This weekend I went up to the Shawgunks with 15 of my J-term compadres and spouses for some mountain-climbing. The Shawgunks (known as "The Gunks" to those climbers in the know) are a set of mountains in the Catskills, just outside of New Paltz (about a 100 minute drive from the city) and provide some of the best climbing in the US. I did 4 climbs during the day of varying difficulties, and rappelled down a big cliff as well! It was alot of fun and I must say, you get a real sense of accomplishment when you climb up to the top of a huge rock!

The other cool thing about this trip was that there were a bunch of people from other clusters who I didn't know very well and who I got to know better during our day of climbing. Definitely make sure that you take advantage of the various trips and outings (including ones that aren't planned under the auspices of school) while you are at school. It's a great way to meet people outside of your cluster in a unique setting (i.e. not a happy hour or a bar night :)

Oh yeah, I signed up for the Chazen trip to Southeast Asia. The trip is about 2 weeks long and hits Thailand, Singapore, and the Phillipines. It's happening over Christmas break and we'll be spending New Years in Bangkok I believe. I should be a Southeast Asia pro pretty soon -- I'm also going to Vietnam with my wife at the end of August!

I have an operations midterm tommorrow, so back to the books...