Advice (unsolicited as usual) to Potential Employers

I had a lovely weekend! I'll write about it later. I also have a summary to finish from last week's D&D. And, oh, before all that, work to do. But! I have been poking around places for new jobs or side jobs or anything, really, and one venue I wish I could take more seriously is Craigslist. It's not that the site itself is necessarily bad for advertising an open position: job listings can be posted on it and it allows you to contact people regardless of the nature of your business (while some sites might not have a category for certain types of businesses).

However, any potential employers out there need to provide a certain minimum of information for applicants to believe that you are legitimately a business, and not just a scammy spammer trying to send endless junk-email to our inboxes.

1. Provide the name of your company. Oh, you don't want to risk people calling you to ask for further details? Well, too bad: you're the company, you want applicants, that's how it's done. This way, we can look YOU up and decide for ourselves in advance if we want to work for you enough to apply.

2. Provide quick and friendly correspondence if you choose not to reveal a large amount of information about the specifics for a position. If you yourself are not too great with this sort of customer service, make sure you have someone else that can handle it for you so you communicate well, and come across as someone that potential employees would actually want to work for.

3. Never, ever, ever try to internet dick-measure with me by brushing off my questions about the position and your company without answering them and telling me that there are just so many applicants already that you'll need me to do some extra work to get your attention.

Point A: I just did. I asked you questions about your company and here we are, talking. Your lack of acknowledgment with regards to this effort on my part says a lot about you as a potential future boss, and the fact that I probably don't want to work for you.

Point B: I don't care how many applicants you have. That's not my business and it's not my problem. If the position has already been filled, say that it has; if you don't like the cut of my gib, then tell me right now that you don't think I'd be a good fit. But if you desperately want someone to apply and are hoping they'll be your ideal candidate, responding in the manner described above is a surefire way to send that candidate off to other pickings in other places.

You'd think I was referring solely to experiences with Craigslist ads, but I've had the same thing happen with companies advertising through CareerBuilder or temp agencies. Right now I can afford to be picky, but even if I couldn't, I'd go to a physical location and apply for a retail position before I'd trust someone who acts like these scummy folk do.

Totally biased, don't care

First and foremost, GUYS GUYS. I HAVE A FIC REC FOR YOU.

Only the Lonely, from the T-and-B anonmeme.

Why am I recommending it? Well, because it just finished, and because I was the requester, and because I love it dearly. More or less I was a cheeky jerk, challenging whoever filled it to make me like Karina and believe she could fall in love with Kotetsu and Barnaby in a believably romantic fashion. I was grouchy at the time, sick of fiction where Karina's attraction to Kotetsu was played straight for sex, or made fun of for laughs. I wanted to see her get a little more serious treatment as a character, like she almost but didn't quite get in the show. And I got to see it here! So I want to share the link with everybody.

Now, as for the weekend! There were ups, and downs, and then deeper downs, but the ups were so fantastic that I was fine with that.

Saturday: So, we hit up the zoo! Having been there the week prior, Dustin and I sort of trailed around behind Jenn and let her lead the way. We ended up seeing the Wetlands trail, which we'd skipped previously. This included some cool things, like the Andean bears (so, so cute!), and a small enclosure where they used to have Capy Baras. Instead, there are now all sorts of tropical birds, and tiny Mexican deer which were SO cute! We did end up seeing the Galapagos tortoises, which was awesome because they were actually moving-- chasing down their food.

We did buy some kettle corn while we were there, and were totally bad at one point when we sat down near the lemur island to get out of the sun. It wasn't our fault, though-- the crazy leaf-foot ducklike bird was so cool looking, we just couldn't help it! So I held out a single kernel of the corn, and he jumped right up and grabbed it out of my hand. Jenn and I were thoroughly amused for a couple minutes doing that before we noticed the big old sign telling us NOT to do that, EVEN HERE, and gosh, we were certainly jerks for not paying attention-- but cute birds! I should probably be a bit more guilty about that than I was. Anything that leads to Jenn giggling that much has to be a good thing!

When we grew tired, around 1, we decided to head out of the zoo and meet with Danny for lunch. Ultimately that lead to sending Dustin as a runner to pick up mochi from the store next door while Jenn and I got sandwiches and soup and salads for everyone. The end result: fucking delicious. But after that we all sort of lazed around; Danny had to go back to work, so I ended up making Jenn watch The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra with Dusty and I, which she was a good sport about. Dustin went home, looking pretty darn exhausted, and Danny, Jenn and I spent some time hanging out by the computers, debating about going to the grocery store. While we did, we caroused through some silly hilarious things saved from 4chan ages ago. Jenn directed me to a hilarious reading of a bad LOTR fanfic that had all three of us in stitches, and then finally we decided we probably ought to get around to hitting up the grocery store, adopting an 'everyone for themselves!' policy for dinner. It is Girlscout Cookie season, so I bought some on the way out.

This meant Jenn ate pickled herring, hot sauce and saltines, probably just to make Danny and I go "ewwww~!" (which we did); I had a frozen dinner of pasta, because I was very, very tired, but then Danny made chili cheese fries in a quantity big enough for me to have some, which was extremely tasty. Also: magnanimous of him. While we ate, Jenn expressed an interest in watching For a Few Dollars More, which made me smile very toothily. Just as planned!

After that, we were all too exhausted to keep going. I showered, and we all went to bed. Just as well! As...

Sunday: marked the Renaissance festival! We assembled with Dusty and Emma, and proceeded, making it to the Renfaire by around 10:30, and stayed till 6. It was good fun, and involved a lot of silliness. We caught an awesome bellydancing show, the Don Juan and Miguel Weird show (we seem to catch that one every time-- not my fault they're so awesome. This year Esmerelda talked and had her own little "I'm totally a dominatrix because I'm a girl with a whip; except for the part where my hilarious dad is way overprotective of me" bit which was SO CUTE), the last Tartanic show (at Emma's requirement-- shirtless sweaty Scotsmen are a necessary part of her RenFaire experience, you see). Also wandered through most, if not all, of the shops, including a neat used bookstore I don't think I'd ever seen before. We also did the maze, and Dustin was the only one who'd thought to bring cash so Danny and I let him sugar daddy us through the faire.

Treasures acquired: Dustin got himself an awesome wooden flute, which we all took turns trying to blow. You may assume lots of jokes were made about blowing Dustin's flute; you would be correct. Dustin also acquired a tiny catapult that was functional and flung marshmallows, which was EXCELLENT! Emma got a sexy black corset and a red shirt to go with it, as well as a clockwork brooch. (Apparently this is for a steampunk pirate thing.) And I got my hair braided all fancily. They put a dandelion in it, even, which was pretty cool, and both Dustin and Danny were awful sweet about how much they liked seeing my hair up, haha. Oh! And I finally got a traveler's sax, because I've only been staring wistfully at those for YEARS AND YEARS, haha!

I also put in an order for a corset with another store because they had some that I liked, but not in a color I wanted. So, might get one of those once they have it in.

We ran into good old Count Victor again, who taught Danny how to tie a noose, dubbed us minion names, and was generally such a gentleman charmer we couldn't help but be excited about it all over again. Oh! Oh and we tried the strength contest thing. I got to "cock", which is about halfway up, and then proceeded to bruise my hand really badly with increasingly poor swings, hahaha! Dustin also tried, and then Danny, who is the best sport ever, tried a few times and got almost to the bottom possible mark. He is fortunately quite goodnatured, and it certainly didn't hurt that we snagged some frozen lemonades after.

After the faire we had dinner with Jenn and then went our separate ways; Emma home, Dustin with Jenn to the airport, and me to work for the next four hours after until I finished the damn project I couldn't finish on Friday before I left. So, I'm exhausted today, but overall pretty decent. And my hair is still up, so my action hero coworker told me she thought it was cute, which was so totally worth it, hee hee!

Module Tonite!

I'm stupid excited for this because I'll be playing a Druid in 4E, which is the only place I've played a druid before, but means I know I enjoy the gameplay as well as the roleplay side (assuming there's anything to roleplay).

Edited: Okay!

So I made a kobold druid named Scarpur, who's from the Dark Sun setting and hates so-called divine beings because they abandoned her planet. She's in her sixties and, well, let's just say she'll be scampering all over the battlefield, even if it doesn't do her a lick of good. Hurray!

In less awesome news, I seem to have a runny nose and feel a little weird. Hopefully I just need to sleep. I did end up taking my hair down because the bobby pins and tight braids were giving me the itchiest headache ever. So, now I have kinky hair like some kind of 80's thing.