Yep. I've been in many house were all the pics were lined along the top of the wall. I am trying to find an example and Google image search is not helping.

I really have never seen this. Despite being poor, though, my family is artistic, and I think we tended to hand things in artisitically pleasing groups just out of instinct, even though most of our "art" was stuff my mom or I painted or drew. I am actually trying to make my mom give me this set of unfinished hooked rugs she made where she made everyone in our family do a drawing, and then she hooked the rugs. I want to sew them together and make one giant rug.

I totally thought I was going to be friends with people like that when I went to college, but no!

By third year I hung around only two of them (surprisingly, one that seemed snottiest when I first met them all.) I never really fit in, but my 1st year roommate was superrich, popular, and we got along well, so I ended up hanging out with all these rich people, and having opinions on the snooty private schools in Canada. Which is totally bizarre to think of now. I don't know what I was thinking. I also had friends were kind of arty freaks, so it was definitely a strange time, but I think it taught me not to be too judgemental of people because of money, looks, and if they went to a crappy private school like Ridley.

Allyson, you need to think of yourself first in this situation. Regardless of how committed you are to the symposium and your complex relationship with your boss. In the end, it's still a job. And if it's making you miserable, you need to changer--when it's best for you--NOT them.

This, very much this.

If you don't hang your pictures at eye level, Sherlock Holmes will think there's something wrong with you.

But whose eye level. I am 5'2" I bet Sherlock Holmes is taller than I am!

Seriously, I have so much stuff hanging on the walls some of them are filled from tip to toe, though.

My landlord's sister was here today with her son to fix the lights that were out in the hallway, and asked if she could come in to wash out the glass fixtures. She was all, "you're SO CREATIVE! This place looks GREAT!"

I was pleased as punch, the place does look supercute.

My pictures are hung at my eye level, which means they're low on the walls.

I hear what everyone is saying about doing what's best for me, definitely. I think in addition to what people are saying about it being difficult to leave with a huge project on my plate, I'm also very attached to the participants in the symposium, and that makes it extry hard.

Jesse is right about it taking several weeks to find a job, I realize, so I better get my ass in gear.

Where gooogle image failed, reality sites have come through. High hung pictures (well, plaques in this case.)

[link]

Also, as a side note, you can buy really cheap houses in rural Nova Scotia.

Allyson, a lot of places will negotiate start dates, and if you can work it out so that you can get a healthy job and not feel like you're leaving them in the lurch, great. If not, you can tell him your consulting rate and do your level best to get things in order before you leave, but if he's being unreasonable, and the working relationship isn't working, then you have to do what's best for you. It will be hard, but it's like ending any bad relationship where you like the other person's family.

That would ping me as "wrong," but not because I'm all full of class and such, but because of the proportions of empty wall:pictures.

Fancy high-class book larnin' with the "proportions" and the ":"!

I also had friends were kind of arty freaks, so it was definitely a strange time, but I think it taught me not to be too judgemental of people because of money, looks, and if they went to a crappy private school like Ridley.

Heh. Even my freshman year roommate, who went to a fancy private school, went there on a minority/first generation scholarship!

We did have one friend with a ton of siblings who didn't qualify for financial aid until three of them were in college, so she was definitely the "richest" of all of us, but even she wasn't overly rich.

it taking several weeks to find a job, I realize, so I better get my ass in gear.

Is it wrong of me to think that, maybe, the actual process of looking for a new place may change your boss' attitude a bit, making him realize how valuable you are to the place in general and the symposium specifically?

Not even in terms of changing your decision or affecting the end result, but it may make the remaining weeks in this current job more tolerable, what with - hopefully - being appreciated again.

Or am I too much of a Pollyanna?

In meMeME not-so-Pollyanna issues, I need to decide whether to go back home and get 3-4 hours of sleep (I have to be back here on 8am to make sure a teacher and a class have all they need), or just try to carry the whole night through. I'm so behind it's not even funny. Sigh.