Sometimes you need a laugh to divert your attention from the bucking of the stock market or the never-ending job search. Maybe You Shouldn't Buy This provides a brief reprieve from the realities of your depleted bank and 401K account highlighting all things frivolous and absurd. You can check out the blog to find the most absurd ways to spend cash if you should magically win the lotto (as it certainly isn't coming from your bonus). From diamond encrusted Ipod earbuds to neon Nike's, you could spend or dream to your hearts content. I don't know about you but the Chanel Segway just seems like a must-have!
I love to travel. I think it provides you the ability to break out from your day-to-day routine and reevaluate life. Travel provides adventure and the opportunities to make new friends and create new memories. That being said, I can't imagine making my personal goal to visit 100 countries in the world let alone all of them as Chris Guillebeau has decided to do. He made the pro-con list of buying an S.U.V. or travel the world and he opted for the travel. It definitely makes you question your decision to stay local when you read his blog about his journeys to the Domincan Republic, Suriname and Nambia etc. While I am definitely not ready to make quite that commitment to travel, it does provide a lovely break from the standard desk job and a fantastic week way to take a refresh on 7th grade geography as you try to figure out where in the world is Carmen Sandiego... or Chris.
I love Yelp. It is a fantastic resource especially when you have moved to a new city. I find their services review i.e. hairdresser, eye brow waxer and doctors most helpful, and it is also my go-to any time I am on the market for some help with selecting a restaurant in a particular area or a good meet-up spot. While Yelp is great, it proves useless when you need help picking out hiking boots or a new DVD player. Welcome Buzzillions! It is awesome. You can search for hundreds of different products and read reviews from actual product users (not the exagerated hype you see on the backs of books / movies), and you can even select the price range you are most interested in. They even offer where you can buy said product at what price points. Amazing! This is truly a life saver, and I am amazed I lived as long as I did without it!
Sometimes work is just so unappealing, you need a mind break. While there are many diversion available, one of the newest (and best) additions to the market is Texts from Last Night. Essentially, if you have received a ridiculous text, you just send the operators of Texts from Last Night an email with the a word-for-word transcription as well as the area codes of the sender / respondent. My favorite entries include but are certainly not limited to:
I think everyone misses the days of big bonuses, positive earnings calls and fun / happiness / excesses prior to the recession if 2007, 2008 and 2009 (and realistically 2010). The ladies at Dating a Banker Anonymous (DABA) chronicle exactly what they miss most about the high-flying days of dating an FBF (Finance Guy Boyfriend; apparently the G is silent... no comment). Grammar aside, their posts are a fantastic break from the Dow 5,000 watch, the discussion of deals blowing up and pink sheets. The DABA girls provide a warning system based on the latest market news as to how friendly / depressed your FBF will be. They also provide a post forum where fellow DABAs can vent and seek out advice for their particular dating conundrum. This is the go-to guide for how to deal with the finance dude in your life. Their best advice was given in the post titled "Relish the Recession":
Oh the glorious days of college and ...gasp... learning something new every day. When in need of new fun fact so you can convince yourself / proudly state you still learn something new every day check-in with the guys at Freakonomics. Here you can learn facts that may actually help you in social conversation such as: reasons why there shouldn't be firewalls at your office, the implications of the tax hike on tobacco and why you should just leave your computer on all the time. It is certainly a nice educational break from your day as a drone and gives you ready ammunition to dominate a dinnner table conversation with your witty interesting (although regurgitated) facts. Yay!
If you ever wonder "Well maybe there is someone else better out there...", the answer is probably "No" unless your man is referenced on the following website. I bang the word dudes. (Sorry, Mom). captures why it is so challenging to find a nice guy to date.... because the world is filled with so many unsavory characters. Sorry, Mom provides a chance for the ladies to detail the horrible habits / actions of boyfriends, friends-with-benefits situations gone awry as well as the consequences of alcohol-induced friend-making sessions. When possible, users post 'anonymous' pictures of the guilty party which is always appreciated so you can learn to avoid these hazards to the dating world. For most, this site will make you realize that really your boyfriend / special friend's habits are pretty tame by comparison while others may identify with or worse recognize the profile of the guy being detailed. At the end of the day, if you or someone you love is involved with a male detailed on this website: Run!. You heard it here first.
Today, my boyfriend told me he couldn't hang out with me because he felt really sick. I went to his house anyway to surprise him with homemade soup. I walk in to his room only to find him hooking up with my sister. She can't drive, our mom drove her there. FML
Today, my girlfriend dumped me proclaiming she wanted someone more like her "Edward". I asked her who Edward was. She held up a copy her "Twilight" book. She was talking about a fictional vampire. FML
Today, my boss fired me via text message. I don't have a text messaging plan. I paid $0.25 to get fired. FML
Wouldn't it be great if saving was fun? or easy? or didn't take so long? "Savings", these days, is the buzz word as the U.S. is in a full fledged recession... It has finally been confirmed by the National Bureau of Economic Research. Thanks NBER! Now that it is official (as if it wasn't made painfully clear by newspaper headlines for the past 3 months); it is time to figure out the saving / budgeting fiasco once and for all. And as we all know, it is neither fun nor easy to figure out ways that will tangibly reduce your spending without reducing your happiness. Luckily, we have a great blog from Ramit Sethi "I Will Tech You to Be Rich." He recently has posted several entries about how to save $1,000 in 1 month. He offers tangible posts on how to make savings a little bit easier and he does it himself!
Sometimes you need a little pick-me-up / something else to look at aside from the spiraling Dow. When you can't justify a Starbucks Grande Non-Fat Chai due to cost or calories, head over to Stuff White People Like. It is a frighteningly accurate how this site stereotypes the Caucasian race. I have learned things about myself that I didn't even know that I liked. My favorite posts include Black Music that Black People Don't Listen to Anymore, Taking a Year Off and Promising to Learn a New Language. It surely will illicit several laughs due to the ironic / patronizing tone as well as a reminder of how typical / standard you and your friends really are. Definitely worth the read when you need to look at something aside from depressing work-related emails or stock market quotes.
I have found a solution for you: Google Flu Trends. Google has come out with this fancy new tool that claims to track the number of cases of influenza. It does so by tabulating the number of searches for keywords such as "fever" or "cough" made in a certain geographic region. Admittedly, this seems totally erroneous except for the fact that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the U.S. government's public-health watchdog, supervised the build and execution of Flu Trends. The team at Google behind this latest platform examined these flu-related keywords over five years, noting times when searches of those terms surged. Then the group compared that data to CDC records over the same time frame and found a strong correlation between when people searched flu keywords and when people have had flu-like symptoms. The accuracy of such a tracking tool seems suspicious, but it may insight you to at least get a flu shot if you area is labeled an "intense" flu zone. The upside to this new tracker: You now have a new excuse for calling in sick explaining Google told you to.
Sometimes I feel like I missed the pop culture bus. Catching a People magazine at the doctor's office is always an eye opening experience for me as my only sources of news are Bloomberg and WSJ... but such is life. As a result of this sheltered life I lead, it is clear I am the last to know about new vocabulary. I still use words like 'lovely' and 'dreadful' as if those were common phrases. Luckily for those living in the dark ages of vocabulary, Word Spy can save you from yourself. Word Spy aggregates and defines the latest and greatest in pop culture / current terminology. It doesn't have the raunchy flair of Urban Dictionary (thankfully) and actually offers words that you could potentially use in a coed work environment like: philanthrocapitalism n. Philanthropy that uses the principles, models, and techniques of capitalism or silent run n. The mass transfer of funds out of a troubled bank by online users. Granted I can't imagine myself using either of those words, but at least I won't feel like I need a translator when listening to the news, friends or even my mom. I am now in the know for at least the next 30 seconds.
On a rare glimpse of The O'Reilly Factor, I caught a five minute special on Marina Orlova, creator of HotforWords.com. Marina is a self-proclaimed philologist, someone who studies linguistics and etymology. Marina's videos are easily seen on YouTube (Warning: do not open if your boss walks by, he / she won't believe you are learning about the origin of words.) Truly after one video, I was left speechless. Marina is from the mother country, so not only are you overwhelmed by her decolletage, you are also trying to understand what the heck she is saying with her VERY thick Russian accent. Normally I wouldn't spend a moment on such absurdity, except that her three minute lessons are actually interesting, and you feel like you are using the Greek / Latin you potentially studied to help that dreadful SAT score. The Take Away: Its at least worth a quick view because you may actually learn something ... or be completely horrified by the distances people go for their five seconds of fame.
Sometimes you just need a break from the phone calls, the never ending flood of emails, or the work to-do list which doubles every hour. You can grab a quick serenity moment and be grateful... that you don't sound like THEY do. Overheard in New York is a compilation of posts by eavesdroppers throughout NYC documenting what they hear and trying to sum up the priceless lines with a title. Easier said than done. While the Overheard crew has created entries around the beach and the office, the New York blog takes the cake because it could only happen in New York.
Sometimes a little cynicism can help you through the day. If your job is anywhere in or around the finance space, you can get a jolt of the news spun with the a cynical twist at the blog, Dealbreaker. Considering the current status of the market, many would suggest that the gloom and doom attitude is the only way to look at the market; while others will enjoy laughing at their friends who threw themselves into the financial fray in hopes of big bonuses and instead have big credit card bills. Anyway you slice you it, you get a little dose of Wall Street reality from that jaded older brother.
Some days you just want to send a card to that former boyfriend or girlfriend, current coworker or failed date, but it is often hard to find one that is fitting. Those are the days you need to take a quick peek at Someecards because you won't find cards like it anywhere else. They have covered some of the obvious topics like Birthdays and Farewells as well as some of the non-obvious like Cry for Help, Flirting or Breakup.
One of the greatest results of the current political climate has been the wake up call to America to replace their political apathy with opinions and interest in our current government. Their is plenty of fodder to react to, and finally people seem to be paying more attention to the issues. Penelope Trunk's blog provides that same type of material but in the career advice forum; often causing upwards of 80+ comments to her career advice and personal posts. Her advice runs the gamut from job hunting at your current job, job hopping and dating at the office. While I certainly don't agree with half of what she says, I appreciate her contrast to my very traditional workplace notions. Her posts engage and cause me to question the current workplace norms. Anyone who can provoke further thought, analysis and discussions merits promotion in my book.
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