Financial Picture, Part 1: Going to Law School

I didn't attend University of Michigan's law school, but they have the most beautiful reading room. 

For me to continue discussing my finances, I almost certainly need to disclose my profession. Although law school is not the only type of crazy student debt professional school in the game in the US, the financial details associated with each program (JD, MD, or MBA) are unique. Being clear is probably necessary if I don't want my posts to be vague to the point of being borderline misleading. I get a little shy about these details sometimes because weird things sometimes happen to (generally women) law students in some internet spaces.

How Much it Costs, How Much I Borrowed*:

I chose law school knowing I had to go to the highest-ranking school I got into in order to easily obtain the private sector "biglaw" job required to pay for the endeavor. My $75,000 scholarship was an extremely pleasant surprise, and average scholarships for applicants with my qualifications have likely increased to closer to ~$90,000 because of certain application trends, though as you'll see, that doesn't take you far if you're not careful and/or don't have outside financial support. Lower-ranked schools actually gave me significantly smaller scholarships and would have been more expensive.

Attending law school in the US is extremely expensive. Add on the costs of living in NYC to my relative financial irresponsibility, and well, the cost of attendance was right around $86,000/year, inclusive of living expenses incurred during summer internships. I offset that with my scholarship and roughly $12,000 savings from two years' work (thanks to free housing and tax advantages from being abroad). I also earned a pretty penny and received a generous tax refund after one private sector summer internship. Some of my internship income and the tax refund were, however, needed for post-school expenses such as my recent move.

Despite my scholarship, savings, and income, I took out $165,000 in unsubsidized federal loans (the only kind available), on the very high end of average. Interest rates are standardized, and interest accrues continuously (but is not capitalized into the principle) while the student is in school. With interest rates ranging up to 7.9%, my total grew by ~$13,000 by the graduation and then another $2000 or so in the months before starting work. I'm fairly certain this list of law schools with the highest average indebtedness does not count interest accrual in school, but if not, more of my peers have considerably more familial financial support than I could ever imagine.

My total student loan balance, law school and undergraduate included, is actually a little more than the $180,000 resulting from the calculations above: I have under $10,000 in undergraduate loans that could have been reduced if I had been more of an adult while working, but the interest rate there is 5% with none accruing while I was in school. My law school balance indicated above may neglect some of my law school Perkins loans too, but those are tiny, at 5% interest, and did not accrue interest in school either.

More nitty-gritty discussion behind the cut, including a minor addendum to the above:

Casual Friday

 

Necklace: Gorjana Taner Small Bar necklace

Sweater: H&M Premium Quality cashmere sweater, M

Tank Top: H&M Basics tank top, S

Skirt: J. Crew No. 2 wool pencil skirt, 4P

Tights: Mukluk fleece-lined tights, S

Shoes: Sam Edelman Petty booties, 7.5

I call my office dress code "casual business casual" because, in my experience, almost anything remotely reasonable goes. Jeans are almost the only item that is off limits. For further context, all of Adina's office-wear would work perfectly at my workplace. In fact, many of my colleagues like to push the envelope towards a slightly more casual direction. A majority of the work outfits on Nine-Thirty to Five are also on-point, though they might work in Southern California, so certain items they can wear wouldn't be suitable for NYC corporate offices.

I wore this outfit last Friday, though in practice, it'd be okay any day of the week. This outfit is about as far on the casual side of the business versus casual spectrum as I go. All of the elements: sweater, pencil skirt, even the ankle boots, are solidly in the middle of the spectrum for my office. It's the design of that H&M cashmere sweater (a birthday gift) that skews extremely casual, and it's made even more so by being slightly big for me on top of being designed to have a slouchy, oversized fit. The rest of it is fine and dandy: that pencil skirt from J. Crew sits a tiny bit higher on the waist and is a little slimmer than my other pencil skirts, which helps balance out the outfit a bit, but either way, none of the other elements would ever raise an eyebrow.

The sweater is one of those things that brings me joy despite being a less than perfect fit. I like that it feels like I'm wearing a cashmere blanket, and that's the only selling point I need to incorporate it into my work outfits. The cashmere is decent-quality for the price - a bit plusher and thicker than Uniqlo's. Some of the design elements might seem strange though, especially the very pronounced dolman sleeves and rather extreme high-low hem along with high side slits.

My Sam Edelman Petty booties are fantastic: very comfortable, true to size, and took absolutely no time to break in. I wore them to work all the time with skirt suits when I was interning in a very formal government workplace earlier this calendar year. After a full fall/winter season's worth of heavy wear last year, I had them reheeled last month ($22 at a moderately expensive cobbler), and they look almost new (there is a tiny scuff in one toe that couldn't be completely fixed, but can be covered when they're cleaned, shined, and polished). I wear them throughout the winter, avoiding only the very wet or snowy days. 

On Quality, Part II: Winter Clothing

I bought two of these wool Assembly sweaters at Madewell last year and really liked them, but they pill badly and haven't held their shape well. 

When I last posted about the general trend towards lower-quality clothing at various retailers, I wasn't fully sold on one part of the narrative: that there is a phenomenon in which most fast fashion is of such low quality that it would literally wear out or disintegrate within one season. My evidence was my experience with a wide range of Forever 21, H&M, and Target-type items, most of which was capable of lasting two to three years, if not more. Most of my "donate or discard" choices were because I got tired of the styles rather than wear and tear.

I might be changing my tune as to winter clothing, because I've recently started truly noticing the great difficulty associated with finding good-quality sweaters and warm tights and leggings. A few anecdotes from the last few weeks as I start bracing myself for winter, including one specific item (fleece-lined tights) for which I've noticed a definite decline in quality:

Note: the below text contains illustrative links, some of which are affiliate links that will result in a few cents commission for me if you click. Thank you for your support!

• It's probably not news that not all wool sweaters are created equal. More often than not, pure wool sweaters that I've owned (from mall retailers like Madewell, if not cheaper sources) have held up to wear poorly when compared to my wool-blend sweaters that contain synthetic fibers. I find that most wool sweaters just don't hold their shape well despite my fairly careful hand-washing and drying flat. They start looking a little lumpy by the end of the season, for lack of a better word. Many also tend to pill easily. 
• I'm clueless about different types of wool, but my Merino wool sweaters seems to avoid most of the issues I mentioned. All of my Merino sweaters have a thinner, smoother knit though, so it isn't a perfect one-to-one comparison, but they have held up significantly better than other pure wool sweaters.  Quality-wise, my Uniqlo Merino wool sweaters have generally been the most consistent, but I'm only comparing it to things from J. Crew (a Tippi cardigan shrank when machine-washed in cold water by accident) and Madewell (that sweater I bought in October feels like it'll pill a little by the end of this season).
• NYC is having an unseasonably warm fall, but my legs are still feeling cold in the tights I used to wear in the depths of winter. Temperatures have yet to regularly drop into the upper 30s and low 40s Fahrenheit range that would lead me to swap my wool coat for down, but I always feel like my legs are freezing in my fleece-lined tights. Part of it the problem is that this year's version of my Mukluk fleece-lined tights are thinner than the pair I bought three years ago. 
• I do have the same problem of being cold in the old pair (still holding up!), so some of it is that my tolerance to cold has diminished. I'm not sure where else to look: there are cheaper options at Target and the like, but I've heard that those are very much one-season items. There's one more expensive brand that does fleece-lined tights, but I'm not especially excited about $35/pair for ones of unknown durability. I also doubt that they'd keep me much warmer.
• Some people might have very different experiences with what tights are weather-appropriate for fall, so I might well be unusually sensitive to cold. This review suggests that Uniqlo Heattech tights are too warm for anything but winter. For me, however, they're only good for cooler days in spring and fall, and not especially different from Uniqlo's regular tights in that regard. I also find the Heattech tights true to size, though with a sometimes odd fit (a little higher rise and longer legs than I'm used to, perhaps). 

Any thoughts on where to buy good wool sweaters or what materials to look for? Also, truly warm and high-quality fleece-lined or other winter tights are probably a bit of a unicorn, but any recommendations on those would also be very much appreciated! 

My Minimalist-ish Graduate Student Kitchen

via Pinterest. My actual grad-school kitchen was, naturally, much less nice.

When I was a graduate student, I cooked almost all of my meals for the first two years. That habit eventually slipped, but I had a good grasp of the bare minimum of tools and supplies I required. I bought my kitchen goods piecemeal, often as needs arose, and that made it easy to keep my cupboards and drawers minimally stocked, even before I discovered minimalism and the KonMari method. When I went through and decluttered all my things KonMari-style, eleven months ago, I didn't do much in the kitchen except repurpose some boxes to serve as drawer organizers.

Shopping-wise, I bought most of my things at HomeGoods or TJMaxx, with an occasional trip to Housing Works, IKEA, or Daiso while I was home in California. When I was stocking my kitchen, I wasn't sure I would stay in NYC after graduating, so the quality of my pots and tools wasn't a priority. The cost of my stock of kitchen goods was probably well within the range of being frugal and reasonable for a student's kitchen. 

A few other notes: Now that I live with K and we combined some of our kitchen things, I have a little more of everything to work with. I cooked often, but didn't bake, which cut down significantly on my kitchen needs and wants. I generally made small, simple meals, cooking mainly for myself or one other person at the maximum, except for the occasional potluck dish. Thus, my kitchen felt fully stocked with just the following (links are illustrative only, some are affiliate, some are not):

Pots, Pans, etc. 1 mini (1 quart?) saucepan, w/ lid 1 3 quart saucepan, w/ lid 1 12-inch nonstick skillet 1 9'' x 13'' baking pan 1 electric kettle 1 cookie sheet* 1 5-quart stock pot**	Tools 1 spatula 1 slotted spoon 1 ladle 1 skimmer 1 1-cup Pyrex measuring cup* 1 set measuring spoons 1 meat thermometer 1 silicone pastry brush**	Miscellaneous 1 salad spinner Tupperware, assorted sizes 1 oven mitt 2 kitchen towels 2 tea strainers 1 soy sauce bottle for olive oil**
Knives and Things 1 8-inch chef’s knife (exact) 1 3-inch fruit knife 1 large cutting board 1 vegetable peeler 1 small cutting board*	Dishes 3 medium-sized plates 3 cereal bowls 1 small rice bowl** 3 mugs 1 reusable water bottle	Silverware 1 four-person flatware set 3 sets of wooden chopsticks**

*indicates things I didn't own or owned in a less efficient size, but that I would have bought 

** indicates things that are a bit idiosyncratic, and that I generally purchased for one particular recurring need

This might seem like a strange thing for me to write about, but well, I find reading about what's in people's kitchens and refrigerators absolutely fascinating. My more rambling thoughts on why I picked particular kitchen tools and in what quantities are behind the cut.