No better than when I started

I have less than a week left at work and how do I feel? Well, oddly enough I feel like I could work for another four months if I wasn't going back to school. Normally by this time in the summer I've been dying to leave for at least three weeks.

So what's different this year? Not a lot. The people are different, but they're just as nice as last year's people so that doesn't count. The job I've been doing is just as tedious, the building the same, the workday and breaks the same, everything else the same. The only thing I can think of is that this year I've been making almost seven dollars per hour more than I was last year. It's amazing what a decent wage can do to your sense of job satisfaction.

And yet, when I look at what the contents of my bank account will be after my last paycheque this summer and subtract the aggregate amount I have received to date in scholarships, really I've barely broken even, and it feels like it's only going to get worse, seeing as my rent is set to increase early next year and my tuition for this semester alone jumped 25% over what I paid in spring for the same number of courses. Ouch.

Luckily at school there is this nice hare krisna guy who cooks special hare krisna vegan food and will give you a whole plate of it for whatever change you have in your pocket at the time. That, plus a generous helping of all the spiders you can catch might actually provide enough protein for healthy skin, hair and fingernail growth.

Still, I think I really should get off my ass and apply for some more scholarships. I could say something like hi, my name is Erin. I used to live in a foster home. I am the president of a really large student union. They give me a budget and I spend it responsibly. I want to get a PHD so that I can wear one of those cool puffy hats. I can't think of a better reason to go through the pain of doctoral studies than that. My friends and family say I'm retarded, but in spite of being differently abled, I get decent grades. I will likely use my education to publish several books of theories and study that will be read by 10-15 like-minded souls and ignored by all of society, and this is how I intend to make the world better.

And yet in the end I always look at the sappy bullshit I write for these things and just decide to go to work instead. It's easier.