It has been a long time since I last posted ... I drafted a few half blogs, but have not sat down to compose something in full for over a year. I have been meaning to move my blogging over to a new website, but have not gotten around to it ..I'm back here because
1. I am starting to forget some of my adventures ... that's why I write, somewhat to keep my friends & family aware, but mostly so I have something to go back to & read when all the memories have blurred together.
2. It's Sunday morning. I went to Mass yesterday. I have work to do. It's procrastination, pure and simple. Probably why I blogged so much while at Oxford.
The big decision today is, do I go for a bike ride, or go for a run? I was all set to bike down to downtown Albany yesterday, but I might clean my bathroom today instead. Big plans. But fear not, things are going to heat up soon:
May 4: Weekend in Philly; originally Jen was going to come up from NYC to visit me, but I merged a trip to Justin in Philly with a weekend with Jen, because I'm efficient like that. Going to pick up Jen in NJ on the way down to Philly. I really hope Justin and the rest of the FMPs somewhat behave themselves around Jen. I put the odds at 70%
May 11: Weekend in DC. Still not sure why, but Regan is the cheapest airport to fly to from Albany. Makes no sense, but I'm taking advantage of it. Going down for a long weekend to see the Monk Formerly Known As 'Topher. I talked John into flying down from Chicago also, should be a quality bro-bonding weekend, insofar as Dominican monks can bro-out. (Or is BPJ Franciscan? I think he's Dominican. I can never remember, and this seems to offend most of my Notre Dame friend. But come on, if you're not super-Catholic, you have no idea either, right?)
May 18th: Pam's wedding! Wedding season begins. Very much looking forward to seeing a bunch of old High School friends I haven't talked to in nearly 5 years. Which is pretty much all of them. Pam specifically asked me to not bring a date*, so I'll be sharing a hotel room with 2 bridesmaids, which would be exciting if my life was a movie and I made terrible decisions all the time. Also, I get to see my little sister before she heads to Texas, and the rest of my family!
*I feel like most people who have been offended by this request. I was just delighted by Pam's pragmatism.
May 25th: Memorial Day weekend in the Big Apple with Maria!
June 1st: Tough Mudder Boston (actually in NH. New state! Still haven't figured out when I'm going to visit Maine while I'm here, really nervous I may not make it). Just started training for the 12 mile obstacle course. Either I remain very motivated through the month of May, or things could get ugly.
June 8th: Grand Prix in Montreal with the guys at work. This will certainly be a weekend of bad decisions.
June 15th: Lauren's wedding! Who knew Minnesota was so darn expensive to fly to? It's like airlines assume people only fly to Minneapolis if they really have to.
June 22 - parent coming to vist? TBD.
And that's it! So a very exciting time, though I can't say that I am taking much advantage of exploring my immediate surroundings. Last weekend I went up to Saratoga National Battlefield, which was cool but the weather was a bit wet. I did make it to Boston twice to visit Maura (and got to see Torie & Jordan while they were also there), but I wish I had done more that. I did swing by Yale to see Lauren when I had to be down at Fairfield for class, but I haven't really made an effort to explore the Capital Region in the same way I tried to explore Milwaukee. The fact that nearly all of the FMPs are up in Saratoga, 40 minutes to the north, means that I rarely go out with them on weekends. The cold weather and the fact that they stay out until 4am also drive that decision making.
Highlights from earlier this Spring:
St Pat's in Boston: Free tickets to a Bruins game (The Boston Garden is even uglier than MSG. Thankfully between the 2 venues, I have spent only $10 on tickets, vs the nearly $200 I spent going to 3 NBA games and a Marquette game in Milwaukee), and a mostly sober experience in Southie for the parade on Sunday (weirdest floats ever).
Elite 8 Game in DC: Text from Sarah joking that she has free tickets to the Elite 8 and wishes I was there to share the tickets rapidly turns into AJ driving 13 hours round trip to DC. Did you know that Scranton is in the Mountains? Really cool to go to an Elite 8 game, but we were rooting for Marquette so I'd have to say I enjoyed the Vietnamese restaurant after the game more than the game itself, which involved Sarah & I bickering like old friends and odd looks from all the couples there on proper dates. Also got to see Julie, which is always a good thing. She has the coolest little place in the shadow of the Capitol Building. And without her help, I would have lost my car in DC. Again. Really need to remember where I park when I go to DC.
Syracuse - Georgetown game: One of the FMPs was kind enough to take us back to his college town & experience a basketball weekend in Syracuse, which had a very football-weekend vibe. Now let's throw things over to AJ's email account for a breakdown of the weekend:
This past weekend I went to Syracuse with 3 other guys in my program, including 1 who graduated from Syracuse. We had tickets to the Georgetown-Syracuse basketball game, which set an NCAA record for on campus attendance for basketball - which is my 2nd NCAA attendance record, along with ND-Michigan with Gina :)
We headed up on Friday & I was able to meet up with Mary, a good friend on mine from ND, and hang out with her & her med school friends. Spent the night at Mary's, and then met up with my fellow FMPs and hung with them & some Syracuse alums in for the rest of the weekend. Game was an awesome environment, the campus felt like it was a football weekend with the size of the crowd & the vibe. They had friends who work at the stadium who emailed them pictures of what the student bracelets looked like, and then we printed out our own bracelets on glossy paper and snuck our way into the student section ... and ended up only being 1 section over from where our real tickets would have been.
Went out to local student bars after the game. Went to Dinosaur's BQQ for lunch on Sunday, which is a famous establishment in Syracuse a bunch of people told us to go to. Ran into Alan there, my Keough hall President from sophomore year who is working in Syracuse for a project for E&Y consulting (he actually started with GE FMP in Aviation & left after rolling off FMP. Gave some nice advice to us while we were all waiting for food.
Hoping to stay in Albany this weekend, and then maybe out to Vermont next weekend.
Watching the Oscars right now with Ashley, heading to bed swoon.
Skiing in Vermont: Went, uh, skiing in Vermont. Meehan is spending her current rotation in Rutland Vermont and gave me a standing invitation. Skied at Pico on Saturday. We then partied at the token club in Rutland, got home at 4am b/c of the DST time change & the general dearth of taxis in Rutland, and woke up at 7am and drove 2 1/2 hours in Meehan's battered Hyundai to Smuggler's Point. Skied all day, drove to Burlington for dinner, and drove back to Rutland, at which point Meehan wrote her paper due at midnight. Did I mention Meehan is a cyborg?
Skiing is awesome! Skiing is expensive. These are the difficult decision I have to deal with as an adult.
President's Day Weekend - from a blogging perspective, this should have been the highlight of the season, so I'll save the ridiculousness for it's own post.
1. I am starting to forget some of my adventures ... that's why I write, somewhat to keep my friends & family aware, but mostly so I have something to go back to & read when all the memories have blurred together.
2. It's Sunday morning. I went to Mass yesterday. I have work to do. It's procrastination, pure and simple. Probably why I blogged so much while at Oxford.
The big decision today is, do I go for a bike ride, or go for a run? I was all set to bike down to downtown Albany yesterday, but I might clean my bathroom today instead. Big plans. But fear not, things are going to heat up soon:
May 4: Weekend in Philly; originally Jen was going to come up from NYC to visit me, but I merged a trip to Justin in Philly with a weekend with Jen, because I'm efficient like that. Going to pick up Jen in NJ on the way down to Philly. I really hope Justin and the rest of the FMPs somewhat behave themselves around Jen. I put the odds at 70%
May 11: Weekend in DC. Still not sure why, but Regan is the cheapest airport to fly to from Albany. Makes no sense, but I'm taking advantage of it. Going down for a long weekend to see the Monk Formerly Known As 'Topher. I talked John into flying down from Chicago also, should be a quality bro-bonding weekend, insofar as Dominican monks can bro-out. (Or is BPJ Franciscan? I think he's Dominican. I can never remember, and this seems to offend most of my Notre Dame friend. But come on, if you're not super-Catholic, you have no idea either, right?)
May 18th: Pam's wedding! Wedding season begins. Very much looking forward to seeing a bunch of old High School friends I haven't talked to in nearly 5 years. Which is pretty much all of them. Pam specifically asked me to not bring a date*, so I'll be sharing a hotel room with 2 bridesmaids, which would be exciting if my life was a movie and I made terrible decisions all the time. Also, I get to see my little sister before she heads to Texas, and the rest of my family!
*I feel like most people who have been offended by this request. I was just delighted by Pam's pragmatism.
May 25th: Memorial Day weekend in the Big Apple with Maria!
June 1st: Tough Mudder Boston (actually in NH. New state! Still haven't figured out when I'm going to visit Maine while I'm here, really nervous I may not make it). Just started training for the 12 mile obstacle course. Either I remain very motivated through the month of May, or things could get ugly.
June 8th: Grand Prix in Montreal with the guys at work. This will certainly be a weekend of bad decisions.
June 15th: Lauren's wedding! Who knew Minnesota was so darn expensive to fly to? It's like airlines assume people only fly to Minneapolis if they really have to.
June 22 - parent coming to vist? TBD.
And that's it! So a very exciting time, though I can't say that I am taking much advantage of exploring my immediate surroundings. Last weekend I went up to Saratoga National Battlefield, which was cool but the weather was a bit wet. I did make it to Boston twice to visit Maura (and got to see Torie & Jordan while they were also there), but I wish I had done more that. I did swing by Yale to see Lauren when I had to be down at Fairfield for class, but I haven't really made an effort to explore the Capital Region in the same way I tried to explore Milwaukee. The fact that nearly all of the FMPs are up in Saratoga, 40 minutes to the north, means that I rarely go out with them on weekends. The cold weather and the fact that they stay out until 4am also drive that decision making.
Highlights from earlier this Spring:
St Pat's in Boston: Free tickets to a Bruins game (The Boston Garden is even uglier than MSG. Thankfully between the 2 venues, I have spent only $10 on tickets, vs the nearly $200 I spent going to 3 NBA games and a Marquette game in Milwaukee), and a mostly sober experience in Southie for the parade on Sunday (weirdest floats ever).
Elite 8 Game in DC: Text from Sarah joking that she has free tickets to the Elite 8 and wishes I was there to share the tickets rapidly turns into AJ driving 13 hours round trip to DC. Did you know that Scranton is in the Mountains? Really cool to go to an Elite 8 game, but we were rooting for Marquette so I'd have to say I enjoyed the Vietnamese restaurant after the game more than the game itself, which involved Sarah & I bickering like old friends and odd looks from all the couples there on proper dates. Also got to see Julie, which is always a good thing. She has the coolest little place in the shadow of the Capitol Building. And without her help, I would have lost my car in DC. Again. Really need to remember where I park when I go to DC.
Syracuse - Georgetown game: One of the FMPs was kind enough to take us back to his college town & experience a basketball weekend in Syracuse, which had a very football-weekend vibe. Now let's throw things over to AJ's email account for a breakdown of the weekend:
This past weekend I went to Syracuse with 3 other guys in my program, including 1 who graduated from Syracuse. We had tickets to the Georgetown-Syracuse basketball game, which set an NCAA record for on campus attendance for basketball - which is my 2nd NCAA attendance record, along with ND-Michigan with Gina :)
We headed up on Friday & I was able to meet up with Mary, a good friend on mine from ND, and hang out with her & her med school friends. Spent the night at Mary's, and then met up with my fellow FMPs and hung with them & some Syracuse alums in for the rest of the weekend. Game was an awesome environment, the campus felt like it was a football weekend with the size of the crowd & the vibe. They had friends who work at the stadium who emailed them pictures of what the student bracelets looked like, and then we printed out our own bracelets on glossy paper and snuck our way into the student section ... and ended up only being 1 section over from where our real tickets would have been.
Went out to local student bars after the game. Went to Dinosaur's BQQ for lunch on Sunday, which is a famous establishment in Syracuse a bunch of people told us to go to. Ran into Alan there, my Keough hall President from sophomore year who is working in Syracuse for a project for E&Y consulting (he actually started with GE FMP in Aviation & left after rolling off FMP. Gave some nice advice to us while we were all waiting for food.
Hoping to stay in Albany this weekend, and then maybe out to Vermont next weekend.
Watching the Oscars right now with Ashley, heading to bed swoon.
Skiing in Vermont: Went, uh, skiing in Vermont. Meehan is spending her current rotation in Rutland Vermont and gave me a standing invitation. Skied at Pico on Saturday. We then partied at the token club in Rutland, got home at 4am b/c of the DST time change & the general dearth of taxis in Rutland, and woke up at 7am and drove 2 1/2 hours in Meehan's battered Hyundai to Smuggler's Point. Skied all day, drove to Burlington for dinner, and drove back to Rutland, at which point Meehan wrote her paper due at midnight. Did I mention Meehan is a cyborg?
Skiing is awesome! Skiing is expensive. These are the difficult decision I have to deal with as an adult.
President's Day Weekend - from a blogging perspective, this should have been the highlight of the season, so I'll save the ridiculousness for it's own post.
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