Every year, we always plan on admitting students from the wait list. However, this year, we saw an unprecedented, record-breaking percentage of admitted students choosing to enroll at MIT (also known in admissions parlance as the "yield"). This year, our yield is going to be around 72-73 percent. Last year, it was 70 percent; the year before, it was 65 percent; the year before that, it was 64 percent.

Unfortunately, this means that we will not be able to admit anyone off the wait list this year. This is only the second time in the last eight years that we have not been able to go to our wait list.

Today, at 5pm Eastern Time, we will notify all remaining students on our wait list via email that we will not be able to offer them admission. At that point, we will consider our wait list “closed” and will not admit any additional students this year for the Class of 2017.

We've seen all the wonderful updates many of you have been sending in, and truly appreciate the time and effort you have put in to letting us know how much you love MIT. We thank you for your patience during this time, and we know you will have incredibly bright futures and awesome college experiences.

Big virtual hugs to you all, and we wish you all the best.
 

As someone commented on Lydia's recent post, around this time of year there are usually a bunch of "pre-pi-day" posts with various thoughts, comments, and advice before the decisions go out. Lydia's is one such post that is worth a read. I've collected a few others from over the years that I think are worth perusing, too (though it is by no means an exhaustive list):

Me, March 16, 2011: Bleary-eyed

David duKor-Jackson, March 13, 2012: To whom much is given...

Lydia K. '14, March 8, 2012: As We Approach Decision Day

Anna H. '14, March 10, 2011: I Challenge You

Chris M. '12, March 13, 2010: Decisions, Decisions...

I will admit this may not qualify as a "real" post as it is essentially a post of other posts, but I hope it provides some good perspective and interesting reading for those of you waiting for Pi Day. As mentioned in the posts above: don't panic, dream big, explore the internet, don't obsess, solve some puzzles, look at cute cats, thank people, and go relax and have some fun while you wait!

Feel free to comment and share your favorite blog posts below too.

[Disclaimer: if you have questions, probably best not to ask them here, as I probably won't be able to respond to much of anything in the next 42 hours or so as we wrap everything up with decisions; apologies in advance!]

Okay, it's 11pm and I haven't eaten dinner yet. Time to go get some food...

To submit Parts 1 and 2, log in to your account on MyMIT. You can also go there to download teacher recommendation forms and the secondary school report form.

To reiterate a few other things mentioned in previous posts by Labs and others (because it's worth repeating):

As mentioned in this post - it is perfectly fine if, through no fault of your own, your school forms (teacher recommendations, secondary school report, transcript) arrive a little later. We're understanding and flexible with your teachers and counselors because we know they are super busy. We're also aware of the teacher strike happening in Ontario - again, if your school forms are delayed a bit for reasons beyond your control, no need to worry (and no need to call or email our office - this will only further slow down the processing of application materials).

If you have already submitted application materials, and are waiting for it to appear on your MyMIT Application Tracking page, please be patient. As my friend Labs has posted, there is a giant pyramid of mail that we are working as quickly as possible to get through. Documents can take up to 3 weeks to appear on your tracking page.

We are receiving documents from over 12,000 applicants - when you account for the fact that each has multiple documents to send in (two teacher recommendations, a secondary school report, a transcript, and perhaps other documents too), we'll probably end up processing at least 75,000 to 100,000 documents or more in the next few weeks, and only a handful of staff on hand to do the processing.

Please do not call or email about missing materials right now. All you will hear back is the same stuff I just wrote above. In a few weeks, after we've conquered the pyramid of mail (and virtual pyramid of electronic documents) - both of which will continue to grow as we try to conquer it, by the way - we'll send out an email to those who are still missing key application components, and at that point, you can follow up with any documents that we're still missing.

In the meantime, please do not resend multiple copies of your documents. It will only make the pyramid grow bigger unnecessarily, and thus slow down the processing of everyone's documents.

As for the Midyear Report, hang tight. You should wait to submit this until your grades are available for your first semester or second quarter (depending on what system your school uses), or February 15th (whichever is earlier). More details to come on how to fill out the Midyear Report in the next few weeks.

Hi there!

It looks like some applicants are having issues accessing MyMIT - we're seeing some unusually heavy user activity today (even above and beyond what we had originally anticipated). We're aware of the problem and are working as quickly as we can to resolve it.

If you can't log in, don't worry; we'll be flexible with the Regular Action deadline, and will post more details in the next few days.

As previously posted, most MIT staff are out of the office today and tomorrow for the holiday, but I'll do my best to update this post as soon as I hear any further news from our friends in IS&T. In the meantime, thanks for your patience, and check out this post for some answers to your frequently asked questions. Have a happy new year!

All best,

Mikey

Each year, we always plan on admitting students from the waitlist. However, this year, we saw an unprecedented, record-breaking percentage of students enrolling from our admitted student group (around 70+ percent). Unfortunately, this means that we will not be able to admit anyone off the waitlist this year. This is the first time in the last seven years that we have not been able to go to our waitlist.

Today at 5pm Eastern Time, we will notify all remaining students on our waitlist via email that we will not be able to offer them admission. At that point, we will consider our waitlist “closed” and do not expect to admit any additional students this year for the Class of 2016.

I know many of you have been sending in additional materials, and we have seen all the wonderful updates you have submitted. We appreciate the time and effort you have put in to letting us know how much you love MIT, and we thank you for your patience during this time. We know you will have incredibly bright futures and great college experiences, and we wish you all the very best at the college you’ve chosen.
 

During that process, we notice a lot of interesting things - for example, spelling errors. [See also: Matt's blog entry from 2008.] Usually, one or two spelling errors on an application is no big deal; we're not sticklers for that type of stuff (and hey, nobody's perfect). But when there get to be a lot of errors, we start to question how much time and effort the student has put into the application. So be sure to proofread and double-check your spelling - and don't just rely on spell check!

Here are some of our "favorites" (and by "favorites", I mean most often noticed and/or most common pet peeves for our staff):

The correct spelling is chemistry, not chemsitry.

History, not histry or histroy.

Subjects that start with "p" and contain "h", "s", and "y" seem to give a lot of people trouble - it's physics, not pyhsics; physiology, not phisiology, phisyology, or physyology; psychology, not psycology, pyschology, psychlogy, or physcology. We've seen it all...

An applicant might play a varsity sport, but not a varisty or varisity sport; she might even be the captain of the team, but not the captian.

Someone might be on the school's robotics team, but not robotoics. Some have even served as president, vice-president, treasurer, or secretary of a club, but not presdient, vice-presdient, tresurer, or secretery/secertary/secratary.

Perhaps one of the funniest misspellings is when students write that they received an A in Engish instead of English.

AND MOST IMPORTANT, it's calculus*, not claculus, calculous, calcoulus, calcoulous, caluculus, caluculs, caluculous, calculs, calclus...

*This goes for pre-calculus, too.

Notice that these are usually found in the activities and self-reported coursework sections of the application - this is because these are usually the most noticeable (in a list rather than a sentence or paragraph), and most people focus on proofreading their essays, but not the forms themselves. Check it!

A pretty cool video, I think, especially considering they filmed/directed/edited/produced the entire thing themselves, and did it all in 2 weeks from concept to finished product. I might also add that all the indoor shots were done inside the recording studio at MIT which I helped build (from scratch!) back when I was in the group. Yes, I'm a proud Log papa. :)

It definitely goes to show that MIT students are all about making things happen. It's much more about participation than spectatorship; people like to do, rather than watch. At MIT, you won't see a lot of people who just sit on their hands and let life happen to them - they're going to want to go out and start something new, create something from scratch, make it go faster, better, stronger...

Here, you can see entrepreneurship, creativity, art, and technology all coming together in harmony - MIT students at their finest.

The song is "There Goes My Baby" originally by Usher; solo by Edan Krowlewicz '12; arrangement by Ben Lee '11. Video filmed, directed, and edited by Luke Plummer '14, Zach Tomlinson '13, and Eddie Kim '13, with several other Logs contributing. I should also mention the audio is all a cappella sung by the Logs, and was recorded and edited by Steve Salinas '12, Mike Miller '09, and Ben Bloomberg '11, and mixed by Mike Miller '09 and James Gammon. (Warning: this song will get stuck in your head...but it's a good one!)

To find out more about the Logs, you can connect with them on the web, Facebook, and Twitter.

Edit: some minor changes and updated credits.

In addition, I attended one of the QuestBridge College Admissions Conferences that are hosted annually by QuestBridge - a non-profit organization that we partner with to help identify, recruit, and select talented low-income students who might not otherwise think of MIT as a place they could apply to, be admitted to, and afford to attend. Anyways, the conference I attended was being held at Yale, and there I ran into Louis Lamia '14, an MIT Quest Scholar whom I met when he was applying through QuestBridge not too long ago. He was volunteering at the conference, and afterward, wanted to write a guest post about his experiences - so here it is. Enjoy!

-----

This place immediately brought back memories of two years ago. I remembered sitting in their shoes, feeling uncertain and intimidated. Most of all, I wished I was on the other side of this whole process. But that Saturday morning I was there to learn how to do it the right way, and to this day, every morning I wake up and look at the Boston skyline, I’m convinced it worked.

I’m speaking about the Questbridge College Admissions Conference at Yale. The idea in a nutshell is to gather up hundreds of low-income, high-achieving students from all over the country and show them that an education at a top tier school, is both within their reach and affordable. I was a student at this conference two years ago, and now as a Quest Scholar, I got to go back to this conference as a Group Leader in charge of getting my group of students around the conference and of course, answering lots and lots of questions.

At the MIT table chatting with Mikey, McGreggor, and Maura (MIT admissions officers) before the college fair

[Ed. note: Louis was a question-answering machine! (Not to be confused with a "question answering machine", which would likely be an unhelpful answering machine...do kids these days even know what answering machines are/were??) -Mikey]

Our experience there started the afternoon before the conference. After getting Indian food for lunch (all paid for by Questbridge), we set off to unload some stuff into the Yale Law School, learn our way around the campus, and get oriented to our jobs. Throughout the day, the first wonderful surprise of the weekend started to kick in. It was genuinely fun to meet the other Quest Scholars. MIT is a very diverse place, but every once in a while, it’s fun to meet people who aren’t predominantly engineering and science majors. It adds a nice bit of perspective to life, a reminder that some people go to other schools and are interested in other things and are still a lot of fun to hang out with.

Me (back row, third from the left) with the other Quest Scholar group leaders, volunteers, and staff at the conference.

The conference itself was very organized and informative, providing workshops on how to use every inch of the college application to communicate something, a presentation on why a school like MIT can be even more affordable than a state school, and of course a talk by Questbridge Co-founder Dr. Michael McCulloch (and if you’ve never heard him speak it’s a memorable treat indeed). I personally had a great time getting to know my group and the other students that I met during lunch, and I appreciated the chance to share the wisdom that I learned at my conference two years ago that helped make my MIT application successful.

The conference was short, and one long day later, we had one last night to explore New Haven with the other Quest Scholars before we headed our separate ways back to our homes or campuses. Nonetheless, that one long day gave me a newfound appreciation for the Questbridge program, the Quest Scholars Network, and what it’s done for me and other present and future Quest Scholars. It is true that today, low-income students have unprecedented opportunities at MIT and other great universities, and I’m very proud to be a part of that legacy.

Today, around 3pm Eastern Daylight Time, we will notify the admitted students via email, informing them that they have been admitted from the waitlist. If you have applied for aid, the Financial Aid Office will follow up shortly thereafter with award packages. Admitted students can then choose to accept our offer (it is an understood part of admissions that some people will shuffle around during the waitlist period; you will lose your deposit at the other school, but it is a standard practice to consider accepting a waitlist offer) or decline it.

For all other students on the waitlist, we will notify them today via email (at approximately 3pm Eastern Daylight Time) that we will not be able to offer them admission. At that point, we will consider our waitlist "closed" and do not expect to admit any additional students this year for the Class of 2015.

Thanks to all of you on the waitlist for your time and patience during this process. Congrats to those that were admitted - we hope to see you in the fall. For those whom we were unable to admit this year, we wish you all the very best at the college you've chosen.

CPW Closing Remarks and Variety Show
Saturday, April 9, 2011
6:00-7:30pm (Doors open at 5:30pm)
Kresge Auditorium

Dean of Admissions Stu Schmill and the MIT Admissions Officers will give some closing thoughts, and there will be 7 really amazing acts at the show:

- Chorallaries (a cappella, co-ed)
- Jacob Sharpe (juggling)
- Bhangra (dance, Punjabi)
- MIT Cheerleading Team (dance, cheerleading)
- Logarhythms (a cappella, all-male)
- Ridonkulous (dance, hip-hop/modern)
- Live Music Connection Guitar-off (electric guitars, shredding)

(For those that don't know, "a cappella" is basically making music with only voices, no instruments. Rockapella is probably one of the most famous examples of a cappella.) Kim actually used to be in the Chorallaries, and I used to be in the Logs (back in our undergrad days).

These are, of course, just a sampling of the 60+ performing arts groups at MIT. There are also a lot of other cool performances going on throughout the weekend, like:
- Spring Greater Boston Invitational Songfest (all 10 MIT a cappella groups), Fri 6-8pm in 10-250
- Wind Ensemble and Festival Jazz Ensemble Concert, Fri 7-9pm in Killian Hall (14W-111)
- Steel Pan Jamboree, Sat 12-2pm on the Student Center Steps (W20)
- Next Act Presents The Scarlet Pimpernel, Fri and Sat 7:45-10pm at Next House (500 Memorial Drive)
- Battle of the Bands, sponsored by the Live Music Connection, Sat 8-10pm, Lobdell Dining Hall (2nd Floor of the Student Center)

(Click here for a full listing of the arts-tagged CPW events.)

Anyways, come to the Closing Variety Show, and say hi to me at the CPW Registration/Help Desk, Student Welcome, Meet the Bloggers, and other stuff throughout the weekend!

Have a safe trip, and we'll see you soon. Less than 20 hours 'til CPW begins!

A few weeks ago, I had an epiphany of sorts. I finally experienced, in true form, what the term "bleary-eyed" really means. Mind you, I was the type of student that had pulled several all-nighters in high school, and even more at MIT as an undergrad (many for studying/academic reasons, but many more because I was having fun staying up late and just hanging out with friends). When mixing and producing albums for my a cappella group, we pulled week-long mixing sessions where I rotated on 4-5 hours of sleep every 30 hours or so for a week. In other words, I've had my fair share of sleep deprivation and utter exhaustion - but never had I actually experienced, first-hand, being truly "bleary-eyed".

This year marked the first year we went fully "online" in our admissions reading process; that is, nearly all application components were either scanned, downloaded, or somehow transmogrified into electronic PDF format. On the plus side, this meant no more having to lug buckets/backpacks/tote bags/suitcases (yes, suitcases) full of paper folders back and forth from the office to read them. My legs and back have been supremely thankful for that. On the minus side, this meant that in addition to the ~12 hours a day I already spend looking at a computer, I'd be spending even more trying to read tiny essays (I'm lookin at you, word-limit violators!), handwritten recommendations, upside-down transcripts, and more. My eyes have not been thankful for that.

Seventeen-thousand, nine-hundred and nine applications. At least five (often six or seven) rounds of committee review before final admissions decisions are set. Nineteen staff readers.

For many students (admitted or not), that PDF application gets seen by many, many eyes, from the time it gets its first review until the last committee deliberation. We read about your family life and your upbringing. We learn about your proudest moments and how you overcame your downfalls. We talk about what it must be like for you to live your everyday life, and how much your teachers and guidance counselors (and interviewers, for those that had them) love you and can't stop raving about you. And sometimes - as hard as we often try not to, because we know the reality that less than 1 out of every 10 will be admitted - we get attached.

We make that leap from reading words on a page and seeing cold numbers on a screen to getting attached to you as a person. We start giving you nicknames, imagining you on campus, and hypothesizing where you'll live and who you'll hang out with. (We sometimes even consider matchmaking, and then decide that's way too creepy.)

But anyways, back to the original point of this story. It was on this day, just a couple weeks ago, after having been in committee for 4 days straight, with another 7 days of committee ahead (no - no breaks for weekends) that I got home, laid down in bed, and tears just started to flow.

They weren't tears of sadness, or happiness (at first). My eyes were just exhausted. I was exhausted. My eyes burned, cried out in pain. As I closed them, I thought back upon the months of January and February, and how I'd spent nearly every single day staring at a computer screen, reading or discussing one applicant or another. Hundreds upon thousands of lives and stories...

The tears then turned to sadness - sadness that many of my favorites would not get admitted, and for all the work and effort that was put into the admissions process, we'd be able to say "yes" to so few. Sleep was no relief - I tossed and turned all night, as vivid dreams of applicants and admissions decisions continued to flow through my head as my subconscious recounted the days passed and worried about the days to come. "Did we admit that kid? What happened to that other person? Did he make it through committee? I hope there's room for her..."

The next morning, I woke up, and rubbed my encrusted eyes. Put on my glasses, and - blink, blink - the world was still blurry. I could hardly see straight, and my eyes were still sore. Several more blinks, and my vision wouldn't come into focus. I then realized, truly, what being bleary-eyed meant. I washed my face, let my eyes wake up, and still tired, headed off to work for another day, another week of committee. Rinse and repeat, so went the days - wake up, committee, dinner, email, (attempted) sleep.

I knew there would be joy for some, but for many more, there would be heartache. There would be times I'd take a step back, and just reflect upon how everything seemed so utterly ridiculous. For so many of the students we weren't admitting, was there anything wrong with them? Could they have done anything better or differently? No. That was the cold, hard truth. But there simply wasn't enough room in the class. They were all amazing in their own ways, but we had to make unbelievably tough choices.

I tell this story not out of angst or in hopes of pity; I tell it to share my personal feelings, and to let you know that the decisions we make are never easy nor flippant; saying "no" is never fun. That said, this doesn't change the news you received. I can't (and don't) expect any of this to change how you feel about it. But I do hope it gives you some insight into what it's like for us on the other side.

Whether you were admitted or not, or still on the waitlist, I just want to say thank you. You've allowed us to read about you, care about you, and get to know you - almost as if I've been able to sit with you in your home and hear a snapshot of your life story. Many times, my friends, family (and even I myself) ask why I do this job - the long hours, the nonstop reading, the endless heartache - and I tell them that in the end, it's worth it and I love it. I love getting to read every story, learn about every person, and feel as though I've traveled around the world without having left the comfort of my own home.

So many of you have poured so much of yourselves, your time, and your energy into the application and the process, and I want you to know that regardless of the outcome, none of that goes to waste. We are all better for having read and heard your stories. So again, I thank you and applaud you all.

With love,
Mikey

Anyways, as Pi Day approaches, I thought I'd put up a post that collects some of the best pi(e) references out there. For those who are awaiting news on Pi Day, I hope this will be a fun diversion for you as you wait. And for those who are not awaiting such news, here are some fun pi(e) references!

From yesterday's Today's Big Thing:

And, of course, the Pi Song:

And actually, if you play both of these videos at the same time, you get an interesting little meta-mashup. (Love you, YouTube Doubler!)

One of my colleagues also made an apple pie for the office today and I was going to take a picture of it, but by the time I remembered, it was all gone. Instead, I give you a transcript of the email that was sent this morning:

From: Erin
To: MIT Admissions Office
Subject: Apple Pie
Date: Thurs, March 10, 2011 at 8:52AM

Good morning,

There is delicious apple pie made by Jamilla in the fridge! Please come have a piece!

Erin

Edit/update, 3/14/11, ~8pm: Some more great pi(e) references:

A pretty sweet video posted by Corey on Elizabeth's "Pi-nal Countdown" blog post:

Courtesy of my colleague Ingrid:

http://wordplay.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/14/numberplay-pi-in-the-sky/

Today, for Pi Day, Kris brought in a chocolate cream pie, which was quickly consumed (but at least I got some pictures this time!)

(To the right of the half-eaten pie you'll also see some homemade Amish friendship bread that Matt brought in, too!)

Here is a picturesque slice cut by Kirsten (my attempt at cutting a piece was awful and too quickly consumed to have been photographed - NOM NOM NOM):

So, feel free to post your favorite pi/pie reference(s) in the comments below and I'll add them in! Do you have a favorite pi song? Or, you could make your favorite flavor of pie and send in a picture (mine's pumpkin)! Or you could try making a pie in the shape of pi while singing your favorite pi song and reciting the digits of pi...the possibilities are endless...

Just saw this article/video on CNN of Prof. Cynthia Breazeal, who works at the Media Lab here at MIT. She gave a talk at the TEDWomen conference on personal robots - some pretty amazing stuff here! It's so amazing, I couldn't just tweet about it - I had to post it on the blog, too:

Maybe one day personal robots will deliver valentines to our doors... (that was my uber-clever way of saying "Happy Valentine's Day!")

My schedule:
Today (10/4) - Rio Grande Valley (Brownsville, Harlingen, Mercedes, and McAllen, TX)
Tomorrow (10/5) - San Antonio, TX
Wednesday and Thursday (10/6-7) - Austin, TX

Then I'm headed back to Boston. A whirlwind trip, no doubt! Hopefully I'll see some of you along the way. (As for the other stops in Texas - Dallas/Ft Worth, Houston, and El Paso - Kim has been hanging out there!)

Well, it's off to the Brownsville Museum of Fine Art for tonight's presentation! On the run again...

Meanwhile, I've been coming across all these really cool stories of MIT in the news that I'll try to post (or more likely, tweet) to share with you all. Today, this mention of MIT was on CNN.com:

http://www.cnn.com/2010/TECH/innovation/08/26/mit.oil.robot/

And a few days ago, this article from Gizmag about work being done on batteries (designed by viruses!) that can be woven into clothing:

http://www.gizmag.com/mit-developing-werable-batteries/16110/

Some pretty cool research and development being done - it's stuff like this that makes me so proud (and in awe) to be associated with MIT. :)

As the new school year begins (and '14s are arriving this week and next!), I'm looking forward to yet another interesting year. In my plans for upcoming posts, I'm hoping to talk a little more specifically about my particular role in the Admissions Office, and some college-admissions-related issues near and dear to my heart. (And perhaps an obligatory "what I did this summer" post...)

Meanwhile, as the summer comes to an end, how was your summer? Do anything fun/interesting/cool?

I've spent the past several weeks with many of my colleagues, working long days and nights to match up all 1,100+ of you coming this weekend with current student hosts. (If your host hasn't been in touch with you, don't worry - you WILL have a host and a place to stay once you get here. We'll work it out! And if your host has tried to contact you but you haven't gotten back to him/her yet, do so ASAP so you can work out living arrangements, a meeting time/place, and everything!)

Anyways, in addition to matching all y'all with hosts, I've also spent the past several months planning the Closing Remarks and Variety Show that's happening Saturday night. Come check it out!

The details:

Saturday, April 10, 2010
6:00-7:30pm (Doors open at 5:30pm)
Kresge Auditorium
(Here's a link to the online CPW schedule entry.)

There are going to be 5 fantastic acts at the show:
- Chorallaries (a cappella, co-ed)
- Imobilare (dance, breakdancing/hip-hop)
- Ariadne Smith '10 (classical guitar)
- Bhangra (dance, Punjabi)
- Logarhythms (a cappella, all-male)

These are, of course, just a sampling of the 60+ performing arts groups at MIT. There are also a lot of other cool arts-related things going on throughout the weekend, like:
- Next Act (they're doing the musical "Urinetown" this year), Thurs/Fri/Sat 8-10pm @ Next House
- Steel Pan Jamboree, Fri 3-5pm on the Student Center Steps
- All A Cappella Extravaganza, Fri 4-6pm in 34-101
- SAAS (South Asian American Students) Culture Show, Fri 7pm in Kresge Auditorium
- Battle of the Bands, Sat 7:30-9:30pm in Lobdell Dining Hall (2nd floor Student Center)
- Emerson ScholarRecitals: violinist Tanya Goldhaber '10 will be performing Fri 12-1pm, and pianist Sarah Rumbley '12 will be performing Fri 5-6pm, both in Killian Hall (14W-111)

...and that's just the tip of the iceberg...so many cool and awesome things to do this weekend!!

Anyways, come to the Closing Variety Show, and say hi to me at the CPW Help Desk, Student Welcome, Meet the Bloggers, and other stuff throughout the weekend!

And tweet me if you'd like...I'm @MikeyMIT. Chris also posted a bunch of stuff about CPW + Web things so you can get your nerd on while CPW-ing!

Have a safe trip, and we'll see you soon. Less than 12 hours 'til CPW begins!

Now, he's returning the favor and coming to visit us this Friday! Pretty exciting stuff.

Regardless of your political views, I think a visit to campus from the President is pretty darn special. Of course, it sounds like with the limited space in our largest auditorium (seats ~1300 people), it won't hold everyone who will want to come hear him speak, so they're going to ticket the event by invitation only with a preference towards students...but it sounds like for everyone else, they'll be webcasting the event live on campus too.

The subtitle of this entry was also my stretched attempt at trying to tie in a completely unrelated, but also important topic that comes up every year. Typically, in September and October each year, we travel across the country to give presentations about MIT. And, many folks come visit MIT's campus, whether it's for a couple hours or a couple days. Usually, when people come to our presentations when we're on the road, or come visit campus, we have a sign-in for students where people check off their name or fill out a form with their information.

Why do we do this? Well, it's really just for us to keep track of how many people came to the event. That way, the next year, we can try as best as we can to find a venue that's the appropriate size. Also, by collecting or confirming your contact info, it let's us know who you are and that you might be interested in learning more about MIT.

Of course, the natural follow-up question to that is often, "so does visiting campus or coming to an MIT presentation help my admissions chances at all?" This is certainly a valid question, as some colleges do track this type of information and use it in their admissions decisions. For those colleges, seeing that you came to a presentation or visited campus shows that you have an "expressed interest" in the school, and they try to use that piece of data to gauge your level of interest when deciding whom to admit.

But for MIT, that is simply not true.

Sure, we analyze the data to figure out whether the recruitment we're doing is working, and how we can potentially improve what we do on an annual basis, but at no point does information about whether you came to a presentation or visited campus have an impact on your admissions decision. We know that not every student has the time, money, or means to come visit - and that's perfectly fine. There's certainly value in coming to visit campus for you to learn about and experience MIT, but for our admissions process, it has zero effect on your chances of being admitted - no worries.

So rest assured, even if Barack Obama was applying to MIT this year, the fact that he's coming to visit campus on Friday doesn't mean he'd have a better chance of being admitted. Truly. (Although, I'm pretty sure he won't be applying - I think he's got some other job he's busy with for at least the next 3 years...)

One of which is from the San Jose Mercury News - "'Printed Chips' Could be Boon for Consumers" where they talk about some new technology that's being developed by a company called Kovio, which apparently was founded by MIT alum Colin Bulthaup in 2001, the year he graduated from MIT with a Bachelor's and Master's of Engineering in EECS. (Actually, it looks like since then, Colin's done way more than that...)

Pretty amazing stuff.

Meanwhile, one of my college friends sent me this article from Technology Review about the 2009 Young (under 35) Innovator of the Year.

It's my former GRT! ZOMG!

(For those that don't know, GRT stands for Graduate Resident Tutor; they're basically grad students at MIT who serve as your floor or hall's resident advisor.)

He's actually doing some pretty cool work on the security of RFID. You should read the article, because it does a much better job of explaining what he does than I can.

Anyways, enjoy. Hope y'all are enjoying (at least what's left of...or maybe what's not left of by this point) the summer!

THE SHARPE BROTHERS
A while back, on the front page of the Boston Globe was an article about two brothers at MIT who perform (juggle? spin? What's the correct verb for this?) diabolo (those of you who went to the Closing Remarks and Variety Show at CPW may recognize them as the closing act). I never ceased to be amazed by these guys!

If you want to see them in action, you should go to YouTube and search for "Sharpe Brothers" - they have some pretty sweet videos up there. :)

Speaking of YouTube, I found this video of someone who put together a short montage of the performances at the Closing Variety Show at CPW this year...a nice little taste of some performing arts groups at MIT. :)

PANDORA
By now, many of you have probably heard of (or use) this, but I'm in love with Pandora. There are, of course, many similar music sites out there like it, but after honing my station over the past couple years, I thought I'd share my station with y'all if you're interested. You can also go here to see how I defined the station, what I liked/disliked/bookmarked/etc.

For those that don't know about Pandora yet, it's basically free online radio, but you can customize your own stations by telling it which songs you like or dislike. It's based off of the Music Genome Project, where a bunch of people have gone through and assigned traits to tons of songs, so based on what you tell the station, it will play successive songs that have similar traits to the songs that you like or 'seed' the station with.

It's basically one of the awesomest things ever - if you've never seen or used anything like it before, you should. The only downside I have with it is the audio ads (which will occasionally play between songs), but I don't mind them that much - they happen so infrequently that it's not a big deal. Pandora also has some limitations for legal/revenue reasons (e.g., you can only skip a certain number of songs per hour, and you have to interact with the player at least once every 30 minutes or it will pause until you click to let it know you're there again (unless you pay a subscription fee that allows unlimited playing). But hey, they have to make money somehow, right?

(Actually, I don't pay the fee because - well one, I'm cheap, and two, I actually like the 'auto-sleep' that happens; if I forget to turn it off, I know it won't keep playing all day and drive my housemates crazy while I'm at work, hahaha)

What's your favorite kind of music? Do you have other sites like it that you use?

TV SHOW UPDATE
So, ever since my last post about TV, I've started watching a couple new shows. Most notably, I've started watching Weeds via unlimited streaming on our "family's" Netflix account. Unfortunately, only the first two seasons are on there, so I have to figure out how I'm going to watch Seasons 3, 4, and 5 (currently airing).

I also caved to Gossip Girl...I'm only part way through the most recent season, though, so I need to finish it at some point. I don't know why, but I just keep watching it. Just one of those guilty pleasures, I guess.

And as the summer* TV season begins, shows like Wipeout and I Survived a Japanese Game Show are some other guilty pleasures of mine. I'm glad Burn Notice is starting up too, but it seems to be going further downhill, imo. Speaking of which, House (formerly my #1 favorite show) has now dropped in my ranks - I really think that show is reaching its limits. Hopefully I'll be able to get around to some other good shows I've been meaning to watch, like Dexter and Mad Men.

Any other suggestions?


*a.k.a. bad

You all should definitely come to the Closing Remarks and Variety Show Saturday night. Details:

Saturday, April 18, 2009
6:00-7:30pm (Doors open at 5:30pm)
Kresge Auditorium

Link to the online CPW schedule entry

There are going to be 8 really amazing acts at the show (in alphabetical order):

- Bhangra (dance, Punjabi)
- Chorallaries (a cappella, co-ed)
- Imobilare (dance, breakdancing/hip-hop)
- Logarhythms (a cappella, all-male)
- Rambax (music, Senegalese drumming)
- Resonance (a cappella, co-ed)
- Ridonkulous (dance, hip-hop/modern)
- The Sharpe Brothers (juggling, diabolo)

(For those that don't know, "a cappella" is basically making music with only voices, no instruments. Rockapella is probably one of the most famous examples of a cappella.) Kim actually used to be in the Chorallaries, and I used to be in the Logs (back in our undergrad days).

These are, of course, just a sampling of the 60+ performing arts groups at MIT. There are also a lot of other cool performances going on throughout the weekend, like Next Act, Caribbean Steel Pan Jamboree, All A Cappella Extravaganza, and the 7th Annual Battle of the Bands.

(Click here for a full listing of the arts-tagged CPW events.)

Anyways, come to the Closing Variety Show, and say hi to me at the CPW Help Desk, Student Welcome, Meet the Bloggers, and other stuff throughout the weekend!

Have a safe trip, and we'll see you soon. Less than 14 hours 'til CPW begins!

I thought I'd take a break from planning to post a quick blog entry; I recently saw this amazing TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) talk by MIT Professor Pattie Maes about a very cool, wearable device called "Sixth Sense." She, along with her research group (including one of her grad students, Pranav Mistry, who she calls "the genius behind Sixth Sense"), has developed this "Minority Report"-esque gadget, which she demos and describes in the video.

Check it out! It's pretty awesome...

I know it's been forever since I've posted anything; I've been insanely busy reading thousands of applications - probably many of yours, in fact! But I did want to write briefly about something really cool that I just heard about recently...

One of my very good friends, Justin '08, is actually being featured on inc.com (along with his co-founder, Chris '09, and one of my other friends, Scot '08). They founded a start-up to help make learning foreign languages easier in foreign-language classrooms.

Go to http://www.inc.com/college to check them out and vote! You can also check out the Lingt website at http://lingtlanguage.com.

I asked Justin to write a little guest entry too, so he wrote a really nice piece for y'all about his journey here at MIT. Enjoy!

When I applied to MIT, I wanted to build robots. My heroes were Rodney Brooks and Marvin Minsky, and my future image of myself was in a white coat tinkering with the wired brain of some android. So, of course, I did what any MIT freshman hopped up on idealism and tech-romanticism does: I got a UROP. In Brooks' Humanoid Robotics Lab, no less. I was going to publish fifteen papers, file three patents, and invent machine consciousness in my four years at MIT, I was sure of it. I just needed to learn Linux first.

Building robots turned out to be harder than I had anticipated. I had built a little line-follower from tupperware, a comparator, and two photosensors in high school, but this was nothing like that. Instead of soldering together the guts of a robot, anticipating the moment when a dozen blinking LEDs would declare it alive, I was researching communications protocols and circuit compatibilities. When my grad student finally gave me an interesting project - to build a sound localization device (ears) for her robot - my initial burst of energy quickly fizzled when I found myself knee-deep in MATLAB dealing with microphone noise and trying to figure out what the hell a cross correlation was supposed to do. The whole thing was immensely educational, but I slowly discovered that I simply didn't have that white-coated future-self in me.

It wasn't much of an identity crisis since I had three years of MIT left to figure out what I wanted to do. I was a Course 6 major from the start, fairly confident that I wanted to work with computers. About two years in, though, I started missing my old pals in the Liberal Arts: namely language, literature, and politics - so much so that I skipped out on engineering altogether one semester and took Chinese, World Music, and two political science courses. I enjoyed this so much that I nearly dropped Course 6 for 17, before my adviser gave me some very good (and probably debatable) advice: an adeptness in technology would be more precious after graduation than a liberal arts education. I could read a lot and think hard to maintain an engaged interest in writing and analyzing world events, but I was unlikely to ever will myself to learn a programming language or systems architecture if I hadn't developed an intuition for technology in undergrad.

So graduation finally rolled around and I was thrust into the job market, delaying the inevitable by spending that summer setting up a computer lab for a primary school in Malawi. I hadn't applied and been accepted to any software firms or investment banks like most of my friends had five months ago, remembering well the misery of pounding out code in a cubicle during a sophomore internship. I had decided instead to apply to a handful of web start-up companies in Boston and the Bay area. Two of my earliest friends at MIT had dropped out to start companies and were doing quite well - the pace and challenge of start-ups seemed tantalizing, technically and creatively. When I got back from Africa, I flew straight to San Francisco, where I crashed on the couch of an MIT dropout and spent my days solving programming puzzles and interviewing with founders no older than myself. The passion and drive of all these entrepreneurial faces was deeply inspiring - I suddenly felt that overwhelming charisma that I had worn when applying for that first UROP at the robotics lab. In the same way that I had wanted to solder wires and create intelligence, I wanted to start my own venture that would consume my energy, combine my interests, and grow to be something bigger than cubicled code.

And so Lingt, a start-up focusing on building online technologies for foreign language classrooms, was born. I spent two summers in China during my MIT career - and it took all six of those months in addition to MIT's language classes to reach a point where I could really speak Mandarin. I saw an opportunity to leverage web technologies to help language students pick up the spoken language more rapidly in the setting that I thought learning occurred best - the classroom.

Contrary to the fleeting half-life of my interest in robotics, my passion for entrepreneurship is proving more sticky. Making sure you find your job interesting is good, but combining your interests (in my case technology and foreign language) to create your job is heaven. Business meetings, marketing strategy, and even the occasional art design keep the right side of my brain very much alive, which is perhaps the greatest benefit of choosing entrepreneurship over grad school or a "real job." Whether my co-founder Chris and I succeed or fail is besides the point (so far so good); by putting together a business that was able to secure a few partners and make technology that people wanted to use, we have escaped our destiny of being pigeon-holed as the "tech guys" for the rest of our lives. So, don't ride college like an assembly line conveyor belt. Abandon those things that don't interest you and figure out a way to combine those things that do. You'll be much happier and better for it on the other side.

Best wishes for a safe and happy new year!

1. I have not blogged in quite a while.
2. I finally have a small breather of vacation time between reading Early and Regular applications.
3. The end of the year is near, which always calls for lists and countdowns.
4. I've been meaning to write a post like this since the big TV premiere weeks in September, but traveling got the best of me.
5. Now that most shows are taking holiday breaks, I've been able to catch up a bit on my shows, and thus there is a smaller likelihood that something will get spoiled for me in the comments.

[Important sidenote: I watch almost all my TV online and/or several weeks after its initial airing, and I absolutely hate it when something gets spoiled for me (similar to most people, I assume) - so PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE no spoilers in the comments! If you absolutely have to reference something from a show that'll spoil it - even if it's already been aired - please put a disclaimer above it!]

Anyways, as you've probably figured out by now, I'm a big TV fan. I watch a lot of TV. So, in the spirit of Advent calendars*, I'm going to countdown my top 25 favorite currently airing TV shows (along with the network it airs on, in case you're curious):

25. Cash Cab - Discovery Channel
24. Dancing with the Stars - ABC (yes, I admit to watching this show...)
23. Dirty Jobs - Discovery Channel (Mike Rowe is amazing)
22. Best Week/Year/Night Ever - VH1 (does anyone else auto-download the Best Night Ever podcasts in iTunes?)
21. Mythbusters - Discovery Channel
20. Any Food Network show with Paula Deen, Bobby Flay, or Giada De Laurentiis (as you will see below, I love watching food-related shows, even though I hardly cook at all)
19. Throwdown with Bobby Flay - Food Network (see?)
18. Unwrapped - Food Network (Marc Summers brings back childhood memories of Double Dare on Nickelodeon...)
17. America's Best Dance Crew - MTV
16. Survivor - CBS (yes, I also admit to still watching this show, although I missed a lot of seasons between the first two and the more recent ones)
15. Ace of Cakes - Food Network (I think if I ever met Duff or anyone at Charm City Cakes, I would have a heart attack.)
14. Iron Chef America - Food Network (even though it doesn't quite live up to the original Iron Chef, this show is still highly entertaining.)
13. How It's Made - Discovery Channel (I could watch this show for hours, if only there weren't other TV shows distracting me from it...)
12. The Office - NBC
11. 30 Rock - NBC (Tina Fey is a comedic genius and all-around superstar)

And now, on to the TOP TEN:
10. LOST - ABC (only a few more weeks until the new season begins!!)
9. The Amazing Race - CBS (a show I am NOT ashamed to admit I watch. I don't care what you say, this show is amazing. It's right there in the name!)
8. Project Runway - Bravo
7. Brothers and Sisters - ABC
6. Desperate Housewives - ABC (this show has had its ups and downs, but this season has been pretty good imo)
5. Ugly Betty - ABC (always a feel-good, warm and fuzzy pick-me-up)
4. Top Chef - Bravo (again with the cooking shows, but this time on a different network)
3. Family Guy - FOX
2. How I Met Your Mother - CBS (NPH is amazing. 'Nuff said.)
1. HOUSE - FOX (I just love the writing and acting on this show. I can't get enough.)

Now, in all honesty, I don't have enough time to keep up with every single episode of all of these shows (though you'd probably be surprised at how many I actually do keep up with). However, there ARE more shows that didn't make the list, for various reasons. Here are a few more lists of mine:

Shows I Used to Watch, but Am No Longer Watching (in no particular order)
(either because I don't have time for them anymore, or they've gone downhill**...)
- 24 - FOX
- American Idol - FOX
- Big Brother - CBS (I was forced to watch this in the summers because THERE IS NOTHING ELSE TO WATCH IN THE SUMMER)
- Grey's Anatomy - ABC
- Private Practice - ABC
- Extreme Makeover: Home Edition - ABC
- Heroes - NBC
- Friday Night Lights - NBC
- Numb3rs - CBS

Shows I Try to Catch When I Can, but Not All the Time (in no particular order)
- The Daily Show - Comedy Central
- The Colbert Report - Comedy Central
- Kitchen Nightmares - FOX
- Dinner: Impossible - Food Network
- Samantha Who? - ABC
- Man vs. Wild - Discovery Channel
- The Mole - ABC

Favorite Shows that are No Longer Airing New Episodes, but Must be Included in a List of Some Sort in a Post Like This One
(R.I.P., my beloved shows!)
1. Friends
2. Arrested Development
3. Seinfeld
4. Rob and Big
5. America's Most Smartest Model (not as epic as the others, but still a wonderfully hilarious show)

Shows I've Always Wanted to Get Into More, but Haven't Been Able to Yet
- Scrubs
- Dexter
- Weeds
- Other suggestions? (And do not say "The Hills" or "Gossip Girl". Not gonna happen. Well...we'll see about Gossip Girl. I may cave on that front.) And if you have ideas on shows from my top 25 that you think should be cut, I welcome your input as well!

Yes, I watch a lot of TV. And yes, I watch a lot of bad TV. But now it's all out there on the table, guilty pleasures and all. So now it's your turn - what are your favorite shows?

*Unfortunately, these TV shows don't come with little chocolates, but wouldn't it be awesome if they did?
**...or they were terrible to begin with, and I've finally come to realize it

But with several blog posts in the past few weeks about how terribly hosed people are, I thought I'd bring some balance to the conversation. I remembered a guest post I wrote a couple years ago (back when Ben was still here - BEN WE MISS YOU!) - this was actually in response to an admitted student who was deciding whether to enroll at MIT, but I think it also applies to people thinking about applying to MIT. I thought I'd post it again (recycling is good for the environment!).

(Btw, I find it funny that in Ben's original post, he wrote about missing me while I was off at grad school, and now, I'm reposting this as we all miss Ben while he's off working at a different school. COME VISIT US BENNO!)

You can just check out the link above, or read below, where I've copied the basic gist of the entry:

So, some context: Mikey received an email from a student who had been admitted to MIT and was concerned that everyone else would be much better prepared than she. Recognizing her concern as a very common one, Mikey asked her if we could publish their correspondence. Here it is:

So, mainly at this point I am very excited for MIT, but I am having some second thoughts. Concerning my peers. When I applied, I was well aware of the fact that MIT attracts the best and brightest... and I'm a bit worried that I'm not as bright and shiny as the others. For example, almost all the people I've talked to have been to the IMO or at least the USAMO or have won some science competition or another (Westinghouse, YES, Intel, take your pick) or have patented something, or have taken their school's science club to nationals. And I've never done any of that... I'm basically a kid who likes math, cats, plants and some plumbing and thought MIT seemed like a cool place because everyone was always building one thing or another, all the time.

But now I'm worried that I won't be able to catch up to these kids and as a result, coming in with no research experience or major math competition experience or etc. will pull me far behind my classmates and I'll struggle to get good grades (I know grades aren't everything, but I'd like to get decent enough grades to apply for graduate school) or find research opportunities or basically show professors that I have something to offer... when in fact I'm not sure I have anything to offer in comparison to the rest of the class of 2011.

I was really psyched to go despite the notoriously huge workload because I was pretty sure that I'd love doing the work, no matter how much there was (I really enjoyed, for example, doing stoichiometry problems and math problems... they're fun for me, but I don't have any true talent for them... I'm a "peasant" of a student, not a "poet" if that makes any sense at all), but now I'm more worried than anything. Please feel free to be honest... if you think that my sort of person can still do well at MIT, that's great... but if not, be as brutally honest as necessary!

So how was your experience at MIT? If you don't mind, can you tell me a bit about yourself? Like, were you one of those USAMO kids?

Thanks again for your time, and I hope I don't sound too hysterical :)

 

And here's Mikey's response, which I love:

Don't worry.

I had never heard of "Intel", "Westinghouse", or "IMO" before coming to MIT. I did not know a USABO, USNCO, or USPhO existed. I didn't even know science fairs and research competitions existed. No joke. I took the "pre-AMC" (back then it was called the AJHSME, and the AMC was called the AHSME - American (Junior) High School Math Exam), did okay on it, and never went any farther (I had heard of the AIME but wasn't even close to being considered for that test). And I felt exactly like you even before I applied to MIT. "MIT students are way smarter than me... I must've gotten in by accident... I'll be like the dumbest one there" is what I seriously told myself. And I totally get your "poet" vs "peasant" analogy... people would talk about how "elegant" a math proof was, or how "neat and interesting" the solution was to that physics problem, while I would just sit there and say "heck, did I at least get the units right?" or use brute force to solve the problem in a way that took 20x longer than it should have and said "hey, I still got it right in the end, who cares if it took 2 hours instead of 2 minutes?" Haha.

But anyways, back to the original point. I came to MIT, and seriously, I probably had way more fun than I was supposed to. (Hanging out with friends in my living group, going on road trips, having spontaneous parties, watching TV shows and movies, playing video games... Not all the time, but most of the time. Don't tell my parents.) Over my four years, I sang with an a cappella group, helped record and produce 2 CDs, sang in a classical group, was part of a religious club, did a UROP, and made many lifelong friends and memories.

But wait... what about the academics?? I graduated with a 4.8 GPA (out of 5.0) - and I honestly had a blast. (I hope that didn't come off as arrogant - I just wanted to let you know that you can have a lot of fun and still get good grades in your classes!)

Believe me, there was definitely hard work involved (it was not ALL fun and games) but really, you wouldn't have been admitted if you we didn't think you could not only survive but THRIVE here academically, socially, emotionally, physically, mentally (and every other "lly" way). MIT is about educating the entire student, not *just* the academics, and the college experience is not *just* the classes - it's EVERYTHING. You literally passed through *at LEAST* 5 different rounds of screening before you were definitively admitted to MIT; we said "not only can she do the work, but she's going to have fun, she'll add to the campus community, she'll be able to make great friends, and above all, she's a great match for MIT." Or something to that extent.

Yes, there are geniuses at MIT, even for MIT standards. I met plenty of them throughout my four years. But you know what? I couldn't even tell for most of them - I had plenty of friends where I didn't learn about their special and unique talents until after having known them for 2-3 years (examples: I didn't learn until junior or senior year that some of my friends consisted of: California State Nintendo Champion... a child TV show star... placed in the Putnam for more than one year... went to Africa to help vision-impaired children... worked on the Human Genome project... owned his own design company... etc... etc... etc...). But when people get here, everyone pretty much leaves a lot of that at the door (unless it comes up specifically). They're all students just like anyone, eager to meet new people... and it was incredibly exciting to have friends like them.

So don't worry. I know exactly what you're going through, and as someone who's been through it all and is on the other side now, I know you'll be juuuuust fine. :)

I know many of you out there probably have similar concerns, and I hope that helps address some of them. Point is, MIT is hard work, but it's also a lot of fun! Then again, I'm sure Snively would point out that I should have a disclaimer that I studied biology while I was here...haha.

Edit: I just read Cristen's most recent post, which I recommend reading as well - I agree wholeheartedly!

So this post's title obviously isn't from a song lyric, but I must credit "hcs" for getting the last one correct! Guster is another one of my favorite bands...

McAllen, Texas
September 12, 2008 - September 17, 2008

I spent a nice weekend in McAllen, eating some great food and hanging out in the Valley. I had cabrito for the first time, which was fantastic. I actually met up with Louann, one of my friends from Michigan, who is down there doing a Teach for America placement at one of the local high schools. She's starting her second year, and is already teaching AP English classes. We had a great time catching up.

My hotel was right next to a Tony Roma's (great ribs!) and Logan's Roadhouse (tasty bread). Tony Roma's had a special where you could get a 3-course dinner - appetizer, ribs entree, and dessert - for like $15. Mmmmm. Aside from the cabrito, I didn't really get a chance to have some authentic Mexican food (which I know many would yell at me for not doing), but when I'm traveling, sometimes I'm just so tired that anything more than a 2-minute drive is simply too far.

Anyways, after visiting a few schools, we hosted a central meeting on Wednesday, 9/17 at a place called the Echo Hotel. There was a decent-sized crowd of about 120 students, parents, and others at the meeting. There were even a few people who drove all the way down from Laredo (about 3 hours away) to attend.

I got to meet 3 really cool ECs, one of whom actually teaches math at the same school that Louann teaches English! What a small world. After the meeting ended around 10pm, some of us went to Chili's (one of the few places in the area that was still open after 10).

Laredo, Texas
September 18, 2008

6am. The crack of dawn. I sleepily roll out of bed, eyes drooping like Droopy the Dog's cheeks. My legs feel like cement blocks. I slump into the shower, allowing the hot water to wake me up and wash the previous day off me. Feeling refreshed, I get ready, pack everything up, and check out of the hotel.

7am. After gassing up, I start my 3-hour drive up US-83, snaking along the US-Mexico border. One thing that I noticed throughout my time in South Texas (and especially on this drive) is that people generally do not like to exceed the speed limit. In fact, they like to drive 5 miles under the speed limit. I don't know if it's a culture thing or if the police are extremely strict or what, but it was VERY different from Michigan or Mass.

10am. I arrive in Laredo, check in to my hotel, and head out to my meetings for the day. I get excited that this hotel actually has FOOD NETWORK (another post on my love for TV to come), but unfortunately I'll only be here for one day.

11:30am. I've been using a GPS unit this entire time to help me get from place to place, which has (for the most part) been extremely helpful. It's like my new best friend. I even contemplated giving it a name. But in Texas, I've run into two main problems:

1) The highways here have service roads that run parallel to them. This poses a problem when the unit can't accurately detect whether I'm actually on the highway, or the service road next to it. Particularly when I'm in the right lane on the highway, and it suddenly tells me to "turn left" off of the overpass.

2) In fast-growing cities like Laredo, the maps on the unit were severely out of date/inaccurate. In one instance, I was on the highway, and the exit I was supposed to take no longer existed. So I figured, get off at the next exit, and either turn around and go back the other way on the highway, or find my way to my destination. So I take the next exit, and all the while problem #1 is plaguing me because I'm in a spaghetti-type junction, so it starts going crazy trying to figure out which road I'm actually on.

At this point, I actually start yelling at the thing because the voice won't stop screaming directions at me: "recalculating...recalculating...drive 0.3 miles, then turn ri--drive 200 feet, then turn--recalculating...when possible, make a u-turn...recalculating...recalculating..." I continue on the ramp I'm on (as there's basically no other choice), and finally see a sign: BRIDGE TO MEXICO.

Oops. Omgomgomg what do I do.

I start to pass all the signs about border policies, firearms, etc. and am furiously looking for an exit to turn around. As I approach the tollbooths, I see out of the corner of my eye this tiny sign pointing to a dirt road that says "Back to U.S." I merge over 6 lanes, get on the path, and finally make my way back towards my destination.

Once I get to my destination (according to my GPS), I'm basically in the middle of a field. Literally. There are no buildings around. I drive until I find a church, and manage to get directions from a friendly pastor in the parking lot.

I also had a scary encounter where the GPS unit almost guided me the wrong way on a four-lane, one-way highway off-ramp. After that, I made sure to download the latest map update and updated my unit.

Due up next: my trip takes me to San Antonio, Austin, Seattle, and New York City. For the solution to the last post's title, you can go here. Personally, I was referring to the Chantal Kreviazuk cover, but there are plenty of great versions of that song. Can you guess where this post's title comes from? (No Googling answers!)

Michigan
Sunday, September 7, 2008

9:00am. I wake up, and go rent a car from the local Budget office. Unfortunately, the only type of car they have is a PT Cruiser - which, although I'm not a huge fan of how it looks, I found it to be very fun and interesting to drive.

10:30am. I begin my drive to Ann Arbor to meet up with a friend for lunch before the meeting.

11:30am. I arrive in Ann Arbor a little early, so I go over my presentation for a bit, then stretch my legs and walk around for a bit.

12:15pm. I meet up with a friend for lunch at Cosi, one of my new favorite restaurants. I don't go there that often, because the food is a bit pricey, but it's quite tasty. (And plus, MIT pays for my food while I'm traveling!) If you ever get a chance to go, I'd highly recommend the Tandoori Chicken sandwich. NOM NOM NOM.

1:30pm. I walk down the block to the Michigan Theater, where our central meeting is to be held. It's a beautiful historic theater, fully equipped with a great crew and A/V setup. I get everything situated, tested, and ready to go.

The local Educational Counselors (ECs) arrive as well to help set everything up. Some bring yummy doughnuts and apple cider from a local mill.

My name is actually on the marquis too! Exciting!

2:30pm. The doors open, and people begin to come in.

3:00pm. We start up the meeting, and everything goes relatively smoothly. A few of the ECs come onstage at the end to introduce themselves and help answer some of the questions during our Q&A session.

4:30pm. The meeting officially ends, but several students/parents/guidance counselors come up afterward to ask more one-on-one questions.

5:00pm. Once the crowds have gone, we clean up, I grab my gear, and head to my car to drop off my stuff. I then walk to the nearby Cottage Inn, where the ECs and I get together for dinner. The pizza there is awesome.

7:30pm. After some great conversation about MIT, the interview process, and just hangin out, I say goodbye to the last few ECs left, walk back to my car, and drive home for the evening. Overall, a great day. Tiring, but fun.

8:30pm. I arrive back at my parents' house, where I'm staying. There's no place like home. :)

Monday, September 8 - Tuesday, September 9, 2008
The next couple days, I visit a few high schools in the area, and then fly back to Boston on Tuesday night. I quickly repack my bags, catch up on email, and SLEEP.

Cambridge, Massachusetts
Wednesday, September 10, 2008

The next morning, I head in to the office to run a couple of errands, check my mail, and pick up a few things for my Texas trip. I go back home, make sure I'm all packed, and call a cab for the airport.

I fly down to Houston, the next stop in my travel plans. It's my first time in Texas, so I'm excited to actually visit the state that I hear such great things about. However, I hear that there's a hurricane headed for the Texas Gulf Coast, so I'm a bit anxious, having never been through a hurricane before.

I arrive in Houston around 10pm, get my rental car (this time a nice Chevy Impala), and head to the hotel. Unfortunately, by the time I get there it's pretty late, and (probably due to the incoming storm) they've oversold their rooms for the night. So they send me to another nearby hotel, but cover the cost to make up for the inconvenience.

By about 11:30pm, I finally get to the other hotel, check in, and get ready for the next day. My head hits the pillow around 1am.

Houston, Texas
Thursday, September 11, 2008

6:00am. The alarm sounds way too early. Sleepy-eyed and groggy, I roll out of bed and manage to drag my feet into the shower. I quickly iron my clothes, get ready, and head out the door for a packed day of meetings.

Throughout the day, I constantly check up on the status of Hurricane Ike. Every update it seems to become more and more imminent that this storm is heading straight for Houston. I stay in close touch with Matt to make sure we have a plan in place in case we have to cancel the Houston central meeting.

1:00pm. The people at Ripley House (where we were supposed to have the Houston meeting) call, and let me know that they are shutting down for the weekend due to the storm. After working out the details, I quickly call Matt and let him know we'll have to cancel Sunday's meeting, and he works on getting the word out as quickly as possible. [I recently found out that shortly after Ike passed through Houston, Ripley House was designated by FEMA as a POD (point of distribution).]

2:45pm. I finally have a small chunk of free time. Since all of my meetings have been canceled for the weekend due to the hurricane, I have a decision to make - do I stay or go? I now fully understand the dilemma that folks down here go through - my hotel is west of city center, so it's not in a mandatory evacuation zone, and I'm told it's in a relatively safe location from the storm. I even think to myself that it could be FUN to ride out the storm, kind of like my childhood days in Michigan, when we'd hang out in the basement of our house during tornado warnings. But then again, who knows how powerful the storm could be, and what the damage will be like...and what if I can't get a flight out of the city when I'm supposed to leave on Monday?

The prudent side of me wins this internal debate and I call our travel agency to see if I can rebook my flight and car reservations so that I can fly down to the Rio Grande Valley (my next stop) tonight. (Turns out, I'm glad I made this decision.) There's a 6ish flight I know I can't make, a 7:30ish flight that's sold out, and a 9ish flight that I have her book me on (I pray that this flight will be able to leave on time and won't leave me stranded in Houston). I then call my hotel in the Valley to see if they have rooms available beginning tonight, and just barely get a reservation (they had 5 rooms left).

I call my Houston hotel to cancel my reservation for the rest of the time, and they tell me I need to check out by 5pm today. I have a meeting until 4:30pm, after which I rush back as fast as I can.

4:55pm. The hotel has already boarded up all their first floor windows. Yikes.

I successfully check out of my hotel, grab everything, and drive to the airport. I can already see overhead that some of the "outer bands" of the hurricane are moving in quickly.

Driving to the airport was pretty scary - luckily, there wasn't too much evacuation traffic because of the route I was taking, but incoming storm was already starting to make headway. One second, the highway was completely dry, things looked bright and sunny, and people were going 65mph; the next second, you'd pass under one of those "bands" of storms and it would be a torrential downpour, with people slamming on their brakes to about 30mph because it was raining so hard. It was almost like going through a car wash, except without any warning. (And there weren't those cool spinny things brushing up against the side of the car.)

5:50pm. I get to the airport and return the car. When I get to the terminal, it's like a madhouse - everyone's trying to fly out of the city. I quickly check in, and the kiosk tells me that there is room on the 7:30ish flight if I want to try and get on that one. I switch to that flight instead, and quickly head to security.

6:00pm. Of course, because it's 9/11, there are special security measures in place. The TSA agent informs me that I've been selected for a random, full screening. GREAT. On the plus side, I get my own, personal TSA agent who grabs some trays, helps me get through the regular security checkpoint quickly, and then brings me to the screening station. He pats me down while some other officers search my bags. They were very nice people, and actually made the process a lot less painful than I thought it would be. They even made jokes about having to confiscate my candy bars because they were hungry, which posed a security threat. I lol'd.

6:15pm. I walk around for about 5 minutes trying to figure out why all the gates around me start with a "C", but my gate is supposed to start with a "B". I realize that the 9ish flight I was originally scheduled for departed from Terminal C, but the 7:30ish flight I was now on was departing from Terminal B. I make a mad dash towards the signs that point me to Terminal B and get on the tram that takes me there.

6:30pm. I walk for what seems like an eternity to finally arrive at the gate, only to realize there are no places to eat near this part of the terminal. Since I now know where the gate is and there's no place to sit over there anyways, I walk all the way back to the central food court and grab a quick dinner. I call my parents and tell them I'm fine, and double-check to make sure my car and hotel reservations are set. PHEW.

7:30pm. They board the flight only 10 minutes before scheduled departure, and when I see the plane I can tell why. It's the smallest plane I've ever seen in my life. It's an express flight, so it's one of those that has one seat per row on one side, and two seats per row on the other, and tiny overhead bins on only one side of the plane. This plane is so small that my head is almost touching the ceiling - and I'm 5'8". I manage to squeeze my bags into the compartments, and carefully slide into my seat. I'm so tired that I zonk out immediately.

8:00pm. I wake up to someone's cell phone ringing. Yes, we are in the air, and the lady across the aisle from me has apparently forgotten to turn off her phone. I expect her to just turn it off, but instead, SHE ANSWERS IT. She has a brief conversation in Spanish, and then turns off her phone. I'm so ridiculously tired that I don't even care. I go back to sleep, figuring that if the plane crashes, it'll probably be less painful if I'm sleeping anyways. Or maybe that whole thing was a dream...

8:30pm. We land in McAllen, safe and sound. I get my rental car (this time a Toyota Corolla) and drive to my hotel. The hotel room I'm in is super nice and looks almost brand new - one of the nicer rooms I've seen in Courtyards. So, of course, I take some pictures:

When I sit down and look at my watch, I realize that it's only Thursday. I can't believe how much has happened in just the last 3 days, from Detroit, to Boston, to Houston, and now the Rio Grande Valley. Time to finally relax and take a deep breath...

More to come from the road! As you probably figured out from the comments on the last post, the answer was "The Blower's Daughter" by Damien Rice. Can you guess the song that the title from this entry comes from? This one should be pretty easy, since about 10 million people have covered it...

For an introduction on me, you can check out my introduction blurb. To kick off my new blog, I thought I'd do some blogging from the road, with some "day in the life"s, similar to others that have been done in previous years (see left-hand column of the "the road" link). So feel free to follow along on my six weeks of adventures in Michigan, Texas, Seattle, and New York City!

Michigan
My first stop is Southeast Michigan - the place where I grew up! I decided to start the trip early and hang out with the fam for a bit, so I flew home a week early. We went "up north" for Labor Day weekend.

[SIDEBAR: for those that aren't familiar with the great state of Michigan, Michigan has two peninsulas - the "upper peninsula" (known as the "UP" - pronounced "you pee," not "up" as in the direction) and the "lower peninsula" (I don't think I've ever heard this called the "LP" or any shorter name - I don't know why). If you live in southern part of the lower peninsula, going "up north" usually refers to either a) going to the northern part of the lower peninsula, or b) going to the UP. In my case it's choice A.]

On the 4-hour drive up, we stopped at Taco Bell (mmmm...soft tacos), and finally arrived at my parents' cabin around 3pm. We then watched the Michigan football game for a bit, and then went to dinner with some family friends. After dinner, we played some Wii (my Mom recently got a Wii at her retirement party), and headed to bed.

The next day, we slept in, and went to a late brunch at one of my favorite local restaurants, Toonies. (OMG I didn't even know they had a website!) After that, my Mom wanted to go [blueberry/raspberry/peach/nectarine/apricot/some other in-season fruit] picking at a nearby orchard, so we quickly drove over to King Orchards. All the blueberries were picked for the season, and we didn't want to pick prickly raspberries, so we went for the peaches and nectarines.

There's Mom and Sis bein silly.

Only $15 for a half-bushel!

We also bought a bag of fresh apricots.

We also bought some yummy (real) cherry soda. (Sorry, I don't have a picture of that!) It's too bad it wasn't later in the season, or we could've started picking apples. I love apple picking.

After that we headed to a local golf course called "The Farm" to play some late-day golf. Here are just a few of the pictures I took of the scenery:

The area, like Vermont and New Hampshire, has some of the most beautiful foliage in the Fall. Unfortunately, most of the trees haven't started turning colors yet. Sad face.

After dinner, we watched this Japanese movie (with English subtitles) about this little girl and her family who rescued a dog off the street. The dog had babies, and then there was a big earthquake. Without spoiling the movie (because I'm sure you're going to somehow figure out which movie this is based on a 2-sentence plot description and no title), the dog tries to help rescue the family in Lassie-style fashion. My sister bawled her eyes out. Her husband (my brother-in-law) and I made fun of her. She smacked us.

My Mom recently bought Wii Fit, so after the movie, we played that for a while -- sooo addicting. But at least you're exercising while you play! I found out that I am horrible at yoga...

The next day, we drove back home, stopping at Toonies for another late brunch before heading out on the road. All in all, it was a fun and relaxing weekend.

Anyways, there's a brief synopsis of my adventures "up north" while at home in Michigan. I'll write more soon with a recap of my meeting in Ann Arbor, as well as my recent escapades in Houston...

P.S. Can you guess the song that the title of this entry comes from? The subtitle is also a (altered) clue. As often as I can, I'll be taking lyrics from some of my favorite songs and using them as blog entry titles (inspired by/stolen from Sam, although I probably will not be able to pull it off as cleverly or interestingly as he did). Solution to come in the next entry.