Anniversary Weather

Last year, on January 26th I believe, I experienced some of the worst weather of my life. There was a huge ice storm that broke tree limps and downed power lines. I didn't have power for 4 or 5 days. My wife and I had to stay with some friends who graciously let us invade their lives for a couple days. It was terrible.

So, when the weather was calling for another storm this year, almost on the anniversary of last year's, it was no wonder that people got freaked out. We stocked up with groceries and waited for the storm. We got a pretty big one. An inch of ice with 6 or 8 inches of snow (see picture above, Dickson St before it got real bad) on top of that. But, our electricity never went out, so it really hasn't been that bad. We got a little stir crazy today so we went to Hugo's (a Fayetteville staple) to grab a burger, and then we went bowling. Winter Storm 2010 was way more fun than Winter Storm 2009.

It has been harder and harder to concentrate on school. Getting a job has become priority number one, so hopefully that happens sooner rather than later so I can stop worrying about it and concentrate on having some fun before I re-enter the workforce. Not that my classes aren't interesting, especially Strategic Management. We've not had a course focused just on business strategy, so it is pretty interesting.

3000% Return

A bunch of friends, and my wife and I, went down to Hot Springs this past weekend to bet on the ponies. I had never been to Oaklawn before, nor had I ever been to the horse races. We left Fayetteville Saturday morning around 8, and made it to Hot Springs in plenty of time before the first race started at 1. Immediately upon getting to the track, I bought a burger, a beer and a race program. It was time to get rich.

Not really. I think in going to the track you have to expect to lose money. I did. I expected to lose all that I took, but that is not what happened. I actually hit a .50 box trifecta on the second race, earning me $90 on a $3 bet. Not bad. During the next 6 races I won an additional two bets, for considerably less money, but still at a profit. All in all it was a pretty exciting day.

That night we all went walking around downtown Hot Springs, which is a pretty cool area. There are a lot of old spa houses that have since closed down and been turned into museums. We ate, went to a couple bars and called it a night. The next morning we got up early, ate some breakfast and headed back to Fayetteville.

It was the first time I had been out of Fayetteville for something other than the holidays in a while. It was nice.

MBA Party and more movies.....

Here is a picture from an MBA party this past weekend. The party was put together by Stacy (second on the right) for all the incoming 2011 class and the outgoing 2010 class. It was a good chance to meet some of the new class. It reminded me of entering the program last January and being really excited about learning, and getting to know my new classmates. It's not so much like that for the 2010 class anymore. We are all just pretty ready to be done and working again. I like this picture because it is comprised of the group of people I spent pretty much all of the first semester with (from the left, myself, Stacy, Alisha, and James). We had three classes in which we were group mates, and we spent many hours working on projects and being really terrible at Markstrat (a simulated world of marketing). Looking back, it was a really hectic and unnerving time, but working with these people helped a lot.

Watched a couple movies I had already seen the past couple days. The first was 2001: A Space Odyssey. In watching it I was reminded of the fact that this movie came out in 1968, and at the time probably blew people's minds. Since then, advancements in special effects and copycat versions of Kubrick's space traveling escapades have dampened some of the movie's effect, but it still is weird as hell and definitely leaves you with more questions than answers once its all over. But, that was the intention of the movie. Even though everyone picks up on themes of evolution, the evils of technology and alien life, few people could probably totally agree and what is really going on in the movie. Which, for me, makes it pretty cool.

Last night, I rewatched Inglorious Bastards, and I liked it way more than the first time I saw it. I am a pretty big Kill Bill fan, and it seemed like Tarantino used some of the same music and visuals in IB, which I found distracting. Also, it bothered me that in the English subtitles when someone spoke French sometimes "Oui" was spelled "Yes" and sometimes it was kept French and spelled "Oui". I wouldn't care which one he used as long as he was consistent. Anyway, the scene in the basement where they are meeting up with the German double agent is really freaking awesome. It was even more awesome that Steph fell asleep during that scene only to be awoken when the guns started going off. It scared the crap out of her, and made me laugh and laugh and laugh......

New Semester/Final Semester

The new semester has started, and I am taking four classes. Four classes left between me and graduation.

The first class is Enterprise Systems which will introduce us to ERP systems, specifically SAP. I have never worked with SAP, so I am looking forward to learning about it because I see it mentioned on a lot of job opportunities. The second job is Strategic Management. This class seems really interesting. I don't quite fully understand what all the class will encompass, but anything that has to do with business strategy is interesting in itself. After that is the Shollmier fund project. This is the same investment project course I was taking last semester. This time around I think we will focus more on fundamental analysis and valuation methods in contrast to last semester which was more technical. My last class is tonight and it is called Advanced Corporate finance. It is taught by a professor I had in the first semester, Dr. Jandik. He is a great person to learn from so I am pretty excited about this class.

Other than these classes I will be looking for jobs when I get the chance. In all honesty, it is stressing me out pretty bad, but I have plenty of time to find a job before graduation and I have a couple decent prospects. We'll see........

Spring 2010

I'm ready for school. The break was good for some relaxing, job hunting and movie watching. But, now I am ready to finish up the last semester and enter the working world again. Steady paychecks and no "homework", that will be nice.

Since my last post I have continued on my movie watching binge. I decided to watch a couple movies I have never seen but felt like I should have. Namely, Wall Street and The Godfather. Both were awesome. I doubt I would have liked Wall Street as much this time last year as I did this year. A lot of the suspense in Wall Street is based upon having a fundamental knowledge of finance. So, I enjoyed it.

The Godfather was even better. I have tried to watch it before, but I never gave it my full attention and often became bored very quickly. Not this time. It is a three hour movie, but it doesn't feel like it. am looking forward to sitting down and watching the second one soonish. I hear it is better than the first.

Well, I bought books and school supplies for the last time a couple days ago. Hopefully this is an exciting and productive last couple months of school. Last semester was grueling. The first semester was a little less grueling. Hopefully, this one is just right. It's crazy to think that in about four months the saga of returning to school will come to a close. I am looking forward to it.