Slowly Going Back Into Debt (Update/Trigger Warning #420)

[Pants]

Dec 14, 2016 9:12:31 GMT -5 chen35 said:

Dec 13, 2016 12:04:21 GMT -5 Shooby said:

ENTIRELY UNEARNED?  Oh ok.  Well, i guess you inherited a crap ton of money.  As for me, i earned every damn dime.

No inheritance. More of being in the extremely right place at the right time career wise. In 5 years I went from being a Sr. Accountant to being the CFO of a mid sized bank. One different decision in several instances would have made that not possible. While I did work hard, I can't say that anyone with my skill set and work ethic would be where I am. Luck had a lot to do with it. I don't think that makes my hard work less noteworthy, but it would disingenuous to say I did this all myself.

Ah but you're missing the point. See, anyone who is doing well worked hard and was smart, anyone who isn't doing well is stupid and lazy.

[NomoreDramaQ1015]

Dec 13, 2016 22:54:19 GMT -5 zibazinski said:

Dec 13, 2016 22:36:38 GMT -5 minnesotapaintlady said:

It totally depends on the hospital.  I'm located right between two major ones.  One will let you do payments and the other requires payment in full with almost no exceptions.

Blood from a stone. If you don't have it what are they going to do? Set up a payment plan or risk you declaring bk.

They send you straight to collections depending on the hospital.   Around here if you do not have insurance the majority of hospitals expect you to pay 100% upfront.  If you can't and it is a non-emergency situation they will turn you away.

They wont accept $50 a month for the rest of your life anymore either.  Alegent goes so far now as to determine the payment for you rather than let you set the terms and if you can't/won't off to collection to go.

It has made a mess because like you said you can't squeeze blood from a stone.

[swamp]

Dec 14, 2016 9:12:31 GMT -5 chen35 said:

Dec 13, 2016 12:04:21 GMT -5 Shooby said:

ENTIRELY UNEARNED?  Oh ok.  Well, i guess you inherited a crap ton of money.  As for me, i earned every damn dime.

No inheritance. More of being in the extremely right place at the right time career wise. In 5 years I went from being a Sr. Accountant to being the CFO of a mid sized bank. One different decision in several instances would have made that not possible. While I did work hard, I can't say that anyone with my skill set and work ethic would be where I am. Luck had a lot to do with it. I don't think that makes my hard work less noteworthy, but it would disingenuous to say I did this all myself.

Timing and knowing the right people had a HUGE role in my career. 

ETA:  I worked hard for everything I have, it was not handed to me.  But I would be delusional if I said that I did this all on my own.  

[Shooby]

Dec 14, 2016 9:15:24 GMT -5 Pants said:

Dec 14, 2016 9:12:31 GMT -5 chen35 said:

No inheritance. More of being in the extremely right place at the right time career wise. In 5 years I went from being a Sr. Accountant to being the CFO of a mid sized bank. One different decision in several instances would have made that not possible. While I did work hard, I can't say that anyone with my skill set and work ethic would be where I am. Luck had a lot to do with it. I don't think that makes my hard work less noteworthy, but it would disingenuous to say I did this all myself.

Ah but you're missing the point. See, anyone who is doing well worked hard and was smart, anyone who isn't doing well is stupid and lazy.

Nobody said that but whatever. If i say the sky is blue some of will interpret that to mean that I hate red. Lol

[whoisjohngalt]

Dec 14, 2016 9:12:31 GMT -5 chen35 said:

Dec 13, 2016 12:04:21 GMT -5 Shooby said:

ENTIRELY UNEARNED?  Oh ok.  Well, i guess you inherited a crap ton of money.  As for me, i earned every damn dime.

No inheritance. More of being in the extremely right place at the right time career wise. In 5 years I went from being a Sr. Accountant to being the CFO of a mid sized bank. One different decision in several instances would have made that not possible. While I did work hard, I can't say that anyone with my skill set and work ethic would be where I am. Luck had a lot to do with it. I don't think that makes my hard work less noteworthy, but it would disingenuous to say I did this all myself.

I disagree completely.

I was a Sr Accountant at one point.  And I was a pretty good one.  But no "right place right time" would have made me a CFO.  1 - I don't have a CPA license and that's usually a requirement.  2 - I don't have the guts to take on such responsibility.

So, while yes, the timing of things might have speed up your promotion, I still think that it was you who made it happen.

Give yourself credit and be proud!

[whoisjohngalt]

Dec 14, 2016 9:20:32 GMT -5 swamp said:

Dec 14, 2016 9:12:31 GMT -5 chen35 said:

No inheritance. More of being in the extremely right place at the right time career wise. In 5 years I went from being a Sr. Accountant to being the CFO of a mid sized bank. One different decision in several instances would have made that not possible. While I did work hard, I can't say that anyone with my skill set and work ethic would be where I am. Luck had a lot to do with it. I don't think that makes my hard work less noteworthy, but it would disingenuous to say I did this all myself.

Timing and knowing the right people had a HUGE role in my career. 

ETA:  I worked hard for everything I have, it was not handed to me.  But I would be delusional if I said that I did this all on my own.  

See, this really bothers me.  Yes, sure timing is important and knowing people is important.  But I think you and Chen are not giving yourself enough credit.

I don't know, may be I am completely brainwashed by the book I just finished reading about how women, no matter how successful they are, still feel like insecure about their success.  I don't know.

But I think running your own business requires certain character traits that not everyone has.  Same for higher level positions.  And I think you both should be damn proud of yourself and not diminish your accomplishments at all by saying "oh it was right place, right time, right people".  I think it was YOU who did it right.

OK, getting off my soap box and am stopping in further derailing this thread. 

[chen35]

Dec 14, 2016 9:53:09 GMT -5 whoisjohngalt said:

Dec 14, 2016 9:12:31 GMT -5 chen35 said:

No inheritance. More of being in the extremely right place at the right time career wise. In 5 years I went from being a Sr. Accountant to being the CFO of a mid sized bank. One different decision in several instances would have made that not possible. While I did work hard, I can't say that anyone with my skill set and work ethic would be where I am. Luck had a lot to do with it. I don't think that makes my hard work less noteworthy, but it would disingenuous to say I did this all myself.

I disagree completely.

I was a Sr Accountant at one point.  And I was a pretty good one.  But no "right place right time" would have made me a CFO.  1 - I don't have a CPA license and that's usually a requirement.  2 - I don't have the guts to take on such responsibility.

So, while yes, the timing of things might have speed up your promotion, I still think that it was you who made it happen.

Give yourself credit and be proud!

That might be true. I'm not discounting my own hard work (not sure about the guts part, when you're offered a promotion they don't ask if you wan it ). The job I took was open for 6 months before I applied. I was laid off from a previous job, or I never would have even considered it. Even then,  I almost didn't take this job, because I worried I'd get bored. I almost left after 2 years for a different opportunity that didn't pan out. Had either of those things happened, which were just luck, there is no way I'd be where I am. I'd probably still be reasonably successful, but nearly to this extent.

[NomoreDramaQ1015]

We deposited DH's savings bond.   It was $7 shy of $2k.   That puts us almost back where we were savings wise before I lost my job.   That helps me breathe a little easier because now if the dog gets sick again or something we don't have to use the credit card.   Now I need to work on getting our budget back on track so we're not so low the day before payday.

I registered for immunology we'll use the cash we just deposited to cover the fees.   I had my boss sign the proctor forms this morning.  Hope I did it right, it was clicking a bunch of buttons online so I am pretty sure I didn't screw the application up.  Boy this is a lot harder than I remember it being when I was 18!

Yes hopefully it will lead to a better paying career for me and a more stable employment future.   I've been meaning to do this for awhile but I had Gwen, then I had Abby, then I lost my job, then DH lost his job and now our budget sucks donkey balls.  

It also does not help I waffled for a long time on getting my master's.   I came to the final conclusion last year that getting my master's will solve nothing.   I have to make a complete career shift for the next phase of my life if I want any significant changes to happen. 

Cashing in that savings bond is one of the best Christmas presents FIL and DH could have given me. I need to think of something nice to do for FIL as a thank you.   DH is easy to thank.

We signed the loan papers for the house.  After crunching the numbers with the lender we decided not to go with 10% down.  It would not lower things that much.   What will lower our payment is they estimated high on our insurance and we're getting it from State Farm for $55 a month instead.   Lender told us jump on that while it's hot because I'm not going to find a rate that low with anyone else.

House was appraised yesterday.  We'll see what it comes in at.   It is possible that depending on what the house is worth plus our 5% down may land us at 20% equity or get us pretty close.   Everyone is thinking the $65k my parents are charging is really low for our property.  

We should at least come in at $65k at any rate.  It may take us replacing the siding before we hit the magical 20% mark and can drop PMI.

[swamp]

Dec 14, 2016 10:00:31 GMT -5 whoisjohngalt said:

Dec 14, 2016 9:20:32 GMT -5 swamp said:

Timing and knowing the right people had a HUGE role in my career. 

ETA:  I worked hard for everything I have, it was not handed to me.  But I would be delusional if I said that I did this all on my own.  

See, this really bothers me.  Yes, sure timing is important and knowing people is important.  But I think you and Chen are not giving yourself enough credit.

I don't know, may be I am completely brainwashed by the book I just finished reading about how women, no matter how successful they are, still feel like insecure about their success.  I don't know.

But I think running your own business requires certain character traits that not everyone has.  Same for higher level positions.  And I think you both should be damn proud of yourself and not diminish your accomplishments at all by saying "oh it was right place, right time, right people".  I think it was YOU who did it right.

OK, getting off my soap box and am stopping in further derailing this thread. 

I don't feel insecure about my success, but I also recognize that who I know gave me some opportunities that may not have been available to me.

When I graduated from law school, I had 0 job prospects, so I had to move home with my parents because I was out of money.   There was a District Attorney race happening at the time.  The guy who was favored to win knew my family and knew of me.   He won, and hired me.  He said, "I don't care if you have experience.  I can teach someone to be a lawyer.  I can't teach you to play nice in the sandbox." 

It is a very small DA office, so I got great experience immediately, and lots more responsibility than if I went to work in a big DA office with formal training opportunities. 

From there, I made the contacts to move up the lawyer food chain.  

That's the luck I'm talking about. 

[HoneyBBQ]

Dec 13, 2016 19:51:45 GMT -5 zibazinski said:

Don't hospitals set up payment plans for people anymore? Are you required to pay it off all at once? Legal bills, ugh.

Luckily I think his max out of pocket is only $5000 or something like that. And that's in the HSA account. 

[shanendoah]

whoisjohngalt - If it helps, I don't believe there is such a thing as "derailing" in one of my threads. I like organic conversations that go where they go. And like you, I tend to be really conscious of, and try to counter act, impostor syndrome, or other attitudes that successful women generally have that discounts their own accomplishments. Sometimes when thinking about my own career and decisions, I try to separate myself and say - if friend X were asking me about this, how would I advise them? And then force myself to take my own advice. At the same time, I also do try to be conscious of my privilege. Having spent so much time working with the foster care system in our state does make it more visible to me. I am proud of how far up the ladder I have climbed and have every intention of climbing higher. But I also try to be very aware that I did not start at the bottom of the ladder, and that the rungs are closer together/easier to climb the higher you get.

zibazinski - And right now, I'm the one making excuses. I have been a member of this community long enough, have enough "friends" here, that I could have survived this going on YM. I have a thick enough skin I could ignore being torn apart. (Well, normally I do. Right now, my skin is a little thinner, which is why I posted on WIR and not YM/YMOT.) But I am also willing to say (where many people were not), that the board does not know the whole story and that I am unwilling to tell the whole story. Now, it is possible that if you knew the whole story, you would still give me the same advice, but I also think it's possible that people would be a hell of a lot more understanding if they knew everything.
I am more conscious of it now, but in general, I have always tried to remind myself that here on the boards, I only know what people are willing to share. I cannot know their complete stories. So I give the best advice I can based on what I know, but it really is up to them to decide if it is right for them or not.

NomoreDramaQ1015 - Thanks for posting about your bond. It reminds me that C has some old savings bonds from when he was a kid. I don't know that any of them are going to be worth $2k, but right now, I'll take $200, just to give us more of a cushion. We'll have to look and find those.

I came here to talk about the financial aspect, because it is one more stressor. And this is the place I talk about financial issues. But compared to the emotional impact this issue is having on our family, the financial part is nothing. As I said on the YM thread forever ago, this is a situation that would be worth going bankrupt over. And so, while I have an amazing in person support group, I turn to them for the emotional heavy lifting. I don't always throw in the "little" things, like the finances, especially not when I have another place I can vent about that. I am trying to manage my resources as best I can, so that I don't wear any of them out.

[zibazinski]

I do understand that. I wish I'd posted here about the shock of DH's will and trust. Instead I got brutalized by the YM crowd. Like I wasn't hurt enough.

[zibazinski]

Dec 14, 2016 10:31:11 GMT -5 swamp said:

Dec 14, 2016 10:00:31 GMT -5 whoisjohngalt said:

See, this really bothers me.  Yes, sure timing is important and knowing people is important.  But I think you and Chen are not giving yourself enough credit.

I don't know, may be I am completely brainwashed by the book I just finished reading about how women, no matter how successful they are, still feel like insecure about their success.  I don't know.

But I think running your own business requires certain character traits that not everyone has.  Same for higher level positions.  And I think you both should be damn proud of yourself and not diminish your accomplishments at all by saying "oh it was right place, right time, right people".  I think it was YOU who did it right.

OK, getting off my soap box and am stopping in further derailing this thread. 

I don't feel insecure about my success, but I also recognize that who I know gave me some opportunities that may not have been available to me.

When I graduated from law school, I had 0 job prospects, so I had to move home with my parents because I was out of money.   There was a District Attorney race happening at the time.  The guy who was favored to win knew my family and knew of me.   He won, and hired me.  He said, "I don't care if you have experience.  I can teach someone to be a lawyer.  I can't teach you to play nice in the sandbox." 

It is a very small DA office, so I got great experience immediately, and lots more responsibility than if I went to work in a big DA office with formal training opportunities. 

From there, I made the contacts to move up the lawyer food chain.  

That's the luck I'm talking about. 

Did you work hard given that lucky opportunity?

[NomoreDramaQ1015]

I get it, Zib.  I never expected any money from my grandmother but the mess she left behind for my parents to clean up pissed me off.  I remember a giant stack of credit cards on the kitchen table with some having balances going back to 1992 before my grandfather died.   Dad said if grandma wasn't already dead he would have killed her.

It hurts when those we love don't take the time to make sure their affairs are in order.   It makes you question things because, IMHO, it's horribly selfish to leave your family to clean up your mess rather than taking care of yourself when you had time.

It's hard to explain, people just assume you are upset because you didn't get any money from the estate and are being greedy.   Which is far from the truth.

[buystoys]

Dec 14, 2016 11:35:50 GMT -5 zibazinski said:

I do understand that. I wish I'd posted here about the shock of DH's will and trust. Instead I got brutalized by the YM crowd. Like I wasn't hurt enough.

I truly wish things had happened differently for you, Zib.  Sending you a REALLY big hug today even though it won't change anything in your past. 

[zibazinski]

Dec 14, 2016 11:43:16 GMT -5 NomoreDramaQ1015 said:

I get it, Zib.  I never expected any money from my grandmother but the mess she left behind for my parents to clean up pissed me off.  I remember a giant stack of credit cards on the kitchen table with some having balances going back to 1992 before my grandfather died.   Dad said if grandma wasn't already dead he would have killed her.

It hurts when those we love don't take the time to make sure their affairs are in order.   It makes you question things because, IMHO, it's horribly selfish to leave your family to clean up your mess rather than taking care of yourself when you had time.

It's hard to explain, people just assume you are upset because you didn't get any money from the estate and are being greedy.   Which is far from the truth.

You are right. I did a lot of things financially that I would not have done had I not had assurances that I would be taken care of do not to worry about it. On top of the pain of losing him.

[muttleynfelix]

Dec 13, 2016 19:49:56 GMT -5 zibazinski said:

I don't remember anyone getting shredded unless they kept making excuses as to why no ideas presented could possibly work. Can't cut cable, can't get a part-time job, can't get their spouse to work, always an excuse. That's how you get shredded. 

Oh geez. There is always something people harp on. Like my husband smokes. I can't force him to quit, but other people think I should be able to make him. I was also told my husband has anger issues because he quit a job he had for 2 weeks because the company announced they were shutting down his office (yes they knew when they hired him). People pick one thing and it gets stuck on and harped on to no end.

[muttleynfelix]

Dec 13, 2016 19:51:45 GMT -5 zibazinski said:

Don't hospitals set up payment plans for people anymore? Are you required to pay it off all at once? Legal bills, ugh.

The hospital I had my kids at would do a payment plan for a year, but if you couldn't pay it off in a year, they set you up at a credit union and you got a personal loan. That personal loan was only for 3 years. Not $20 a month forever.

[NomoreDramaQ1015]

Credit Cards are popular here.  If you cannot pay in full then they want you to sign up at the desk before they will treat you.

Even our vet has one now.    That way they get paid right away and it's the credit card company's problem if you can't pay the bill.

[zibazinski]

Geez, I remember joking to DD she was finally paid for. She was old enough to get the joke.

[The Walk of the Penguin Mich]

Dec 14, 2016 10:31:11 GMT -5 swamp said:

Dec 14, 2016 10:00:31 GMT -5 whoisjohngalt said:

See, this really bothers me.  Yes, sure timing is important and knowing people is important.  But I think you and Chen are not giving yourself enough credit.

I don't know, may be I am completely brainwashed by the book I just finished reading about how women, no matter how successful they are, still feel like insecure about their success.  I don't know.

But I think running your own business requires certain character traits that not everyone has.  Same for higher level positions.  And I think you both should be damn proud of yourself and not diminish your accomplishments at all by saying "oh it was right place, right time, right people".  I think it was YOU who did it right.

OK, getting off my soap box and am stopping in further derailing this thread. 

I don't feel insecure about my success, but I also recognize that who I know gave me some opportunities that may not have been available to me.

When I graduated from law school, I had 0 job prospects, so I had to move home with my parents because I was out of money.   There was a District Attorney race happening at the time.  The guy who was favored to win knew my family and knew of me.   He won, and hired me.  He said, "I don't care if you have experience.  I can teach someone to be a lawyer.  I can't teach you to play nice in the sandbox." 

It is a very small DA office, so I got great experience immediately, and lots more responsibility than if I went to work in a big DA office with formal training opportunities. 

From there, I made the contacts to move up the lawyer food chain.  

That's the luck I'm talking about. 

Me doing as well as I did in what is now an impossible field was part luck and a lot of recognizing what was going on around me.  I lucked into a job in research, where most PIs hired someone to run the lab and they were the PIs right hand person.  Unlike many research jobs, people in this field tended to stay for life.  There isn't the same sort of turnover that you normally see in research.  

When he asked me to run his lab in TX, I knew that this was the opportunity that I needed.  I needed to get out of Boston, where my rent which started out at 50% of my paycheck later dropped to about 40% after being hired by him.  But it was still too high and it gets really hard schlepping groceries in the snow (my hip had started acting up at this point).  Loved the lifestyle and what I could do, hated the fact that I knew that I needed to get the hell out of there because I could not afford it on my position.

One of the things that I did was look for holes and filled them in.  By the time I left, I could do any job in the lab from dishwashing to animal work to some of the most technical protein chemistry.  Most of the more advanced stuff I had to learn on my own.  I also brought projects to him, and tried off the wall stuff on my own working after hours.  Several times, my off the wall ideas produced papers and directions for the PIs research.  With universities, a position is frequently determined as X years of experience + MS or X + 8 years experience + BS.  So I went and got an MS on my own dime in Biotechnology.  What this degree did do was help me with the protein chemistry and EM work, and it also jacked up my salary quite a bit.  However, it got put on a credit card (and was a good part of the $40K in debt - about 25%).

When we moved again, I got a 30% raise but it wound up being about a net equal move in income.  Cheaper living in TX + no state tax accounted for a lot.   Again, I looked around and tried to identify holes in my knowledge.  My PI was bombarded, as he was now dean and I took over a lot more responsibility in writing, and putting together presentations for him - things that he normally did for himself.  However, the hole in my knowledge was statistics, so I started taking a couple of biostats classes so I could take over this and realized that if I was going to school, I may as well get a degree out of it.  This university DID pay for employee education.  

When I left, I had a coworker who I was training.  Over the years, I told him that he really needed to start looking at the job the way that I did and he needed to find some niche that he could fill that would make in invaluable.  He was 15 years younger than I, and I really encouraged him to take initiative and write up some of his stuff and start learning statistics because when our boss retired, the stats would be a leg up that a lot of people don't have.  He ignored me.  I went to bat to him more than once, but the way that our PI worked was that if you took initiative, you were rewarded for it.  He did the work, just the work and no more than was required.  How you were rewarded were things that could benefit you (like presenting at international meetings), looked good on CVs and you could network with other people. 

So I did very well for what my career path should have paid, well above average.  But I worked my ass off for it and was continually trying to find new lines of research we could explore (some of which resulted in substantial grants).  I also took advantage of my benefits, and how my PI rewarded people.  Some luck, but mostly work.

When I went out sick and had to give up my position for LTD, my PI told me that he desperately needed me back.  But by giving up my position, he could repost my position when I was ready and post it at a higher grade than I was at - as even from my last upgrade, I had jumped onto another job track with my education, responsibilities and experience.  It would have taken me from making about $64K to $75K.....and he did have the money to pay me.  I know he would have made a lot of concessions for my disabilities, even though working in the lab would not have been smart.  The deciding point was that he was 65, and the school was getting a new administration.  Seeing his FB page, I would not be surprised if he retires in the next year or so.

[The Walk of the Penguin Mich]

Dec 14, 2016 11:52:21 GMT -5 zibazinski said:

Dec 14, 2016 11:43:16 GMT -5 NomoreDramaQ1015 said:

I get it, Zib.  I never expected any money from my grandmother but the mess she left behind for my parents to clean up pissed me off.  I remember a giant stack of credit cards on the kitchen table with some having balances going back to 1992 before my grandfather died.   Dad said if grandma wasn't already dead he would have killed her.

It hurts when those we love don't take the time to make sure their affairs are in order.   It makes you question things because, IMHO, it's horribly selfish to leave your family to clean up your mess rather than taking care of yourself when you had time.

It's hard to explain, people just assume you are upset because you didn't get any money from the estate and are being greedy.   Which is far from the truth.

You are right. I did a lot of things financially that I would not have done had I not had assurances that I would be taken care of do not to worry about it. On top of the pain of losing him.

This truly sucks.  When I moved out here, TD changed his will and included me substantially in it so I knew that if something happened to him, I was protected.  We need to do a new will again, even though I have changed him over to beneficiary to all of my retirement accounts and me his.

[NomoreDramaQ1015]

hen I left, I had a coworker who I was training. Over the years, I told him that he really needed to start looking at the job the way that I did and he needed to find some niche that he could fill that would make in invaluable

Very true.   Despite the fact that it's not my favorite thing to do my animal skills are invaluable.   They are what have kept me employed despite an ever shrinking pool of money to hire/keep people.

I've found that despite it being a corner stone of a lot of research in academia quite a few people refuse to work with animals or just plain suck at it (whether intentionally or not I do not know).  

I do feel I was lucky to land in the lab I did from the start and have a PI who was extremely knowledgable about running a colony.  I am often shocked at how little some PIs know about taking care of their animals.  I really like my current PIs but they are not what I would consider the best at colony management.   They recognize this and that's why I got hired on the spot.

Animal work is very important but it's not the job that gets accolades or a lot of thanks.   It's why people don't want to do it.   If I am doing my job correctly I am often taken for granted.  

Part of taking immunology is not just to switch careers but to better understand why I am doing what I do.   If I can keep the bigger picture/grander goal in mind it helps keep me from getting so burnt out.

[Pants]

Dec 14, 2016 9:45:11 GMT -5 Shooby said:

Dec 14, 2016 9:15:24 GMT -5 Pants said:

Ah but you're missing the point. See, anyone who is doing well worked hard and was smart, anyone who isn't doing well is stupid and lazy.

Nobody said that but whatever. If i say the sky is blue some of will interpret that to mean that I hate red. Lol

At some point, a person might wonder why that is. 

[The Walk of the Penguin Mich]

Part of taking immunology is not just to switch careers but to better understand why I am doing what I do.

This is why I kept taking courses.  By understanding the chemistry behind things, it made me better at doing the actual research.  It is easy enough to follow directions, but unless you understand what is happening, you have absolutely no ability to trouble shoot.

I'm tooting my own horn, but I am really good at this because I understand so well the mechanics.  More than one company where we have purchased kits, I have tracked down their problem and told them what they needed to do to fix it (mainly, because I did not have the time to wait around and make them realize that they had a problem and send me correct replacements).  The advantage of this is that when they finally DO realize that they have a problem, I get a "whoops, we goofed and here are replacements" letter from them, which means I can do off the grant projects for other purposes/people.

Immunology, advanced biochemistry, protein chemistry, EM are just a few classes that have allowed me to do this. 

I've found that despite it being a corner stone of a lot of research in academia quite a few people refuse to work with animals or just plain suck at it (whether intentionally or not I do not know).


Those who refuse to work with animals were the first to go in a budget crunch.  We have had 2 women in the lab who have flat out refused to do so.  As some of our work was with animals, when things got tight we usually wound up with animal contracts (we had a monkey colony and a really good disease model) that we could 'market'.  Usually monkey studies required everyone in the lab work, from the PIs down.  So if the PIs (we had 2 that would regularly help out when needed) had to do animal work, so did everyone else.

[NomoreDramaQ1015]

One of the first things I had to do when I arrived at Creighton was perfuse a mouse.   PI told me that he started doing that because he had so many techs/students/post docs come thru and refuse to work with teh animals.  He would find this out after months of investing in them only to start over again.

He decided to cut to the chase and make killing a mouse the first task you had to complete.  If you couldn't do it he knew right away you were a waste of his time.

[swamp]

Dec 14, 2016 11:41:48 GMT -5 zibazinski said:

Dec 14, 2016 10:31:11 GMT -5 swamp said:

I don't feel insecure about my success, but I also recognize that who I know gave me some opportunities that may not have been available to me.

When I graduated from law school, I had 0 job prospects, so I had to move home with my parents because I was out of money.   There was a District Attorney race happening at the time.  The guy who was favored to win knew my family and knew of me.   He won, and hired me.  He said, "I don't care if you have experience.  I can teach someone to be a lawyer.  I can't teach you to play nice in the sandbox." 

It is a very small DA office, so I got great experience immediately, and lots more responsibility than if I went to work in a big DA office with formal training opportunities. 

From there, I made the contacts to move up the lawyer food chain.  

That's the luck I'm talking about. 

Did you work hard given that lucky opportunity?

absolutely.  I was not about to fuck up an opportunity like that that was basically handed to me on a silver platter.   I realized how fortunate I was to get that opportunity.    The man who hired me is a stand up guy who has been a career mentor for me.  I am forever grateful to him, and I pay it forward when I can, and will continue to do so.

[Lizard Queen]

Sorry to read so many here have been having a difficult 2016. Ours has been tough financially as well, but at least we got 2 newer vehicles and a roof out of it. My savings have really dwindled. Guess it's good I had so much stashed in the first place. However, thinking about the financial aspect of it all leads me to frustration and anger, so sometimes I think it's good to bury your head in the sand a little bit until the storm passes. Maybe that's just me.

Here is one positive thing that came out of feeling broke: found an unused restaurant gift card last weekend, and we were really excited!

[Shooby]

Dec 14, 2016 13:04:40 GMT -5 Pants said:

Dec 14, 2016 9:45:11 GMT -5 Shooby said:

Nobody said that but whatever. If i say the sky is blue some of will interpret that to mean that I hate red. Lol

At some point, a person might wonder why that is. 

Nah.

[Deleted]

Dec 14, 2016 10:27:33 GMT -5 NomoreDramaQ1015 said:

House was appraised yesterday.  We'll see what it comes in at.   It is possible that depending on what the house is worth plus our 5% down may land us at 20% equity or get us pretty close.   Everyone is thinking the $65k my parents are charging is really low for our property.  

We should at least come in at $65k at any rate.  It may take us replacing the siding before we hit the magical 20% mark and can drop PMI.

What the house appraised at doesn't affect the 20% equity required not to have PMI.  That is based on 20% of the purchase price.  At least that is the way it was explained to me when I purchased this house.

Also, you will likely owe federal taxes on the bond in April.  If they didn't withhold for you, you may want to keep that in the back of your mind so you won't be surprised. 

I hate unhappy surprises.