Anxiety and Looking for ... ?

Got into UCDavis, unofficially, of course. They are going to recommend me for admission to the Graduate Admissions Office. So there is a slight chance that I won't actually get in. Naturally I shouldn't hear good news so early. But I am more anxious about my future plans in terms of finding something to do this summer. Anyone looking for a newly graduate who specializes in research methods.

Three exams next week. Econometrics on Tuesday, History of Battle on Wednesday, and Public Health on Friday. History of battle is turning to be a lecture version of a History Channel special, so I have been (unconsciously?) very attentive in class. The only bothersome part is where I have to identify locations on a map. Really? A map? I thought the important parts of history were not memorizing the locations and dates but instead understanding the rationale behind events, (insert critical analysis things), etc. I am not too worried about the exams themselves, just that I have three next week.

Realized last Friday that I have to write my thesis. "Realized" is a soft way of putting it - I was actually startlingly reminded by my Thesis co-Chair that I have to churn out a draft soon. Whoops... currently on page 6. Should finish the theoretical section today and start reporting some numbers and charts by the end of next week. Wait, exams next week. Okay, the week after that then...

Jobs? Jobs.

Yesterday I wrote my first real cover letter. By "real," I mean I actually want someone to read it and think, "Oh, I think I can hire this guy or call him in for an interview." I mostly been faking this whole look-for-a-real-job-after-graduation-thing, but I realized (aka my parents finally convinced me) that I need to set up a back-up in case my grad applications completely fall through.

Which they were in danger of doing so.

They (well, some of us) call this era the Golden Age of Information. Obviously, this means that when a professor submits a recommendation online, the system does not follow through and actually acknowledge and file away that recommendation. What to do? Some Internet stalking (Golden Age of Information ftw!) later, I called his house number because he had been unresponsive to his work email and office number (Golden Age of... Information?). Everything should be solved, but it turns out that until we get cybernetic implants that allows us to remain constantly connected to information networks (Ghost in the Shell, much?) the most important factor is how close to can keep ourselves to that information highway.

I'm not a Fanboy, I'm not a Fanboy

Regardless of my interest in video games and other media forms (Harry Potter and some animes, anyone?) I do not consider myself a fanboy by any means. I can control my passionate interests around other people, and if asked to write an essay on it, I can keep it concise and excitement at a minimum for a typical audience.

First.... omg assassin's creed brotherhood looks amazing. I am slightly disappointed I won't be able to play it until next semester when I bring my PS3 to cornell. The combat system shift towards the offensive along strings of assassination kills, managing your brotherhood of assassins, using them in gameplay, and so much more that hasn't even been revealed yet. I desperately want it.

I've also been trying to find a coop video game to play with my girlfriend - so she isn't bored out of her mind when I am playing - and am rediscovering PS3 splitscreen shooters. I am deciding between CoD: WaW and Resistance 1.

Anyway, I am writing my grad essay for stanford and I am trying to hard not to sound like a fanboy when I am writing about Caroline Hoxby. But she is freaking amazing. She's advised disserations for Kirabo Jackson, Sandra Black, Bridget Long, and Leah Boustan who are awesome in their own right. I would probably give a toe just to work under her... but it's hard trying not to sound like a fanboy in my essay

Really a Zero-Sum Game

$2324.

That's how much my 25 graduate applications will cost me, including sending my GRE scores - this is kind of ridiculous. Undergraduate applications were nothing like this at all. I am applying to so many schools because it is very hard to get into grad schools and random luck plays a large role in applications since the incoming class size is often less than 30 or 40.

While writing this post, I took two schools of my list. I can afford to be more selective about schools since I am interested in labor and education economics. Most schools don't have faculty who seem to be really into it.

Go big, or go home...?

Ridiculously Busy Procrastinating

Okay so taking 20 credits wasn't entirely in my plans... I am getting my hands into some real research. I am pulling data files from the Displaced Workers Survey Supplement to the Current Population Survey for my thesis. This involves looking at a codebook, finding the right column numbers to pull data from, and then using Stata to pull them out. Apparently it's easier with SAS but... I don't know how to use SAS. Crap.

On top of that is my original research project from the summer that I have to reconcile (aka, actually do). Although it is part of one of my classes, I definitely feel more invested in it then I would be if it were a typical class. My other classes so far don't seem like a lot of work. Oh, wait, there's the real analysis class. yeah...

On the other hand, courses for next semester - my last undergrad semester - have come out! Some out of the way classes that seem interesting so far are CS1110 with Java, and the History of Battle. Yes, the history of warfare. Hell yes.

So much to do...

and less and less time to do it. I got my thesis approved (!) which means I'm taking 20 credits now. My thesis is on the signal effect of sources of unemployment on displaced workers' re-employment wages and probabilities. The proposal only skimmed the surface of a decent working model, so I have to work on the theoretical model as well as learn how a hazard model works. The work is far from menial and should definitely be fun.

Not as fun is that I'm also trying to stamp out a decent personal statement, but I have many different things to talk about. I hope I can fit everything into the 500 word limit.

Here, There, Everywhere

It's the second week of school and Labor Day Weekend is here. I'm pretty excited to start the long weekend of reading and problem sets - no, really.

I ended up dropping the evolution class because (a) it's a freshmen class, and (b) I have to read 6 books to write three ten-page papers. Too much work for a three credit class I wanted to take just for fun. So I swapped it for an IO class - because (a) it's an economics class! (b) I kept on seeing IO as a research specialty for econ professors, and (c) because there are problem sets. Problem sets are always so straight forward compared to those convoluted readings.

The economic analysis of the university class is getting to be fun too. This afternoon I was shooting ideas for my research paper in my head and it was an absolute blast! I haven't done that since around July and the high I got out of it was amazing.

On the other hand... analysis is confusing. To make matters worse, my prof has parkinsons so whatever he wrong on the board starts normal sized and then gets smaller, smaller, and smaller. That and he always stands in front whatever he's writing so when I doze off for a bit (which happens often, it's right before lunch!) I immediately become lost.

Oh, and applications? Yeah, applications. Need to work on a good personal statement.

Is this it?

I just registered for Fall 2010 courses this morning, and a little while later I realized I just signed up for my last year of college. Real college. Graduate school, no matter how it may seem, is not college version 2. This freedom I have now, that I've had these past three years, will only last one more year.

On a related note, I just got a dabbling about "projection bias" in my behavioral econ class. It says although people can see how their preferences will change in the future, they will underestimate the magnitude of that change. Maybe right now I am underestimating how I will miss college after it's over. So have fun now!

In related terms, I am taking Intertemporal Econ next semester, and I found the textbook for the class in the mathematics library. Its a pretty tough read, and I think the professor already thinks I leaning towards wimping out and not rising to the challenge. Well, I can work through that book, so I accept your challenge! concede and now I am taking Causual Reasoning and Policy Evaluation instead.

Pi Day Celebration!

First, I have a gripe about today. It is March 14, 3/14, Pi Day: where we celebrate the wonders from this great number. It is also Daylights Savings Time, when we "spring forward" one hour. Why this specific number? Because of... Pi? Yes, without Pi we would have Daylights Savings Time, but an inaccurate one at that. We would spend years of trial and error trying to calibrate our time systems without our dear Pi. The gripe? I demand an extra hour today so I can study for my exam (midterm, prelim, whatever) tomorrow.

Next, there have been an increasing number of student deaths at Cornell via the bridges. It is difficult to properly address the irrational activity of such students but... no, I can't talk about this. It just doesn't jive well for me.

Anyway, my spring break (unofficially starts) this Thursday! I am going to be taking the bus back early Friday morning to get home in the late morning. I did the same thing last summer and I remember not being able to sleep on the bus as I originally planned. Maybe I should buy some sleeping pills? Or I might just sneak some liquor on board and pass out after the bus drives by Binghamton. I will probably do neither and just force myself to sleep by eating a lot of food. That's a pretty safe way to go about doing it.

Here are my spring break goals!

• Play Assassin's Creed 2: I did not buy FFXIII. While I could finish it in the one week of time I have, I would also neglect other freedoms on my spring break - such as eating and sleeping - so I am going to wait until the summer to sign away my life on it. AC2 is a substitute, and I won't miss it as much when I come back to campus.
• Visit RU: This is pretty self-explanatory. The only problem is how to get there. The RUPD is pretty stringent about parking so I will have to bum a ride from someone. I think I will spend two days and a night there, I am not completely sure yet. There are a lot of people I want to see and party with, so it will be fun!
• Read Harmless Econometrics: I borrowed it, need to finish it.
• Try not to think about my research project: I have been thinking about instead of daydreaming, and I used to daydream a lot. Even though I am doing it for my personal gratification, it feels more and more like work than play.

Pre-Gaming

If you want to do something for a long time, you should try it out first to see if you like it.
Let's define "try it out." For most people this is an internship or research position at an organization or with a professor where they (let's face it) do bitch work. Things in the intern market have gotten better since the "get me coffee and make copies of this" phase." (I'm not even sure if that was the previous state of the intern market: any studies out there on intern conditions?) But it's still pretty monotonous stuff.
It's also pretty important monotonous stuff. I've been doing some thinking about my research project and where I am going to get my data from. I'm pretty sure I will have to go down to the SAS Registrar's office, get on both knees, and beg for data like my (academic) life depended on it. Then proceed to the Institutional Research and Planning Office, get on both knees, and beg for some more data. Did I mention they may not even have the data I am begging for?

"Have you no humility?"
In short, no. When it comes to getting a proper "try it out," I want to expose myself to every inkling of experience there is to offer. Down the road, I would rather not have to do these things when I could get it more easily at an equal or lower cost. But for now, this is going to be pretty cool! I'm excited.

Goal in Sight

Right now I aspire to do an Honors Thesis about the effects of class distribution over various times on changes in majors for different departments at Cornell. I have already discussed doing it with a few professors and it sounds pretty certain I can do the Honors Thesis. It's a two-semester long stint and requires intensive background research and thinking before submitting an application with a faculty supervisor.

There are alternatives such as an independent study which provides assisted research over one semester with a faculty member. But an Honors Thesis takes much longer, includes a thesis defense, and allows me to pursue a research topic from start to finish! Unfortunately, not anyone can do an Honors Thesis. It requires an academic standing in the 20th percentile.

Admittedly, I am a nerd, but I am not the brightest crayon in the box. But it means I have a goal to work towards. Although having a higher GPA increases my chance of entering grad school, having a higher GPA pretty much guarantees getting to do an Honors Thesis because of a definite cut-off level. It is unlike high school when I was applying to college because I was not guaranteed admission based solely on my class rank or GPA.

Fortunately, now I have a greater incentive to do better. I have not been giving it my all recently and I have prelims coming up. I recently had a nightmare I had completely forgotten a class and did not realize it until the final had already passed. But here is the motivation!

Nerdilicious

I am a nerd.

It's something I would not have admitted to a few years ago. But here I am, a self-respecting nerd. I was always on the look out for something to make me happy - something mature. Since I left high school, I believed having no major or direction would be better than having the "incorrect" major or direction. I tried to a few different things, but found all of them unsatisfying. I wanted to pursue many different fields and did not commit to any specific one. I was unintentionally waiting for something else to come along that was even more attractive. Bit by bit, I figured out what I liked to do and what I didn't like to do.

What did I like to do? It turns out I had known all along: I love to be creative and experiment with the world around me to see what happens and why it will happen. It was something I had known since I was a kid playing around with Legos, learning about the world through the TV, and wondering what would happen if I messed around with the circumstances and introduced animals to different places. People are (only) slightly different from animals and collecting data from people is far easier than collecting data from animals. I want to study the data patterns and trends - something economics lets me do.

Unfortunately, it took a while for me to understand this about myself. I started with wanting to do "important" and "relevant" government things to gain recognition from others. When I wanted to do something more in that area, it turned out I needed a graduate degree. To pursue a graduate degree, I did research for one summer in economics because it is something I am above-average at. Left to my own devices over the summer and struck with a near-terminal case of boredom I found myself thinking of ideas to research... and loving it.

I do not believe in destiny, but if you look around for long enough, you will find something you like to do!