Money In My Pocket

Spooky

The ghosts are in the air, the pumpkins are on the door steps, and the lines are formed at the haunted attractions. It is definitely Halloween.

I most certainly do not spend any money on decorations or candy. I might spend a few dollars at the thrift store, so I can piece together a decent costume. After all, we all have a little child within us for a costume, and I might use it for a Halloween party. For some reason, girls love to throw themed/dress-up parties. As always I try to keep a tight budget on holidays, especially when Christmas is right around the corner. But, I do enjoy a good scare. My friends and I heard this one place had a really good haunted house. So of course, we had to check it out.

We were all excited to hear it had a group rate. Need-less-to-say, we found their magic number of thirteen people in order to receive the group rate. The best part was that we were able to skip the line, since we were a group. In the end we had a pretty good time and even managed to save a little money during the spooky season.

Halloween

Each year, an organization I am in has a Halloween get-together for its members.  We just have food and play a few Halloween themed games together, but it is a fun opportunity for us to get together.  Of course we dress up in costumes for this get-together, but we have a unique way of doing it.  We all come up with costume ideas and write them down on slips of paper, then we put them all in a bowl and draw out a costume idea.  The rule is that no one can tell anyone else what they are dressing as in advance.  We all have to wait to find out until that night.  Usually I will go to a costume shop or thrift store to get all of the components of the costume, and try to spend no more than about $20 in the process.  This year, though I drew the perfect costume.  While I will not say what it is for fear that other members of the organization might find out, I do not have to purchase anything for it.  I have a friend who was this last year for Halloween and she still has the elements of her costume in her closet, which she is going to let me borrow.  There are a few things I have that can make do for pieces that are missing, and so this year will be the first time since I have been a member of this group that I have not had to purchase anything for a Halloween costume.  Maybe I can use the extra money and splurge on some Halloween candy.

Rub a Dub Dub Dub

Thankfully the social norm for hygiene has changed greatly over the last several hundred years. I enjoy remaining clean and not being forced to withstand my neighbor’s repulsive stench. This has me spending more money in order to maintain my perfect look. Yet, I am not complaining at all. I just find a way to save a little money in the process.

The list of essentials include items like toothbrush, toothpaste, mouth wash, shampoo, body wash, razors, shaving cream, face wash, cotton swabs, deodorant, etc. From my observation, the male list is considerably shorter than the female list of required items. (Lucky for me until I am married.) Everybody has their favorite type or brand for each item, and I have discovered mine also. It really does create a certain aroma about you, and I know my pets can identify me by my scent. I know some people will use specific brands in order to attract the other gender but I don’t fret over the small things like that.

Sometimes when I purchase these items, I will use coupons but that is a hassle in order to collect all of them. I usually just buy in bulk so that the price is less per unit ounce for each item. Or I will just stock up when I go home. Either way, I am always looking so fresh and clean, clean, clean.

The Job Search Part 4

I met with my History advisor not only to talk about my academic schedule for next semester, but also to discuss ideas he could share with me to help in my search for a future occupation. He reinforced that graduate school is always an option, but since I do not know what I would study in graduate school I just don’t think I could be as successful as I could with a clear vision to work towards. Next he listed the typical jobs for students with History degrees, like working for a museum or even the park service. He of course added that because History is such a general liberal arts degree there is not too much I can do without further education. He was kind to note last the fact that right out of college a student with such a degree would not make much money. While I am not looking to make a lot of money, I do need to make enough to support myself. I would also like to be able to save a little for my future while working even if it is only a few years before I go back to school. This would especially prove helpful if I do go back to school because I will have at least something that I can use to pay tuition instead of relying on loans for everything. I think after this conversation, I will not be actively pursuing anything that has to do directly with the field of History because it just does not seem feasible, especially the way the economy is looking today.

Interviewing

The good thing about college is that the administration wants to place their students in jobs upon graduation. The career center has a multitude of services that assist us in finding an employer. I recently used a barrage of career center procedures in order to impress my interviewers.

Just like fingerprints, no interview is the same. I am trying to earn a Co-op position or internship with an engineering company, therefore the career center prepared me for this specific type of interview. They gave me plenty of free reading material to brush me up on the proper etiquette of everything. They had several free sessions at night that would recap the dynamic reading material and told us how it pertained to college students. They looked over my résumé, and we even performed a mock interview. The career center had suit cleaning coupons from one of the local dry cleaners. (Talk about a smart business move on their part.) I thought the interviews would be very intimidating, but they were not. The scariest part was the tiny little room which placed me within a couple feet of the interviewer.

The recent surge in postal stamps put me back a few extra cents when I mailed thank you notes to the interviewers, but it should pay back when I land the position. I also needed to buy a business folder in order to hold résumés and business cards. I looked more professional this way and was able to take notes during the interview. (They kinda run together when you do many interviews back-to-back.) Now I sit back and wait for the offers to come in.

The Job Search Part 3

I also met with a couple of my public relations professors. Initially when I went into the first of these meetings I thought I would present the opinion that I did not want to do firm work within PR, but rather I thought I would be better suited for corporate work where I could really invest myself in one effort rather than a little bit of everything. But what the first person I met with said, and the second person confirmed, is that firm work is a wonderful way to learn about many different aspects of a job in public relations. While all firms do not allow student interns, for instance, to go around seeing all the different audiences PR practitioners work with, some do. They both suggested that I look at applying to these types of firms for internships after I graduate, so I will not be stuck in something I do not enjoy, but I will also be able to gain the experience that otherwise would take me years to accumulate. This will also give me the opportunity to try out a place to live upon graduation. The firms that I would apply to have offices in the larger cities throughout the U.S. but also throughout the world. While I would not make much money while completing an internship like this, I could potentially get a job out of it, or at least learn what I enjoy doing and don’t enjoy doing, and discover something about living in a new place.

Sardines

There are unique ways to create revenue while in college. One of my friends just happens to be a genius for thinking of this one idea. I wish I had the same circumstance so I could turn a dime as easy as him.

During concerts or athletic events, he and his roommates move all of their cars out of their driveway and charge the fans for parking spaces. Since he has a prime location, they make some serious dough. They charge about twenty dollars per spot and of course they squeeze the cars in like sardines. I have heard of people doing this and even organizing a whole apartment complex to relocate their cars to a shopping mall in order to charge for every possible parking space.

Because we are in the real world now and not completely sheltered from all evils, I started to wonder about the liability of doing such entrepreneurial schemes. For example if anything happened to the cars, I believe it would probably be covered by the landlord or the home owner insurance. They are also taking the risk of vandalism to their house by inviting people to park in such vicinity to their cozy abode. Between the four roommates, they rotate turns as the security watchman over their house and cars. Like I said earlier, I wish I had the same opportunity for this wallet stuffing idea, but I will have to think of something better.

Thumbs Up

It has been a real blessing having my sister at college with me. We have been able to do a lot of things together including socializing, breaking bread, and bumming rides with each other like a hitchhiker with our bent thumbs. We use to do a lot of these same things during high school, but I took them for granted then. Now we’re recreating these all over but on a larger and better scale since we’re in college.

 

We help each other out on a lot of things and it is nice to be treated to a meal or ride. I even had her drive me home the last time we both had the opportunity to return home for the weekend. I’m thankful that her trunk was large enough to fit all my dirty clothes. Momma washed these, another way to cut costs. But on the flip I also treat her to a few things too. So I guess it all equals out in the long run.

The Job Search Part 2

While I realize that in the last post I did not really convey any information about my job search other than I would be telling you about it and that I met with people to try to determine what to do, I will now go into further detail about those meetings. While at the career center, I learned about some of the many resources they have. I had no idea that they had their own small library and computer lab for students to use specifically for the job search, to work on resumes, or even apply for jobs. It is a great quiet place to get some work done towards making sure you are well informed and well prepared for the search and application process. I got a resume critique, advice about how to get my name out there, and even some networking tips. I have a lot of work to do now. From working on a cover letter for applications to preparing a networking email, this will really add to the amount of stuff I have to do. I think that I will have to put it off for a while because of all the work I have to do with school (the due date of my senior project is rapidly approaching and I have done nothing more than checked out some books from the library), but my goal is to have all of the things we went over at the career center completed before the Christmas holiday so I can set up another appointment to meet with my advisor to edit all of those materials before I send them out.

The Job Search Part 1

Just a couple of days ago I made appointments to meet with an advisor at the career center at our school, a professor I had last semester, and a professor I have this semester. The purpose of all these appointments (I still have one coming up with my academic advisor) is to try to determine what I will do after graduation. It was getting disconcerting hearing my friends talk about what they wanted to do after graduation when we were having lunch together or hearing people in my classes tout that they already have job offers when they won’t even graduate until May. I just felt so behind the game. I have no idea what I would like to do upon graduation, but no matter what I do I will have to be able to support myself. I will take all of you along for the ride as I try to figure things out as they pertain to my future. I do not promise that this will be a regular series, and right now it looks like an indefinite number of parts will comprise it, but look for updates as I will be posting them whenever I hit important points along the road. Later this week I will give you my first update.