Tag Archives: CBS’ The Early Show

November 4, 2010 · 8:32 am

Dream on

Not too long ago, we had fun here talking about our first jobs. The idea came about when the Today show ran a series about its hosts’ first jobs. The post prompted readers to share memories of theirs.

This week, CBS’ The Early Show has been airing a series on dream jobs, in which the hosts and others from the CBS family help viewers score their dream jobs, if only for a day–working at the zoo, cooking alongside Bobby Flay, writing cards for Hallmark and so on.

This got me thinking. I don’t know about you, but my idea of a dream job takes on a different form with each passing year.

When I was four, I wanted to be a ballerina nun. That lasted until I was six, when I wanted to be a go-go dancer. Actually I was a go-go dancer, in a make-believe go-go club my friends and I set up in the garage, with the help of my mother, who made us all fringed hot pink go-go dresses. We had one 45 rpm record, The Beatles’ “Can’t Buy Me Love;” two if you count the flip side, which was “You Can’t Do That.”

It has turned out that I’ve had a real dream job or two in my life. Or at least good jobs with dream perks. For several years, I got to travel the world, sometimes via corporate jet, doing fascinating work. Still, working in public policy as I did, it was not unusual to work on a single issue for years on end with seemingly little hope of completion.

It was then I used to dream of being a supermarket cashier. In addition to a fondness for groceries, what appealed to me most was the ability to finish a day’s work completely and definitively, with nothing hanging over my head. When your shift ends, you turn in your cash drawer, clock out, go home and leave it behind. You come in the next day with a clean smock and a fresh outlook.

I no longer have that dream because I am fortunate to be engaged more recently in project work, which carries with it that same sense of satisfaction–of completing a project, wrapping it up neatly and beginning a new one.

My husband has what many consider a dream job, and yet he dreams of other options. He is an oceanographer and wants to be a cowboy.

I can’t say at this moment what I’d consider to be my dream job. Maybe a shoe model.

Your turn. What did you want to be when you grew up or, now that you’re grown, what would be your dream job, even if you could do it for only a day?

12 Comments

Filed under Beauty and Fashion, Family and Friends, Food, Movies, Television and Radio, Music, Travel

Tagged as , , , , , , , ,

October 28, 2010 · 8:28 am

Empty phrases

Last spring, I wrote a couple of blog posts on useless words. One was on phrases that mean nothing in which I referenced a list of 10 Annoying Phrases That Serve No Purpose. The other was on verbal pauses, you know, words like, “you know” and “like.” Based on comments I received, I learned that some people have emotional or habitual attachments to certain phrases or verbal patterns and don’t share my opinion that, while some expressions may be clever upon their arrival on the language scene, it eventually becomes time to move on from them.

At the risk stepping out on another flimsy limb, I’d like to add two more to the list.

The first happens to occupy second place on the list of 10 Annoying Phrases That Serve No Purpose: “at the end of the day.”

I first took notice of “at the end of the day” in 1991. I was working with a Harvard-educated consultant who used it in just the perfect context:  when all is said and done, when everything else has been taken into consideration. I noted how descriptive—and original—it sounded. I may have even picked it up and used it a few times. Not too long after that, I heard about an industry executive from the Gulf Coast region who, when testifying on Capitol Hill, used the phrase to sum up his testimony. He had the creativity to follow it up with something even more descriptive:  “At the end of the day, when the gumbo boils down . . .”

Almost 20 years later, I believe “at the end of the day” has become stale and overused. It has lost its punch. Unless, of course, it is followed by a clever colloquialism.

The second phrase, while innocuous enough, has come to be spoken without thought. Still, it precedes a great preponderance of sentences these days. “You know what?” Pay attention and you will really begin to notice. Again, there’s technically nothing wrong with it, but it is way overused. “You know what? I am going to have eggs over easy.”

These two sayings hit me in the face yesterday morning as I watched former JetBlue flight attendant Steven Slater being interviewed on the major morning news programs—NBC’s Today, ABC’s Good Morning America and CBS’ The Early Show. 

As a refresher, Slater was the airline employee who had a colossal meltdown on a flight from Pittsburgh to New York, cursed out a plane full of passengers over the intercom and, when the plane landed at JFK, grabbed two beers, popped open the emergency exit door and slid down the escape ramp. He parted ways with JetBlue and pled guilty to two criminal charges.

In three network interviews, he told his side of the story, using “at the end of the day” and “you know what?” collectively at least 10 times. My favorite, though, was on GMA, when he was asked how his notoriety has affected him. He said, “At the end of the day, I still put my pants on one leg at a time.”

Don’t people usually take their pants off at the end of the day? Maybe he was referring to his PJs, in which he probably spends a lot of time these days.

6 Comments

Filed under All Things Wordish, Movies, Television and Radio, News, Travel

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , , , , ,