The last year of my life in bullet points

A lot has happened in my life over the past 12 months. One year ago I was in Ann Arbor. I am here now as well. Between these A2 stints a bunch of stuff happened to me. I had the best and worst months of my life. Some relationships became much stronger, while others completely disintegrated. There are very few things I did that I regret, though those few things stick out like gaping wounds because of just how deeply I regret them. I only did like three stupid things, but they were VERY stupid, and they all involved women. Three is also the number of women involved in this time line, though the distribution of said mistakes was not even among them. I learned a lot I guess. Here's a brief recap in deliberately ambiguous bullet point form. I don't overtly name anyone, though it should be rather obvious to anyone who knows me who these people are. No one reads this anyways so it doesn't really matter.


August/September,

Moved to The Upper East Side of Manhattan!

Met Carter Page. You don’t know who he is because he doesn’t want you to.

Jogged in Central Park.

Had the most awkward, even painful interview of my life at www.priny.com They felt I handled it quite well and decided to hire me.

A poorly defined 3 year relationship ended over the course of five minutes or was it one month, or was five months? idk. I do know that over those five minutes it was clearly redefined as nonexistent going forward. This was my fault. I didn’t mind at the time. Maybe this was the problem? Maybe...

Watched my chosen industry unravel over a similarly bleak time scale. This was not my fault.

Talked to a lot of people in Nigeria over the phone.

Played a small role in closing an international deal worth hundreds of millions of dollars. On that note, I was completely unpaid (though I’m sure PRI, would argue not uncompensated) even though I feel I added real value to the project. This in contrast to my previous work at a law firm in Detroit where I was paid much more than the marginal product of my labor would dictate.

Found the Brooklyn warehouse party scene, and met a very smart and beautiful girl from Park Slope as a result.



October (Without a doubt the best month of my life,)

Had my first kiss with Park Slope girl here: ( Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Reservoir, Central Park) at sunset.

Spoke Chinese over the phone at work! Everyone thought I was so cool. I was thinking about how cool it would have been if they had given me money.

Met a bunch of members from the cast of Gossip Girl at a bar.

Was mistaken for a Hassidic Jew in Williamsberg.

Saw TV on The Radio play in Brooklyn

Saw Dan Deacon play in Brooklyn

Went to maybe 20 loft/warehouse parties

Met Bill Clinton on the street, and shook his hand

Was punched in the face on my birthday

Found Isaiah Berlin, rather, Joel Rosenthal found him for me.



November,


Robert Mugabe called my friend a witch, coming from a total asshole like him this is a badge of honor.

Saw Obama win the election at a bar in the East Village with my Canadian friend and a gay couple from Sweden who just had to apologize for anything bad that may have happened to my mother when she grew up there.

Remembered to eat lunch and dinner in the same day with Park Slope girl’s help.

Ran out of money.

Had Thanksgiving dinner with Park Slope girl at 11:55PM on the Upper East Side. We had steak, fuck turkey.


December,

Slept for more than 4 hours a day

Had my last Upper East Side brunch, for now...

Made the “mistake” of writing someone a letter of apology, the mistake of course was that everything in it was true...

Decided that said letter a was mistake

Decided that said letter was not a mistake, but that giving it to its recipient was.

Decided writing said letter was a mistake.

Didn’t mind writing that letter and finally decided that writing/delivering it was not a mistake...



January (without a a doubt the worst month of my life),

Went on a road trip, and was almost killed by a drunk driver. Douchebag. I almost died in Ohio on the highway, how boring.

Went crazy in Pennsylvania , like certifiably crazy. (no joke, I was a mess)

Wrote a very a stupid email. Like the dumbest, least coherent thing I’ve ever written in my life. Writing/sending this was a mistake. (I was CRAZY)

All the girls at Bucknell were quite attracted to me in my crazed state.

Drove home and was no longer crazy.

Woke up to hear Obama become president of the United States.

Saw Park Slope girl for the last time. Remembered how to properly break up with someone you care bout, and did so. It wasn’t as sad or hard as I had expected it to be.


February,


Fell in love with the smartest girl in the world. A very hot European law student. (She is so hot that the Croatian word for ‘sunshine’ is in her name) I’m in an astronomy class right now and we learned that the sun is very HOT. We ironically lived closer to each other in Manhattan than we did at Bard. But we never chilled in NYC.

Started coaching ice hockey. 33-7-2, something like that.



March/April/May,

Nothing unique happened at all really, I went to Puerto Rico, it was a waste of money.

I did start working for the Dutchess county legislature, Fighting corruption!!!!



June/July/August,


Moved to Ann Arbor, and like(d) it.

Found Ambrosia

Was asked for $600 from a drifter. At Ambrosia.

Saw someone get taken to the hospital after being hit in the head with a large stick, outside of Ambrosia.

Learned I don’t like astronomy, it’s all lies!!!

Found a useful sleep pattern (one that does not revolve around days)

Was asked to join a business venture in Eastern Europe, will I?

Finished reading Bonfire of the Vanities which I started last August.

Started reading Man in Full Maybe I’ll finish by next August.




It was an interesting year. To me anyways.



Alex

What's not to love

http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2009/07/in_praise_of_immigration.cfm

It's very often that a policy or social view is so transperantly good for economic growth and moral conscience but liberal immigration polices managing to do both. All of this manages to ignore the balance of power gains from allowing a speaker of Egyptian arabic or say Albert Einstein into our country. Quality of life arguments against immigration seem to be catalyzed by purely xenophobic hatred for outsiders rather than sound economic argument. It may be true that These people would uncomfortable living with so called foreigners in Queens or Dearborn. I don't know why one should care much about their opinion, especially when its hurts our country in the long run. these people also seem to forget that their ancestors likely came here on boat a few thousand years after the original inhabitants of North America did anyways. They always seem to draw the line of when immigration became unacceptable to shortly after their own family arrived. How convenient.