Ok. I pulled this off another site. I think its one of those lame email forwards. Anyways I’m going to list it and then comment on it if I have something to say.
1. Every clock on campus shows a different time.
2. Two meals per day is the standard.
3. Road trip whenever possible.
4. Going to the mailbox was never an ego booster/breaker before.
Never got any mail. Except for that junk mail.
5. You will begin to nap again.
Napping started back my freshmen year. Always took an afternoon nap after classes were over.
6. Your bookstore bill will almost equal your tuition bill.
Argh! Barnes and Nobles.
7. Squirt guns = stress relief (and “Assassins” if you’re in SPB).
8. Instant Messenger becomes an addiction.
Never had Instant Messenger in college.
9. E-mail becomes your second language.
I discovered email in college. It was big then. Probably bigger to me back then.
10. College students throw paper airplanes, too.
11. You never realized that so many people were smarter than you.
Yep. Many more people smarter than me at college. Or at least they could sound like they were really smart in the classroom discussions.
12. College football is the coolest thing on the planet.
Lipscomb never had a football team. It still isn’t cool.
13. Western Europe could be wiped out by a plague and you wouldn’t know it, but you can recite last week’s rerun of “The Simpsons” verbatim.
News lost its coolness in college. We never watched it.
14. Cartoons are for all ages — especially “Scooby Doo”.
I don’t know about that. But the return of the Dukes of Hazzard was the event in my dorm at college.
15. Disney movies are more than just classic.
But I don’t watch Disney movies. And they weren’t big at Lipscomb.
16. You will never rent more movies in your life.
I never rent movies anymore. Never.
17. No one is too old for video games.
During my freshmen year someone got a hold of an old Space Invaders game. Cabinet version. We held a tournament with a Papa John’s Pizza as the prize.
18. Procrastination is an art form.
19. Snood is more addicting than cigarettes.
Never used either. I don’t even know what Snood is…
20. It never hurt so much to get sick.
Thankfully I was never sick in college.
21. Care packages are right up there with birthdays.
Never got a care package. Thanks, guys.
22. The health center nurses are only there because they couldn’t make it at a real hospital.
23. Campus is only clean for Freshman Orientation and Family Weekend.
24. Nothing you want to register for will be open.
Nothing ever was open. Except during my Senior year.
25. Classes — the later the better.
Actually I enjoyed having early classes. Got them over faster for an afternoon of sleeping.
26. You are no longer thankful that the fire alarms are here to protect you.
Hated midnight fire alarms. Hated them.
27. Jeans may be worn as many times as the wearer desires.
28. The only time you dress up is when your jeans are dirty.
29. Showers become less important; sleep becomes more important.
I showered everyday thankyouverymuch.
30. Asleep by 2:30 a.m. is an early night.
Asleep by 2:30a.m. is a late night. I was always asleep by 1AM.
31. Creativity in the dining hall is key.
32. The “Freshman 15” is not a myth.
Actually I think I lost 15 pounds my freshmen year. Maybe 5 lbs.
33. If it’s snowing out, the only reason you will leave your room is for food (or in Lipscomb’s case, class).
34. Dishes smell after days of piling up.
Never had dishes.
35. Cereal makes a good meal at any time of the day.
Sometimes I ate lucky charms because the meals at Lipscomb’s dining hall were unacceptable.
36. You will eat anywhere that has a buffet.
37. You will eat anything that is free.
There was a time when they offered free pizza in the student’s center for watching the Florida-UT game. I got my free slice(s) and left. Got alot of mean looks.
38. New additions to the food groups: ramen and pizza.
39. You will get to know the pizza man by name.
I must have had pizza at least 2 times a week. Maybe more.
40. Stealing from the dining hall will become second nature.
People stole the lunch trays to go sledding on.
41. ATMs are the Devil’s Advocate — ATM = “Another Twenty Missing”
Never used an ATM in college. Parents were nearby.
42. Duct tape heals all wounds.
Huh?
43. Keys have never been so important, but you still manage to lose them or lock yourself out of your room frequently.
I was locked out of my room maybe once.
44. If they say you can’t have it in the dorm, they’re just kidding.
45. You will come to hate hallways/elevators with a passion.
A friend of mine got stuck in the dorm elevator once. One hour in there.
46. Those ugly cinder blocks are not soundproof.
47. Pictures, posters, e-mails, or anything else to cover the ugly cell we live in will become wallpaper.
I hung pizza boxes on the walls. Those personal pan pizza boxes.
48. Everyone is only nice for the first week. After that, no matter how nice you are, some people won’t smile back. Get used to it.
It’s so true.
49. You are never alone.
50. College is the ideal lifestyle except for all those pesky classes.

“You can’t go home again.” That’s the old saying. I went back to Lipscomb today. Went to University Bible and had lunch on their food court. My friend Dustin was in town. I hadn’t seen him in several years. We were at Lipscomb together. And during our tour we were reminded about how old we were. Ten years ago in 1993 we entered Lipscomb as freshmen. While the rest of these kids were 8 years old. Just entering 3rd grade.
University Bible is some kind of hybrid Bible class and chapel combined. All takes place in the Allen Arena. And nobody is taking notes. They’re just sitting there like its a typical chapel. Makes me wonder how hard the final exam is on it. Or if they even have a final exam.
So the history goes, David Lipscomb gave his farm to use as a Bible college. There is a clause in there that says all students must have chapel and a Bible class everyday. If they don’t, the farm reverts back to the Lipscomb family, which I’m sure would develop it for a cattle farm. In the middle of Green Hills.
So students take Bible and chapel everyday. On the schedule, you’re in Bible for 5 hours a week, but only get credit for 2 hours for some odd reason.
Changes? Fundamentally nothing has really changed much. The kids are still preppy. Thursdays mean everyone wears Greek letters on their shirts. Someone should remind them that they’re not part of a real fraternity, only an imaginary frat otherwise known as a social club. The word “fraternity” is equated to social drinking by Lipscomb’s definition.
The kids are walking around with backpacks and seem to be overly concerned with fickle things. Like whether or not AIM works on Lipscomb’s network.
The facilities have changed. Allen Arena is nice. But at the same time they haven’t done anything with the Burton Bible Building. I have been told they are going to tear it down and make a fine arts building. Then build another Bible building elsewhere on campus. There are some strange proceedures on Lipscomb campus. Like the McFarland building. It was built with government funds, so therefore no Bible classes can be taught there. Whild Ward lecture hall (attached to McFarland) was built with donated funds. So therefore they are able to have Bible classes there.
On the food court, Dairy Queen is gone (I still miss it), yet Pizza Hut is still around. Only this time with cinnimon bread and breadsticks. I wish they had that when I was there. Sub Connection is there for all your pseudo Subway needs. Why can’t they belly up some money and get a real life Subway or Jersey Mikes in there? I can remember during my senior year taking my lunch to class. Eating a sub sandwich in Systems Analysis. I also remember having a mouthfull of sandwich when a professor asked me a direct question in regards to the class discussion. All I could do was sit there and swallow a whole bite and attempt to answer the question. During my senior year Lipscomb didn’t give me room for lunch. So I managed to squeeze it in during the 15 free minutes after chapel before and during class.
Like I said before, my freshmen year at college were some of the best prolonged time in my life. Things never rally were the same after our freshmen year. We tried to recreate the magic during the sophomore year. But you can’t prolong it. Whatever past is past. As if the classes somehow get harder or students just get more and more jaded.

Dinner with Dustin tonight. Dustin is a friend from Lipscomb who moved to Denver a few years ago. I hadn’t seen him since he moved. I’ve talked with him on the phone briefly a few years ago. But that’s been about it. It was great to catch up and see what’s happening.
We both agreed that our Freshmen year at Lipscomb was some good times. Probably the best few months of my life were between January – April 1994. You can say “oh that was a great vacation.” or “that was a great camp.” But rarely do you have a long span of time where seemingly every day is a good day. I have never laughed as much and experienced such hilariousness as then. For the most part I hung out in Dustin’s room….in the basement of High Rise. Dustin’s room was decorated in some kind of 70’s museum. The wall of aluminum cans. Maurice the lamp (named from Steve Miller’s “The Joker”). The light up church signs. The chandelier of ties. It’s all very difficult to explain for those uninformed without getting into inside jokes. Just be aware that the Freshmen year of college could potentially be your best year of your life. The extra freedom of college life coupled with relatively easy classes equals good times.
Just a note. The Hermitage Applebee’s has pictures of Lipscomb’s campus hung in the lobby area. I thought it was weird. Dustin pointed them out to me. I guess the manager may have gone there or something.

A few of my friends are entering college as freshmen. Classes start soon. I do remember college. It wasn’t that long ago. Or at least it doesn’t seem to me. A friend confided in me that he was scared of flunking out. Nope. Not going to happen. Only those who sleep through class and refuse to study flunk out. Otherwise college was reasonably easy. Just put some quality time in studying and you can expect to do just fine.
I majored in Government and Public administration. I’ve always said that it was a easy major. I was scared away from a CIS major mostly because I was fearful of getting B’s. And supposedly there was a good chance of getting that grade when majoring in computers.
You can always distingish the college freshmen from the upperclassmen on the first week of the fall semester. Freshmen have the brand new white shoes and the brand new backpacks. Its inevitable. They’ve also got that deer-in-the-headlights look to it. “Will this be on the test?” they ask the professor. They’ve also got that “Change the World” attitude by which they get involved in student government organizations. Whereas what I found at Lipscomb was that the SGA was nothing more than a puppet regime with no real power. Sure, they can try to change the opening and closing times of the library. But they yielded no real power, except to have weekly meetings for complaints’ sake.
What is the great white hype at college these days? In my day it was email. Yeah. Email. We had just gotten it. And like a kid with a new toy we used it constantly. Always in the computer labs checking our mail. Getting mom and dad to buy you a new computer for your dorm room under the false pretense of getting papers typed, when in reality you wanted your email.
We didn’t have blogs or many discussion boards back then. Just email.
I think the next big thing or the most current big thing at college these days is blogs, instant messaging, and downloadable music. That’s what the kids are into these days. Oh yeah…and ultimate frisbee. Some things never change.
Meanwhile Josh’s blog got a facelift. Be sure to continue to visit it while he studys abroad in Hungary this Fall.

Time is slowly ticking away for the end of the year…and the end of a school semester. Those school days are long gone for me, yet I still remember them. I have quite a few friends who are in college. No doubt they are in the stressed out mode right now….or if they have completed all of their exams, able to live a relatively stress free life until the end of the year.

• Dead Day – At Lipscomb University once the regular classes were over, we’d have a study day which was always on the Friday before final exams started. Even though it was called a study day, but many people choose not to study. Most of us called it “Dead Day” since nothing was going on at school. If students had jobs, they would just work all day and come back and study.
  On this free day, I can remember going to a 24 hour play…which is kinda a misnomer since the play didn’t actually last 24 hours, but instead was written and performed within 24 hours. The student directors would receive quotes which they would have to work into the dialogue of their play. I went to one of these plays and was impressed at the actual depth of the plot and dialogue of the play written so quickly. And it was funny too.
• Freshmen Comp Exams – For some reason Freshmen Composition (English) exams were held first thing Saturday morning. I guess they decided to get all of them out of the way. Freshmen Comp was really one of the few classes which most incoming Freshmen took.
• Exam Scheduling – Exams started on Saturday and lasted until the following Thursday. If you were lucky, most of your exams were scheduled 1 or 2 a day and could be completed within just a few days. Most of the time this was not the case. Some students complained that they had 3 exams on one day (which they could easily change by asking their teacher for an alternate time). I can’t specifically remember having 3 in one day. But I can remember having most of my exams completed by Monday or Tuesday, but having to wait until Thursday afternoon to take one lone exam before going home for the break.
• After exams were over… we’d pack up and go home. Friends had aquarium fish which they couldn’t take with them over the Christmas holidays. So they just left them and hoped the weekend/vacation feeder capsules would keep them fed until January.
  I can remember not taking home my computer during the holidays. I’d probably rethink that option now, because the computer is such and intricate part of my life these days.
  The dorms were relatively secure. However I wouldn’t leave huge wads of money lying around. One of my friends didn’t trust his RA and decided to put a password protection on his computer during the break.
  Rarely did I stay for graduation. Other than my own, I can remember going to 2 graduation ceremonies at Lipscomb. And only one of those was a December ceremony.

I had a conversation with a friend of mine who is an incoming freshmen at college. She talked about her classes and how she liked her teachers. Reminded me of my days at Lipscomb. I decided to list my favorite and worst college classes.
Favorite College Classes
In this list, I’ve classified my favorite classes as to not only how much I enjoyed it, but how much I remembered years later about the class.

• Personal Evangelism – Dr. Gerald Fulks. – Dr. Fulks was a business teacher, but taught this evangelism course on the side. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I still have my notes from that class and look at them every once and a while.
• The Holy Spirit – Dr. Harvey Floyd – A very good class. Dr. Floyd was well qualified to teach this class. One of the required books for the course was one that he had written.
• Old Testament Themes – Tom Seals I had never been told the history contained in the Old Testament. This class exposed me to the entire Old Testament. I found out that it wasn’t as boring as what it was made out to be. In fact, it is pretty interesting. Mr. Seals was probably the most likeable professors at Lipscomb. More than any other professor he showed a genuine love and concern for his students. I remember we started each class off with a prayer. It was a huge class (probably about 200 people), yet Mr. Seals provided enough time for class discussion.
  Footnote: It was in this class when I found out about the Oklahoma City bombing. We had a special prayer for the victims when class began on that day.

Surprisingly many of my memorable classes at Lipscomb were the Bible classes. We were required to have a Bible class each day at Lipscomb. Sometimes this meant having 2 Bible classes – a Mon., Wed., Odd Friday Bible class; and a Tues., Thurs, Even Friday Bible class. These Bible classes came at a time when I really needed them. Before my only exposure to Bible in a classroom sense was Sunday School at church. I learned ALOT from these classes.
By contrast I don’t remember too much from the business and computer classes at Lipscomb. Somehow alot of it was memorization and applying common sense.
Least Favorite Classes

• COBOL – with Andy whatshisname – It was a 7:40AM Tuesday, Thursday, Even Friday class. I was totally lost in this class. The professor was away most of the time. We pretty much taught ourselves COBOL. I remember talking to the Dean about how the teacher was not actually teaching the class.
  Surprisingly I did get an A out of the class. The summer after the course was over I ran into the professor while at McDonald’s. He said I got an A because I didn’t miss any days.
• Some type of Literature class….I dropped out of this class after I found myself totally confused on what I was supposed to be doing. This was the only class I ever dropped out of. I later on took my required literature course in the summer.

I know about half a dozen incoming Freshmen at Western Kentucky University and Freed-Hardeman University….both sets from various church functions. It’s kinda weird that I know a bunch of people at each school, but it was bound to happen. Within southern Kentucky the default school that everyone goes to is WKU. No other school is even put into consideration. Why? It is reasonably affordable and closeby.
Whereas at my church, you’d think that Freed-Hardeman is the only school available for Christians to go to. The preacher is from Freed-Hardeman; our youth minister is from FHU. Even our youth intern is from FHU. Consequentally many of our high school seniors at church have decided to go to FHU. I believe we have 2 or 3 going in as a Freshmen this year…adding to the 3 or 4 that already go there. My only gripe is that there might be an unwritten rule around church that FHU is the only option for Christians to go to. No other Christian schools are even mentioned. Next summer I hope they consider getting a youth minister intern from some other university….maybe Harding…..
All of this brings to mind my college life. I kept a relatively low profile at Lipscomb. Only had a small group of friends. People come up to me all the time and ask if I know their relative/friend who went to Lipscomb at the same time I did. There is a 75% chance that I don’t know them. I still keep in touch with most of my small group of friends from Lipscomb. The rest of the people there were just faces in the crowd.
If I had it to do over again, I would have had more fun in college. I was too busy trying to study and had a chip on my shoulder that kept me from having fun. My Spring semester Freshmen year was probably one of the most extended fun period of my life. Seemlingly after that year all I did was buckle down and study.