Toxic money

 Just having the weirdest start to January 2025 - so many conflicts over money all happening in the first week. What is the universe trying to tell me?

PhD student whose dissertation I edited this past fall didn't send the payment for many weeks, ignoring my emails, and finally told me that she would pay me only half what I charged (which was criminally low already) because I missed her deadline and caused her stress. I told her that the amount she was offering me was insulting, but I would take whatever I could so I don't have to continue dealing with it. We will see if I get anything at all from her (I doubt it). This is especially galling because I had to work on her paper when I was in the middle of moving, and it was super inconvenient for me, but I did it anyway because we had made our arrangement many months earlier, when I had no idea what would be happening in my life. So my integrity was rewarded with her complete lack of any.

When I asked my landlord about moving the epic amount of snow from the weekend snowstorm, he got super pissy and said he could raise my already below market (!) rent if I wanted him to cover snow removal. We got in a pretty good fight about it after he informed me that the other woman in the building would not be helping pay for the driveway to be cleared because she works from home and doesn't need to go anywhere (I guess ever, it's 10 below zero, this snow will be around for at least a week). My neighbor and my landlord are willing to go to the mattresses over this, and DAMAGE our relationship, rather than chip in a FEW DOLLARS for someone to shovel. If we split it 3 ways, it would have been less than a tank of gas for each of us. Truly bonkers. Now I feel super uncomfortable living here, not because of the snow issue, but because of their conflict style. My landlord lets Jordan live for free in the building next door, even though she has behaved very erratically, with apparently no consequences, but he's taking a super hard line with a very responsible renter, over a tiny issue. I suppose he would be more pleasant and kind if I was a pretty 30 year old...

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Just had the realization of this being the strangest coincidence: the amount of money the student withheld is exactly what I paid for the snow removal. What???

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Oh, the upstairs neighbor moved her car on Tuesday, after I removed the snow in the driveway, and shoveled out the snow the city plow pushed in front of the driveway for a second time. I'm fuming!

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The Universe saw fit to give me a chance encounter with the neighbor on Wednesday morning. I said, "You said you didn't need to move your car." And she said, "I had a family emergency." (I doubt it.) I said, "That's why you move the snow!" She said "Well I apologize." So I guess that's that. Though she noticeably did not offer to pay her share of moving the snow...