Kind of a mixed bag of feelings here. On the one hand, my hours are up and down like nobody’s business. Only 11 scheduled hours this week, but I was able to pick up an extra 7 (8 with an hour meal) on Friday from Monica, so that brings it up to 18. Which is… bare minimum. Next week for now it’s at 14, maybe 16 if they keep me as an on call (probably not).
But on the 24th my parents are visiting ! They are bringing Evie and since the only hotels near us that accept pets are rundown probably crack and hooker joints, I told them to check out the Hyatt in Blue Ash (about 15 miles away from us) and that worked. I feel better about them being out there, too. Not that our area is bad, but it’s so hit or miss around here. Literally one block is lovely and the next block is meh, and the block after that is crackwhores and heroin dealers.
Well okay. Maybe not that bad. I had a somewhat negative view of Cincinnati before moving here. I never thought I would mind being here a couple years, maybe 3, and that’s still true. But honestly I want to leave this area by the end of 2017. I love some places around here–Mt. Adams, Mariemont, Oakley, Hyde Park, half of Clifton, and some places further out like Kenwood and I can’t remember the name of the other place, but I’m not a city girl. Not a country girl, either. I like the suburbs, what can I say. I mean, I like busy suburbs.
And there are things I’m getting used to. I’ve accepted that half the people I meet are probably addicted to heroin. I’ve gotten shoved off onto the shoulder 3 freaking times at the SAME spot where a connecting small highway between I-71 and I-75 begins (it’s called the Norwood lateral, a 4-lane highway that spans about 3 miles) which doesn’t make sense because nobody has to merge. There are two lanes from different directions that converge side-by-side and I’m always in the right lane coming home, and 3 times in a row as soon as the two lanes are side-by-side, someone in the left lane IMMEDIATELY just gets into my lane. I’ve honked each time and been shoved onto the rumble strips fully onto the shoulder and NONE of the 3 times has the other person realized “Oh ! There’s a car in that lane !”
Actually, as bad as Cincinnati drivers are (wonder if it’s because they’re all on heroin ?), one other thing I’ve noticed is how many times there are 3 lanes on the highway, and one car from the left lane and one car from the right lane want to get into the center lane at the same time, and like watching a magnet, almost collide with each other and then swerve back to their respective lanes. I only saw that, strangely, a handful of times in Virginia and yet here I’ve had to have seen it 20 times or more. Makes me all the more cautious changing lanes when there is a car two lanes over (because inevitably they will start getting into the lane the same time I do). And of course they were doing major construction when I moved here, then sort of took a break over winter, and now the traffic patterns on I-75 change every couple days (literally), so that doesn’t help.
Anyway. Totally did not talk about what I wanted to in here. Instead I vented about how utterly terrible the drivers here are. I refuse to get an Ohio license plate (we’ve circumvented changing my plate because Dad is still a co-owner on my car for the time being and his residence is in VA). Cori just got his last month and I told him I didn’t want to be in his car with him anymore LOL
He also applied for quite an extra chunk of money to help out with rent, which I appreciate (even though it’s student loan money which we’re going to have to pay back). We’re doing… okay. Not great. We’d be up s**t creek if Dad wasn’t helping us. But this way we have a decent emergency fund and I can pay down my credit cards (I’ve been paying 30% rent, electricity, my car insurance/our renter’s insurance, and my credit bills–dad has been paying about 70% of the rent for the last few months).
Surprisingly, though, USAA upped my credit limit on my main card by $1200. Shocked me. I haven’t even really been using that card since 2012. Not that I needed more credit, but now it looks better because I have a larger ratio of credit to debt. It went from about 67% used and 33% available, to something more like 50/50 exactly. Which is about the max I wanted, anyway. I still have two other cards that are both generally around 70% used, so I need to focus on that. Really, though, I want to get rid of the Bank of America balance. They haven’t lowered my APR since 2007 (and I never carried a balance on that card until 2011) and the APR sucks anyway, and they haven’t increased my limit since 2009. My USAA cards have awesome rates (can a rate be awesome ?) and they give me a credit score and they up my limit automatically as long as I make minimum payments (I was just surprised they upped it by so much this time). And actually, I never had a minimum payment on either card until I moved (timing sucked, but whatever). Mom said USAA does this thing where like, say you have $500 balance and you pay $200 one month and $100 the next month, that’s $300. And they calculate a minimum payment to be something like $20. They don’t actually show you the $20, they show you “$0 due” and instead, they apply the $300 you already paid to the following months. I can’t explain it well. It’s sort of like you paid a lump sum, so it counts for several minimum payments over the next several months, and only when the $300 catches up will you be required to do minimum payments.
USAA is awesome. Bank of America sucks.
~Rachel
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