In My Salad Days

This past week was very, very busy for me. I was hundreds of miles away from home in the distant land of O-hee-oh (or Ohio as most people know it). I was so far from Utah in order to attend the Ohio Valley Shakespeare Conference, which was held at Owens Community College in Toledo, Ohio.

My paper "The Forgotten Fool: Geoffrey Chaucer" had been accepted for presentation--something that does not often happen when one is an undergraduate. The fact I got accepted while an undergraduate greatly reflected the rest of the conference: it was a very warm, open environment. I was able to make many friends while I was there, mainly professors and doctorate students, and I honestly had a wonderful time.

The best news of all came on Saturday. I was announced as the winner of The M. Rick Smith Memorial Undergraduate Student Essay Prize, which completely floored me. Of all the undergraduates present at the conference I was selected as the best, and even had members of the panel come up to me in order to specifically tell me about how much they enjoyed my paper. Sometime this week, once I get it uploaded, I will be putting up a link to my presentation, which I remembered to record. Until then, I think I am going to go and take a well deserved nap.