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!

schmoozing in the computer lab..

as I frantically work to finish a group project due in.. 12 hours! What I mentioned in my last post about this project was pretty much the only thing I could talk about it. This time's subject is top secret! Hehehe. We turn it in tomorrow, then go into the second stage on Tuesday, so I'll be able to talk about it then.

Otherwise, no fascinating insights or pretty pictures to share this time, i've locked myself in my room this weekend as I wrote my group's paper and tried not to freak out too much when I studied for my accounting midterm on Tuesday. Siiigh. I can't wait for spring break! I'll be going on my first cruise, I'm really excited! =D

didn't finish that installment of car pics..

I s'pose this can be my picture post of the week as well!

After blogger cut out on me after the first upload, here's the rest of the pictures!

going once.. going twice...

I had the BEST strategy class today! It was so funny. But before I dive into that I need to give some background information on class this semester.

So we had a huge group project for Rolls-Royce last semester, this semester the group project's a bit smaller and has to do with mergers and acquisitions. We have to do research and write up a report on a pending deal, and then participate in actual negotiations next Tuesday. So these past couple of weeks, we've been hitting up cases really hard and practicing negotiating. One of the options that's usually open is putting up your company on an auction block -- this is banned from our project though. However, my awesome organizational behavior teacher conducted an in class stimulation regarding just why companies hate auctions so much.

The first auction was your regular open auction. My professor had a cup full of coins and started the bid at one dollar. We had to bid in increments of 10 cents, and off we went. One of my classmates won it for.. around $5 I believe. The actual value of the cup was around $7, lucky guy.

The second auction was a Dutch, closed auction. It was the first of its kind I'd ever seen. Everyone has to stay silent, and the first person to bid wins the item. The price starts at a pre set, high price, and then decreases at certain intervals of time. This time it was a Ziploc container of coins, and the price started at $20. I personally valued it at $7 because I saw a lot of pennies in it. However, a classmate pulled the trigger at $12. There was around $14 in the box, not bad!

The last auction was a.. hrm. I forgot the name. But the highest bidder and the second highest bidder would both pay, but only the highest bidder would get the item. This time it was a one dollar bill. So, one of my crazy classmates started off the bid at $1! While we were staring at him in shock, another evil classmate bid $1.01. Ooh boy, that guy would have the pay the $1 now. Someone else jumped in with the same intention, and for a while it seemed that it would end at $1.05, but I thought, eh. What the heck. I'll have some fun and go for it. So I bid against one of my friends. And we continued, going up in 1 cent increments for about one dollar, then she started going off at 50 cent increments, and I bit the bullet and bid $3 for a dollar bill. She stopped then because she'd known me since first year and knew me too well. Once I got in, I would win this thing. Hahaha.

Purpose of this class? Show how people can get caught up in the hype and how management makes bad decisions in bidding wars. This is also why people hate auctions for companies. 

That was pretty darned fun, but before my poor professor gets condemned for gambling, we weren't really paying for money. I wanted to honor my bid and pay her the two dollars, but alas and alack, my check was refused as she was only joking about playing for real money. Brilliant woman. She deserves tenure.

as promised...

Pictures of the car show that I attended last week! Here are pictures of some weird, some favorites. Feel free to bash or approve of my car taste accordingly. =P There was also a first floor with an exhibit of eco friendly cars -- solar panels on the hood?? I like how the Mustang hood grew longer and longer, then abruptly shrank -- probably because people became more environmentally conscious? Check back for the next installment! I must head to work now.