Wednesday, October 25, 2006

Wine & Cheese Schmooze Fests

Part of the territory is voluntary/mandatory attendance at wine and cheese gatherings with the firms. Voluntary in that it isn't compulsory, but mandatory in that you are shooting yourself in the foot if you don't go.

Tonight I got the inevitable question - so why aren't you interviewing for a summer position?
My breath caught in my throat for a minute - so calculating - what did they want to hear? Was this a test? What is the right answer?

So I took a deep breath and said - "Well, once I sign on with a firm I want to be able to dedicate myself and my time. And before I do that there is some travelling that I want to do and some adventures I would like to get out of my system. I'd like to try as many things as possible and take advantage of as many different opportunities as I can."

And there was a pause and then he smiled, and said that he did not summer either. He took the summer to do a tour of Europe. And then the conversation moved forward and we chatted about various trips that we had taken, yada yada yada.

Whew...land mine number one avoided.

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