Black in College

Besides the plethora of bad news regarding the opulent Douglass house, my weekend in Matawan has been decent. The boyfriend and I are not at square one regarding the apartment search because two people unexpectedly bailed out on us. I was so sure we had the Douglass house, and that we would find an additional person, but I was quite wrong. Now, the boyfriend and I are looking for a place together. Of course, there are the potential dangers of cohabitation, but as long as we each have a place to sleep and a different area to do our work, I think it should be fine. (As long as I can have my own nook away from the boyfriend.) If M stays above the bar, then Rai can move in with her and all they would need to do is find another tenant. I tried sending M a message, asking if she was going to stay at the bar, but she has yet to return my message. This is getting old.

In the midst of all this, I’ve been trying to get some freelance writing done and looking for jobs. There’s going to be a part-time and summer job fair in the beginning of February, so I’m definitely going to make time for that. I’ll try to make the boyfriend come as well. It would be nice if I had a little more security than this. Hah… The refund check should hold me over for five or six months, and I should be able to find a job by then. Not to mention the freelance writing I’ve been doing may gain some momentum, and could prove to be a decent supplementary income.

The boyfriend didn’t get to sleep until about six o’clock this morning, so he didn’t officially wake up until about five o’clock this evening. I woke up this morning a little after nine o’clock–and this has been going on since I returned from Ohio. Our schedules are completely out of whack with each other, but it actually works out pretty well. For instance, I got an entire day to work on another blog I call, “The Anime Connoisseur.” The first blog post is a review of the first three episodes of Speed Grapher, and the opening credits of this anime features the song, “Girls on Film” by Duran Duran. You can check out the link to the right of this page under The Soapbox. Anyway, I wish my new blog was a Today.com blog, but I added it to the directory, so that may help it get some exposure. I’m thinking that the use of Project Wonderful ads will help a lot. Apparently, some people make a decent amount of money running ads on their blogs from Project Wonderful–perhaps I can get in on the fun. In addition, Today.com seems to have gained enough faith in Black in College to allow me to apply for a second blog with them. Black in College was approved rather swiftly, so I’m hoping my new idea goes well. Thus far, I’ve managed to make a little over $35 with this blog since its inception in October. Not bad. I just wish the payout was $25, rather than $50.

In other news, the boyfriend’s housing dilemma may be just about solved now. He’s managed to get five people to agree to sign the lease for the labyrinthine house that lies about about a mile away from College Avenue. I guess the boys can rest assured that they won’t be forced to live with icky, sticky girls like me, M, and Rai… Now all I have to do is make sure I have my own apartment situation figured out. If it boils down to living above the bar for another year, I don’t have a problem with that, but I would like the landlord to get back to me some time this century. If I did get to move to the upstairs apartment–even if I had to live with Rai–then I wouldn’t have to go to the boyfriend’s house all the time to get away from all of the hubbub.

Despite all of those stressful elements, what I’m most worried about right now is getting my thesis proposal over with so I can get an A in the first half of Comparative Literature Honors and then just get started writing the thesis itself. This week, the boyfriend and I planned to do nothing but relax, but I might at least get some reading in tomorrow while he’s hanging out with a mutual friend of ours. Due to a variety of planned illegal activities for tonight, I don’t think I’m going to be able to get up early enough to meet with one of my advisers for my prospective individualized major is Soil Science. Thus, after this weekend’s visit with the boyfriend’s parents, I’m going to spend the rest of the remaining week of Winter Recess trying to write at least the first 20 pages of my thesis. That would leave only 25 or so more pages for the remaining semester–difficult, but doable. This past Fall, I watched the boyfriend hammer out a 15 page paper in a night, so with enough fire under my ass, I can write at least 20 pages in a week. I’ll work on getting my library privileges returned, getting my bibliography completed, and then all I’ll have to do is read and write. I may try to dedicate at least 10 hours a day working on it. Not to mention all of the precalculus I have to brush up on before the semester starts. It seems the break may be more stressful than the actual semester… Nah.

Well, I’m back in New Jersey sitting at the boyfriend’s laptop trying to do a million things at once. I’ve been trying to check my grades, write articles, promote my blog, connect with other bloggers, etc. If I’m going to make this thing my part-time job, then this is what it’s going to take.

Anyway… the drive back to NJ was torturous initially, because my siblings and myself had to squeeze ourselves in the back of my mother’s tiny Rav4 for four hours during the ride to Pennsylvania to meet my step-father. First of all, we were late, which annoyed me because I was certain my step-father would have a fit. (Surprisingly, he did not.) And during the ride my mother only spoke with Michael (now her fiance, though she is not yet divorced). All they ever do is flirt and touch each other, and I really wish they could have calmed that down for my brother’s sake. Unlike my sister and I, my brother is new to this whole divorce thing and may need a little time to adjust. I know what he’s going through, and I can’t protect him.

Once we met up with my step-father, it was time to say good-bye. I knew my mother would be alright, because she has Michael to occupy her mind, but my sister is going to have a hard time. Her friends from high school are both in state colleges somewhere and she’s going to be starting school soon herself. They’re not going to be attending the same school, but I’m hoping she can make new friends there. I’ve been worried about her more than ever, because of all the drama that takes place with the family. She tries to make it seem like it doesn’t bother her, but I know she feels like she can’t relate to any of them. Even while I was in Ohio, she just sat on our mother’s laptop all day and checked messages from her online friends. She’s decently famous on Youtube (her video below) for making MGS music videos of both humorous and artistic value. If she would just get herself a cell phone I would be able to keep in better contact with her. Her undying love for the Metal Gear Solid franchise has made me want to buy a Playstation 3. Once my refund check for Spring 2009 comes along, I may do just that.

Of course, contact with anyone right now would be a lot easier if I could pay any of my bills. After splurging on all of the accessories for my apartment, I keep getting messages from Amazon and Netflix pestering me about the money I owe them.

But I digress: After the excruciating drive from Pennsylvania to NJ, I spent about an hour and a half opening presents from my step-father and watching Star Wars with my brother. Seeing the look on my little brother’s face after I told him I had to get on the train to New Brunswick would have broken your heart, too. Am I a good sister? I try to be, but all of the work I have to get done just seems to get in the way. Imagine if I was graduating and trying to hold down a job! Geez, I would never had any time to travel to see anyone. I’d have to build up “vacation days.” My step-father drove me to the PATH station and my little brother road along. If I could just pay my cell phone bill I’d be able to call him!

Back in New Brunswick, the boyfriend met me at the train station and I got a look at his new hair cut. At first I was sad because I like longer hair on men, but I realized that the shorter doo really brought out his facial structure more. He looks older too, which is obviously a turn on. Hah! If only I wasn’t on the rag, and then I’d be able to do something about these urges. We stopped by my place to pick up my space heater, and walked over to his frigid abode. After settling down, I noticed there were a couple small boxes and a round, furry hat sitting at the other side of the room. The boyfriend really went out of his way to try to make it up to me after our little incident over the phone while I was in Ohio. He got me a portable DVD player, a round, furry hat with leopard print, a pair of earrings, a bronze-colored shirt, and a collection of three of Phillip K. Dick’s novels, including

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?

After the boyfriend left to take care of his last exam for the Fall semester, I spent the majority of the day working on blog and article promotion. I signed up for some writing sites that I’ll probably never submit anything to, although I wish I would. I’m just worried that I’m going to spend all my time writing articles and no one’s going to pay for them. Not to mention all the brainpower (that I don’t have) that’s going to have to be spent writing articles of exceedingly high quality. Perhaps my best bet is to just keep writing for Triond and perhaps work my way through Hubpages and Bukisa. I’m not sure how how much I like the other sites, since I’m pretty established at Triond and after a great deal of effort I’ve managed to insert myself in the community. With these other sites I’d basically be starting from scratch. I was thinking I may write for all three and just divide the content between the sites depending on how popular they happen to be on that particular site. For instance, Bukisa focuses on How-to articles, Triond doesn’t have a particular focus, but people usually like articles written about strange things. As of right now, it seems Hubpages is similar to Bukisa in that it doesn’t want poetry or fiction, but I’m not sure what sets that site apart. If I do intend to make some kind of part-time living off of these sites I should just shut the heck up and start writing. But with all of these sites I’ve been joining lately, it takes a long time to get the codes, link up other services (such as Amazon or Google Adsense) and then to post articles I’ve already written. Xomba, Reddit, Technorati, and Twitter are my newest social bookmarking experiments. Perhaps they’ll work well for me. They seem to be doing decently, but it’s hard to tell if that will translate into cashmoney.

I was intending to finish the remainder of my Sanskrit take-home exam today (and I did finish most of it), but I didn’t finish as much as I would have liked to. This means that once the boyfriend heads off to Matawan for the vacation, I’m going to have to head back to my place to finish this thing and send it off to my professor before he loses his patience and decides to fail me and get it over with. Not to say that I wouldn’t deserve it. I didn’t do two quizzes and I have no idea what grade I received for the midterm. I have a feeling he’s not going to fail me (he’s too nice for that), but my grade will be either a C or B. Obviously, I’m hoping for the B, because as a four credit class, that C may bring my GPA for this semester below 3.0–which is all I want out of life these days.

My short vacation in Matawan was pleasant, because the boyfriend’s family is generous and caring. They tend to be a bit high strung, and their attempts to dissipate tension is usually through laughter–this is where the boyfriend gets it. They have no qualms with inviting me over for holidays, but I know if I were to invite the boyfriend to stay with my family for the holidays they’d give him a lot of lip for it, and then call his phone a million times just to make sure he wasn’t shot. The only thing they know about black and Hispanic communities is what they see on television and they seem to think that spending a few days in what can be called my “hometown” will only lead in death or destruction. I try not to get visibly offended when they make comments about the boyfriend’s hair being too curly or “wild” when they really mean it’s not white enough for them. This perplexes me, because there are plenty of white people with curly hair–people just seem to think that straightening their hair is the way to go. I love curly hair and I tell the boyfriend so when in front of his parents. Their liberalism is reassuring, otherwise they’d probably say way more offensive things without realizing it.

However, they did me a big favor and took me to PetSmart to take a look at the guinea pigs. The boyfriend’s father was the most adamant about doing it. He seemed to want to keep a promise to me, even though they hadn’t promised anything of the sort. There aren’t many (if any?) pet shops in New Brunswick, so I don’t get a chance to enjoy the company of animals. The boyfriend’s parents’ cats have warmed up to me these days, though.

[WARNING: THE FOLLOWING IS A RANT]

The two bedroom apartment above mine at the bar might be up for rent, and because the boyfriend’s housemates don’t seem to know what they’re doing for the upcoming school year, they aren’t giving him any information about their housing plans. Once the first week of the holidays is over, many of the apartments now available are going to be gone because Rutgers is so crowded. I told him he may want to move into the upstairs apartment with my friend M’s boyfriend (who also lives in his house). When he mentioned the idea to his parents he laughed as if it was a joke and his parents (annoyed at the mere suggestion) pretended to find it funny. There’s nothing sketchy about the bar, I keep trying to tell him and them. It’s just above a bar. I don’t feel unsafe, I just don’t like the noise. In any case, I was quite annoyed by this scene, but I didn’t mention it to the boyfriend. He seems to think they all I do is try to stress him out by complaining about things. Yes. I do complain a lot, but that’s because there’s a lot to complain about. For starters, the boyfriend has a tonsil problem that makes his breath smell bad. He can take preventative measures by gargling with special mouthwash twice a day. But he doesn’t do it. So when I tell him to use the mouthwash, he gets a sad look in his eyes and (AGAIN) begins to pity himself and his plight. I’ve told him a million times that if he gargles with the mouthwash twice a day there wouldn’t be a problem, but the only things he can seem to think about are philosophy of science or religion. He really should be using that stuff every time he eats, but he probably couldn’t manage to do that either. If he’s not using the mouthwash and he can’t be trying to kiss up on me either.

[END OF RANT]

Anyway, the night after returning to this godforsakened city, the boyfriend and I went to take a look at some apartments. The first apartment was the studio I believe I mentioned in an earlier post. It’s a decently sized place, about the size of my place above the bar. There’s a little kitchen area, a pretty big refrigerator, a tiny private bathroom, and a lot of storage place. There are a couple drawbacks. For instance, the landlord wants to rent the place out in January (and my lease doesn’t end until June), even if I found a subletter, I wouldn’t have the security deposit and first month’s rent until the 20th of January, and the tenant painted the place this horrible light purple color. On the other hand, the landlord said he’s willing to buy the paint if the tenant is willing to put in the labor. So if I want to paint the place anew, I can jazz it up the way I like. All of the storage space (tiny, flat drawers and awkward cabinets) take up a lot of the wall space, so I’m not sure what I would do with all of my posters and tapestries. But I’ve done a pretty good job with my space above the bar, so I’ll figure something out. Another bonus of the place is that it’s a couple blocks from Douglass campus, where a good deal of my classes are going to be. I’ve e-mailed the landlord, asking him if he can work with me on paying for the security. If he’s willing, I’m going to use that as a bargaining chip for the other girls I’m supposed to be living with to start stepping up their game. Last year apartment-hunting was a one woman operation and it was stressing me out. I’d love to be able to stay somewhere and be alone for the weekend if I wanted to. Staying at the boyfriend’s house is really wearing on my nerves.

After eating at my favorite Mexican restaurant on George Street, we bought some salt to melt the ice sitting casually on the boyfriend’s front steps. Upon completing that mission, we headed to another apartment all the way down Hamilton Street. There, we were greeted by a cute little brick house and a bunch of people moving about, packing. I assumed one of them was the landlord, but apparently not–he was on his way. The tenants spoke of him kindly and offered to sell us some of their things, otherwise it would be gotten rid of. Again, this pain job was ghastly, but there were a lot of good things about the place. First of all, it was in a decent, quiet area of New Brunswick near trees. There’s another apartment on the second floor inhabited by graduate students, and heat, water, and sewage were included. There was a small patio-like enclosure in the back of the house and a large yard. It’s a nice place, but they’re looking to rent it out for January, and it’ll be difficult to find three subletters for the bar. Not to mention the hassle of moving during the winter time. If I do move into a one bedroom or a studio, I may ask my step-father or the boyfriend’s parents to help me move. I wonder how either will feel about the idea.

The landlord for the studio says he’s “been on the road” and hasn’t been able to show too many people the place. He claims I’m only the second person he’s shown it to. In that case, he may find it a relief for someone to express a very strong interest in the place. The problem is the money. I wish I could give him something to hold on to until the current tenant moves out.

Last night I hung out with Rai, a friend from my old dorm and a prospective apartment-mate for the 2009-2010 school year. I showed her the list of available (although not affordable) apartments in the area. So far, not so good. She seems to think that one way or another we’ll find an apartment. What she doesn’t know is that I’m just about ready to start looking for a place on my own - for the right price, of course.

The rent around here is getting more expensive for the same crappy houses and apartments and everyone I know is looking to graduate soon. Even a couple of the girls I’m supposed to be living with haven’t given me concrete answers as to were they’re going to be at any given point. It depends on their job prospects, of course. The only thing I can do is look for something cheap and small. The boyfriend and I have considered moving in together, but we’re still a new couple and we’ve agreed it’s probably not the best idea. On the other hand, if the people we know disappear, we may not have a choice.

I found a listing for a studio recently and I sent the landlord an e-mail, but he didn’t respond. Then I tried to call him earlier this morning and he didn’t pick up what I’m assuming is his cellphone. The listing says it’s available immediately, but because of my lease, I’m not going to be able to move in until June of ‘09. I figure I’ll try to set up an appointment to see the place and if it’s decent, and the landlord doesn’t seem shady then I’ll try to see if I can sign a lease for June. Then all he’ll have to do is find someone to live in it for six months (if he hasn’t already).

I have considered just losing my security deposit and moving out no matter what happens, but I really would like that security deposit back.

Also, with the addition of an individualized major and the prospect of spending three more years in school ahead of me, I’ve been trying to find a job. With no success, of course. I may be able to work with NJ Community Water Watch this summer if they’d allow it, and there are some internship opportunities I’m interested in, but nothing concrete. I’m going to have to make blogging and freelance writing my part-time jobs–and perhaps I’ll actually make some decent money selling out my life. The problem is finding the damn time.

Lastly, I have decided that every Wednesday is going to be “White Wednesday,” where I share something I’ve learned about white people (in particular white men) from the week.

Today, I realize that white people seem to think they have all the time in the world.

As it turns out, my little temper tantrum was completely uncalled for, because the kitchen cart I ordered from that sketchy company came a lot earlier than I was expecting. Of course, I didn’t get a response to my nasty message, but given the complaints on the consumer sites, that doesn’t surprise me. I’m not worried about it, though. I just don’t plan on ordering from them again. The kitchen cart I ordered definitely wasn’t worth over a hundred dollars on that account. It’s not the sturdiest thing in the world, but it was easy as hell to set up and it does what it’s supposed to do. I shouldn’t have a toaster oven in my room, due to the potential fire hazard, according to the lease. I don’t think the landlord is going to see it anytime soon anyway.

But yeah, the room is coming together, thanks to my mindless spending. I’m glad it looks nice, but I’m going to have to tell Frank the Landlord that I’m broke until next semester. He’s pretty lenient, so I don’t think he’s going to make a big stink about it.

These days, in preparation for my potential soil science individualized major, I’ve been setting up meetings with various faculty who I think will be able to sign off as academic sponsors. I need one of them to be my faculty advisor, however, and that’s going to be the hard part. Blah. I don’t think it’s even worth getting into. I’m just hoping I can have this thing settled by next semester. Who knows if it’s even going to be approved… I just wish I’d thought to pursue this earlier.

In any case, exams have been completely demolishing my brain, and I haven’t had the chance to work on my thesis at all. I’m worried that I’m not going to be able to get the credit for these past two semesters. Not to say that I’ve been doing a great deal of work for my thesis–I’m still only working on the proposal. I’m just not sure how I’m supposed to write the entirety of the thesis in one semester. I’m supposed to be officially start during winter break. Which means the “break” aspect of the upcoming recess is going to be non-existent.

Tomorrow I have a quasi-interview for an internship position with NJ Community Water Watch. I don’t know if the position is guaranteed or not. As far as I can tell, the campus organizer seems to like me well enough, but it’s also possible that they are starving for interns. If my memory serves me well at all, and I’m pretty sure it does, then I remember that NJCWW was a pretty demanding experience, even for a lowly volunteer, as I was for a good week. All the business with changing my major and all that really took a lot out of me, and once I started getting sick from overexposure to disgusting college kids, there was no way I was going to be able to survive long nights talking about stream monitoring. This is not to say that I’m not interested in it, however.

If I get this internship, that means I earn three credits, it looks good on my resume (for future environmental jobs and for summer employment with NJPIRG/AmeriCorps), and all I have to do is go to meetings and write a 10 page paper at the end I’m pretty sure.

Another exciting thing about my schedule is that next semester I’m going to be taking a graduate-level course in Quarternary Science. I’m going to be taking Pedology with the professor who is going to be one of my faculty advisers.

On that note, the Geology department had a holiday party earlier. Graduates, undergraduates, and faculty were invited and they even brought some of their children. Gah. I should have invited the boyfriend to come along. I was just standing there for a majority of the time waiting to see if this geochemist would show up so I could ask him about being one of my faculty advisers. Once he did show up, he basically told me I should talk to someone else. But for the individualized major, at least two of the faculty members I choose have to be from the School of Arts and Sciences, and I’m pretty sure he makes the cut. If he rejects me, I’m not too sure what I’m going to do. Really, all I need is a signature. I doubt being a faculty sponsor is going to require much commitment.

Y’see if I blogged everyday I wouldn’t have to worry about trying to cram so much crap into one post.

“Hello. The more I research your company over the internet, the more suspicious I become. It seems you have a horrible approach to shipping your items and your customer service is non-existent. I should have purchased my order from a reputable seller with which I am familiar, but I decided to give your company a chance–only to find out that there have been an incredible number of incidences that begin like mine (with a lack of contact) and then descend into red tape. I will be contacting Mercantila by phone on Monday (tomorrow). If I do not receive satisfactory information regarding the status of my order I will be contacting Google, Paypal, Bill Me Later, and all of these other services you use to seem legitimate. I will ask them why they are tarnishing their records by working with a fraudulent and misleading company. I will then send a complaint to the Better Business Bureau. I will then write yet another scathing review of your company on any site that will take it. Please, send me information regarding the status of my order.”

…And that is the threatening message I sent to Mercantila this morning. Contrary to any kind of logic whatsoever, I’ve been spending inordinate amounts of money on accessories for my apartment. This is not to say that these things are not needed, but I could very well have waited another month or so for the next semester to come around before spending money. I was just so desperate to improve my state of mind that I began buying posters, tapestries, a spaceheater, an exercise ab wheel, a toaster oven and most likely something else I can’t remember. Lastly, I bought (or at least I am currently attempting to buy) a kitchen cart for my room upon which I can rent the toaster oven and make decent meals in the comfort of such room.

Mercantila’s website is overloaded with guarantees regarding their customer testimonials, how safe and guaranteed their shipping is, and yet when I Googled the company, I came up with a plethora of complaints against them–all of which are beginning to become my reality. In order to attempt to avoid a lengthy process of nonsense and red tape, as stated above, I have decided that a simple, threatening message may do the trick. I don’t want to have to deal with them for too long, and I want to be able to get my toaster oven from off of the floor. Their refund and return policies leaves a great deal to be desired. I should have just gone for a more familiar company.

The problem is that Amazon and a couple other sellers had some really great kitchen carts that were a lot more expensive, and Mercantila’s prices were just right. Not to mention that I bought the cart via Google Checkout and received $10 off the final cost of the item. That’s not a bad deal, unless you’re dealing with a company that deliberately misleads its customers. Anyway, we’ll see if that message will get them to pay attention, and maybe they’ll actually attempt to improve their services. The interesting thing is, like Amazon and other online merchants, they have a section of the site for writing reviews, but none of the reviews I read were for any of the products were especially bad, so I figured the company must be doing something right. Gah. It would have made more sense to do research before letting them withdraw money from my account.

Anyway, next semester I’m going to focus on buying more clothing. I don’t have anything professional, and since I’m going to be looking for a summer job (that will hopefully pay a decent amount of money) I’ll need professional clothing for interviews and possibly for the job itself. I also need to buy summer clothing while they are still cheap. Some shorts/capris, tank tops, sandals, etc. I’m hoping that I’ll be able to dress better than I did last summer. I didn’t (and still don’t) have much of anything, and I was walking around in a shambles. Once the spring semester comes I’m going to try to fix myself up. I’m sure the boyfriend would like that. He said he has noticed that I haven’t been “taking care” of myself lately. If I didn’t look like a bum, I wouldn’t feel like a bum and vice versa.

Yesterday, after a little over an hour of delays that caused me to miss lunch with my Asiatic friend, the Rutgers therapist called me and asked me a series of questions. Apparently, the call is not an intake session, but a pre-intake session. Because my last intake session was in the Spring of 2008, I have to do all of the paper work (including abysmal questionnaires) all over again. Oh. Woe. Is. Me. (That’s what we intellectuals like to call sarcasm.) (And that’s what we meta-intellectuals like to call facetiousness.)

Anyway, I spent nearly all of yesterday studying for my Geology exam. I am determined to ace this exam (and the final paper and presentation) so I can seal an A. I did decently on the last two exams, but my attendance at lab deteriorated as my depression set in, and I have only kept in contact with the professor via e-mail. I’ll kick myself for not going to his office hours at least a couple times, but his class was the last of the day, so I wanted quite desperately to just run to the bus so I could get back home in time to eat a decent meal and study for my other subjects. Even without a job, I find that I’m busier than ever.

I’m determined to get an A in Human Evolution as well. Not to mention, it’s a four-credit class, and would help to outweigh the other subjects I have been neglecting. I’m hoping my thesis advisor gives me an A, but my communication skills leave quite a bit to be desired, and I have stood her up at her office more times than I would like to recall. I suppose I get that aspect of my personality from my mother.

And today, I’m going to spend the majority of the day studying as well. I’ll study cavemen and dirt all day–with maybe just a dash of a dead language.

Anyway, I keep thinking about what exactly I’d like to do with ecology, and I’m really interested in looking for a summer job (either full time or part time) that deals with hands-on interaction with cleaning, and being outdoors and getting sweaty. I’d like to work with the environment, and if I have to work with people, I suppose that’s acceptable as well. It’s just a matter of going into the right program. I want to get into the higher level sciences (and I’ll have to if I want to go to graduate school), but it looks like I’m not going to be able to finish school until another three years, and who knows if I’m going to have the money. I think programs like AmeriCorps may be able to help with that, but only so much. I may have to be a part-time student (although part-time students don’t get nearly as much financial aid). I was hoping to get a lab job of some kind, but I haven’t been able to get into any science class this semester and I won’t be able to get into one next semester without the math requirements. This is such a mess. There are so many things I wish I had done differently. But, if I am a part-time student that would leave me enough time to work. I just wouldn’t be able to graduate until 2020.

While at Rutgers, I’ve considered trying to apply for a dual degree program with Environmental Public Health. But we’ll see. If I did indeed try to do such a thing I wouldn’t be able to apply for another couple years anyway. But it would be nice to be able to get a Masters without the lengthy application process. I’ll think about it.

Well, of course I haven’t eaten yet. So I’m going to have to figure out some way to fix that.

There are a number of things I’m looking forward to this Spring 2009. For one thing, that would mean another refund check from the Cashier’s Office so that I can continue to pay my rent, buy groceries, and… live until I find a job. The last few jobs I applied for responded asking for my availability, and I haven’t received a response since then. And I’ve been searching the job database every few days with no luck. The only thing I could find that I may qualify for is a job with Summer/Winter sessions, so I guess I’ll send them an e-mail asking them if they’ve already found a candidate, etc. My only other options would be as follows:

1. Go back to CTAAR and ask them for my job back.
2. Go back to telefund for $10.50/hr
3. Apply to RU-Info, which only pays $7.15/hr

And, none of those options are any good for the following reasons:

1. Codename Automaton still works there a long with only one other girl. I’m not sure what either of their schedules are, but I know I won’t be able to deal with a mere $7.50/hr to put up with their nonsense. That kind of money was fine when my rent was only $365 a month, but I had a roommate and it wasn’t worth it anyway.

2. Telefund is the worst kind of job for people like me. I don’t mind helping people when they ask me for help with purchasing a certain item or finding out certain information (such is the case with customer service-oriented jobs anyway); but I can’t stand the idea of calling people up and telling them why they should be giving their money to Rutgers.

3. RU-Info, despite paying too little, requires a great deal of commitment for the peons who answer the phones with calls from concerned/meddling parents or scared freshman. They want meetings, various training programs, and a constant sunny demeanor on and off the phone. Sorry, no can do.

The additional money from my refund check will also go to furnishing my apartment (I still don’t have a frame for my futon mattress–I’m tired of sleeping with my head to the floor) and to investing. The boyfriend and I have already set up a brokerage account, it’s just a matter of having the money to invest. So, the both of us have two months to learn how to invest. I plan on looking at some library books, but my privileges have been suspended since I’ve been hoarding so many books in my apartment without returning them in time. I guess I’m going to have to figure out how to take care of that. Anyway, right now I’m looking into Netflix and Amazon–they seem like companies that are going to last through many people’s financial crises because people are going to be relying on them more to sell their own products and to buy goods at reduced prices. Not to mention, these are companies I have trusted for years now and their developments seem to be saying that they’re doing well.

Lastly, the Spring semester means looking for another apartment. I’m not sure if my apartment-mates M and J are planning on living with me again, because J is finicky and flaky and who knows what she’s doing to do at any given moment. M, on the other hand, is considering going into the PeaceCorps. It takes a while to receive an assignment, though, so I’m not sure why she would feel hesitant to say whether or not she would want to live with me unless she just doesn’t want to. That’s fine with me, I just want to live with Rai. Rai was a prospective apartment-mate last June, but she decided she wanted to live in the Rutgers apartments not too far from my place. Anyway, her numbers were too low and she didn’t get a place, so she ended up living in Highland Park across the bridge. Like me, Rai’s not happy with her messy apartment-mate either, so we have decided to live with each other. Whether or not that includes M is another story. I’m just tired of living with messy people with attitudes. One of my last apartment-mates (F) attacked me one morning for supposedly not cleaning my dishes when she was leaving tons of food and crap all over the place. And once it was time to move out she bounced and didn’t clean a damn thing. Psh.

Now I have to deal with J who is another one with an attitude. She seems real friendly at first, but I really should have gotten to know her habits more before deciding whether or not I wanted to live with her. She lived in my dorm at the same time I did, so I thought I knew her well enough. Nope. She seems to think that the kitchen is an extension of her room by proximity–leaving her garbage and crap all over the place. The only thing she does do is the dishes and she seems to think that that vindicates her completely. She has no idea how much time I spend trying to make the apartment habitable. If I never cleaned, I can only imagine what my place would turn into. What I would like is for J and M to move into together so they can realize just how disgusting the both of them are. I’ve already had a talk with M about keeping the apartment clean, but I realized it’s not my job to tell people how to grow up.

Alright, I’m getting hungry, so the boyfriend is going to have to wake up…