So, I've been doing some thinking lately.
As some of you know I am an Economics major. Within the past year, I've converted some of my Economic thinking to a much more classical notion of Economics. Basically, I ascribe to the writtings of Henry George, who believed that rent should be taxed and only rent. Not doing so will lead to vice, misery, poverty, war, recesions and many other social problems.
I've been totally out of money for the past, oh, I dunno, 3 months or so. In case this has never happened to you, well, it sucks. Since I'm not much of a materialist my lifestyle really hasn't changed much, except I'm a bit more bored now then I was before. Which is fine, because I spend more time doing things I should be doing.
However, this past weekend I finally got payed and went out to the bars. yay me. Met an old friend of mine, a gay guy named Matt, a friend of his named Cricket - a beautiful jewish girl - and in general just had a good time.
Maybe today I can finally send out all those CD's! Hurray!
Right now I'm listening to some electronica called Kruder & Dorfmeister. It's kind of cool, in a spacey mellow kind of way.
The days are getting cold here now. The nights even colder. The leaves have all changed and the maples are just beautiful. The leaves started to fall a couple days ago, which is just about right, since they normally end up falling the week before my birthday. Today is my birthday actually. I'm 27. Three more years, I will be 30. What then.
I've started to look into grad school. I want to stay in the NE or maybe go to the pacific side. The only school I've been thinking of in the south is William & Marry, and honestly, I have no real inclination to go back to VA, especially that area. Don't get me wrong, I met some fantastic people, and I especially loved living in Hampton, but if I had to add up all my good memories and bad memories I would be a severe memory deficit. The mountain biking was good. Some of the resteraunts were pretty good. There is a good chance that my negative feelings toward the Navy is what is predjudicing me against VA. But, i'm getting on a tangent.
I'm looking at three different types of grad schools. MBA, Law, and academia.
For MBA I'm looking at
Colorado @ Boulder
NYU
Yale
OSU
Oregon U
Wisconsin @ Madison
For Law I haven't looked much into it, so only
NYU
Vermont Law
Yale
Academia I'm looking at PhD and masters programs in Economics. Given my academic record, I stand a better chance of getting into a good MBA program them an academic one, but who knows.
Colorado @ Boulder
NYU
Yale
UVM
and a couple more
I could always go for a few more ideas, if any of you have them
Toodles
These past weekends have been just crazy. I think it's going to be like that all summer long. Two weekends ago I went and hiked in the Catskills and this weekend I went home to Platsburgh.
I had this great idea for my father and step mother for my brother Jeremy except they weren't so keen on the idea. I wanted to take him down here to the campus with me for a couple days and then to NYC for a day or two during one of our little breaks. He turns 16 here in a few days.
Of course Christine squleched this idea saying Jeremy has no time. Can you believe it? No time. He has to work. He has to go to soccer. For the love of Christ the kid is still a kid. You know, it's ironic, because they sit around and bitch about how they never have any time for anything and they are setting Jeremy and Katrina up for the exact some type of no time life style. Who wants to live like that?
sigh. it's so saddening. And then Christine was like, we might be going down to NYC this summer. You can meet us there. Wouldn't that be fun. Oh yeah.... let me go and get some lythium first.
So, i've got a couple midterms this week. A lot of reading. No money. No time. No sex. A lot of the gym. It's getting cold. The leaves are changing. I'm making an apple pie tonight. I'm out of groceries again! I want to get out of this country for a few months or years. I just want to go. I want to go to grad school at NYU or Yale. I want to go live in the mountains. Montgomery GI bill is causing me a nervous breakdown. I am relaxed.
crazyness. I think i need a massage.
This title is dedicated to my sleepiness lately. This is a good thing. I am finally wearing myself out enough during the day where I feel tired when going to bed, rather then out of some obligation to go to bed.
Here is my schedule as of late, I am still working out the finer details, so I can start breaking them.
Mondays: Wake up around 9 or 8AM, eat some food, shower and shave. Go to campus to do homework. This is a very important lesson, I have learned I suck ass at doing homework at home. I go to Kline at eat Lunch. I have Calc I from 1PM to 3PM. I then go to the gym and work out. 6 sets of push ups, 3 sets of inclined presses, 3 sets of military presses, 3 sets of standing bar rows, 3 sets of skull crushers, 3 sets of shrugs. Then I go run a few miles. I come home, shower again, go back to campus and eat dinner at Kline, maybe put a steak or piece of chicken in some marinade for later that night. I have a class from 7PM to 8:20 on the inteligence systems of the US. It's a fun class (called open and closed).
Tuesdays: Wake up around 9 or so, shower, shave, eat or go to kline and eat. I have stats class at 11:30. I get out at 12:50 and go work out. 6 sets of squats, 3 sets of leg presses, 3 sets of sitting machine rows, 3 sets of lat pull downs, 3 sets of calf raises, 3 sets of shin raises, 3 sets of barbell curls, 3 sets of dumbell curls. I come home, do some homework maybe, play some video games and make dinner.
Wednesdays: Wake up around 9 or so, shower, shave, eat or go to kline and eat. Same class schedule as Monday. No work out. Come home, finnish reading for Fridays class which is due on thursday.
Thursday: Wake up at around 9 or so, eat or go to kline and eat. Same class schedule as Tuesday. Finnish paper for Fridays class due by 6PM. Make dinner. Play some video games. Same work out as monday
Friday: I have class, the economics of justice, from 2-4:00PM. I eat at kline in the afternoon, finish any lingering reading. I work out same as tuesdays.
Saturdays and sundays are: find me a movie theatre days. Or, I want a beer days. Or, I am bored days. Or, i haven't yet decided what to do on my weekends yet days.
I read on CNN last night when I got home crowd esitmates were around 450,000. That may have since been revised. To give you an idea of how many people there were, people stood shoulder to shoulder from 34th street along 7th avenue all the way down to Canal street. That's around 40 or so NYC blocks. You can't even see half that distance due to the curveture of the earth. 34th is where the empire state building is and canal is just north of TriBeCa and just south of SoHo. Basically, it's a good long distance.
I got to New York around 11 AM or so; I went for a walk in Greenwich village since it was close to where we were starting (14th and 7th ave). I saw the Greenwich ralley and they were moving kind of slowly at this time and by the time I had decided to turn around go meet up with the rest of the march at meeting point they were still several blocks down 14th approaching from the West.
Chelsea and the crew from the south had their own ralley which had been going on since the very early AM met up with the ralley from the south. The folks from East village and alphabet town then converged on us from the east and the police slowly shuttled all the smaller rallies in, opening up the baracades for them.
After the march got going a large contingent from Westchester County had been marching along 20th or so street and met up with us and they were later shuttled in.
The energy there was really incredible. I am sure most of the images you will see will just be a few select people, but the vast vast vast majority of the people in crowd were normal people who wanted to support a common cause. One woman had a sign that read: I am a middle class , married, white women with two children. In other words, she was saying: this is America. Yes, there were radicals there was a lot of fringe groups also, but that's to be expected.
A common theme was "this is what democracy looks like". When we marched past any Fox news truck we boo'd. lol. When there was one from a competing newssource close by we cheered them. Several times we cheered the cops who where very cool to those who weren't being complete idiots. Once or twice there was a chant "give the cops a contract" because the police may or may not be protesting in a couple days since they are currently without a contract.
The sound was at times pleasent, other times earth shaking and defening, and at others symply amazing and awe inspiring. I can not describe it properly.I have been to some big concerts in my time. Greatful Dead in 95 at Highgate VT, Phish at Clifford Ball in 96 so I have seen big crowds before, but nothing, and I do mean nothing like this.
It took me three hours to march the route from 14th along 7th down to 34th and past MSG, where we all boo'd like crazy and yelled "shame", around to Broadway and down to Union Square - around two miles. All the water vendors had sold out water by the time I got to them along the route and I was about to die when I got to Union Square. Luckily there was a bunch of water for sale (on dollar) and I bought some water and then went and took a nap in the park for about an hour up against a tree. It was very pleasent, ironically, with tens of thousands of people walking around.
I went to the East Village to go get some eats. I'm not sure how many of you know the East Village but it is probably the most eclectic collection of resteraunts in a single neighborhood anywhere. This is also the dollar bin place of trendy clothing. East Village is probably one of major trend setting places of America. Also, it's not very expensive and the people are people are cool and layed back. Not normal, but layed back.
New York is very Neighborhoody. Especialy Manhatten. If you live in Manhatten then you also live in a neighborhood and this is what identifies you and it's a big deal. If you live on lower east side your probably Jewish or Chinese. If you live off Union Square your probably a hardcore liberal who is also a health nut. If you live in SoHo your a beat poet, artist, or you own a gallery. If you live in TriBeCa your just like the people in SoHo except add the word "starving" to that. And, in the east village you could be anything, really. This is where you go to see people with a 12" long spiked mohawk with purple hair and 3" ear plugs. But, you are just as likely to see a woman pushing a kid along in a stroller on her way to church (there is a church right smack in the middle of St. Marks). It really is an eclectic mix and what I like to think of as the ultimate in acceptance.
So, I went to this 24/7 resteraunt called Yafa's Cafe which I have read good things about and I was not disapointed. They served all kinds of great Mediteranean food with a Lebanese theme. I got the Pene pasta and a couple beers and it was wonderful. For a 10 dollar main course in NYC this was a top notch meal. By this time it was time to hop the 6 train and go back to Grande Central for the train ride back to Poughkipsie.
All in all, I enjoyed myself and it was a good feeling, one which I will be able to look back on with good thoughts.
I'm listening to The Arcade Fire. The album comes out Sept 14th, I think. Check it out, or harase your local DJ/station if you live in a small town like me.
School starts in exactly a week from today. I am happy about that. The sooner the better.
The weather has finally started to cool off. This is a good thing. I really hate wakeing up in the middle of the night sweating because it's 110 degrees inside.
I bought a video game the other day, it turned out to be the expansion for another video and this means I spent 30 dollars on a video game I can't even play. How fucked up is that?
