Black Friday

I know that yesterday was technically the day for giving thanks, but this year I am most thankful today, the day after Thanksgiving. For the past three years, I covered regional business for The Roanoke Times and it was my unhappy duty to write about Black Friday. For those unfamiliar with this very American phenomenon, let me explain: Black Friday is one of the most popular shopping days of the year. It's a day when thousands of people wake up at ungodly hours to claim coveted items at ridiculous discounts. Usually, things are pretty festive. I've interviewed many a shopper who views their early morning dash-to-the-deals as a holiday tradition. In the past, however, it has been far from festive for me.
Covering this event, you see, meant dragging my bleary-eyed self out of bed at 3 or 4 a.m. when most of my family and friends remained tucked up in bed, soundly sleeping off their dinners. And I didn't even get to score any $400 flat screen TVs! Instead, I'd pull into near-full parking lots, shake my head at the dozens of people lining up to pounce on the aptly-named "door busters," and interview them. Hours later, when these same happy shoppers walked away from the mall dragging bags stuffed with purchases and mentally calculating the money they'd saved, I'd wander back to my car with a notebook full of quotes, mentally composing the next day's story.
But not this year. This year, I slept. And believe me, while I might have missed out on $5 sweaters and $12 universal remote controls, I cannot imagine a better way to spend Black Friday.

Black November

... sounds ominous, huh? And maybe a little over dramatic? Well that's what I thought when I first heard the phrase. "How hard could it be," I thought to myself, "I've been in the working world! I know rigor!"
Oh, the naivete...
What with 36-hour simulations, recruiting events that go long into the night, chapters of reading, cover letter deadlines, WACC calculations and a persistent sniffle, this month has been bad. As in, no sleep bad. Grumpy all the time bad. Constant headache bad. Baaaad.
Thankfully, the end is near. Though I often find it hard to think beyond the next day's caseload, I managed to check my Outlook calendar yesterday and realized that I'm halfway through with this dreaded month. And just days away from Thanksgiving and a blessed 5-day reprieve from class!

Faculty chats

Recently, Darden's faculty was named number one in the nation. But here's a confession: apart from my in-class interactions with my professors, I didn't really take advantage of this resource at all last quarter.
This quarter, however, I have. Motivated in part by a few less-than-stellar participation grades, I started sending emails to my professors asking to meet with them. So far, my trips to the faculty office building have been incredibly rewarding. Not only have my professors listened to my concerns, they've made real efforts to understand where I'm coming from and offered helpful advice. Given my relatively quiet disposition, these one-on-one meetings have gone a long way in increasing my comfort (and maybe even confidence) in class. I'm still far chatty, but more and more I'm starting to come out of my shell.

New Prospectives

Just days after beginning classes in August, I, like many of my first year peers, volunteered to act as a host for prospective students. Because we're usually paired with people of similar geographic, educational and/or professional backgrounds, it didn't surprise me that months went by with nary a word from Student Admissions. After all, how many California-raised, UVa-educated reporters are out there looking at business schools? Even given recent newsroom layoffs, not many.
Still, I got an email last week that I'd (finally!) get to play Darden host. And at 9:30 Monday morning there I was, name tag glinting, ready to usher a prospective student through First Coffee and Global Economics and Markets. The experience was great -- not only because I got to see the caliber of people Darden is attracting, but because I had the chance to reflect on and share what business school has meant to me. And it's meant a lot.
Since I arrived in Charlottesville this summer, I've learned how to build intricate models and spreadsheets, draw up income statements and balance sheets, navigate tricky employment relationships and find Operations' infamous bottlenecks.
Day to day, it's often difficult to step back and realize how much I've been exposed to here at Darden. But talking to my prospective and answering her questions really helped me see the big picture: that though difficult and nerve-wracking, this school has widened my horizons in ways I never previously imagined.
And, while it seems like just yesterday that I was in her shoes, filling out applications and touring Grounds, it's been a transformative three and a half months. I only hope I was able to convey that to her.

Autumn in C'ville

Admission: I love Charlottesville, especially in the fall. The weather's brisk, the leaves are changing and there's ample opportunity to engage in traditional Autumn activities (note apple picking photos above).

When I first started thinking about business schools, Darden rose to the top of the list not only because of its stellar reputation, but also because attending Darden would bring me back to C'ville.

A double 'hoo, I first fell in love with this city about 10 years ago. I was a junior in high school on a college visit with my dad. As a native Californian, UVa wasn't even on my radar - my target list was almost all UC's. But then I took a tour of Grounds. Particularly in the fall, UVa is stunning. It's brick and columns look even more stately set against a backdrop of orange leaves. The lawn becomes a playground for fleece-clad frisbee players. And it doesn't get more quintessentially college than treking across Jefferson's "academical village" clutching a cup of coffee and a book. Ten years ago, I knew it was the perfect place for me. Today I feel the same way.

But don't just take it from me, the New York Times has also found a few reasons to travel down to the 'ville: http://travel.nytimes.com/2008/10/26/travel/26hours.html?ref=travel.

Re-charging

After the past few weeks of hardcore studying and socializing, a re-charge weekend is in order. And lucky for me, the weather cooperated. Rainy and autumn-crisp, it's a perfect curl-up-on-the-couch kind of day.
Unlike weekends past (and future), there will be no costume parties tonight, no late nights out. In fact, as I type, my boyfriend is reclining in his "man chair" watching football. We've got a pot of stew bubbling in the kitchen. And I'm shaking off a mid-afternoon nap. Lovely.
Necessary, too. Because at Darden, the constant cycle of classes, cases and company briefings can easily lead to burnout. To keep it at bay, you need a lazy day every now and again -- a day when you can shove away your case binder and Corporate Finance textbook and leave them unopened until, well, Sunday.

Q2

Q2 began bright and early Monday morning and with it, a couple of new courses: Financial Management & Policies and Global Economies & Markets. For an English and History major like me, classes like these strike fear in my heart.
... it's the numbers. Quantitative analysis just doesn't seem to come naturally to me. In fact, it's sort of a foreign language. Yet here I am: reading income statements like I once read Jane Austen and checking ratios like I used to check grammar. And that's a good thing. Because if there's one thing I realized in Q1, it's that I'm about to learn a phenomenal amount about subjects I once shirked from. Ask me again in a couple weeks and I may not be fluent. But I just may be conversant.