PotD
Well, that guy has a nice row of teeth...
So, I guess I will begin my tale on Friday morning, the day of my departure. Well, umm, we all got on a bus. All 37 or so of us. Mostly I was reading Pride and Prejudice, which was surprisingly okay. In fact so okay that my prejudice against books of that nature. We paused part of the way there to get food. Everyone wanted to walk several hundred feet to the nearest Subway, instead of the Burger King that was three feet away. Of course it's also raining, since it makes a better story. Anyways, I'm waiting by the side of a highway for the light to change, and so I'm standing underneath the traffic light post. Soon large drops of water that had been concentrated on the light post are hitting me on the back. To top it off several cars drove by at high speed through puddles. Whatever. And Subway was, well Subway. I'm not really a fan, and I'm certainly not a fan of Jared. Besides, it is expensive.
So anyways, we get back on the bus after getting soaked. Eventually we arrive in Iowa University (or is it U of I? Who cares, it's Iowa.) When we arrive we find that nearly all the passage ways to out dorm rooms have been blocked by construction. This makes the already labyrinth like building neigh unnavigable. Eventually we found a way to our dorms. Getting back out was another matter. The little group I was with ended up climbing up and down fifteen different flights of stairs. Eventually we emerged in the kitchens of the cafeteria, and the cafeteria cleaning staff had a hearty laugh at our expense. Anyways, the cafeteria had large glass walls that looked into the main lobby, so we finally got out. Then we went and played a game of ultimate frisbee. The field we would normally have played on was being torn apart by around fifty five million ton bulldozers and excavators, so we had to improvise. We ended up playing on a very awkward incline, made even more awkward by the inclusion of several trees. But it was a good game in any case. Mismanagement of time meant that I had fifteen minutes to get all the way back to my dorms, walking up several hills and past the John Pappajohn business building, find my way back to my dorm room (I did finally memorize the route), take a shower, and change into nicer clothes. I somehow managed to do all of this, which I found to be highly improbable.
After all that we went to the Brown Bottle, which was a nice Italian restaurant. During the meal we played a game or two of Fluxx. We went back to the dorms, and I was introduced to the game Sheepshead. Apparently it's a German game, but that still doesn't explain to my mind all the satanic imagery. We also played an intensely modified version of Egyptian Rat Screw (otherwise known as Egyptian Rat Killer, and any number of other names). The new rules were that, in addition to the normal slaps, you can slap two cards if they are congruent mod 7, and three cards if they form an arithmetic or geometric progression. This makes for a crazy amount of slapping, and a crazy amount of mathage. Eventually mod 7 was changed to mod 6 because people memorized the pairs too easily (for example Jack 4 was a big hit.) After all this craziness we went to the team meeting, and got our snazy new T-shirts (I can now go around two weeks wearing only math T-shirts.) At around 11:30 I finally turned in.
I awoke promptly at 6:00. Got breakfast efficiently, and made my tin foil hat. Our entire team of thirty people went into the competition with tinfoil hats. The idea was we'd be obnoxious, conspiracy theoryie, distracting, shiny, and oh, did I mention obnoxious? My hat was closer to a headband than a hat, but it still reflected the sun into people's faces. The originator of the idea wore two tin baking pans on his head. It was surprisingly effective at catching rain. In fact I've never before heard a bus driver say "You're gonna have to empty your hat." Anyways finally the glorious ARML competition!
To be continued... (I'll have more ARML, info on the soccer tournament we won, and more random junk)
Way to end on a cliffhanger, I know. I gotta get you coming back here somehow.
