North Maple Rag

Tonight I had dinner with six friends. I met one of them in the second grade, one in college, one at my job in DC, and three are NYU students I met this fall. Despite the fact that each of them is witty and smart, I was nervous right before we all met up. I'm not sure what I thought would happen. A brawl? Conversations leading them to believe I'm not cool enough for them anymore? Awkward, sullen silences? None of those were likely, but I was nevous nonetheless. Luckily, everything went swimmingly. Everyone looked like they had fun. They said they had fun. I'm choosing to believe they actually did.

So, switching to something completely unrelated, I've had some great mail lately. Some of it was mail that went to my house last fall that I just saw for the first time over break. Here are the highlights:

• My student loan refund check arrived yesterday. There were some miscalculations last semester and I ended up getting a more than I'd expected. Yay!
• I finally saw my rejection letter from Stanford; not only did it arrive weeks after I'd started at NYU, there's a typo in it! I think it was supposed to say "fine academic record" but instead it says "find academic record." Silly Stanford, who needs 'em?
• Despite turning down their offer of admission nearly a year ago, the University of Illinois thinks I'm a student. I received a letter today urging me to set up direct deposit at their financial aid office for my student loan refund check. Uh yeah, I should do that . . . at the school I'm actually attending.
• Retirement savings accounts are just about the best thing ever. I saw my federal employees retirement account statement while I was home and it made me so happy. Whenever I start to feel bad about the fact that I'm living off of money I haven't earned, I can think about that nice little pile of money gathering interest. Woo! Thank you, taxpayers, for matching my contribution.