Leaving Vermont Never Easy

I spent my last night in Vermont taking advantage of the icy conditions with some skates at Shelburne pond; a small pond a few minutes from my house. I went with friends in the middle of the night and although there wasn't too much moonlight, the stars were out and it was beautiful. Even though I skied earlier in the week, it was nice to do one last thing that will be more difficult to do in Boston (at least at night while listening to the coyotes) and nuanced creeks and cracks of the ice. Only one word really to describe the experience: liberating.

I Missed my Virtual Tee-Time

Any one who knows me knows that I am not so great at being on time. Being in a van pool at work will make me more punctual like being a tennis captain did but I have some work to do. Yesterday, I went to play golf at an indoor facility that had HD virtual golf screens. Yeah, I know, it's pathetic; I'm addicted to golf and needed my fix. But anyways, my friend Joey told me we needed to be on time for our 4:00 tee-time since they were booked all day (and apparently almost every day). I mistakenly played tennis with my dad from 2:30-3:30 thinking I had enough time. And I would have except that I refused to leave at 3:30 with the match still going on (I needed to put my dad away). So much to my friend's dismay we showed up 10 minutes late to Gonzos (the golf place). We proceeded to walk in anyways with our full set of golf clubs.

You wouldn't think virtual golf clubs would be like the real ones but apparently since we had booked an hour and we were late we would have to pay for the full hour. We asked if we could just play and pay for half an hour since that was a normal option there but they said, "No. You booked a full hour. We have a tight schedule and don't want any gaps." Considering it was going to take 10 minutes to set the thing up and they were charging other people extra who were still playing on "our" course, we decided to leave as my friend said: "and now you have a gap in your schedule." End of the story: half hour drive for nothing and my tardiness making some one angry once again. At least I won the tennis match.

Bait and Switch

I just got off the phone with my uncle Rich (Herb's brother) who had a message for my dad: (in very strong Boston accent) "Tell your fathah that I have an issue that needs to be settled: I know a girl who wants to get in to Saint Mike's and she needs your fathah to show her around. Now here's the thing: academically she's mediocre, but you should see her. She makes it up in looks and personality." My uncle Rich networks and uses connections better than anyway one else I know. He wasn't asking my dad for a favor but he's smart to use these connections anyways. He even went through the people-who-like-coffee-networks in my family for when I start selling coffee next month: "your uncle Glenn, yeah, he would like free coffee, and you uncle David, he could use a free cup, and I'm at Starbucks 365 days a year, every day. You don't believe it's possible but it is." Even though using connections could have helped me get my potential job, I'm sort of proud that I got it on my own. Looking back on my job search, one thing stands out that I've wanted to write about for awhile.

As difficult and annoying as the job search process can be, the worst part is that not only are there tons of crappy jobs out there to sift through, there are also the pyramid and ponzi schemes to watch out for. I had one such encounter with an entry level "no experience needed" job at Nova Marketing. This is Barbara Ehrenreich's classic "Bait and Switch." Perhaps I should have been warned by the job description:

[All openings are FULL-TIME and need to be filled A.S.A.P.!!
There is no experience necessary. If you are a new graduate, or someone who is aggressively pursuing a change in careers, please APPLY! ]

No experience? Should I be a good guy? How bout a team player? In fact, there was no job description, the base pay was "n/a," and the amazingly poor website playing techno music should have tipped me off that there was nothing of substance here. What does Nova marketing do, who are they? Of course it is just some random marketing company in Woburn, MA with a nice name like NOVA. Fortunately at the top of a google search on the company I found two people complaining about them. I decided to go the interview (getting one the day after I sent my resume in - with no cover letter) anyways just to see for myself and to make things interesting. Sure enough, I got there and while I waited, about 20 other people must have been called in with the receptionists: "well, the sooner you can come the better. We have lots of openings." Surprisingly, I did not get a group interview but got to meet the president herself: Kate Malone. Kate talked a mile a minute while her fingers snapped on keywords like: "We work with DARE (snap), 100 other national (snap) businesses, etc." After only 10 minutes of speaking with perhaps one of the most fake people I have ever met and not being asked a single question about my past or who I really was she asked me when I would be ready to start. But first, it was my turn. I asked how much the salary was and she said that we would talk about that in the second round interview (the one where you work an entire day for them for free). I then said that I was a poor college graduate and needed to have an idea of how I would live my life working for NOVA. She said that most people make about $30,000 their first year but the second they can, not all the time, jump up to $65k! "Wow," I said, "that's great." But unfortunately when I asked about the base salary she said we can't discuss that at this time and then asked with a frown whether I had a problem with working on commission?

I suppose all of my questioning didn't get me called back for the second round but it was an experience to remember and I'm glad I went. I still don't know how this job got on career builder.com

Apartment Hunting

...is like looking for a job but a whole lot more fun. People also need me as much as I need them so the game is a little more even. I'd like to find some cool roommates but is that likely when every one you meet is random? A few more days in Boston than back to VT to study for the GRE's because even though it's the last thing I want to do, taking them at some point was inevitable and I don't start work until the 11th of February.

New Year's Resolution: No more cheeseburgers?

After a short hiatus from blogging I am back. I just came back from L.A. where I saw some MAC friends and went to a Jewish retreat about an hour and a half north of L.A.. I know what people are thinking: I went to some brainwashing weird religious thing. But it wasn't like that. Besides it being a really good vacation (although California wasn't very warm), I learned a lot and had a good time. We played paint ball and did some rope's course stuff, which I'm into, and then we had some good discussions about religion. While I was not brought up religious, I decided I needed to learn some more and figure out what I want to do with it in life. We talked about more academic discussion topics like Jewish history, the decline in our numbers, intermarriage, etc. and we also talked about more religious things like latkes and dreidels, no not really, but things like why Judaism is different, living ethically, how you should judge some one (actually: how to be a mench), why being more observant can bring meaning to your life, and how exactly people who eat cheeseburgers can go cold turkey. While I am not going to become orthodox or anything now, I think celebrating the Shabbas (even if that means just lighting candels and eating dinner with family) once a week might be nice and maybe I should try dating a Jewish girl for once.

I finally got a job after 3 1/2 months of frustration. I am going to be selling natural food products at a fair trade company called Equal Exchange. It is a little bit outside Boston but I am planning on moving there in the next few weeks to start in February. It was such a relief to finally get some thing interesting with a useful purpose. More on this later...

Lastly, I spent a weird New Years bouncing around the city (N.Y.C.). I was trying to make it to a party right when the ball was dropping but didn't realize that you can't move within a 10 mile radius of Time Square. Now normally I would never do any thing as stupid as go to Time Square to see the ball drop on New Years but this was even more idiotic. I spent the precise moment of 2007 becoming 2008 looking up at some scaffolding squeezed between a few million people I didn't know joking about no of us could move. At least it seemed like a fitting ending to a year that I was all too excited to end.