My weekend (Thursday evening)

Now, my plan to get a haircut failed because I just didn’t have the time to get off campus on Thursday night and be back in time for BBQ and games at 5:30. To say a few things about BBQ and games on the dining hall patio, I’ll think I’ll just that that the music was too loud to carry on even the slightest conversation and that the sun set so early that the ping pong tables and playing card packs were pretty much useless by 6:30. At this point, I retreated into the dining hall for a relaxing dinner with both faculty and students, where we ate our meal in peace and enjoyed each other’s company and conversation. Meanwhile, a group of about 15 juniors danced in a huddled pack right in front of the DJ and speakers, leaving at least 90% of the available courtyard space completely empty. Of course, this makes sense considering that Karaoke wasn’t scheduled to start until 8:00. At about 7:10 I walked out of the dining hall onto the dining hall courtyard where I ran into one of my good friends from the freshman class. I asked him how his evening was going and then informed him that I would be able to go on the Dibeen Forest trip after all (he had told me earlier that he was going and that he was sorry that I didn’t have time for it). He replied by saying that he weekend was going horribly and that he wouldn’t be able to go on the Dibeen Forest Trip because his Mother was feeling sick. I asked why he wasn’t enjoying his weekend, or at least the first night of it as I pointed out; and he told me that he was a five day boarder and that all of his friends had already left for the weekend (he was staying for the night. Since I was planning on spending my evening just doing laundry so that I would have more time for the rest of the weekend, I invited him back to my dorm to hang out with me. When I tried thinking of both something other than laundry that I needed do to as well as something that might cheer up this student, I thought of one thing: filling out me absentee ballot and voting for the president of the United States of America. While we (but mostly I )read and re-read both the English and Spanish directions to be sure that we knew what we were doing, the student game himself the talking cure, complaining about the imperfections of the school and asking questions about etiquette. These questions ranged in topic from appropriateness of asking someone about his/her religion to the proper phrasing and tone of questions and replies. When I had finally assured myself that I completely understood the ballot directions, I wrote in the name of my selected candidate, put the ballot inside its envelope, sealed and signed it, put that envelope in another envelope and then sealed that envelope. I gave my ballot to Tiffany Norman (Freshman Dean and teacher) today (October 13, 2008), and she is going to give my ballot and any other faculty member’s ballot/emergency ballot to the U.S. Embassy representatives who are coming to campus this weekend to pick them up. After I filled out my ballot, the student left and I did my laundry and made my bed.