Wow! I can’t believe that finals are over and it’s FINALLY summer! Except it’s snowing in the middle of May in Pinetop, AZ… but that doesn’t surprise me all that much. I am so excited to be a junior at ERAU next semester! The time has SERIOUSLY flown by soo fast, my head is spinning.  I thought that since I’m one year older now, that I’d give you all a list of things that I’ve learned in my sophomore year in college.

1. The library is your best friend.  Forever. BFF. Remember that.

2. Chartwells, as much as I avoided it while living on campus, is actually not that bad. (And when you have no food in your fridge and no meal plan, it looks and smells delicious.)

3. Pay your rent and bills, on time when you can. Yup… that’s a big one.

4. Get to know lots of people in your classes. It comes in handy when you leave for a volleyball trip and you need homework help.

5. The Student Union is a rockin’ place to be. Since I couldn’t go home in between classes because I live too far away, I would spend tons of time playing pool and making a ton of friends!

6. If you live off campus, still remember to check your school mailbox every once in a while. When you wait to open it until a whole semester has passed, it WILL explode on you.

7. Don’t be afraid to go into your professor’s office during office hours and ask for help. They are happy to help you if they see you are working hard and honestly trying to get a good grade.

8. Night classes are not for the weak. If you take a night class, be prepared to be strong and stay awake. I brought snacks to help me focus through the two and a half hour class, from 6:30-9pm.

9. DO NOT park in the residence hall parking lot if you live off campus. Bad idea. Unless of course you want a ticket from security… then be my guest.

10. College is supposed to be hard, and you have to study a lot to do well, but remember… it’s also the best time of your life. College is fun… don’t stress too much. You have to enjoy yourself, and ERAU gives out plenty of opportunities to do so.

So, these are the lessons that I have learned and relearned my sophomore year in college. I hope that everyone out there reading this can take what I’ve learned and apply it to their college experience, hopefully at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University!

“Laugh longer, live louder.”

-Anonymous

Whew!  Finals are ALMOST over.  I’ve gotten the harder ones out of the way thank GOODNESS.  Study time has literally taken up most of my time since last Friday.  Not kidding.  I had a Personality and Profiling final Monday morning, I took my Chinese and Observing Asian cultures final yesterday, this morning I took my U.S. Foreign Policy final, and tomorrow is my Forensics final.  So it’s cram time!  My roommate and I (like every other student at Riddle) have had our moments of procrastination, though.  Such as: watching A Very Potter Musical on YouTube, attempting to flip eggs while we are frying them (which was actually quite hilarious!), singing Disney songs randomly in the middle of the night, and taking random grocery shopping trips to get out of the house.  Ohh, finals.  This is what you do to us.  Sooo, we’re pretty much sleep deprived and can spout out just about anything on any of our study guides.  Which is good, because we’ll do great on our finals!  We’ll only be slap-happy for a little while longer!  Whoohooo.

The egg toss up…

And here’s the miss…

And the SPLAT!!

Oh the pressures of finals week.  My brain feels like that egg: splattered.  BUT, it will all be worth it when I get good grades in all of my classes!  That’s the good thing about finals at Riddle: if you work hard and do your very best, you will be rewarded, one way or another!  So even though it’s tough, it’s a challenge that is so worth it.  I love being challenged.  I love when I overcome obstacles and can say, “I did it.”  Impossible isn’t in my dictionary, and I’m sure that everyone who comes to Riddle feels the exact same way.  We work hard no matter how hard classes get, because we know that someday all of our hard work will pay off.  So, BRING IT, FINALS!

“When we long for life without difficulties, remind us that oaks grow strong in contrary winds and diamonds are made under pressure.”

-Peter Marshall

As Cassie already mentioned in her blog, we got to work together on Preview Day this past week which was a BLAST!!  I just loved being able to work with some of the coolest people at ERAU!  Granted my fingers did get a little tired from all the balloon tying, but hey, that’s okay!  I had a great time with Cassie and people I got to meet on Saturday, and I hope that the prospective students enjoyed it almost as much as I did!

Unfortunately I was not awake enough at 6:30 am to grab my camera so I could take pictures with Cassie, but Lauren always has her camera, so this is the Lower Hangar during the Activities Fair after my afternoon shift was over.

This week heralded in one of ERAU’s famous traditions on campus: Sigma Chi’s Derby Days!  Derby Days is a week-long competition between teams of girls (aka sororities, sports teams, etc.) and it is so much fun to be involved in anyway, but it also helps raise money for cancer which makes it about twenty times better!  All week, we’ve been having competitions and dressing up for different days of the week to earn points for our team.  I am on the Volleyball team, and my roommate Lauren is on Alpha Xi Delta’s team, so we’ve been documenting our awesome costumes together!

Sleeping Beauty and Leonardo!

Western Wednesday!

Here’s my Derby Days team (which is most of my volleyball team) with our “Coach” who is from Sigma Chi.

This is my (orange) team and Lauren’s (pink) team playing Dodgeball in our “Decathalon” portion of the competition.  THAT was fun!

Tonight, the activity was “Survival Game”, where Sigma Chi brothers would run around campus with different animal names taped to their backs, and we would have to either tag them or hit them with socks to get points (pretty much like an arcade hunting game, only it took over the entire ERAU campus!).  It was pretty epic. 

There’s also a Penny Wars portion of the competition that raises money for the cure for cancer.  Each team has a jug to put money in, pennies and bills are negatives, so the point is to get as much silver money in as you can and sabotoge everyone else by putting in tons of pennies!  The good news right now is that Volleyball has the most coins in our jug.  The bad news is… they’re all pennies.  We’ve been sabotoged already.  That’s alright… we’ll pull ahead!  And all the money goes for a great cause anyway, so either way, we win!  (However, if you go to Riddle and you want Volleyball to actually win, not just metaphorically… remember: silver coins.  Thanks!)

So the rest of this week will be very, VERY interesting, so I will update you all with the Derby Days winners at the end of the week!

“I am no stranger to healthy competition- working hard and playing hard.” (especially when it comes to working for a good cause! )

-Richard Branson