You know it is off season because...

[macurtis]

... you clean up that mess you made in your room during build season.

[Pat Fairbank]

...you take an interest in answering the FIRST Jeopardy questions because there's nothing else to do on CD...

[santosh]

You have finally been able to eat dinner with your family.

[angelc24]

...you've been able to stay in your house for more than 5 minutes awake.
...Your parents have learned to ignore the constant "well, at robotics.."

[richardp]

• You no longer carry wire, wire strippers, and wire cutters in you pockets
• You don't smell of solder
• You have time to clean your tools
• You have to use VEX and Outreach to have a party at Dave's on a long weekend!
• You have story's that don't involve robotics
• The only plans that you are detailing and trying to get exact numbers for involve getting Dave
• You realize how many inside jokes w/robotics friends you have
• You have money to go and buy the tools that you wanted
• You get e-mails that don't have to do with robotics

[JackN]

You read every regional Chairmens winner that you can get to see how to improve for next year.(By the way if you have one email me)

[sure_smile]

oh wow....
a) the dryer no longer has lock nuts and 1/4'' bolts and washers from your jeans rattling around in it
b) you actually begin taking notes in class again rather than doodling transmissions
c) your friends decide to have a party because they haven't actually seen you outside of class in about 3 months
d) you actually begin to go to bed sometime before 2 AM
e) you work on award stuff between homework assignments, not the other way around
f) your mother realizes her first-born is still alive; therefore, she rejoices
g) you eat things that don't come from boxes and bags or that you add hot water to...for that matter, you actually eat

['lil Gach]

~When you are sitting at home trying to figure out where you want to go or what you want to do that not.
~ Finding out you actually have a floor in your room
~ Eatting other food then just Wendy's every night
~ You sit at the lunch table and talk about IRI and how much fun it is going to be
~ You talk to your friend who is making robots out of sticks and paper and legos.. ( She is only a freshman and we have her hooked!!!)
~ You actually have time to go home and do your homework and it is not 10 at night or later
~ You actually get to see your friends that are not in FIRST over the weekend
~ You see your family more then in the mornings before school!

That is all I can think up of now but there is a lot more I bet..

Tiffany

[KelliV]

1) Your room is clean
2) Your family knows who you are
3) Your voice mail no longer states "I am at robotics and can't talk... call me in May"
4) You no longer dream of Tetras
5) Your friends , who are all in FIRST of course, aren't talking about it every minute of the day
6) You only check CD once a day
7) You are considering trying to pass as a 7th grader just to do FLL.
8) You build K'NEX robots that are the same size as your FRC one
9) You make the same countdown chains that you did when you were in preschool for X-mas... for Kickoff
10) You refer to your friends by their real names... not their CD screen names
11) You reply to threads like this one

[NeedMoreEngines]

...You enlist in BattleBots and now your robot has a flamethrower and a buzzsaw.
...You realize that Woodie Flowers looks a lot like Willy Nelson
...You find the one crucial peice that you spent 3 build meetings looking for.
...You notice that you're still wearing your safety glasses.
...You no longer put 80/20 or 7/16 as answers to random fraction problems.

[Elgin Clock]

Originally Posted by Jessica Boucher

everybody's working on their photoshopping skills

Grr.. I guess my "skills" are not that good. I can't access that skills link.

[Heretic121]

you know its offseason because people are graduating from school and school is out w00t!

[Beth Sweet]

Originally Posted by Elgin Clock

Grr.. I guess my "skills" are not that good. I can't access that skills link.

To everyone who has made this comment,

The skills link links to a NEMO thread picture. To view this picture, you must be a NEMO subscriber. I'll attach the pic for everyone to see below...

[KathieK]

...you are going through FIRST withdrawal...

Thank you, Beth, for posting the photo. For those of you unfamiliar with NEMO, it is the Non-Engineering Mentor Organization, open to any adult or college mentor who deals with the non-engineering side of the team such as public relations, fundraising, travel, mentor recruiting, etc. For more information, see this NEMO flyer. In honor of NEMO's first anniversary, PeteK created the NEMO chicken photo for me showing how much we've grown in the last year. Pete created the one I use as my avatar, also, because I am too chicken to post my real photo to CD.

[Brian Lesser]

You know its off-season because...

-You start asking youself and other people what a deadline is...
-You have more time to make sprite recolors of yourself just so you can use them as avatars here and on other message boards...
-You feel awkward when you realize that you have nothing to do on Monday nights >_>
-You don't go to CD every day
-You actually use your engineering/animating skills outside of the team
-You actually get recognized for your accomplishments by the high school
-You have the urge to see everyone from your team again after not seeing them for 2 weeks
-You start experiencing the wonders of "sleep"

and last but not least...

-You don't hear from me for over a week...