What is up with homeless people nowadays? I swear, they are getting greedier and greedier!

Examples
1. Saw a guy on the subway THROWING OUT PENNIES from his cup of begging money on the floor. OK, even I don't throw away pennies! And Jessica says that she heard that some people YELL at you if you give them pennies. WTF!

2. Before I got transferred to NJ, I walked by this woman next to work every morning, and every morning, she stands there shifting back and forth saying "quarter....quarter...quarter..."

3. In Miami, Dennis pointed out that every person that came up to us asking for money asked for not just one quarter, but TWO QUARTERS. TWO QUARTERS!!! Once upon a time, that bought a COKE! That's not just spare change! I wonder if they would they yell at me if I gave them 5 dimes or 10 nickels?

4. Today in the PATH station, this woman asks me for a DOLLAR. A DOLLAR! Is this inflation adjusted begging or something? What happened to giving these people your SPARE CHANGE? A dollar is NOT spare change.

Sheesh.

So I just got back from an MBA information session. What was I thinking on my walk back? My career, how I was to best get a head start on that track?

Nope.

Why do people bother going to clubs/bars/lounges to meet people? The caliber of people at an MBA info session are wayyy better. Plus the fact that ~40% come from finance and another 30% come from consulting doesn't hurt. Not to mention the free alcohol and hor d'oeuvres. AND everyone's got their contact information on a business card ready to hand out. What more could a gold digging woman want?

Disclaimer: This does not mean I have or will ever hit on someone at an information session. I was just thinking about this as I was walking out b/c the event was held in the W hotel, which has Underbar right underneath it.

This is why I feel like I will eventually need to leave NYC.

We're JUST starting our careers, yet I already feel the discrepancies creeping in. I'm not trying to say I'm regretting my job choice or anything like that; I actually enjoy the work to do [On a side note, this guy walked by my desk today and noticed I had divided up my Skittles by color, and goes, yea, no wonder they hired you hahahahaha], but obviously I can't really expense the things I do, so my take-home income isn't the same. I can only imagine how things will be as time goes on, and the discrepancies only become more glaring.

This week's NY Magazine really had a buncha good articles; it talked about how far a dollar goes here, and there's also a survey to see how much money you need to be earning (post-tax) in 10 years to be living the lifestyle you want. ($120,000 for me). For that survey, click here.

On a more depressing note, there's also an article about a father who takes home $676 every 2 weeks. sad. =(


Besides that, life is going well. Splurges for the month: Snowboard, Shiseido lotion, trip to DC, and plane tickets to London. Whew!