Posted 7:01 PM by Zachary (e-mail)
Southern California? Miami Beach? Northwestern Michigan?!?


If you answered "C", you're right! Wanting to take advantage of our last couple weeks in Michigan, my wife and I headed up north this week, making two sightseeing stops.

First, we headed to the Traverse City area, spending most of our time in Sleeping Bear National Park. It's quite a sight: 400+ feet tall sandy dunes, squeezed in between thick forests on the East and the massive Lake Michigan on the west.


Much of the Lake Michigan coastline is made up of small towns, and Traverse City is a good launching point for day trips to the parks, various golf courses, and Michigan wineries.


The second day of our trip was spent on Mackinac Island. This is a quaint little island, home to just 600 people year round, where there are no motorized vehicles allowed. After an 18 minute ferry ride over from Mackinaw City (the crossing point between mainland Michigan and the Upper Penninsula), you enter a Victorian-style town with horse drawn carriages and 200 year old homes.


Unfortunately, the weather was disagreeable, so we didn't rent bikes and tour the entire island (it's about 8 miles in circumference). I could imagine spending a week there (in July or August, when you're guaranteed temperatures above 70) and just chilling.

Notes:
1. If you visit Traverse City, I highly recommend the Bowers Harbor Inn for dinner. Very good meals, very good atmosphere, very good service, very good views of the sunset, and very reasonable prices (downright cheap compared to New York).
2. Travel times: Ann Arbor to Traverse City: 248 miles, 3 hours 43 minutes, average 66.7 mph; Mackinaw City to Ann Arbor: 274 miles, 4 hours 25 minutes, average 62.0 mph, 9.8 gallons, 28 mpg.

Posted 5:29 PM by Zachary (e-mail)
Tidying Up Loose Ends
Since there's little MBA-related stuff to write about, it looks like I'll be wrapping up this weblog early, in the next few days. I've added an index to the front page, to make the blog more navigable to new visitors.

Things are sleepy here in Ann Arbor. I do run into a classmate once every few days, but by and large, everyone's gone, either on a [gorgeous] vacation or to their new home in New York, San Francisco, Chicago, etc. I'm spending most of my time packing stuff--I'm at the point where I see the light at the end of the tunnel, although that's usually when it turns out there's another sixty boxes to go--and taking it easy. Hope to get a bit more golf practice in before leaving town.

Posted 10:01 AM by Zachary (e-mail)
The Switch to ZipCar?
Moving to Cobble Hill, Brooklyn, it clearly doesn't make sense to bring our car with us. Insurance and parking alone would probably run over $300 a month, and (being a 50 minute walk from work and a 3 minute walk from the nearest subway stop) we'd use it no more than once or twice a month.

Which is why I'm really intrigued by the ZipCar model. ZipCar is a type of rental car membership; if you pay a $50 annual fee, you can reserve any of their cars, which are parked in lots around the city, for as short or as long as you want. That is, you could reserve a car for three hours and pay the hourly rate, or reserve for four days and pay the daily rate. Best of all, gas and insurance are automatically included with each rental.

Clearly, this is a business model that works for dense urban areas like New York, and it's appealing to me because:
1. Convenience - I can rent for a few hours on Sunday, and the cars are right next door. No conforming to Hertz office hours.
2. Savings - $69~$75 for a one day rental--gasoline and insurance included--is cheaper than I'll find at a regular rental agency.
3. Car Variety - Clearly this company is aimed at my demographic, since they have a bunch of Mini Coopers, BMWs, Volkswagens as part of their rental fleet.

The downsides are:
1. Annual Fee - I can't say for sure that we'll end up using the service enough to make up the $50 annual fee each year. But I feel the convenience factor would cover the small shortfall.
2. 125 Mile Limit - The rentals have a 125 mile daily limit, after which you pay something like $0.20 per mile. For most trips in the New York City area that will be fine, but clearly it rules them out for longer weekend vacations (thankfully, Ocean City is just close enough).

Posted 8:49 AM by Zachary (e-mail)
The American Road: Cheap and Fast
Americans take many things for granted, and the interstate highway system has to be near the top of this list. This thought crossed my head as my wife and I drove to and from New York on our apartment hunting trip.

How Fast? How Cheap?
I timed our drive back from New York to Ann Arbor. Including our two gas/food stops, it took 9 hours and 11 minutes to cover the 612 mile (984.9 km) span from the George Washington Bridge (connecting New York City and New Jersey) to our front door. That comes to an average speed of 66.6 mph (107.2 kmh), which is not bad, considering that 1. there were over a dozen construction sites along the route, and 2. the speed limit for most of the drive was 65 mph.


As for the cost, our trusty, 2001 VW Beetle used 25.2 gallons (114.6) liters of gas on the trip, which cost $52.24. This divides out to an average of $2.07 a gallon, a price that most Americans would consider egregious. But I wonder if I could buy gas for $0.46 per liter in any part of Europe? Incidentally, the Beetle got 24.3 miles per gallon, which isn't bad.


As for tolls, we paid $5.85 to cross Ohio, and $0.75 (I think) to cross from New Jersey into Pennsylvania. Exiting Manhattan is free; if memory serves correctly, it's about $6.00 to enter.


New York Apartments
Even for someone from the area, there was still an initial shock when confronted by just how small and old and expensive the housing stock is. Ultimately, our trip has to be considered a tremendous success--we found a newly renovated apartment with a great backyard in a nice neighborhood, all in just four days, but still: our rent is going up 70% and our apartment shrinking by 50%. Or course, our income is going up infinitely, since it's zero right now.


The apartment is in Cobble Hill, Brooklyn, an nice residential area just south of Brooklyn Heights (where the above photo was taken; yes, that is Brooklyn).


As with any trip to New York, I spotted a few interesting scenes, captured by my digital camera.

For example, you decide: the elderly gentleman in the photo below is

a) Peacefully enjoying a pleasant afternoon relaxing in the urban jungle.
b) A street corner dealer of PCP.
c) Deceased, and his family wanted to save money on the burial.

And who says that New Yorkers don't have strong social values? A message we can all agree upon:

Posted 4:34 PM by Zachary (e-mail)
2001 Volkswagen Beetle For Sale
Incoming Ross School of Business students should be aware of the school's Classified Ads website:
https://www.bus.umich.edu/ClassifiedAds/

If anyone is looking for a very moderately used (<27,000 miles) 2001 VW New Beetle, check out my ad on that site (or e-mail me).

It's also a great place to find furniture and appliances sold for cheap by just-graduated students.



Update 6/8/2005: Sold!

Posted 8:48 AM by Zachary (e-mail)
The Greatest Motion Picture in All of Human History
...is now on sale in DVD format.

Go. Buy. Enjoy. Otherwise, the terrorists have already won.

Posted 6:21 PM by Zachary (e-mail)
The Most Relaxing Week of My Life
...was this past week. With a caveat: I generally don't like relaxing, and quickly get bored. But after the excitement (that's one word for it) of graduation week, the constant action of the final week of school, and the general stress of this last term, I relished every second of doing nothing. And the weather even came around and behaved for once, with sunny, high-70s days throughout.

So most of my time has been spent sunbathing, barbecuing, lunching with classmates, working on starting up my next weblog, and watching movies (The Interpreter: much better than expected; Kingdom of Heaven: generally good, but directionless at times).

By the end of this week, I'd say that the majority of my classmates will either be moved out or off on an overseas vacation. The few that are still in town are using the time to play golf, socialize with fellow alums, and generally chill.

The relaxing days will be coming to an end soon enough, what with apartment hunting in New York and then the move. And then the start of work...I am almost drooling at the opportunity to start making money again.

Posted 10:28 AM by Zachary (e-mail)
New Building Plans


Dean Dolan officially launched the new building project yesterday, described in this press release. A lot of the work behind the new building is already done; notably, the overall design is pretty far along (see image above). From my perspective, it seems like the school is now in the final design feedback and fundraising stage.

This PDF describes the fundraising campaign in detail (and is the source of the image above).

(Thanks to Journey to my MBA for pointing out this story.)

Posted 10:50 AM by Zachary (e-mail)
Students Leaving Town
Ann Arbor is not yet a ghost town, but it's considerably emptier today than a week ago. I'd esimate that at least 30% of the [entire] student body has already moved out, if not more.

Most MBA students are still in town, but from conversations with classmates, I'd say that half will be moved out by May 20. Most students are taking advantage of the two or three months off before their jobs start.

My primary goal over the next ten weeks before I start is to take it easy. I don't want to feel rushed packing, apartment hunting, moving, or settling in. My lease here lasts until August, so there's no pressure to leave early. I'll find the place in New York that I want to live in, I'll move out there, and unpack everything, on my schedule. Only then will I consider any vacation or trip.

Posted 10:20 PM by Zachary (e-mail)
Retiring a Weblog, Plus Why [Not] To Blog
Now that my days as an MBA student are over, this weblog has outlived its purpose. Originally, I wanted to offer a window into the Ross School of Business MBA experience; I think I've pretty much achieved that goal. I might put up a few more concluding posts about Ann Arbor, moving out, etc. as my time here winds down, but once I move out, the posts will end (though the site will remain).

As for me, I've got some other blogs going, as hobbies. None are job related. All are on niche subjects that I know pretty well. And, for the time being, they'll stay anonymous.

Why You Shouldn't Blog
Many bloggers try to encourage others to jump on the blogging bandwagon. I'd like to play devil's advocate, by starting off with ten reasons you shouldn't start a weblog:

10. Blogs never die, thanks to Google and its archives. Do you want a propsective boss, five years down the line, reading your personal thoughts?
9. There are a lot of sensitive people out there. There will be someone offended by what you write. They may harass you for it.
8. You can get fired for it, if you're not careful. Trust me, it's easier to find out who a blogger is than you think.
7. HTML is not fun, and getting a weblog to look distinct requires it.
6. You're not a good writer. Don't worry, most people aren't.
5. Blogging takes time. You're always complaining about not having any.
4. Reading blogs is interesting. Writing them is a hassle.
3. There are probably 100 other bloggers with the same opinions as you; 50 of them can write better too.
2. Sure, it's a thrill to write a few posts and get your first site traffic; but do you really have the perseverance to do it week after week, month after month, year after year?
1. In the end, what do you get out of it? So some strangers, somewhere out there, read your thoughts about something. And?

Why start off with the negative? Frankly, it's because over the past few months I've grown more and more tired of blogs. It seems more and more like a medium driven by hair-trigger overeactions, and uninformed opinions.

...

If you're still reading, this means that you're seriously interested in starting a blog. Here's my advice:

1. Write about what you know. There are thousands of bloggers out their pushing their (sometimes informed, sometimes uninformed) opinions about Iraq or global warming. The way to make a contribution is to write about something that you have unique knowledge about.

2. Write about what you like. In the end, no matter how important you think the social security debate is, if you get bored writing about it, you won't stick to blogging about it.

3. Your writing will improve. One of the fringe benefits of being an active blogger is that you're forced to frequently wrestle with how to express things succinctly.

4. Have a mission statement, stick to it. Edit yourself. Over the past two years I've written two or three posts related to political issues. Each time I've paused, and despite watering them down to be as inoffensive as possible, I've ended up not publishing them. Because they just don't fit into what it's like being a Michigan MBA, which is the purpose of this site. And I know how irked I get when a site I read regularly starts spouting off about this or that hot-button issue.

5. Think before allowing comments. Understand that feedback from readers is nice, but it also can become a serious time commitment. Since this blog was meant to be my experiences at Michigan, I didn't feel that comments would add anything useful.

Here's a practical, step-by-step post about starting your own weblog.

Update: Here's another good collection of advice for would be bloggers. I particularly agree with points 10, 12, 14, 19, and 25.

Posted 9:55 PM by Zachary (e-mail)
So How Bad is the Michigan Weather, Really?
During the first year, I was pretty diligent about describing the weather. You can go through the posts, starting here.

In comparison with New York City (my reference point), Ann Arbor Septembers are nicer; Octobers and Novembers are comparable; Decembers, Januaries, and Februaries are slightly colder and much grayer; and Marches and Aprils are much, much colder and more miserable. I haven't spent May through August here, so I can't comment on them.

So it's not really the degree of cold that's so bad--I've felt plenty of frigid days in Manhattan. It's really the length (on the back end) of the winter, and they grayness of it, that suck. Especially with Michigan's Winter term ending so early (before May), students really have little nice weather to enjoy together before everyone scatters for the summer.

Put another way, it's May 3rd, and instead of wanting to go outside for BBQ or golf, I want to stay inside out of the sleet (yes, there was sleet this morning), 40 degree temps, and driving winds.

Posted 4:01 PM by Zachary (e-mail)
Two Graduations, Two Commencement Speeches
Over the weekend, I heard two very different commencement speeches, from two very different speakers, one as an MBA graduate and one as the proud husband of an MSW graduate. Jerry White, co-founder of the Landmine Survivors Network, gave a passionate and personal talk about the loss of his legs to a mine in Israel. Lloyd Carr, head coach of the University of Michigan Wolverines football team, gave a rousing pep talk about never quitting and staying humble.

The interesting twist: the former was given during the business school ceremonies, and the latter in front of the graudating social workers. On second thought, perhaps not so surprising: MBAs need reminding of the less fortunate in life, and MSWs need encouragement for the daily grind of helping them.