Show and Tell: Trip down South

I recently came back from my trip that took me from Georgetown to Georgia, visiting several universities to learn more about various MBA programs.

On the school end of the trip I visited 5 schools in total. I discovered that Duke's school of business was not for me, and I won't be applying. All the other schools rocked in their own different way, and I will be applying to them all. The list includes:

• McDonough (Georgetown's School of Business)
• Darden (University of Virginia's School of business)
• Kenan-Flagler (UNC's school of business)
• Terry (University of Georgia's school of business)

But in addition to visiting schools, I saw a lot of family and friends down south that I hadn't seen in a while. Granted, between the near constant cycle of travelling and school visiting, I didn't have as much time to spend with them as I would have liked, but it was good to reconnect. Thanks for letting me crash on your couches, guys!

The highlight of these non-school musings was definitely spending Halloween in Athens, Georgia. Athens, for all intents and purposes, is a college city. So imagine a few thousand people my age all dressing up in costume and going to the bars. Even just chilling with a beer watching all the people walk by in their costumes was like an awesomely crazy parade.

My favorite part of Halloween, however, had to be just before me and my friend went out to the bars. We get dressed up in costume, him a fairly good replica of The Continental - an obscure Christopher Walken SNL sketch - and myself as the Burger King. We were hungry. And, well, this happened:



Needless to say, the people at McDonalds were pretty amused. The irony made the fries taste extra delicious.

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Show and Tell: video game style

Man, it seems I've been playing a crap ton of video games lately - all of them good.

• World of Goo (PC, Wii) - This game is simply an amazing, unique experience. This game has it all: beautiful graphics, addicting music and gameplay that is extremely habit forming. Basically, you have a bunch of goo blobs, and you have to get them to a pipe at the end of the level by constructing whatever structure you need to get the goo to said pipe. Dump on that an insane amount of creativity, and you have an approximation of what this game is like.
  
  But I realized exactly why I love this game so much: I feel like a little kid again playing it. This game is so fresh and different, and requires me to think outside the box, that I feel as though it's got that same magic I discovered when I was banging away at an NES controller at age 4.
  
  Seriously, each level thusfar has brought with it huge, rewarding gameplay revelations. Each level I've completed gives me a huge sense of accomplishment. This game puts me in such a childlike trance that I'm momentarily jarred when I come back to a world in which Santa doesn't exist.
  
  
  Yup, just like this.
  This is one of those rare games that is fun for anyone who plays it. Highly, highly recommended for everyone who likes to have fun and has a pulse.



• King's Bounty: The Legend (PC) - This game was everything it advertised and then some. I checked it out expecting solid Strategy/RPG gameplay, along with a fair amount of personality and humor. I got excellent Strategy/RPG gameplay and a great amount of personality and humor.
  
  This is the first RPG where I'm actually reading the interactions with the NPCs. If you're familiar to the genre, typically when you find someone with a quest it's usually the same: click, click, click, accept quest, click, go kill or retrieve X, return for reward, rinse, repeat, find next guy.
  
  I'm instead finding myself reading all the dialogue, as well as all of my responses, because often I find myself highly amused by what's being said. And I'm loving every minute of that.



• Portal: Prelude (PC) - This was a fan-made mod to one of 2007's best games, Portal. I'll be honest: it's tough. I haven't even been able to get through the first level, so I've largely given up on it. But it is Portal, and it's free. So if you liked Portal, there's no reason you shouldn't keep trying to run through the endless turret fire in the first level give it a go.
  
  You can download the mod here.



• de Blob (Wii) - I can sum it up in 10 words: the love child of Jet Grind Radio and Sonic Adventure.

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