Last Day in Dallas

Note: Probably not going to be as... "interesting" as the last two posts, just don't feel like it today.



The problem with preparing ahead is it makes the time right around the end extremely boring. Instead of having packing and such to keep me busy, I just get to sit around and wait.

Went to a party last night to celebrate a friend of mine's birthday. Had a good time, I tend to not be much of a party person but this was actually rather entertaining. Her boyfriend had set up a photo shot area and we had a blast shooting about 200 or so photos. Maybe some of them will show up on facebook, maybe not, who knows. Met a cute girl there as well with these adorable blue glasses, studying to be a costume designer all that, but alas with China, Hendrix, and consulting in the future it was not meant to be; enjoyed her company none the less.

Anywho going to have dinner with the fam tonight, my mother is finally getting back from Florida so I at least get to see her for one night before I'm shipped off. For some reason it reminds me how much I'm going to miss hanging out with my friends this summer. O well at least Booz is coming to China for the summer so we should be able to meet up for at least a week or something.

On a side note away from travel. I'm a very curious person, always wondering why things are the way they are, this is especially true when it comes to people's thoughts and actions. Which is probably why I like to argue/debate so much, finding out why people think the way they do and challenging them to critical to their own opinions is fascinating to me. And this becomes doubly important when dealing with myself. I'm a constant curiosity to me (though rather boring to most other people I freely admit).

The reason for the explanation is because I wanted to relook at the Myers-Briggs personality test that I did last year, just for chuckles. Anyways I then found a corresponding test that basically takes your type from the M-B test and places you in the Keirsey Temperament Sorter. And low and behold guess what my temperament is... Mastermind.

The accuracy of this description is rather scary, and on top of that a lot of my favorite people from history such as Nietzsche, Peter the Great, and Newton were supposedly this same type. What was also kind of cool was that I just started really getting into Nietzsche about two months ago.

Anyways the reason why I'm so... excited might be to strong, but at least energetically interested in this is because it gives me some sort of weird validation for how I think and my personality. And since the "Mastermind" temperament is found in only about 1% of the population it kind of explains why it's so hard for me to find other people that think the same way.

Well that's my sharing for the day, sorry it was so self centered, but I guess it is a blog.

Love,
Kevin

Preped and ready, just need to wrap it all up

Dear Internet,

Well I'm gonna be out of here soon, like Sunday soon.

I now feel confident in saying that I am fully stocked and prepared for my trip. I have all of my supplies assembled from laptop and socks, to toothpaste and deodorant. Doing my last load of laundry as we speak.

All I've got to do now is assemble everything into a suitcase and backpack.

*roar from the crowds*

"O Kevin how are you going to fit 5 months worth of stuff into only a suitcase and backpack!?"
"Your packing skills must be truly top notch!!"
"I wish I could be like you."
"Your face looks funny."
"The way you type is kind of on the wrong side of dyslexic."

*/roar from the crowds*

Calm down, calm down, I realize that it's not a lot of space but quite honestly I'm not taking that much. For instance I'm just taking a week and halves worth of clothes. The reason is because I don't want to transport it, I don't know how much space I'll have, nor am I 100% on how the weather will feel. So essentially I'm taking the stance that I'm going to one of the largest cities in the world, I'm pretty confident I can find what I need.

"But China isn't America!!"

Yes I realize that over half their population isn't obese but I feel pretty confident I can find something that will fit my fat ass, or if not I'll just have it custom made.

Switching gears my actual concerns lay in the classes I'll be taking and how I'm going to get to and from work every day.

Classes: For instance, I have no idea what classes I'll be taking. In fact I have no idea what's even been offered. The most info I've been given (despite repeatedly asking them for more) is a sheet of paper that has a list of classes that we're offered before. So I have no idea what classes I can take, what their time schedule will be, or how hard they'll be. These are MBA classes, so how many should I take? Will taking 3 completely overwhelm me to the point where I crawl into a small gutter and have a mental break down, or is taking 5 going to put me in a trance of eternal boredom? Who knows, just going to have to figure it out when I get there. On top of all of this the university there wants me to take Chinese classes.

"That sounds reasonable to me, do you want to stay in a perpetual state of typical American ignorance or something?"

No, I really would rather not. BUT here's the skinny. These classes are not just twice a week for a few hours, they told me they were going to be for HALF A DAY, FIVE DAYS A WEEK. Well that's just all fine in dandy if I knew that from the beginning but it wasn't till late last fall when they told me I would be doing this. That's a year after I was accepted into the program. I've already made commitments with a company to work as an intern while I'm in Shanghai. On top of that my school is paying me to do so! So how much does keeping my ignorance save me? Thousands. Sorry, I know I'm going to have some drama over this, but hopefully they'll understand.

Getting to work: So my employer and I have been looking at the best way for me to get there from my school. If I had a car the total time would be about 15-18 min. But by train or bus we're looking at well over 40mins! Well when you're only going to be working for 4-5 hours a day, two hours of travel once it's all said and done it's quite a bit!

Well I think that's all I really want to talk about today, if there's more I'll post it tomorrow or Saturday. For some reason I feel the blog posts before the trip are just as important as the posts before, kind of like a bench mark for how I think now. That way I can look back and laugh at my unpreparedness.

Thanks for your time Internet. I know you have a lot of things to read out there, and I appreciate the time you're to read my ramblings.

P.S. I'm slightly loopy in the head, AND my great grandmother is a player, just so you know.