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For the past few weeks

I've been waking up in the morning and Couldn't understand: who I am, where I am, what day of the week it is, where it is that I am supposed to go now, and what I am supposed to do...

The Big Read by BBC

http://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/bigread/top200.shtml

1. The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien
2. Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen
3. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman
4. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
5. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, JK Rowling
6. To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee
7. Winnie the Pooh, AA Milne
8. Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell
9. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, CS Lewis
10. Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë
11. Catch-22, Joseph Heller
12. Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë
13. Birdsong, Sebastian Faulks
14. Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier
15. The Catcher in the Rye, JD Salinger
16. The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame
17. Great Expectations, Charles Dickens
18. Little Women, Louisa May Alcott
19. Captain Corelli's Mandolin, Louis de Bernieres
20. War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy
21. Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell
22. Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone, JK Rowling
23. Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets, JK Rowling
24. Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban, JK Rowling
25. The Hobbit, JRR Tolkien
26. Tess Of The D'Urbervilles, Thomas Hardy
27. Middlemarch, George Eliot
28. A Prayer For Owen Meany, John Irving
29. The Grapes Of Wrath, John Steinbeck
30. Alice's Adventures In Wonderland, Lewis Carroll
31. The Story Of Tracy Beaker, Jacqueline Wilson
32. One Hundred Years Of Solitude, Gabriel García Márquez
33. The Pillars Of The Earth, Ken Follett
34. David Copperfield, Charles Dickens
35. Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, Roald Dahl
36. Treasure Island, Robert Louis Stevenson
37. A Town Like Alice, Nevil Shute
38. Persuasion, Jane Austen
39. Dune, Frank Herbert
40. Emma, Jane Austen
41. Anne Of Green Gables, LM Montgomery
42. Watership Down, Richard Adams
43. The Great Gatsby, F Scott Fitzgerald
44. The Count Of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas
45. Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh
46. Animal Farm, George Orwell
47. A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens
48. Far From The Madding Crowd, Thomas Hardy
49. Goodnight Mister Tom, Michelle Magorian
50. The Shell Seekers, Rosamunde Pilcher
51. The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett
52. Of Mice And Men, John Steinbeck
53. The Stand, Stephen King
54. Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy
55. A Suitable Boy, Vikram Seth
56. The BFG, Roald Dahl
57. Swallows And Amazons, Arthur Ransome
58. Black Beauty, Anna Sewell
59. Artemis Fowl, Eoin Colfer
60. Crime And Punishment, Fyodor Dostoyevsky
61. Noughts And Crosses, Malorie Blackman
62. Memoirs Of A Geisha, Arthur Golden
63. A Tale Of Two Cities, Charles Dickens
64. The Thorn Birds, Colleen McCollough
65. Mort, Terry Pratchett
66. The Magic Faraway Tree, Enid Blyton
67. The Magus, John Fowles
68. Good Omens, Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
69. Guards! Guards!, Terry Pratchett
70. Lord Of The Flies, William Golding
71. Perfume, Patrick Süskind
72. The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, Robert Tressell
73. Night Watch, Terry Pratchett
74. Matilda, Roald Dahl
75. Bridget Jones's Diary, Helen Fielding
76. The Secret History, Donna Tartt
77. The Woman In White, Wilkie Collins
78. Ulysses, James Joyce
79. Bleak House, Charles Dickens
80. Double Act, Jacqueline Wilson
81. The Twits, Roald Dahl
82. I Capture The Castle, Dodie Smith
83. Holes, Louis Sachar
84. Gormenghast, Mervyn Peake
85. The God Of Small Things, Arundhati Roy
86. Vicky Angel, Jacqueline Wilson
87. Brave New World, Aldous Huxley
88. Cold Comfort Farm, Stella Gibbons
89. Magician, Raymond E Feist
90. On The Road, Jack Kerouac
91. The Godfather, Mario Puzo
92. The Clan Of The Cave Bear, Jean M Auel
93. The Colour Of Magic, Terry Pratchett
94. The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho
95. Katherine, Anya Seton
96. Kane And Abel, Jeffrey Archer
97. Love In The Time Of Cholera, Gabriel García Márquez
98. Girls In Love, Jacqueline Wilson
99. The Princess Diaries, Meg Cabot
100. Midnight's Children, Salman Rushdie

Over 7 mln views on Youtube...

 

Somebody just had to come up with this!

 

The funniest part though is how quickly the popular song was picked up and played around with close to November 6 :

Of course Republicans could not have leaft this unanswered!

And next weekend we're going to a Gangnam Style dance Flash Mob in Washington Park =)

It was an interesting and intense week

Presentation of management consulting groups  - definitely broadening horizons of my understanding of the industry. Interesting how companies being together in the same service fields have quite different vision on their perfect hires and yet same vision of the result they want to achieve. Some of the presenting managers are easy going and confident and look for hard working and innovative graduates, others - are pushy and focus on perfectionism, GPA scores and other qualities that usually define a Type-A worker easy to manipulate :) Yet - the consulting services, tactics and goals are similar.

IBC soiree rocked as always. Interesting acquaintances, great atmosphere, mind-challenging topic for conversation. God bless this club that clears up the despair and stupidity buildup from my brain in a few hours!

Midway into my last semester it turned out a graphic calculator is required for my Senior level Financial class. For just one topic.  Last and only time I used it - was for my Calculus class. And I sold it right after.

Von Zobel is done with his lasik. Knocking on the wood and feeling proud for this guy!
Thanks to him we now have our fridge full of super tasty food! :)

Dad... might be able to get out of that Forge Plant swamp eventually. Knocking on the wood for him as well.

Certain things just started to fall back into place.

It's past midnight

and I am watching a video in Thai on Youtube on how to use TI BA II Plus to calculate MIRR.

.... Just For my information  - years later - on how I got to such a life...

Woke up
Drove to work
Worked
Drove to school
Sat through two classes
Drove home
Cooked
Ate
Worked out
Took a shower
Worked again
Started a group project
Crawled to bed lighting up my way to bedroom with a cell phone
Slept.


*****

They say it's labor that turned ape into a human... I think labor has just the opposite effect on me! ;)

In the light of recent visit to USCIS

I remembered how I stopped at their office a couple of months earlier to drop off some pictures and documents.

It was a Monday morning, and apart from one applicant of African origin there was a European looking couple with 2 daughters before me in the wait line. The couple had a French accept and in an upset tone were explaining to the officer why they exceeded the length of their stay per their visas. The officer was explaining them their two options - both in accordance with V&I legislation and by the upset voice and long pauses of the man I could tell he was not quite happy of losing the opportunity of getting entrance visas to the US. And it did sound like their visas applications might be denied forever now...

The little girls behind my back were reading a book in French, sharing the replicas of the characters and making up details and stories about them. That was too cute and they had no clue what was going on. Their parents sounded even more upset and demanding; as if in disbelief that they have to cope with the rules, and no exception can be made for them.

I heard all these voices in my both ears and ... could not help smiling! Wondering what their nationality was, I thought that life is not always black and white, and that one can never rely on the immunity of what is perceived to be widely-recognized and generally accepted characteristics. And then I also thought that maybe life is not so unfair after all :)

UCSIC is definitely was the best investment in my life! =)

*** Feel free like a bird and - hurray!!

Lipetsk saw me in

with abundant greenery, heavy heat and gloomy faces. From time to time it is less and less like the town I knew and grew up in.

Every time I come there I feel like the place got more crowded and stuffy. People in the streets in mid-Summer heat: pressed down. Humid, sticky heat. Heavy air.  Few teens and kids: are they all in summer camps? Are they not let out in the heat?

 More cars on the road, more trafic jams,  but few parking spaces. The first floors of houses are made into grocery and clothes stores, hair salons, notaries, watch and shoe repair... Shops are everywhere. You'd think everyone's in retail and sales.

Ads painted right on the pavement - "Eat Sushi at Home" and - a phone number. Men and women handing around in parks at night. Beer in bottle. Laughter, music, kids, dogs. The contrast between women 35 and under and over 35 - is too obvious, but I could not describe or explain it if I had to. Maybe it's all about self-perception and expectations and perspecives for the remainder of your life based on achievements and social status? And looks?..

It's amazing how many clothes stores are now in Lipetsk. Good style, good quality, higher prices - that I got used to in...   the past years.

In my Maternal Granmother's courtyard the pavement is ruined, big wholes in the asphalt and no benches to sit on. Iron entrance doors with codes. The Chestnut tree outside Granny's window grew huge; a shield against summer sun.

Sokol - looks and feels like Costa-Rica: incredibly green, hot and casual. The park became jungles... Houses are well painter from front sides with paint cracking and chipping off at the back side.
Paternal Ganny and Grandpa's courtyard is filled with cats and pigeons. Holes in pavement and slabs are crushing. Granny and Grandpa's birch grew tall and... branchy. Older women occupy the benches outside and just like 1.5 decade ago look at me with curiosity. Granny never had time to sit outside with them, neither does she have time now. Grandpa has not been outside in months.

"Stolpovskiy is a goat" read garages nearby. Ha! Someone got angry with Uncle but is feeling powerless ? Politics :)  He is starting up a new project - Sokol district got a new, clean, well equipped and professionally staffed medical center. With the remaining space around building wisely made into parking spaces :)

What does it mean when you meet people you have not seen in years, some for just a couple years, and some - in about 7 years - and they do not ask you questions, and do not tell you anything about their lives? And behave so naturally as if you just left yesterday?

Doctors and clinics - make me feel like a cripple who won't live past 40. Because:  *fill in with a long list of symptoms * . Oh, this long-forgotten feeling.

Dogs barking at night. I am so knocked out by day's marathons in the heat I sleep right through.

The river is monopolized by motorboats. Loud and stinky. You have to pick the swimming area just right - so you are far enough from the shore with silt, shells and roots of the water plants and not too close to the middle of the river where a drunk or careless driver of a motorboat can run you over.

Did not make it to Rechnoe garden. Maybe it's best to keep it in my memory as it used to be?

Dad's worried and offering help. He and Angelina never slow down. They have a whole garden with greenhouses. Fresh tomatoes and cucumbers for breakfast every day. Some special cheesecake bars from Voronezh :)

Prices kill me. Economical natural selection in action...

The shelves in the office in Dad;s house are full of books. And foreign language study books and tapes. Dad is hooked up on cosy, good feel comedies. I feel him.

Watermelons are sold right from big trucks parked along the freeways. Friends are giggling: "Only on August 2 you can't buy a watermelon. No, you just try to explain to somebody from abroad why on August 2nd you can't buy a watermelon anywhere in Russia! Who can figure that out?!"
A somewhat  sadistic joke. Hmm.

Never made it to the forest. I wonder what it looks like now. Will preserve this for my next trip and conserve this piece of the past together with my other souvenirs...

It's the beginning of the end.

My brain does not cooperate.

Sometimes morning news

can change in a split second a thought "I made a mistake" to a thought "Whatever. At least I have time to set things right".

Ops Management professor during the class:

- It smels like fire in here!  There must be a toaster standing outside the classroom and somebody's frying a toast...

Don't eat up my slack!

The first week of the new summer schedule trial revealed its major fault: I somehow forgot to include time slots for meals and rest :)
Very true actually! A Freudian slip in time management... Why putting on your schedule something that does not really take place in your life? :) I eat at my desk or in the car, or on the way from classroom to parking lot... Have rest in car or - techincally "family" time is rest too... Or while doing laundry or cooking - my Dad would say that change of things you're doing is itself a rest.

From the other hand I started to get jealous and protective of my time as never-never before. Almost irritated when something unplanned comes up and messes up my plans. Our professor in Operations Management tells us scarry stories about contractors fired because of inefficient time use; and I do feel those project managers right now, sometimes holding myself tight from yelling outloud: "Don' eat up my slack!!!"

I realized that without an efficient time management system I won't survive this summer

Had to update my schedule :)  So now I have a schedule that breaks down all 7 days of the week by activities and time slots. The day would now start at quarter to 6, and finish at 11. And would have shorter period of time for studies, chores and self-development every day. Even the weekends have blocks of several hours for catching up with work, studies, family and social life =)

Looking forward to pulling off this experiment successfully!

The spring was hectic.

The summer promisses to be even more crazy.
Note to self: if one day I find myself missing this time of my life: remember about my rejected petition for internship excemption, request for additional evidence from CIS, and Lisa's rejected petition for housing off campus.
In addition to the 45 hour work week, 2 classes and insane heat.

And with desperate attempts to create somewhat significant life memories...

Me in the language-learning world

How awesome would it be to be the main character in some foreign language study book?!

First, I would have had a very  typical,  very traditional name for the country I was born in, and for the language the book was written for. Margot in my world of Manuel de Francais.   Margaretha - in some Deutsch ohne Probleme :) Last name would be pretty typical for the area too; although it could have an unusual sequence of letters, if would be no longer than 2 syllables, and definitely shorter than 11 letters.

In the event if I was not born in the same country where the action in the units of the books takes place, I could still be a lucky tourist or a visitor to this country. Say, came to Rome to visit my friend for a month and meanwhile - picking up a little Italian :) My host family would be extremely friendly and nice to me: in the very first  few units they all introduce themselves to me,  would show me around the city, do a tour of the local sights. In the following few days I would visit a local university and talk with one of the local professors about the differences in education between their country and my home country. I would go to a grocery store and purchase some random amounts of some random foods: one kilo of apples, 200 gr of cheese, salad, 1/2 kg of potatoes.  Then I would go to a shoe store and would purchase the second pair of shoes I was recommended.

In the middle of the book I would see a doctor about something minor. I would complain about simultaneous headaches, sore throat, loss of appetite and sleep - and would sounds as miserable about it as possible. The doctor would take my temperature and diagnose a cold or a flu; write a prescription for something good for fighting merciless seasonal flu and would see me off with all the most pleasant wishes to get well and promises to check on me in a couple of days to make sure my cold is getting better.  Whatever you came to your doctor with,  he will never look at you like at an idiot, and would be most sensitive, polite and pleasant. In foreign language study books everyone is always sensitive, polite and pleasant - wherever you go. Talking back ,swearing and being rude  is never considered in these books :)

Once feeling alive again I would head out to a local museum or art gallery. I would talk about entertainment and music with my friend, ending up in a long discussion with all her family about their tastes and preferences.
Having realized that it is about my time to leave, and I have not tried much of the traditional cuisine, my friend would invite me and several friends of hers to a restaurant where the traditional dishes make at least 50% of the menu.

On my departure day, the whole family would say buy to me, me a good trip back and would be invited to stay with me whenever they go to my home country :) everyone would be polite and pleasant. After all, all the foreign language books are about nice and pleasant adventures in A foreign country  with a  happy ending :)

Done.

Was able to put all Jons and Michaels into the right place, got the history and the civics right... 6 in a row answers were correct, did not have to go up to 10 :)

Thoughts of the day:  If a simple sentence "When is Thanksgiving" suffices for language proficiency, -  my work emails are definitely quite impressive.

And - following their method of placing the position in front of the name, I should ask to be addressed at work as Consultant Rita =)

I logged out of my second International Markets Finance exam

 with a strong feeling that it is as bad as it gets: the final tasks was to summarize Dodd-Frank reform: one sentence for each title...

Nevertheless, the Bank Analysis project proved me completely wrong.
I looked at the task list and understood that this project alone should weigh full course worth credits. There was so much to do, that even with the instructions and UBPR already distributed to us I could hardly imagine where to begin to get the best use of my time (which I barely had).

By the time I fished out all the numbers and was done with the calculations for DuPont analysis I got pretty optimistic about finishing this project by the end of summer semester :) NIM and Burden analysis got me completely lost in UBPR: could neither understand where the numbers in the example came from, nor - how the calculations in the example were done and results were obtained if the formulas in the instructions were used.

By the time I got  to peer analysis I realized I would only finish this project when I retire.
The analysis itself was, as always, the least painful part. The bank sucked badly compared to its peers throughout my whole analysis sections - luckily for me, since the actual entity was shut down in 2008...
With project and tasks like this, I sometimes feel it's not even possible to get the bottom of it ; but eventually,  with just a bit great deal of persistence, flax seeds oil, coffee and Visine - I manage to break through. Some time after that the story repeats itself =)

The bottom line and the note to self: to go over this post if I ever decide to go to grad school.

Somethimes I feel that if I take one more step forward - I will die

... and then I will fall down on the ground and fall asleep =)

"Tap to the left... or to the right...." (c)

I made myself an unexpected gift this year and... somehow, from out of nowhere, I was able to download Liquidator.

I've no idea why for the past many-many years I only remembered about this computer game right before this New Year. Of course, I was already getting a different impression of the game now; some things did not seem to be that exciting anymore, some seemed just absurd...

... But nevertheless I got carried away by a wave of memories of how, these many-many years ago I played this game with my school best friend, on her computer, in her room. Back then this was one of the few Russian action computer games, something rather original... We had one keyboard so we had to  share our responsibilities in such a way that my friend was navigating while I was jumping, shooting and opening the doors. After a while we would switch =)

... We would burst into evil giggling; we mocked at the voice and the catch phrases of the operator in the game; shoot napalm into walking skeletons, ghosts and wizards; and once, when we opened a door and were suddenly attacked by some weird butcher with an axe  - we both screamed outloud =)

The daily routine rush sucks you in so smoothly and unexpectedly you don't even notice it

 until at one moment you realize you are out of juice and out of breath and your thoughts are straggling. Quantity of tasks are inversely proportional to quantity of time.

No, no one said it would be easy. But with hindsight - I should be probably used to this by now, if not ashamed of the spontaneous moments of weakness. If at 10 I could combine  school, with good grades in my "special mathematical class", music school, extra English lessons, books, friends and some creative activities - 15 years later, I just must be a professional multi-tasker!

"Breathe!" - says my boxing instructor.- "If you do not breathe you won't get enough strength and concentration for your punches".

"Don't forget to breathe" - says my yoga instructor,- " You are rushing into your poses too much. Take it slow, move smoothly and keep on breathing deep".

...If I have already done so much to bring myself to where I am now, I bet I can do more. There is nothing in my life now that has not happened before, in one form or another; only when knowledge and skills grow and develop - the challenges become harder, and the goals - higher. And that must be a good sign :)

So I continue working, and studying, and writing, and reading, and running, and punching, and cooking, and learning something new, and playing the piano, and laughing with friends, and making travel plans, and planning my next big leap.

And breathing...

My winter weekends of 2012

There is something wrong about your immediate supervisor actually telling you to go home...

New Year cleaning

You know that your regular workouts finally start to pay off... when scrubbing a dark dye spot in a bath tub with a double force makes it come out =)