After an amazing summer in Australia, I am finally back at Wheaton what I hope will be another eventful and successful year. I came back a few days before the freshman got here for WAMs (which stands for Wheaton Athletic Mentors). For those of you who don’t know about the WAMs, each athletic team has about two individuals who act as liaisons between athletics and academics at Wheaton. We attended various meetings along with RAs and preceptors about sexual assault and learned about our job as leaders on campus. We helped move in all the freshman bright and early that Saturday as well, which brought me back to that day two years ago. I still can’t believe I’m already a junior in college.

Anyway, classes have started and the workload is starting to pick up. As an English major, I am trying to fulfill my requirements for two pre-1800s literature classes. I am taking the 18th Century Novel which should be interesting and is with a professor I really like. Even though my US Foreign Policy class for my Political Science minor is at 8 am (way too early to think), the class is really informative and obviously extremely relevant to what is going on in our world right now with the War in Iraq. Introduction to Macroeconomics and another writing class I think are good electives to take. I think it’s good to take classes in all subjects and get the real “liberal arts education” that Wheaton is known for.

Preseason for basketball starts tomorrow too. We lift, play, do pilates, sprints, and core workouts five days a week. This will prepare us for the big day on October 21st (a little later this year) when our actual season begins. I am really excited to play with my team and start getting a taste of what the chemistry on the court will be like this year. Also, I’ve never done pilates before and have always wanted to! It should be a nice refreshing workout to accompany our usual sprints and lifting. Well, that’s all thats going on now! I’ll write more soon!

This week surprisingly went by fast, even though it was the first full week of the semester. Classes are starting to pick up with work and reading has been taking up a lot of my time. Between reading “Pride and Prejudice” for my English class and several articles for my US Foreign Policy class, this week has consisted of reading, eating, basketball and attempts at full nights of sleep. Our basketball workouts are in full swing for pre-season and I am really sore. We lift twice a week, play and do conditioning and agilities three times a week and pilates on Friday mornings. I am excited about getting back into “basketball shape” for the season and can’t wait for our first game. We had four recruits stay overnight this week and participate in some of the workouts. Coach suggests we bring them to the Loft at night to hang out. Don’t get me wrong, I love the chocolate frappes there but my Loft money on my card is almost all gone…and it’s the third week of school! Anyway, I was delighted to hear from my coach that all of them loved it here at Wheaton! Sounds like this weekend should be fun. I am going into Boston Friday night for a cancer benefit for my friend’s uncle and possibly will get to see one of my friend’s in her new apartment. Saturday is one of my best friend’s birthday’s and supposedly there is a courtyard party going on in EECS. I’m sure we will make the best of it!