IT'S FRIDAY! thank goodness.

so this morning i rode my bike to class since it wasn't raining. i was running a little late, but thats ok. i actually made good time on the bike, i just left the house late. well i like to park my bike outside the rec center, (my bicycle that is. i'm still trying to talk my parents into the idea of a motorcycle), but the rec center is a ways from the rest of my classes. well, i look at my phone after i chain up my bike, and i have five minutes till class starts, but a good 10 minute walk to get there. well about a minute into the walk my friend texted me to infor me of a pop quiz we were having in class today. so i took off running. i was sweating so much by the time i got to class. i'm not forsure if you are familiar with UT's campus, but it's up hill both ways to class. well the quiz wasnt until the end of class. so it wouldnt have mattered if i was a few minutes late. oh well. it was funny. and nice of her to make sure i was coming to class.

well thats my anectodote for today. i'll finish the post with another story later.

so not having cable is a good excuse for not watching the DNC. but then again, we bought one of the digital tuner boxes. basically it's a set of the rabit ear antennas that also pics up HD channels. we realized the other night if we had just gotten that thing in the first place instead of waiting on comcast, which we are still doing, we could of watched the olympics. i can't even explain to you the range of emotions that i felt when we realized that.

well, i was about to say i wish the DNC was a replay of the 1968 DNC, then i would watch it, but in reality, i dont wish that. that was a hard time in American history. I have watched a little bit of it, but it kinda makes me sick to my stomach. Next weeks convention will probably make me sick as well. just not quite as much.

so the first full week of my senior year is over. it went fairly well. had two quizes. they went ok. rowing practice started back up, that went ok as well. except for the rain. just like last year at the beginning of the season, i'm having doubts as to whether or not i want to continue to row. i was telling my friend samantha the other day, who is also on the team. that if i decided not to row no matter the reason, i wouldnt have any hard feelings about the time and money spent on the rowing team. rowing was there for me in a tough time in my life an has provided many good friends and memories. but i'm pretty sure i'm going to stick with it. we'll see. the reason i would not row is because so many people come and go every year, that alot of my close friends are not on there anymore. which is ok, but the new guys on there are kinda.... well, pricks. sorry to say that.

one of my classes is ridiculous. i cant remember if i told ya'll about this or not. the teacher doesnt even teach. the students do the teaching. i dont understand. no one understands. but the class is required. the part that i am excited about is the service learning opportunity. we can either write a ridiculous research paper which requires us going to a government agency and interviewing everyone in the department and talking about their problems, or we can go to the local schools here in knoxville and mentor kids. basically just hang out with them. the principles of the school came to our class the other day and described it all to us. it's very exciting. our teacher wants us to do this instead of the paper. you can tell when he describes the paper to us. haha.

the principles said "if you here of anyone that has a gun or weapon, let us know immeadiately". that kinda let us know the real situation. i dont know if you heard, but there was a shooting last week at one of the knoxville high schools. apparently it's common.

i'm going to give you an exceprt from my teachers email. this will let you know how the class is. somewhat...

"The beginning of the semester is always chaotic. You don’t know what you’re doing; you’ve never had any class like this previously, Things are disorganized; we’re all getting different information. No one is happy about paying $38. People are stuck in nether land in adding the class. When they add they cannot get on Blackboard immediately. Memos, memos, memos; reflections, reflections, reflections; what’s the difference? What are the readings and Where are the readings located? What are the mentoring options?"

i just thought this was funny. especially from a 70 year old man. we had to do a project in class. who could stack sugar cubes the highest/quickest in the class. my group came in third after like 6 rounds. one of the rounds we all had to have out eyes shut. pretty crazy.

anyways. you probably dont wanna know about all this. i'll finish with another story.

so it finally stopped raining sometime yesterday so when i had to go back over to campus i was going to ride my bike. well i was moving along pretty well, which was probably too fast for the greenway which has alot of people on it. well the section that breaks off to go to campus curves around and... goes up hill, like most things on campus. well i didnt slow down and i was doing like 20 mph. since it cruved upwards, my peddle hit the ground and my bike did a 180 and just about ripped the back tire off. the tire went flat of course, but i'm just glad i didnt go flying down the side of the hill. that would of been bad. but i picked up my bike and started walking the rest of the way to campus. i had to get to a metting. luckily all that was wrong with my bike was a flat tire. an easy fix.

i'm hoping to do a bike race in atlanta next weekend. it's a 24 hour relay race. should be a fun time.

hope ya'll are doing well

piece