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A Review of My Side Hustle (Part 1 of 3)
I have been doing my side hustle for a little over a month now, and naturally, I have some thoughts. Let me start by saying, I am overall happy with the process. I have gotten to read some really interesting books that I would not have noticed otherwise. There has also been one book that I could not finish. It just bugged me too much. But that is not the fault of Online Book Review. (And while it seems from the reviews that many people agreed with my issues, many others did not and enjoyed the book tremendously.) Now that I have said something positive (and honestly, my overall experience…
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Gratitude Journal #21
Remember last week when I wrote that I thought doing my gratitude journal on Sunday nights would be a great way to end/start my week, as long as I remembered to do it? Yeah, I forgot yesterday. Or, I did not completely forget. In the morning I thought about it, but by the end of the day, I just plugged myself into a computer game and watching the Democrat debates (because I did not have a chance to watch them live). Gratitude journal was completely forgotten, until this morning. Gratitude Entry #48 – Unexpected time with friends Mid-week last week, the decision was made that my BFF would come hang…
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Gratitude Journal #20
If I can make this work, it seems like ending/beginning each week with my gratitude journal would be a great plan. So I am going to try to make this a regular Sunday night thing. After the excitement of the last few weeks, this week has been fairly quiet. But that does not mean there are not things to be grateful for. (In fact, a quiet week is something to be grateful for all on its own.) Gratitude Entry #46 – Baby Birthday Parties This week, the babies of two different friends turned one year old. I got to help celebrate the birthdays of both of them this week. Watching…
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New Page & Side Hustle
Nowadays, a lot of people have “side hustles”, ways to make money alongside their regular job. These used to be called “second jobs”, but that was before the gig economy. And for a lot of bloggers, their blog is their side hustle, at least until they can grow it to the point of it being their primary job. That is not me. I thought, way back in the day when I was managing four active blogs, that it might be. But then I realized that blogging was an enjoyable hobby for me, and trying to turn it into a money making device kind of sucked the fun out of it.…
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Book Review: The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison
I first read Katherine Addison’s The Goblin Emperor back in late 2015 or early 2016, somewhere in the same timeframe that I read Among Others by Jo Walton (review) and Uprooted by Naomi Novik (review). I loved all three books for different reasons. Among Others is a love letter to reading and books. Uprooted has one of the strongest beginnings I have ever read and an engaging plot. The Goblin Emperor is all about the characters. I honestly could not tell you what the plot of The Goblin Emperor is, beyond it being a “year in the life” style story. Things happen. It is not a boring book with no…
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Gratitude Journal #19
Last week, I commented that it had been a crazy two weeks… Well, the crazy continued for one more. I knew it was going to. This is standard end of the year crazy for my job, but it is still crazy. I am quite happy now that most of the big events for work are over for the year (there is still the promotion party to go, but that is on a much smaller scale ). And now, I get to concentrate on the actual main part of my job – finances, as we are at the end of the state two year budget cycle, and our fiscal year/biennium closes…
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Gratitude Journal #18
It has been a crazy two weeks. I had every intention of writing a gratitude post last week, and then the week was just gone. And I kept thinking about it this week, and kept having the intention to write the post, and suddenly, it is Sunday afternoon. I realized I needed to stop what I was doing and write, otherwise, I would not only go two weeks without writing a gratitude post, but I would not get up any content at all this week, and that is most definitely not what I want. Writing is like so many other things, the more you make time for it, the better…
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College and University Funding Models part 3 – Return to the 70s
The second of my proposed funding models is also my preferred funding model, and in the end, the hardest one, in my opinion, to achieve. Because achieving it will take a whole lot more than the states just willing to throw more money at higher education. Honestly, I think the best funding model for state universities would be a return to the funding levels the states had in the 1970s. This was the time period when students could afford to pay for their tuition by working part time during the school year, maybe full time during the summer, at minimum wage jobs. Maybe they take out some small student loans…
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Gratitude Journal #17
One of the problems with the long weekend is that, in my head, it is not just the weekend that is one day longer, but the week, too. This post should have gone up no later than yesterday, but yesterday, I still had one more day of the weekend to go, so in my head, I also had one more day to get this post up “on time”. What have I been grateful for this week? Sunny days? Retirement parties? Spending an evening babysitting my best friend’s little boy? All of those things, but they are not quite what is making the list today. Gratitude Entry #38 – Lazy Days…
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College & University Funding Models part 2- Public Education
As mentioned last week, the first of the alternate funding models I live for universities is the public education option. First, let me be clear that I am only talking about public universities, those that are already funded via state budgets. Private and religious universities, like Harvard and Notre Dame would not fall under this, and would need to figure out their own new funding model, if it came to that. What are the benefits of the public education option? Well, that makes post-secondary education, up to the Bachelor’s degree level, free for everyone in the state, not just the economically disadvantaged. Because middle class families have difficulties paying for…
