Welcome Back, Me -- CB 2000.07.07
Okay, so I've been procrastinating a *little* bit since my last entry.

Strike that - I've been downright lazy...

Do you realize how much can happen in three and a half months? So much, in fact, I would be just as well-off starting this little journal project over from scratch.

Let's see if I can bring myself back up-to-date. I'm now living in Kalamazoo, MI. I graduated May 27, and moved here June 9. I'm here becuase I have accepted a job offer - for those of you familar with previous entries, this job is in fact with the same company with whom I interviewed right before Spring Break - the one with whom I had a second interview. All told, the process ended up taking FOUR interviews - one at school, one in the office in Indy, another in the Indy office with the Kalamazoo manager, and a final interview in Kalamazoo with the manager and the five guys already working here. By the fourth interview, I was fairly certain that I would be getting an offer; but, to make things interesting, the offer didn't come until the day before graduation.

I think a lot of people don't understand the culture of my school, with respect to job offers. At my school, all the *top* prospects have job offers within the first couple of months of senior year. The majority of students actively looking for jobs have offers by the time graduation rolls around. Thus, it is generally the slackers, whether it be scholastically, or in the job search, who graduate without standing job offers. Well, due to my financial situation, I wasn't able to even start my job search until the middle of January, putting me eons behind all the other graduating seniors looking for jobs. Looking at the companies I interviewed with, I actually had a 50% offer rate; granted, I only interviewed with two companies.

So anyway, now I'm living in Kalamazoo, a good four and a half hours from my old life in Terre Haute, iN. By far, the most ironic occurence related to my move had to do with dating. In my five years in college, I had never dated anyone for longer than, oh, three weeks. So, now we come to the end of my senior year, and what do you suppose happens? If you guessed that I started dating someone, well, I guess you're just psychic, or managed to pick up on my completely non-subtle segue. I was actually "dating" a girl from the Woods. I say "dating" and not dating becuase, in all actuality, it was never anything very serious. But, even though it pretty much ended with my move to Kalamzoo, it was fun while it lasted, and upped my three-week barrier up to three months.

So now, I'm starting all over in Kalamazoo. I've been here for almost a month now (today actually marks four weeks). I'm situated at work, and when my parents get in later this evening with a truckload of furniture from home, I'll pretty much be all set in my apartment (except for the state-of-the-art entertainment center that I haven't bought yet, since I'm being good and staying out of debt as much as possible). It's a really nice feeling to be able to make, save and spend money, instead of living the poor, starving college kid life. But, right now anyway, it's a tradeoff for having to start my social life all over from scratch. I'm getting the seeds planted - I'll be visiting my second church this weekend, I've gotten information from the Civic Theater about getting involved there, and I'm trying to find people to play tennis with. I figure it all happens slowly, especially with not having the college atmosphere - the ready-made social circle. Fortunately, Kalamazoo is also a college town - Western Michigan University and Kalamazoo College to name the two biggest ones - which means, starting in the fall at least, there are plenty of people my age here.

I've also baeen doing my best to keep up with the Atkins Diet (the lack of tennis hasn't helped matters, but hopefully that will change). For those keeping track, I'm at about 205, which represents a total loss of 65 pounds since January. And actually, I've been "maintaining" that weight since the beginning of May. That comes out to an astonishing 16 pounds per month that I lost between January and May. Between the tennis season ending (thus, two-hour daily practices ending), and a major life-changing event (graduation and moving), I haven't made a conscious effort to lose recently. Now that I'm pretty much settled in, I'm starting back up again. My intent is to take a martial arts class, which, combined with a regular tennis regimen, should provide ample exercise to keep the fat-burning fires ablaze. I actually only want to lose another 25 pounds or so. I have a week-long conclave to attend for my chemistry fraternity, for which I am a voting delegate, and I will have to buy a new suit for the banquet, since the one I (my mom) bought in March is also now getting too big. I would like to lose as much of my 25 pound goal as possible before the middle of August, so that the suit-buying trend won't keep up at the same rate that I've had to buy new belts. At $300 a pop, it gets to be a bit much!

Well, now that things are getting more back-to-normal, I should be able to be much better with keeping up with the journal.

Only time will tell...

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