C-C-Cold

Seeing how my fingers were too cold to even type yesterday, I had to wait until today to write this entry. Yesterday was one of those winter days where all you want to do is stay inside under the covers. I knew it was going to be a rough day when even poking my head out from underneath my blankets made me shiver. Go away outside world.

Just about every college, university and school system was out in this region except of course for Western and Kalamazoo College. I drove to class with my window down because my windshield was frozen on the inside as well as outside - don't try this... your head then abruptly freezes as well. It's scary watching all of these southern Michigan drivers try and manuever in the snow. One strong push on the breaks and you could end up looking into the headlights of someone else.

Still no word from the Western Herald guy. Although I'm going to email today to see what's up. Hopefully I can get a response and a job soon. I've started writing beat articles for my journalism class, so I have some work to showcase for him.

Locked down a few more hotels for the West Coast trip. I purchased a hotel in Portland which is fairly close to the airport - which is good because we're only there one night. I believe sometime soon Drew is going to get a real neat one in downtown San Francisco for when we spend a night there. We're going to leave the last part of the trip open just in case we get behind or find something we hadn't anticipated before going out there.

This weekend is going to be pretty laid back. No work. No school-work. No money. The last of these limits me of doing pretty much anything, so I'll most likely be hitting the rec center, hanging out at home and gearing up for the Super Bowl.

So I now realize that I've been complaining a lot (no money, it's cold) so I'm going to try and not complain as much on my next entry, but of course no promises. This is me in my mid-winter rut.

Pictures Aplenty

Well, today I became even poorer by telling myself that I had enough money to buy a camera. It was something that needed to be done, however. With the trip creeping up and my older Canon in shambles, I purchased a smaller, cheaper PowerShot. I've read good things about it online with one customer even claiming he lost it in the snow for 3 weeks before finding it and is still using it to this day. Even the Best Buy guy liked my purchase. He didn't even try to offer me something more expensive - thank god. The memory card holds about 1200 pictures which should suffice for the upcoming trip - I would hope so!

The costs should be pretty fair from here on out. We need to reserve a few more one-night stays at different hotels and I need to make sure that I have enough cash to cover other random costs - like taxis, food, gas and other random stuff. But the large costs are done and over with. My wallet is barely recognizeable.

Still no word from the Sport Editor dude at the Western Herald. He's probably a busy man. If I don't hear from him soon, I'm going to pay him a visit on campus to further push my interest in writing articles. It's only been one week though, so I can't get overly-aggressive.

My camera ---> http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=8266164&type=product&id=1170290185654

Well, I'm Officially Pumped

I reserved today at the Hilton in Las Vegas for just 104 dollars - not bad. It's right on the strip and is only a few miles from the airport. Just a few more hotels to reserve and we should be all set for this trip. I don't know if I've ever been more pumped for anything more in my life. Experiencing the west coast like this with my best bud and seeing all of the major cities in one trip is going to be one for the memories. Here's to hoping that the money situation holds up.

I'm going to predict some of tomorrow's games. I'm going to go ahead and say that I'm fairly excited for these championship games and that I'm not so excited about going boarding tomorrow in single-digit weather. So instead, I think I will sit at home and watch Green Bay and New England hopefully own and meet up in the Super Bowl. I would love to see a Brett Favre and Tom Brady match up. Pack is going to win 33-14 and New England will win 31-16. Those are my predictions and I'm sticking to them.

Alright, what a late night for me. More good news to come hopefully and may my extended weekend (we at WMU get Martin Luther King Jr. Day off) give me oodles of rest for the upcoming haul until spring break.

Closer...

Finalizing! We have purchased the plane tickets from Las Vegas to Portland and back and Drew last night made reservations for the car rental which was real cheap because we bought the plane tickets through Southwest. Pretty much the only thing left to do is to check into some hotels in the spots where we're staying. Drew said that he found some pretty cheap and neat hotels in Big Sur that are right on the ocean and I'm going to make it my duty to find an affordable and awesome place to stay in Las Vegas. But everything is falling into place for sure, which is definitely cool...

Western Herald

As of the other day, I will most likely be working for the Western Herald - which is the student-run newspaper here on WMU's campus. I spoke with the Sports Editor during a tour of the Western Herald that we took for my journalism class. He sounded pretty confident that he would be offering me a job because they always need writers. What I will be writing and how much is yet to be determined, but I am pretty pumped about actually producing some polished work for other's eyes to look at. This is the direction my life is heading in these days and I'm excited to get this opportunity which should definitely give me a leg-up for the future. It's going to be cool to speak with the Western coaches and players and get an inside look at college sports. If you want to take a look at the Western Herald's website, click on the link below.

www.westernherald.com

Ahh... the Joys

The joys of being a college student again are many. There are some parts I wish would remain hidden. One of those is feeling so poor that you cringe when you drop quarters into the washing machine. I thought I was smarter than Western this time around and could beat the system. I thought wrong. After two parking tickets in less than two weeks, I have folded and purchased a parking sticker. Apparently, they even figure out when your a student without a parking sticker just based on your license plate number. So instead of dropping quarters into the meters this year, I'll take the 180 dollar hit and park in the student lots. No more parking tickets at least.

And when did books get so expensive? I just paid 225 dollars, for ONE class. The books were all used too which made me wonder how much they would have been had they been new. Yikes. Looks like I'll resort to dinners of Easy-Mac and Peanut Butter Sandwiches this year. Just hoping I'll be able to save a few dimes for my trip this spring. In the meantime, you'll find me shivering in the coldness of this dark apartment (heat=money) and wondering what I'll be able to sell on ebay for 5 dollars.

The Trip: Enhanced Version

Drew and I did some pretty insane planning this weekend and we came out with a very awesome trip. To say the least, I'm stoked. We pretty much ironed every detail for what we should be doing each day. Here is what the awesomeness appears as of now:

Friday - I take the train from Kalamazoo to Lapeer. Drew and Emily pick me up (it's about 20 miles from Lake Orion). Stay night at Drew's.

Saturday - Fly out of Flint Airport early in the morning. Arrive in Los Angeles after a stop in Minneapolis. After picking up rental car, drive to Las Vegas - barely escaping the traffic. Hopefully get there late-afternoon, early-evening. Visit multiple Casinos, buffett bars, lose all money and then return home. Naw, just kidding. Stay night at hotel somewhere on strip.

Sunday - Fly out of Las Vegas airport with destination Portland in sights. Spend day in Portland visiting sights, including Voodoo Doughnuts. I'd really like to take some sort of memorial to the place where my friend Mike passed away as well. Hopefully meet up with Drew's sister Andrea and Rob.

Monday - Wake up early again to fly back to Las Vegas where we pick up car and head for Big Sur, California (small town on coast, about two hours south of San Francisco). Reach Big Sur, chill and relax.

Tuesday - Head for San Francisco. We would really like to visit Alcatraz Island and there is also a San Francisco Giants-San Diego Padres game that night and that is a good possibility. Stay night somewhere in San Francisco.

Wednesday - Make our way back south towards San Diego. Stop either there or somewhere else - we're trying to give ourselves some lee-way in case we get behind on some of there other days.

Thursday - Travel to Los Angeles (we pushed our train departure date back a day). We are to board our train and depart at 6:45 at night. Sleep a ridiculous amount of hours.

Friday-Saturday - Enjoy views aboard the train as we pass through Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Kansas, Iowa, Missouri and Illinois. We even pass parts of the Grand Canyon. Relax and recharge our inner batteries all the while. Reach Chicago Saturday afternoon after 42 hour train trip. Travel with Emily (who will be in Chicago) back towards Kalamazoo and Lake Orion.

Sunday - Sleep, sleep and more sleep. Upload a very high amount of pictures. Attempt to amount for a week's worth of missing class. Mentally tare myself away from the Pacific Ocean and to the dreary thought of finals in a couple weeks.

http://voodoodoughnut.com/ - here is the site for Voodoo Doughnuts, a store that sells very unique and odd doughnuts in Portland.

http://www.amtrak.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=Amtrak/am2Route/Horizontal_Route_Page&c=am2Route&cid=1081442673827&ssid=132 - Our Amtrak route.

Our road routes - not as bad as if we drove all the way to Portland and back (1,000 miles each way).

10 States (not including Michigan), 7 Days, 5 Big-time West Coast cities. Excellent.

I Am Old: Part Two

I saw someone on campus I knew today. I was really excited. Turned out I had no idea who this person was or where I had seen her before, but the idea that I recognized someone's face was uplifting. It was the first time all week I had seen someone I at least recognized (disregarding seeing Geoff at the rec). Wow.

Heading to Detroit this weekend to partake in lots of craziness - and mostly with the man, Drew. We have the U of M (#1 in nation) vs. WMU Hockey game tomorrow in Ann Arbor. We have a Saturday filled with absolutely nothing - awesome! Trip planning. And I'm overjoyed at the thought of meeting up with Robbie, Matt and maybe Don Saturday night for some drinks and/or general hanging out (remember we are old and the bar scene might be a bit much). Just hoping the snow... excuse me, rain doesn't hold us back.

Want further proof that I'm old. Here ya go. I actually care about politics now. I'm going to go ahead and say that I'm a superfan of Obama's. Actually, I do like Edwards too, but Barack is the man. I was giddy when I head Kerry supported or "endorsed" him today.

Well, I better shore this up. Seeing how I'm old now and it's 11:57 pm, I better rush into bed because Conan's coming on and I'm never awake for that anymore and for the reason that my body pretty much completely shuts down on me at midnight. And I actually finished all my school-work before midnight. There is no way I even started homework for another hour three years ago. So proud.

I Am Old

Long gone are those days when I dreaded Mondays and was gung-ho for Fridays. Long gone are the days when I feared I would oversleep my 9 am class. Long gone are the days when I disliked going to class and once in class, nodded off on more than one occasion. Long gone are the days when I would stay up until 4 am the night before a test. Diagnosis: I'm Old. Yes, I realize that I'm 23 years old and for many of you reading this it might seem juvenile for me to be calling myself old, however I beg to differ.

I entered back into a scene where college "kids" live for the weekends, party on Wednesday nights and can't even picture waking up before noon. Out of place, ancient... name it what you want but no matter what, I'm an old man. I find it hard anymore to even keep my eyes open past midnight. I think my body is telling me that yes, you used up all your college-type days awhile back and you must conform to being an adult. A grown-up college-student? Hrmmm... I'm at a loss for words to describe my situation because most people go back to college to get a masters and not ANOTHER bachelor's degree. In no way, shape or form am I knocking what I am doing. I'm just citing several reasons for my feeling aged.

Wednesdays are going to be days I live for this year. Class at 9 and Class at 5:30 which means about 7 hours of either rec center craziness or homework busyness. Either way, I like the huge break and have always been a big fan of the once-a-week night classes. I could also hit the rec for a couple hours after my class ends at 8. Options, options... I feel like I've never had so much freedom in college even though I did (and usually spent it playing videogames, sleeping or lounging).

No more all-nighters for this guy. Well... at least not yet. It's only the first week.

When Affliction Becomes More...

There are many problems in this world that are under-appreciated. Kids starving in nations we've never heard of. People dying every minute for the wrong reasons. For many living in the United States, they are oblivious to these problems. It seems as citizens of this nation we are becoming increasingly more aware of these issues and problems, but there is some work to be done.

I'm guilty of being an oblivious member of our society for the fact that I could do a lot more to prevent some of these problems that plague us today. For part of my life, I struggled deeply with depression and was actually diagnosed in high school. It even carried into my college years and I believed that I had some symptoms of bi-polar disorder. I know first-hand how hard life can be and how depression greatly affects someone's life. Through aging and support from many people in my life, I have mostly overcome this affliction but it remains a thought in my mind always.

I've really wanted to participate in Out of the Darkness Overnight for awhile now. This suicide prevention walk is supported by the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention and I found out about it through a friend in college. I've talked about doing it for awhile now and think that this year might be the appropriate time to do it - because it seems to be my year of traveling. The only thing is, I need some help. When you register for one of these walks (the spots this year are Seattle and New York City) you need support through donations. I'm real interested in doing the Seattle one - enhancing my West Coast experience even further. I promised myself I'd do this one year and this year seems like the right year for some reason. If you're interested, check out the website below.

http://www.theovernight.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=home.viewPage&page_id=742C7D2A-FEAB-2DA6-FE0972E0264CC80E

Student Again

Today was my first day back as a student at WMU. Ironically, my first class was in the College of Education building. The same building I thought I would probably never set foot in again. When the professor remarked this morning something about being old, I was overcome with the feeling that I probably belonged more in front of these students than with them. I definitely wasn't the oldest in the class (some 280 strong), but it was close.

It's going to be a weird semester, but I'm sure the initial feeling of being old and out of my element will pass soon and I'll move through the semester smoothly - we can all hope. I only have three classes and the fact that I'm taking a break from these in April to road-trip relaxes things even further.

Also, I can now start using the rec center on a regular basis which I'm extremely thrilled about. New Years resolution of course - isn't it everyone's? Seems so until people give up halfway through January because of the combination of cold weather, being busy and being lazy. Hopefully none of these attribute to my quitting on working out this year and I've got Corey to push me as well. Plus, we just lost all of our snow due to extremely warm temperatures - bummer. I might even be able to start running outside in the middle of January... crazy.

Twenty-08

There are several things I'm looking forward to and many of them are coming soon. I'm returning to school to start working on another degree. Where this will lead me I have no idea, but I'm hopefull these classes will lead me in the right direction. This is also the year when my younger sister gets married. This has certainly been a different and special time for my family and I'm anxious for this summer when the wedding is set to take place. It will be different not seeing her as often around holidays and on trips, but in all seriousness I'm happy to be gaining a member to our family, in Steve.

Perhaps the thing I'm most excited about this year, is the trip I'm taking out west this spring. I'm traveling by plane, car and train across the country to Califonia and back again, soaking in as much as I can in-between. Going with Drew will definitely be awesome and I'm now counting down the days until we depart to the Pacific Ocean and all the lays in its boundaries.

I hope everyone had a relaxing and family-filled holiday. Mine was relaxing and went by way too fast, but I'm excited for some of the reasons I listed above. Happy 2008!