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– Slate has an interesting article on clothing sizes.
– Both AlreadyPretty and Lisa from Privilege discuss how to step outside your sartorial comfort zone.
– Lucky rounds up the 10 things you still can't purchase online.
– The Careerist calls BS on Working Mother‘s list of Top 15 Jobs You Can Do From Home. Meanwhile, Jezebel shares their take on a CNN story about how working too much can”depress the hell out of you.”
– SavvySugar has some suggestions on how to annoy your boss. The WSJ has some tips on how to get your resume seen in an era when many companies use computers to screen out “about half” of all resumes.
– Two personal notes: Independent Fashion Bloggers was kind enough to feature me as their “Professional Blogger of the Week.” I'll also be speaking at the IFB conference on February 8.
Did we miss anything? Add 'em here, or send them to news@corporette.com. Thank you!
karenpadi
Congrats on being named the “Professional Blogger of the Week”!
PT Lawyer
RE: The Careerist article.
Hi, My name is PT Lawyer and I am a senior corporate attorney. I work from home, as do many lawyers at my firm. It can be done. I’ve done it for several years.
Anon
It can be done, but most professionals I know that work from home (full or part time) lucked into the job. Such jobs aren’t usually advertised–they are created to keep specific people on a team.
Arty
Right, but you are not a “trial” attorney, which was one of the Careerist’s main objections. So you’re not actually a counterexample.
Blonde Lawyer
The other thing that article missed, though the comments mentioned, is that just because you can work from home doesn’t mean you can be home with the kids at the same time. Most employers require you to have a kid free house when you are working or a locked office door or something.
I can work from home as needed (like if I’m sick, waiting for a delivery, etc.) but my employer would not let me work from home in lieu of daycare (if I had kids.) It also wouldn’t be fair to my imaginary kids for me to be working 8+ hours a day with them there. What would they be doing? Watching TV the whole time?
K
Already Pretty has a…unique…approach to dressing, so I would keep that in mind.
anone
I wouldn’t be caught dead showing up to work in any of her get-ups.
An
Yup
KW
That working mom article is so far off. There is no way county transportation planners can work from home. Yes, the feds like promoting telework, but for that job, it is super hard to accomplish.
KC
So, i have a question for the hive – well, more like a statement that i’d like some reaction to. I’m 26, in a long term, stable, great relationship, and I have no friends besides my boyfriend. I work in an okay job, mostly administrative, and have hobbies that I enjoy and generally feel like a happy, fufilled person, or at least i’m on my way to feeling fufilled in my career – i’m happy with the path that I’m on. I’ve always been some what of a loner, but I made some close friends in college, but I find that now we’ve grown apart both in years and distance, I don’t “miss” them – sure, i hope they’re well and occasionally send a text or chat, but I don’t feel the NEED for anyone else in my life besides my parents and boyfriend. Is this normal? I feel like as women, we’re constantly innudated with images of women interacting with other women,from shows like sex and the city and stuff like that, and I really don’t have that kind of friendship with anyone besides my boyfriend. He’s a lot like me too, he really hasn’t kept in touch with many of his college friends. We are both likable enough people, and were both Greeks in college (i only mention this to demonstrate we are capable of interacting with others) thoughts? any ideas how to make any of these magical friends? sometimes, I’d really love a friend to go get a pedicure with….I’m in DC, btws, so any friend making suggestions for there are appreciated.
30
There’s nothing wrong with you. We don’t all have to be extroverts–or surrounded by people all the time. It’s easiest to meet people through work, so if your job isn’t helping, are there groups/classes related to your hobbies you could drop in on? That might be a good way to find a girlfriend who shares your interests.
Cat
No advice, but I could have written this post, so you’re definitely not alone! I also have a loner personality and need “alone time” to feel like myself. While I can be sociable enough with people I know (and people I don’t know, in relatively smaller doses at a time), I get enough interaction between work colleagues and husband that I’m not sure I would have enough social energy to really keep up with multiple close friends as well.
38
There’s absolutely nothing wrong with the situation you describe. In fact, I think it kind of becomes more normal as you get older. I had a group of SATC-type pals who I hung out with almost every weekend the few years after college. Now we get together once a year and send Christmas cards, except for one whom I see about once every month or two. I suspect we’ll see each other even less though once she is married, which makes me kind of sad. I know we would all drop what we were doing in a moment for one another. But honestly, once people start having kids and getting married or coupled off I think it takes a lot more work to keep connections active. Between work and life, it’s just hard to keep all the balls in the air. And honestly, I think it’s ok not to keep it all going sometimes if you’re pretty happy with how everything else is running along. Ask someone from work to go out after work for drinks occassionally or to snag lunch, and you’ll likely build a partner in pedicures soon enough. The other thing that might help is setting up something with the folks you do chat with that’s pretty far out in time–it’s really tough sometimes for me to play social director like this, but it always results in at least a few of us getting together. And I think we always come away from it realzing how much we’ve missed each other. Even if it is once in a blue moon until we see each other again. If you’re feeling like you want an influx of new folks, then definitely get invovled in volunteering with something you’re passionate about. It’s amazing how fast a common cause can kind of bring people together.
Erin
I live in DC too and met most of my friends through church and through other friends. I also have a lot of friends here I went to college or law school with (so many of my friends started as friends of these college friends). I have about 6 close friends, several of whom live in my neighborhood and who see them at least once a week (at and after church) if not more. The friends who live farther away I see once or twice a month. No idea if I’m normal or not.
If you don’t go to church, can you find a group setting that meets weekly or monthly, like a professional meetup, alumni club happy hour, dance class, etc? That, of course, assumes you want to make new friends – if you’re happy the way you are, no need to change.
Seattleite
I’m an introvert, and so haven’t really had the ‘group’ friendships that media tend to celebrate. What I have had are several close one-on-one friendships with other women. They have met each other, but we all prefer the quieter and closer communication that happens with just two people present.
I think it’s important to have friends outside of family and SO relationships. Outside of family to broaden our perspective (and possibly alert to pathologies) and outside of SO, because being the sole entertainment buddy/emotional support is exhausting over time. It also results in a very boring SO after a few years.
MM
My boyfriend and I are similar – busy jobs, and our hobbies (outdoors stuff – hiking, etc.) take up most of our weekends. We’ve been together since before moving to our current city, and it’s always been easier to just hang out together at home than make the extra effort to make new friends, so I really only have a couple of close gal friends in our current city, even though I always had lots of them in school. I feel guilty about it when I think about it – like I should be dedicating more time to making more close friends, but really, I feel like I hardly have time for the few friends we do have! One thing that has been really nice in the last year or two is that we’ve made a few other “couple friends” – other couples that we’ve become good friends with – we’ll do stuff all together (coming over for dinner, going to baseball games, etc.), and then we’ll also hang out one-on-one – the 2 of us girls will go shopping or something while the guys do something else. We’ve become pretty close this way, and boyfriend and I don’t feel like we have to abandon eachother to hang out with our friends. Plus, my boyfriend really appreciates that I don’t try to drag him shopping with me anymore :-)
AnonInfinity
I just read the SavySugar article, and this was one of the tips on how to annoy your boss:
“Regularly bring up your accomplishments. Patting your own back is fine every once in a while, but high-fiving yourself for every little victory is sure to frustrate both your co-workers and your boss. Save the boasting for your year-end review and always note your successes with a purpose — as in, say, while negotiating salary.”
Wasn’t there a discussion on here a couple of weeks ago about a woman who noticed that her male co-workers would come in, even after the most minor hearings, and brag to anyone and everyone that they’d won? I don’t go to my peers and say, “Partner A told me I did such a great job on that motion,” but I’d definitely tell the partners I’m working with each time I won a motion/hearing/whatever. Maybe that’s different because they have a direct interest in the case?
Anony
Following Kat’s recommendation I invested in Wolford cashmere tights. But last week I hand washed them and dried them too close to a heater. I noticed on time but there is an area where they are almost transparent and about to tear. Is there a way to contain the damage ?
Lisa
Thank you Kat! And congrats on speaking at IFB. I love that concept, Corporette in there with so many young things wearing the daring.
girl scouts
Interesting post made here. One thing I’d like to say is the fact most professional career fields consider the Bachelor Degree just as the entry level standard for an online college diploma. Whilst Associate Certifications are a great way to begin, completing your Bachelors opens up many entrance doors to various careers, there are numerous on-line Bachelor Course Programs available through institutions like The University of Phoenix, Intercontinental University Online and Kaplan. Another concern is that many brick and mortar institutions make available Online variants of their degree programs but generally for a extensively higher price than the providers that specialize in online course plans.