My New Life Plan

So today was a day of hypotheticals compared to my reality. Hypothetically speaking, if it were 75 degrees outside today I could go for a jog and enjoy this beautiful city. Reality, it's 61 degrees with the wind blowing 10 miles per hour and overcast. Weather.com says that it feels like 61 outside, and I would seriously debate that with someone right now. It's COLD! I have sandals as shoes, 2 pairs of pants, and countless dresses and sleeveless shirts. My only pair of longsleeves is a t-shirt I purchased last week at the University of Illinois. Fact: I should have prepared my suitcase better when I was at home 2 weeks ago, and will now be going shopping this weekend. As a result of the previous stated fact, I will also be hitting up the post office (AGAIN) to ship home all of my shoes and dresses that are better suited for Alabama Septembers.

I miss my favorites in Auburn, which lead me to Hypothetical #2: If I were to walk from Milwaukee, WI to Auburn, AL how long would it take(since I don't have a car)? According to Google Maps, the journey from Milwaukee to Auburn should take a short 11 days and 3 hours. However, I highly doubt google takes into consideration that I will be dragging my overweight suitcase across the country with me, and will most certainly need food and sleep. There is a chance that I could lose a wheel on my suitcase, which could extend my time indefinitely. The upside to this journey is that I expect to lose some weight, which should increase my chances of being selected to be on the next Bachelor (since I applied last week). If the Bachelor doesn't work out for me, I expect the Discovery Channel to give me my own show if I miraculously complete the journey. A downside to this plan is that I only have 7 vacation days. I've used one already, and I'm pretty sure my bosses would be wondering why I wasn't at my next chapter. Other than that I see no major reason why this couldn't be a feasible task. Another downside is that while google does take me along roads, these roads don't travel through the most populated regions of the states I would be crossing. I would be going through the sketchy towns of Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Alabama. I'm most concerned about Kentucky and Tennessee. After watching the Hills Have Eyes, I can only imagine the interesting situations I would encounter. Also, back to the fact that it's cold outside, the weather could really put a halt to my travel plans daily. So basically what I'm trying to say is that I plan to stick to flying for my travel plans, and avoid walking cross country for my vacations.

Another hypothetical that arose this afternoon was grad school. This thought wasn't so much a hypothetical as it was a debate with myself over the possibility of this being my plan for next year. Should I go to grad school? Can I afford it? Where do I want to attend grad school/live next year? Is it too late to study for the GRE? What kind of job will I get to afford this? Who will live with me? Is it really this cold outside right now? (Oh wait, that's not hypothetical, it actually is cold.)

The conclusion I came to was that I'm moving to Texas. This really has little to do with grad school, and more to do with the fact that I think I could have fun living in Austin. I can apply to the University of Texas for grad school, and get my MBA while enjoying a warmer climate and some good football. Bonus: the fact that Allison said she would move there, and I know other people in the area already. I will certainly go into debt for the 2 years I'm back in school, and receive tons of criticism from certain people about my life decisions and the fact that I "need to grow up". I'm working on the "growing up" part, but I refuse to do that in a boring manner because let's face it, that's just not my style! You only live once, so as long as I can make it by, I choose to live a little and see what I can make of my choices.

Now I just have to be realistic and figure out how to financially support all of my choices! :)