Originally posted 3.24.12 at www.Forbes.com.

"If you want to know what my five-year professional plan is, ask me what I do on a Sunday afternoon and not what’s ticking on my career clock."

I was in a job interview last week that was going well. I was connecting with my interviewers, I’d done my research on the position, and the job sounded like it would be a good fit for my writing skills and desire to mentor undergrads.

Then came the killer question: “Where do you see yourself professionally in five years?”

This question really only has three answers, and when posed to an ambitious Gen-Y candidate, none of them will make you look good. Here’s what I mean:

It’s easy to see Twitter as merely a source of amusement—especially if your feed is bogged down with inane, minute-by-minute updates from friends and celebrities. After all, who cares what Nick Nolte had for breakfast or that your cousin lost her keys again?      

But Twitter can be so much more than a workday distraction. It can be a powerful career tool. More and more recruiters are turning to social media powerhouses such as LinkedIn and Twitter to find candidates and communicate open positions. Plus, with a little savvy, Twitter can be great for building your network, gaining industry know-how, and uncovering unofficial job leads.     

Before you start tweeting your beak off, though, be sure you’re up to date on Twitter etiquette.

1. Be a Pro
Your Twitter profile will be one of the first things a recruiter finds when he Googles you, so from the moment you create an account you should make sure to put your professional face forward.

The Fleming Museum, University of Vermont • Burlington, VT • www.uvm.edu/fleming • Through May 20, 2012

By turns abstract, edgy, and haunting, the photographs in Persian Visions: Contemporary Photographs from Iran fully transcend the geographic boundaries imposed by the exhibition title. These are not the images that have flashed across American television screens for the past ten years; they’re far subtler than that, muting everyday violence with digital multimedia, blurred focus, and the ever-present veil motif.

Subject matter simmers just beneath the surface, at times brought to a rolling boil by Fleming curator Aimee Marcereau DeGalan’s decision to juxtapose the contemporary prints of the traveling exhibition (toured by International Art & Artists, Washington, D.C.) with nineteenth-century photographs of the Middle East in a complementary show.

Originally posted at http://www.emsexploration.com/wordpress/mitts-for-when-the-mercury-drops/

When the skis, boots, poles and skins made an appearance in the living room for the third night in a row last week, I knew it was time to either get my husband a hamster wheel, or go visit the snowmakers on the mountain.

Vermont holds the record for most terrain covered by snowmakers in the East — after all, it’s home to “Hug a Snowmaker Day” (really), so we headed up to Jay Peak to pick up DJ’s season pass and to check out the powder — whether real, imagined, or man-made. (And as per last night’s snow-dump, everything is newly dusted in fresh snow.)

We arrived late enough in the day that all of the lifts were closed, which made skinning up the mountain both easy and legal, according to Jay’s AT/backcountry rules (off-limits when the lifts are running). Stir-craziness abated, DJ took a few turns while I put my new Black Diamond Mercury Mitts to the test.