Preparation

25 days and counting. My semester abroad in France is fast approaching, and I'm doing all that I can to prepare myself. French instructional CDs have taken the place of my car's radio, comedies and action movies have been substituted with movies rich in European historical context, and gone are the days of book titles like "Fight Club" and "Catcher in the Rye" and instead are filled with "World War II Europe" and "All Quiet on the Western Front." Needless to say, i'm scrambling and I'm still lightyears behind most international relations students when it comes to knowledge of my future country. I'm kept encouraged by the amount of information I have obtained, and retained, just over the past couple of weeks. These last few weeks will be spent doing very much the same. Then it's off to France! Well, not quite yet. We have a two week "Identity Seminar" beginning when we land in Berlin, Germany on August 26th. We'll begin in Berlin and travel to Warsaw, Prague, Nuremberg, and then finally arrive in Strasbourg. The itinerary looks incredible, with guided trips to a lot of the "must sees" of each city, yet at the same time offering a good amount of free time to explore the cities by myself. As for Strasbourg, there's still a lot of unknowns. I still don't know what classes I'll be taking at the University there. I'm hoping I got into all of my classes; with 34 students in the program the only circumstance I have to worry about is having enough fellow students sign up for that class or else they'll drop it from the curriculum. I don't know where I'll be living and we don't find out until we actually arrive in Strasbourg in early September. I won't know whether I will be able to secure an internship in Strasbourg until probably mid-September, although again, the fewer number of students traveling in the fall encourages me that there will be positions available. A lot of uncertainties, but none of which dampens my excitement of 4 months in Europe.

Thought I'd give a quick update of how my bucket list is coming...

1. Go to Saratoga to see a horse race. Complete

2. Check out the Hall of Fame in Cooperstown (I've been before to see Nolan Ryan get inducted, but I've never been in the Hall!)

3. LEARN FRENCH (at least conversational) In progress

4. Make a Coldstone ice cream with EVERY flavor of ice cream.

5. Run a half-marathon competitively.

6. Go to a major league baseball game.

7. See Hair on Broadway.

8. Go out to Cape Cod with firecracker.

9. Get a score of 10,000 or higher on Brick Breaker Complete

10. Update this blog AT LEAST once a week. FAIL

New running update:

I've had in my head for a couple weeks now the idea of running to work. After checking gmaps pedometer (the best GoogleMaps hack out there if you ask me) at http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/ I found that it was exactly 13.1 miles to work. Now if you're runner, you recognize that that's not merely a coincidence: it's fate. So I finally realized my goal this morning and made the run. Here's some interesting numbers associated with it:

15.06 - pounds of Co2 reduced by not driving to work

.81875 - gallons of gas saved

2.643 - cents worth of greenhouse gas emission reduction, based on current RGGI secondary market carbon allowance price of $3.51 for one ton of carbon dioxide emissions.

1502.43 - calories burned

Au revoir,

Justin