So I've got less than two weeks left here in the city...its been a really good experience.  I don't think I could ask for anything more out of an internship.  I got to test out Finance, see what Lehman Bros is like, and see what it would be like to live in New York, NY.  I'm looking forward to having some time off before school starts though to relax, figure out what I want to do with the rest of my life, and look for a job/interview with companies. 

It seems like life is just flying by.  Three years of college have gone by so fast that at this point, its like I can see the end of the tunnel, but I don't want to be in the home stretch.  I guess I'm close to ready to move on to something else, but at the same time, this next step..the working world, doesn't seem like an enjoyable next step.  For the rest of my career, I will have a job. I've been a student for 21+ years and I'm now realizing that in less than a year, I won't have summers off,  I won't have three weeks for winter break, I probably won't be staying up til 3 am on weekdays.  Life starts to get more "normal," practical, and not nearly as much fun.  If only life was like something on TV, where we could replay the good parts, slow down the fast parts, and even fast forward some of the boring parts. 

My love is coming in a week!  To make up for calling her the 'old ball and chain' in my last entry, I'm supposed to be only nice in this one and even tell you, the public, about her.  So I thought I'd give you a little BioData:

Name: Monica Patel

Age/Height/Weight:  21, 5'4", around 100 lbs, but probably under

Born:  May 10th, on a small island in Canada, Prince Edward Island

Hometown: Solon, OH (near Cleveland)

Citizenship:  Dual U.S. and Canada

Skin Complexion...however you spell that word:  Fair

Year: To be a senior, Grad in 2006

Majors:  Politicial Science, Sociology  Minor: English

GPA:  Higher than mine

Future Plans:  Law school and then making more money than me

Favorite color:  Orange, i think

Likes: Cheese, Hugh Grant, Friends, Sex and the City, Shopping, Reading books (unlike me), researching into places she wants to visit, looking at Friendster for girls for Viren (and sometimes Mohit too)

Dislikes:  Me drooling on her pillow, stuff with sauce, fake people, people who are dirty, the cold (cause she's little), studying for the LSAT

Drink of choice:  Appletini, Mudslide, and/or Buttery Nipple...i think

Current Location: Columbus, OH. 

Next Vacation: August 14-20 to visit me in NYC

Currently Reading The Namesake : A Novel By Jhumpa Lahiri see related

This thing is tougher to update than I expected and/or wanted.  But to summarize the past few weeks...here's how its gone.

A couple weekends ago, Cohort kids came to town to visit.  We had a quite good time sightseeing (again) and hanging out.  The highlight probably would have been relaxing by the Hudson river, overlooking Lady Liberty and drinking a few beers at this Chinese Restaurant.  Fun fun.  Then it was another long working week.  Pretty monotonous I'd have to say.  Although someone from work was guest bartending on the Upper East Side on Thursday night so a bunch of interns and first year analysts went out and had a good time.  Its only after I left that I truly realized that I had just drank the five strongest drinks probably ever made by a "bartender."   I took the subway, although I don't think I picked the right line..but to make a long story short, I took a cab home.  Work the next day was shittastic, with a splitting headache and zero motivation to be there.  Don't think i'll be doing that one again for a while...

Then on Friday night, being the spontaneous kid that I am, I decided to go back to Cbus for a few days.  Its always nice seeing the old ball & chain and other friends and just being at home.  Its such a change of pace, getting away from the city...totally different way of life.  So much quiteter and peaceful.  I think there is a constant 'buzz' around Midtown, no matter what day what time.  Even going do different part of the city like the Upper east side and Upper West Side, you notice how it just all of a sudden gets serene.  Its so cool...those are def. areas where I would want to live if I ever chose to live in the city. 

Work week again was kinda boring, long, and monotonous.  In the end, I don't think i'm gonna like this whole working world crap.   I should be a student for life.  College is def. the best four years of your life, hands down.  No wonder, a lot of people are starting to stay back for five years.  I can't wait to get back.  This year will def. be great...grades won't be as important as soon as find myself a job, no IAA stuff to do, not as much other involvement..basically I'll have time to just sit back, relax, and really enjoy this final hurrah. 

I did go to a Yankees game this week.  It was pretty cool (since the tix were free). As for the game, Al Leiter is old and not a good pitcher anymore.  I do wish he was as bad of a pitcher about four years ago when he beat the Reds in the one-game playoff between the Mets and Reds to get that final spot in the playoffs. 

And today, I ate at the resaurant that the Seinfeld people always were at!! You know, the place that just says "Resaurant" on the side.  Too bad the actual inside is totally different than what the Seinfeld restaurant set was like.  This place gets so many Seinfeld fanatics come visit though that they should re-create the place so it looks like the show.  A lot of people came in the door, and were like "Damn, this looks nothing like the show's inside"  It would def. bring more customers and not just sight-seers who take pictures of the sign.  There was autographed stuff from the cast on the inside, but still...not as glamorous as I would have wanted and expected.

Ok thats enough for now.  Stay Classy, Columbus, Centerville, NY, Cincinnati, Toledo, Cleveland, Kentucky, and whereever else I have friends this summer.  I'll see you on the flip side. 

Xanga just ate my latest entry....I pressed submit and it disappeared.  This gives me an excuse to boycott now for a few more days...

It was a good one too...damn

Currently Listening 100 Years By Five for Fighting see related

So here comes Xanga #2...hmmmm its kinda tough to type on demand.   Time to let the mind just flow randomly....my mom came this weekend and I was a great tour guide.  I showed her Ground Zero, Wall St. South Seaport, Little Italy, Chinatown, Times Square, where I work, Central Park, the Upper East Side...pretty much a lot of places.   We also made our way to Jersey City, where they have this street that is more Indian than...well India.  It was smelly, people threw shit on the ground, the stores weren't air conditioned, there were flees, people looked trashy...I guess in the end, people were able to bring the Homeland to them. 

Work has been okay...I'm working a lot and I appreciate college more and more with each passing day.  No other time in your life can you wake up at 10:30 or later on weekdays, stay up til 4, and party like a rock star (not that i do that since i'm a loser...but senior year, now that will be different!). 

Tonight I went to dinner with some friends at this Thai restaurant that I've now been to four times (I'm pretty sure I can now just be like "Can I have the Usual") and we started talking about people who "talk a lot."  By that I mean those people who talk the talk but fail to walk the walk.  People who are flaky, who don't follow through...the people who end up disappointing.  More and more, I've come across people who take on more than they can handle or just say stuff to try to impress others, but don't do shit.  If there is one thing I really can't take in this world, its that quality of not following through what you promise.  what the fuck is a promise anyways if you don't intend on fulfilling it?  People lose a lot of credibility by not following through.  I remember last year when I was working at Pfizer, this guy was talking about his biggest inspiration, his father, who was a Salesman who has been the nation's best medical equipment rep for the last twenty years straight, making a few million dollars per year in an industry where the average income is below $100k.  The key to his success:  he would always follow through.  If he promised he'd be back in three weeks, he'd make sure that he was back in exactly three weeks, not three and a half weeks, not two weeks and five days, but precisely in three weeks.  Its the whole mentality of a commitment actually being something you can't waver on.  This concept does not sound so difficult in theory, but its astounding that so few people can do it.  If you don't give people the opportunity to be disappointed in you, you'll do well in life, no matter what the profession.  People who quit on things or have no intention of ever fulfilling their talk won't make it too far in this world...at least I hope.

And those are my random thoughts.   Boo ya baby.  Coherrrt is coming to visit for the weekend and it will be a super good time.   More after the weekend....stay tuned my lovely stalkers...you know who you are.

Xanga

After a few years of stalking what everyone else thinks/says, maybe its time that I started being one of those weirdos who in fact is just doing what most middle school girls are doing...keeping a journal. 

I have been working like madd this week and last, and I should be sleeping right now, but instead I am drafting my first ever Xanga entry.

Today the London bombings happened.  Watching all of this moments before I was to get on the busiest subway system in the world put a lot of thoughts/ irrational fears in my head.  You always think 'what if'.  But in the end, you can't live your life in fear, and whatever happens happens.  Life will go on as normal. 

I read this simply amazing Xanga entry today that really made me think...and triggered it being time for me to write down my thoughts.  After all, I don't have much shame, so if I'm going to write it down, might as well do it while entertaining as oh so many have done for me over the past few years.   Ok back to the entry, one of Faraz's friends wrote this almost introspective entry about what is success.  So many of us seem to be wanting something differerent, completey different, out of life.  As graduation is getting closer and closer, I hear the words "I want to get away from Ohio and go somewhere else, 'somewhere different'"   Ahh...I know I've said those exact words hundreds of times.  This entry talked about our definition of success.  I know personally that I've always envisioned success being getting out of Ohio, the small "farmland" as people seem to know it out here on the East Coast and going to the Big City with the Bright Lights.  The city life just sounded so appealing, so fascinating, so Sex and the City.   We had these big dreams of escaping what we've known for so long to a new, exciting adventure. We've taken for granted our childhoods, discounted them as typically suburban and boring, and hoped...always hoped for that day when we'd have our cushy midtown manhattan loft, a palm pilot full of events, meetings, and lavish affairs scheduled, and a career that puts in in the fast track of life, where we never have to worry about the thing that runs this world....money.  We envy those who have it...envision the day when it willl our turn. 

Here I am, in the city that is undoubtably the center of the globe, the big apple.  Am I living the life....some may call it that, but most won't.  Have I seen people who are living "my dream" and definition of success?  Absolutely.  This city is so full of culture, so vibrant, so unique. 

But I have learned something this summer, reality sets in quick...nothing in life is quite like you imagine it to be.

NY is fabulous.  Amazing City.  Great Experience.  A lot of people come here to "find themselves."  Before I got here, I thought that maybe that was why I was coming to the big city as well...to truly discover who I am and my place in life. 

I've learned a lot about myself from this new experience....I "found" myself a while back, in this little place called Ohio.

Now a little excerpt from the Xanga entry that in a way inspired me and gave me this epihany...

"Now, quite frankly, the thought of a huge agency in New York doesn't excite me as much. I don't think I really wanted that bigger city, that big city job that people would kill for. I wanted what I thought it would make me. I wanted to get away from what I am, to someone that I thought was better. I wanted to turn my back on everything I grew up with, because I needed something different. I thought to get something different, I had to make great changes in myself...what made me...well, me. I wanted to be sophisticated and know about all the different gallery openings and underground music scene and the boroughs and who lives where and when what is going on...I wanted to walk down the streets full of people in a hurry to get everywhere, myself the same way. I wanted acheivement and style, all rolled into one well dressed woman, striding confidently on streets where the sun barely shines. I was tired of the large expanse of sky above me, mountains around me, the parched desert below me. I had an absolutely heartwrenching case of wanderlust and boredom with life. It was time for a complete overhaul."