I’m sure at one time in their college experience, all students have experienced boredom.  What people choose to do with this boredom, however, is the difference among many students.  One Saturday, some of my friends and I were going through this.  We were bored, so we decided we wanted to go to some kind of haunted house, cemetery, or  something similar.  Being honors students, we had just finished reading Nelson Johnson’s Boardwalk Empire, so when we saw Jonathan Pitney’s house come up on a website listing local haunted places, we decided that we had to go!

Of course, we had to go late at night to hopefully experience some ghosts and get really freaked out.  At around twelve thirty in the morning, we all piled into our friend’s minivan and made our way to Pitney’s house.  We did get lost on the way there and drove by it several times before discovering which one it was, but eventually we got there.  Because the house was on the corner of a main street, we had to park on the side street, in the parking lot of a cemetery which was ominous in itself.  After looking around in the cemetery for a bit, we made our way over to the Pitney house.  However, it was not what we expected.  We expected to find the house to be extremely old, possibly quite deteriorated, in a desolate area.  The actual Pitney house is in a residential neighborhood and is kept in good condition.  There are people living in it, so it must be recently renovated.  The house is unique in that it is built to be much squarer than the more modern houses around it, and it also has three stories which are rare to see nowadays.  Also, above the final story, there is a small, lookout tower on the top, at least that’s what it looked like to me.  Whatever one would call it, they are not frequently seen on most houses.  Because there are people living in the house, unfortunately, we were not able to sneak around and get close.

On our way back from the Pitney house, we went through the cemetery again.  This time we found the Leeds’ family graves, Leeds, as in Jimmie Leeds, the farmer who owned all the land in this area and sold it to Pitney.  There were very recent graves from the Leeds family all the way up to graves that were no longer readable. Several of the older graves were also sunken into the ground; one was over three quarters of the way in the ground, completely unreadable.  We could not find the original Jimmie Leeds gravestone, so I assumed that this almost completely sunken grave had a good chance of being his.

Even though the Pitney house was not what I had expected, getting to see it and experience a part of this area’s history that I had read about was very interesting.  The Leeds’ graves were an added bonus!  We had no intention of looking for or finding these, but it was another interesting piece of history to experience. This was definitely a better way to cure our boredom than just watching a movie.

I went to the Get Involved Fair this week. It was very exciting. There were tables everywhere and tons off music and brightly colored posters decorating every table. Everyone wanted you to join their club whether or not you were good at whatever they were advertising.

The first say was inside because of “inclement weather” but it was sunny pretty much all day. But the second day was outside and there was chalk writings advertising for clubs all along the sidewalk from my housing building to the fair. They were really colorful and eye catching, you couldn’t help but watch the ground as you walked.

I personally think the fair was much better outside, the tables went in spirals and lined the path and really made the circle feel alive. I had never seen so many people all out on campus at once. I joined two clubs, and I’m happy with that. My friends joined three or more just because they could. I am happy that they found interesting things to join, but it’s hard not to when you see how many clubs and organizations there were out there. Every table was decorated just to advertise what their club was like, and it was gorgeous. The Chemistry Society had a picture of an atom and their banner that read “Chemistry Society” and they had bismuth crystals on their table (which by the way and GORGEOUS!). The Gaming Club on the other hand had an game cube out on the first day since they were indoors, but the second day they had a chess board out. The Anime Club had drawing and shirts out on their table, Student Senate was registering people to vote, and EDIBL had candy bugs on their table.

I really look forward to seeing this again next year, and maybe I’ll be sitting at a table advertising for some new club that I’ve founded. There were so many clubs to join, and some didn’t even have tables out but you could hear people talking about them and wondering why there were no tables. I really enjoyed the Get Involved Fair, and I think it was a pretty good start to this semester. Hopefully it will continue to be as awesome as it was this year.

A few weeks ago on September eighteenth I, along with a group of friends, went to the second girls’ volleyball game of season in which our Stockton Ospreys were facing the Rutgers-Camden volleyball team. In all going to the game was fun; the Ospreys won and we got free Stockton memorabilia out of it.

We walked into Big Blue, the Stockton gymnasium, at about seven at night, as the game was about to begin. We were pretty excited because they were giving away free tee-shirts sometime during the game. We, as well as the other Stockton students, were pretty enthusiastic about the game, cheering for each player as she ran onto the court after being announced. The girls got ready and began. At first, our, or at least my, faith in our team was a little shaky since in the first set of the game the Rutgers-Camden team won in a close match of twenty-five to twenty seven. Even though it was a loss, Stockton, both players and fans, retained their good spirits for the second set and it payed off. The girls pulled out a solid win in their second set, much to the joy of the players and crowd. The fact that this was the set in which they gave away the tee-shirts also helped with crowd moral. The crowd seemed to be enjoying themselves since, even though most of the friends I came with came for the free shirt, they decided to stick around for the rest of the game because they were having fun. Continuing with their phenomenal playing, the girls on the team came out with a win in the third and then the fourth sets of the game, giving them an overall victory in the game.

I personally had fun at the game and it seemed like the rest of the crowd did as well. I would suggest that everyone should consider going to the volleyball games; they are exciting and enthralling for all who attend.

As an introvert, it’s never easy for me to make friends or even socialize with people. However, I see college as a chance to start fresh and try to make new friends as well as get acquainted with old friends who are also Stockton students. The past three weeks have been extremely overwhelming for me. Between the copious amounts of course work and essays I’ve been faced with recently, I am still trying to have fun and get involved at Stockton. As a commuter, it’s a bit more of a challenge to get involved and make friends on campus because a lot of students know each other from living in the dorms and have already established the group of people they want to call their friends.

Recently, Stockton held a Get Involved Fair which I decided to check out and see what it was all about. As I walked out of F-111, my last class of the day, I noticed the main hallway was filled with students and tables lining the left and right sides of the hallway. There had to have been close to a hundred tables, stretching from one end of the hallway to the other. As I wandered down the hallway, I couldn’t help but feel a sense of community and certain diversity from all the different clubs, organizations, and fraternities within that one hallway. I had no idea how many different organizations there were at Stockton; it was yet another thing that overwhelmed and simply amazed me.

There were so many choices down the hallway ahead of me. As I walked down the hallway, I was confronted with clubs for reading, gaming, fitness, helping the community, writing, so many unique unions to join based on one’s personal interests. As I made it to the end of the hallway, I saw a girl playing a ukulele at a table that had a piece of paper on it which read, “Stockton Music Union”. Music has always been my passion. I have been a flutist since I was nine, and more recently, I have become a guitarist, pianist, and ukulele player as well during the past two years. The Music Union was something that appealed to me so I decided I would sign up for the club. I signed up and decided that one club was enough for me for now, since I am still trying to get adjusted to the college life.

I went to the first Music Union meeting this past Tuesday. There were probably only about twenty of us, maximum, that showed up for the club. Everyone in the club seemed so friendly and welcoming, and I felt right at home. We went over who we were, the instruments we could play or wanted to learn, and the types of fundraisers and charities we would do as a club. It was a really nice feeling to be surrounded by musicians once again. I was in marching band during my four years of high school and I always found it more stimulating to be around fellow musicians than people who weren’t musicians. Anyhow, I think I’ll like the Music Union. Next week we have to play two compositions or songs in front of the club to show our skill level, I hope I do well and show everyone my talent.

As a high school student, I never did much for my school.  When I wasn’t in school, I was swamped with work and a family to take care of.  I was never able to partake in the clubs, school events, or athletics.  When I walked in the doors of The Richard Stockton College of New Jersey, I was ecstatic about exploring the different opportunities that I am now able to take advantage of.  I wanted to be able to make up for all the experiences I missed out on as a child.  However, I was clueless on how to go about my search.

On September 19^th and 20^th, my prayers were answered.  During these two days, Stockton College held a “Get Involved Fair”.  This fair held the answers to all my problems.  As I walked the hallways of F-wing, I was immersed into the crowd as hundreds of students rushed to the tables to sign up for their favorite clubs.  As I wandered past each table, I began to ponder how I was going to decide which ones to join.  It seemed as though every club held interest to me.  Soon after, I decided to give in to my temptations.  I went to every table that seemed enjoyable and signed my name.  Before I knew it, I had signed my name to ten different clubs.  When I left the fair that day, I was a new member to clubs ranging from Biology to Gaming.  I have never experienced a more satisfying feeling.

On September 19, 2012, The Richard Stockton College of New Jersey was visited by a special guest speaker, Anita Hill.  Anita Hill is a writer and a victim of sexual harassment in the workplace.  She visited Stockton to tell her story, and to inspire women to stand up for their rights.  Unfortunately, even though she arrived with noble intentions, I feel that the Anita Hill event was ineffective and dull.

I walked into the event center with high expectations and excitement for the speech.  What I witnessed was a great disappointment.  The speech was nothing like I was expecting.  I felt that Professor Hill spoke in far too many circles and repeated the same argument over and over again.  After the first twenty minutes, I found it difficult to focus on her story and fought myself to stay awake.

This speech was uninspiring and downright boring.   I was unable to retain any of the information given by Doctor Hill because I could not focus on a single word she spoke.  She did not speak of any of her experiences or how to truly deal with harassment in the work place.  I felt as though she preached too much about history and women’s rights with far too little personal input.  As a victim of harassment, I was hoping to be able to find a strong connection with Anita Hill.  Instead, I sat unentertained as I stared, eyes unmoving, at the clock, wondering when the speech would be over.  Once the questioning was over, I was relieved to have been able to walk out the doors.  This event proved to be a great disappointment, and a huge waste of time.  I was unimpressed with Doctor Hill’s presentation, and will most likely not attend her future speeches.