It goes a lil' something like this...(the Back Story)
I was planning to take a trip to South Beach, Miami with my fiance, just before things get insane
with our theses. The trip was more of an opportunity for me to celebrate my birthday, and to actually take a vacation where I said to myself "I'm on vacation." I have not done that in years. I know other PhDers can understand the guilty vacation... Oh and also, to look at potential wedding locales. This means I did have to do some work on the trip. Anyhoot. I booked plane tickets for Columbus Day weekend and I was obsessively looking for decent, economical places to stay. So of course I was going back and forth between TripAdvisor.com and Kayak.com. At the same time, I have been preparing myself for growing up and getting a job. So apart of this preparation was to at least consider thinking about dressing like a professional woman. As a part of that preparation I decided that I was not going to take or wear anymore of those wonderful free career fair t-shirts. Because it turns out that's pretty much that was all in my wardrobe. Well, the day before the MIT Career Fair I bought a suit! Yay for me! And I desperately wanted to finalize our lodging details for our trip to Miami. So I checked on a place and plowed through the reviews on TripAdvisor, getting very anxious whenever I saw a negative review. And then I booked a place.
with our theses. The trip was more of an opportunity for me to celebrate my birthday, and to actually take a vacation where I said to myself "I'm on vacation." I have not done that in years. I know other PhDers can understand the guilty vacation... Oh and also, to look at potential wedding locales. This means I did have to do some work on the trip. Anyhoot. I booked plane tickets for Columbus Day weekend and I was obsessively looking for decent, economical places to stay. So of course I was going back and forth between TripAdvisor.com and Kayak.com. At the same time, I have been preparing myself for growing up and getting a job. So apart of this preparation was to at least consider thinking about dressing like a professional woman. As a part of that preparation I decided that I was not going to take or wear anymore of those wonderful free career fair t-shirts. Because it turns out that's pretty much that was all in my wardrobe. Well, the day before the MIT Career Fair I bought a suit! Yay for me! And I desperately wanted to finalize our lodging details for our trip to Miami. So I checked on a place and plowed through the reviews on TripAdvisor, getting very anxious whenever I saw a negative review. And then I booked a place.
The next day I put on my first real professional woman outfit in well...years... and got ready to be a grown up and went to the career fair with resumes in tow. On the way in to the career fair, some company that I was not aware of was giving away T-shirts. And..well... Shhhhooo don't tell nobody but, I took one. With the promise to myself that it would only be for PJs. So I start walking down the aisles of companies, with butterflies in my stomach like OMAG- Oh My Aaaffrriiicaaannn Gaawwddd! I'm going to have to dress up everyday for the next few decades of my life and go to work at 8am everyday. That's a big change from grad school life. And while most of the companies say you can dress casual, I know my kind of casual will not fly;o) It's not as bad as this guy (see pic to the right) who we saw on ocean drive though,...
It's kinda nerdy/corny but I felt some excitement when I saw the TripAdvisor booth. I would have never thought they'd be at the career fair. And they said they were looking for Course 6 students, MIT-speak for EECS (Electrical Engineering and Computer Science). And they were wearing T-shirts. And they were giving out T-Shirts! I'm sure the recruiter was kind of taken back when I came over to them beaming with a giant grin on my face exclaiming and was like "I was just on your site last night!" And was so excited that I was able to pick a place to stay because of their site. After a lil' convo I noticed they were giving out nice black t-shirts and well...That makes this Free-Career-Fair-T-shirt #2. Yikes! Gadzooks! Bip! Bam! Blow!
It finally comes down to the morning before our SoBe trip. And I'm packing a few things, and I notice that I have a free career fair bag and in it, are two free career fair t-shirts. Of course my face lit-up when I saw the tripadvisor t-shirt and, I slightly embarrassed to admit this, but I said to myself "This will be great for the beach!" So, in the words of Fabulous and The Dream, I had to just "Throw it in the bag". Well, my fiance and I were literally working on our theses and looking for jobs all the way up until it was time to go to the airport. I remember just getting a couple hours of sleep, waking up desperately tired and trying to figure out how I could put off the trip. But I had to go meet my advisor, then I came back to take a lovely run along the Charles in the pouring rain, and followed that with a job interview. As we were rushing to leave I noticed that we were both quite scruffy, but did not feel out of place since I'm used to being scruffy...and being in an environment where scruffy is ok...and sometimes Cool! Although, I must admit that a few folks do try, check out MIT's Charm School! But taking scruffy to South Beach...well that's why I'm writing this post! He hadn't had a haircut and I was my usual Happy Disaster! But we grabbed our bags and headed out. We land in SoBe that night, eat, and pass out.
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