Another update - it must be Spring Break! (To note: All spring break means when you're married and in grad school is that I have more time to read the stuff I want to read. Only, I don't read that much more, b/c nothing is worse for productivity than hours of yawning daylights.... ).
Mostly, I love my job ... I get paid to read after all. But man, there are days when I just want a *job.* I'm not materialistic .... but I'd like to be able to at least think about buying a decent car, or updating my computer at my leisure, or even taking the occasional small trip, without having to contemplate how I'm going to manage to pay for it all. I mean, these aren't ridiculous requests .. I don't want a Mercedes or a mansion. So it goes.
It sort of points out something that I've been in denial about: getting a Ph.d is *totally* a middle class flight of fancy. Getting a Master's can really increase your value on the job market, and is a relatively small investment of time and money. Other professional degrees (law, medicine, pharmacy etc), while expensive [read: no tuition waiver], have *huge,* practically guaranteed pay-offs.
But the Ph.d ... You can't let yourself go into major debt, because the odds of getting rich doing this are small. Don't get me wrong - academics do well (I hate academics who whine about not being "paid" enough. Your job is reading and teaching what you want/love. Give me a break....). But only the elite of the elite (read: lucky) really get rich doing this. So, you have to be careful about how much new debt you accumulate.
To add to that: Graduate student pay is terrible ... Having things like parental help really helps. Of coure, I don't have a lot of parental help - they just aren't in a situation to help me out (and i'm almost 30 and married - I have no business getting their help). What that all means is that grad students tend to be *middle class* folks already. First generation college students are supposed to go into productive fields like *law.* Then they send THEIR children to grad school. I fucked the whole thing up.
But so it goes. I'm building character. Soon, this will be over (right?), I'll have a job... Soon my wife will be done, have a job... So, no biggie. It just bogged me down a bit yesterday.
********************************************************************************************************************
My Weekly Artist Chart
My Weekly Track Chart
My Overall Artist Chart
My Overall Track Chart
Mostly, I love my job ... I get paid to read after all. But man, there are days when I just want a *job.* I'm not materialistic .... but I'd like to be able to at least think about buying a decent car, or updating my computer at my leisure, or even taking the occasional small trip, without having to contemplate how I'm going to manage to pay for it all. I mean, these aren't ridiculous requests .. I don't want a Mercedes or a mansion. So it goes.
It sort of points out something that I've been in denial about: getting a Ph.d is *totally* a middle class flight of fancy. Getting a Master's can really increase your value on the job market, and is a relatively small investment of time and money. Other professional degrees (law, medicine, pharmacy etc), while expensive [read: no tuition waiver], have *huge,* practically guaranteed pay-offs.
But the Ph.d ... You can't let yourself go into major debt, because the odds of getting rich doing this are small. Don't get me wrong - academics do well (I hate academics who whine about not being "paid" enough. Your job is reading and teaching what you want/love. Give me a break....). But only the elite of the elite (read: lucky) really get rich doing this. So, you have to be careful about how much new debt you accumulate.
To add to that: Graduate student pay is terrible ... Having things like parental help really helps. Of coure, I don't have a lot of parental help - they just aren't in a situation to help me out (and i'm almost 30 and married - I have no business getting their help). What that all means is that grad students tend to be *middle class* folks already. First generation college students are supposed to go into productive fields like *law.* Then they send THEIR children to grad school. I fucked the whole thing up.
But so it goes. I'm building character. Soon, this will be over (right?), I'll have a job... Soon my wife will be done, have a job... So, no biggie. It just bogged me down a bit yesterday.
********************************************************************************************************************
My Weekly Artist Chart
My Weekly Track Chart
My Overall Artist Chart
My Overall Track Chart
VIEW 7 of 7 COMMENTS
Seriously he hasn't been funny since his stint on Monday Night Football.
I didn't even see when it was on, but I saw an ad or two for his last HBO stand-up special recently, and he was recycling jokes from an HBO special of his when I was in college, like in 1993!!!