You are currently browsing the monthly archive for October 2007.
Stats midterm this afternoon. It was ridiculously easy, which either means I aced it or missed the boat entirely. Successfully completed my Network Structures take-home last week, which was more difficult than I expected, though certainly more intuitive than Accounting (which I am taking tomorrow). Notice a trend here? I always seem to be blogging when I ought to be practicing my T-accounts.
First year recruiting has officially begun on campus. All the I-banking and consulting aspirants arrived to school today in suits, and paced the Winter Garden like feral cats as they bided time between corporate conversations. I, on the other hand, totally bagged on the only marketing presentation of the day. Can I really? Get excited? About working for Pepsico? Oh wait, I think that is the sound of my soul crushing. Thankfully, though, all of this is coming directly on the heels of my sob session in the career coach’s office last week, in which she said specifically not to attend presentations for companies I didn’t want to work for. So that’s a relief. I actually heard about a job over the weekend that didn’t sound completely miserable. More on this week’s favorite post-MBA career path next time I write, but suffice it to say I am feeling less overwhelmed in that regard since my breakdown. And hoping to catch Lars and the Real Girl at the cinema this weekend so I can finish that cry…
Halloween was a riot. Favorite part was the dress up party with L and V. Posting a photo from our preparations below. L did all the tats on V’s Amy Winehouse costume by hand. And they were amazing. Also, first year foodie club meeting at La Madia last night. Highlight was roasted artichokes with dipping sauces and triple pepperoni pie with truffle oil drizzle. /drool/
When I made the late night run to Jewel, I was bleary-eyed from being at school all day and I guess I didn’t check the packaging very carefully. I remember being fairly proud of myself for finding something organic and presumably more healthful. I also picked up the 10 lb bag, so I wouldn’t run out as quickly and find myself in this predicament again. Poor kitty took one bite and gave me a funny look. I admit, the food came in bigger chunks than I was used to, but I didn’t think much of it at the time. Kitty’s been awfully finnicky lately about his food, so I took his seeming distress as par for the course. (He hates it when I change brands.) After a few days had passed and he still wasn’t really eating much of the stuff I decided to check the bag. And lo. The food I’d been dutifully setting before him 3 times a day was clearly labeled as dog food. Whoops. But I can’t imagine any real damage has been done. Sam’s been known to eat all kinds of random things in the past. And lived to tell the tale. He’s been much friskier (and seemingly more contented) since we switched back to cat chow. All’s well that ends well. And now I have a funny story to share in my ACT seminar next week.
Midterms this week. I have a take home due for Network Structures on Friday. Stats and Accounting in class Monday and Tuesday respectively. Will be studying most of the day tomorrow, Friday and Saturday. Have plans to make dinner with a fellow foodie from school Saturday evening. We’re planning to hit Whole Foods for inspiration and provisions and then cook the meal together. Plus, he’s promised to bring a special ingredient or two. Not sure what, but he’s Italian so I’m intrigued. Afterwards, a few of the girls are coming over for a pre-House dress-up party. And then Halloweening at House. Hopefully I won’t be so destroyed on Sunday that I will still be able to put in some major study time for accounting. Oh accounting. You are not fun at all.
Oh, and the good news for the day? I had my first resume review with a 2nd-year coach from the Corporate Management and Strategy group and he said I’m in really good shape and that he could tell I’d already spent a lot of time on it, which I have. Phew!
I can’t believe I am still awake. But I finally got my cash flow statement to foot for my accounting homework assignment tomorrow. And I finally updated my resume (first round) for my meeting with the career coach Wednesday. Lord did that take a long time. But the sense of accomplishment has got me feeling pretty buzzed. Should I add another hour to tomorrow’s sleep deprived misery and muddle through my financial statement analysis assignment? Or cut my losses and roll with the 4 hours I have left for sleep and dreams? Neither choice is optimal.
My first midterm (a ten-page take home assignment) is due Friday, but I have Thursday free (thankfully no career events this week), so I should be able to get it done without pulling another long night.
The other big win today was successfully plowing through 70 pages of the densest reading we’ve had for micro yet, and still managing to make a couple of (I hope) insightful comments.
Other news? Dinner at Avec tonight with L to celebrate the referral bonus she received when I moved in. So I’ll be shuffling off to dream land with visions of foccacia with melted cheese, fresh herbs and truffle oil dancing through my head. And housemade goose sausage. Yum.
“Do you know how to integrate a function? Can you help me solve this?”
Last night’s TNDC theme? Bad pick up lines. As I’m pretty much always willing to play along, like any good student, I did my pre-party research and arrived armed with a few crowd pleasers.
Rule #1: Know your audience. Big time nerds (and we all are one at the GSB) love nothing better than to flex their cranial muscles. So I carried around a piece of paper with the formula on the t-shirt pictured above and went trolling for someone to solve it. The big time prize actually went to Miz A, who, looking over the shoulders of the cluster of future investment managers trying to solve it, shouted out the answer in roughly 3.14159265 seconds. For those of us whose calc is a little rustier, the solution can be found here.
Rule #2: Don’t be afraid to be a little forward. The big winner of the evening was “I wish you were my problem set …” (I am told this one is going in the Overheard at GSB column of next week’s ChiBus. And then? I will be the stuff of legends.) Unfortunately, though I can’t take credit for this one, I am also loathe to reveal my sources. (Let’s keep the MF on the DL, yo.)
Rule #3: Spread the love. Share your gems with as many people as possible. That way you a) diminish the likelihood of any one person feeling singled out by your attentions and b) make lots of new friends. I must add my disclaimer here that a couple of my “new friends” may have mistaken my tongue in cheek humor for sincerity. To all the Married But Available’s who took this as an opening to play grabby on the dance floor, my bad for the misunderstanding. No, wait, actually I think that bad was yours.
Some of my classmates were very creative. Others? Not so much. Most commonly used opening line? (And, sadly, these were not intended as contributions to the evening’s theme so much as genuine conversation starters.) “So, are you a first year, full time?” Followed closely by “SO, WHERE DID YOU GO FOR UNDERGRAD?” (Caps intentional to convey the volume at which one must speak to be heard in such environments.) My personal favorite was one of many stellar contributions from L. Directions? Lick finger. Apply to target’s shoulder. Then lean in and say, “Let’s get you out of these wet clothes.” Classic.
Mad props to my cuz for being such a good sport. And many thanks to the salmon sashimi we enjoyed at Oysy pre-party for being so divinely delicious, melting and sweet. That? Was my major moment of zen.
Now that I’ve efficiently squandered almost all the time I had blocked for my Network Structures case write up, I’m afraid I have to bid adieu and make a bee-line for the bus. But before I go, for those who can no longer bear the nail-biting suspense of my mystery meeting with my micro prof, here’s a brief synopsis of our anticlimactic encounter. Apparently there’s no problem at all. He just wanted to make sure I had an opportunity to ask any additional questions I might have about the material we had covered. Which I didn’t. Notable take-aways? “In my opinion, you’re doing well in the class so far. Really well. You’re always prepared and you make good contributions to the discussion.” Also? “Don’t worry about the final. Really.” All this? Leads me to believe that my grade in the class is entirely a matter of his opinion. And so far his opinion of me is good. So though I may not be mastering all of the technical aspects of the subject, I am learning [his words, not mine] how to “think like an economist,” or more appropriately, like a Chicago MBA, which is actually why I’m here. The upshot? I am crossing Micro off my list of things that are keeping me up at night. Which leaves plenty good room for additional problem sets. Sweet. 
I am sick. Really sick. Having trouble breathing, wishing I was sleeping sick. My nose is red. My eyes are bleary. And, yes, I am that disgusting person in the back of your class snorting, snerfling and breathing heavily into my soiled tissue. I feel like ass.
Tomorrow may as well be called “Microeconomics Day” on my calendar, as I have a lecture, two study groups and a meeting requested by the prof. Not sure what to expect from the latter. Okay. Actually I have a hunch. Being this sick makes me really, really emotionally vulnerable. Just about anything can set me off. So yesterday, in our review session with the professor, it’s possible that there may have been a point at which I was on the verge of tears. I may have even squeezed out a couple by mistake. But I promise it had almost nothing to do with the sitation. Just that I was over-tired. And peevish. And it’s been a while since I’ve had a good cry. And (let us not forget) I am very, very sick. Assuming he asks, I am dreading having to explain because I may just break down crying in the middle of it (for whatever reason, talking about crying always makes me cry). The alternative explanation is that he thinks I need more help than anyone else in the class (else why would he have asked me, and me alone, to come by his office tomorrow?). If so, I’m doubly injured, because I actually thought I was keeping up pretty well. I guess there’s no use in worrying about it until I actually go meet with him. For all I know, his invitation to stop by tomorrow could have nothing to do with my performance in the class…
In better news, I am feeling pretty good about my other classes. Stats is proving to be much easier to grasp than I expected (partly due to the fact that the prof is really good at explaining things in the lecture, and partly due my exposure to the early material in Pre-MBA Stats). I’m even keeping up in accounting, though with midterms on our heels and more graded assignments coming due, the pressure has been mounting on all fronts. Perhaps that’s why I feel so concerned about Micro, because there is no way to measure progress, as we are simply being graded on the final and class participation. And without the benefit of having any assignments leading up to the final, it is hard to know what we’ll be tested on. Even when asked directly about the content of our final or the criteria against which we will be measured, he has demured from responding, claiming that he doesn’t want to limit our conception of how to solve a case by offering examples of how it might be accomplished. He also asserts (in a “wait and all shall be revealed” way) that next week we’ll actually set aside the textbook and begin devoting class time to case work. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain, pulling the switches and levers. Okay, enough about Micro. It is out of my control. And besides, I’ll have plenty of time to talk about it tomorrow.
On another topic entirely… I just made a box of risotto 
(I know, put the magic words “box of” in front of any meal and it’s pretty much instant yum!) and I don’t think I want to eat it now. Why is it that Target brand foods are so yucky? This? Is the last time I am seduced by the Archer Farms packaging. The last time. Because 1) my “risotto” looks nothing like the steaming bowl of savory goodness on the box and 2) my “risotto” is gross, grainy, and though I’m not exactly sure what it does taste like, I’m absolutely certain that it doesn’t taste like rice, red pepper or leek. And it certainly doesn’t taste good. Bleh. But then I have to stop and ask myself. Would the starving children in Cambodia turn down this steaming bowl of rice? Not unless they knew any better. So count your blessings that you do, girl, and suck it up.
Dim sum at Phoenix this morning. The greasy factor was pretty high. Tasty? Eh. Not so much. But it served its purpose, namely providing the sustenance I needed to push past the lingering fug of last night’s festivities. The last time I ended a night in Hunt Club was the night I lost my phone. Luckily this time all my wordly possessions made it home with me, but I am afraid I may have left my dignity on the flip cup table. I don’t know. I am having trouble remembering. Hopefully someone will find it and send it back to me.
Because I am feeling poor and whiny (and actively avoiding my accounting homework), I will close this entry by offering you the following evidence that I am on a student budget:
And now’s the time on Sprockets where we do cash flow statements. /sigh/ I’m off.
The weather is officially changing. This week brought with it lows in the 40s/50s, winds of 20-30 mph and gray skies. I am told this is the kind of weather I’ll be begging for come March, but it’s just about the coldest we would ever see in Florida, so it feels like winter to me. Nevertheless, I have resisted breaking out the serious winter gear and am instead trying to muscle through it with fewer layers in the hopes that I’ll toughen up a bit before the real winter comes. Also? The shift in humidity is wreaking havoc on my skin. I finally broke down and purchased some real face cream last night. Gone are the days of $100 CVS runs. My $8 bottle of Olay felt like a total luxury binge.
Finished the week with a grand feeling of accomplishment. I am finally in a groove with my work load and managed to stay on top of pretty much everything (including the cohort commercial) without working myself into much too much of a panic. My moment of zen? Camping out in the ballroom of Ida Noyes Hall to storyboard for the commercial concept with R. (We’re filming next Sunday… hope to post the finished product on YouTube after we debut at Golden Gargoyles so everyone can enjoy.)
On Thursday, I went to see Interpol with eight guys from my class. The show was amazing. And it was great to be there with other people who knew enough of the words to sing along. The venue was old atmospheric theater, replete with proscenium stage and starlit sky. A kind stranger took this (blurry) pic of me and the boys outside the theater after the show.
Afterwards, we all piled back on the red line train to Lincoln Park, where our TNDC co-chairs were hosting “Trailer Trash Thursday Night Drinking Club.” If I haven’t explained already, TNDC is a regular Thursday night event, organized by a small group of second year students, that regularly draws about 300 of our classmates. Because these events bring the masses, the venues are typically apostrophe bars, but the drink specials are good and it’s a great way to connect with other students. I’m told TNDC is a long-standing GSB tradition. And they say we’re all a bunch of stiffs… You have not really lived until you’ve seen the Future Investment Bankers of America in trucker caps and wife beaters.
All of the I-banking aspirants in our class are participating in the IPO challenge this weekend – a 24-hour valuation exercise in which teams of 4-5 students compete against one another for an opportunity to compete against other schools later this quarter. I am thankfully not participating, which means that I am spending my Saturday in PJ’s, drinking coffee, catching up on email and listening to the new Radiohead (which is solid, btw). A little later, I am meeting up with the 1st year kulture klub for an indie flick at Landmark.
Walking up to Target in a bit to get folders and other needed office supplies so I can organize the mounting pile of course notes on my dining table. Also need to get some leggings so I can extend skirt season a few more weeks.
Why do I even bother? From now on I plan on just copying and pasting the posts from this blog. I know it says 2005, but are you sure he/she’s not in our class?
As of last week, I’ve been invited to my first second-year function – a Halloween party at House (which, according to legend, has been the site of many a debauched gathering). The invite clearly states that none will be admitted without costume. And since then, costume research online has been my primary outlet for procrastination. So it was no surprise that this evening on my near-nightly pilgrimage to Caribou Coffee for free WiFi, smokes on the patio and peppermint tea, my feet found their way into a local costume shop. Sadly, this joint doesn’t have rentals and what’s off the rack is out of my price range, but I did get some creative inspiration, meaning that once fully ensconced on the patio of Caribou, I squandered my WiFi allowance (and time, precious time) on Google searches for randomness like “Robert Palmer girls,” and “make your own toga,” both of which proved fruitful in that I now have two really great ideas for which I am lacking key materials (namely, electric guitar and whatever fabric, trim, etc. you would use to make a toga). Next? I saw a bunny costume for sale and couldn’t help imagining an Elle Woods style entrance at the 2nd year bash. You remember the scene. Elle’s arch rival at Harvard invites her to a costume party, but when Elle arrives, fully outfitted in a pink Playboy bunny uniform, she realizes that she is the only one wearing a costume. I know it’s a little insecure of me (You: “Insecure much?” Me: “Why yes. Yes I am.”), but I couldn’t help that fleeting pang of paranoia. (Not that the 2nd year who extended the ‘vite in any way resembles a rival… if anything, you could say that she’s gone out of her way to make me feel included since before I even got here.)
In a way though, isn’t that paranoia kind of what Halloween costume planning is all about? Riding the fine line between over-the-top and bleh? No one wants to show up and be the only one who took the costume rule seriously. Or too seriously for that matter. Just as much as you don’t want to be the loser who dons cat ears with the same clothes you wore to school earlier that day. (Yes you. And don’t think your eyeliner whiskers are cutting it anymore either. Meow.)
So far, serious costume idea contenders are:
- Robert Palmer girl (if I can pull it off with a modicum of recogizabiity sans guitar)
- The Laziest Gal in Town (I can technically recycle last year’s costume since no one here has seen it, which means that I may as well consider reviving…)
- Mrs. Mia Wallace (because it would be hysterically funny to see how many times I can replay that one before the reference becomes either so obscure or so overdone that the whole world cries foul)
- Greek Goddess (another revival concept, only this time I would have to make the toga myself)
- A First Year (the meta costume – it’s self-referential, self-depricating, and not immediately obvious. I’d carry around my NFT guide and Photo Facebook, wear my GSB bookbag, ask the second years lots of stupid questions about DAS and recruiting. But then I’d worry that not enough people would get the joke. So… no.)
- Zombie Cheerleader (not really, but I just threw that one in there because it was one of the more ridiculous costumes on the rack the H-ween shoppe and I did think of all the sexy nurses, cops, pirate wenches, et al that I browsed, this one had the most potential.)
And now, having finally put to bed the case readings for tomorrow’s class, I am further avoiding my micro textbook, engaging in procrastination by writing about my procrastination. How meta of me. I swear. I wouldn’t avoid it so much if it weren’t so a) mind-numbingly dense or b) utterly confounding. Also? There is a lot of it. Oh, and did I tell you that since Monday our well-meaning prof emailed us at least three additional articles (which were forwarded to him by what I presume are quiet types who won’t speak up in class and so try to make up their participation points by emailing random sh*t after the fact), which he is sure to bring up in class, bringing the total number of pages required for tomorrow up to, oh, I don’t know, about a ba-zillion, give or take a merciful god in heaven please take me now.
In other news, last Friday the dean’s office released the 2007-2008 copies of the aforementioned photo facebook, so the talk around school has been mostly about who’s hot and who’s not (yawn). In fact this week’s ChiBus poll was to that point exactly (“Which MBA class has the hottest ladies?”). In response, I wrote a post on the ChiBus wall decrying this fact (the question I posed was “Did I sign up for B-school or America’s Next Top Model?”) and within seconds (literally), my post had been hidden and the weekly poll topic changed to something about the most fulfilling career tracks (double yawn). There has got to be some middle ground here though. I love me some funny. Tongue in cheek is awesome. I just don’t like my funny served with thinly veiled gender bias. That’s all.
The biggest surprise so far has been how great I feel about my stats and accounting classes, especially as these were the two classes I’ve been dreading most due to my lack of experience in the subjects. But who’s that girl? Raising her hand in class because she know the answer? That be me! Guess those pre-MBA prep courses really paid off!
Even micro isn’t really getting me down this week. Sure, it’s a lot of reading. And we move REALLY quickly through the material in class. But I met with the prof yesterday morning, and in addition to delivering the message from the rest of the class that the lecture had thus far been insufficient to reinforce understanding of the material (I found a much more diplomatic way to say this, natch), I also learned that he doesn’t really care whether we have a robust understanding of the complexities of the subject… so long as we understand the basics and can regurgitate them in a way that’s sort of related to the case or the readings, he’s happy. Our little meeting turned into a 1.5 hour one-on-one review session in his office. That helped relieve some of my anxiety too.
The best news of the week though has to be my assignment for the Business Solutions Group. I’ll back up a bit to explain that everyone has been falling into industry-specific student groups these last couple of weeks. Until we start real recruiting (i.e. interacting with recruiters on campus), these memberships are treated as a proxy for a statement of intent, i.e. if I join the marketing group I am likely to pursue an intership in marketing. Likewise with investment banking, consulting, etc. I joined the obvious (marketing), the corporate management and strategy group (b/c they hold all of the events related to management training and rotational programs, as well as corporate strategy careers), Net Impact (a national org of MBA’s for social responsibility) and Business Solutions Group. I’ve had several classmates question my sanity regarding the latter, because it involves a quarter-long team consulting assignment with a local company. You might say they have a point. I’m maxed out on classes. And I somehow got roped into producing our cohort commercial for the Diageo brand challenge (more on that later). And I’ve not much of a life as it stands. But it just sounds like the best possible use of any free time I can manage during the next quarter. Basically, I’ll be working on a team of five on a product development assignment for a local retailer. We have a facilitator who has been through the program and knows the ropes (bonus). And there are five of us. I’m told to expect around 3-4 hours a week. Sometimes more. Sometimes less. That? I can do.
So I was pretty psyched about the assignment to begin with. But then I found out that I got assigned to my first choice client. Now? I am ecstatic. Not only am I juiced about the assignment (retail is so different from anything I’ve ever done from a marketing perspective, so it will be a great stretch assignment)… Not only do I think the product is something I could actually get passionate about… But there’s a very real possibility that there I may get some pretty, pretty wearable loot out of the deal. Sweet.
