THE BATTALION
slEWS IN BRIEF
Corps of Cadets
weekend review
A&M's Corps of Cadets
old its annual M
nd Review on the
m Drill Field at 5 p.m
three-day review
i various activities
ig cadets and midship
om schools across
More than 70 cadets
scuss leadership theoif
ractice and hear the
)f guest speakers. There
o be round table discus-
n topics such as hi
spectives on leadership
hip in the 21st centur)
)w to lead teams
js schools around
will be represented,
ig Virginia Tech, Virgiri
Institute, The Citadel,
Georgia College,
h University and the Ui
academics. A midship
om the Naval Academf
ico will also be present,
te representatives from
alveston, Texas Christian
;ity and Prairie Vie
vill also take part int!
id activities.
fest 2003 to
Willie Nelson
Nelson will
t 2003 on April 5,
chili cookoff held«
Texas.
/ill be joined by
r, Cory Morrow, Cross
an Ragweed and Cap'
ite last year's downpour,
nt attracted 25,i
id organizers
:han $105,000 to
mmunity charities,
als said entries wil
;d beginning in M
cets will be $20.
:r Bush’s focus on In
ader war againsttenor-
)sama bin Laden’s ncl-
n the Sept. 11, 2001,
resent danger that we face
)m terrorism and from al-
Democratic leader Nane;
: BATTALION
Brandie Liffick
Editor in Chief
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Aggielife
The Battalion
Page 3 • Friday, February 14, 2003
Going the distance
Students share extreme ways
they've surprised Valentine's Day dates
By Nishat Fatima
THE BATTALION
Getting kidnapped from your bedroom and
being blindfolded at 5 a.m. in the morning
would be a traumatic ordeal for most people. For
Victoria Masters, it was a way for her boyfriend
to show how much he cared.
“It was sunrise the morning of Valentine's
day. and I was sound asleep in my bed. All of a
sudden I was rudely jerked out of bed, and before
Icould gather myself, I was blindfolded and my
hands were tied up. I was led by two people out
to a car, and I was too terrified to even scream,”
said Masters, a junior business major.
Masters said even the subtle hints dropped by
her boyfriend weren't enough to ease her worry.
“All of a sudden in the car, all of my favorite
songs started to play, and that ter-
r
rifled me even more,” she said.
“It made me think that whoev
er was trying to hurt me had
been observing my behavior
for a while.”
When the destination was
5 reached. Masters said she was
in for a surprise.
“After about 20 minutes of
i driving, I was on my last nerve
i with worry,” she said. “Then, the
car stopped and one of the peo
ple came to the back seat, gently
led me out of the car, untied my
hands and took off my blindfold.
As I opened my eyes, I saw my
boyfriend and his buddy, with
IKjsilly grins on their faces and
the local IHOP behind
%> them. We went inside and my
| % parents and best friend were
there too, all in on the
scheme.”
Masters said she
appreciated her
boyfriend’s effort.
but was too shaken to be enamored.
“I know that my boyfriend just wanted to be
romantic and surprise me, but I was still trying
to calm down from the scare I had felt earlier,”
she said. “Also, I had stubbed my toe, and I only
had on my pajamas while it was freezing cold
outside. And since 1 was straight out of bed, I
looked like a complete mess in front of every
body. Since then, we broke up, and even though
we laugh about the story now, it wasn’t the
brightest thing that he had ever done.”
Rachel Herrington, a sophomore biology
major, said she wanted to surprise her boyfriend
with a breakfast-in-bed treat, but the results
were nothing like she had planned.
“I went out of my way and got to his house at
six o’clock in the morning, even though I had to
be at work at nine,” she said. “When I got there
I reminded his mom not to give off any hints,
because she is horrible at keeping secrets.”
Herrington found out that a simple reminder
wasn’t enough to keep the cat in the bag.
“I had been working for at least an hour, and
still had a ways to go,” she said. “I was still in
the process of making waffles with strawberries,
buttermilk pancakes, fresh coffee and juice
when I heard his mom yell, ‘put some nice
clothes on’ from across the hall. I was mortified,
but ran across the kitchen anyways, hoping that
she was talking to somebody else. But sure
enough, she was coming down the stairs, and
leading my sleepy boyfriend with her.”
Herrington said there was no way to salvage
the situation.
“Apparently, (my boyfriend’s mother) tried to
be helpful by going into his room and waking
him up for breakfast, without even asking me if
1 was ready,” she said. “To make things worse, as
(his mother) walked in the room, she opened his
blinds, bringing into plain view my car parked in
his driveway. She didn’t even have to say a word
after that for him to figure out what was going
on. It ruined all of my hard work.”
On what he described as “the most messed
up” Valentine’s Day in history, Stephen Ross
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said he upstaged his friend’s con
cert, embarrassed himself by singing
in front of a hall full of people, was
called a drunk while sober and inadver
tantly gained a “fiancee,” all because of
what he thought was a clever scheme
impress his girlfriend.
“I had been dating this girl for about
six months before we had a Valentine’s
Day to celebrate,” he said. “She swore
by humor and said that it was vital to rela
tionships. Keeping that in mind, when we
went to see my friend’s band perform on
Valentine’s Day, I secretly asked my buddy
to lend me some stage time so that I could
serenade her. Since everybody knew I can’t
carry a tune to save a life, I figured that it
would be a sure-fire way to impress her. I
sound worse than a crow when I sing and
figured it would get her as well as the whole
crowd roaring with laughter.”
Ross said that his theory worked per
fectly until he reached the chorus to the tune
he picked.
“I chose to sing the song ‘Coffee and TV’
by Blur because my girlfriend loved that
song,” he said. “I got through the first verse
and noticed that my girlfriend was laughing
hysterically, just like the entire hall. 1 was
basking in the glory of the attention I was get
ting and because my plan was going so mag
nificently. I got to the chorus of the song and
sang the part, ‘Take me away from this big
bad world and agree to marry me,’ when sud
denly my girlfriend jumped out of her seat and
yelled, ‘Yes, I’ll marry you.’”
Ross said that he was flattered, yet mortified
at this unexpected surprise.
“Right as she accepted my proposal, the whole
crowd, who had been slightly confused up ‘til this
point, started to clap as if everything made sense
all of a sudden,” he said. “In the midst of all of
that chaos my girlfriend started to run upp to the
stage. As I saw her approaching, I heard my
friend yell from back stage, ‘Is he drunk? Did he
IVAN FLORES • THE BATTALION
just propose to his girlfriend? Did that idiot forget
that he isn’t even in college yet?”’
Ross said that he was completely sober, but
he had a lot of explaining to do that evening.
“I had no clue that she was so into the rela
tionship,” he said. “I never imagined that things
would turn out the way that they did that night.
She wasn’t happy when she found out what was
really going on, and I think that incident was the
beginning of the end for us. All I wanted to do
was make her laugh.” •; <
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