Oh yeah and how could I forget… this wouldn’t be a blog post unless I mentioned the blues in some way….so here we go

Best night of my life December 23, 2006…I had been bugging my dad for a while to get some blues tickets while I was going to be in town. Even though I went to the game with some friends earlier in the week, once was not enough! I begged and begged my pops to get some really great seats for the game against Buffalo, which I thought was a lost cause since well it’s my dad. But man oh man did that nagging ever payoff. My Dad, Sister and I arrived at the game about a half hour early only to wait in line for a chicken basket, hot dog, a burger, and some drinks. With our arms filled with over priced food we made our way to a small table and began to nibble away, when it happened. Out of the corner of my eye I saw a sharp dressed man walking towards me. I couldn’t help but to turn and look at the man wearing the silvery gray suit, which was more than slightly wrinkled. It was weird, my eyes slowly came into focus and my brain went into over drive. It was Blues forward Dallas Drake, a toothless, tough-guy, strolling through the arena clasping the hands of his two children. All I could do was blankly stare. I could hear my brain not telling, but yelling in my skull… “Dallas Drake that is DALLAS DRAKE!” I was frozen, just watching him walk away. I wish I could have come up with something good to say to him, but I am pretty sure that a mixture of fumbling words would have been the only thing that I could have produced. After he had past I resumed my consumption of my half of the chicken basket, wishing I had said something cool to “Dally.” Not to long after that my sister became wide-eyed and started to indicate something behind me was interesting. I turned and looked and there he was again striding across the floor, in a rush to meet up with a man with a mic in his ear…I didn’t want to try anything. I might have gotten roughed up by the man in the black suit.
After this encounter we headed to our seats. We went down, down, down to the fourth row, right behind the blues bench. Oh my good lord I could see and smell everything. I took the seat closest to the tunnel, and without hesitation I wrapped my hand around the cold railing and peered down the tunnel and into the Blues staging area. My heart was floating on cloud nine, this was an amazing moment. Soon those giant, skillful, rough, tough, toothless men would be making their way down the tunnel all geared up and ready to go. That night the blues were to face the Buffalo Sabers, one of the better teams in the league and a heck of a lot better than the Blues.
After warm ups the trainer collected all the stray pucks and made his way back into the staging area, but not before tossing a few pucks up to some of the little kids that surrounded the tunnel. I have to admit I felt a little childish stretching my hand out and begging for one of those practice used pucks. Who knows my favorite player probably took a shot on goal with that thing. So as the trained walked past me I out stretched my arm over the rail and yelled after him “how about a puck?” He turned round, looked me straight in the eye and probably noticed my old school throw back 1998 blues sweatshirt, (my 1.99 value village prize possession.) reached in his crate and pulled out a puck. In the blink of an eye it was in the air and heading straight at me. With gaping hands I felt the cold rubber meet my skin, my fingers curled around the edges and I held on for dear life, slightly with disbelief, I felt incredibly lucky.
At every intermission I stretched out my hand and reached for each player as they walked past. As I high-fived each of them my hand looked so minuscule to their glove clad hand, it was kind of funny. When the players made contact with my hand I couldn’t help but to show my further support, “way to go Weight, nice job out there Stemp, keep the hits coming Wideman, way to block those shots Legace.” I was proud to say that I knew every name of each of the guys out there and couldn’t have been more thrilled to watch them dominate the Buffalo Sabers. With an overtime win of 3-2, I left the Scottrade center elated, so incredibly happy that my Blues were getting back on tack and I got to high-five each of the guys I have been following ever since forever. Being in the arena was a thousand times better than listing to the games on my computer in studio. This one game made my December. I don’t know what it is in me but I just love St. Louis BLUUUUUUUUUUUES HOCKEY.

in Prague showing nothing but love for my home team, that sweatshirt has seen a lot.

An update of sorts.

It has been far to long since my last post and I intended to fill you in.

The end of the semester went along pretty smoothly and final critiques were probably the most surprising event of the last five years. I can’t say that I was all that cool calm and collected or even that confident in the work that I produced for this semester end project. I gathered my thoughts and began to present my project in front of a panel of three outstanding professors, one of which had been my studio professor in the past…which cranked up the pressure. I slowly went through my design scheme and explained my architectural metaphor the best that I could without sounding too full of it. After I had gone through my spiel, there was a pause. It was one of those pauses that every architecture student is deathly afraid of. It is the kind of pause that leaves students thinking, oh dear lord I’m going to get slaughtered, followed by a string of foul words. But soon after that long silence, I heard my past professor say the most amazing thing ever. “I have to commend you on your presentation Laura…” ….HUH? WHAT? Were my exact thoughts, and I am pretty sure you could have read these phrases scroll across my forehead as they were crossing my brain. The others soon jumped in and further complemented me on the job that I had done, “This looks like a 5th year project.” “you are right where you should be” “You really have created a building that unravels” Holy-moley this crit was going along perfectly, I couldn’t have scripted it better my self in the most self absorbed dream. The professors added some great advice and pointers on how I could make the project sing a bit more. The suggestions they had were right on the money, and I agreed with most of what they had said. But, overall they liked it just the way it was.
I stood there after my crit wondering if it were a dream, if it really happened. Thank go it was real, this was the boost I needed after that semester full of doubt.

I didn’t have many other finals; I had one test in history, a watercolor rendering and a short paper for my project programming. It was a good finals week, seeing how I didn’t feel like I was running around like a chicken with its head cut off.


My Christmas break was a bit shorter than normal because of a class that I am taking over winter intersession. This class isn’t offered during the normal school year and is one I have been thinking about taking for a while. It is called LEED for accreditation. Basically I am learning how to create a sustainable building and with that learning how to study for the test that one must take to be LEED [Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design] certified.


What is LEED®?
The Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Green Building Rating System™ is the nationally accepted benchmark for the design, construction, and operation of high performance green buildings. LEED gives building owners and operators the tools they need to have an immediate and measurable impact on their buildings’ performance. LEED promotes a whole-building approach to sustainability by recognizing performance in five key areas of human and environmental health: sustainable site development, water savings, energy efficiency, materials selection, and indoor environmental quality.


So now I am spending my days 12-5 in a classroom and taking notes and after that I am working on some little homework assignments and surfing the Internet.