It’s official: I passed my final exam, which means I passed my final course, which means I have an MBA. I guess technically I wait until my convocation in October, but whatever.
So…now that I have BComm, FICB and MBA trailing after my name, what fun words can I scramble those words into? I suspect it could be difficult, given the paucity of vowels.
[tags]mba[/tags]
OK, I think I have this sorted. Here’re my choices (first / second) for the thirty films:
Now I just have to fill out the form and cross my fingers.
[tags]tiff, tiff08[/tags]
I have now read through the film festival guide book and marked off the films I would like to see. This is my first year seeing 30, and I think I may not have been sufficiently adventurous. Seeing 30 films means picking 60 (you pick a 1st and 2nd choice for each ticket) and I don’t think I’ve marked 60 films that aren’t off-limits because of venue.
Nellie’s going through hers right now. We have to have them all selected by the end of the night since I’m leaving town tomorrow. Speaking of which…must pack.
.:.
More film news: they’re making not one, but two sequels (probably) to Hard Core Logo (imdb | rotten tomatoes). Time to grow hair again, Hugh Dillon.
[tags]tiff, tiff08, hard core logo[/tags]
We got this message earlier today. It wasn’t even from a valid phone number, it just shows up as “3001” in the call display.
Guudeneva [.wav, 25k]
Okay then.
[tags]voice mail, weird[/tags]
I obviously haven’t had much to comment on the Olympics, though I have been trying to keep up. There’ve been lots of great stories — the little singing girl swap, Michael Phelps, Canada’s late burst of medal-winning, the Cuban guy kicking the referee in the face, and so on — but the one that’s really bothering me is the furor around Usain Bolt.
For those who don’t know, Bolt won the 100m dash, generally regarded as the showcase athletic event at the Olympics, without breaking a sweat. He actually cruised the last 20m or so (since no one was around him) and even pulled up a bit when he started celebrating his win. This caused a wave of indignation from…well, old people. They were angry that he didn’t “run through” the finish line, that he pulled up and started to celebrate (beating his chest, etc.), and that his celebration was a little too exuberant.
I find this patently absurd. Usain Bolt is 21 years old. He had just broken the record in the world’s premier race and become, pretty much officially, the fastest human on the planet. He’s from a country that’s fairly well known for exuberant celebrations. He’d just capped off four years of grueling work by winning in front of tens of thousands of screaming fans. With all this screaming through his mind, in the final 1.2 seconds of that 9.69 second run, you expect him to become austere? Maybe show some emotion by pumping a fist? Ridiculous.
One of my enduring mental images of the Olympics is Donovan Bailey, having just won gold in the 100m in Atlanta, decelerating after the finish line with his arms spread wide, eyes bulging, screaming triumphantly. Was that, too, classless in the eyes of the likes of Bob Costas, one of Bolt’s biggest detractors? Many have taken Costas to task for this, but I think Heather Havrilesky from Salon might have done it best:
He became the fastest man on earth by a long shot, breaking his own record, while every other contender huffed and puffed along several feet behind him. How would anyone dare to claim that he owed it to the fans to run even faster, or that he disrespected them by celebrating a little early? What in the world is Costas, space alien from Planet Honky, talking about? Why should Bolt care about class, of all provincial, bourgeois values? What the hell is class, anyway, but some arbitrary code that soulless, high-capitalist professional robots live by? You know what I like to see in the world’s greatest athletes? Exuberance, and joy, and tears. I’d like to see them rip their clothes off and run around the Bird’s Nest naked.
Side note: the words “Planet Honky” made me laugh out loud.
As much as NBC would like to proclaim Michael Phelps’ 8 gold medals the story of these Olympics, I don’t know how it can’t be Usain Bolt. There are imbalances between the number of events available to swimmers compared to other disciplines, so I think it has to come down to who utterly dominated on the biggest stage, and who became a star in the process. In my mind Usain Bolt owned his competitors, the fans and these Beijing games.
[tags]usain bolt, bob costas, heather havrilesky, beijing olympics[/tags]
Another beautiful morning in Halifax, my last on this trip. In an hour I’ll have breakfast with Stanzi (in town temporarily herself), then head to the airport.
Last night I met up with friends at Salty’s for a few drinks on the waterfront. Somehow I ended up with a bottle of Moosehead…tragic. Anyway, some of us left there and had a fantastic dinner at Il Mercato. Knowing I’d have pasta the following night I stuck to seafood (never a bad choice in Halifax) and had shrimp & salmon…both fantastic. We knocked off a couple of bottles of Chianti Rufina (and a glass of white for my fish) and ordered decadent desserts. One of our party may have over-extended himself, but he recovered quickly.
Feeling poetic, we decided to finish off the evening at The Bitter End. It wasn’t a long night for me by any means though. One friend hit the wall and left early. My glasses of Macallan lasted me ’til around 11, but I needed some solo recharge time. I walked back to the hotel alone, suddenly reminded of how quiet Halifax streets (those outside the downtown core, at least) are at night. It felt peaceful. It felt right.
I was done. It was time to go home. Home home. I know I talked about Halifax being my spiritual home, if there is such a thing, but home is ultimately wherever Nellie is, and that’s where I feel like I need to be right now. I feel like a little chunk of me hasn’t lived there for the past four years…it’s lived in a text book or the computer or a hotel room during a week away on course. It’ll be nice to have that chunk back, and for Nellie to have it all there too, since she’s done without it for the last ~1400 days. What’s more, she’s been amazing about it. If she were anyone other than herself I probably wouldn’t have made it to yesterday.
One final, funny note: last night, sitting at The Bitter End, they were playing (What’s The Story) Morning Glory? by Oasis. Odd choice, since it’s an old album…then I remembered something: after writing the last exam of my undergrad — which happened to be the very same subject as the one I wrote yesterday — I met some friends at the campus pub to celebrate. That day in the pub they played the fairly recent Oasis CD (What’s The Story) Morning Glory? and we discussed the ridiculousness of the lyrics to “Wonderwall” over celebration beer. Twice in my life I’ve had that particular celebration, and each time I had the same soundtrack. The world’s funny, if a little precious.
[tags]halifax, mba, salty’s, il mercato, bitter end, oasis[/tags]
That’s it. Done. Finished. Kaput. All over but the crying.
I wrote my last exam this morning. I was the third one out, finished around 11:00. Went straight to the bar next door with the other early exiters and had a beer. Then another. Then some veggie burgers. Then more beer. Now I’m performing the very important post-celebration rite of relaxing in my air-conditioned hotel room. We’ll head for dinner a little later; for now I just need to chill and absorb.
It feels good. Really good. But I don’t think it’ll sink in until tomorrow. Or maybe Wednesday when we get our final marks.
[tags]mba[/tags]
We finished our last day in the classroom today, assuming everything goes well in my exam tomorrow. It started to feel long, but the fourth day always does. Wrapped up around 5, grabbed some dinner at the Economy Shoe Shop and came back here to do some work. Not studying really, but case analysis. It’ll be an odd exam.
I ordered a class ring today too. Not exactly sure why, since I can’t imagine ever wearing it. I asked if I could donate the money instead but that seemed to confuse things, so I just picked the smallest, plainest one I could in white gold (Dan doesn’t do yellow gold) and pulled the trigger.
OK, gotta go meet up with the group to review our brilliant insights.
[tags]mba, dalhousie, economy shoe shoe[/tags]
A pretty easy day. Executive speech in the morning, grad photos at lunch, a full afternoon session and dinner at the Red Stag at day’s end. Only problem was the surplus of heavy food & beer, and now I’m far too sleepy to do any work.
Tomorrow’s my last day of class (and therefore my last night of studying) evah. I can’t say I’m not a little excited about that.
[tags]mba, dalhousie, halifax, red stag[/tags]
Just got back from a cruise around Halifax Harbour. People seemed to enjoy it; most of them haven’t seen Halifax from that vantage point. It was pretty gray and on the verge of raining, but the water was calm and wind not too cold. We ate on board the tall ship and the food was really pretty good. Nice time. A few of us stopped for a beer on the way home, but I was way too full to even finish it, and it started to rain anyway, so we walked home.
Half done the classroom portion of the week now…believe it or not, I almost wish we had more class time. There’s so much going on this week it feels like we haven’t had much time to really dig into this course, but I’m not going to complain at this point if they want to take it easy on us.
[tags]mba, halifax, tall ship silva[/tags]
Skirl | Dan Dickinson 