nonpretentious

Prospective Taunts from Playground Bullies who will Grow Up to be Apple Employees

In the style of “first comes love, then comes marriage”
First name’s Palm, last name’s Pre, you don’t get to play with me.

In the style of…
Have fun listening to your Zunes.  Lots of luck without iTunes.

In the style of “Bubblegum, Bubblegum, in a dish”
Directions: Circle up in group. Each person cup their hands together & stretch forearm to center of group circle. Choose leader to boink each set of hands in the center.
Tweetie plus Facebook, I love my apps. What is on your piece of crap?

Fail safe: Sticks and stones may break my bones, but IE6 will never hurt me.

Dear Graduate Student: An Exchange

Dear Graduate Student,

Stop pretending. You aren’t interested in helping me. You didn’t make a lesson plan for today’s discussion section. You don’t care about this subject. And the stain on your shirt from “today’s” lunch that you jokingly apologize about—was there last week, too.

Simply, I’m not sure I can respect you. For one, your entire community seems to be divided into two equally unappealing camps:

1) People with knowledge, ambition, and sensitivity—who are painfully awkward and have physical deformities that will sabotage the attention of a lecture hall for eternity (female mustache, dental work that deserves its own multi-disciplinary study, bookshelf-sized booty);

2) The funny, outgoing, individuals who lack a working knowledge of anything, but still try and speak with authority in front of sort-of-impressionable students. In some alternate universe, I’d call you “cool” or facebook friend you. Even if we shared a sizable wall-to-wall, it couldn’t justify taking your suggestions to heart.

But its what your camps share that’s the most upsetting. As academia’s freshest faces, you should be able to connect with us, or at least impart some kind of understanding and optimism about our experiences. Instead, you seem no more human than our god-complex professors and cracked-out advisors.

Why? Is it so liberating being out of our shoes that you want to impose the same kind of mindless restrictions and requirements on our learning? Or is academia really about hoop jumping, groveling, and eating shit until you are published/tenured/die? Let me know.

-Undergrad

–

Undergrads, write to your graduate students here.

Grad students, write to your teacher’s pets here.

All venting is anonymous.

Tag, you’re it!

If you are anyone who has a Facebook account, you have probably been tagged on this meme where you share 25 random facts about yourself. Well here’s mine, and now you, Nonpretentious, are asked to share the same. Go!

1. I just moved to NH in August, 2007. This is the first time I have lived more than 45 minutes away from my parents.

2. I am an only child and wish, now more than ever, that I had siblings.

3. I am getting married on May 30, after a 22-month long engagement to my best friend.

4. I really enjoyed wedding planning..until it got to the little details…and somedays I just get too overwhelmed.

5. I have a job that I absolutely love and everyday I am thankful that I haven’t been laid off…yet.

6. My Catholic faith is a really important part of my life, and I find strength in going to mass each week.

7. I enjoy lectoring at church and being a Eucharistic minister.

8. I have had at least 3 wedding nightmares while being engaged. They involve forgetting to book a limo, freaking out and cancelling my bachelorette party, and….the third must have been really bad because I have blacked it out of my memory.

9. I am loyal to a fault, and people take advantage of that.

10. It makes me really upset that I have fallen out of touch with friends, especially those from high school, but more so that those friends still keep in touch with each other.

11. I am a really good listener, but have a hard time expressing myself.

12. I get nervous in a most social situations…and sometimes it makes me studder. I hope nobody notices!

13. I wish I could be happy with my body image…I struggle with weight issues from time to time.

14. I have a super hard time being consistent with habits (i.e. going to the gym..eating healthy foods) but I am consistent with relationships, I have been with jordan since 2003 and I am really proud of our commitment to each other.

15. I have a terrible addiction to soda. terrible!

16. I am really excited to have children, but am terrified of screwing them up. But I want to have at least 2!

17. I have an extremely unhealthy addiction to facebook.

18. I love working in the court system, and secretly wonder if I have what it takes to become a lawyer. I tend to not give myself too much credit.

19. I switched majors the first semester of my senior year in college and had to stay an extra semester, but I am now, very happy with my decision.

20. Jordan and i have an insane move collection, that we alphabetize, of course, and separate the TV on DVD from the movies. You know they cannot co-mingle.

21. I didn’t do my first shot of liquor until my senior year of college. I waited until I had the right people around me

22. I have an unhealthy obsession with the mail. I cannot wait to come home and check it everyday..and even when I am traveling for work..Jordan won’t even check it because he knows how excited I will be to check it when I finally come home. I don’t know what I will do if mail delivery goes down from 6 days a week to 5!

23. I was in the annual musical from 6th-12th grade. But..I can’t carry a tune. I wish I still had the self-confidence to act.

24. I met Keanu Reeves in Chicago at like 130 in the morning. I was there for an honor society conference and it was the most amazing night!!!!!!! i love him and i don’t care what anyone says. what does a diehard fan say when they are faced with their idol in the flesh? “I really liked you in the Matrix..” I am so ashamed of myself.

25. I love animals, and am sad that we can’t have any in our current apartment. I can’t wait until we move somewhere/own our own home and can start our own zoo. Which may or may not include humans.

Tag, you're it!

If you are anyone who has a Facebook account, you have probably been tagged on this meme where you share 25 random facts about yourself. Well here’s mine, and now you, Nonpretentious, are asked to share the same. Go!

1. I just moved to NH in August, 2007. This is the first time I have lived more than 45 minutes away from my parents.

2. I am an only child and wish, now more than ever, that I had siblings.

3. I am getting married on May 30, after a 22-month long engagement to my best friend.

4. I really enjoyed wedding planning..until it got to the little details…and somedays I just get too overwhelmed.

5. I have a job that I absolutely love and everyday I am thankful that I haven’t been laid off…yet.

6. My Catholic faith is a really important part of my life, and I find strength in going to mass each week.

7. I enjoy lectoring at church and being a Eucharistic minister.

8. I have had at least 3 wedding nightmares while being engaged. They involve forgetting to book a limo, freaking out and cancelling my bachelorette party, and….the third must have been really bad because I have blacked it out of my memory.

9. I am loyal to a fault, and people take advantage of that.

10. It makes me really upset that I have fallen out of touch with friends, especially those from high school, but more so that those friends still keep in touch with each other.

11. I am a really good listener, but have a hard time expressing myself.

12. I get nervous in a most social situations…and sometimes it makes me studder. I hope nobody notices!

13. I wish I could be happy with my body image…I struggle with weight issues from time to time.

14. I have a super hard time being consistent with habits (i.e. going to the gym..eating healthy foods) but I am consistent with relationships, I have been with jordan since 2003 and I am really proud of our commitment to each other.

15. I have a terrible addiction to soda. terrible!

16. I am really excited to have children, but am terrified of screwing them up. But I want to have at least 2!

17. I have an extremely unhealthy addiction to facebook.

18. I love working in the court system, and secretly wonder if I have what it takes to become a lawyer. I tend to not give myself too much credit.

19. I switched majors the first semester of my senior year in college and had to stay an extra semester, but I am now, very happy with my decision.

20. Jordan and i have an insane move collection, that we alphabetize, of course, and separate the TV on DVD from the movies. You know they cannot co-mingle.

21. I didn’t do my first shot of liquor until my senior year of college. I waited until I had the right people around me

22. I have an unhealthy obsession with the mail. I cannot wait to come home and check it everyday..and even when I am traveling for work..Jordan won’t even check it because he knows how excited I will be to check it when I finally come home. I don’t know what I will do if mail delivery goes down from 6 days a week to 5!

23. I was in the annual musical from 6th-12th grade. But..I can’t carry a tune. I wish I still had the self-confidence to act.

24. I met Keanu Reeves in Chicago at like 130 in the morning. I was there for an honor society conference and it was the most amazing night!!!!!!! i love him and i don’t care what anyone says. what does a diehard fan say when they are faced with their idol in the flesh? “I really liked you in the Matrix..” I am so ashamed of myself.

25. I love animals, and am sad that we can’t have any in our current apartment. I can’t wait until we move somewhere/own our own home and can start our own zoo. Which may or may not include humans.

What Does Your Facebook Profile Say About You? (An Introduction in 4 Parts)

The top of my profile on Facebook.

Here's What the Top of My Facebook Profile Says About Me (...with notes...)

Hi, I’m RecruiterEsq and I quit my day job to form a company that is still figuring out how to articulate its vision.  

If you’re OK taking career advice from someone with that disclaimer…

…that’s mostly what i’ll post about under this name.

Think of a mullet:  RecruiterEsq is the business in the front.

Get Rich Quick with Web 2.0 (Part 1): Network & Chat at the Watercooler – A How-To Guide on LinkedIn and Typing (I mean, Twittering)

I’m simply boggled by the multitudes of articles out there that are dedicated to teaching people how to use “social media 2.0.”  If people take the time to sign up for the site, enter their name, their e-mail, create a password, verify that they’re human(ness)…don’t you think they should be smart enough to know how to use the website?

Judging by the literature that’s out there, it doesn’t look like it.  Instead, it looks like marketing professionals need to learn how to use these tools for marketing.  Human resource professionals need to learn how to use these tools for sourcing and recruiting candidates.  PR professionals need to learn how to use these tools for feeding information.  And, the casual, narcissistic user needs to learn how to strategically gather more followers, connections, or fans while staying true to his or her casual, narcissistic self.  (Note:  a few of those blog authors would learn a few things if their links were a little more user friendly, don’t you think?  It’s a little lesson we learned awhile ago thanks to evil beet!)

Therefore, in this series of articles, nonpretentious will be your meta guide through the guides as we take a look at what the “pros” can teach us on how to use these so-called “social” media sites…the first two we attack?  Well, obviously LinkedIn & Twitter! Continue reading…