all right, i left off on november 1st. ingress week. ingress itself means "moving forward," and that's what the week is intended to do. it prepares the pledges for initiation, helps them grow and bond. an exciting and life-changing week, i must say. i learned a lot about myself, had fun, and bonded with my brothers. went through ritual and such. it was quite an interesting week. walking all the way across campus to the music part was kind of a pain in the butt, but i made it to class. although sometimes hard to focus while living in the house, i managed to get my schoolwork done. :). and on top of that, i aced my final test for the fraternity, so that was awesome news.
not only was it ingress week, but i had NATS on friday--all day. NATS is a solo singing competition in which i've never been able to participate because i was always performing my high school plays that weekend. however, my first NATS experience proved to be a positive one. i got to see some friends from wartburg and isu that i hadn't seen in awhile, and i made it to second round! hooray! i didn't make it PAST second round, but i was satisfied with my performance, so oh well. tough toenails, right?
waking up saturday morning. yikes. initiation all day. we left the house at 10:15 and got back around 4. it was kind of nerve racking... like all of the work that i've had to do led up to that day. all the stress was over. and i could relax! phew.
pics!
paul and i at the house during ingress week.
all the guys after initiation... all dressed up and spiffy!
all right, back to the entry.
tuesday nov. 7th = election day. wow. what a day. i took the day off from classes and volunteered for the democratic party as part of the northern iowa democrats. i walked the town of waterloo knocking on doors from 10 to 2, then made phone calls from 2 to 3. i VOTED for the first time between 3 and 4, then went to uni singers. after a short break, i returned to phone banking until 9. i went to the party to wait for the results, only to find out that every candidate i supported won! needless to say, i was happy and pleased.
pics again...
me, gina, and amanda on election day! (we were taking a break from phone banking)
me making phone calls!
since then, i've been really busy with school to do much else. the new hy-vee opened last tuesday, so i've been working a lot the past two weeks. it's really nice, and i think it's appropriate that we finally redid the store. it's a college town, and it was definitely needed. as far as classes, i have to write a huge research paper for intro to lit... tentatively about langston hughes and music during the harlem renaissance. it's a bit of a change for me, but hopefully i'll be able to pull it all together. also, my last big oral comm assignment is NEXT TUESDAY... something called a "round table discussion." we're doing a topic that i'm really passionate about--poverty in africa. i think it's going to go well. plus, i really like the people in my group.
as for tonight, i'm attending the honors general assembly meeting. i need to talk to jessica moon about my class schedule too, so hopefully i will get some things figured out tonight. at 8, i'll be attending the opera scenes recital... getting my 8 recital requirements in for my music major!
thanksgiving this week. i'm staying in the dorms. my roommate is already gone. goals for this week: learn all my music for juries, work on my oral comm round table stuff, and research for my intro to lit paper. on top of that, ill be working. YIKES! i hope i'll survive.
