Great Potential



Here's the Link

This article is from today's Purdue Exponent (That's the school paper. I don't think it's award winning...but I could be wrong).   Reading it, there were a few things I remembered about how my dad got his job that didn't make the article. I'm going to share those things here.
Quick frame of reference: I was a junior at Ball State so obviously very busy doing super cool things and not living at home, but my parents were still in Muncie so I saw them regularly. Also, you should know that I have a very sporadic memory. There are years of my life that I don't have any memory of living. Back to my dad. I don't really remember learning that he was interested in the job or even hearing that he got an interview or the story about Roger being late. I do remember him preparing for an interview, but I'm thinking that could be the interview with the committee that he references. I really just remember three things.
1) Power Point Presentation - He put together a power point presentation and I remember proof-reading it. It was full of exceedingly optimistic charts and graphs demonstrating exactly how he was going to turn the program around, and, personally, I thought it was a little bit over the top, but Dad did not. Go big or go home, I guess, and turns out that it worked.
2) Networking - In the article he said he went overboard soliciting phone calls, which I think is probably the one factor (if I had to pick one) that got him the job: The glowing recommendations. He had every volleyball coach who might matter call, of course, and then just anybody else who might have any influence. I remember him standing in the narthex during (maybe after, but probably during) soliciting a call from a John Purdue Club heavy hitter, whom I should probably know because I should know the names of all of the elders I went to church with at that time, but I do not.
3) I Quit - This one could be an old wives tale because I was not there to witness it, but it's one of my favorite parts of the story. Dad was teaching middle school PE and health at this time, but once he got the call that he got the job, he quit. From what I'm told, Kyle, the middle-schooler, had to clean out his office, and as the article reports, he was on Purdue's campus the next day.
Now what the article doesn't say is that he lived in student housing for months before they could buy a house and was driving back and forth to Muncie a couple times a week. He immediately started building a program.

So I just found this, the highlight video from 2003, while looking for their record that first year. Their record wasn't impressive enough to share although I believe they finished around 8th in the Big Ten, which was a great improvement from 11th. The video's a little long, but watch a little bit of it. If you've been to a game recently, you can see how far we've come and some great potential for the future. Plus my dad looks a lot younger.

Rainy Days and Mondays...

This song just popped into my head today and it won't seem to leave. To help us through this rainy Monday...

Peter Dinklage is Hot

If you don't watch Game of Thrones, you should. Peter Dinklage plays Tyrion Lannister, a misshapen dwarf and most people's favorite character (including author, George R. R. Martin). But he is not misshapen. He's hot. I don't mean to sound insensitive here, but if there was some way to document the hottest dwarf ever, he has to be it. Now if just being the hottest dwarf ever wasn't enough to make you swoon, it turns out he uses his powers for good. If you watched last night, you saw Mr. Dinklage ever so cooly mention a Martin Henderson at the end of his acceptance speech and told us to google him.  When you do, you get this. I'm not going to recap it here, but I think it was a cool thing to do. It seemed genuine...not cocky or bitter just cool.

I'm going to bring it back to Thrones to wrap things up here. Like I said, if you haven't watched it, you really should. It's on HBO. The first season is available on demand now and on DVD March 6. Based on the book series by George R. R. Martin, it's a fantasy surrounding several houses battling for the Iron Throne and the right to rule the Seven Kingdoms. And Peter Dinklage isn't the only one who's hot.  

Maybe it's Spring

Some years I can tolerate the winter, and appreciate it for what it is, and be grateful that I get to enjoy all four seasons (unlike people in LA and Miami). This is not one of those years. Christmas is over, winter should be, too. Let's move on. We've even had some unseasonably warm days the past few weeks which has me wondering if maybe it's spring. I have absolutely no issue with spring coming early. Maybe the groundhog will come up with a new sign to alert us that spring's not right around the corner... It's already here. We were patient with winter last year so we are being rewarded with an early, early spring!
I've been around long enough to know that a few warm days in January or even February does not a spring make. We have not seen the last of winter's fury and we'll more than likely have two feet of snow in time for the Super Bowl. Due to this dose of reality, I've given myself a goal. If I can get to March, then I know I'll make it. March seems like the holy grail, the start of spring, the answer to all of my prayers. While March can still be a little depressing, it brings with it March Madness, The Hunger Games movie, spring break (which I don't actually get, but I'm hoping to show enough growth to be happy for those who do), and occasional to frequent sunshine. In Indiana it can drop 30 degrees in a day and be 65 and sunny one day and 25 and snowing the next so all I am asking for is a few more days where I can wake up and say to myself "maybe it's spring"....At least enough to get me to March.

Tribute to Cursive

OK, I did this in September when I heard the state removed cursive from the standards. Poor penmanship aside, I was able to make all of the letters., and I think its a shame that future generations won't have the ability to sign their names in cursive. So if you have kids, I think you should teach them to write in cursive. That is all.