 11, 2007
Oh yeeeaaah!
The last few days have been pretty crazy busy for me. I suppose that will be the norm, so updates may not be as frequent as I would like. Sorry. But anywho...
Well, on Sunday I went to my first church service in the Chapel. It was really neat. Lowrey generally sits as a group near the front. The readers are always students. The organ is quite magnificent, and authentic...no pics of that...yet. Otherwise, it was like a normal church service (though I suspect the average age is tilted slightly lower than usual). I had a boatload of homework every night since then, tonight being no exception. The classes are good, and THIS saturday is actually when I'm doing the Eagle Count somewhere about 25 minutes from campus.
I also went to CSO's Tuesday testimony (in lieu of a Wednesday service) which is from 10-11 AM in the Chapel. That was really fun too. Students and teachers alike participate in it, and a fella in my house runs the service.
All this week, whenever I find time, I have been walking around my house with my basketball and a Sharpie marker...perhaps you see what is coming, in part. All new students in the house have to find an "artifact" of theirs that carries some personal significane and go around the house and have every single person in the house sign their "house name" on it. I will eventually be told what my house name is, though apparently not until next week. It will be something ridiculous, as everyone else's.
Today was my first day of working at Principia. 3 days a week I work in the Pub, plus every other weekend. I also work Saturdays in the dish room and Sundays as the Grill Call. In total, my schedule is only 6 hours per week...I guess it'll add up...eventually. Salary = $6.50/hour. I have bunches of reading and writing tonight, and there is a house meeting later tonight. Bye byeeeee
Well, on Sunday I went to my first church service in the Chapel. It was really neat. Lowrey generally sits as a group near the front. The readers are always students. The organ is quite magnificent, and authentic...no pics of that...yet. Otherwise, it was like a normal church service (though I suspect the average age is tilted slightly lower than usual). I had a boatload of homework every night since then, tonight being no exception. The classes are good, and THIS saturday is actually when I'm doing the Eagle Count somewhere about 25 minutes from campus.
I also went to CSO's Tuesday testimony (in lieu of a Wednesday service) which is from 10-11 AM in the Chapel. That was really fun too. Students and teachers alike participate in it, and a fella in my house runs the service.
All this week, whenever I find time, I have been walking around my house with my basketball and a Sharpie marker...perhaps you see what is coming, in part. All new students in the house have to find an "artifact" of theirs that carries some personal significane and go around the house and have every single person in the house sign their "house name" on it. I will eventually be told what my house name is, though apparently not until next week. It will be something ridiculous, as everyone else's.
Today was my first day of working at Principia. 3 days a week I work in the Pub, plus every other weekend. I also work Saturdays in the dish room and Sundays as the Grill Call. In total, my schedule is only 6 hours per week...I guess it'll add up...eventually. Salary = $6.50/hour. I have bunches of reading and writing tonight, and there is a house meeting later tonight. Bye byeeeee
Saturday, January 6, 2007
Pics
A pic during sunset over looking the bluffs. Yes, in the lower right of the shot is a barge going by
The rest of these shots are all in the area, including the chapel.
Friday, January 5, 2007
My Bad
Sorry for a little delay betwixt posts. Everyone has been having issues with the internet, and I've been busy as well.
Today at dinner was really neat. It's the one time when professors and administration people serve the students their meals. It doesn't end there either. They put your food on the plate, they make your drinks for you, and then another teacher approaches you as you walk away from the drink table, takes your tray of consumables, and walks behind you to your seat. They pull out your seat, remove everything from your tray, get you drink refills, all while you listen to a live jazz band compiled of students. The piano player in the band lives 2 doors down from me, he's pretty good. The teachers also periodically walk by with a dessert tray too. It was pretty fun. Good food too: Salmon, cooked zucchini, a very good punch mix, carrot cake and berry tart for desert, and a friendly smile all around. Geroge Moffet was serving out the main course and I of course introduced myself as the son of my father. He and his wife knew of me immediately (she was demoted to serving the vegetables).
All of my classes sound pretty interesting and relatively demanding. I first had Global Environmental Issues on Wednesday. The teacher is a former Prin student who accepted the teaching job after spending some years living/working in Fairbanks, Alaska. There isn't much structure to the course yet, he's new to teaching the course and hasn't formulated a proper layout yet.
Yesterday I had Wildlife Conservation (WC) and American Biography (AB). WC sounds really neat. Three weeks from tomorrow the entire class will meet at 7:30 AM and spend the next 4 hours observing and counting all of the Eagles in a certain area near the campus. We'll be using telescopes/binoculars I'm sure, but it sounds pretty neat. Hopefully I'll be able to take some pics in the process. WC also has a full-day field trip some time in February to the St. Louis Zoo.
AB is a course that seems to be about learning how to read a biography: When was it written relative to the subject's lifetime, what relavent stuff is going on during the time it was written, what sorts of sources does the author use, what scope, style, bias, thesis does the author have, what's the background of the author. These elements are all included in discussions about the material in the text as well, and the books all sound pretty interesting. There are a total of 4 in the class: Sickles the Incredible, The Life of Mary Baker Eddy, Molly Spotted Elk, and A Bright Shining Lie. The time periods range from the Civil War through the Vietnam War.
It has been very fun so far walking around campus talking to people I don't know. Everyone is usually willing to talk to you, and everyone is friendly.
Last night was my first experience with house meetings in Lowrey. Most everyone in the house meets downstairs at 10:30 PM. There's a big wrestling mat in the middle of the room and chairs all around. The mat wasn't really used for THIS meeting, but apparently it usually is. There are some brief announcements, what's happening socially on campus, etc. then a couple guys usually have a story to tell, not necessarily with any theme or purpose other than it's funny. One fella talked about a particular experience during his study abroad in Japan in a public bath...it involved dancing. Being the first meeting of the quarter, the new guys had to be brough to the middle of the circle (me and 3 other guys). I was the only transfer new student, the others were only new to the house, not campus. We had to say our names and where we're from firstly:
"What's your name?"
"Wil-.."
"YYYYYYEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH"
"Where you from?"
"Chica-.."
"YYYYYYYYEEEEEEAAAAAAAHHAHHHHHHHHHHH"
Then we had to do the worm dance. That was about it, but it was a pretty fun atmosphere. One guy tried to fit himself into a mini-fridge...not quite. A soccer ball was being kicked all over the place. 'Twas fun.
That's all for now. We have classes tomorrow just for this one week because of the funky start time. Class starts at 8am, OH BOY! G'night
WGM IV
Today at dinner was really neat. It's the one time when professors and administration people serve the students their meals. It doesn't end there either. They put your food on the plate, they make your drinks for you, and then another teacher approaches you as you walk away from the drink table, takes your tray of consumables, and walks behind you to your seat. They pull out your seat, remove everything from your tray, get you drink refills, all while you listen to a live jazz band compiled of students. The piano player in the band lives 2 doors down from me, he's pretty good. The teachers also periodically walk by with a dessert tray too. It was pretty fun. Good food too: Salmon, cooked zucchini, a very good punch mix, carrot cake and berry tart for desert, and a friendly smile all around. Geroge Moffet was serving out the main course and I of course introduced myself as the son of my father. He and his wife knew of me immediately (she was demoted to serving the vegetables).
All of my classes sound pretty interesting and relatively demanding. I first had Global Environmental Issues on Wednesday. The teacher is a former Prin student who accepted the teaching job after spending some years living/working in Fairbanks, Alaska. There isn't much structure to the course yet, he's new to teaching the course and hasn't formulated a proper layout yet.
Yesterday I had Wildlife Conservation (WC) and American Biography (AB). WC sounds really neat. Three weeks from tomorrow the entire class will meet at 7:30 AM and spend the next 4 hours observing and counting all of the Eagles in a certain area near the campus. We'll be using telescopes/binoculars I'm sure, but it sounds pretty neat. Hopefully I'll be able to take some pics in the process. WC also has a full-day field trip some time in February to the St. Louis Zoo.
AB is a course that seems to be about learning how to read a biography: When was it written relative to the subject's lifetime, what relavent stuff is going on during the time it was written, what sorts of sources does the author use, what scope, style, bias, thesis does the author have, what's the background of the author. These elements are all included in discussions about the material in the text as well, and the books all sound pretty interesting. There are a total of 4 in the class: Sickles the Incredible, The Life of Mary Baker Eddy, Molly Spotted Elk, and A Bright Shining Lie. The time periods range from the Civil War through the Vietnam War.
It has been very fun so far walking around campus talking to people I don't know. Everyone is usually willing to talk to you, and everyone is friendly.
Last night was my first experience with house meetings in Lowrey. Most everyone in the house meets downstairs at 10:30 PM. There's a big wrestling mat in the middle of the room and chairs all around. The mat wasn't really used for THIS meeting, but apparently it usually is. There are some brief announcements, what's happening socially on campus, etc. then a couple guys usually have a story to tell, not necessarily with any theme or purpose other than it's funny. One fella talked about a particular experience during his study abroad in Japan in a public bath...it involved dancing. Being the first meeting of the quarter, the new guys had to be brough to the middle of the circle (me and 3 other guys). I was the only transfer new student, the others were only new to the house, not campus. We had to say our names and where we're from firstly:
"What's your name?"
"Wil-.."
"YYYYYYEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH"
"Where you from?"
"Chica-.."
"YYYYYYYYEEEEEEAAAAAAAHHAHHHHHHHHHHH"
Then we had to do the worm dance. That was about it, but it was a pretty fun atmosphere. One guy tried to fit himself into a mini-fridge...not quite. A soccer ball was being kicked all over the place. 'Twas fun.
That's all for now. We have classes tomorrow just for this one week because of the funky start time. Class starts at 8am, OH BOY! G'night
WGM IV
Wednesday, January 3, 2007
For Real
Alright, now then, a real post...now that I have time.
Presently it is about 8 in the morning on Wednesday, my first day of class. I have only one class on Mondays and Wednesdays, at 1040 for 2 hours. The class is titled Global Environmental Issues (2). My other two classes are Wildlife Conservation (2) and American Biography (3). I just signed up for them yesterday. They had us go through this whole training thing to know how to sign up for classes and look up certain things regarding classes. It's the same system they have at U of Illinois, so I breezed through it.
I also took my math placement test and did my french interview yesterday. I'm exempt from any foreign language, but I still might take a class or two, or even minor in it. I'm not sure when I'll hear about my math score, but I'm sure I don't need to worry.
I've met quite a few people in the few days I've been here. I can't remember half the names I've heard though. Several people from Africa (Ghana, Nigeria, and Kenya..so far), and most from USA, but only one guy is from Illinois so far. My roommate is actually from Stockton, CA, a mere 20 minute drive from where I was living with Granny. Charlie is his name. He's on the swim team here, he's a Mass Communications major, and he takes reaaaallly good pictures with his fancy Digital SLR camera. He's got one that is a 30 second exposure and it captures 5 separate lighting strikes while overlooking the bluffs.
Every day, during the week at least, there is half an hour set aside for CS study, usually done with the reading of the lesson. No classes can be scheduled at this time, and all offices shut down.
Every house has an RC (Resident Counselor)...literally someone who lives in the dorm year round. Mine is JD. He has a wife and daughter and has been here for 11 years. He's a really nice fella, he used to live in the Boston area, so he's a Patriots/Red Sox fan (like me, in case you're wondering) and he's very helpful/friendly, as are all the RCs. They all pretty much have open door policy into their living space, including JD. Usually it's just to hang out and watch TV or a certain movie (the rooms don't have cable TV and reception is no good).
There are lots and lots of nice people, most everybody is really. The campus is really nice too, of course. I was stricken with absolute happiness a few times, completely immobilizing my left hand.
My car can be parked on campus for only FIVE DOLLARS per quarter. I like that.
Sorry for the random-spurt format. Everything is happening all at once for me at the moment, so I'm just writing what I can remember.
JD was saying that a few times a quarter, most of the guys in the house will strip down to boxers, cover themselves in shaving cream, and run around part of campus shouting "West West West!" From what I've gathered, Ferguson usually throws thing at them for redemption. Ah, college. S'long for now, shower/breakfast time.
WGM IV
Presently it is about 8 in the morning on Wednesday, my first day of class. I have only one class on Mondays and Wednesdays, at 1040 for 2 hours. The class is titled Global Environmental Issues (2). My other two classes are Wildlife Conservation (2) and American Biography (3). I just signed up for them yesterday. They had us go through this whole training thing to know how to sign up for classes and look up certain things regarding classes. It's the same system they have at U of Illinois, so I breezed through it.
I also took my math placement test and did my french interview yesterday. I'm exempt from any foreign language, but I still might take a class or two, or even minor in it. I'm not sure when I'll hear about my math score, but I'm sure I don't need to worry.
I've met quite a few people in the few days I've been here. I can't remember half the names I've heard though. Several people from Africa (Ghana, Nigeria, and Kenya..so far), and most from USA, but only one guy is from Illinois so far. My roommate is actually from Stockton, CA, a mere 20 minute drive from where I was living with Granny. Charlie is his name. He's on the swim team here, he's a Mass Communications major, and he takes reaaaallly good pictures with his fancy Digital SLR camera. He's got one that is a 30 second exposure and it captures 5 separate lighting strikes while overlooking the bluffs.
Every day, during the week at least, there is half an hour set aside for CS study, usually done with the reading of the lesson. No classes can be scheduled at this time, and all offices shut down.
Every house has an RC (Resident Counselor)...literally someone who lives in the dorm year round. Mine is JD. He has a wife and daughter and has been here for 11 years. He's a really nice fella, he used to live in the Boston area, so he's a Patriots/Red Sox fan (like me, in case you're wondering) and he's very helpful/friendly, as are all the RCs. They all pretty much have open door policy into their living space, including JD. Usually it's just to hang out and watch TV or a certain movie (the rooms don't have cable TV and reception is no good).
There are lots and lots of nice people, most everybody is really. The campus is really nice too, of course. I was stricken with absolute happiness a few times, completely immobilizing my left hand.
My car can be parked on campus for only FIVE DOLLARS per quarter. I like that.
Sorry for the random-spurt format. Everything is happening all at once for me at the moment, so I'm just writing what I can remember.
JD was saying that a few times a quarter, most of the guys in the house will strip down to boxers, cover themselves in shaving cream, and run around part of campus shouting "West West West!" From what I've gathered, Ferguson usually throws thing at them for redemption. Ah, college. S'long for now, shower/breakfast time.
WGM IV
Tuesday, January 2, 2007
Information
So my DIRECT line, to my room that is, is: (618)374-4440.
My mailing address is:
William Moller
Principia College #685
1 Maybeck Place
Elsah, IL 62028
I gotta go take a math placement test, be back shortly!
My mailing address is:
William Moller
Principia College #685
1 Maybeck Place
Elsah, IL 62028
I gotta go take a math placement test, be back shortly!
Everybody!
Hi. I'm presently sitting in the lower level of the Science Center on campus (the really long and short building). They're teaching us how to use our internet accounts as well as something else regarding our writing seminar stuf...That doesn't start for a few minutes still, so no problem. I can't go into too many details at the moment, except to say: This place is sweet.
I haven't met my roommate yet.
I do have a phone number, but I can't remember it at the moment.
I haven't been given a mailbox assignment yet.
I take a math placement test and a french interview today.
I also register for classes and buy books today.
My room is pretty much set up.
My resident counselor (RC) is a really cool guy. an RC basically is an adult, usually with a spouse and children, who lives in the house with you, except they live there year round. They are there for guidance, maintaining order (apparently a necessity in Lowrey), and helping out with pretty much anything. His name is J.D., he's been here for 11 years, he's a RED SOX (!!!!) fan, and very cool.
Lots more to say later, gotta do more training for the moment. Also, pictures forthcoming when I haev time and when I actually take some pictures. Ta
WGM IV
Hi. I'm presently sitting in the lower level of the Science Center on campus (the really long and short building). They're teaching us how to use our internet accounts as well as something else regarding our writing seminar stuf...That doesn't start for a few minutes still, so no problem. I can't go into too many details at the moment, except to say: This place is sweet.
I haven't met my roommate yet.
I do have a phone number, but I can't remember it at the moment.
I haven't been given a mailbox assignment yet.
I take a math placement test and a french interview today.
I also register for classes and buy books today.
My room is pretty much set up.
My resident counselor (RC) is a really cool guy. an RC basically is an adult, usually with a spouse and children, who lives in the house with you, except they live there year round. They are there for guidance, maintaining order (apparently a necessity in Lowrey), and helping out with pretty much anything. His name is J.D., he's been here for 11 years, he's a RED SOX (!!!!) fan, and very cool.
Lots more to say later, gotta do more training for the moment. Also, pictures forthcoming when I haev time and when I actually take some pictures. Ta
WGM IV
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