Summer "Break"

Throughout the summer, I kept getting the same advice from the 2014's about what to do in the week between the Summer and Fall terms: RELAX.  Rent a house somewhere outside of Boston, catch up on sleep, and re-charge.  Well, this last week has proven once again that I am not very good at relaxing.  What started out with the best intentions of down-time ended up as a week packed full of activities and adventures spanning 4 states and 2 coasts.  It was a blast, but I think the 14s were on to something with the idea of making it into a true break.

It all started on Saturday morning, when I woke up early to meet up with the Cambridge Running Club for their weekly long-run.  I'm still getting used to being one of the shortest-distance and slowest-pace runners of the pack with a 12-mile loop at a "moderate" 7:50 pace, but it was fun as usual and very well supported.  After a quick shower, I linked up with Karl to head out to the airport to ride in the backseat of a Cessna 172 as he completed his check-ride for one of the local FBOs.  We flew a quick hop down to Rhode Island (State #2) before heading back to the airport for a couple touch-and-goes.  It was absolutely wonderful to get back in the air after a 3-year hiatus and I'm looking forward to more flying adventures in the Fall.

On Final Approach to the North Central State Airport in Rhode Island

Another quick turnaround at home found me heading to Logan Airport for the next adventure.  My "Mystery Trip" for Cynthia, which was a well-guarded secret until she guessed the destination a week before the trip, was to San Diego (State #3) to visit her good friends Shannon and Rebecca.  We took the new direct flight on Alaska from BOS to SAN and within 6 hours we were on the other side of the country.

The trip to San Diego was short (2.5 days), but packed with lots of fun times.  We spent a day at the beach, including my first experience surfing.  I got up long enough to get a picture but didn't last much longer than that.  Definitely something to work on next time I get a chance!  Then we had a great feast on the waterfront of Coronado Island looking towards downtown San Diego.  The next day we did a running tour of the city, including Little Italy, the various parks along the waterfront, and the gas lamp district.  Shannon works at the Museum of Natural History in Balboa Park, so we spent some time walking around the park and exploring all the neat things that there are to see.  Then we had a wonderful feast of Mexican food before crashing for the night and heading back to Boston in the morning.

Ok, so maybe there was some relaxation to be had this last week!

Freeze-frame that looks like I'm actually surfing!

Balboa Park in San Diego

We got back to Boston in time to meet up with my mom, who had flown up in the middle of a visit to my brother in Maryland to explore Boston for a few days.  Over the course of two days, we managed to cover the entire Freedom Trail, including a tour of Paul Reveere's House, the USS Constitution, and climbing the Bunker Hill monument.  There was also time for exploring the MIT campus and eating some wonderful food around town.

We finally got the "Classic MIT Shot" in front of the dome

USS Constitution ("Old Iron-side")

Faneuil Hall (Along the Freedom Trail)

Friday was spent getting organized for the fall semester, including ordering course packs and looking at textbooks (though I'm waiting to buy those until the first week of class when I can figure out which one's are actually necessary).  I also may have purchased a new toy in the form of a Samsung Galaxy Note tablet.  After the massive paper pile-up last semester, my goal is to use the tablet for case study readings this Fall instead.  I'm still figuring out how to use the tablet, but it looks promising.

To round off the break, we filled the last weekend with a 10-mile hike in the White Mountains of New Hampshire (State #4) to cover our 4th and 5th of the 48 4,000ft+ peaks (Flume and Liberty).  Then yesterday we headed to Salisbury Beach in northern MA for some more surfing and exploring.

On top of Mt. Liberty, NH

It's been a busy week for sure, but it definitely fit my mantra of "Work Hard, Play Hard".  Perhaps the 14s were on to something when they recommended a week of relaxation, but I've had a blast and wouldn't really change anything if I could do it over again.  Next up is the Sloan MBA orientation this week followed by Fall classes starting after Labor Day.  Back to work!

That's a Wrap!

With an unceremonious click of a mouse, our summer term of LGO has come to an end.  That click was the last step in submitting the last of 6 papers that were due this week and it was somewhat anti-climactic considering everything that we have done over the last 11 weeks.  The truth is, we've been celebrating the term for a couple days now, but this paper was the last hurdle before the true break could begin.

The entirety of our LGO learning can be summed up by the 13" tall stack of papers sitting on my coffee table at home.  That is all the readings, case studies, P-sets, and papers that we've reviewed / created over the last 11 weeks that I haven't had any time to sort or make any semblance of order.  It's truly hard to believe that we covered all of that information since the beginning of June, but that's exactly what we did.  Yes, it was  lot of work and yes, there were a few times during the summer where sleep was sacrificed to get assignments done and some of us wondered if we'd make it to the end, but the truth is that it was an incredible experience and I wouldn't trade it for the world.  We now have a week off to reset (we're heading to an as-yet undisclosed mystery trip!), and then it will be time to jump into the Sloan orientation and the Fall courses of MBA core.

Of course, just because we've been working like crazy at school doesn't mean we haven't had a lot of fun times.  Here are some highlights:

Perfect weather to walk along the Charles, on our way to dinner in Back Bay.

Final Statistics project: dropping paper helicopters from the 3rd-floor stairwell.

LGO end-of-summer celebration BBQ

The emptiest that I've ever seen the LGO lounge (5:30pm on the last day of classes)

What do we do after the last day of class?  Mini golf and drinks in the Sloan lobby of course!  Here's the Boeing contingent up to no good.

Like kids in a candy store: LGOs visit the Verizon Wireless Innovation Center in Waltham, where they develop all the latest gadgets utilizing 4G LTE technology. 

After a 3-year hiatus, I finally made it back into the air thanks to my classmate Karl Kulling.  He was getting a check-ride to stay current, so I hopped into the back of this beautiful 2006 Skyhawk (complete with a G1000 flat-panel cockpit!).  More pictures to come soon.

Fun Summer Diversions

It's been another series of busy weeks!  As I look back at my previous posts, there seems to be an ominous pattern of decreasing frequency.  Once a week, then once every-other week, now a span of three weeks.  I can only attribute this to having such an amazing time in the LGO program and packing my hours with so many fun things that I haven't had much time to post here.  A quick catch-up...

Several of my classmates have posted fantastic articles about summer classes and recent activities, so I won't spend any time repeating it here.  We're two weeks away from the end of the summer term and I'm having mixed feelings: on one hand, very excited to have a week off before MBA orientation starts, but on the other hand sad to be closing out the summer here at LGO that has been so much fun.  Our class has grown into a strong community over the last two months and we have had some good times together.

At the beginning of the summer, my team set a goal of leaving weekends open for fun or individual coursework.  We've since discovered that that goal was a little ambitious, and have been getting together on Sundays to work on some group assignments and to get ready for the upcoming week.  That still leaves Saturdays open though, so we've been taking full advantage of the chance to get out and about.  Here are just a few highlights from the last few weeks...

Karaoke
I'm happy to report that the LGO tradition of Karaoke Thursdays at the Thirsty Ear pub is alive-and-well!  We've had a pretty consistent showing over the last several weeks and have had fun getting to see a different side of our classmates (and occasionally professors!). 

[SIDE NOTE: Just about a month ago Cynthia Lin and I became the first "LGO 2015 Couple" and since then have been having a wonderful time together.  The rest of this blog will make a lot more sense with knowledge of that fact :-)]

Rock Climbing
Cynthia is a big climber and has been itching to get to one of the climbing gyms in the area.  Last Friday we rented a car for the weekend and finally had a chance to make it to MetroRock.  It's been about 8 years since I climbed last and I was definitely rusty (and quite sore the next day), but it was a lot of fun to try something different.  There's also a new climbing gym in town, Brooklyn Boulders, that we've been trying fruitlessly to find time to visit.  Someday...

MetroRock Climbing Gym

Fishing / Lobstering in Maine
Last Saturday we headed to Maine with Cynthia's sister and parents (who were visiting from MD), with the intent of fishing on the Atlantic.  They had arranged for a charter boat to take us out from Wells, ME in search of striper fish.  But before we could fish for the stripers, we had to catch a bunch of mackerel for bait.  So we spent about an hour trolling around catching mackerel after mackerel (sometimes 3 on the same line!).  Feeling confident in our abilities, we headed out to seek the larger stripers.  What had started out as optimism soon faded as we managed a few bites and one broken line but couldn't manage to reel anything in.  As a consolation prize, our skipper offered to pull his lobster traps and split any of the catch up between us.  So we went out and pulled 6 traps and found 5 keepers.  Before heading home, we stopped at a local lobster shack to eat some of the local fare...complete with the outrageous lobster bib!

Cynthia and her Lobster (plus an awesome sister photo-bomb)

Tourist Shot

First Red Sox Game
The Sloan School organized an outing to a Red Sox game last week, so I finally had a chance to experience a game at Fenway Park.  Unfortunately,  they were playing the Mariners!  So yes, I was that annoying out-of-towner cheering for the visiting team amongst a throng of Red Sox fans.  What looked to be a cake-walk win by the Mariners (7-1 heading into the 8th inning) soon turned into one of the most exciting baseball games I've witnessed.  Through a combination of bullpen confusion by the Mariners and an incredible rally by the Sox, Boston ended up pulling off an improbable 8-7 victory.  Not the result that I wanted, but it was an fun game with a great group.

A Night at Fenway

LGOers celebrate an improbable Red Sox comeback
(while fellow Northwester Dan and I wonder what the heck happened)

Building a House
This weekend we chose something a little different for our off-day: building a house for Habitat for Humanity.  12 LGOers and SOs headed up to Danvers for a day of shoveling, flooring, painting, and drilling giant holes through concrete walls (Nicely done Ammar!).  More info here.

LGO at Habitat for Humanity (Photo Credit: Ammar Asfour)

Running
With the busy class schedule and so many diversions, it's been a little hard to get into a regular running routine, but I took a big step (or stride?) a few weeks ago by joining the Cambridge Running Club.  It's a great group of very good runners, and one of the first times I've been towards of the back of the pack while running 6-to-7-minute miles.  They push me every week, and their twice-weekly organized workouts have been keeping me motivated.  Every Saturday morning they host a long run from Cambridge, including fully stocked water stations and a post-run feast.  Now that's my kind of running!

CRC "Magnificent Seven" during a recent club relay race / BBQ

Cooking
As a nice diversion during the weekdays, we've been having fun cooking some wonderful meals (and making lots of left-overs).  It's a nice excuse to learn some new recipes and eat some great-tasting and (mostly) nutritious food...

From-scratch lasagna with stir-fried eggplant and roasted brussel sprouts

Chicken piccata with bell peppers and noodles

French Toast + Bacon = Happy Sunday Morning :-)