but yeah. basically, gina being the president of the northern iowa dems definitely helped us out. after the concert, we drove back to des moines & spent the night there at gina's parents' house. the next morning was the official inauguration ceremony. we had to get up early to get good a good parking spot. the ceremony was cool though. here's a few pictures:
culver/judge!
governor culver talking about his plans for the future.
after that, we went to the taste of iowa luncheon. lots of food from lots of different places all over iowa. really good. i'm pretty sure one of the best parts of the weekend was all the food. so good. we went back to gina's hometown (a suburb of des moines) and hung out for awhile. gina got her hair done, and we got ready for the ball! awesomely enough, there was a reception before the ball, so we got to network while eating more food before being shuttled to the ball.
gina and i on the shuttle to the ball!
all right. so the ball was a blast. i ate some iowa state fair food... kinda good but kinda random for a ball. gina and i hung out, i ran into some friends from des moines & iowa city. it was a great time. dancing, music, food, and governor culver! all in all, it was a great weekend.
the rest of the week was pretty typical. meetings, class, pike recruitment, buying books. all kinds of fun. speaking of which, pike recruitment went really well. we pledged 8 guys on thursday, and they seem like pretty good gentlemen. recruitment, i've found, is always fun. i love meeting new people, and recruitment tends to foster that, as well as richening the friendships you already have. greek life is awesome, and i'm so glad i'm a part of it.
in fact, that does bring me to another thought. in the past two weeks, something came up in the greek community of concern. we had a temporary greek advisor this semester, and she ended up resigning about a week or so ago. so now her job is being spread out among a few people in the student activities center, which kind of make things inconvenient until they find a replacement. i really want us to get a strong, educated, courageous advisor who's going to expand the greek community at uni. but even still, we need a larger population of students in general here, not just in the greek community, and i'm glad that benjamin allen wants to increase enrollment. hopefully these next few years i'm here will bring great things.
speaking of great things, campaigning is starting for the nisg elections at the end of february. i'm pretty excited because a friend of mine, andrew, is running for president, and i think he has what it takes. the next few months should be pretty interesting for uni, what with all the campaign propaganda and such, but we'll deal, i'm sure. i really want to get involved with nisg (northern iowa student government) in the future, but right now, i just don't have time for it. but good luck to all those running! (that goes for my friends hilary & drew as well!).
last but not least, i applied for summer orientation staff this week. it's something i wanted to do since i was a freshman and first met all the staff. they seemed like awesome people, and the idea of doing that for the summer seemed right up my alley. the funny thing is that i didn't realize it was an actual job until i saw the application. i thought it was just a volunteer thing, so it'd be even cooler to get paid for it cause i wouldn't have to work at hy-vee for awhile! but anyways, we had an informational group meeting tonight for all the applicants, but at the same time... it was also the first round of the selection process. kind of scary, but i wasn't too nervous. i laid back and just tried my best to be myself. i'm feeling confident about it, and am hoping i get a call back!
last but not least, one last picture.
me and kim. she's kind of a big influence in my life.
