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Yeah its GVSU!
Well I am in San Antonio. I arrive on Wednesday and we are having a good time. Who is we? Well I mean team GVSU Greek; Aaron Haight, Shawna Cullen and of course myself. We are here for the Association of Fraternity Advisors (AFA) annual meeting. Lets recap my trip.
Getting ready to come was insane. Very busy. Had to write some papers, then pack, get stuff from Meijers, prepare for my Bolivia trip, and get a haircut. Lots to do, and I still found time on Tuesday night to go to Perkins to eat with my Brothers. Good times, even though Ramiro almost killed us a few times on the way.
Surprisingly on Wednesday at 8am I was able to get a haircut. I opened the Allendale phonebook, which is very thin, and found the first place in the book. Anne's Beauty shop. I called and she was able to get me in. Yeah! So I drove over. The place was on the side of a house, very small, she (I assume Anne) was a shorter old lady. She started to cut my hair. We chatted. She happened to be going to San Antonio this weekend as well! Wow. And the other great thing was, the haircut was only $7! Nothing beats a good $7 haircut, with no appointment, at 8am in the morning.
Well that afternoon, after some good times with Shawna on the place (she is a scared flyer) we made it to Texas. It was not very warm, but kinda sunny. Either way better then Michigan. The riverwalk is awesome! Very scenic, great places to eat and drink, and awesome atmosphere.
Now the conference. Well it has been awesome. Some of you might know about what AFA is, for those who don't here is a recap. It is the national association for people who advise fraternities and sororities. The conference is held in conjunction with the North American Interfraternity Conference (NIC) which is the national group for all of the large national fraternities. So there are tons of Greeks here, and every Greek advisor in the country. Lots of fun.
Last year I developed a good professional network here. Made some great connections and reunited with some of the people who made a difference in my life. That is why I am in the field, because people can make a difference. The field might not make me rich, but working with fraternities and making a difference is very rewarding. It beats designing car parts and making other people richer.
Well at this conference there is a case competition. That is when teams of two students are given a hypothetical situation and then have to say what they would do to solve it. Some of you might remember that I won the GVSU competition with Becky in February. Shawna and I competed last year and did not place. So we came back for more, figuring that Bowling Green would win again. See, BGSU is the big school in Greek Life. They have the most professionals in the field and have a great grad program. They usually win the competition and are really cocky at the competition. Was team GVSU intimidated? No way. And guess what... we won! We won! We won! When they announce our names I could not believe it (well I could since I dreamed we won, and Shawna predicted it) and walked to the stage to get our award check. It felt good. you know what felt better... when leaving the luncheon, I heard a group of the BGSU grads complaining to one of their supervisors... it felt good. Did I mention we won?
So I have had a blast. Good receptions, good times, excellent talks with many old and new friends. I am dropping hints on jobs, and also getting many people coming to me about jobs. It feels good to have people seeking me out, instead of me out there hunting. Did I mention I am having a good time? Well I am.
Right now we are watching GVSU on ESPN2. We are in the national football championship football for division 2. It is exciting. Watching to see our students on TV. The things which excite you at a small school... sad I know.
Back to the game. Tonight is the fancy dinner, then at the crack of dawn to fly back to Michigan. I will be in Michigan for 24 hours, then I turnaround to fly to Bolivia! Yeah!
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The Spork
As many of you have been witness, I know a lot of random stuff. People always ask me, why do you know that? I simply answer, I read it somewhere. Today I will lay to rest the mystery and let people know why I know, what it is that I know, and how I came to know it. Stick with me here folks.
I went in to work at GVSU today at a little before 8 am. I drank tea today instead of coffee, and I got some work done. Then around 11 I was done with meetings and such and headed to my other job, downtown to CompuCraft. On my way I picked up some Taco Bell, which I know is not authentic, but who cares. I got two soft tacos and my favorite item, the Zesty Chicken Bowl. What does this have to do with my random knowledge? Nothing yet, I am getting to it, stick with me folks.
The two tacos were great, I put mild sauce on them. Then the chicken bowl, they always kinda overflow and just smell great. I love them, but you know what I really love? The spork. Now you are really wondering, what does this have to do with anything? Stick with me folks.
As I ate I wondered about the spork. Where the name came from, and maybe even who invented it and when. Who first uttered the word, 'spork.' Then began my quest. Using my favorite intellectual resource I searched the web. My first couple google searches came up with sites with no useful information. Some non-reliable sites like this: The Ralph, and Housing and Food. Then I got it... what I was looking for. I found some useful information on the US Patent Website. The first listing for a the spork was in 1907, with new updates to the spork in, 1960, 1970, 1978, and an ornamental design in 1998.
One site had some useful information as well, and about tons of other inventions: About Dot Com. That site linked to another site which was all about the Taco Bell Spork! This was so cool, and so delightfully strange that I had to link to. Sporks are Godlike. Look at the anatomy of the spork, too funny.
Does that answer the questions now? I have random knowledge, because I look up random things when the idea comes to me. So if anyone ever happens to ask about the spork, I can say, "It was first patented in 1907, with updates as recent as 1998." Guess what, you now have some more random knowledge as well. Wasn't that fun?
Well I just wasted a lot of time, I got to get back to this huge to-do-list I got. Later.
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