finals, class reviews, and a little girl cat fighting

Finals...they were nice. I had them all and I conquered each one of them. It was great. ONe for breakfast, one for snack time, one for dinner...and then a few days later one for dissert. Here are my evaluations on my 5 classes:

organization of sport organizations...2
-the class was a joke...how to relate to other people in your organization. Granted people do not know how to do that these days because they were never taught how to share their candy when they were 4 so we have to take these classes to know how to talk to people who have different personalities. Its a good class to sleep in and as long as you really read all the material before all the exams you should be fine. I liked the presentation section. The teacher was kinda bland but he was a graduate student so this review only covers the concept of the class...with is 2 out of 5

strategy of sport organization...3
-the class was alright, a little bit better than organization. There was a lot of material and all of it taken from harvard business school. It had good material, but not enough to cover the entire semester. In my opinion this class could have been united with organization to make a more condenced class. The proffesor was really into her subject and tried to make it very difficult, but thats how most female teachers are...passionate...about assining tones of readings...of how to help the enviorment...yea....

economics of sports...4
this class was very interesting. It was economics but it made sence since it was adapted to sports. very interesting class. The professor was some big time that made his own books and was also the advisor of economics related to sports for congress and other big organizations. He really was big time. But he woudl jsut talk and talk in class and it was so amusing and interesting it easy hilarious. Best part was all the quizes and the one final were open book. Love it

sports law...5
this class was it. I lvoed it. it was my eraliest at 8:30 but I relaly enjoyed the class. It was all law stuff applied to sports. It was grea.t I just had to take notes non-stop and follow as detailed as I coudl but I really felt educated. I did really well in this subject too, probobly since law runs in my blood. Top things were the class was always let out at least 15min early and that he gave you reviw questions that were mostly what was on the exams. Iddnt have powerpoint but that was feasable with notes and light reading

rocket science...3
good class. blow off class. took it for fun with 2 manager buddies and one basketball player, witch says a lot. I enjoyed the class, very educational. It was a class were you could either sleep, got to get amused by the nerdy professors weird jokes, or just do something else. Everything was on the slides and th weekly quizes you could do with your notes and the exams were just the material on the slides online. Fun class. Interesting. And not too shabby. Recommended.

So that is how my finals went. And the classes. And now I am done...forever...in these classes. Time to regrister for new stuff and all that dandy stuff. Yea, so I am goig to stop radling here and let you go on with your every day life.

Now for those who missed the action, a few weeks ago we saw some examples of women agression. Now many people overlook how tough and roudy women really can be. Some just dont notice that women can be plain mean. Well, I got somethin here you might want to see to recalculate your perception of women athletes. They can fight and run and score...and pull you down...by your hair

Final Times at Ann Arbor

Well that time of year is here, that it is ending soon. And for some reason everything starts to pile up on you, very very quickly. It started out with a ton of school work, studying and writing papers for all my classes, but I also was able to go to two orchestra concerts, a St. Mary Dance and had a mini dance party at Rina´s house with a couple of buddies. Like to dance salsa or swing? Well, we got you covered! Hahaha it was good to spend time with them before I left. But it was also physically exhausting as I started to get sick in the mix of all the packing and studying and hanging I had to do.
What a memorable time!

The Saint Mary Dance with Mark and Ashley

Me Mark and Brad goffing off
at Rina´s garage

I also had my chatecism kids´First Communion. I had worked with these kids all year,w orking for their first reconsiliation the first semester and their first communion for this semester. I had 5-6 graders and after they figured out I am a cool guy, we started to get really into it. They ended up understanding everthing within context of the scripture and tradition and they began to asnwer so many good quality questions that I am not even accostomed to hear from adults. It was great. And then we had rehersal Friday afternoon and the big mass Saturday. I was so proud of my kids: they were ready to recieve Christ for the first time because of all the work I put into them; they were a product of my hard work and focus. It was awesome that I had a direct effect on their lives and they will always carry that. Wonderful. I wish I had as cool a chatechism teacher as they had.

My Catechism Kids

I have to tell you of my intence philosophy paper. It was over Averroes and his question of wether or not God, an unchanging and eternal being can know the changing and temporal world. The argument goes that if God never changes, how can he know things that do change, like the wether, our beleifs and events. How can his knowledge be one even though knowledge must change according to the change of the world? Anyhow, that was my topic at hand and I had to adress a few issues and at the end I made an awesome 2200 word paper. IT was sweet. Took a lot of work and ended up working up till I had to turn it in. Success is beautiful.

This past week I was loaded as well. Friday was hectic. It was the UCO Final. John asked me to make the slide show. So I started to work on it first thing after my Stats final. It took me all week to study for the sucker and I think I did aweful. But you can only do so much. So I worked a lot on this slide show, from that night till 3am then started first thing the following day and went all the way to 5:20. And I was like awwww, dang it! It was the first time all year that we had 80 degree wether and I was shut up all day in my room working on the slideshow. But it was done and even though the event started at 6, I wanted to play ball! So I did! I went out and owned on the blacktop and then get in like at 6:20 and showered and changed and grabbed my magic props and then left to the place. And it was a beautiful day, just wonderful. And the slideshow went wonderful as well. Check it out and tell me what you think.

After being there for a while I took off cause I had a magic show...yes! I had a magic show! First one in a while! Like a year and a hlaf! For those of you who dont know I did magic professionally for 3 years from 10th-12th grade in high school through the summer until I began college, and once I got here I was so involved with classes and the christian community and basketall that there was just no time. But since things were loosining up here at the end I figured out I could take a show and thats just what I did. I grabbed my bag and left the finaly a bit early and got my game face on and went over to the place. And it was AWESOME! I got there and they delayed it for a while so I got to meat all the people there and get comfortable before I started. And then I went all out, which was only appropriate because the host also went all out. They decorated the whole appartment with magic themed stuff and even had magic potion and magic streamers and a magic flag and had a fog machine that went off for my entrance and after each trick. And they went nuts! They loved it! YOu have no idea! There was so much anticipation going into the show, especially scine most people didnt beleive there was an actual magician that was going to perform. But once I got started, epople were ready and went bonkers! Complete bonkers! Lets just say that I amde a lot of friends that night and had another fan club started here in Ann Arbor. It was great. Absolutely great.

DP the Great!!!

As that face attests, I dazzled everyone

What can I say?
I get a fan club everywhere I go

Saturday, the 24th we had a surprise birthday aprty for Rina who is truning 19. We got one of friends Chris Flanagan who has a bike to pick her up for a short ride and then instead bring her to the huron river where the gang was there awaiting. Then we got conoes and took off. It was so much fun! Then of course it started to rain and hail and thunderstorm, and of course the girls got scrared so we had to go to the side of the river and that ment of course that I had to drag the boat back mostly by myself. Hahaha it was such an adventure and I had so much fun. After that we went to Mark´s house to celebrate and that was good times.

The Survivors

Rina´s response to her guitar birthday cake

Sunday I went to Christ the King for the last time and then went to packing, or trying to pack. Always so much stuff going on its so hard to get down to it. And that followed on monday. I was working on packing. I fannialy got my boxes so I went to work. I had 3 medium to ship with books and shoes and some clothes and 2 large ones to pack with jackets and winter clothes and bedding. And my roomates that are in that same philosophy class were studying up a storm. But I went to a party instead. I went to this blueplex party in Ypsi. Its the women´s household there and they were having an end of the year party cause Eastern Michigan was done with the school. And that was cool. Got to hang out with some women that I have never met before and chill with the guys.

Blueplex party

Tuesday was weird. I woke up and I wasnt feeling good. Like at all. I got up early to start studying on my exam. I was up by 8 and went to study. And all of assuden I feel asleep at 11...and then woke up at 1! I was like, holy cow! ANd right then I get a text message from Will the Head Manager to come meet him at the office to get my Letter Jacket! So I run over and we got to Schembeckler Hall were football is and I got my jacket right away! And It looks tight! Just thing, I will always have this jacket. It is something that I can wear and have and is a simbole of Michigan and I am apart of that great legacy. I see old men come to Crisler all the theime wearing their old letter jackets. Some day I can too. THis is awesome, a distinction, a recognition that I can keep forever. Really really cool. Ad no, its not just like a high school letterman, this si a varsity Michigan Letter Jacket. Its ligit; the real deal.


Then I was on the move again. I shipped my 3 boxes with the help of Bethie. Then I had to go back and forth and get stuff done. And then I took a nap. Slept for liek another 2 hours. I really was feeling light headed and buzzy and my stomach was not good. But I kept on moving cause I had too. Then the dormtroopers went to go play lazertag cause there was a tuesday special. And of course I wanted to go and show my aweful colour blind skillz. But I was still feeling really bad. But you either live happy or die tryin, so that what I did. And it was fun and I didnt do as bad as I thought I would. THen some of my buddies came over to the Dude for the last time to hang with me. Of course there were the dudes but also Rina, Ashely and Bethie and her sister Sarah. It was like the last time we would see eachother to perhaps late August. So we made the best of it makeing fun of eachother in scategories. It was great haha and Brad is so FUNNY! Finally whern his girlfriend left that boy is amazing! He is so funny and so much fun to be with. Dang, Bethany should just stay up there and let Brad be Brad! Jealousy?...yeah, you could say that. But dang he was so much fun. It was a pretty emptional goodbye but its all good, Ill be back in 4 months!



Weds was another full day. I woke up feeling aweful. No work out. Study. Study...cant dang it! I had to pack them last boxes and clean. THen I had to go to the basketball office one last time to pick up some things. Then I had to get a blue book and then this and that. So I finally get to Angell Hall super worn out super tired and sucked out of energy and I had 30 minutes to get ready for my final, of which 10 were spent in the bathroom. Yeah, it sucked. But the final didnt turn out to bad, nt at all. They were either short essays or long essays which allowed me to explain myself. And what was better yet, even thoug I didnt get to go over the topics study wise, I was able to talk and explain most of them with MArk and Ashley the day before. So I had at least thought of responces and I just wrote them out! Wow, that was awesome! Thank God.

But the day was far from over. I got back and did my best to finish packing my boxes for storage. Everything that was not in those boxes had to go with me on the plane. I called Bethie and she came by to take me and the boxes to the Caldwells. That was funny too cause I played a little joke with Rina, saying I was not going to be at her house to drop off the boxes but really went to surprise her only to find that she wasnt there because I told her I wouldnt be there haha. BUt then we found eachother and us 3 went on a tour of Eastern Campus. It is a very clean and nice looking campus, well, except for the dorms. THey have a lot more dorms than I thought they would, being a communer school. I thought, who would ever want to say they live int he dorms at Easter? hahaha. They looked like prison cells! THey really did hahaha. But the rest of campus was very nice and clean. It reminded me a lot of Delmar College here in Corpus. It was nice and modern and clean, but you know what, it had no passion, it had no soul, it had no antiquity of style that really shone off to the rest of the campus. It was not beautiful or while or charming like the Ann Arbor Campus. It was not alive. But thats ok; not every campus has to be as cool as Yale or Notre Dame or Michigan. Haha

I got back to the empty dorm at 9pm to meet with the guys. It was our very last time that the fellowship of the Pentadude would be united. It was the last time. We went to David´s house and built a bon fire and talked and smoked pipes and chilled for a long time. It was great, becasue a lot of these guys are seniors that are moving on. And for the rest of us, well most are in household int he summer there in Ann Arbor but I am back in Texas. So either way, i might not see them for 4-8 months. It was a very special moment...well, besides the fact that I became super sick. My stomach was killing me and I was so light headed and dizzy and baaa it was awesful. I stayed next to the fire to stay warm. But when I left it I was shivering like mad even though I didnt feel that cold. I dont know...all I know was that it was my last night there in Ann Arbor and it was suppose to be super cool but I was feeling awful but I tried to make the best of it.

Last time, baby!
The Pentadude will live forever in our hearts!

Of couse I got back at the Dude at 2:30am and slept in my bare matrice in my clothes and zipper hoody to stay warm. I got up at 6am to get my bags and meet my godmother, Miriam Torrez and drive to the Detroit Airport. And it all worked out. I had to make sure my luggage would change with me cause I was going American half the way and Contenental the rest. And of course I was stuck in the plane for an hour and a half on the runway with American (cause American sucks, every time) and then missed my other flight and got back to Texas 2 hours after the original plan, but the fact was that I was back, in Texas, that once used to be my home and now where I reside for 4 months of the year. It felt like I haddnt been gone. I felt like I jsut seen my parents and brothers, even though my brothers looked taller and my parent slooked older, haha, but you get the picture. It was good to be home, in hot, humid, and sun-killing flat Texas. Its good. Yee-hawww!!

Sweet Pre-Spring Break Week! 9th-15th Feb 09

What a week! I love these little gem weeks when you do just about everything imaginable in a short time span!

Tuesday we played against Michigan State. Now this was a dissapoinment. We had all been working so hard for this game. Well, for the most part that is. And hten State came in and was playing on the top of their game. Both teams were struggling scoring, but they were just mearcyless on the defensive end. They are so big and play so quickly that they completely shut out our offense. You can see that my the fact that we only had 15 in the first half! And Manny had his second bucket of the game wit a few inutes left in the game! They really shut manny out, but also our wings. They played a 2-3 defense, and since they were so big and quick they could cover the open 3 in a heart beat. So we ahd no open 3s, all contested, leaving us with a 4-24 3-point shooting. The only force we had, surprising ly enough for his small size, was Peedi, Deshawn Sims. He was the only one making consistent baskets, and it was impressive to have him shoot at such a high percentage. All in all, it was very dissapointing, and so much drama happened on the bench with cups spilling, running out of towels and players throwing up and bleeding; it was a mess. I yelled so hard and got intot he game so much that by the end of the game, and when I finally had to accept defeate, I was dead, truely worn out completely, as if I had played in the game. We will have to win on Sunda against Northwestern.

There I am on the bench

Weds I jsut studied all day. I had a stats exam for thursday and I had to be ready for it. Well, Thurday ame about and I didnt have nearly as much time that day as expected to study, which was a big annoyance as I had to cram in a lot of material and 2 practice exams in 2 short hours. Then I ran over to the undergraduate science building to take my exam. Now I was getting the concepts down, but I still had a difficult time distinguishing between what formulas to use, because we have like 4 different formulas to find th sample mean of a population proportion, so to know which one to use in a given question was difficult. I have no idea what I got, but we will see.

Right after the exam I literally ran over tto the dorm to meet up with my room mates to go to the Red Wings Hockey Game! I didnt really get to eat. I just went inot the caferteria to make a big turkey sandwitch and walked right back out. Ben got 4 slices of pizza and walked out. We all waddled over to David´s dads car and took off. We had 6 strong: me, david, ben, mark, alex, and todd (a dude that will live in the quad next year). I had tons of energy in the car and alex and mark took turns playing the beer pong application game on my iPhone. We drove to Detroit and thats when I saw a border patrol SUV and I was dazzeled to see one from all the way from Texas up in Detroit. That was until I was educated that they have a border patrol for Canada as well and that there was Canada across the Detroit River...wow, I had no idea.

The game was pretty fun. It is much better watching it live. I had a bunch of fun yelling the whole game. I was still horse from the MSU game so I am pretty sure my voice is getting wore every day progressibvly. My bad. But it was tons and tons of fun. We all placed bets who would make the first score and I picked #26 because that was my football number in high school. It was some ceck republic dude but low and behold he scored first! So I got a free pretzel from my firneds which I shared to everyone. The Wings ended up wining 4-2. Yeah, Go Wings!

Friday was a whole different ball game. And it was freakin sweet. Mark Pressprich, my good friend Mark, haha, well he told me as we were driving up Thursday that since I actually had nothing going on Friday night, that I ahd to go dancing with him, salsa dancing that is, the best type of dancing around. Well, I havent been salsa dancing in a while, alothough I love it, so I said sure, I would go. And wow, what a night! Originally it was going to me me, mark, Rina, and Bethie, but then their friend Adam from high school came and then Ashely showed up later at the Heidlerberg. And what a night! I was going all out with my moves. I danced with some of the loacals early on and then when it got dense and sweety around I sticked with out 3 girls and just had one of the most liberating fun on the dance floor I have every had. It was great to dance with them 3 and me and Mark had an asolute blast. We danced till like 2 and then we went outside to discover it was snowing again! It had just all melted away a few days ago, but now we had this thin layer of soft white snow.


We were kinda hungry and didnt want the night to end,s o we all drive over to Pizza House. Haha, we had so much fun as we talked about basketball (that was my fault, but hey, it was NBA AllStar weekend), school, nutrition, and NFP (Haha, I am not kidding). We kept having fun and being goofy and trying eachother´s deserts and wow, another great night was in development. Me and Mark were just going all out and yeah, awesome. I love going to bed at 4.

Which, speaking of which, we had to get up bright and early on saterday for the Valentine´s Girls Breakfast! So I hardl slept at all, my voice was gone, I was beggining to feel a little sick, and my knee was gone, and with little sleep I troddled over with Ben to Campus Chaple. I set up some of the food and coffe and I was in charge of entertaining the laddies as they got some pancakes and tried to pour the coffee. And then I joined Ben and Will to sing some songs to the ladies and it was awesome, hahaaha. And poor Mark slept in. We all knew he would. After that I got Alex tot drop me off at Crisler Arena for some practice. And after practice, inspired by the NBA Slam Dunk Contest that was going down tongith, all the players gave a few tries themselves at Dunking the ball, which led to us managers attempting to do as well. Haha, epic failier. After that I lifted even though I was feeling a bit tired.








I got back to the dorm like at 4pm. I took a shower and got some reading done and then Bethie came by to pick me up. We drove over to Borders in Ipsi where Rina works and did some of my History489 reading there...well, for a little, till I got distracted and wondered around the building, looked at sport car magazines (Top Gear, yeah!), tasted some hazlenut coffe and talked to Rina and Bethie. And then Mark joined us all of assudent, ready fot eh night. That night was the 80´s Valentine´s dance at St Mary, the one I made the poster for that was all over campus. He showed up with his look and was ready to go. We were laughing at this book called "How to get girls" that was written by a 9 year old! Hahaha. Check out an exlusive border´s interview here.

We drove back to the PentaDude and chilled ther trying to watch the NBA 3-point shooting contest and Slam Dunk contest, But it was taking forever tog et there and they had all their NBA Cares propoganda and it was really annoying so we just goofed off as I tried to get a costume up for the 80´s theme. I ended up wearing my one pair of jeans, stealing Bethie´s shirt (I kid you not), my gradnfather`s orange shirt and my saxophone tie around my head. It was epic. Haha, and together me and Mark went to conquer the land of the 80s. Ashely was there and so was my catechism partner Danny, and me and MArk were goffing off the whole night. The cool thing is that since none of us were there in the 80s, we can pull off whatever rediculous dance we want and get away with it, haha. And that is exsactly what we and mark did. But alas, because of the fatige, little sleep, working out, malnutrition (I forgot to eat lunch or dinner, haha, I know), no voice, little sickness, and the fact that we were up and slasing all night last night, we left early, haha, but not by much. I just wanted to sit down. So me and Mark, AKA Los Charros Borachos (thats right, and dont you forget!) went back tot he PentaDude and then killed some Nazi Sombes on Call of Duty IV World at War on the PS3. We ended up staying late anyways. But hey, it was fun.
Sunday....sunday sunday. It was one of those days that I got up and had hours blocked off for work, but since I finally had some time to myself, the first in weeks, and since I actually got to pull out my bible and devotional and spend some quality time with God, well, lets just say I lost about 3 hours doing that, haha, woops. Not really a bad thing, but I did loose a lot of time. And then I had to get ready for my afternoon living at St Marys. So I packed up my belongings and get my lesson plan ready and went for the large afternnoon. I had cathecism class with Danny and the kids, but the annoying this was that the Northwestern game was on and I couldnt watch it! We had to beat these guys! So I followed the entire game on my iPhone, but the game took foever! It went into my NCSA meeting, and since the game was close the entire game, it just kept getting longer and longer. The last 2 minutes felt like every rebound they would call a time out,a dn then there was a foul, and then we were up by 5, and then, woops, lets make them tied. And then alas, overtime. Overtime! Ahhh! I cant even watch the game! I am watching it closely on my phone and not even paying attention tot he meeting. I just kept nodding my head and tried to keep the facial exressions to a minimum. It was a constant struggle between hypervenelating and acting as chill as possible. And then we finally won and I just felt so relieved, like haha I was feeling relaxed. We won, and thats all that mattered. I played saxophone at mass with my hourse voice and then went back to the PentaDude where one more epic adventure awaited me.

Well, here is the deal. On Friday David turned 23, yes, I know, it is very old, but I non-the-less speak the truth. So the girls (rina and bethie) were going to make their epic cake for him, but the old man desided he was too old for school and took off Friday afternoon to go home. So we had to call that off. But the girls would not give up, no they wouldnt. So they reschedualed for Sunady night at 10ish. They showed up with this insane red flannel shirt cake, haha, and they brought Ashely along with them. But then we couldnt figure out when he would come back. And so we messed around with duck tape and fighting off the girls with their weird ways and watching the slam dunk highlights. And then Alex and Ben came back,s aying that they had men´s group and that David was talking and would probobly take forever. So in anticipation, and in our preparedness (is that a word?) he finally came and we busted out the cake and the knife and the fun and wow, it was so glorious. I even had an old man poem written for him with the aid of my new rhyming dictionary and that was pretty cool as well. All in all, it was great to have the trio girls over att he PentaDude and messing around with cake and duck tape, I mean, you cant go wrong with that. Haha. And then when they left us dudes could not end the night and so the Nazi Sombe slaing ensued and then I finally put all my stuff online and it was one amazing week. Wow. Haha. Cheers -DP


NBA Slam Dunk Contest Highlights