See You in the Real World

The internet has brought about a new era of communication and action.

For those of you who don’t know…

When a large group of people assemble suddenly and perform an unusual action for a brief time then quickly disperse, it’s called a Flash Mob.

You can find some famous ones, here, here and here.

This afternoon, I organized my first Flash Mob…

At 2:15pm, a good friend of mine named Garrett and I were studying in our Fraternity’s library (the ‘Brary). He finished his work and I still had half a paper to write.

Bragging, he announced to everyone in the ‘Brary that he was “going to take a nap.”

Furious that I still had to write a paper and Garrett was going to sleep, I decided to organize a flash mob.

I immediately sent the following email to my Fraternity listserv (90 people):

Subject:
If you’re not doing anything…

Message:
Garrett just informed me that he’s going to “Take a nap.”

I would like to prevent him from doing this.

If you’re not doing anything between 2:28pm and 3:30pm, please call Garrett at 336-###-#### and ask him a worthless question.

Thanks,
Alex

End Message.

In the next hour, Garrett got 40 calls and 16 text messages.

Needless to say, he did not fall asleep.

Pomer – 1, Garrett – 0

Note: Thanks to those of you who participated.

You know that age-old joke about how all college kids have no money?

You know that age-old joke about how no one has any money when the stock market crashes?

You know where I’m going with this?

I, along with everyone else, am broke. So I went out and got a pencil-pushing job for some extra bills to get me through the semester. I work for the national office of my Fraternity in a small office in Carrboro. Aside from helping them improve their website, I don’t get to do anything really cool. Mostly a bunch of paper filing, folding and stamping.

I’m fine with that; I need the spare change. But in a time of economic stress, most companies are trying to be as efficient as possible.

Occasionally, I spent time working on packets, handouts, etc. that my Fraternity will be receiving in the next semester. For the last three days, I’ve been organizing, stapling and binding a packet that is to be sent out to each chapter (alpha) of our Fraternity.

I know that when I receive this packet in two weeks, I’m going to immediately throw it away.

Talk about frustrating…

When you’ve only been there for a week though, it’s tough to tell your boss, who’s spent a bunch of money on some pamphlet, that “this just isn’t going to work.”

Next year, if all goes according to plan, I’ll be working in an ad agency somewhere. Advertising is going through a big transition phase right now and a lot of the old stuff just doesn’t work anymore.

After today, I don’t think I can stomach working for a place that’s still handing out pamphlets, doing mass mailings, etc.

Even if it’s worth the money for me, it’s not worth money in general.