Signs It's Over

I take off for a relaxing week in the Green Mountains in the morning, the First Years roll in on Saturday, and Jim Zielinski & Counselors are shipping out to visit prospectives all over the globe. These plans all look good on paper, but it's easy to wonder how I'm sure summer is over. It's only mid-August! But the calendar isn't lying. It's no trick of the light. It's over. Here's how I know:


Exhibit A. I'm out of toilet paper. Not to mention that this isn't even my bathroom anymore. Summer housing on campus has been vacated. I'm back on Porter 3rd where I belong.



Exhibit B. Travis has completely bugged out. He is pictured here in the room where all the mailing/magic happens, but since this was taken he has moved on to his post as an Orientation Leader for New Student Days. One might say he went postal with the end in sight, but that would be a bad pun on too many levels for this late date in August.



Exhibit C. I'm exhausted. I've been running all across the Midwest searching for good ice cream (no, Dairy Queen does not count). I finally found the Dairy Haus. It's just down the road in Rockton and the homemade fare is worth the dough. This picture shows Lucy '07 and Rachel '08 enjoying their dinner the way every child dreams they will when they're all grown up. Truth: I bought Lucy the ice cream as a bribe for her help with my big move across campus this afternoon-- easily the wisest four dollars of the summer.



Exhibit D. Our fearless leader (Sue) has turned into a Who.



Exhibit E. We've come full circle on the blog. You know the show is over when you see the Grand Casali Fountain at rest in the freshly-painted Gold Key Office. Brandi is ready and waiting, prospies.



Exhibit F. Among all these low-quality pictures of this week, it might be difficult to spot the irrefutable evidence that summer is toast. So, in case you need some more concrete proof we've still got people manning the phones, here's a stealth photo of The Boss, still chained to his phone to answer your questions! I risked my life to snag this shot.

If all this wasn't enough proof that this season is on the way out, I'm afraid I've run out of clues for you. I've got a bus ticket and a boarding pass tucked into my wallet and that's enough for me. I'm "publishing" this and signing off. Hope you all had a great summer, we sure did. Please e-mail, visit, or instant message us anytime. Summer is over, but the Admissions Office is open year-round.

- Julia

And a river ran through it...

but it starts as a trickle...

Students are slowly returning to campus in spurts, flowing smoothly across their Beloit stomping grounds with fresh energy. For those of us that have been here for a while, the returning faces spark not a small bit of excitement, for we know that life is again breathing itself back into the campus and college community. Yet, new faces sprinkle themselves throughout the waves, unsure and still slightly confused, that feeling of drifting that First-Years often experience. Never fear, they will find what they will, with us as their guides if need be.

Regardless, I'm ready for school to start, classes to begin, clubs to meet, and experiences to continue. Summer has been fun, but summer can be tiresome and finally we return to the place of our own, the place we call home.

I guess I could be rambling, but in many ways not. This is the beginning as all points are, and off I go on another adventure.


Travis...

Those End of Summer Blues

The first waves of RAs are arriving for training today. Over lunch, I saw friends from the house packing up and moving out. While I don't move across the street to Porter Hall for another week, the signs of the impending shift are everywhere. After work today, I am headed to the bookstore to drop some cash on as many used textbooks as my hands can hold. So, things are changing. We've been blogging about it for weeks. It's time for us to present a solution:



Yes, I'm talking about picking up a new hobby. It's a last-ditch effort to salvage some feeling of accomplishment from the syllabi-free months, but it's not the worst use of time. Myself, I'm learning harmonica via laptop. It kills a lot of afternoon hours when the creek is too high for a quick dip and the sun is too hot for a casual stroll. Above, you see Michelle "Longlost" Casali and I faking skills way back in June, but these day I'm making a sincere effort, and progress. I've been reading up online and practicing diligently. In all seriousness, I'm starting to feel like I'm getting somewhere with this old knicknack.

So, turn up the jazz. Crank the blues. August is hot and sticky. Welcome to harmonica season!

- Julia

Living On The Cheap

All summer long, my friends and I have been grilling out, inheriting leftover foodstuffs from people coming in and out of the residences with various programs, and generally eating anything we can find. We are summer workers and we are not on the food plan.

During the academic year, especially when I've got running, being on a meal plan is a no-brainer. It makes sense to cook for myself during the summer when I have time to be cheap and forge around Woodman's for the best deals, but this just isn't the case during the regular year. Besides, it's lovely to go to Commons at the end of a long day and sit down with all of my friends. Being on a meal plan is hardly all about food.

More than any other kind, I love free food. Admittedly, the photo at the top of this post (featuring Julia Leavengood Boxer '07 to my left) was taken at a Dairy Breakfast in Wallworth county where admission was five dollars. Such social events are well worth the cash in my book, but I won't say the syrup wouldn't have tasted sweeter if the grub had been gratis.

The point of this entry is to encourage all prospective/college students to go to the websites of their favorite chain eateries and join the birthday clubs. Now. Get on the mailing list, kiddos. Hoard the weekly promotional coupons. When you're paying tuition, these pieces of paper are the golden tickets to a world of luxury. Yes, there are certain establishments that will give you a free dish on your B-Day, but only if you've signed up on the site. My favorite carb-toting chain (born in Madison), will give you a regular sized dish of noodles for nada, if you're willing to put up with the rest of their junk e-mail. I recommend using an old e-mail account to collect the onslaught of coupons, but mostly I just recommend signing up.

And now, after giving out shameless advice in promotion of coupons, what can I have to say for myself? I'm kind of stingy, but I know how to eat well. Plus, if you're not taking advantage of Dairy Breakfasts and Free Cone Days, you're just plain missing out.

Catchphrases: Cooking is fun. Food is good, free food is better. Eat more kale. Cowabunga.

- Julia

The Final Countdown *cue music*

Hey guys. This is it. It's the end. It's been great, and I hope you've enjoyed my random comments on this blog. Tomorrow is my last day in the Admissions Office. Probably not forever of course, but as a paid employee, I'm shaking the dust of this office off my feet and moving on to...not bigger/better things, but different. RA training starts in about two weeks, so I'll be putting my skills to good use making the campus a better place to live. Yay.

Since I have no real news to report (other than the fact that the heat has officially escalated from stifling to soul-crushing), I thought I'd wrap my summer blog up with a little something that combines two of my favorite internet phenomenons: LOLCATS and Oscar, the nursing home cat who predicts residents' deaths by curling up next to them.


That's my last contribution to the Beloit Summer Blog. Enjoy the rest of your summers. For those of you who are incoming first-years, I might run into you in a couple of weeks (yeah, you're excited, admit it) and if you're prospective students, come visit campus! It's pretty sweet.

Kisses,
LDM

Things have been figured out... and broken

So I talked to Residential Life today and I will be moving back on campus. It's a relief to know that I will have somewhere to live in two weeks. Now I just have to go through all my stuff, pack more efficiently and take a bunch of stuff home.

I've also gotten a lot more excited about coming back to school. Maybe it's because I've made a lot of great friends this summer. Maybe it's because I watched the Devil Wears Prada and got really excited about going shopping for new school clothes. Or maybe it's because I'm excited about decorating my new room.

The downfall? I broke my toe last night. Well, actually, this morning. Around 1am my friends wanted to play ultimate frisbee so we did and I broke my toe because I was playing barefoot. Now I have to go in and see the trainer and explain this to my new coaches. It happens I guess.

*Brandi

Julia Goes To The City

This weekend I decided to go to Chicago and walk amoungst the rest of the world. Things are awefully quiet around here on the edge of August and the weekend train pass is awefully cheap. A trip into town was the perfect antidote for a weekend that I would otherwise have spent napping on the Effigy Mounds rereading Harry Potter's fate.

So, early Saturday morning, my friend Lucy and I took the Metra line into Chicago and wandered around the Lincoln Park Zoo. We strolled the waterfront and Michigan Ave and did the touristy thing all the way from the Garden District to the steps of the Art Institute. There, we met a couple Beloiters for dinner and made our way to Grant Park to see the boat parade for Venetian Night. The boats "dressed up" as Chicago's greatest moments this year. There were a wide variety of blues brothers, Cubs fans, and dancing cows holding lanterns on deck as the yachts passed. We even saw Poseidon the Parade Master (pictured in the background, sorry about the photo quality):



On Sunday, I returned to Chicago by myself to be brave and stuff in the presence of large buildings. My new favorite is the Chicago Public Library-- eight stories of BOOKS!!



In any case, the library was closed when I got there and I have yet to go inside. It's big though, right? Several blocks east of the library, it was a gorgeous sunny day and I was thrilled to be out of Beloit for a taste of that smoggy, city air. I spent the day picnic-lunching on apples and brie, reading from park bench to park bench. I have to confess that I ate dinner at nowhere special (just the usual, Panera), but I am deeply in love their Tomato Mozzarella Salad.

At the risk of painting the wrong picture of Beloit's finest, please see Karen Baumann '10 (below) being intimidating in Panera. She was trying to scare me into giving up a tomato or two, but it was my birthday. I don't share tomatoes.



AND for the benefit of those of you who have been reading all summer, I have posted the following photo of a large fountain a couple blocks off of VanBuren. Thanks for sticking it out! Look for a best-of-midwestern fountains entry to appear in this blog in the near future.



In addition taking this weekend as an opportunity to get out of town, I was also able to pose with Ceres (below)-- my favorite summertime gal. While all this travel was a great diversion to plan and execute, I am most excited about the return of, well, everyone. Tomorrow is the start of August. Ceres and I are ready for the next adventure.



- Julia