Country Music Fest!

Tomorrow I'm going to the Country Music Fest in Massachusetts and I must admit, I am completely stoked about this! Brad Paisley, Jason Aldean, Easton Corbin, Sarah Evans, Darius Rucker, and more will all be playing there. They don't always get so many big names together like that, plus I've never heard any of them in concert before. I'm going with a lot of friends too, probably close to 20 of my friends are going to be there, and many of us will be all be seated together.

In other news, I bought a camera a couple weeks ago and finally got it this week. It is a Sony NEX-5 camera, one of the new hybrid digital cameras that takes near-DSLR quality pictures but is half the size of a DSLR. I've been playing with it quite a bit and I really enjoy it. Many people don't realize that I actually love photography, until this past week all I've ever shot with was a point-and-shoot cannon, which, although it did it's job superbly for the past 5 years, doesn't take the quality pictures necessary to do some real photography. I'm looking forward to using this camera a lot in the future (one of my friends is getting engaged next semester, it'll be awesome to record that whole thing in HD and then take some awesome pics later!).

Also, school starts next Monday. I'm only taking 17.5 hours this semester (as compared with the usual 20 or more), but some of the classes will definitely be challenging. Thankfully, last semester I found a study buddy in my major that I do a lot of homework with. Together, we were able to solve pretty much all of the homework problems for the entire semester. Some classes, Dynamics in particular, often had problems that most people couldn't get the right answer to. We normally figured them out, and if we couldn't we would collaborate with some other super-smart people in our major and eventually figured them all out. This semester should be pretty fun, or, at least I'll learn a lot.

I'll let you know how the music fest goes!

-Storm

A new year, a new semester

This is the last weekend before school starts, and I plan on taking it completely easy. I'll celebrate my birthday tomorrow, maybe catch a movie, and just rest up as much as I can - basking in the life of no responsibility for the last weekend before march sometime!
Engineering students rarely have light loads, and sophomore engineering students are certainly no exception. This last semester I did the best I have since arriving at the Academy - my GPA was higher than all of my freshman year, which is surprising since the classes I was taking this past semester were considerably more challenging than the "basics" of freshman year.

Why am I telling you this? I actually have no reason. Just wanted to throw down an update because it has been a while...
I miss Texas, I miss the wide open plains, the adventurous homeland that some call "wild" but I call home. I miss the crack of my rifle, the embrace of close friends, and the steering wheel in my hand (we cannot drive at the Academy). However, God has been good to me here at the Academy, I have made many great, great friends and as a whole we are our own support group - taking care of each other all the time. Without the amazing people at this school I would have left many months ago.

I think Thomas Edison said it well: I have friends in overalls whose friendship I would not swap for the favor of the kings of the world.

For those of you schooling this next semester, good luck; for those of you working, may you find joy in your work!