Uncertain beginnings
Aug. 28th, 2004 12:23 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tiedyedaveMy graduate existence has begun.
I am finished with the basic setup of my apartment, modulo dining table and chairs, which are not coming for another three weeks. Things are a real mess right now, since I have some plastic and cardboard lying around that needs recycled, a lot of empty boxes and packing from stuff coming in the mail, and general disorder with dishes and laundry. This weekend is maintenance time. :-)
Before I came to Austin, I check my $ and tried to determine how much I could spend on what. I almost worked it out right, but there were three snags:
* All those little things (mostly from Target) add up to a lot. Somewhat more than I (conservatively) estimated. Oops.
* I have never seen a health insurance plan that required the whole annual payment up front, but that's what my new insurance wanted. Admittedly, $100/month is very very good for health and major medical, but $1200+ up front kind of blindsided me.
* I had very cutely balanced my stipend/month versus my expenses/month, and all was well. However, I totally forgot to account for the fact that my expenses started in August, and my stipend starts in September. Doh.
So in short, I overspent, but my parents spotted me some money for the time being so I'm not too deep in the hole. Still, asking my parents for money always makes me feel like a tool; I ought to be able to get by in the world entirely on my own, even as a low-income graduate student.
I registered for the required immigration-course-thing and PL, and finding all the AI courses closed or conflicting, I settled on Feature Oriented Programming. FOP is almost a total wildcard, but I am starting to get the sense that it will be a very interesting experience, despite the fact that I will have to use Java. Well, at least it's not C++ or lisp. PL looks nearly identical to 312. This is bad because I won't be seeing new material until nearly the end of the course. This is good because it will be a helpful review, it's my advisor's course, and it's (knock on wood) an easy A. 398T (the required course) is this warped amalgam of professor presentations, advice for new TAs, an eventual independent project, and anything else that Dr. Priebe can pull out of the aether.
Internet radio is pretty nice. So far I have TranceAirWaves and KUTX (which has NPR). However, it looks like my chosen route (mp3 stream through Winamp) is not widely supported.
Grocery shopping for myself is fun, but dangerous. If I'm not careful, I'll buy food for an 8 person house, just out of habit. :-)
And I say "uncertain beginnings" because a lot is up in the air right now. I made very rapid progress over the last few weeks in moving in, getting around, and making friends. However, I can feel myself losing momentum, which will be a problem because in the end, I'm here to do research, and research requires momentum.
I am finished with the basic setup of my apartment, modulo dining table and chairs, which are not coming for another three weeks. Things are a real mess right now, since I have some plastic and cardboard lying around that needs recycled, a lot of empty boxes and packing from stuff coming in the mail, and general disorder with dishes and laundry. This weekend is maintenance time. :-)
Before I came to Austin, I check my $ and tried to determine how much I could spend on what. I almost worked it out right, but there were three snags:
* All those little things (mostly from Target) add up to a lot. Somewhat more than I (conservatively) estimated. Oops.
* I have never seen a health insurance plan that required the whole annual payment up front, but that's what my new insurance wanted. Admittedly, $100/month is very very good for health and major medical, but $1200+ up front kind of blindsided me.
* I had very cutely balanced my stipend/month versus my expenses/month, and all was well. However, I totally forgot to account for the fact that my expenses started in August, and my stipend starts in September. Doh.
So in short, I overspent, but my parents spotted me some money for the time being so I'm not too deep in the hole. Still, asking my parents for money always makes me feel like a tool; I ought to be able to get by in the world entirely on my own, even as a low-income graduate student.
I registered for the required immigration-course-thing and PL, and finding all the AI courses closed or conflicting, I settled on Feature Oriented Programming. FOP is almost a total wildcard, but I am starting to get the sense that it will be a very interesting experience, despite the fact that I will have to use Java. Well, at least it's not C++ or lisp. PL looks nearly identical to 312. This is bad because I won't be seeing new material until nearly the end of the course. This is good because it will be a helpful review, it's my advisor's course, and it's (knock on wood) an easy A. 398T (the required course) is this warped amalgam of professor presentations, advice for new TAs, an eventual independent project, and anything else that Dr. Priebe can pull out of the aether.
Internet radio is pretty nice. So far I have TranceAirWaves and KUTX (which has NPR). However, it looks like my chosen route (mp3 stream through Winamp) is not widely supported.
Grocery shopping for myself is fun, but dangerous. If I'm not careful, I'll buy food for an 8 person house, just out of habit. :-)
And I say "uncertain beginnings" because a lot is up in the air right now. I made very rapid progress over the last few weeks in moving in, getting around, and making friends. However, I can feel myself losing momentum, which will be a problem because in the end, I'm here to do research, and research requires momentum.
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no subject
Date: 2004-08-28 12:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-08-28 12:22 pm (UTC)The essential problem here is that due to my fellowship, I don't have an RA or TA position the first year, which means I'm not a University employee, which means I don't get the normal insurance plan that employees get. It may be in the end that I'm only paying $epsilon a semester too; it's just very complicated this year. :-)
no subject
Date: 2004-08-29 08:31 am (UTC)$12 and a bus ticket to the tracks?
no subject
Date: 2004-08-28 12:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-08-28 03:51 pm (UTC)Better?
no subject
Date: 2004-08-28 05:55 pm (UTC)Internet radio
Date: 2004-08-28 04:22 pm (UTC)I also recommend you get iTunes, which has a whole bunch of internet radio stations built in, and it's much better than Winamp.