the 4 year plan

it is now pretty clear that i will be in georgia tech for a good 4 years. it seems that the financial implications were more serious than i had anticipated, and as a result, i can forget about any hopes of graduating in the 2 or 3 year plan that i had been pondering over.

with the 4 year plan, i will now seriously seek an internship opportunity, starting this summer. i guess it pays off in both ends in a sense that not only will i get paid well, but if i do well and impress the company that hires me, i could also be looking at securing myself a job before i graduate. hopefully the money accumulated until then will help finance my education for a year at least. and if aid application goes well, then everything will be set.

its amazing to think that even if georgia tech was one of the cheaper of my choices in university selection, the cost is still very very steep. the cost of education has never seemed more cruel.

if i had really intended to graduate early, then that would have meant paying up more as well, which wouldnt have helped. plus, i have the priviledge of being able to skip a semester, and usually taking in 4 full internship semesters will force the student to stay in college for 5 years, but since i can do the internship semester and graduate in 4 years flat, why not right?

so that settles for the duration problem. another problem that is yet to be settled is my major. i could do a double major once im done with one, but im not sure if thats gonna be helpful. but its still up in the air at the moment. i guess i gotta figure out what course to take first. right now, im signed up for 19 hours, i know im pushing it, and ive been considering to drop to 16 or 17 once i get the chance to add and remove courses again. im thinking of dropping my japanese business translation course and taking up english ii, so that i can get that done and over with. i guess i'll put psychology on hold for next academic year and do economics instead too. and if i drop circuits, then im looking at a tough, but manageable 17 hours. my target will be to maintain a GPA of 3.0 so that i can remain in the dean's list for the year.

so thats that.

watched 'the pianist' last night. that was a really great movie, attention to detail and the expressions were delivered very well. and to think that that was a true story! 'almost famous' was a so-so movie, im not sure why it should be ranked that high, and 'magnolia' was a pretty interesting tale involving multiple random events all connected somehow, but i felt that it was too long.

so three more to catch from that top 250 list that ive downloaded. there are still many more, but 'saving private ryan,' 'schindler's list' and 'the seven samurais' are the three that i have currently in my laptop. and those three promise to be a really good time, only that each one of them is at least 2 hours and 40 minutes long. so its going to be also a test of attention as well.