Okay... so how much of this is true? Beth wasn't there, my keyboard was only half dismantled when I put up the away message (so it was left hand + a screwdriver), and I probably have no aptitude to learn Dvorak.
     But, in maintaining my geek status, I've been trying to get my Mac at work to do something cool. Anything cool. Anything to justify its existence. Thankfully, OS X being a sad pathetic version of Unix, there are lots of Linux psychopaths and Unix junkies trying to make the mac do cool things. "Look, we've ported YAGS to OS X! w00000t! I don't know what I would have done without YAGS!" (for those of you who don't know... pretty much any Unix program that starts out with YA-- is "Yet Another - -"... and as such, probably a redundant piece of software to have around. YAGS is something I just made up... don't go looking to download an RPM or something).
     Anyhow, the cool mac trick I'm working on is getting Win98 running in Bochs. Basically, I'm going with Bochs because the Mac warez scene sucks major balls and I don't wanna waste my time finding a version of Virtual PC that runs in OS X that isn't a trojan horse. Well, the Win98 ISO I got was a bit of a dog... It boots and (presumably) installs Win98, but it doesn't seem to be able to format. So I had to copy over my Win2k ISO, run the setup to the point of formatting, and tomorrow I will hopefully install Win98. I doubt the networking utilities will work, and I'm not willing to devote much time to an emulated OS that will run slower than concrete mixed in molasses. So, it can only be a stupid mac trick.
     Tuition time is coming up again. I think I've got it in hand this year by going with the installment plan. Still, though, if anyone wants to generously donate about $1500 to the cause, I'll be thankful. :P Seriously, I'm not hurting for money, but it's annoying to know that I've saved all year so that I can make the minimum payment necessary to start a payment program on my education. I worked my ass off and did a damned fine job saving so I could get up to the level of layaway. I did the math, and if you take what I get in free tuition from my job, added it to my yearly income, and then recalculated my hourly wage, it's somewhere just under $15.00 per hour for web design, with a cap on hours. Typical wages for web design usually range anywhere between $25.00 and $50.00 for just HTML depending on the client and the complexity of the job. I feel especially ripped of for the work I put in. Especially when you see just how much I have to take care of (Boris and I share the Ramapo College website and the Ramapo College intranet site, but The Catalog" is all mine). For a site of this complexity, a freelancer would demand $50.00 an hour simply because of the headaches and incredible frustration that come along with a 6,000+ page website. And me, I'm making $15.00 and am being told that it's a great deal.
     Granted, there are benefits, but none of them in the sense of the word you're thinking of. I get no dental, health, or life insurance. No investment plan. No anything. But, I set my own hours, which is great. Well... I don't actually set my own hours, but I get veto power. So I guess it's not that great. I get to live on the RCNJ campus all year. But then again, I'm required to by contract to keep the job, and I have to pay for the housing. I do get paid breaks, though. But that's only because payroll hasn't noticed yet.
     But I'm gonna stop ranting about that. I'm lucky to have a job. And for someone with no car who lives on campus, this is as good as it gets. But if I get a job offer programming for $35k-$40k per year right out of school, you'd better bet I'm gonna take it. To me, that's a fortune. You may think I'm nieve for thinking so, but I'm sure I'll be living with a roommate right out of college (I don't expect to afford my own place), and I have my ways of saving money. $40k a year is about $525 a week (assuming 2 unpaid vacation weeks and 33% taken in taxes). Assume rent is $1,400 a month. Split with a roommate, you're responsible for $700 a month of that. You would be earning $2100 a month, so a third would be rent. That's not all that bad. Leaves you $1400. $200 for groceries, $100 for gas, $300 for utility bills, $200 for personal expenses... that leaves about $600 leeway. I could live quite well on that.