Bucket List

So it's been awhile since I've posted. I'm pretty sure I'm going to try to make up for it by posting twice. (It's like when you eat a salad after eating a steak to even out your diet, right? That makes sense I'm pretty sure...)

So I was extraordinarily motivated late one night while I was daydreaming about my new goal to travel the world. I came up with a loosely-organized plan, listed all the places I want to visit, tried to find the cheapest way to do it all, and wrote it all down in an Evernote list.

Then while I was motivated I came up with a bucket list. I expected to forget all about it and procrastinate doing any of it. But it turns out when you're unemployed you've got lots of free time (that which isn't being spent applying places, that is...) to do the stuff you've always been meaning to do.

Anyway, here's my work-in-progress list. I'm currently working on four of them. These are not in any kind of prioritized order.

• Travel the world
• Chop down a tree with an ax
• Mona rope swing one more time
• Ask out a complete stranger
• Build a computer from components
• Learn to make beautiful websites
• Go to culinary school (or at least a few great culinary classes)
• Get married to the girl of my dreams
• Move out of Utah
• Learn/memorize how to fold a fitted sheet
• Fly a kite from a mountain
• Leave a message in a bottle with my contact info
• Do as much family history research as I can get information for
• Go on a date in a foreign country
• Learn Spanish
• Learn French
• Learn Italian
• Learn Japanese
• Learn to do a kick flip on a skateboard
• Learn how to do a backflip
• Make money from selling an iPhone app
• Start a successful business
• Learn to sing like I've always wanted to be able to
• Learn to play the piano
• Start practicing violin again and perform again at least once
• Try growing my hair out
• Ride an elephant
• Be in a place with 24 hours of light/darkness
• See the northern lights
• Throw and catch a boomerang
• Take a road trip on a motorcycle
• Learn to sail
• Learn to tie all those knots from boy scouts I forgot (and know when they're used)
• Learn to pick a lock
• Learn to hot wire a car (if reasonably possible...?)

Can you guess which four I'm currently engaged in?

Overwhelming

My checklist of things to do before I leave for LaGuardia airport to fly back to Provo for the rest of summer:

• Finish preparations for and give our Comms 381 group presentation
• Write three 5-paragraph essays for my Comms 381 final
• Finish up and fax in all my internship forms and do an exit interview for BBDO
• Return a bunch of clothes for H&M
• Buy a new suit from a shop we found a few weeks ago
• Do all of my laundry
• Pack everything, including figuring out how I'm going to fit the tennis balls I bought. (This may include buying a cheap new suitcase)
• Write thank you notes to the people I've been working with at BBDO New York
• Take pictures with the friends I've made in the program and say my goodbyes
• Somewhere in here get 2 nights worth of sleep (yeah right)
• Go to work tomorrow (this will have to end up being a half day for me, as I can't finish everything otherwise)

I feel just as blindsided by having to leave NYC as I was to leave Provo. I wasn't very emotionally affected by leaving Provo until I was in the car on the way to the airport.

I wonder when it'll finally hit me that my time here is over already.

So it just hit me how much work I (1) didn't do over the Thanksgiving break that I was planning on doing, and (2) how much work that means I have to do this week to make sure I'm on top of things.

It'll feel so good to get it all done though, which is the only motivation I can find to actually get the work done.

Ughmath

The title is in opposition of the YouTube channel "Yaymath," which has actually given me a great review of math principles I've forgotten over the years.

Speaking of math, I think that if you let f(x) = (1/x) = number of showers I took today, x being the amount of busyness/fun I had today, then:

lim x->infinity f(x) = 1/x = 0.

In other (real-people) words, I was so super busy/had so much fun today that I definitely never had a chance to take a shower... whoops.

Woke up at 8, studied math until 9:45, took my test from 10-12, regretted some of my answers from 12:15-12:45, picked up Ari to run some prepare-for-NYC errands, etc. from 1-3:20, sold another football ticket/went to the dismal football game from 3:20-6-ish, ate some Dairy Queen, gassed up my car, and went to the Real Salt Lake Soccer game from 7-11-ish.

Some concerns of mine as of late:

• I don't know how things are happening in NYC yet. I don't even know where our place is...
• I feel like I should feel like I have a TON to do to get ready for NYC, but I feel like I just need to pack and then I'll be ready.
• I find myself wanting to listen to Dashboard Confessional. Those of you who really know me know what that means.
• I *really* want to get As in all of my classes this semester but I'm starting to wonder if that's going to happen...

Well I'm going to bed. This should be an interesting week to say the least.

After today!

Matt, this one's for you. Well actually just the title.

Four presentations and 2 books down. Just 1 1/2 more short (easy) essays and 225 papers to grade. At least that's what I keep telling myself. Really, even after I grade the papers I have to spend hours putting them all into excel and making sure everyone's grade is right, and ranking the speakers by how much the students liked them.

But I get paid to do all that, so it's not like it's the worst thing in the world.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FoIFa94fD3c

Except not about a girl. More the whole finishing the year of school thing.

UPDATE: Essays are done, so I'm officially done with classes this semester! The 225 papers and everything else with work remain. For now...

To-do List

So I seriously have the worst memory of anyone I know. I'm not sure what brings it on. Sometimes I feel like I'm very smart in some ways, and very dumb in others, and when it comes to remembering things, I definitely fall on the dumber side...

So I make lists. Except when I forget to. And then sometimes I forget to look at the lists.

• Find housing for Fall/Winter of next year
• Figure out my schedule and what classes to take in order to boost my GPA as much as possible
• Make sure I have something substantial to do this Summer
• Find somewhere to volunteer regularly
• Get back in to doing things in the AdLab
• Learn SEO (work with LeadGenix?) and see if my idea for an NPO could work...
• Get involved in some other program where I can gain leadership skills
• Get a job -or- see if I can get the bulk sales thing going to make some side cash while I attempt to stay sane doing everything else above.

The funny thing is I know I can do it all, but fear of failure stops me.

No more.