misplaced conformity

The Opposite of Bored

Woo, it seems it’s blogging time for the Michigan side of the Mintchaos family.

Most birthdays I have fun exploiting one of the best excuses for all my friends to gather in one place at one time, but rarely do I feel any older. This birthday was the first exception to that rule. And no, it’s not because I can drink legally now.

Most of the summer I have been a pretty sad camper. I had little means of transportation, no job, and little money. I was bored, and though there is plenty to do around my place, I was so overwhelmed by sheer traptitude, I accomplished little. But right around my birthday, things started to change.

To begin with, about a week before my birthday I opened a checking account and got an ATM card. I’ve had a savings and credit card forever, but the checking side of finances is new territory. I went to a lot of places that took checks after mine came in, because it made me feel like and a-dult. I used that checking account to set up a PayPal account to buy and sell a few things on eBay. All four of my first items actually sold, too!

On July 30th, Shaun and I headed out to Chicago for duel purposes: to visit Xian and Ann, and to attend Chicago Gamesday. Gamesday was on the 31st, and was a blast. Not only are Warhammer nerd some of the cleanest, least oily nerds around (at least, compared to the Transformers con going on next door), but I made first cut in the Golden Demon competition’s Warhammer 40K Squad category with my Grey Knight Terminators. This was a bigger honor than it sounds like, as a.) I’ve only been painting minis for 9 months, and b.) Chicago was the place to compete this year, and the winning models were IMPOSSIBLY gorgeous (look at the website pictures and imagine them 10x better—the harsh lighting for the photos takes away almost all of the subtlety of every piece). That was with my Grey Knights. To top it off, I ran into my Uncle Taka, whom I haven’t seen in at least five years. My cousin Chris plays, apparently.

Then we hung out with Xian and Ann down at Millenium Park, which was supah-cool. Behold Xian and Ann in front of the Gehry pavilion, and a neat occasionally-water-spitting fountain that came complete with a playable ankle pool. It was the coolest.

August 2, my birthday, was rung in with a Mike’s Hard Lime (delicious!) at midnight, and racing home to get Jiji before the boarder closed. They closed at 6:00, and I kid you not our arrival time was 5:59. We had stayed a little later than expect at Xian and Ann’s to breakfast and chat. We arrived back at my place at about 7:30. The family and Grandma were all excited, and shoved balloons and cards in my face. It was cute! Then my mom and dad pushed me into the garage…there was a truck. For me. Not free-and-clear, but they paid the down payment, and the first two months payment on the lease of a 2004 Ford Ranger. It is my dearest baby. More fun gifts were given, including the Queer Eye book which I have been secretly lusting after since its release, and it has nothing to do with my crush on Thom. Or Ted either. That was followed by a Friday night dinner party with Ann, Jeff, Steph, Ed, and Shaun at P.F. Chang’s, which was more fun.

Then, the following week, I went into the local Games Workshop. Mike, the manager, has been promising me a job as soon as a spot opened up, and I really wanted to work there, hence the holding out on looking for other jobs. I was ready to just wait for tutoring to kick back up by this point. But Mike says, “Want a job?” Of course, I was excited. The catch, it was the part-time position, which gets paid less and only gets 8 hours a week. However, as soon as a better position opened up, I would be first in line to get it. I took it, figuring I could supplement that money with tutoring. A week later, he called me and said a fulltime position had opened up. At first I turned it down, figuring school, but we were talking about it at a later visit to the store…I could work mornings (all of my classes are evening classes, and I would have to give up my two free nights for the parttime work), and could skirt the minimum number of full-time hours (27-30). Also, fulltimers get sick days, three weeks paid vacation a year, and full Blue Cross Blue Shield benefits.

So in the span of August, I have gone from jobless, checkless, transportationless, poor, college student to a full-time working, benefits-having, checking, brand new truck owning(with lowish payments thanks to a cousin in Canada who works for Ford), college senior (did I mention I’m starting the senior year of my bachelor’s degree yet?).

Whew.

Posted by Andrea at August 20, 2004 11:51 AM | TrackBack