Looking back on the week.
Mar. 9th, 2013 09:35 pmAfter having found some mild success with it, I'm kind of tempted to write a primer on networking for beginners, heavy on the specifics. "Be sociable and outgoing" is helpful, just not in the same way as "When contacting other professionals in your area, keep the e-mails between three to ten sentences." There might or might not be a market in it, but it's something that's been on my mind, moreso since I've actually gotten some success in the area. Of the people I've contacted, some of them never responded, some wrote back and said they weren't in the right area to help me out, a few told me they'd pass on my contact information, and a couple agreed to talk with me. Everyone in this last group has been friendly and congenial, and one of them gave me the list of yet more people to reach out to that might be able to help out in some way.
The biggest birthday present I'm giving to myself is taking next week off of cover letter writing. Of all the things I don't want to do on my birthday, that's pretty high up on the list. I'm not going to take next week off of job work entirely, though - I wouldn't feel at all comfortable doing so, or even all that relaxed. But now that I have a decent idea of how it works, I'll be doing a little bit more of it.
In other news, I made lunch for my dad today. The rest of my family was out at a local horse track - no, I didn't know there was one, either - and he was coming back from a short business trip. So I invited him over to my place for soup and tea. It wasn't a fancy meal, just leftover minestrone and some bread I'd gotten at the market, but there wasn't much food in my parents' apartment, and he told me how he was coming from conference foods like limp pasta and all-lettuce salads, so what I'd served was pretty much the sort of thing he needed in his stomach. Honest food made by hand. We drank tea afterward, and took a long walk along Riverside Park and by the Hudson on this unusually warm March day, and basically filled me up with the sort of gentle cheer that comes from long conversations and company.
Tomorrow I have to get to regular errands and some of that networking, and for a change, I'm not dreading it entirely. Just mildly.
The biggest birthday present I'm giving to myself is taking next week off of cover letter writing. Of all the things I don't want to do on my birthday, that's pretty high up on the list. I'm not going to take next week off of job work entirely, though - I wouldn't feel at all comfortable doing so, or even all that relaxed. But now that I have a decent idea of how it works, I'll be doing a little bit more of it.
In other news, I made lunch for my dad today. The rest of my family was out at a local horse track - no, I didn't know there was one, either - and he was coming back from a short business trip. So I invited him over to my place for soup and tea. It wasn't a fancy meal, just leftover minestrone and some bread I'd gotten at the market, but there wasn't much food in my parents' apartment, and he told me how he was coming from conference foods like limp pasta and all-lettuce salads, so what I'd served was pretty much the sort of thing he needed in his stomach. Honest food made by hand. We drank tea afterward, and took a long walk along Riverside Park and by the Hudson on this unusually warm March day, and basically filled me up with the sort of gentle cheer that comes from long conversations and company.
Tomorrow I have to get to regular errands and some of that networking, and for a change, I'm not dreading it entirely. Just mildly.
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