like a chicken with its head cut off...

Yeah, so I'm kind of running around like a chicken with its head cut off; it's just what the end of the semester always seems to look like for me. I have all my class stuff, projects, papers, tests and so forth and then I have my counseling at the middle school and tutoring and don't forget my RA duties.

One of the coolest things that the RA's get to do all year long is plan/participate in a program called Crimson Christmas that works in conjunction with Big Brothers/Big Sisters to sponsor a Christmas for a child in need. While I'm not on the committee that plans the event my hall does get to sponsor a little girl, so I'm in charge of collecting the donations from my girls getting her presents (we get a list of things that she wants and needs from BB/BS) and hosting her at the event. In the past, I've participated as a student host both my freshman and sophomore years. You meet the kid and you get to play games, eat lunch, meet Santa, and open presents with them and even though it falls on the Sunday before Finals Week it's a really nice way to start a hectic time by really setting out to do something good for a child who really needs and appreciates it.

A girl and her sponser doing crafts at Crimson Christmas in the past.

While that is a break from finals, most people are only thinking about finals and my residents are starting to freak out because these are there first finals in college. At our last CBA we talked about effective habbits, study and otherwise, for these last two weeks before break and although at the time they didn't really seem to care a few of them have already talked about some of the things I had mentioned. I'll give the girls of Forrer Fourth Front a shout out here, "You can do it girls!"

To all you perspective students out there, keep your nose to the grindstone, it'll pay off when you get your acceptance letters!

So... I broke an arrow with my neck...

Did you see that guys? I broke a real life archery arrow placed in the soft part of my neck by simply taking one step forward.

Step 1: Place the arrow properly on your neck

Step 2: Take a step forward

Step 3: Shatter Arrow
Photos courtesy of Paulina Bryant

This took place at the scholarship conference I went to last weekend in Van, TX. And was an exercise in confidence building, because if you were confident and took a strong step forward then you break your arrow, but if you take a timid step the arrow slides up your throat and leaves a big old red red mark, so you have to have confidence in yourself and your abilities to be able to accomplish the task.

My Small Group for Team Building Exercises
Photo Courtesy of Nancy Phillips

The conference is always an interesting experience and this year was not exception. Unfortunately I had to miss two days of class to attend the conference, we left early Thursday (Shout out to my Boyfriend, Townsend, for driving me to the airport at 6 AM) and didn't get back until late Sunday night so we missed out on both classes and homework time, fortunately I had been able to warn my professors in the beginning of the semester and we were able to work out plans for me missing class on Thursday and Friday. That's one really, really nice thing about Transy is that you can work with your professors for conflicts and they know who you are, even in Intro classes like my Preparing to Act course.

The whole group of students and alumni from across the country for the Phillips University Legacy Scholarship.

I'm trying to catch up on all that I missed out on and I'm doing an ok job, except for the program I have to write for Theory of Programming languages that I'm ignoring while I write this blog. :)

I hope that your college search is going well! TTYL.

Room for One, please!

As I started to look at schools, the thing that interested me the most was getting my own room to decorate the way I wanted, I mean your dorm room functions as your bed room, study, living room, game room, and even your kitchen some times. So to help out with your imagination I would like to share some pictures of my room, granted I'm an RA and I have my own room, for various reasons, but you can at least get the idea.

Each Forrer room comes with two closets and two sets of drawers

Two People Forrer Rooms have two desks, some have a little bookshelf for above your desk

Since I don't have a roommate, I have plenty of room for a couch, but if you bunked your beds so could you!

All beds on campus are Extra-Long twins, my dad and I made the canopy last year for my room in Rosenthal.

The nice thing about living in Forrer is that you can have a really good community on your hall. The bad (for me) is that you share a bathroom with all the people on your hall. Just say yes to shower shoes!

Familia!

Well hello to all you boys and girls! I hope you're been having a great fall so far, I know its college visit madness right about now, my little sister Maggie is working on hers I know, so good luck to those of you who doing the same!

So, this pleasantly warm weekend is Family Weekend, a wonderful time of the year when the families of all the students are invited to come hang out on campus with their kids. There's plenty of things to do, like checking out my fellow blogger Cory, or CoCo as I like to call him, in the play - Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, or checking out the Art show by senior Kathleen Burke or coming to the Family Weekend Concert with all of the musical groups, including me in the Transylvania Choir!

My parents came up, like they always do, not because they want to come strictly for Family Weekend, but because it's always situated the weekend before my birthday! That's right folks, this here blogger turns 21 tomorrow! I'm not planning anything to big or crazy, but some of my friends and I are going to go out to eat for some delicious Mexican Cuisine.

Moving right along, registration is right around the corner and being an upper level student now, next semester I'll be taking two computer science courses, with the same professor, and two Spanish courses, with the same professor. So, needless to say, it's going to be an interesting couple of months, three of the courses are also situated on Tuesday/Thursdays so through one of the CS professors, I sent in my resume for an internship next semester, a paid internship. Here's hoping I get it. :)

PS My boyfriend's familia has season tickets for UK football so last weekend I got to go watch the game! Up close and personal!

Oh hai thar!

Fancy seeing you here, have you noticed how beautiful it is outside? Well, erm, at the moment it's kind of raining and not entirely pleasant but the tree's are gorgeous! The trees of Transy were a major selling point for me, I mean I enjoy walking around and feeling like I'm in a park, and a lot of our campus seems to be just that. There's families that bring their children/dogs to walk around campus and in fair weather students linger outside, less recently in the past couple of weeks but we all enjoy the beautiful views of campus throughout the different seasons.

I unfortunately have not gotten a lot of opportunities to enjoy trees this fall expect for when I'm hurrying across campus for class or on my way to work on Sundays (I work in a nursery at a local church.) I've done a lot of fun things that I haven't gotten a chance to blog about so I'll do the rundown. :)

Fall Break!

Fall Break was a couple of last Monday and Tuesday, so I got to go home for the first time since RA training and it was glorious. I got to spend four days with my family, four nights in my (full size) bed, four days with my pets, and two extra days without classes. Now don't let that lead you to believe that I was without work for those four blissful days, I had a program to finish for my Theory of Programming Languages class and a test to study for and a book to read for my Gender and Communication class. It wasn't easy to make myself work during break, but I did and was thankful for it because as soon as class started Wednesday the professors were on their A game and I haven't stopped running.

I snapped this picture in Indiana on my way home, yay trees!

A Halloween Dance!
My sorority throws a "informal" (dance) for our pledges, where they get to decide the theme and then a group of active members sets them up with on a "Blind Date" from a list of names the pledges give the active members, the "date" usually ends up being a group outing with the active members, their dates, and the blind date. This year, opposed to taking my non-dancing boyfriend I opted for my ex-roommate and best friend, Erica and we dressed up as Cat Woman and Poison Ivy. It was a lot of fun, but I had been on RA duty the night before and I was exhausted and she had been up since 6:30 for a speech and debate tournament in Berea so we didn't stay very long but we had a lot of fun.

Me as Cat Woman and Erica as Poison Ivy

Midterms
Midterms as in test have been happening and quickly approaching (if I wear a costume to class for my midterm on Friday I get 10 extra credit points!) The report we get is reminiscent of elementary school, with the only possible outcome is either a "S" for Satisfactory of a "U" for Unsatisfactory. It's all S's for me! :)

I hope you all enjoying the trees more than I am!

You are beautiful in every single way...

Hello there! I hope you all have been doing well since we last talked, I know I've been crazy busy. It turns out that as time goes by it doesn't get any easy to juggle all the things you do in college because you typically get roped into more and more things.

One of the new and really cool things that I'm doing this year is working with groups of middle school girls from LTMS on their views of beauty and how they can learn to see themselves as beautiful. I had planned on doing this as an after school program, but working with the school psychologist I'm going to be doing sessions during the day. I went over to LTMS after class this morning and worked on mailing out permission forms and hopefully I'll get to start working with the girls in two weeks.

This whole program has grown from a series of workshops I did two summers ago that were inspired by the Dove Campaign for Real Beauty and I was motivated to get involved in this type of community service by the Phillips University Legacy Fund, which is an outside scholarship I recieve that requires all of its recipients to complete a service project where we take on a leadership role. The Phillips University Legacy Fund is a unique scholarship because it's a fund create by the alumni of Phillips University, a university that went bankrupt and had to close but since then has paid off all of their debts, and is given only to students who attend Disciples of Christ affiliated universities and colleges. Every year they send us somewhere new and exciting, my first year we were outside of Santa Fe, NM, last year we were in Davis, OK and this year we're going to a Ranch in Van, TX.

The other Transy students at the Conference in OK.

I know that Transy isn't known for its religous affiliation but that affiliation did play a major role in my college decision, as a Disciple I had a special Disciple admissions counselor and I became eligable for outside, Disciples scholarships. Now don't get it wrong, Transy may have a good core group of Disciples students but the affiliation doesn't require you to go to worship everyday or anything, it's just a little friendliness between the university and the church. If YOU'RE a Disciple and you're interested in finding out more about the Transy DOC connection, shoot Betsy Pigg and email at bpigg@transy.edu, she's really awesome and can answer pretty much all of your questions.

Find some time to enjoy the fall!

As the world turns...

It seems as though time at Transy just skipped an entire weekend because of the sheer intensity of the events that transpired from Friday to Monday, yes folks I am talking about that special and very unique event of Woman's Greek Recruitment.

If you hadn't heard, Transy is very Greek and we are consistently ranked in the Top 10 universities with a "Major Frat and Sorority Scene" by The Princeton Review (this year we're #4.) When I first saw this during my online college search I was almost immediately turned off, I didn't want to be surrounded by pretentious men and women prancing around campus sporting their letters, all looking the same and limiting their social circles to only include their brothers or sisters. Reminded by my mother that not all things are the way they may look on the outside, I went ahead with my investigation of Transy. So at the last possible moment before winter break I scheduled an overnight and was surprised to find that I wasn't meet any of the preconceived ideas I had about the students on the campus. Sure there were more Sperry's, J. Crew, and Vera Bradley than I was use to but I think that kind of goes along with the whole college scene right now.

After I got to campus, I still wasn't sold on the idea and I remained independent my first year, but as a sophomore I went through recruitment (check out my very first two posts,) pledged and later joined one of the awesome women's chapters on campus. (For the sake of anonymity, I'm not going to talk about my specific chapter, just know they're all amazing.) Since joining my chapter I have loved giving back through our philanthropic efforts, have fun at social events, and learning more from my sisters than I could have ever imagined.

The whole point of this story is that yes, Transylvania University is chalk-full of "Greeks" but because of many different factors we don't subscribe to school of thought that members of one chapter can't be friends with members of another chapter or for that matter that affiliated students can't be friends with unaffiliated students. Although there are many different organizations on campus, as cheesy as it may sound, we all really do identity ourselves as Transylvania students first and it was that unity that I finally saw during the course of my first year that showed me I could be whoever I want to be within or outside of a Greek organization.

If you have any further questions about Transy's Greek Life you should check out the website and remember to keep an open mind about the labels that are attached to every school you look at.

My sisters and me on the last night of recruitment

I hope everything's going swell for you! I think I may be getting sick, so I wish you all the best of health!

Heeeeyyy Yaaa! Hey Yaaa!

That's Hey Ya as in Outkast, if you're clueless about it still... youtube it. :)

Anyway... School has started, class is in session, and the [hypothetical] party has begun. Already this year looks like it's going to be quite an adventure. As I told you many moons ago, this year I'm tackling the Resident Assistant role and because of that I've been on campus for three weeks. Training was way intense but I'm glad of that because I feel ready for the year, or as ready as I can be. It's really interesting to be back in the realm of first years even as an RA, its very fun to watch my residents start to blossom into women away from their families. Move in was an exciting ordeal, watching all of the parents moving the "children" in to their dorms and eventually leaving them "under my watch."

One of the exciting things about being an RA is planning CBA's or Community Building Activities, already I've had two plus a hall meeting- our first CBA was "Speed Dating" with one of the boys halls, where the girls lined up and just talked for three minutes with all the guys. Our second activity was having Laina, the nurse, come to talk to the girls about the services she offers and good practices for remaining healthy. Another fun thing I got to do as an RA was to decorate my hall in whatever theme I wanted, I choose "Save our Earth" here are some pictures:

The first bulletin board, not so much about saving the earth, but background is made up of the scraps of my other projects (and is 100% recycled paper) and a reused calendar I found in the trash.

Second bulletin board, boasting most of the contents of my recycling bin, and useful info on: recycling, carpooling, and how to get involved at Transy.

Each of the rooms in Forrer has one of these little bulletin boards outside of them; on each of them is each roommate's name and a photo so everyone will know each others face.

There are a bunch of fun themes on the first year halls this year, there's a Dr. Suess's "Oh the Places You'll Go!" theme; a Survivor theme; a Saved by the Bell theme; and a bunch of other neat ideas.

I hope you all are starting your own school year off right and hope you're having some fun!

Till next time! Abby

PS. Since the city of Lexington is lame and thinks that people care about the Bengals ;) I didn't get to watch the Colts game today. But in case you didn't hear... they won!!

Summertime and the living is... hot!

So guys, this is what my summer has come down to, blogging. :) I know all of you anxious readers have just been hoping and praying that I would update on my summer adventures so here I am, making all your blogging dreams come true!

As I had talked about, I had been looking for a (paid) summer internship and I had thought I'd found one, but alas the Friday before I started they let me know that not only could have me in for 6 hours each week but they wouldn't be paying me either, because of my financial situation I declined their offer and started looking for another position. All the while I had been planning on working for the school nurse, Laina Smith, in the Student Health Services office. The plan had been to work in exchange for a room for the summer, but that supposedly violates the Fair Labor Standards Act, so I'm also getting paid, which is helping out with that pesky money thing. I had also applied to work for Dr. Moorman and Dr. LeVan for the Computer Science Summer Academic Camps, and they had offered me the job so that's three weeks of full time work, our first camp was actually last week.

This camp was an introduction to computer programming, for incoming 8th-12th graders. This was our only overnight camp and I'm thankful because anyone out there that has children, siblings, or even knows of anyone in this age group knows how much work we had in front of us. Oh yeah, there's one more thing, out of the 27 campers, we had one girl. Needless to say we had to work from the time we woke up, 7 AM, to the time we taped their doors at night, 11 PM. I don't think I've ever slept so soundly before in my life. The day was full of both academic and recreation sessions, all but one of which all three counselors had to be present for, but it was fun to talk with the kids and help some people see a side of computers they hadn't ever thought about before. Next week we start our first week of Day Camps for middle schoolers, and that will be Lego Robots, so that should be fun. :)

Dr. Moorman and some of the guys at the Intro Camp

Another cool thing about living on campus is that I get to hear about all the research that my friends are doing with their professors, which some people may have thought didn't happen at a school like Transy because our professors aren't here to research they are here to teach and because they like teaching. But I guess in the summer they are given an opportunity to work with students to share in research. I'll have to ask around about some of the projects and get back to you on that.

I hope that you guys are having a good summer so far, going on adventures or working to save money for college. :)

The rest of the trip...

So, I'll give you a quick run-down of the rest of the trip:

Day 2: Italy - We had most of the day to ourselves to explore the city, then we went back to the hotel for dinner and then we had our first concert in a church outside of Venice. The priest who organized the concert was really nice and we were invited to a party after the concert with some of the rest of the church members.

The Grand Canal and Rialto Bridge

Day 3: Traveling - Bled and Ljubljana (Lub-li-anna) We set out on the road in our bus really earlier this day and drove for a little while, got a little bit lost and found ourselves in Austria, then ended up in Slovenia. We took a lunch break in a little town in the mountains called Bled that had a picturesque little lake complete with a castle and a island (the only one in Slovenia!) We got to spend a couple hours exploring the town and then we got back on the bus until we got to Ljubljana. We had an independent dinner and explored the city a little bit and enjoyed our four star hotel.

The Bled Castle

Day 4: Ljubljana - We went on a tour of the city which included a ride up the top of the mountain and the city's castle where we could see the whole city. We got a free afternoon and then we had dinner at the hotel and then we put on our concert. A bunch of us went out and enjoyed the city after the concert.

The city's mascot is a Dragon and one of their bridge's has four Dragons guarding it.

Day 5: Loooong Travel Day - We spent nearly 9 hours on the bus, stopping for a quick lunch at a coastal town in Croatia. We got to our hotel, which was not very nice, and had dinner at the hotel we all were pretty tired and there wasn't much to do around our hotel so we went to bed pretty early.

The Adriatic Sea, which we drove along for a good part of the day

Day 6: Split - Today we got up early and rode the bus into town for our tour. We then had the rest of the morning and most of the afternoon to ourselves which we used to explore and do a little shopping. We got back on the bus to hotel and had dinner and got ready for our concert, which was in the oldest Roman-Catholic Cathedral in the world! It was a little small but it was really interesting and a very cool experience.

The cathedral we sang at, the Cathedral of St. Duje

Day 7: Travel to Dubrovnik - After another day of travel along the coast we got to the city and then to our hotel where our whole group got put into a villa and the hotel was only a 2 minute walk from the sea. We played in the sea for a little bit and then went to a grocery to get sandwich making and we had a little picnic on our balcony. We explored the area around our hotel a little and enjoyed spending some time with all of the people on the tour.

The main hotel, Grand Hotel Park, as seen from our Balcony

Day 8: Dubrovnik - We rode the bus into Old Town, which is all inside of walls, really tall walls that go all the way around the city with only two entrances. We met our guide, Bozo, who was pretty awesome and got a tour of the city. Then we were given tickets to walk around the city on the top of the walls, which was quite an experience, we started walking around the sides next to the ocean, which I really enjoyed and then the sides on the land side got really high and I got pretty nervous and didn't venture very close to the edge. After a nice long lunch by the harbor we caught the city bus back to the hotel and showered and got ready for the concert. We got to sing at the church in the middle of the city, which was really neat. We sang a preview outside of the church before our concert.

The City walls and the Sea from the top

Day 9: Dubrovnik/Lokrum - We got to go to this awesome island off the coast, we hiked up to the top and we could see the whole island and the whole city of Dubrovnik. We spent the day jumping off cliffs into lagoons and playing on the rocky shore. For me this was the best day because we just got to relax and enjoy ourselves. We had our last dinner at the hotel and a little ceremony for our guide, tour bus, and seniors.

The lagoon - We jumped off that cliff, awesome

Day 10: Back to America - A LONG day of travel, we woke up at 3:45 to get to the airport in time for our flight then flew from Dubrovnik to Frankfort, Germany then ran through the airport to get onto our flight then after 8 hours we got to Chicago where it was raining so our 7 hour layover turned into a 9 hour one, we didn't get to Cincinnati till 11:30 and didn't get back to Transy until 1:15 in the morning.



It was def a whirlwind trip, but I'm wouldn't trade anything for the experience, the Transy May Term Trip is something everyone should experience and there's so many really cool places to go for different classes. I had friends go to Spain and France, Greece and Turkey, and Ireland. I'm sure there were other places too, there's always great opportunities.

I'm baaack!

That's right folks, your's truly is back from her whirlwind European Choir Tour! Let me say, it was warm, sunny, and didn't even think about raining the entire 10 days we were there. The plane rides, both there and back were long and kind of stressful but the trip was well worth it. We left Transy around 6 in the morning and drove to the Northern Kentucky Airport for our flight to Chicago, once we got to Chicago we had a 5 hour layover until we left for Frankfort, Germany. Once we got to Germany we had to race through passport control and security and just barely got to our flight to Venice in time to board it. When we landed in Venice we had to wait for everyone to find their luggage and to exchange their cash for Euros, and then we finally got to get on the bus to see Venice.

As you may imagine, we all had hoped to be able to go to the hotel freshen up, rest a little before we began our explorations but no, we went straight from a nearly 24 hour trek to being plopped down in the middle of Saint Mark's Square in Venice to find lunch in a place where we didn't know the language. Needless to say, this first day started off to be quite overwhelming and didn't slow down because we got a guided tour after our lunch break. We all were interested to hear the history of the place and excited to be in Italy, but I know that I personally was almost too tired to really appreciate everything that our guide was saying.

St. Mark's Sqaure, this doesn't come close to illustrating how many people were there.

After our tour, we got a chance to go see a demonstration of Murano Glass Blowing, one of Venice's most famous art forms. And then, finally, we got to go to our hotel. I'll update you on the rest later!

The final countdown!

So this is it, right? One day until you (that is if you're a senior) have to give your decision to your college. I didn't wait until quite the last day, but it was late April by the time I had decided. Since I'm from Indiana, so I'm not sure what schools people are looking at, but I had it narrowed down to Purdue, Rose Hulman and Transy. I had to wait to make my decision until I had the financial aid info from all of them and heard back on scholarships and so forth. Even though Purdue is a state school since I wasn't the valedictorian or a National Merit Scholar, I didn't get any merit based aid from them and since my parents make enough money I didn't get very much Federal aid for Purdue either. Rose Hulman did a pretty good job making sure that I would be able to attend, but I would have left with a substantial student loan to pay off. Transy obviously loved me best :) because I got a pretty good scholarship from them and some other aid.

Ultimately, I decided against Purdue for financial and some other reasons (half of my graduating class was going there and I needed a change of scenery) and I decided against Rose Hulman because I wanted a little bit more diversity in curriculum and it just wasn't my scene. So Transy it was, and Transy it is. I just hope that you all pick the school that's right for you, not because someone tells you that you should go there with them or because your parents think that this school would be best. Look at the thing from all angles, you'll find the right one for you. :)

Here's a throwback to Orientation Weekend last year, a bunch of us sitting on one of the Transy Signs

Well enjoy your weekend, and do something fun with your friends! Adios.

For the longest time...

Hey dear readers! Sorry it's been so long but with finals and May term break, I got off schedule in the blog writing department.

My grades for winter term ended up alright. I was kind of afraid of my Computer Organization class because I had missed a week when I was sick at the beginning of the semester and had gotten a behind, but I pulled out a solid C in that one, this was only the second C I've ever been happy to get, the other being in Chem I, that class was def not for me. I did well in all of my other classes, A, A-, B+ so I was pretty happy with that. My finals week seemed to drag on forever since I only had one each day, but it finally ended and I got to go home for May term break to celebrate my Dad's 50th birthday. My mom threw a "surprise party" that wasn't much of a surprise because you can't really get our house ready without someone knowing, but there were aspects that he didn't know so I suppose it was a surprise-ish party.

My Dad's Birthday Cake (I decorated it!)

So we're all back at Transy and enjoying May Term. Since I'm going on the choir tour, we have rehearsal from 9-12 every day (M-F) until we leave, which is a week from today!!!! We're singing several songs from throughout the year and we also have 5 or 6 new songs that we are learning, one is in Slovenian and one is in Hebrew, so we're working hard to get down the pronunciation on those two. Friday we are giving a concert (at 7:30, Old Morison Chapel if you're interested :D) of all of the same things that we will be singing on the tour.

I'm getting really, really excited about the trip. I looked up the hotels we're going to be staying in and I've started on my packing list and I'm just ready to get on a plane and be there. :)

Our First Hotel, Park Hotel Villa Marcello Guistinian, outside of Venice

That's all I have for now, but expect to hear from me again soon. Arrivederci!

Finals! AH!

It is once again that dreaded time of the term, yes dear boys and girls, it's finals time. This is our last week of classes and then next week we have finals. I think Transy has a pretty good deal with their finals, we have nothing to do on Monday, it's called Reading Day, and then we start our finals on Tuesday. All of my finals worked out that I have one final every day from Tuesday to Friday. The way it works is that every Monday, Wednesday, Friday (MWF) or Tuesday-Thursday (TTh) class at each time slot get's a certain time and day during finals week. Like all MWF classes that regularly meet at 9:30 have their finals on Thursday from 12-2 and all TTh classes that meet at 11 have their final from 8-10 on Tuesday. Sometimes this scheldule works out great, but then some (rare) occasions you get 3 of your 4 finals on one day, in that case professors will let you rescheldule your exams for another day, it's really not too bad.

These last two weeks of the term are always the craziest because professors want to make sure they cover everything and you have to turn in final papers before the term is over or do final projects, like I have in my Computer Organization class. There are a lot of people spending a lot of time at the UK library (which we have full access to and a shuttle that takes Transy students there) so they can spend all night studying to get ready for their last tests or getting a head start of studying for finals. Personally, I think a good night's sleep helps me be able to get all of my stuff done during reasonable hours, so I go to bed pretty early for a college student, around 12:30 pretty much every night. It works really well for me, but I know some people just can't devote that much time to sleep every night.

Still on my plate for this week (meaning it's due on Friday) I have a breadboard and a program to finish for Computer Organization. I already had a paper that was due for my education class yesterday and one for Psychology today. I also had a group project in Spanish that we presented today in class (got a 49/50!) So needless to say, I'm very ready for this term to be over and for our little May term break, it couldn't come soon enough!

I should get to work! Go out and have some fun for me!

Campus Sing!

Last night one of our sororities, Chi Omega, put on their annual canned food drive competition called "Campus Sing." It's a night where all of the Greek organizations and the independent students get the opportunity to show off their... er singing skills, well some people sing, or attempt to, but it's mostly turned into a dance contest. I have to say this is probably ranked highest among all of the events on campus because everyone get involved, and the end result usually is a lot of laughing and merriment. Every year there's a theme, last year it was "The 90's" and this year it was "The Evolution of the Artist" so this year every group got to chose an artist and show their evolution through song and dance, the girls all chose performers: Beyonce, Brittany Spears, Justin Timberlake, Michael Jackson, Will Smith; but the some of the boys went with a more unconventional artist like Picasso and Salvador Dali, but there was also The Temptations and Garth Brooks. I unfortunately didn't get to dance because all of the rehearsals were at the same time as Kimberly Akimbo rehearsals (which is now done! Thank goodness.) But I did get to watch which is always fun.

The most important object of the night though was to collect as many cans as possible for God's Pantry, a food pantry that serves people throughout Fayette County, and Transy donated enough cans to run 6 of their pantries for a week, over 15,000 pounds of food! And not to brag or anything, but my sorority donated the most cans, over 3,000 cans of food! It's a really cool event, and one of my favorites at Transy. :)

That's all I have for now, but I'll leave you with this video of last year's performance by the brothers of Delta Sigma Phi, def my favorite in the two years I've seen it. Have fun!

Did they have brains or knowledge? Don't make me laugh!

So, I've been working with Michael Cronk in the Career Development Center on my resume and we've made some great alterations to it. The whole objective of my visit was to get some advice on a summer internship and hopefully get some of that much needed networking to find a position for the summer. Last summer and the summer before I was in an engineering co-op at Rolls-Royce in Indianapolis, but since I decided to change my major from the Physics/Pre-Engineering route to Computer Science and Spanish I couldn't really stick around there for the coming summer. Not to mention it's hard to be so far away from all of my friends and my boyfriend for the whole summer. Anyway, I'm excited to try out something new in the Computer Science field and stay in Lexington for the summer. Now that I've fixed my resume, the next step is to meet with Susan Rayer, the Director of the CDC, to find the perfect position for me this summer. Let's cross our fingers for something good!

My Friends Aaron and William from my Rolls-Royce Co-Op

I'm sure some of you are thinking that I'm being a little over achieving with the co-op and internship talk, but I'll tell you my co-op experience helped me realize that something I thought I was sure I would love to do, wasn't exactly the right thing for me. So, this is me telling you to get out there in the field you think you'd like to be in and do the work that the people are doing. You can go through your whole college career loving all the classes you take for your desired career, but you could get into the work-force and find out that you don't really want to be an engineer and really wish you would have taken more communication classes so you could be doing Journalism. Transy tries their hardest to make sure this doesn't happen by requiring classes from all sorts of disciplines but you may be surprised once you're out there in the workforce. So, this is me, Abby, your friendly Transy Admissions Blogger telling you to get out there as soon as you can! (I started second semester of Senior year.) It's not something you have to wait around for.

Respect my Authority!

Ok, here is is folks, the Friday before Spring Break I found out that I got a position on the RA staff! I even know where I'll be! Next year I will be the RA for the Front Hall on Fourth Floor of Forrer Residence Hall. Guess what? That's a first-year hall, so if any of you lady readers decide that Transy is the place for you, there's a possibilty of me being your RA! Cool, right? I'm not sure if I've talked about the set up in Forrer before but I'll give it a go.

Areal Photo Courtesy of Google Maps, Enhanced by Yours Truly.

Forrer isn't really a stand alone building, it's connected to the Campus Center and the Cafeteria. In the picture above: Forrer is the area outlined in red, the Caf is outlined in Green, the Campus Center is in Orange. Our pool is inside of the campus center and that's outlined in blue. But we're talking about Forrer. Forrer is four (4) stories of residential housing + a floor with a reception desk, mailboxes, our campus DPS (Department of Public Saftey) office, all of the Sorority Chapter Rooms, and a computer lab.

Each residential floor is separated into 3 different "halls" -Front (Purple), Back (Blue), and Side (Yellow). The first and second floor house all of the sororities, two on the first floor: Side and Back (there is no First-Front because of the front lobby) and two on the second floor: front and back; the third hall (side) is an "unaffiliated" or Indy (Independent). The Third and Fourth floors are reserved for First-Year girls. Third back is also used for upperclassmen overflow, there's a funny story about room selection last year and me getting the crappiest number to sign up for a room and almost having to live up there, ok so it's not that funny...

So I hope that's not too confusing, but if it is, feel free to send me and email or post a comment.

Boys- Your housing is much more simple, all Clay Hall is First years, except for the fourth floor where some Indy upperclassmen men live. Davis Hall houses all four Fraternities and some Indy upperclassmen as well.

That's all I have for you right now, but check back later!

It's a beautiful day!

Yes indeed, it almost looks like spring is actually here folks! Put away the parka and the ear muffs and you should probably pull out the rain boots, but not today. Today is BEAUTIFUL!

Last week was Spring Break, I, unfortunately, didn't go anywhere exciting but home. Indianapolis was pretty gloomy the whole week but a couple of days were decently warm and I stayed busy helping my dad out at his office and helping my high school with their musical. I was much more interested in helping my high school because they're doing the same musical I did my sophomore year, Cinderella! I was a step-sister and my older sister was Cinderella, it was a great time.

That's me in the middle, Calliope

Anyway, we're all back on campus now trying to get out minds back into the swing of things, I'm sure you know exactly how that feels, and we're all enjoying this beautiful weather. I know I mentioned earlier some of my favorite nice weather hang out in Back Circle, but I thought I might give you all some more of my favorites around campus because:

1. The steps of MFA (Mitchell Fine Arts Building)
   This is the perfect late afternoon study spot the steps are shaded by the best trees but if you venture out into the sun the stone steps provide a perfect amount of coolness on a warm afternoon.
   
   
2. Haupt Plaza
   Right in the middle of the academic side of campus, Haupt Plaza is equipped with benches and the view of everyone walking to class. It's perfect for people watching or a long lunch with something greasy from the Raf (The Rafskeller) or sitting after class with a group of friends.
   
   
3. The Lawn outside of BSC (Brown Science Center) and Hazelrigg
   This is my favorite spot for classes outside, probably because my Calculus I and II professor, Dr. Stufflebeam, treated us to class here a few times complete with white board and everything needed for a good lecture, well maybe the attention wasn't quite all there. :)

Now, all I really want to do is go lay out in the sun, but alas I'm at work for another hour. I have rehearsal for "Kimberly Akimbo" tonight; we only have six more rehersals before opening night! If any of you live in Lexington and want to come see a Transy Theatre Production, our performances are next Thursday, Friday, and Saturday March 26-28 at 7 pm in Little Theater.

Until next time!

Scholarships!

This week and last week have been busy with prospective students on campus, to be exact the finalists for the William T. Young Scholarships are here for their interviews. It's kind of exciting to think back senior year when I had to chose a school, and for me at least a lot of that choosing depended on the aid and scholarships I got from the schools I applied to and Transy did a really good job making sure that they weren't beat out by anyone else. Now, I unfortunately didn't apply to Transy until after the deadline for the Willie T scholarship had already passed but I did apply in time to qualify for the rest of the scholarships. The Willie T scholarship is a full tuition and fees scholarship but there are also plenty of other academic scholarships ranging from $10,000 to $7,000 a year.

I just thought that would be something useful for you all to check out!

Later Gators!

I put my thing down, flip it, and reverse it

So today SOL (student orientation leader) applications were due, and I, um, didn't get mine done :-/... It's all good, because I got an interview for the RA position, well it was actually two separate interviews, one with two of the Head RA's (HA's) for next year and one with the other HA and Bob Brown, the director of Residence Life. I thought they went well but there are 18 girls interviewing for 6-8 positions, so we'll have to see and hopefully in a couple of weeks you'll find out that I'll be an RA next year. (Knock on wood!) I still need to finish my AA application and just in case I don't get anything, I'm also going to apply for some study abroad scholarships for next year. But anyway, I know you all, as prospective students have miles and miles of applications ahead of you so start early and work hard on them, don't let those deadlines fly by!

Speaking of being a prospective student, I've been asked to share with you the Top Five Things that I liked about Transy as a prospective student... so here it goes!

1. Transy is a small university, about 1200 students, but it's not out in the middle of nowhere! Lexington is a great city and Transy is close enough to stuff downtown or a short drive away from all sorts of great stuff, AND if you like football and big school sports you can always be a UK fan, I mean most people here are. (I stand by my back up school Purdue for the big sports stuff. Sshh, don't tell anybody! )
2. Athletics at Transy are good, but they aren't so intense that they take over your entire life. You know, I was going to swim and I was excited because I would have been able to do that and still have time and energy to devote to my studies.
3. The campus is really pretty. I had looked at a few schools in Indiana where the campus had no trees! It was really important to me to be somewhere that makes me feel good when I'm walking around in the different seasons, and Transy has that. There are green places and trees and flowers and all sorts of growing things.
   
4. The professors are excited about the stuff they teach and the class sizes are small. When I visited, I sat in an upper-level physics class where the professor sat at a table with the eight students in the class, if someone didn't understand something, the professor could sit down with the student and see what was wrong.
5. Everyone seemed really excited about me being there. From the other students in the classes I sat in on to everyone on the swim team, to the people around campus, they all made me feel really welcomed and even better, wanted.

So, for all of you folks out there, I suggest you come for a visit to really check Transy out, I'm not lying when I say, I came to Transy because I fell in love with it during my visit and I know you could too, so don't be scared away because of something you see online or hear from a friend, try in out for yourself and schedule an overnight and if you do, shoot me and email I'd love to meet up and talk, I mean you already know me!

I'll talk to you guys later! Go out and have some fun!

'Tis the season of applications!

Yes dear readers, it's true all the applications for campus positions are out and about, and I'm all over it. From Campus Center Manager to RA (Resident Adviser) to AA (Admissions Assistant) to SOL (Student Orientation Leader) to all of the scholarship applications it seems I spend more time writing about myself then writing for my classes. Let me stop and say, I love Transy, and I'm always looking for ways to try and give back a little to the community, so I've gotten applications for RA, AA, and SOL and I would be thrilled to be able to do any of them. So far, the only one that's been turned in is my RA application and last night was the "RA Carousel" which is kind of like a big group interview. When we got there we were assigned a group, so like a carousel, we went around with the group to six different rooms and did different activities, like draw characteristics for the perfect RA or talk about our views on different campus policies or build an RA team from a list of applicants. It was actually pretty fun but it ran long and I was late to practice for Kimberly Akimbo.

Speaking of that, we started blocking this week and it feels good to be back on stage. I did so much theater in high school that it was kind of weird not to be on stage, or acting, and I was afraid that when I got to college I wouldn't be able to do any at all since I wasn't going to be a Drama major, but thankfully there's folks of all sorts in all of the drama and musical groups on campus regardless of my unrelated major. And if I would have followed through I could have done swimming as well. (I'm only reminded of this because I'm writing at work in the Campus Center and the swim coach just walked by.) That was def something I was impressed with when I visited Transy, was that people could be involved in so much. I know athletes that are in as many theater productions as possible and AA's that are also active in Greek Life or Student government.

The moral of today's story? Transy rocks (as usual) but also the people that go to here rock out all over campus while keeping their grades up and their heads on straight. :)

I'll catch you cats on the flip-side. Later.

PS. My picture was taken the other morning for "looking really cold" it got onto the Herald Leader Website at least.

Let it Snow!

The weather outside is frightful but my dorm room is so delightful, and since there's to class to go to, let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

That's right kids, yesterday was the 3rd time in history classes at Transy had ever been canceled and today was the fourth! Being from "the north" (according to my friends at lunch today since Indy's north of the Mason-Dixon Line) I'm not to terrible impressed with the snow, but the ice is crazy! The trees in the Rosenthal Complex are so heavy with snow that the pathway is blocked and most of the highest branches are touching the ground. Serveral of the big trees around campus have lost big limbs and last night it seemed the whole of the Transylvania Campus had been turned into a ice-rink, that is with the excpetion of Fourth St. which becomes a river with any kind of precipitation. It's very pretty to look at but I don't envy the members of the physical plant trying to keep campus running. The electricty's out in the boys' dorms - Clay and Davis, and the new fancy Thompson Hall and from what I hear there's a large crowd gathering in Forrer's Back Lobby on their laptops staying warm in the heat.

Also, I've started my work study working the William T. Young Campus Center it's nothing too exciting but it's a job and it pays and I need the money for my trip in May so, work I shall. This week is also "Cabaret" a review show the Choir puts on and I've started rehearsal for Kimberly Akimbo. Since the campus has been shut down today and yesterday it's not quite as crazy busy as I was fearing it may, but Monday night was. I had rehearsal for Cabaret from 7-9, auditions for "School House Rock Live" from 8-10, Kimberly Akimbo rehearsal from 8:30-10 and a campus center scheduling meeting from 9-9:30. Yeah, I didn't get to stay at anything for as much time as I was supposed to but, sometimes that's how I gotta roll. C'est le vie. :)

Until next time!

Mmm, give me some spring please...

So, I'm not all that happy with my body at the moment. Starting Saturday afternoon I started having these really sharp pains in my lower abdomen, and when I say really sharp I mean: "OW OW OW OW OWEEEEEEEE, KILL ME NOW!" pain. It continued like this for a couple of hours then it got better, then late that night the pains came back, then again the next morning and continued on and on throughout the morning and into the afternoon, so my boyfriend and I try to go to a urgent care, but they were CLOSED! Needless to say, sitting in my boyfriend's tiny car in the cold, I wasn't very happy. So we decided, after some parental counseling, to go to the hospital. After we got there, the doctors did a bunch of tests and we were there for 5 hours to find that they weren't sure what was wrong and sent me home with some nausea meds. :( I continued to be sick until Wednesday, I finally got my ability to hold down food and today I made it out of bed for some normal activities. So it's better, but the moral of this in my here admissions blog is that my Transy friends were there for me. Whether they were texting me to see what I was doing and found out I was sitting in the hospital or stopping by once they heard that I was under the weather, or offering soup or advice, my Transy friends were there for me.

Proof! Legit Hospital Bracelet.
(Blurred so yall can't steal mah identities)

Also, as I was sitting in class this afternoon, a little loopy from my nausea medicine I gazed out the window and scratched at my seasonally dry skin and dreamt of my warm spring and early fall days, my favorite days at Transy. On warm, sun-drenched days students stream out of their dorms or the library to soak in the rays of light to help them in their photosynthesis and get some energy in a healthier way than an energy drink from the eighty or a cup of (illegal) coffee. On these days you can find students sprawled on any of the lawns on the academic side of campus under the shade giving trees, but my favorite spot on these days is Back Circle, the circle behind Forrer formed by the drive past Thomson, Davis and Clay Halls. Back circle is a refuge for the over studied, for the volleyball lover, for the people watchers, for the sun-bather, the barbecue-ing fraternity or the cornhole-ing student group.

I could, and have, spent the majority of days laying on a blanket, doing (or at least pretending to) do my homework. I've spent warm nights on the benches laughing with my friends, and I made the majority of my friendships in our dear back circle. Last year, shortly after returning from Winter Break, it was unusually warm and pretty rainy and a pick up game of mud football broke out, that game of mud football is among one of my most fond memories of Transy. Unless you were unaware, it''s not all about the things you learn in lectures or labs, but the things you experience in the time you spend at college, that makes the trip worth while. I'd like to say, so far, my trip has taken many unexpected, yet enjoyed detours; I wouldn't have it any other way.

Post-Mud Football in Forrer
With my Girls, Veronica and Meg.

Backstreet's Back Alright!

Hello Blogging World! Long time no see!

I know that I didn't give you all a wrap up of last semester, but everything ended up pretty well; we'll just say, no C's for me! Break was nice but it's hard to be far away from all of my friends here. I spent the first week at home by myself most days because my sisters were still at school and my parents were working. The second week was the week of Christmas so I got to spend more time with my sisters at least, my parents still had to work a lot of the week. Christmas itself was nice and relaxing, it's always nice to see people open the gifts you got them, there wasn't anything big for any of us but we all got Guitar Hero World Tour to share, but being together as a family is always the best part. The next week my boyfriend, Townsend, came up to Indianapolis to spend New Years with me; it was nice to have a little bit of Transy in Indy with me.

My Family on Christmas Eve

Over break, my parents and I decided that I would leave the car I was using, a Volkswagen Beetle, at home so my mom could use it to drive to and from work because it's a lot more fuel efficient than her mini-van. I figured that I didn't really need a car when all of my friends, and boyfriend, have them so I don't idly drive around wasting gas and I usually have a ride everywhere I need to go.

But we're back now, and we've been back for two weeks so it's been enough time for me to get back into the swing of classes. I'm really enjoying most of my classes, even Psychology which I'm taking for a GE credit, and my Education class which is an interesting insight into the whole education process. Spanish conversation is easy but a really good review of vocabulary and so forth and Computer Organization is different from any of the other CS classes I've taken so far.

Then on Wednesday I decided to audition for the Theatre Guild's student directed production of "Kimberly Akimbo" and I somehow landed the title role of Kimberly, a 16 year-old girl from a dysfunctional family who ages 4.5 faster than the normal person. So I'm really a 60 year old 16 year old. Kind of weird, and really scary to think about but exciting at the same time.

So, this semester is thumbs up so far, except the past few days its been FREEZING! Absolutely freezing cold, we checked the temperature Thursday morning and it was at ZERO! Thankfully campus is small enough that even the farthest classes really aren't too far and we don't have to spend 20 mins walking around outside trying to get to a class.

That's all I have for now, but I'll talk to you all later. <3