I took a late evening nap today, the kind that you hope will carry over in to the night and leave you with a seriously augmented night's sleep. Alas, no dice.
I also took a GRE pracitce test today, and got a 670 verbal, 420 math. Those are some noticeably disparate scores, eh? After looking over the answers to the math portion, I realized that I made some pretty careless mistakes. I always feel this intense pressure to finish the sections quickly, and end up having ten of fifteen minutes left over. These practice tests are making my general feelings about this test way better, so I'm glad that I just bought a book that has, like, seven older tests in it.
While riding my bike today, I also realized that a lot of this whole test-taking process is all in your mind. I'm not that bad at math, but when I go in to a practice test thing that, well shucks, I'm going to really stink this one up so I might as well get it over with - that just isn't productive at all. If I just cool out and think happy thoughts and have confidence in the knowledge that I do have, I think it will only help. There's a little life lesson tucked away in this GRE studying, wouldn't you say?
My roommate is currently moving her bed out of our shared basement room. For the month that we have both been in this house, she has slept exactly one night in this room. Which works for, because I paid for half of this room for the month of September and had the room to myself the entire time. This also means that I paid for the full room for October, which is twice what I had anticipated paying for rent when I moved here. Granted, my rent is still just barely over $300, so it's still a fracking bargain. And, after checking my bank accounts, I'm still doing ok.
Maybe I'm spoiled. Does it take a sort of princess to sit on her laurels all day and not bother searching for a job? I guess I'm studying for the GRE so that, in theory, future me can have a job that is meaningful and worth another $50,000 in loans (holy poop). And we all know that a princess wouldn't bother with that sort of thing. Plus she wouldn't have to take out loans in the first place. Maybe I'm just not desperate enough yet. If I needed money immediately, I would probably be more apt to click on the ads on Craig's List for dishwashers and what have you. But I'm not there yet. But there has got to be a job in this town that I am qualified for that doesn't involve washing dishes or making sandwiches. I really don't want to work retail again, but that may be the only option.
I've also been considering the prospect of teaching English aborad. One of the guys I live with has done it, so I should talk with him and get his perspective. There's one problem, though. And I almost can't believe I'm about to say this. But I don't think that I, the cantankerous hermit crab of a girl who would typically prefer to be alone than with most groups of people, would want to go anywhere abroad by myself. I've spent enough time by myself since I moved here to know that meaningful friendships are important to me, and I don't feel like I have many these days. I have one close friend here, and the few others that I have are across the country. I would love to have the experience of teaching abroad, but something like that would be so much more meaningful if I could share it with someone else. (Cue the 'Full House' music when one of the girls learns a valuable lesson about life.)
That being said, I should teach English in Poland. Or Italy, since I already know a decent amount about the Italian language. It would be awesome to go anywhere in Eastern Europe, but it would be tough to be around any Cyrillic language without knowing anything about them. All of the teaching programs say that you don't need to know the language, but I'm dubious.
Just about four weeks to go until I take the GRE. I wonder what would happen to my score if I studied every day? It would go up, presumably. And considering that I've started looking at non-library graduate programs that I'm ultimately less qualified for, my scores are probably going to need to be pretty good.
I wonder just how many people there out in this world wide web that write in their blogs and write in their journals and think that they want to make a living doing it? And what of the aspiring writers who don't write in blogs? What of the countless people who want to be writers? Why do I presume that I could even be a semi-finalist for success in the journalism/writing realm? Well, I guess I would be willing to sign my life and a good deal of future earnings away to a student loan corporation, for one. I have no experience, but I'm trying to get some. I will weasel my way in to Emerson's graduate program in writing and publishing. It may take a few years, but I will get there!
More studying, job searching, and coffee chugging tomorrow. Living the dream.
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