1 perfect thank you note won't get you a job. 100 perfect thank you notes just might.

LIKE A MAJORITY OF FIRST-YEAR business school students, I'm in the middle of the summer internship search. I'm gunning for a job in consulting, and applications are due in a few weeks for the big firms. Like any other Type-A overachiever, I'm doing as much as I can to make sure that when I pull the lever on the big employment slot machine, I pull cherries or sevens and not... uh... you know, something that leaves me without job.

The hardest part about this whole job search thing is the fact that, ultimately, it's out of my hands.

This is hard for me to accept.

I don't do hard drugs. I don't gamble. I don't fall in love easily, as any number of ex-boyfriends can attest. Not because they're stupid things to do (which they are), but because they require you to surrender yourself to something else: a chemical, chance, or someone else's uncertain affection.

My father may be surprised to read about this need for control. I frequently leave on trips without a map, directions, or even a precise destination address. Yet I know that I can always call him and he'll tell me where I've managed to wind up, and how to get where I'm going, thereby providing the illusion of control. (All that said, I pray he's not actually reading this blog, as it occasionally acknowledges the existence of sex and that I have a semi-functional sex drive. Dad, if you're reading this, those things are lies. Also, Hillary made me do it).

I know that I'll eventually need to give up on this need, that being successful eventually becomes less about doing the right thing all the time, and more about leveraging a rare moment of possibility and otherwise rolling with the punches. It's hard to make that shift, though, when doing what I can to determine the outcome of uncertain periods has been relatively successful.

Here's hoping the illusion lasts a little longer.

Ida Maria - "Oh My God"

"You think I'm in control? Oh my God."

Secret lovers, that's what we are

MY FORMER CUBEMATE AND I were obsessed with that T-Mobile MyFives commercial, the one where one guy says to the other guy, "Dude, what's my girlfriend doing in your five?" And then the other guy tries to play if off like it's nothing, but then the girlfriend calls and the ringer is that song "Secret Lovers."

HaHa! Hilarious! Oh man, and then we'd just laugh and laugh...

Alright, so it's not that funny to recount, but when you're at work the bar is lower.

Anyway, M, this is for you.

Tato Salad - "Cell Phone Five"

"The older the prune, the sweeter the poon."

Like uncool girls talking about popular girls

LAST NIGHT, I HAD a long discussion about the difference between Canada and America. Actually, I wasn't involved because, as an American, I know absolutely nothing about Canada, but I had the opportunity to listen while two Canadians discussed the relative merits of their homeland.

I'll spare you, my enormous reading public, the details, and instead let Cute with Chris sum it up for me.

Cute with Chris - "Canada vs. America"

"That's right, Jesus is lord."

The wisdom of children, my ass

THE FIRST SONG I EVER memorized was "You're So Vain" by Carly Simon. I was young, certainly far too young to grasp the song's interpersonal complexities, too young even to memorize the words correctly. By way of illustration, when Carly sang "Some underworld spy, or the wife of a close friend," I would sing "Some underwear spy and the wife of a clothespin." My mother never attempted to correct me. She probably thought it was cute. Like a lisp.

Like a lisp, if it's not corrected quickly, your son winds up a fag, and gets tormented in elementary school because not only is he singing Carly Simon in the playground, he's singing it wrong with a fucking lisp.


REGARDLESS, THIS LYRIC MADE perfect sense to my child brain. While singing, I would picture a clothespin puppet, dressed up in a pretty felt dress, yarn hair pulled back, standing next to a man wearing a cape and a pair of underwear over his eyes to conceal his identity. I may have confused spies with Zorro.

When you're a kid, your ability to discern the reasonable from the absurd is severely limited, as my friend, whose imaginary friend "Broccoli" (a human-sized head of broccoli), can testify. I think that's one of the reasons kids attach to such horrible songs. The neighborhood kids used to spend hours dancing around with Elton John's "Crocodile Rock" on repeat, and our parent's never tried to kill us! Not once!

Even if we put aside children's music (hey, remember Raffi?), there's enough kid-friendly, soul-grating music by otherwise credible musicians to fill thousands of trips to and from Gymboree, the day's playdate, and any number of mind-numbing soccer games. One key entry into this pantheon of shame is surely "You Can Call Me Al" by Paul Simon. Why can I call you Al, Paul? And it's not Betty, okay? I'm having enough trouble with the kids in the playground and I don't need this from you.

The song makes no sense, but an entire generation of kids grew up singing the song from the wayback at the top of their lungs. It turns out it was an international phenomenon, as Jens Lekman explains, before launching into a worthy rendition of the song. Lekman gets at the heart of what makes the song so annoying - the chorus, and Chevy Chase's smile in the original video - and then does us all a favor and gets rid of both. The guitar riff in the hook is pretty amazing, right?

Jens Lekman - "You Can Call Me Al"

You need two mics to rock this hard.

If you have to ask, you probably are

EVERYONE, AND I MEAN EVERYONE, spends most of college making poor choices and being a risk to themselves. Fortunately for those of us who graduated before 2005, most of those poor choices get put in a box and left in the past, to be opened like your middle school time capsule once every five years at reunion.

Unfortunately for later classes, however, that time capsule is called YouTube.

I'm Not the Fraternity Bicycle

What's the fish hook all about? Besides being genius.

Doctor, Lawyer, Accountant, Lover

I STEPPED INTO THE ELEVATOR behind a young woman in her late 20s. I was listening to my iPod, which generally means "Do not talk to me, this is my Britney time," but because she'd held the door for me while I checked my mailbox, I nodded and said, "Thanks."

"You a lawyer? You look like a lawyer," she said, looking at the tie I was wearing.

I laughed. "Nope, sorry. I'm a student."

"Yeah? For what?"

"Business."

"That's nice," she said, approvingly. "You can be my accountant when I'm a millionaire. I'ma make a record. I know you won't cheat me 'cause you from the hood."

I smiled and promised I never would. The doors opened on her floor and she stepped into the hallway.

She turned around. "You got a girlfriend?"

I laughed. "No."

"You need one? It's Chermelli. I'm a model too," she said, running her hand down her hair and bouncing her ass out a bit.

"Nice to meet you," I said, sticking my hand out.

"Nice to meet you too, baby!" she said, taking it.

Chris Recites Britney Spears