Love that dirty water

Love that dirty water Ive returned from France to the States just in time for lots of exciting things: the arrival of the Class of 2008 on campus, the announcemen of MITs new president, a big Red Sox winning streak a pretty exciting time around these parts. Its great to be back in Boston. And now that Ive returned from a long time away, Im getting ready to head out on the road again for my Admissions World Tour 2004. Well, maybe not World Tour per se, but I will be hitting the metropolitan New York City, Baltimore/Washington, Seattle, Portland, and San Francisco Bay areas. If youre in one of those areas, I hope youll come see me at one of my meetings (you can RSVP at this link). Yesterday was a pretty good day. For most of the day, the entire Admission staff met to prepare for our respective World Tours. We brought in some speakers to give us some good stories to tell on the road. Perhaps the best stories were provided by Prof. Kim Vandiver, the director of the Edgerton Center. Dont be surprised if at the meeting you attend you hear us repeating some of Kims experiences with, say, the Solar Car Team or D-Lab. After work, I caught up with some friends and students in the Concourse Program lounge in Building 16 for our semi-regular gaming. The game of the day was Puerto Rico, which I had enjoyed previously with my friends Beth Brian in Seattle. I sadly had to leave before we started playing Seafarers so that I could go check out Mitras awesome Class of 2008 party in the Stata Center, then off to do some bar trivia with some of my old MIT Quiz Bowl buddies. One more note about France: I wish I were still an undergraduate, so that I could take advantage of a free trip to Paris! I picked up a copy of the MIT newspaper today and one item caught my eye: it said that MIT was seeking undergraduates with French proficiency to go on a two-week, all-expences paid cultural trip to Paris! The program, which I was just hearing about for the first time but I suppose has been around for at least two years, is called January Scholars in France. MIT has all these secret trips, if you know where to look Civil Engineering students going to Hawaii, Earth Science students going to the Galapagos Islands, City Planning students going to Venice or Barcelona or yes, the list goes on. Current music: R.E.M., Lifes Rich Pageant (their best album and theyll be in Boston on October 29!)