Stina on Sports

A good friend of mine from waaaay back in the day, Christina, was a standout lacrosse player in high school for the Westhill Warriors and a standout lacrosse player for four years at Gannon University where she was also a contributing sports writer for "The Gannon Knight". She's currently back in the Cuse working for a local community college and pursuing her love of sports writing.

She frequently posts insightful and intelligent sports commentary on her blog Stina on Sports. It's great to have a woman's point of view in a male-dominated arena. I've never been a huge sports fan, which some find hard to believe considering I was a college athlete (yes, I retired after freshman year due to multiple surgeries), so I love reading her blog to feel like I know what's up in the sports world. I have a better knowledge than many people (male or female) of what constitutes a good or a bad play in most sports, but I don't keep track of key players, top coaches, and championship caliber teams. This comes in handy when I want to comment on a recent play, but not when the discussion turns to the players' prospects in the NFL or what team they're in talks to go to and how that will change the league. Her blog covers it all, from NFL conference predictions to the recent scandal with the Jets and female reporter, Ines Sainz.

And she's pretty to boot! Too bad she's engaged, gentlemen.

I encourage all of my readers, male or female, to give her a look. I promise you won't be let down.

Thank you, Penn (not Penn State)

Students are returning to college campuses around the US, which means that I'm being forced to procrastinate by reading Facebook Newsfeeds, FmyLifes, and Texts From Last Night all about the stupid decisions that they are making. In honor of their bad decisions, I've decided to make a list of things I miss now that I've been out for over a year. Some led to bad decisions, others I just plain miss.

• Day drinking - Now when I pop open a beer at 1pm I look like an alcoholic, in college I looked normal.
• Eating whatever I want - I used to love cheese fries. I haven't had them in at least 6 months.
• Close proximity to friends - It was so much easier walking up a flight of stairs to see my good friends. Now I have to fly all the way up the East Coast.
• Close proximity to, well, everything - Going to school in Philadelphia meant that I didn't need a car. I could walk to the grocery store, to class, to work, take the subway downtown. Now it's a minimum 15 minute drive to get anywhere. Life was so much better when I could go for strolls around campus whenever I wanted to. (Except at 2am when the real residents of West Philly strolled about.)
  
• Parental Funding - Granted, I worked all four years of college, but having my parents back me up with grocery money each month made day drinking and eating whatever I wanted at 3am far less of a financial strain.*
• Lounging on The Green - When you had an hour to kill between classes, you could lounge around on the grass and quickly accumulate a large group of people with nowhere else to go. Lounging to college students is like honey to flies. Who wants to be a motivated, prosperous human being when the sun is shining and friends are amassing?
  
• Making bad decisions - If someone goes out now, gets wasted, and ends up sleeping in their underwear on the couch they're frowned upon. In college, that was a normal Friday night.

I was hoping that I'd be over my four year affair with college by now, but the sad part is that the bitch (pardon my French) ripped my heart out. We had a good, no great, thing going for 4 years and I was just shoved out there door with no more than a piece of paper stating that I'd been there. It's no better than an "I survived Pike's Peak" t-shirt. I want to go back! I want to survive it again, and again, and again.

I'm painfully bringing myself to believe that this feeling, this desire means that I got out of college what I was supposed to. A great experience, great friends, great memories, and a great education. So, as much as I miss it and hate it for dumping me, I have to thank Penn for 4 of the best years of my life.

Hurrah for the Red and Blue!

*I must apologize to my parents, who I'm sure knew about all of these shenanigans. Mom, Dad, your money went to groceries, I swear. A girl's gotta eat.