The End of Dodgeball

Well the dodgeball season is over and we ended up 2-2. In softball we were 1-3, which is sad. Although our one win was spectacular, so that makes up for it. Now I can look forward to the summer sports... which at Tech include Kickball, Beach Volleyball, and more Softball. I am most looking forward to softball, and hopefully we can put together a crack team this time instead of the patchwork of loosely affiliated people we called a team this past season. Kickball could be fun, or could be lame... I guess it depends if you play sober or not. Volleyball... I need to find some players for that one, as engineers tend to not want to play sports... what's up with that anyways? Maybe I can scroung people from the pick-up games at the crc.

Also new in Ben's world, my parents mailed me an Easter check for 100 bucks with which I am supposed to use for "fun" this spring. So I will because you should respect your parents wishes. My first order of business is to buy a Bocce Ball set. I love playing it and I've always wanted one of my own. Hopefully this summer we can get some bocce ball games going over at Piedmont Park. Also with the rest of the money, I'm going to pick up a frisbee, football, softball bat and a beach volleyball. I somehow forgot to bring any of those with me when I moved, and I could use new ones never-the-less.

See yall in two weeks after the semester is over. Don't expect any updates until around May 6. My last big presentation is May 5, so hopefully afterwards we'll Cinco de Mayo it up somewhere and I can write about that. Ole!

Bank of America building

The Bank of America building is a sight for sore eyes after a long night out at the perimeter. It lets you know you've made it back to the city.

Summer Internship Update

Looks like the Volpe and GTRI internships are going to both come through, so now I have a decision to make. They are both based out of GA Tech, so I won't have to move for either, and I'm assuming pay will be comparable... although as long as I can make rent I don't really care. So it is pretty much down to which I want to work for or what type of experience I want.

Volpe is a government transportation company funded by the FAA and based in Cambridge, Mass. GTRI is the Georgia Tech Research Institute based in Atlanta and does a whole variety of things. I think GTRI can give me more interesting and relevant experience and probably enhance my job opportunities seeing as some of it might be secret-level work. And I would be working with 3 or 4 other of my favorite people from the lab. On the other hand, Volpe will give me direct experience in what my GRA work is for. But the job entails basically crunching numbers in Excel... which is boring as all hell, yet important to their work.

Well, after writing that out it seems like I really want to do the GTRI internship. There you go people, my thought process - blogged for your convenience. Whichever job I take for the summer, at least I won't be taking any classes! And it turns out I only need 3 more classes to graduate. And one doesn't even have to be a technical class! That means I will take 2 this Fall, and then 1 in the Spring, and then I'm done... unless I get a phd, but that's a whole-nother subject...

Lazy Saturday Afternoon

I decided to update because 1) After a full 7 days I have my internet back (damn comcast), 2) I haven't in a while, 3) It's a lazy saturday afternoon (~2:30 and I still haven't showered or put on non-sleeping clothes).

So, for softball we lost our last two games, the second of which was because the ump hated us. They give sportsmanship ratings for each game and we got pretty low that game. Forget them. And besides, there's the summer league to look forward to. Besides softball, also in the summer is kickball and beach volleyball... awesome! Hopefully I can find a team to join for all 3 "sports". Is it weird that the thing I look forward to most in summer (besides no classes of course) is softball, kickball, and beach volleyball? I don't think so. Hopefully the tuesday ultimate games will continue too. I want every excuse possible to get outside and run around like an idiot.

My week in a nutshell

Sorry for the incredibly long softball post last time. I try to think before I blog next time.

Uh, let's see, what have I been up to the past week that's worth blogging. Not a whole lot but I will anyways. The main thing is I'm most likely (90%) going to stay in ATL over summer. I got a possible internship lined up that will even allow me to work mostly (or totally) from campus. Even if I would have to go into the office, it's actually closer to me than campus is (and campus is only 2 miles away). So that worked out very, very well.

Other than that I had completely bombed a statistics test Friday, and we got stomped in dodgeball Wednesday night by basically the Globo-Gym team from the movie. I think I smell smoke... hope that's not a fire in the building. I'm gonna go check it out. Hmm, don't see anything. I saw on the show "Lost" (awesome show) that if you smell burning a lot you could have a brain tumor.

Anyways, also on Friday the prospective grad students for our department came to visit. We did happy hour and went to the Highlands bar scene, and I'm not sure if they really had a good time, but me and my friends did, and that's what's important, right?

We got another softball game tomorrow night, and even if it's a good one, I promise I won't write more than 5 sentences about it in my next blog. And they won't be really long sentences either. Promise.

Softball Victory!... against all odds

All I can say is wow. I had to write about our softball victory tonight. Let me paint a little picture of the game:

Firstly, to all those haters of the spring break shirts... I was wearing my other cheesy spring break shirt I bought in south beach (it was a 2 for 1 deal) that says "Pass the Bong" over a Pabst Blue Ribbon logo. Clever! Anyways...

We are a bunch of aerospace engineering graduate students (draw your own conclusions) and tonight we played Phi Sig Kap fraternity, who had on their roster a very large man named "Turbo" (no lie, like an american gladiator). We got no chance right? Well, actually no, most of the game we were getting spanked. The funny part was "Turbo" struck out all 4 times at bat. The gladiator was swinging at everything and not getting any part of it. I think his best hit was a very weak foul tip that just kinda dropped. But anyways, not here to pick on anyone.

Intramurals are played such that when the game time gets to 50 minutes you finish up the inning you're in and that's the game. Unfortunately for us, at the 50 minute mark, we were down by 5 runs (14-9) and they were up at bat (top of the 4th... yeah it's short games). The game up to this point had been riddled with errors on our part, missed grounders, overthrows, you name it. So I had it in my mind they would get probably at least 1 or 2 runs in the inning (they had been getting about 5 per inning already).

Not to be. Sensing the urgency of the situation, the team courageously stepped up with amazing fielding. Bryan caught a looong fly to deep center even with the lights in his eye. Mark had another great catch at shortstop, and the last out was just a simple throw to the first baseman (me). Three up, three down... it was a miracle. But we were still down 5 runs and it was our last at-bat. Could we pull it off?? Well, obviously we did, but read on anyways.

Ok so I forget the whole chain of events, but over the course of the inning we scored 3 runs and then I came up to bat. I was already 2 of 3 for the night with one homerun, so I was feeling pretty good. I don't think they liked that homerun so at my previous bat they pitched me real inside and it resulted in an easy infield fly out. Clever bastard. Well I wasn't gonna let him get away with that again.

The pitch... sure enough here it came fairly inside... I said screw this. I took a step back and WHAMMY (anchorman reference), sent a nice drive over the infields head for a basehit. Ok so two outs, we're still down 2, but up steps Pete... the potential tying run. Pete is a big guy and good at softball so I'm crossing my fingers hoping he nails it. Sure enough...WHAMMY, sucker was GONE. Oh but wait, it's not gone, it's just a real high pop fly to left field. There's two outs so I'm just running my ass off anyways, and so is Pete. Just when I think we're sunk, the left fielder completely botches the catch! Not only does he not catch it, but it tips off his glove, hits the ground (turf) and somehow takes off on it's own towards the back fence. It's another festivus miracle! I end up scoring but Pete only makes it to third.

Ok, we're not in the clear yet, still 1 run down, with 2 outs. Up steps Bryan from Texas, also not a small guy. He's had some good hits tonight too, and sure enough he nails a solid basehit, bringing in Pete. That's a TIE GAME. Amazingly we had come back from the depths and tied the game! Now the pressure is off, becuase when you're down that much, tying seems mighty satisfying. We get our last out and so I thought the game would end with a tie, but the refs call for extra innings, so we get back on the field.

Yet again, in amazing form they go 3 up, 3 down and we find ourselves back at bat with the chance for the win. Ok, so I forget exactly what went down, but basically other Brian hits a triple, and then someone else brings him in on the next bat, I believe it was Aaron. VICTORY!!! Oh and I forgot to mention we played one man down the entire game. BALLER SON!

Well you all get the idea... it was a great ending to a seemingly hopeless game. It was a much needed win, seeing as we lost our last game pretty bad. Hopefully this will turn our season around enough to make the playoffs, and get that coveted B-League championship t-shirt.

If you just read that whole thing, then you are cool and my friend, possibly a candidate for my BFF (southpark reference).

Oh and in dodgeball news, we had a hard fought win last night as well. We won 3 games to 1, and this time Nick brought his camera so we got some pics and videos (hilarious), one of which I put below. Check it out and notice the cool uniforms I designed for the team. A thing of beauty if I say so myself.

What a sharp looking dodgeball team! Great uniforms. And who's that cool guy 5th from the left? He's my favorite.