Vive le Dash

 For no good reason it has been wayyyyyyyyy too long since our last update, but here we are. Our 2020 year in review: All the way back in January, when Covid was around but not yet a serious concern for me, I started my second semester of school. After all our Christmas gallivanting around Europe it was nice to be back in Nice and to see all of my classmates. We were still able to take a couple trips in early 2020, one to Bordeaux and a very quick weekend in London. Within days of coming back from London, France shut down and my University closed. You were no longer permitted to leave your house except for groceries or to go to a pharmacy. If you did leave your house, you had to wear a mask the entire time and carry around a hand written note swearing you were being a good, considerate citizen to the republic of France. The risk of not following these rules was a 500 € fine. Nice distributed 2 mask to anyone living there and patrolled the streets with police and (supposedly) drone

 Fall break vacation! Ashley had a week off from school so we had our first European frolic. Even better, we met up with friends who were traveling too. Europe is very easy to travel by train or plane, but since we only recently arrived with Koki, we do not really have a lot of options to leave her behind. And while she’s allowed on local/regional trains, she’s not allowed on the Eurostar trains and apparently not on any trains in Spain (WTF, Spain?). So we rented a car. I will probably need to write a whole post on just driving in Europe, but I am actually getting pretty good at it (spoiler: avoid cities). The best part about a car is of course the freedom to go wherever whenever you want.  Barcelona was our first stop to meet up with Michael and Natalie. Spain is only 4 and a half hours from Nice and Barcelona only a couple hours beyond that. Since we had limited time that overlapped with them, we shot straight there and skipped over all those beautiful French cities by the sea. Sav

I think it time for me to write a blog post. Mostly since I’m procrastinating my criminal risk paper. 😇 I feel the need to walk you through a typical week for me since in general my program is so different from an undergraduate program or even a typical master’s program.  And, despite what my Instagram looks like, I am not on vacation.  A little background on my program.  I am in Nice, France in an English-speaking Global MBA at EDHEC that is scheduled for 10 months with potential to be extended IF my final project is an internship and IF that internship is longer than 2 months.  EDHEC’s global MBA really focuses on accepting a diverse student population. My current class has about 85 students from roughly 30 different nationalities. I am also part of the consulting club and the women in leadership club. What a lovely building... that I view from the inside all day My schedule is supposed to be class from 9 am – 4:30 pm with an hour and 15 min lunch break.  In reality, while class alw

I love my dog Koki way too much. It actually is strange to me how attached to her I am. I grew up with dogs and of course loved having them, but Koki is MY dog. Ashley and I raised her from a puppy. We spent time training her, socializing her with other dogs and people, and even took her to school. Like I really love this dog. But my love PALES in comparison to Ashley’s. If Ash had to choose between me and the dog, she would not hesitate on picking the pup. When it came to researching ways to get Koki to France, Ashley had to leave that to me. You see, if you start researching how to move a dog abroad, lots of sites  such as the Humane Society  recommend that you do not fly dogs–particularly in cargo–because, sometimes, they do not make it and it was stressing Ashley out. Well, Koki is 50 lbs and cannot fly in the cabin anywhere. Unless we decided to send her by boat (which you can do luxury style for 4k) or charter a flight (as low as 10k by one service!), she was going to have to go

It’s been a hell of a year. Ash had just started at NIH, we moved to Rockville, we did a ton of traveling including to three of our friends’ weddings and a couple trips abroad, Ashley got accepted into grad school, I got promoted, we got MARRIED with our own amazing wedding, and now, to top it all off, we’ve moved to Nice, France for her MBA! It’s been a crazy, BUSY ride. Working at Deloitte was a great experience. I had an amazing team of smart, dedicated, and truly wonderful people. I learned a whole lot about consulting and working with clients using everything I know or could think of with data to solve problems. I probably learned more than I’d care to admit, mostly through osmosis, about process improvements, communication, change management, and–dare I say it–project management (I mostly learned to stay away from that!). That’s what happens when you are around smart people all day. And I guess now I know more than ever about workforce strategy and management. I did try to stick

I filled a lot of paper writing about my time in Africa.  Considering I've only managed to write in my journal a handful of times in the three months I've been back (yes, three damn months) I was quite impressed with my work.  Look! Seems like a lot, yes?  Well I was just reading Paul Theroux's The Great Railway Bazaar.  He took a six month trek and he filled out six notebooks just like those!  Way to take the wind out of my sails… But what, anyway, do I intend on doing with these tomes?  First I plan on typing them up.  I know, I know: why not type them up to begin with?  There is something much more intimate putting pen to paper.  You feel like you really created something.  Take a picture and impress me with anything you wrote on your computer.  When I write I use ink, because there is no taking back a thought after it has been born.  Plus typing them all up is to relive them.  Walk down memory lane. Second is completely theoretical.  I'd like