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student loans

budgeting, career, questions, retirement, student loans

Chicken-Counting

As I mentioned last week, I’m starting a new job in a couple weeks. And this means that I have a lot more clarity on certain topics than I did a month ago. I know where I’m going to be working, I know what my salary will be, and I know when and where I’m supposed to show up on my first day.

But there are a lot of details that I don’t know yet, and I’m feeling very impatient about finding them out. If you could put a magical microphone up to my brain and listen in on my thoughts for a few moments, they would sound something like this (imagine me talking reallyreallyfast):

February 16, 2016 by S.N.

big questions, numbers, student loans

Convergence

I don’t know about you, but I spend a lot of time thinking back on decisions I made five or ten or fifteen years ago and wondering where I’d be today if I’d done things differently. Especially decisions related to money and career. What if I hadn’t gone to grad school? What if I hadn’t taken out any student loans? What if I’d put $100—or more—into my Roth IRA every month consistently for the past ten years?

February 11, 2016 by S.N.

big questions, career, student loans

Of PhDs and Personal Finance

So, I’ve graduated. There’s no graduation ceremony in January, which is fine because I’m not too big on graduation ceremonies anyway, but as of a couple of days ago I do officially have a PhD. All I have to do at this point is watch the mail for my diploma. And to mark the occasion, I thought I would tackle a question here on the blog that I’ve been attempting to answer for years:

January 28, 2016 by S.N.

career, goals, student loans

Towards Unknown Shores

Happy New Year, everyone!

This post is going to be a bit personal, so I’ll first give a quick update: in December I successfully defended my dissertation, which marks the end of over five years working in the same lab. It also means I’m unemployed. In other words, this particular New Year happens to coincide with a major life transition for me: I’ve finished one chapter and am in the midst of figuring out the next one.

January 2, 2016 by S.N.

student loans, systemic problems

The Mysterious Case of the Poorly-Defined “Living Expenses”

Okay everyone, today is the day that I disclose something about my debt that I don’t usually talk about. And the reason I don’t usually talk about it is because…well, to be honest, I only fully came to terms with it this week. It’s a tough and somewhat embarrassing topic for me, but I also think it’s a pretty important issue, so here goes.

October 27, 2015 by S.N.

anxiety, awareness, student loans

Knowing is Better than Not Knowing

You know how sometimes when you see an email in your inbox that you know might contain scary and important information (medical test results, an acceptance/rejection letter, that sort of thing), your stomach drops, your heart starts pumping wildly…and instead of opening the email and reading it, you get up from the computer and go do something else instead?

September 19, 2015 by S.N.

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