Saturday morning (in the correct chronological sense) I was awoken to quite a surprise: Robin stumbling into 409B, fresh off a plane from MSP. She was quite noisy about it, making a HUUUUGE rucus while getting ready for bed.

Saturday morning (in the usual astrological sense) we all got up and had breakfast together before Robin and I hit the town to pick up some party necessities and lunch food. When we got back to the apartment, we packed the soft-sided cooler, a blanket and chairs, and had a great picnic on the Quad under the flagpole. With an enormous block-M flag flapping overhead we ate pulled pork and sliced mango, played frisbee, and watched people. We also hit Steve & Barry's for a hat, Stucchi's for a cone, and Shaman Drum for a book.

In the late afternoon, a grad party in my honor hosted by Jenelle at Huron Towers. Both of our parents had brought food, we contributed burritos and bevies, and about 20 family and friends came to celebrate along the river. As is so often the case, the whole thing happened much too quickly - before it was even possible, people were heading home. Closest family hung out in my apartment for a while afterwards, talking and re-visiting the memory board Jenelle made.

Sunday morning we had leftover margarita mousse for breakfast, played frisbee on Mitchell Field, and then said goodbyes in the parking lot. Robin and I headed toward the airport (with a stop at Jenelle's for a pre-flight snack and Ollie-tainment) and then it was, somehow rather suddenly, just Jenelle and I enjoying a sunny Sunday at home.

Tuesday morning I got shots. I needed shots for work (!?!) and UHS doles them out all the time, so I got a jab in each shoulder. (This will be important later.) In the afternoon, gym and grocery and cooking. Jenelle was around in the evening with a lull in school work, so we watched "An Inconvenient Truth" and struggled with printing at Ross. Sometime during the movie, my shoulder started to hurt. By the time I went to bed, I couldn't lift it above horizontal, I had a raging headache and was feeling nauseous. The only logical explanation for my overnight malaise and today's droopiness: I now have Tetanus, diptheria, and Hepatitis-B in addition to clean laundry and a spiffy apartment.

And there have been calls. Always, calls. To UHS to set up shots, then back to set up a post-shot physical sheet sign-off. To the DJ inquiring about addresses, to old friends inquiring about boxes, to EZPass inquiring about account status. Mom and I laughed about this the other day, but it isn't that funny! Why do we always have so many calls?!?

Saturday we didn't have DW stuff; instead of a(nother) Tigers game we spent the bulk of the day indoors at First Presbyterian Church doing pre-marriage counseling. I don't think I would categorize these six hours as 'fun,' but it did feel productive and was pleasant enough. We left feeling good about our standing as a couple and with a couple of one-liners that will probably last for years and years as we work through issues that come up.

Afterwards, home to relax for awhile, take in the end of a pretty ugly Red Wings win, eat a $5-Hot-and-Ready pizza because that's the best we could come up with in terms of food ideas, and then visit the DW bonfire just down the street from Huron Towers. It's fun to go to low-key events because it's easier to talk with people without loud music, easier to just hang out without needing to dress up or sign up, and easier to just show up and not worry about cost or appearances.

Today was the international picnic and MBA2 section kickball tourney; Section 3 took third (I think) in the tournament but there weren't broken hearts because after nearly four hours in the sun everybody was pretty rundown. So, we scouted parking at Crisler and headed home for an evening 'in'.

I spent the day working on papers. Final papers, I suppose, for BA512, STRAT669, and GradSchool12782807. Neither paper is really a specimen to hold above all others, but after two years learning about incentives I find it ironic that my incentives at this point all favor turning in pure fluff. With no awards on the line, no GPA difference to be made, and (importantly) no need for the credits in the first place, I literally do not have to complete these final exams. At Webb I wondered to a Professor in Senior Spring if I would fail his class. He countered by explaining that it isn't in the school's best interest to fail me, but that I should still work hard. I knew that he could fail me, preventing my graduation, unless I earned a grade. To endanger my impending graduation I would have to literally write something so offensive or steal something so viciously as to be kicked out of the University. Those are not good incentives to encourage high performance in the waning days of b-school.

I've been mum on the Virginia Tech thing because who needs two more sorrowful cents? Today, though, an email stirred my thoughts. It came from U-M administration and advised that the U would be reaching out to parents of current and incoming students to make them aware of security on our campus. I think that's great, but I am guessing that some paranoid parents called and asked "can this happen at Michigan?" The answer, clearly, is yes. Yes. Forty-one-thousand times over, yes. But who wants to live life like that, to attend a University constricted by fear? Virginia's governor today said that the commission investigating would include a representative of higher education because 'the changes that may come from this tragedy are not as important as maintaining the University learning community.' Thank you sir. FDR would be proud.

2:32 - Mandarin oranges are my favorite 'exotic' fruit. This is a taste which harkens back to the days of giant steel tubs of them in the lunch line at RRHS on "Oriental Food Day." Woof... as if calling it "Oriental Food Day" was bad enough, the selections were usually chop suey, chop suey noodles, rice, and mandarin oranges.
2:48 - I'm down to the dregs of my salad and getting into the nitty-gritty formatting of draft 1 of our STRAT 669 paper about Yahoo!.
2:54 - Just heard a mobile phone ring from across Kresge 4... rules are rules, people, and this is a silent floor. Anyway, why would you have both (a) your ringer turned to 11 and (b) a cartoon theme song ringtone?
3:09 - MSWord is bringing me down. How can this be the best word processor out there? Probably it isn't, which begs the question: why are we using?
3:24 - Little study break gives me time to edit and upload this picture from last night's 6-5 Tigers win over Kansas City.

Friday morning we got up at a very un-spring-break time and (whippeeee!) got back in the Vibe for a trip north to Grand Traverse. We met the baker, the florist, the chef and the disc jockey in a quick pan-Traverse tour. There weren't too many decisions to make, but we did clarify myriad details about timin...who is doing what when and with whom. Then it was time to go home. The deer lined the highways - we must have seen close to 200 whitetails - but were, to a tail, uninterested in even looking up as we passed. We talked with parents and had subs, but it still felt like a long trip. The silver lining is that the next time we head through Kalkaska we'll be on our way for the festivities to begin.

Today felt like Sunday, which made it even more cruel that I had a high noon team meeting at Ross. It wasn't wonderfully productive, but we wrapped at 3 anyway and Jenelle and I had an afternoon of boat-reminiscing provided by free magazines which arrived from the Detroit Boat Show that transitioned quietly into an evening of APHC and wedding invitation paper cutting with a side of quesadillas.

Friday we found ourselves ahead of the imaginary red line which was our arrival schedule, so we hit the Erie Canal Museum. It was fabulous. Located in an old weighlock (literally, a lock used to weigh the boats for fee assessment) building, this museum had a great mix of canal building, canal use, and canal closing history. An annex in the now-filled-in lock contained a full-size model canal boat, and the museum shop had a zillion cool items.

With the rest of the day we made our way to Vermont's eastern border to meet Pat and Sue - and Rosebud and Smarty Jones. Over the next two days we talked wedding stuff, had a couple of great meals, went to the farmer's market, met a new arrival, explored Hanover and Dartmouth, and visited Simon Pearce glass and restaurant. It was a great visit, as visits with McCoys tend to be. All too quickly it was time to jump back in the Vibe for the 12 hours back west to Michigan and school or spring break.

To celebrate our return, Jenelle had wisdom teeth out this afternoon, which should provide the chill time required for us to get going on invitation construction.

Otherwise, Opening Day. I stayed in and watched the Tigers from home. There were 44 thousand people at Comerica already, and they lost. I also did what I could on AOV and read for class. That's Monday.

Saturday was a day of errands and a dry-run of invitation production, neither of which came off without a hitch. Errands went thus: I picked up the final two components of my tuxedo, we picked up ribbon for the wedding and a paper cutter, Belle Tire was doing 'physical inventory' and couldn't be bothered to rotate tires, and Hiller's Market is the grocery store we'd use if we were urban professionals. Then the first assembly of the invitations. Hmmmmm. A few miscalculations by the Photoshop operator (me) means that we'll need to revisit a few things, but all in all we were very pleased with how things went. In the evening, APHC, some hoops, and "The Importance of Being Earnest."

Sunday was a sunny, beautiful day here. We spent it outside doing three things which all Americans must do on sunny days: cleaning our cars, going to the park to throw things at one another, and eating ice cream. We had pesto for dessert and then hunkered down to get back into the grind of the real world - grading, paper writing, studying for PRAXIS. You know, bleeeehhh.