Running Utes. Sweaty, Tired, Sore, Running Utes.

A while ago I mentioned that Jessie (who, along with getting into the Lassonde Center, has already landed a job upon graduation. God, I hate her. Hate her with me. We’ll hate her together) organized a team to run the Wasatch Back Ragnar relay. Basically, 13 of the other MBAers ran about 200 miles straight, relay style. That is ridiculously macho. Way to represent for the U MBA kids. So here’s a bunch of pics of my classmates who I think are just awesome. And no, I didn’t run. When I exercise, I prefer to take my life into my own hands. And I’m not talking eating-at-the-suspect-taco-cart taking my life into my own hands. I’m talking mountain biking with much better riders while being naturally blessed with no balance whatsoever. But I digress.

That's Ashley running at night. She is so not afraid of the dark. I've never written about Ash. I'll have to one of these days. She's the sweetest spelunker ever.

And that's Filip passing the baton off to Jarum who is, apparently, harnessing the wrath of the gods.

BTW...I should not say anything bad about the taco carts. I’ve eaten there hundreds of times and only gotten sick once which, I feel, is a totally acceptable ratio. You can’t go wrong with the cart in the south parking lot of Sears on 8th South and State Street. There are two in that parking lot, actually. Go to the one on the east end, not the south end. The eastenders were first. I used to drive by there every day on my way to work and remember vividly when the southenders started showing up. It got ugly fast. For a while there they were both simultaneously blaring music over each other. Dueling fiestas. That’s the problem when your brick and mortar is actually wheels and a trailer hitch. Competition can set up shop in your backyard. Sears, incidentally, seemed ambivalent to the whole thing. It's been dying a slow death there for 15 years. Mariachi requiem.
Check out this picture of Yogesh. Eye of the Tiger? This picture is so that song. That is a look that hits 3 out of 4 at the dunking booth.

Next to him is Sam getting shot out of cannon.

"Brick and Mortar”. That’s a term I heard for the first time when getting my MBA. It’s a clever way to refer to a physical place. I mean, it’s kinda clever. Of course here in Utah, instead of brick and mortar it’s more like stucco and…uh…stucco. Variety is the devil’s plaything. No, I exaggerate. Salt Lake is a beautiful city. Uniformity only really festers in some of the sub-divisions. They can be very Edward Scissorhands sans the cool hedge sculptures.

I don't know what Filip did to justify a judo chop from Robert, but I don't imagine that Filip survived.

On a Utah Culture note, Moroni got struck in the face by lightning. Utah has a bunch of Mormons. It was founded by Mormon settlers. We have lots of Mormon temples. Each Mormon temple has a gold statue at the top of it. The statue is the same on each one. It’s an angel named Moroni blowing a horn. Apparently, Moroni will blow the horn at the end of the world. Basically, it's dinner bell for the apocolypse. So if you’re driving by a Mormon temple, roll down your windows and listen. If you hear a horn blow…well, roll’em up.

Anyway, one of these statues got struck in the face by lightning. My knee jerk reaction was to call all my Mormon buddies and warn them that they might be barking up the wrong tree. But it occurs to me, those statues are basically lightning rods. I’ve lived here my whole life and this is the first time I’ve heard about one of them getting hit. The fact that those aren’t struck a dozen times every storm is nothing short of a miracle. Maybe these Mormons are onto something.

Incidentally, I think Microsoft’s spellcheck recommendations for Moroni are downright offensive. In a row… Moronic, Moron, Maroni, Morons. That is not nice.

Here's Aline with Dan's belly. Everyone's a winner.

Will Wonders Never Cease?

…I got an internship. Two of them actually. Started last week. Y’know what I just found out is my favorite thing in the world? Waking up. More specifically, waking up with no alarm clock. Like when nature intends me to wake up. And for me, it involves a few of those wake up, roll over, and slide back into sleep maneuvers. So nice. I had about a month where I got to do that every day. Then go to the gym. I hear people say if they didn’t have jobs they would just go crazy. What has two thumbs and would NOT go crazy? This guy.

But anyway, I have now committed myself to 55 hours of work a week for the rest of the summer. It’s good though. These internships are good news for me. I found one through Utah CareerLink and one through good old-fashioned David Eccles School of Business networking. I hate that word. Networking. It suggests to me that the only reason I want to know someone is because the relationship will somehow benefit my career. Which is lame. And I would be friends with Varun even if he didn’t get me an internship. But he totally got one for me. A good one. Thanks Varun. You are my favorite DESB grad. And that’s saying a lot because one of my best poker buddies graduated from the program a few years ago. I think the program frowns on gambling so I should point out that when we play poker we bet buttons. And cupcakes.

I want to mention that Varun hooked me up after we finished taping for a video that’s going to run on the DESB website. When they post it, I’ll let you know so you can see me in my internet debut. There are three guys and I’m whichever one you think is the most handsome. No seriously, I’m the one that looks like he’s on your nephew’s T-ball team. I’m 32 and look like I’m 17. I got carded for a Rated R movie when I was 30. And I was with a girl at the time. Emasculation seems to be a theme in this blog.

Young Folks by Peter Bjorn and John just came on over Pandora. I love this song.

The only bit of a bummer is that both internships may want to me to continue working part time through the school year. Ug. Last year was a killer and I had no job, let alone 2. I’m banking on the rumors that the workload eases up a bit during the second year. Of course, most people probably don’t pick electives that they know they will find baffling. Like advanced finance stuff. Oh well. Too bad, too. I was actually doing really well grade-wise. It amazing what you can accomplish when, unlike most of your classmates, you have no spouse, no family, no job, and English is your first language. Grades are pretty low on my list of priorities, but I’m not looking forward to watching them tank.

Actually, I was planning watching them tank regardless. I’m going to take this opportunity to tell you about the Lassonde program. Utah has this amazing program that any potential students should really look into. Basically, a ton of research is done at the U (that’s what locals call the University of Utah…the U. Sorry Miami, your nonsensical logo may be the shape of a U, but Miami Hurricanes lacks the sheer “U” power that the Utah Utes carry. We’re fine sharing, but it’s clear that you aren’t. Luckily, you haven’t been particularly relevant recently so it’s easy not to care what you think. Wow, I’m snippy tonight.)

But I was talking about the Lassonde Program. Long story short, Lassonde takes business, engineering, medical, etc. students…teams them up…and has them investigate and develop business applications for technologies developed in the research arms of the school. Market size, business plans, financing, marketing...all the fun stuff. And it’s for real. Real money. Real business. Real opportunity. Amazing, amazing program. Having said that, they didn’t want me. I did not make the cut. I was bummed. And surprised. I shouldn’t have been. My classmates are bright, ambitious, and awesome. I don’t know who all made it into the program from my class, but I know who applied and there is no shame in losing a spot to anyone.

I did however, remind Jessie about applying. And she got in. I hate her.

Anyway, I was planning on doing Lassonde during my second year so instead I’ll do my internships. And my one internship does almost exactly what I would be doing in Lassonde. So right on. I’m cool with it. Except for stupid Jessie stealing my stupid spot. Brat.

BTW... the fact that Prof. Schallheim's son commented on my last post made my whole summer.

My Hero...Sigh

See this guy? This is Chris. Followers of the blog may recognize him as the GQ guy fleeing the scene of the gas leak. He’s my hero. FDR, Bill Russell, Hugh Hefner…make room for one more. See, Chris and I took Cases in Financial Analysis together. I passed. In fact I did well. Because of Chris. ONLY because of Chris. He was in my group. And I don’t think any of my other groupmates would be offended if I asserted that he was pretty much our entire group.

He carried us. Well, at the very least he carried me. And I feel bad about that. I feel like I was just a weight around his neck all semester. I wanted to understand and he always patiently explained. But I was like the kid who is kicking and punching the lifeguard in the face as he’s being dragged from the pool. I’m sure it would have been so much easier for Chris if I had just resigned myself to the fact that I was being rescued and gone limp. Or really, if I hadn’t jumped in at all.

I’ve been Chris. In my undergrad, I’ve totally been the Chris. There were certain subjects I seemed to catch onto pretty easily and scholarship pressure had me pretty motivated to succeed. So I’ve carried the group. I just never thought I’d be on the other end of that. But I was in this class. It was awful.

This class I’m talking about, Cases in Financial Analysis, turned out to be one of my favorite classes by far. Dan said he wished he could take the class again and I totally agree. It’s basically a David Lynch movie. First time around you are exposed to great stuff, but you know there are depths that you are just not diving deep enough to reach. Chris is swimming around down there. Aline, too. But not me. I’m in the shallow end with floaties and earplugs. Still, I learned SO MUCH. (See that? I capitalized it. I must be serious.) This class gave weight to my MBA. It made me feel like I know business. Like I know it more than the day-trader scientists I play poker with. Beyond the mechanics or theory that anyone can just look up. This class gave me real insight. Real analysis and valuation skills. Real understanding. I totally have a crush on this class.

Dr. Schallheim, my professor, was great. For one, we had a dunking booth at the end of the year at some festival thing and Schallheim was handed a ball, turned, and nailed it. No prep, no hesitation. Got’er done. What a stud. But if he parents anything like he teaches, I feel for his children. Seems like his idea of swim lessons would be tossing the kids in the pool and diving in after them just before they drown. That was the class. He frequently left us to our own devices when working cases. Lots of mistakes, lots of “wasted” time, lots of frustration, lots of learning. Classes like that are great on one condition. Don’t have more than one per semester. If you have a schedule full of Schallheim and Schmidt, well, good luck with that.

Lots of aquatic references in this post.

One more thing. Why Yogesh, a guy in my class, is just rad…he’d thrown 8 balls at the dunking booth. Missed all 8. Some quite badly. He shook his fists, clenched his eyes shut, and declared for all to hear, “My blood is boiling!” Then he bought 4 more balls. Hit, hit, miss, hit. Well done, Yogesh.

Know what? Aline's gonna be pissed when she sees I cropped her out of the pic.

Well, I’d better get back to looking for an internship. And yes, it’s probably too late. Crap. I’m assuming no one will be reading this over the summer so I’ll probably stop posting until the fall. But it appears they’ll have me doing this again for year 2 so if you enjoyed reading it, check back. And if anyone has any questions or issues they’d like me to blog about over the summer, leave a comment. I have a feeling I may end up with an uncomfortable amount of time on my hands.

Darned Kids with Your Music

It sounds as though people in the program are starting to read this blog. Eep. I guess I’m not going to run the “Professor So-and-So is a Complete and Total Ass” post. I want to make something clear, even though Jen told me not to. “It will ruin your rebellious and ruggedly manly mystique,” she said. Maybe those weren’t her exact words, but I know that’s what she meant in her heart. Anyway, the school asked me to do this blog as part of my assistanceship with the MBA office. I only bring this up because I don’t want people thinking I feel like everyone needs to hear the stuff my brain craps out. So Sam, as much as I’d like to follow your suggestion and talk about Dan and the furries, I really can’t in this forum. All I will say is that I always thought of Dan as a bunny. Turns out he’s a squirrel. Who knew? Isn’t that bushy tail just a nuisance?

One would think that a week before all my giant projects were due and 2 weeks before I face waking up with no school and no internship, I’d be working on those things. Not so. I chose to indulge in University-Related-Extra-Curricular good times. First, Grand Kerfuffle. Holy crap. Spellcheck just fixed “kerfuffle” for me. But now it’s telling me that that’s not how you spell “spellcheck”. Odd. Anyway, Grand Kerfuffle is an annual out-in-cold campus concert. Girl Talk opened for Lupe Fiasco. Kick. Push. Coast.

Good show, but disturbing. Kids these days. I heard that the 80s had come back, but I had no idea. Pinks, yellows, neon greens…all striped together. Ill fitting tops. Stretchpants. Dear Lord. It’s what all the kids are wearing. And I totally know why. They’re not old enough to remember the first time this tragedy took place. Flock of Seagulls, Qbert…meaningless to them. So they don’t understand the pain of looking back and remembering you once wore that stuff. Pictures of me from 5th and 6th grade no longer exist. I made sure of that. No one wants to see me rocking my Miami Vice pink/grey look. Crockett and Tubbs rolled up into 75 lbs. of skinny white kid was completely against God’s plan. It’s ok, though. I was the cutest toddler ever and my parents had me in leisure suits up through 3rd grade. So there are plenty of cute little Tony pics out there. And no, that's not me in the green. That's Girl Talk.

And with digital media and Facebook and MySpace and the interweb and all, well, stuff doesn’t disappear anymore. So don’t do it. Don’t wear that stuff. Especially if you’re a guy. One day, your son’s not going to care that your clothes were hip. He’ll see the pics and all he’ll know is that one day his Dad woke up and thought, “I think I go with turquoise today. Oo, and hot pink!” There’s only one person I know that can pull off super colors, and that’s Samantha. Hi Sam! And I’m sorry everyone else, but you are no Sam.

So the concert was Wednesday. We also had an Attitude Adjustment on Friday. I wrote about them once before. This one was uneventful relative to the last one. Let’s just say the after-party of the prior Adjustment involved the cops and we all learned a valuable lesson. That pilot that landed the plane the water? Is he a hero? Turns out that the real hero is me. But that's a different story.

But one thing I want to reiterate about the Attitude Adjustments is that they are paid for by Dean Brittain. Thousands of dollars, I’m sure. And he’s leaving! We’ll miss you Dean Brittain. And not just because of the free booze. I mean, a lot because of the free booze, but not totally because of the free booze.

I must say, I'm really enjoying the contrast between the Dean Brittain pic and the Girl Talk pic.

Made-Up MBA word of the week…"imitability". Frankly, it’s stupid that that isn’t a real word. I just used two "that"s in a row. Can I do that? Again, English majors, we ain’t. Thank you, Jen, for that.

My Classmates...How I Hate Them

So I need to write about Jen. She is my bff in the program. My bmbaf, I suppose. And as long as I’m writing about Jen, I need to write about Jessie. One of my other MBA friends. These ladies are hags. Hot Accountant Girls. It’s a very interesting phenomenon. I discovered it in my undergraduate career. Accountant women are just knockouts. A dozen years ago in my undergrad it was Allison and Stacy. Now it’s Jen and Jessie. Even the one MACC (Masters of Accounting) student I know, Lauren, is crazygorgeous. Yes, I meant that as one word.

God’s cruel joke, really. Their poor boyfriends. Sure, someday your wife will be beautiful. But eventually you have to ask her about her day. Then it’s “debit” this and “credit” that. Oy. Talk about a Catch 22. Listening to that’s gotta be a kick in the teeth. I’ll take the homely sportscaster or peg-legged brewmaster any day.

I kid.

Jen (the blonde) and Jessie (the brunette) are phenomenal individuals, really. Jen heads up the MBA Womens Association. I don’t know the exact name of her group and I don’t care. Ouch. That wasn’t nice. I suppose I’m bitter because she picked the one group I can’t join. Where I’m persecuted for my parts. Some bmbaf she turned out to be. Jessie put together an MBA Wasatch Back Team. The Wasatch Back is a 24 hour relay super marathon race thingy. If you like running up mountains in the middle of the night, boy howdy, does Jessie have just the thing for you.

Anywho, point is, they’re awesome little overachievers. Which comes to why I hate my classmates. They’re all awesome little overachievers. They keep showing up to class in suits and pantsuits. I know what they’re up to. Interviews. Jobs…internships…silently, they’re snatching them all up. I learned to stop asking about their plans for the summer. It’s depressing. “I’m interning at Goldman’s.” “I’m splitting time between a couple of startups.” “I’m going to China for a month and then coming back to chair the Fed.” Jerks. I should be working on that.

I register for classes tomorrow. One mandatory management course, a field study, two finance courses, and two information systems courses. Did I mention I’m in marketing? Hm. Not a whole load of marketing in that line-up. Isn't college the time for experimentation? It's Prof. Schaefer’s fault. The finance course I took from him was just a gateway course leading to harder, more dangerous finance courses. My HP 12c calculator is basically paraphernalia. It’s an after school special, really.

Made-Up MBA word of the week…”depercentalize”. English majors, we ain’t. We can thank Dan for that gem.

Prof. Austin...in 300 Words or Less

Bonita Austin teaches my Business Strategy class. She used to be a big city securities analyst. Senior Vice President at Lehman’s Bros, among other impressive things. But she missed the open spaces where she could ride her horses and train her show dogs. So she traded in the power lunches to be a professor. Now she’s pulling hay out her hair minutes before facing down 65 graduate students. Basically, she’s a character out of a chick flick. …strong, successful woman taking on new life to follow her heart. Shouldn’t Harry Connick Jr. be the janitor or something? (I don’t have a pic of Prof. Austin, so here’s the trifecta of chick flick crap I’ve had to endure in the last few months.)



There’s a very tricky element to Prof. Austin’s class, the Position Outline (or PO as the hipsters call it). We have to write up 4 POs over the course of the half-semester. These are 300 word case write-ups. The key here is “300”. Verrrrrry short. When I first read about the 300 words I thought, “Sweet.” No. Not sweet. Not sweet at all. Sour, actually. Some of my classmates have spent their 20+ years of life mastering a sort of refined eloquence. For them, I’m sure 300 words is no problem. Me, I’m all about barely coherent rambling. I drop 300 words in about 4 seconds. So POs and I don’t get along. I write out my thoughts but by the time I wrestle them down to 300 words, the mangled corpse of a paper that remains bears no resemblance to what I intended. “…competitive advantage good barriers to entry purple monkey dishwasher.” …and words like “the” and “a” never make the final cut.

So the POs are tough, but they force you to be succinct. Which is good. And they force you to choose between a myriad of issues and focus on just a couple. Which is also good, especially for someone like me. It’s interesting because so much of the class is just common sense, but it’s surprising how many elements of a situation one misses when thinking about things. This is a core class and that’s good. I think it will make us all better business professionals.

If you’re one who worries about grades, word of advice. Sit on the right side of the classroom in Prof. Austin’s class. Participation is 1/4th of the grade and her hair sometimes falls over her left eye. I’m convinced that Brittany doesn’t get called on because peripheral vision doesn’t exist when it comes to the left side of the room. Got to get out from behind the blonde curtain. Besides, all the cool kids sit on the right. It’s like the back seat of the school bus.

Speaking of the cool kids, we 1st years beat the 2nd year and MACC students in the annual basketball game. We rule the school. (When I say “we” beat them, I should point out that “we” is not “me.” I played basketball in 8th grade and scored 2 points all season. That’s my career.) Apparently Dmitri hit the game winner. Hardwood assassin. It has come to light over the course of the year that our class is so much better than all of the other classes at absolutely everything.

300 words exactly. (Not even close.)

Dmitri, in the Student Lounge, with the Candlestick

Since I’ve written about professors, it occurs to me I should probably write about classmates. They are people, too. And what better place to start than the international students? My class holds folks from all kinds of strange and exotic places…China, India, Russia, Brazil, Taiwan, Thailand, Wisconsin, Poland, Czech Republic, and Georgia (the country, not the peaches.) Granted, you have to sift through a lot of white bread like me to find them, but they’re there.

We’ll start with the Brazilian. Our resident Brazilian, Aline ((uh-LEE-nee) I have no idea how to spell things phonetically) is…well…you know that stereotypical view of Brazilian women as beautifully fit girls dancing around on Carnival floats? Aline does nothing to dispel this stereotype. So what type of man gets a lady like Aline? Two words. Pediatric Neurosurgeon. Her husband is a pediatric neurosurgeon. If I ever pull a George Costanza and lie about my career to impress strangers, I’m not going with architect, I’m going with pediatric neurosurgeon. You could introduce yourself by saying, “I’ve dedicated my life to saving children,” or “I’m a brain surgeon.” Either way, you’re golden. Pediatric vs. Marketing. Neuro vs. Data. Surgeon vs. Analyst. Every aspect of what he does is so much more impressive than every aspect of what I do. Grrrrrrrrrr.

Then there’s Dmitri, the Russian. He’s straight out of a Guy Richie movie. Best dressed guy in class by far. Jackets, hats, scarves, hip shirts…he’s got it all. Total slightly formal Eurochic. Just enough to make the every other guy in the class look like a complete no-style Neanderthal. I can’t decide if he’s a spy or an assassin. He's just too laid back. Too sophisticated. This is no MBA student. What’s more, I can’t decide who in the class he is spying on or planning to kill. I worry about David. Dmitri’s always sitting right behind him. If Dave goes missing and Dmitri suddenly drops out of class, remember that I called it.

Both Dmitri and Aline share the same two characteristics I find in every single international student. Super friendly and super smart. Without exception, I find this to be the case. It’s to the point that if you look like you’re from around here, I’m probably assuming you’re a little dim. That was a joke. But if you look you’re from around here and you’re wearing a Cowboys jersey, well…