A College Tour & Sideways Rain

We left at O Dark Thirty. For those of you unfamiliar with that time, it's early enough where you drive in the dark just long enough to be annoying, your head keeps telling you it's not the right time to even be up, and coffee really isn't cutting it. Good thing we did though, as we pretty much did the WHOLE COLLEGE TOUR. Like we saw all of it. ON THE BEST FREAKING DAY OF THE YEAR. Anyhow, I digress.

So, Lexi is looking at SUNY Schools (State University of NY). Since the beginning of time we have urged her to stay away from the private schools with their high tuition rates, keeping her loan costs low, and being smart about where she is applying. Of course it appears now that there are only two state colleges that actually have the field of study that she is interested in and one happens to be in the middle of Long Island which involves traveling through New York City. So, we went to visit the one college that has Astronomy and isn't in the middle of Long Island.

The forecast called for a 100% chance of rain and I believe the weather tried to exceed that prediction. I think the only time it stopped raining was when we were five minutes from home. The upside was that it wasn't snowing, although it might have kept one dryer. We came armed with umbrellas & boots. We got there just at 10 am, which was when the event started. Upon rounding the corner to the gym where all the tables were set up, a bunch of cheerful students wearing yellow t-shirts over their winter jackets started jumping up and down and yelling WELCOME TO SUNY NEW PALTZ!!!! Chipper little turds. I started crying, but lucky for me nobody could tell because hello freaking sideways rain. Right about then the umbrella went inside out for the first time of the day and I stopped crying and started laughing.

A little chit chat in the gym at various tables (Financial Aid, Transfer Student, Etc.) was followed by a tour of the Physics department. I swear it took twenty hellish minutes with rain rolling down my sleeve to get across campus to the most awesome building ever. I had taken to holding the one side of the umbrella down so it would stay right side out. Turns out they have a completely new science center, which was full of rocks in glass cases. Nobody would let me look at rocks. We had to go look at lasers and tables that floated on air. Ok, so the Physics department was super cool.

We then hit an astronomy show and then THE MAN made us eat lunch in five minutes because hello, we still had to tour campus in the sideways rain. Joined a group and toured everything. Due to the weather, students were strangely absent except for the cheerful yelling ones with the t-shirts over their coats. We found all the students at the dining hall and stepped past the buffet of pizza and extremely large waffles to emerge again in the sideways rain. Two more dorm tours later and I was pretty much done. The last one smelled like a combination of stale milk and rice krispies with a side of teen spirit and three girls who wouldn't look at us were in a room slightly bigger than my laundry room.

Sadly the tour didn't include a stop at the local brew pup to help erase dorm living from the brain. I'm slightly claustrophobic so the whole thing gave me the shudders. Turns out the other two in my party were also not excited. Right about then Lexi learned if she transferred too early, she'd have to give up her car. Dorm living is an essential part of college so she'll have to rally.

Well, the first tour is done and dusted. We have two more scheduled and then have decided to circle back around to come to some conclusions on next steps. I'd be extremely grateful if the next tour could have a little less weather. I don't think my umbrella can take much more.