timuralp

It's not that we're better than you, but, as Walter would say, "Donny, you're out of your element". Anywho, second year starts on the 8th. Last year of classes at last!

Yea, I don't know why people are obsessed with DD coffee. I don't drink coffee, but my stepdad who's an avid drinker was never a fan. Then my east coast friends loved it. Go figure... From talking to all the visiting people I decided it must be mediocre. Anywho, I obviously can't vouch for every corner of the east coast, but in MA we had a nice coffee shop downtown that, once again according to my stepdad, made good coffee. He also bought beans from Trader Joe's, so maybe that's something to check out. Good luck with the pursuit of caffeine

Err, and this makes you "Officially Grad" how?

hehe now you're generalizing unfairly

That's your problem - you're next to/in New Funswick By the way, before you get all high on exercise and healthy living, check out the grease trucks. They are awesome!

Oftentimes, if you're a full-time student, you can claim temporary residency and not register the car in the state you're in. I changed my residency because I bought a house here and I also don't want to deal with absentee ballots when elections come around. If you earn money in a state, you usually must pay taxes to that state. If you're also a resident of another state, depending on the agreement between states, you might have to pay taxes there as well. This means you might have to pay taxes twice. When you change your address, you can get the change of residency sticker in some states, which isn't much hassle and doesn't involve getting a new license card. Look all of that up for the particular states that concern you.

Yea, please make sure to wear clean clothes every day. I'd rewear jeans or shorts a couple of days, but don't overdo it... Make sure to shower daily and not turn into my smelly office mate (seriously, the kid must shower on weekly or bi-weekly basis... grrr). To an earlier question, all of the schools I've been in (Massachusetts and Michigan) have no problems with people wearing shorts. One of my profs in undergrad would wear shorts to all his classes.

I would suggest meeting random people who don't go to school in the town. Seeing if there are any clubs/sport leagues you want to join. Explore the local wine or beer world, if you're into that. Work on hobbies (man, I wish I had time to work my bike )

I wear shorts on regular basis, well, until winter comes and I wore them even for meetings with my advisor, since the first day.

Plum market

Right... depends on the school and the "real" insurance in the states can be quite pricey, when you have actual bills and discover you have to pay 30% of things like an MRI that run around 2-3k. Luckily, my university has an awesome grad student "you're covered for everything, ever" insurance, so I don't have to worry anymore

I'm not leaving 4th grade for the rest of my life then By the way, how awesome is this? http://www.voltaicsystems.com/

I find a backpack to be most comfortable for everything I haul and it is irreplaceable when riding a motorcycle. I found messenger bags to be too limited in capacity after carrying one for a few weeks. Ultimately, I think only you can figure out which bag is best for you and the stuff you have to carry. I'd just go to a store and start trying a bunch on. If you have some idea of how much stuff you're gonna carry, you can try stuffing some in and seeing how it feels.

Here's something to consider: figure how much you're paying rent/year, multiply that by 5 or 6. That's money you won't see back. Then figure out how much your mortgage is, the interest you're paying, and the line at which it's still more profitable to buy a house. If you find that you're better off even with a modest house price drop, you should consider it. Oh, and in a lot of places you can get houses with almost 0 down and just the closing cost on your grad stipend.

One thing is AT&T isn't DSL over POTS, but they started running fiber to the node (i.e. your neighborhood) and then coax or twisted pair to your home. The mostly fiber+some coax is a lot better than coax to your house, a-la comcast. I'm using comcast only because I can call them every 6-9 months and tell them I want to switch, thus prompting them to offer me a deal on the services, which ends up being cheaper than AT&T and I'm also in the lab 10-12 hours and sleeping (hopefully) for 6-8, which means great service at home is not as crucial But look into U-verse and if you have lots of roommates, look into comcast business plans - if you split it, can get some awesome interweb speeds for reasonable prices. Oh, and don't use dial-up... preserve your sanity

Parking on north is pretty simple, on the other hand, so if you have a car, live wherever the hell you want. Personally, I wouldn't live in U-Towers, but look around Kerry town, Packard, Green road. If you have a car, then coming there for the "social" life is easy, especially if you have the after hours permit. Also, anyone else coming to AA, a motorcycle or a scooter is awesome in the summer - you can park in most U-M garages for free and free in downtown structures. Sadly, you have to garage it for the winter...

forgot to mention one link, for people interested in trying this option: http://tuxmobil.org/mylaptops.html Find your model there and go nuts

Not to be really mean, but typing "they're" isn't that much harder Anywho, people mentioned Linux, and I'll only throw in a word of caution. I run it myself and actually set it up for my stepdad to use and he hasn't had any issues whatsoever. So, why would I caution anyone? Because, for example, in his case it took me a couple of hours of looking at source code to get the ethernet card to work. Linux can be great if someone sets it up for you and that person installs everything you ever need so you never have to mess with it yourself. Or... if you have lots of time on your hands and desire to google things on regular basis. You can also setup a dual-boot and tinker with linux when you have time (that probably won't happen in grad school ) The Mac suggestions aren't bad, just because they are indeed easy to use and you won't deal with viruses/malware as much (people just don't bother writing those for OS X apparently ). They are expensive, like everyone pointed out. If you're gonna look at other manufacturers, I'd really recommend Asus. Their hardware has always been reliable for me. Something like this, for example: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6834220518 I'd also recommend reinstalling the OS once you get it, just to get rid of the random programs that come preinstalled, but that's just my preference

Northwood is quiet... and close to North campus, which is good and bad. Most things are on central campus. There's a bus though. I'd say craigslist is reasonable... Although, I didn't look there, I know others had decent luck with it. Also, ask within your department if there's a housing mailing list and then send an email to all the other grad students.

I'd go with talk to people in your lab and meet people the first few days. If the class allows for collaboration, you guys could definitely work on stuff together. There are a bunch of clubs at U-M and I would look through those. You can just search the U-M website. Depends on the students and what you're interested in. If you're looking for dancing/club kinda deal, Live at PJs, Fifth Quarter, Rush Street (prepare for overdressed people on occasion), Millennium club. Bar Louie, Arena, and Sportskeepers, as well as BWW are pretty good places to see the game (whichever one you're trying to catch. I managed to convince BWW to show Minnesota vs Iowa ). If you're looking for a good beer and to hang out, try Grizzly Peak (brewery), Arbor Brewing Company (brewery), Heidelberg (german beer), or Ashley's (undergrads abound, but good selection from all over). There are a bunch of other places on central campus, but I wouldn't recommend them... Although Blue Leprechaun has the cheapest fish& chips I've found. There's the rackham orientation - not very useful. Your program will have an orientation too - go to that. After that, just be friendly, meet people. Most that you'll meet will be in your department probably and sadly. I ended up joining things like the wine club to try to make friends outside the program. Your mileage may vary. Try going to some football games - occasionally people meet there, although half of the students are not entirely coherent. You can friend me on facebook if you want, then you'll have 1 friend outside the program As far as mine, I'm in CS and we're pretty anti-social, sadly. So, I actually made friends on the visit weekend with some biomedical engineers, had a friend in biochem, and met people in ME. I didn't really make any friends in CS that I hang out with until maybe second semester. I like to think that's not the norm and that psych people will be more social

check out yelp, as well. yelp is awesome for most places. and I mentioned sam's club because it's closer than costco and according to google there's one on detroit st - i'll have to go investigate this, because that'd be awesome

a lot of students do live there... it's a bit quieter, there are mostly other grad students there, some families. depends on what you're looking for, as usual

then you should also mention sam's club.

Ok, good point. Check the regulations I know the particular school I'm in doesn't care, so long as you're not the TA for that class. If you are, you can ask to not have to grade work of some student.

don't forget to bring your bentley