Official Senior Status

So I know I have not written in a while to you guys. So here is what I have been up to in the last couple of weeks. I have successfully completed my senior audit, which confirms that I have achieved all the necessary requirements to graduate from Elmira College with my Biology degree. This term I am taking Yoga, Cell Biology, Botany, Animal Physiology and Evolution. I know many of you are asking why take so many classes during what is pretty much my last term at Elmira. Well the truth is. I only need Botany and Evolution to graduate all the other classes I am just taking because I am interested in the topics. Also, I decided to take all my favorite professors this term because I will not see them after commencement. One thing that I have liked about my experience at Elmira is that within my biology department I have been able to form some strong relationships with my professors. The more they get to know you the more they push you to succeed. The guidance is there, the encouragement is there and most of all the opportunities to do well are there. Any of you who are interested in the sciences here whether it be Biology, Chemistry or Biochemistry this is definitely the place to be. Take advantage of the research opportunities throughout the school year and take advantage of the numerous summer internships that are offered. Well so long for now. I am going to prepare for my two exams on Monday. Animal Phys at 2:25 and Evolution at 6 p.m. I will tell you’ll how they went.

One More Week...

So right now I have no motivation at all to do work. This is the final week of classes and I have all of my work turned in and should be focusing on my three finals but for some reason I have not been able too. Not to mention, I do have over 400 pages of reading combined to do for all of my classes. I know I should probably get on it but I just do not have the motivation. I think the only reason why I am feeling like this is because we have never gone this far into the school year. In the three years here I always remembered being home around the 13th. Instead I am going to be home on the 21st which is three days before my birthday and four days before Christmas. Well enough about my lack of motivation. This past weekend we indulged in the oldest tradition at Elmira College. No not singing. We had our annual Holiday Weekend celebration. On Friday night we had the Holiday Banquet and students were encouraged to sign up with their favorite, administrator, faculty member or coach. Of course, I signed up with my favorite administrators and friends Shawn and Katie Karney. At the banquet the administrators are responsible for carving the turkey and of course Mr. Karney took the lead on carving the turkey. The meal was amazing and the caroling lead by the members of the TALENTED CLASS OF 2010 was quite interesting. Especially, because no one knew that we were supposed to lead singing. On Saturday we had the Holiday Ball that started at like 9 and ended at 12. However, earlier in the day all those 21 year old members of the college community participated in Survivor Saturday which is pretty much bar hopping for the majority of the day. After the dance I ended up at the bar and back to twin towers dormitory for more laughs and endless stories. I can’t believe it is my last one. Well so long for now world. See ya. Maybe I will write to you guys once I am at home and let you know how much I am not missing 30 degree weather and snow all over the ground.

Toast to Simeon Benjamin

Toast to Simeon Benjamin

How do you know when you have been to Elmira College for four years? You find yourself toasting to Simeon Benjamin at a bar for leaving us all of his money and not his grandchildren. So over Thanksgiving break I made my usual visit to Southborough Massachusetts to visit my MA family. Well it was actually my freshman year roommate that decided to transfer but they are pretty much like family. Nonetheless, we still keep in touch and we visit each other often. He along with a few of his friends even decided to visit me in the Bahamas over a break. The night before Thanksgiving Day which is apparently the biggest party day of the year, we decided to visit this bar. So I was thinking that he would just be meeting up with a few of his friends and that I would find someone to end up talking too. By coincidence, I saw three other Elmira College students that were also in my senior class. Before the nights events began we all gathered around and made a toast to Simeon Benjamin for leaving us all of his money and not his grandchildren. Everyone around us looked at us as though we were crazy. None of us cared at all though because we all knew that EC would be proud and we were just letting Simeon Benjamin know that we were thankful. Isn’t what Thanksgiving Day is all about anyway?

Halloween 2009

So this past weekend for Halloween I decided that I was going to visit a friend at Fredonia to check out their party atmosphere. Well let’s just say things did not work out the way I planned and I ended up staying here for Halloween. A decision I did not regret. So for the past month or so I had planned with my bro Brian that our Halloween costume would be Chippendale Dancers. So obviously we had to look the role and act the role. Earlier that day I had a play date at Hartwick College so we left for Hartwick at about 8 a.m. and returned about 5 p.m.. As soon as I got back the preparation for the night events began by hitting the gym, stuffing my face with food and paying a little visit to the liquor store. So my partner and crime and I were ready by like 10 and met up with Beth and Steph for the night. The first stop was at Goldhouse which is essentially a house on campus for students to live in. Of course, because it was a big event and none of the houses or cottages were given party permits the residence life staff were forced to break it up because there were literally over 150 people inside the house and another 100 outside. Talk about crazy night. Even though, the party was shut down we did not let this rain on our parade. I continued making my rounds visiting my fellow RA’s on duty and saying hi to people all around campus before heading to the bar. At first, when I got to the bar the security guy said that they were no longer letting people in. I looked behind me and realized that he was only saying that because cops were watching the place. After like a minute or so he checked our identification and let us in. After the bar we all headed over to halfway house to celebrate the Men’s Hockey team 6-2 win over Morrisville. We got to halfway at like 2 a.m. and I got a text from a really good friend of mine that graduated from Elmira in 2008 saying that she was coming to meet me at halfway house. We hung out for a bit, danced until we could not dance anymore then we got her a ride home. I on the other hand made my way back to my dorm safe and sound not regretting my decision at all to stay in Elmira for Halloween. Definitely a night to remember!!!!!!!

4:00 a.m. Denny’s

So the other night I got a call from my fellow Bahamians inviting me to their suite. I told them to give me a few minutes because I was on the phone talking to my ex-girlfriend from home that now goes to College in Canada. To them this was a big deal because they all knew that we never really talked anymore. So about an hour later I went over to the room to find that everyone was extremely giggly and acting extremely ludicrous. At first I felt extremely out of place but I had a blast laughing at everyone attempting to sing karaoke to their favorite songs and most of all pretending to be on the runway doing the catwalk. So after about 2 hours we realized that we were extremely hungry and that Denny’s would be the only thing that would fulfill our craving. Driving was out of the question, so the next best option was to take the local taxi service; Totem Taxi. It took us about 20 minutes just to leave the campus, not because we had to wait on the taxi but because we had to pretty much visit every dorm on campus so that everyone could get their money and stop to the ATM. Once we got to Denny’s it took us like 20 minutes to order because we had some of the most indecisive people ever. Not to mention three of them forgot their glasses so we had to pretty much read the entire menu to them. I told them they might as well learn Braille if they are going to be this blind in life. By the time we got our food I was sure that the waitress was about to kill someone. We could hear her in the back shouting at her cook because apparently he was messing up all the orders and she was sick of working with him. It sounded to me like it was a lover’s quarrel and that there was something else behind their frustration with each other. We all just laughed it off because they were going at it for at least 30 minutes. At this point I finally remembered that I was scheduled to give a tour that morning at 9:30. I thought to myself I should just stay up the whole night because other wise I would not wake up at all. So I set like three alarms and texted all of my friends that I knew would be up at that time to call me to wake me up. We eventually left Denny’s and paid for all our meals, tipping the waitress more than usual because she pretty much ran the restaurant herself. That night at Denny’s was great and will definitely go down as one of my favorite moments at college.

Parents’ Weekend- Love, Laughter,

Parents’ Weekend the third and final part of the Orientation Trilogy ended in a bang. In my senior year and rapping up my time on the Orientation Committee I was able to share my final Parents’ Weekend with my mom and friends. There was no need to worry about how she would occupy herself while I was running around doing stuff. She always enjoys visiting campus and hanging out with my friends and traveling around the Finger Lakes region. The hypnotist performance was amazing this year. Prior to the show my mom and I were sitting back talking about how this is all staged and that most people that go on the stage are just seeking attention. Lol. Well it turns out that hypnosis is real. Ten minutes into the show we noticed that Claudette, my good friend and my mom’s adopted daughter for the weekend was in a trance. Suddenly she was responding to the voice of the performer and began physically acting out everything that he was saying. We were dying with laughter in our seats because she kept falling in and out of the trance so we just suspected that she was faking. Well believe it or not she was not faking. When the hypnotist said that right now you will feel like you have insects crawling all over your body. Claudette leaped out of her seat and ran out of the theatre screaming and scratching herself. I was dying with laughter and so was everyone else around us. My best friend Brian and my mom ran after her to take her up on stage and from there she became the star of the show. Her imitation of Michael Jackson was ridiculously funny and at the end of the night she was known as the king of pop reincarnated. Parents’ Weekend was amazing and having my mom here with me to meet all the people that have impacted my life over these last few years made it even more special. Before she left Brian and I had arranged for both of our families to visit The Corning Museum of Glass. That was an experience that none of us will forget. We were able to see the glass making process, the bending of glass and also purchase some amazing souvenirs. In my opinion this was the best Parents’ Weekend ever.

Claudette’s Michael impersonation
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/video/video.php?v=1125494102146&subj=1375800437

Mice and Open Mic Night

Hey World.

Life at EC is continuing to be as entertaining as usual. Classes are going well, the people are still as outgoing as usual and everything is still purple. The other day I decided to take a nap before my animal behavior class. If I knew that the intended 20 minute nap would end up being an hour and half. I would have not taken a nap. This made me 15 minutes late for class of course. Once I got to class I realized that we were going to be playing with mice. Or to be more scientifically correct. Looking at the behavior of the mice and assessing their social interactions. I just want to say that I was not a fan of this lab and I am going to leave it there. If you want to know what happened write a comment and I will be sure to tell you. Let’s just say it is not appropriate for this page.

This week we had open mic night and this event took the college idea of treating everyone like an individual too the extreme. Some people should just realize that they don’t have what it takes to be the next Beyoncé or Taylor Swift. I don’t think they get it. Even though singing is one of our oldest traditions, no one is ever asked to sing alone. So please don’t ever do it unless you are sure of what you can do. At open mic night I was able to see some good talent and some not so good talent. I was really impressed by Beth Sharry ’13 who originally accused me of not knowing anything about country. Lol. I must admit I am not an avid country listener but I do seldom listen to Carrie Underwood; that is only because she is ridiculously hot though. So maybe Beth was right after all. The point is the girl can sing.