Originally Posted by AbnormalQ

So, my mind is being pulled in so many different directions. Spent 31 straight hours yesterday and Sunday putting together a project paper. I was just drained, and forgot about an apt. for my little one, since we are thinking of putting her in school next jan. Welp, call back, and they cant seen Addy until after the holidays, by which time there might not be spots left.

I just...damn. My little one is so ready for school, and this place is perfect and so high quality. I'd be very excited for her to make some friends in her age cohort, rather than being at the house all day long. Now, I fucked that up (my wife forgot about it too, but Im not putting this on her) and it looks like she wont be able to start until next fall.

Then, literally as I get up from that news, I get in my car to go to the gas station for some little shit. Check the mail. Ah yes, just what I was looking for, my rejection letter from Oxford. Didn't even get an interview.

Put those two things together, along with a lack of sleep, and I feel completely emotionally wasted. I put my heart and soul into that application and didnt even make it past the first round. Mensa has published my poetry, graduated with honors from undergrad, been abroad at Oxford before and had two Dons writing recommendations, as well as from the Director of my current program, where I have a 4.0 at one of the top engineering/tech schools. I've started four companies since I was 18. I volunteer for the Make a Wish Foundation. I tutor children at my local middle school. I run marathons as a hobby. Blah blah, fucking blah.

I tried, over a period of years, to form myself into the perfect applicant, with gobs of advice along the way. And I didn't even get a chance at the table.

I mean, do I have to be curing cancer, too? And on top of that, I failed as a parent today too. It does not get any worse. I just, idk, feel like shit. Cheer me up, OT.

Sucks dude. If it cheers you up when other people have shit days too, I'm probably gonna find out soon I got shitted on by my LSAT and will get rejected by all the top 20 law schools. Lols

Oh, did your wife pray for you when you submitted the app? If she didn't that may be it

 

Originally Posted by norcaljeff

Does knowing that i lold hard reading your crushing of abq help at all? I hope so. (i even knew you didnt mean it a mean way but it was so destroying lol)

Abq: See, the sad thing about a guy like you is in 50 years you're gonna start doin some thinkin on your own and you're gonna come up with the fact that there are two certainties in life. One, don't do that. And Two, you dropped a hundred and fifty grand on a fuckin education you coulda got for a doller fifty in late charges at the public library lol <3

Sent from my iPhone

haha this. lmfao.

but yeah, it prolly is your fault

Was hoping that was the case.

I got in just doing the online application, they didn't ask for an essay, it was a pretty easy process to be honest.

20 fucking years from now little abq is going to make kelly gag on the subway with her hipster antics. IS THAT WHAT U WANT

 

Originally Posted by AMARTIN1181

20 fucking years from now little abq is going to make kelly gag on the subway with her hipster antics. IS THAT WHAT U WANT

Oh God, if I have a hipster daughter, I'd kill myself.

 

Originally Posted by kellykip

Lol - I Love AbQ - just breaking balls - the things that are important to each person are relative, and it's never fun hearing that somebody you like and respect's dreams got smashed. And it's gotta be fucking hard as hell knowing how to do the right thing with a child with a disability; but god only puts those obstacles on those he feels best equipped to handle it correctly.

Ya well the reason I hate him and Niptuck are one and the same. They don't give a fuck about me and I don't give a fuck about them. I am hoping that more bad things happen to both of them. Not like either of his examples were actually bad in the grand scheme of things which makes it even more laughable.

He was a douche to me and I was a douche to him. What's the difference?

The biggest problem I have with both of those fucking fools is that I really never did anything to them EVER! EVER!

We might have disagreed about Unions or Taxes but I never went at them unprovoked. If they want to say different and can prove it I will eat my words and apologize. If not they can both go fuck themselves. And Towman LMFAO! What a fucking tool/douchebag/POS slimeball.

 

Originally Posted by rocket5

Ya well the reason I hate him and Niptuck are one and the same. They don't give a fuck about me and I don't give a fuck about them. I am hoping that more bad things happen to both of them. Not like either of his examples were actually bad in the grand scheme of things which makes it even more laughable.

He was a douche to me and I was a douche to him. What's the difference?

The biggest problem I have with both of those fucking fools is that I really never did anything to them EVER! EVER!

We might have disagreed about Unions or Taxes but I never went at them unprovoked. If they want to say different and can prove it I will eat my words and apologize. If not they can both go fuck themselves. And Towman LMFAO! What a fucking tool/douchebag/POS slimeball.

you really wish bad things to happen to people you efight with on the intrawebz?

seriousely dude....get a life...

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Originally Posted by FenwayKing

cheer up, man. I hate to use 'personal anecdotes' because most of them have 0 relevancy to a person's situation, but mine just might. my "worst day ever" was the day i got rejected from Harvard as an undergrad. I was absolutely devastated. I thought I was the perfect applicant; I had all the same feelings you wrote in your OP. I was pissed off---how could they do it to me? What more could I have done? It turned out to be one of the best things that ever happened to me. I had a great four years at Duke and am enjoying the hell out of my life right now. Had I gone to Harvard who knows what would have happened? I'm probably working some stuffy job in NYC or D.C. that I hate. Duke gave me just enough freedom and a perspective on world outside typical elitism that I'm doing something I enjoy while working on my entrepreneurial pursuits. Who's to say missing out on Oxford won't do the same for you?

You have to use your biggest disappointments as fuel. Oxford doesn't want you? Fuck 'em, make em regret them turning you down. Go out and do something awesome. You and I both know you have the capability for it. See what you can do to make the best of this situation and how you can turn this into an advantage.

Jordan said it best:



Good luck.

Now this is a good reply. Nicely said man.

I'll admit I laughed out loud pretty hard too when I got to your post, Zep (I mean, obviously not about the fact that your dad died, that's horrible man, I'm very sorry for your loss (my own father, with whom I was very close, also passed away 3 years ago, so I really do know how horrible it feels)), but I mean like, in terms of the timing/delivery of your post, it was just hilariously crushing/rapesauce at that point in the thread in the context of the thread lol.

That said, I still feel really bad for ABQ, regardless of the fact that there are obv far worse things out there than what happened to him, like, I still totally can understand how gut wrenching that shit probably was for him today. To spend all day, every day, working extremely hard, putting every ounce of energy into one specific goal, and worse yet a goal which there really isn't any direct substitute for (given that he was saying that there really aren't any other colleges in the world that have the type of department, with the specific type of thing which was exactly what he was looking for, like, the perfect exact thing he wanted), and to just spend years slaving towards that, and then just have it all vaporize instantly like that in matter of seconds at the mail box, I can def imagine how sickening that would feel, and sympathize.

Keep your head up Ab, life will still most likely be extremely fun and awesome regardless. Maybe a little less awesome than it would've been. Maybe a little more awesome than they would've been (no way to ever really know for sure). But will most likely be some level of awesome regardless, and that's the important thing. So, once the freshness and rawness of the wound wears off, and eventually it obviously will, focus on how fun and awesome life is, and things will be chill.

tough luck AQ. shoulda told them about your leather-bound book collection.

I also feel really bad for abq, but my only advice is to not give up. For someone to work so hard and do so much for this one and only goal it means to me that you have an absurd amount of drive that 99.9% of people don't have. Don't let this mishap put off that ridiculous ambition and drive you have.

Right now I'm in a similar position as you. I'm working my ass off for 2 things:

1. Move to Equity Research by mid 2012
2. Do everything necessary so that I go to a top 15 MBA program in the US or a top 5 prrogram here in Canada by fall 2014.

Both things are extremely hard to achieve but I just keep saying so myself over and over "don't give up, don't give up"

now I say it to you abq, don't give up.

 

Originally Posted by MUPokerPlayer

tough luck AQ. shoulda told them about your leather-bound book collection.

I have many. Ok not really. Just about everything I own like that is in pdf.

 

Originally Posted by Unforseen

question: can't you reapply

Yes, but the timing was right now. Next year or thereafter, I cant say that will be the case. People act like I didn't take my family into consideration. I did, and that why it was most likely now, or never. So I decided to take a shot.

But, I don't rule this out.

 

Originally Posted by skankmofo

Did you want Oxford so badly or the opportunities it offered? Those opportunities are still there, maybe just find another way to get them, only issue is that it seems like from this and other posts that you wanted Oxford more than what comes after Oxford...

So this was the fundamental thought process....

I want to, in the future, create my own job. That's all I've ever done in the past. The most recent thing went poorly. In order to start a new thing, I resolved to be more patient. If it took me a decade to acquire the suite of skills I'm looking for, then that is ok with me. I wanted to go about building a better foundation for my next idea. I am business and philosophy trained. I resolved to learn how to think like an engineer. So I entered a unique program that merges the analytic sciences with the science of management and decision making. The next step was to develop a unique research interest. It just so happens that Oxford, a place that I had always dreamed of returning to for my graduate education since my experience there in '07, has a department unlike any other in the world, and they just started offering a masters there in '09 in that research interest. It was a perfect fit. And so ever since I discovered this, everything I've done since, I've had my application profile in mind. Maybe not the forefront of my thoughts always, but still, there.

My plan from there was to then develop a professional network within that narrow interest by working in a big tech firm for a prolonged period. Because they pay well, and I would spend some years living ok, but frugally. Clear every debt I have Then, by 35, I should have the entire framework in place to research, create, manage and find capital (talent and VC) to implement it all.

Or, maybe in my research, I find something I need to move on NOW. I was open to that too.

But ultimately, Oxford was about the research. Where I am now, there are also opportunities to do things I could do nowhere else. I am going to pursue those things. Am already working on my plan B. Don't have time to dwell. (tho on some level, I will likely carry this with me until I die. the rejection letter is already framed and hung above my desk, right next to the poster of Vince Lombardi's essay, What it Takes to be No.1)

 

Originally Posted by ScottBrewr99

I went to Oxnard, Ca, and believe me Q, its not that great a place. Trust me.

Now this i believe.

Lolzing!

skip the college-prep nursery school and send the kid to a real school, with real kids to play with. IMO.