Call of Duty: Black Ops ZOMBIES!!

Call of Duty: Black Ops is one of the newest video games that is out right now. Not only is there campaign and multiplayer online matches, but there is another part of the game called "Zombies". In Zombies you and your partners have to defend yourselves from the zombies. you work your way level through level to get better weapons and that way you can better defend yourself from the zombies that are coming in. The higher the level, the harder it gets to fight the zombies and even more zombies keep coming. There really is no way to end the game so you have to keep playing until everyone loses.

Thanksgiving Break

It seems like school just started and now it's already Thanksgiving Break!! And what does Thanksgiving Break mean? It means that theres only about a month until Christmas! Thanksgiving is always a great time to spend time with your family and to have a great meal. This year over Thanksgiving Break I even have a job so that I can make some extra money to have for school.

St. Joe vs. Lakeland

Tonight St. Joe goes to LaGrange, Indiana to take on the Lakeland Lakers in the second round of IHSAA Sectional playoffs. During the regular season, St. Joe devastated the Lakers 63-7. Now it is a rematch, and after last year's big win for the Indians, Lakeland has become yet another rivalry for St. Joe's football program. It was the second to last week in the 2009 season of Indiana High School Football, it was another year of offensive woes for St. Joe football, our offense had not been able to achieve much the entire year. It was a different story on the other side of the ball, our defense had been ranked in the top five defenses for the past two years and it was the same thing for my senior year. I had started at defensive end for St. Joe Junior year and I was doing my best to fight back from an injury and earn my starting spot back that I had gotten replaced in. St. Joe went to Lakeland with a 3-4 record (it was a very troubled year with injuries and we had one of the toughest schedules in the state), the Lakers came in with a 7-0 record, they thought it was going to be a push over. Had they forgotten about the years past? St. Joe has always dominated in this series and we were not going to let them think that they had a chance to beat us this year. However, we were facing one of the best teams that Lakeland had ever had, I will say that they were a pretty good team, but that was not going to make us feel inferior. We were better than them and we knew it. It was a very close game, in the final minute the score was 10-9 in St. Joe's favor. Lakeland had the ball and drove down the field and scored to make the score 15-10 with three seconds left in the game. They thought they had won the super bowl, it was a great moment for them (a rural Indiana school to beat and South Bend school). They lined up for the last play of the game (it was a kickoff). All they had to do was make one more tackle and they could shake our hands and go celebrate in the locker room. Well I'm proud to say thats not how this story ends. They kicked off and our return man caught it. The last three seconds ticked off the clock and the buzzer sounded in the middle of the play, Colin (the returner) had still not gone down. He found a hole in a mass of blockers and ran right through it. He was on his way to the endzone!! The Lakeland kickoff team ran after him as hard as they could, when Colin got within a couple yards of the endzone he leaped in, we had done it! We won 16-15 on the very last play of the game!! Our team walked off the field with our heads held high, the Lakeland fans looked like they wanted to kill us. That game sealed the birth of the St. Joe/Lakeland rivalry and from now on, especially tonight when the players are playing for a chance to go to the sectional title game, it will be a great rivalry game to watch.

Continuing the Research Project

My group has decided on our topic. We are going to do our research papers on how video game violence effects the people who play the game. We thought that it would be a very good topic to write our papers on because it is pretty easy to argue the standpoints of either side of the argument. One side being the view that video game violence has a negative effect on the player and causes them to think that real life violence is not that bad because its just a prank in the video game. The other side being that the violence in the video game is not taken seriously by the player and the player still has the correct state of mind about the difference between virtual and real life violence. There are also many sources that have their standpoints on the subject, therefore we will not be short on information for our topic.

Choosing a Research Paper Topic

This week in class I was given the assignment to form a group with other students in class and pick out a controversial topic to write a research paper about. I joined with Alex, Paul, and Jordan and we all looked up topics to write about on the internet, we were all pitching our ideas to each other about what would be good to write about. One of my ideas to write about was the debate on whether the 9/11 attacks on America were government conspiracies or pure acts of terrorism. Other ideas the my group came up with to write about were topics such as abortion, alcohol abuse, cults,etc. We still have not completely agreed on an idea for what we would like to write about but we have worked well with each other in the same group before so I have no doubt that we will be able to think of a very good topic for our research papers.

Ball State Homecoming 2010: Rock the Red!

This week is homecoming week here at Ball State. I have never been a part of it before so I really do not know what to expect. I have heard that it is a great week to be a Cardinal because of all the activities that go on on campus. To kickoff the festivities of homecoming, there was fireworks on monday night, then there were things like flag football, air jam, homecoming dinner, and the bed race (see picture below) to celebrate the occasion. The homecoming football game is Ball State vs. Western Michigan Broncos, Western Michigan is also a MAC (Mid-American Confernce) team. I think it would be pretty awesome if the football team wins the homecoming game because I know that if they do the Ball State students will be really excited that would make homecoming this year even cooler. The game is at 12:00 P.M. on saturday afternoon. I hope that everyone has a great homcoming and  GO CARDINALS!!

T.G.I.F.

From now on until the semester ends I only have one class on friday!! I had always had an eleven o'clock and then a one o'clock class but now my one o'clock class has ended because it was only a five week course. The course was ID 101, a freshmen seminar course to teach me about the transition to college life and how to enhance my study skills so that I may study more effectively and understand everything more clearly. I finished the class with a ninety-eight percent. I am very excited to only have to go to an eleven o'clock class every friday now because I still do not have to get up too early but on the other hand my class is not very late either, I get done at 11:50 A.M.

A New Rivalry

  VS.

St. Joseph's Indians versus Marian Knights. It is one of the biggest rivalries in the state of Indiana. It's been a traditional catholic school rivalry ever since the schools first opened. My family has always been a St. Joe family, my dad, brothers, myself and even my cousins have all played football for St. Joe. My sisters have been trainers for the football team, cheerleaders, and a cheerleading coach. As you can see, we all have had big parts of this historic rivalry. But this year it is a different story. My youngest sister, Katelyn, decided that she wanted to transfer out of St. Joe and wanted to enroll at Marian. She is even still cheering for Marian's varsity cheerleading squad. This year begins a new family rivalry. My whole family is going to the game to see these two schools battle it out on the gridiron, to see my cousin, Austin, play for the Indians, and to see my sister cheer for the Knights. Who is everyone in my family cheering for? Each of us only knows the answer to that question in our own hearts. It's hard for me to choose because I just played my senior season for St. Joe last year and I would like to cheer for my cousin. I really do want to see St. Joe roll over the Knights with all of the Indian pride that they have because St. Joe is the team that I put my heart and soul into for four years, but then again in another way I will still be very proud of my sister if her team gets the W.

Another year, Another loss to Michigan :(

It was so predictable. Michigan was driving down the field with less than two minutes left. What happens next? Of course they score. The Wolverines score to take the lead 28-24. Notre Dame had come back from being down 21-7 to make the score 24-21 with Dayne Crist's 95 yard touchdown pass to Kyle Rudolph in the fourth quarter (see the video below). Of course with the ball back in Denard Robinson's (Michigan Quaterback) hands it was inevitable that Michigan would probably score and give the Irish the ball back with barely any time to even make their way down the field. Like every other time when Notre Dame is down with less than two minutes left, a field goal will not help. Notre Dame had to score a touchdown. Dayne Crist overthrew his receiver in the end zone with no time left. We lost... and as a Notre Dame fan losing is such a depressing feeling because everyone that hates the Irish seems to love to make fun of you during those times. But all Notre Dame fans stay faithful no matter what, we all look forward to seeing our team win again and we all know that Notre Dame's loyal sons will march to victory again!

Home

Home is what I have been missing the most while here at Ball State. When I say home, what I mean is I miss my parents, I miss my girlfriend Jordan, I miss my Aunt Jan who is like a second mother to me, I miss my brothers and sisters and my neices and nephews. I remember at one time hearing the words "Home is where the heart is", and it wasn't until I moved down here to Muncie to attend school at Ball State that I understood what that actually meant. Being here isn't the same as going to camp or going on a vacation and missing home, at least for those there is a definite time when you will go home and be able to stay there. When I'm here it's so different, I live here but it is not my home and when I went home for Labor Day weekend it just wasn't the same as "being at home". To me, being at home means you get to stay at home with all the people you love in the place that you love and that wasn't the case. I wanted to stay home but I couldn't. There was a metaphorical force that was dragging me back to Muncie as I reached out to grasp at time and pull myself back to the beginning of the weekend and restart at the point when I was just arriving into South Bend. I had never appreciated South Bend more in my life than I did when I arrived on friday. With the windows down and the wind blowing in, I could feel that I was finally home. I had not seen my family or my girlfriend yet, but I knew I was closer to them and that it was only a matter of time until I would be with them. When I arrived at my house, my family wasn't there yet, so I just waited. I couldn't wait to see them and give them all hugs, I hadn't seen my dad in almost a month since he was gone for business before I moved in at school. After seeing them, I was off to see Jordan. I was so excited. As I pulled my car up the driveway I couldn't help but smile. I saw her come around the corner of the house to come meet me, she looked so beautiful. Her amazing blue eyes sparkled, she spread her arms and I embraced her in my arms. I don't think I've ever given her a bigger hug. I had made it, I was able to be with all of the people who I love, and the was no better feeling in the world.

LaFollette has WEAK INTERNET

If you live in LaFollette then you know what I am talking about. It seems like every other place on campus has the greatest wifi connection. Is it because LaFollette is such an old buliding? Is it because it is on the very northeast edge of campus? Who knows, but I know that living in LaFollette is such a hastle when it comes to the internet. There is an alternative for trouble with using the wifi in LaFollette. You can go to Wal-Mart and purchase an Ethernet cord, but in some rooms in Lafollette the data outlet to plug in the cord is broken. Now that poses a problem doesn't it? I was one of the lucky ones that got a room where the data output actually does work (However, it is still a slow connection). I wanted to test fact that the internet works perfectly fine everywhere else on campus. So, I decided to do my fantasy football draft in multiple places on campus. I started in Noyer Hall and walked towards the library and everything seemed good. I walked even farther south toward the Atrium and everything was still working fine. I walked back up McKinley Ave. on the east side of the street (near the new fitness center) and all was well with the connection. As soon as I began to cross the street to get to LaFollette the connection started to go bad. I then had to rush up to my room to plug my computer into the Ethernet cord. I thought it was the weirdest thing that I was walking down the street while drafting a fantasy football team and as soon as I went back to LaFollette the connection started to go bad, proving that although there is an internet connection in the complex, but it is just very very weak.

Alex and Paul

Alex and Paul are the familiar faces that I see every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday in my English 103 class at 11:00 AM. I don't really know too much about them, except for the fact that Alex attended both Cathedral and Carmel High Schools, but I'm sure that by the end of the semester I will learn more about these familiar faces that sit across from me.

Ball State

First day at Ball State University and I am making this blog for my English 103 class.