Quick Update.

In the end, I did find an apartment (but one between Grammercy and the East Village, not in Harlem). This building is about a century older, and my ceiling isn't much more than seven and a half feet tall. Short as it may be, my apartment is warm, cozy, well-maintained, and only costs about twice as much as I ever imagined paying for a one-bedroom. I have a bed, a desk, a rug, a bookcase, a table, one pot, one pan, an amazing toaster, a matching (borrowed) set of table and chairs, and a fridge stocked with only wine bottles, baking soda, and a Brita pitcher. A very red sofa is on mail-order and due to arrive in a week or two. I'll write more about my efforts to turn house into home, but not now.

I spent three weeks in Australia, a couple weekends in Boston, and one Christmas weekend in Sarasota. Sydney was warm, friendly, and other-worldly (those details will have to wait as well). At the end of May, I'm going to China for two weeks: Honk Kong and Guangzhou. A trip to China has been so long on my "someday, wouldn't it be lovely" list that I'm not sure I'll believe I'm going until I'm there. I do, however, have the tickets. For the fourth of July, I'm hoping to visit family in Oregon.

In the past five months I've worked too much, missed my friends and family, had my camera stolen, and learned much more than I expected. Switching careers is humbling; I no longer know all the answers.

I've considered starting a coffeeshop, a teashop, a flowershop, several different kinds of software companies, an ad agency for podcasters, and a couple of real-estate ventures. I'm too young to know if my itchy feet are just something I need to learn to deal with, or an instinct I should follow.

I went to go see the Mets play the Marlins today, but the game got rained out.

It's good to write again, even if it's simply expository and rather perfunctory. I'll find the funny again soon, I promise. I expect it will arrive when I try to put together my "ready-to-assemble" couch, if not sooner.

A Short Bio.

I'm a computer scientist with entrepreneurial ambitions masquerading as an investment banker in New York. I graduated from MIT in 2005, after which I spent a couple months interning with Prodea, an "inventor capital" firm. I worked for IBM in the Extreme Blue rapid-prototyping program in 2004 and developed methods for helping electric utilities use smart meters and dynamic pricing to prevent power outages. I designed the first iteration of Creative Commons' ccMixter music-sharing service in 2003 with my friend Matt Drake. Before that, I was a software engineer for now-defunct indy music-vending startup Digizaar, a pilot program using micropayment technology. I also worked in MIT labs on telepresence and gene-sequencing projects.

I'm interested in the future of media, privacy in the era of online identity, and the evolving financial services industry. I'm also interested in delicious food, french bulldogs, and photography.

If you'd like to discuss any of the above, feel free to e-mail me at ispivey (at) alum (dot) mit (dot) edu. A detailed resumé is available on request (possibly).

Job? Check. Apartment?

So after all the plane flights and resume-dropping and general stress of job-hunting, I landed a big one. I'm moving to New York to be a "Business Analyst" for Macquarie Holdings, an Australian firm that buys the hell out of companies and stuff. For various reasons, I'm totally stoked: everyone at the company seems really laid-back and fun, I get four weeks of vacation, they're going to send me to Sydney for three weeks for training, and, most importantly, I get to learn how to buy companies. Awesome. I start work on November 14th.

I've been apartment-hunting in Manhattan since Monday, and it's been quite the memorable experience. The low point came yesterday afternoon at a building off Convent Ave in Harlem. In one building the super says (in his Jaime the Science Friend drawl), "Come here, check this out, this one isn't for rent yet, but you gotta see this. Only in the movies, man." And what do I see inside the first bedroom?

All the windows are covered with black paper, there are dim red lights everywhere, and there's some huge S&M rack complete with ropes and rods and scaffolding and shit. The super said when the last tenant moved out, she just left it in there. He has it on eBay (though I couldn't find it in a couple minutes of searching), and says he has offers for more than $3500 already. "You never know who lives next door, man," says the super. Thanks, buddy! Now how the hell do I get out of this building?

I did, however, find a nice apartment at 123rd St & Broadway, just north of Columbia, that I'm going to make an offer on this morning. It's kind of sort of in Harlem, which sounds scary to a white honky from Florida, but I explored the neighborhood last night at around 10PM and never once felt like I was going to get a shiv in the kidneys. There's a bar/restaurant that looks suspiciously like the Miracle of Science, a couple Chinese take-out restaurants, a yuppy-looking Thai restaurant named "Blue Angel", and a convenience store on the corner that sells fancy beers. I did, however, have to spend quite a while reassuring my poor mother that I wouldn't be killed or mugged were I to live there. I think I shouldn't have mentioned the housing projects up the street.

Please, Sir, May I Have A Job?

As you may or may not know, loyal readers, I'm looking for a job again. And since I'm trying to switch careers already (a novel feat, considering I've yet to hold a full-time job for more than four months) most of my previous job experience is entirely irrelevant. This, then, is how I find myself marching around MIT's uncomfortably hot Johnson Athletic Center in uncomfortably stiff dress shoes and an uncomfortably woolen suit. Not that the experience is novel. I'm almost positive I've yet to miss an MIT career fair. This career fair, however, is different. At this career fair, I'm wearing the stinky cologne of desperation.

Well, it's not that bad. It looks like I won't have much trouble getting a job in investment trading, and those positions not only pay well but also give me a chance to learn about a wide variety of investment products and methods. And if that doesn't sound exciting, I really don't know what does. So far, however, it looks like they'd ask me to relocate to New York, Chicago, or D.C. And as much as those jobs aren't my first choices, they're a lot better than sleeping on my friends' couch while sending out resumés and making phone calls.

Which brings me to the real source of desperation, honestly: I want to get off my borrowed couch and have a home. It's stressful enough to be living out of my car, but I feel even worse cluttering up Tony, Tony, Brian, Bryan, Greg and Magellan's living room. Wherever I end up, I'd like to end up there now, please.

But things are looking nowhere but up, happily. And I think I got all the angst out of my system, so you shouldn't be hearing any more of this from me.

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