There is never nothing happening

My extremely light week continues.

I went to Gotee on Wednesday, where I found out they were finally moving to their new offices in Franklin. I worked furiously on the master vault for 4 hours, at which time they shut down the server and I helped get things packed and marked. The move was going to take a couple days, so I was told not to come to work on Friday. Score.

On my way north on 65 I hit accident traffic; I went 3 miles in 45 minutes. Coincidentally, I was running late to make my appointment to look through the eight bedroom house off Nolensville. I made it over there and absolutely loved it. I'm taking Jon and Ryan over in an hour to have them look too and see what they think. I REALLY like it though...

Lost was almost like an episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, making for a relatively entertaining episode, but it didn't really further the story at all. I guess it's an OK trade off.

Thursday classes were uneventful, and I spent the evening at a combination of Reverb, Jess and Kendra's watching an Office marathon, and watching Casino Royale/playing Farkle at Kurt and Tyler's. A good night all together.

Yesterday I did basically nothing for most of the day. Another personal growth convo was taken care of at 10 (down to 7 more). Matt came over and watched Children of Men with me in the afternoon, and then we all went to Buca de Beppo for Jess' birthday. Tons of fun, great food, a great dinner experience on the whole.

When the waitress brought us our bill, she had split it up and told us that it was going to be like $27.50 each. When she said that, the whole table got real quiet, and I don't think anyone breathed for a few minutes. I picked up the receipt and realized that everything had been put on our tab twice, and everyone calmed down real quick. It came out to $12.86 per person in the end, a much more agreeable sum.

After dinner a bunch of us went to see Peaceful Warrior, a movie about a male gymnast who fights back from a career-ending motorcycle accident with the help of a mysterious mentor and comes back better than he was before. Don't let that plot line fool you: I would not call this a good movie. I will say parts of it were tolerable, but the story and characters were not well developed. At all. The best part about this was it was free, so I guess it might have been worth it.

Now I'm at Reverb, and I just got done with a group project where we had to create a cue sheet for all the music in a movie, Pieces of April. It's nice to get paid to do homework, even if the movie was almost as bad as Peaceful Warrior.

I need to write my strategic paper this weekend, and I'm hoping I can bring myself to just sit down some time and knock it out. Odds of that happening before Monday night? 12:1. At best.

These are the days

Today has been... awesome.

I got up this morning and ran over on Belmont's track, where I discovered that I run faster when it's on a flat surface, but I can't run as long without a destination.

Next up was chilling in the Beaman, always a good time. I then had strategic management, where a group presented their final case (mildly interesting) and I got the first half of my final paper back including my favorite comment to get from a teacher: "This was a pleasure to read! Thank You!" I figure when a teacher thanks me for doing a required assignment, I must have done something right.

After that class, I went to my 2:00, which ended up being canceled. I used the extra time to go to Target, where I got Children of Men (can't wait to see it again!) and found the 10th season of Friends for $20. A very successful trip.

So successful, in fact, that I decided to skip artist management and watch Friends instead.

Sooooo nice.

400

That's right, post #400 on this baby.

Yesterday was the SIFE regional competition out at Opryland. Our team did extremely well: we won our league and are in the top twenty in the nation for business ethics, market economics, and sustainability, each of which put us in nationals in May. I'm not sure if I'm going to go, it will mostly depend on whether the piracy video is in the top ten for that competition or not. We should find that out in the next two weeks.

After the competition we went to Caney Fork Catfish Farm for a free dinner, and then I went to Opry Mills, where I got a new pair of jeans for $15 and a pair of shorts of $16. Not a bad deal. Then I went home and, after 2 venue changes, I watched Borat with Julie and Rachel and various combinations of Kendra, Jess, and Sarah. Parts were hysterical, parts offensive, parts extremely uncomfortable. All that is to say I don't regret having watched it, but don't have a real desire to see it again.

Now Saturday is here, and I am at Reverb. Again. We're looking at that house this afternoon, and on one hand I hope it's a good fit, but on the other I think we can find a better one. Something cheaper, a little further north, all that. But we'll see.

Tonight is the Other Showcase, aka Ben's last chance to make it into the Best of the Best. Good luck dude!

House of the rising sum

Apparently we hadn't decided to officially move out of our house until we all sat down and talked about it on Saturday (I kind of thought it was a done deal...). Anyway our landlord, Tommy, found out through the grapevine that we were planning on moving, and put the house on Craigslist Sunday night, wanting $200 more/month than we currently pay (which is what he did to us last year, except it was $300 for us). By yesterday, he had lined up two showings for this afternoon. I wasn't at home for the first one, but gave the tour to the second group since Tommy was a little late. They were obviously from Vanderbilt (there are no guys that huge at Belmont), and one's name was Thad (pronounced with a "th" like in "the"). They also made a beer joke, so obviously not from Belmont.

While all of this is happening, we've started looking in earnest for a new place. Our best option so far is on Granny White, about a mile from our current place, but we haven't heard back from the owner. Our next best is about ten miles down Hillsboro Road, basically just west of Cool Springs. We're going to look at it on Saturday, and I think it's a great option for us. Here's a link to some pictures and a description of the place: 128 Cavalcade Circle

And now I just had to give the tour again because a group of guys came over wanting to see the place again. I better not spend the next two weeks giving tours to anyone who wants one, cuz that would blow. Seriously.

Beyond all that, this week has been and will continue to be marked by a whole lot nothing. Of the seven class meetings that I attend over the week, three have been canceled. And, since three are already done, I only have one more class this week. I also have the SIFE regional competition all day Friday, which will be... interesting. I hope I don't die from boredom spending 13 hours with the SIFE team at Opryland (at least I don't have to spend all day on a bus or anything). If we make it as a team to the national competition, it's May 6-8 in Dallas, which has the potential to suck because that's smack dab in the middle of finals and right before graduation.

I have no motivation at this point to find a job. None whatsoever. There's a decent position at Sony ATV Publishing that I should have already applied for, but instead I'm sitting here, waiting for the last possible moment or inspiration to strike.

And now Quinn the Eskimo is here, so it's hair-cutting time (and I will jump for joy).

Who knew Hoyas were so ruthless?

And so ends another Belmont men's season. They had us going in the first couple minutes, but I knew it was too good to last. The Belmont women, on the other hand, I think have a decent shot at an upset of Georgia on Saturday. I guess we'll see...

My tests today were relatively easy, especially artist management. I'm predicting a high A on that one; low A in strategic. Now I just need to take the COBA KAT on Saturday morning and I'm done with this crappy week.

You should check out improveverywhere.com. It's these strangers who join together to pull elaborate pranks, like 300 people going on the subway in New York without wearing pants, acting like it's completely normal, and having people waiting when they get off at the next few stops selling pants. All sorts of craziness, check it out.

Seriously?

So I'm sitting in the Beaman, trying to study for Strategic, and there's a girl sitting 10 feet away whining in the phone about how everything that can possibly go wrong for her wedding is (it really isn't, she's just over-stressed).

And there's two girls with a campus group, SAGE (Students for the Advancement of Gender Equality) selling baked goods 15 feet away in the other direction. Am I the only one that sees something wrong with this picture?

An update on the chaos

Halfway through the week that doesn't end, and yet it's flying by.

My artist management test, which was supposed to be Tuesday , got pushed back to tomorrow. I did, however, get a study guide for it, so I guess that works out well.

This morning I worked to get everything together for the SIFE video, and we got it all mailed out. Then it was off to Gotee, where I did some random stuff before leaving early to take... THE EXIT EXAM! (Duh duh duh)

The test itself was not very hard. I'm pretty confident I passed all three parts anyway, so thats all I can ask for.

Now, I must prepare for my strategic management and artist management tests tomorrow. The more important of the two is strategic, since I can review for the other during the Belmont tournament game tomorrow. Tip off is 1:55, in case you were wondering.

Can I just say that this is a great time for serial drama on TV? They pulled one of the biggest shockers on 24 this past week, Lost is gaining back its steam from the first two seasons, and even Grey's is decent. It's another week of reruns for The Office, though, so it's not all good.

Back in the Habit

And so now, after all the wonderfulness that was last week, I am back in Nashville. And it kind of sucks.

Yesterday was recover/homework/community group day. I didn't sleep as much as I wanted to; couldn't have if I'd tried (and I did). I got up to run this morning, and made it about a half mile before I got a terrible side ache. I walked for a minute or two, then picked back up running. This kept happening the rest of the time, except the aches came more and more frequently. So I only made it around 4 miles today. This week will, most definitely, be spent working my way back up to 6 miles, rather than maintaining it before some expansion of my off days (T/Th).

This week includes, by day:
Monday: Showdown, Music supervision project due (done)
Tuesday: Artist management test, Record company operations paper due
Wednesday: Gotee, Music business exit exam (just shooting to pass, that's all I need), Reverb
Thursday: Strategic Management test, Reverb
Friday: Gotee
Saturday: College of Business exit exam (graded and factored in to my strategic grade, but not required to pass to graduate), Reverb, dinner and laser tag with community group

Plus, all of this comes just as the NCAA tournament starts. What on earth are people thinking scheduling everything they can think of for the week after spring break? If I were a panda, PETA would be all over this. Animal cruelty.

Not everything is bad, though. I found out the PSA will be shown on four local TV stations in the near future! The local CBS, ABC, a CBS offshoot, and Comcast will be showing the commercial soon, and that makes me happy. Belmont has really gotten on board with the video, and has been pushing it to every contact they have. It's great and all, it just means that I'm the go-to guy for coordinating when people stuff for it, and that's one more thing on my plate. The whole project is nearing it's end, with our entries due to SIFE Friday. I need to write a few pages of info on that tonight...

Sometimes I wish I took more risks.

Ugh, I need to start on that SIFE stuff if I'm gonna get done in time for class and back-to-back episodes of 24 this evening...

National Lampoon's Spring Break Vacation

Yes, yes, it's been 12 days since I've done this. I'll try and fit all those days into one post...

Spring Break

As I've stated on here before, I took nine other people to Minnesota of all places for Spring Break with me. It was awesome, to say the least. The drive up began at 6:30 on Saturday, March 3. A mere 17 1/2 hours later, we were at our final destination. The "cabin" was gorgeous as usual, and there was a fresh blanket of at least 18 inches of fresh powder waiting for us.

Ben arrived Sunday afternoon in Minneapolis, so Matt and I drove to a family gathering in Cambridge to meet my sister, who had picked Ben up from the airport. I got to see a spattering of relatives on my mom's side, and we departed after about an hour there. Upon returning to Gull, we figured out our meal schedule for the week, had dinner, and concluded the evening with a viewing of The Prestige, which was quite good, even though I had it figured out about 45 minutes in.

Monday was another light day. Matt, Ryan, and Lee went to Danielle's house in St. Cloud to use her snowmobiles for a couple hours, while the rest of us stayed to play in the snow, which included digging a fort, tossing a Frisbee, a mild snowball fight, and throwing people in the air on the lake (Lots of snow on the lake, so it wasn't painful). My parents had everyone over for dinner Monday night (delicious), and we played two rounds of Battle of the Sexes, which we split.

Skiing on Tuesday meant we were on the road at 7:30. A light snow persisted all day, adding three inches of snow to the already impressive totals, and making the roads a little slick (which resulted in a nasty spill for Tim that left him at the cabin for the day). Wild Mountain had hardly anyone there, which made it that much better for the people that went skiing. Jess and I didn't really want to ski, so we stayed in the chalet until lunch, then went over to spend the afternoon on the tubing hill, which we found out was closed during the week. Thus, we ended up back in the chalet, which allowed Jess to take a much-needed nap while I began reading Harry Potter for the first time. The first car left Taylors Falls at 4:30, the second at 7. We relaxed that night, and watched Stranger than Fiction, which I liked a lot.

Wednesday was our day out at camp. We slept in and arrived just after lunch, beginning with the sliding hill. There was so much snow it was hard to get going, especially at first, but we slid for an hour before things dissolved into a mass snowball fight. Eventually people got cold, so we went to the gym and played basketball, floor hockey, and carpet ball. Then, we climbed the Ice Tower, which was a ton of fun, and four of us even made it to the top (me not among them). That night I went to hear my dad preach at the Assembly, and came back to play Pinochle with Ben, Julie, and Jess.

We spent Thursday at the Mall of America, which went by really fast. I picked up a shirt, a pair of shorts, and a 9000-piece puzzle (which is ridiculously huge, and will not be started until we're in a new house). Sarah and John had everyone over for dinner after this, and then we went to see "Triple Espresso", which included a unscheduled pre-show tour of downtown Minneapolis. The show was hilarious, as usual.

Friday was the day everyone recharged. 6 people went to the casino around lunch, while the rest of us went into Brainerd to get groceries for our Italian feast a la Jess that evening. My family came out for dinner too, and we all had a great time and great food. The rest of the evening was spent cleaning and prepping for our departure, which we all agreed came far too early, and if I was not in school and had a job that would allow it, I would have stayed another week just to chill.

The drive back on Saturday was faster than the one there, and was thankfully uneventful.

I have to go to Showdown now, but I will be back on to talk about the last couple of days this evening.