Brice and I became good buds while we were in Australia for a trip with International Student Volunteers. There are seriously too many memories to count with that kid and the rest of my ISV group, but the memory that I'm gonna have to go with here was the moment that we really became friends. It's the first night of the trip, we're in our bunks, Brice is listening to his iPod, me just lying back with my hands behind my head thinking about things, and we're about to go to sleep after a grueling day of nonstop travel. It's like any other uneventful bed time until all of the sudden Brice sits up, looks over to me and says "What if these ear bud chords got wrapped around my neck while I was sleeping and I didn't notice then I died." Hell of an ice breaker. I started cracking up, and we made a deal that if it sounded like he was dying, I would wake him up. And you bet your ass I would have saved him too, because not only were he and I the only men in that house, it was also clear to me that a guy this absurdly funny was a guy that I wanted around while having the experience of a lifetime in Australia.
The last time I saw Brice was when I visited him and his family in Happy Valley for the Penn State v. Michigan State game in 2010, and it was a blast. Him being at James Madison and me at MSU we've kind of lost touch over the last couple years, but we still chat here and there and as far as I'm concerned he'll always be a buddy of mine and I'll always be there for him if he needs someone to save him from dying to headphone strangulation.
Cheers mate,
Andrew
