Conclusion

Well the time has come. It is the fourteenth week of the Spring 2009 semester and this will more than likely be my last blog entry ever. Although I’m happy that I have one less homework assignment to do every week, it’s a little disappointing seeing as for the most part I didn’t really mind writing down some of my random thoughts, stories, beliefs, likes, and dislikes. I wasn’t really a fan of writing some of the assignments but I liked writing the “free entries” every once in awhile. Since I am not one for giving long, emotional speeches, or writing it in this case, I will answer a few of the questions given on the blog information sheet. The first question is, “what have I learned from keeping a blog?” This question isn’t the easiest one to answer but I guess I learned that some parts of my life could be considered interesting to others. Before starting this last entry, I looked through a few of my old entries and some of them actually were quite interesting and humorous, usually at my own expense. The next question asked was whether or not I’d advise other students to keep a blog. I think that if you enjoy writing and/or letting people hear about yourself, then keeping a blog seems like a good idea. Finally, it asks what advice I’d give to others on keeping a blog. My advice would just be try to talk about things that others would find interesting. For free entries, I tried to tell stories that readers would actually enjoy or talk about things that others in the audience could relate to or find funny. I’m sorry that I had to end my blog with a boring, plain entry with random questions that no one at all cares about. I’m sure for the most part though that my only audience is probably the students in my English 101 class. The only reason they’re probably reading is because we have to comment on everyone’s blog at least two times. Well, to anyone reading, goodbye and good luck with whatever you end up doing.

A Fun Visit to Normal, IL...

For this week’s blog, I’m supposed to give suggestions to my friends on what I would tell them to do if they came to Normal and I was unable to show them around. I think this may be the hardest blog of the year for me. I grew up in Oak Lawn, which is one train or bus ride away from the city of Chicago. In Chicago, the possibilities were endless. You could see a Bulls, Bears, Hawks, or Cubs game, go to the zoo, see some of the biggest skyscrapers in the world, or just walk around and enjoy the scenery of downtown. So to decide what I would tell my friends to do for fun in the city of Normal is not an effortless task. Personally, without a car or any mode of transportation, I know very little about the city itself. I guess the first thing I would tell them to do would be to take a walk around the Illinois State campus. I could have someone give them a tour of the different parts of the school such as the quad, dorm buildings, and other buildings. This isn’t necessarily the most exciting campus so I would hope they scheduled a visit on the day of a sporting event. With all of the different sports, I’d hope at least one had a game that day. They could see a basketball game, a football game, a baseball game, or even a rare track meet. Hopefully the teams could keep it close and then it could prove to be very entertaining. Next, I would hope they chose a day when a concert was playing either at the Brayden Auditorium or at the concert hall in downtown Normal. There have actually been a few popular bands such as T.I. and Red Jumpsuit Apparatus who’ve recently put on concerts here. Any concert would most likely prove to be a fun time. Finally, to the end the night I would make sure they got a sample of one of my favorite places in Normal, Gumby’s Pizza. I would make sure they tried the Pokey Stix and hopefully, if all went right, they would have a fun visit to Normal, IL.

My Unlucky Trip Back Home...

Last weekend, two friends of mine, Joe Ward and Brendan Namoff, who go to the University of Illinois and live in my hometown decided to visit here on Friday night and leave Saturday morning. We decided that it would be fun for them to come even if they were only going to be here for a small amount of time. After finding out that they were leaving on Saturday morning, I thought it’d be nice to go home for a night to get a few things done and then come back here on Sunday night. Saturday morning came along and it was pouring rain. I knew the ride might take a little longer than usual, especially in my friend Joe’s 1998 Saturn, but decided that it couldn’t be much longer than the usual one and a half to two hour drive back home. It was not long after we got onto the highway that the driver’s side windshield wiper started to malfunction. Eventually, while only about twenty miles out of Bloomington, the windshield wiper went completely off track and was as far right as possible. We could only see out of the passenger’s side window and ended up going about 45 mph until we got to the first exit. We went to a car dealership and a gas station, both of which told us that the nearest mechanic was 20 miles down the highway. Thinking creatively, we bought 2 rolls of duck tape and tried making a barrier so the wiper could no longer go off track. We got back onto the highway and within ten miles the duck tape started unpeeling so we got right back off into another small town. After going to another car dealership and two gas stations, both said there wasn’t much we could do but wait. We sat in McDonalds until my older brother called and I told him what had happened. He immediately said, “Why don’t you try Rain X?” I didn’t know what Rain X was but I guess it’s something you put on your windshield which deflects rain so you don’t have to use your wipers. We put it on and it worked perfectly. We ended up driving an hour and a half with no windshield wipers on the highway. I got home completely soaked and miserable after a two hour trip had turned into a five hour trip. I don’t think I will ever forget this horrible experience.

My ISU Football Game Experience

For this blog we’re supposed to talk about an event which we’ve attended at ISU this semester. To be completely honest, I’m not very involved in the school at all. During high school, I used to be on different sports teams and a few different clubs. I didn’t mind it at first but by senior year I was so sick of being involved and decided that in college I wouldn’t get very involved at all. I wish I could say I attended at least one basketball game because that’s what I’d like to write about but the only thing I’ve really gone to was one football game at the beginning of the year. The game was towards the end of September and it was the homecoming game against Eastern. I really only attended it because pretty much all of my friends were going to it and someone I knew from Eastern had driven two hours to see the game. So game day came and my friends from all the different dorms (excluding Tri-Towers) met in my dorm room in Atkin-Colby. We walked to the football stadium and ended up getting there early in the second quarter. To my surprise, the game wasn’t all that bad. For the most part it was pretty fun and I got to see a wide range of people from classes, my floor, my home town who I hadn’t seen in a while. The atmosphere was a very fun one. Everyone was getting pretty into it and ISU had a lead for a good part of the game. It was actually a really close game but ISU ended up losing just at the very end. Overall, it was a pretty good experience. For the last part of the blog we’re supposed to say what we learned from it. It’s really hard to say that I learned anything while attending an ISU football game on a Saturday night. I guess I could say that I learned that maybe getting a little involved, just going to sporting events and such at ISU would make the experience better.

Horrible Luck

For this blog we’re supposed to write about any topic we’d like. I was originally going to write about my picks for the coming up March Madness Tournament. But I figured that’d be a little boring so I decided I would tell a story about an event that happened to me the first Sunday of break. It all started a few weeks ago. I found out that during an ISU radio show on a Saturday night they would be giving out tickets to T.I. at U of I. Knowing that there probably would be no one listening to the ISU radio on channel 5 at 8-10 pm on a Saturday night, I stayed in until about 9:30 and the giveaway finally started. I immediately called in and ended up winning the tickets. Even though I’m not a huge rap fan, I was excited because I usually don’t win things and have horrible luck. I decided to take my girlfriend who goes to DePaul and knew I would have to drive her back early on Monday morning. When Sunday came along (the day of the concert), the weather was very bad. But despite this, we drove from my hometown of Oak Lawn (south side of Chicago) all the way to Champaign. The wind and weather was bad the whole drive there but I figured it’d be worth it to see the concert. When I got off at the Champaign exit after 2 and a half hours of driving, I got a call from a friend of mine who said the concert was canceled because the power was out. After this, I stayed at U of I for about an hour and decided that I would go to ISU to pick up my power cord for my laptop which I had forgotten. With the horrible weather I spent the night at ISU. When I got here the whole campus was dead and no one was in site. I asked the guy at the front desk and he said “free parking”. The next day I woke up to leave at 10 in the morning to find out I got a parking ticket. After that, I drove from ISU to DePaul then back to my house. Four and a half hours later, I was home. With a canceled concert, 7 hours of driving, a parking ticket later, I’d consider it one of the worst experiences of my life.

What I'd do with $80,000...

The question which I am supposed to answer for this week’s blog is what would I do if I were to get all the money that I’d spend during my four years at ISU and had to go out into the real world and “spend” it how I’d like. Having no money in my wallet and less than $200 in my bank account, it’s difficult to imagine how I’d spend $80,000. I think the first thing I’d do with the money would be buy a car. I wouldn’t go out and buy an $80,000 car but I’d just get one that’s somewhat new and that could last longer than the long line of beat up cars that I’ve driven since I got my license. Then after that I think I would buy some things that I’ve really wanted over the last few years and just haven’t had the money to buy. It’d just be small things such as a nice phone, a new iPod, tickets to a few Bulls, Bears, and Sox games. After that I think I would spend a little bit of time on vacation outside of the United States. Besides two short trips to Canada, I’ve never left the US. I would probably go to Mexico where my $80,000 would seem like so much more. After buying a new car, buying a few small things that I’ve wanted for awhile, and going to Mexico I’m not sure exactly how much money I’d have left but I’m sure it’d still be a good amount. I think after all that I would get a job that requires very little effort and has really flexible hours. It probably wouldn’t pay much but I’d try to go as long as I could living off of the money I received for not going to ISU and my money from my job before I had to enter back into the real world. There are probably so many better ways to spend $80,000 but I think this would probably be exactly what I would do with it.

Tips For Incoming Freshmen

For our seventh blog assignment of the year, we’re supposed to give helpful hints to students who will be attending ISU next year. After getting through my first few months at ISU, I think there are a few tips that I could give to an incoming freshman that might help them get through their first semester.
My first tip to incoming freshmen sounds pretty nerdy but you should probably try to actually go to most of your classes. It’s a lot different than high school because most of your classes it is optional to attend and there is no punishment for ditching classes. I usually missed about a class a week, which isn’t good, but I still went to almost all of them. I had a lot of friends who would randomly decide not to attend classes for really stupid reasons, especially on Fridays. I always hated going to class while they got to sit around, but in the end, two of my good friends that I hang out with almost daily ended up on academic probation and I didn’t, so make sure to go to class.
My second tip is to mix up what you eat in the cafeteria and try to eat somewhat healthy. I started out last semester with eating pizza, hamburgers, and chicken sandwiches with just about every meal. Not only did I put on a few pounds, but I’m so sick of the greasy food. Try only getting the greasy foods occasionally and instead getting salad, cereal, fruit, and sandwiches from the deli. That’ll keep you from putting on the pounds and from getting sick of the eating the same foods.
My final tip involves a problem that happened for me but probably wouldn’t for many other people. Make sure to get an “XL Twin” sheet set when buying sheets your dorm bed. I got a letter about buying them through the school but I didn’t want to spend the $20 so I just took the sheets off my twin size bed at home. This was a mistake. For the first half of the semester, I dealt with the problem of my sheets constantly coming off. If you don’t want to wake up every morning on a bare, dirty dorm mattress, just spend the extra money and buy the XL twin size sheet set beforehand.