En route to Knoxville

I’m sitting in Terminal number 2 at La Guardia waiting for my flight Knoxville by way of Cincinnati stealing bandwidth from North West Airline’s unprotected wifi. I haven’t been able to post much on the blog for the past week because I was in the office until 10:30pm almost every night, and also worked Saturday and Sunday. We have been tied up in a face-lift operation on a popular site that is re-launching soon, and it has required a lot TLC to get it ready

While I don’t plan to make a habit out of this schedule, I honestly do prefer marathon work sessions to short bursts of a couple hours spread out over multiple days because I find it very easy to lose focus when you begin a “simple” task and complete it days later. I guess this is in line with my approach to other areas of life, where I’ve found that I’m much more effective as a sprinter than I am as a marathon runner. I’m very good at taking a concept and developing it in a living, breathing element in a short amount of time, but I don’t have much interest the maintenance. This is probably why I love making (and delivering) websites rather than trying to maintain the content on them. I get my best work done late at night and early morning, although I’m increasingly becoming a morning person.

While I think “going corporate” is an overstatement, I’ve made a lot of changes to my life recently. The first and most important change was to cut myself off financially from the parents. I had to make a withdrawal from my personal savings to make the security deposit on the apartment, but everything since then has been me. To date the only remaining linkage is my cell phone contract which is still under the family plan, but this will change next month*. With an apartment and utilities under my name, credit ratings have become very important to me. Anyone who has rented in New York knows that the process is grueling and personally invasive. Background checks, credit checks, recommendation letters, proof of employment from HR, and base salary requirements are among the hoops you have to jump through. I sometimes wonder if its easier to get hired by the CIA or NSA. When I applied for the first apartment in Brooklyn, I found out that my credit rating was less than desirable, largely because you are judged heavily by the amount of debt you have versus the credit line you’ve been extended. This is tricky because as a college student, you are often extended “safe” cards with very low limits. It looks much worse on your credit to be $450 in debt on a $500 card than it does to have $2,500 on a $10,000 card. I made it a priority to get my cards down to $0 and I’ve been able to keep them that way. It really feels great.

These days you are more likely to find me at the gym at 8am than you are to find me at a bar at 10pm. A couple months ago Natasha and I went vegetarian (my second time for those keeping track), and I adjusted my diet accordingly. I don’t drink soda except on vary rare occasions, and go for whole wheat when available. While I feel better on a day-to-day basis, the true ulterior motive is in the long term: I’m planning to run in at least one marathon during the 2008 calendar year. I run 3 miles a day on the treadmill, and once the weather improves I will resume my 5+ mile runs across the Williamsburg bridge into Brooklyn.

I’m still fighting my inner procrastinator, but I’m enjoying the new found responsibility and manageability of this new life. And it’s a little scary as well. When I arrive in Knoxville, I have a rental car waiting for me, which I’ll drive to my own hotel room. Once the meeting is over, I will fly back to NY tomorrow night and pretend like I didn’t just trivially hop down half the country.

My flight is boarding at this very minute so I’ll wrap this up, but I wanted to explain why this blog had gone silent, and commit to “paper” (mostly for myself) what is different about my life. I think that if I document it and process it, that I’m able to really appreciate the amazing opportunities in front of me. I’m happier than I’ve ever been, and I hope to keep it that way.

*In regards to the cellphone change, I’m pretty up in the air. I’m tired of T-Mobile and would really like a company that provides 3g wireless modems and phones, but the prospect of HDSPA is pretty attractive. I’m also planning on getting the v2 iPhone (3g) which may or may not mean signing my life over to big brother (AT&T). Does anyone have opinions on Sprint, Verizon, etc? I’d love to hear them

GO GIANTS!