This post is way too shallow for all I need to say.

I am just going to try and recap.

La Vida- I showed up that morning to go to La Vida (met Kevin from Golden) and went for an 8 hour van ride to upstate New York. It was pretty awesome group of people for the van. It would not be the last of the random groups though. So here I find myself in the middle of the Adirondack mountains knowing absolutely no one. We did an ice breaker called "Fatty Llama" where you would walk around and they would call out commands and you had to find your partner and then do the pose. On of the poses was called "Ride the fatty llama" so you would jump on your partners back and run around.

We then had to dig through a pile of name tags and figure out which people were in our groups. I knew I was in Kayak but I didn't know who else was. I was the last one to arrive at our meeting place and I am not going to lie, I was dreading it when I saw the people. It looked like a very awkward group of people. We then did a scavenger hunt (which included singing ring around the rosie at the top of our lungs) for our "sherpas" (the guides/counselors).

Skip ahead through the strange ice breakers and team building. We get in the Kayaks on the 3rd day and start paddling. It took us forever the first day and it was just a lot of shallow converstations at first since no one really knows each other.

(Skip ahead a few days.)

None of us has showered or put on deoderant or have any idea what time it is and we're all dead tired of paddling all day, but at least we feel comfortable around each other (ecspecially since I told everyone to do the trust fall off of the ropes course. We had some pretty nasty food and then licked out bowls clean after every meal to clean them.

We had some really cool Sherpas Lis and Mike. They were pretty dang funny.

I won't go into everything about La Vida but here are the highlights.
1. We came to a point on the lake/river and couldn't go down it so we had to portage (carry our kayaks) through town. Just imagine about 12 college students who haven't shaved or showered in over a week walking down main street and stopped at a traffic light carrying kayaks. It was awkward.
2. While walking through one of the camp sites Caitlin suddenly felt a sharp pain in her leg. Then I did too shortly after and then again. We quickly discovered we were being attacked by bees and made a dash for our lives. My first bee sting ever. Good news: I am not allergic!
3. When you get back from La Vida to "Base Camp" they have you do a skit to share about your time. Our group did Kayak The Musical. It basically ended up being the greatest thing ever. The next day when all the other groups were making noise to show off our really humble/patient sherpa Mike came up and said "It doesn' matter how much noise we make, or how well we do on this race, because WE PONED THEM LAST NIGHT." We are now known as "that awesome kayak group that did the musical skit."
4. There was an 8 mile run/walk. I am proud to say I ran it all and in 1 hour 31 minutes. However, it has result in my knee feeling like it has just declared war on the rest of my body.

Note: I also did something called Solo days. You sit out in the forest by yourself for 2 days and 2 nights and fast (no eating). I also fasted from speaking for the time (that was really hard but awesome.) Basically one of the best experiences of my life just reading the bible, praying, listening, writing.

Also after the trip I had 9 best friends so it was really easy to be out going because I know that I have these people from La Vida to fall back on.

Orientation-
I got there a day before everyone on my floor (because of La Vida) so I spent one night all by myself. Met my roommate. His name is Ben (we have 4 guys named Ben on our floor.) He is the perfect roommate. Messy (like me) easy going (like me) funny (I hope like me) and brought everything anyone could ever possibly need for college including a fridge, tv, and air purifier. He is also a really heavy sleeper. He is basically awesome as is my whole floor of guys. I share a bathroom with 2 basketball players who are massive. I am 6ft and the shortest guy, it is a new experience.

My residence hall is on something called the Hill. It is set off a little from campus and is on top of a hill but I hear that freshmen who live on the hill tend to loose wait not gain it.

Orientation was essentially just strange. Every few hours I was with a new group of complete strangers. We did however go into Boston. I went to the North End (Little Italy) and that was awesome and an entirely new experience. Then that night they had a dance for the freshmen. It was a lot of fun. that is all I am going to say about that.

School
I am technically a "deciding major" but I am taking the biology classes which I am excited about but are also scary. The books are also ricidculously expensive ($140 for my biology book). I do have a pretty sweet babysitting job which I get paid $12 and hour for hanging out with these 2 kids and I get to borrow the ladies car to drive them around. I auditioned for a theatre job which would have been perfect but it is during the middle of the day and conflicted too much with classes. My biology class has a professor from Harvard Medical School teaching and we began with a song about biology. I am excited for my survey of calculus class, it looks really interesting. I really want to audition for "The SweatyTooth Madmen". It is the school's improve troupe and all the upperclassmen say I should do it because I remind them of the leader guy who did it and just graduated.

Funny things:
Out of 290 girls 23 of them are named Sara.
The ratio is 3 to 1 in favor of the guys.
Our police is affecionately named the GoPo (a play on Popo and Gordon Police)

I know there was not much depth to that but I need sleep.

Everyone, do me a favor and stop posting.

I have already been on the internet for 3 or so hours trying to catch up on facebook/blogs and I am absolutely nowhere near done. So I would love to post all about La Vida and college and all of these cool/crazy people out here, but I am using my roommate's cable and I want to talk to him right now so keep it real. I have a language placement test tomorrow.

I'm not worried

Let's recap my journey to campus.
I left at 6am (I was suppose to leave at 5:30am but in typical fashion I was late) and got to the airport fine. Check in my baggage which was probably 40 lbs overweight (they didn't care) and said goodbye. Went through security and got to my gate. I was flying stand by but they said the fly was open enough I would make it on and just gave me a boarding pass. Cue insanity. The plane's battery dies, they try to jump it for like 2 hours (I guess they don't have a replacement battery) then we finally steal a plane from another group of people. Right as I was walking through the gate my ticket sets off the alarm as they scan it. They ask me to stand aside and ask if I have gone through security. Of course I did, how else would I have gotten here. They tell me to go talk to the lady at the counter who turns out had given me the wrong ticket. I get the wrong one and I am the last one on the plane (which means I get the middle seat since southwest lets people choose where they sit.)

I get to Baltimore fine. We decided to fly into Providence Rhode Island because Manchester New Hampshire looked packed. There were about 6 or 7 flights from Baltimore that day. Because we had been delayed the plane missed its connecting flight to Providence (not a problem since I knew I might get bumped anyways) but then all the people who missed their flight got on the next one, which bumped me back another hour. Then all the people who couldn't fit on that one went to the next one and I got bumped again. I go up to the counter (because I have to check in every time with the lady to get my name on the list) and she says it doesn't look good for the next flight either. At this point I have been sitting in an airport for several hours. I start calling people, wanting human contact.

The flight is just about to leave and I am standing at the counter hoping for a miracle. A lady who missed a flight and had top priority goes up to the desk and puts her name on the list. A guy from the flight comes out and says they have one more seat. The lady at the desk starts calling off names of people and I am watching as no one stands up, finally I hear A. M******. Here's the thing, I am non-revenue non-employee, which basically means I am last on every list. She looks at the pass (which tells her I am a non-rev), gives me a look and then tells me to hurry I have 30 seconds to get on the plane. So I run and grab my bags and my phone (which is charging in the wall) and run for the plane. She doesn't even print me a ticket she just tells me to get on. (I think she felt bad that I had been sitting there so long.)

I get on the flight (last one on and in the middle seat again). The guy next to me tries to talk to me the whole flight about Denver and college. I land in Providence (my first time in Rhode Island) and when I get off the plane the girl who I sat next to on the plane was propossed to at the gate. Thanks to a lot of pictures and my surprised look I will probably be showing up as a "That Guy" on college humor soon.

I went to baggage claim (assuming my luggage got left behind in Baltimore since I barely got on the flight) and discovered it wasn't there! not a surprise. I search around the place for the southwest baggage area and couldn't find it. I almost called my Aunt Nancy (the one we got the tickets from) to see if she knew where it would be. About to call her I find it and see that they they had my luggage (they just send it ahead of you when you fly stand by.) Shane finds me without too much difficultly and we drive back 2 hours to college.

Woke up the next morning at 11 and I went with Shane and some of his friends to the Quarry. A giant hole in the ground (like from Garden State). Spent the day jumping off cliffs into lakes. A lot of fun. I leave saturday morning for New York and LaVida. If I don't post before then, I will try and get some of the pictures up afterward. Keep it real in Highlands Ranch till you all leave for college guys.