Let's play a game.

It's called "Find the American student at school on the weekend."

I had a semester project and paper due on Tuesday so my group decided to meet at school to compare notes, edit the paper and divvy up the presentation responsibilities.

Now mind you 60% of the students at the school are non-American anyways so this number might be skewed. But I was the only American there for most of the afternoon. Almost all of the French and Turkish students were there. I'd bet this differential would be even stronger on a Friday or Saturday night but alas I'll never find out, because I won't be at school on those nights to find out.

That said the project finished up well. It was about a merger between two very different organizations and the problems that the different structures and culture caused in the merged organization. The teacher seemed to like the presentation and I handled most of the paper myself since I speak and write the best English of my group (composed of an American, Venezuelan who hates Chavez, and Turk.) Also the combined project components are almost 40% of my grade in this class and I felt more comfortable carrying it in my own hands even if it meant a couple of late nights

I have three things left before the semester ends. Two papers (one about 25 pages and the other 10) and a finance final. Both papers are group projects and so not quite so bad as they might seem.

First paper is about McDonald's and the problems their facing now that their mass market has started to differentiate itself. Second is on whether the IMF should be bailing out countries.

While most of the last few months has been about school, I've also done a few things outside of it. I've been playing fairly regularly in a weekly poker game. So far so good, I've only not finished in the money once and I've won outright twice, chopped the pot once and finished third. This is in a total of about six games, so as Bart Simpson would say "that ain't not bad."

Also I've been doing a Thursday night trivia competition. This week and next is a two week tournament for some decent prizes ($200 cash to the winning team) so I'm pretty jonesed up for that. My mind seems to do well retaining useless trivia for whatever reason.

I have to go read up on Fark and the paper to make sure I'm covered on current events.

More later.

Jeff