justme009

Agreed. When I was younger, I always put down more than what I thought was the "going rate." The worst they can say is no, and tell you what they are willing to pay you. My sister applied for a minimum wage job two weeks ago, and on her application, she wrote down $2 above minimum wage, and she ended up getting that! With no experience!

Sorry! I meant that it would be a $2000/year raise from what I'm making right now.

I'm 23 and graduated college in April. I currently work an entry-level Government job in order to "get my foot in the door." This week, however, I was offered two great career-related jobs, and am finding it very difficult to choose one ... so here I am, asking for any advice or input! I know I would love both jobs, so that's not even a factor right now. JOB #1 - A 1-year maternity leave position as a Marketing Coordinator for another company. It's a $10,000/year raise from what I'm making right now. Since it is not an entry-level position, I feel very fortunate to be given this opportunity. It is definitely 100% just for one year. JOB #2 - A 1-year position with my current employer (in a different branch of Government) as a Communications and Special Events Coordinator. It's a more entry-level position than Job #1, and consequently pays significantly less (however, still more than I am currently making by about $2000/year). It is a 1-year position, but could be extended past that ... or be made into a permanent job. Because Job #1 is a higher level job, I think I would benefit more in that one year than at Job #2. However, because I already work for the Government, I am basically guaranteed to stay employed for as long as I stay with them. If you were me, would you take Job #1 knowing that it offers more responsibility and more money, or would you take Job #2 knowing that it pays less but offers to build on your established tenure and guarantees you employment within Government once the 1-year term is over?

I KNOW!! Last week I went out for drinks with an ex-boyfriend and told my man that I wouldn't be late - well I ended up not coming home until pretty late at night, and he didn't say a single thing! Arghh! I didn't do it on purpose or to make him jealous, but it would have been nice to see a little spark of jealousy out of him. I think you're right about girls always being jealous of a boyfriend's ex ... but for you to know that he actually spends time and is his best friend! Wow, you must be strong as all hell. As much as I'd like to say that I'd be okay with that, I don't know if I'd be able to handle something like that. The jealousy would drive me crazy. I definitely admire you for that!

Yeah, that's exactly how I feel. They went on trips together, he taught her how to fish and they went canoeing ... I see these pictures, and I get mad because he doesn't do those things with me. I think part of the problem is that I know he would never get back together with her, but maybe he wishes he was with her instead of me. And to find that out ... that would almost hurt more than finding out he was leaving me to go back to her. I asked him about it a while ago - why he had so many pics of her, and none of me, etc ... and I asked if he still loved her. He said that he didn't love her and that he loved me, but he didn't look at me when he said it, so it wasn't very convincing. Ahh! I hate being such a girl sometimes and over-analyzing everything to death.

My boyfriend is naturally very private and secretive. If he is writing an e-mail or talking on MSN to his friends (his computer is right beside mine), and I walk over, he'll quickly minimize the window - even though I know he's talking about nothing, and just to a guy friend or something. Anyway, a while ago after he went out for a bit, I went on his computer and found in his pictures folder that he had a nude video of his ex-girlfriend. It was a digital camera movie of her walking around her apartment naked back when they were going out. It wasn't at all sexual, but it still puzzles me if it's okay for him to have video like that of an ex-girlfriend. Also, and I may be totally petty here, but he has a photo site up on the internet of all these photos he's taken over the past 5 or 6 years. And back when he was dating her, he took all these photos of her, and they're plastered all over that section of his page. But he's never taken a single picture of me before. It makes me jealous. I think it's silly to be jealous, and I try so hard not to feel that way, but I just can't help it. Am I just feeling what any normal girlfriend feels towards a boyfriend's ex? Or am I being way too petty about things ... ?

I feel the same way you do about your boyfriend. I've been dating my boyfriend (who's 25 - I'm 23) for 10 months, and he always chooses his friends and video games, etc over me. We hardly ever talk about anything, and I used to feel so ignored. It got me so depressed. At first I thought it was perhaps because the relationship was doomed ... but then I made a post on this site, and got some good advice from people here! I started going out and doing things by myself. I joined yoga and kickboxing classes, and am starting to do my own thing. Slowly, things are getting better. It takes time though. I've noticed improvements in his affection towards me (although it's not to where I'd like it to be yet), and we talk more because we have different things to talk about now. At first, it sucked. I was out doing my own thing, and he was still ignoring me and not spending time with me. I was mad because I was doing everything I could to spend the least amount of time with him in order for him to want to be with me more, and it seemed like it was back firing. It took about 2 weeks for it to finally start working. So yeah, I can definitely relate to what you're going through. Just go out and do your own thing. Eventually he'll come around. And if he doesn't, then you know what to do.

So this is my situation: I was friends with a guy for about 7 years. We'll call him DB. Mostly over the internet since he moved to another city just as we became friends. We would talk on MSN all the time, and e-mail back and forth almost daily. We'd tell each other everything, and we became quite close. Two years ago in August 2004, I was going on a road trip by myself to visit my old University, and decided to stop and visit him for 5 days since I hadn't seen him in seven years! It was then we realized we had feelings for each other, and everything changed. From August 2004 - April 2005, we were seeing each other about every 6-8 weeks, with one person flying to see the other person (we live about 1500 km apart). He said that I had no idea how strongly he felt about me, and that every time we had to say goodbye, he'd have to try really hard not to get too emotional. He'd talk about me all the time with his friends and co-workers, and when I was there for New Years, all of his friends told me they had never seen him happier with a girl before. A few times, he even said that it was almost worth it for him to move and see if it would ever work out between us. Then in April 2005, he said that the long distance became too hard for him, and he thought it'd be better if we stayed friends. He said that it wasn't what he wanted to do, but it was the right thing to do. He then started dating someone else. I was crushed. Heartbroken. We continued to talk and e-mail regularily, maybe 3 or 4 times a week ... and it was really really hard for me to stay so close to him, but bottle up all the romantic feelings I felt towards him. September 2005, he was going on a family vacation to my area, and came to see me. We hung out for a few hours, and then he asked if he could have "one last kiss." (He was still going out with his girlfriend at the time). All these emotions came flooding back and we ended up sleeping together. He said that he never stopped having feelings for me, and he always thought about me, but the long distance was too hard for him. I haven't seen him since then. In November 2005, I started seeing my current boyfriend. We've been together for 10 months, and we now live together. I love him a lot, but I always find myself thinking about DB. He's travelling Asia right now and won't be back until Summer 2007. We still talk 1-2 times a week over MSN or e-mail. I guess I'm just unsure as to what to do. I love my current boyfriend so much, but always in the back of my mind, I think of DB. On some level, I think DB might be "the one" for me, but how will I ever know if we don't live in the same city? And what about my current boyfriend? I'm not being fair to him. I don't want to lose him on the small chance that it might work out with DB ... but also, I don't want to never try with DB in case he really is the one for me. I just don't know what to do and I'm so confused. Any comments or insight would be greatly appreciated!

My boyfriend and I both work a full-time 9-5 job. I take distance education classwork when I can (and am trying to pay back my hefty student loan), and he sometimes does contract software development work for people. We live in a basement suite, so we don't have a yard to take care of yet. I do all the laundry, the dishes every day, and I tidy the bedroom. We will both help with meals - except I'll usually prep and clean up, and he'll do the actual cooking. We both go grocery shopping together, but he pays for it all - and he also does all the finances. We have also divided the weekly chores up. He usually cleans and scrubs the bathroom, and I'll sweep and vacuum the rest of the house. Anything that needs "fixing" he'll take care of. Anything that needs to be prettier, I'll probably end up doing. haha He makes about $10k more than me a year, so we both agree that it's only fair he pays for all of the groceries, and expenses towards the place. If we go on trips, he will pay for basically everything except for meals (which I will pay for). That way, I can concentrate on paying off my student loans, and saving up money to buy property together one of these days.