It’s over! The GMAT is over! Ah, what a relief it is to have that done and out of the way! My unofficial score was high enough that I’ll be officially accepted into the MBA program at Xavier (I’m provisionally accepted now, which allowed me to start classes in August). I have to admit I was a bit nervous and worried heading into the test, feeling very ill-prepared and tired. I had to get up at the butt-crack of dawn in order to get down to Lexington, plus It’s been an up-and-down month emotionally and I didn’t study as near as much as I should have, but in the end, it turned out just fine. I did about as well as I should have expected based on the material I studied, but I know I could have done better if I had been more prepared. Oh, well, it doesn’t matter anymore…it’s been taken and behind me now!

After the test, I went to the new Sonic in Florence to treat myself…but it’s still packed – cars were still lined up around the block. Bummer…I settled for a Frisco Burger and Cookies and Cream shake at Steak ‘n’ Shake instead. Mmmmmmm…..

To unwind after the test, I met Patrick and Ashley at Kings Island for Halloween Haunt (formerly FearFest). What a way to end the day!

This was the first weekend for the Haunt, so it wasn’t too crowded. We got to go through 7 of the haunt attractions, plus ride The Beast in the dark, which is always a must.

One of the haunt attractions was the pirate-themed Red Beard’s Revenge. Groups of 6 or so go through the haunts at a time and we were grouped with a family with a 5 year old girl. The little girl eagerly wanted to go at the front of the line and bravely led the whole way through. At the end, she shouted at one of the performers “I”m the captain of this ship!” She was awesome!

During the wait in line for one of the haunts, we met three people from Indiana – who were more than a little drunk. We ended up hanging out with them the rest of the night and I can’t remember the last time I’ve laughed so much! I wish I could remember some of the things they said – I’d have a list of quotes a mile long. They definitely added a lot of entertainment and fun to the evening.

Ashley provided plenty of entertainment as well, screaming her head off and running from performers. She choked me a couple times and threw me around as a shield from the chainsaw-wielding dead people. On several occasions, toward the end of the haunts, she ran out of them only to have the performers chase after her, with some encouraging by the rest of us. I laughed so hard I cried at times. I’ve been debating on getting a new digital camera or a camcorder as a birthday gift to myself. As much as I wish I had been able to record parts of this evening, I think I have my answer.

The haunts were pretty good overall. I really liked the Trail of Terror. Red Beard’s Revenge and Massacre Mansion were pretty good, too, but the clown-themed CarnEvil wasn’t all that great (though Ashley, who was scared to death of clowns, made it worth it.)

On Sunday, I helped my friend Ben put together an all-in-one crib/dresser unit. We decided that women must have written the instructions and labeled the parts – and did so to make men’s lives more difficult since they weren’t the ones suffering through the pregnancy. We were victorious, so if any of you many soon-to-be parents need help putting yours together, just let me know.

Back to work tomorrow…where do the weekends go…

Finally some down time! It feels like I’ve been on the go without much time to just sit and relax for way too long now. It’s been a good busy, but it is nice to have nothing at all to do for a change. Well, I guess I shouldn’t say I don’t have anything to do – I haven’t touched my homework for tomorrow’s class yet and I need to get prepared for the GMAT this weekend. And that’s why I’m blogging. College procrastination is like riding a bike – a skill you don’t easily forget…

Amazon just went live with their new mp3 download service. The songs and albums are cheaper than iTunes AND they’re DRM free, meaning you can play them anywhere since they’re not tied to specific software or music players. Kinda surprised the RIAA is letting Amazon do that, but Amazon is big enough that it should last and not get shut down.

What falls shows are you looking forward to? The Office premiere is tomorrow! Heroes was pretty good, but there are still a lot of questions. Chuck looked pretty good. I missed Journeyman – anyone see it and recommend it? Kid Nation isn’t horrible but I doubt I’ll stick with it all season. I can’t watch much live TV, so I’m loving my DVR.

Got some work to do on my computer. When I upgraded a few months ago, I installed Windows Vista. It’s not bad, but I don’t know what the hype was about is. I had some issues, but nothing huge until I had a LAN party with the guys and we couldn’t play several games because of Vista. Vista doesn’t have IPX and DirectX10 is missing DirectPlay (it was deprecated). Also, there are no Vista drivers for my mp3 player and my cell phone doesn’t play nice with Vista. Since I don’t see any great benefits for being on Vista, I’m going back to XP rather than worrying about fixing up Vista. That’s a project for a weekend before I have a test

I’m also looking for a new theme for the ol’ website. It’s been a while since the last change, so it’s time for something new. What do you think – should I stick to the dark background with light text, or switch it around (as it used to be). I’ll probably take the opportunity to upgrade to the latest version of Wordpress as well and remove some things, too, such as the gravatars from the comments and clean up the sidebar some, in an effort to streamline things some.

Hmm, that’s all I got for now. Keep me in your prayers as I deal with some bitterness and take the GMAT this weekend. I’ll be good to get the GMAT out of the way. Heading to Kings’ Island for Fear Fest…er, Halloween Haunt…afterwards, so that’ll be a good way to unwind afterwards.

***You Are a Frappacino***

At your best, you are: fun loving, sweet, and modern
At your worst, you are: childish and over indulgent
You drink coffee when: you’re craving something sweet
Your caffeine addiction level: low

What Kind of Coffee Are You?

One of the toughest parts of a break up is how to handle the ex afterwards. Should you try to be just friends? When should you be friends? Or should you just let each other go and move on, living separate lives? How much time and distance is appropriate for healing? When is it appropriate to move on?

I’ve always had trouble letting go of relationships, thus making it hard for me to be “just friends.” It takes me a while to cleanse myself of a relationship, to get to the point where everything I see and hear doesn’t remind me of the failed relationship. This stems from my problem of jumping into relationships too fast and with both feet, so when the relationship is gone, I can’t easily climb out. I put too much of myself, my heart and mind, into the relationship, and even when things aren’t going well, I simply do not know how to hold back. This can be good at times, but it hurts like the dickens when things are over.

Reaching that point of friendship definitely gets tougher when it seems the other person has moved on quicker than you expected. (Ah, expectations…what horrible things those are.) It definitely sets back the healing process when you feel your heart has been sucked out of your chest and tossed aside like a rag doll. It makes you wonder just how much feeling there was on the other person’s behalf, makes you wonder just how much they were really into making the relationship work. It makes you feel stupid for everything you put into the relationship, that you were really blind to the true nature of the relationship. No matter how much or little time has gone by, getting that first whiff that the ex has truly let go and moved on really stings.

But who really determines how much time is appropriate before moving on? It’s different for every person and every situation, and that’s essentially the problem. If only it were set in stone that each person gets x amount of time after a relationship of y months before moving on… But there’s no manual on this stuff, which is why it can hurt so much. But as my many married friends can attest, it’s all worth it in the end…right? What doesn’t kill you only makes you stronger, and this is just another obstacle and step in the healing process (at least, that’s what I’m telling myself). I need to suck it up, hold my head up high and just keep taking those baby steps. As Red Green says, I gotta keep my stick on the ice. Time heals all wounds – or so it’s said. That’s my little rant for the night.

Busy but fun weekend…started with hanging out with co-workers at Jefferson Hall and ended at the Ohio Renaissance Festival today. I’m tired, so rather than write about it right now, I’ll “photo blog” it. More later…after I study for the GMAT…hopefully…

Two weeks ago I stopped dragging my feet, sucked it up and scheduled a day to take the GMAT. Unfortunately, it’s apparently the “off season” for taking the test, and after factoring my schedule, there weren’t too many choices of when I could take it. There were no weekends in the near future at the Cincinnati office so I checked out availability at the Dayton and Lexington offices. I found one weekend, the weekend of the 29th, in Lexington, so I grabbed it.

That’s a little more than a week away now! Uh, oh…

I haven’t studied for it at all recently. I got about a third of the way through one of the library books I checked out last month, but I’ve had to return those books and haven’t studies since. I do have some practice tests I can take, but I’m running out of time. I’m not going to have much free time at all this weekend to study, so I’m getting a bit worried about it. Maybe I should have started taking one of tests instead of blogging…vvNah!!!

Wish me luck!

Got this joke from my dad:

Four football fans go rock climbing one afternoon – a Kentucky fan, the Louisville fan, a Tennessee fan, and a Georgia fan.

They had been arguing all the way up the mountain about who among them was the most die hard fan. Upon reaching the top of the mountain, the Tennessee fan proclaimed to the other three “This is for the Volunteers!” and promptly threw himself off the mountain as a form of sacrifice, screaming “Rocky top” as he fell to his death.

Not to be outdone by the Tennessee fan, the Georgia fan jumped up and shouted “This is for the DAWGS” and threw himself off the mountain barking “Woof..woof, woof, woof!” as he crashed on the rocks below.

Refusing to be out done by the Tennessee and Georgia fans, the Kentucky fan rose to his feet and yelled at the top of his lungs “This is for THE KENTUCKY WILDCATS!” and without hesitation, pushed the Louisville fan off the mountain shouting “Fly Cardinal Fly!”

I like how it says “the” Louisville fan… Go Cats!

Several months ago I was introduced to the sermons of Pastor Mark Driscoll of Mars Hill Church in Seattle. His sermons are available on iTunes and Mars Hill’s website and he has become one of my favorite preachers. He’s relevant and straight-forward, pulling no punches while still being Biblically focused – and he’s very humorous. He has some great sermons on spiritual gifts, singleness, dating, being a Biblical man, etc. I highly recommend him to everyone.

I pulled some “Driscoll-isms” from a Facebook group on him and posted them below.

“Ladies, if a guy isn’t willing to inconvenience himself to be with you, he won’t be willing to inconvenience himself to keep you.”

“Gentlemen, let me submit to you…that it is attractive, too. When a girl asks ‘So have you been up to?’ and you say ‘I got a job, a house and started a college fund in faith that God would send a godly woman for me to marry and have kids with’ it is better than saying ‘I’m a guild leader on World of Warcraft.’”

“God’s in it for two things: glory and punchlines.”

“Why are you dating her?” “She’s hot.” “So’s Hell!”

“Honestly, I am glad that more people don’t go to church in Seattle, because if they did, they would likely end up at churches led by pastors who are going to hell with their gay partners. Things are so bad that even two Baptist churches have gay pastors, and when the Baptists are gay, the city is officially lost.”

“There is nothing sexier than a woman who can parse a Greek verb.”

“Why is it that if I were God, I would be up on my throne in heaven with the scent of my wife cooking bacon all around me?”

I ordered one of his books this weekend, The Radical Reformission: Reaching Out without Selling Out, and I’m looking forward to getting into it.

The UK football team did what many thought was the unthinkable – they beat in-state rival and #9 ranked Louisville last night 40-34! Go Cats! It was an awesome game, back and forth the entire time, but thankfully the ‘Cats came out on top in the end. This was the first time in 30 years that UK has beaten a top 10 team, and what better team to do it against than your in-state rival! It’s good to have something to cheer about and root for as I anxiously await the start of the college basketball season! I think there’s another bowl game in UK’s future.

Go Big Blue!