You learn something new

Well, you had a slow day if you only learned, saw, or experienced 1 new thing a day. I am sure I learned more than just one thing, but in my research paper for my anthropology class, I was able to pick a topic close to home and write about religion from a psychological perspective. Turns out religion has significant mental health benefits including anxiety and aggression reduction and increased recovery time for depressed patients. One point for you, religion.

You know what that means?

Do it yourself. It's Cheaper.

That is something that usually holds true. You can pay to have someone do something for you or you can get the pieces and do it yourself. Take the laundromat. I can drop off my clothes and pay 80 cents a pound or I can do it myself and save an average of 5-6 bucks a trip.

Today my roommate helped me reach that same realization with food. I was about to buy premade Turkey meatballs because I liked the idea of having some meatballs with my pasta or making a meatball sandwich. I hadn't seen them carried here before and threw them in the cart. A few minutes later he remarked that I should just buy ground meat instead and make them myself.

After initially disregarding the suggestion, I changed my mind and made the switch. For the same price as the pack of the premade (and most likely very subpar) meatballs, I was able to buy 3 pounds of meat. This was 4 times the weight of the pack of meatballs. Already, this was a good decision.

I was, from this pack of meat, able to make a dozen and a half turkey meatballs, custom to how I wanted, as well as 6 turkey burger patties, also custom. (Don't worry, they were different recipes). It may have taken me over two hours for all of the preparation and cooking, but the result is unqeustionable. My meatball sandwich was incredible.

Lesson of the day: DIY

Picture today is not to reinforce pushing pennies. Instead, this is my college change jar. I started filling it back in September of 2006. I'd say very little went into it my first two years as most of my food shopping was on my parents (aka credit card) and 90% of what I ate I got from the caf anyway. Only small purchases of a movie or piece of clothing would generate change. Eventually I spent more cash and got more change. I decided way back in September of 06 that I would not cash this jar out until I graduated. It would be a little graduation present/bonus to myself.

Well 1 week from classes ending, and 1 month from graduation and I cashed it. I am a little bummed about having to do so early, but funds are dwindling fast and I was faced with the dilemma of holding out to fulfill the plan, or cashing it and having it to use for my last few city adventures so I could essentially still go on these adventures and not have to sit in my last weeks in NY.

So, I didn't make it until graduation, but my present to myself is to make sure I make the most of these weeks by having a little extra in my pocket.

Here they come

The lasts. I know for a while now there have probably been lasts. Last snow storm in college. Last midterm, etc. But over the next few weeks there will be a lot more. Last Friday of classes followed by the last of the rest of those days. Last day of classes, ever. Last assignment due. Last final. As well as last city adventure, last day on eddies, last band practice, last concert I'll ever play.

This was triggered by a friend of mine posting on her Facebook about her last day of classes being tomorrow. It'd be funny if it did nothing but rain for the next two weeks. I remember the first two weeks we came here it did nothing but rain. Talk about making it difficult to adjust to a new lifestyle.

I am trying to stay positive, though. Alex and I have decided to cancel our cross-country adventure due to financial reasons. It was becoming impractical and definitely either requires more time to plan or more money, or both. But other things are looking up. I am excited about the possbilities that lie ahead. I am pretty much open to anything right now. I have not explored job options too much, but I am considering other avenues as well. There is a Teach English program for one month in China that sounds like an amazing opportunity as well as several interesting positions through Americorp. All of these options have me very optimistic about life-after-graduation.

The near future is looking bright as well. Things are kicking into high gear for our Go! Mississippi fundraising and interest looks high for our t-shirts. Hopefully if we can generate half of that interest in our concert that I am responsible for we will be on our way in terms of covering the cost of our travel. I could not be more excited for the trip. It was definitely a decision made in haste, and with little foresight. Two months later and I could not be happier about making this choice. I am so grateful for the people I have gotten to meet through it and still have not totally grasped the idea that in 6 weeks I will be flying to Mississippi to work at at kids summer camp for a week. I just hope I have enough time to take pictures of everything.

In summary, the future looks bright. Yes there are one thousand lasts coming up, but there is so many firsts to follow them. I just have to make sure that the time between then and now is not wasted, even if it's just spending time with people here doing absolutely nothing but being with each other.

In The Sun

One More Song

Made it to my first legit Penrose show tonight. So happy to finally say that. Also, killing two birds with one stone, also saw my first concert at Arlene's Grocery. Excellent small sized venue. Add in that I got a ride with the guys in the band so no transportation cost, and since I was giving them a hand with the equipment I was considered part of the band and didn't have to pay the cover charge and you can see why it was a great night.

Oh yeah, and they were face-meltingly good. So much energy!

Paranoia! Paranoia!

I remember dreading band practices. Confession: the week leading up to practice at one point was a total drag. It used to be a chore to make sure a lot of things that needed to happen, happened before we practiced. Back then it was rigid, everyone stuck to what they were comfortable with and that was that.

Now I couldn't be more thrilled. Even if we never got to play a show I'd still want to practice, and as often as possible. It's a blast. It is so relaxed and comfortable. I don't sing on 4 or 5 songs now, and I'm excited by that. I play the drums on some songs, and everyone else is changing it up too. We are also comfortable enough that we might, on the spot, play through the majority of a song that we never planned on playing.

There is a level of enjoyment that fills my weeks that end in a band practice, which definitely was missing at one point. It's so comforting to know that. I don't care that were playing other people's songs or that we have had no success with parties this year. We're playing music for each other, with each other and loving it. That's what matters, and that's why I started doing this six years ago.

Missed Connections

Made eye contact with someone on the train today. Instantly got the feeling that I should go say hello. Then played 1000 senarios about how it'd come off as creepy or backfire which ultimately led me to staying in my seat. Need to work on that.

Check!

Today I was able to cross the first thing off my bucket list that I made for college. It is a long list, and it is really becoming questionable whether or not I will get through it all. It is still nice to be making any progress on it.

After over two years in the making, Warren and I finally made it to B&H photo. This place has been one of mystery to me ever since our failed attempt at going there in October of 2007.

This was all part of an incredibly enjoyable day. It started out as one that would be cut short by a meeting at 2 pm. But due to Warren needing more time I was able to bump the meet up to before we left for the city, which also gave more time to Sarah Romeo who had hoped to come but wouldn't have made it in time had we left when we planned.

After B&H and meeting with Ellen for lunch, Sarah and I parted ways with Warren and cut across Central Park to head to the Lincoln Center theatre. This is only the second time I have seen a movie here, the first being only a few weeks ago. Here I was finally able to see How To Train Your Dragon, and let me say. This is the best movie I have seen this year. It was beautiful to watch, a blast to sit through in IMAX 3d (unlike Avatar which was taxing) and just an incredibly pure and fun film that I would absolutely see again. Parents should take their kids to this. It's engaging enough visually and in humor that any age group should be entertained and engrossed.

(this is the elevator downstairs to what I am told is where kids movies are shown. Ours, being in IMAX, was upstairs, but I am totally hoping I get to travel down this escalator for a movie before June - it's so cool looking!)

Hypocrite

Recently I played an open mic night at the coffee house down the street from my apartment. I got upset, and posted on twitter how I was not happy with a certain friend of mine who did not come to it. I was annoyed that, knowing he was doing nothing else, he still did not come to show support.

I realized tonight how much of a hypocrite that makes me. A good friend of mine and his two brothers play together in a band. They are all friends of mine, and people I played music with at one point. I have watched them go from just enjoying to play music, to creating music, to recording a cd, to growing as musicians, vocalists, performers, etc. And in all of that, I felt close to them, apart of their growth.

Tonight, I realized after talking to my friend, that despite being a part of all of this, seeing them play on campus, and at house parties, I have not been to a single show of theirs. I have been invited by them, personally, and through facebook, to over a dozen different shows of theirs. Each time one comes up I either cannot make it, or don't go. Several times I have opted not to go out of convenience or having no one to go with. I don't think that there is more than two occasions where I have an actual reason for not going.

It's really upsetting to not only have that as the truth, but to not even realize it. These are great dudes and each better musicians than I am at anything I do. I am not making excuses anymore. I can't pretend to support them and never see them play. And I can't hold anything against anyone who does not come to see me when I, so often, neglect to support them.

It's been almost 3 years

The last time Circa Survive put out an album I was in Times Square at midnight. We, myself and Alex, went to Virgin Records in the summer of 2007 on a weekend in NYC. There to see Bright Eyes, we made a trip to the store to pick up On Letting Go. We grabbed the album off the cart at midnight before they could even put it on the shelf and ran to the register. Unfortunately, being there with no computer, and sleeping in a hostel, there is little you can do with a CD.

In time though, I would listen and fall in love with this album. It is probably the best album artwork I have seen.

Today I got their 3rd album, Blue Sky Noise. Printed on blue vinyl and featuring the strangest art work I own, I couldn't have been more excited to find it waiting on my door step as I came home from class. And it was totally worth the wait. This band certainly is not everyone's cup of tea, but I have enjoyed everything they have made for 5 years now and am happy to say that hasn't changed after listening to this record today.

Hard Drive

It's sad to think that at 22 I am already struggling with memory. I have really vivid memories of thing that go back a long way, but there are times when I am just in shock of how easily I forget things, things I have done, things I was supposed to do, etc. It's scary to enter a room and not remember why you were headed there, or come to realize you don't remember being apart of something you were actually there for.

Luckily, we have photos. You might not always have a camera on hand for every important moment, but for the ones you do, it's really nice. I have take a whole slew of pictures of the past four years and it's nice to be able to physically page through the years here.

Places To See

Trying to kick the planning stages of the cross-country train trip I hope to take after graduation into high gear. As of now the route looks to be as follows:

Philly -> Texas (city TBD)
Texas -> San Diego
San Diego -> Seattle
Seattle -> Minneapolis
Minneapolis -> Chicago
Chicago -> Philly

Getting excited.

One Moment

To maybe look at things pessimistically for a second: I don't think it is possible to have a day where literally everything goes right. I think that something doesn't play out how it was meant to, expected, etc. Maybe there's days where everything is just in the middle, but I think there is some kind of balance that whenever there's a shitty day, something good seems to happen, or whenever there's a great day, there's some moment in it that's sub par.

Today started off terribly. I have been exhausted this week with all that has been going on and have been getting very little sleep. I went to bed last night after running a full day on about four hours of sleep, culminating with helping host and perform in an open mic night.

I woke up this morning for my 10 am class, at 10:45. The first word out of my mouth was not a pleasant one. Turns out, I was able to see what time it was so quickly because my phone was still in my hand. No I don't typically sleep with my phone. What happened was, I was so tired that while I was setting my alarm on my phone I fell asleep. I woke up and realized I was almost there too. Essentially all I had left to do was flip the setting to 'ON'.

I was then supposed to meet up with my research team and head to CT for my first dyad, and get hands on training so that when I take over the Bridgeport Site on my own I will know what I am doing. I no sooner get over my missed class when I get a message saying they are leaving very shortly, am I ready? I texted back and said that I needed at least 20 minutes and that if that was too long, don't bother. The response was basically a - we'll see you next week.

Feeling really pissed I was about to get back in bed. I had already missed class and my opportunity to go to CT, so whats the point in staying awake? Phone rings. "Hey, we are going to wait for you. Hurry up!"

The trip was highly informative and extremely successful. I got back earlier than I planned and felt happy that despite my poor start, today was not a wash. Then I get an email. I had submitted my fund raising event 3 days prior and today was when I was to hear back. Leaving the office after being told 'I hope that event isn't for this semester' left me with little hope. Around 5 o'clock today I received an email explaining that my event had been approved, with the extra requests authorized as well.

I think I may have danced. No, I know I did. And then I told anyone who knew I was worried about this. It just continued to baffle me. I still, as I am writing, can't believe that it went through. It is not like it should not have, but that they basically told me that it was too late in the year to book an event.

To add to things, my good friend Tom Murphy and his band Penrose played an amazing set trying out for the opening spot before MGMT for our spring weekend and they won the competition.

And, a woman whose blog I read frequently got back to me about something I had suggested to her. There is this book that was written for kids that I think that the reason it happened, the book itself, and what the goal for it is are all so incredible. Unfortunately I don't have kids, nor am I close with anyone who does, and so knowing about something like this ends there. I wanted so badly to share this with someone who could appreciate it and read it to their son or daughter, so I sent her the information on it to this woman. A few days passed and I never heard back so I assumed either she did not care/care for it or she did not see my message. Tonight I got a message back from her and not only did she see it, but she loved it, and wants to tell more people about it!

So yeah, maybe today was not perfect, but it was pretty damn close. I'm still ecstatic about it all. And now I need to try to sleep.

Open Air, Open Mic

We have open mic night's on campus here at school, and they're ok. It is something about the atmosphere there that just feels uncomfortable. The on-campus coffee house is very much its own community that feeds itself and rewards itself. The performers are members of that community and being there I feel like an outsider.

Luckily tonight was the first open mic night at the blend and it went well. Hopefully next time we will get more performers. We had about 10 or so and it last 90 minutes. Either we need to extend people's time or get more performers to fill the full 2 hr 30 min. The night went real well, though. I played a song that I really enjoy and was hoping I could do justice to. It is not complex, it is just a beautiful song that I was introduced to through this video. You should watch it - it's extremely calming. The music performances ranged from pretty good to great - one girl specifically had some pipes. The spoken word was great too. Save for one that seemed a bit strange, these too were anywhere from cool to very impressive.

I can't wait to do another.

Hello, old friend

I have been in college for almost 4 full years now. I have written at least one, but most times, two or more term papers in a given semester. You might think that after that many times of working last minute, the wee hours of the morning, or afternoon prior to the start of the class it is due in, I would learn how to pace myself better.

Unfortunately, the lesson I have learned through these experiences is that:

A - very rarely is there a paper length or topic that is outside the realm of being completed in one night
(last semester I completed an 18 page paper in the course of one night.)

B - the more last minute a paper is done, the better I do on it
(one semester I made sure to get one term paper out of the way a week early to have time to do the other - the earlier one elicited a B, the one completed 4 hours prior to class received an A)

C - no amount of deprived sleep or frustration with an assignment outweighs my intent to procrastinate even worse on the next one

As such, it is 1 am the night before my biggest paper of the semester is due and I am about halfway through it, still needing about 10 more pages before I can rest. It's been a few months, but me and 5 am are about to become reacquainted.

It's All Happening

I remember last year when a friend of mine, Ellen, was a combination of upset and bitter at her newly acquired graduation gown. It is not that it was the wrong size or anything. Instead, the message that the gown carried with it - 'it's over'.

Today, I picked up my cap and gown, my Alumni card, and filled out a senior survey. It's almost time.

(Today's picture breaks the one-thousand mark for pictures taken on my phone.)

New Blog!

No, I don't mean new entry. I have created a new blog here. I am not abandoning this blog. I just felt that separating my 'Fordham Moments' entries from my regular blogging made sense. I don't intend to slow down on this site, although posts other than my BREADCRUMBS may be more rare. I will do my best to keep up with both.

Thanks for reading!

Life Graph

I have returned from my retreat, and am very glad it happened. We really had a blast. Tim was less about formal/forced heart to heart conversations (though some happened) and more about comfortable bonding. We played several games including mafia, apples to apples, and reverse-hide-and-seek which is also called charades. It was not apparent during the activities, but this worked so well. We really all got very comfortable with each other over the course of a few hours.

Before bed we all made up questions and put them in a hat. Then, one at a time a question would be picked and read. Everyone would write an answer down and submit it. The object being to guess and learn who the answers belonged to.

Finally, this morning we all sat around and gave/listened to our life graphs. Essentially, you are asked to talk about yourself, your life, the ups and downs, the major moments that have gotten you hear. It's funny what you think of. When you are given 30 minutes to think up how you would explain to a room of people who don't know much about you, who you are and what the 20 some years of your life have consisted of, a lot crosses your mind, and it is really difficult to create one narrative. It seems to jump around, and without a doubt, much is glazed over or missed all together. For everyone it seemed, myself included, there were points we either meant to but never said, or realized we just did not include moments after we finished speaking. You sit and wonder how such a momentous event could have escaped you, or what you spoke about instead, and how people might not have totally gotten you from it by having left this out. As time passes you think of more and realize how incomplete the portrait you painted for them was.

Hours later, and I still am thinking of things I wish I had thought of then. But, how can someone totally explain to anyone who they are in 5-10 minutes? Would it even matter if you had an hour, or a day? And yet we still are able to know or loosely know and understand the people around us. For most of us, conversations like this never occur with a friend. Maybe over the span of months or years the details of this 10 minute depiction are revealed, and even then, maybe not. Still, we believe, we feel, and maybe we even do know these people around us, without ever knowing their life stories. Is it that the past doesn't matter? Or is it that we reveal more about who we are casually than we realize?

I am going to start on my 'college moments' blogging this week. I really want to give it a lot of effort and I have recently found a way to fill every hour of my week, so we'll see how it goes.

(We started the retreat with a cook out. Picture above is pepper/potato/tomato shish kabobs, burger patties consisting of sausage/turkey/beef/cilantro/onion/pepper and quail. Yes, quail.)

Movie Screening

A Cathartic Experience

I am going to put a decent amount of thought, as well as be looking for input from friends, into making my Fordham Moments list that will eventually become the driving force of my blog updates over the next six weeks. I think something like this can be viewed as sad or too much for people as it forces them to face the reality of our culminating college years. For me, while it can be those things, it is also a really great experience. It is leading me to page through, in my brain, all of the things that have happened over the past 4 years of my life and really dwell on them, write about them, etc. I am looking forward to it.

Tomorrow I have a screening in the city followed by a retreat for my GO trip. I won't be able to post once I go on the retreat, so my post will be early tomorrow.

No Shoes

Today, Toms Shoes, a company known for the conrtibution to developing countries, hosted an national day without shoes. To promote awareness, people today went without shoes regardless of where they went.

Even though it is not the safest, or cleanest place, I braved the Bronx and went barefoot most of the day. I had to wear shoes to work this morning, but from 1 pm on, it was bare feet.

I was a bit worried about the grass, but all in all I was unencumbered by the lack of footwear. My only run-in was at TD Bank where the ATM was closed, and I was not allowed into the main bank. I was allowed in the coffee shop, and the laundromat, however.

It was a cool event, and enough people asked that I felt like it mattered.

I hope that I can keep up on my new idea. Recently, after flipping through my Facebook photos I started reflecting back on my college years and some of my fondest memories. I started wondering what some of the best times were and mentally began scanning my college career. This along with a friend of mine's idea to make it his newest blog project has made me want to do something similar.

I won't be make a top 10 list, or discussing major events throughout college. Instead I am going to use this space, maybe for awhile, maybe every couple of days, to reflect on single moments that stand out in my years here. I hope it doesn't bore anyone.

We All Fall Down

Man, when it's hot, it can be exhausting. Today's heat was nice, but maybe a bit too hot. In a few months from now, at the same temperature, I wouldn't think twice. But when the first day it breaks into the 80s, it almost reached the 90s, it is definitely an adjustment.

I am tempted to turn on the air conditioning, but I am going to try to avoid doing so as it will cool off very soon. It's a funny thing, the air and heat, and how I view it. My parents try to only turn them on when they can let it run for a long period of time. I don't mean hours or days, but if it is not going to become consistently cold or warm for at least a week in a row, they don't see the need for it.

Even though I think this a strange and ridiculous stance to have, it seems to have rubbed off a bit. It won't take a week of hot weather for me to turn the air on, but if its going to be more bearable in a day or two, I won't bother. Is that normal, or do people turn on their air or heat soon as it becomes necessary?

Anyway, I did not hide from the heat today. Instead, myself and a pretty decent crowd of friends who I don't see enough of (some of them) spent a large chunk of our day light hours out on Eddies parade, the campus quad. Days like today are ones where you are all sitting there, knowing you have hours, if not days, of work to get done but if you are going to be distracted by how nice it is outside anyway, might as well just soak it up and worry about the school work later. It's why the attendance rates in classes once April comes around seem to never be full capacity.

Field trip tomorrow is cancelled. The deal we get is day-specific, and so all the parents would have had to okay paying more money for their kids to go on the same trip. I'm guessing by the email I received a few hours ago saying it was not happening means enough parents were not up for that. Bummer, but I can understand the logic - why would you pay double what you were initially meant to pay for the exact same trip? I guess I will have to find time on my own to go see How To Train Your Dragon.

Eggs In a Basket

So, today's meeting went less than spectacular. I met with Emily, in the GO office, to discuss the details of my music bash/blowout fundraiser. What followed my proposal was a list of delicately delivered reasons why not:
1.) booking that building is next to impossible with such short notice
2.) an outdoor event might present noise problems
3.) an event this size will require you to submit an expected number of students for the event
4.) with that number comes a number of necessary security guards which cost 50 dollars per person per hour
5.) you will end up losing money on the event the longer it is because of the security bill
6.) there are several other activities planned and booked around campus already for that day

There were still others, but you get the point. So I am back to square one as far as this event is concerned. This is unfortunate because the ideal situation, the event I had created and envisioned was something that would be a real treat for the student body as well as a great opportunity for our trip to get some significant donations. Now, as it looks, I have to set the bar significantly lower - bummer.

Also, one of my roommates, yesterday, along with his girlfriend, decided to take a bag of Reese's Easter Eggs and hide all of these chocolate candies throughout our apartment. As I started this I came across a few more around my room. I fear that when we move out we will still be finding them. Let's just hope no other animals find them first.

(pictured above is one of dozens of candies scattered through out the apartment. this one is on the corner of my window.)

TBD

That's what I have written down now, mentally, for the 5 or 6 things I have to figure out before I can submit my request/permission form for the event I am planning. I had the idea, for my GO trip, as a fund raising idea, to host a music bash, of sorts.

After throwing the idea out there it has developed into having it, preferably, outside and on the last day of classes. This way, students won't have papers or anything due as they might in the week prior, nor will they be jumping into studying yet for finals.

To file the permission form, however, I still need to determine:
The exact date (tentatively decided but not certain)
The start time
Duration
Venue
Name/Title of the event
25-50 word description for the weekly event news letter

A lot of this stuff I have ideal answers for, but making sure it is a happy medium between what I want and what would get approved so as to not have the event denied is where I am right now. I have a meeting tomorrow with someone within the GO office who should have a better idea of what would get approved. Fingers crossed that the end result is positive. This could be a really cool event for most of the school if it all works out.

Easter

Easter is great because its another holiday where our whole family can get together.

And, of course, be endlessly entertained by the new additions.

Harmony

Today was interesting. It was in the mid 70s, despite it being only in the first week of April. The Phillies were playing their last exhibition game at home, and I just happened to be in the city, but...

I was next door, inside, watching the very bad 76ers. I have not been back to that arena since Iverson was on the team, and we were one of the most exciting organizations to watch. I loved it then, and being back today was all too strange. I had never seen the arena this empty. A place that can hold almost 40,000 people was probably holding close to 10,000. The introductions, game play, and cheers all just felt sad. I know teams go through their slumps, but when I got familiar with the NBA and the 76ers was on their rise. I grew up following them as they became a spectacle. One of the first games I remember was the opening game at the new arena. I still have the ticket. With Iverson, and Jerry Stackhouse featured on the ticket.

Eight years since I last attended a game there, today was a reminder of what the place used to look like, sound like, and feel like. So much has changed. Not with the building itself, however. If you did not tell me what the date was I would not realize it had been so long. It was a really great time, those seasons almost ten years ago.


I think I am getting old.

My First...

suit. I went today with my dad to go pick it up. I still think it is a little big. Both the tailor and another employee explained that I'd 'grow into it'. I understand a suit is meant to last a little while and so their thinking is I will fill it out eventually. Maybe so, but for now it's a bit big. But what do I know, it's my first one. Maybe it should fit like this. Either way, I am glad I have one. Now about that resume...

A Sense of Pride

Back in 2008 The Coen Brothers released a movie titled Burn After Reading. It was rumored they would be using one or two locations on my college campus to brief scenes. They were shooting during a break when no one would be around. I have seen the movie more than once and don't recognize any place in it. Whether they changed their minds about the scene shot, or if it was even shot there at all, is unclear. But since then Fordham has become a bit popular for films.

That same year, a movie production studio was in talks with Fordham to use our radio station studios to film a movie staring Uma Thurma who was to play a talk show host. The deal fell through, but it was cool enough that it could have happened.

Over the past year, 3 movies have had scenes shot on our campus. Last spring a Michael Dougles movie, rumored to be called 'Solitary Man' was being filmed on campus. The movie co-stars Jenna Fischer, Susan Sarandon, Jesse Eisenberg, and Danny Devito. It was unclear if all of these actors were at Fordham during the filming, but today a trailer and some photos were released. I know countless movies are filmed in the New York area every year and having spend the past 4 years in this city, there are many places I have come to recognize. Nonetheless, seeing my school campus in a trailer has a totally different sensation. I am not pro-Fordham (which is not to say I am anti-, just not passionate about it), but it still feels oddly cool to have a connection to it, watching those scenes.

In the fall, Oliver Stone shot a few scenes on our campus as well for his new film, Wall Street 2, also staring Michael Douglas. Part of me wonders whether Douglas suggested the campus as a site to shoot after being on it for his other movie. The international trailer was released about 6-7 weeks ago, and while it is a brief scene, there is a quick clip from our campus featured in this trailer as well.

Finally, in the winter of this year a single scene was shot on the steps of Keating. This building is beautiful to look at, and it is no wonder that it is the point of focus for a location when shooting on the campus. I am fuzzy on the details about this movie, but I do remember the scene was about the main character, who was a graduate of Fordham, who was using it as his location to announce his candidacy for some governmental office. I am going to ask around to see if anyone remembers who the actor was, or any further details about this one.

I am not sure if this is a recent upswing in movie studios' interest with the campus or if this has been happening in the past, but it is pretty cool to be around for it. I hope another one happens before I leave. Maybe I will actually get to be an extra in it.

(pictured: the first volume of a graphic novel series I just started. It is pretty good stuff)