Yale and HBS Trip

Did you know I've never been to Boston before? Never had any desire to visit either. As a proud New Yorker (is there any other kind?), I never saw the point. Well it turns out my good friend is going to visit HBS, Sloan, and Yale on September 17-19 so I'm going to keep her company. I'm really going for Yale and perhaps put the nail in the coffin when it comes to deciding whether to apply to Harvard or not. I'm sure I'll fall in love and want to waste my time and apply (dammit). But maybe I'll meet an arse or two and decide otherwise :P I have no interest in MIT at all but I'm going to treat this as a mini-vacation. Even if I don't want to attend the school, it's always interesting and fun to check out the campuses of world-class universities. I've never been to Harvard! I've been to Yale only once when I was terribly young (my cousin went there for undergrad). This'll be a fun holiday becuz I do need to get away. My friend is also super fun so it should be enjoyable. And you will benefit too cuz I will blog about it hehe. Time to start looking for airfare from DC to NY. Does anyone know the easiest way to get from Boston to New Haven? I'm assuming Amtrak or cheapo bus (my kinda style).

Wharton and Yale are going to be the other round 1 schools I apply to, but I'm going to procrastinate as much as possible before starting those apps in earnest. Maybe I'm delusional but I feel good about my chances at Columbia. I'm still on the fence about HBS (high input of energy, low likelihood of success). And my interest in Stern is starting to wane. While it suits my needs (program and recruiting-wise) and I know I'd have lotsa fun, I really want a super elite brand. I know it's stupid to care about such things but it's true, Lafou (prize for anyone who knows what movie that's quoted from!) Since Stern has such a late Round 1 deadline, I guess I'll decide whether to apply much later. So the order right now is Columbia, Wharton, Yale, and maybe HBS and/or Stern.

By the way, my friend is super smart. She went to Brown for undergrad (is it just me or are all Brown alumni super cool?) and she's also visiting Berkeley and Stanford on her own the week before our trip. I'm so proud of her cuz I got b-school into her head. She works at a non-profit and is not happy with the way things are going. Her ROI will be sweeeeeet.

So that's the big news. In other news, I am the site manager for DC Public Schools Beautification Day this saturday. I have to be at the school by 7:30 am! Oi vey indeed. It was impossible to get in touch with the school's point of contact too. I just found out that there is major construction going on inside the school so we will ONLY be landscaping and sidewalk clean-up. It's a liability and safety issue. So I guess my volunteers will be done by 8:30 haha.

I'm an idiot and actually volunteered to be Project Coordinator for 2 OTHER volunteer events on Saturday too. One is keeping senior citizens company at a senior home and the other is performing yard work for the elderly. I actually volunteered for these two events over a month ago so I didn't keep track of the dates. Oh well, looks like I will be attending DCPS Beautification Day instead. I'm also excited because I will get to see a friend for late lunch this saturday whom I haven't seen in a year.

Everyone knows I hate my job but today I had a conversation with my manager and almost yelled at him which would've been really bad. My company is such a campy, feel-good, hand-holding embarassment of a consulting firm that screaming at my manager is probably the only way anybody ever gets fired. Basically he was being a piss-poor manager (too much to get into) and I had enough and gave him some harsh tone in my voice in front of all the the other team members. I was going to really let him have it but he had to run to a client meeting. I cooled off in the meantime and apologized to him later so that I don't get fired needlessly and do something that realllllly hurts my admission chances at a top MBA program. Trying to play it smart :) Since I used to work on one of Deutsche Bank's trading floors (the Emerging Markets-Latin America floor which is a notoriously volatile market), I am so used to yelling and cursing. Looks like I'm in the minority ;)