Interviewed by Cate at Show my Face

Today I am being interviewed by Cate from Show my Face. Cate sent me a series of thought-provoking questions to answer here today. Cate was one of my first regular blog-readers and daily commenters. For that, she earns a special place in bloggy-heaven. I love Cate’s blog for her humor, her ability to say so many things I think, but would never be brave enough to say, and her ability to respond to nearly every single person who comments on her blog. She makes me look really, really inept at this particular task. Cate also deserves accolades since she hooked me up with a great new laptop when my last one caught some infectious disease a couple of months ago. So, truthfully, without Cate, this blog might have met an untimely death.

(Insert applause for Cate here)

I had the opportunity to ask Cate some questions on her blog today too. Click here to see her answers to my questions.

I'm going to start by asking a follow-up from the awesome interview Jenny conducted. You indicated you're more likely to give advice than to receive. What do you feel was the best advice you've ever given?

I indicated that I was likely to give advice, yes. I did not attest to the quality of that advice. In fact, I think that I do give stellar advice; people just rarely ever listen to it. So, I guess it would be hard to measure the quality of my advice, considering the majority of it hasn’t been implemented. Maybe one of my blog-readers can chime in and gush about my genius advice that changed their life. Waiting. Still waiting … wait, is this thing on?

And a follow-up to the follow-up, since I'm so creative that way. What piece of advice have you given that didn't work out?

Okay, see above. Apparently the majority of my advice hasn’t worked out, since people rarely seem to listen to me. However, I will say that I have advised a plethora of people against taking new jobs and I always end up being in an “I told you so” position. I don’t rub their nose in it, I just write about their bad decision on the internet. So, without divulging any secrets, I’ll just say, listen to me when it comes to career choices, okay?

What would be (or has been) your perfect vacation destination? Let's go with a family trip, a "woohoo, Kate's with a sitter" trip for you and your husband, and a "woohoo, your husband IS Kate's sitter" trip for just you!

In the past ten years I’ve had the opportunity to travel quite a bit. I’ve realized that my best vacations are ones that don’t require doing much. So, while I’ve visited a significant number of major cities in the US, they just require me to do too much work. I hate navigating the transit systems, meticulously planning daily agendas, standing in tourist-attraction lines with a multitude of claustrophobia-influencing people, wondering whose idea of relaxing this would be. I’m quite happy to be beach-side, enjoying warm weather, good restaurants, and the most significant looming decision to be if I should wear my Reef flip-flops, or my Rainbow flip-flops. My two top vacations to date have been Key West and Hilton Head. So, whether alone, with spouse, or with family, anything that fits this criterion is perfectly suitable for me.

Since you work in HR, I assume you've probably conducted your share of job interviews. What's the most bizarre answer (or question) you've ever received from a job applicant? I always hate being asked "what's your worst quality?", any interesting answers for that?

Expectedly, I’ve had more awkward situations than can be documented here. My all time most bizarre interview is best portrayed by relaying the conversation that took place:

INTERVIEWEE (Hereafter referred to as CD (Creepy Dude)): I just want to let you know that I have a criminal history.

ME: Having a criminal history doesn’t exclude you from employment. Depending on what your conviction was and how long ago it occurred, there are still some positions that you would be allowed to obtain. We will get to those questions soon.

CD: Well, I’ll just tell you that I am a sex-offender.

ME: Okay, well, again, we’ll ask you some specific questions about those convictions in just a moment.

CD: I’m a registered sex-offender. I’m listed on the sex-offender registery.

ME: Yes, ummm, I see. Well, we might as well just skip ahead and ask you those conviction related questions now then.

CD: Yeah, I’m not a only a sex-offender, I am a REPEAT sex-offender. I just want you to know.

After the interviewee left, I used so much hand sanitizer, I think my skin needed detox from all of the alcohol. I momentarily tried to conjure up a way I could turn that hand sanitizer into desk sanitizer, chair sanitizer, pen sanitizer, and mental-image sanitizer.

I often feel misunderstood or unheard. What is something that not a lot of people know or realize about you but you wish more people could know?

Oh, this is an ineffably difficult question for me. I feel misunderstood the majority of the time. Admittedly, likely not unheard, but misunderstood, which can be unheard on a different level. I would pretty much say that nearly any assumption that people have about me is inaccurate, except for the handful of people that know me very, very well. The most audacious is the people who believe that I truly have it all together and I can’t control the urge to shout … do you read my blog people?

Cate, it’s been a pleasure! Thank you for taking the time to participate in my bloggy interview exchange today. I hope you enjoyed it.