So now coffee’s good for us, too.
A Harvard researcher said last week that regular coffee drinkers may be lowering their risks for certain kinds of cancers and Type 2 diabetes by indulging in what many of us already consider to be the nectar of the gods.
Whether coffee lowers the risks for those things or not matters not a whit to me. Good, bad or indifferent, I’m going to continue drinking it till I keel over because I’m a lot nicer to children and animals and yuppies when I’ve had my morning cuppa joe.
Still, it’s good to hear something positive about one of my four basic food groups. Actually, I’ve been on a pretty good run lately, drink-wise. A few years back they told us one reason the French live so long is all that red wine they toss back. There have also been studies saying that a little hard alcohol (which I assume includes all that yummy scotch) isn’t bad for you, and might even have benefits, taken in moderation. I’m working on that last part.
Other studies have also had nice things to say about dark chocolate and steak.
I’m reminded of the old Woody Allen movie, Sleeper, where Allen’s character, Miles Monroe, awakens after being frozen for 200 years, only to learn that doctors finally realized cigarettes were good for you all along.
Why, if all these current studies are to be believed, I must be one of the healthiest people on earth.
But even if I’m not, you know what? I know what I like and I’m going to keep enjoying them until the grim reaper shows up. Because it’s the sensual pleasures, like food and drink and sex, that make life worth living.
Maybe we could all live 20 years longer if we obsessed over carbohydrates, hung out in oxygen bars and exercised to the point of exhaustion. The question then is, with life reduced to such a repetitive, crushing bore, why would you want to stick around another two decades anyway? To do what? Eat more sprouts?
Give me 70 years full of good food, good drink and good friends. You go to the gym; I’ll go to the steakhouse with that little redhead in accounting who likes her good times. You’ll live longer, but I’ll have more fun.
And isn’t that what life is about? Having a good time while you’re here?
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No idea is too stupid if there are enough suckers out there to fall for it. And there usually are.
Here’s one: Video resume services.
The idea is that you need something to differentiate yourself from all those sterling applicants scrambling for that big marketing job at Python Software Security. What better way to do that than to dazzle 'em with your wit? Show 'em a little bit of your stuff.
A really little bit. Like 30 seconds, or something. That’s what these services are offering.
One young collegian, quoted in an Associated Press story about this emerging internet trend, had no doubt that she’d only need 30 seconds to sell herself.
“I feel like my personality is what really seals the deal and if they can see my personality I’d get a better chance of getting the job,” she told the AP.
That may well be true, Ms. Job Seeker, but do you think 30 seconds of video will give your potential future boss a window into your soul? If you believe that, I wouldn’t hire you to tend my house plants.
Besides, even if the video ran an eternity -- say, three minutes -- what does it prove? Maybe you’re just telegenic, like John F. Kennedy was. Is that any reflection of your skills? Besides, your video service edits this snippet to make you look, well, simply mahvelous. You could be a drooler, for all I know. No video on earth will enlighten me.
Not that a prospective employer can’t be taken in by a slick package job. One woman who reviews resumes for a real-estate company told the AP reporter that she welcomes the video pitch:
"After a while (resumes) would become hypnotic. Everybody today knows to say the right things they know employers are looking for."
Really? And what is the “right” thing for someone to say in a cover letter? If you’re looking for a drone to punch in, do the work and sing the company fight song, then hire the guy who says all the “right” things. (The right things, I presume, are all the empty phrases about being a team player and being dedicated to boosting company sales.) If you’re a boss looking for talent, it requires a little work on your part.
The only way you can get even the most cursory read of someone’s personality is by using the old-fashioned method: a face-to-face conversation. You have to ask questions and receive answers. It’s the parry and thrust of the interview that really tells you whether someone will be a good fit or not.
But, you argue, a video might at least get you in the door for that critical interview. Maybe, but a cover letter tells me a lot more about you and is much likelier to pique my interest. Especially a concise, well-written cover letter, since stumbling across one of those these days is like finding a needle in a haystack.
No, the video resume sounds to me like a lame way of avoiding the necessity of describing yourself on paper, for a new generation of worker who lacks the requisite writing skills. And let's be brutally honest here: This service is intended for good-looking people, period. Because the only thing 30 seconds of video will tell me is whether you're a babe, or a babe magnet.
And I don't care.
All I know is this: If you can’t write me a lucid note and then sit down and talk with me, then you can’t work for me. No matter how pretty you are.
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Tony Long is copy chief at Wired News.
