California FFA News Winter 2013 | Page 6

Confessions of a California FFA Gage Gabrielle It was freshman year. This was the day I had been secretly dreading for quite a few weeks - the day of the Opening and Closing Contest. I was playing the part of Vice President and when I had finished making sure all the officers were at their stations I proceeded to say “Madame President, all officers are...” There was just one small problem. The President was a boy and my inexperienced public speaking skills sent me into panic mode! Instead of moving on I said out loud, “Oh shoot. I mean...ughhh...I meant Mr.... uhhhh”. By that time I had forgotten what else to say. That’s the day I figured out it’s probably better to just pretend that John who sits next to you in class, clearly a boy, is a girl for the day than freak out. Lesson learned. I can remember back to my freshmen year at the Greenhand Leadership Conference in Colusa. We had to do a type of obstacle course race, and when it was my turn to go, I was sprinting down the pavement in front of everyone and of course my feet flew out from under me. Suddenly, there were a lot of “ooohs” and “ahhs” and my face turned an interesting shade of hot crimson. When I skidded to a stop, I got up and scurried out of the range of attention. Needless to say, the orange team won that fateful day. My bleeding knee, however, did not. Riley Just thinking of all the embarrassing moments in FFA makes me turn red because I probably have way too many for the average Joe. Probably one of the more hot face instances would have been just before COLC my senior year when we were practicing for our lip sync. The song was ‘Gangnam Style’ and our team had spent hours the night before perfecting the choreography to show our advisors after our officer meeting. With less than five minutes until the end of lunch, we showed the advisors and all the students in the ag department our lip sync for critique. Sure enough my purple corduroy pants that I had had since freshman year let out a loud rip. Not just any rip, my pants had literally split in half in front of EVERYONE. I wanted to die and I had to wear a sweater around my waist for the rest of the day so I wouldn’t be late for class. Get Your Latest News Published in CA FFA News! Here’ how s 1) Submit an article about your chapter’s recent activity. a. Article should be 100-150 words. b. Please do not include members or advisors names within the article. c. The “Chapter Scoop” should be about an interesting and/or unique type of FFA activity. We are not interested in the traditional type of activities to include monthly meetings, Career Development Events and judging teams. This is an opportunity to showcase new and innovative chapter activities. 2) Attach a GREAT quality digital photo. a. Ensure the photo is in color and showcases a picture to help further explain the submitted article. b. Photos that are acceptable include members in appropriate clothing and displaying appropriate behavior. c. Photos must be sent as individual jpeg files. 6 California FFANEWS • Winter 2013 3) Email the above information to Jackie Garcia at [email protected]. The Subject of the email must include your chapter’s name. In the email, please include the author of the chapter scoop. CA FFA News Deadlines: Material Due by 11:59 p.m. Wednesday, January 22, 2014 Wednesday, April 9, 2014 Date Magazine is Published Spring 2014 Early Summer 2014 * If the Chapter Scoop does not meet the above qualifications, it may not be included in the publication. Material sent after the respective due date will not be included. •