Tertiary, My Dear Watson: Explosions, Brotherhood, and Mordor

Thermite reaction anyone?

So I have two midterms this week and thus this post is going to be pretty short and for that I am sorry. I hope that my video makes up for it partially. And I welcome any sort of sass incriminating my short post because I realize I've been sassy in the past to someone (Sorry Nicole, I didn't mean it!).

My pledge class has dropped down to five guys (burgers?) now. We started with eleven, and now only five are left. It definitely sucks that so many have had to drop, and I personally was at a point where I was 90% sure I was going to drop, but the past two nights have been extremely fun (I'll talk about later) and I think I'm going to stick with it, especially since its less than a week before I become a brother.

I have gotten tired of partying and am really trying to get my shit together so to speak. I want to focus more on my studies and I want to get in better shape by setting up a regimented work out schedule. To support this goal I've taken a pledge of sobriety for the rest of the semester. Kevin is betting me $5 that I won't be able to be sober, but I'm determined to prove him wrong and become $5 richer.

This was the reason I was feeling apprehensive towards the end of my pledge-ship about joining because I was progressively getting the feeling that partying was more a part of the fraternity than I originally anticipated. However, these past two nights have really changed my mind. We started "live in week" on Saturday night where we live in the fraternity for a week to complete our transformation into brothers. I was originally apprehensive because of my two midterms (Wed. and Thur.) but so far it hasn't been that bad.

And last night was the turning point in what made me want to stay. The entire pledge class (all five of us) banded together to perform the most amazing stunt ever. During chapter meeting we had one of the pledges go and steal all of the brothers' shampoo and a couple other choice objects. It was hilarious to see the reaction after chapter meeting where everyone seemed to be missing their shampoo. Moments of utter foolishness like this make all of the work worth it.

So my week was basically full of me debating whether I wanted to stick with my frat or drop. I've decided to stick with it and hope for the best. I hope I've made the right decision, only time will tell.

Finally, I want to relate to mostly Derek the sheer awesomeness of Berkeley nerdom. My chemistry professor (not the one seen above; we have two, I think I explained it before in another post) was showing a demo (Bromine + Aluminum) that resulted in a beaker full of rust/orange smoke and flames and he commented that "Looks like we're containing Mordor in there!" Let's just say my eardrums still hurt from the eruption of cheers and clapping that came after the professor's joke.

Coincidentally the same day my pledge brother made an epic LOTR reference. We were planning on how we would defend a counter-raid from the brothers, when he said, "We're Helm's Deep right now and we're defending against attack. We can use these as arrows (Zico bottles) and then we'll barricade the door with the pool table." Other pledge brother: "They could still climb up the window..." Original guy: "We can just kick them down like they did to the Uruk-hai's ladders." Everyone at Berkeley is nerdy in some way. This week was dominated by LOTR it turned out.

And for the cute picture of the week: