I present to you the four things I have become completely reliant on in my quest to pursue two careers at once:
Me, caffinated.
Coffee (preferably Dunkin Donuts), my iPhone, good eye makeup and a physical, old school paper notebook. The iPhone serves as my audio recorder and long commute multi-tasker. The notebook because there are still times it is quicker to write in longhand, plus it holds all of my to-do lists. The eye makeup helps me not look like a crazed zombie, and the coffee is pretty self-explanatory.
Thus, my silence here is understandable. Between move-in at work and a plethora of writing assignments, I am engaging in mega-prioritization.
One of those writing (well, kind of writing, more social media) assignments is that I have been named a Yahoo! Trending Insider. A few weeks back, I entered a contest to find one of Yahoo’s most influential users, and I was named a finalist. I was whisked away to a day of training, and am now in the midst of the contest…of which I am losing badly.
This was to be expected in the first two weeks of the contest. Student move in at my full time job was going to be my handicap, plus the fact that I had every single writing assignment ever assigned to me due in the same week. But I am ready and willing to make up for lost ground.
How does it work? I’m supposed to share Yahoo’s trending content via my social networks. Thus, I give you a link, and you click on it and read it. Now, I won’t link to every piece of trending content, given that I know my audience doesn’t turn to me for “Scarlett Johansson cell phone pictures.” (But if you do, here’s a link to Yahoo’s story on that, so please click on that so I get points.) I’ll try to pick content that is trending that you might actually be interested in. I’ll link to it here, on Twitter, Facebook and Google +. The links will be tagged #YInsider or say “I’m an Insider!”
So click on the links, and let’s see if I can make up for lost ground. The contest ends during the first week of October. They will name a top five – my modest goal is just to crack the top five. Right now, I’m in the bottom three. If I lose, oh well. I got a lot of great stuff from the contest already (like a yodeling Yahoo button and a night in a swanky hotel), and I am already flattered just being included in the top nine.
Now let me get back to my students, my coffee and checking off to-dos like Buffalo Bills QB Ryan Fitzpatrick checked off touchdowns last Sunday against Kansas City. It was like a Oprah giveaway. “Scott Chandler, you’re getting a touchdown. CJ Spiller, you’re getting a touchdown. Stevie Jackson, you’re getting a touchdown. YOU’RE ALL GETTING TOUCHDOWNS!”
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And now, here’s the legal fun!
“I have been selected to be a Yahoo! Trending Now Insider! For the next six weeks, Yahoo! will be providing me with exclusive trending content, which I will be sharing with all of you.”