I'm Back!

Hello all!
So its been a while (sorry Lindsay!!!) but I am back and blogging. Since I've last posted the terms have changed, Thanksgiving has come and gone, and new classses have started up. Oh and I have also passed the first term for Ambassadors. The second term looks to be more riggorous but I'm still feeling confident about my chances :) I also have a 4.0 GPA after last term, so I'm feeling pretty good about this whole college thing!

The weather has been...well...Erie-like ever since December rolled around. I'm accustomed to the snow and cold being only an hour away from here but I never had imagined the wind that comes off the lake! But the campus does look lovely in the winter when it isn't snowing sideways. Its really a pretty picture.

Speaking of pictures, here are some of my friends and I last weekend:

Christmas Tree outside of the Union

Cookie Icing!

Gingerbread house!

It was a pretty great time. Not sure what we all have planned for this coming weekend but I'm sure something will happen. Until then thanks for reading!

Brendan

Final Papers, Ambassador Speeches, and Troubles With SAC

Here at Mercyhurst it has been a rather uneventful Monday but a rather busy previous week and weekend. Most of the previous week was consumed in work for my final research paper for my Intro to Intel class. Luckily I had worked on it already in the previous weeks and it was rather manageable. College has so far been very much akin to my advanced placement classes in high school: do your work ahead of time and it is all very easy and mostly stress free. Work is only hard for those who fall behind or procrastinate. My friend across the hall had the same project and started working on it the day before it was do. He got it done on time but he didn't leave his room until dinner Sunday night and he wasn't totally finished until 11 at night! College is really only as stressful as you make it. If you work hard and work ahead it should be a breeze.

But one thing that is always at least a little stressful is public speaking. And that's exactly what my fellow Ambassador pledges and I had to do for at least 3 minutes last Wednesday and Thursday. I've grown comfortable with public speaking, so it wasn't a huge issue...but i think even the best public speakers have to have a few butterflies in their stomach before they speak! My topic was the history of Ambassadors itself and i felt that i did very well. We'll have to see what the Ambassadors say in the end but i feel confident at this point. The key to doing well is making sure you don't have too much or not enough information and to practice your speech in front of people as much as possible. The overall content of the speech and the comfort level of the speaker seemed to be the most important factors that separated the good speeches from the rest.

But despite all the work, there is still plenty of fun to be had at the Hurst...well except when the SAC cancels open skate at the ice rink! (Though for the record SAC rarely disappoints and I love most of their activities!) Whoever planned the event failed to notice there was a club hockey game booked at the same time as the open skate hours. To their credit they hoped to just push it back to after the game but when the game went into overtime they decided to scrap the whole event. It was disappointing both for my friends (especially my one friend Jess who was a former figure skater and had been looking forward to it all week) and all of the other students who didn't go to one of the many Halloween parties over the weekend. Parties aren't really my style so I was stuck with very little to do this weekend. It is a simple fact of college that parties are all around you and it all depends on how you react to their presence. Though one shouldn't be too quick to judge people who party or people who don't. I know many people on both sides of the fence and I would miss out knowing a lot of nice people if i only dealt with one side of of the spectrum. It's a personal choice that you should respect even if it is not the choice that you would make.

But that's enough of me rambling about the realities of college for this post! I'll be back with anything interesting I experience this week.

Thanks for reading!
Brendan

2:40 AM Saturday

When story starts that late (well technically early I guess) it has to be interesting.
So my roommate and I had been up late and by the time 2 AM rolled around we both decided to call it a night. I was in that place somewhere in between sleep and awake when I heard an alarm from somewhere. I looked at my phone thinking it was my alarm I had just set for tomorrow morning and, seeing that it was not the source, realized it was the fire alarm from outside. Neither of us were totally aware of what was going on before a vicious pounding came from the other side of our door followed by our RA, Ashely, shouting:

"GET THE [expletive] UP! THIS ISN'T A DRILL!!!"

If you don't already know what goes in the brackets, ask your parents.

So I managed to find my pants, shoes, and phone in the dark as we were all orderly hurried out of the building. As we descended the stairs, the overwhelming aroma of burnt popcorn filled the stairwell. As the entire population of Warde Hall stood in the parking lot with only pajamas to hold off the cold Erie wind we all thought the same thing:

What idiot makes/burns microwave popcorn at almost THREE IN THE MORNING?!?!

Here are some images of the early morning's events:

Of course, the fire department eventually came to take care of the microwave and we all got to head back in some 20 minutes later. When i reached in my pocket to find my room key, I realized I had forgotten it on the way out. All I had in my pocket was the paper from my fortune cookie that I got with our Chinese take out earlier. It stated:

"You will make many changes before settling satisfactorily"

When I opened it at dinner it didn't make a lot of sense but by the time I got back in my room this morning it somewhat did. I had changed from sleepy, warm, and comfortable in my quiet room to the exciting, cold, uncomfortable and noisy parking lot before I could finally get to sleep that night. At the time the irony was too much for my tired mind but in retrospect it was pretty funny! At least I got a blog post out of it :P

Thanks for reading!
Brendan

Back from break!

Hey everybody! I'm back from fall break and posting from my friends room. I know i promised a  more exciting page after break but break can sometimes be even busier than when classes are still on! I'll get around to more pictures and such soon though. Break was still very productive. It was nice to be home and get some home cooked food for once in a while. I'm a pretty big sports fan so Saturday was a pretty fun day with college football, playoff baseball, and hockey all in one day! I'm a big fan of all the Pittsburgh sports teams so it was nice to see the Penguins beat up on those evil Flyers :P

I'm really glad to be back at Mercyhurst though. It's already become a home away from home to me and i have a fantastic group of friends to pass the time with. I doubt any of us will be going home in the coming weekends since fall break just ended and Thanksgiving is coming soon so we will likely have a lot of fun weekends coming up. I'll be sure to post all of the fun and shenanigans our brotherhood has here at the Hurst! :)

I have a midterm in Intel this week (which I'm not to worried about since i got 100% plus bonus points on the last test) and a few other things but it should be a good week.

Thanks for reading,
Brendan

What's Up!

Hello!
This is my first post on my new Mercyhurst blog! Sorry if the page looks a little dull. Midterms tomorrow at 8 in the morning don't leave one a lot of time for bells and whistles lol. But I do want to say why I'm here and why I chose Mercyhurst.

For me, Mercyhurst has to be the perfect location; it's not far from home but far enough for me to feel away from home, its not huge but it's accomidating, and it's in the city without being "in the city". Not only was it the best choice but, for me, it was just about the only choice because of the Intellegence Studies major that is almost unique to the Hurst. It's everything I expected in college and much much more!

Like I said, midterms are consuming my night a little bit, so I'll have to wrap this post up. But fall break is on he horizon so expect much more soon!

Thanks for reading,
Brendan