An Eventful Week
This past week has been a blast here at Centenary College. The action began Thursday night in the Cline fishbowl (which is the lobby of the Cline dormitory, for you perspectives), with a Super Smash Brother Brawl tournament. Brawl is the Wii version of the popular Nintendo game Super Smash Brothers, in which popular video game charaters from various games (such as Mario, Star Fox, Zelda, Link, Captain Falcon, etc.) battle against each other in a last man standing competition. In the game I usually use either Marth, Pit, or Captian Falcon; for the tournament I chose Marth for the tournament, from the game Fire Emblem, who is one of the strongest players in the game. But unfortunately I lost in the first round to sophomore Chris Christ. There are 3 semi-final rounds; in each round there are 4 players who have 5 lives each; the last player alive at the end of the round advances to the final round. Now when I say I lost in the first round, it's not because a lack of ability, it was because Chris cheated (well he didn't really cheat, I just say he did). At the end of the round I had 9 of the 19 knockouts in the round while Chris only had 5. What he did was sit 'round and let the other 3 players kill each other while he holds on to his lives. He called it strategy, I called it cheating. So if you are going to play Smash Brothers against Chris Christ, you've been warned! (Chris is my suite-mate and he knows I'm not serious)
The next night, Centenary hosted a outdoor movie night in the Schell, which is oue outdoor amphitheater. A huge screen was set up on the theater stage, and a double feature was played; the first showing was a guy movie, The Bourne Ultimatum (the third and final film in Robert Ludlum's Jason Bourne Triology); and the second showing was for the ladies, Enchanted (Disney's film about an animated fairy tale in the live action world). Both movies were very entertaining (the Bourne Ultimatum was better because it is part of one of the best triologies of all time), and they served cold stone ice cream, which I consider to be the best ice cream in the world (and if you haven't had it, you've be deprived!). Overall it was a great event and was very proud of the college for having something like this on campus for the students! I would like to thank the CAB organization for doing such a great job and hope thay do this again next year!
On Saturday morning our ladies soccer team was hosting an indoor soccer tournament here in Shreveport, so I went to the first two games of the morning. Centenary had 3 teams in the tournament, a maroon team, a white team and an alumni team. The other teams in the tournament were La Tech, Monroe, 2 University of Arkansas Little Rock teams, and Bossier Parish Community College. I made it in time to watch the 2nd half of the Centenary(white) vs. La Tech game, in which we really struggled to score, and ended up losing the game. The second game was Centenary(white) vs the Centenary Alumni team; the Centenary(white) team ended up winning 4-0. It was a fun game to watch because I knew almost every player playing. I did not get to stay for the rest of the tournament, because I had to move on to my next event (like I said it was a busy weekend!). But I did find out that UA Little Rock ended up winning the tournament; two girls from my high school play for UA Little Rock so it was like a consolation victory.
After leaving the tournament I headed to the Fitness Center, where I was entered in the 4th Annual TKE Poker Tournament. Like the title suggests, the tournament is hosted by the TKE fraternity and all the proceeds go to Alzheimer's research; so I could say I was playing so that I could donate to a good cause, but let's be real.....I was playing to win! The tournament cost $10 to enter and with that you got to play poker and received a free lunch provided by Pie Works. Also there were small gift certificate prizes for the winners of each of the opening tables, the top 20 finalists received a cigar, and there were numerous raffle prizes given throughout the tournament. Also, the top 5 finishers received a larger prize package based on the order they finished. The past 2 years I have made it to the final table and finished 5th overall in the tournament, winning a movie package with movie theater gift cards and movie candy; but this year I was determined to win the entire tournament because a $300 Best Buy gift card was on the line! I could tell you about the ups and the downs of the first few rounds of the tournament but let's just cut to the chase; I made it into the top 5 for the 3rd year in a row, but this year I had the advantage of being the chip leader to start the final table (that means I had the most chips out of all the people left, for those that don't know poker). But my stack began to dwindle quickly. First I went all-in back to back hands against weaker chip stacks and lost both hands, so my chip count quickly dropped from 15,000 to 11,000. A few hands later 4 people went all-in, including me. Sadly to say, I lost the gamble again, but my large chip count allowed me to stay alive with only 1,200 chips; but, the 2 players were eliminated and now the tournament was down to 3. A few winning all-ins later I had raised my chip stack back up to around 4,000 when the two remaining players, Dr. Aizawa and a freshman named Noah both went all-in; Dr. Aizawa beat Noah and a few hands later he too was out of the game, leaving my small chip count against Dr. Aizawa'a huge lead! Thus, I began the process of chipping away at Dr. Aizawa's chip stack and eventually I picked up on his methodical play and was able to win enough hands to put me back in the game. After winning an all-in, I regained the chip lead, then a few hands later, we both went all-in; Dr. Aizawa had pocket 7's against my Big Slick (Ace, King) so it was a coin flip for the winner (the odds in this situation are exactly 50-50), but the luck feel in my favor as I hit a King on the turn and won the tournament, along with the Best Buy gift card! The tournament took 5 1/2 hours to finish but it was well worth it. I would like to thank the TKE fraternity for putting on such a great event; and I will be coming back next year to defend my title!
Later that night I had the honor and privilege of escorting the beautiful Ms. Jessica Jones to the ZTA spring formal. The formal was held at the Convention Center in downtown Shreveport, where they had set-up a dance floor and a DJ, along with a drink bar and some great snack food. We arrived at the formal around 9:30 and we had a blast! It was tons of fun getting to dance and relax with friends while looking good! (Jessica definitely out did me, she looked great, check the pics on facebook!) The coolest thing about the formal was by far the chocolate fountain right up until I spilled some chocolate on my tie, then I didn't like it anymore! After the formal Jessica and I went to eat at Murrell's (she had never eaten there before; if you don't eat at Murrell's at least once after midnight while you're at Centenary, you shouldn't be allowed to graduate). It was the perfect end to a perfect Saturday.
On the following Monday night we had the Centenary All-Sports Banquet at the Holiday Inn off I-20 and Pines Rd. And before I start talking about the actual banquet I would like to thank the two people who made it happen: Ross Gilbert and Jennifer Majchrowicz. Jennifer and Ross were our SAAC Co-Presidents and not only did they do an amazing job this year in raising support for our athletic program, but they did a great job with the banquet and they deserve a lot of credit (so if you see them around campus, say thank you, you don't even have to explain why). Beyond that, the banquet began with a great dinner while the athletes sat around and conversed with one another; then, coaches stood up and recapped their season, while offering individual accolades to their players. Then night concluded with a very enjoyable slide show of a compilation of pictures of our student athletes.
And that concluded my enjoyable, yet extremely busy week! Not to mention I had class and school work on top of all of that! But, before I go, I would like to announce that our team has found a new basketball coach, Coach Greg Gary, coming from Duquesne University, where he served as the head assistant last season. The players had an opportunity to meet him last Thursday night, and we discovered that he means business right away, because he had us working out at 6am the next day. I don't know what to fully think of him just yet, but I believe he is committed to the Centenary program and will get good things done around here. That's all I can say for now, but I think that's very assuring for the moment, and only time will tell the rest. Well I hope everyone had a wonderful week to match mine, and I hope all is well with whoever is reading this. Until next time, be safe.
