:Nintendo Widow

I survived my recent western regional intern conference in Scottsdale. Don’t get me wrong, I did have fun. I also realized how long it’s been since I was 21 and free beer was the ultimate goal of me and my peers.

I stayed at a really nice resort from Wednesday morning until Friday afternoon. My schedule was booked solid. I did have some free time in the evenings after 7pm, but from 8am until then I was busy with lectures, team-building activities, and wandering from one side of the complex to the other. I did meet some cool people but it took a while to find them. To give you an example of what I was up against, here is a snipped of conversation I overheard while checking in.

Chickie 1: Wow, your bag is full. What did you bring?
Chickie 2: Mostly makeup and hair products.

Each evening, we had a themed dinner. The dress code was casual but we were still at a business event. We even had a dress code. Still, some people thought it was appropriate to wear a tube top to a company event. She looked really really cute but….. a tube top? Hmmm….

After doing my time and getting through the crazy schedule, I was ready to head home. I’d eaten plenty of free food and consumed plenty of free wine but it was enough. I was ready to sleep in my own bed again.

During the closing ceremonies, our host announced the winner of the team competition and guess what? My team won! Out of twenty-nine teams my team had won enough events and shown enough team spirit to take home the grand prize! Yay! I knew we could do it! I was for it all along! *cough cough*

I’m really proud of my team. Despite my constant skepticism, we really pulled it off. The contest. We pulled off the contest, not the tube top. However, I did hear that many a tube top came off after 10pm when the bar closed. I was asleep and in bed like the old lady that I am. After this weekend I can honestly say that thirty is not looking so bad.

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On Thursday, I had my last class as a first-year. As of Tuesday night, I will officially be a second-year. I kind of feel like a second-year already because I’ve spent the last three days talking to newly admitted students. This was the full-time MBA admit weekend and I was busy. I’ll go into more detail later, but here is the list of what I’ve been up to.

Thursday

Last class of the year
Admit weekend welcome dinner
Pub Club

Friday

Participated in “Financing your MBA” student panel
MBAA meeting
Study-tour orientation and summer goal-setting
Farewell TG for the class of 2007
End of year party for class of 2008

Saturday

Led the admitted students on a day trip to Bainbridge Island
Met the admissions staff for lunch downtown
Greeted my dad and stepmom and took them out to dinner
Drank two large glasses of red wine on my deck

The rest of the week will involve sightseeing, making phone calls, shopping, drinking, and eating as much good food as possible. Now? Bed.

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The interpretive dance of the unholy trinity was a huge success. We turned it into a skit with props and a soundtrack. We were completely silly and had a great time. I either totally scared my classmates or thoroughly entertained them with my goofiness. We ended up having three “actors” and a narrator. Let’s just say that I wore a tiara and did a kind of weird square dance with my on-stage love.

And that’s all I’m going to say. I think it was recorded so the video will haunt me for years to come.

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I should be stressed but I’m just too tired. Don’t get me wrong; I’m not a pitiful grad student. I’m just tired. I’ve had a head cold for the last few days and I just can’t last as long as I normally do.

Despite being tired, I’ve been in a good mood all day. I turned in my statistics project and my team turns in the microeconomics project tomorrow. Even though I only have a few more days until finals begin (plus one take-home final), I’m optimistic. Today was the first day this week I’ve felt really well. My head didn’t hurt and I didn’t feel exhausted walking up the stairs in my apartment.

The only depressing part of the day was attending the accounting help session. I’m totally lost on bonds and long-term leases aren’t much better. I take comfort in the fact that the majority of my classmates are as bewildered as I am. Therefore, there might be a curve on the exam.

It’s funny, I’m acting like I’m going hiking through the desert or that I’m leaving the country for an extended period of time. I called my parents tonight to visit before “the weekend.” I expect to be too busy to return any phone calls for at least five days. I gave them fair warning and got plenty of sympathy in return. I’m not feeling sorry for myself, but it does help to have a little parental pity now and again.

Danny is doing well. He went on a brief business trip earlier this week. It went well and now our homelife is back to normal. However I do get a few more pity points because I got up at 4am on Monday to take him to the airport.

As far as studying goes, my classmates and I already have that giddy, bewildered look of people who are half way through finals. This is bad since we haven’t even started yet. We are all overwhelmed and don’t really know where to begin. I’m trying to remain optimistic but I know I’ll be reading up until exams start. All I can do is lay off the caffeine, remember to eat, try to get enough sleep, and pray. Okay, I’m being a bit dramatic but our tests are going to suck. At least we get free beer when we’re done. More on that later.

To all (or any) MBAs who read my site, good luck and don’t commit ritual suicide if you get a less than stellar grade on your Stats final. There is too much good vodka in the world for that.

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Tomorrow is considered the most frightening/haunted/spooky day of the year. Blah blah blah. It is downright scary for me. I have a team paper and presentation due tomorrow at 8:30 plus a Micro Econ midterm at 1:30. Fun fun. I had a take-home accounting exam over the weekend and I dropped it off at 8:30 this morning. I’ll still have a lot of assignments due on Wednesday, but tomorrow night should not be nearly as stressful as the last few days have been. Ugh.

I need to study but I am clearly procrastinating. Okay, time to end this post. Wish me luck!

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How do you know when you’re in grad school or how do you know when things that were unacceptable are now fine as long as you show up to class on time and turn in your work?

Exhibit A: eating nutella from the jar is an acceptable snack

Exhibit B: Your socks don’t match but your jeans are long enough that no one will notice. Probably.

Exhibit C: You only pack cold lunches because you don’t have time to microwave them before running off to the next meeting/class.

Exhibit D: You check your class schedule daily because you just can’t remember if one or two days have passed since the weekend.

Exhibit E: You ask your husband how his weekend was even though you were in the same house the entire time.

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I’m tired. I’m almost crazy tired, like how you feel after staying up all night. Stringing together words into coherent sentences is extremely challenging.

I have so much work to do. Tonight was easy. I only had four hours of work. As time goes on, I’ll probably become more efficient at churning out homework but for now it’s painstakingly slow.

Despite the amount and difficulty of the work, I’m enjoying myself immensely. With the exception of one class, I like my courses very much. The teachers are good at what they do. At the end of each class, the students say Thank You. How often does that happen? “Thank you sir for giving me work that kept me up until 2am. When can I have more?”

The discussions are really fun. I used to be a total wallflower in class but now I speak up as often as I can without sounding like an annoying little overachiever.

The best thing though is working with a group of students who want to be there. I’ve worked in teams before that did not care what the outcome of the project was or how quickly they could accomplish their goals. The amount of knowledge and motivation put forth by the students is inspiring.

The downside is that I get home at a decent time, but I hole up in the bedroom to read and study. Danny has his hobbies but I think he’s ready to get his wife back for more than an hour at a time.

The cats, however, are thrilled. They can sit on the bed with me for hours and nobody moves.

This weekend shouldn’t be too bad. I only have three homework assignments and no massive amount of reading; you know, easy.

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Ernest image courtesy of theezreview.co.uk 

Reality is starting to set in. Even before classes began, it was easy to spot the first-year students. Their heads were buried in course packets and statistics books. While the second year students were playing foosball, the n00bs were organizing their dayplanners and scheduling team meetings. I know because I was one of them.

I’m not terrified and maybe I should be. I mean, my brain is about to be crushed, juiced, and then remolded into a high-speed business machine.

Just to give you an overview, we have two classes everyday with a three hour break in between. For now, I have class from 10:30-12:20 and 3:30-5:20 Monday and Wednesday, and then classes from 8:30-10:20 and 1:30-3:20 on Tuesday and Thursday. On Friday, we switch times according to section. We either have a four hour block in the morning or a four hour block in the afternoon. Did I mention that I have a day planner? I don’t know if my puny brain can handle the schedule much less managerial economics followed by accounting.

In between classes, I plan to meet with my team, catch up on reading, research whichever projects are due, catch a quick nap, and possibly eat. If I combine some of these activities, I just might survive until Christmas.

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Disclaimer: I realize what happened to me is a bit of an anomaly. I think it is a funny story. At the time, however, it was really stressful.

This week, I began what is known as jumpstart. This is accounting and statistics bootcamp for those of us who haven’t studied either one of these subjects in years, or for that matter, ever. I did take statistics last year, but I haven’t had any accounting experience since my undergrad course in 1999.

So far the class is really good and the teacher is quite helpful. This part of my day was fine. The next part is what stressed me out.

Three times a day, for three days a week during jumpstart, the career center hosts workshops. These are optional and anyone can sign up. They last for an hour and are geared toward the incoming MBA student who needs a little help on his or her resume or interviewing skills. Today, I attended the resume workshop.

Before attending this workshop, I knew that the teacher was going to use my resume as an example. I also knew that she would critique it and help me improve it while the class watched. This made me nervous but I agreed. She said that a few other students would have their resumes reviewed as well.

The first half of the class consisted of general resume advice. The teacher was very competent and made lots of good suggestions. Then, she got to my resume. I have to say that she admitted she was using me as a guinea pig and that I was brave to let her discuss my resume. Then she passed out copies of my resume to the other 25 or so people in the class. Gulp. Now everyone had a copy of my “pseudo resume” or the one I had whipped up for business school with the hope of improving it before it went public.

Next the teacher asked me to explain my career goals and what kind of job I wanted to pursue. I think I did a pretty good job explaining my motivation and goals even though I don’t remember exactly what I said.

Next the teacher began to go down my resume line by line and asked me about my greatest accomplishments at work. This was hard but not impossible. It’s just a little unnerving to have twenty-five people watch while you articulate how publishing a set of manuals (I was a tech writer) might have impressed customers, saved tons of money, and rescued children from a volcano in Tunisia.

I have to say that the teacher realized how uncomfortable I was and she made a big effort to praise me for the things I had done correctly.

We started to move on to the next resume, but then the teacher realized we were out of time. Darn. The guy who just barely missed the critique breathed a huge sigh of relief. He came up later and told me that he was glad I spoke for as long as I did. It was actually kind of funny.

Now that it’s over, I’m glad I had this experience. I have to give a three-minute prepared speech on Friday and that will be nothing compared to being questioned about your career goals in front of 25 of your peers. In typical anal-retentive fashion, here is a list of pros and cons for the workshop.

1. I got some really good feedback on my resume.
2. The teacher was very positive and gave me some clear advice as to how to improve my wording.
3. Now that my work history has been under the microscope in front of twenty-five of my classmates, they know way more about me and might even be able to use their contacts to help me find a job.
4. Plus, they witnessed me being questioned and I’m sure I won some sympathy points just for that.
5. I think I’ve gotten over myself a little bit. I need to just relax and realize that everyone is here to learn and I’m not in a massive two-year-long competition.

Cons:
1. Twenty-five of my classmates have a rough copy of my first-attempt resume which includes my undergraduate GPA and phone number.
2. Also, I really wasn’t prepared to be the star of the show for thirty minutes. I kind of feel like a jackass.

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