SEED SOWING

NICE ELEVATOR SPEECH
I spent almost all day yesterday through the wee night and this morning preparing my resume and myself for my first ever Job Fair. [I don't think my school had these when I was in undergrad? I moved to Providence my senior year for my internship and pretty much never looked back at main campus. I didn't even go back for convocation, so the place could have burned down for all I would have known. (It didn't.)]

So, I went to a Job Fair. Yeah. (Pride? What pride? There really isn't any room for pride when you've been laid off and were the primary source of income for your family. I have Responsibilities, now.) I was not the only job-seeker over 20yo there, btw, so stick that in yer pipe, Mr Bernanke. The good thing about being older is that it's really easy to set yourself apart: my resume looks better, my 60-second sell is better, my research on the company is better, etc. The recruiter at one booth even complemented my "elevator speech" as she called it. She said she'd been talking to inexperienced undergrads all day and found it refreshing to speak to an experienced professional. It was a very nice thing for her to say! I think I snowed the young guy from JnJ, though. I asked him if they were recruiting for JnJ subsidiaries as well, b/c JnJ just entered into a partnership with Crucell to develop an antibody for influenza and my extensive experience with mAbs and my passion for infectious diseases sounded like a fit too-good-to-be-true. He just stood there blinking and asked me to come back later to talk to someone else. Crucell has positions available in the EU. Think I could telecommute??

BEST FAMILY EVER
I was in and out of the Job Fair in less than an hour. I hit the 8 companies that had jobs on-line I was interested in and came back home. Well, I stopped in to see my advisor and caught his Admin, instead, who is the spitting image of Amber from "Parks and Recreation". Nuff said?

When I came home there was a big smelly package for me from THE GREENES who rock the house made me feel like the most loved sister ever! They sent all wonderful, smelly glittery bath salves from LUSH that I promise to myself to use up during this layoff, rather than save for Molly's wedding or for New Years Eve - even though we almost always opt to stay home and, um...play Scrabble. (No that isn't a euphemism, I'm a gamer!)