Finding my way back home

This marks the final day of my two week journey through various parts of the US and what I dubbed as a practice round for traveling alone in Europe. Obviously I cheated here by staying in hotels, with friends, and family, but this country doesn't offer nearly as many hostels. I arrived in Chicago on Monday evening where I came straight to my Sammi's place to meet her. I had to wait for her to get back from work and her dance class so I waited inside the mini restaurant/coffee shop next door. I decided to walk outside a little early since it wasn't too cold and I was just in time for the show. I don't think my sister realized I was watching, but her attempting to park for 10 minutes was quality entertainment. It's not that she's a bad driver or poor at fitting in parking spots, she's just still learning, 13 years later. She'll undoubtedly defend herself, but I don't think there are many excuses besides "I was teasing the parking spot with the honor of keeping my car between its lines." Besides that there wasn't much to do and we both had to wake up early, so she went to sleep and I watched TV.

The next morning I woke up around 7 a.m, not purposely, but it worked out. I called the rental car place to see if they had my reservation that the dude who lives with my sister was supposed to make, but he forgot. They were able to get me a car though by 9 a.m (and the discount in the end) so it all worked out, he can have his name Jeremy and the title of my sister's boyfriend back, the ring may just cost a little more from my dad. Totally kidding, anyway, I walked a mile down the road (luckily it wasn't freezing or raining in the morning) had my Mazda 6 waiting for me and drove straight to Madison. Once outside of Chicago it's a pretty easy and semi-boring drive, took about 2:30 hours to get to the hotel. I did find a great 80s radio station to sing along with, but that faded out quickly once I crossed into Wisconsin leaving me disappointed. I was luckily able to check in to the hotel as soon as I got there at 12 (check in wasn't until 3), and was able to relax for an hour before my first day of meetings commenced. I met with the graduate coordinator who set me up with a bevy of activities for both Tuesday and Wednesday. It was definitely a large difference between Colorado where they ask if you want to meet anyone or take a tour, but didn't go ahead and just do it and show you what they have to offer as best as possible. The first professor I met with was real nice and informative, I realized the more people I met the less questions I had and more awkward the meetings would seemingly become, but what can you do. He was great though, we talked for about 20 minutes and then he invited me to lunch with him and a student from abroad so I was able to snag a free lunch at a place called "Ian's by the Slice." It was good, however, I didn't want to burst everyone's bubble and tell them the real name of the restaurant is "Georgio's Pizza" at Michigan State University and clearly it was more "Ian's stolen slice," but solid "gourmet" pizza nonetheless. I took on a piece of barbeque chicken finger pizza and macaroni cheese pizza then went on my own around campus for about an hour until my next meeting. Madison had an awesome campus and one of the city's best attributes is the fact that Madison is #1 in the amount of restaurants per capita in the country, that would be something I'd love to take advantage of. So I checked everything out and really enjoyed myself, it was slightly rainy, but not freezing cold on Tuesday so I was able to enjoy what I was seeing.

Before my 3:30 meeting I decided I had more time to kill so I'd embark on a journey that I normally wouldn't. I went in to a coffee shop and decided to order something and couldn't find tea or something out of pure blindness, so I went with the most random sounding coffee. Apparently this one comes with a warning as before the order was processed I was told "this drink has 3 times the amount of caffeine as normal coffee and you need a flavor to counteract added in." So like any person who was caught in this situation, I told them it sounds great and I'll take it to avoid any embarrassment of telling the truth that I had no idea what I had really ordered. I took the drink, sipped it and it actually tasted good. If you know me and the effects of coffee and/or caffeine, probably wasn't the best idea. I drank about 3/4 of it in a matter of minutes and went to my meeting. could feel a bit of shakes coming on as I arrived at the grad advisor's office, we talked for a while, she answered some more questions and I fought my leg from shaking uncontrollably as often is the case without caffeine, so with it just means a larger fight. I left campus and went right to the hotel where I immediately passed out (because that's what coffee does to me in the end). I woke up, went back to the State street area and walked around some more. I had forgotten that Madison was the capital of Wisconsin until I had started walking that night and looked up to see the biggest fucking state capital building ever. I felt slightly embarrassed that the whole day I had been walking up and down the streets I didn't notice that behemoth in front of my eyes.

I went to bed around 1 last night, though I had one of those dreams where you feel yourself sleeping (and by "one of those" I'm just hoping this is normal I guess), but you feel someone is staring at you during this process. I tried to wake myself up in fears that the person was about to murder me, I could feel myself in Hulk Hogan sleeper hold mode, putting one arm up only for it to collapse against the mat. I tried it again and boom right back down on the mat, but finally the third try I got my burst and was able to wake up a bit more terrified than when I went to sleep. I turned on the TV and thought "that'll be a fun dream in Europe when I actually am in a room with 10 other people who could be staring at me in my sleep." It took about 30 minutes more to pass out again, but I did and escaped the night with dreams of seeing an old high school friend who went to Madison at some party, which was weird, but nobody was trying to kill me.

I went back to campus to meet with another Professor and have another full day. Once again it was very nice to talk with these people. Today was a bit different in that I met with actual students and went to lunch with a couple of them. They were real nice and not hard to interact with, which was nice. It was also good that I didn't have to initiate the contact necessarily because although I am starting to get better in that category, I don't know if I'd just go up to random students not knowing if they were even part of the program and be like let's go to lunch and tell me all about your life and the programs. After that I went with them to class, it was class that was getting a tutoring on iMovie and since I want to think I was more versed in it than the guy they brought in to demo it I found the lesson amusing. I skipped out of class early since I had a final meeting with a professor. I went to that meeting, said thanks to the grad coordinator and went on my way. Wisconsin was extremely generous with everything and it kind of made me think maybe I was smart or something the way they spoke about how difficult it was to get in this year and how highly rated their department is. After everything I hopped in my car and proceeded back to Chicago where I am currently conveying my message.

Now comes the decision time, I enjoyed Madison a lot and Michigan State I already know well. Colorado I have yet to hear from, so I'm not sure about that one, but I liked what I saw there as well. Michigan State makes their students decide by March 23rd, leaving 11 days to decide if I'd want to return. I know I have to make my own decision by April 7th before I leave for Europe, but it'd be nice to know all my options and weigh all the financial implications etc. for a couple more weeks. I have no idea where I will end up. Each school is unique and offers their own style of program, I won't know any students at any of the schools (I'll still know people in the state of Michigan, just not up at MSU to my knowledge). If you got an opinion on the matter, if I should move on to another school, stay in state, or stay in Europe let me know.

I get home tomorrow night and while I'm enjoying traveling I am ready to be home to plan the major excursion. I'm envisioning a very busy few weeks where time will fly and not much will truly be planned, but I'm hoping to continue putting together a rough sketch of the order I'd like to arrive in cities and the better sounding hostels to seek out. I will still keep this journal up to date with the details of European planning and my final graduate school decision, but for those looking to take a break for a few weeks I will be sending out the link to the journal one more time before leaving for Europe.

Thanks for joining me these two weeks, hope you've enjoyed yourself. Now go put on some headphones, look in the mirror, turn up the Rod Stewart and ask yourself Do ya think I'm sexy?

-BK