Checks in the Mail = Love

When I came back from Thanksgiving break, it was like a carnival in my mailbox! I finally received my reimbursement check from my eye insurance, and I also had a check waiting from mysurvey.com. Add that money into what I got today for returning the Zeno I bought (such a waste of money ugh), and I made a $100 deposit to my EF today!! I know it's not a whole lot, but I'm desperate for all I can get at this point. I updated my sidebars to reflect my new money stuff. (On a side note, how much of a bummer is it that I've only paid 3 car payments and have paid of 5% of my loan already, while I've been paying off my student loan for 2 years now and have only paid off 10%?? Ugh.)

I'm getting so excited for Christmas!

I usually hate all the Christmas hype starting before Thanksgiving, but for some reason I am getting super excited about Christmas this year! I was kind of a freak this year and bought most of my presents in the summer at various craft fairs and festivals. So far I got presents for my sister, brother, two best friends, and a birthday + christmas gift for the boyfriend (his bday is Christmas eve). I already wrapped them too-- don't judge! :-P But anyway I hardly have any more presents to buy. Here is a short list of who I still have left to buy for and some ideas about what to get them:

Dad-- Texas Roadhouse gift card $40 (his favorite restaurant-he's mega obsessed)
Mom-- new walking shoes or a Wii game $40-50 (she wants Sports Resort or Boom Blox)
Grandma-- Susan Boyle's new cd + something else (Do you guys have any good ideas??) $40-50
Roommate-- kitchen gadgets or nice stationary $10-15

First day at the lab

Today was the first day of my food study, and I made $15. :-) I don't get paid until the very end of the study, which will be in early December. It'll be nice to get it then though, because then I'll have $75 to use for Christmas presents! The food was pretty good, not stellar or anything, but definitely good enough. You should see the portion sizes they give out though- I'm not sure anyone could eat that much food. I got two whole trays full of stuff to eat, thank goodness I don't have to eat everything!

I have a syntax test tomorrow, and I can't even make myself care about it. I think I studied enough, but I did not study well. I am basically being irresponsible and playing around on the internet instead of doing any work (as you can see). I must say, Facebook aps are wonderful in these situations- I'm completely addicted to Restaurant City...

Sometimes I love grad school (and those times usually involve free money)

I submitted my NSF grant proposal today. When they told me about the grant last year, I was totally meh about it. For some reason I didn't want to do it, even though it's about $30,000 a year for three years and I wouldn't have to teach at all. Call me crazy, right? But this year I've been working on it for the last 2 months, and I finally submitted it today (right under the deadline)! I'm not really sure if I'll win, since it's a national competition and I'll be competing against linguists from freaking MIT, but it was a good learning experience for future grant writing. AND! (possibly the most important part), our graduate school gives you a free THOUSAND DOLLARS just for applying. I am nervous it won't actually happen, but hopefully that paperwork all goes through alright, and soon I'll be getting my moneyyyyyyyyy.

PS- They picked me for the study! 3 free meals a day on Tuesdays and 75 bucks, here I come!

Cool Food Study

Remember how I posted once about how much I love getting paid for experiments? Seriously, one of the best parts about going to a big research school. Today I signed up to do a food study, and it seems really sweet. All I have to do is go to the lab once a week for all three meals and I get paid $75! I mean, really?! I love food, I love money, how is this a bad thing? Plus, it'll almost be like I'm getting paid more than that since I won't have to buy my own food. Today I went in to taste-test some of the stuff, and it seemed pretty normal (and really tasty!). I also filled out a big pamphlet about my eating habits and attitudes, so they'll call me tomorrow to let me know if I'm in. I'm a bit nervous they won't take me though, because even though I think my eating habits are perfectly normal, sometimes other people don't seem to think so. But I guess we'll see, I'm keeping my fingers crossed!! ($75 wow!)

I absolutely <3 Halloween

Halloween is my favorite holiday out of the whole year, even better than my birthday and Christmas. I love the horror movies, the candy, and seeing everyone's costumes. This Halloween should be good, even though I didn't buy a real costume this year. I am going as a peacock, and I only had to buy some peacock feathers for $10. I already have a shirt with peacock feathers on it, feather earrings, and teal eyeshadow and shoes to wear, so the feathers for decoration were all I needed to complete the costume. It should be awesome, I've always wanted to go as a peacock sometime and now I can!

Another cool thing is that my little sister is coming up to visit for a Halloween party with my friends tonight. She should be here in an hour or so, then we are going to Cici's Pizza for dinner and then getting ready the rest of the night. I hope this party is really fun, because I stayed in last night instead of going out. It should be though, I am really excited for it.

Happy Halloween everyone!!

I passed!

I passed candidacy!! I am now a PhD. Candidate... boo yah!! The exam went really well, I wasn't too terribly stressed and once we got the ball rolling and they started asking me questions about my work, I settled in and felt really good about it. PLus they only deliberated for about 3 mins or so before letting me know I passed, so I think that means all three of them agreed that I did well. :-) I'm super proud of myself, and I think my parents are too, if the $100 check I just got in the mail is any indication!!!