You Live and You Learn

This post may be more aptly titled, "Thoughts, Questions, Discoveries, and Life Ponderings Whilst Conducting My First Ever Big Girl Job Search." That seems a little long, but I'm not ruling it out completely just because... I mean, how often does one have the opportunity to say "whilst"?

1. Stating a desired salary is the most awkward thing, ever. Let's be honest, I've spent the past four years working as a part-time coffeehouse barista and summer camp counselor just to put gas in my car -- anything over $5,000 a year is an insane amount of money to me at this point. Beggars can't be choosers, people. I simply desire to have a salary. Please don't make me continue to fill in the desired salary box.

2. Finding a grammatical error/typo on a company's job listing should automatically guarantee me the position, right?

3. When I click "full-time" under the search criteria, I do not mean "full-time for the next three months, and then you'll have to find another job." Bummer.

4. There are graphic designers who work with print and layout design, and there are graphic designers who work with web design. We need distinct, completely unrelated names that do not overlap in the slightest, because it's slightly discouraging to find ten "graphic design" positions and then realize that the majority of them require flash/animation/computer coding skills that I do not possess.

5. Victoria's Secret is currently hiring a graphic designer, if anyone is interested...

6. Pretty sure my favorite requirement to even apply to a job (thus far) is 300+ friends on Facebook and over 200 followers on Twitter. It baffles me to think that simply could not have existed five years ago... or to think that somebody could be denied a job for not having enough Twitter followers.

7. For whatever strange reason, I've always loved filling out surveys, so oddly enough, the whole job application thing is growing on me. If I try really hard, I can almost pretend that I'm spending hours filling out a bunch of surveys... all about me...

8. I understand that for most jobs, the overall importance of the resumé is the content, not the layout & design. But let's be honest: my resumé is all about the looks. It's kind of the whole point. However, it's slightly frustrating when companies won't accept a PDF file... Word documents only. How am I supposed to express my creativity in a Word document? Certainly not like this:


Yeah, that's what I thought.
9. While everyone older than me has already come to this conclusion, I felt the need to reiterate its truth: I don't already have 30 years of experience in the design field, so I'm horribly under-qualified for every position I've applied to thus far. Who knew that "entry-level" actually meant "a minimum of 3-5 years experience"?

10. Everything would be grand if somebody would pay me a desirable salary (whatever that's supposed to be...) to live in North Carolina and design cards and invitations of all sorts: save the dates, wedding, birth announcements, birthdays, parties, holidays, etc. [I'm looking at you, Tiny Prints. Why are you in California, and why are you currently not hiring? I could make every single one of those designs and we both know it.] If you know of anyone who could make this happen, send them my way. I'm getting really good at filling out applications...


Let's go, #jobsearch2012 :)

Monday Medley

Mmm, Monday Medley. Not only a wonderful excuse for some alliteration (which I love), but also a very eloquent way of saying "I-haven't-blogged-in-nearly-two-weeks-so-I-should-probably-post-something-before-people-yell-at-me-but-I-don't-really-have-anything-significant-enough-to-write-an-entire-blog-post-about."

So... Monday Medley it is. Or the Monday Mix. Monday Miscellany? Mishmash? Mélange? Mélange is French, which reminds me that "mon" means "mine" in French, which makes me think of "Monday" as "my day"...and that's a much better way to start off the week...

But I digress.

We'll start off with a Friday Phone Dump, which has been conveniently changed to a Monday Phone Dump so as not to confuse my lovely blog readers. Although I was super close to calling it a Friday Phone Dump just for the fun of it...

This accurately sums up my past few weeks, left to right, top to bottom:

1. I went to Elmo's with my RA friends and colored the 2396th duck of my undergraduate career.

2/3/4. I made a note of how gorgeous it was outside while I was stuck inside working on homework/job applications. (Hmph.)

5. I drank Starbucks with Laura. I've actually done that every week for the past two years.

6. I watched the majority of seasons 2, 3, and 4 of One Tree Hill on Netflix while pretending to be Peyton.

7/8. I hung out with baby J & his big sister. I actually do that every week as well.

9/10. I met Bill Cosby. When I walked forward to meet him, he announced, "Be careful. This one asks for money!"

11. Zach bought a car! He asked me to help him name it, but I currently don't have any ideas. Suggestions?

12. Zach's new car reminds me that my car is getting old. I can't believe I've traveled 60,000 miles in this thing!

13. Since Zach finally has a car again, he got to come see me :)

14. He brought flowers.

15. He is cute.

• • • • •

Continuing on with the medley, we have my most recent accomplishment: I joined the Be The Match Registry (formerly known as the National Marrow Donor Program).

In doing so, I learned that it normally costs around $100 (lab fees) to register. BUT thanks to some donations by people with significantly more money than me, you can join for free today and tomorrow. I mean, seriously, who doesn't love free? I timed myself, and it took less than ten minutes to fill out the online registration form. Then I got a kit in the mail to do a cheek swab, and...tada! I could potentially end up being a match and saving someone's life in the next 38 years. No big deal.

But actually... huge deal! If you're interested in joining the Be The Match Registry, click here. Or here. Or here. [They all actually go to the same website, but I figured that listing it three times would make people three times more likely to click on it, right?] It's a really great thing, and it's super easy to do! And did I mention it's free through the end of January...?

• • • • •

I don't plug causes often, but while I'm at it, I suppose I'll post more than one and let you choose your good deed for the day :)

My all-time favorite blog is Enjoying the Small Things by Kelle Hampton. I've mentioned it before - it's frequently the highlight of my day on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. Kelle has two precious little girls, the youngest of which (Nella) has Down Syndrome.

For Nella's 1st birthday last year, Kelle set a lofty goal of raising $15,000 for the National Down Syndrome Society... and she ended up with over $100,000! She is hoping to extend that amount to $200,000 by Nella's 2nd birthday party, which is a week away, and she has less than $10,000 to go.

It's impossible to read Kelle's blog without being inspired to give. I typically see things like this and think that it would be a wonderful opportunity for people other than broke college students to donate. But even broke college student here can afford to give up $5 or $10... and combined with your $5 or $10, that can go a long way. Small things, great love, baby.

Click here to donate. Or here or here, just for the fun of it :)

And now that you've hopefully been inspired to do something great with your day, perhaps you can also be encouraged by some Hillsong lyrics that I happen to adore.

A pretty great reminder to kick off this week :) We can just call it a Monday Message. Monday Memo? Monday Motivation...

Happy Monday!