whew... wrap-up time

Monday, October 27, 2003, at 01:02PM

By Eric Richardson

A lot has happened, and I've been busy, so I'm going to wrap up a lot in this one post. The three midterms are in the past now, so that's good, but as usual the interesting things aren't school, so let's not dwell on that.

Last Thursday I ran sound at the Ragazzi Room for Matt Wertz. I had never heard of him before Wednesday, but it was a cool show and I really enjoyed his music. I had sort of an odd vantage point, actually sitting directly behind Matt while he was performing. Fun stuff.

Then, Friday a couple of us from the USC Waterski Team headed up over the grapevine to a ski lake a little bit south of Bakersfield for a tournament hosted by UCLA's team. Waterski tourneys are always a blast, so it was really good to get back out there. I didn't ski well, but I hadn't been on a ski in about a year, so I can't complain too much. Read on for more on the tourney...

Our USC contingent this weekend was pretty small. We only fielded three competitors, but considering a lot of people thought our team didn't even exist anymore, it was good to get back out into competition. I've taken over as captain of our team, so first on my order of business was getting organized and starting to make sure that we get more involved in our conference.

I mentioned that the tournament was hosted by UCLA... Now I've definitely bought into the USC/UCLA rivalry since I've been here at school. I revel in the fact that our football team owns LA. I definitely enjoyed last year's basketball sweep. I try not to go to Westwood (home of UCLA) without proudly sporting my cardinal and gold. And yet, our team spent nearly the entire tournament hanging out with the Bruins. D4, my roomate, sees that as a problem. I don't think I do. I've got nothing against their waterski team. Sure, I hate their school. Sure, I give them a hard time about our sports superiority. But I don't harbor any animosity toward their waterskiers. In a couple weeks we're going to do a joint waterski BBQ before our football game, and I'm considering it a friendly encounter. We'll give them a little support before we head over to the Coliseum and beat up their football team for the fifth year in a row.