Tuesday, March 24, 2009

what an epic weekend

I haven't had such a crazy weekend since first year, and now that I'm recounting it I'm thinking "gee - did all that really happen?"

So we left last week with my fear of everything to come, and I got it all done! In fact, my take home midterm is currently sitting in my comm school mailbox with a grade on it -- but I reallllly don't want to look at it. I don't think it's going to measure up to my insane standards. Sigh.

So, last weekend, I threw a party on Friday just for the heck of it. I haven't rounded up my friends for a party since first year and felt that I was long overdue for one. Since this event I've realized that people don't really check Facebook anymore, it's aggravating! The majority of the people I invited didn't respond, so I had to track them down in person and ask them if they were coming. After I did that I thought hmm, about 20 folks are coming, that's fine. It'll be a nice, intimate crowd. Wow, little did I know, 80 people came! I had a delegation from every single club I'm currently active in, and a lot of friends from first year. I don't think I spoke in a normal voice that night, I was too busy screaming in delight at seeing people I hadn't seen in two years. Definitely a good time.

Saturday night I went to a friend's 21st, but only really went to laugh at him lounging on his bed. I'm not sure why he was in bed for his birthday party *shrug*. After that I went with friends to attend a dance party on the Corner -- definitely a good DJ, and those are really hard to come back. And the highlight of the night? I played Starcraft with a bunch of guy friends until the wee hours of the morning (or more specifically, 5am). ..was I nuts or what? 

Weekends are supposed to be a time to catch up on sleep, but I totally shorted myself. This week marks the major recruitment week for a peer mentoring organization I'm co-chair of. Speaking of which, I'm really proud of how far we've come. In two years, we've progressed from a sprawling, unfocused, disjointed group to one that close knit, very active, and much more known in the community. I'm so proud of my executive board and all we've accomplished together. Now if only all the groups my life were this wonderful, I would've been quite happy this year. Ah well.

Monday, March 16, 2009

wheee my butt's on fire!

As usual, not really. I just have the slight feeling that I'm hurtling through a black hole for this week. I have so much to do and so much due that it's slightly scary. Really scary actually.

Let's see.. take home midterm due, quantitative analysis memo due, lotsa homework due, recruitment for a club I'm president of, and drawing up the budget for my sorority. Eeeeep. This is your typical week after spring break, when everything underneath the sun decides to descend on you and see if they can crush you by sheer amount of work. Picture a chicken with bugged out eyes running around frantically. Meeeee!

I had an absolutely fantastic weekend though, it was Virginia Women's Chorus' tour weekend. This year, we went up to DC and performed in the National Cathedral! I was so excited for it, this is probably the most prestigious place I've ever performed at.

We left Grounds at 10 am on Saturday and got to DC at around noon. Weather all weekend was quite horrid though, overcast, cold, rainy, and gloomy. Following our arrival, I went on a five hour shopping marathon at Pentagon City Mall with lots of my fellow singers. That was definitely my exercise for the week, my thighs hurrrrt. Later that night I went walking on the streets of DC with one of my sorority sisters that also happen to be in the chorus. Of course, night life in a big city is definitely much more different than Charlottesville.

Although there's a lot of stuff going on (and I had the most amazing spinach artichoke dip at a diner on the corner of 18th and U), I have to say I've grown used to the secure atmosphere in C'ville. I pretty much walk down the street without a care, whereas in DC I was definitely hunched over my bag and looking around suspiciously -- probably being wayyyy too paranoid.

We performed at the service on Sunday - and wow. I only want to perform in cathedrals from now on. The vaulted ceilings give us such amazing reverb. After our last song, I swear our voices echoed for a good 10 seconds. A lot of parents came and surreptitiously filed out after our performance (or as subtle as you can be considering the front seven pews were all parents..). The Head Virgil was an absolutely wonderful man, I wish I remembered his name. If I get my hands on a picture, I'll post a picture of us in the National Cathedral.

I seemed to have done lots of extraneous work last week though, sigh. I spent five hours in the lab working on abovementioned memo, only for the professor to tell me that my group was referring to the wrong chapter. I've spent 10 hours on my sorority's budget thus far, and it's still not done. *gaspfaint* I stayed up until 4am on Friday working on random things -- I'm such a nerd, usually people stay up in the wee hours of the morning partying. Hahaha.

Thursday, March 12, 2009

weee are the champions

News that the Commerce school has made it to the top of business school rankings has pretty much swept UVa in the past couple of days. There's a banner from the comm school's secret society that proudly congratulates us in the fourth floor lobby. I just finished reading an article in the Cav Daily that delves slightly into the reasons for the comm school's success. But my sweetest taste of being at the top? My ever so obnoxious high school friend who attends Wharton has stopped jeering at me on Facebook. Haha. =D

A lot of publications and student opinions point to our new facilities and strong curriculum as a big reason for our success. I like to think it's all the opportunities we have at the comm school. The faculty and admin are so student oriented that it's easy to feel spoiled here. Admin work overtime to make sure we're attracting recruiters from all places, and our faculty genuinely listen and make changes according to student opinion. It's one of the reasons that's made our curriculum so strong. (Of course, it's not easy to think of our curriculum lovingly when you're deluged with work.. but I'm sure I'll look back on this year easily next year, maybe even with a bit of fondness. ..maybe.) It's the combination of all these factors that make the McIntire School of Commerce so strong.

The Cav Daily article brought up an interesting point -- how other schools could learn from the comm school. Of course, money might make the world go 'round and would definitely give the College a nicer building than Cabell Hall, but the same could be said for any school. The biggest difference I feel between the College and the comm school? Probably a sense of unity. Of course, the College is also huge, and I've never experienced the other undergraduate schools at UVA, but in my two years there, I've never really met a teacher who would work all her connections to get notable guest speakers in class. Or a professor who would endlessly tie in concepts we're learning in class to real time events - constantly bursting the college bubble. I haven't seen teams of professors get together for meetings and brainstorm how to best approach this semester's curriculum. But I must insert a disclaimer here and say that it's likely this occurs after you declare your major in the College, of which I never bothered to and thus will never find out how major departments function. (I do hear my sorority sister raving about the religious studies department's cake on Fridays though. Potential religious studies majors, take note.)

Monday, March 9, 2009

oh to be back on that ship..





Ah, to be hit with the cold reality of school again. Where was I the past week? Definitely not in C'ville! The last week was UVA's spring break -- or aka our weirdly early spring break. For some reason, ours is a week or two weeks before everyone else. Thus I never have any luck in trying to get my friends from other schools to hang out with me.

However! I did have a great week (of course, it was much too short). Typical UVA spring break activities include going home, going on an alternative spring break trip, going to the beach, going to Mexico or Florida, or going on a cruise. I went on the last this spring break, and was pretty pumped since it was my first cruise. It seems that a lot of UVA folks also went on a cruise this break, but most of them went on a seven day one to the Bahamas. I was on the five day cruise to Mexico. Thankfully I didn't go on the Bahamas one -- we had crazy weather just before the ship left that resulted in 11 inches of snow on Virginia ground. Apparently, that storm followed the Bahamas cruise all the way. 

I like to say that I ate enough on the cruise to sink the ship, and that was probably close to the truth. I went with nine friends and was thoroughly embarrassed at every meal. We'd order four appetizers, two entres, and three desserts at each meal! O_O Oh to be a crazy college student.. hahaha. Pictures are of the ship and other related spring break goodness!