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| venting
I'm so angry at this insurance agent! Completely furious, in fact. I
got in a bike wreck (when a car hit me) a couple of months ago, and now
they claim they have a witness saying that I was riding on the sidewalk
before I entered the road. I know that this is not true because
1) I'm pretty sure there is not even a sidewalk at this intersection
2) I never ride on the sidewalk with my road bike. Ever.
But
now he says that he's only paying 75% of the bike's cost because of it.
I think that it's an arbitrary number, and I'm guessing that insurance
agents can't just make up a number like this, since I was issued no
ticket for riding on the sidewalk, while the car that hit me was issued
a ticket for "failing to yield".
I want to check the
intersection again to make sure that there is no sidewalk there (as I
think), but otherwise I want to talk to this supposed witness that they
have.
It's not even that it's that much money; I just hate when
people lie. There are various scenarios going through my head of how
this guy got the info on me riding on a sidewalk, but I'm guessing that
he asked a leading question to the witness, who just agreed with him.
ARGGH. Why??? | | |
| Most of you have probably heard of Freecycle, and in fact, I think that I posted about getting cool stuff on it before. My best finds so far have been a hybrid bike, a set of cross country skis & boots, and most recently, a Christmas tree stand for our house's tree.
I decided to give back to the community by posting an old computer that I recently replaced.. it runs windows 98 and is really slow, but this didn't stop the masses from wanting it! From my ad, I've gotten tons of responses, varying from this sad note:
Hello again. I know I already wrote you once, but I wanted to hurry and try
to get it sent out before you got too many replies on it. So now I want to
write and explain better and why I would like it. I am a stay at home mom with
three children and my boyfriend is the only one working, and they haven't had
much work for him so for a 2 week pay check he brought home $104.00. And all
my oldest daughter has asked for her birthday and Christmas were a computer
to help her with her schooling. So if you still have the computer I would VERY
much like it and it will be greatly appreciated. Thank you! to this much more urgent note (never mind how she sent this note if her computer really had crashed)
I AM INTERESTED IN THE COMPUTER MINE CRASHED PLEASE LET ME KNOW IF YOU STILL HAVE
THANK YOU
to the modern chatspeak (complete with a 'ty', which I don't even understand)
Hi I am very interested n this 4 my daughter ty
I couldn't decide for a while, but I eventually chose to give it to another graduate student who was looking for a computer for his son. Maybe out of empathy for fellow grad students. I wish that I had twenty of these things to give away!
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So I haven't written in ages. I've been alternating between feeling
pretty down and pretty happy lately. Down in that I failed my A exam a
month and a half ago, and I can no longer get a doctorate; instead I'm
finishing a master's thesis this semester. At first, I was shocked and
disappointed, and I cried a lot; there had never been a disappointment
like this in my-so-called-career. I knew that my research wasn't going
all that well, but I guess that I just assumed that after spending 4
years at a university, there was really no way to fail. In fact, no one
else in my class has failed besides me, so that made it all the more
difficult.
On the bright side, I am excited to move on to new things, whatever
they may be. I am happy to be done with a very frustrating research
project; something that I had long ago lost passion in.
I've had to revise my long term goals.. while I had always planned on
becoming a professor with a focus on teaching, without a Ph.D., I am
limited to community colleges and high schools (I really have no desire
to teach any group younger than that over the long term). I don't think
that this is necessarily a bad thing, for I am thinking that I will be
happier just doing what I really enjoy, which is teaching, rather than
feeling obligated to teach at a research university because it would be beneath
me to work at a teaching college. But then the options are so many!
Different options include the following--
-Apply to community colleges : this is more time consuming because jobs are generally only advertised on the website itself
-Peace Corps : work abroad in teaching for a couple of years. The pro is that it's not hard to get into.
-Math for America/Knowles Fellowship : two cool 5 year programs which
pay for a master's at columbia/bard/nyu (maybe other schools for
knowles) and then are followed with 4 years of teaching math in
secondary schools in nyc
-Prep schools in northeast : most of the older prep schools in the northeast offer 1-2 year fellowship programs
-TA in Qatar at Cornell?
-Something else completely?
My dad told me last night that teachers "teach because they cannot do."
In other words, he thinks that my career interest is not a good one. He
suggested that I work for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC)
because the government is building a lot of nuclear plants in the near
future. After he said that, he told me that I was free to ignore his
advice. I'm glad he offered that option. | | |
| It's finals week at Cornell, and I can hardly notice the difference. I just saw a girl walk by with a "Got Beer?" Shirt. I overheard her say on her cell phone, "Yeah, let's totally get shitfaced tonight!", and then she giggled in glee.
Has another year come and gone already? Have my surroundings changed? Have I changed? Would I notice if I had? Am I warped because I've now been in a college environment for 8 years? Will I ever leave college?
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| Finally, the saga of the camera is over. After attempting to sell my
camera on ebay, starting some time last month, I finally am done. My
first bidder did not even contact me, so I contacted the next bidder
after a week had passed (ebay rules), who agreed to buy it. However, I
discovered to my chagrin that he had a shipping address in Russia! He
thankfully agreed to pay extra for shipping, rather than the low price
that I had foolishly advertised, assuming that everyone who used ebay
lived in the U.S. After receiving payment from my new Russian buyer
through some intermediary in Florida (don't ask questions: it was
SKETCHY), I set about to mail the package this morning.
As luck
would have it, this morning featured a charming 8 inch snowfall (and
it's still snowing!). I spent the better part of an hour mailing the
package to Russia (this guy bought my camera there). First, I
went to the on-campus post office. Then, I realized that you can't use
credit cards (of course, I had little cash). Then, I went on a mad
search for an ATM, taking leads from strangers on the street, until I
eventually found one that was my bank. After returning, the post office
lady says, "Oh, russia? I'm sorry, but you must fill out a customs
card. On the top of this lengthy form, it says something about the fact
that "we have the right to open your package and search through the
contents." As it's going to Russia, I'm certain that the authorities
there will take the opportunity to do so. Actually, my friend from
Colombia told me that nothing sent through the U.S. Postal service ever
arrives in Colombia because the postal workers steal it. I wonder if
this is true in Russia.
Anyway, next, the woman at the post
office inquired into my choice of box: "This isn't a wine box, is it?"
I pleaded with her, saying that it was not. In reality, it looked a lot
like a wine box, and I'm not entirely sure where it came from (I just
found it lying around the house). The good news is, I am finally free
from this camera, which took ages to sell. I almost don't care if some
Russian postal worker steals it. | | |
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