First week Back Home

Being back home is always weird. First off, it feels like you have never left or have only been away for maybe a few days. But in reality I was away from home for 4 months. This happened to me when I came home for the Christmas break too. But this time things are hot...very hot, and all my friends are still in school.

Monday morning I got up, excited for the day and my first day working for the hooks. I wanted to go work out but being sick kept me out of the gym. However, I was asked to go to the Hook's office early that day to see the park, meet everyone, and to get some office work done. So I got there at 10 am and I was able to meet everyone and check out the ballpark. I have been there before but this time I was able to see all the background stuff. Real cool and real simple. Then I went to clean and tape balls. We have this thing called Grande ball day. Grande is a cable provider down here. Once a monththey have this ball day. They sell baseballs for a dollar a piece. All the money goes to charity. After the game they put a bucket out on the field and everyone tries to throw the balls into the barrel. Whoever makes it into the barrel shares a $1500 dollar prize. So I had the joy of preparing the balls. First off I had to clean the balls used from the last time. Each ball had a four digit number on it. I had to copy that number on a ticket stub, and then tape that little ticket stub on the ball. That way whoever bought the ball would taire the stub off the ball and then throw the ball. Then the balls that landed in the barrel would have their numbers called and matched with the ticket stub. So I worked on that from 10:45 am to 3 pm. At 2 pm I had done 900 balls by myself before more people came to help.

Since I am ballpark entertainment, I usually will have to get there at 3pm. So at 3 I stopped doing balls and started with my daily duties. We hung posters of the sponsors of the day and put up the player score cards and did all the little things to get the game going in relation of us. At 5:30 we open gates and greet everyone in. At 6:30 we go nuts. We start going all over the stadium looking for people to do promotions. We send all the information up to the press box where our main man and the PA announcer are waiting for all the information. Then we carry on the game plan the entire night. We do everything, from asking questions to holding competitions to throwing out shirts to going out into the crowd and making cheers. My first day was so much fun. It was fun cause I was learning on the fly and because my job is just fun period. After the game we say bye to everyone, clean up our equipment, take down sponsor posters, talk abut the next day, and take off. I usually leave between 10:30-11pm. It was great.

The next morning I went to lift. I go to the Corpus Christi Athletic club. It was a hard workout. I forgot how much you sweat in this humidity in Corpus. Its ridiculous. It was a hard workout. Got other work done. Then went to work again. Got to the ballpark at 3pm. Did everything as usual and the game went on. This game went by real slow. The next thing you know it was the bottom of the 9th and we tied the game. And on we went to extra endings. 10th, 11th, 12th. We werejust cheering with the crowd, trying to keep them interested even though it was past midnight. We finally ended up having a fly ball to the left field getting through the player and bounced over the fence for a home run at the bottom of the 13th inning. It was a long game. We were lucky it was Grande ball day. All those balls I cleaned were sold the entire game. So people who bought the balls had to wait all those 13 innings to throw their balls. It really helped keep people in the stands. The ball time was great. balls from everywhere. Only 3 people made it into the barrel. Over a 1000 balls got their duty. I got back home like at 1:30 am.
You can read about the game here:
http://www.caller.com/news/2008/apr/23/cosbys-clutch-hit-lifts-hooks/

I was off for the last 2 homes games on Weds and Thursday. I like to put Weds cause I always mess up spelling wednesday. So I cheat. But anyhow, I had those days off. I ran for the first time back in Corpus on Weds. And man was it hard! So frustrating for 2 reasons: 1 it is super hot and humid here in Corpus. 2 I was out of shape b/c of being sick and not being able to do anything physical for a week. The combination was ugli! I was slow and dying from the heat. I went in the shower and had cold at full blast on my face and wrists trying to cool off and unsuccessful.

On saterday my brother had his high school formal. I graduated from Annapolis Christian Academy. I went to those formals in my days. They were alright. So we dropped him off and went to the boat show. We saw some cool cars, like porches, mazeraties, and a ton of yachts. We went to the end of the yachts and we saw this huge, 125 foot yacht. It was crazy big. Only really useful for parties, I would think. We were told they have had over 100 people on it before. The yacht had 12 rooms and took a 6 man cru to opperate. It used 50 gallons of petrol on cruse and 150 on top speed an hour. Some lawyer out of Galviston bought the 2000 year build yacht for $8.3 million dollars.


That was cool but not as cool as the yacht next to it. This 50 foot yacht was pimp. We were able to climb into it and go on the top part and sit down. It was so peaceful up there. We went down into the cabin and it was so cool. The captin's chair was like a thrown filled with cushions, dials and a nice wheel. There was a grill and a mini kitchen and 2 rooms and a bathroom too. The lounge area was surprisingly roomy. I can just see it now, get one of these suckers and put a plasma tv in the lounge area, invite friends over, so fishing or swim during the day, play cards on the top or play video games in the lounge, grill up some food, and chill for the night in whatever you can lay on. That would be so much fun. This boat was the coolest. Its price was over $1 million dollars, but the boat special brought it down to $959,000. Not bad, eh? Yeah right! But....if I ever did get the cash, I would try to buy one of these things at 70 feet and have a special compartment for my Lotus and a few bikes. Then me and Ed, my best friend/brother, would just cruse along the eastern bay, hanging out in the city in our Lotus and come hang out with new friends in the Yacht. It would be so much fun. Doubt that will ever happen, but hey, it would be cool. You have to admit.

We went to peir 99, a real good outdoor seafood place. Good stuff. Even though the Celtics somehow lost to the Hawks. That night I hung out with some friends at a lame bonfire at the beach. Yes, we have beaches here at Corpus. I got back home at 3 am. On sunday the suns and spurs played again. Now the 3rd game the spurs played perfect. Everything you want in a team they did. Parker was on fire, scoring a career high 41 points and added 12 assists in a 115-99 win over the Suns. The suns played their heart out, but when playing a great team who played perfect with a great coach (which Detroit doesnt have...), they are unstoppable. The suns had no luck for this perfect game to be #3. So the 4th game was on sunday afternoon and the Suns just took off. They had this big lead going into half time. The next thing I know my mom wakes me up at 5:15 telling me that mass was at 6. I was like, wow, I just missed the entire second half because I slept through this boring game on the couch. There was like 3 minutes left in the 4th before the Suns won a 105-86 game.

Shaq and Nash had no answer to Tony Parker going All-Star on them

After mass I went to my good friend's birthday party. Since I graduated, I was on the non-annapolis basketball team. I got on fire and was leading the scrappy, non-basketball playing squad against an all ACA Warrior basketball squad to a 21-6 game. We killed them. And they all play on the school team. And none of my guys did. Heck, they were all homeschoolers. And I am an old 19 year old guy fresh from his first year of college who played 6 years of varsity basketball and 5 years of varsity 6-man football and am now a basketball manager for the University of Michigan Men's Basketball team. And we killed them. Sweet, sweet victory.

So the week was good. First week back and a lot has happened. I am off from baseball till the 3rd of May, next saterday, when the team comes back from traveling. So I got the week off, and we will see what happens! Cheers -DP

End of school maham

Well Fokes....I was so busy these past 2 weeks that I didnt even have time to stop by and say hi! It was terrible! Work coming out of my nostrils and all other bodily openings! Its wasnt even funny! But alo, I am here now. And so we begin

School was nuts. My Movement Science 110 final was pretty good. Hard, but I got a B. Overall in the class I got a B. Thats great at Michigan. I studied a lot for my econ101 final. Of course I should have studied more, but I picked up some extra shifts on friday and saterday...I wont tell you how much I worked those days, but I will tell you that they were a lot. So of course when those days were gone, I killed my butt studying for econ101 all sunday, monday and tuesday. I worked and worked, and it seemed I was getting the concept down...and I really was, really, but then that blasted last exam came around tuesday night and the rest was history. It was so hard. I didnt know what was going on. It was definitely harder than the last exams covering the same material. There were 33 questions. 10 were true/false, and the rest were multiple choice. I had to guess on 6 of them, completely guess b/c I didnt know what the heck was going on. They would show you a graph of the marginal cost tell you the average total cost was at minimum, and expect you to advise the monopoly whether they should increase or decrease output, increase or decrease price, and that was if you said stay open in the first place! Baaa! So essentially I guessed 6/23, thats like freakin 25%! It was terrible! I wanted to kill someone! But I was too tired and brain dead to do so! I turned in my exam to my GSI and told her it was butt hard. She said it was surprisingly hard for her too...which tells you something....

After the exam that tuesday night I went strait to the St Mary end of year dance thingy. It rocked as usual. I went to the Christmas one and had a blast, and this one was swell as well (thats a rimmer!). At first I was so frustrated about the exam, so my friend Devon took me up stairs and we wrestled to get the frustration out. I beat him real fast, but it did a great job of getting that frustration out. I was going crazy in the dance again. My dancing skills have improved leaps and bounce since last year, no joke, really, like I can actually dance kinda now. You have to believe me (Arce and Casey). I have been working diligently to get some some, natural moves down, and I am at the level were I can just hit the floor and not worry about how undanceful I am any more. Good stuff

Weds they had a barbecue at my dorm, and when they do something like that at Bursley on North Campus, its a big deal, cause we have over 1000 students living there. So in stead of getting there when everyone else would, I went to lift and came back at the end, and there was still a huge line. But I played some football and stuff...you just had to stay out there cause the weather was so good! Finally Michigan turned sunny! Finally Ann Arbor came to its amazing spring self! I mean, sure the leaves were not out yet, but hey, the temperature was a perfect 72 degrees, with the sun out not too bright, with a smooth breeze, and I could go on and on, cause it was perfect. So I spent a little too much time with my friends, but it was worth it.

(Me and Marc, my buddy from Cameroon that lived right next to my room)

So I did finish classes and my last final on tuesday, the 15th of April. But I had 2 papers due at noon on friday. I also had to pack all my storage boxes and my boxes shipping back home for the 3-5 pick up on friday. So I was flying, trying to get through this paper as fast and as good as I could. I had the great idea of playing tennis with on of my buds there, Eugene, and we played out in the sun from 11:30 to 2pm. I lost the first set 6-2, it was pathetic. But I lead in the second match starting 2-0. We tied 2-2, then I lead 4-2, then we tied 6-6. We fought back and forth and then I finally lost 9-7. It was crap. SO close! It was my first game in ages. But the sun killed me as I always does, and Im not just talking about the sun burn. I got a massive head ache. It was terrible. I wanted to do nothing but sit around the rest of the day. But I had to work. And then I had to write my papers. I ended up taking an hour and 1/2 nap b/c everything felt so weak. Then I wrote some more and more until I finished at 2:30 am. Then Eugine came back to taunt me cause he beat me and b/c I looked so tired and weak and he only needs 3 hrs of nap time a day. And with that I began to clean! And Pack! and Clean! And then I died at 5:30. I got up at 7, packed a little more, then took a 1/2 hr nap, packed packed packed, and then I left at 10:30 to go to my meeting. I dropped of my 2 papers and went to my meeting at cottage inn with the St Mary NCSA (Newman Church Student Association). Then I went back, packed like a freak, cleaned and was done by 3:45, just like I needed to. I had 3 boxes for shipping, 2 of storage, 1 plastic container of storage, and a cleaned refrigerator for storage. I had way too much crap with me. After that, I went to drop off some stuff, picked up my suitcases from a friends house, and went to the Briarwood mall with Annika before she leaves forever back in Germany. I was lucky enough to borrow a friend of mine's car. Matt is awesome- just for the record. He wants to start his own gaming developing firm, so all you should buy the games he makes, cause he is a great guy. I will remind you guys in the future, so dont worry about it too much now. So I did all my errands, got back and packed my bags, or tried to squeeze everything that was left in those bags, and then died again. I was kinda sick cause of the sun/lack of sleep, so that night was not pleasant. But considering it was more than the last few days combined, it was nice. I was sleeping on a bare matrice cause everything was already shipped. I stole Pete's blanket, my roommate (no, pete is my roommate, not the blanket silly!) and that helped a little. I did wake up a few time drenched in sweat. I was sleeping in the same clothes I wore all day cause thats all I had. I got up that morning, tried to figure out what to do to sign out, and finally left with Miriam Torrez, my awesome Godmother who took me to the airport. This was the first time American Airlines has ever been good to me. I actually got to Corpus on Time and with all my luggage! A miracle indeed!

W3ll, being back in the hot, humid Coprus was strange, but kinda nice. My dad and two younger bros, Christopher (AKA Skunk...dont ask) and Michael (Aka Sumo/Mega Wario) were jumping up and down to greet me. Michael even had a shirt that said "MR. HAPPY" and had a smiley face on it, haha. We went back home to see my mom and Carlos (AKA HotDog), oh, and the dog (Pepper, the only other female in the house). My dad finally decided to complete his Texaness and bough a grill. He loves grilled food, he just doesnt like the smell afterwards on his clothes and hair (Weak Sauce!), but he finally got one. So we grilled and ate outside by the pool and fountain and chatted the night away. Then of course we watched basketball together. Thats kinda my imprint on the family. I love to watch NBA, especially the playoffs, and since the playoffs began this saterday, we watched some of the first few games to come. Those darn spurs! GRRRR! I give Tim Duncan credit, but looser Manu Ginobli had to make the game winner to lead the Spurs over the Suns by 2 points in double overtime. And then the rockets just flopped. It was ugli. We will see what happens in the future.

Ok guys, I think I have spoken long enough. I had a lot to fill you in. Upcoming is my first week in Texas, including my new job with the Corpus Christi Hooks, so we will see how that goes. Also, more playoff action ahead, and who knows what else! Adios! -DP

Birthday and Retreat!

Hello, everybody. This was a spectabulous week. So much happened. The highlights were of course my birthday, my SM101 presentation, and the St Mary retreat. Other stuff happened here and there as well, such as the weather flirting with Spring but not quite, but yeah, whatever.

(My Birthday gift from my awesome Michigan Mother, Mrs. Seromic)

BIRTHDAY!!!!!
So my Birthday was pretty good for the most part. I was super busy. I didn't have time to breath. So, just for you guys to know, my birthday is April 2nd, so I just had it this past Wednesday. And I am now 19! Yeah! I woke up early, studied. Went to class. Studied, studied. Went to Basketball practice. Got back up North Campus. Studied, studied, studied. Then I worked on the Website a little till it was finished. And then I headed over to the Blue Apple where I cleaned dishes from 9pm till close, which was about 1:45 am. Then I went back and crashed. Yeah, it was a killer cool birthday. I was really happy to turn 19. I got a lot of wishes from friends. And facebook went crazy. I was getting an email on my phone about a new wall message at a rate of a message every 5 minutes. It was insane. And I got over 80 birthday wishes! You guys did great! Lets see if we can top that off next year! So for the most part, my day was cool. When John, the dude who runs the Blue Apple heard it was my birthday, he said, "Daniel, why are you working out tonight? Why didn't you get a sub? Why didn't you go to Canada and do stupid things like everyone else does?" And I was like, "cause I don't do stupid things, and plus, I work hard." "That you do, Daniel, that you do," he said laughing away. So yeah, it was pretty funny.

Presentation

My SM101 presentation went fantastic. My group went first, and I was really pumped about it. The rest of my group did fairly good, they were really organized and on top of things, but they were a bit bland in their actual speaking. People were looking tired, but that had more to do with it for the fact that they did not want to be there and rather be sleeping. So anyhow, I went up there, full of energy like I usually do. I was going off, not even noticing my note cards. I showed them the website and pretty much went of there. We finished and they all thought we did really good. Our Teacher, Mrs. Donahue, said that we really set a high standard, so that is a good sign. Everyone thought our website was awesome, and so do I :)
Check it out here: http://www-personal.umich.edu/~dpinedo/WC_Home_Page_index.html

Laudatio Retreat
The St. Mary Retreats never disappoint. I lead the first one I ever went in October last year and it was so good. For those of you who don't know, I am a Catholic, and I love the faith. God touched me so much the last retreat. Well, I got on way beyond the registration deadline, and I am glad I did, because once again, it was awesome. Had a lot of fun with all the talks, my small group, and playing ultimate Frisbee in amazing weather, and being a goof ball all the time. The retreat was about the beatitudes, and my group leader, Mikey, was "on those who are persecuted." I had great group people.

(Mikey and me in the middle, in between two other cool people, Maggie and Brian)

(My awesome small group...our theme: Blessed are the persecuted...and in this case, it is Mikey...)

There were 53 people in the retreat, including me, much larger than the 24 from last time, so there were a lot of new faces and for the most part, I didn't get through all of them. I know, I feel bad about it, but what can I do? I hung out with some of the older people, the seniors, like Andrew, and with Devon of course, a junior. I hung out with my German buddy, Annica. She is a graduate foreign exchange student with an awesome accent and will unfortunately be leaving for good in 4 weeks. I also meet this cool girl named Laurel, and she just joined the church on Easter Vigil! The mass we had Saturday night was only her 3rd time to share at the table. I thought that was so soo cool.

(Annica sitting next to me and Laurel in the back couch)

(Me and some friends at the retreat)

And I hung out with a lot of other friends, like Albert and Sarah and Mike and and and... yeah, a lot of other dudes. I had a fantastic time. I was really being crazy. Saturday Sarah made like a little Mohawk from Andrew's clayish gel right before her talk, so I went in to do my own creation, because I could, and plus, it was a retreat, so I could get away from it...but, it didn't quite work. My hair is really weird and Nothing would work. So I just made a pointy thing in the centre of my head, but it wouldn't stand. So I grabbed one of those small drinking/rinsing cups, cut everything but the bottom of the cup, and then cut a hole in it. So I put this ring of cup around my pointy hair thing to hold it up while it hardened. Well, later I found out that it didn't work so well, so I looked stupid for the entire day. Haha, plenty of pictures to go around on that. So yeah, great retreat, a lot happened, the weather became awesome, and I cant wait for the next retreat!

(The 2007-2008 NCSA Council)

(me just being stupid)

Well guys, I could go on forever, and when I mean forever, I mean forever. But, fortunately for you guys, I will not. Sorry that I went picture frenzy on you guys. I will say that I love the weather! It is awesome! It is 60 degrees with the sun out and a light Northeast breeze. Oh my gosh! Amazing! I went for a run and was just staring at all the trees and great nature stuff to be seen. I cant believe I go to Michigan when it is cold and come back to South Texas when it is hot. But that is cool, because in exactly 2 weeks from today, I will be back home in Corpus. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is cool. So I am excited for summer. I told you I could go on forever. One more thing though -- I calculated that the number of days I have for school including classes and finals is 6 days...yeah, 6 says. Rediculi. I cannot wait. But the amount of work between now and 2 weeks is huge! Comon Daniel, only 2 weeks, you can do this....

Cheers guys, and I pray for an awesome 19th year -DP

(Who's your Daddy?!)