Norm Elrod
Jackson Heights, NY
joblessandless[at]gmail[dot]com
January 15, 2010
Conan O’Brien
Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien
100 Universal City Plaza
Building 2220
4th floor
Universal City, CA 91608
Dear Conan:
I’m so sorry to learn of your recent job troubles. Employers can be such a pain sometimes. I know from experience, having been laid off four times in the last decade, most recently in October 2008. [...]
Category Archives: Job Search Websites
Open letter to Conan O’Brien offering job search help
Friday, January 15, 2010
The top 5 reasons I hate lists
Monday, December 14, 2009
I spend a lot of time online these days, between reading email and cruising the Internet in search of gainful employment. And I’ve arrived at one immutable and irrefutable conclusion… lists suck. Feel free to disagree. Feel free to argue. Feel free to accuse me of crimes against the Internet for dressing down the vaunted [...]
Unemployed man’s best spammer friend returns
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
Something was missing in my life. My days felt a little darker, my nights a little lonelier. There was an emptiness in my stomach, in my soul, in my bank account, that no amount of cookies or Maury reruns could fill. I perused the job boards looking for solace, but none was to be found. [...]
How job sites annoy me… let me count the ways
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Job sites annoy me. It admittedly doesn’t take much, given my current unemployed state. I’ve yet to encounter one that provides the ideal job search experience, if something so oxymoronic even exists. Every job site, from the all-encompassing (Monster, HotJobs), to the industry-specific (American Marketing Association, Media Bistro), to the company-specific (Joe’s Burritos and Plumbing [...]
Don’t let desperation cloud your judgment
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
[Ben continues to fight the good fight, looking for work wherever he might find it. He fell a little short of the promised land in his last post. This time, well, he's even further away and feeling a little desperate.]
Ben Breier, 23, was a reporter and web producer for the New York Observer’s Politicker.com, a [...]
The curse of unemployment
Friday, July 3, 2009
Looking for a job is sort of an all-or-nothing deal. Either you find one, or you don’t. I haven’t, for seven months. There’s some comfort to be had in knowing that the job market stinks. Companies continue to layoff employees, and those hiring receive millions of resumes, even for that freelance position scraping burnt gunk [...]
Jobless and less and more, but also less
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
I wrote the following post for The Wall Street Journal blog “Laid Off And Looking” a little while back…
Getting Help After Multiple Layoffs
The piece discussed the Obama administration’s policy in Iraq and Afghanistan and the political and social repercussions in a nation fighting many battles at home and abroad. Or maybe it explored ways to [...]
Paying it forward – a little help for the unemployed
Friday, April 24, 2009
I’ve received lots of help from lots of people throughout my job search. And I am grateful. Without your support, I’d be unemployed AND feel ignored. Somewhere along the line I would’ve taken to drink to soothe my fragile ego. Alcohol – being the gateway to depravity and debauchery my teachers always claimed it to [...]
New York unemployment event
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
There might be one or two of you out there who are unemployed. I can’t imagine what the problem is given all the jobs I see and hear about. Why just this morning three recruiters accosted me in the subway station with promises of everlasting joy if I signed up with them. Alright, so technically [...]
My spam is better than your spam
Friday, February 13, 2009
Mmm, mmm, gross.
Because my resume is posted everywhere, job sites, recruiters and job search companies spam the crap out of me. Some emails are intended to be helpful – 10 tips to improve your resume, 8 ways to turbo-charge your job search, 6 reasons not to drink whatever you find under the sink and end [...]