I'm thinking...pimp.

Kennel work at a vet's office? Not a lot of money or hours. . .

I'M SORRY.

this is probably too vague and general to even post here.

chalk this up as a freakout from stress.

sorry...

STOP APOLOGIZING, YOU.

I say streamline your life by putting something to the side for a year and focus on getting the bachelor's. Then get the dream job. Then use your free time to focus on writing and art.

Yeah, streamline. You need to take something off your plate, even if it's something you love.

Also, I need a house boy.

you want some kind of man-dwelling hybrid speck? You have some weird kinks.

Honestly? You're probably going to have to suck shit for a year until you finish your degree and can get into the field you want. If you're seriously overwhelmed, the volunteer work, as much as you love it, may need to be backburnered.

Just remind yourself that it's only a year. It's a finite period and it will go by.

Thanks, Adam.

it's just that, FUCK!!, (sorry!), I have this damn novel in the works AND I ACTUALLY HAVE A FRIEND WHO WILL HAVE HIS LIT AGENT READ IT!

and i have a job THAT I LOVE AND BELIEVE IN probably waiting for me if i finish the bachelor's!

and i don't have time to do half the animal advocacy that i want to do! i've become, like, a junior damn guru on urban wildlife situations and such and i have events CONSTANTLY and people e-mailing me questions and conferences to attend and protests and dealings with legislators and [GHAAH, ETC...]

and i REALLY want to start that damn t-shirt shop! and draw and paint and sculpt!

AND I WANNA SPEND TIME WITH MY CATS!

but i work and sleep and sleep and work.

*sigh*

sorry.

THIS IS SHANE'S BRAIN ON DRUGS LIFE-FREAKOUT.

(speck, i'm there for the house-boy. no pay necessary)
;-)

Filing. Call up a temp agency, show that you can alphebetize, and beg to stock shelves or file.

My friend worked one summer as a landscaper (glorified lawn mower) for a golf course. VERY low-stress, and he got to spend all day in the sun.

Another summer (or maybe it was the same one), I got a two-week job counting houses on the garbage route for the city - basically, I rode along with the garbage truck and clicked every time we passed a house. VERY low-stress.

In other words, temp work. The temp means low pay, but almost no responsibility except to show up on time.

I second the temping. Low Stress == Low Responsibility. You need something you can do where you don't care if you get fired. An Office job for a faceless corporation with access to the internet (http://www.writely.com) means you can do your writing secretly at work too.

Don't worry about selling the novel until it's done (and by done I mean that you've finished at least two complete drafts, with a waiting period of several months between the first and second drafts during which the novel sits in a drawer). There's no hurry. It doesn't matter at all if your friend's agent will read it--if it's good then plenty of agents will be willing to read it once it's done. (Don't pin your hopes on that one agent, either, by the way.)

Scale down or eliminate everything else until you finish the degree--life is long, and things are best done well rather than quickly. There will always be opportunities for volunteer work; your cats will spend time with you whether you want them to or not.

Any entry-level 40-hour/week cubicle job should suffice if you want enough free time to do things. Stress is most likely to come from jobs that have unspecified hours, in my experience--you want a job that stays at work when you leave for home. Temping might not be a bad idea, either, but I don't know much about that scene.

Prospero Speaks Much Wisdom.

What Muddgirl and Seanyboy said. Temping, if you can get steady work doing it, is the easiest thing in the world. They don't work you too hard, because you're the office equivalent of a substitute teacher. And everyday feels like either your first or last day at a job - you don't have to be invested in pleasing people, or making friends with the right people, or having any interest other than detached amusement at the usual office politics.

shane, I just thought of the perfect job for you: Seal Clubber. Fresh air, plenty of exercize...

shane, I absolutely recommend part-time jobs, specifically temping thru an agency.

my roommate and I are both in the late acute stages of Midlife Crisis, hence we both dropped out of the rat race to engage in some serious personal navel-gazing. Both of us really needed out of our soul-sucking corporate cubicle hells. in his case he had life-threatening hypertension looming from an 80-hour-week in an IS department. in my case, I took a companywide shutdown/layoff as a spur to get my own life back on track. I mean, no five-year-old ever daydreamms about being a Corporate Finance Bitch, right? I have similar work/life/balance issues to yours; I decided to (finally) pursue a higher education while re-igniting the artistic endeavours I set aside shortly after graduating high school *mumblemumble* years ago.

roommate is now a bike shop mechanic. I'm currently doing a stint as a medical records clerk on campus here in Boulder. Easy peasy for both of us, well except for the part where we're both having to deal with living at rougly 33% of our former incomes. which is amazingly easier than it sounds if you're disciplined about spending.

neither jobs are the most intellectually stimulating for us, and it sure was great pulling in mad bank in Cubeville... well except for the stress-related medical problems piled on top of never having any time or energy to ever *spend* it. On the flip side, our health, our sanity, our free fun time, and most important our creative side projects (him = music, me = photography) are flourishing.

and if that doesn't work out, well then I'll thumb-wrestle speck for your houseboy services.

I took a break from my big law firm job about a year ago to work for a judge. Lots less money, but I definitely needed the break. I was in a real career crisis at the law firm, and had no idea what I wanted to do with my law degree on a long-term basis. Now that I've spent my year with the judge, I've got things at least partially figured out, and even have a five-year plan and shit.

I highly recommend finding a job that you can leave at work at the end of the day. I'm not sure I agree, though, with the temping suggestions. I've never done it, but I had some friends who temped and were miserable. I'd guess a lot depends on the agency and the employer with which you end up working. Bike shop mechanic, though, would be a pretty sweet gig.