Change of Plans

Seeing as I'm already $21500 in debt to the federal government, I'm starting to rethink going back to GSU to get my degree in sociology. While I'm only 6 classes away from having that degree, don't quite know what I'd do with it considering I'm wanting to go into museums/archives. So I'm thinking I could do the BUNAC program for Ireland starting in like January 2012, then go on to try the BUNAC program for Britain and then go for my Masters. I think it would be a better use of money and such considering I'd be just working for a year and a half. Plus I've wanted to go to Ireland for so long, and what better way other than studying abroad.

"I'm About to Whip Somebody's Ass"

So this weekend, my mom confronted my aunt (her sister) about her "rendezvous" at the house my mom owns. My aunt felt that was invasion of her privacy and promptly declared she was going to move out (and actually did start the process.) She had left and come back, and then decided I needed to be talked to about how things should be now that she was moving out.

1. She declared that I need to come home more to watch out for my mom. That's fine and dandy when I can get the time off. Retail holiday season is starting, and I start my second job next week. I'll come home when I can. My mom knows that.

2. My aunt declared that her older sister is ruling my mom, and that's why I need to come home. (Plus she felt that she needed to be like 2 inches from my face when she told me this, while I was cooking.) Uhh, my mom is essentially the matriarch of this part of the family. I doubt her sister is telling her what to do, plus she's 56 and been married since she was 17. I'd say she knows how to run her own household by now.

3. She came at me with, she was going to remind me of these things every time she saw me. I stopped her right there with the words "Just don't." She tried to pull that shit with me before in declaring that I needed to give thanks to her God for the success that I've had in my life. Uhh, no. While I do believe in a higher power (and refer to it as The Powers That Be), I do not believe the Christian God to necessarily be that higher power, therefore I am not going to give thanks. That night she went on and on about how I needed to become Christian. I don't come after Christians about why they believe what they do, so what is the need in trying to convert me?

She did back off when I told her not to pull that crap though. Finally. Our family has already become so fractured with the death of my dad, and her drinking and whoring around then getting upset and bitchy when somebody called her out on it did nothing to help.

But on to the next. Tell me why three people managed one tv/dvr for a year with very few problems, but before he even moved in, the new roomie was insisting on having cable in his room? First he hounded me with trying to get a jack put in his room. Comcast won't do that in apartments. It took me getting bitchy before the point got through. Now he's stuck on using a splitter. I asked someone at Comcast about that. They said it would downgrade the signal. He was told this. He's still insisting on the splitter. At this point, I'm past caring. If it messes with the internet and such too much, I'll get my own internet and just watch everything online. I practically do that now. Shouldn't be too much of a hardship except for missing Thrashers games. I will be sad about that, but life goes on. Times like this I fucking hate spoiled brats.

All that was to say this. I am normally one of the calmest people you can me, and it's hard to make me well and truly mad, but this last month alone, between 3 people, I've been ready to knock someone on their ass. And if this continues, I do believe I will.

The Plan

I love discovering new things, so having discovered blogs written by black women expats has been awesome, especially since I'm looking to become one myself. I know I'm probably going to be reading as much of them as possible considering how I used to be as a kid (like being obsessed with sailing around the world - something which still would be awesome to do). I've been obsessed with travel since I was young and having lived outside of the country once, I can't wait to do it again. That and getting to travel to all those places I didn't see on my last trip over. I'm hoping things come together like I want them to, especially since I'm getting a plethora of info about various things like the fact that BUNAC has a 12-month work program in Ireland and a 6-month on for Britain. I mean, with the plan I currently have running in my head, the 6-month program would fit in beautifully. Granted a chance to live in Ireland for a year would definitely put the England thing on hold.

So tentatively my schedule is as follows:
Graduate from GPC by December 2011 (I'm thinking I could be done after Summer semester though)
Graduate from GSU (again) by December 2012 (once again, I might be able to get it done in Summer)
Do the 6-month BUNAC program (from January to June, maybe February to July)
Start the 24 month Museum Studies Program at Newcastle Uni in September 2013

I'm getting excited about the thought of this working out. Granted school here will put me in further debt more than likely.

Coming Together

So I think things might be coming together in my head for trying to move back to England. I've found a two-year program at Newcastle Uni that I want to do. It would be almost £22000 ($33000) for the program, but in that time, you not only complete the MA in Museum Studies, you also get like 46 weeks of work experience. The only downside is having to write a 12 to 15,000 word dissertation for the MA part.

To top it off, I found out that Newcastle leases rooms at Garth Heads, which is where I stayed before on my study abroad. I loved living Quayside, and think it would be totally awesome to live there again. It's £4300 for a 48 week lease, and Newcastle has guaranteed postgrad housing for the first year, so if I couldn't make it there, I could get somewhere else.

Now I've just gotta figure out how to save money. It would be awesome if my mom lived down here so I didn't have to pay rent, but alas, at least I'm only pay about $300 for it. Could be worse. It's my credit cards that I need to figure out how to get rid of.

School Thoughts After Actually Having Graduated

And since I neglected my other plans for the future in that post...

When I interviewed for the library job last week, and I mentioned I was going to GPC for their library science program, the director of circulation mentioned that I should just go after a master of library science considering it would take about the same amount of time and most of them are completely online. So I went ahead with all my processes for GPC. If my money comes through before school starts, I'll go ahead with that and go for the Master's a little later on. If it doesn't, I'm just going to try and get everything settled for trying to enroll at Valdosta for spring.

In even further ahead future plans, I want to go back to GSU to get my Sociology degree. When I graduated, I was 6 classes away from having that degree, so I figure I can go back and take 2 or 3 semesters to complete it, and then I'd have 3 degrees under my belt (either an Assoc. and 2 BAs, or 2 BAs and a Masters). Granted I like the sound of the second set more, but I needed to go to school now to postpone the loan payage considering I've been having trouble finding a job.

My biggest thing comes with the Master's I really want. I can either stay in Georgia (and go to Georgia State) or I can go back to England (going to Northumbria's rival Newcastle). I kinda feel that I'd have a better chance with the field that I want in England because they have so much history, especially up North, but that could just be me wanting to go back. What I do know, is that the British National Museum is huge and I would love to work there. But here in the US, we do have the Smithsonian, which from what I remember was pretty epic too. The other thing would be cost. It would definitely be more expensive for me to do the 1 year program at Newcastle, but it could possibly weight out to be the same as doing a two year program here.

My biggest thing is I want to be at a history museum. That's where my passion for museums lie. I doubt I'll ever go further with history straight up. I wanted to get a Ph.D., but GSU kinda ruined my love of history (ironically Northumbria showed me exactly what I wanted to do in History). So it's like choices choices.

The Plan...

Gods. I so miss Newcastle (England in general). I haven't been there in a little over two years, still think about it almost every day. Matt and Jenny came over last week. He's gotten so skinny. They're making me miss the North more. If the plan I'm cooking up works, I want to do like a week in Northumbria and two weeks in Scotland. I only got to go to Edinburgh originally, so there's so much more of that country I need to see.

I'm going to try and go for saving up $40 a week, $50 when I can spare it. If I move back in with my mum, this plan might get a little further. However, having the full time job in Atlanta would definitely be more awesome. Every time I think of moving back to Dalton, I feel a little miserable. Away from all my friends whom I love and don't spend nearly enough time with. At least I'd have Juli in Dalton.

Keep on trying...

I was surprised. Yesterday I was on a writing kick. I'm actually surprised I've made it this far on it considering I usually just give up on the stories I write. But I guess since I changed where I was going with it, I gave myself some new interest. And I've noticed, I can't do sappy love stories. In pretty much every story I've conceptualized, the guy and the girl were together in some capacity, something happened to break them up and they get back together for a time, maybe permanently, but if I can find a way to make it not happily ever after, I'll do it. I don't know what that says about me. I know I'm a realist, but it seems I'm a cynic too. I'm not surprised though. My HEA didn't work out right, and I think I knew it wouldn't all along. I mean, Ryan was with another girl when we got together, so I would guess that should have been clue number 1.

I think I've lost count of the number of jobs I've applied for. What sucks more is only one interview has come out of all of those. And I can't figure out what it is. I know I have a big year gap between my two longest jobs, but that's because of my study abroad. All this is documented on my resume. It's crazy. But I'm still trying. I'm going tomorrow to try two more places. After that luckily I get to take care of something that will make me quite happy: a season Thrasher ticket. Though this is coming from my mom in the form of the insurance money from my dad's death, I guess she just wants to do something that'll make me happy.