Hello

Well if anyone saw that last post (cousin Jordan) forgive me it was a bit of frustration. Anyways, things are good, I talked with some friends and I feel much better. Hope all is well with everyone.

Spring Spring

Springtime has definitely arrived in southern california or so it seems. By pring, I mean 80 degrees which will soon be 100 here in a little over a month. Anyways, first to school stuff: never met with my graduate coordinator apparently he is gone this quarter, but I have been emailing with him. Spent all week going through sources and have a few more to go. May start writing today, but probably tomorrow. Filed my grad check, I just need to enroll in my continuation "class" and Im all set.

Stacy got officially admitted into Antioch University of NE in Keene, NH so congrats to her and that is where she will attend for graduate school, big exciting news there.

Won my second match ever against John on.... Thursday the 15th I think? It was a 5 setter that went 6-4, 1-6, 7-6 (3), 4-6, 6-4. The 5th set was serve and volley only, so that was exciting to come through on that. Going to play again tonight, hopefully eradicate the vision I watched today of Nadal pummeling Verdasco in the Monte Carlo final 6-0, 6-1 blah.

Finished up Fable and ME1, so I can give those back to Shannon. I tried Knights of the Old Republic, a star wars game that was really popular about 6 years ago, but I just couldnt get into it. So I have really been playing alot of Final Fantasy, I have about 16 hours into I think, its a great story and game.

Been doing really well with my fitness lately, my last off day was last sunday. Ive run 3 miles twice this week, worked out twice, and played tennis twice. This is the pattern I want to settle into if possible. My diet has been ok maybe 75% where I want it to be, so I need to keep trying to improve in that area.

My friend Mike from San Diego is coming up tomorrow night for his bday and will stay until wednesday afternoon. That should be a lot of fun to have him around for a few days. Tough to never have friends around but it will be a nice change. I just need to really focus in on my thesis and keep plugging away at it. I feel good because Im working through these sources but ultimately I havent done any writing and its a little intimidating. Oh well, Im confident it will be ok in the end.

Hope everyone else is doing well.

Where does the time go??

Hello,

Wow so its been a bit since ive posted. Well lets see, my birthday was good, I won my first tennis match (against John) so that was a nice bday present. Then the trip up north with stacy was great, we had a lot of fun in wine country I was bummed to leave. Wine tasting was fun, it was a cool experience, I defintely want to try it again. We took a back way home too that was really pretty so it was awesome to spend some quality time together. Then my friends Jon came for a week, we had a really good time. Saw San Francisco, Stanford, Palo Alto, the Google Complex, Los Angeles, Palm Springs, San Diego, and went for a hike. Fit a lot in for just 6 days, he had a really good time and loved it though so Im happy about that.

Tomorrow, Im going in to meet my graduate coordinator to get all my stuff sorted. Im going to try to enroll in the comp exam class and dump the thesis. I just have no motivation to finish it, and I NEED to graduate in june. I dont want to waste anymore time and money here. I finished all my classes, and I got all A's and 1 A-. I just need to finish this one stupid culminating experience and Im set. So cross your fingers I can take care of that tomorrow.

Other than that, I have been playing tennis a lot, my serve has really improved since I have been practicing it a lot more. I have been losing a lot of close sets that were just decided by a few points. Um, Im playing fantasy baseball for the first time and Im in second after the first week which is good. Trying to beat the first Fable on my cpu and Mass effect 1 on the xbox so I can give those back to Shannon and Rob. Also, I have been looking for other jobs in the area, but there just isnt much out there right now. It can be a little frustrating but it is what it is I guess.

Thats about it, things are pretty good. Ive had a rough last few days just dealing with boredom, trying to figure out my school stuff and crap. Hope everyone else is good.

Hello Spring

Hey all,

Hope everyone is good, been a few weeks since I posted. Going to keep it short. I went up north the 11-15 and had a great trip with Stacy. We did a lot of things and it went by really quick, but it was fun. Im driving up there a week from today, so I'm really looking forward to that. We are going to stay at my sisters for a night and then in Napa for a night, so it will be a nice little getaway for us. Then, my friend Jon is flying into SF on the 31st and he will be out here until the 6th, so for about a week and a half I will have some good company.

On St. Pattys', I went to the Indian Wells tennis tourney for the day. I had a lot of fun, got to see some great matches, and had breakfast with Nonnie (my grandma) that morning. Hmmmm, what else... Turned in my last paper in class last thursday and I have my final this upcoming thursday. Oh yeah got a letter from UCLA... denied. I have heard back from everywhere except Oxford and UCR, UCR still needs my transcripts but Im not going to send them in so blah. Reading a couple different books and been watching March Madness of course. I picked Syracuse to win the whole thing and their chances are looking quite good at this point. Also, Im trying out fantasy baseball this year and had my draft yesterday: I got some pretty solid players so hopefully I have a good first year. I finished Long Way Round, the motorcycle documentary on Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman riding around the world, and started Long Way Down, where they ride from Scotland to South Africa. It really makes me want to get a bike and go for a ride.

Played tennis yesterday, played really well too considering I havent played in 2 weeks. I'm revamping my serve, so it will take a while until I get back to serving well but once I get there my serve should be a lot better than it was. Hit the ball with a lot of spin yesterday too which is important. My older sister, Shannon, drove down last night too for a few days so that will be fun. What else... Stacy's bday was March 19, Happy birthday babe, and mine is March 26; so I'm turning the big 24 here soon haha.

Anyways, thats about it; things are good. Hope everyone else is well.

Living the ups-and-downs of trying to finish grad school

Welllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll it was not my favorite week of the year thats for sure. Basically, I got an email from my grad coordinator saying he couldnt sign off on my thesis due to some issues he had with it. He suggested I take it to a political science professor affiliated with the program and see if he would be willing to sign off on it. I've done this, but given the late notice of this and his apparent anger at the whole situation, it is doubtful that he will agree to pass it through. More than likely, Im going to have to do a substantial rewrite of it that will take me into next quarter. It wont change my graduation plans (June) but it will cost me close to $1000 dollars that I dont want to spend. Oh well, what are you going to do right? Such is life.

I finished Friedman's Hot, Flat, and Crowded. Overall, its a really good book, a bit repetitive, but carries a strong message. There is substantial economic incentive to pursuing energy efficiency in the US, and it could help bolster our economy during the 21st century. But as he points out, we are currently not ready to make the hard decisions necessary to move into this direction. If we do move this way, it could be seen as an influential piece that helped trend the country in that direction. I learned a lot, however some parts were a bit dry due to Friedman's detailed explanations on certain energy things, but I liked it.

Didn't have to go to class at all: had a furlough on tuesday and skipped thursdays class. Ill get my essay back in next tuesdays class. Got some bloodwork done and got the results, everything came back great so im as healthy as an ox for now. The next nice thing to do would be to visit a dentist since I haven't seen one in about 5 years, but without insurance thats a no go for now. I began reading Supercapitalism, a book for my econ class, its a pretty easy read and somewhat interesting which helps. Oh, I also bought my tickets for the Indian Wells tennis tournment. Im only going one day this year, March 17, but its the quarterfinals so there should be a lot of great matches that day.

Flying up north on thursday, definitely looking forward to getting away. Have a lot of things planned with Stacy, so it should be a lot of fun. Hmm... I think thats about it for now. See ya later.

Goodbye February... Hello Month of My Birth

Well, its been an interesting week to say the least. I finished my essay for class and turned that in, feel pretty good about it, Im shooting for a high B, maybe low A. I got my exam back and got a 93.5%, one of only 3 A's, so that was definitely a good start to the class. My next assignment isn't due until March 18th, so I have a nice break and hopefully won't feel so burned out by the time that rolls around. Still waiting to hear back from: UCLA, UCR, Oxford, and Harvard for whatever thats worth.

Went out to Palm Springs on Monday and spent the night with my uncle Brendan, which was good fun. We played apples to apples a really fun board game, which I proceeded to win because my board game skills are off the charts haha. Then, a bunch of us played ping pong for a few hours which was a lot of fun. I was pretty rusty at first but warmed up quickly. The next day (tuesday), I visited Jennie's (Uncles gf) new salon she opened up. Its got a good location and is pretty good sized for what she needs. Got my haircut, which is always a plus.

I finished Mass Effect 2, which was a great game and I am definitely looking forward to Mass Effect 3 in 2011 ugh. Started a second play through on Dragon Age, been playing halo a lot with garrett again which is fun, and I am about halfway through Thomas Friedman's Hot, Flat, and Crowded. HFC is a really good book so far, but pretty dense on environmental terms so its not for everyone. Jennie also gave me 4 books to read, so I definitely have a big pile of them just waiting for me.

Overall, everything is good no complaints, I just have been dealing with boredom a lot lately. I think I am so used to having so much school stuff going on from the past 6 months that not really having anything to do has been a weird transitions. Im trying to do other stuff more, Im planning on either running or playing tennis tonight but it rained yesterday so I will have to check conditions. Im flying up to Sacramento in 11 days on March 11 to go see Stacy so I am definitely looking forward to that. Take care everyone.

Restless Restless

Ever have one of those days that you just feel slightly irritated? Just sitting at work bugs me, the fact that I have school work bugs me, the fact that John won't email me back to play tennis bugs me haha. I don't know what my problem is.. just like this ever-present impatience.

Well after 1 stressful day (Thursday) and 1 somewhat stressful day (Friday), I got all the necessary forms signed/filled out and turned them into the office of graduate studies with my thesis on friday. I definitely felt a huge sense of relief after that. I also got an email from Berkeley... didn't get in. Thats 6 responses so far.. hopefully I will here from the rest soon so I can put that behind me. I'm currently working on a 7-10 econ paper due next thursday on budget deficits and the national debt. Pretty easy stuff, just a bit boring and I literally have zero motivation since I finished my thesis. I'm pretty sure I am experiencing burn out. I am so close to finishing this degree that I just want it to be over with now. Especially since I had to pay my school 700$ out of pocket to pay for my thesis class since I added it past the financial aid deadline or some shit. That was another reason my thursday was stressful besides finishing my thesis stuff. It takes a lot for me to get stressed but man having those 3-4 things in one day sure did it to me.

Anyways, got about a page done of this econ essay and im dragging my feet. I was going to work on it yesterday but decided to read a book instead. I read and finished the Art of Racing in the Rain, one of the book's nasty sent me. It was really good and I highly recommend it to anyone who has a dog or loves dogs. It will definitely give you a new perspective on your furry friend; had some sad parts, drama, really well-written I thought and an easy read. Then, I went for a run (2 miles) and just played video games.. pretty boring day but much needed.

Hope this feeling goes away, I hate this, I'm usually so content lol I don't want to feel uncontent. Anyways, talk to you all later.

In a thoughtful, but peaceful mood

Hey everyone,

I was just thinking about how important it is to be humble in life. I mean, by all means have confidence in what you do, but just remember how lucky we can be in life. Especially here in America, we have some extraordinary luxuries that we expect and are provided daily (such as food and shelter) that are completely unknown in other parts of the world. I feel very blessed and fortunate most of the time.

I got my thesis back from my committee chair with his edits yesterday, he was very thorough which is good. He also said he thought it was interesting, enjoyed it, and it definitely offerred something for people looking to expand their knowledge on politics in Africa. In other words, it was better than I feared. The other member of my committee was unable to return an edited version to me because he had  the birth of his son! Congratulations to him, I told him not to worry as my chair was thorough. He said he would read through it and contact me if there was anything glaring that needed to be fixed. I guess this is a little of a blessing in disguise for me as I am already short on time, the thesis needs to be confirmed and signed off by my committee and turned into the university for the first formal review by friday. Also, my chair had never read a thesis before as a chair so its kind of been a lemming-like experience with none of the 3 of us exactly sure what to do or if we are doing to right. Clearly, I am the one idiot in the history of the program to choose to write a thesis haha, and its increasingly going to be a waste since the chances of me pursuing a PhD shrink by the day. Nonetheless, it has/is been a good experience and I will always be able to say I wrote a thesis. Plus, it literally means that besides this and my last class I am done with the program, so its nice that I won't have to take comprehensive exams at the end. I started working on his edits last night and have worked on them literally on and off all day. I'm about halfway through I would say, so making fairly good progress.

I had my first assignment in my economics class last night, it was an essay exam worth 25% of my final grade. It went fairly well, I'm guessing I will get a high B or low A. Pretty long exam, but not too difficult. The first paper is due on February 25, a week from tomorrow, that I haven't even thought of. It only has to be 7-10 pages though so I'm not worried I can write that pretty quickly now.

Speaking of the PhD thing, I have heard back from a few other places. So far I have received 5 responses: 4 no's from Cambridge, Stanford, UC San Diego, and Yale and a request from Leeds uni for a more detailed research proposal. Leeds was kind of a shot in the dark school because I met some cool guys in Barcelona that lived there and at the time was considering England, but I am not going there. Its just not meant to be. I still am waiting to hear back from Harvard, Oxford, UCLA, UC Riverside, and UC Berkeley. Like I've said, not expecting to get into anywhere and not sure if I would go even if I did but we will see how it goes.

Played Mass Effect 2 a lot last week. In about 4 days time, I logged over 20 hours of gameplay. Great game, nice distraction too. I hadn't played video games in nearly 2 months so it has been fun to get back into one.

And most importantly, I got to spend Friday night-Tuesday morning with the girlfriend, which was awesome. We had a lot of fun, got to do some cool stuff like hiking, playing tennis, seeing movies, going out to dinner, and just enjoy each others company. Already looking forward to my next trip up north.

Anyways, hope all is well out there. Im doing good, getting close to finishing this master's thing so just trying to push through before I have to figure out my job/living situation haha. Take care.

Happy February 8th!

Hello all,

I'm trying to do a better job of posting more often, seems like I'm doing a good job, plus I have been on my computer non-stop lately. First, today is my dad's 51st birthday. I got him a book and took him out to dinner so that was nice. Next... I submitted my thesis to my committee for review . This is by no means the end of the process, but to have a near completed draft is a huge deal. Ill find out in about a week what I need to fix (and how bad it is). As long as it doesn't completely suck.. I should graduate by the end of March, thank god. So needless to say, its like part of a weight has been lifted off my shoulder, not completely off, but there is definitely a little less pressure on them. This also means that yes tonight, I will finally start playing Mass Effect 2 after 2-3 weeks of it just sitting in my room.

And most importantly... only 4 days until I am extremely happy. Have a good night everyone.

Quick Update

Hey hey,

Its raining and I'm at work, which suits me fine. Getting pretty close to having the first draft of this thesis wrapped up. Im sending it off to my committee on Monday, I just need to finish the body and conclusion, the introduction is virtually done. I went down to USC last night and hung out with a few buddies for a couple hours. It was nice to get out of the Inland Empire (basically anywhere east of Los Angeles) for a little bit, change things up.

In PhD related news, I got my first acceptance  rejection letter back... Stanford U. No big surprised there, that was by far the school that I had the least chance of getting into seeing their average minimum GRE scores was 1400 and mine is only at 1240. As I have posted, I'm fully prepared to get 10 letters that follow this vein, so it really doesn't bug me in the slightest.

6 days until the girl comes down, can't wait. Take care all.

PhD? Maybe going the way of the white buffalo...

So I have been laboring at the actual thought of entering a PhD program and the implications it would have for my future. I was first warned against this by Dr. Chambers, my ancient greek history professor at sac state. Then, more recently, by Dr. Janiskee who is the chair of the political science department at san bernardino. Both professors pointed out to me the ultra-competitive job market for people seeking university teaching jobs in the humanities. That the long hours of graduate school combined with the reality of going $40,000-$50,000 dollars worth of debt is not worth it. That you are extremely over-qualified and extremely under-paid for the work you do. At the time, my thought process was such that I acknowledged these problems but brushed them aside and continued to blindly pursue this idea I have of being a PhD holder. Thats one of the main things I have been worrying about lately. I have an IDEA of what I imagine it to be like in a PhD program and how the job market would just open up to me afterwards.

So I have been scouring the web researching this topic. I have read the blogs of the now-departed Invisible Adjunct. I also follow a few other blogs of professors who write explicitly about this. The outlook is extremely grim. Across the board, the number of tenure-track university positions has declined dramatically over the past 20 years. Adjunct professors who work part-time with no benefits are becoming the norm at universities, with many of these professors teaching at 2-3 different colleges a week to make ends meet. A predicted expansion of PhD jobs that encouraged an explosion of students to get their PhD's never came to fruition; which produced a saturation of PhD holders in the job market. In other words, there are X number of PhD academia jobs and X+1,000,000 job applicants. While competition alone isn't enough to scare me away, there are other mitigating factors.

1. Without funding, I would go deep in debt (roughly $50,000 dollars) and as an adjunct would make $30,000 dollars a year? No thanks.
2. A PhD program would take a minimum of 4-5 years, putting me at 29 years of age before I even enter the job market.. thats a lot of lost time and opportunity. Not to mention, I could easily spend another 4-5 years and countless moves trying to find a tenure-track position and NOT find one!
3. While the thought of being a PhD student has a certain amount of prestige and romanticism to it, the reality is that I will spend long hours in isolation: researching and writing, helping professors with their research, and rubbing shoulders with a certain type of person which I'm not entirely sure I care to spend a lot of time around.
4. I don't have a financial net to fall into; my family is not available to help me financially. So, if I was unable to get a job, you could see me in the streets living in a cardboard box.
5. There are a few others I was thinking of last night, but can't seem to come across them at the moment.

Now I have other options: High school and community college most notably. Also, If I don't enter a PhD program I have the flexibility of choosing where I want to go and what I want to do. A program would lock me into a location for 4-5 years and prevent me from pursuing other goals. Not to mention, what if I went halfway through a program and decided at that point I no longer wanted to do it? What a waste of time. I have spent many hours and nearly $1,000 dollars completing my 10 applications for programs, but that defintely will not be a deterrent to me if I decide I do not want this. I have never been afraid to walk away from something, and this is no different.

Now just in case someone is reading this and getting depressed because their life goal has always been to get a PhD (it has never been one of mine, which makes this realization probably easier to bear), There are exceptions. My older sister Shannon is getting her PhD in Clinical Psychology because it is necessary to have this qualification in order to have job options. People in Engineering, Math, Medical, and the Sciences will have no trouble finding jobs with a PhD. If you are in the humanities: it really comes down to teaching or if you are in Political Science like me working for the government, or a Non-Governmental Organization. I don't really have the desire to work for the government, and NGO work can be difficult to break into without having the right connections.

Basically, these are the thoughts I am having while waiting for my acceptance rejection letters to arrive. This could all be moot point, because to be honest I am not expecting to get into more than 1 or 2 programs if I'm lucky. Its all really a crapshoot: getting accepted, making it through the program, and finding a job afterwards. And then there is this, I am not sure that the thought of constantly reading academic work, researching, and trying to get paper, articles, and books published is something that exactly thrills me. While I have been fortunate to have a few publishments now and its very exciting, they were papers written for classes, not because I was trying to get published. I like reading academic and intellectual stuff when I want to learn it and its exciting, and I like learning in general when it comes to that. But its the idea of teaching, instructing, and interacting with students and other intellectuals that really draws me to teaching. I am a pretty social person, and I don't want to have to lock myself away from my family because I have some deadline I need to hit on some paper or something. Plus, I really want to be able to coach football again (something I love dearly) and the thought of never doing that again is something I am not really comfortable with.

Just on my mind, felt like I needed to write it out after thinking about it for a few days. I can see a scenario where even if I get accepted to some places, I just turn them all down and walk away from it. I need to start looking back into finishing up another bachelors (so I can teach at a community college) and finishing up my high school teaching credential. If anyone has any thoughts, feel free to post.

Sunday Bloody Sunday

No, nothing is wrong; I just recently listened to this song is all haha. New developments:

1. Finished my UCR app
2. Submitted my final paper for the publication in the Journal of Peace and Terrorism Studies
3. Did my taxes (got 400$ back, thanks Obama!)

Slowly working on my thesis... My goal is to finish it by February 5 and give my committee 2 weeks to read and review it before the first formal review is due. Watched the OZ Open Final last night and Federer beat Murray in straight sets, so congrats to him on Grand Slam #16, what a great achievement. Speaking of tennis, played the last 2 nights and playing again tonight, fun fun stuff.

My Aunt Nasty sent me 3 new books that I am really looking forward to reading, but like ME2 they will have to sit on my desk until I finish my thesis. Not much else new to report, just trying to stumble through this thesis and get it done.. what a relief it will be. Anyways, hope everyone is doing well.

New post already???

Haha, not sure why I am posting again so soon, I feel like a lot has happened in 3 days I guess! I have a few new developments: first, I decided to apply to ONE LAST school as a backup college so I am applying to UC Riverside. Not sure if I would go if it was the only place I got in, but hey why not.  Second, I got an email this morning notifying me that a paper I wrote on arms control measures in West Africa had been accepted for publication in the Journal of Peace and Terrorism Studies. Really exciting stuff, they are based out of Syracuse University in New York and if I want to, I can present the paper at a conference they are having at the end of February. I just need to check my schedule and see if I can get some funding and I might consider doing it. Their editing board ripped my paper apart pretty good, so I am in the process of fixing it and hopefully resending it back tomorrow or the next day.

Monday, I went quadding with my pops for the first time in a few months. We had a good time playing in the mud (it recently rained down here) and it was nice to get out. Quadding has always provided me with some of my best thinking time, my body is so engaged with the environment and controlling the quad that my mind becomes super clear and I can really focus my thoughts. Kind of a strange phenomenon because I really zone out, which could be a bit dangerous while riding but oh well lol no accidents yet right? Tuesday, I put in a good day's work on my thesis. I consolidated most of my writing from the summer and am at 54 pages. My target is 80 so I'm hoping with my introduction, literature review, cleaning up the body, transitions, and thesis I will be close to that target. Also, got my books for my class on Tuesday which look pretty interesting.. I'm looking forward to reading them.

I watched the Pianist today (great movie) and Obama's first State of the Union. He said all of the right things, I just hope there is some substantial action behind it. Our country really is in a tough position and I hope he can provide the leadership and strength the country needs right now.

Ran 1.5 miles on Sunday and 2 miles today without any pain in my left knee/upper shin. I am going to really ease back into running, and only run on the track. I think I would flip out if I got hurt again.. but I felt good overall. My cardio is pretty decent because of all the tennis, but my legs are definitely out of long-distance running shape. Suppose to play tennis manana, but never heard from John, so maybe I will just work out in the morning. I hope some people watched the quarterfinals of the Oz open.. there were some great matches. Oh yeah, My sister and her fiance bought me Mass Effect 2 for Christmas which arrived in the mail on tuesday. The game looks so fun, but I think I won't be able to play until after I finish my thesis. If it is anything like the first one or Dragon Age (made by the same company: Bioware) it will consume all my free time. So that is just sitting on my TV stand and tormenting me for the next few weeks I'm afraid.

On a more personal note: Stacy bought her ticket to come down here from February 12 (night)-16 (morning). Needless to say, I am ridiculously excited for this.

Where did January go?

Hey everyone,

Been a bit between posts but for good reason. I spent January 17-22 up in Sacramento with Stacy which was really good. Did some fun stuff, walked around Old Sac, went to a drive-in, had dinner with some friends, watched a lot of movies, and just got to spend some good time together. I also got to see my uncle and cousin, and another friend that I coached with at Colfax. Definitely was tough to leave, but she will be back down for Valentine's day weekend so in about 18 days or so.

Finished the essay for the Magdoff book, so I am officially done with my independent study. All I have left to graduate is one class and finishing my thesis. Today, I caught up on all my reading for the class (I skipped both classes last week while I was in Sacramento) so I should be all set with that. Starting this week I really need to treat my thesis as a job and put good, solid hours of work into it. The first review reading or whatever is February 19th.. so its coming up in 3.5 weeks. I also finished my Oxford application, so I am completely done with apps since I decided not to apply to SOAS. Now I just have to play the waiting game until March to see if i get in anywhere.

Got my school money, which was nice. Catch up on some stuff... also I got 240$ back on my credit card from my bank. When I originally bought patriot tickets in December a guy tried to burn me by not sending the tickets so I was able to cancel that transaction thankfully. I need to buy my books for class on tuesday.. I only need like 3 and they are only going to be like 60-70$ which is nice.

I haven't played any tennis in about 8 days since I was gone, I was going to play last night but had some miscommunication with my buddy. It worked out though I had a really good in-depth talk with my dad for about 3 hours which was nice because it doesn't happen often. I have only seen like one match in the Australian Open too, which is already halfway over but Ill get to watch more this week.

Things are awesome though, everything is great. Hope everyone else is good. Take care.

2010 has the start of a wonderful year

First things first:

On January 7, Stacy and I decided to officially start dating. I am extremely happy about this and very excited for the future =).

Quite alot has been going on the past 8 days. I finished the second of my economic independant study essays, so all I have left is Harry Magdoff's Imperialism without Colonies. I had my first paper presentation at a conference last Saturday ... it went pretty well, it was more laid-back then I thought. There was about 15 people in the audience and all you do is read your paper to everyone. Its good though, you get some good feedback from people and get experience presenting things to people you don't know. I also was able to have dinner with my buddy JB and hang out with my friend Mike for a few hours while I was down there, so it was a good trip.

I started class last night... my only class of the quarter and my last quarter hopefully!! Its an economic class, I think I will like it and the teacher seems nice, if but a bit boring. My Oxford app is due on January 22, so I need to finish that up. I think that will be my last application (I don't think I'm going to apply to SOAS in London; don't really want to go there). Been having some issues with money; work hasn't paid me on time, my school grant got delayed by a few weeks, along with having to pay for a stupid speeding ticket. No big deal just kinda weird how everything hits at once. A friend who owes me 150$ though is about to pay me back so that will be good.

Tennis has been really good lately too. I experienced the best 2 week stretch of playing I've ever had. I won at least 1 set for 9-10 straights days of playing. Yesterday, I didn't play that good, but hopefully tomorrow Ill pick right back up where I was playing.

Got a few things to take care of.. Sunday as soon as I get off work I'm driving up to Sacramento spend 4 days with Stacy. Its going to be awesome, I can't wait. Need to get my hair cut, finish the last economic essay, and.... I think thats it lol. Anyways, hope everyone is good; Im doing great! bye bye.

Welcome 2010!

Well I have to say it was a good start to the new years. I spent a wonderful weekend with quite a special person :). Miss Stacy came down and we had a great weekend together, hope everyone else really enjoyed the kickoff to their new year as well.

Got a bit of a busy week coming up: I finished the first of my three economics essays (15 pages!). Paul Baran's Political Economy of Growth was challenging. Next up is Andre Gunder Frank's Capitalism and Underdevelopment in Latin America that looks to be more of the same. On Saturday, I am presenting my Rwandan Genocide paper at the conference in San Diego. I finially heard from the professor who heads the phi theta alpha chapter and im a little more at ease.. I thought it had to be this big presentation but she said most people just straight up read their papers, which sounds boring to me. I imagine ill talk about the more interesting parts and maybe ready some direct quotes from the paper, should be a good experience. So I'll head down there friday night and chill with Mike and then probably hang out with him on Saturday after my presentation.

Watched Boise State beat TCU last night 17-10... really good defensive game. Chris Petersen and Boise never fail to amaze me; they called this fake punt on a 4th and 9 from their own 30 when it was tied at 10-10. Great stuff, makes me really miss coaching. I have been playing a lot of tennis lately too and quite well I might add. I think I have one a set for 3 or 4 straight times. Last time I should have won 2, but the lights shut off right as I was about to serve and completely screwed up my momentum. Im going to play today and we are at 4-4 in a set with me serving again so we will see how that goes. Been eating a little better, need to keep working on that, and I really need to start hitting my weight machine blah.

School starts next Tuesday, somewhat excited for that. A little anxious though because I REALLY need to get going on my thesis and I just haven't had the chance with these economics essays and my applications. I really hope I can knock this thing out because the first reading is mid-February :\. Other than that I just have one class so the school stuff should be fairly simple besides finishing my thesis.

Lifes great and today is beautiful. Wish the best for everyone. Speak soon.

Merry Xmas and here comes New Years!

Hey everyone!

Hope you all had a great xmas, I sure did. I got: A vest (grandma), 50$ (mom), 25$ itunes card, 100$ jcpenneys card, a tomtom, axe stuff, a new racket (which i returned and got some other tennis stuff since I already have 2 rackets), and some little stuff. The rest was all from my dad, who always hooks me up on christmas. My older sister and her boyfriend got me something too, but I wont get it until the end of January... pretty sure it is Mass Effect 2 though which is rad because that game will be epic. My dad and I went and saw Sherlock Holmes on xmas too, which was pretty good I thought, I haven't read the books but I know it was a lot different from them. Santa brought my dad a bunch of movies which is always good for me since I am a pretty big movie buff.

I had a quick 2.5 day trip up to Norcal last sunday through wednesday. Monday night we had a huge party of like 25 at Chevys, which was fun because one of my best buddies Brett was in california from florida with his girlfriend and I havent seen him in forever. I got to see some other friends I hadn't seen in a while either which was good. Afterwards, we went to Club Car and Pistol Petes (2 auburn bars). My other friend Matt and I shot some pool and then my friend Stacy met us there and we played for a bit. The next day I got to visit my friend Kyle and see my cousins Kari and Kelsi, who were in town from Minnesota and Oregon. They were both home from college. That night, I went out with Stacy and had a blast at the Auburn Alehouse and Petes again. Then, early wednesday morning, I left and drove straight to San Diego and watched Cal play Utah in the Poinsettia Bowl at Qualcolm; shoutout to Ernie for hooking me up with tickets. Mike went with me and afterwards we got some pizza and I drove home. I was pretty tired given I had only slept 4 hours the previous night.. just a whirlwind few days.

Im really excited for New Years; Stacy is coming down to spend a few days and we are going to have a great time. We will be going out to Palm Springs to kick it with my Uncle and his gf and some of their friends. It will definitely be a good time. Hope everyone else is enjoying the holidays and speak soon.

Its beginning to look alot like christmas..

Hello all,

Hope everyone is enjoying a wonderful holiday season. Where to start? Well I got A's in both of my classes, which is awesome. My independant study will be done by january 1 (my self-imposed date for finishing my essays). So basically, I am 3 essays, 1 class, and 1 thesis away from my master's degree. Exciting stuff huh? What else.. oh yeah I now officially have 7 of my 10 applications submitted. The next one is for Leeds Uni on January 1st as well. Today I submitted my arms control paper to be published and accepted at a conference at the end of February at Syracuse Uni, so I hope it gets accepted.

I had a great trip to the east coast: 2 days in NYC, 1.5 days in Boston (got to see the patriots live WOOO), and 2 days in Manchester, CT (my former old town). The picture above is of Grand Central Station on Manhatten, then the patriots game (our seats were 7 rows back from the endzone!), then me and kaat at the game, the old north church in boston, and finally my old house in manchester. Got to spend some time with Kaat, a friend I met in Spain, who is studying in NYC and we had fun going to the patriots and walking around Boston in the rain. Then in Manchester, I spent most of my time with Jon Phelps, who is an old football buddy. I also got to see my friend Mike Goldstein for a few hours and my last relative in Connecticut, a cousin named Val. All in all, great trip! I had some transportation issues in the form of delayed flights, missed buses, and missed trains haha. It all worked out good though, except for my patriot ticket fiasco but I don't even want to get into it.

It was a short trip, but a good length althought I forgot how amazing boston is. If I ever move back to the east coast, I will definitely be moving there. What a great city... it just felt like home. Id like to take a trip back and spend 3-4 days in Boston and another 3-4 in Connecticut. Got some good reading done on the trip too: Superfreakonomics, The boy who harnessed the wind, and Open (andre agassis biography). All 3 books were really well done and I enjoyed and recommend them all. Tomorrow night, I am heading back up to Norcal for a few days to see some people. Then wednesday I am suppose to go to the Cal vs. Utah bowl game, but my friend hasn't let me know if he was able to get tickets yet or not.

Things are going pretty good, I really need to stay focused on school and I completely failed at that today haha oh well. Playing tennis tonight which is a plus! Oh yeah, saw Avatar last night.. really cool movie with the best CGI effects I have ever seen. Pretty soon they won't even need actors. Anyways, take care and speak soon.

End of the Quarter is so close!

I submitted my app to UC San Diego last night, so I'm officially done with 4 out of the 10 apps. The next 3 (Harvard, Yale, UCLA) are due on 12/15/09. I need to finish these by thursday night, because that is when I am flying back east for 5 days and I don't want to worry about it while I am out there. I also submitted my paper for Geography 600 tonight, so I am officially done with Geography. I should easily get an A in the class I only needed a 70 out of 100 on the final paper to do so. I finished my paper for Poli Sci 622 completely too, so I will just do one final readthrough and edit tomorrow or thursday and submit it on thursday. That class I have an A in, so if I get an A on the paper I should get an A in the class. My goal is to finish one of my three essays for my econ independant study. Even though my professor said he would extend it into the next quarter, its probably a good idea to get one of them done. Then, I can finish the other 2 over break and focus on my thesis.
Today was pretty productive, I edited 2 papers for a friend for his classes. Also, I saw slumdog millionaire.. GREAT movie I highly recommend it. Really powerful and just the flow and style of the movie were great. Also, my buddy Garrett and I beat the new Halo ODST campaign woohoo it only took us like 2 nights lol its pretty short, but fun. I bought my patriots tickets today, booked the hostel in Boston, and got things cleared up with Kaat. Really excited to go back east for a few days. Speaking of that, I got a surprise call from my buddy Jon who I will be hanging out with. I played football with him in Connecticut and have not seen him in like 10 years!!

I finished fast food nation yesterday, pretty good book. The author's writing style is a little repetitive, but the message and information were really sound. On the flight over to NYC, im planning on reading SuperFreakonomics, the sequel to Freakonomics. The first one was really good, so Im excited to read this.

My dad brought home the Xmas tree today and I decorated it.. always good times and memories. Ill have to take some pictures and post them. Anyways, happy holidays to everyone and god bless....

PS: Oh yeah! It is Jimmy V classic Week on ESPN for College basketball. This is my favorite charity and supports cancer research. PLEASE go donate something, anything!! It is the best charity ever!!!!!

Crunch Time

Hope everyone had a great thanksgiving! I sure did; spent a week in northern california with friends and family. Played some tennis, met with some old friends, made a few new ones.. always a good time. Oh yeah, I bought a few books before I left: Fast Food Nation, The Gathering Storm, Open, and SuperFreakonomics. I'm about halfway through Fast Food Nation so far and it is really good; its about how the fast food industry develped, does business, and spread across the country. My Aunt Nasty gave me a book too called "The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind", which looks really good too.

So I am done with 3 of my 10 applications. I submitted to Cambridge, Stanford, and Berkeley. The next group are due in about a week. School-wise Im done for the semester except for my 25 page paper which I havent started yet.. Yikes! Other exciting news is I got Netflix today and LOVE IT. All Ive done today is watched movies: Nick + Norah's Infinite playlist, 10 things I hate about you, Mall Cop, Phenomenon, and now im watching the Never Ending Story. Its 9$ a month, I get 1 disc for free at anytime, plus through my xbox there is 100's of movies you can stream instantly.

When I was up north I played some tennis with my buddy who works for Berkeley's football program.. it was so cool I got to tour the football facilities and even met some coaches. I have definitely been missing football lately.

Tomorrow I need to mail some writing samples, and work on my paper. Oh yeah my East Coast trip is coming up in like 10 days super excited for that too! Hope everyone is well!