Judge if you may, but I'm addicted to ChatRoulette

That's right folks, your favorite Transy admissions blogger has an addiction to ChatRoulette. What is ChatRoulette you may ask? According to the all-mighty Wikipedia, "Chatroulette is a website that pairs random strangers for webcam-based conversations. Visitors to the website randomly begin an online chat (video, audio and text) with another visitor." Sounds kind of creepy? Well sometimes it is, but sometimes it's a really awesome way of meeting people from all over the world. I now have AIM buddies from Ireland and Italy, and I've met people from California to Richmond, KY. Now, you might be asking yourself why I'm talking about this on my admissions blog, well funny thing is, I end up talking about Transy with pretty much everyone I meet. I'll give you some sample dialogue of how a typical conversation might go, I'm "Me" and the random stranger is "Partner".

Partner: Hey!
Me: Hi! How's it going?
Partner: Good, u?
Me: Bored because I'm obviously done with all of the homework, readings for class, meetings, and other responsibilities that I have because otherwise I would never waste me time on a website like this. (:
Partner: so ur a student?
Me: Yep, are you?
Partner: ya.
Me: Where are you from?
Partner: minnesota, go golden gophers! where r u from?
Me: I'm from Indiana, but I go to school in Kentucky.
Partner: uk? do you know the john wall dance?
Me: haha. I actually go to the other school in Lexington, you've probably never heard about it but it's way better than UK.
Partner: whats it called?
Me: Transylvania University.
Partner: dracula?
Me: haha, not the first time I've heard that one. Transylvania actually means "across the woods" in Latin and we were the first university west of the Allegheny Mountains.
Partner: allegheny mountains?
Me: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegheny_Mountains
Me: It's actually the 16th oldest college in the US.
Partner: ok cool. What are you studying?
Me: Computer Science and Spanish

And it continues from there, but you get the picture.

There's a Ben Folds impersonator that composes songs on the spot about the stranger he meets, so Ben Folds put a concert on ChatRoulette.

It's funny for me to think about the days when the name Transylvania meant nothing more than a place in Romania where all the vampires hang out, but it's refreshing to remember that a large percent of the population has no idea who we are. I like to be able to share my stories about Raf Week, Greek Life, Residence Life, and adventures abroad.

Spring has sprung

Please forgive me for the serious lack of updates in the last month, it's been a busy time. Seeing that, I have a lot to tell you all about!

Since we last talked, I've been running around campus like a crazy person with all of the different organizations I've been a part of. I got to be a part of a fun event the last weekend in February, the committee I'm on for RA staff decided to put on a Karaoke contest! We had pizza and snacks and of course some awesome karaoke selections, and we had an amazing turn out! It was a lot of fun.

I convinced my two good friends, Emily and Erica, to sing Sk8r Boi with me at Karaoke.

The next weekend was a really cool event that the Panhellenic society put on for Women's History month, my fellow blogger Amanda read some original works, you should check out her update on that. I read "My Short Skirt" from the Vagina Monologues but there was a little bit of everything.

The next week, was the craziest week I've seen in a long time here at Transy, the week before Spring Break and I was leaving two days early. So, I got to squeeze 5 days worth of tests, papers, rehersals, meetings, and programs into 3 days - very little sleep was had. On Thursday, my friend, Elizabeth, and I headed out for a Peace Conference in Kansas City. I'll save the details of that an the rest of my Spring Break for next time! Until then, enjoy the sun!

Lions, Tigers, and Rhino's, Oh My!

Hello blogging world! I hope this finds you well on this cloudy, rainy day but maybe you’re not from around Lexington and you’re reading this in the warm sun, if you are I’m jealous. It’s (continued) to be busy in the Transy neck of the woods, but that’s really pretty good for me. I tend to be more productive and organized when I’m busy because I have to write down the things I need to do and then I remember that I have to do those things instead of remembering them all the night before they need to be done. There are a lot of exciting things going on around campus these days, the winter drama production of Rhinoceros opened last weekend and continues this Thursday, Friday, and Saturday at 7:30, tickets are $10 to the general public and $5 for the Transy community and you can call (859) 233-3621. Not to mention our very own admissions blogger, Cory Collins, portrays one of the lead roles, Jean. I saw the play last Thursday with the first round of students who were interviewing for the William T. Young Scholarship; the play is def an experience you don't always get in the theatre.

Blogger Cory Collins turns into a Rhino
Photo By: Jason Sankovitch

The William T. Young Scholarship is a full ride scholarship that is totally merit based, anyone who applied before December 1st is considered for the scholarship and if they are found to be eligible they are required to complete an additional essay and conduct an interview on campus. The interviews are conducted over two weeks with two separate sessions of students. Each student comes to campus early on Thursday where they are introduced to a student host that they will spend the night with and just hang out with over their two days on campus. The interviews are conducted from early Thursday through Friday afternoon and the students get to sit in on classes and socialize with faculty and staff, not to mention each other. This year I was selected to be a student host and got to hang out with a senior for the day (Hey Sydney!) It was fun experience especially since I couldn’t of even been considered for the scholarship (I was a late applier).

Besides that, last week was "Greek Week" which is a time where the Greek community bands together to do some cool things, from a pep rally to a blood drive to a letter writing campaign for St. Jude's and a bunch of other fun activities ending in the Greek Awards the recognize accomplishments made by each chapter in the preceding year. It was a busy time, so I snuck back home to Indianapolis for the weekend and it was really nice to just be at home with my family and to see some old friends.

I hope you all have stayed dry today! Good luck wrapping up the college search, if you have any questions just leave a comment or shoot me an email!

So much music...

I hope this finds you well as deadlines start to approach for scholarships, applications, and that all mighty day May 1st looms in the air.

My class schedule this semester is a unique one, but one that you are more likely to find as you get into upper level courses. I am in two Spanish course, Spanish Civilizations and Golden Age Spanish Literature - they complement each other well because we get the history of the time period in Spain and then we get to read some of the literature from the period. The literature is a little bit harder to understand than the history, it's kind of like reading Shakespeare but in a Spanish. The interesting thing about these two courses is that they are both taught by the same professor, Dr. Orlins. Then I'm also in two computer science courses, Computational Theory and Netcentric Computing, that are quite different fields in computer science but once again they are with they same professor, Dr. England. So I only have two professors this semester.

Also, today I'm helping out with the musical scholarship auditions for incoming majors and minors. It's been fun to listen to all the music and it's really exciting to think about all of the possible new musicians that could be here next semester.

Just hanging out waiting to sign some people in

I hope you all are staying warm!

Life is a cabaret Old Chum...

Every year, the Transylvania Choir presents a musical variety show that we like to call Cabaret and each year the choral ensembles get to vote on a theme and then work like crazy for three weeks to pull together group numbers complete with choreography, not to mention all of the solo and group acts that are included.

The Transylvania Choir sings its way into hearts during Cabaret

This year the theme is "A Night at the Movies" and we have numbers ranging from the choir's rendition of "Eye of the Tiger" from Rocky to a solo of "Kiss by a Rose" from Batman Forever to my solo of "And All that Jazz" from Chicago. This is my favorite part about being in choir because I was a die-hard show choir member and musical star at my high school and this kind of rekindles all of that fabulousness.

My favorite part of all of this, is that the whole Transy community comes out to support the choral groups at all of this -there's first-years through seniors, faculty and staff, parents and alumni- all who come out to enjoy a fun night of entertainment. Another great thing that's happening this year is that all of the proceeds (tickets are $5) are being donated to Hope for Haiti.

Transy Boy's Acappella (TBA) is always a highlight of Cabaret

If you're interested in attending everything goes down this Friday and Saturday the 29th and 30th of January in Carrrick Theatre located inside of the Mitchell Fine Arts Center at 7:30 both nights. The box office will be open for ticket reservations Jan. 29, from 12:30-3 p.m. The phone number is (859) 233-8601.

Come check it out if you're in the area, it's a great way to see the dynamic of campus

The hills are alive with the Sound of Music!

Dear, dear readers. I do hope that you've had an enjoyable start to your new year, my own has been fairly eventful.

Let's see, during the last week of break the Transylvania Choir, of which I am a member of, had a "Continental Tour" aka we all piled on a charter bus and roamed about Kentucky and Indiana. Because the tour is conveniently situated in the middle of winter, our stop in Bloomington, IL was canceled due to snow and we skipped it after our show in Ashland, KY and we took a night off in Lexington and then the next day we got to travel to my hometown of Indianapolis.

We got there in the afternoon and had the opportunity, well I made the opportunity, for us to stop off at my high school, Arsenal Technical HS, and we got to share some of our music with them, they shared some with us and we sang a little together. That night we performed at my home church, Downey Avenue Christian Church, and the choir stayed with host families from my congregation, I got to stay at home and pick up some of the things I forgot. It was pretty amazing to be able to fill the sanctuary I grew up in with music from the place where I'm continuing my "growing up" process.

The next day we drove back to Covington, KY after lunch in Bloomington, IN and that night we had a mixer with some alumn's and a prospective student, I had lots of fun talking to the strangers because I'm wierd like that, but at the end we got to share a few of our songs. The next morning we participated in a worship service in Covington and then came back to Transy. I was quite a journey but fun was had by all.

Some of my choir friends and I at the mixer in Covington, KY

Since then classes have started and that's all a completely different story I'll update you all on at a later time, but for now have fun and stay dry!

Finals: A through F

I left you all before finals which is always an interesting time of the semester. I don't think that I (or any of my fellow bloggers) have explained about finals weeks at Transy.

Classes end one week before you're really done and the next weeks is Finals Week. You might have read about "Reading Day" this is always on Monday of Finals Week, it adds to the weekend to give a small reprieve to do some last minute studying for your finals on Thursday-Friday. Then each day is carefully planned out to provide a separate time for each final. For example, if you have a 9:30 MWF class you have your final at 3 on Monday and your finals for a 1:30 TTh is at 9AM on Thursday. This way you don't have to worry about overlapping finals and they usually work out to be fairly spread out.

I know this is a little late, but if you have any questions about finals or ANYTHING else about Transy just let me know! Comment or email me. Have a great day!