Two weekends ago I participated in the first-ever Great Lakes Valley (GLVC) Sports Endeavor Forum in Indianapolis, Indiana. After two days full or lectures and seminars, on Sunday night the candidates and I attended an etiquette dinner. The etiquette lessons were taught by Maria Everding who founded The Etiquette Institute for the purpose of training and certifying adults to teach business, social, college, and children's etiquette programs; as well as, the popular dining etiquette tutorial. At this dinner we were taught proper dining and manners. One of the topics that we covered was how to present a “good” hand shake. She proclaimed that a hand shake from a female should be strong and powerful instead of weak and dainty. A male student-athlete confessed that he would not shake a women’s hand as hard as he would shake a man’s hand. All the female student-athletes at the table were all offended including me. Ms. Everding was shocked as well, and said that it was certainly acceptable to shake a female’s hand with a firm, strong hand shake. I wonder if this is how all males feel??

Now that I understand the idea of what you are looking for in a blog, I wanted to add some additional ideas to this piece. After reading Gauntlett’s introduction, I wanted to tie femininity into this post as well. On page 11, Gauntlett describes, “that the ideas of ‘masculinity’ and ‘femininity’ have been pulled through the social changes of the past few decades in quite different ways.” He also explains that, “Modern women are not generally very bothered about fitting their identity within the idea of ‘femininity’ and femininity is not typically a core value for women today.” I have to completely agree with Gauntlett because I do not think femininity is a huge important as it was a centuries ago. Women today are very independent, self-motivated, and confident than the women centuries ago. Times have definitely changed and it’s important for women to keep showing off their strong characteristics to set themselves apart! However, who is still presenting femininity in modern society? Magazines? How do women feel if they are criticized for her ‘lack of femininity?’ A woman should express herself how she wants without media or public outlook judging her.

http://www.theetiquetteinstitute.com/

I don’t really understand what to blog…but I will give this a try……..

Here we go…One gender difference that I have noticed is between the men’s and women’s NCAA Division 1 basketball rivalry week. Rivalry Week is a week of programming by ESPN devoted to showing the top rivalries in college basketball. The men’s basketball programs have been broadcasted and televised every single night of the week thus far; however, I have not seen any live women’s basketball games. There are many articles that state the must see games and predictions for NCAA Men’s Basketball just like the “Bleach Report” I researched. For example, North Carolina vs. Duke Men’s college basketball is considered one of the most intense and fierce rivalries in all of sports. Sadly, when will society care about women’s basketball? As a female basketball player, this is very frustrating….I wonder if this will ever change??

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/338037-ncaa-mens-basketball-rivalry-week-must-see-games-and-predictions

Be careful who you put your efforts, time, and confidence into...most aren't worth it, some don’t care, and the rest take advantage of it. Choose wisely.



There come times in everyone's life when you're faced with a choice that involves risk. Perhaps you want to change careers, move to a different place, quit your job and start a business, begin a new relationship, have a child. However, the scariest part for me is the “unknown.” Right now, I am at the point in my life where I have no idea what I want to do or where I want to be. I will be graduating in May and it scares the shit out of me that I do not have future career plans. It's the big, life-changing risks that we face only a handful of times in our lives that can stop us in our tracks. Yes, I have some logs in the fire…I have been taking risks at applying to Masters programs, to obtaining a 2^nd bachelor’s degree, to searching for jobs.  However, what I have learned through this process is; whether you succeed or fail, taking a risk will stretch you and give you faith in your strength and abilities and the confidence to do even more. Life doesn't come with guarantees. That can make it risky and perhaps scary, but it's also what makes it interesting and fun. As you go through your life, the parts that are going to stand out are not the ones where you plodded along safely and did what was expected of you. The shining memories will be the times when you took a leap of faith, whether you won or not. Lastly, I leave you with this quote, “It's not what you did that you regret the most, it's what you didn't do!"