The internet isn’t all cats and memes.

In some corners, you can find professional social channels for advice and guidance for all things work. I’m a member of one such e-group where someone posed about quitting: “Any advice on a resignation letter?”

Harmless enough, but the poster continued about how much work he does for the company, how the leadership will “soon find out” once he’s gone, and how the job was encroaching over significant personal boundaries with his family.

Several responses advised the poster to refrain from venting and to keep it short and simple. …

I’ll make this (moderately) brief, just like a good email should be. And straight away, I want to clarify that this story isn’t about email content. That’s up to you. This is about context — length, layout, courtesies.

Over 290 billion emails are sent and received every day, expected to grow to nearly 350 billion by 2023. Also by that year, more than 4 billion people are expected to use emails. Wow.

With so many notes exchanged, we want to get them right. …

What was the last piece of real, good encouragement you received from a colleague? Perhaps it was “good job!” or “keep up the good work!” or, my personal favorite… “hang in there!” The latter is always fun in the wake of a disaster like a hurricane, or, you know, a pandemic.

To be clear, these are perfectly fine remarks. And for the most part, I bet they are usually well-intentioned. But I don’t think fine cuts it anymore. We are living through a complicated, unusual period of time. Few expected it, fewer prepared for it. …

One of my undergrad professors used to say the line, “If you love what you do then you’ll never work a day in your life,” jokingly followed by “…because no one will pay you to do it.”

But whether you love the work or not, you work. And especially for post-grads, you hop. You’re the generation people love to write about related to job-hopping, even though it’s not unique to 20-somethings — I’m seven employers into a 20-year career.

You might hop around for various reasons, none the least for trying to find something passion-centric — or at least passion-adjacent…

Nestlé, the brand synonymous with chocolatey joy for youngsters, announced today the launch of its new alcohol-infused beverage for children, HARD QUIK.

First released in 1948 as a powdered accompaniment for milk, the drink has been a treasured staple in households for generations. “I can remember Pappy making this for us in the basement while Mother had her evening screams upstairs,” said Nestlé’s Director of Product Insanity, Bernard W. McNinnypoo.

In recent years — especially over the course of the pandemic — the company’s sales have been markedly lower than projected. McNinnypoo notes:

“Before COVID-19 struck, we would always have…

38% → 34% → 28% → 10%. Those are the rates at which my submissions on Medium have been rejected from January through April. (Yes, I keep a spreadsheet. No, I’m not a crazy person… not entirely.)

Looking through these figures, I thought, You’re getting better at this, Wildstein! It hasn’t been a solo journey, though — even if Stephen King tells us, “Writing is a lonely job.”

Enter superhuman Medium editors.

I’ve been here for about one year, but only really started taking it seriously in early 2021. I credit this “serious start” with one particular piece that showed…

You are there, out there, somewhere. Our little poppyseed. You exist — maybe only as an idea just yet, but you’re there. It’s the strangest, most foreign sensation I’ve ever known.

We are incomplete with you, little one, of this I’m so invariably sure.

I don’t know how we will find you. So often I have answers; perhaps not all of them, but enough to feel safe, to feel sane. Though here I have none. My head searches for the path forward — it usually serves and leads me.

Yet here, I have only heart. …