Days 333-336: April 29-May 2, 2013

To begin the week I stopped by Soma for the first time to grab a smoothie. It was very good and I am surprised I have not stopped by Soma yet. My "Jungle Juice" smoothie was a great snack to get the day started, as this was the beginning of the long and challenging week that would culminate with two exams in 24 hours. It was time to sprint towards the finish line of 2L year as crunch time is upon us. The bad news is it was two of my non-multiple choice exams, but the good news was it was also my only two open-book exams. So the plan was to spend two days prepping for each, and then buckle up and get the job done.

First up was Administrative Law, and after a long day spent mostly studying for Secured Transactions (I had designated both Sunday and Monday as Admin days), I put together a couple hours worth of refreshing in Admin towards the end of the evening. It was challenging spending the whole week in the library as the weather was getting to be quite nice outside, but I was fortunately able to spare some time to go for a run on Monday before I really had to lock it down. I think I did a good job of organizing and prepping for round one, but we'll have to wait and see how everything comes back in the end.

Secured Transactions is.... well there is not much positive to say about Secured Transactions. Tropical Secured Transactions, however, is something else. Immediately after my Admin final, I got right into Secured, as it would take the entire rest of the day to actually figure out what was going on in that class. Towards the end of the night, it was down to the I-Jiggles office, where we found a random pineapple, paired it up with our globalization monkey, threw in some casebooks and statutory supplements, and created Tropical Secured Transactions!

On the final day of 2L year, it was the culmination of essentially the worst season of 24 ever: two exams wrapped up within 24 hours. But, like Jack Bauer, I put my game face on and finished strong (well, hopefully—we'll find out soon). It's a relief to finally be done and finish this long stretch and put an end to the challenging and strenuous 2L year. Oh, and it also happened to be another beautiful day in Bloomington.

Days 329-332: April 25-28, 2013

Thursday was a sprint day at the law school as I rushed to learn as much Corporate Finance as physically possible. I ended up spending most of the day in the journal office, as I-Jiggles has a surprising number of students in the class, so we were all learning together. Kunle taught me the most important thing about Finance: none of it actually works in the real world. I will plan on keeping that fact (which is entirely true) off of the exam though.

The Corporate Finance exam seemed to go fairly successful. Although it was challenging, I think I managed to learn quite a bit in the short period of time I had to race to learn it yesterday. Hopefully it was enough! Anyway, it was a decent day outside, so here is another nice Spring shot of campus and some flowering trees.

On Saturday it was time to turn my attention to Admin Law, as I am now entering the dreadful stretch where I have four days to prepare for two back-to-back exams: Admin and Secured. We also got these fun cool I-Jiggles tote bags as an end-of-the-year gift. I don't know what I will use it for yet, but it is always fantastic to rep I-Jiggles!

Sunday was a cloudy and occasionally rainy day, which matched the mood in the library as I continued to cram for Admin, and it seemed others were busy getting ready for their second week of exams as well. They did put up brand new flags though, and I took advantage of the windy afternoon to take a shot of them. Sunday finishes up my round of Admin studying, as Monday I will begin two days of Secured before we get ready to take on the third and fourth quarters of exam season within a span of 24 hours. It will be like an incredibly boring episode of 24—hopefully I can be as successful as Jack Bauer!

Days 325-328: April 21-24, 2013

We spent all of Little 5 (the largest college party in the country) in the law school library studying for exams. Of course, this meant that we got to spend the whole day watching all of the undergrads walk by the law library windows having fun. So to combat this problem, David constructed a nice sign to try to interact with, as they would refer to them on Lost, "the others."

On Monday I finally caved in to peer pressure and popular demand and ended my six-year run of Taco Bell sobriety to try the new Cool Ranch Doritos Locos Tacos. And I must say, it was worth it because those things are fantastic. Maybe it's because they are so new that they cannot start giving out stale taco shells yet, but I will have a hard time staying away from Taco Bell in the coming weeks as I will surely want to go back for more. I have also missed Mountain Dew Baja Blast, which is one of my favorite drinks that I used to always have in high school, but due to my six-year Taco Bell sobriety stint, also made its first reappearance this week.

Tuesday night it was back to the Union, my typical pre-exam Battle Station spot to sum up all I've learned about Corporations before my first exam of the semester. The first exam is fortunately multiple choice, but this is going to be a rough home stretch with four exams in total. I am feeling good about Corporations, and I better get off to a fast start because I think each one I face is going to be progressively more challenging!

Wednesday I finished the first of my four exams, Corporations. It was then an immediate transition into preparing for Corporate Finance, which is coming up on Friday. It was a cold and rainy day in Bloomington, as the weather took another turn back down. Here is a lone blossomed flower by the Sample Gates that has closed up overnight in the chilly mid-week weather.

Days 317-322: April 13-18, 2013

On Saturday we held our first ever class Bar Crawl, with these fantastic shirts designed to perfectly approximate the 2L year. Our Bar Crawl coincided with the 3L Bar Crawl, and we ended up meeting up at the final bar in the trip. It was a fun night to get out and see some people before we will all start to buckle down for Spring Semester finals!

Sunday it was back to the law school to start to get ready for our last week of classes. It was a beautiful day outside, but I had to lock myself inside the library to finish up all of my cite-checking and reading for the week so that as the week began I could get a head start on some of my exam studying. This semester is going to be a tough one, so time to get cracking!

Monday was a brief break to enjoy our long-awaited student-faculty basketball game at Assembly Hall. It was an amazing experience and exhilirating to walk down the stands and onto the court level to lace up the shoes and take the court. We were thoroughly dominated by the stacked faculty team, but it was a fun experience and a great game nonetheless. I managed to knock down a three from the corner, hit a Watshot in warm-ups, take one unbelievably long three-point attempt, deliver some good passes and a nice save out of bounds into an assist, and get to the foul line. I was mostly neutralized by the size of our opponent (it was like playing in a Big Ten game), which mitigated my ability to really play at the 3 where I'm best, but it was a fun time. One thing to note for the future: college courts are MUCH longer than gym ones....getting back on D and taking the ball up on offense gets tiring real quick!

On Tuesday we had a couple of storms come in the afternoon and again in the evening, so it was a rainy night. There were even more storms overnight, with plenty of thunder and lightning. I do enjoy some spring and summer thunderstorms, and since we had such a long drought last summer, it is nice to finally get some rain again.

This spot by the Courthouse stood out to me this week as I was thinking about what happened in Boston. My thoughts and prayers go out to all those affected, and I am thankful for the people of Boston who bravely stepped up to help those affected and helped ensure that the people behind this were doomed to fail in their attempt to make us lose faith in humanity. Evil can only prevail when good people do nothing, and the people of Boston showed us this week how we can heroically respond to tragedy, fighting out evil and ensuring that in spite of terror, we as humanity can continue to seek our own Freedom from Fear, through the bravery exemplified by the best of us.

There were storms brewing in Bloomington on Thursday evening, and while none of the strong storms came in during the day, the hard rain came earlier than expected. I ended up getting caught during my evening run in two strong downpours. It ended up being worth it though, as it made for quite an enjoyable run, and I really picked up my pace, which had been slacking lately. It was a good distraction from prepping for exams, which I returned to following my brief time outdoors.

Days 310-314: April 6-10, 2013

It has been quite the busy week, so here is another large batch of uploads at once. Saturday was a day spent indoors cite-checking, and I even stayed in the library long enough to close it down. Of course, closing on a Saturday only means staying until 10:00 PM, but it still gets mostly empty by then. Even though I spotted up in my new corner hiding spot, most of the pit is empty by the time I am getting ready to leave.

Sunday was the first amazingly beautiful day of the year, with perfect weather in the 70s and plenty of sunshine. Although I was supposed to stay in and do work all day, I couldn't help going out for a run in the perfect weather. After finishing up my run, I was able to take this great shot of the Sample Gates. I then finally went back to the library to finish up my work for the day, enjoying my favorite spring-time library drink, a Starbucks iced green tea.

Monday was law school free stuff day, as I got some IJGLS "swag" and a Lexis Camelbak. The IJGLS stuff was for submitting the winning entry for Aman's end of the year gift, which was a photo of him superimposed on a famous person's body. My entry was him as Tom Crean at the introductory press conference, with the Crean and Crimson shirt saying Global and Legal instead. The Lexis bottle was from another training, doing some Lexis points hustling.

Tuesday was another beautiful day in Bloomington, so I took an afternoon break to take a few shots of some of the spring flowers and perfect weather. Here is a spot just inside the Sample Gates by the student building. I ended up going for another run after classes to enjoy the nice weather, and then moved back into the library to finish up my reading for the day and a bit more cite-checking.

I am not really sure what this "IU Strike" is, but I think it is something to protest tuition that the students are all going crazy about. Sounds like a dumb idea to me, especially when law school tuition is the one that is into the 30,000s. But you give undergrads a chance to act like there is an "important issue" and they will jump on it whether or not they even know what they are doing. Just ask UVA how their living wage campaign is still going. Anyway, Wednesday finished up classes for the week (only one more week left...), and I ended the evening by serving as a juror in a mock trial, which was pretty fun and exciting. We ended up as a hung jury, but the side I voted with carried the slight majority!

Days 284-287: March 11-14, 2013

Monday started off a nice, cold, week of spring break. Definitely not getting off to a warm weather start like we did last year. Here it looks like all of the law school's trees are being torn out and replaced with new trees. It is a bit of a mess now, but I am hoping as spring continues the landscaping will begin to develop a bit and start to develop a nicer look.

Tuesday was 50-cent wing day, so I went to the best place in B-Town for wings, Buffa Louie's, to grab some lunch. My favorite order is five wings in medium and five in medium BBQ, which is the single best sauce I've ever had on wings. Buffa Louie's is also conveniently located by the most awkwardly placed sign in all of Bloomington (and maybe in any city), which is the Hoagy Carmichael sign located just behind the USA Today sign. This sign hangs out right into the middle of the walkway, and I know of at least one or two people that have walked right into it.

On Wednesday I put in some quality time at the library to take advantage of the extra time over break to finish up all of my associate work for journal, catch up on some early executive board work, and take care of a couple other random errands. Wednesday also brought the surprise of some additional snow, not much, but enough to coat the grass and at times look like a much heavier amount was coming. Even though I love the snow, it is getting to the point where it is time for some warmer weather to come around. After taking advantage of the quiet library to get some photos of our beautiful study area, I finished off the day with a nice relaxing trip to the gym to get in some running and lifting and to play a bit of basketball.

Thursday was still a bit chilly, but we took advantage of the afternoon to head up to Indy and stop by a few of the breweries to sample some different beers. We started at Fountain Square (the Indianapolis version and NOT the Bloomington one), moved on to Flat 12, where we got free samples and enjoyed the nice warm outdoor fire pit, and finished off at the aptly named BlackAcre, what should be a law school favorite and had some great brews, good food, and amazing sweet potato fries. Tomorrow it will be off to Chicago, following Indiana's second-round B1G Tournament game, where although it will be the warmest day in Bloomington of the week, the weather will be much colder up north.

Days 273-274: February 28-March 1, 2013

Thursday was a day spent mostly in the journal office, alongside our lovable kickball trophy with his new t-shirt and our favorite globalization monkey. In the morning I had my interview for next year's executive board, and in the afternoon I spent most of the day cite-checking. While our trophy looks as excited as always (most likely due to being a champion), our monkey seems somewhat tired and/or passed out. He must have been spending a long day cite-checking as well...

Friday was the moot court final arguments, and they were pretty great. All four competitors did a fantastic job, and we had a great panel of judges led by the real Judge Kima Royce and Professor Cody Zeller himself. Also, we had armed bailiffs at the bench because why not, this is Indiana. At the end of the night, the two champions were named and were well deserving. I certainly could not have done that well at this stage of the competition, which is why I was rightfully eliminated in the Octofinals! (And just in time to celebrate my birthday party.)

Days 268-272: February 23-27, 2013

Saturday was our I-Jiggles Global Party, which I attended after The Vegas Bombers extended our win streak to three games by defeating a team on an eight-game winning streak in epic fashion. We are really starting to come together and make our playoff run! Global Party was a lot of fun as well. I contributed to the European representation with some Abbey Ale (I think from the Netherlands?) and my favorite Belhaven Scottish Ale. The Belhaven was my favorite beer in Scotland and is still my favorite beer of all time. It is like a lighter and creamier tasting Guinness, and while the widget-loaded draft cans are fantastic, nothing compares to the true Belhaven drawn off the tap in the Scottish heartland.

Sunday closed off a very busy four-day weekend with a quiet day at home combined with a bit of work to catch up for the school week. I ended the evening by partaking in one of the rare events of the year where I cook my own dinner. Here we have some pork chops and mixed vegetables accompanied by a glass of Oliver Creekbend Traminette, Indiana's signature wine. All was delicious, proving it to be another rare occasion: the occasion where I cook foods that are not corn on the cob and they all taste good.

My dinner Monday was not quite as wholesome as my home-cooked Sunday meal (don't worry, I had a real dinner later on), but I stopped by Potbelly to pick up a vanilla malt and sugar cookie to keep me going as I finished my high school math homework, also known as our second problem set for Corporate Finance. I'm still not sure if I really remember what math means, but I keep saying that one day I hope to keep track of my personal finances like a corporation does, so it should eventually come in handy. I used to get these sugar cookies all the time in D.C., and although the ones in Bloomington are usually a little over-baked, this one was quite delicious.

Tuesday was a sad sad day. After watching an amazing moot court semifinal argument, we went over to Nick's to catch the Indiana game, where the Hoosiers disappointed and were upset by the Golden Gophers of Minnesota. We still have a great team, but we really have to stop it with these letdown games, particularly the ones in which Cody Zeller decides to play like a little kid. With Watford in foul trouble and Zeller getting beat up down low by the Gophers (getting beat up by a Gopher is as sad as it sounds), things were not going to end well, even with Indiana fighting back from their countless mistakes to keep things close until the end. Better get back to practice, because with only three games left, we are going to have to win at least two and maybe all three to win the Big Ten and secure that #1 overall tournament seed and midwest regional placement!

On Wednesday we all stopped at Noodles for lunch, where Megan was surprised by the new drink machine they added this semester. While I did think these machines were super cool when they first came out, I am starting to not like them so much because they have way too many choices, and take forever to use even when you know what your doing and using them quickly. They take even longer to use when people can't figure out how to work them, and can create some huge lines at lunch. But they are certainly designed in a fun and interesting way, which reminded Megan of her favorite drink machines at McDonalds—"It's like a factory for drinks!" (Actual quote.)

Days 264-265: February 19-20, 2013

Tuesday was my first (and fortunately only) round of oral arguments in the Spring Moot Court Competition. Of course, my argument had to be scheduled during Indiana's biggest game of the season so far, at #4 Michigan State, during the last 5 minutes of the game. Starting at 7:00, I began the part of my moot court preparation where I watch Indiana basketball instead of doing anything moot court related. Then, I had to run over to the law school, and here I am pre-argument, watching as much of the game as I could on my phone before I had to go in (and naturally, wearing my IU gameday tie). The game was incredibly close, and I had to go in with 1:23 left as Indiana was down by around four. As I told everyone, that was the most nervous I've been before any of my oral arguments, and it had nothing to do with moot court at all. Following my oral argument, during which my judges, bailiff, audience members, and moot court board members were all keeping track of the game on their phones, I was informed that Indiana came through in an amazing finish to win the game! Following that, I was informed that although I had a solid performance (maybe pulling it a little too close!), I was unfortunately (but not really) eliminated from the competition. Woot! Now I will get to celebrate my entire birthday and not be compelled by the karma Gods to argue during my birthday party. And most importantly, Hoosiers win!

On my first day eliminated from the competition, I took advantage of my ability to be an eligible fan and joined the audience for Tim's argument. The argument was fun to watch, and Tim made a successful rebound from falling down the stairs to make a compelling and efficient performance. Unfortunately, in a close decision, he was also eliminated. But, on the bright side, he does at least get to join me and Charles in being free and finally off the moot court island!

Days 262-263: February 17-18, 2013

Sunday was finally the slow and relaxing day of this four-day weekend that went by amazingly quickly for a four-day weekend. We had a group dinner at Darcey and Dareus', and I brought my famous corn on the cobs! I love making corn on the cobs, because they are easy to make, they show my true Hoosier spirit, and mostly because I get to post this amazing photo to prepare everyone for what I will be bringing: http://bit.ly/HVfKd6. My actual corn on the cobs looked much more appetizing, and got to enjoy the show with some amazing other foods, including chicken, carrots, potatoes, and plenty more!

Monday was a surprisingly warm day, so warm that I went for my old Spring drink at Starbucks in between classes and while catching up on some Admin Law for tomorrow morning. It was a good throwback to have my Venti Sweetened Iced Green Tea Light Ice or as David calls it, "What did you just say?" Reminds me of some good warm Spring days from last year hopping between the law school and the Union in the nice warm weather to do not-fun things like read for Property and write LRW memos. But soon enough Spring will bring some of the fun things we have been waiting for—like March Madness, kickball games, and the annual dodgeball tournament!

Days 254-260: February 9-15, 2013

It's official: I have finally found a new and replacement pair of basketball shoes. After almost nine years playing in the old and battle-worn Shox Status', I found a very similar style replacement pair of Shox. I picked these up in the fall and have been skeptical about the change, electing instead to wear these with my candystripes. After giving them another go tonight, I decided to retire them from outdoor use for good (after only four outdoor wears) and keep them as the replacement basketball shoes. It is amazingly easier to keep your footing on shoes that are not nine years old. Tonight they helped me put on a fun performance more in line with my games of old: 3+ steals, 8-10 deflections, lockdown man defense giving up just 2 points in 3 games, and scoring from inside, mid-range, and on the fast break. It was fun to run the floor and play hard again, the only thing missing from my game today was the three-point shot. Hopefully with more hours on the floor I will be able to keep up the status quo, and if so, I might have a shot to avoid feeling like an old law student playing on Assembly Hall and put up a decent game instead.

Following my own personal basketball resurgence, Indiana had a huge road game on Sunday to follow up the upset loss at Illinois. Again, I am kicking myself for making Illinois my preseason pick to take IU's #1 ranking—I did not expect the Butler and Wisconsin losses, but we got #1 back just in time to make my prediction come through. Fortunately, the trio of Oladipo, Zeller, and Watford were HUGE and the defense tightened up to hold a solid lead in a hostile environment, giving Indiana their first road win against a ranked opponent in Tom Crean's tenure. This win was especially huge following the "mulligan" the rest of the top-5 teams gave us this week, and we should be able to maintain a solid position as long as we keep winning. My new IUBB GameDay mug got off to a good start in its first use, and will hopefully be enjoying many more victories in the weeks to come!

This was an interesting promotion I stumbled across. They are giving out giant paper bags when you buy something at Hallmark, and then if you bring the bag back in two weeks you get 20% off everything you can fit inside. Unfortunately, I do not really ever have to go to Hallmark enough to actually buy enough to utilize this promotion, but it does seem like it would almost be fun enough to participate just to stuff up the bag like it was a shopping spree or something. If you did enjoy collecting various greeting cards, you could sure fit a huge amount of them in this bag to get your sale!

The Moot Court bracket is officially up and Moot Court Madness begins in approximately one week. Unlike March Madness, where I hope Indiana makes it all the way to the end of the bracket, I am hoping to put up my best D.C. Sports impression and go one-and-done. I am going to attempt to have fun doing it however, as I have set up Mike's Moot Court Scavenger Hunt, where I make my best attempt to sneak in as many famous quotes and/or phrases into my argument while still maintaining a proper and professional argument style. This is my attempt at making additional work more entertaining and productive (and sadly may actually improve my overall performance). Hopefully this does not put the Karma Gods against me and give me an unwanted victory, as Karma is already stacking the deck against me by setting me up for a second-round argument on my birthday, one year after I had to finish an LRW memo on my birthday, should I pull through with the "double-upset" victory (that is referring to an upset for both sides, because I am sure neither of the two competitors in this match will want me to win).

Girl Scout Cookies! I came across these at College Mall this week and had to pick up a couple boxes since I haven't had my own in forever. Naturally, I picked up my two favorites, the Trefoils (old fashioned shortbread), and the #1 Cookies of All Time: Thin Mints. I finally broke into them and they were as good as ever, and even better than I remembered (particularly the Thin Mints). Thanks Girl Scouts for your awesome cookies! They are the perfect way to end the week and head into another long weekend.

On Thursday night it was back to Nick's for the first repeat performance in Bar Review history. Because Bar Review has been lackluster lately, with the bar selection waning as we have made it through most of Bloomington's marquee establishments, and others are being saved for Spring when we can best make use of their outdoor amenities, Nick's was selected for its second go-round in an attempt to reinvigorate the brand. After the recently renamed Team Avalon completed their first match as The Vegas Bombers, it was off to Nick's to celebrate the unique "Valentine's Day Style Bar Review," which basically means, Thursday Night at Nick's playing Have You Met Tim?

On Friday I begun work on my poster to bring to the Purdue game tomorrow, our general admission game of the season. We will get to line up before the game tomorrow to get good seats, and I am going to make an exciting poster to display from my prime Crimson Guard vantage point. What will it be? You will have to watch at 2:00 PM on ESPN2 to find out! And additionally, this photo finally completes the first ever week-long version of Connecting the Dots' "Photos of the Day[s]!"

Days 247-250: February 2-5, 2013

Saturday night was the most intense matchup of college basketball (and probably the most significant sporting event in general) that I had ever been to. ESPN College GameDay was in town for the #1 vs. #3 Indiana-Michigan matchup at Assembly Hall. The game was amazing from start to finish, and the crowd matched the intensity level and left Assembly Hall shaking all forty minutes. This year, I was on hand to watch Indiana defeat the #1 team in the country, never giving up the lead to Michigan, and reclaiming the #1 spot all for themselves. It was amazing to finally be a part of such a huge game that your team is able to follow through on the expectations and pull of a strong victory. I hope to have many more of these games at Assembly Hall, and hopefully we will bring this kind of performance to the NCAA Tournament come March.

Sunday was another beautiful day in Bloomington as the ground remained blanketed by the additional snow we continued to accumulate over the weekend. Here is one of our Indiana University clocks that you can find scattered around campus. One evening in November, while running by one of these clocks with This is Indiana playing through my headphones, I heard the clock ringing on the hour. The song had just reached the "One banner . . . six banner knocking on your door" segment, as I realized that the clock I was passing was ringing on the hour to 6:00 PM. As you can imagine, that certainly pumped me up to finish my run strong. Tonight there was no basketball though, as it was Super Bowl Sunday. Aside from an interesting power outage at halftime, the game was surprisingly good and went down to the very last possession. It was a big win for the Harbaugh-Crean family, hopefully not their last championship of the year! It also earned Stafford County its first Super Bowl Champion in Torrey Smith, and earned me the distinction of being able to say I beat a Super Bowl Champion in high school football. No need to worry that I only logged three seconds of playing time, still counts. Boom.

Monday I had my first homework assignment of the semester due in Corporate Finance, which accounted for three amazing achievements: (1) I got to say I was "doing my homework" rather than "studying" for the first time since high school; (2) I got to do math problems on an old-fashioned sheet of notebook paper where I was able to "show my work," even circling my answers just like high school calculus, and then staple together to turn in; and (3) most importantly, I was able to use my old tricked out "Oh Six" TI-84 graphing calculator! Back in '06 when we were graduating it was the cool thing to say "Oh What? Oh Six!" so one of my friends had a bunch of bumper stickers made up. I ended up getting custom blue and orange North Stafford colored plates to put on my calculator, and used one of my stickers on the back to make my awesome school spirited NSHS calculator. And now I get to use that calculator in law school. Boom. (Again.)

On Tuesday I finally turned in my final moot court brief for the spring competition, freshly bound from FedEx Office. Working on the brief the second time around was amazingly easier and more fun. Most likely because after realizing how little it mattered compared to the overall process, it ended up being much simpler and less stressful than the first time around. I was then able to devote more attention to adding fun anecdotes throughout such as help and/or HELP. You probably don't know what that means, and you should be thankful that you never will, because after a couple weeks I never will need to anymore either. Furthermore, I will now be accepting suggestions for popular quotes and/or phrases that I will attempt to incorporate into my arguments in an entertaining and creative fashion. Feel free to submit candidates for the final list via email or comment, as I will compile a final version to hand out to those in attendance so that they can play their own version of "Moot Court Scavenger Hunt" to see how many I am capable of completing.

Day 246: February 1, 2013

It was a beautiful afternoon in Bloomington on Friday after the light snowfall from the evening before. It was also another frigid day with highs hovering near 12 degrees. But it was definitely worth fighting off the frostbite to take a walk around campus and enjoy some of the snow while taking a few photos. Friday evening was the Women's Law Caucus Auction at Serendipity to raise funds for POP and Middle Way House. There is both a silent auction, and a live auction event with the most sought after packages provided by various law professors who partake in fun activities with students.

We set our sights on Hoops in Assembly Hall, for the honor of playing basketball on the hallowed grounds of Indiana lore. After some aggressive bidding we were able to fight off the competition and secure our winning bid at $525, right around our max bid, although our aggressive bidding strategy was successful at keeping the competition from knowing that we were even close to the max. It looks like a #1 preseason ranking sure puts up a premium on the package price, which only sold for approximately $200 last year, but I will be looking forward to stepping onto Branch McCracken Court and taking my own WatShots! Before the evening was over, another group I joined was almost successful at winning Brews with Buxbaum, but we ended up having to drop out of the bidding after the aggressive bidding style was less successful. But it was very successful at inflating the price up to almost $1,200 and raising a ton of money for POP and Middle Way House that we now don't have to pay! Woot!