Stupid comp.

[Matt]

First I'd like to say I can't beleive your making me read all of that.

Pros.
- Gain work experience With a part-time job? Helping pay maybe a couple hundred bucks a month for rent and buying a couple T-shirts? I have a better idea for work experience. Why don’t you do what I’m sure Lady and *G* had to do out of high school and work 60 hours a week just to barely make ends meet for a little apartment and eat nothing but Ramen noodles for a year because that’s all you can afford. Having a 20 hour a week job IS NOT experience. That’s what I would call freeloading off your mom while you continue to float through life. If I had even suggested dropping out of high school and getting a job, I would have been kicked out of my house. Maybe that’s what you need.

I'm not planning on dropping out of school permanently, its just 1 year. and none of that realy has to do with work experiance? What I mean by work experiance is well... experiance working in any manner, and a possible refrence for future work.

- get real life experience Again, you won’t be getting any real life experience. Maybe you don’t realize what life is because I know I didn’t realize it until I left home. I was one of those kids who thought “hmm, $1,000 a month for an apartment. Not bad at all”… but try tripling that if you want to have insurance, power, gas, cable, internet, phone, cell phone, cars, or anything else that is considered a necessity in life. If you don’t graduate, you really won’t have to worry about any of that because you’ll either be living with your mom your whole life (who is nice enough to put up with the laziness) or you’ll be living in a nice roomy double-wide where your number of kids outnumbers the number of teeth you have left.

ok, lets not count that one, but I don't think you got what I meant.

- gain a drive to get a better job which means going to school I’m thinking that by this you mean getting a crappy job which will make you want to go back to high school. I’ll address this at the end.

What I meant was the fact that I have 0 drive to go to school, and maybe this would help.

- get time off from the only life ive known for as long as I can remember (school) Cry me a river. You’ve experienced less school than about half the people in this clan. I’m going for my PhD which means I have 6 years ahead of me and I’m 20. Looking back, high school was an ABSOLUTE JOKE how easy it was. So excuse me if I don’t have much pity for you considering dropping out at 17 because you can’t hack it.

Damnit, I told you I'm not planning on dropping out. And I also told you school is easy, that has nothing to do with me hating it, its the fact that Ive been doing it over, and over, and over, and over, maybe not as long as other people but im not other people.

- make money At minimum wage moving heavy things (ie, a job a monkey could do)… I’m sure it’s lucrative pay. I guarantee you won’t have any extra money. My fiancé works 40+ hours a week for $30 an hour and we don’t even have enough money to put in the bank to save. When you’re working half as much as he does for a fifth of the pay… somehow I don’t think you’re going to have any money to save.

He must get very few hours. And Im not intending to have alot to put away, but what I have put away, would be for things such as games, etc.. for when I move out on my own. That way my money can go toward bills etc, and I won't have to worry about being broke at the end of the month. I realise I won't have much, but its better to have a little saved.

- start paying my own way, partialy. (I intend to start paying for part of the rent, by choice, not by demand) You’re not paying your own way, you’re mooching off your mom and giving her enough money to maybe pay for the food you eat in a week because groceries aren’t cheap either. If you really want to pay your own way, do it. Go get an apartment and work your ass off to pay the bills.

Right now Im mooching, if I were to start paying, I wouldn't be doing that quite as much, now would I? Also, I would be helping with things such as laundry, groceries, dishes etc... And if you understood our lifestyle, you'd realise that most of what gets done around here.

- I take a little control of my life. The only thing you’ll be controlling is the start of a downward spiral.

How? by being away from school for 1 year, thats gonna ruin my life?...

As for the rest, which I wont bother quoteing, I didn't once say it was difficult, and I needed it easyer, which is what your implying, as a matter of fact I said it was easy.
And once again as I said before me going back to school wouldn't be an option, it would be pre-arranged, and pretty much without my decision even being in the matter, I would not choose living on the street over school, and my mother would not let me live here if I wasn't planning on finishing school.

You seemed to have ignored most of what I said because I had to repeat myself several times, I think I should try a person to person disscussion about this with some people. You have no reason to beleive all that would happen, other than its what happens most often, that you've heard about, and I guess its much harder for you to understand when you don't know anything about how my life is run, other than I spend most of my time on the computer, to avoid my pothead freinds/brother/sister.

If you remember I once told you that if I explained my life it would sound dramatic and sad, but I realy do have an easy life. I still dont understand why you make refrence to my posts as if I stated I have a bad, or difficult one. I'm sure I'm comming off as immature to you, and its very possible that I am, but what I dont understand is why? other than the fact that you think I'm exactly like every other highschool kid who seems to think when somethings difficult they shouldn't bother. It's difficult to drag myself to class everyday, and I'm sure that when I finish highschool, I will look back and say "damn that was easy, I dont know why I ever complained?" Thats because when I look back all I'll remember, is a couple hot girls, some drawing, and playing a game of president (card game) every lunch.

EDIT: anywho, thanks pinkie... I think I should try talking to soem of my teacher, and maybe some people who understand whats goin on in my life, so they can make an educated responce to my thoughts.

[pinkie]

Had to correct you here before I start:

He must get very few hours.

40 hours is a standard work week. 40+ hours means more than a standard work week. This is few hours? Ooookay. Anyways...

You're telling me that I'm not responding to your points but most of what you had just responded to me with was "you don't understand" or "I'm not dropping out". So I guess I'll respond to these two claims...

You say that I don't understand yet I assure you I understand exactly what you intend on happening but I'm taking that an analyzing it and that's what my responses are to. I'm going further than what you are explicitly saying and responding to what you are implying. Since you don't believe me, I did some quick research. Feel free to check it out yourself if you're so interested in making an informed decision. This was published by the EPAA (Education Policy Analysis Archives) in 2001 by Arizona State University. They did a study on high school drop-outs and gave them a follow up survey to see who went back. Everyone of these people surveyed had intentions of returning to high school... amazing how familiar this sounds. Here were their results:

Of the males studied, only 21% of them returned to high school to get a diploma. Only 36% got a G.E.D and 43% did neither. Keep in mind, many of these people studied dropped out not because they were pouting about school but were basically forced to leave for financial reasons (explained in the study). Most of these people did not want to leave - they WANTED TO GRADUATE and look how bad the results are. I don't know how much more obvious this can be.

You almost exactly fit all the average characteristics of the people studied to a T but 1 difference. Most of them want to complete school and you want to leave (even though you THINK you're going to return).

Perhaps now you understand that I did in fact understand but was taking it a bit further than what you explicitly stated. I know you don't think you're going to drop out completely. Unfortunately, I do think you will never return if you choose to drop out. Is that the kind of response you wanted to your claims that I don't understand?

Now in addition to this since I have supported my claim, here's some more evidence supporting why you shouldn't drop out.

I know you're going to read this and blow it off thinking "it's going to be different for me". But whatever - keep thinking that, print out out my previous post, and look at it in 20 years. I know when to drop it and I'm done spending an hour writing something that's completely disregarded.

[Matt]

40 hours, $30 per hour... O.o
$1200 a week. thats $4800 a month, and he cant save money?...
hmm.. well he is supporting you, I'm assumins since your still in school, not working yet. And your 2 big-ass dogs. =P
still you must live in a decent place. And still I think you guys would have to pay more up there then here... not that important though..

And sorry if I came off as rude when I said you didn't understand, and you were ignoring my points, the point I refered to was that I didn't find school difficult, and you were calling me an Immature person who was having a hard time, so he was going to drop out. "cry me a river" or somthing along those lines? And that I had said I didn't have difficulty in school.

I haven't been dissregarding your points, and I'm not getting pissed, just a little frustrated with the part stated above. I just don't see me as the type to fall into the everyday statistics, as a matter of fact I do my best not to. And if I wasn't good at it I'd be smoking (ciggarettes/weed), I'd be back in my old neighbourhood with my best freind who started out like me, and ended up a pothead, that got into some even worse stuff. I realise I may be expecting too much of myself, when it comes to beating these odds, but I'm extremely close to getting kicked out, and my only 3 options are
1) Major rapid improvement.
2) step back and get a new outlook, then step forward again.
3) give up, and get kicked out, or leave.

Now I realise the obvious choice is "DUH!! IMPROVE, DUMBASS!", but easyer said than done. I have a major lack of will power when it comes to this, and I sincerely doubt I could do it. I could try, but if I do and and dont make it, then thats pretty much it for my education... My home school isn't an option for me anymore... I could try for Cederbrae if I got kicked out of Wexford, but if I did that, I would have to strugle to get into illustration, which is what I want to do, seeing as how I'd be comming from an artisticaly challenged school and it'd be harder for me to get into college with "expelled" on my Permanent record.

[pinkie]

matt345 said:

40 hours, $30 per hour... O.o
$1200 a week. thats $4800 a month, and he cant save money?...
hmm.. well he is supporting you, I'm assumins since your still in school, not working yet. And your 2 big-ass dogs. =P
still you must live in a decent place. And still I think you guys would have to pay more up there then here... not that important though..

That is gross, not net so take out taxes. $1,200 for rent each month. 2 cars so we have payments on those as well as insurance. Utilities, electricity, phone/cable/internet, water/sewer/trash is a good $300-500 a month. We do eat though and wear clothes so those aren't cheap. That's just for the bare necessities. I'm not saying we live in a dirt hole because we're doing well for college students comparatively but money isn't running like water and we do run tight on cash like everyone else. The cost of living in Chicago is a lot higher than Canada I'm sure.

matt345 said:

I just don't see me as the type to fall into the everyday statistics, as a matter of fact I do my best not to. And if I wasn't good at it I'd be smoking (ciggarettes/weed), I'd be back in my old neighbourhood with my best freind who started out like me, and ended up a pothead, that got into some even worse stuff. I realise I may be expecting too much of myself, when it comes to beating these odds...

Like I said...

pinkie said:

I know you're going to read this and blow it off thinking "it's going to be different for me". But whatever - keep thinking that, print out out my previous post, and look at it in 20 years. I know when to drop it and I'm done spending an hour writing something that's completely disregarded.

[Matt]

pinkie said:

matt345 said:

40 hours, $30 per hour... O.o
$1200 a week. thats $4800 a month, and he cant save money?...
hmm.. well he is supporting you, I'm assumins since your still in school, not working yet. And your 2 big-ass dogs. =P
still you must live in a decent place. And still I think you guys would have to pay more up there then here... not that important though..

That is gross, not net so take out taxes. $1,200 for rent each month. 2 cars so we have payments on those as well as insurance. Utilities, electricity, phone/cable/internet, water/sewer/trash is a good $300-500 a month. We do eat though and wear clothes so those aren't cheap. That's just for the bare necessities. I'm not saying we live in a dirt hole because we're doing well for college students comparatively but money isn't running like water and we do run tight on cash like everyone else. The cost of living in Chicago is a lot higher than Canada I'm sure.



Like I said...

pinkie said:

I know you're going to read this and blow it off thinking "it's going to be different for me". But whatever - keep thinking that, print out out my previous post, and look at it in 20 years. I know when to drop it and I'm done spending an hour writing something that's completely disregarded.

Ok, say your right, and I do become an everyday statistic, but keep in mind we don't know for sure and its just the odds. Aren't my odds still better takeing a break and comming back, then trying febaly to do somthing I've been trying to do, and have failed...?

[pinkie]

That's why the words lazy and immature have been thrown around a few times. There's absolutely no reason at all why you can't pass aside from laziness and immaturity. You just don't want to admit it. Besides, you even said yourself you weren't trying.

[Matt]

You just don't want to admit it.

I did. you must have missed it.

Maybe I am being immature.

Besides, you even said yourself you weren't trying.

What I was saying is I was having trouble forceing myself to try... In other words to give a shit, even though I know its important, I can't seem to care, as much as I should.

[pinkie]

I didn't miss anything but you're making excuses as to why you can't do well.

For example, "I can't seem to force myself to care" - it's an excuse for laziness. Most people don't care but we suck it up and go because it needs to get done.

[CaptainUnicorn]

I wouldnt worry about it, I think that we all know in the end Dowerboi will make the right decision

[pinkie]

originalgumby said:

I wouldnt worry about it, I think that we all know in the end Dowerboi will make the right decision

What is "the right decision"?

[Matt]

pinkie said:

originalgumby said:

I wouldnt worry about it, I think that we all know in the end Dowerboi will make the right decision

What is "the right decision"?

which ever results in me getting a decent job that I enjoy. =P

of course, we won't know until it actualy happens.

[pinkie]

originalgumby said:

I wouldnt worry about it, I think that we all know in the end Dowerboi will make the right decision

Good, then don't worry about it. My point by asking what the right decision was is that there's an obvious difference in opinion about what the right decision is. So there's obviously no way to know that he "will make the right decision" at this point regardless of which he chooses and by dropping the subject that won't change. So if you ask me, saying "he'll make the right decision" isn't a very intelligent comment.

matt345 said:

which ever results in me getting a decent job that I enjoy. =P

of course, we won't know until it actualy happens.

Despite all of our debating, you and I only disagree on ONE thing: you feel that if you drop out, you'll be able to come back when you have a serious mindset on school and I think if you drop out, you'll never go back and will be stuck at a minimum wage job.

On my side, I've provided numerous statistics, facts, documentation, and have several people agreeing with me as have posted on this thread. The only thing you have is your opinion. No fact, no documentation, no support from other people. If you don't see the sense in this now, I don't think you ever will. Good luck.

[Matt]

Yeah pretty much. But your facts are statistics, and arent neccisarly facts that I won't go back. You have given more reason for me to stay in school this year, than I have for takeing a break. But the thing is, we shouldn't base our lives around the statistics of other peoples failures... though it still should be taken into consideration.

We both agreed that I'm being immature in school, and im sure we both agree the only way to counter-that is by making a 'mature' decision, which brings us back to the original argument, which do I have the better odds. My choices seem to be, take a break, and try not to become a statistic, or try to basicaly over-come my problem that ive had since roughly Gr. 10.

I don't think anyone I know, knows me well enough to guess which odds are better. Right now I'm thinking, try and stay in, and if I get kicked out, take a break then beg to be let back in.

[~Lady of the View~]

Matt, I have one word for you...ambition!! I took the liberty of including the definition since you probably don't know this one based on the recent arguments:

am·bi·tion ( P ) Pronunciation Key (m-bshn)
n.

1. An eager or strong desire to achieve something, such as fame or power.
2. The object or goal desired: Her ambition is the presidency.
3. Desire for exertion or activity; energy: had ambition to go dancing.

Pinkie is right in that we had to work long hours at shity jobs while furthering our education. We were both lucky, if you will, in that we had entry level jobs in a hospital on a nursing floor. Believe you me it could have been worse.

We had high school diplomas so we could get those kinds of jobs. Most importantly we had the AMBITION to be more than be thought possible. We went from scraunging in the couch for change to pay rent to buying a home for $240K just last week (no we didn't pay cash but got the financing we needed). Education and AMBITION being the key to unlock doors we didn't know were in our way.

You can say those are only stats but at this point what other evidence do you have to go on aside from selfish laziness and immaturity geared to give you your way. A way that Pinkie and I can see being damaging.

A quote for you to think on: Why put off till tomorrow things that CAN be done today??

[Matt]

Yes I know what ambition is and my point was that I lack it. Its not exactly a store bought thing :-\

Why put off till tomorrow things that CAN be done today??

Another point I made - I may stand a better chance of succedeing tomorow. The purpose of this whole thing was to figure that out =P

lastly:

Right now I'm thinking, try and stay in, and if I get kicked out, take a break then beg to be let back in.