Prelude

By summer 2006, I had had two years of full-time work experience, which prompted me to start contemplating the MBA. I knew that a GMAT score is valid for five years, so I could start preparing for the GMAT and get it out of the way first. I ordered the official guide (orange book) and the verbal guide (purple book), and started doing the questions timed. With my background in math, I didn't think that I would need the quantitative guide (green book).

However, I started to procrastinate after a little while, because I did not want to start the daunting task of preparing for the GMAT essays. I downloaded the topics and tried a couple, and my best record was an hour for an essay. How was I supposed to accomplish it in half an hour, on the test, twice?

Then work got busy, so my GMAT books sat on the shelf collecting dust for the next year and half.

For the record, when I did the diagnostic test from the OG 2 years ago, I got "above average" for reading comprehension and sentence correction, and "excellent" for the other sections.