it only works if you talk back.

So, this past week has been hard in regards to money, mostly in the realization that I don’t have much…

I would not consider myself to be a financially irresponsible person, for the most part I think I am pretty good. That being said though, I haven’t been living as though I’m poor, I have gone to movies and eaten out when I probably shouldn’t have, etc.

So, it takes big things like this week for me to finally leave my debit and credit cards at home…

It all started Wednesday when a retarded automobile incident brought me to finally plunking my credit card down for $953.35 on Friday. I was also (for some reason) compelled to do my taxes on the same day… bad idea.

Yes, I am a full-time student, so paying taxes aren’t really an issue… what is an issue is that I was technically “self-employed” for 2 months, making a fair amount of money. This means that I need to claim this amount as self-employment, and pay CPP on the amount, both as the EMPLOYEE and the EMPLOYER. Minus what I have paid in taxes (a minimal amount this year) I will owe approximately $750 in CPP. This amount may go down a bit when I enter expenses, but likely not enough…

That means that by the end of April, I will owe approximately $1700.

Unfortunately, I get paid once a month, and at the worst possible time. Not only that, but all my wages are essentially claimed by my fixed expenses. I won’t be starting my summer job until Apri 24th at the earliest… which will actually also bring added charges of insurance… ugh.

All in all, it has just been a bad week financially. Really bad.

So I am confined to my home, eating the remaining scraps in my fridge and cupboard, and I will collect as many damn cans as I can.

I’ve also applied for another part-time job, at the Telus World of Science which would actually be awesome, and I’m hoping that might work out for some additional income, and a foot in the door there…

I can’t wait for school to be done.

I forgot my extended syllabus at home for Luke-Acts today… that means that I’m pretty lost in terms of what is being said. Greek grammar and sentence structure is lost on me at this point. Next year, maybe not so much.

Monday/Wednesday/Fridays are not the best school days… Counseling is pretty much my least favorite class this semester, I then have a useless spare, followed by Luke-Acts where I can’t really follow anything. The only class which is pretty decent is Pastoral Life Issues, and that’s just a bunch of guest speakers coming in…

Someone asked me today “what’s new?” I said “not much.” That’s not really true. There’s a lot that is new, mainly a new relationship that puts a smile on my face everyday. Sure, a lot is the same: school, work, other things. But a lot has changed in the last few weeks: I’ve been changing my eating habits even more, going grocery shopping more frequently, and cooking up a storm. That’s new for me. I’ve struggled in this last week to get to the gym 3 times, but because my eating habits have changed I’ve actually still lost weight. I’m down almost 10lbs since my first “Fitness Assessment and Body Composition Analysis” and I’m not scared to go do another one, which I need to schedule soon.

March is a jerk, and I have a major project due almost every week, and sometimes even 2 in one week. Right now I’m working on my New Testament Theology paper, which is about the theology of the temple in Paul and Revelation. It’s been a fascinating study and there is so much to say that I hope to do some justice to it in 10-12 pages. I am so deeply indebted to the work of G. K. Beale that I just want to give him a big hug. Once I get this paper done (4:30pm Thursday at the latest) a fairly big load is lifted off, until I start again on a Pastoral Life project, then Counseling… It just keeps going and going.

I’m taking a class at St. Stephen’s College at the U of A this semester called “Just Sex”: Integrating Sexuality and Spirituality. It’s been pretty good in terms of challenging me in my understanding of how they integrate and getting some great conversation going in 3 hour chunks every week. One of the unfortunate things is that there are only 3 people in the class… yesterday I was the only one who showed up… class was cancelled. While I certainly had a lot of work to do on other things, and I was ok with it being cancelled, I felt bad for the professor. This is a class that is barely surviving, it wouldn’t even have run if there had been only 3 people registered from the beginning… I hope that more people show interest in this course, as it has been fantastic for important discussion, exploration, reflection, and self-discovery.

I cannot wait for this semester to end. I always look forward to working with bugs/reptiles in May and June. I’m not so sure what July and August will hold though, and beyond that into next year… I won’t be in as many classes next year, and I’m planning on doing a course online this summer to further lessen that course load for my fall semester. Hopefully I can get a job in July (or maybe as early as May) that I can maintain through the school year. While I’m sure I could return to Starbucks, it’s not the environment I want… especially not a drive-thru store.

Speaking of driving… That’s something that I don’t know if I will or won’t next year. I need my car for May and June for my bug job, but depending on what I do over the rest of the summer, I may need to keep it around for the whole year. I’ve actually really enjoyed taking public transportation over the last 6 months or so. It certainly has it’s less glamorous moments but overall it has been good. I’m paying for a U-Pass anyways, so I might as well make use of it. It’s also really nice to not pay for insurance, gas, and maintenance. If I’m able to make it another year without using my dumb car over my last year of school, it might be worth it… It’s not that I don’t like driving, I just don’t like the cost :)

Speaking of money… I don’t have a lot of it in my account right now. In fact, I have barely enough to cover my MasterCard bill (which isn’t that big) this month. For the first time in my life I may not actually pay my entire MC bill off this month… at least not completely before the payment due date. I get paid a few days after it’s due, so it’ll probably be covered then. Everything will be gravy once May hits, but I’m scraping by right now… Though, to be fair, I could just call my investment person at IG and get her to transfer some $ into my checking account… It’s probably best to do that rather than incur some unnecessary interest. I should also do my taxes ASAP, I think I have a few $$ coming my way (not all that many though).

Well that’s probably enough useless info for you people…