Hate Mail!

As the photo editor of a nature magazine, I received my first hate mail! Addressed to me, personally! Hubby says that I should frame it.

Fun things to do in Anne Arundel County in the Winter

Anne Arundel County has a pretty impressive parks department, with a great selection of winter programming for both children and adults. Since I don't have kids...here are the best of the adult highlights:

• Pottery, sewing and quilting classes at the South County Recreation Center in Harwood, Maryland
• Ice skating in Glen Burnie Town Center and Quiet Waters Park in Annapolis. You can also take classes and rent skates. Quiet Waters is open pretty much all day (from 9 or 10am until 9pm), every day except that it's closed on Tuesdays.
• Inexpensive yoga and zumba classes, from about 7.50 to 10.00 per class
• Adult ballet, modern, tap, hip hop and belly dancing classes. Classes start in Jan-Feb and cost about $100.

See the online catalogue of winter programs that Anne Arundel County offers here.

The best yoga deal around is not through AA county, but rather Community Yoga night in Galesville. Renaissance Yoga offers $5 walk-in yoga every Wednesday evening from 7:15 to 8:15 at Galesville Memorial Hall, right next to the fire department on Galesville Road.

Bars and Restaurants in Deale, Maryland

Skipper's Pier's outside patio and dockbar.
Photo: Flickr/Oblivious Dude








As far as restaurants in Deale go, if you're crazy about fried seafood, you're in luck. If you're looking for something a bit more sophisticated...be prepared to drive to Annapolis.

Happy Harbor: This cheap beer mecca is popular with the charter boat captains. It lies right on the water at Rockhold Creek and if you sit on the dockside patio, you'll instantly feel like you're on vacation. Land of the $2 Budweisers and $3.50 Sam Adams seasonals, Happy Harbor is a great place to get a cheap beer along with a burger or fried fish sandwich.

Calypso Bay: A goofy tiki bar on Rockhold Creek with not-great food, the place nevertheless seems popular with young people. If you like frou-frou drinks and neon palm trees, you'll feel at home. The roomy sports bar happily eschews the tiki theme and feels like a normal bar, complete with pool table and several televisions.

The restaurant food is sub-par, although standard bar fare like buffalo wings is passable. Avoid the gooey, sweet coconut shrimp. With the raspberry coulis that accompanies them, they taste like shrimp-flavored jelly doughnuts. On the plus side, Calypso Bay offers $1.50 crabs on Wednesday nights in summer, and 25-cent oysters the rest of the year. You just can't beat those prices.

Skipper's Pier: Skipper's is terrific:  good seafood, expansive modern menu, and a reasonably-priced Friday night seafood buffet that isn't half-bad. The fish tacos are so tasty that it's hard to order anything else, unless it's the perfect seafood platter, which has the crabbiest crab cake plus fried oysters and shrimp.

But the setting is what makes Skipper's stand out. Skipper's straddles Rockhold Creek and the Chesapeake Bay, and you can eat on a huge patio over the water. Even better, there is a double-decker bar at the end of the dock. As many people arrive at the dockbar by boat as by car, which is very appealing if you can ignore the gratuitous and prolonged engine-revving of people calling attention to million-dollar speedboats. 

In addition to the gorgeous setting, the outdoor bar gets a constant cooling breeze that makes it easy to sit outside for hours, even in August. The great sound system, crowd-pleasing tunes, and engaging bar staff make Skipper's a fun place to spend a weekend night. Start early at Skipper's, because the 30 and 40-something crowd trickles out by 9 and the bar closes by 10:30pm on weekends and 9:30 on weeknights. If you're young enough to think that 10:30 sounds too much like your parents' bedtime, and bored enough to withstand the mating calls of scantily-clad 22-year-olds, you can always head to Calypso Bay after hours. Personally, I have to be pretty desperate before going that route.

Pete Green's (but more affectionately referred to as Petie's): Locals LOVE this dive, which features -- what else? -- fried seafood and crabs. As with many Deale haunts, this restaurant/bar offers quite a few beers, but nearly all of them are domestic. Who knew there were so many flavors of Bud Light and MGD?  The restaurant not only lacks a waterfront location, it's also ugly, dark and tiny. However, the terrific food and convivial company make up for the lack of ambience.  Petie's menu is on the expensive side, but the quality and portions justify the prices. Eating the well-seasoned, perfectly-fried food reminds me of living in New Orleans, which is a pretty big compliment to any restaurant.

The Happy House Pizzeria is a fairly typical local pizza joint:  think friendly owners, grinders, gyros, lots of sandwiches with cheese and tomato sauce, and  Greek salads. Try the eggplant parmesan sandwich, which is one of the best I've ever tasted. The thinly sliced, crisply fried eggplant avoids the usual eggplant sogginess. The sauce tastes heartily of tomatoes and the sandwich is served toasted with golden bubbling cheese. What's not to like?

The Greek salads, which feature dark green lettuce, juicy tomatoes, olives, an oregano-flavored vinaigrette and loads of feta cheese, are huge and tasty. But avoid the steak subs, which are greasy and unappealing.

Nearby restaurants:

Pirate's Cove in Galesville: Gorgeous waterfront setting in the beautiful sailing town of Galesville 10 minutes north of Deale. Average food and decor, huge portions, reasonable prices. (I almost feel like I could stop there). Two could easily split the smoked bluefish appetizer and a salad for dinner. Pirate's Cove is a nice place to get a cold beer and share a platter of fried fish while looking at the water in the summer, or eat prime rib in the cozy ambience of its two fireplaces in the winter. Warning:  the restaurant's website implies that it's a romantic place. As I found out on an anniversary date with my husband, it is not.

La Fiesta in Edgewater: A cute place for a strip mall, but don't expect authentic Mexican food -- or prices. The margaritas aren't bad, but they're not great either.

Friendly's in Edgewater: Home of the Happy Ending sundae. Now, some people can't hear the words "happy ending" without giggling, but the "happy" innocently refers to how you will feel when scarfing down a petite sundae after your meal. (But since I have to titter each and every time I see a "speed hump" sign -- whose idea was that, Maryland? -- I guess I shouldn't judge).

Friendly's features middle of the road diner-style food in a sanitized, family-friendly atmosphere. Their sundaes are pricey and diabetic shock-inducing, but I have to say, delicious. I recently ordered one of their candy-style ones, and it oozed with hot fudge, peanut butter sauce, whipped cream and, the pièce de résistance, hot marshmallow sauce. I remember loving the marshmallow sauce as a child, but naturally assumed I would hate it as an adult. Revolting, right? But I'm happy to report that marshmallow sauce is still pretty awesome in its warm, sticky glory. And the peanut butter sauce is a salty-sweet dream.

Friendly's menu also features something I'm longing to try but haven't quite been able to justify, even after a year of fantasizing:   all manner of pancakes and french toast topped with ice cream and sundae toppings! 

About Deale: This tiny boating, fishing and farming community on the Western Shore of Maryland is about 25 minutes south of Annapolis and 45 minutes from Washington, DC.

Photos
Skipper's Pier photo: Flickr/Oblivious Dude

In theory, it could be true that I sold cars for a living

I sold cars for a living one summer. Or, to be more accurate, I sold a car for a living one summer. One whole car. To say that I didn't excel at car sales is an understatement on the measure of "Sarah Palin isn't a policy wonk."

This is another job I got because of my gender, but it's probably not what you're thinking. I actually showed up in response to an ad for a receptionist, and somehow got talked into a position as salesperson.

Some explanation: this was in the heyday of a really terrific marketing campaign that introduced Saturn to the car market. Unless you're too young, you probably remember the ads. They were primarily aimed at women, and made a revolutionary offer to just tell people the price of the car, with no games, gimmicks, or negotiating. Lots of people were intrigued, and every other car dealer soon wanted a piece of that action.

The dealership that I applied to (Subaru) had had some success with one female saleswoman -- which they attributed solely to her gender. In fact, she was a bright, outgoing woman with a knack for sales, but the good ol' boys who managed the place never thought to credit her salesmanship.

So when I interviewed for the job, the manager astutely deduced that I am, in fact, female and decided solely on that basis that I should sell cars. He explained that the dealership was emulating the Saturn model: they were going to be honest with their customers, earn their trust, and not engage in high-pressure techniques that scared people away.

The problem is, the high pressure old school method of selling was in the manager's blood. He wanted the crowd but his heart was not in the whole truth-telling, fair-dealing honesty thing.

Many times, the manager explained to me how a lie was something that was, theoretically, almost true...if you looked at it just the right way. It could be true. Like the day I was sent out to the grocery store parking lot to look for beat-up cars. My mission was to leave hand-written notes on every beater with the message to the owner that I was looking for a car like that for a customer, and to call if they were looking to sell. When I asked if any of this was true -- or just a ploy to lure people to the dealership -- I was told that it was "possible" that we wanted beater cars to sell. He said "it could be true."

So the whole thing wasn't for me. Sure, I put the notes on the cars. But when people actually called me back, I quickly told them the truth. Which left them a little puzzled, and me with no customers.

The other problem is that the dealerships make all their profits on overpriced used cars. The model is simple: get the customer into a car -- whether it is new or used -- and steal his trade-in. Customers are so focused on how much they're paying for cars that they give little thought to how much they're getting for their old ones. Then dealers sell the trade-in at a ridiculously inflated price. The difference between the pittance you they for trade-ins and the obscene prices they charge customers (after a quick wash and shine) is what makes dealerships and unscrupulous salesman rich.

One of the reasons used cars are so much more profitable than new ones is the Internet: people can look up the sticker price on the 'net, while used cars have tons of variables that make their values more nebulous. Or at least, that's what the salesman want you to believe.

There is some money to be made in new cars, but it's not about how much customers pay for them. One of the more disgusting things salespeople do is to make a big deal out of negotiating for a car. Once it's done, you relax, because after all, you're home-free. Then you visit the nice credit manager, who robs you blind. The credit manager's ostensible job is to find a loan for you to pay for the car (which the dealership profits from), and help you work out the details. His real job is to sell you a bunch of options you don't need: hugely profitable extended warranties. Undercoating (this is the worst...you get it whether you pay the extra grand for it or not). A high interest loan. Car mats that come with the car, whether you pay extra for them or not. A million options you can't really afford, and which usually add up to paying thousands of extra dollars for a car.

So when I tell people that I sold cars one summer, they often don't believe me, and with good reason. But I swear that I did sell one car.

1-day jobs

My best friend and I moved to a new state and had to find new jobs, so we applied for every cocktail waitressing job we saw in the paper. After all, the money was great in New Orleans.

We quickly interviewed and got positions with a big function hall/nightclub, bought our required tuxedo shirts and bowties (I'm forever buying tuxedo shirts and bowties and throwing them away, praying I'll NEVER need them again), and began our first shift on singles night. Or as we refer to it, Old Person Meat Market. OPMM featured disco lights, easy listening and disco light music, and an enormous and nearly empty dance floor. Even better, it was overrun by vain bearded men in mock turtlenecks, blazers and gold jewelry (they took the admonition to "dress to impress" very seriously) drinking gingerales. By the way, gingerale = no tip and no refill. Best friend and I took our collective $9 in tips home and never went back.

But the specter of OPMM haunts my nightmares still.

That's Just Mean!

Yet another way to take advantage of job seekers' desperation: offer to send their resume to the top of employer searches for a fee (with the darkly implied corollary of sending resumes to the bottom if job seekers don't pay the extortion...uh, fee). Saw this kind of thing on a bunch of career posting sites:

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Denny's Waitress

My first waitressing job was at Denny's in a suburb of New Orleans.

Denny's waitresses are a hard-core group. They work grueling 8+ hour shifts that don't ease up for ten seconds. They manage coffee pots, condiments and heavy diner plates with machine-like precision. They make time to prepare complicated sundaes in the middle of juggling way more tables than you would think possible, in absurdly short time frames. They earn respectable livings off 15% tips on $4 entrees, and they don't complain. They do it all while not appearing to rush and calling their patrons "babe" and "darling." Most of them do it into their 70's. I was not one of them.

And they knew it. I trained on the hellish breakfast shift, where not one of the wait staff was less than 65 years of age. Very few of the patrons were, either. Denny's offers discounted meals (less than the normal high of $4 per entree) to seniors, who heavily took advantage of it. Being the most junior waitress, I "inherited" one of the most annoying patrons. Every day, he ordered the Senior Slam breakfast with an off-menu request for poached eggs. Every day he demanded that the eggs be carefully prepared and dried with a paper towel, so they wouldn't be wet. Every day he sent them back to be re-dried. Every day he left me 10% on his $2.70 breakfast.

I never conquered the breakfast shift. Every day was a whirlwind of grueling work, confusion, and pain. It was like trying to survive a tornado...for eight hours at at time. My elderly co-workers relished it.

Luckily, once trained, I worked the overnight 11 to 7 shift, with the teenagers and the drunks. This shift was actually pretty awesome, as far as diner waitressing goes. The kids were way more fun to wait on than the adults, especially since I was barely older than they were. The drunk people on their way home from partying were the best tippers and easiest to deal with. Always entertaining, invariably in good moods, and not picky at all. In fact, the drunks rarely remembered what they ordered; as long as you placed some kind of greasy sustenance in front of them, they ate it. On a few occasions, they also fell asleep in it. They certainly didn't send food back to the kitchen. And because they never felt much like doing math, they always overtipped.

But then I was assigned to the swing shift, 3 to 11pm. Ahhh, dinner time for vacationing families on a budget. This shift lacked the absurd volume of the breakfast shift, and the overtipping of the overnight period. Instead, there was a short but insane dinner rush that mostly involved fixing special kid-proof drinks, fetching crayons, and cleaning the mashed food and trash kids liked to throw under the tables. It also involved dodging said children, who were often allowed to roam free in the restaurant, tripping tray-laden waitresses and screaming like wild animals. We were just killing time during the rest of the hours.

People always mention racism at Denny's, and perhaps it did exist. But not at my restaurant, which was managed by a patient, fair black woman who never would have tolerated racist or otherwise prejudiced behavior. Even towards the large Sunday afternoon crowds of Baptists, who ran us around with special orders and demands, and often actually left advice cards or religious materials in place of tips. Ageism, on the other hand, might've been a different case. Only, in this instance, it was ageism against the younger waitstaff, who routinely took the worst shifts and tables. Perhaps it was because of our lack of commitment: we were never going to put in the 20 or 30 years you needed to before you were accepted as a Denny's insider.

An incident that stands out in my mind: the young daughters of one of my co-workers visited the restaurant with their dad. Their mother, an intelligent, model-beautiful woman who possessed enviable blond hair, blue eyes and chiseled features, had been working at the restaurant all of her adult life (she was maybe 40). Her mother - now in her late 60's - had worked the vicious breakfast shift for many years. So when the waitresses gathered round to coo over the pretty young girls, I guess it made sense to label them "future Denny's waitresses," which is what one of my co-workers did, without a trace of despair. That's the kind of commitment I just didn't sign up for. I left Denny's after a few months to work on Bourbon Street, New Orleans.

Pros:Half-price Grand Slam breakfasts...Denny's french toast and over-easy eggs, you are the breakfast of my dreams. I miss you. Love, Lisa

The look of shock on someone's face when I announce that I used to wait tables at Denny's

Cons:Where to begin?

Photo: Flickr/Thomas Hawk

A Reprieve

Sometimes a temp assignment is a gift. Right now I’m working in the interactive online department of a top-tier political mar-com firm. In a really short time, I’ve learned a good deal about how to use, optimize and analyze Google AdWords, create sophisticated and useable metrics for online campaigns, a thing or two about Salsa Labs’ progressive online organizing platform…okay, I know I sound like a total geek. But it really is exciting and educational to be here if things like metrics, data and politics float your boat (they do mine).

And, drumroll please: I got to write a marketing proposal for my favorite senator. Score!

Sadly, this assignment ended today. So sad. Please let me stay here forever! Don’t send me back to endless story pitching, boring admin, or the bureaucratic hell of non-profits.

101 Jobs I've Held #4: Coffee Shop Girl

Youth and Beauty

I say "coffee shop girl" because the small chain I worked for only hired females of college age or younger. Little did I realize this would be the first in a long line of jobs that would exploit my youth and, well, fairly mild cuteness. Mostly my youth. I was so naive that I worked the whole summer and never noticed. It's pretty obvious now...the attendants now wear little pink tank tops and look like the coffee version of Hooter's waitresses. But I swear it was more subtle when I was there.

Click this link if you want to be seriously disturbed.

Over-Eager Elders

Mornings at the coffee shop were hell. While applying for the job, I was told that I might have to work an occasional early morning shift, but somehow ended up having to wake up at 4:30am to work early shifts every day. Just what every 19-year-old wants to do on summer vacation. At least my shift ended in the early afternoon and the shop was close to the beach...but then it rained almost every day.

From 5:30 to 6am I had to make 28 pots of coffee (don't ask) on three coffee brewers. While juggling pots in a nearly-impossible time-frame, I had to accept the doughnut delivery and count the papers, ready the register and perform a host of other minor tasks. It was a complicated dance but if you were really on the ball (aren't we all at 5:30 in the morning?) you could just about squeak through.

Unless there were interruptions. And there were always interruptions, in the form of over-eager elders banging on the door like caffeine-crazed zombies and begging me to open early. These regulars knew we opened at 6am but could never wait. Because 6:00 in the freakin' morning is just not early enough. In my first brush with "the customer is always right, even when he's an idiot" school of thought, management insisted I let the zombies in early for their coffee. Despite the fact that it meant I would never be ready for the morning rush.

Fun in the AM!

Ahhh, morning rush. The shop was directly on a major commuter route into Boston, so between 6 and 8, I faced an endless litany of pre-coffee commuters. Cheerful bunch.

Dance!

Coffee shops, especially in the pre-Starbucks caveman era, didn't really pay well. I think I made about $6 an hour (including the few small tips we received). However, the shop offered the occasional opportunity to earn some real money. For $20 an hour, you could don a giant pink cup costume - essentially a cup with legs - and stand in front of the store and wave. Maybe dance a little. However, my stepdad forbade it, which seemed really unfair at the time. Looking back...thank God for parental judgment.

Coffee Drinks

While pretending to take coffee seriously, the chain served a slew of flavored brews and a wide and profitable variety of unhealthy sugar/coffee/whipped cream/flavor shot concoctions. We also served espresso drinks but were only given about a minute's training on the machine. On the rare occasion someone ordered a cappuccino I panicked and made any kind of random drink using water and coffee and the machine. If you ever ordered an espresso drink on my shift, I apologize: it may have looked right but I'm pretty sure it wasn't what you were expecting. In the sense of tasting like actual coffee.
--------------
Pros
All the free coffee I could drink

Cons
It turns that drinking lots of coffee makes me very jittery
Pre-coffee morning people
An early introduction to sexual harassment
Early mornings = no social life

Illegal Internships

I'm NOT crazy: the recent preponderance of internships advertised that clearly should be paid jobs is a) getting worse and b) illegal. Thank you for always reading my mind, New York Times. And thank you, Obama Administration, for trying to turn back the labor abuses that have multiplied since the last guy took office and gutted enforcement.

“If you’re a for-profit employer or you want to pursue an internship with a for-profit employer, there aren’t going to be many circumstances where you can have an internship and not be paid and still be in compliance with the law,” said Nancy J. Leppink, the acting director of the department’s wage and hour division.

Ms. Leppink said many employers failed to pay even though their internships did not comply with the six federal legal criteria that must be satisfied for internships to be unpaid. Among those criteria are that the internship should be similar to the training given in a vocational school or academic institution, that the intern does not displace regular paid workers and that the employer “derives no immediate advantage” from the intern’s activities — in other words, it’s largely a benevolent contribution to the intern.

I've seen unpaid internships for jobs that were clearly data entry or worse. I've also witnessed employers fluffing up descriptions to recruit interns who would then be obligated to pitch stories to reporters for most of the week - the PR equivalent of telemarketing.

On the other end, I've also seen unpaid internships demanding skills in complicated software platforms, extensive writing and research experience, HTML expertise and a host of other things that those internships are supposedly there to nurture. Employers seem to have decided that since a lot of college kids learn pretty great computer skills, they don't really need to pay for them. But since this is obviously displacing work that would normally be paid, it's illegal.

Ms. Leppink said many employers failed to pay even though their internships did not comply with the six federal legal criteria that must be satisfied for internships to be unpaid. Among those criteria are that the internship should be similar to the training given in a vocational school or academic institution, that the intern does not displace regular paid workers and that the employer “derives no immediate advantage” from the intern’s activities — in other words, it’s largely a benevolent contribution to the intern.

In addition to being unfair to the interns who do perform drudge work for no money, unpaid internships tend to depress class mobility in this country. Workers need them to make connections and gain the experience employers seek, but generally only wealthier kids - who count on the financial support of their parents -are able to take them. I appreciate that the NY Times addresses this fairness issue.

While many colleges are accepting more moderate- and low-income students to increase economic mobility, many students and administrators complain that the
growth in unpaid internships undercuts that effort by favoring well-to-do and well-connected students, speeding their climb up the career ladder.

Bad Job Titles

"Team Member Loyalty Assistant"

The name says it all. Actually, it really wasn't a bad job. Just an incredibly embarrassing title. I was later promoted to Team Member Loyalty Manager. No kidding.

You won't find that job title on my resume...it would be too humiliating. Luckily, I don't have to since the powers-that-be wouldn't let my boss officially rename it (so I'm still coded as the more palatable "employee relations manager").

Jobs I have had: #2 in a long, long series: Video Clerk

As a pretty innocent and destitute twenty-ish girl, I took a part-time job at the video store a few blocks from my apartment in New Orleans, right on the beautiful St. Charles streetcar line. The store was a pretty impressive operation: good video selection, quite a few snacks, a large rent-to-own furniture section, pay by the minute cell phones, recording studio...and a thriving collection of p-o-r-n that paid for the whole thing. (Not trying to be coy...but experience has taught that you don't want to be Google-searched for that particular keyword). They kind of forgot to mention the p-o-r-n before I took the position.

And this wasn't just any old p-o-r-n section. Without having anything in the world to compare it to besides Skinemax, I'm still pretty sure this was the hard-core stuff. Your basic multiple, um, appendages in one poor overcrowded ass, faces covered in, gulp, slime kind of entertainment. And that's just what was happening on the cover art.

Even better, all my co-workers at the video store worked there for the porn, which was free for employees. And they thought it was very funny to suddenly disappear when customers came to check out p-o-r-n videos, with their discreet billboard-sized stand-ins with the aforementioned activities taking place on them. So if you wanted to enjoy a relaxing night of smut in the privacy of your own home, you had to go through me first. Pervs of the world, I apologize.

My co-workers also thought it amusing to check out the most out-there nasty fetish titles to my account...which then stayed in my permanent rental history.

So this wasn't my favorite job. But it wasn't my least favorite, either.

Jobs I Have Had: Popcorn Concession Girl

Highlights:

• Free movies, and I could bring my friends
• Seeing the Fugitive twice with my dad during a really hot summer. Ahhh, air conditioning!
• Free popcorn

Lowlights:

• A head-to-toe polyester uniform. Not the worst I've ever worn, but close. It included too-tight navy pants, a white/plaid shirt, red vest, and finally...a bowtie. Awesome.
• Waaay too much free popcorn
• Cleaning the "butter" machine. Never eating popcorn again.
  

photo: Flickr/protoflux

Dubious Honor

I just met with a recruiter or three. Sadly, the one who liked me best was the temp recruiter. And why shouldn't she love me? I'm pretty sure I'm the best temp in all of Washington, DC. This isn't a boast; it's gotta be the world's most dubious honor. How can I be everyone's very favorite temp -- a magical contractor who not only handles high-level work way outside her pay grade, but diligently performs odious, tedious tasks with care -- and still have no job offer?

And, I'm such a spazz...the recruiter told me she wouldn't even write my bottom-line salary expectation in her notes because it was too low.

I'm pretty sure the favorite-temp/salary things are related. Just a sign of my high self-esteem.

Cover Letter Hell

Writing the perfect cover letter is literally an impossible task.

Here's a some well-accepted advice on how to construct the perfect letter. You must use ALL of it. Then guess why it's so hard for me to apply for more than one job a day.

1. Write with the utmost confidence
2. Don't be arrogant
3. Describe your achievements, skills, and background...
   
4. ...without using the words "I" or "me" (I dare you)
5. Be natural and let your personality shine through
6. Maintain a formal, business-like tone
   
7. Describe in detail how your accomplishments and experience relate to the position using specific examples...
8. ...in one short paragraph
9. Start strong by using a creative rhetorical question
10. But don't use gimmicks!
11. Mention how you heard about the position
12. Don't waste your readers' time by explaining where you heard about the position

In addition to all the conflicting advice given about this agonizing task, the sample letters to guide you contain some of the most awesomely douche-tastic sentences ever conceived by man. More on that later.

Another internship! Oh, boy!

The economy sucks, and young college grads can hardly get work at Burger King. They're desperate to find work and will do just about anything that improves their chances. So if you have a need (or want) for free labor, why not take advantage of their desperation by repackaging any task, from data entry to feeding your cat, as an internship?

Here's an recent egregious example from Craigslist (edited for brevity and to protect the guilty):

We are “XX team,” the unofficial athletic & social club of the [Unnamed Gov't Agency] . Our mission is to help [Gov't Agency] employees and contractors make friends throughout The Agency - and you can help! This is a great opportunity for you to learn about the [Gov't Agency], make valuable contacts – and play softball and/or kickball!

YOUR DUTIES: Your Main Responsibility - We play our games on The National Mall, in the shadow of The Washington Monument. Most fields are on a first-come, first serve basis. Your primary duty will be to arrive at The Mall around 3pm on game days, and “camp-out” on a field until the team arrives at 4:30pm. Feel free to bring a book and a camping chair and work on your tan! Additional Duties - The XX Team also has a need for creative writers, journalists, photographers, web-site & graphic designers. If you have any of these skills (or would like a chance to develop them) let us know! Other Opportunities - After you've joined our organization, you may see opportunities to add value that we hadn't thought of. Let us know your ideas - we may let you run with it!

BENEFITS TO YOU: Your internship will take place outside! You'll get to play softball & kickball on The National Mall! You’ll get to make new friends! You’ll learn about the [Gov't Agency] and make valuable networking contacts! And while we can’t promise you that one of your contacts will turn into a job opportunity, there is always that possibility!
****************************************************
PLEASE NOTE: (!) This is not an [Gov't Agency] internship. We are not officially affiliated with the [Gov't Agency] . We are merely a large club composed of Agency employees & contractors. You will be interning for an extracurricular sports club - not a government agency.

I especially love how they dangle the vague possibility of making contacts that might in some obscure way eventually lead to a job when it's clear that this "internship" holds no more networking potential than hanging out at your local Starbucks or crashing cocktail parties on the Hill.

Smell the baby's head!

My dad forgot my birthday, and I awoke to a loud singing voicemail from him the next morning.

Happy birthday, Lisa D
You are no longer thirty-three
Here's a fact you can't ignore:
You are now thirty-four

My dad had it all wrong. This was my 33rd birthday. But my slightly fuzzy morning-after-birthday-at-a-brewpub-brain couldn't quite be sure. So I hopped on the Internet and Googled an age calculator, sure that my dad was the one whose brain was addled by age. But the calculator confirmed the hateful lyrics in my father's song. In a sad aside, this was also an unfortunate truth for my husband who doesn't remember his age but knows he's a year younger than I am, and was equally shocked to find out he's actually 33. So we both aged an extra year overnight. Thanks, Dad.

[If I was the tea-partying type, I would've at least had the comforting option of believing that this was actually a government/Internet conspiracy to trick me. Unfortunately, unlike Glenn Beck, I tend to let facts get in the way of my most cherished notions. Although...no one has produced a birth certificate validating the fact that I was born in 1976.]

Smell the baby's head!

Last month I visited my recently married friends, Chris and Jeff, for Mardi Gras. Another friend joined us for a parade with her 18-month-old toddler, Olivia. If cutie-pie Olivia doesn't make you want babies, nothing will. My slightly intoxicated friend Chris, married just under a year, sat next to me holding Olivia and tried to convince me I should have kids soon. "I'm just not ready. I need to find stable employment, and I'm probably going to go back to school," I argued.

But Chris knows that I'm just stalling. These are perfectly legit reasons - but you can always find a good reason why it's not the right time to procreate.

"SMELL THE BABY'S HEAD!!," Chris demanded, proferring Olivia to me. "It will OPEN your CERVIX," she shouted among the families enjoying the Sunday afternoon parade.

I explained to Chris that the idea that smelling a baby would trigger some kind of chemical reaction arousing my maternal instincts was utterly ridiculous. Plus, I had already tried it. Nothing happened.

Irrationality

Since I can't wait forever for those maternal urges to kick in, 34 years old means it's time for me to make a rational decision to just have the damn baby. But as my mother pointed out recently, there is no such thing as a rational decision to have a baby. Well-documented research shows that childless couples have happier marriages and experience about a 15% higher life satisfaction level overall. Also, they have a lot more money and the women have perkier boobs, to boot.

But my wonderful, patient husband really wants children. And I'm getting to the panicky age where I can't screw around much longer. It's pretty much now or never -- so I guess we're taking the plunge. But first I have a month to consume all the coffee, alcohol and mercury-laced fish I want. Cheers.