1 comments Thursday, August 30, 2007

So, as my friends and I made our way into the school's cafeteria at lunch the other day we were struck with a problem. There were more students trying to eat than there were seats. We searched and searched, eventually finding a table in the back that had 4 seats around it...there was 6 of us. After we had gathered enough chairs to squeeze all of us at that table I started to look around. What I saw shocked me.

As I looked around, I noticed several booths, just in my general vicinity, that were occupied by one person, just reading a book. At any other time during the day, this would have been perfectly acceptable, but at lunch? No sir. Not when there are people struggling to find ONE open seat for themselves and eat before they have to rush to their next class.

The school has many different venues for studying, many of which are much quieter...such as the library! At lunchtime, the cafeteria is very busy and many conversations are taking place, a why would you want to:
A) Take up a whole booth for yourself when there are single seats.
B) Attempt to read/study when there is a high level of static noise around you.
C) Continue to stay there once you notice that people around you need seats.

Now, I don't have doctorate in ergonomics or anything, but common sense tells me that you shouldn't take up an entire booth for yourself, just so you can read and do that cool little thing where you prop your feet up on the other side.

If you're reading this going "Oh my gosh, that's absurd", then you're right. It's really freaking absurd and it needs to stop. I want my lunch table gosh darnit.

-Bobby

3 comments Sunday, August 26, 2007

So I know that this is a topic that is probably well covered and has been re-hashed over and over again, but I want to bring it up.

In today's society, college means partying, which HAS to mean alcohol is involved. What happened to the days of going to so and so's birthday party and just hanging out. Nothing mattered when we were younger, why should it now? Yes, I know how prevalent alcohol and many other substances are in college, but why must it automatically be associated with it as soon as the word "party" is mentioned. Also, why must college be all about drinking and making decisions that you'll probably eventually regret?

Even though I've only been here for a week, I've been able to meet enough people to know that alcohol, drugs, sex, and many other things are a common occurrence around here. So, I've been thinking...why? Because it's one of the only ways you can fit in, right? Wrong.

Many of the newer students come here knowing close to no one and one of the only ways to meet new people is to go where there are lots of them, otherwise known as parties. It's obviously not easy enough to strike up a conversation with someone in between classes, or in the lunch line. You have to be inebriated before any conversing can happen, that way you can pretty much act however you want and no one will know any different. It seems to me that that philosophy carries on from year to year in a never ending cycle.

What made me want to write about this is a conversation Tyson and I had with a few girls we met today at lunch. They were telling us about how they weren't "alcoholics" as I claimed they were. So I asked one of them "Well, how often do you drink?" She responded with "Not that much, just probably about every weekend." Yeah, she's an alcoholic, and the first step to recovery is admitting your problems =]

They were both shocked when Tyson and I said we didn't party/drink. It was as if we were some foreign beings, and the fact that we don't drink didn't register in their minds.

Everyone chooses the path that they travel in life, ours happens to be a lot different from most others in college. Oh well, we still have fun.

-Bobby


0 comments Friday, August 24, 2007

Tyson and I experienced something that's semi rare to find in a college enviornment tonight. Fellowship through religion. Somehow society relates college life, especially on a Friday night, with parties, alcohol, and other activities. Tonight we experienced something different.

At lunch, Kevin (one of our room mates) told us about a "progressive dinner" that was going on later in the evening. He explained it as a way for us to find a new church here in Chattanooga being that we all had just recently moved here. For those of you that don't know what a progressive dinner is, it's where you eat at a couple different churches, eating different parts of your meal and getting to know the people at that church.

It was a really good experience and a relief to see this at my school. The fellow students that went with us were really easy to get along with and easy to talk to, and we all had some good laughs. It really made college feel more like "home", although I know it never truly will feel exactly like home. Anyways, we made some new friends that will hopefully not be a one time thing.

I'm so happy it's friday. Woo.

-Bobby

0 comments Wednesday, August 22, 2007

The other day I was walking across our living room with a can of macaroni and beef that I was making for dinner, and Bobby decides that he needs to tackle me...hard. We both went down, and the can of beef and macaroni was dented terribly. It's a good thing we have concrete floors...it helped soften the blow.

Don't worry, the macaroni and beef was still delicious.

-Tyson

3 comments

So, this morning was pretty interesting. Let me just start by saying that Tyson is very prone to injury and will likely get hurt multiple times throughout the course of the year.

After waking up Tyson and I usually just sit there for a moment and wake up slowly. As I looked over I realized that Tyson was now out of his sheets and adjusting them slightly. Then I closed my eyes and I hear the sound of the springs in the bed compressing and being released...a bouncing sound. I look over and Tyson is on his knees bouncing up and down trying to be funny. I find it pretty funny and start to laugh. Right here is where I start to see things going downhill.
As he's bouncing, I notice that the weight of his body is shifting forward and the end of the bed (which is wooden) is near. He is obviously oblivions to this health hazard as he continues to bounce. As he bounces his head, more notably his nose, makes contact with the wonderful wood bed frame that UTC has provided us with.
He proceeds to yell out in pain with words such as "Ow" "Oh wow...that really really hurt" "Gosh dang it, my nose is now bleeding profusely"

It was the perfect way to start the day and is a great memory to remember at the end.

-Bobby

3 comments

Tyson has a sister, Camille, who also goes to school here at UTC. She is a sophomore and is in the Chi Omega sorority. Yesterday, she called Tyson and asked if there was any chance that Tyson and I could come over to her sorority house to help move their big dining room tables down to the basement so that they would have more room for recruitment. Being the great big bro Tyson is, he agreed. Tyson and I made our way down the the house, and as promised help take two big tables down out of the house for them. All the girls were quite thankful, but before we left they asked if there was any chance that while we were there if we could also carry a copy machine outside to the trash area because it had recently broken. We agreed, thinking we could get some brownie points from a houseful of girls, and also thinking that it wouldn't be too big of a problem, I mean we're both relatively well built guys.
Anyway, it was a full size copy machine. One of those machines that you find in big offices and kinko's stores. It had to have weighed at least 200 lbs. We figure we had to make it as maneuverable as we could, so first we popped off all the trays and drawers that stuck out of the sides. We then tried carrying down the stairs, and surprisingly all went relatively well until the machine got tilted slightly and the top of the machine flipped open, we couldn't set the machine down, and neither of us could move our hands to try and close it, so we called out for someone to come help us. A girl came over and we just told her to break it off and get it out of our way, she did, and just as she did, somehow the whole entire copy machine broke in half. I was on the downside of the staircase and was able to stop the whole machine from going pummeling down the stairs and crashing through the window, but unfortunately I caught the majority of the copy machine on one of my knees, which is now quite bruised and swollen. This was quite a site indeed, just picture 3 people on a narrow staircase, a full size copy machine in TWO pieces, and we're all trying to gain enough composure to finish getting this thing down the stairs.

Thankfully, we finally get this thing out the front door, but it couldn't possibly be that easy, the trash pile was in the back of the house, so we still had to get it down there.

The top half had a power cord attached to it, so what simpler way than to just tie up and run down the driveway with it, kind of like a sled dog. Tyson took the power cord, tied it around his waist, and on the count of three took off. Unlike most of our ideas, it worked rather well, we got the machine down to the back of the house in less than a minute, with only one small hitch. Halfway down the driveway the bottom of the machine drops out and all the ink goes all over the driveway. I yelled "wait! stop!" as soon as I saw the mess Tyson was making, but he was too caught up in the moment to hear me. This got the first half of the machine in its final resting spot, but there was still the second half.

The bottom half didn't have a power cord of any kind attached to it, so we couldn't pull it like the previous part, BUT it did have wheels. Being that we both have experience in skateboarding, how hard could it be to ride a copy machine? Surprisingly yet again, the idea did actually work fairly well, Tyson jumped up on the copy machine, and luckily their driveway was slanted downhill, so he just rode the machine down to the bottom and into the grass before he fell off.

After finishing our "work" and getting all parts of the machine behind the house and into the trash pile, we went back into the house and were graciously thanked by all the girls for all the hard work we did. The story then finished in the best possible way, with cake. The sorority offered us cake, and we generously accepted.

After all our work was done, we then confidently headed home, knowing that together we are unstoppable.




0 comments Saturday, August 18, 2007

Move in day not only signified the start of a new chapter in my life, but it also made me realize that from that point on I needed to be self sufficient and that my parents would no longer be with me every step of the way.
It was an emotional day but it was also very relieving to know that my parents are only about an hour and a half away in Nashville. We spent the entire day together and ended it with a nice dinner with my bests friends' family.


Who might that be? Tyson Ward is the name he goes by although his real name is quite interesting. You (the reader) will read about him on a regular basis because most of my stories stem from things we do.

Although this is short, it sums up what happened and is a base point for the stories that will unfold throughout my college career.