I spent the bulk of today navigating travel websites and class schedules and department faculty listings, coming up with the most efficient way to visit four schools in four states while still trying to have time for a run or a swim, or, gasp, a spin bike?!
Training tips for the travel-weary, anyone?
Here’s the plan (and, by the way, this is all starting from San Diego, I’m skipping the part about me getting from Seattle to San Diego because I already wrote about that, but it hasn’t happened yet.)
Sometime before Monday 3/22: FedEx Ground a bike to Colorado.
Monday 3/22:
6 a.m. flight from San Diego to JFK.
7 p.m. masters swim.
Staying with one of my brother’s friends somewhere in Manhattan (upper east side?).
Tuesday 3/23:
Early a.m. run
Spend the day at Columbia visiting SIPA
Evening flight to Boston
Stay at my little sister’s sublet in Somerville.
Wednesday 3/24:
a.m. run/swim somewhere
Spend day at Harvard
Evening flight to BWI
Spend the night at HOME in Maryland!
Thursday, 3/25:
Visit 8 a.m. class at SAIS
Tour campus and sound smart to people
Try to eek out some kind of exercise somewhere
7:25 p.m. flight from Reagan National to Raleigh/Durham
Overnighting with a TBD current Duke student.
Friday, 3/26:
Early a.m. run or swim
Then all day Open House at Duke
Evening reception
OMG overnight in the same place as last night! Oh the luxury!
Saturday, 3/27:
6 a.m. flight to Colorado Springs to play with Benjamin!
Friday, April 2:
4 pm flight to San Diego
Now, two of the schools I plan to visit have not sent out decisions yet, so no one get excited about Harvard or Johns Hopkins please. It’s just that I don’t feel like flying allll the way back out there to visit again if I get in, and after my unexpectedly awesome experience at Boulder I realized that there is no way I can make educated decisions about my education without first visiting each of my options. Of course it looks awesome on the website! Of course the professors sound smart! Of course this one is better than that one, U.S. News and World Report says so!
(And, if I find out I did not get accepted to Harvard or SAIS before my planned visits, then I will be more than happy to spend those two days training and sightseeing and chilling out!!)
Packing is going to be interesting.
