By the time I apply in September/October, I'll have had a 1.5 employment gap in my resume. Since graduating undergrad, I've never had a gap in my employment and worked full time while receiving MS degree. But I'm a non-traditional applicant, age 30, and the recent 1.5 year gap looks pretty bad IMO.

Out of that 1.5 gap, I spent half prepping lsat full time and the other half prepping about 30 hours per week and doing food delivery apps in the evening. No volunteer work. I live with my parents who are extremely "high risk" for covid-19, which is why I stayed away from employment and volunteer work where I was in regular contact with people. The heavy LSAT prep was necessary for me bc of low ugpa (CAS 3.1), and being out of school so long really degraded my test taking skills.

Beginning of this year through the summer I was applying for jobs almost everyday, but was getting rejected left and right bc I worked in the cannabis industry for 4 years, and cannabis in state I currently live is illegal. The few jobs I did get offers for during that time were not better than what I was making with food delivery apps, hence sticking with the delivery apps so I could focus on studying.

The intense studying was worth it, I went from 140's to 170's on my last 4 practice tests, and I'm taking Aug 2022 LSAT. I also have a job lined up for September. But I still don't have a legitimate sounding excuse to explain my gap in addendum. I'm also already writing an addendum for my low ugpa (bad freshman year taking all the premed science course).

I feel like I'm pretty much screwed getting into a top 30 program being a splitter (hopefully august goes well), and having a large gap.

Any advice is welcome