620 GMAT Score 38/38 :-/

So I'm not going to give a big long debrief because A.) I'm bummed and B.) I'm exhausted from driving 5 hours up to New Hampshire.  I made it up there in good time, but after running around the last couple of days I'm pooped.

But as the title suggests...much to many people's surprise, I took the GMAT today and scored a 620.  Some people (not people who are in schools I want to be in) are saying that they would kill for a 620.  Me... I'm thinking "I want to die because of the 620!"  Not really.. it's not THAT serious, but it kind of is!  So this was my second time taking it and I felt fine going into it.  I didn't put much thought or time into my two essays, so I wouldn't be surprised if I got a 4 or 4.5.

The essays are not what threw me off.  The first two quant problems put me off kilter.  I don't even remember what the first one was, but I do remember guessing.  Then I got the second one which was a very easy conversion problem and I didn't that one correct either.  Some people may be asking, "How do you know if you got them correct?"  Well if I got them correct, then they can be marked off as lucky guesses because that's exactly what I did.  Then I just felt dumb for the next couple of questions until I got into my groove.

Needless to say the GMAT saga is not over and I plan to take my next and last attempt as soon as possible.  I cannot study for another 2/3 months.  That's just not going to happen.  My brain can't take any more.  Every single day for a year I've had to think about this exam it's so draining.  So to anyone out there who may be contemplating business school.  Just take the exam as soon as possible and get over the hurdle.  It's a necessary evil.

So now, I'm going to have to do what I wanted to avoid - study while writing essays.  I have to get my applications in by January 5th so this is going to be a very lonely holiday season for me because I will need to study and write essays throughout.  It can be done though!  It must be done!  It will be done!

On the flipside of things - at least I did improve by 40 points and I'm closer to my goal of an 80% range. I know what I need to do for the next time.  I will not be scheduling a date ahead of time.  I've exhausted all practice exams and I will not waste 3 hours in a day taking practice exams.  Timing for me is not the issue... it's content.. and not even the hard content...the easy  content.  I knew the content well when I was scoring in the mid 40's range so once I'm comfortable knowing all of the easy content, then I will schedule my exam.  It won't be hard for me to get back to that point.  I think I simply missed my peak this time around.  I need to peak the day of my exam and I overshot it by a couple of weeks.

Whatever, no excuses needed.  I know what I need to do... and I shall do it.  At this point what's there to lose?  I will say that the lowest score I thought I would get was a 640 so I just hung my head down in shame when I saw a 620 then went to the bathroom and let out a couple of curse words - may have punched something (myself), and then got it together.

On a lighter note.... I'M UP IN HANOVER!  Well technically I'm in White River Junction, Vermont.  Dartmouth is about 15 minutes from here, and I'm just laying in bed relaxing!  Tomorrow is my class visit/campus tour/INTERVIEW.  I'm looking forward to it.

I also reached out to a couple students I know up there to see if they wanted to meet up with me.  I'll be meeting up with one student whom I met last March and kept in touch with.  I'm excited to hear what he's been up too.  He knows what I've been up too!  I also reached out to the Tuckie who was at the Reaching Out Conference.  I'm going to meet him in between two of his classes because I need a favor from him pertaining to one of my essays.

On that note - I'm going to sleep because I'm exhausted!