Ramshackle Wonderland

I'm Melting...

The heat finally kicked on in my place. Radiator heat is a wonderful thing, but it would be nice to have some control over it. My radiators are old and either don't have control knobs or have knobs that serve no purpose other than decoration.

For those of you who know me in the real world, if you don't hear from me for a few days there's a good chance I've suffered a heat stroke and am lying dead or dying on my apartment floor. I'd say the cats might be eating my rotting flesh, but they're rendered nearly immobile by the heat, themselves...

Of course, if I make it to the office tomorrow I'll get to freeze my ass off in my meat locker of an office for several hours. At least I have that going for me.

With all these dramatic temperature changes, I should up my Tylenol PM budget, shouldn't I?

Austerity Measures

As I'm looking into law school, I'm realizing I need to save as much money as possible while I'm working. I've just opened a new checking account for my variable/discretionary spending and am keeping my old one for regular bills. A third checking account at a separate bank will take all my Vic earnings which I plan to pretend don't exist at all. Finally, an automatic transfer to my savings account from my bill-paying account completes the picture.

Why am I telling you this? Well, because I'm trying to decide if the $8.95 a month for this blog fits into the budget. I know it sounds like a small amount, but all these little amounts have the potential of adding up to something big over the next year... Then again, as I stay home more and get rid of my beloved cable TV (I'll miss you, Daily Show and Colbert Report), I'll have all sorts of spare time for reading (Chicago Public Library, here I come), blogging and (gasp!) cleaning my soon-to-be not quite so squalid hovel.

Ah, the hovel. That brings up another issue. I'm less than 2 blocks from The Vic and the El. I'm a perfect bike riding distance from work, meaning I spend next to nothing on transportation. I think I've ridden the El or a bus fewer than 5 times in the last 2 months and the walk home from The Vic after working a show is a breeze. I love the location. There's so much going on all around me. Then again, I have noisy neighbors and could get a larger place for probably $200 a month less if I moved farther northwest. Of course, moving costs money and would wipe out a couple of months worth of the savings. What to do? What to do?

Perhaps I should think of something more interesting before starting to type next time around...

Law School?

I'm seriously thinking about going to law school. It's something I wanted to do, but my unhappy lawyer uncle talked me out of it. I thought about it before embarking on my interior design adventure, too. At that point the cost scared me away. Now I'm thinking the 20 years of work I'd still have ahead of me by the time I graduated would leave me plenty of time to pay off my student loans.

When I mentioned it to our corporate counsel at work today she was very supportive and even mentioned that we might be able to work out some sort of tuition reimbursement (obviously not for the full amount) if I went part-time and worked part-time. We're going to have lunch next week to talk more about it.

Mr. Mike, lawyer and instructor at one of the two Chicago schools with part-time programs I'd consider, has also consented to lunch with me later this week to answer some questions I have as I try to determine just how realistic a plan this might be.

Now I'm a bit worried that my Harrington School of Design days may come back to haunt me. I've notices all the application instructions I reviewed (University of Chicago, Northwestern, DePaul and Loyola) all said that you needed to list all schools attended. Would that count? I think so. And would they take me seriously as an applicant once they knew about my failed experiment?

I'm definitely going to apply for the part-time programs and might apply for an early decision at Northwestern. Hell, if I got in there I'd have to go...

Another Saturday Night

Last night as I stood in line at Din's, my local convenience store with the regular assortment of basic household items on drab shelves and well-stocked porn display, waiting to buy my cat food and pint of Ben & Jerry's after working the Cold War Kids show at The Vic, I realized maybe Miami wouldn't be so bad...

Settle Down

I turn my back for a few months and look what happens...

Work has consumed the better part of the last year of my life. I've had a couple of "I should blog" moments, but have usually fallen asleep on the couch instead.

Now the job is trying to make me move to Miami. They're moving my line of business under the auspices of a company we recently purchased there. On the one hand, they're wanting to give me what is soon to be their biggest account due to a renewal that led to consolidation of work previously spread among this company and other vendors. On the other, I know no one in Miami and senior management there seems oddly combative.

They're looking at having me move in January. If I don't go to Miami, I may be out of a job. If I do go in the interest of remaining employed during very uncertain economic times, I'll be blogging lots.

There is one hope for a position here in Chicago with another line of business. It would be a great opportunity and I've been told it's mine if they decide to continue in that line of business. For them, that decision hinges on being able to find someone with suitable technical expertise to replace someone who is departing. If they can't get someone locked in in the next week or so, they'll pull out of this line of business. They have an offer out to a woman from TX, but it's not looking good. The economy is making her leery of relocating. There's another candidate I may help interview next week. I hope he's good.

Other than work and a terminally unsuccessful love life, there's nothing to report. For the life of me I can't think of any of the things I'd recently wanted to mention if I ever blogged. Guess I'm a little rusty...