hooray armadilloâ„¢

Drinks and Tapas (not pictured)

Last weekend I visited Melissa in Granada. Before going, I had been told by many people how beautiful and truly awesome Granada is. I was not disappointed. The city has SO much history and such a unique sense of culture from the merging (and subsequent separation) of the Moorish and Spanish peoples making it easily one of my favorite places I’ve ever visited. Melissa was an excellent tour guide, translator, everything…it was such a wonderful weekend. I want to go back…now.

This semester has taken its time and has also flown by at the same time. I only have four weeks left and only two of those will be at Parliament. I really can’t believe I’m almost done!

With that in mind I’ve been thinking about what I’m going to do post Spring Semester ‘09. I’ve come to the conclusion that I am not going to rush to get out of college in December ‘09. There are plenty of factors that made me decide that that is not what I want to do. I won’t list them all here. Now that I’ll have two semesters left at Clemson means I can easily spread out the remaining classes I need to take and therefore not really have to do any summer classes. TOP SCORE!

With my senior year figured out (for the most part), I need to backtrack and have some idear for this summer. After leaving Parliament I’m heading back to Germany on the Eurostar. F*** you, Ryanair. My sister’s year of working and living in Madrid comes to an end shortly after I get there. Time for family vacation! After that Aileen and I plan on visiting Portugal — one of the places in Europe neither of us have ever been. I don’t know how feasible it would be for me to stay in Germany for the whole summer. So I’m thinking of job options in Clemson for at least part of the summer. What do you think?

Leaving that borefest behind, I’ll move on to something more interesting. While I only have four weeks left in the UK, I still have loads to look forward to the biggest being the Euro-blitz Travelpalooza ‘09 with Melissa a.k.a our spring break.

Not to brag…but to brag, this trips includes:

• Meeting up in Florence, Italy and spending the weekend exploring the beautiful Italian city
• Flying to Paris for a night and day…Eiffel Tower, The Louvre, Arch de Triumph, crêpe, other French stuff
• Leaving Paris by train to Luxembourg to tour the city by night and find a nice Luxembourgish Thai restaurant
• Heading “home” to Germany for the rest of the week to relax in the slower-pace part of Europe

Needless to say, I am really really looking forward to this trip. I can’t wait to see Melissa again and enjoy exploring a little more of Europe with her! Not to mention all the Chianti, Champagne, and Riesling to be had.

…looks like I got to #3 on my list from my most recent post sooner than I thought.

For this week and next I’m working at the ad agency BBH. They don’t have an intern position per se so the best I could do was a work experience for two weeks. However, getting some exposure to the industry is a plus and the ability to make some contacts is never something to turn down.

For the most part, the kinds of tasks I’m given are not very demanding in regards to my graphics background. I knew the most beneficial part of this work experience would be the fact I get to talk with people from every department, not necessarily the actual work. So I’m keeping that in mind and just enjoying the change of scenery and opportunity to network. The majority of my tasks include image searches for various pitches that go on in the Production Department. Interesting image searches thus far:

• People holding large puzzle pieces

• British Airways plane on the runway at dusk

• A profile shot of people going “shhhh”

• The concept of sharing

I’m quite enjoying it so far and like the people I’m working with. It’s just me and another guy here this week doing the work experience program. Not sure about next week, though. The BBH office is in a super cool part of the West End. Just off Regent Street near Carnaby Street — a famous shopping district in London. We get sent out regularly to get things. For example: coloring books, photos of sandwiches on shelves, DVDs, and a Greek or Turkish language version of Vogue. So it’s nice to get to explore a new area of London…just as long as I don’t venture too far into Soho and the sex shop district…

London is still the awesome. A friend of mine from last summer in NYC who lives in Ireland is coming to London this weekend. ‘Twill be fun to deplete the supplies of Guinness in the city. I’m going to Granada to see Melissa in a couple weeks (March 20th) and I can’t wait to see her! Everything I hear about Granada makes me really excited to go check it out. Although it’s in Spain, it’s got such a different culture than the rest of the country and indeed Europe from what I’ve heard. Excited. EXCITED. EXCIIIIIIITED!!!

Current school/life plan:

1. Do one class during first summer session and then do something for the rest of the summer…like, you know, a job
2. Figure out how to spread my remaining classes over the last two semesters
3. Change my mind…