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Updated: Apr 16, 2021 482 Comments · by

Tuesday’s Workwear Report: Lylia Stargaze Ponte Sheath Dress

The Personal Shopper (TPS)

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Our daily workwear reports suggest one piece of work-appropriate attire in a range of prices.

Ted Baker always has the most gorgeous floral prints. This blue and green palette is so pretty, but it doesn’t look too busy when paired with the black solid top. When dresses come with belts, I often swap them out for something else in my closet, but this striped belt is so lovely! This dress would be perfect for a workday with an evening event where you want to look a little bit special but won’t have time to go home to change.

The dress is $295. Ted Baker London has its own sizing, but it’s available in sizes that are roughly equivalent to 00–14. Lylia Stargaze Ponte Sheath Dress

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About Elizabeth

Elizabeth is a 30-something lawyer living on the East Coast. She spent seven years as a Biglaw associate in NYC, three years as a partner at a medium-sized firm, and is now in-house counsel for a large company. She loves Diet Coke, '90s sitcoms, and dresses with pockets.

Comments

  1. Just a reader

    Good morning! Would appreciate suggestions on a great rain/trench coat. I’m starting a new job that will require much more business attire than I’ve worn for last 15 years (and my beloved Barbour just isn’t going to cut it for work any more!). I anticipate wearing lots of pants and skirts/dresses with tights and flats/boots. I’m in the humid, rainy South, so there’s a good chance this coat will get lots of wear for much of the winter. Would prefer a darker color over tan (but I’m ready to hear reasons why tan or grey may be better than black). Would like to spend under $200 if possible. Thank you for any suggestions!

    • Anon

      What’s your budget? I was pleased with the classic tan coat I got from L.L. Bean as a gift years ago. They may have other colors but I’m not sure.

    • Pompom

      Eddie Bauer Girl on the Go trench in a graphite, if it’s available. The hood zips off so that it can be more of a mac shape, but the hood on is also great. I live in the south, too, and in its uninsulated version, it is enough in the winter (layers help).

      • Anonymous

        I just got one and I love it! I got the insulated which is enough for parking-lot-to-office in 40s temps, which is our usual winter here. For colder than 40s or playing outside all morning with kids it requires another layer.

        • Anon

          I’ve been wearing this since October in Alaska and it is amazing. I have been wearing another layer since temps dipped below freezing, but I even wore it Fairbanks last week where it was -40 with a light down jacket underneath.

      • Jules

        I have this – in black unlined and in the dark eggplant with the button-out lining – and it’s great, but it does not read at all formal to me. It’s more like a parka, IME, and the word “trench” in the title is a misnomer.

    • Anonymous

      Also in the south. I prefer a lighter color for a trench or raincoat, as we get a lot of rain in the spring and fall when a black coat just doesn’t look right.

    • Anon

      In the South also– I use the London Fog trench in a light khaki. It also has a removable liner, so I can wear it as a coat on those days where it’s winter but too warm for a wool coat. (Like today).

      • NY CPA

        I have the London Fog trench with removable liner and removable hood, and really like it. Mine’s navy, but it came in khaki, navy, or black (and came in plus sizes too!). You can sometimes find them on sale at Nordstrom Rack and the like.

    • Anonymous

      I have a trench coat I got from Cole Haan a couple of years ago that people have mistaken for Burberry. It looks very polished and I routinely get compliments on it. I agree with preferring a lighter color in the South.

    • anon

      I have a trench coat I got from Cole Haan a couple of years ago that people have mistaken for Burberry. It looks very polished and I routinely get compliments on it. I agree with preferring a lighter color in the South.

    • Just a reader

      Thanks, everyone! I’ve looked at the Eddie Bauer Girl on the Go, and I’ll look into the others. Have a great day … and wear those rain coats! It’s raining here today!

  2. Anonymous

    What bag would you take for a multi destination city break with friends? (I’m U.K. based so ideally brands available here or inspiration for what to look for). I have a longchamp folding rucksack which I love but it’s just a bit too small. I’d prefer a similarly styled rucksack I think, something not too sporty but better to carry than a tote. I find a shoulder bag gets a bit annoying all day walking about and most cross bodies seem too small for a decent size water bottle and cardigan.

  3. Anon

    Is it worth putting “no relocation assistance needed” in your cover letters when applying to jobs out of state? We don’t need it, but I also wouldn’t turn it down if it was available and I don’t necessarily want to shoot myself in the foot if the benefit to disclosing is negligible or non-existent.

    • anonymous

      I think something like that would be addressed during the offer stage rather than cover letter.

    • Anonymous

      Or mention that you will be moving to XYZ city on Date A. I don’t want to hire out of market people that I’d have to wait to move, pay to move, pay to take the bar, give time off to, and maybe the person wouldn’t even like it here. They go to the bottom of the list (or really, off of the list). But if a person is already committed to coming here sans job (and perhaps licensed here), possibly due to a spousal move or family or something else, that person gets bumped up.

      TL;DR: it’s not the moving expense; it’s that there is a lot more to go wrong with a non-local hire vs people already living here

      • Worry About Yourself

        Yup, all of this. I don’t make hiring decisions, but my career is in talent acquisition. We do hire non-local people who have to move for the job, especially for niche, high-level roles, but the hesitation to do so is understandable, you have to be a bullseye, knockout candidate.

        If we’re gonna hire a someone from outside the area, it helps to know they’re already committed to moving here specifically and have ties to the area already. If they’re just putting the feelers out in every major city because they’re open to moving, or they have wanderlust and are looking for a change of scenery, that’s all well and good for them but if they move here and end up hating it or get homesick, we have to go through the hire process again in like six months and that’s a pain, so we’re trying to prevent that situation.

        In other words, no one wants to hire a flight risk, especially if there are plenty of suitable, local candidates.

        All that isn’t to say it’s impossible to get a job in an area you don’t currently live, but it’ll improve your chances if you can include on your cover letter that you’re already planning to move there, and briefly explain why if you can.

    • Lana Del Raygun

      I think it makes more sense to briefly explain your interest in moving to that area.

      • Anon

        +1. If you can demonstrate specific interest in that area, that is especially helpful. If you are in a field that requires licenses or registration with a state body, I highly recommend doing that. You will have a leg up over the other out-of-state candidates who haven’t demonstrated such a commitment to relocating to that state.

        • Anon

          Thanks for these tips, everyone. I don’t have family in the immediate area, but I’m drawn there for QOL, proximity to other relatives (2 hours away), and LCOL. I’ll see if I can spin that into something that makes it sound like I’m committed to living there.

          • Anon

            If you have relatives 2 hours away from the city center, I totally think you can say that you have family in the area or that you want to move to be closer to family.

  4. Cb

    I’ve been putting off writing something for 6 months and finished it in 4 hours today (whilst procrastinating on something else). What are you going to tackle today?

    • Angela

      Edits on an agreement that I’ve had comments back on since 12/18. Hey, now that I’ve looked, that’s actually not that bad, considering two weeks are basically lost to the holidays. Practically speaking, it’s only been on my desk for 2 weeks!

    • anon

      A few days ago, I finally called my car insurance to ask for a better rate. I’ve been procrastinating that for months, but now I’m saving $200!

    • Belle Boyd

      I’m going to respond to several job postings that I’ve been considering. Yesterday’s incident where one of the men in my office got particularly nasty with me when I asked a simple question made up my mind that it’s time to GTFO. NOBODY has the right to treat me that disrespectfully in the workplace.

    • Anon

      Not something I’m doing today, but a few weeks ago, I finally got umbrella insurance. It took a 5-minute phone call and 10 minutes to review the paperwork.

    • Senior Attorney

      I have a stack of correspondence I need to get to. Ugh. Will dig in today.

      #dothething

    • Anon

      Expense report
      Calling back the guy who is a pain in the ass
      Making appointments

    • NOLA

      Schedule my office upgrade (for my desktop) to Windows 10. Got a threatening phone call from IT yesterday. Ugh. It’s just such a hassle not to have my computer and IT has made a mess of these upgrades.

  5. Shortie

    I always love the look of Ted Baker prints. Seeing as how I’m a very petite 5’1″, never gonna happen. But a girl can dream?

    • Ribena

      I have a few friends around your height who look fantastic in Ted Baker! Especially in a style like this (rather than the fit and flare which might have an overwhelming amount of fabric)

    • Is it Friday yet?

      They also make great separates! I have a pencil skirt that I get tons of compliments on. The patterned t-shirts are also great under suits. I bet something like that would work for you.

    • Anon

      I’m 5′ 2″ and loooooove bold prints (Ted Baker and otherwise). And bold polka dots. And stripes.

      Honestly, I don’t think height is much of a barrier to wearing loud clothing.

      • Shortie

        My issue isn’t the prints. My problem is that I’m petite and small and the clothes are proportioned to a different body type.

  6. Moms of older kids -- summer Q

    I know when I was growing up, we were largely unsupervised in the summers (my mom worked, but as a teacher had summers off; she was at home in our house generally but there if needed and helpful to have for rides). That’s not the case now.

    If you have tween / teen kids, when did you start leaving them alone in the summer? We will have a legit teen relative visiting for a few weeks this summer. I would have to drive them 7 miles to our pool in the morning, but could sign them all up for a half-day tennis camp and let them hang out at the pool for the rest of the day (but they would be stranded there (so if we have rain/lightening, they just have to hang out in the clubhouse); teen is too young to drive). But it seems like a lot to have 13-11-9 YO kids by themselves all week (esp. since the teen isn’t here as a babysitter, but to get a break from her angry divorcing parents).

    I feel like an afternoon driving nanny / college kid is the fix, who can loosely supervise but (importantly) can drive and adapt to what the day brings.

    • Housecounsel

      Such a hard age. Agree that a college kid who can drive is a great solution. This also makes visits to friends’ houses possible, and you can ask the college kid to pick up your dry cleaning, start dinner, etc. I always did this in the summer before I worked from home.

    • anon

      My oldest is 10, and I wouldn’t feel comfortable leaving him to his own devices all summer. In my area, it seems pretty common for families with tweens and young teens to hire a college student or older high school student to drive them around and just be around for backup. (Now, where people find these unicorns is a whole other dilemma!)

      • Housecounsel

        Our town has a Facebook page where college kids advertise their availability. Also, nearby colleges might have job boards.

    • Anon

      You really jumbled a lot together there.

      Let me get this straight (because it’s hard to follow): you have a 13 year old relative visiting this year who is getting a break from her divorcing parents. You also have an 11 year old and a 9 year old, who are doing tennis camp and maybe swimming.

      It seems that whatever your plans are for your kids, you include the cousin. Having the cousin there doesn’t change any of your problems; if she weren’t there, you would have to figure out what to do with your kids and how to manage bad weather. Your clubhouse likely has rules about kids under the age of 16 being by the pool without adult supervision, so there’s also that issue.

      Either have a college kid drive them home after tennis camp, or have Uber installed on someone’s phone for rides.

        • Seventh Sister

          Lyft certainly will in my city, though it is not official. My 8yo and his 14 yo babysitter Lyft to ballet class and back. I’m not sure when I’d let my kid take a rideshare alone, but probably mid-high school. Yes, there are kid-focused rideshares, but the price is so high it’s basically cheaper to hire a sitter on your own.

    • Anonymous

      I started leaving my daughter home alone all day at age 12, but I won’t do it for more than a couple of days in a row because otherwise she turns into a miserable couch potato. She can walk or bike to the pool, the store, and friends’ houses, and she doesn’t have younger siblings to mind. Both of these factors make me more comfortable leaving her alone.

      I would not leave a 13-year-old alone in charge of younger siblings/cousins for an entire day, much less several days in a row. I’d hire a college kid to chauffeur and supervise the lot of them.

    • anne-on

      College aged kid for driving and/or ‘housekeeper’ who is really 50/50 housekeeper/driver&wrangler for the kids seems to be the solution in my area. Obviously one is cheaper than the other…but oh my gosh would I love a housekeeper!
      We do an au pair, mainly to cover summers/snow days/breaks. BUT they are not able to do household chores for you. Picking up some milk and starting kid dinner, yes, running your errands (dry cleaning, full grocery shop, doing all the household laundry), no.

    • Anon

      13 isn’t old enough to supervise kids by herself all day, and as you said she’s not a babysitter.

    • anonymous

      Let them hang out all the pool all afternoon. I loved doing that during the summers as a teenager. This was early 90s and luckily the pool was close enough that I could ride my bike.

    • Anonymous

      OP here. Thanks for all of the thoughts. In our city, a lot of camps are just for kids in K-5, so if you are 13, you have aged out. So the camps my kids usually go to are out for the cousin, hence the rethink (and my older kid will be aging out next year when she is in 6th grade). If our city weren’t so spread out, this would be easy, but I think all of you who said “college kid” are probably spot-on. The 13YO doesn’t really need her own sitter, but the driving thing and need to have her not feel like the supervisor of my kids are tipping the balance.

      [Can you tell I work with either women with babies and men who have no idea?!]

      • Anon

        Does the 13 year old have any specific interest, either academic or athletic? If money isn’t a big issue, I would look in to some specialty camps for the 13 year old. Middle school seems to be when there are a lot of camps with specific focus, like a soccer camp or a robotics camp, and a lot less general camps in my area. If you have any local colleges, they often have some really interesting camps.

    • SC

      When I was a tween/young teen, my mom hired a college-aged babysitter during the weeks I was home. It was a really nice option. I was lightly supervised and could spend time riding my bike around the neighborhood and at friends’ houses. We were also allowed to swim in the pool with the babysitter’s supervision. On rainy days, my mom would leave enough cash to go to the movies or something. I think there were also occasional trips to meet school friends at the mall (because people just hung out at malls in the 90s). It was a good balance of making sure someone was available to drive and make sure I wasn’t a complete couch potato, and having unstructured time.

    • Anon

      Maybe split the baby. Kids all at home together most mornings, licensed driver babysitter say from 11-3, kids at home till you get home from work.

  7. Anon

    Help me figure out how to compost in a tiny kitchen in a tiny condo. I grew up in a family that started composting early so I know about the benefits and how it works when you have your own large yard with a compost pile, but I’m struggling with making it work here. I am really sensitive to smells and stickiness and I haven’t found a way to have a small compost bin that doesn’t get disgusting/require non-eco-friendly plastic liners. Seems to defeat the purpose. What works for you? Also, we have access to a bin by the dumpsters to deposit compost in.

    • Cb

      Could you keep the compost in the freezer and take it out 1x or 2x a week? Just in a big tupperware. That would fix the smell/stickiness issue.

      • Anne

        My parents do this with a plastic bag. Before there was municipal compost collection they would bring the bag to the farmer’s market for collection weekly, it worked well. I had a friend use the under sink composter, which also worked well but did have a slight order and she had to find people to give the soil to.

        • Anon

          If you have the option of taking it out daily or every 2-3 days, the fridge would work as well.

    • Anon

      If you have room in your freezer for a coffee can or similar, you can deposit your scraps in there until you’re ready to take them out.
      My freezer’s tiny, so this isn’t usually an option for me. Because I hate, hate, hate slime, so I take my scraps out that day as part of my general kitchen cleanup after cooking.

    • Anon

      Are you looking to actually compost or just collect scraps that get put in the bin for pick up to a composting facility? If the latter, just get a bin in the freezer like Cb suggested. I have a large one from Ikea — around 5 gallon size. It felt like it would be too big, but I can empty it only once a week so it works. If it gets too full (like if I’m hosting and cooking a lot), I dump into a compostable bag and shove the bag to the side.

    • The original Scarlett

      We just compost daily (mostly just cook dinner at home) and keep those little thin green bags out during prep and clean up and take it out immediately to the compost bin (but it’s part of our city’s trash collection so it’s easy)

    • anon

      Instead of a lidded bin, I have a bowl lined with newspaper. In the summer, I have to empty it every other day to prevent smells.

    • Worry About Yourself

      Is there a local composting organization that could come pick up your food scraps for a small fee? That’s what we do in Boston, $10 a week includes pickup, a clean, airtight bin, and optional finished compost delivery if we want it (and they donate our portion if we don’t). I don’t know where you live but it’s worth a Google search, more and more areas have at least one local org (often a non-profit) that does this. We have a small bin in our kitchen we line with compostable bags, and then we transfer the compost to the big bin for pickup, or earlier if it gets full between pickups.

    • anon

      I don’t know anything about urban composting systems, but if you are looking for a way to store food scraps in your kitchen, I like the stainless steel bin from Gardener’s (link to follow). The lid seals tightly enough that no smells escape, even when (bratty, rebellious,) daughter lets it sit full for a several days. And when there is “compost tea” or something in the bottom, it’s very easy to rinse it in the sink or even wash is dishwasher.
      Another tip, put a coffee filter in the bottom. I always have one full of wet grounds from my morning addiction, but I suppose you could buy filters even if you aren’t a coffee drinker.

    • Anon

      I use an open bowl in the kitchen for my compostable scraps and empty it daily. I don’t put meat in it because I have cats and they would get into it, so any meat/bones goes to the outside compost bin right away.

        • anon

          never do it in a garden compost heap, because it will attract rats and such. But my city compost facility expressly allows it. I think it also makes a difference how hot the composting process is, and that varies from private to professionally performed compost.

        • Anon

          Yes, I’m the person you’re responding to and meat goes in the city compost bin. They specifically allow it.

    • Anon

      I finally bit the bullet a couple of months ago and got a small compost bin for the counter of our small home: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B015YFG888/ref=twister_B01DUJK7TG?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1
      This one came via suggestion from my local hardware store that I completely trust with recommendations. We’ve had it for about 2 months now & no smells, fruit flies, nothing – it works great. I only need to empty it when it’s full every 3-4 days I would say (family of 4). I do use a compostable liner just to keep it clean, so I’m not sure I follow why that is a problem in your original post unless those are not as compostable as I would think or something? I dump the contents & compostable bag all in our compost bin (we are in the Bay Area where we have compost service).

      • Anon

        I’m the OP and I’ve found that those leak. Maybe I had a bad batch or something.

        • anon

          I find that they leak if left to sit for too long – but if I empty it every 2-3 days, it’s fine. You will need to empty it pretty much daily if you put really wet stuff in it.

          • Anon

            +1 and don’t put wet coffee grounds in – once we stopped doing that, we stopped having leaks

    • Anon

      I have a plastic compost bucket, I think it is OXO brand. It does get gross but you just rinse it out. There is no way to avoid it. I’ve seen ones with paper bags that you can compost the bag but you’d still have to rinse the bin and it’s not as ideal for composting.

    • Walnut

      I’ve used a stainless steel bucket with a carbon filter on the countertop and also just a separate trash can with a compostable liner in a cabinet that I empty every few days as it gets full or smelly.

  8. Angela

    My lunch today is leftover stir fry made with fish sauce. When my husband walked into the house last night, his comment was, “What are you cooking? It smells HORRIBLE!” How bad of karma is it to reheat such an item in the office microwave?

    • Anon

      Maybe try nuking a bit at home first to test? If your husband walked in just as you added the fish sauce, yeah, that can be rough. I find that it tends to mellow really quickly once it’s a part of the dish. I add fish sauce to a variety of dishes, some of which you wouldn’t think it would be in. Once it’s incorporated into the dish, the smell isn’t an issue.

    • anon

      Ugh just eat your lunch. You can try putting some coffee grounds in the microwave with it to deal with some of the smell.
      Signed,
      preggo lady who can smell everything and wants to vom but understands people need to eat

    • anon

      Fish sauce smells the worst when it’s added to the pan. After it cooks for a bit, it gets less pungent.

      • anonymous

        I agree. After it’s cooked, I don’t find the smell of fish sauce that strong. I’ve reheated food with fish sauce and don’t smell it.

    • annienomous

      My office has a firm ban on two (and only two) foods being microwaved: Fish and popcorn.

      • Mrs. Jones

        My former office had the same ban. I wish my new office had the fish ban. I’m not that smell-sensitive but I hate it.

        • Anon

          This isn’t fish though. It’s fish sauce, which is a totally different thing. Not OP but I never notice a bad smell when dishes with fish sauce are reheated. Many/most Thai dishes, including pad Thai, have it. Do you complain when people reheat leftover pad Thai? I doubt you notice it.

          • Anon

            If her husband smelled it coming in the front door then it’s strong. It depends on how much you use. A little fish sauce in pad Thai isn’t a big deal, but when I make Vietnamese caramel salmon the house can smell for days. I would absolutely not do that at work (and am trying to come up with a way to make caramel salmon outside)

          • annienomous

            I don’t generally complain about food smells, period (that microwave rule was not my making.) But I did just eat leftover red curry cold because I didn’t want to make the office smell. So, no, I wouldn’t complain but also I just wouldn’t eat up leftover Thai food; I’d eat it cold.

  9. Sabbatical as a family - temporary relocation

    Reposting from yesterday afternoon:
    Help me think through some options that my family may have.

    Background: My husband is a professor and will be tenured soon. He has applied for a sabbatical, which the school grants every 6-7 years. He would like to take that starting this August/September. Including the summer before and after the sabbatical, it would be 15 months off-duty for him (May 2020-August 2021). He has contacts in the bay area and could probably work from there for a year if he wanted. We are currently in the Midwest, own a house (fully paid off), our kid is in preschool and will start kindergarten in fall 2021, after the sabbatical ends.
    I have been at current job for 3 years, and am due for a promotion that I should get in March, but not guaranteed. Long-term, I would like to shorten my commute or find a job that’s 80-90% remote.

    We have started to explore options how to spend the sabbatical.
    1) Stay where we are, me trying to find a new job that fits the criteria. I.e. the boring option, no effort required.

    2) Take a 3 month break to travel and recharge (haven’t had a real break of >1 week for almost 6 years). For this, I could ask for an unpaid leave at current job, but am pretty sure this won’t be granted, especially right after a potential promotion. After 3 month break, return to current city and do the boring 1). I may have to find a new job.

    3) Take the travel break, then relocate to the bay area for a year. Kid can go to daycare there. I could find a job there that will expand my skills and increase my value on the market. If we return to current city after sabbatical, I would either return to old company (different role, increased salary?), or some other company, or work remotely for bay area employer if possible.
    If we relocate temporarily, there is of course always a chance we will not return as opportunities may come up.

    Is there anyone who has done a sabbatical like this with a spouse? From a hiring perspective, what would you think about a candidate with a one year stint in another location?
    Do you have other creative options I am currently not thinking of?

    • Anonymous

      Yes literally anywhere except the Bay Area. It’s a horrible city terrible transit and way over priced. Don’t voluntarily go there

      • Anon

        Whoa
        The Bay Area is crowded because so, so many people want to live here, so don’t let one naysayer put you off.

        • anon

          yeah, I know I could save tons compared to other places in cost of living, but I still find living here enjoyable in many ways.

    • lawsuited

      Unfortunately, I think any option but 1) will come off as flighty to a prospective employer. It may be unfair but I think the impression that prospective employees don’t *need* to work makes employers nervous. Maybe use this year as an opportunity to lean into your work (and hopefully new role) while your husband takes care of the lion’s share of child and home duties. I was positively carefree while my husband was on pat leave and I was working because he had bandwidth to take care of all child and home-related things including planning birthday parties and vacations and Halloween costumes. Definitely take some great vacations, just not 3 consecutive months.

      • Anon

        Sabbatical isn’t really vacation for a professor though. It’s a chance for her husband to focus on research since he’s not teaching, and of course since he has no teaching duties he’s not tied to a specific location. I imagine if they don’t relocate her husband will still be working relatively long hours, including travel, so I don’t think asking him to take on the lions share of the family/household duties makes sense. (Academic spouse, fwiw.)

        • lawsuited

          In that case, I think adding a voluntarily adding a move, a new job for OP, a new childcare solution for kid for that year is not an awesome idea.

        • Sabbatical as a family - temporary relocation

          This. Sabbatica is not a “leave” to stay home and do nothing. It is a relief of teaching and other admin duties from current university.

    • Anon

      If your ultimate goal is to have a mostly-remote job or a shorter commute, I’m really unclear as to why you’re throwing the Bay Area into the mix. You label (1) as “boring” and “no effort,” but your long-term goals require that you not leave your job, flit around San Fran, return to the Midwest, and try to find a new job. Traffic in the Bay Area is so brutal that it’s hard to imagine you would come out ahead in commuting time by relocating there.

      In your situation, I would take the promotion (husband will still be at work then), aggressively hunt for a new job that fills the criteria, and ask to take some time off between the old job and the new job.

      • Sabbatical as a family - temporary relocation

        The bay area because my husband has strong ties to a few large companies there and could spend his sabbatical working there.

        • Anon

          Are you sure there aren’t restrictions about being paid by an outside company while on sabbatical? I know of someone who went on paid leave from a university and worked full time for the private sector and got in big trouble. When I say big trouble, I don’t mean he lost his university job, I mean he was indicted for fraud and may have to serve time in jail. If he’s getting officially a university employee during this year who is supposed to be doing research, I think it’s unethical at best and criminal at worst for him to collect a salary for a tech company. Tread carefully here.

          • Sabbatical as a family - temporary relocation

            Good point, we will look into this.

            Some of his peers have, for example, worked at a startup, but I don’t know what the financial implications were. I admit that in many cases, the spouse worked in academia, too, so might be easier to negotiate a one year stay somewhere else in that case.

        • Anon

          So why would you uproot your family and leave your job to be with him during that year? This makes no sense.

          • Sabbatical as a family - temporary relocation

            Because we do not want to live long distance with a young family? We do not have family locally, and being a quasi single parent with a (currently) longish commute while husband is in California is not attractive for multiple reasons.

            My promotion might not materialize and the sabbatical gives us the chance to do something else for a year or so. And I should exploring my job options anyways, so might as well look at another location and see what’s out there.

          • Anon

            If you’re going to “look at another location,” why is that location San Fran? Again, you’re not going to shorten your commute while you’re there.

        • Anon

          At my university, this *might* fly if your husband could make a real case that he’d be advancing his research through this collaboration. But he couldn’t draw a salary from both the university and an external company, it would have to be unpaid leave. And in general, doing this kind of research collaboration gets very tricky very quickly due to the longer-term questions about who controls the data.

    • no

      I’m confused, is he going to be tenured before or after this sabbatical? You seem to be considering the possibility of not returning to the Midwest, but isn’t there some understanding of returning to your university after sabbatical? And if there isn’t, you’re not going to be “free” for the whole year if your husband is actively trying to find a new job in academia.

      This bay area thing sounds exhausting frankly. It seems unlikely that you’d really acquire that many new skills in one year to increase your value in any market. And why would your company want to take you back after a year but not negotiate an extended leave?

      I think you are trying to turn his sabbatical into some sort of eat, pray, love adventure instead of sitting down and having a conversation about what your joint long term plans really are.

      • Anon

        Yeah, this is strange. Many universities have a policy that require you to pay back sabbatical salary if you don’t return after your leave, so if your husband is seriously considering leaving after this, I’d make sure this doesn’t apply. Also, does he really have a year at full salary? Many universities only pay a semester salary or give a whole year for a half salary and require external funding for additional salary, so living in the Bay Area could be expensive if you don’t have a job too, and seems like it could be a tough sell to get someone to hire you for a year.

      • Sabbatical as a family - temporary relocation

        He will be tenured this summer. And yes, of course the university wants to retain everyone returning. But the deal is: Work 6 years full, then take a sabbatical for 6 months full pay/12 months half pay. So he is “due” for a sabbatical and there is no conditional clause of being tied to current school for x number of years after returning.

        • pugsnbourbon

          But would he be willing to give up tenure? It might make sense if he wants to transition out of academia, but if he’s planning to stay in professor role it seems like a “bird in the hand” situation.

          • Sabbatical as a family - temporary relocation

            Why would he give up tenure? He will be tenured this spring/summer. The sabbatical starts right after – many of his peers do it exactly the same way.

          • pugsnbourbon

            I was responding to your sentence: “If we relocate temporarily, there is of course always a chance we will not return as opportunities may come up.”

          • Sabbatical as a family - temporary relocation

            That’s right. My understanding is that once tenured, any other university that he may want to consider after a corporate sabbatical would have to offer at least the same. (I know there’s a formal process involved at a new university, but they usually do not hire tenured associate professors from other schools at the lower non-tenured assistant prof level.)
            I do not think my husband would want to ditch his academic career altogether, ever.

          • Anon

            I think you are really underestimating how hard it is to get another tenured offer at a new school.

          • Anon

            What does your husband have to say about all of this? I truly hope he understands the nuances of this process better than you do.

          • Anon

            “That’s right. My understanding is that once tenured, any other university that he may want to consider after a corporate sabbatical would have to offer at least the same. ”

            LOL.

            (Deep breath)

            HAHAHAHAHA.

            No.

            My husband is a tenured professor. I moved across the country (LDR from the start) because he would have to restart the tenure clock if he moved to be with me. The only exceptions to this are people who are complete superstars or are full professors.

            In fact, tenure often does not even transfer between institutions when they are all part of the same state system.

          • Anon

            Anon at 6:06, is your husband at a tier 1 research university? Mine is and we know lots of people who have moved post-tenure into the same position at a similar or higher-ranked institution, at both the associate professor and full professor ranks. To be clear, I’m not saying moving is easy by any means, and I understand why your husband couldn’t just up and move to you, because the odds he could have gotten a job at one of the handful of universities in your former city would be small to non-existent. I don’t think OP should assume her husband will get a tenured job offer at a different school post-sabbatical, and I don’t think she is assuming that. But IF he/they want to move, and IF he applies to other universities after getting tenure, and IF he gets a job at one of them (lots of ifs, I know), he would be coming in at the same rank, ie., associate professor. Your use of the term “tenure clock” makes me think you may be thinking about tenure track but not yet tenured faculty, and I agree a tenure-track assistant professor would be more likely to lose some ground by making a move, although it’s possible to move (even to a more prestigious institution) without completely resetting the tenure clock – we know several who have done it.

        • Anonymous

          This. One of you needs to carefully read the faculty handbook (and union contract, if applicable). I’ve never heard of a university that did not have a minimum period you had to work there after the sabbatical or else repay salary and sometimes even benefits from during the sabbatical. And very few people are such stars that a new university to which they are jumping will repay it for them.

    • Anon

      I would definitely do detailed research about COL. I’m not sure where in the Midwest you are, and obviously there are places like Chicago that are pricier, but in my Midwest college town there are nice single family homes in good school districts in the $250-300k range. In the Bay Area, you’re looking at literally 10 times that for single family homeownership, especially if you want to be reasonable commuting distance to Stanford or Berkeley. There’s no public transit to speak of, so it’s not like Chicago or NYC where you could live in the outer burbs for affordability and commute in on a train. If you want affordable houses (and by that I mean SFHs under $1M), you’re looking at an hour+ commute to a place like Stanford, plus the schools in the “affordable” places are not great. I’m sure your husband would get a big raise if he accepted a full time offer at Stanford or the like, but I really doubt it would make you wealthier when you take into account COL. I love the Bay Area (my husband did PhD and postdoc there) but we really wanted to move to a lower cost area for his faculty job.

      • Anon

        I would only nitpick at the no public transportation to speak of. It certainly isn’t as great as NYC, but there is the BART (especially if Berkeley is at play in her scenario) & Caltrain that get people around from outer burbs. Doesn’t serve everywhere, but she could take that into consideration.

      • anon

        for a sabbatical though, there are often options to rent from other faculty who are on sabbatical themselves. Perk of the many academics here.

        • Anon

          Yes, I believe at least in the East Bay there are actually specific housing rental websites just for this purpose.

        • Anonymous

          SabbaticalHomes dot com. A number of my neighbors have sublet through this.

    • Sabbatical as a family - temporary relocation

      Thank you for all the comments. A couple of clarifictions:

      1. We would not buy a home there, but probably rent a place (2-3 BR), as we’re comfortable with downsizing. We have lived the 3 of us in a 900 ft, 2 BR before buying our house here.

      2. We are fully aware of the cost of living in the bay area vs. Midwest, we have many friends there.

      3. The question is: Can I strategically plan do to something in a year or so that will benefit my career? If it matters, I’m in healthcare, but also finance/business development adjacent.

      • Anon

        I’m in Finance and have hired a variety of levels and types of roles.

        What level are you in your career? If you’re in the analyst/ sr analyst beginning stages, then you could get a finance-adjacent role for the year, learn some skills at a new area, and then come back into finance type roles. However. You’re likely going to be lateraling for both moves, so likely no promotions will happen. (Even if you get a promotion right before you leave, you’ll likely only be hired at your current title).

        I’d be worried that you won’t get hired for a few months on either end though – I’d advise you to prepare for a split house situation for a while. Job hunt now, and maybe move out earlier than the rest of the family if you get an offer now. And/or stay behind until you get an offer and can put in your two weeks. And then you’ll need to do the same coming back to your current location.

        If you’re manager level or above, this is going to be a LOT harder to orchestrate and I’d be skeptical that you’re going to get meaningful skills out of your year. Looking at your resume, I’d definitely wonder why you took a job across the country only to move back a year later and worry about your longevity. You’ll likely be better off taking the year off of work, positioning it as “taking care of a family obligation” and hoping you can get hired when you come back. I’d consider this option even at the analyst/ sr analyst level honestly, and if I were in your shoes and had this opportunity, I would have done this at any level of my career. The short term promotion hit would be worth the mental break and “adventure” of it all, but I’m also a little more risk-tolerant than many in Finance.

        • Sabbatical as a family - temporary relocation

          Thank you for this perspective!
          I am at the analyst level looking at a promotion to manager (without people reponsibility), but have several years of research experience under my belt (prior to my MBA). One reason I’m hesitant to just take a 15 months break is that I have spent a long time in academia before transitioning to the “business” side, and would really like to position myself for better career opportunities.

          But maybe I should reconsider the professional substantiality of a one-year stint with the minus of a move/uprooting of our currently comfortable life style.

        • I'm married to a Professor

          I think you run the risk of labeling yourself “TRAILING SPOUSE” which has some unfortunate consequences which may or may not be worth it to you.

          Could you work on finding the 80-90% remote gig so that you can WFH while you are in the Bay Area? Maybe fly back once a month? You’d largely avoid the trailing spouse label problem, avoid the having to find two new jobs in a year problem, and have made progress on what you say is your long-term goal. Just a thought.

      • Anonymous

        Why would anyone want to hire you for any sort of important job for a year? None of this makes any sense

    • Sabbatical as a family - temporary relocation

      Thank you everyone for your critical comments! You definitely brought up a few other factors we need to consider from a short-term and long-term perspective.

      Love this community!

  10. Anonymous

    When you paid off your student loans, what did you do with the money that had previously been committed to the loans? I feel like I do best when I have a tangible and reachable goal, but I’m not sure what my next goal should be. I fully fund my 401k, have 6 months of living expenses in savings, my car is paid off, mortgage is 3.6% so I’m not in a hurry to pay it off, I don’t want to do (any more) major home renovations. I contribute a little bit to a Vanguard fund every month – I could bump that contribution? I’m single, no kids, if it matters.

      • Senior Attorney

        This is a good one.

        However if it were me I would probably use the money to take fabulous vacations.

    • Anon

      I started aggressively funding my vanguard index funds, with some general goals around how much I would save a year and each month. But I also knew that I have long-term goals that are expensive (kids, purchasing a new home and maybe renting out the current home) and know that I want the flexibility to pursue those goals, like the security of a big investment account, and think that my retirement accounts won’t be enough even though I max out my 401k and fund a backdoor roth IRA.

    • Anonymous

      I would bump the Vanguard contribution. My sole goal with my money is to retire as early as possible, whatever that means (which I haven’t decided thanks to the giant question mark that is healthcare in America), but I do know that just saving as much of my “extra” money as I can is a good way to get there.

    • Never too many shoes...

      Have no mortgage was really important to me, so I started to focus on that.

    • Jeffiner

      We put it towards retirement, although we were already fully funding our 401ks before. Now a surprise baby is on the way, and we’ll back off on the retirement funding for daycare. Having a few years of extra-retirement funding makes cutting back now more palatable.

  11. Grad School Tips

    What are your best tips for packing for grad school? Would you maximize or minimize what you’re lugging across oceans? I’m moving to a different country for a couple of years on a pretty tight budget. Please talk me into or out of packing or shipping everything from my yoga mat, boots, and towels so I don’t need to buy them new.

    • Cb

      I did a transatlantic move (US to UK) and one of my regrets was bringing so much. I just had way too much stuff in my tiny grad school space. Luckily I settled here so I don’t have to bring things back across the ocean. I’d bring things that would be expensive to replace. Bring your boots, shoes are always more expensive in the US. Your yoga mat if you love it. Bring one towel and buy the rest at IKEA.

    • Anon

      Do a lot of research on both options – without knowing exactly where you are going, it’s hard to estimate shipping costs.

      I did a much less serious move – US to Canada – and made out much better paying $1,000 to have a company (ABF) sell me space on a big truck (by the linear foot!) and move all my junk. I couldn’t have come close to replacing the bare minimum of my furnishings for $1k. Everything costs money. Like, if you need to buy a towel, washcloth, plunger, and toilet brush, that right there is probably $30 unless you go cheap cheap cheap.

      That said, moving all your stuff is a ton of work so you are trading time for money.

      • Anon.

        I agree with this. The cost and time to replace items (or find the minimum of things at the quality you want) is a factor to consider.

        This depends also on the price levels in target country. If I was moving to a LCOL country, I would buy everything there if possible.

      • Anon.

        Will also add that climate is also an important factor. We moved to a country with slightly warmer climate a few years ago, and I stupidly took all the clothes from home country with me (because relo company paid for everything to be shipped, it didn’t matter). I wish I had taken the time to purge.

    • anon

      I did this, shipped about 4 large boxes and flew with two suitcases. It’s probably not a huge money saver, but you also have less running around to buy everything for your household and you feel more settled in with a few sentimental items. It was worth it for me.

    • Anon.

      I would consider whether your target country has a good student second hand market. E.g. in the US, in most college towns international students sell their whole household including cups and plates when they leave the country, and you can find everything you need locally, especially if you are moving a a few weeks before the semester starts.
      In other countries (e.g. my experience with Germany), people seem to invest in quality furniture that they move around multiple times rather than buying new, and the second hand market might not yield good stuff.

      • anon

        funny, I was just going to comment that European cities with universities usually have an equivalent of craigslist where you can get all the basics for cheap, Berlin especially.

        • Anon.

          True, it depends on location. I find that depending on what your own standards are, most of it may be IKEA.
          (I realize that sounds snobby, but we definitely had trouble getting rid of cheaper “student” furniture in Switzerland in a city with 2 big universities prior to a move to the States even though we moved a week before the semester there started).

  12. Bedbugs and hotels ugh

    Would seeing a Bed Bug Registry posting from October 2019 give you pause about staying at an NYC hotel (it’s the Sheraton Times Sq)? And if it does, would it give you enough pause to ask to stay at a different hotel for a work trip where a bunch of other people are staying at the Sheraton?

    • Anon

      One single post? No. Almost all hotels have one. Many people get some other kind of bite and mistakenly assume it’s bed bugs. Multiple recent reports would give me pause though.

    • anon

      I’m incredibly paranoid about bedbugs. But won’t necessarily let myself reject a place for one report, especially if its a huge hotel. You could also search the TripAdvisor reviews for “bug”. If there’s more than one recent report, and especially if the hotel doesn’t respond explaining their abatement measures, I’d switch. Otherwise, go and just check the bed quickly before you unpack (which we should all be doing at all hotels regardless…)

      • pugsnbourbon

        Check the bed, the headboard, and leave your bags in the bathroom if you can.

    • Anon.

      Put your bag onto the suitcase rag, remove the comforter on the bed, check the bedframe and check for any stains on the white sheets and/or mattress.

  13. Anonymous

    Has anyone ever used a service to assist in creating a resume such as Top Resume? They say they have people with industry specific experience, optimize for key word searches, and will create a linked in resume as well all for less than $400 .I’m inclined to try it but don’t want to waste my time either.

    • CHL

      If you want help with your resume, I might look for an actual individual (sometimes they do coaching too) in your field and city. I am in HR and have generally not seen great results from services.

    • Pompom

      Whatever you decide to do, make sure that the end product is easily and quickly editable by you. Will allow you to make needed updates, additions, deletions, etc. over time, and to tailor as needed. I’ve seen a lot of “professionally created” resumes that needed foreseeable updates after being done, and it caused headaches for the resume owner due to software versions, file types, fonts, formatting that was not easy to work through…

    • Anon

      I would never pay hundreds of dollars for this, no. Look on AAM for resume tips, I think it’s pretty easy to do yourself. If you know your industry you should know what keywords to use.

  14. Anonymous

    Bay area is SUPER expensive. Can you live in 1000 sq feet if you had to?

    • Anon

      Frankly, 1000 sq ft apartment would be on the larger end of what a family of 4 live in where I’m from (HCOL Asian city). Most middle and upper-middle class families (lawyers, professors, govt workers, etc) live in 600 – 800 sq ft 3/2 or 3/1 apartments with kids. People make it work, they don’t NEED a big house with a den, one bathroom per person, guest bedroom, library, and yard (sure it’s nice to have, but not a necessity). I will say that built-in storage, functions (laundry, dishwasher, fridge are all built into the kitchen cabinets at my place, and a kitchen island doubles as a table and water station) and scaling the furniture to the size of the house is key.

    • Anonymous

      Depressing comment. I live in 1000 sq feet with another adult, 2 kids, and 2 cats. It’s not ideal, but it’s fine. Millions of people do it.

      • Anon

        Same. I’ve never lived in more than 1000 sq feet. My current place — 850 sq feet — feels comically large for me and my kid and cat. We could easily fit another adult, kid and cat in here. We were quite happy in 600 sq feet. I think the huge expenditures of energy to heat, cool and light such enormous houses, not to mention to fill them with stuff and to drive to them, is driving global warming, and the fact that this is considered a “requirement” by many makes me sad.

    • Anon

      Absolutely. I lived in a 600 sq foot funky studio in San Francisco for years in my 30’s and loved it.

      You really do not need all that space. We waste so much. The heating/cooling costs alone, my goodness….

    • Anonymous

      …Yes of course, unless you have a large family. That’s about the size of (or larger than) two-bedroom apartments I’ve lived in.

    • Sabbatical as a family - temporary relocation

      Absolutely we can. We’ve lived in 900 sqft 2 BR 1B until my kid was 2.5 years old.

    • Anon

      I assume this is to the sabbatical poster, and I think the point is that the cost of housing is going to be a huge shock to someone coming from a Midwest college town. Obviously lots of people can and do live in 1,000 sq feet but she says they own a fully paid off single family home in the Midwest and to keep that standard of living in the Bay Area is going to be impossible without a huge salary increase. And she’s talking about quitting her job and her husband taking a year at half pay, so the financial piece of this is a bit puzzling. Most people don’t take a huge pay cut to move to one of the most expensive cities in the world.

      • Sabbatical as a family - temporary relocation

        Oh we have no illusions about COL in the bay area, we are fully aware that we would not be able to afford living in a McMansion there, LOL.
        I brought up our fully paid off house in the Midwest because it means we can reasonably keep the house with limited expenses while spending a year somewhere else – no mortgage payment plus rent in SF.

        • Anon

          If you’re gone for a full academic year, you can almost certainly rent out your Midwest house.

    • anon

      My family of 4 lives in 1000 square feet in Palo Alto and life is awesome. There’s no “if I had to.”

  15. anne-on

    Tips/advice/Guidance/’Learn from my Mistake’ insight please!
    We’re beginning to plan a gut renovation of our kitchen/mudroom and will be opening one wall to have a better eye-line between the kitchen and family room. We (I) cook 3-4 nights a week, host big dinners 3-4 times a year, and bake at least weekly. So I need a proper working kitchen and to store gear (food processor/stand mixer/baking sheets/etc.) We have A LOT of snow/sports gear so the mudroom will be outfitted with (likely custom) floor to ceiling built ins to hold/organize as much as possible.
    Any tips from those who have gone through this? Favorite blogs that go into details on layout of their cabinet/design? The pretty pictures are fun but I feel like I need insights from real people that don’t have ‘butler pantries’, 1000 sq ft kitchens and mudrooms as big as my kid’s bedroom…

    • lawsuited

      Deep drawers are a great way to store small appliances that you don’t want to live on counter tops permanently. Put vertical dividers into some of your cupboards to store baking sheets/cutting boards. Definitely include some floor to ceiling pantry cupboards in your design, but don’t bother making them particularly deep – you’ll never be able to see the stuff at the back. I think a combination of open and closed storage for dishes can be lovely and add some personality if you’re someone who loves crockery/glassware and wants to look at your favourites (like me). Most importantly, don’t assume that a new kitchen will make you new people – if your family inexplicably puts dishes in the sink rather than in the empty dishwasher, get deep double sinks so you can accommodate this bad habit and still have a sink free when you need one. If your husband always dumps his keys/change/wallet on the kitchen counter, plan for an alternative spot in the kitchen for those things to be dumped.

    • Anon

      I liked Emily Henderson. I think she did a piece on mudrooms, but I like her insights generally.

    • Senior Attorney

      Get pullouts in all the lower cabinets. Totally worth it. We have vertical storage for cookie sheets and cutting boards in a high cabinet and that’s very handy. Make use of all your upper cabinet space by installing cup hooks or hanging wine glass holders to the bottoms of the shelves.

      If it were me I would just leave the stand mixer out, but my husband insists on having it put away so it’s his job to lift it in and out of its lower cabinet.

      Also, he put a warming drawer in the kitchen before I showed up and I thought it was ridiculous, but turns out it’s the best thing every for keeping things warm as well as proofing dough. We use it pretty much every single day.

      Finally, make sure you have good task lighting. Apparently his designer has never actually cooked meal so the lighting in there is just awful.

    • Jeffiner

      We also cook/bake a lot, but didn’t have room for wall mounted double ovens so we got a freestanding range that has two ovens instead of a warming drawer. Its fabulous.

      My husband wanted a real range hood, so we put the microwave under the counter. We rarely use the microwave, so its nice that its not taking up prime real estate.

      Yes on good task lighting. Also make sure there are lots of outlets.

      • Senior Attorney

        Yes, I had one of those ranges in my old house and I loved it.

        And see about having USB plugs in some of those lots of outlets.

    • Anon

      It’s a boring suggestion, but go to kitchen stores! The designers will tell you what works and they know their stuff, plus they have the catalogs with all of the built in options and fancy cabinets that you won’t see on pinterest. If you’re tight on space, do pocket doors to section off the mud room. Also depending on your layout, you may be able to squeeze in a pantry closet for storing big things.

    • AnonInHouse

      It doesn’t always work, style-wise — but, cabinets that go all the way to the ceiling! Our last home was more modern than traditional, and the kitchen was pretty small. But because cabinets went all the way up to the 9 or 10 ft ceiling, we had so much storage. Also, have a solution for corner cabinets so that you don’t have wasted space, soft close drawers, drawer pullouts in cabinets, and under cabinet lighting. I miss my old kitchen…!

  16. Anonymous

    Reasking from a few days ago… Does anyone have an on-line or digital portfolio for their work. If yes, how do you structure it, e.g., talks, publications, videos made (either by or of you) etc.? If you’re in hiring, do you find this useful, particularly in the social sciences or marketing or research? Any other thoughts on this? I’m a novice applying to research jobs and this is a requirement for one place and I was wondering if it is a useful tool generally.

    • Lana Del Raygun

      This is super field-dependent. Can you look up the portfolios of people who work at the places you’re applying to?

      • Davis

        I agree. Some fields will expect a website, others a GitHub repo, and others a Google Scholar Profile or OrcID profile. If you feel like sharing your field you might get better input.

  17. Anon looking for relationship advice

    Is it silly to come to the internet for comfort? Maybe. Has anyone has the experience of getting back with an ex S/O after some realizations? Obviously, this is something I’m going through. I was blind sided, because we were truly happy. This was confirmed to me. Ex S/O said some other crappy things so there was no reason to lie about happiness. We very outwardly had a serious, committed relationship (which he established) for almost 7 months and spent the majority of the week together from about 2 weeks into dating (based on both of our efforts). I had my own realizations and one was that if this relationship is truly over, I want to move back to X city because I moved to current Y city on a very large whim. So that’s provided me comfort. But, I don’t want to run away from something good and I want this decision to feel really right. I’ve made it through a large majority of my 20s with really making sure when I felt these feelings for someone, I was sure they were real. So I am willing to work with him and grow (we both have our own issues that respectively need work to better ourself and I respect his), but I’m not going to wait. Any stories? My belief is S/O got inside his own head (family sent him home with Christmas presents for me, we hosted holiday dinners in our own city together, other brother is proposing soon, he has some severe heartbreak, him and I had both been single for years). And please, I don’t want the “you were dumped, move on.” Because I am fully prepared to do so. But something strong in my heart/gut thinks there is something more here that I shouldn’t literally run from until I know it’s right. FWIW, I’ve been praying for clarity.

    • Anon looking for relationship advice

      OP here – if it helps for clarity, it hasn’t even been a week yet….just really missing my person and worried he’s not eating vegetables (I cooked so I made sure he did).

      • CountC

        He’s a grown a$$ adult. If he can’t figure out how to eat on his own, you shouldn’t even be remotely considering trying to convince him to get back together with you.

        • Worry About Yourself

          Seriously, if he’s so bad at taking care of himself that he needs a girlfriend cooking for him to ensure he eats veggies, that’s not someone I recommend building a life with. OP, find a grown man who can cook his own meals and eat veggies voluntarily.

    • Monday

      Wait–have you already moved back to X city, while he is in Y? Or are you still in Y and wondering whether to move back to X?

    • Anon

      I can’t offer you comfort, because this situation isn’t really workable. He chucked you out of nowhere and now wants back together because… Christmas? He’s tired of being single?

      Move back to your old city and live the life that’s best for you. Don’t be with someone who is this much of an emotional screw-wit.

      • Anon

        Wait I interpreted it the opposite – that he dumped her after Christmas for no provided (to us) reason.

      • Anon

        Yes, this.

        I’ve gotten back together with people after a break up. I am no longer with those people. I won’t say it’s certain to be a mistake, because nothing in life is certain, but it’s pretty certain.

        • Worry About Yourself

          My boyfriend came back less than 24 hours after dumping me, and that was years ago, we’re even stronger now, so it can work. That said, I’ve also tried to get back together with someone I’d broken up with, and then I was reminded why I dumped him. And I’ve had a lot of exes I wanted to get back together with and they had no interest in that, and in hindsight, that was a good thing, for both of us.

          OP, if it’s been weeks and he’s still not showing you any interest in getting back together, don’t keep yourself open to that possibility, let yourself grieve for a bit and move on.

      • Ellen

        He wants to garden. Period. Men who only want to garden do not care about, or want to be with you you once you put your bra and panties back on. He will also want to do what Dad calls non-procretive gardening, which is gross. Move away from this schlub now!

    • Anon

      So many questions – so you were “only” with him for 7 months? How old are you? What was the stated reason for him ending things?

      I’m very much a “work through relationship problems” sort of person, but that requires the other person to want to engage with the process, even if imperfectly.

      • Anon looking for relationship advice

        Op here – yes, we were exclusive for a little over 6 months. I had been casually dating someone before him but about after a month-ish of dating him, I ended it and then lo and behold, S/O asked for the commitment that same weekend. I’m 27 and he’s 29. And as for the reason, it seemed too personal to go into but truly, I think he’s putting so much pressure on himself to get this perfect and not f$^& up that he got scared of what the potential next 20% brings and if it’s right. And I’m not saying that I am going to wait around forever, but I do respect his past because he respects mine. He’s putting a lot of pressure on himself to find a soul mate that I think he isn’t really being realistic. Of course, he may never realize this and at that point I’m sure I will have found my clarity and literally moved on. But people make mistakes, emotions are hard, and I want to make sure I give this the respect it deserves because if I jump away too soon, I might regret it more than it’s worth. I can be very happy and fulfilled where I’m currently at. It’s just with my lease going up in May, I need to make a large decision I want it to be right.

        • anon

          There’s a lot going on here and I can’t tell how long you’ve actually been apart. A few weeks? If he’s putting that pressure on himself, that stress is naturally going to extend to you, the person he’s in a relationship with. It’s not clear to me whether he even *wants* to get back together. I don’t know — for problems of this scale, I don’t know if a cooling off period of a few weeks is long enough to tell whether he’s even ready to be in a relationship with you.

          And for goodness sakes, don’t let a lease agreement dictate whether you’re in or out. Evaluate the relationship on its own merits.

        • Lana Del Raygun

          Okay, but … does he want to get back together with you? I don’t think you’ve actually said that anywhere, so it sounds like you’re deliberating whether or not to accept that he really meant it. If he hasn’t, like, come to you with his hat in his hands begging you to take him back, I don’t understand where the question is coming from. If he broke up with you, you have to assume it’s over, not hope that he’ll change his mind.

          • Monday

            This too. He would have to be asking with urgency for another chance, AND proving how you can trust that he won’t “get in his head” and suddenly dump you again.

        • Anon

          May is a while away. Start making plans to move when your lease is up and see if he reaches out with some true clarity about what happened and what HE needs to work on. People do freak out sometimes and may come to their senses pretty quickly.

          Also consider – if you really think he dumped you because he doesn’t think you’re good enough / aren’t his “soulmate” (wtv that means) do you really want to stay long term with a man that thinks so little of you or will be questioning your relationship the entire time? Why live with that level of anxiety?

          The posters say it all the time on here, and IME I find it true: when a guy really cares for you and wants you, he will let you know. This man is not letting you know that.

        • anon

          Your post is hard to interpret but I’m reading this as (i) he broke up with you because in his view you’re not his soul mate/he doesn’t feel about you the way he should feel about someone he’s in an LTR with, (ii) you are interpreting this as “he really loves me so much and he’s afraid of his own feelings so that’s why he broke up with me”+”he is seeking an unrealistic level of happiness,” and (iii) even though he has not suggested he wants to get back together you are seeking permission to NOT move on and to try to get back together with him.

          OP, with all kindness: your relationship is over and the sooner you start the process of letting go, the sooner you will move on to a happier place. Could this be emotional immaturity/fear of his own feelings? Yes. It could also be that he realized he doesn’t really love you and Christmas with his family made him realize he needs to cut this off before it goes further.

          None of that really matters, because the one cold, hard, and difficult truth is this: he broke up with you. That means he does not want to be in a relationship with you. When someone tells you that, respect it and move on. You say you don’t want to “jump away too soon.” The jumping already happened, and he was the one who did it. The best thing you can do for yourself is to block him on social media, delete his number from your phone, and start the process of moving on (which includes letting yourself mourn for a while but NOT sending him emotional emails, texts, or DMs).

        • Anon

          You can’t fix his problems for him. Please don’t try, it will only end in heartbreak for you. Only he can fix them, if that is truly what’s going on. Maybe he just realized he doesn’t want to be with you.

    • lsw

      I dated someone for a year, learned an extremely big lie from a friend, broke up with him, talked it out and got back together tentatively a month later, broke up for good soon thereafter. Happened to meet my now-husband about six months later and realized what I had been missing in a strong, healthy relationship. I do feel like trying to get back together and learning it didn’t work was important for me but I was also able to call it quits pretty quickly when I realized the trust was just gone.

      Relationships are work but they shouldn’t be Just Hard. That’s something my wise friends told me at the time and I know to be true!

      • Senior Attorney

        All of this is so true.

        I left my husband after 12 or so partly good but largely bad years and he convinced me to come back. Made a lot of promises, things were better for a while. Three years later I left for good and was only sorry I’d wasted those three years. Met my now husband soon after and OMG it’s so different when it’s right and healthy.

    • Anon

      I’m sorry, I seriously didn’t understand more than a couple of sentences of this, and I can’t be the only one.

      Work on writing it out more clearly and re-post, or better yet, try the relationships sub at reddit.

      • Anon

        Sorry, but +1. Next 20% of what? Pressure to find a soul mate… so, he’s saying he doesn’t think you are his soul mate, but you think he is just being too unrealistic as to what a soul mate is? Do you really want to be with a guy that doesn’t think on some level you are his soul mate?
        But not sure I’m reading this all right.

      • Anon.

        I’m glad I’m not the only one confused about the original post. It’s not clear at all what OP’s situation here is.

      • anon

        I was really doubting my reading comprehension skills on this one. Glad I’m not the only one who couldn’t decipher what’s happening here.

      • Anonymous

        Agreed. It was so hard to understand what the OP was trying to say–which leads me to believe that in her head, she is obscuring the facts on what happened here or making excuses for the guy. Dude doesn’t want a serious relationship with you.

    • Anokha

      I say this with kindness, but IME, the only way I’ve seen it work out is when both individuals are committed to change. And here, it sounds like it’s just you. So unless he is actively saying “we can work it out”, I don’t know that you can unilaterally make the needed changes (not should you). Move to City X.

    • Pep

      My experience is – every time I’ve gotten back together with an ex after a breakup – the resultant second (or third, ugh!) breakup is exponentially worse.

      I’d cut your losses, move back to the city you love, and focus your efforts in meeting someone new there.

      • Pep

        Also, not to be harsh, but “I think he’s putting so much pressure on himself to get this perfect and not f$^& up that he got scared of what the potential next 20% brings and if it’s right” is just wishful thinking/rationalizing on your part.

        • Is it Friday yet?

          +1,000 Which is understandable, because being blindsided by a breakup SUCKS, but you can’t live your life hoping that maybe he’ll grow up and see the error of his ways. The best thing you can do for yourself is move on as best you can, hard as it is.

          • Housecounsel

            One of several red flags was your comment about S/O “getting inside his own head.” That is a meaningless phrase, invoked by my college daughter and her friends to justify all kinds of crappy behavior. I think maybe they first heard it on The Bachelor. I am sorry, but I think you are overthinking way too much and you’re rationalizing. Please base your decisions on his actions and what you see in front of you. not hopes. Relationships just shouldn’t be this hard. I knew my husband was the One when I realized I spent zero time analyzing the relationship and/or trying to figure out what he meant by this or that. I wish you the best, but I don’t think your best is with this guy.

        • Monday

          Even if that’s exactly what he said to OP, it sounds very immature and unaccountable. Your (joking?) comment about him not eating vegetables also suggests you’re caught up and trying to take care of him. This person is not ready and/or not serious about you. I recommend moving back to X and building a life that’s exactly what you want. (I myself moved back to X after a divorce, and it’s probably the best decision I’ve ever made in my life.)

          • January

            +1. Also – and it took me a long time to really learn this – but men who want to commit to you will not be scared off by things like their brother getting engaged or their family sending you holiday presents.

          • Monday

            +1 January! This is straight out of “He’s Just Not That Into You,” which despite its annoying title and shtick is fundamentally a truthful and wise book.

    • Anonymous

      What nonsense even is this? He dumped you. Being with him is not a option. Move on with your life.

    • Lana Del Raygun

      I haven’t had this experience personally but it sounds like what one of my roommates went through. He got inside his head, dumped her, asked her to take him back, and dumped her again because he still wasn’t really committed to her. It’s not worth it.

        • M

          Does “getting inside his head” mean he remembered he’s a commitment phobe? I don’t see anything here that gives room for hope.

          OP, I’m sorry you got blindsided, but my advice is to move on to someone better. Everything is raw now and you miss him, but once you get through it, I suspect you’ll see that you deserve better.

        • all about eevee

          I guess it means he let himself introspect about what he wants in his life? I have no clue, but I have seen this phrase used often as a rationalization of behavior in situations where the dumper just isn’t strong enough/likes attention too much to say “I don’t want to be with you ever, leave me alone, I’ll buy my own microwave-the-bag steamed vegetables” to the dumpee.

        • Cat Mom

          Overthinking something. Make it more complicated than it is. Looking for problems that aren’t there.

          • Anonymous

            If “getting inside his head” means overthinking something, I do not believe that the OP’s boyfriend broke up with her because he “got inside his head.” I believe he broke up with her because he did not want to be in a relationship with her and realized that he was at a point where he needed to make that clear to her. Also, if “getting inside his head” means overthinking something, I believe very few guys break up with girls because they “get inside their heads” Oftentimes, the break up comes at the first point that the guy actually does think about things (meaning, when the relationship has gone on long enough that it can no longer be considered casual, or the girl starts to pressure him).

    • Anonymous

      This guy sounds immature. So he started to really feel something for you, freaked out, and broke up with you right around Christmas? What a dolt. If he can’t even handle good emotions then how is he going to handle bad ones? If this is someone you’re looking for a future with – run. This is not the person who will help you when your mom is in the hospital or hold you while you mourn a close friend or be supportive when you lose your job. This is the person who will run from all those things because feelings are scary.

      • Angela

        Not to hair-split, but clearly the Christmas vibes weren’t “good emotions” from his POV.

    • Anon

      Ok I don’t want to give you false hope but I have seen it happen and work well.

      I think 3 or 4 of my cousins married their college GF/BFs. They all broke up for a brief time shortly after college, got back together, got married several years later, have kids and are happy and appear to have great marriages.

      That being said – the key here is (I think) the timing of when they got together/broke up/got back together. It all happened in their early 20s when people are first figuring adult life out (and were long distance as they moved apart after college).

      Any of my friends who have tried this as established adults have ended up breaking up for good and having it not go well… at all.

      • Angela

        College relationship != couple in their late 20s who were together seven months.

      • KT

        Agree with this completely. I do have a “success” story. My husband and I met in undergrad, and after two years, he broke up with me to take a job in a different city after graduation. But then, about 12 hours later, he called me back freaking out that he made a mistake, and the answer was actually to talk to me about his anxiety and plan our future. I told him to take 2 weeks to cool off, and then we would meet, and *I* would decide if I would like us to get back together. In the end, we did, I actually got a job in his new city, we moved in, and got married. The 12 hour breakup and 2 week separation was 6 years ago.

        All that being said, this situation sounds different. The OP here is older. He did not call her back a day later and beg forgiveness. This relationship here appears to be…over. But obvi I could be wrong.

    • Worry About Yourself

      A few months ago, someone here said “you’re either a game changer or a placeholder,” and honestly, being a placeholder isn’t a terrible thing – it doesn’t mean you’re worthless or anything, but it’s not something to waste your time over. In this case, he’s determined that you’re not a game changer, and he feels there’s no sense in continuing this commitment to you if that’s the case, he wants to hold out for that at this point in his life. You WILL be someone’s game changer someday, and then it will all make sense, but in order for that to happen, you gotta let this go. And I don’t mean you gotta stop thinking about him and force yourself to cease all the feelings, but it sounds like you haven’t even started the process of mourning the relationship because you think he’ll come back. Chances are, he won’t, so start that grieving process, let yourself feel sad, and then begin the process of letting go.

      I’m 30, and in the last year or so I’ve started to realize how much of my 20’s was wasted on guys who weren’t right for me. They weren’t bad guys! Well, some weren’t great, but a fair few were genuinely awesome people but we just weren’t compatible, and ignoring that fact and trying to cling to them anyway caused a lot of stress and drama.

      • Anon

        That was me, from a friend of mine who is dating again after divorce in her 40s, she got it from some book she read. And it is so, so true.

        OP, I was in a relationship with a guy for 6 years, from college to afterward. We broke up a grand total of four, yes four times. He dumped me, I dumped him, we broke up mutually, finally I dumped him and cut all ties. We just kept going back to the same poisoned well over and over again and it was never better or different. It was emotionally draining, it required a lot of energy better put elsewhere, and it kept me from meeting decent guys I could have been happy with. I did meet my husband after the last breakup and I am grateful that I recognized him for what he was right from the jump because of the previous bad relationship. But the “placeholder and game-changer” thing was in full effect. I never had to worry about how he felt about me; I never had to wonder where the relationship was going or whether he was invested. He told me he was and backed it up with action. OP, if your guy is on the fence about you to the point that he dumped you – this is not your person. Your person is still out there. Take some time to grieve and then get out there and find him.

    • Anon

      Dumping someone is not a sign that actually you are very deeply in love with them and want to be with them forever.

    • Angela

      Seven months is not that long at all nor worth “fighting for,” to the extent that’s even possible when your s/o has dumped you because he realized things were getting Serious because you spent the holidays together. Good relationships do not have this much drama/heartache. Move on.

    • Anonymous

      I dated someone for 3 months. It was going great, no problems. Then, he got drunk and had a bizarre conversation about he was falling in love with me but I wasn’t “his person” or soulmate. That he had some idea in his mind that he’ll instantly know when he finds his soulmate upon first meeting, a gut feeling that he didn’t have with me. I told him I disagree in the concept of love at first sight, that I get to know someone and learn about them by dating, and we shouldn’t consider to see each other if I’m not “his person”. He is 37, I’m 35. I guess we dumped each other. It hurt, but it made me think he’s immature. I share this story because your guy seems the same. I’m sorry you’re hurting. I wouldn’t want to get back together with someone that emotionally immature.

  18. Paris Q

    All – my husband and I are looking at relatively short getaways to celebrate an upcoming milestone birthday. Because we have small kids, we think the most we can swing is probably 5/6 days. Is it unreasonable for us to consider Paris as an option? I’ve been to Europe several times, but never Paris and my husband has never left the country at all, so we were thinking it might be a fun option. We’re flying from the east coast and are not trying to tack on other cities or side trips. Is this too short a trip for such a long flight (relatively speaking)? Other suggestions?

    • Anon

      Others may disagree but I go to Paris every year for 4-6 nights between meetings and it’s fine. I love it!

    • Anonymous

      Oh definitely do it! Aim for direct flights if at all possible. I went, solo, for four days, including travel time (so 3 full days there) and it was 100% worth it. No, you won’t be able to see everything, but neither would you be able to if you went for a week.

    • Anon

      Just did 5 nights in Paris with a toddler last spring (from the Chicago area). It was great! Go for it.

    • Anon

      I went to Paris for 4 nights over an extended weekend (landed on a Thursday left on a Monday) and enjoyed my time. I’ve been before and didn’t need to see the touristy stuff so I had a great time just roaming around and keeping things low key. I went by myself though, so I don’t know how doable it is with small kids. eg I get over my jet lag quickly but how do your kids cope with jet lag? It’s a short trip to get used to the time only to switch right back.

      • Anonymous

        Oh, I should probably clarify – the reason I think we can only swing 5/6 days at most is because we’re not bringing our kids (ha!). I think that’s the most we can get my mother in law to watch them.

    • anonn

      We did 9 days from the Midwest and it took us 3-4 days for our 14 month old to adjust. BUT, it took us 3 legs to get there, our kid was teething, and it was a 7 hour time change. So, I think if you can get there in 1-2 legs, it would be great. Check out the blog Brooklyn Limestone, she’s taken her 2 kids from NYC to Paris several times for shorter trips. Lots of great tips. Also, we used her photographer in Paris and she has some great travel tips on her site/insta too- Katie Donnelley .

    • NYCer

      We have done long weekends (3 nights) in Europe from the east coast numerous times, so I don’t think 5-6 days in Paris is too short by any means. Go for it – you will love it!

    • Senior Attorney

      I did three days in Paris a couple of years ago on the way home from a vacation elsewhere in Europe and it was divine. I say go for it!

    • Cat

      Go for it! With direct flights it’s super easy. The time change isn’t that bad if, like many NYC flights, they are ideally timed to take off at 9-10 pm so you can get at least 5.5-6 hours of semidecent sleep on the way over. (I hate flying to Europe on the 6pm flights because by the time I’m sleepy, we’re halfway there, and then I’m a complete disaster trying to operate on 2-3 hours of sleep!)

    • Never too many shoes...

      That is a perfect length of time for a city visit. You can do a lot in that amount of time. I have done four days trips to both Portugal and Italy (one city per trip) and it is more than fine and definitely better than not going at all!

    • anon

      I think 5-6 days is plenty to spend in Paris! Honestly, if I had more time than that, I’d probably add another destination rather than spend additional time in Paris. (I know there’s plenty to keep someone busy for weeks and months in Paris, but I think it’s a great city for 5-6 day “bites.”)

  19. Harkliniken

    I probably spelled that wrong….

    Anyone here tried it? I am definitely losing my hair, in my 30s, and it seems more promising, and cheaper, than a hair transplant. And anecdotally sounds more effective than Rogaine. But my derm doesn’t know anything about it, probably bc they don’t license the product to derms to sell. TIA!!!

    • Anonymous

      Idk why you’d go for the fake product instead of tried true and tested Rogaine

    • Anonamoose

      Go to a dermatologist. There are different types of hair loss, and early treatment is key for success. Don’t wait, don’t just try rogaine, don’t use random stuff of the internet.

  20. Worried sister

    Hopefully this won’t out me. My brother has a background as an accountant but has spent the past couple years working on local political campaigns. Always losing ones. I think he’d love to end up in government, but he hasn’t worked for a winning candidate. He’s extensively networking, etc., but that hasn’t translated into a regular full-time non-campaign job.

    He was on a campaign that lost in November and has now told me he’s joining another campaign, which I feel pretty certain will not be a winning one, through March. He’s in his mid-30s at this point, and this career just doesn’t seem to be working out.

    I want to guide him more concretely than I have been. And I think he’d be open to some guidance. Did anyone here ever work on campaigns and transition to something else? It’s kind of breaking my heart. I want him to do something he loves, but I also worry about this career long term!

    • anon

      I say this with kindness, but this is not your problem to work out. Unless your brother is specifically asking for your guidance, you need to back way off. (I say this as a big sister who has had to learn this the hard way. Let your siblings make their own mistakes and be very careful about giving unsolicited advice.)

      • Anon

        +1. Unless you think things will get so dire he would start trying to tap into your finances, this is not your business.
        The only thing that I think would be maybe acceptable is if in your natural course of life you come across someone you think would be specifically helpful for networking for him & make an introduction, but even then more like “hey, thought you might be interested in being introduced to each other!” with no direct implication or expectation on your end.

    • Anonymous

      following this one — my brother has been working, fulltime, on an unseen “start up” project for 8 years now. i’d love to do an intervention or something but he’s a grownup (almost 40)… and what does SA always say? people are not projects?

      • Senior Attorney

        I do always say that.

        Allow me to say it again: People are not improvement projects.

    • Anon

      I get it but is he unhappy/worried about his finances/career? I’m thinking no, otherwise an accountant — clearly someone with a marketable skill — would not keep jumping on campaigns in his mid 30s. This is a game most play in their mid 20s. What is the appeal to him? It may be being part of a common mission, being on the road, really bonding with your buddies on the campaign since he’s with them 24-7 etc. If these are it, accounting and government will NOT make him happy as it’s the total opposite. Why not look into political consulting? IDK what they do exactly but they do something that allows them to be on the road etc. but they make private sector $, 401ks etc.

      • OP

        Hmm… yeah. I guess the other thing I’d say is he’s married with a toddler and they are trying for another. So that’s probably why my antennae are up – I feel like I need to look out for them too! I’m also by far the most career savvy person in the family.

        I think what appeals to him is the networking and the politics. And that campaigns are where his relevant experience of the past two years lies. He’s the type who can be happy a lot of places though.

        • Senior Attorney

          I feel like that is another reason to butt out. If anybody should be doing an intervention it’s his wife, not his sister.

          • OP

            Haha fair. Um, his wife is getting a prolonged PhD in a subject with limited employment prospects?

            I suppose I will just wring my hands in private. I just love him and his kid(s) and worry (know) that he’s floundering. But not sure how to help.

          • Senior Attorney

            It turns out people want different things out of life. Maybe they like the life they have. I know, it probably blows your mind (like it blows my mind that my son doesn’t want a 9 to 5 desk job with a pension), but there you have it.

        • Anon

          He should find a flexible, stable job that allows him to get his campaign fix in his spare time.

          I LOVE working on campaigns, but I like a regular paycheck, too. So I work on them in my limited free time.

        • Anon

          Yeah, not your circus, not your monkeys. I tend to agree that the fact that he has his own young family makes your meddling worse.

      • OP

        Ugh, yeah I’m getting a lot of pushback. I should also say, he sends me his resume to review and consults with me on big decisions! This isn’t like it’s uninvited. He’s not specifically looking to switch fields, but he does regularly consult me on, well, a lot.

        I’m very nice and give good feedback! We have a very solid relationship!

        • Anonymous

          Yah that’s all fine I’m not saying you’re a bad person. But srsly. Mind. Your. Business.

        • Anon

          I understand and disagree with the others who say not to interfere. I am close to my younger brother and would do the same for him in a heartbeat. Unfortunately I dont have good advice for you as I know nothing about political careers. Maybe you should look up skills of similar folks on Linkedin and see what transitions they have made?

    • Anonymous

      totally not your problem. but my BFF worked on a bunch of loser campaigns in campaign strategy and ended up transitioning to being a research director for a top political media machine. Friend is 15+ years in and still loving it. All up in partisan politics all day long.

    • Anon

      +1 to it not being your problem and also campaign work is VERY different from government work. Are you sure that’s what he wants to do? Maybe he just likes working on campaigns.

    • Anon

      Maybe this is too late for you to read, but as someone who works in politics at a very senior level (and has done campaigns) here’s the deal:
      Campaigns (as staff) are for people in their 20s. Definitely not people who have kids. The hours are long, the pay can be okay (over the last few years, in more senior roles), but there’s no stability. It is an up or out profession (electoral politics) – you’re either good at it and you move up (winning doesn’t equal good here, FWIW) and eventually move to a committee/consultant role, or you move on to something else. What your brother is doing is not uncommon, but let me tell you, if he still hasn’t moved up, one more campaign won’t get him there, and working in government is not the same as working on campaigns, and working on one isn’t a path to the other (or, there are paths of much less resistance). He will, at some point figure this out. Electoral politics is a small industry, and people who actually “work” in it (not volunteer – if you have another job, you’re not working on a campaign, you’re a donor or a volunteer, period – we’ll tell you something else to get you do more though) know who he is and have made the decision to not pursue him for other opportunities (like political consulting work). That’s it. He’ll figure it out on his own.

      • Anon

        We don’t even know what he’s doing on campaigns, though. It seems like OP just dismisses the entire field as not worthy. But maybe he’s managing and actually making money. Maybe he actually LIKES it.

    • Anonymous

      I worked on campaigns and transitioned into nonprofit fundraising (development) because campaign work is too unstable to pay my student loans and support my lifestyle. However, I wouldn’t focus on the fact his candidates lose. Someone will always win, and many others will lose. Maybe he’s working for progressive candidates in a conservative area, or women/POC candidates in a primarily white area, or whatever. Sometimes candidates run to move the needle without expecting to win.

      If he is happy with very intense, short term, not particularly well compensated work…it is not your problem to fix. If he’s been in the field awhile, he knows what he has gotten himself into.

    • theguvnah

      Almost everyone in the entire government, political, and nonprofit advocacy sector has at some point worked on a campaign, so yes, there easy ways to transition to something else. I’m flummoxed by this question.

  21. Anon

    Super bizarre situation as work. There is a male senior partner who spends hours a day one-on-one with his much younger female associate. They take daily, out of office breaks for extended periods of time. (I do not think there is any type of affair going on but he absolutely dotes on her). Staff makes comments about how unfair it is that the associate isn’t working at work, comes late, is distracting with their lengthy personal convos, etc. The Staff attempted to raise issue with one person in management. That person refused to address it due to the status of the senior partner. Staff now wants to complain to other management but is concerned about retaliation. We aren’t big enough for HR. I think the associate will be in a world of hurt when senior partner retires because she isn’t used to regular hours and I honestly feel badly to some extent that she is in this situation. I am a senior associate, not management. I would like to stay out of it. Does that make me part of the problem?

    • Anonymous

      OMG stay out of it. If other people want to be so naive as to tell on the happy couple, let them. This happens at every law firm, everyone sees it, but no way leadership will do anything about it given that the guy is a senior partner with likely a lot of business. It’s naive to think they’ll do anything to harm or embarrass a business generator. Don’t feel too bad for this girl — she’ll likely land in house with one of his clients or will inherit some of his business when he retires.

      • Anon

        Oh yeah, I definitely didn’t mean that I personally would complain? It’s more of an issue with staff now complaining to me about and whether to discourage them from complaining again. I try to end the conversation as politely as possible with some neutral/generic thing – like yes, I can see how that would be frustrating. I think I need to come up with a bank of responses to the staff that doesn’t come off as cold but also doesn’t encourage further discussion. My honest opinion is that the situation will resolve and it isn’t worth risking their standing/jobs to complain about attorney conduct. But I don’t want to be doing something morally/ethically wrong by discouraging a complaint if that makes sense.

        • Anon

          “My honest opinion is that the situation will resolve and it isn’t worth risking their standing/jobs to complain about attorney conduct. But I don’t want to be doing something morally/ethically wrong by discouraging a complaint if that makes sense.”

          Your first sentence is completely correct and what you should be communicating to them. Your second sentence is nonsensical. Unless she’s fraudulently billing clients, what is the moral or ethical source of the complaint? There are a lot of reasons that some people get away with not doing their work; that is an issue for management, not for their peers.

          • Anon

            Point taken – I meant moral conflict regarding encouraging someone not to report something that I think is a bad work situation for the associate. No reason to think anyone is doing anything fraudulent.

          • Anon

            Why does it matter if it’s a bad work situation with the associate, so long as it isn’t harassing or illegal?

    • Cat

      Stay out of it. The proof is in the billable hours. When they are out of office on a “break” how do you know they haven’t decided to work from a coffee shop for awhile? And if the associate is getting good training from the senior partner, she’ll be in a great position to interview for in-house life if she’s unhappy with working with others after he retires…

    • rosie

      Whatever partners are enabling this senior partner to behave like this are a huge part of the problem. It is so sad to read that staff are complaining about the associate…what about the partner? This is a male senior partner problem not a younger female associate problem. This associate is in a very difficult position. If you are at all in a position to intervene, please please do so. Whether it’s talking through side channels with other partners to help get this associate work from other partners, or helping her deflect some of the attention.

      If the associate is in “a world of hurt” when the partner retires, it is not because she is not used to regular hours, it’s because the rest of the attorneys at this firm have allowed this senior partner’s behavior to continue without regard for the associate’s career development.

      • Anon

        I know the staff is frustrated with both parties. I unfortunately don’t think I am in any position to intervene – as an older female I feel badly about standing by without trying to help her. The situation doesn’t affect me other than the staff being annoyed. Just watching the trainwreck.

        • anon

          Other than distracting loud conversations, I don’t understand why staff care so much? Staff and associates aren’t comparable and they’re not evaluated on the same metrics. If staff want flexible schedules, then they can enjoy the trade off of billable hours and working at client demands. It doesn’t sound like this is a problem for the firm in general– it sounds like needless drama and gossip—except for the impact it may have on the associate’s career. She’s the one who should be concerned, if anyone. (I’d add that it could expose the firm to liability, but I think we all know how unrealistic it is that there’d be a lawsuit or threat over something like this.)

        • rosie

          Are the staff actually impacted or are they just gossiping? Are they having to stay late or have fire drills because of the behavior? If not, who cares. To me this whole situation sounds like cattiness from staff and a young lawyer being left to deal with the senior partner that no one else at the firm wants to interact with so they’re happy to have him focus on her.

        • M

          If you’re not in a position to intervene then that’s your answer. I would discourage staff from talking about it since they don’t know what her hours actually are. If she starts working more with a different partner, her time in the office may change.

          Attorneys often have more flexible hours and less face time during normal business hours than staff. In my office, non-exempt employees have to log their hours and can only flex 2 hours a week (i.e. miss 2 hours of work and make it up by coming in early or leaving late). Attorneys can work whenever as long as they are keeping up with their cases and doing their jobs. That’s because attorneys can vary between working 30-80 hour weeks. Some attorneys come in on the weekend, some stay late, some come in early (or all of the above when a case is going to trial). We all work on average more hours per week than the staff.

          In your office, apparently the associate’s hours are fine with the partners, so staff needs to accept that. I’m sure from the outside my job can look pretty cushy because I go to coffee and lunch with my coworkers, but we spend the entire time discussing issues in our cases and brainstorming. And the staff doesn’t know how late I stay at the office because they’ve all gone home.

          I think everyone needs to stay in their lane unless the senior partner is jeopardizing the associate’s career by putting her in a difficult situation and there’s something they can do about it (even if it’s just raising it to a different partner).

      • Anonymous

        This is a male senior partner problem, aided and abetted by other (probably male) senior partners, and the only thing that will happen if OP complains is retaliation against her. A peer, not a subordinate, needs to put this dude in his place.

    • Anonymous

      We had a nearly identical situation in our office. I am certain that in your office management knows all about it, and if they wanted to deal with it they already would have done so. Our situation was only resolved when the junior woman broke off whatever relationship it was she had with the senior male and transferred to another department. As a bystander, your only realistic options are to deal with it or leave.

      • Anon

        It doesn’t affect me personally at all (workwise or otherwise). I think that management probably assumes when the partner retires it will resolve itself!

    • anon

      Yeah, my instinct is to stay out of it UNLESS you are really close to the associate, which it doesn’t sound like you are.

      Also, are they getting their work done? I agree the optics aren’t great, but if they are both producing high quality work, management probably does not feel the need to address it.

        • Anonymous

          If he’s generating good income, then management isn’t going to do anything.

    • Anon

      I had to read this twice to see if it was about me…but I think not, phew! I’m not having an affair with my partner, but I do work closely with a partner who is almost 80 and spend lots of one-on-one time with him. He’s in the process of retiring (though he has been for a few years now) and a lot of our discussions are about business development and mentorship. He spends time with me as opposed to other junior partners because I’m the only person interested in this niche area of law (others have left the firm or retired), but he is planning on hiring others. I do get a lot of work from other partners (billed 2400+ last year), but they travel a lot, so virtually all of my face time comes from him. I think most associates know that I work for a lot of other people, but some may have blind spots and assume I only work for the senior partner. I don’t think any partners would assume this based on the way evaluations work and they all know I had a ton of other partners review me. For what it’s worth, getting mentored by him has been seen as a huge plus in my evaluations and the attitude has been that I should take advantage of it while he’s still here. Time spent outside of the office includes meetings with clients and potential clients, bar association lunches, related dinner events, etc. He once invited my husband and I to dinner at his house (with his wife and neighbors) around when we got married, but there have been no other social hang-outs. I’m explaining all of this because I realize that to my coworkers, they don’t see the reasons why we leave the office together, just that we do often. I also have never been conscientious of this because I never thought anyone would think I’m having an affair with someone 40+ years my senior, but I guess that’s a thing. Before assuming that the relationship is inappropriate, I would really carefully evaluate if your perspective could make things look worse than it is. Are you able to see one another’s time entries? For context, I log most of these events as business development time, so the associate’s time entries may give insight if the time is career-related or personal.

      • Anon

        OP here – lol it’s definitely not you. Way to go billing 2400+ hours btw!

    • Anon

      What the heck does this have to do with the staff? If by staff you mean other junior attorneys who are missing mentorship opportunities, that sucks, but if he’s retiring soon and she’s not doing any work, they are getting those billables and won’t be affected by his retirement. If it’s actual staff like paralegals and admin – tell them to stfu, they have entirely different functions and likely keep far more regular hours than any attorneys. It kind of sounds like jealous between staff and attorney run amok. This doesn’t affect them one iota – and who knows she may be working early morning or late night. Or not at all. It has nothing to do with staff and if firm management wants to make a decisions by balancing her lack of hours matching up with her comp v. her the value of her keeping senior partner happy (whether it’s a romantic relationship or father-daughter-mentee type) then that’s up to firm management.

      I agree, stay out of it.

    • Angela

      Staying out of it is so clearly what you should do I’m not even sure what we are all here talking about.

      • Anon

        OP here. I appreciate the perspective and definitely didn’t word the OP well! On no planet would I complain to management about the situation myself. It was more a concern of whether to discourage staff from doing so. Staff is upset about the distraction and nature of the relationship. Management is all older males; I am one of 3 female attorneys. I think the situation is messed up but you all have confirmed I don’t want to be involved on any level.

  22. Anon

    There are certain foods I just cannot stop eating. So I don’t buy them, but then I get depressed thinking about a life without those foods, so I buy them and eat the entire bag! Is this a binge eating problem or just an issue with certain foods? It happens with anything salty and crunchy: pretzels, tortilla chips, nuts, crackers. Any tips on how to eat these foods with moderation, or do I just need to cut them out of my life?

    • Anon

      I have the same problem with some food, but am not willing to live a life where I never eat those items again. I know I can’t change my willpower, trust me, I’ve tried. So what I do is not buy them for the house, but will go to the store and purchase a single serving when I want the item. So, instead of buying a big bag of pretzels for the house, how about just purchasing a snack size bag when you want them?

    • Lily

      Portion them out. Put 10 (or however many is a portion size) chips into a ziplock/reusable ziplock and take that to work with you (or to the couch with you, or whatever) and tell yourself that that’s it.

      • Anon

        “Tell yourself that’s it” is pretty simplistic for someone who has already said she doesn’t have self control around these foods.

        To OP, salted potato chips and chocolate ice cream can’t be in my house. I order them when I’m at a restaurant or whatever but I can’t stock them at home, because they are my weakness. It’s better that way. Can you do the same?

        • CHL

          Agree – I can buy a snack bag of chips when I get lunch but not have a full sized bag in the house (I cannot portion – I just pick up the next one). I don’t know if this is helpful to you or not but I heard a podcast around Halloween that “You are a grown up adult with a credit card and you can go buy a candy bar whenever you want.” For whatever reason, that resonates with me – kind of a delay, don’t deny mentality.

          • anon

            Delaying is also my best strategy. Potato chips are my cryptonite. Portioning a bag out or buying single serving bags does not work for me. Convincing myself that I can always get a bag next time I’m grocery shopping helps. Sharing the bag with my husband means I can’t munch it all alone (this doesn’t always happen). Committing to one flavor, that I can only get at Trader Joe’s, means I am not tempted to buy when at other stores. Never shop hungry. Also giving myself permission to splurge on better snacks (like fresh berries) if that can stop me from buying cryptonite. I end up buying a bag every 1-2 months, and inhaling it. That’s the equilibrium I can live with.

        • M

          I agree with this. Sometimes clear rules are the only way to moderate. Not having it in your house, but being able to order it at restaurants seems like a good compromise.

        • Anon

          Yes, if “tell yourself that’s it” is your advice, then you don’t get it at all.

      • Anon

        Haha that would never work for me and Ruffles. Agree that this is simply not useful advice.

    • Never too many shoes...

      Not the most environmentally friendly option, but this is what the Costco multipacks are perfect for. I always have those prepackaged almonds in my desk because if the big bag is there I will eat a meal sized portion due to the same problem you describe.

    • Mallory

      The philosophy behind Intuitive Eating tackles this issue as part of it – I haven’t looked into it for myself personally, though I’ve seriously thought about it. The basic idea is that by completely depriving yourself of things it makes the desire stronger – a natural human response. By having it available, the allure will wane over time, and moderation will be possible. Not an expert, so take with a grain of salt. Think it would be worth looking in to :)

      • anon

        I tried this once with a problem snack. I ate so much of this processed treat that I made myself completely sick and have never wanted it again, going on 11 years. I would not call that a success. I’m sure it’s worked for others, though. For most things, I do exactly what others say, keep it out of the house, but get single servings out to satisfy the craving.

        • CountC

          This approach doesn’t work for me either. I would eat every last bit of it, every single time. I really suck at willpower around food.

        • Anon

          I’m the same way. Oh, I can have cheesecake whenever I want. Great, I’ll have at least one slice a day for the rest of my life.

    • anon

      Those foods are made to light up your pleasure sensors, so it’s more than just a willpower issue. There are certain foods that I just can’t have in the house because I know I lose all sense of self-control once I start. That doesn’t mean I never have them, but I have them very sparingly. Or I buy the smallest package available, and I don’t buy it every time I go to the store. Honestly, moderation can be very very hard for some of us, and abstaining (or putting really clear limits around them) can actually be easier. Learned that from Gretchen Rubin!

      • anon

        Exactly. There was a neat article in the NYT several years back that detailed the R&D process for popular snacks and it was fascinating. Obviously that doesn’t mean that people don’t/can’t be expected to exercise will power, but these snacks quite literally are designed to make you want to keep eating. It’s not just an accident and OP (and those of us like her) shouldn’t be too hard on herself for enjoying something she’s biologically predisposed to enjoy (animals eat! their brains reward them! it’s a feature, not a bug) and that has been designed to make her want more. The way of exercising willpower that works for me is to keep it out of the house. If it’s there, I’m likely to eat it. If it’s not, I won’t go out of my way to get it. If it’s not in the house, I don’t waste mental energy (most times) “debating” or fighting with myself over whether I should be eating it. I still allow snacks/treats sometimes (eg, good deserts at restaurants, buying a single portion of something), because life of deprivation doesn’t work for me. Best part is that the longer I go without having these snacks as regular items, the less I crave them.

    • Anon

      Buy pre-portioned snack packs at Costco. Pack exactly one every single day to take with you to work and enjoy it at lunch.

      The “all or nothing” approach does work with some people, who have the willpower for “nothing.” With a lot of other people, it causes binging. The subject could be a certain food, whole categories of food, spending, s#x, booze, time on the internet, whatever it is that triggers your brain. In these circumstances, you have to understand that you CANNOT go cold turkey and “never” have those things; you find a way to have a certain amount of it and enjoy the living heck out of that certain amount.

    • Anon

      I also practice IE, but there are certain foods that just don’t seem to work well for me. I find that it’s too hard to listen to my body cues and that while tasty, certain things like chips aren’t satiating. My solution is, like others have mentioned, that I don’t keep the foods in the house, but that I still have permission to go buy them anytime I want (including in the larger bags, not just snack size bags). This has helped significantly with the frequency of craving these foods, but I still tend to eat the whole bag once it’s home (salt and vinegar chips are my krypotonite). I’m fine with that and I believe that all foods have a place in a healthy diet. It would not work for me to “ban” or “never” have those foods.

    • Anonymous

      I’m like this. I never keep it in the house but I do allow myself to buy one treat a day at the cafeteria at work.

      Some people are moderators and some are abstainers. In my house, I need to be an abstainer. Having to make the trek to the cafeteria in the other building allows me to be moderator at work. I never understood the people who suggest using single serving packages in this situation, like when you struggle with self-control, it’s not a big barrier to open the second pack instead of just continue with the big pack.

      • Anonymous

        The point is that you just buy one single-serve pack at a time, just as you do in the cafeteria.

        • Anonymous

          Right but if you’re at home, you have an entire box of single servings sitting in your pantry. I would just plow through them over a couple days. Having to walk to another building to get the next serving, and the cafeteria only being open certain hours, provides a physical and temporal limitation that’s a lot more than something staring at me from the pantry all evening.

    • Anonymous

      I try not to be unsupervised with snacks. I’ll indulge guilt-free when I’m around friends because I’m not going to eat the whole bag (if only because I don’t want to deprive everyone else!). Maybe it’s time to schedule a movie night so you can have some snacks in a “supervised” setting.

    • Anon

      As you can see from these responses, you are not alone.

      Certain junk foods are triggers for me, and I certainly love a good food/snack when I am stressed or depressed.

      My compromise is keeping things out of the house. And every week or two, I will grab one bag of those delicious large corn chips at Trader’s. And if I eat them all in one day, well… then no more for tomorrow. My loss.

    • Anonymous

      I understand how you feel. If I say “no” to a food, I just want it more and more. The only thing that works is buying a small bag and rewarding myself with that. I can’t get a multi-pack because I’d eat all of them. I have a particular weakness for Smartfood popcorn. I’ve tried buying the microwavable packages as they’re healthier, and it doesn’t do it for me. I crave Smartfood. So, about once a month, I’ll buy a small bag and scarf it down.

  23. Anon

    In a networking scenario (think: one on one coffee, not a reception at a conference), is it acceptable to say — I am looking to move on from my job but intend to stick with it for x time period longer because of benefits vesting? (X is months, not like 5 more years). Or does this venture into the territory of too much financial information, stoking someone else’s curiosity about your finances etc.?

    I feel like dudes are matter of fact like this about $$$ all the time and other guys heard this and “respect” that, but IDK if women are — I’ve literally never heard it. I am very much wanting to move on but am close to the finish line on a vested pension, which is such a rarity these days; I didn’t think I’d ever stick with this job but since I have, I find myself thinking what’s a handful of more months for a small pension (present value around 200k, not 2mil but it’s still better than nothing). It’s not like I’d bring this up to people left and right, having had some one on one coffee meetings, I’ve been asked — why don’t you try to move on NOW. Didn’t want to say the pension thing so then it felt wishy washy to be like, well I’m considering it, weighing options etc. What do people think?

    • Anon

      I would probably just say “I’m looking to move on this summer” without stating financial details. People can guess what you mean.

    • CHL

      Agree – I can buy a snack bag of chips when I get lunch but not have a full sized bag in the house (I cannot portion – I just pick up the next one). I don’t know if this is helpful to you or not but I heard a podcast around Halloween that “You are a grown up adult with a credit card and you can go buy a candy bar whenever you want.” For whatever reason, that resonates with me – kind of a delay, don’t deny mentality.

    • CHL

      Don’t forget that companies “buy out” people’s bonuses and vesting all the time as part of recruiting packages/ signing bonuses. It’s a piece of compensation that you would forgo in joining their organization and a lot of companies are willing to pay for it.

    • Anon

      I would just say that my pension vests in x month, and I’m looking to move after that. If you don’t give a reason why you are not ready to move yet, I would most likely think you are wishy washy or like the many friends I have who spend years complaining about their jobs and saying that they want to leave before they finally actually start looking – and I have no desire to try to help those people, because it is wasted effort.

    • Anon

      I think a lot of women can come off as flaky (unjustifiably) when we try to communicate grounded, logical concepts in a way that is socially acceptable *for women*.

      If you’re asked why you do not move NOW, the response is simple: “My pension vests in May; I receive nothing if I move before then.” If you feel the need to elaborate, “The math works out to something like an extra $50,000 per month.” Be very matter-of-fact.

      • Anonymous

        This – so many times people act like it isn’t socially acceptable for women to mention $, while guys I know are very specific in saying – nope not leaving now or even giving any hint of it bc it’ll jeopardize my 100k bonus or 20k in stock options or whatever and then they’re thought of as such responsible providers.

    • Anonymous

      I think you just vaguely say, I’ve made a commitment to complete 10 years (or whatever) at this organization (and let them guess whether that’s a professional or personal goal or means you have projects to wrap up or whatever), and change the subject back to leaving — after that, I’m really looking forward to focusing on x, want to explore y, etc.

      If you do decide to tell people more specifically why, you can say I need to make use of my benefits or so that my benefits will be vested — definitely don’t put numbers out there. Although everyone understands on a personal level that we need benefits (so it doesn’t hurt to say why), it’s also not something you lead with when job searching.

    • Anonymous

      I vary on this based on who I’m networking with. I’m a 40 yr old lawyer so when networking with the peer age group in the same space, I don’t hesitate to mention pensions, bonuses etc because those people get it; they know for example that pensions are rare in our industry so they’d get why someone would want to stick it out if it’s 6 more months.

      OTOH when networking with older guys, I don’t mention it because they simply don’t get it. They’ve had many of these benefits since day 1 of their career so it’s NBD to them to forego them at one job. Plus with some guys you get a bit of a “surprise” reaction – like why would you be worried about that surely you’re married and your husband makes more than you. With those men it’s like – none of your business why but I’m looking to make a move in Q4 of this year.

      • Anon

        “like why would you be worried about that surely you’re married and your husband makes more than you”

        I’m insanely proud of my husband’s career, but I make more than he does. (His hours are a lot more flexible, though, which is an incredible contribution to our household.) I have found that dropping that into conversation takes a lot of the sexist edge off these interactions.

      • Anon

        This. It’s none of their business. You control the message about you. You don’t owe anyone an explanation.

  24. Anonymous

    Thoughts about a guy sending flowers to you at work as an apology? This has happened to me a couple times with different guys and I find it so weird and intrusive. Before anyone says, oh he’s just being niiiiiice, let me explain. If he screwed up badly enough that he feels the need to send flowers, then it’s pretty bad. Like, I’ve already broken up with him or he knows a breakup is imminent. I’m just trying to get through the work day but now I have a reminder of our fight sitting on my desk. Plus it’s very public. Everyone at work will ask, oooo who sent you flowers, like I’m supposed to say something nice about the guy at a time that I’m really not feeling nice toward him. Why on earth are you bringing our fight to my office? If you must send flowers then send them to my house. Also – maybe actually fix the thing you messed up instead of acting like I can be bought with pretty things? Harumph.

    • Anon

      Idk this doesn’t bother me much. If I don’t want to see the flowers, I just set them on the desk behind me, or put them on the floor and throw them out on the way home. Flowers are out of sight out of mind. Also, if you’re telling your coworkers you’re getting flowers because you got in a fight, you’re telling too much of your business. If someone asks about them, just don’t answer and give a light smile. Most won’t pry.

    • UHU

      I’ve never liked these personal intrusions at work, unless it’s from a colleague or client in which case it isn’t personal. Is it possible to refuse the delivery next time? I would give the arrangement to the receptionist or in some other public place and also lie about why I received them: a client thanking me for that amazing thing I did; trying out flower of the month club; my sibling/friend lost a bet… Definitely not the truth.

      • CountC

        Tell the receptionist to keep them at the front desk/refuse the delivery or put them in a common area.

    • Sparky

      I didn’t like them being sent to my home either because I agree with the ‘bought with pretty things’ feeling. If he messed up you deserve an apology and the effort it takes to fix the issue going forward. And that goes both ways.

    • Anon

      Someone attempting to buy my forgiveness with flowers would get absolutely nowhere. I agree, fix your mess! Them sending the flowers to my office would just make me extra livid, like they’re trying to use the social pressure of my colleagues to get me to forgive/get back together with them just because they’re “so nice” to buy me flowers.

    • MagicUnicorn

      This doesn’t solve the main issue, but you could give the flowers to the receptionist/mail room clerks/etc. if you just need them out of sight so you can focus without all of the intrusive interruptions.

  25. anon

    I need help with suit shopping. I’m 5′ 2″, hourglass, like 115lbs, and Hugo boss suits fit me perfectly. I’m looking for a few more brand options for suit as I’ve started a new job that’s all suits all the time. Where should I start?

    • anon

      Depends on budget, but Theory may work for you. For lower cost options, try Banana Republic and Jcrew on sale.

  26. Anonymous

    Does anyone eat anchovies? I feel like they’re so healthy I should find a way to eat them. I like them in Caesar salad dressing but the thought of opening a can and popping one in my mouth is yuck.

  27. Anon

    Since people are discussing investment accounts — how much do you have in non-401k/IRA investments? What are your goals for that numerically/what are you saving for? Also — age/location (HCOL/MCOL etc)?

    • Anon

      $0, and will probably remain $0. Mid-30s, LCOL. But we have an unusual situation where we each have two retirement accounts we can contribute the limit (currently $19,500) to, plus we could an open an IRA (haven’t yet because we aren’t yet maxing our four retirement accounts), so we are saving more in retirement vehicles than most people. Someday, when our mortgage is gone and daycare bills are gone, we may have the means to save beyond these retirement accounts. But that seems a long way off.

      • Housecounsel

        I have been maxing out on my 401k my whole career and rolling over when I change jobs and so has my husband, but we don’t have a lot of savings beyond that. We have kids in private school and college so I am hoping we can do some other investing when they’re done. I don’t have a numerical goal. I’ve done a few online ‘how much you will need in retirement” online calculators, and gone through it once with a financial planner, but they all say I will need what seems like an utterly ridiculous amount of money. The formula seems flawed to me, but maybe that’s just wishful thinking? The formulas assume that my cost of living will be very close to what it is now, but I don’t see how that can be. I don’t plan on keeping my five-bedroom house and all the attendant costs and won’t be paying travel sports or tuition. My kids will theoretically be self-sufficient. I have LTC insurance. I am sure I am missing something.

        • Anon

          Healthcare, especially if you develop dementia. LTC insurance is very spotty and doesn’t generally cover a 24/7 aide, which people with advanced dementia need. It’s not that your costs are guaranteed to be high, it’s that there’s a possibility they will and you should save for that contingency. Hopefully they will be lower than anticipated and you can make your kids wealthy when you die.

        • Anon

          I don’t think you are missing something, I think the financial advisor field has bad calculators that are designed to install fear in people so that they can make money. I currently live on about half of my take-home pay and save the other half, but financial advisors always say I will have to replace 80% of my salary. That makes absolutely no sense and none have been able to defend that calculation when asked about it.

          • Hmmm

            I agree with this. I am fortunate enough to only need to live on about half of my salary now, I doubt I will need 80% of it when I retire. Yes, healthcare can be $100k+ per year if you need live-in aids or something like that, but I think most people only need that for the last few years of their lives, not the entire ten (or hopefully more!) years that they are retired.

          • Anon

            Yes, this. We realized this the first time we used a retirement calculator. It said we needed 80% of our (high) income to live comfortably in retirement (nope) and that our money needed to last until we were 95. All our bio-grandparents died before age 80 and two of our four parents have already passed. I don’t think living to 95 is in the cards, and I’m not going to plan for that.

            “Hopefully they will be lower than anticipated and you can make your kids wealthy when you die.”

            Not all of us want this or think this is a reasonable or desirable goal. I believe in hoping for the best and planning for the worst, but following financial advice that tells me to save a ridiculous amount of my current salary so I can live on the interest from my investments and leave the principal to my heirs does not benefit me, it benefits the financial services industry that can charge fees on assets under management. If the quote above is from a financial advisor or someone who works in finance, bear in mind they are directly benefiting from the vagaries and built-in inequities of that system. Fortunately, people are starting to question whether or not financial services firms with skin in the game are impartial dispensers of good advice. Kind of like driving into a car dealership and asking the salesperson if they think you need a new car, IMO.

        • Anonymous

          The flaw in most of the calculators is the % of your current income they assume you need in retirement. No, I don’t need 80% of my current income in retirement when I currently live on 40% of it. But half of the basic calculators don’t even have an option to set it below 60%.

      • Anon

        You don’t have an emergency savings account? Obvs. not a financial advisor, but you really should pull back on retirement vehicle savings so you have to do a 401k loan for a busted pipe or broken down car.

        • Anon

          An emergency savings account should not be in an investment account. Emergency savings needs to be in a safe place, not the market. Nothing they have said indicates that they don’t have an emergency savings account.

        • Anon

          We have an emergency fund with ~six months of expenses at our current standard of living (could easily stretch to a year or more if we cut back on luxuries like travel), but that’s sitting in a bank in a savings account. The question was about investing outside of retirement and we don’t do that. It’s a very similar situation to the poster below at 12:01. If we maxed all our university accounts, I think it would be about $85-90k/year (some of it post-tax money because we have Roth through our employer) which is close to 2/3rds of our pre-tax salaries. So yeah, not in a position to max out, at least not while we still have a mortgage.

      • Anon

        Same here. We have about $10k in a brokerage account because my husband and I both work at a university with mandatory employer and employee contributions to a 401a, plus the ability to contribute to a 403b and 457b. That’s about $100K per year, or about 2/3 of our salaries, so we don’t actually max these out, though we do contribute to Roth IRAs on top of this.

    • Anon

      Mid 30s, single income, MCOL, my non-retirement fund is approximately the same amount as my retirement fund. My short term goal is to hit 1 million combined. I know I should have more to retire on, but it’s such a climb that 1 million is a less stressful number to envision.

    • Anon

      Early retirement or at least working part-time. I have more in non-tax-advantaged investment accounts than in my 401K due to a modest inheritance and a lack of 401K contributions while in grad school.

    • Anon

      Around $40k. I need about $100-120k, on top of my emergency fund (which is in CDs and a savings account) as a downpayment on an apartment in my VHCOL city. Slow and steady!

    • Anonymous

      Mid 30s, married, 3 young kids, Boston Burbs. We have 700k in retirement assets (250k roth, 450 regular) and ~40k in college funds. We have about $60k in cash and $100k invested in mutual funds. We have about $500k left on our mortgage and the house is worth ~$900k.

      Our HHI has fluctuated from $200-$450k over the past 6 years; I think the average is somewhere around $325. DH and I each have the “earning power” to earn around $200k. Right now he’s making $200 with a $40k bonus. I’m working part time/freelancing and making $85-100k depending on what projects I get. With all our main expenses, we can live on his salary alone– and that includes part time preschool and daycare tuition for two kids (about $2500/month). My salary goes to vacations, nice-to-haves, more aggressive mortage payoffs, and more recently, a $200k home improvement project. We contribute somewhere between $50 and $80k to retirement funds annually [DH has a 401k with matching; I have a Self Employed 401k with employer profit share matching, we do Roths].

      When we retire, we plan to sell our current house and downsize both in size and cost of home. Conservatively, we’ll have over $600k in equity in the house and will buy our next place in cash. We took a look at our budgets and decided we would be living on like 25-35% of our income in retirement. we added $25k/year for healthcare costs (I know it is often more than that, but not for the entire duration of retirement. and if I get diagnosed with early onset dementia in my late 50s, i have already told DH i want to get a divorce and to sit around in a medicaid wing for 40 years. No sense draining our assets while my mind turns to mush.*)

      *I have worked in and around alzheimers for over 10 years. I don’t say this without a deep understanding of the disease and the toll it takes on families (and finances). My family has no history AND a history of living super long.

    • Anonymous

      mid-40s, Midwest
      presently only saving $100 a month into an index fund, but in previous years as much as $2k monthly (and lots in retirement accounts)

      currently $175k cash
      $2M+ in investments, $750k post-tax (about $150k in 529s and other for kids)

    • Anon

      $120K in retirement accounts, $200K in savings (CDs), none in nonretirement investment accounts.

      I have $640K mortgage left on a $1.2M, 1400 sq ft apartment in a burb of a HCOL city. Mostly throwing the money to overpay the mortgage once the prepayment fee term is over in a few months. Also saving for grad school in a few years. Early 30s, single.

  28. no

    Favorite candles that cover odor but DON’T smell like flowers? Anything floral makes me sneeze. I love my open plan kitchen but hate the way the whole house ends up smelling like onion/fish/etc.

    • UHU

      Anything Jo Malone or Anthropologie has great options and though pricey, they last a super along time. Oh! Ikea also has some lovely non-floral fragrances, at a much more reasonable point.

    • anon

      I think opening a door/window, cleaning the kitchen as you go does more to cover kitchen odors than a candle. febreeze makes some deodorizers that have minimal fragrance, so you could try one of those. In terms of candles to try, i would go for a citrus type scent (i like the ones from nest). I also think a diffuser works well for refreshing the house, again i normally use citrus based oils (i got a mixed pack from target).

    • Flats Only

      You want the “kitchen candle” from the Vermont Country Store. Just search, it will pop up. It doesn’t have much of a scent, but if lit while you cook it will keep your house from smelling of food. I have no idea how it works, but it totally does.

    • Senior Attorney

      It’s too late for this year, but during the holidays Trader Joe’s has these amazing candles in holiday scents like evergreen and currant and gingerbread. I plan to stock up next year. Also they have occasionally had some fabulous ones that smell just like lemon cookies. Keep your eyes open for them — they all come in small aluminum tins.

      Failing that, I like vanilla candles, which are widely available.

    • Anonymous

      You need to eliminate the smell, not cover it up. If your range hood is vented outdoors, use it. And get a Hamilton Beach True Air plug-in charcoal air filter. I have two of them (one in the bathroom my husband prefers for his, uh, morning constitutional, and one next to the bed of my large stinky dog). They really work.

    • anon

      Bath and Body works still has its semi annual sale going on and we went on Sunday – stocked up on tons of candles for about $3 each, many in holiday and/or foodie scents. Might be worth a shot.

      • Worry About Yourself

        Yep, the fall/Christmas single-wicks are 75% off right now! Well, what’s left of them anyway. They had a ton of 3-wicks for $10.50 but that ended on Sunday.

    • PolyD

      I put small bowls of white vinegar in and near my kitchen to get rid of food odors that won’t go away. It seems to help, and while your place will smell faintly of vinegar for a bit, that goes away quickly.

    • Worry About Yourself

      I opt for candles that smell like desserts for my kitchen, and burn them when we’re cooking with garlic, or cooking scallops (they smell so good before you eat them, but the lingering smell after dinner isn’t as enjoyable). I would recommend anything with cinnamon or apple, they tend to be pretty powerful.

  29. anonn

    We did 9 days from the Midwest and it took us 3-4 days for our 14 month old to adjust. BUT, it took us 3 legs to get there, our kid was teething, and it was a 7 hour time change. So, I think if you can get there in 1-2 legs, it would be great. Check out the blog Brooklyn Limestone, she’s taken her 2 kids from NYC to Paris several times for shorter trips. Lots of great tips. Also, we used her photographer in Paris and she has some great travel tips on her site/insta too- Katie Donnelley .

  30. Housecounsel

    I feel like I’ve seen this mentioned here before. Is there an app that you can set up to tell you when something goes on sale? I have been kicking myself since Black Friday for not buying a particular pair of boots, and they aren’t on sale anywhere. I wouldn’t mind paying full price if I hadn’t seen them 25% off back in November. Thank you!

    • Anonymous

      You can use honey. It’s a chrome extension that you can set how much you want the price to drop before it notifies you. It works on most major sites including amazon and is amazingly helpful.

      joinhoney.com/ref/y5t8gc (this is my referral code and if so many people use it I get like $10)

  31. Anonymous

    I’m looking for a good diet/eating plan for the next 30 or so days to reset some of the damage i’ve done to my waistline over the holidays. Main goal is getting rid of the extra 5lbs or so that showed up while still having energy to work out occasionally (barre) and chase the kids. I have no particular diet restrictions. I do have 3 kids under 6, so something that “cooperates” with feeding them would be great. I’m not terribly excited about the idea of two totally separate meals every night.

    What do you like/what would you recommend? My husband generally eats low carb, so I could double down on that, but I get really cranky without carbs.

    • Anonymous

      Whole 30 might be a good option. I would say it’s pretty kid friendly as long as your kids will eat, like, chicken and vegetables. You just have to cook a lot. You can have a lot more carbs than you can on something like keto – sweet potatoes are in almost everything I make!

    • Anon

      I don’t think there is much advice for a “diet” that will help you drop 5 lbs in 30 days that will stay off except to eat clean. And by eat clean it means no cookies, cakes or added sugar desserts except for special occasion (trying to be realistic), sticking to small servings of whole grains (rice, barley, oats, etc.), small to normal size servings (ie 4 – 6 oz) of lean simply cooked meats, and filling up on non-carby veggies and fruits. I find it’s easier to maintain eating like this as a family by cooking dishes by food group so everyone else can fill up on what they want. So a typical dinner might be grilled chicken, mashed potatoes (low or no butter), green beans/brusselse sprouts, and a bowl of grapes or orange for dinner.
      If you’re a volume eater keep multiple big pieces of fruit around, in your purse, and at work. If not, a small handful of nuts are useful to tide you over to the next meal.

    • Lily

      Portion control would be the easiest “fix.” Either cut out excessive snacking, or try to trim your lunch/dinner portions by 1/2 (add some steamed or raw veggies in to take up some of the empty room on your plate) and see what happens. I find this easiest because I can eat exactly what I am already eating, but just have to eat less of it. It will also serve as a way to figure out if you’re eating the wrong things, because if you’re eating junk, then eating less junk will leave you feeling weak and cranky, but if you replace that with healthier food, you can get away with more of it and feeling fuller.

      • Anonymous

        This. 5 holiday pounds can usually be combated (at least initially) with small fixes. Cut out alcohol, drink more water, limit sugar, add more veggies or leafy greens to your diet in place of carbs (swap out rice or grain as a base and sub lettuce).

    • UHU

      No sugar. Full stop. If you want to be strict i.e, not just stopping on what is obvious; read labels, sugar is in everything from crackers to sauces. This should help immensely.

      For me, once I framed exercise as just something to be done as part of my daily routine like taking a shower or brushing my hair, I’ve been consistent. What form that can take, from low intensity to higher, is variable and can be anything from a yoga class to a 7 minute session on an app to a few hours hike or a half hour run.

    • shananana

      My post holiday drop the five pounds usually looks like, cut out most dairy, limit starchy carbs to once a day, alcohol to once a week and actually measure and write down my food choices. That and increasing water consumption usually does it within a month. I rebel strong against any kind of structured diet plan though, so this is more of my mind trick so it feels less diet and more just a general clean up lol.

    • Anon

      When I feel this way, I make a huge pot of vegetable-only soup and eat that instead of one of my meals (lunch or dinner) for a week or so. I usually make a soup that’s largely cabbage, potatoes, carrots, beets and lots of dill (beets + dill is lots of flavor!), with a little veggie stock, and I allow myself to eat essentially unlimited portions of it. I limit myself to fruit, mostly apples and clementines in the winter, as snacks and desert, drink lots of unsweetened herbal tea. This plan has the added benefit of increasing your fiber and water intake.

    • Anon

      I also think simply cutting out sweets and alcohol and bringing your lunch to work will help a lot. I echo the suggestion of soups. Here’s a very easy vegetable soup I make a lot:

      Dice onion, celery, carrot, and mince some garlic. I don’t always have celery and carrot so I add whatever I have. Sauté in a bit of oil, adding the garlic toward the end. Add 1 can broth or 2 c stock, 1 can tomato purée or diced tomatoes. Salt, pepper, and whatever herbs you like – I like Italian herb mix. When the onions etc are soft enough add 1 bag mixed frozen vegetables and 1 can of drained beans – chickpea or black beans are good. You can add some chopped kale or serve this over fresh spinach if you like more greens. (Don’t mix the spinach into the soup for storing, it gets slimy, but kale will hold up.)

      In the winter, frozen veggies are usually better quality than imported veggies so don’t get too hung up on that part. I like the bags with peas, green beans, carrots, and corn, but I also like the mixes that have green lima beans too. Whatever floats your boat.

      This is good to bring to work in 2c mason jars and reheat in the microwave.

      My kids like this soup with grilled cheese half sandwiches or just some bread to dip.

      • Anon

        I forgot to say, I add water after the veggies to get it to a soup like consistency, otherwise it can be very dense/thick and stew like. Taste for seasoning at the end.

  32. Anonymous

    Is anyone on here pescatarian? How many servings of fish do you eat per week? I am trying it out and so far have been sticking to low-mercury fish like salmon and skipjack tuna and originally planned to do 3 servings of fish per week, but I find it so delicious that I wish I could have more than 3/week. How do you keep track of mercury levels?

    • Anon

      I would mention this to your doctor, but you’re probably fine sticking to low-mercury fish.

  33. Anonymous

    Ladies on dating apps: do you set your age range to younger than your age? Why or why not? I’m trying to decide if I’m blocking myself from meeting someone because I have age and height filters set. I’ve never dated someone younger than myself, but I have three younger brothers, so tend to associate younger brothers with them and I am not looking to be someone’s mother or caretaker. I also find the men my age are so behind in emotional maturity that the thought of trying younger makes me cringe. Am I wrong?

    • anon

      Married now, but when I did online dating a few years ago, I set my range to about 2 years younger than me and up to 8 years older (so basically a ten year range). I didn’t want someone substantially younger mainly because I was concerned they might not be in the same place as me (looking for marriage and kids). My now-DH is two years younger than me so it worked out haha. How old are you and what kind of rel’ship are you looking for?

      • Anonymous

        OP here – I am 29 and I am looking for my life partner. Which is why I tend to date older because guys in their 20’s (so far in my experience) are not yet “life partner” material. They seem to have a lot of growing up to do still.

        • anon

          That makes sense. At 29, I would probably go no more than two years younger, and up to 5-6 years older, to net you the widest pool. As for the height filter, everyone has their own preferences. I’m 5’4″ and wanted someone at least a couple inches taller than me (which most guys are) so set mine at 5’6″ and above. I have dated shorter guys before and it was fine, but not necessarily something I’d prefer.

        • Anonymous

          Seems pretty limiting. There are probably plenty of 27/28 year old guys who might be interested in a serious relationship. DH was 27 when we met and I was 31. Not sure you should dial it back to 23/24 but I’d definitely think you are limiting yourself if you start at 29.

      • Anji

        My boyfriend of 13 months is 1 year younger than me. We met on a dating app and never would have matched if I’d filtered him out by age (or height, for that matter). He is “my person” and we are excitedly planning to be engaged in the next month or 2. I’m ridiculously happy and thankful for him. PLEASE do yourself a favor and keep your options wide. My belief is that standards should be high for character issues but more flexible for superficial things like height/age.

    • anomanomanom

      I think it depends on how old you are? I mean, at 27, absolutely not, at 37, yeah I have my filter set up to 5 years younger. I know several women in their later 40s dating men 7-10 years younger than them and I wouldn’t know that honestly if they hadn’t told me.

    • Anonymous

      Remove the height filter. I would not expect that to be accurate in the slightest.

      I have a little more faith in the age filter, though obviously people mess with that too. My answer depends how old you are. If I were 25, I probably wouldn’t be open to dating someone younger. At 35 though, meh, anyone over 30 is fine.

    • Anon

      I think this definitely depends on how old you are. IMO, the older, the wider the parameter on age. For me, at 22, the minimum age would be 21 to avoid people still in college and upper range would be 28 as I didn’t want someone itching to get married. In late 20s, I set the range three years below and 7 yrs above to stay roughly in the same generation and place in life. If I was single in my mid to late 30s, I’d do a 5 yr range down and 15 yr above my age as after a certain period of time, to me so long as you’re of experienced working age and “could take on a new kid” age, it was fine by me.

      For height, my range was set not by my preference but by “how absurd would this be strategically”. I’m 5’2 so my range was about 5’5 to 6’3 (trying to be open)

    • Anonymous

      My age range? No, because in the reverse case I wouldn’t treat a person who lied about something so easily verifiable. Their age range, younger, yes. Surprisingly, I find younger men (mid-20s up) more emotionally mature and self aware than older men (late 30s up). Give it a try, have fun– a date isn’t a commitment.

    • CountC

      Yes, I do. I have dated younger and older and have not found a reliable pattern as to which group is worse. I set mine around 4 years younger and older. Some younger men have matured faster than older men and vice versa. I don’t think you can reliable paint one group of people with a broad brush. I’m right off of 40 and IME 36 year olds are generally in the same place in life as me or at least enough so that we have things in common and can have meaningful conversations. Likewise, generally speaking, a 46 year old isn’t old enough to be seriously considering retirement (as I am not even close).

      • Anon

        Same here! And my boyfriend (who I met on a dating app) is 4 years younger than I am, so I’m glad I did. You’re also limiting yourself by having a height filter. I don’t know what your filter is, and I get the thing that a relationship can’t work if you’re not physically attracted to someone, but I’m not convinced there’s a real difference you can see between 5’11” and 6″ such that a filter really works IF your concern is that you’re blocking yourself from meeting too many people.

        • CountC

          Agreed on the height restriction thing. What’s the harm in removing it? You still don’t have to talk to anyone you don’t want to.

    • Monday

      My brother is 4 years younger than I am, so my age minimum is his age. I just can’t get on board with the idea of someone younger than my younger brother. (It doesn’t have to be rational!)
      That said, at 38 I see very little correlation between men’s ages and how serious or functional they are. I’ve also been surprised to find that those who pursue me tend to be slightly younger, rather than slightly (or much) older than me. I’m currently seeing someone 1.5 years younger, who is the best prospect I’ve met in a year on the apps.

    • Anon

      I would first reexamine the height filter. If you feel like you need to date men taller than you are, why? This is a vestige of patriarchal thinking that you probably don’t engage in in the rest of your life — if you don’t expect a man to support you financially and protect you from predators, then why does he need to be a certain height? If you are “only attracted to men of a certain height” or “we look better in pictures if he’s taller” or “I worry about looking too tall,” examine these ideas as well. They all go back to the idea of the woman as the weaker one and the man as the dominant protector.

      I’m 5’4″ and I’ve dated men at all points in the height spectrum, and I’ve found that height is in no way correlated with personality traits. Incidentally, my scientific analysis has also shown that height is not correlated at all with other er… physical size attributes.

      • anon

        Um, sometimes it’s just a matter of attraction. It doesn’t need to be examined. It’s just physical attraction. I am that person who thinks that everything is caused by The Patriarchy, but really, wanting to date someone taller than you is not necessarily the patriarchy. I don’t need a guy to be fit and have muscles to defend me from predators but I am still more attracted to fit men– is this also the patriarchy? Is this not valid and am I some how going to reason myself out of this preference? I guess I get irked at women constantly being told that their preferences for attraction are not valid, or that a height preference is some illogical, shallow, pointlessly self-limiting and unexamined desire. Pretty sure OP’s not dumb enough to expect height to be correlated with good or bad personality traits.

        • theguvnah

          I think it’s been pretty well established by now that attraction is at least partially informed by societal conventions, no?

    • Anon

      At the moment, my age range includes men up to 5 years younger than me. It has always included some years younger, the exact amount has just changed as my age has changed. For example, I didn’t want to date a 24 year old when I was 29, but I did date a 27 year old and the reason it didn’t work out had nothing to do with his age.

    • Anonymous

      YMMV but my DH is the same height as me and 4 years younger. Definitely reconsider your limits on age and height.

      I only changed mine to an inch below my height as I find most guys overestimate their heigh anyway. I always assumed I’d marry someone 6ft plus because I’m 5’10”, turns out that was wrong. Do I miss my 6’6″ ex-BF? No, because he was a tall douchebag.

    • AnonNYC

      When I was dating, I would 100% have adjusted my height filter before my age filter. The emotional maturity angle seems to have a much bigger impact on long term happiness, and there are some very handsome short dudes out there!

    • Anon

      Yeah, you’re probably not doing yourself any favors to not consider dating people who are a little younger unless you’re like 22. It’s not like you were undateably immature a year ago, so why would someone else be?

    • anon

      When I started using the apps post-divorce at 35, I set my age filters at 30-45. I thought I would end up mostly dating men my age or older, but I got a ton of interest from men in the 32-33 age range, so I’m glad I didn’t set it at 35. On height, I never set a filter. My ex is over 6ft, but my current BF is my height (5’6ish). It’s way more important to me that he’s smart, funny, handsome, and kind. Honestly, I feel like I really benefited from all the women out there setting their filters at 5’8. He’s awesome.

    • Anon

      Re: height, I’m really tall (over 5’11”) so I’d be excluding 50%+ of men if I insisted on someone being taller than me. I dated before apps, but I wouldn’t have set a height filter, personally. I think it’s unlikely I’d be attracted to someone who is 5’4″ or even 5’6″ but I wouldn’t want to draw a bright line cutoff anywhere, because what if I missed out on a great, hot guy who was just under that cutoff. Fwiw, my husband is under 5’9″.

      I think if you’re having tons of online dating success even with height (and other) filters, that’s great and you should keep doing what’s working for you, but if you’re looking for ways to expand your dating “pool,” removing height filters is an easy one. You don’t have an obligation to meet anyone or to go on a second date with anyone you met but weren’t attracted to.

    • Anon

      You should absolutely remove both of those filters if you’re looking for something that eventually ends up in a serious relationship. If you’re just looking for casual gardening, you do you.

      • Ellen

        If you remove all filters, you will find yourself with all kinds of men, and you will wind up with men whose primary interest is gardening. That is the least common denominator b/c all men are interested in gardening, and if you wind up with that, you will find yourself exhausted from men who will do nothing else. My personal erogenous zones are not for every man (at least not until I am in a serius relationship) and it should NOT be fair game for every guy the first time he meets me, and that is what you will wind up if you wind up without filters. You also could get a s-xueal disease by letting every man into your erogenous zones on day 1. FOOEY!

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