Landed in LA

Another travel blog! YAY! I am going to be spending all of 2011 away from the main campus of Ithaca College, which is a really weird feeling. I counted, and I will have been on 14 planes this year as well (maybe 16 if that's how I get to my cousin for Thanksgiving)! Now, I am three hours behind Boston instead of 6 hours ahead.

After moving two days ago and having to settle into a new house while packing to come to LA, I landed safely in Burbank's Bob Hope airport an hour later than expected after a delay at my layover in Dallas. At the baggage claim, I met two other girls from the LA program, and we took a taxi van to the Oakwood apartments together. Ithaca College has some sort of agreement with this apartment complex to allow us to stay here. It's an amazing facility with two pools and two gyms located not too far from the Pendleton Center (the IC building in LA). The apartment itself is like being at a hotel. I have my own room and bathroom with tons of closet space, and we have central air. The down side is that my roommates and I need to go buy kitchen stuff and linens for ourselves because the apartment is only semi furnished. My roommates are Shelly and Maddie. Shelly goes to Curry College, so I met her once this summer prior to coming to LA, and Maddie is usually at IC, but I didn't know her before I got here. She's been running errands with her dad today, and Shelly will be arriving tomorrow. I seriously need to get some shopping done though. The weather today is gorgeous, and it was only when I started to unpack that it hit me that I'm not just on vacation.

Tomorrow, I start RA orientation for two days, and then comes the general LA program orientation for all of us until Wednesday. Both are going to be fun. The program staff are really nice. We are going to hike to the Hollywood sign, see a movie, and do some other fun stuff to get an introduction to LA. Thursday, I have two internship interviews and then another one on Friday. There are also several over internship positions I have been contacted about, so I feel pretty good about my ability to get an internship as of now, but nothing solidified yet.

The first week of classes and internships begins August 22. I will be interning 3 to 4 days per week, and I am taking 2 of my required classes. On Tuesday nights from 7 to 10, I have Government and Media, and on Thursday afternoons from 2:30 to 5:30, I have my Senior Seminar. It's so crazy to already be a senior in college. The time went by so quickly!

Anyway, I hope you all like the new blog, and I'll try to be just as informative as I was on my London one. That's the update for now.