Puttering and Packing

[miss_yt]

Since Dad wants some of my stuff ready to go out to the car tomorrow, or at least on Sunday, I have been doing some packing. I put all of my books in a box...well, actually, I had to divide them among multiple boxes. Logistically, this is a bad thing, but as a character indicator I believe it is a good thing. I also took down my posters and rolled up my rug. My room looks rather oppressive and box-like without these little touches. Also, whenever I sit in my rolly office chair, there is no carpet to stop it, so it careens backwards across what I hesitate to call the hardwood floor. Kind of annoying. At least I haven't fallen over and killed myself yet, but it may be only a matter of time...

I still have to call the guy in the apartment and ask what his monthly utilities bills are, so I will have an idea of what I'm getting into. colorwhirl[1] and I plan to keep them down by not using AC this summer. I have agreed to pay the electric bills, since we are doing a "you pay this and I'll pay that" arrangement rather than the more complicated "split." So if I get a part-time job on the side or find good freelance, work, then we shall have a ****ing AC, thank you very much.

(No, colorwhirl, I'm not mad at you, I'm just being emphatic.)

I just realized that I will be 22 tomorrow. And on Sunday I will officially be a college graduate with a degree and everything. And in a couple of weeks I will be living on my own (so to speak) and holding down a job. I find that a rather daunting prospect, even though it means I've done well for myself so far.

I'm going through a tutorial for regular expressions, because my boss-to-be said I should read up on them for work. They'll train me, of course, but he expects me to know the basics beforehand. I find most of it rather straightforward when I read it closely, though it will take me a while to get the hang of it. The function of the dot - the "." - is still unclear to me. It is supposed to be a substitute for a "negated character class," but it seems to me that it is a placeholder for "anything," as in, when you want to designate something inside quotation marks, you look for "." in the search. I have the feeling I'm not getting the whole idea, though. Can one of you computer geeks please enlighten me?



[1] Henceforth, my flatmate. "Roommate" is inaccurate because we are not living in the same room, and "apartmentmate" is awkward. Therefore, "flatmate."

Comments

[desdenova.livejournal.com]

Happy birthday, congratulations, and good luck in your new job! (So many things at once!)

[pinesandmaples]

So if I get a part-time job on the side or find good freelance, work, then we shall have a ****ing AC, thank you very much.

I don't object because of the price, although it can get expensive. I object because of the energy usage. I object because of the damage excessive energy usage does to our environment. I'm half tempted to chip in some to make sure we get full wind power from PECO (since it is available for not too much more a month), but honestly the AC is not something that we need overly much of. If we open windows and have a nice cross-ventilation thing going, there isn't honestly much need for the AC either. It's not like we want the apartment frigid; we just want it at a nice, balmy temperature with some air moving.

Also, I honestly don't think you'll need a side job. It's very easy to live on your salary (around $21,000 a year...which is also what I make, ironically enough) if you just budget properly. Most side jobs you'll find in this city will be food related. And I really don't think you want to be serving food/coffee/bussing tables on weekends.
I also think that will over-stress you. Just keep an eye on your money. Seriously. Blinding realism, but that's also coming from the person who has been watching the job market in this city for the past year.

I promise to cut back on the blinding realism IRL. I'm actually usually pretty reserved when it comes to those things.