Oh my goodness, finals are STRESSFUL!!!! Right now I’m on Thanksgiving break but it isn’t really going to be much of a break for me! I have two term papers due when I get back but I haven’t actually started either of them. I have to come up with some way to present these two papers to their respective classes. I have journals that I was supposed to be writing a little bit at a time since Mid-terms but have been slacking on doing. I also have work to do for a University Ministry Night that is happening the week after break. It’s a really good thing we have a whole week of for Thanksgiving!!!! Many people would read this and think oh well she has been slacking all semester doing everything else but her homework. That’s not the case at all!! I have been doing my homework. I’ve been better this semester than any other about doing the reading I have to do for all my classes on time every time. The problem is that these papers have to get done ON TOP OF all that reading. Trust me, when you get to college the reading is not 5-10 pages per day. I’m talking, if you combine all the reading I have to do for all my classes, every night I have been reading at LEAST 100 pages. Most days I read more like 150-175 pages. Doing that and everything else I’m doing has left me with little enough sleep.
So as not to make this too much of a complaining session, I guess my advice to you all when you come to college is this: get involved it makes the college experience infinitely better but make sure not to get so involved that you don’t have a life because that’s not fun. Find a balance. Have enough time to do all your homework on time, after all that is the reason for coming to school- to learn something!

Posted by Saint Leo University at 12:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Ever heard of Seussical the Musical? Yeah, I hadn’t either until this semester. Every semester University Ministry puts on a musical; this semester it was Seussical. (I will attempt to avoid any kind of rhyming during this blog. It may be difficult!)

Our director of music and drama ministry for Saint Leo started this when she came in the fall of 2006. In two and a half years we have done Godspell, Children of Eden, Once on This Island, and now Seussical. We put on this production because of its many social justice themes. Many of my friends were in this semester’s production. It was a diverse cast. Actors don’t have to be experienced; for many these are their first productions.

What is really nice though is how they bring many people who don’t usually get involved in “ministry things” involved in ministry things. People really come together to put these shows on. This year I saw 3 of the 4 shows. What’s great is seeing how many people come to support the students. Not only do friends from campus come to watch, family members are always in attendance, professors come out with their families, the monk and nuns always have some kind of showing, and people from the community who don’t have any ties with the university love to come watch too.

Seussical was a crazy show with crazy costumes. My favorite part of the show was watching the kids of all ages in the audience relate to the stories from their childhood. I talked to one of the nuns one night. She said when she was young she memorized big sections of many of the Dr. Seuss books and was really looking forward to seeing how much she remembered from them. Here are some pictures…

Posted by Saint Leo University at 11:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Okay so we go to a small school, which I’ve talked about a lot, but another key point about our school is that we are definitely in the country. If you want an urban school, Saint Leo is not it!! There are good and bad points about this. The country provides a very different atmosphere and social opportunities than schools in large cities.

One of the things Saint Leo students do often is patronize Applebee’s. We go there all the time. It is almost impossible for someone to attend SLU without finding out about half off appetizers and 2 for 1 drinks after 10pm. Many a Saint Leo student spends their 21st birthday at Applebee’s in Wesley Chapel, myself included.

This month is was my friend Jen’s turn. Sunday November 9th was her 21st birthday. We went out on Saturday so that she could have her first ever alcoholic drink at midnight. It was a combined birthday party for her and one of her sorority sisters who was turning 22 so it was a big party. We all got there right at 10pm and there was a packed house!!! In order to accommodate our party of 20+ people we all had to sit outside.

Of course it couldn’t be a warm early November evening; we had just had our first cold front. It was probably a good thing we were outside though, because we are a rowdy bunch. We were singing along to songs, and screaming down to each other on the opposite end of the table. It was great. We had a fantastic waiter too. When midnight rolled around he was on top of things and brought Jen’s mudslide out right away. What’s funny is that he even recognized some of the people at the table, knew they were over 21, and didn’t even ask for their IDs. I’m not trying to say we are a bunch of alcoholics, but what I am saying is that if that doesn’t tell you how often SLU students frequent that place, I don’t know what will!

Posted by Saint Leo University at 11:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)