CAS blogs

This month I was able to participate in the planning and help in scheduling events that would take place on my A-Term experience in paleontology field work in Seymour, Texas. Planning this week out in the field was fun because as a group we were able to first to preliminary research about the area, this was nice because we learned a lot about Seymour and the flora and fauna that we would be dealing with while there. Looking at the challenges we may face was also important because we had to plan accordingly to this, things such as weather issues or dangerous fauna such as scorpions, centipedes, and rattlesnakes. We also had to prepare to interact with our partners in Seymour working at the Whiteside Museum of Natural History. Planning these interactions was important to the trip as we had to learn from them as well as figure out when we were actually allowed to be on the site working. This was also my second time on the paleontology field trip and due to this I was able to provide some ...

Recently I tag teamed an issue with my friend in order to solve a problem for a family that needed help with driving hours. A middle schooler's family reached out and needed help driving their child home a couple times a week and my friend saw this message and reached out to me asking if that was something I wanted to do. I decided that I was able to do this so I reached out to the family and said that I was able to do this for them and we met in person and talked over the phone in order to make it happen. By the end of the week I was taking home the middle schooler three times a week for the foreseeable future. This would not have been possible if my friend hadn't reached out to me and made me aware of this opportunity, therefore working together can help with a lot of things in life even if it is as simple as spreading information/word of mouth. 

 This weekend I attended the Astroworld festival as a vendor of popsicles. This was my first time working with this company and I was a little bit nervous as I was a last minute addition with little experience. Once I arrived I was assigned a popsicle stand where I stayed and sold popsicles throughout the evening. I was scared to take on this challenge because I didn't have a good idea of what to expect but as time went on I really got the hang of it. This was a difficult task for me especially because I am also an introvert and this was a popular festival with over 100,000 people in attendance. I had the chance to interact with a lot of new people and talk to them about a variety of topics, other than popsicles, and feel like I was able to come out of my shell a little bit. I sold popsicles with a friend for about 5 hours, during this time there was a period where I was working the stand all alone and I feel like I got a lot better at talking to people and being a good salesman in...

 Last night I played a flag football game with the Bearkats and we were able to pull ahead and win the game. It was a lot of fun, but I definitely have areas that I need to get better in. We work great as a team but sometimes we have our own individual problems that we need to solve. Personally I know my strengths which include the ability to catch the ball and run fast, and these strengths help me a lot while playing. But I also need to work on developing my skills in other areas such as pulling the other teams flags when they have the ball. Sometimes I miss their flags and they get farther along before someone else is able to stop them and I feel bad. Luckily we have practice today and I will be able to work on my skills so that I don't have to worry about it as much anymore, and I will be able to perform better than ever.

 This weekend I had the opportunity to work at a car wash event and clean peoples cars. It was a huge success and over the course of the morning we cleaned many cars and brought in a lot of money. As a group we faced a lot of challenges however, there were times where the flow of cars was slow and we had to think of ways to attract new customers, so a couple of people took a sign and went to hold it up at a street corner nearby to attract people. We also kept running out of soap so we had to designate some people to make sure we didnt run out when we needed it. As a group we kept the car wash up and running very successfully and we had many customers up until closing in the early afternoon, this project definitely wouldnt have been possible if we hadnt all been working together to make it successful because we were all important parts of the system. We had stations for rinsing, scrubbing, re-rinsing, and drying, all before we sent the car on its way, and everyone working their part...

Last week I took part in a martial arts course for the first time and learned a lot of new things about martial arts. The first thing that I learned about was the physical side, I got taught how to do kickboxing for a while, learning how to throw punches and kicks and turn them into combos that are effective and quick. Then I also learned about Jiu Jitsu and how to defend myself if a fight is brought to the ground, which is where most fights end up because people usually start grappling and end up on the ground which is where kickboxing become null and jiu jitsu is going to be really helpful to escape danger. I also learned a lot about the mental side of martial arts, knowing that you need to have discipline was a point that was stressed a lot and I learned a lot about setting goals and taking the steps to achieve them without giving up, learning the attitude necessary to be a winner. Over the course of the class I got a lot better at the physical side, becoming a lot better at doing k...