With or without grant money?

...with roughly a year's income saved up.

Save it. Maybe take a quick vacation, but a year's salary isn't that much (unless, of course, you have a year of disposable cash).

if there's anything you think you might rather be doing
than whatever is it at your job
use a year to try that other thing
push yourself to do something
that you can use
to make something of yourself in the future
more the sort of something that you really want
instead of wherever your current job is leading you

On second thought, I'd finish my MBA in RE Development. I could do it now, but it is just not worth dedicating the time.

I'd still invest/save the other 80%, though.

I would do nothing but watch movies, eat cucmbers with lemon,salt, and chili and SEX

just an essay?

Anyway great post, I'm taking a sabbatical of sorts myself. I'm not sure what I'm doing besides travelling - planning to a do a Marlin and drive from state to state looking at great modernist architecture, have decided what's after that though. Maybe a sketch/architecture/wine tour of Europe

I'd buy an old car that I could fall in love with and nurse it to near perfect health.

difficultfix has the right idea...

i'd do a george costanza and just lay around in my boxers eating big blocks of cheese.

I'd travel, take photos, read books, repair an old house, and work at my favorite restaurant.

Trace, where are you doing the MBA in RE Development?

difficultfix, sex is dangerous. it'd take you half the year just to trust someone enough (and get both of you tested for everything) before you could really go at it and have fun...

i think i'd do exactly what im doing right now. i guess thats a good thing.... move to a foreign country and work for an architect you've admired for the last decade

atechno,

how do you "do a marlin?"

well, technically, I have not started ;-) Don't have that year off yet!

Probably will never do it, learning enough just making things happen, reading books, talking with colleagues, etc.


There are several schools that give working professionals "Executive" or "Certificate" MBA's, both of which are accredited. Doesn't matter, really, though, as it is the skills you are going for.

This one requires 10 years pro experience in the RE industries (arch counts) and you can take as long as you want to complete (most complete in about 1.5 years). Drawback is it costs more than $15k.
It is at the Daniels School of Business, at UofDenver.

43N88W - did you just apply cold? did you have a contact there. I kind of see myself doing that soon. working in a foreign country for sombody who's work I truly admire. Is the money descent? How long do you see yourself staying there? Can you get licensed in that country?

for a year i would backpack all over the world - that would be fucking amazing.

Nicolas Benjamin

if thats the case I will watch movies and eat cucmbers till the test come in then I will have sex...once I am done with that and if I still have time I will probably look into those big blocks of cheeze.... or maybe I could start a muffin shop where I only sell the muffin tops....

difficultfix, are you raza?

cucumbers with lime, salt, and chili powder is every mexican's favorite snack.

I'd kayak the length of the Mississippi. Then walk from Chillicothe Ohio, to Los Angeles, like the great Charles Lummis.

Road trip from Atlanta to Tierra Del Fuego in patagonia, and back.

go back to england and spend a year in the town that i grew up in

backpack the world would definitely top my list. i've done three months in europe. i drool at the thought of three months in asia, 3 months in africa, 3 months in south america....

is it sustainable to fly out to so many places apropos drooling?
or maybe, sustainability does not belong to this thread in principle.

I would move to Nashville or Memphis and become a studio musician.

On the weekends, play some blues clubs.

Sure would beat the hell out of being a "CAD/IT Specialist"!!!!

ether thanks for the idea. I think that's top of my list...just how can I afford it. Maybe I'll give it a try. I met a guy a couple years ago that was sailing in a 23ft yacht, to all the sea/ocean facing countries in the world - solo. Man was an idiot!! He'd often not have enough $$ for fuel, so he'd do odd jobs to buy a tank full, other times relying completely on the wind. It took him nearly 6 months from the galapagos to the falklands.

I am looking at a map of South America, and despite the fact I don't speak Spanish (or anything else besides English), I am yearning to drive the continent from say Guyana...my version of motorcycle diaries

Techno, if you make your point of entry columbia near the panamerican highway I'll pick you up on my way down.

whatever it is you decide to do, I hope you're not back at that predictable job and repetitive life after a year or two.

werd, crave.

a-techno, i dated a girl who's folks spent their honeymoon sailing a 23' sailboat around the world. i would pepper them with questions anytime we were together. btw, i spent less than 5k on my extended trip to europe.. that was back in '01, so the dollar wasn't quite so bad then. i definitely could have done it cheaper. now that we are starting a family, the opportunities to do such trips are nil but i figure when my daughter is old enough (in college), we can take them together! honestly though i'll probably encourage her to see the US before she goes abroad. we have enough things to see and do in our own country to last a lifetime.