17 May 2011

Townie's List: Top 10 Things to do in State College, Pennsylvania During the Summer

10. Breakfast at the Original Waffle Shop

Waffle_shop
Screen_shot_2011-05-17_at_8

9. Walking Tour of Penn State with a picture by the Nittany Lion Statue or Joe Paterno statue.

Nittany_lion

Probably the single most-visited tourist stop at Penn State --- if you go to Dear Old State, you'll probably even get wedding photos next to the Lion Shrine. 

8. Swim at Welch Pool. 

Welch_pool
Welch_pool_2

Cool off on a warm summer day. The summer passes are a great deal.

7. Coffee or Tea at Saints Cafe while reading a book from Schlow Library.

Saint's Cafe, while it may not be from the Tea Institute at Penn State, is an excellent stop -- packed all-year round with locals, fun music, and great tea and world coffees. Join the Adult Summer Reading program at Schlow (or sign up your kids) for fun prizes --- nothing beats the old McDonalds coupons. 

Schlow

6. Climb Mt. Nittany and stop at the Foster's Train Shop.

An oldie, but a goodie. Found in the historical village of Lemont. Slow down, enjoy Lemont.

Train_store

5. Picnic and Volleyball or Creek Walk at Spring Creek Park , Whipple Dam or Bald Eagle State Park.

Spring_creek_park

You haven't experienced State College until you've had a picnic at Spring Creek Park or a cook-out at Whipple Dam. Great Sunday afternoon spot -- careful during the holiday season, they might be crowded.

4. Dinner at The Green Bowl

Greenbowl
If you haven't been here, you can't imagine what you're missing --- best food for the best price in State College, PA with this mongolian style grill.

3. Watch the Sunset at Jo Hays VIsta  (and then hike the Mid-State trail to Hawk Watch Platform for gorgeous panorama views)

" Typically, warm, spring days will bring the masses out to Jo Hays Vista..."

Jo_hays_vista

2. Bonfire at the Fire Tower

Little_flat_fire_tower

The Little Flat fire tower is a great destination for a hike any time of year. Little Flat is the geographic name of an area on the northern edge of Greenlee Mountain only minutes from downtown State College. Several trails converge at this steel tower which overlooks Boalsburg and Lemont.

See OnwardState's writeup.

1. Ice Cream at Meyer Dairy

Meyer_dairy_ice_cream

"Meyer Dairy, currently owned by Joseph C. Meyer, Jr, grandson of W.C. Meyer, who purchased the first Meyer farm back in 1887. Fresh milk was delivered by a milk wagon (which can be found inside the dining area – maybe it’s a replica?) starting in 1910, and the Meyers continued delivering milk in the area until 1947. The current building was constructed in 1970 and has the feel of a small general store, selling milk in glass jars (including chocolate and strawberry milk!) and eggs produced on the farms located behind the dairy. Of course, the star attraction for me was the ice cream counter, front and center. 

 Before ordering a cone (priced at an unbelievable $1.75!)" via One Good Scoop

================================

Extra Credit: Bike the Seven Mountains , Play with a Dog in the Park, or go Rope Swinging

Bonus Points: Go Spelunking in the J4 Cave*

 

*This would be #1 on the Top 10 of Things You May or May not Be able to Do Legally in State College, Pennsylvania

13 May 2011

Steve Jobs Commencement Speech (05) - You Are Already Naked


When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: “If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you’ll most certainly be right.” It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: “If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?” And whenever the answer has been “No” for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

12 May 2011

14 Ways To Be A Great Startup CEO: Absorb the Pain For the Team @jbaptiste

Absorb The Pain For The Team

A startup CEO needs to be the personal voodoo doll for a startup. They need to be able to take on a strong burden of stress, pain, and torture all while making level headed decisions. You can't have the troops stressing and worrying about the difficult challenges at hand. A good startup CEO will absorb the stress, so the rest of the team can carry on. He also needs to be able to mask this pain and stress. Not that he should hide or lie to the team- I'm not encouraging that. Most of the day to day nuances+stresses of a startup aren't worth having the entire team worry about and the CEO needs to bear that pain.

21 Apr 2011

Global Engagement Leadership Experience Graduation

15 Apr 2011

Back to the Future: Peter Thiel cc @therealkaapro

"I want to go back to the future and back to a time when people were thinking about how to use technology to make the world a dramatically better place — not like the present, where technology is largely seen as irrelevant and specifically as bad...

[Education] is basically extremely overpriced. People are not getting their money’s worth, objectively, when you do the math. And at the same time it is something that is incredibly intensively believed; there’s this sort of psycho-social component to people taking on these enormous debts when they go to college simply because that’s what everybody’s doing...

Paradoxically, education has become a way to avoid thinking about your future. Instead of thinking about your future, you go to school and defer thinking about your life....

As a society, we do not take enough risk. And high debt is very inimical to risk-taking, which is an extremely important component of progress...The elitist view in the U.S. is that even if people concede that college is not for education, the caveat will be that, well, surely it’s for all the smart people. What we want to suggest is that there are some very smart and very talented people who don’t need college."

Via http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/257531/back-future-peter-thiel-intervi...

15 Apr 2011

@joshk, 4/15/11 10:58 AM

Josh Kopelman (@joshk)
4/15/11 10:58 AM
Adding Twitter to @Firstround's "Woulda Coulda Shoulda" list - frc.vc/3c7

"The venture business is humbling business.  Every firm has their "anti-portfolio" -- but few publish them.   We have our woulda coulda shoulda list - and Twitter is amongst the top companies (alongside Dropbox and Zynga).  "

Sent from my iPad
14 Apr 2011

Peace is Possible

Peace_is_possible

13 Apr 2011

…because one lifetime with you would never be enough; this is my sacred vow

8 Apr 2011

2011 Taiwan International Watercolor Art Exhibit presented by the Tea Institute (in photos)

7 Apr 2011

Narrative

 

David Adewumi's Space

David is a student at the Pennsylvania State University.