Another Weekend

Hey everyone. Another weekend is here again. Forgive me if I ramble on a little. Finished a bottle of red wine between Ming and myself. Haha... All his fault, throwing away the cork of the wine bottle.

It's been a busy week of sorts. Another jam packed weekend with meetings, homework assignments, presentations and the like to square away. I guess, half the bottle of wine is taking its toll on me already and coupled with exhaustion, I'll probably be heading to bed pretty soon.

Funny moment of the day: Allison dozed off in class (it was a boring statistics simulation lecture) and Prof Sahin realized it was boring too. She made Allison sing a song in front of the class and as I would have expected, she did her favorite rendition of "Part of Your World" from Little Mermaid. Hahaha, totally hilarious...

Alright, time for a little more work and then perhaps bedtime.

Take care everyone...

What Happens...

What happens when reality comes crashing down on you? What do you do? Do you know how much... just how much I miss you?

Days at the B-School

The semester is rapidly flying by and the end of this term is drawing close very rapidly. Kinda wishing that this won't end because I'm having so much fun (not in your typical way) at school. Classes and work are demanding but they're pretty enjoyable for the most part.

The weather today was pretty good. Well, at least until 5pm. Decided to risk it and go to class in a polo-tee, shorts and sandals. Sat out in the courtyard to study between classes. Lovely day out until the dark clouds started appearing at 5pm. The rest is history. Was in the b-school from 9:30am all the way until night time; approximately 12 hours spent in the b-school. Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining. Froze my ass off though walking back in the rain at 15 degree celcius. Heh...

Some stuff are really disturbing and makes me feel uneasy all the time. The old feeling of helplessness and fear. Hope all will be well soon. To my pals, do take care of yourselves ya... You guys are always on my mind.

Best of luck,
Wilson

P.S. I dreamt of you last night... =)

A Lighter Weekend

It's been a considerably lighter weekend. Only a few projects to work on, a case study to do, hrm... a few homeworks here and there. Considerably lighter weekend than every other weekend I have had since the start of this term.

A brief recount: Thursday, ended class at 4pm, had group meetings all the way up till 5:30pm, headed home and went for a run to work off the stress of the week. Met up with Lenny, John and Aaron for dinner at Chitpole's (their fajita burritos are the best; I am officially swearing off Big Ten Burritos and Pancharos). Later that evening, I headed out to a classmate's place for the pre-bowling night party. Courtesy of Jordan (ever so helpful), I made it to the VIP list of that party. For that, I took pretty big hits (alcohol wise) at the party.

We went to the b-school and took the buses to the bowling alley, where the entire BBA Class of 2008 bowled (or tried to). More beer, pizzas and crazy fun. Probably more than half of the kids were terribly wasted and it was pretty funny to see them bowl. Not so amusing to see the degeneration of kids from one of the top business schools in the country and in the world. The less heartening sights were of course drunk kids making out all over the place; makes Zouk seem almost decent. Ah well, it was a pretty good time. My classmate probably bowled half of my games in her drunk state, earning me the "why are you such a shitty bowler" question a million times. Haha... Was sober enough to run home after that and read my Finance 310 case. Not too bad given the amount of alcohol I had.

Friday was pretty uneventful. Nice weather, another run, and then went to meet up with Ming and some kids from Tzu Ching for dinner at a new Taiwanese restaurant on campus. Decent food, probably good enough to make the boss of TK Wu start to panic a little given their close proximity. Went to catch Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (hell yeah!) with quite a few kids from my batch. I grew up watching that so I think it was a good movie. Did more work after I got home but that, is just another uninteresting point to mention.

Saturday, lazed around for a good part of the day and went to grab groceries in the afternoon. Bought some stuff which we ate at Joshua Tree over spring break. The few which warrant notable mention are of course the infamous bagels and Colby Jack cheese (Scott must still be having nightmares of our Oh-ah-peh-ah-som loser eat all bagels game). Tasted darn good I must say. Work and rest for the rest of the day. Run too. Weather was pretty nice out, around 10 degrees I think. Warm enough to run in singlet and shorts.

Sunday. Slept in till late. I hopped out of bed after a bad nightmare. Stupid dreams haven't hit for some time. I guess, being exhausted does cause the mind to wander a fair bit. Bleah. Not fun at all. Worked on my case report, powerpoints, etc. The usual. We cooked Nasi Lemak for dinner at home and it was pretty awesome. Not much time to do anything really fancy but good enough for Ann Arbor standards.


Ming and I went for the Banff Film Festival, a outdoor adventures film festival which showcased crazy or interesting stuff which people did. Check out the details at Banff Mountain Festival.

Mad ski stunts (jumping off a freaking 200 foot cliff in the middle of a ski run), iceberg climbers (do you have any idea how insanely dangerous that is in the middle of the Atlantic?), whitewater kayakers flying off waterfalls (yes you heard me right, waterfalls), fascinating mountain bike stunts and of course the crazy couple who biked from Mongolia, across the deserts and mountains, through to China (Xinjang and other provinces), through Tibet, and to India's Bay of Bengal. 8500km dude. Just 2 people on bikes, no vehicular support, no water, no communications, nada, nothing. How's that for an outdoor adventure. "The crazy things people do" just doesn't do them any justice huh.

Alrighty. That's my weekend recap for you. I haven't gotten down to writing up on my Spring Break. Maybe some other time.

Until then, chill out and jiayou for those who have a rough week ahead. I hope all will be well for all of you. You guys will be on my mind.

Peace out.

Wilson

P.S. My apologies for the long rant, just decided to write brainless stuff for 10 minutes and this is the result. Have fun reading.

Wish I Could Be... Part of That World...

Heya, how's it going folks?

I vaguely remember posting a similar video of the clip from Little Mermaid before, probably in this blog. It's all Allison's fault. Singing this song with Casey over and over again before OMS311 class and getting it deep inside my head. Grrrr...

It's a beautiful song though. Nothing like a little touch of Disney to brighten up one's day. =P Little updates: Things are definitely looking up. Turned down an internship offer from an organization which had been kind enough to grant me the position which I had applied to. Finally got an offer for another position which was what I wanted. Absolutely delighted! Anyways, summer plans are pretty hazy at the moment. Too many things which I want to do and countless choices which I want to do all at once but they are *ahem* mutually exclusive events.

Maybe I'll do Singapore for one month then LA for another 2 and half months, or if I can find another position after my one month in Singapore in a sector which I would like to work for, I'll stay. Whatever it is, don't really expect to hear from me after I return to Singapore. My life effectively will shut off for one month when I'm interning because it's the one opportunity which I wanted more than anything else in the world. If anyone is up for supper or meeting up maybe around 2am in the morning, feel free to contact me when I get back. Else, I'll see you guys probably after my internship (if I'm not flying off directly).

Damn, I want to go to travelling! Spain, Italy, Prague, Puerto Rico, Brazil, Shanghai, Russia,... the list goes on. Wonder when I'll have the time/opportunity to do that.

Ah well, back to work. A huge load off my mind, but the work load at school is still as unforgiving. No worries, I'm having a ton of fun working 24/7. Hahaha...

Always on my mind.

Best regards,
Wilson

P.S. Would have been lovely to cross the 90th month mark into the 91st month... Memories...

Burn the Weekend Away

Yet another weekend burnt off in the wonderful business school. Spent more than 9 hours in the b-school library today working on homeworks with my groups (and we're not done yet). This is fun in a twisted way.

It's common nowadays to hear people regretting their choice of applying to the business school. Well, I don't really feel that way. Given that this shit load of work makes my freshman year seem like stroll in the park, this business is fun in it's own sadistic way. Hahaha... OMS homeworks which take forever to finish; the frantic rush every Sunday to finish up the write-ups/reports; burning up countless hours in the b-school library.

Don't really have time to rant too much. Yesterday was Saint Patrick's Day. Supposed to celebrate the bringing of Christianity to the Irish by Saint Patrick (if I'm not mistaken). Ask any college student and they probably can't tell you anything about St Patrick's day, except to get drunk or die trying. Drunk kids ambling down the street at 10am is quite an amusing sight.

I stayed sober pretty much and went for The Friar's St Patty's day concert since Michael was performing in it. It was an absolute blast. Totally hilarious and those guys sing really well. Great job dude!

Time to hit my books again. Hope everyone had a great weekend. Will try to deliver on my Joshua Tree Spring Break account soon.

Until then, stay healthy (and warm for those in Michigan).

Best regards,
Wilson

P.S. I hate the feeling of getting hit by a truckload of memories out of the blue during the day. I swear it sucks big time.

恋爱频率

Busy day but here's a nice song which just got into my head all of a sudden. Sweet MV. Enjoy!

Checking-in

Hey everyone. How's it going?

Been a long time since I last blogged. Life has been pretty hectic. Jam packed with exams, projects, field trips, homework assignments, blah blah, the usual. Finally got an offer for some jobs which I am contemplating over. Still holding out for the job which I really want.

One nice thing is that the weather is FANTASTIC today!!! 20 degree celcius! Can you believe it? It was nice enough that I was walking around in my t-shirt and sitting outside in the b-school courtyard during my break. Best weather in a darn long time. Not going to last long, but oh well, it's good while it's here. Snow coming again this weekend.

I was really tired when I got back from class today but decided to pick my lazy ass up and went running. I decided to do the "when you see a stop/traffic light, turn and continue running" theory. Ended up running into the Arb, through the slush and ice. Beautiful as it is, I think I must have been a pretty spectacular sight when I came out of the Arb with my legs splattered with mud. Hahaha... Good painful run though. =)

Okay, so school is busy (as usual) and the world is still insane (the last time I checked) and now, it's time for me to get back to the busy insanity. Will try to blog again when I'm free.

Thanks to my family and friends who have bothered to check on my blog despite my poor churn-out rate.

Peace out.
Wilson

P.S. Ford sold their majority share in Aston Martin (hell yeah! thats the way to go); Chrysler is looking to be sold off to PE shops (Blackstone and a few others in a consortium); KKR offered freaking $6.9 billion for Dollar General (largest retail chain in the US); Caremark, ExpressScripts and CVS are still fighting their guts out; United Health bought Sierra Health for $2.6 billion; last but not least, Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) beat earnings forecast and reported 29% freaking jump in their EPS (but still took a tumble courtesy of the nationwide mortgage/loan slump. Watch out for Lehman Brothers reporting on Thursday (NYSE: LEH)

The I'M Initiative

Came across this news article which mentioned about the I'M initiative by Microsoft. Not sure how true/effective this is but it seems to work. No harm trying if some good can be done when messages are sent out through MSN. Great move by Microsoft for publicity. Do check it out sometime or click on one of the links on the right to be redirected to the official website.

Back to School (Spring Break Part 1)

First day of school after the spring break. A little tired out even though classes weren't too tough today. A load of work comes crushing back down again though. Time to get down to work again. Don't really have much to say about my day.

I'll talk a little about my Spring Break trip.

Flew out to Ontario, California with Ming on Friday afternoon with all our gear. By the time we got there, the sky had already turned dark and we went for a quick dinner at a nearby diner, caught some Smackdown! on TV (it's been quite awhile since I've watched wrestling) and headed to bed.

Saturday morning was pleasant and we walked around the area, admiring the absolutely stunning view from our hotel of the snow-capped mountains just in front of the hotel and the airport. Lazed around a little in the morning watching some cartoons (Tom and Jerry still rocks!) We met up with the rest of our group at the airport and took a pretty long drive in our two vehicles (Minivan + SUV). A scenic drive through mountains and valleys. Passed by mountains covered with wind farms (huge stretches of wind turbines) and just lots of gorgeous sights.

Finally pulled into our first camp ground, Joshua Tree Lake (more like a pond) and camped out in the open desert. The sunset was beautiful and we cooked a pretty sumptous dinner over our portable gas stoves.


Before I carry on, a little about our group. There was Ming and myself, two trip leaders Jeanette and Jen, siblings Scott and Shannon, Laura, Brandon, John and Eric. It was a fantastic bunch of people to be out camping with, especially the siblings. The two of them a totally hilarious and Scott is almost a walking television. Just hearing them recite entire chunks of movies or television shows amuses everyone no end.


The following morning, we got out into the freezing cold (and we soon found out that this kind of temperatures would persist throughout our trip, ranging from the forties in the day to below freezing at night (sub thirties). Nothing like a cup of hot boiling water to start the day.

We headed out to Desert Queen Ranch, an amazing place which this man, Bill Keys lived with his family, using his mechanical knowledge and resourcefulness to survive out in the desert, where others chose to mine and try their luck. The ingenuity of this man was totally amazing. Building dams, digging wells, taking things apart and building his own machines out of spare materials, all by himself! Cutting granite rocks to build dams at the age of 70, wind mills, machines. Just amazing.




What was even more amazing was the fact that the park ranger told us that the kids, who were now in their eighties, returned to the ranch late last year for a holiday with their children and grandchildren. One of the old men said that the lorry which they had propped up to use as a machine driver (i.e. lift up the vehicle such that the wheels are spinning freely; attaching a belt to the wheels and using that to drive machinery), was in the wrong location. Mind you, this Ford lorry had been rusting there for more than 50 years. The old man went to the pile of spare parts (which I can assure you was more of a junk pile), picked up a few pieces of metal, tinkered with the lorry for a few minutes, and made the old monster come back to life! On top of that, he drove the darn thing to where the lorry was originally when they left the ranch after the death of Bill Keys.

We headed over to a man-made hot spring as a group and another classic moment came about there. This old lady came up to Scott and pulled his leg when he was doing a handstand. Scott thought it was Ming or myself playing with him and he was all ready to come up and dunk us. Surprise surprise. The old lady went, "HAHA I saved your life!" Scott was totally freaked out. She continued to terrorize Shannon and a few others in our group before we left the place.

Had another wonderful night at Joshua Tree Lake campground, setting up our tents once again and preparing dinner under the shining stars and chilly winds. Gathering around a fire pit to get some warmth after dinner, thinking things over. Good times... and of course, listening to the "Shannon and Scott Show", who joked non-stop.

By the way, I shared a tent with Ming and Scott. That was absolutely awesome. I slept fitfully for most of the nights, usually waking up in the middle of the night in my sleeping bag, shivering from the severe cold. Much as I was able to dump most stuff off my mind, get away from the homework, job search, my mobile phone, computer, emails and the madness of school/life, just one thing wouldn't leave my mind. I dreamt of you, every single night. Even I find it hard to believe, and believe it or not, I don't really expect anyone to understand. Just wanted to get it off my chest.

Well, I guess that's all for today. Have a great day/night.

I miss you.

Back to Reality

Hello everyone.

It's been a pretty long time since my last blog entry. I just touched down back in Detroit Michigan a short while ago. A little too late since it was already Monday morning by the time I got back home. First time I've touched my computer in more than a week or had access to some form of technology. Kinda dreading it really.

Anyways, I'm too tired out to write about my spring break trip to Joshua Tree National Park in California. It was definitely a blast and a much-needed getaway. I'll upload my photos and write more about the trip another day.

It's back to school once again.

Welcome back to reality.