Darkside Dreamland

If you are the typical American worker, today is your happy day, because today is Friday!

It’s that magical day that means time off for the weekend. And think, the previous four days you spent most of your time attempting to make yourself look more like this:

Because hey, being that guy in cubicle three that people avoid give you more time to read my blog.

But lets use this time constructively. Remember, there are lots of people that feel just like that cat. For that matter there are lots of jobs that make people look and feel like that cat. Hopefully that can change.

If you hate your job, or if your job hates you, there are things you can do about it. Especially on a Friday when you have will have plenty of time to waste that is not at your desk.

1. Make a list of the things that make you happy.
2. Make a list of the things you hate at work.
3. Now next to each item in both lists, write down a job that applies to this item.

For example:

I hate processing the mail - Mail Clerk, secretary, etc.

The Ocean makes me happy - Marine Biologist, Lifeguard, etc.

Get on Monster, About, or any degree of college search (that doesn’t list print your degree here sites) and see what it would take to avoid the things you hate and find a career or path to something that makes you happy.

If you think all of that is happy granola crunching bullshit, think about this. You probably have a friend who loves his/her job. When they talk about work it’s generally not in between shots of cheap whiskey. Depending on how much you hate your job, finding a new one or even going back to school might be cheaper than your drinking habit.

When can you do good things for completely wrong reasons? Well, I suppose there are many answers to that question. The reason I to be discussed here is doing the right thing because of your resume.

There are many organizations that do great things - the Humane Society and Boy’s & Girl’s Club come to mind - that many people may be participating in for all the wrong reasons. That very wrong reason is to build a resume. I get questions from younger co-workers like “Hey, do you think working for the Boy’s & Girl’s Club would look good on a resume?” I want to address these questions.

What I always ask when I get these questions is simple. “Do you like working with kids/animals/the elderly/etc.?”

I typically get a blank stare. They aren’t even thinking about why they would join an organization that does great things for people, only what that organization will do for their paycheck down the road. So with just a slight pause I tend to finish the sentence with a less kind line that sounds a lot like “they would be better off without you.” because it is the simple truth. If you want to build a resume on the back of a less fortunate group they will be better served by you forgetting the idea.

You might think that is a negative attitude on my part. Indeed the reaction I usually get is: but I/they would still be helping!

I would like to remind you that tapeworms are a great help for losing weight. The problem is the results are not healthy. And the same goes for helping kids for a resume. They will get attention and maybe some laughs, but the fact is that they are being helped by someone who doesn’t like kids. The difference in quality of care and energy is obvious.

The other side of the coin are people who are looking for organization to do good with. Their questions are almost as stereotyped, but in the opposite direction. They ask, “Do you know of a good organization that works with kids?”

When the question gets spoken, that person is thinking about kids, not about the royal Me. It also gets a much different response from me, I open an internet browser and start looking for groups they could join, asking follow up questions that are always met with answers, and knowing that when it does show up on a resume later it will be record of service and virtue rather than a record of greed and vice.

Have you ever wondered if society is going downhill? Ever thought that maybe the distance between people has gotten so far we no longer care?

Well, a recent article shows that this could be true. However, it also shows that this is not in any way new. Let me share the headline and a couple of sentences of an article from the Daily Record.

Woman sat dead in front of TV for 42 years.

Croatian police said she was last seen by neighbors in 1966, when she would have been 42 years old.

Her neighbors thought she had moved out of her flat in the capital, Zagreb.

…

But she was found by police and bailiffs who had broken in to help the authorities establish who owned the flat.

A police spokesman said: “So far, we have no idea how it is possible that someone officially reported missing so long ago was not found before in the same apartment she used to live in.

[headline in bold, italics added for emphasis]

I think the real shocking part is not that she was dead for 42 years, but that she was reported missing!

Normally when someone I know or a family member doesn’t show up to an event, meeting, etc. I will call, but once no one answers the phone I tend to do things like check their home. But apparently, no one thought to open this tomb up to even check is she had fallen and broken a hip.

Oh well, chalk one up for indifferent world.

My friend Parallax has once again found internet gold for me to bring to you! This time in the form of an article from the always apropos Matt Taibbi.

The article can best be shown by the introduction, in my opinion:

The word “squeeb” is a crude mix of squid and dweeb, and by inventing it I mean no disrespect to the squid, which in most respects is an excellent and admirable animal. In the ocean there’s almost nothing you’d rather be than a squid, one of nature’s most perfect predators — fast, resilient, ruthless, more intelligent by leaps and bounds than your average fish, and able to squeeze into impossibly tiny cracks. In the ocean, there is no hiding from a squid, I tell you.

But on land, a squid is about as useless as it gets. It’s a spineless, squishy little hunk of seafood that wouldn’t stand a chance in a cage match with a baby squirrel. It has no heart, and its first instinct when trouble comes is to hide in a cloud of its own excretions. This is why a squiddy word like squeeb seems to me to be a good way to describe the American voter during a presidential election season.

Matt Taibbi, Rolling Stone

From that little opener the article seems much more light hearted than it is. Taibbi hits hard in this three page story (that you should read… right now!).

The general thrust is that Americans have become just as weak and pandering as our politicians. We have lost any real patriotism for cheap one day love affairs with the idea of nationalism. We let the media show us pretty pictures that we take as truth and, more problematic, important to our lives. We scream about Obama’s pastor, Hillary’s aide, and McCain’s associations. However, we have failed consistently to look at what these candidates actually do with all that power we keep voting to give them.

Before you even finish reading this short post, don’t even mention the full article, you will probably be pulled away. The next media sensation is right around the corner. This may very well be the most important test of you attention span in history.

Please don’t fail.