One Week Down, 1,499 To Go

First off, an actual message from the MTA, “Please be careful with your jewelry because it’s always chain snatching season”. I've been saying the same exact thing for years. I'm glad someone is finally paying attention.

A lot has gone down since my last post. I got a blackberry. In addition to writing an entire post from my new blackberry, I can write an entire post on my new blackberry but I'll just make a few remarks about it. I used to just check my email a few times a day, and I guess I kind of liked checking my gmail and yahoo accounts at the end of the day and seeing a couple emails in each mailbox. But now as long as I have my blackberry in my pocket I have my email in my pocket, which I guess was the point of getting the thing in the first place. The only way I can explain it is like, every evening when I checked email it would be like a mini-Christmas, but now Christmas is 24-7 so it's just not as meaningful when I get an email. I'm reading this over and it sounds ridiculous, I know. Maybe I just over-estimated how much I wanted to be connected. All that said, I love that I can check the internet whenever and once I learn how to play with the bells and whistles I imagine I'll really enjoy/appreciate my yet-to-be-named electronic device.

While I went a little more high-tech in one aspect of my life, I've gone a little more low-tech in another. When I got back from SE Asia I started running not on the treadmill but on pavement. Like old school Prefontaine style. I really don't care for running, but running outside was definitely more palatable. I've been running a few days a week for the past 6 or so weeks and I'm kind of starting to like it. So now that I'm in the city, I've taken this whole running thing out of the gym and back to the streets, specifically, the roads in Central Park. And as far as Central Park is concerned, a) I don't think I've seen, on average, a better looking compilation of people in one locale in New York. Even the homeless folks are tan and fit. B) They got this reservoir right in the middle of the park, but let's not tell too many people about it because I like having it all to myself. C) You can basically do whatever in Central Park and nobody will even flinch. I saw these two girls taping themselves doing a full on provocative dance routine right in the middle of the Sheep's Meadow and nobody seemed to even give them two looks and on that same walk through the Park I saw a guy on a horse and carriage ride propose to a girl. I actually saw it go down right then and there and I'm pretty sure her tears were tears of joy. The Park really is an awesome place, as long as there's still daylight. I don't know what goes down in Central Park at night, but I am assuming things that are not kosher. Even though I'm enjoying my evening run I do miss the camaraderie of team sports. It's a little lonely running solo. I'm a team sports person, and always will be, and sometimes I have to fight the urge as I pass a struggling runner to slap them on the backside and offer them a word of encouragement because that's what you do if you're trying to help a teammate, but in Central Park that's called assault, brotha. This past Friday I even got to give a little thank you to Central Park when we took a day during our first week of training to paint railings in the park. Good karma, let me tell you.

And now to what you all have been waiting for...the job 411. I don't know when it hit me that it was for real, and by "for real" I mean no more school, no more Summer of Finger Part III, no more fun, no more laughing, no more smiles, no more puppies. I think it was when I woke up last Monday morning and put on a jacket and tie that I realized shit's done changed. At some point last Monday, my first day, we had a break so a bunch of the guys in my associate class went down to get some fresh air. So there we were, standing outside the office building on the front steps, yukking it up, the South American guys sucking down Marlboro Reds, the rest of the us talking college football, and then I just had this weird realization that to the outside world we probably looked like a bunch of 100% Grade A-certified Suits who did this on the reg, even though not a day before we were all free children of the Earth enjoying the dusk of what was an outstanding and relaxing summer. Ah how it all can change so quickly. For my first rotation I'll be in Asset Management. Doing exactly what, you ask. Managing some assets, obviously. We still have another week of training, but I'm ready to get the show on the road.