misspriss.org

Today is picture day at the school. My son has such a great smile. I reminded him to smile nicely for the photos. And here’s where the conversation got interesting.

“Mama, are you going to take the pictures today?”

“No, buddy, I’m not the photographer.”

“Well, what are you going to do?”

My son has noticed that mommy’s been sad the last few days. I might be having a midlife crisis, brought on by the prospect of being unemployed around the holidays. Again. Or maybe I just don’t know what I want to be when I grow up.

Someone asked a question on FB the other day and it made me pause. It was “Are you making a living doing what you’re good at?” I don’t know. Do I want to continue to look for work along the same lines of what I’m doing now? Am I topped out at what I can do without some more schooling? WTF am I good at?

So I was honest with my son: “That’s a good question. I don’t really know, honey.”

And then this kid, who never fails to surprise me with what comes out of his mouth, said the most profound thing he could. And blew my mind.

“Why don’t you just be yourself?”

Out of the mouths of babes, no?

There’s been a lot of debate going around the past month or so about whether a social media manager should be under 25, over 25, newly out of college, a seasoned professional … you get the picture.

The kerfuffle started when a new college graduate wrote an article on NextGen about why all social media managers should be under 25 (linked above). And what a firestorm that started. Heavy hitters came out of the woodwork to respond to that one (just go look at the sheer volume of comments). There were many good, thoughtful comments telling the author that her article wasn’t terribly well thought out and, well, ageist. But then a lot of the comments started becoming quite ageist themselves. Most of them had good points, but that doesn’t mean there still wasn’t a lot of “come back when you’re older” attitudes being thrown around.

I remember when I turned 30 and felt that *finally* people were starting to take me seriously and listen to me when I had something to say. Before that, I had a lot of ideas that I thought were good or could work (in whatever job I was working – it wasn’t SM at the time). And I basically got the equivalent of a head pat and a “that’s nice” response.

So I know where the author was coming from, in many regards. You can have mature 25 year olds, and you can have some that seem like they haven’t even hit their teens yet. Everyone’s different.

So here’s an idea.

Let’s stop judging so much by a person’s age and instead look at their actual experience. Or listen to their ideas. They might have some good ones. Sure, they might need help in executing them (hell, I think I still need help in executing much of the time), but why not give them a chance with some mentoring and guidance?

I’ve been on Twitter since 2007 and Facebook since it was still college-only. That alone doesn’t qualify me to be a Social Media Manager, but the rest of my knowledge and experience certainly does.

The age debate still rages and each time it pulls me back to remembering how I felt just 15 short years ago, wondering if I’d EVER be taken seriously. So let’s not discount someone because they may be young. Or old. Or in between. Look at the individual and you might be pleasantly surprised.

decorated keyboard, a photo by lola goetz on Flickr.

I am currently loving Washi Tape. Like, a lot. I saw something like this on Mary Ann Moss’s blog, and she had seen it somewhere else. I was waiting for someone working on my computer, so while that was going on, I decorated my keyboard. In addition to the numbered tape, I had a few different types of alphabet tape. This was the result. I don’t know how long it’ll last, but it’s fun in the meantime.

keyboard tape, a photo by lola goetz on Flickr.

I am currently loving Washi Tape. Like, a lot. I saw something like this on Mary Ann Moss’s blog, and she had seen it somewhere else. I was waiting for someone working on my computer, so while that was going on, I decorated my keyboard. I had numbered tape, which was perfect for the number pad.

Annnnnndddd, we have reached the “But, why?” stage. Let the fun begin. Ah, 4. You are just SUCH a joy. /sarcasm

A few weeks ago, I tweeted about how we saw one of the guys from Storage Wars at the Kobey swap meet. We heard it over the loudspeaker, but didn’t catch quite all of it. I thought they were comparing a bunch of the vendors that buy storage stuff to the guys on Storage Wars. And then we rounded a corner and saw the great big “Yuuuuuuuuuuup!” on the side of a truck.

Oh. It’s THAT Storage Wars guy. The most annoying one on the show. I don’t know if his personality is a put-on for the show or not. But if it’s an act, he made sure to stay firmly in character while he was there. He would only take pics of people if they bought something. But not the stuff he had out on the ground. The stuff in his tent. Shirts and stickers that had his catch phrase on it.

Now, I didn’t want a picture with him anyway, nor was I going to spend $2-3 on a stupid sticker that says “Yuuuuup” on it. But I did want to see what kind of stuff he had brought with him, so I poked around a bit.

I was not impressed at all. Dave Hester, your stuff was junk. It stunk.

Let me back up a bit. We go to the swap meet a lot. At least twice a month, sometimes more. There are a lot of people who do a garage sale type of set up, with everything spread on tarps on the ground, or maybe in boxes. But the pros that are there week after week have tables set up and everything laid out so you can easily peruse their stuff. Yeah, there’s a little bit of junk now and again. But most of it is in decent shape and spread out so you can browse.

But not this Hester dude. He had boxes on the ground piled with stuff. It was mostly crap. Things were water damaged, dusty, musty. Broken. He just threw some stuff together. His real reason for being there was to get people to buy his shirts. It had to have been. He didn’t respect our swap meet at all. I expected someone who brags about all the great stuff he has to really BRING IT when coming to the swap meet.

And he totally didn’t. And it kinda made me a little mad. You come to our swap meet, disrupt things, throw around your attitude and all you bring is the dregs that you couldn’t sell anywhere else? No thanks, dude.

I did buy a reel of 8mm film that I’ll use for some art stuff. But it wasn’t worth my time to dig through all that junk. I was looking for a particular type of old photo album, but there was very little that was worth anyone’s time of day. I’ll stick to our regular vendors who are there week after week, reasonably priced, and present their stuff well. Oh, and are NICE.

I’ve kindof gotten tired of the show anyway. It was fun to watch for a while, but the whole fighting and drama stuff is getting old. I’d rather watch the one with the two guys (Auction Hunters) that is mostly about their finds, not the drama. (Even if it does seem a little too good to be true sometimes. I really don’t care about that. I just enjoy it anyway.)

So tell me. Are you a Storage Wars fan? Are you going to tell me you love Dave and he’s the best thing ever? If you do, I don’t think we can be friends anymore.