GALFROMDOWNUNDER UPOVER

On becoming an accidental candidate at a job fair at the height of the 2009 recession UPDATED 2023 with additional intel.  Originally published: 2/25/2009.  Read an edited version of this post on Fastcompany We interrupt this program for a report from the cold, hard pavement outside your window. A jobseeking friend invited me to join her at a Women for Hire Career Fair  2009 at the Sheraton New York. Thinking it might provide a palpable insight into the current state of the nation for my FastCompany blog , I hastily printed out my resume as required (complete with a nice glaring typo - doh!) and jumped in a cab to make it by curtain call. Might I add, my color printer suddenly chose to malfunction that day, and printed out a resume striated in red, white and blue, like a glorious 8 1/2 x 11" American flag. No matter, it's a just a formality for my friend's benefit, right? On arriving at the entry cutoff time of 1.15pm - 45 minutes before the advertised closing time of 2pm...

After 30 years of keeping me fashionably late, my Golana watch has finally resigned. As if pining for a time when there were more hours in the day, it tells me it's brunchtime when people are heading back to their desks; it's ready to wine and dine when I should be hitting the hay. This tiny little watch - about the diameter of an Australian 5 cent piece - was the object of my desire for months, until I finally broke down and bought it with my very first paycheck: $A247. $247 was a lot to blow in one go, let alone on a watch. It felt like $1500 feels like now. I remember gazing at it through a plate glass window in Canberra, Australia, when I was 17 years old. The store, called Gold and Silver (I think),  jutted out from a very desirable little enclave of shops called Centerpoint, overlooking a pedestrian plaza. It was an exclusive little mall, selling fancy clothes by Aussie fashion icons like Nadjee menswear, Cue, and probably the best frozen yoghurt fruit salad I ...