The (Last?) First Day of School!

So Monday was my last first day of school. Unless I can't find a job and am forced to go back for a phD. I'm pretty excited about all of my classes, but they are going to be a lot of work. My "fun" class is political economy of urban development, wherein we delve into the various theories of political economy and how those have played out in practice over the course of the 20th Century in urban areas -- Fordism, suburbanization, renewal, etc.

Then I have international trade theory and policy which I'm taking mostly for the macroeconomic perspective. Sadly, my first choice for this, macroeconomics at the Graduate School of Business, filled up before non-MBA students had a chance to register. I think it will be good, though (lots of graphs!), and towards the end we get to focus on the "human elements" like immigration and labor practices which should be really interesting, and tie into PE of urban policy.

Lastly, I'm taking microeconomic analysis. Basically, it is a three course sequence to write an in-depth, publishable statistical analysis on a topic of our choosing. The first two quarters are "to get us ready" for the last, taught by James Heckman. It's a bit scary and probably way over my head mathematically, but I'll have a really good understanding of rigorous analysis (and a class with a Nobel Laureate!) by the time I graduate. Which at least in theory is why I came to the University of Chicago in the first place.

All ready, the weekend seems very far away. Several friends and I went out to Starved Rock for a bit of hiking Sunday to celebrate our last day without homework (I would have pictures, but Meredith hasn't sent them yet). It was incredibly muddy from the summer flooding and I came away with at least a million mosquito bites despite repeated application of Off!. But, it was fun. And nice to get out of the city for a few hours.

No big plans for this weekend, except to try to stay on top of reading. And also to avoid the riotous baseball fans across the city.