Small Town Movie Theatre

With our first exam in the bag, LegalMBAyhem and I decided to see a long overdue movie at the local cinema.

When I made the decision to come to Charlottesville, I knew I was giving up many of my big city amenities. The frustrations in lack of good shopping have been apparent, but this afternoon, I have discovered a new one: movie theatres.

Now, I'm not talking about the lack of reclining seats, large screens and stadium style seating. I'm talking about a few of the following examples:

- Lighting: we walked into the theatre and there were NO LIGHTS. Good thing we have smart phones for illumination.

- Movies starting on schedule AND running all the way through: a few minutes after the movie was supposed to start, the first commercial came on. After that, the lights went back on, and the pre-movie radio station started up again.

- Not being accused of stealing pens: As we were sitting and waiting for the now-overdue movie to start, the man who sold my friend her ticket came into the theatre looking for the pen she used to sign her credit card slip. He then asked us when the movie was supposed to start, and we said "ten minutes ago."

- Movies that start on time: We eventually had to go and ask them to start the movie again.

Oh, Charlottesville.

Sent from my iPhone

Last Patriotic Post, I Promise

The Winter Olympic Closing Ceremonies are on TV, and I'm thus beginning the end of my extreme patriotism.

Canada beat the US in hockey this afternoon. It was sweet revenge after all the ribbing I took last week when we lost. Of course, staying true to my Canadian nature, I am avoiding the temptation to gloat to a few certain key people. I DID send an email back to the guy on my learning team who rubbed in the loss last week saying congratulations on the silver medal, though.

Speaking of which, if you are an American reading this, congrats on the silver!

Several other things are making me swelteringly proud of my country today.

1) We broke the record for most gold medals ever in the Winter Olympics. In 1976, USSR had 13. We finished with 14.

2) After the Olympic torch fiasco at the opening ceremonies, we chose to laugh it off and opened the closing ceremonies with a spoof.



3) While people DID watch the game down here in Charlottesville, most of my friends showed up minutes before it started. Back home, people were lining up outside the bars at 7:30 in the morning to get in and watch the game. Way to love hockey!



So, I'm not done with being patriotic, but I think that with the Olympics ending, I won't feel the same swell of pride and homesickness that have haunted me over the past two weeks. If you are up there in Canada, know that I wish I could be celebrating on the streets and spontaneously bursting into the anthem with you all!

Go Canada!!!

So, there are many things I could blog about. It's the last day of Q3, and all that stands between me and Barcelona is four exams and one DA class. Yesterday, I came across a really cool opportunity to satisfy class credit, help out the Haitian economy, and work with a successful local businessman.

But all of those things can wait (Q3, Barcelona Global Business Experience (GBE), Creative Capitalism class) in favour of blogging about the fact that my country totally rocks.

After losing an inconsequential game to the Americans in men's hockey on Sunday, I took a lot of verbal beating. People that I didn't know were sending me messages via Office Communicator to rub in the loss. All of that made last night's 7-3 beating of Russia that much sweeter.

Just for the record, I've been trying to be as nice as possible to my Russian friends, all of whom trash-talked me before the game.

To further amplify my sense of national pride, we won gold and silver in bob-sledding and have a guaranteed medal today in women's hockey.

I'd write more about why Canada is awesome, but my final class of Q3 is about to start!

Homesick... Where's the Hoser Hut?

In case you are living under a rock, you are probably aware that the Olympics are going on back in my home and native land.

Over the past few days, I've watched the opening ceremonies, watched Jennifer Heil lose the gold medal to an American in women's moguls, and celebrated Bilodeau's first gold on Canadian soil. I am currently sporting my official Olympic Hudson's Bay Company Canada hoodie.

This morning, I started planning a Canada vs. USA hockey game viewing which has morphed into a Canada-themed party. I've looked up Canada flags on Amazon and tried to figure out where I can buy cheese curds to make poutine.

If that wasn't enough to set me homesick, tonight's episode of How I Met Your Mother featured a trip to Toronto, complete with a visit to Tim Horton's and a view of the pretty Canadian five dollar bill.

I think it's official... I'm homesick!

In the spirit of the day, check out the Molson Canadian rant.

Happy Valentine's Day! (And why I'm happy to be alone for this one and next)

One of my fellow bloggers posted a great piece about dating within the Darden bubble. As a balance to her piece, I wanted to write something for all those of you who find yourself putting your own flowers through the grocery check-out. (Oh, or am I the only one who buys myself flowers?)

Miss MBA did a great job of outlining some of the pitfalls of dating at Darden. I'll take some of hers and add a few of my own:

• Lack of available men and women (though I disagree that most of the good girls are taken, since I've got some AMAZING single friends)
• Hook-up culture (hint to the girls: hooking up with a guy most definitely does not mean he will pursue a relationship)
• Lack of time
• Darden Bubble Time Warp: you can know someone for a month, but due to the fact that you see them every single day and potentially spend hours and hours together, you feel like you've known them a year. This is great, but it can lead things to moving too fast and depriving you of the opportunity of seeing them over several seasons of life.
• Incompatible life plans: It isn't always the case that you will meet someone who wants to end up in the same geographic location as you. Given this, a committed relationship is tough because it means that either someone will have to compromise, or you eventually break up. In fact, for many new Darden couples, the first big challenge is going to come over the summer when they are thrown into a mandatory long-distance relationship.

Given these challenges, I've heard that successful, long-term relationships are the exception rather than the rule at Darden (and B-school in general). Now, for a girl who was forced to buy her own flowers on Valentine's Day, this may be a depressing revelation. What do you mean, I'm going to be single for the next year and a half?

However, my strategy class has taught me well. When it comes to dating, I've done the environmental analysis. Given these facts, how can I best position myself for the future? Is it possible that this is not a challenge or something to be woeful about, but an opportunity?

Well, I'm glad you asked. Over the past little while (i.e. since my somewhat cynical blog post of a few days ago), I've learned to see this season of my life as an incredible opportunity. So here are the reasons why I'm glad that I will be single for the next little while.

• When will I ever again be surrounded by so many amazing single women who are more focused on their careers than on dating and marriage? There are definitely relationships around here, but for the most part, there isn't pressure to find someone or have dating stories to bring to cocktail hour.
• No pressure. I've accepted the fact that I'm going to be single, thus I do not have to worry about whether a guy seems interested or not. I don't need to feel like I need to go out and find a date for the upcoming SHE auction. I can go and look fabulous all on my own. (AND, most of my friends are also going stag, which builds on my previous point.)
• This may come as a surprise, but I'm not perfect. I've realized that while I've got a strict list of qualities that any man I date must posess, I've given no thought to whether I'm good enough for that man. Having a distinct season of singleness will allow me to work through some of those things that will better prepare me to be a better girlfriend and wife.
• Flexibility, flexibility, flexibility... Next year, when I start making decisions about where I'm going to live and what I'm going to do, all that will factor into those decisions is which companies will hire me and what I want to do. I won't be conflicted about how much to factor in my boyfriend, or feel upset that he isn't thinking about me.

Why I Love Darden

In honour of the Day at Darden event today, I figured I would share some of the things I love about Darden that have really hit home today.

1. There has never been a more intense training for public speaking and being forced to back up your answers. This quarter especially, I really feel the pressure to speak confidently, without hesitation. I have always been used to trying to be somewhat tentative in order to build buy-in. This isn't always the best way to build communication. When I've stated an answer like a question in a few classes, I've had profs call me out on it. Now I'm learning to speak with certainty. I think it's a much needed skill. (And guess what, I can still use my old skills to build buy-in.)
2. Today was a fun moment where everything came together. We used Decision Analysis (DA) in our strategy class. I love it when we've been dancing around concepts, and then you pull them up in another class, only to discover that after a few days of sneaky case-based learning, you actually know something new.
3. Perhaps the most important part... And here's the honest, two-sided view of Darden... This week was horrible for me. Between a big group project paper due this afternoon, a full week of cases, several volunteer commitments, another paper coming up AND trying to get into the internship search, I had a brutal week. (Oh yeah, and my car is buried under three feet of snow. Yippee.) I was up until 1:30 several nights, despite usually being able to a strict bed-by-midnight policy. BUT, I have amazing friends down here. The community at Darden is so amazing.

So, those tips and tricks on transitioning to Darden are still coming. (Though I'm mostly planning on going back through my blog and borrowing old material, so if you can't wait, feel free to search my Darden posts!)

Julie's Trinity

In honour of the upcoming Hallmark-created-hell-day that is approaching on Sunday, and a conversation during our blogger meeting about whether we, as bloggers, should be blogging about things such as dating at Darden, I would like to unveil my latest relationship theory: Julie's Trinity.

In our Global Economies and Markets (GEM) class, we learned about Mundell's Trinity, which is the economic law that a country can only achieve MAX two of the following objectives:

• fixed exchange rate,
• unlimited capital flows
• independent monetary policy

Now, I would like to present to you... Julie's Trinity.

In interactions with guys, a girl can have MAX two of the following three things:

• attention
• physical intimacy
• committed relationship

And, although one of my fellow bloggers did not want to put this in a blog post, I will warn all prospective female students that if the available dating pool is a consideration for you at any B-school, I would encourage you to instead check out the local scene or the affiliated law, medical or other graduate schools.

On a completely different note... I would like to wish a belated congratulations to all the first round admits to the Class of 2012! Stay tuned for a post on my tips for your transition to Darden.