ORU Week 1

I am a failure.

Between my internet not functioning, my busy-ness and my bit of laziness I have been unable to get a blog up since my actually moving in to ORU. It has been a blast! A bit overwhelming and very tiring, but it has been a total blast and I am so excited about my college life here. So since I have dropped the ball I will recap on my first week here in one long blog.

Friday 8/8/08: Move in day

After a night of anticipation and very little sleep I woke up @ the hotel and drove across the street onto campus. We pulled in through a tunnel of cheering upper-classmen welcoming us to the campus. Our cars were immediately rushed by R.A.s, Chaplains and other students who were helping with freshmen move in day. The rest of that day was spent unpacking and getting my student accounts set up. At night we all went out with our wings for ice cream.

Saturday 8/9/08: Harbor craziness

This day was solely devoted to getting us all acquainted with ORU and with each other. We did tours, devos, games etc. We also had our commissioning service. All of the new students received prayer from the RAs and chaplains while the ORU worship team rocked it on stage. It was awesome.

Sunday 8/10/08: Sabbath

The school made sure that sunday was a free day so we could all find a church and spend it relaxing. We visited Victory Christian Center, which is right across the street and is a great church. Afterward we ate lunch and just relaxed for the afternoon. That night is when I had to say goodbye to my parents because they had to leave early Monday morning. It was very sad, but we all got through it okay.

Monday 8/11/08: Registration

I had to start getting classes settled and set my room up on Monday. 

Tuesday 8/12/08: Worship Audition

I was very nervous, but the audition and placement test for the worship arts major was very easy and I had no problems at all. Once I got through the audition I got my schedule set up and picked up my books. My roommate moved in so it was nice to finally meet him.

Wednesday 8/13/08: Scheduling Craziness

I thought my schedule was done on Tuesday but it wasn't... at all. It took hours of meetings with teachers to get my schedule set up right but I got it all done. I also got to spend some time with Desi's parents before the headed off. Last night we all went to the movies and I really enjoyed a fun night out before the start of classes.

Today 8/14/08: Class begins

Today I had 4 classes. That's a lot for one day in college.... but I have that much everyday. The classes seemed manageable today, but i wont really know until next week. I just know that I am way exhausted and I have to get organized. I will definitely sleep good tonight. Tomorrow is another introductory day for classes and then we get a weekend for all of this to sink in. I hope to keep the blogs up through the craziness. Once life gets into a rhythm I'll return to writing about things more interesting than my life haha. 

But until then...

God Bless & Stay Electric!

900 Miles on the Okie Trail: Travel Day 2

We made it!

Today was our final 5 hours of travel to Tulsa. The driving was a little rougher than yesterday due to heavy rain and sheer boredom, but we got into town successfully and we can finally relax for a little while before the chaos of college move-in begins. 

On our previous trip to the school I put the wrong address into my gps and we ended up in the ghetto of Tulsa (yes they really have one and it is quite creepy). Due to having to redirect we then had to go through downtown to get to the campus. This time we had the right address in and we got to go around the city through a very nice residential area. We pulled up to the school and ran right up to the huge praying hands statue to take our first picture at the school. We decided to get some registration stuff done in the admissions office and I got to get my ORU lanyard at the bookstore. Woot! 

Now I'm sitting in the lobby of our hotel because you have to pay for in-room internet... 10 bucks a night to be exact... I know, ridiculous. I think we're gonna grab some grub that is not fast food for once and then just chill here for the night. Tomorrow is a way hectic day with moving in and all so I might write in tomorrow night, but I don't know when I'll end up getting time. Either way keep checking in and I'll be writing more soon.

Stay Electric!

Due to driving I wasn't able to take many pics today. I'll be taking more pictures of the school throughout the week and today's pics should be on Flickr later or tomorrow. 

900 Miles on the Okie Trail : Travel Day 1

 I am currently writing from a hotel room in the small town of Sullivan, Missouri. It is about an hour west of St. Louis. We have almost exactly 5 hours of drive time left until we get to Tulsa so I am very happy about that. 

My day started with a frantic hour of last minute packing for the trip. After having a breakdown with my sister as we said our goodbyes, I grabbed a drink at Sbux ( an iced caramel macchiato to be exact... just in case you were curious) and we hit the road. It was a pretty easy drive, but it got long. I've never driven further than 3 hours at a time and today was more than double that so it took a toll on me. Destiny kept me company for the majority of the day and we had the iPod so it was fairly smooth sailing. 

As far as the sights out west go there's not much. Just a lot of green flatness. We did get to see Indianapolis and the massive Colts arena which was awesome. We also saw a humongous cross, fighter jets doing flight formations over head and the famous St. louis arch. I've seen this all on previous trips, but it is still a cool experience. After fighting through St. Louis traffic we decided to find a hotel. We werent thinking about the fact that Six Flags St Louis was in its busy season and all rooms within 20 some exits were booked solid. That brings us to now. Were in a very nice Baymont inn and we are that much closer to our future.

I'll have another more detailed blog soon talking about the overall experience of packing up an moving out to school. I'll also be putting one up tomorrow night after we're settled in in Tulsa about tomorrow's trip.

Thanks for reading and next time you hear from me I'll be an Okie! (not really... I hate that word... I'm a Pittsburgher ... I just live  in Tulsa for a while)

A few pics of today

900 Miles on the Okie Trail : Final Prep Day

The packing is finally finished. After hours of hauling boxes to the van in the heat all of my stuff is finally out of the house. I was particularly impressed with the way that my father configured all of my junk into a mini-van jigsaw puzzle. I must admit trying to get all of my stuff together was rather stressful but now that we're done I am very relieved and I am nothing but excited to get goin

I know that I didn't get the pictures uploaded last night, but no fear... my pictures of my packing adventure are now on my new flickr page! Click the link to check em out and feel free to subscribe to my photocast in my favorite blogs list on this site. I'll be writing from the road tomorrow afternoon. Here we go!

ORU Packing Day Photocast

900 Miles on the Okie Trail : Prep day 1

Welcome to my series of blogs about my trek across the country to Oral Roberts University in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Last night/today was my first big prep day for the trip. I began the daunting task of packing my life into boxes this weekend and today I drove all over from 1:30 until 11:00 saying goodbye to friends and family members. Tomorrow will be my final day of prep for the trip. I'll be doing my final bit of packing and loading up the copper cruiser (my corolla) for my voyage. At the bottom of this post I've included some pics of the school just in case you haven't seen it. These were taken on our February visit. Tomorrow I'll post pics of my mess of stuff that needs packed and things of that nature. Make sure you check back in tomorrow evening and everyday this week. Every time we stop at a hotel/panera/sbux or other wi-fi hot spot I'll be doing little trip updates. Keep our families in your prayers and  I'll be talkin to ya soon!

*pics are gettin updated tomorrow am*

FYI: Most of the good pics were taken by Desi