Scott Keenan's Guide to Gift Giving

I’m going to start this post by admitting that as an incredibly selfish person, I don’t have this mastered at all. As the Christmas season approaches I thought I would share some tips and tricks that I have picked up in hopes that I can get some help from the tens of people who read this blog. I always try to pick a gift that has some thought put into it, because those gifts are generally less expensive. This is difficult as I’m not really a very thoughtful person. Also, you don’t want to get something too thoughtful, because some sentimental people tend to cry…I don’t deal well with that.

Children

Don’t waste your time thinking about what the child wants. They’d be happy with a couple boxes to build a fort out of. Until a child is 5 or 6 the gift is really for the parents. You might think this gives you a free ride on gift-giving for a few years. Have you even been to a baby shower? When it’s time to open the gifts, the women stop eating and form a “shame-train.” First the gift is opened in front of everyone, and the expecting mother hands it around for everyone to “get a closer look at” or “judge.” At a baby shower it’s easy to fly under the radar with a gift card or a combination jumpers/baby-blanket package, but at Christmas, you have to step up your game.

Suggestion:

Books – Don’t buy ones the kids will read by themselves. The parents will tire of them quickly. Buy something that a 6 year old would read, so the parents can read it to them. It’ll definitely get read (provided the parents do that kind of stuff) and at the very least it will be more entertaining for the adults.

Brand-name baby clothes – Nothing says “I have a gay uncle” like a vintage tee and jeans with a lot of distressing.

New age toys for children - They are incredibly over-priced, but have a pretentious explanation to accompany them about how they’re made from all-natural products, or painted with colors that engage the baby and make it smarter so it can grow up to be a genius with ADHD.

Once the children hit a certain age, apparently you have to start thinking about what they like? When they were 3 or 4 you could go into a toy store and tell them you need a gift for a three year old boy and the clerk was all kinds of helpful. When you say seven year old girl they start asking you questions. “What is she into?” After a few minutes of awkward staring you realize this was not a rhetorical question the clerk was asking while he thought about it. “You work at the toy store…you tell me.” Then he gives me attitude like I’m that guy who left his kid in the car with the windows up. Kids this age are weird. All of the toys in their category kind of look stupid and cheap, or they’re out of my price range. Apparently they’ll like a piece of cardboard that has their favorite cartoon character’s face on it…but who knows who that is? A few weeks before Christmas is too late to admit that you don’t.

Suggestion:

Classic toys for children – Even if the kid never touches it, the toy will have some camp value that will engage the adults a little bit. Kites, Dominos, etc.

Teenagers

 …Cash?

The Elderly

They already have everything. Chances are they also have a storage shed full of the crap you bought them last year. Unless you are absolutely sure they need or want something specific or you can afford to send them on a trip, buy something disposable.

Suggestions: Cards, pictures, lottery tickets etc.

Parents

My dad never knows what he wants so every year he gets a combination of leather mittens and/or some kind of flashlight. I pretend it’s thoughtful. He pretends he likes it. We both win. Mothers are obligated to enjoy any piece of garbage you give them. I’ve been looking through her cupboards and replacing low quality cooking tools with higher-end, Paderno-style goods for the past few years. My favorite part is the stuff she doesn’t end up using is given to someone after a few months….last year that someone was me :D Now I’m in the process of finding other things that look like perfectly legitimate presents that could eventually find their way to my house.

Friends

My friends that I buy gifts for get incredibly thoughtful gifts. Of course by thoughtful, I mean cheap. Nothing says “thanks for hanging out with me this year” like a crappy Christmas tree ornament with an elaborate story attached to it. They also happen to be my favorite gifts to receive from friends.

If you have friends who thought “Hey, you know what would be a really good idea? Let’s also force our friends to get wedding presents for our New Year’s Eve wedding on top of all of their holiday purchases.” I have some wedding gift ideas below.

Weddings

… Nope

My rule used to be that because I don’t plan on ever having a wedding where I force people to bring presents, I don’t buy them for other people. I make an exception to this rule when there’s an open bar, because I know I can make my money back. Buy strictly gift cards or something from the registry. If you are thinking of ignoring the registry so you can get them something personal….don’t. You’re the reason people end up with four toasters. You could do something slightly sentimental to COMPLETELY make up for the lack of gifts...like mentioning them in a blog post ... Congrats Jess and Jimmy.

Ok people, this is the extent of my knowledge. There is just over a month to Christmas and I clearly have no idea what I’m doing. Post comments below or find me on Twitter or Facebook and send me your suggestions. 

Top Five Ways to Procrastinate but Still Feel Good About It. By Scott Keenan

Procrastination does not have to make you feel like you’re a failure. As an Olympian of putting things off, I've found several ways to procrastinate that defy the actual definition of the word. The key to not feeling like you’re wasting time is to find something that creates the illusion of progress without actually helping you get whatever it is you’re trying to do, done.

1. Cleaning

This always needs to be done, no matter how much of it you’ve done recently. If you run out of space in your house, there’s always the car, the lawn, and small closed-in spaces you wouldn’t normally clean. No time to get any work I would get paid for done today. I need my house to be spotless!

2. Planning

This is genius. You make a list of all of the things you have to do. Then you prioritize them in the order you’re going to complete them. Depending on how many things you have…this could take forever. Especially if you think really hard about each one, and then make sub-lists of all the steps involved in each item of the original list. There’s no limit to the amount of planning that can be done before the actual execution of something. For example: Are you applying for jobs? First, identify all of the jobs you are going to apply for and make a list of them. Then list them in order of which ones you want the most. Then list them in chronological order from the one that closes first to last. Do you know how long that takes? ALL AFTERNOON!!...if you do it the way I do.

3. Baking

You know what would save sooo much time? Already having meals prepared and divided into portions. 

Step 1: push everything you needed to do today aside. You’ve got to spend all afternoon making something so you will have more time to do all those important things. 

Step 2: Pick something you’ve never made before. Make sure it’s some kind of 3 part jigsaw puzzle of a recipe where you have to make one thing, then make another thing, then put the first thing in the second thing  and fold it into the shape of a swan or equally complicated ornithological creature, and bake it….TWICE! To take up additional time, you could put all of the ingredients into small Pyrex bowls first, like they do on cooking shows. Then if a camera crew stops in, you are all ready for your cooking show, which is super productive because of all the money you’d make from it. 

Step 3: Tweet about how you spent all day cooking.

4. Saving Money

First thing every morning you should check your bank account online. Get really angry about some of the purchases that you didn’t authorize, stomp your foot….scratch your head….yeah you bought those….never mind. Then think about all the money that has to come out of your account this month and make sure there is enough to cover everything. Then look at how much you spent on stupid stuff like coffee and restaurants. You don’t have anything to show for all that money now. Think of ways to avoid doing that in the future, like taking your own coffee to places…or baking. Look at how much you spent on groceries. Did you feed a team of athletes last week? Start looking at flyers to find out what’s on sale this week. Make a list of all the things you need to buy and all the places you need to go to get them. Sound familiar? That’s right…you’re planning again. Spend some time thinking of the most effective way to go to all the places you need to go to get all of the things that will help you save money. There is no distance too far to travel to save 50 cents on a tube of toothpaste.

5. Increasing Your Klout Score

If you’re ever going to be taken seriously by the internet, you need a pretty decent Klout score. For those of you who don’t know, Klout.com is a site that tells you how cool you are on a scale of 1 to 100. Seriously though, it is supposed to tell you how much influence you have based on your social network followers and their engagement with your posts. You can tell it’s super legit because it gives you more points for visiting their site more frequently. Also, people can give you K+’s if you influence them. I’m sure there is a super complicated formula that measures how high your klout score should increase per K+. Once you get super popular and move to a bigger city, there are all kinds of “perks” for having a high klout score like free sandwiches and coffee. To increase your score you need to engage with other people with high klout scores. First you need to identify the people you know with high scores. Then you need to talk to them (Online though…if you call the on the phone it doesn’t count…unless you post that you talked to them on their Facebook wall and then they agree by commenting and/or liking your post). Also, engaging with people who have low scores really doesn’t do anything for you, so don’t waste your time “Liking” your mom’s post about supper….even if it's homemade spaghetti, which I haven't had in a while (just saying). Then you have to read the news and post interesting articles that will generate discussion or that other people will “Like” or share or retweet.  In turn, you should comment, “Like” and retweet other people’s posts, because they will remember that you helped them and may help you back. It’s pretty much a vicious circle of time-wasting that results in other people also wasting their time.

The most effective methods of procrastination involve doing all of these things in succession or some sort of circular pattern that brings you back to the original form of procrastination. Of course, eventually you need to get actual things done, but using these methods will make you feel less crappy about not doing them than spending the afternoon playing Angry Birds.  

How is Your Online Recruitment Strategy Working for You? By Scott Keenan

Do you recruit online? Welcome to the bandwagon. Everyone recruits online so you can go ahead and stop feeling special about how technologically advanced you are because you were able to maneuver Monster.com… no one even goes there anymore. If you’re having trouble attracting qualified candidates, it could be due to the ineffectiveness of your recruitment strategy and not that you’re a horrible employer.

Most companies will post their job ads on the company website and a few other choice job sites and call it good. This is certainly effective for attracting the attention of active candidates, but neglects a much larger pool of qualified candidates.

Some Definitions:

Active Candidates – These people are currently looking for jobs. They can be unemployed or working in a position they’re unhappy with. They habitually check online job sites, newspapers, etc., for new job ads.

Passive Candidates – These people are not actively looking for work, but could still be swayed to apply if something caught their eye.

Step 1: Make it Easy

The first step is to create the ad itself. Break it down into parts and be specific about what you’re looking for. Clearly note your “Must Haves,” your “Nice to Haves” and your job description in separate paragraphs (bullets would be even better). No one wants to read a short novel about a position they’re not currently working in, nor do they want to go through line by line and decipher what is essential for the position, and what are just assets. Being clear about what someone “Must” have in order to be considered will allow the applicants to self-screen.  This means your administrative assistant will not have to go through quite as many resumes for candidates who clearly do not qualify for the position, and s/he might stop having daydreams where s/he cuts your brakes. Also, candidates will not waste their time applying with no chance of employment. If you have a pay range for the position, put it in the advertisement. This eliminates the additional time you spend reviewing resumes and interviewing candidates who wouldn’t work for the salary you’re offering.

Job applications are time consuming by nature. Try not to make it worse. Some companies require you to fill out an extensive profile on their website, and then submit a resume and cover letter anyway. Why would you WANT to make applying for a job MORE of a pain in the ass? Further, if I filled out a profile on your website when I was looking for work a few years ago and I heard nothing back, I will be reluctant to take the time to update it now. Unless you’re getting a large volume of applicants and can afford to lose candidates who aren’t interested in filling out another form and getting another password, lay off the online system.

Step 2: Make it Sexy

A colleague recently sent me a job ad simply because of how creative it was. It was forwarded to her by a former co-worker, who found it on a blog that discusses innovative graphic design. Did someone say free marketing? This company posted their job ad on their website and it made its way to me on its own, free of charge.

A new trend in job advertisements is a short description of the type of person the company is looking for. Listing suggested personality traits reduces the risk of hiring someone with no personality. If you have an amazing corporate culture and a positive work environment, why would you keep it a secret? Sprinkle some of your personality in your job ad. If it’s entertaining enough, it will get “Liked,” tweeted and reposted reaching exponentially more active and passive candidates than traditional job postings.

Want to make it easier to share your job ad? Work it into your social media strategy. Posting and tweeting capitalizes on all of your current clients and followers, who are already somewhat familiar with your services. It also makes it much easier for them to share it with their friends and clients increasing the number of views your ad gets.

Step 3: Make it Personal

My favorite response to a job application was an email I received letting me know that I would not be considered for the position. The Human Resources Coordinator took the time to read my resume and wished me luck on the job hunt and on moving forward with my CHRP designation. She took a PFO and turned it into an electronic hug. Do you know who wins in this scenario? That’s right, the company that just told me to go pound sand.

Obviously, it’s not feasible for most companies to go to this degree of personalization for each applicant, but it is certainly appreciated when the applicant is kept up to speed on the competition, even if it is just an automated email that says “your application has been received” and “the competition has been closed.” Not sending them anything is the equivalent to receiving an acknowledgement email that says “sucks to be you loser.”

A Guide to Thrift Store Shopping - By Scott Keenan

Have you ever been in a situation where you had to cut your spending significantly? Whether it happened because of an unexpected expense, unemployment, or your parents just took their credit card away, be prepared for a tailspin of depression. Once you hit rock bottom, you basically have two options. Marry someone rich or start enjoying simple things that previously caused you to turn your nose up. These can include, but are not limited to, coupon clipping, sale searching, air miles collecting, and thrift store shopping. Before the universe caved in on you because of whatever caused you to be poor, the thought of wearing something that once belonged to someone else might have made you vomit a little, but now it can be an exciting extra-curricular activity…you can’t afford yoga anymore anyway.  The outfit alone is one month’s rent. Once you have come to terms with the fact that you’re not in a position to run to a store and purchase a brand name at retail prices you’ll need a little help to get started.

Determine Your Quality to Price Threshold

This is the amount of money you are willing to spend above certain classes of items for additional quality. Before you fell below the poverty line and became a burden to society, you might have decided that it was within your budget to purchase a pair of $60 jeans for the additional quality they had over the ones you could have bought at Walmart, but could not justify the $200 as the denim was not made of adamantium.( If they were, they wouldn’t be jeans… they’d just be AWESOME.) Now you have to decide whether you’re going to find a thrift store that hangs its used goods on racks or just dumps them in bins. The price difference is spending $10 on an item vs $2.50.

Bin Land

If you have absolutely no quality threshold, you can venture to “bin-land.” These are the skeziest of all the thrift stores. They just take bags of clothes and dump them in bins marked “pants” and “shirts.” If your allergies don’t immediately flare up upon entering the store, drop to your knees and thank God for your ridiculous immune system. Pick a spot in the bin to start. Get in there and push all of the clothing to one side. Go through each item one by one, but do it quickly. Most of what is in the bins is garbage. Every now and then you will stumble upon a brand name in your size that still has the tag on it. One or two of these finds will make it worth whatever disease you contracted digging through these piles of filth.

 A note on etiquette: Never start searching in another person’s path in the same bin. It’s the thrift store shopping equivalent to flipping them off. Always start with the clothes they have already gone through. If someone starts looking at the clothing in front of you it is important to immediately flare your nostrils, curl your lip and glare until you’ve initiated a fight to the death or they move. (Fights to the death are common in Thrift stores, bring a knife or something)

Classy Thrift Stores

If you’ve decided that you still haven’t quite reached “bin-land” level poverty, you can opt for a more upscale used clothing store. These places disguise themselves as regular stores by hanging their clothes on racks , but still have a vast selection of suits from the 80’s, leopard print things for men and women and clothing that looks like it has leprosy or other assorted diseases. Because of its more convenient layout, these stores typically charge more for goods, regardless of the quality. They typically have a larger selection, with a higher probability of finding something that closely resembles what you would have worn pre-poverty. You just end up paying a little more for it here.

Outlet Stores

These are not thrift stores. If you’re shopping here, you’re not poor enough yet or you’re over budget. You definitely won’t find anything that has been worn by anyone else. You’re just looking through slightly damaged goods, or last season’s overflow. You are much less likely to run into a friend who is shopping for their Halloween costume though. You can go ahead and save face…but not much money.

Bringing Your Amazing Finds Home

This is the part of the experience where it’s important to note that you have just purchased things that belonged to a person you don’t know anything about, including their hygiene habits. It is entirely possible that they had some parasite living on them that will eat you in your sleep. You may think that because this article of clothing still has the tag on it, it’s safe….it’s not. Remember all the sad and decrepit clothing you saw in the bins reaching out to you yelling at you to either buy it or set it on fire and put it out of its misery? They touched it.

Seal the clothing in the plastic bag and bring it back home. Keep it sealed until it is ready to be thrown in the wash. Wash everything in boiling hot water or molten lava regardless of what the tag tells you to do. Put it in the dryer on the “Kill” cycle for “practically forever.” If your dryer has a “fumigate” setting, use it.

Like most things you’ve never tried before, it’s possible to start getting excited about thrift store shopping. You simply find an irritating way to bring up how much you spent on your clothing. You can be creative and try and work it into the conversation… or just be a tool about it and randomly ask people how much they think you spent on your outfit. Once you have felt the high of finding something expensive, with the tag still on and only paid 2$ for it, there is the risk of addiction. Thrift shopping is also a gateway drug to tailoring your own clothes (especially if you’re not good at it) and dressing like it’s the 80’s including wearing cords and bedazzled things. It’s important to have a sane friend nearby to make sure you’re not dressing and acting like a complete tool after the experience. Parents and siblings are most likely your best bet for this type of feedback. 

Budgeting For Beginners by Scott Keenan

You mean you’re supposed to pay for things BEFORE you get them?

TV has lead me to believe that it is my duty as a young person to party every weekend, wear couture and take trips to tropical locations on a regular basis. The only thing getting in my way is my bank account.

I have a hard time believing most people my age are able to afford all of the things that they do. I’m often flipping through my Facebook account only to see many of them with jobs that pay much the same as mine are off in tropical locations, impeccably dressed, purchasing new homes and filling them with big screen TV’s and other assorted gadgets. The truth is most of them can’t. Welcome to the age of entitlement, where working hard (or not) means you deserve a nice trip or something nice for yourself regardless of your ability to pay for it

I’m not singling anyone out here. When I’m on vacation, I tend to deserve everything and I worry about the cost of it when I get back home. I’m also not singling out young people. It’s easier to refer to them, because I know they probably aren’t making enough money right out of University to live in a $200,000 home with a full entertainment system, brand new vehicle, bedroom set, and every unnecessary attachment that has ever been created for an iphone (including the circular saw).  I definitely know a lot of older people who go severely into debt at Christmas and have barely paid it off by the following Christmas.

Most of your problems can be solved by being a little thrifty for a few months, and being realistic about what you can afford. Other problems can be solved by going back in time and wearing some form of contraception. Also, winning the lottery wouldn’t hurt.

Step 1: Find Out How Much Money You Make.

Let’s pretend your salary is $40,000 per year. That’s not how much you’re worth. Check your pay stub. You make significantly less than that. If your bi-weekly paycheque grosses $1,500, you make about $1,200. Thus, your monthly budget should be for someone who makes $2,400/month not $3,000. Depressed yet?

Step 2: Determine Your Current Expenses.

Look back through your bank accounts and your credit statements. Add up your monthly expenses and find out how much you actually spent last month (or the average of your monthly expenditures over the past three months). Separate these expenses into needs and wants. Make sure you get them all. Try using budgeting software that links up to your bank accounts so you catch all the expenses. Sometimes you don’t actually realize you’re spending money on certain things (like all of your bank fees).

Writing down all your expenses really hurts your self-esteem. You realize how incredibly stupid you are with your own money. A couple coffees per day doesn’t seem like a lot, but a 2$ coffee twice a day works out to 120$ per month. A nice coffee maker would pay for itself pretty quickly. Now think about how many times a week you go out for lunch, and how much that adds up to.

Note: Don’t be too ambitious to cut things if you’re not actually committed to cutting them.

For example: Deciding to spend less on beer is only good if you do it. If you plan to spend less, and then you end up going over-budget you just screw yourself over.

Step 3: Talk to an Adult

You’re supposed to be saving 10% of your income and using 10% to pay off debt. These percentages could be higher, depending on you. This is the part where I will digress and tell you to speak to a Financial Planner. You need someone to look at your current situation and determine what is best for you. Also, you need to find one who’s not a complete moron. All of them will encourage you to buy some kind of insurance. It’s how they make their money. You should have a little insurance as long as you can afford it, just in case something happens. You’ll know how much of an idiot they are by the number of questions they ask you.

Terrible Financial Planner: After coming into some money I went to a planner at my bank and told him I was looking to put it into an RRSP to save it for a down payment on a house. He said that is a good idea…end of discussion. He didn’t ask me what I did for a living or how much money I made or even open my account to look at it. At the time, I was working for the government and I knew that if I planned on staying there long term, there was no reason to put money into an RRSP because when I went to draw my pension, my RRSP would actually result in me paying more in taxes.

Good Financial Planner: I went to a much better Financial Planner with the same question. She went through my bank account and asked me about every expenditure I made. After I showed her my budget, she challenged me to save the extra 300$/month I said was leftover in a separate account. She also had a mortgage broker in the office speak with both of us to give me a better idea of how much I should be looking to spend on a down payment, and a mortgage. Her distrust in my ability to identify how much money I actually spent, coupled with the anal retentive attention to detail when going through my bank account made me much more comfortable with her recommendations.

Step 4 Create Savings Accounts for Big Items

Most banks now have some sort of e-savings account, where you can have as many as you want for free. These are useful to keep your savings separate. Personally, I have separate accounts for gifts (including Christmas), toys for myself (including clothes and a new phone that doesn’t suck when my current contract runs out next year) and a TFSA for travel. I put 50$ per paycheque into gifts and toys, $25 into the travel account and 25$ into RRSP’s. This way when I have to buy gifts or decide to get something for myself, it doesn’t affect my monthly budget.

Obviously, you can’t go anywhere nice saving just 25$/pay. If you’re being paid bi-weekly, there are two months out of the year where you get three paycheques for the month. If you stick to your monthly budget, these cheques are just additional cash to drop into any one of your additional savings accounts. A couple 1,200 cheques in your travel account make for a nice vacationJ. (Grammatically speaking… does the period go before or after the smiley face?)

Step 5 Credit Cards Are Your Friend….Unless They’re Not.

Most financial planners will encourage you to use cash. That’s because by the time most people go see a Financial Planner, they’re already in trouble. Credit Cards can be your friend if you can use them properly. Get something that has points or air miles and go nuts. If you can use your card for all of your expenditures, stick to your budget, and pay it all off at the end of the week, the card is your friend. It’s like getting paid to spend money! You do have to have some self-control to do this.  For some people, the idea that you don’t actually need the money in your account to purchase something drives them crazy and they end up buying ridiculous things like sweaters for their pets.  If you can’t pay the card off at the end of the week, you’re not using it right. You should cut it up immediately, cancel it and stick to jars with your monthly budget in cash.

If you get really into it, like I did, you’ll find creative ways to decrease spending and increase your points.

For example: I used to buy the office lottery tickets every week. I would collect everyone’s money and purchase the tickets with my credit card. I got points for using the card, and didn’t have to use one of my transactions to withdraw cash for the week, because I kept theirs. I also offered to pick things up for friends like movie tickets or snacks and had them pay me cash in return. This is convenient for them, and I get points for doing it….did someone say win-win? It certainly makes you less bitter about the fact that your dentist doesn’t do direct billing.

Step 6 Get Married

Marry someone rich or who at least makes as much money as you. Simple math would agree that paying rent or a mortgage is easier with two people than with one. Also, if you have a super cheap wedding, people will still buy you presents and give you money… Think about it.

A lot of people don’t budget, and end up overspending on things they don’t really need. They also fear that the budget will impede on their ability to do things that cost money. It actually does the opposite. Once you’ve put together a realistic budget, you realise how much money you were wasting before, and how much more you can do with your savings. It also relieves a lot of stress when it comes time to pay bills. If you stick to your budget you never have to worry about being able to afford your rent at the end of the month, or going into debt buying gifts for the seven weddings you went to this summer. You also get to splurge on yourself once in a while and get something new completely guilt free. 

Side Note: Rich people stay rich because they stick to their budgets.

Google Is Not a Doctor - By Scott Keenan

As a high functioning hypochondriac, I outwardly ignore all symptoms of illness unless they become so persistent that I’m required to acknowledge them. Though, I know that most mild discomforts are usually the symptoms of much bigger problems like some kind of impending death or terminal illness. Ignoring this knowledge allows me to function like a regular person, but every now and again I slip up and google my symptoms. Google is the worst doctor ever. It knows all of my worst fears and multiplies them by ten. Below are a few of my recent Google searches.

Itchy eyes – Pinkeye, put on some sunglasses and head to the clinic to get a prescription.

Mild cough – Pneumonia, see doctor immediately.

Headache – Terminal Exploding Cancer Aids. Make peace with your enemies….there’s not much time left.

Sore throat – Evil parasitic aliens have hatched inside of you. They are attacking your throat and will most likely erupt out of your face. Just panic!

Sharp pain in my side – you are being eaten by a bear, play dead.



Dramatization



For about ten years I have been experiencing what may or may not be sleep paralysis. I kind of half wake up unable to move. I was pretty sure that I was actually having a dream where I am awake but am paralyzed. Then I struggle a little and finally jolt awake still in the same position as when I was dreaming. I usually have these nightmares during times of stress like exams, periods of unemployment, and that time in the summer when all the shows you like go into re-runs and the only new ones are the terrible summer reality shows (shiver). Recently I discovered what sleep paralysis is and I have all of the symptoms, including the feeling of impending doom. Not always, but sometimes I dream that there is a person in the room watching me lay there, or something is holding me down vs me just not being able to move. When I wake up, whatever it is has disappeared. I fully intended to continue believing that I am just dreaming.

 However, I did wake up around 3am one morning after having this nightmare. I opened my laptop to google my symptoms, and I began to read what appeared to be a credible source. It outlined the scientific explanation of not fully waking up; therefore, some sleep phenomena occur during wakefulness. This includes dreaming and paralysis. This is where the article stopped being helpful.

The site then went on to explain what the “actual” cause of sleep paralysis is, which is an attack by a ghost, demon, devil or negative energy. Super! This, in hindsight, is hilarious. However, at 3am alone in my room, it’s not the most helpful sleep aid. A very convincing pie chart reveals that 60% of all sleep paralysis incidents are the result of an attack by an evil spirit.

Upon further inspection, my specific incident was the result of sorcerers from the 4^th region of Hell using their supernatural powers to tie my body with chords of black energy. First, I would like to know how many regions of hell there are. If there are only 4, then it can be assumed that these sorcerers are pretty bad-ass and I should be concerned. If there are like 10, then who cares? These guys are only in region 4. I’ll start to worry when I start to see signs of 6 or 7.

According to Paranormal State, most supernatural activity occurs around 3am. Therefore, this site’s analysis of my situation must be completely valid, as it coincides with a theory from an A&E reality series. I decided that if the problem persists I will need to take action. In consultation with Engineers I have created “to-scale” plans to trap the entity.

Evil Spirit Trap

I am still in the planning stages, but hope to have a model up and running shortly. I will keep you posted. Here is a link to the site I found if you're in the mood to either mock me or terrorize yourself a little. 

http://www.spiritualresearchfoundation.org/articles/id/spiritualresearch/difficulties/sleep-paralysis

Social Networking at Work: Why Banning Facebook Makes You Like… the Oldest Person Ever. By Scott Keenan

Many organizations have banned Facebook, LinkedIn and other sites to combat work avoidance and increase productivity. This might work for some companies for now, but seriously….how old are you? I tried to explain to one of my superiors that I still check facebook on my phone, and it ends up taking longer than if I could just do it on the computer. She then expressed concern that I would run up a large phone bill. At first I was a little puzzled at why she thought I wouldn’t have purchased a data plan with my smart phone (does she think I’m stupid?), but then I realized she thought I was checking it with my office phone… the touchtone phone on my desk.

What Banning Social Networking Says About You

1. You don’t think much of your employees - You know who puts parental controls on things?...Parents! Treating your employees like children will naturally result in your employees acting like children. Giving an employee a computer and limiting what they can do with it lets them know that you don’t trust them to work efficiently on their own. In turn, you will retain many employees who are unable to work efficiently on their own. Congratulations??

2. You’re not interested in exploring innovative ideas - The ban can also stifle creativity. Social Networking has proven extremely effective in marketing, promotions and other areas. However, your staff will need access in order to use it effectively, or come up with ideas on how it can benefit the organization. Have you ever tried to research how social networking can improve your recruitment process using a computer that does not have access to social networking sites? It’s basically like making a peanut butter sandwich without peanut butter, knowing you will have to present this sandwich to the very people who banned peanut butter in the first place, and convince them that peanut butter is great. (I just won an award for using peanut butter the most times in a single sentence…it’s not a Pulitzer, but it’ll do for now).

3. You’re just lame - An inability to understand and follow technology just makes you appear out of touch. Even my mom can go on "the Google" or “Like” all of my Facebook statuses. (She doesn’t tweet yet, so that’s still cool.) If you do plan on blocking sites for anything other than security issues, make sure you block all of them. If you blocked LinkedIn to stop your employees from looking for work, why didn’t you block Career Beacon or other job banks? If Facebook is blocked why isn’t Twitter? You know I can link all of those together and still update my status every ten minutes right?  If you’re trying to block these sites to increase productivity, because you’re super-old and kind of lame, your main concern with these sites is the amount of company time your employees will waste using them. Newsflash: The internet has millions of different ways to waste my time. Social networking is but one of many. Remember when you tried to block msn messenger, and then they just created e-buddy and a slew of other similar sites? Aren’t they just going to do that again? Here’s a neat idea! Why don’t you check on your employee’s progress with the projects they’re working on and evaluate how they’re coming along? It’s called performance management….it’s kind of your job. If they’re not performing adequately you can look in to how much time they spend on these sites to see if work avoidance is the issue. You cannot look in to how long they spend on these sites on their personal phones or how long they spent staring off into space this week. Employees will rarely track this information for you. At least if they do it on your computer, you have some evidence of the work avoidance.

What to do with Gen Y

Young employees are rumoured to have a strong sense of entitlement, so you need some concrete reasoning behind why you’re removing these entitlements. Remember that this generation has grown up using social networking as a form of socialization. Prohibiting its use is just like telling them they can’t stop and chat with each other in the hall on company time. I’m not saying that there’s never a reason to ban these sites. There’s always the issue of bandwidth constraints or security issues. Just make sure when you’re imposing the ban, you’re doing it for a legitimate reason you can communicate to your staff so they don’t feel as though they’re being treated like children. Also, make sure you’re doing it in a smart way that doesn’t make you look old and out of touch. Alternatively, a much more effective approach would be a policy regarding internet use. Tell them their internet use should not affect their ability to do their job, and follow up if there are performance issues.

Side Note: When the phone bill comes in, you should be able to check how many times your employees tried to call facebook on their touchtone phone. Refer these ones to your EAP, and pray for their families.