I love to snowboard. I’ve been out west several times, but its always so expensive that I can’t go very often, stay very long, or convince very many people to go with. Fortunately, the University of Iowa has a Ski and Snowboard Club to help make things more fun and less expensive. I went on their snowboarding trip over break for a few reasons: 1) I figured it would be sweet going with a ton of kids from Iowa, and 2) it was CHEAP.

Seriously, we stayed in awesome, ski-in/ski-out condos for 5 nights and had four days of snowboarding in Aspen, CO; and it all cost $409. Maybe that doesn’t sound cheap if you’ve never been to Colorado to snowboard, but I can tell you from personal experience that planning a trip like this for twice that price would be a challenge. Lift tickets alone cost close to $100/day and condos are expensive. Especially ones like these, we had kitchens, balconies and were literally less than 100 feet from a trail.

Enough economics. I had a blast! Any trip out west is guaranteed to be the highlight of a winter, but this was my best trip yet. Aspen isn’t just any mountain; in fact, its actually four mountains, and every one of them is great. And having 150 other Iowa students there made a huge difference. A friend from my home town went along, (you apparently don’t have to be a student to go on the trip,) but we also hung out with the kids in the next condo. It’s nice having a bigger group to ride with and it definitely makes a difference when you’re passing time at night.

Sorry, this is getting so long that I’m getting bored, so I won’t bother concluding it.

END

-DN

Key:

• ABC = nicer wording
• [ABC] = omit for viewing pleasure

I’M BACK!

Ok, due to my most recent streak of laziness, I now have not just one but two whole months of my densely scheduled life to describe to my [small and indifferent (or non-existent)] very large and dedicated audience.

So, last post was one Dec. 2, 2010. Since then, I have: studied for finals, taken those finals, celebrated finishing my first semester, received marks for said finals, celebrated/cried over those marks, went home, snowboarded a ton, celebrated [Christmas] a politically correct, all-inclusive winter holiday, [snowboarded a lot more] visited family and friends, come back to school, gotten used to my new schedule, changed my major, created a whole new schedule, [snowboarded some more] studied, eaten [like 50 of the exact same meal] a wide variety of healthy food at Burge (my view of those meals has changed since my [illogically] positive post last fall)…

…finished all of tomorrow’s homework, thought I was going to go to bed early tonight, read my email for the tenth time today, found an email from the admission department, remembered my [imaginary] enormous fan base, started to write a real blog, changed my mind and started typing a ridiculously long list of unimportant things, fought with myself internally about the usefulness of posting such a list, decided that some [messed up] inquisitive reader may find it interesting, finished typing this list…

And that’s about everything I’ve done for the last two months. If you read all that, [I’m sorry] good for you. I’ll try to include a little more detail and a little less [absolute stupidity] silliness in my next post.

-DN

I say a lot of random things in here, but watch to see a tour of my freshly christmas-decorated room.

[youtubewd]M9T0mtP-BvI[/youtubewd]

Out of everything that has made my experience at Iowa amazing, the absolute best is the people with whom I’ve spent my free time. Around the third week of the semester, I had the pleasure of running into one of the best groups of guys I’ve met. All of them were charismatic. All were kind. There were freshman though seniors, studying all kinds of majors. Immediately, they all wanted to know everything about me and do anything they could to help my experience at school.

These guys live in a house by the river, and one Sunday they invited me and some other friends over to eat some food and hang out. We went, ate, talked, had fun and around ten o’ clock, we left, knowing that we wanted to go back the next day. The next few days, we kept going back and kept enjoying ourselves more than any of us had since arriving at Iowa. I got to know all the guys who lived in the house and all of the others who hung out with them.

That Friday, those guys invited us to dinner and then a party. It was great partying with so many people whom I actually knew. There were plenty of really nice girls, and I enjoyed talking to everyone.

After about a week of hanging out, we all decided that we could make ourselves better with a few commitments. We all agreed to study at the house for at least 5 hours a week. We ran a fundraiser there for ALS research. And all of us have participated in at least 4 (8 for the older guys) hours of community service.

I spent the last week living with these guys so we could all get to know each other better. We slept in the same room, ate, worked out, studied and hung out together virtually non-stop. We all had an awesome time, and bonded a lot. Now we know each other better than anyone, and though it may seem strange, we call each other brothers.

Yesterday I was initiated into Phi Delta Theta fraternity. After spending a few months bonding with all of my new brothers and learning about our history as a fraternity, I couldn’t be more proud to be a part of anything. We really are a family. There are over 70 of us, and I love every last one of them. I know there’s nothing I couldn’t tell or ask of them, and nothing they couldn’t tell or ask of me.

Too often, fraternities are thought of as party clubs, fitting of “Animal House” stereotypes. Some of us do party together, but we party because we’re friends; we aren’t friends because we party. Studying with the older members improves my habits and helps me finish my work. Requiring each other to complete community service work helps the community and makes every one of us better men. I have never made a better decision than to join my fraternity, and my confidence in that decision will only grow stronger over the next four years.

This won’t come as much of a surprise to anyone who understands public health well enough to know the consequences of combining poor sleep patterns, sedentary lifestyles, obscure diets and close living quarters; but a massive infection recently took over the University of Iowa. Fortunately unlike any of the usual outbreaks associated with college campuses, this one seemed to be quite enjoyable, both to the infected and those trying to avoid it.

Symptoms included an unnatural desire to chase uninfected students, unexplained vulnerability to white, cotton projectiles and death (or recovery, depending on how you look at it) after 48 hours of starvation. Despite their abnormal symptoms, these students–known by the larger body as zombies–appeared uneventfully healthy. They were most easily recognized by the bandannas worn around their heads and necks. Survivors wore similar bandannas around their arms.

Apparently, this epidemic was planned several weeks before the initial outbreak last Monday. Participants in the “Humans Vs. Zombies” game signed up online and received registration codes. When they woke up last Monday, they all tied bandannas around their arm, armed themselves with a large stock of “sock grenades,” and proceeded to class with caution. If they spotted a zombie, humans could either run indoors or on a bus (safe zones) or attempt to hit the zombie with a sock (stunning the attacker for 15 minutes). If tagged by a zombie, the human had to give up his or her registration code for the zombie to use to “feed” online. The sacrificed human then joined the zombie crew, and the zombie was able to live for another 48 hours without feeding.

By the end of the week, almost all of the over 600 players were zombies. Virtually every student on campus recognized the game and offered praise to the few remaining humans. This is a great example of some of the unofficial campus activities that make college so much fun.

Living on my own has been a big change, and I’d say I’ve, for the most part, handled it pretty well. I’ve completed my required assignments, eaten a decent healthy diet, and kept my room surprisingly tidy. But I decided last week that a lot of my habits need to be stepped up.

My sleep schedule, for example, has been completely mutilated. I sometimes get to bed sooner on the weekends after parties than I do on a weekday after homework. It’s not uncommon for me to finally decide to hit the hay at 2 a.m. on a Tuesday night, knowing that I need to wake up about five hours later. Part of this is a high level of activity. (As much as I hate to admit it, taking 18 hours isn’t quite as easy as I expected.) On top of studying, I spend a lot of time with my fraternity: either hanging out, volunteering around town or studying more. Add in two-hour Skype conversations at all kinds of times of day with friends back home, you can see why organizing my time is a challenge.

But my self-inflicted sleep deprivation is the result of more than just a busy schedule. I had pretty poor time-management. Between checking Facebook ten times per day, researching conspiracy theories and spending time blogging, I wasn’t devoting nearly enough time to my studies. This really hit me hard when I took my first Calculus II test and I realized that reviewing material might actually be worth my time.

Over the last few weeks, I’ve been redesigning my study habits. This has been a gradual process, and I admit that I’m still not a perfect student. (Last night was another late one, and my intake of this morning’s Calc lecture suffered because of it). But I’m slowly finding out what works for me. I’ve found that it’s really nice to get out of my quite room and overly-stimulating fraternity house, and do my studying in coffee shops and other stereotypical places. I’ve also started writing out a daily schedule next to my to-do list, which has helped much more than I would guessed.

I’m glad to have all of the necessary resources to make this transformation. Iowa City has a plethora of intriguing venues for studying, and my fraternity brothers have been helpful in improving my habits. I can’t imagine trying to make these changes without them.

The Hawkeyes lost last Saturday. That’s hopefully not news to anyone, but from what I saw, our losses extended past the gridiron and into the stands. Not only did our team lose, but our fans did as well.

I saw plenty of the expected harassment of visiting fans before the game. This didn’t bother me much. In fact, I’m not ashamed to admit that I participated. Football rivalries and offensive language seem to go hand in hand, and overall, they probably add to the the atmosphere of a much-anticipated match-up. There were plenty of slurs and insults thrown toward Wisconsin fans and their comically named mascot Bucky, but they all came right back at us with the same confident tone. Nothing seemed abnormal about the pre-game attitudes this weekend.

The real surprise came at the end of the game. After the clock ran down on an unfortunately uneventful final charge, the stadium lay silent. While the Iowa fans quietly coming to grasp that the game had truly ended in loss, the Badgers patiently allowed us to do so. Perhaps they were equally shocked, or maybe fans are raised with a bit more empathy in Wisconsin. It’s also certainly possible that they all saw the look in our eyes and decided that focusing our anger wouldn’t be a healthy decision. For whatever reason though, the Wisconsin fans didn’t say a word. There was no harassment, not even from the red-shirted Wisconsin students who had previously enjoyed arguing with the hundreds of loud-mouthed Hawkeyes in the student section. Overall, the Wisconsin fans were very humble in victory.

I wish I could say the same for the Iowa fans. I never would have imagined that anyone could be as arrogant in defeat as the students and alumni I watched returning to their cars. Though the large majority of us were at a loss for words, far too many still had plenty to say. The pre-game yelling continued, only now it was strangely one sided. I saw countless Wisconsin fans walk quietly and humbly while wild, rude and usually drunk Iowans told them they sucked.

University of Iowa Football is known for its dedicated fans, but this time, things were taken too far. Sometimes we ought to just accept defeat and move on. Wisconsin fought a good game and Iowa did too. It’s unfortunate that our fans had to add to an understandable loss on the field with an inexcusable defeat in the stands. I know that we’re better than that, but last Saturday, I wondered if “badgering” shouldn’t be called “Hawkeyeing.”

-DN

When I saw the plan for spirit day, my first thought was, “That would be really cool, but it’ll never work.” Striping Kinnick Stadium with UI’s glorious colors seemed like an awesome idea; I just thought it would be impossible to get 75,000 people to follow the plan. It turns out that I was way wrong, and when I walked into the game, I was absolutely blown away.

All around the stadium, fans were sorted into perfect bands of black and gold, changing color about every 15 yards. Every section was perfect. As much as a yellow shirt would stick out in a sea of black, it’s obvious that virtually everyone got it right. Of course, the game itself was just amazing–there’s nothing like watching an Iowa game from the Hawks’ Nest. I can’t imagine a more perfect conclusion to homecoming!

It may sound odd, but an interesting part of college life is going home. I’m heading back this weekend, and I can’t wait to see my friends and family or watch another high school football game. I’m looking forward to a few days of busily running around everywhere trying to see everyone before I have to leave, only 48 hours after my arrival. That’s not to say I don’t want to return to UI. I’ve been having such an awesome time here that time has flown by. The thought of missing a weekend of Iowa City night life is almost regretful.

College students are known for the mountains of food that they consume on daily basis, and even with a brand new multimillion-dollar rec center, staying in shape can involve a lot of self restraint. There’s simply too much great food available. For one, there are two residence halls that serve food daily for those with meal plans. Burge is on the east side of the river, (where all of the undergraduate classes, offices and all the coolest students are), and Hillcrest is on the west side (where they stick things like the graduate programs, athletic complex, lamer students and that burgeoning metropolis of a hospital that’s consuming the campus).

In the mornings at Burge there are tons of toasters, waffle irons and cold cereal for those who like to do things themselves as well as plenty of hot food, including everything from french toast sticks, to sausage links, to a personal omelet bar. They’ve also got tons of fruits, juices and a million toast and waffle toppings.

Go back in the afternoon or evening and you’ll find pizza, pasta, Asian food and all of the do-it-yourself options from the morning. There are also different items put out each day such as hamburgers, hot dogs chicken parmesan, steak, and a million kinds of soup.

Hillcrest is pretty similar except (in my opinion) 10 times better. Like I said, it’s all the way over on the (well, I’ll just stop at “west” this time) side of campus, but it’s worth the trek. I think the food is a little better, (completely different pizza recipe, soft-serve ice cream, CHOPSTICKS!) the view is much nicer, and the thing that really gets me is the plates. They’re ridiculous. The mexican food has fiesta-ware-style bowls, the italian has a black and white check around the outside of the plate (very Italian classy!) and I can’t even describe the asian plates and actually do them justice. Just trust me; they’re cool. Maybe I’m making too big of a deal out of this. (They are plastic after all.) But it’s the little things that count, and Hillcrest has got the little things down.

It doesn’t stop there. Right next to campus is the Old Capital Mall, complete with, I think, seven restaurants. Just to the east is the downtown, with way to many eating establishments to count, (though most of them are bars, which I can’t enter after 10pm thanks to some recent misguided legislation…but don’t get me started with that). There are also tons of street vendors on game nights serving everything from corn dogs to, well, it’s pretty much stuff like corn dogs…but it’s nice. I really think all of that needs another post, but there is one place in particular that I know I will be discussing in more detail sometime in the future. It’s called the Hamburger Inn No. 2. It seems to be a family-owned diner just east of campus. Can’t wait to write that post (hopefully with photos.) Till then, I’ll be living it up and expanding my waistline in Burge and Hillcrest.

-DN