Shannon!

I m a recent college grad currently halfway through a Master s program. I ve also just started working at a great job, full time, and I love it so far. I still live at home with my family (because it makes more financial sense...instead of paying rent somewhere else, I live home rent free but pick up my share of the bills to help my family).

However, when I finish my grad program, my goal is to move out and get my own place. My mom wants to sell our house by that point as well. I ve always wanted to live in a nice, newer development or re-purposed loft or apartment downtown (my job is close to downtown as well) in my city. However, there s been big economic growth recently and rents have sky-rocketed downtown and developing neighborhoods around the area and have ballooned to as much as $2k/month for a one bedroom, one bath. (I have friends doing this right now and it sounds ridiculous to me.) But the houses in the surrounding neighborhood haven t had yet experienced this sort of growth in prices. There s 4 bedroom, 3 bathroom houses for sale that range from $60k-$250k in neighborhoods that are doing fairly well right now.

I ll be 25, 26 upon completion of my degree and there s not a single part of me that would want to live long term in another city (travel, yes. But nothing longterm as all of my family is here). Would it be more advantageous to consider buying property at a younger age instead of renting?

I just got an industrial piercing on Friday and I know that I should not be sleeping on it. It's in my left ear and I try to sleep on my back or my right side at night. But sometimes, I move around in my sleep and will roll over to the left side. I'm not a particularly heavy sleeper so when it happens (and because my ear is still tender), I can feel it and roll back over to my right side or my back.

I don't sleep on it for extended periods of time but it's happened the past two nights where I wake up a couple of times on the wrong side. I just really, REALLY don't want to get those bumps on my ear from not taking care of my piercing.

How bad is this overall for my piercing? It's never for more than a couple of minutes once or twice through the night but I'm just concerned.

(I clean it with antibacterial soap and a Q-tip, as my piercer recommended, about 4-5 times a day and do the sea salt soak with a Q-tip or a cotton ball at least 3 times throughout the day.)

And worse case scenario, if bumps do appear, if I take the piercing out, would get continue to get worse or no?

Thanks.

Or Co-worker, I should say.

I work in an office and I really like my job. The work is enjoyable and the people are super nice. But, one co-worker just is so lazy but so entitled that it's driving me crazy. Yesterday, most of us worked late to prepare for a major meeting that's on Friday. I don't mind it at all, but our general manager got us both together to ask why a certain assignment hadn't been completed. She was given that assignment and I knew nothing about it. But instead of owning up to her error, she looks at me anId proceeds to blame the entire thing on me. I was surprised, needless to say. I said that I wasn't aware of the assignment but I'd be more than willing to finish it. It took there days. This is the second time this has happened and it puts me behind on my own work.

We both have entry level positions and she's been with the company 2 months longer than I have. Because of this, when she tries to “assign" me work like she's my superior, I get annoyed mainly because I'm fixing her mistakes on top of my work while she's shopping for cars online or tweeting or complaining about Mr not finishing what was her task.

Basically, I'm just wondering how to best deal with this. I don't want to complain to our GM, and I'd rather us deal with it, but her attitude OS getting ridiculous.

About a month after my 18th birthday, I had my wisdom teeth taken out at the Cleveland Clinic. But, before I had my procedure done, my mother called our insurance providers at the time to make sure everything would be covered and they said yes.

About a year after that (sometime last summer), I started getting calls from a collection agency saying that I had an outstanding balance of almost $6,100 from the procedure. I told them this wasn't correct, they said it was and how could I make payment arrangements. I was unemployed at the time and full time college student so I had no way to pay and the people I spoke with told me they'd check with the Clinic to make sure everything was accurate.

A few months later, they called back and asked for a payment. I told them that I had spoken with my insurance company before I had even scheduled an appointment with the Clinic and was told everything was okay. They told me to contact my insurance company to try and file an appeal. I did. But the insurance company told me that I had waited to long to try to file an appeal and asked why I didn't contact them sooner. I had NO idea that I had an outstanding balance because I never once received a bill from the hospital or from the insurance company. By the time the collectors called me, it was well past the appeal deadline.

They called again. I asked if I should get in contact with the Cleveland Clinic to see if there was something that could be done. They (Capio Partners) told me that it was too late and that the matter should be settled with them, not the hospital. This continued for another two-ish months. "Hi, do you have money yet?"

"No. I'm unemployed but looking for work." (Which was true.)

"Is there anyone you could borrow from? Could you use your student loans?"

"Uhm, no."

"Ok. We'll call back."

Then yesterday, I got a letter in the mail (that someone accidentally threw out and I lost the ******* contact information) from a law firm about the debt going to collection proceedings or something. I had planned on calling them today, but can't since I can't remember the name of the firm to look them up.

I got a job about a month ago and was waiting on Capio Partners to call me back (they NEVER gave me the same contact information twice so I never knew who to call because they called from different locations) to try to set up some payment arrangements. I only work PRN so I can't afford to pay that entire balance but I'd pay as much of it as I can (even though I feel like I shouldn't have to).

Is there anything that can be done? Should I try to call the Cleveland Clinic even though in the letter it told me not to? I feel like it's not fair that they waited to send my bill to collection a year after I had the oral surgery done and they never told me anything about an outstanding balance. I honestly cannot afford a $6,100 bill right now AND still pay my tuition/fees for school. But I don't want to get sued or have my credit trashed at 20.

I have friend that had her purse stolen at a club one night by (her words) two black men. Okay, fine. Whatever. Stuff happens and sometimes they suck.

After it happened, she started dropping a LOT of racist and classist remarks regarding poor people (who, apparently, are all thieves -- or would still if given the chance) and n**gers even though she's half-black (black and Puerto Rican) and grew up in a relatively poor area. And, as a black person that's not exactly wealthy ("broke college student" here), I took offense.

I've known her since we were in elementary school. I know her family, she knows mine, and we've grown up together (sandbox, junior high, boy drama, college, work, etc.) and she's never been this way around me but she apparently has this habit of doing/saying things like that when she's around white people. It makes me really uncomfortable and she's said that she'd never do that around me again.

Doing it arond me isn't the problem, though. The problem is that she's saying racist, self-loating remarks about people because her purse got stolen (or whenever she's upset). How do I deal with a friend like that? Should I sit her down and talk to her about it or what?

I'm all for people having their own opinions and that you have the right to do that but come on! Your purse being stolen or getting cut off in traffic by someone who looks differently than you is no reason to go on these tirades against an entire community of people! It was just so surprising and off-putting that I had to leave her dorm room because of it.

What should I do?

https://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash4/319321...

and

http://cps-static.rovicorp.com/2/Open/Getty/Carmen...

(I'm not 100% and it's for a contest--albeit, a really random one)

https://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-prn1/549683...

Thanks!

I apologize in advance for the length (but if you want to skim through it, the first and last paragraph sum it up pretty simply, I guess)

So, a few months ago, I was watching television in the living room when my step-father came in from being out where ever and snatched the remote from my hand and tried turned to something sports-related. He grabbed the wrong remote, so the TV didn't change and he says, "My time, go upstairs." I didn't and when I wouldn't move and he couldn't figure out how to switch from DVD to the cable TV, he just started turning things off. I asked him what he was doing and he replied something along the lines of "Hey, I asked you if I could watch TV, now fix it." He was acting basically like because he "asked" (which he didn't), like I had to obey and skip off upstairs when I had been downstairs comfortably watching reruns of something on Netflix for about thirty minutes before he even came back home.

We got into an argument. I didn't necessarily care about the TV but mostly because I felt completely disrespected. He snatched something from me, yelled and me and basically ordered me to leave so he could watch TV. He was drunk (of course), but still. My mother heard us arguing and came downstairs to see what was happening and sided with me because she felt that he had no right to come in from being out at a bar and try to take control of everything if it wasn't to his liking. I said "**** it" and went upstairs to clean my room and listen to music out of frustration of being yelled at by him over the freaking tv.

We haven't spoken since and this was in May (I think). Not so much as a "hi" to one another. If he needs something from me (like to fix electronics or to burn a CD), he asks me through my mother like we're all playing some twisted game of Telephone at summer camp. And today, he asked to drive my mother's truck so he could pick up some things but since I have a job interview that day, she said it would only be okay if I drove his car because it's an hour trip by bus one way to the interview site. He refused saying he had no interest in helping me and that he doesn't like the situation where he has to like me just to be with her and that I need to take the bus (which I have no issue doing when I need to go to school or actually start work if I do, indeed get the job since where the interview is is quite a bit further than where the actual potential place of employment is since they do them in groups).

Before this, we got along fine generally. But we went the entire summer last year without speaking to each other as well and he didn't talk to me from June until Thanksgiving (thankfully, I was away at college when that happened so it was really like from June to mid-August when we stopped talking). Now that I'm going to a university closer to home so that I can commute, I think it's bringing up the same issues as before where he just wants it as him and my mother and with me gone (I'm a full-time student and it is pretty hard to find a job that is part-time but where I can make enough money to live off of and have my own place or share place with a friend). This isn't an issue with my mother, however, who tells me all of the time that I can stay home as long as I need to and there's no sense in taking out massive loans just to live in a dorm 20 minutes from home. I agree with that but I def plan on moving out when I finish school in a year and a half.

So basically, how do I make this situation work? I hate having my mother in the middle of me and her boyfriend who's been living with us since I was in high school. But, as an adult (I'm 20), I don't like being yelled at like a child or disrespected especially over the television. I just have a big issue with him always, always, always demanding that he be respected but never respecting me.

Just curious...

when I was learning how to drive, I was told that if Driver X hit another car from behind, Drive X would be at fault. However...

I was coming home today and heading on to the highway. It was my car, a large truck in front of me, and a small silver car in front of the truck. The truck was going well under the speed limit and I went around it at a red light and stopped beside the small, silver car. The driver apparently thought I was trying to get in front of him (when I was actually just trying to get from behind the truck) to head on the freeway. The guy in the silver car speeds off as soon as the light turns green and glares back at me (I didn't even notice he was staring at me until he was in front of me).

I manage to get in front of the truck and the silver car is going about 40-45 mph (I was going just under 40 and he was ahead of me). He sped up as we turned on the highway and slammed on his breaks just as I was turning in behind him. I didn't hit him, thankfully, but it was a hard stop. I saw him turn around at look back at me and laugh and he sped off doing over 70 (I was doing 65) and he vroom-ed off still laughing. I was pissed, but didn't break 65 mph because I know cop cars usually sit around and try to catch speeders during that time of the day and I did not want to be ticketed.

Anyways, if I had hit him, would I be the driver at fault? The big truck was behind me (albeit, pretty far) so that driver wouldn't have seen the driver in the silver car turn around and cackle at me when he tried to get me to rear-end him. Even when I blew my horn at him, he laughed even harder, the douche.

I was just wondering...

Thanks!

I'm pretty sure there are no lyrics but the tune is pretty close to ba dum ba dum ba da da da ba dum ba dum, etc. There's a voice over at the end and I think there was like a camera flash. It was a procedural show but I can't remember the theme song to save my life and it's driving me crazy.

Thanks!

I have a Toshiba Satellite p755 and my television is a Westinghouse. I want to be able to connect them so I can watch YouTube and Netflix on my tv sometimes. There's an HDMI port on both, but if I use an HDMI cable, will I have sound? I've heard from some people that I might not be able to get sound by an HDMI and I want to be sure before I buy either.

How does one go about spotting scammers on Craiglist? I've been looking for a part time job using the site to help with college costs and I sent my resume to one company. I got an email from the hiring manager who proceeded to tell me that I was an "exceptional candidate" because of my previous work experience. He instructed me to upload my resume to their site so that his boss could view it but then towards the end of the email got very snappy saying that "you are a decent candidate, but I will not hesitate to keep looking if I don't hear back from you within 24 hours." It seemed like he is rushing me to go to this website and fill out my information but the disclaimer for Craigslist says to be wary about being directed via email to other sites and entering personal information.

Does this sound like a scam? I've applied for other jobs on Craigslist and nothing bad has happened before, but this interaction seemed a bit suspicious to me. However, I don't want to lose out on a job that pays as well as the add said it did.

I will be drug tested in the few days and one of the things they screen for is continine (a nicotine metabolite). I smoked Hookah about two-three times from the span of mid-December to two weeks ago. I don't smoke cigarettes, cigars or use tobacco in any other form except the two or three incidences of Hookah in the past several weeks. The drug test uses urine (not blood or hair). Will the results be able to detect Hookah from two weeks ago? It was shared, so I didn't smoke it all. What about second-hand smoke?

I got wrapped up in the moment and took two really small hits of a joint. It wasn't very much because it burned my nose. It was the only time I've ever smoke and I have an interview coming up. I don't know if I'll be drug tested during the interview so I'm really worried.

How long will it stay in my system?

I'm 19 and I had a physical about a week and a half ago that said my cholesterol was elevated. When I was mailed the results it said that if it was a serious elevation (or, rather, if there was a problem) that I would've have been called in to speak with the doctor again but I wasn't. So, I'm not freaking out about it or anything because I've had my cholesterol tested in the past and it was well within normal range.

However, is there any way to lower it with a change in diet? What other types of food should I incorporate and expel from my diet to lower it and keep it maintained? My mother also has high cholesterol and takes fish oil tablets daily. Should I try to take something similar maybe once a week?

Thanks.

Also, if it makes any difference, I am overweight (BMI 30) but when I went away for school last semester, my diet consisted largely of pasta, potatoes (baked, fried, shredded and grilled, etc) and pizza because well, that's all they ever really had that didn't look/taste like slop. Since I've been home in the past few weeks, I have started to lose a bit of weight since my diet has become more diverse (thankfully!).

It's a jaw tooth that is apparently breaking down because my dentist never completed the root canal (they moved, didn't say anything and they destroyed the crown they had ordered for me after we finally tracked them down. Needless to say, I was pissed.)

But now I'm away at school and it's a 5-6 hour drive home from school. There are dentists here, but my family's insurance won't cover the complete costs and I don't have the cash to pay to have the root canal finished. Plus, by the time the permanent crown is made and ready, I won't be in town. So, should I wait until break in about a month to get it fixed? It's not hurting at all and I plan on brushing an extra time or two during the day to compensate.The piece that broke off is small and there's a filling there, so it's not just dentin that's being exposed because that was all removed when I got the partial root canal.

It's for my creative writing class and could only one page long (which is much more difficult than I thought it'd be).

Thoughts and opinions would be very appreciated. It's called The Blind Pig

Thanks to Prohibition, speakeasies and blind pigs began to pop up all over the place. The speakeasies were more in the big cities but too many cops and government officials frequented the good ones. It was the quickest way to get tossed in jail because if they got busted in a place like that, sipping on wine, then everyone else did, too. Plus, they were too fancy. Only rich people wanted to get dressed up just to sit in a dingy bar and drink moonshine.

The pigs were where the real fun was. After working from sun up to sun down at the dock or at the mill, people would start trailing in to the pigs still wearing their work clothes. My Chuck and I strolled in every Friday with our hands practically covered in dirt from working on the railways.

Trumpets blared over record players and heads bobbed merrily along when me and Chuck walked down into the smoky and windowless basement just as the door slammed behind us and we sat at one of the last open tables. Chuck sat down all gentle, like an old man and bitched about work while I pulled out a chair with one hand dug into my pocket looking for a cigarette with the other. "My back's ******* killing me!" Chuck moaned. Junior (the owner) brought us our usual drinks, whiskey, and Chuck sighed reaching for his before practically inhaling it. "I swear to God, man, when I come into some cash, I'm gonna play a hundred lotto numbers, win, and tell everyone down at the railway to kiss my ***."

"Before or after pigs fly?" I asked. I had found my cigarette and used one of the lit candles on the table to light it.

"Why don't you give me a call if your sister starts to sprout wings."

I took a sip of the God-awful whiskey, "**** you."

Chuck's head managed to turn practically all the way around when a group of three girls came click, click, clicking down the stairs in their fancy high-heeled shoes. None of the other women there ever dressed like that, none of the other women came to put on a show. Just by looking at their clothes you could tell they didn't belong without even knowing anything about them. They glided by the card tables with men talking and laughing so loudly about nothing that you could hear them over the jazz music, slapping down dim nickels and dimes.

"What are girls like that doing in a place like this?"Chuck asked, turning back around. "That one with the black hair is a looker. Let's go say somethin' to 'em!"

"You wouldn't do that if you saw what I saw." Chuck looked ragged and worn out. The only thing hiding the dark circles under his eyes from sleepless nights were the layers of dirt, mixed with sweat that was still caked on to his face. I probably didn't look any better, but I wasn't eyeing the rich girls standing in the corner all snooty-like.

We both sat there for a while just people watching. Candles flickered on their tables, us in our filthy work clothes, card games going at every other tabe, Junior running back and forth slinging drinks and those girls. Those girls. Chuck stared hard at them in their little circle while they just whispered away

I raised my still-full glass into the air, "A toast!"

"To what?"

"I don't know, winning the lotto someday."

"Here, here; brother!"

I'm a sophomore in college thinking of switching my major from microbiology to Environmental sciences with a minor in urban planning. I'm really leaning towards switching because I'm less and less okay with the idea of being a "lab rat" for the rest of my life after my internships in the lab and being in graduate school for years and YEARS.

Anyway, what's the job market like for environmental scientists? I plan on obtaining a masters if I switch but I'd like to work for at least a year after having by BS for training (to be a more competitive applicant) and to save money. I live in a city that used to be a big steel town where there is more talk about restructuring the city's faltering economy around things like "green" resources given its position on Lake Erie. I think this will have a great impact on job security in the future, but I don't know how fast or slow this change will be.

How good is the salary for environmental scientists with just a BS versus having a Masters?

I'm 19 years old and I've been a D cup since middle school. I'm not particularly thin (~170lbs and 5'5 --I've lost weight before and the boobs stayed the same size. Honestly, I think they may have gotten bigger since last year), but I've been experiencing back pain for the past few years and my mom mentioned the other day that it might have something to do with my boob size. Even when I'm sitting down, it feels natural to sort of slump forward because my boobs feel like they're pulling me down and my back arches and my shoulders roll forward. I've been trying to practice good posture for years and I sit straight when I consciously think about it, but even when I'm just walking along I feel like I'm being pulled forward.

I had a relative get breast reduction surgery a few weeks ago and asked about it and she told me that she feels so much better with having gone to a B/C cup. I told her about my back and shoulders and she says she had that issue to and her insurance was able to cover everything because it was medically necessary. I think I was a C cup for a year or so in the fifth or sixth grade but then ballooned up to a D/DD cup size. My bras (no matter what kind I buy) dig grooves into my shoulders that hurt, leave scarring and will actually get these weird bumps on them that swell up and hurt like hell. Not to mention the pain in the *** it is to do anything that involves jumping or running without wearing two bras. *embarrassing*

And superficially, it would be super nice to have an easier time finding shirts that fit, but I can stretch the shirts; my shoulders and back are what's bothering me. I won't be able to see my pediatrician until around Thanksgiving or Christmas break because I'm away at school. Should I mention this to him?

(I'm a college student, but my bookbag is never heavy because of the way I schedule out my classes to avoid bringing more than one of 500+ page, hard cover, science textbooks.)

I'm currently a microbiology major but I will be transferring to another school in the spring as a biology major hopefully in a combined BS/MS program.

I DON'T want to go to medical school though. I've been thinking a lot about going to graduate school for pharmacology, but I'm interested in acquiring more information about different options as well.

I have a year's worth of research experience currently and I'm a sophomore with another research placement in a new lab and will likely not join a lab actively in the spring but will apply for summer-long programs at research facilities near my home. Presently, everything as been related to molecular biology and I really find that interesting.

So, what can I do with a degree (beyond just a BS) in biology, or more specifically, molecular biology? (Other than teach.)