Procrastinating as We Speak

The title is a little bit misleading... Yes, I am procrastinating, but I've also already done a lot of studying and put a lot of focused time into preparing for my impending doom that will come in the form of a Physics II exam at 5:30.  I'm extremely worried because after my last exam, which I thought went fantastically, I was disappointed to find out that I got a 48%. Woohoo! Yeah! Sweet! Not.

These exams are formatted in a seemingly simple fashion, but I suppose I must've been simpler than the test that day in order to get just less than half the questions correct... The teachers create and solve a set of sixty physics problems that have to do with the chapters that we've been "studying" and distribute their solutions via scholar.  Twenty-five questions "virtually identical" to twenty-five of the sixty solved problems will be seen again on the exam, AND, here's the kicker, we can make a formula sheet! Ah it seems so simple how could I have possibly screwed up so badly?

The night prior, a Thursday night, was the men's lacrosse teams first social of the year with the women of delta delta delta.  I had a grand ole time and at the end of the night I found myself sleeping on a sofa in the lacrosse house.  Thinking back on it, we had designated drivers... Why didn't anybody tell me that they were leaving before I fell asleep? Anyways, I woke up the next day around 8 AM on the day of the test.  Not too worried, I walked home with a little help from the Blacksburg Transit in the rain.  Once I got back to my apartment I crashed on my bed, planning on a two or three hour nap before my physics class at 12:20. But what do I do?? I overslept it! I overslept a class that started at noon! Way to go Andrew, that was just awesome.  Now it's one o' clock and I've got a test in four and a half hours and a hangover the size of an elephant.  I'd never been so out of it before.  So I texted my friend and hustled my way to Torgerson to get some studying done before my exam. Like today, I had my formula sheet finished with equations to every problem from the sixty problem set and I thought, what could go wrong? (not that things hadn't already) So i studied continuously in a haze for the next four hours and once I got out of my test I was confident. I'd never felt so good about a physics test in my life. Clearly it was false confidence as almost all the questions I missed were off by .1 or had the wrong sign in front of it. I didn't put enough information on my formula sheet to pick out the changes and make the necessary adjustments in my calculations.

But what's passed is past, I've got a much more in depth formula sheet today, got a little bit of sleep between studying until 2 AM and a workout this morning at 6:30 AM, and I'm totally sober and ready to take on exam two. Well, at least I think I am. I might be hyping myself up a little bit but I guess that's what I need since I've got to make this grade significantly better than my last one.

Better Ingredients, Better Pizza

Last Winter, and the beginning of this Summer found me working at Papa Johns Pizza. Yes, yes it is true. Better ingredients, better pizza is actually quite factual.  I've come to realize that after working at Papa Johns for around three months.  It really doesn't even compare, just look at the commercials of the competitors.  Pizza hut has their "Big Dinner Deal" which includes a square pizza, some breadsticks and something else for a very low price.  First off, you just can't toss dough into a square. That shit is pre-made and it's oh so obvious to the trained eye. Second, if they were to put out that many breadsticks and square pizzas all around dinner time for such a cheap price, they probably get bombarded.  And, as I've come to learn, when you get loaded with orders they take longer and longer to make and put through the oven. I'm sure they wouldn't keep the prices so low if they knew it'd slow their service so significantly.  But it only takes half the time to make because all they have to do is sauce a pre-made dough template and top the pizza, pull the frozen breadsticks out of the freezer and throw them in the oven. Easy. At Papa Johns we would've had to grab dough out of the tray, still in a lump mass, aerate the dough with spiked rollers and flatten it, toss the dough, stretch the dough and then sauce and top the pizza.  All before putting it in the oven.  The process of tossing dough can take anywhere from 1-3 minutes depending on experience.  This may seem insignificant, but when you're working a dinner rush or a big pre-order it can set you back a very significant amount as opposed to doing the same work with a pre-made dough.  Breadsticks are another story... Well, not really, it's much the same. Making breadsticks involves aerating the dough, just as before, much more stretching, and then cutting before topping them with Italian season and then putting them in the oven.  Bottom line, I dislike Pizza Hut and the way they go about pizza. Oh, and stuffed crust is a very complicated concept if you actually make the dough. It'd actually require tossing the dough, which in some of their deals it seems that Pizza Hut does not, then finding a string of cheese that could span the circumference of the pizza which would have dough rolled over it.  It can be done with legitimacy, but again it would slow production in a very significant way that I cannot believe would be practical to a businessman. If anyone has worked at Pizza Hut and can disprove my claims I'd love to hear it. But for now and until I hear otherwise, I'm siding with Papa Johns and their real tossed dough and fresh ingredients when it comes to pizza.

On another note, Papa Johns is not my favorite type of pizza, just my favorite fast food version.  My favorite pizza comes from a small, family owned pizza parlor in Troy, New York where my old school was located.  This parlor was named "Big Apple Pizzeria", but we called it "Pizza Bella".  I'm not totally sure why. Anyways, this place had an excellent sauce to dough to toppings ratio and had the greatest combinations of ingredients in their pizza. My favorite being a nice slice of chicken, bacon, ranch. Also, they're open until two in the morning so that was always a great late night snack. It's not as big as a Benny's slice but I assure you, the taste for just $3 is absolutely superb.

The Stereotypes of a Lacrosse Player

****Disclaimer: I don't enjoy when people stereotype lacrosse players with negative connotations, I just happen to fit the part.****

Today I'm going to write to you all about the stereotypes, both false and true that accompany playing lacrosse.  First, if you're not familiar, watch this video and you'll feel like you know everything.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nqg01Nk3SYI

This is known to the viewing audience as the most stereotypical lax bro to ever grace the Earth.  Although the video is clearly satirical, it holds many truths and I will show you how they apply to me and my life.

I do name my sticks. Judge me. If you don't care for your sticks they won't care for you when you're on the field. It sounds superstitious and strange but an ignored stick won't play how you want it to.  My closet is full of pastel button downs, bow ties and boat shoes.  Most of the Summer you can find me wearing a lacrosse pinnie of some sort, whether it's from a camp or a former team.  My choices for pants over the Summer and spring include exclusively pastel shorts and athletic shorts. Except on game day; dressing nice is a must on game day. Most of the time when I hang out with my friends on breaks it involves ripping a little bit of cheddar (heading to the nearest turf field/backyard and having a shoot around on an empty net). This is all purely coincidence, by the way. I'm not a huge fan of being called a lax bro at all.

Now, I'll go over a little vocabulary:

Flow: The hair the shows out of the back of a players helmet.
Snipe/Cheddar/Top Cheese: A high shot
GB: Ground ball
BTB: Behind the back (pass/shot)
Sauce: To win a 1 on 1 match-up effortlessly
Bag: A deep and undefined pocket in the stick head
Fish/scrub: A bad lacrosse player
Rip: A hard shot
Yard sale: When a defenseman knocks the offensive players stick out of his hands with a check


But I'll go back to the video.

Believe it or not, dodging through the hallways of a house, and to a lesser extent a school, is a lot of fun. As in the party scene, I don't believe I've ever tried to show off stick tricks to break the ice but I won't say it's a bad idea either. I do grow my hair out every year for the Spring season. I'm a firm believer in the mantra "Look good, play good" so how you look on the field does affect how good of a player I think you'll be. There are exceptions to the rule but as a whole it is fairly accurate.

So that's my insight on the stereotypes of a lacrosse player. And, although I hate to admit it I am in accordance with a fair amount of them.

Side note: my old school actually played the actor in the video in lacrosse a few years before I got there and they would all give him shit over this every year. It wouldn't be that cool because he's just in a viral video but he's kind of a celebrity in the lacrosse community.

And for comic relief, one more  vocab word.

Hospital/Buddy Pass: A high arching pass that leaves a player vulnerable to devastating hits... Like I was given in the video below! Haha those are never fun.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uMY1wNMGmUE