30 August 2007

CONFIRMED: Scheduled wheels up at 9.00 on 8.31.2007

I'd have far preferred the 19.20 flight to Heathrow, but American Airlines has assured me that there are no seats available. Assuming there will be no mitigating circumstances that would alter either this or my current plans, I now have a confirmed departure time of 9.00 tomorrow morning. Huzzah!

Prep.

Plenty to be done today in preparation of wheels up tomorrow morning: deposits, withdrawals, returns, exchanges, purchases, reimbursements, reconciliations, a healthy amount of shredding (don't ask), &c. And packing. Didn't mention packing, did I? Packing, checking, cross-checking, and checking again.

D-2 H-11 M-3

27 August 2007

My Own Personal D-Day

The level of stress induced for me in preparing for long-range travel is considerable, though not unmanageable. Can't wait to actually get on my flight, though. Scheduled wheels up at 9.00, Friday, August 31.

D-4 H-20 M-35

06 August 2007

Mr. Negroponte, Meet Mr. Dell

My search for an inexepensive, yet functional laptop for my travels to Europe came to an end yesterday, when I was loaned an old Dell Latitude C600 from an old employer, who rarely uses the thing. It requires some updating (PCMCIA cards for ethernet and wireless internet access; a USB splitter; and a new battery), but overall, is in wonderful shape and will serve me fine for the next five months. It's certainly not a MacBook Pro, but it's closer to one than it is to an XO.

Troy, by Way of Route 93

This morning, I'm off to Fall River to do some data entry and training for BSAS at Steppingstone, Incorporated, a service provider that operates some ten houses that provide support to both the homeless and people who abuse substances. According to the town's website, Fall River, which is about an hour-long drive from Newton, was known as Troy in the early 19th century, with its name officially being changed to "Fall River" in 1834. Fall River, of course, is probably best known for Lizzie Borden (alleged celebrity murderer of the 1890's; imagine a fin-de-siècle cross of Paris Hilton and O.J. Simpson), for being a major mill town in the late 1800's (the town was also known as "Spindle City"), and for being the destination of a proposed extension of the MBTA Commuter Rail.

05 August 2007

Croatian Inspiration; Overcommitment Redux; Smackdown: Nicholas Negroponte vs. Steve Jobs; and Yet Another Failure

When I started a blog, I wondered if anyone would actually read the damn thing. Initially, my reason for blogging was to work in a medium in which I could write on a daily basis. There are, of course, other forms that my writing could have taken: a diary, daily free-writing, a notebook of musings and thoughts, &c. But the public nature of blogs somehow made this particular medium more compelling for me than others, despite my belief that any feedback I might receive was irrelevant to my purpose of quotidian composition. Of course, anyone call tell at a glance that I have failed miserably in my attempt to write each day. But in the course of my occasional posts, I have found that I am most compelled to write when I have received comments, whether they be feedback on writing, a response to particular argument, a reflection, or simply a friendly recognition of the post. Having said this, it is therefore not surprising that I compose this post just having received word from a good friend of mine suggesting that I write more often. Knowing that there is at least one person who attends to my musings makes them worth all the while.

***
As I mentioned in an earlier post. I've committed myself to working some sixty to seventy hours per week for the last few weeks of August. I have I have yet to earn a considerable amount of the money necessary to cover expenses for living in Budapest, so in addition to a full-time position working on data migration for the Department of Public Health's Bureau of Substance Abuse Services, I've taken a half-time position at a public university, assisting a graduate college in preparing for a major accreditation review. These positions, along with doing various paid work for my family (I'll be installing insulation in our attic this week), should minimize the amount I'll have to obtain through loans.

One of the major expenses in my budget is a laptop. Supposedly the computer labs at Central European University (CEU) have rather inconvenient hours, so the purchase of a laptop is requisite. I am torn between a desire for something elementary and inexpensive (think Nicholas Negroponte's XO design for the OLPC project, retooled for adults) and a desire for something completely over the top: a 17-inch MacBook Pro. I'll probably settle somewhere in the middle: something not quite as simple as the XO, but considerably cheaper and lower-end than a Mac.

***
Finally, I sadly report that, as a result of a lack of both discipline and time, I have officially resigned from my efforts to learn Hungarian before my impending trip to Budapest. Thankfully, CEU offers a two-credit course in basic Hungarian for which I intend to register come September.

***
Eagerly awaiting an underfunded trip abroad, I remain,

-M