I caught myself thinking it would probably be a little more difficult now to dig a hole then it was before. Sometimes it is harder to go thru life without committing multiple felonies than you would think it is. Still I doubt it will come to that.

When I arrived at work, Beverly and I sat down and discussed which on-line courses would be the most advantageous for me to take. Beverly made me pre-register early for the next semester. She also insisted that I take the correspondence courses in an accelerated time frame.

Sometimes I am not sure if Beverly is my Pimp Momma, my Mentor, or the Mother that she feels I should have had all along. Her insistence on this means that I have to pay for these courses early. I do have the money – but not much more. I am constantly trying to build up my cash cushion. Difficult sometimes, but I know that it is needed.

On the other hand at least I now have some income which is at least semi-legit. When I finish school I won’t have a ton of debt to keep me a financial wage slave for the rest of my life. My long term goal is to have enough money that paydays don’t matter. (This may take a while.)

Later on Beverly called me into her office and handed me a plain envelope with my name on it. In it was a short note from Mr. Kostas saying how much he regretted my ruining such a lovely outfit and telling me not to be a stranger but to “feel free to stop by when I need something done”. Not sure what he meant by that. It also had a gift card for Christopher Banks, which is a very nice shop at Patrick Henry Mall. I looked at Beverly and stated “You said not to take anything from anybody but you.”

“I know. That is why I am the one that is handing this to you.” Yep, definitely my Pimp Momma.

“What did he mean by ‘stop by when I need something done’?”

She hesitated a moment, then looked at me and said “He is kind of what people would call ‘old fashioned’ about some things. He means if you need a favor you could ask him. But always remember that nothing in life is free and you should always think carefully before you do something like that.” I do not have any problem understanding what she means.

I can tell that he and Beverly have some history together. While my curiosity might like to know what it was, my sense of inner survival knows that this is a cookie jar I do not want to open.

Beverly smiled and said this will be the last time I will take four correspondence courses at once. Beginning next year I will only need three courses at one time, which will take some of the work load off me. It helps that when I am in her office I can play some of my online courses as back ground on my lap top while I am doing other tasks for her. The only thing that makes me slightly nervous is that smile she gets when she is thinking something devious. Especially since it seems to usually have something to do with me.

Ann was of course ecstatic about the gift certificate and the chance to do some ‘retail therapy’ as she calls it. I reluctantly agreed to go shopping with her tomorrow but only if we could use some of this money on her too. After all, to me it was free money so why not spend it to make someone happy that I care about?

* * *

After busting out that gift card at the mall, and spending a little bit more, we decided to get our nails done at Maxine’s. Ann wanted to get our hair done too but I thought that would be a little bit over the top. Besides Ann’s gorgeous red hair never seems to even need a brush, not even when she first wakes up.

After our shopping spree we went to Vito’s for some killer baked ziti.