I started with this photo of a striped sweater and seersucker pants when I was looking for ways to wear my seersucker pants...the pants that made me feel like a sucker every time I wore them because they were so low-rise. (I don't know about you, but it's not a fun pastime for me to keep tugging my top down at the back because I feel like I'm about to expose my ass to the world whenever I'm sitting down.)
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| From landsend.com |
So I got rid of the annoying pants but kept the idea of a sweater with orange stripes and paired it with a subtle polka dot print instead.
Lightweight light blue/white/orange pullover sweater (JNY), $3.51/wear
Denim skirt (thrifted, Great Northwest Indigo), $0.50/wear
Black polka dot blazer (thrifted, Talbots), $3.25/wear
Orange flats (Payless), $1.25/wear
Gold tassel necklace (Kohls), $1.11/wear
Outfit total: $9.62/wear
...And with real (bright) shoes because the sandals in the catalog photo are hideous! For me, summer means putting my ballet flats into high rotation. (I don't own a pair of sandals.)
When looking for an explanation of the phrase "changing tack," I was astounded to discover that it is highly common for people to say "changing tact" instead. What the hell would that even mean? "I am now going to use a different method of handling this situation adroitly and with sensitivity."
For the last day of my first week back to work, a changing tack outfit (with nautical-ish stripes) seems appropriate, given that my week did feel like I was sailing into the wind.
In other news...Another topic near and dear to my heart: Why Do So Many Grad Students Quit?
I just saw this evening on FB that one of the people I started my PhD program with (who graduated from My Masters U. the same year I did) has bought a house--she is starting her assistant professorship in the fall...at the University of the big empty state northwest of mine where I always joke about people getting directional state jobs, hah. And all I could think was, God, better her than me.
4 comments:
When a third of doctoral recipients don't have a firm job offer at graduation makes me really wonder why anyone would spend eight years of their life to be in that position. They could have spent eight years on a career track that would put them in a fairly good financial position, as well as having a more normal life in the process.
Yeah, I think many people who are considering grad school don't know how bad it is--especially in the humanities fields. And even if they have heard the statistics, I'm guessing that many are used to being a very solid student in their undergrad classes and think that they'll be one of the ones to finish the PhD and get an academic job, not fully realizing that they'll be competing against other people who were also very good in undergrad.
I quit with the masters (in sociology), but it wasn't because I was stressed or driven toward craziness. (That's why I quit my highest-paying job ever, three years from retirement.) It was just because I realized it wasn't a good fit. The research I was good at (quantitative stuff, e.g., are minorities still doing worse than average, duh) and the research I considered useful (qualitative stuff - why are minorities still doing worse on average; which kinds of equalizing strategies work best) did not intersect. I am good at theorizing and testing things. I am scared of going into social situations I do not understand (why would I research things I already understand?) and participating in them.
Debbie--Interesting, I can see how not be suited to the kind of work you believe worthwhile would be a problem.
It is pretty much universal that people my age and older, who went to grad school more or less directly after undergrad (i.e., who attend grad school in the late 90s or earlier) and are now professors, say that grad school is much harder to get into and a much more grueling experience than when they did it.
One of the reasons my program sucked was that older faculty were brought up in a model where there was a lot of very demanding coursework with very high expectations, and your dissertation was a long thorough examination of a subject, but you didn't have to have any publications or any research (other than your diss.) to get a good job in marketing as long as you had a good diss. and you had impressed your professors in the coursework to get good recommendations. Younger faculty were brought up in a model where the coursework load was much lighter and the focus on research much more intense. Younger faculty seemed more in tune with the current times, in which the diss. is often now "3 A-level publications stapled together" and you need to have publications, plus a solid research pipeline (papers under review and projects at various stages of development) to get a good job. The program handled this difference by overwhelming us with a heavy, demanding course load AND very high research expectations from Day 1. I was envious of my friends in the psychology department, which was operating purely in the "modern" mode...which was stressful enough. (However, I'm sure that they were envious that graduates of my department typically land jobs at colleges named University of State or occasionally decent private schools you recognize the names of not from basketball.)
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