Words I’ve Written
Serial Entrepreneur Mukund Mohan Welcomes Your Skepticism (And Might Hire You For It Later)
Talking with Mukund Mohan for thirty minutes was like drinking an entire french press full of Philz Canopy of Heaven.
That is, it left me feeling decidedly buzzed, and wondering how any substance could pack so much energy.
Fitting that his newest venture is called BuzzGain.com. Since hitting the shelves last week, this unique DIY PR service combines the fun and flirtatiousness of social media with the numbers-crunching seriousness of Google Analytics.
Mukund’s your typical Silicon Valley everything-preneur (in French, literally, everything-taker…) who has a voice in every social media outlet, three or four viable project ideas bubbling up daily, this little BuzzGain company that he’s co-founded, and even his own ‘personal’ blog where he writes about such tedious ‘personal’ details as theories of global economics, market-watch on certain major mobile handset makers, productivity tips, and a world of other, widely useful topics.
Also, did I mention that he’s really really nice? And articulate? And donates a quarter of BuzzGain’s profits to children’s education? And likes the SuperBowl?
Lucky for me talking with amazing, excellent people only makes me hungrier. Otherwise, I might not have gotten out of bed today.
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From I Will Teach You To Be Rich
Tip #19: Save Money, Eat Well and Look Hot in Less Than an Hour
… 3. Etsy. Etsy is a way cool crafty, arty site where people from all over the country showcase their talent and sell the beautiful things they created. I have a thing for unique, handmade metalwork earrings. The mass-produced commercial stuff doesn’t hold a candle to a hand-hammered pair of sterling silver danglies. But, they are f-ing expensive at the boutiques where they’re normally found. Then, I found Etsy. My Fashion Institute of New York friend and all her jewelry design classmates make beautiful stuff, then sell it on Etsy without the boutique markup. The other day I found some one-of-a-kind metalwork earrings for under $20.It’s not just for women either - there are men’s items, stylish home things, art, gadgets, books, and more.
Know anyone who wants these $14 Republican finger puppets for the holidays?
Site: http://www.etsy.com
Items: Unique, handmade everything - gifts, furniture, books & zines, jewelry and tons more.
Brands: No brands! This is the place you go to find the one-of-a-kind delights that are usually exclusive to hip boutiques and gift shops, at a fraction of the price.
$$ Saved: Saw a cute pair of earrings for $18. Saw a similar pair at a boutique last month for $45. The difference? $27 or 60%.
Time Saved: This site may not actually save you time because it is so full of all kinds of fun, impressive stuff to ogle. However, ogling here is probably still faster than scouring your city or town for similar cute items.
Added Bonus: If you’re crafy, you could actually make some money on Etsy this year. List your stuff!
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From The Natural Bite
5 Natural Ways to Reduce Swelling After Jaw Surgery
After my upper jaw advancement surgery exactly 2.5 weeks ago, I wanted my facial swelling, crusty lips, and general mask-like appearance to go away as quickly as possible so I could see what I was really going to look like for the rest of my life. I had very little swelling for the first 60 hours after jaw surgery. I commended myself on all the bromelain I took in the weeks leading up to jaw surgery and thought I was in the clear.
But, on the fourth day, my swelling reached its ugly peak. On the fifth day, Dr. Li called me Richard Nixon. On the sixth day, still nothing had changed and so I resigned myself to the slow recovery process I’d heard about and feared.
Suddenly, magically, on the seventh day, my mask loosened, then crumbled. I could smile without pain, I could laugh without restraint. People stopped looking at me with pitying glances. And, for the first time, I looked in the mirror and saw the old me instead of the expressionless, taught dollface I’d been seeing for the past 7 days.
Now at 2.5 weeks, no one can believe I had surgery. While this irks me slightly because I’m still on my crappy restricted diet of mush and gruel, I’m just happy not to invite stares anymore, and even happier with how healthy and right my smile looks.
Here are 5 things I did to reduce my swelling after getting my skull sawed…
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From Girls in Tech
How To Talk To Engineers: Lessons From A Silicon Valley Fuzzy Techie
I love engineers. But, I’m not one.
I’m a Murakami-devouring, French-speaking, fuzzy techie. That is, I took a total of two non-humanities courses at Stanford: Intro to Statistics, whose only textbook was “Cartoon Statistics,” and Search For Life in the Solar System, a freshman course about alien life between the Sun and Neptune.
How then, did I end up as a web product manager at an engineering-driven tech start-up?
I learned, after a few early failures, how to talk to engineers.
Here are the THREE things to remember when talking to engineers:
1. Bring value to the table. The simplest way to gain anybody’s respect, especially members of the ‘ruling’ class of your company or organization, whether they’re engineers in a tech start-up or male analysts at Goldman, is to know something that they don’t know but might like to know.
The HR Director at my old company was a smart young woman who could easily have been pigeonholed into being another one of those “HR girls.”
She never let this happen because she had lots of valuable workplace and HR information that EVERYONE – even engineers – needed to know. And, she wasn’t afraid to make it clear in her (highly articulate) conversations with developers.
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Prose from Fuzzie | Techie
A blackhaired lady beside me crescendos above the notes from my headphones.
Chinese is the music of my aunties.
The Chinglish melodies sing nonstop jobtalk, the banter of my mother. I’m suddenly flying, not on the BART to Civic Center, but across the sky, over brilliant green rice fields to Chongqing.
Summertime, badly paved streets overwhelmed with traffic, and trees.
Popsicles and fried bread from the browned peasant men on the corner. Another one the shade of tanned San Franciscan rooftops who fixed zippers and shoes for one yuan.
Stray cats and dogs, wandering the courtyards, lazy with humidity.
Stray children, mingling with pigeons, fingers gripped greedily around sweating glass bottles of coca-cola…
And, just as suddenly, the music tapers. Transit screeches to a stop.
