I'm the man who loves you.

[raybear]

The swelling in the tonsils has gone down and have less pain in my right ear, so hopefully I'm beating down this infection. All I want to do is sleep sleep sleep, and that's mostly what I am doing. Yesterday I got back to the hotel at 5 pm, ate, fell asleep, work up at 10 pmish when Lowenstein called, went back to bed after we hung up, slept until 7 am, woke up to take medicine, went back to sleep and woke up at 9:30 just in time to watch "Normal" on HBO which didn't suck. Now I'm on campus paying bills before two afternoon lectures, then back to bed.

Money has always stressed me out and I assumed it was because I never had enough. But dealing with this big fat multi-digit check from the federal government for my financial aid is stressing me out too, because I'm waiting for the phone call that say "um, that's not your money, give it back" because I don't seem worthy of having it. So on one hand I'm scared to be spending it, but on the other I should spend it so if that call comes I can honestly say "sorry don't have it." In case you're wondering, I'm not using the money to buy plane tickets to Paris and $200 underwear, as one of my fellow students did. No, I'm using it to pay off credit card debt I've been carrying around with me for years. Which is why my hands might be shaking (that and being sick). I'm having a hard time believing some of those balances are actually "zero" now.

It's a genuine concern about the government taking their money back, I'm not just being paranoid. I think they overloaned me. They'll figure it out, I'm sure and either a) I won't get any loans for next semester to balance out; or b) they won't notice until the end of my tenure as a grad student and it will just be added to my big total. I'm fine with either option, because using their money to pay off my credit cards, then putting the money I've been paying monthly into a savings account will save me lots of money on interest.

Maybe there's hope for me yet in being somewhat fiscally savvy. Okay, not savvy. Maybe just competent.

I need to go get a couple vitamin waters to make it through this afternoon.

Comments

[nineinchlovely.livejournal.com]

The Direct Loan limits for graduate students is up to $18,500. That's the max they can give at a federal level but you can get an alternative loan to fund any gaps between 18500 and the cost of attendance. Be mindful of total aggregate limits (including your undergraduate stuff) but for the most part, they don't usually allocate too much.. it's usually the other way around.

[raybear.livejournal.com]

right, it's not an issue with my award letter -- it's that i'm pretty sure my "first half of the dispersement" got dispersed twice. i thought at first it was a mistake, that i just got double letters. now i'm thinking that either a) i got my first half twice; or b) the dispersed the whole year at once, but did it in two transactions.

i'm prepared for either outcome though!!

and don't think i'm not glad to have a finanical aid guru in my life should i need assistance, now that i'm back at school......