MKNonline Blog

Everyone, big news! Our family just got a brand new addition. Her name is Kailey, and she’s three months old. As you can tell, she is absolutely adorable.

She’s a mixed breed puppy, half Sheltie (Shetland Sheep dogs) and half Bichon (aka. Yorkie, I believe). I’ve looked all over the place to see whether this mixed breed even exists, and it seems like she’s a bit one-of-a-kind. I hope it doesn’t lead to medical problems a little later on, but she’s perfectly fine and healthy so far. We’re taking her to the vet tomorrow. Oh, her name is Kailey. It’s not too feminine, and the K name goes with the family tradition of everyone having a name starting with K (exception being my mom. My Vietnamese/middle name starts with a K).

She was the fiestiest of the litter at the puppy center, which my mom associated with being a good sign. For a puppy, we feel she’s pretty well-behaved. She obviously has no control of her bladder/anus though, but at least she mostly goes on newspaper if we can’t get her outside. She also waivers between extremely hyper to downright lazy, but that’s normal too. She loves grass and has a strange fear of empty soda cans, and is easily distracted by everything. She learned to climb the stairs today and it was a true moment of preciousness. I just REALLY hope we’re ready to take care of her. Already, I’ve spent practically my life’s fortune for/on her (no regrets so far!). The issue is my brother and I go back to school in the end of April. And my parents both work, so it’s crucial we get this thing somewhat housetrained ASAP. Just having it this weekend so far, it’s needed far more attention than I originally imagined. Tomorrow is the first big test of leaving it home alone for an extended period of time.

How we even got to this point still baffles me. I begged, pleaded, and was on best behavior for the past two weeks in order to convince my parents. To them, it seemed kind of random, and really, it was. But I got bored, and I’ve always wanted a pet, so one day, I started begging and manipulating until they saw I wouldn’t back down. It’s how I get most things from them. The original plan was to get a young cat but not kitten. We visited a crazy cat lady on Friday to see our options, and my mom didn’t like any of the easy-to-maintain-but-just-as-cute cats. Instead, she sees two little kittens in a room where the walls have been literally torn apart and instantly falls in love. This is ironic given my mom’s OCD. Her rationale is we could train those kittens to the personality we want. Plus, they were the cutest. Hard to argue that. With that issue deadlocked, we headed to dinner in West Hartford. On our way to dinner, I remembered there was a Puppy store that we always passed but never went in. So, we went in, and let me just say, cutest-but-most-expensive puppys and kittens ever. But sure enough, come Saturday morning, Kailey’s in our den/family room.

This puppy has already brought the family somewhat closer, in my opinion. The biggest surprise is that my mom has taken such a liking to it, however selective.

Pictures of Kailey below. Notice the brown eyebrows, one of it’s cutest features.

Well, barring the senior reception and maybe an ISA dinner and picnic, my INROADS career is over. I don’t think it will truly hit me until my internship is officially over, but there was definitely moments of realization at our recent LDI and the awards banquet recently.

For any minority students who are looking for not just an internship, but truly a career opportunity, I can’t fight for INROADS enough. To go from being a shy, quiet, unmotivated high school senior with no idea how to get a job much less a good one to having the opportunity to apply for an IT Leadership Program in a Fortune 50 company and to either way have an offer by October the latest…that’s extreme. Even more than that were the friends, the perspective, and again, the friends I made in the program. It’s weird that I won’t have a summer of forced training workshops to see everyone, but I know that come graduation, all of those people will be waiting for me, cheering me on.

These friends, besides being really the only truly diverse people I know, are smart, driven, and know how to have fun. Just look at this picture below. It’s the future class of CEO’s, I can guarantee it.

I don’t know where I would be in the summers without INROADS. Probably just sitting here blogging three times as much. The Inroads Student Association, of which I’m VP of Hartford, sponsored a trip to Six Flags New Jersey. I mean, we go to Six Flags every summer, but SF New England was getting a little played out. This park is monstrous compared to the old Riverside. Luckily, Merly hates roller coasters as much as I do. Just seeing Kingda Ka, the worlds tallest coaster, made me lightheaded. How do people not die more often from that stuff?? Anywho, we went on a safari, saw a tiger show, saw a dolphin show, rode on bumper cars and river rapids. Ate some Dippin’ Dots. It was really one of the highlights of summer. And look! Group picture! I love group pictures!! Obviously, you can see that I overpacked again for an occasion.

This picture reminds me how much I’m going to miss INROADS and the friends I’ve made once it’s done. By the way, I take full credit for this group picture, even though I didn’t take it. Haha.

I clean out my cameraphone pics like once every blue moon. I’m going to try, after every cleanup, to post some of my favorites and tell the fun stories associated behind it. Of course, you can find all my pictures on flickr

Nice pic of Faneuil Hall I took on 4th of July weekend. For a camera phone with no flash, I was kind of proud of this.

Old person’s concert on that same weekend. It was some Beatle’s cover band.

My favorite picture I’ve taken with my cameraphone so far. It’s just a Boston skyscraper shot, but this picture alone made my phone worth it.

For once on a July 4th weekend, I decided to make a little trip up to Boston. I wish I had more time up there, but for interns, there’s no such thing as Monday off. Nonetheless, I managed to pack in all my groups of friends in one and a half days. And man, did I pig out too. I also bought (and by I bought, I mean Scott bought) a dog tag with a Boston Red Sox bling. Another one to add to my collection.

Chowderfest is highly recommended to any Boston 4th of July tourist by the way. So much free chowder and other things, I thought I was going to explode. I just wish I could’ve been up there today for the fireworks and barbeques. Below are my attempts at photography. Various shots from Quincy, MA and downtown City Hall.