First couple days working at the News & Observer!

Phew, this week has passed by so quickly!! I came back from Maryland last Monday afternoon and hurried around trying to get everything done. I had to vacuum the apartment (so I wouldn't have allergies.. Boo.), buy groceries (yay for healthy eating! I'll explain more about that later.), do my laundry (it's so expensive! I miss doing laundry at home!!), and grab some things from Duke for the Duke Journal of Public Affairs (http://www.dukejournal.org/ - Look out for our upcoming issue analyzing terrorism!). After finally getting settled, I got ready for my first day of work!

Wednesday, May 26 - Headed in to work at 9:30pm at the News & Observer office in downtown Raleigh (a lovely place!). I got trained with the writing and editing program the newspaper uses and learned some interesting things, like how the N&O shares a Sports section and a Features section with the Charlotte Observer (meaning that some of my stories may be published by both papers!). After being taught that system and being reminded to fact check my stories, I got a brief tour of the newsroom (3rd floor, though Sports is on 2nd floor). After, I met my mentor, Robbi Pickeral and had lunch with her at the Raleigh Times (it used to be a newspaper before its circulation fell too low and it was forced to close). I got to see downtown, which was really cool! After, I met with the two head sports editors in Raleigh and got my first assignment -- to write a feature story on somebody. (I can't tell you who because then that would spoil the surprise, but be on the lookout for a link!!) & Since I didn't get the chance to take a lot of pictures, these are from the Internet.

A picture of downtown

Right near where I work! I want to say a little bit across the street.

A drawing of an angled front view of the office. (It's a fairly large building with 3 stories and a basement).

A small picture of about half of the office.

Thursday, May 27 - Interviewed some people for the story and got started on it. Otherwise, nothing much.

Friday, May 28 - Headed to Zebulon (that should give you a hint about the story!) to interview three people and headed back to the office to keep working on the story. After work, I came back to my apartment and had some dinner and edited the Duke Journal before heading out for a trip downtown with Stephen. We walked around for a little bit and saw the State Capitol before it started raining (and thunder and lightning)! The rest of the evening was spent relaxing while I continued editing the journal and now am about to watch a movie before calling it a night. Below are some photos that Stephen took with his new DSLR camera!

A map of downtown in front of the park across the street from my office

The right-hand side of the office at night

A quaint street leading up to the State Capitol

A picture of the lightning!

This weekend should be more relaxing with Memorial Day (and no work!) on Monday, but I got another story assignment, so I'll be working on both those stories. I also discovered a gem while reading movie reviews about Sex & the City 2 -- there's a film out in Raleigh from the Sundance Festival by street artist (graffiti artist) Banksy called Exit through the Gift Shop at The Colony. I'm thinking of seeing either that or the foreign film The Secrets in Their Eyes at another local theater, The Rialto. It's great how they show independent and foreign films! Otherwise, if the weather holds up (I sure hope so because it was so nice this afternoon!!), I might go for a swim or a jog, or head downtown again for a bit.

I'll try to keep updating more, but the internship is keeping me busy! Oh, and in other exciting news.. I have a work email address (patricia.lee@newsobserver.com) & a work phone number!!

Summer 2010 - Fresh start!

Warning: Long post ahead. (But with pictures!!!)

Wow, so these past two weeks have been insane!!

Brief breakdown & TONS of pictures to follow, so get ready!!

May 2 - 8: Reading period (no classes)/Finals week! I had a ton of errands to do to prepare for my internship in Raleigh this summer (I'm doing a sports internship for the Raleigh News & Observer and will be covering local college sports, the Durham Bulls, & the club soccer team nearby). So I had to get my apartment ready (I was going to put up pictures but realized that probably wasn't a good idea..) & do stuff like visit the dentist (ew, I had to get a cavity filled) & the like. I only had one final on Tuesday & a presentation on Wednesday (check out my Computer Science final project here! It only works with some browsers, though :( ) so I was pretty much cruising for the rest of the week. Our dorm did a great job of providing 9pm snacks every night of finals, like pizza, Cookout milkshakes, fruit and yogurt parfaits, and Dunkin Donuts, all of which were delicious!!

(North) Myrtle Beach, SC: May 8-10 - Last day of finals! So I headed to my apartment and started moving things in and had a pretty packed day with signing the lease form, etc. After, a couple of us (we had a total of 10 people heading out with us) started driving down to MYRTLE BEACH, SC! Basically, Myrtle is the place to be after finals end. Most people stay from Saturday or Sunday to Tuesday or Wednesday, and about half of Duke is there. It's a touristy beach with clean, pristine sand and waters (I like to think I'm a slight beach connoisseur...) and random mini golf and food places like pancake houses, waffle houses, and tons of gas stations. We also went clubbing at the Spanish Galleon in downtown! Here are some pictures of the beach now!

Wilmington, NC: May 10-11: But my beach adventures weren't over after we left Myrtle. We drove back up to Wilmington, NC, another beach city & stayed with my roommate, Caroline, for a night. It was amazing! We had delicious homemade food AND we got to go on her boat!! We rode around and ate at a dockside restaurant where I had a super yummy crabcake sandwich. Then we went back out on the boat and went tubing!! & After, we went to a small, secluded beach and hung out. Not too many pictures because the boat was super windy, but here we are again!

Semi-group picture on the boat!

Tubing!

Raleigh, NC: May 12-13: Just hung around getting the apartment ready, installing Internet, buying pots, pans, food, etc. Boring stuff. So..moving on.

Clarksville, MD: May 13-24: Headed up to Maryland with my boyfriend! My third time here (once in 8th grade for a DC trip & once earlier this year to cover a Women's Bball game for the Chronicle). It's been amazing so far! Good weather except for today.. it was gloomy & rainy :( The first night we got back super late so we just went to sleep.

May 14 - Went to visit Stephen's high school and walked around Centennial Park. It was quite gorgeous! There's a huge lake there, a playground, basketball courts, tennis courts, and they have boat rentals!! Oh, and plenty of grass, of course. We came back, ate dinner, and played Life. (I LOVE board games!!!)

May 15 - I don't really remember what we did today. I think we walked around at the mall and got 1/2-off frapps at Starbucks (I love Starbucks!!).

May 16 - Today was Stephen's mom's birthday! We went to a Chinese seafood buffet to grab lunch for a belated birthday lunch then headed to Costco. After, Stephen and I headed to Centennial Park again to go rowboat-ing!! It was a lot of fun, but definitely tiring. When we got back to the house it was around 5-6ish, so me, Stephen, and his brother made dinner for his mother. Spaghetti with sautéed vegetables and meatballs, garlic bread, tossed salad, and a cookie cake. All homemade! It was tons of fun & quite delicious, surprisingly! Then, we headed out to watch Avatar at a friend's house and came back super tired. Below are pictures from the rowboat!

Rowboat!

Manhattan, NY: May 17: We woke up really early in the morning and rode a bus from Baltimore to NYC ($30 round trip per person!!). We left at 8am and arrived at around 10:30am. It was a really smooth bus ride and we got there really quickly. We started off with Starbucks (of course!) in the morning & saw Madison Square Garden (Duke bball team's second home!!!). We then grabbed brunch at a place called Harries (I think?) & it was absolutely delicious!! We kept walking and saw Times Square & a huge Toys R Us! We also saw the Apple Store in the glass cube thing (Oh & this was my first time to NYC!) and a bunch of break dancers, as well as a person on stilts dressed up as the Statue of Liberty. We also walked around Central Park and rested on the rocks for a bit before taking the subway to Whitehall St. to take the ferry from Manhattan to Staten Island (where we saw Elmo!!) to see the Statue of Liberty (since we didn't have enough time to take a real tour) and then walked around the city and hit Wall St. & Broadway, saw the NYSE, and then kept walking until we hit Chinatown. Then, we took the subway to Union Square, where we saw the Empire State Building & some NYU buildings. Then, I met up with a friend from back home and went to Greenwich Village to eat some delicious food. After, we caught the subway back to Penn Station & headed back to Baltimore. Crazy & fun trip!!! Pictures now!

Break dancers outside of Central Park

Statue of Liberty!

Central Park!

Toys R Us!

Times Square

View from the ferry

Elmo outside of the ferry station to get to Staten Island

Wall St. & Broadway!

NYSE!

Greenwich Village!

May 17-18: We didn't do much these two days. Ate Qdoba & Five Guys (for the first time!) and shopped around at the mall for a bit. Played a couple board games, like Sorry & Clue. Heading to DC tomorrow to check out some of the museums, walk around, & grab dinner with a friend. Can't wait! (DC's my favorite city of all time!!) Thursday and Friday will be hanging out with some of the local kids who are just finishing school, like going ice skating, laser tagging, etc. Then it's back to Raleigh/Durham on Monday, and I start my internship at 9am on Wednesday! (So early!!) Super excited!

Hope you all are having a just-as-exciting summer!!

LDOC Already.. & Last Day of School is .. SATURDAY?!

First off ..

Our 2010 NCAA Champions banner is up on the edge of Duke campus!!

Now back to what I was saying..

Wow! We just had our Last Day of Classes (LDOC) on Wednesday, which was a blast! Rather than give a debrief of what happened this past week (you can guess the usual classes, extracurriculars, & fun activities with friends), I'll detail what happened in the past two days. They both seem so long!!

& On a sidenote, it's 2:53am & I'm in Kilgo Dorm & there is old school music playing outside. Not too loudly but just enough to remind me to find time to relax before finals (since it's the weekend) and maybe even dance around a bit. Perfect!

Wait! Sorry this is so jumbled. I just realized another outstanding day was last Saturday! I ran a 5K for Angels Among Us, which is for the Tisch Brain Tumor Center. I hadn't exercised in a super long time, but it was tons of fun running with friends! (I didn't have my phone to take pictures, unfortunately). After, I headed back to East Campus to eat and get ready for our Chronicle formal, a banquet in honor of Matt Sclafani.

Chronicle sports staff - super dark because the flash broke on the camera

The banquet was filled with super delicious food (tortellini, penne, steak, chicken, spinach and artichoke dip, cheeses, a veggie platter, cheesecake, brownies, etc.), and it was great being able to hang with people from the Chronicle (especially sports staff - 1 of 4 girls!). The awards went to very deserving people, and the dancing after was fun! Great way to end off the Chronicle year!

Anyway, back to LDOC. I woke up at 10am and then headed over to West Campus for a nice brunch with my Chi Omega sisters. After, I met up with some friends in Kilgo Dorm and proceeded to play music, dance around, grab a quick lunch from Panda Express, and hang out until class started at 2:50pm. Book presentations were pretty interesting, but I was pretty ready for class to get out at 4:05pm to say that I had just taken my last class of freshman year. I'm still in disbelief and shock! After, a friend and I headed back to the main quad and listened as loud music played from a stage set up for the night's concert.

We had Rooney (yay!!), Big D & The Kids Table, Flogging Molly, and JAY SEAN!!

Jay Sean!

Here are some videos that people uploaded: Down - Jay Sean, Paddy's Lament - Flogging Molly, LDOC Time Lapse by the Chronicle photographers!!

After, we headed back to the room and just hung out, played music, had fun!! I didn't get to take many pictures, so here's one random one.. I have NO idea what we're doing. Probably singing? Being weird? Who knows!

Me, my neighbor 2-doors down Gabby, & my amazing roommate Caroline!!

We then headed to McDonald's for a late-night food run and proceeded to go to sleep shortly after.

Thursday - Woke up late, walked to Chipotle (by Duke hospital) for lunch (which was delicious and super filling!) & then just hung around for a bit with friends and then headed to Mt. Fuji (in Brightleaf Square) for a friend's birthday dinner. I did a lot of walking but it felt really nice since the weather was gorgeous! We came back then just talked for a long time before watching Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle and calling it a night.

Friday - Woke up at 2pm & headed to a meeting for the Duke Journal of Public Affairs then headed to von der Heyden Pavillion to do work. The Iced Caramel Leche is DELICIOUS, by the way. Stayed in the library (or cafe, rather) for pretty much 8 hours (unfortunately) and finished editing a 10-page literature review paper for my Writing class and completing optional computer science practice problems for extra credit. (Wow, I haven't used those words in a LONG time!) I took a short break in between to grab dinner at Tommy's (their mac 'n cheese is delicious, by the way! I know I've mentioned it before, but I just had to mention it again). I finally left the library a little after midnight and talked with friends and played flash games for a bit before heading to McDonald's again.

I have one final left for Chemistry & a final project demo for Computer Science before I'm done with everything. Then it's off to Myrtle Beach, SC with friends!!

I'm not sure how often I'll be updating this over the summer or at the end of the school year, but in case I don't get another chance this year -- goodbye! Thank you for reading through my posts (or at least looking through the pictures) & I hope they weren't TOO boring! I'll be interning at the News & Observer in Raleigh this summer and writing sports stories, so maybe you'll see my name here and there! I'll also be serving as a tour guide this summer at Duke, so I definitely hope to see some of you then!

This has been an amazing year, & I still can't believe it's happened so fast! I wish I took more pictures, but there you are... Bye again!!