<p>Three weeks and counting. Everyone been to his/her local Bed, Bath? Will your stuff be waiting to be picked up in Kingston? Have you mastered the assigned material?</p>
<p>Who’s ready to rock?</p>
<p>You’re so excited you posted this thread twice!</p>
<p>i’m mad excited to.</p>
<p>I haven’t been to Bed, Bath, and Beyond yet.</p>
<p>I live really close so I’ll be cramped in a car with all my stuff.</p>
<p>I’ve hardly mastered the reading material yet. I have another 20 pages of Metamorphosis and practically everything left of The Origins of Species.</p>
<p>lol.</p>
<p>For those who don’t know, you can go to your local Bed, Bath & Beyond, go through the store and scan, with a hand scanner they give you, everything you want at college, then they print a list for you, upload the items you selected to their computer, and all those items will be waiting for you at Bard (Kingston, actually, the closest BB&B), in boxes, on the date you tell them you want to pick the stuff up.</p>
<p>Very convenient.</p>
<p>Kids from all over America are flying in to Albany today, en route to Bard. In order to avoid seeing this board declared dead from lack of interest, how about posting where you’re coming from? </p>
<p>Come on dudes, time to rock.</p>
<p>I’m coming from…</p>
<p>Downstate NY. Very exciting, right?</p>
<p>I’ll bet it’s exciting for you.</p>
<p>Which is all that matters.</p>
<p>Ehh… </p>
<p>I’m excitED for Bard, but it’s not all that exciting of a drive from where I live to Annandale.</p>
<p>I’m sworn to secrecy, but let’s just say that someone in this household is jumping out of their skin.</p>
<p>Well as a new Bard Mom, I just want to say that the check in at Bard on Saturday was amazingly easy: the whole process took 20 minutes, and I loved that the first station on the way - was to register to vote! The dorm room my son is in is twice as big as any dorm room that I ever experienced at College (Berkeley in the sixties), and Botstein’s performance was as usual totally fun, mesmerizing and even the moments of arrogance were forgivable because there wasn’t a moment of boredom. And my son, who hates sitting and being lectured to was enthralled. Then after all was said and done, unpacked, new roomate met, stuff bought in the bookstore, we wandered over to Blythwood, the Levy Institute, the clearly most beautiful part of the campus and just wandered down the trails, the formal gardens, looking out on the Hudson filled with plants and egrets in the distance. It was a totally perfect day, and although I woke up this morning totally sad that my boy is gone, I can’t think of a better place for him.</p>
<p>^^ We had the exact same kind of day. It was absolutely beautiful.</p>
<p>Check-in was a breeze, the dorm was nicer than expected, and Leon Botstein was his usual combination of pointy-headed intellectual and stand-up comedian.</p>
<p>We too went over to Blythwood, but first we saw the exhibit at Bard’s Hessel Museum of Art (Rachel Harrison: Consider the Lobster) whose NY Times reviews were stellar, and now I know why. It rivaled any art gallery in Manhattan for space, originality, and intrigue.</p>
<p>Bard is just an unbelievable place, and my daughter knows she is extremely lucky to be a freshman there.</p>
<p>And like you, morvoren, I am extremely sad that I won’t see my daughter very often, but I couldn’t be more thrilled that she is at Bard.</p>
<p>My daughter was happily accepted to Bard, but is deferring for one year. Reading the posts here, I too am excited for her, as well as all of those lucky and fortunate students who are on campus right now! Wishing everyone at Bard a terrific year of intellectual growth, and fun!</p>
<p>Right, checking in was easy. Everything was easy, and fun. Bard is happening.</p>
<p>The Holiday Inn in Kingston, however, is not. What a dump. Old, dirty building behind a parking lot of semis, drunks screaming most of the night, no wi-fi, a surly staff (with one exception), a dark ages TV. </p>
<p>I’ll sleep in my car before I ever stay there again.</p>
<p>Well one week down, and while I have only had one voice conversation, the last txt message from my S was sweet: I’m fine, every day gets better and better. Although I have an awful lot of work right now :(. </p>
<p>To me that is a perfect situation.</p>
<p>Got our first lengthy email today and it made me cry - because I was so happy for my S. He’s in heaven - 4 hours of homework a night for L&T, a professor he says is terrifyingly wonderful & phenomenally brilliant, and he’s loving every minute. Sang at an open mic, went to a poetry reading with an amazingly enthusiastic audience, has made a bunch of friends - he’s absolutely thriving in the creative intellectual environment that we had our fingers crossed for.</p>
<p>We’ve received a few happy text messages, and we’ve got our first call scheduled for this evening.</p>
<p>I hear you, SpiritM. My daughter is loving every second. L & T is a brilliant way to begin college — everybody’s in the same boat, and there are very few upperclassmen around, so there’s a real sense of camaraderie.</p>