I signed up for Pinterest last month.  I have a few Facebook friends – and one coworker – who are really into it, so I snagged an invitation and created an account.  It’s kind of fun, sort of like a visual Facebook.  You post (or “pin”) photos of things you like from fashion to home furnishings to recipes, graphics with quotes, images from web sites, then write a few words – or a lot of words – about them.  Other people can “like” your pin (similar to liking a Facebook post) or “repin” your pin (like a Twitter retweet), with or without adding their own comments.  I’ve already found a few recipes I want to try from pins.  It’s a fun time-suck, for sure, and I’m not nearly as hardcore as my co-worker, but I’m enjoying it.

The T-Mobile MyTouch 4G Slide. It has a physical keyboard which, interestingly, I never use.

New cell phone report – last month I got a T-Mobile MyTouch 4G Slide and while it’s a nice phone, I’m not in love with it.  See, I really, really (really) wanted a Blackberry, but when the old Samsung Highlight (AKA the POS) went missing, I had to get a new phone, and without getting into details and using the rest of this post to explain my phone plan, I choose to pay full retail price for the phone (I pay more at the outset, but less each month.  For me, it works better with my budget).  I did not have enough money set aside to buy the Blackberry Bold, which is what I wanted, so I went with the MT4GS.  If only the Samsung had waited another month to go missing…Anyway, this is the first phone I’ve had that has Internet access on it and I have to admit I’m digging that.  There are a lot of things I like about the phone, including the phenomenal 8MP camera, but there are some things I don’t – for example, I haven’t yet figured out how to turn off the Twitter notifications that I keep getting every five minutes (“You have 1,572 new Tweets.” I don’t care!), and that when the ringer is on mute and the vibrating alert is on, the vibrating is audible – people (read: co-workers) can literally hear my phone vibrate.  Plus, it’s heavy.  I keep my phone in my front pocket at work and it’s pulling my jeans down, especially because after losing 25 pounds, my jeans are kind of big on me.   But I don’t hate it, which is good because I’m stuck with it until October 2013.  BTW – I found the Samsung three days later when it started chirping due to a low battery from under my bed!  How it got there, I don’t know.  I still kept the MT4GS because I didn’t want to pay a $50 restocking fee.

We haven't seen any of this yet this season...

The weather has been crazy – it’s nearly the middle of January and we’ve barely had any snow, although that’s supposed to change soon.  The temperatures have been in the 40′s too, and we should be in the low 30′s.  Not that I’m complaining, though – I have a 30-mile commute one way to work and when we have snow my commute is easily doubled or even tripled.  A couple of years ago on the last work day before Christmas we had a snowstorm that deposited several inches during the day.  The drive home was hell.  It literally took me three and a half hours to get home from work.  No joke.  If it wasn’t the day before Christmas Eve I would have found a hotel and stayed the night near work and went home the next day after the roads were cleared.   So now I have a Winter Kit that I keep in my car for just such a situation – it has everything I might need for an overnight and it’s ready to grab and go.

Shameless self-promotion - the nancy b*eads logo/business card.

I went through some of my old jewelry supply catalogs today and pulled out a lot of design ideas.  As I’m looking at these designs and thinking of how I can use them in my own designs, I decided I really have to start making jewelry again.  I have a few crystal bracelets up on my jewelry Facebook page (http://www.facebook.com/pages/Nancy-Beads/270872009595067) but I need to do more.  I’m a very creative person and I feel best when I’m creating.  I haven’t done enough of that lately and it’s going to be hard to find time now that I’m back in school, but I need to do it.  Plus it’ll give me some extra money, which is never a bad thing!

So, back to the Resolutions – I promise (promise!) that I will have them up this weekend.  And no, this year I’m not going to include getting married by the end of the year on the list.  That didn’t quite work out.

• I am going back to school!  I got accepted into Eastern Michigan University‘s Integrated Marketing Communications Master’s Degree program, and I will be starting on Tuesday.  It’s exciting and scary at the same time.  It’s been 13 years since I’ve been a student, and this program is entirely online, so not only do I have to get back into student mode, I also need to learn how to be an online student.  One thing I have discovered so far – textbooks went up in price exponentially since 1998!
• October 22 was a magical date – I saw Duran Duran at Casino Windsor and it was honestly the best concert I have ever seen.  Of course, I’m a Duranie from way (way, way, way) back, so maybe my saying it was the best concert ever is a little biased.  Okay, maybe a lot biased, but it was really, really good.
• Weight Watchers works!  I joined WW in June and after a bit of a slow start, I have lost 25 pounds to date, including today’s weigh-in.  This is huge for me, as I am in a constant battle with my sluggish metabolism (thanks to a severely underactive thyroid) and my hormones.  It hasn’t been easy, but hasn’t been as difficult as I thought it would be, either.  Does that make sense?  I hope to continue this downward trend in 2012.

I also met some fantastic new friends in 2011 (hi Katie, Monica, Melissa and Christina!), and I hope our friendship can grow in 2012.  More Girls Night’s Outs and the Adam Ant concert in February will definitely rock.

So, lift your glass and toast to the new year, with all its possibilities.  Cheers!

Photo illustration by jscreationzs

I was surprised at how easy it was – I made the marinade last night and let it sit all night and all day today. I think the chicken was marinading about 18 hours by the time I got around to cooking it this evening! I didn’t eat it as a sandwich – instead I sliced the cooked chicken breast and served it over a bed of brown and wild rice (Bird’s Eye Steamfresh Brown and Wild Rice with Broccoli and Carrots), but I will definitely make it as a sandwich next time – this would make a good lunch!! Here’s the recipe (the recipe as it appears in the newspaper is in italics; my notes are not. The photos are mine) -

CHICKEN SHAWARMA (from the Detroit Free Press, August 25, 2011 edition)

Serves: 8 / Preparation time: 10 minutes (plus marinating time) /Total time: 35 minutes

MARINADE

• 1/4 cup lemon juice
• 1/4 cup canola oil
• 1/2 to 1 teaspoon ground oregano or thyme
• 1 teaspoon smoked paprika
• 1 teaspoon cumin
• 4 tablespoons plain yogurt
• 3 tablespoons white vinegar
• 4 crushed garlic cloves
• 1 teaspoon salt

CHICKEN

• 2 pounds of thin boneless, skinless chicken breast

FOR SERVING

• Pita bread
• Tahini sauce or garlic sauce
• Cucumber slices
• Sliced tomatoes

Preheat the grill to medium. Remove chicken from marinade and discard marinade. Grill the chicken pieces until cooked through, about 12 minutes, depending on thickness. You also can use a grill pan, tabletop grill or panini press to cook the chicken. Once cooked, remove the chicken (leave the grill on) and shred the chicken.

My chicken after it was cooked and sliced – it was so moist and juicy and smelled divine:

To assemble shawarma sandwich, spread the tahini or garlic sauce on a pita bread, add the shredded chicken, cucumber slices and sliced tomatoes. Roll up the sandwich and grill again slightly just to warm the pita.

As I mentioned above, I did not make the chicken into a sandwich, but rather served it with rice. Doesn’t it look delicious? By the way, preparing it the way I did – without pita – makes it gluten-free! So if you’re following a GF diet, go ahead and indulge!

Cook’s note: To make the tahini sauce, combine 5 tablespoons tahini (sesame seed paste), 1/2 teaspoon salt, 1/2 cup water, 2 garlic cloves pressed through a garlic press and 5 tablespoons lemon juice. To make the garlic sauce, purée 1 peeled bulb of garlic and 1 teaspoon salt in a food processor. Slowly add olive oil 1 tablespoon at time until the mixture becomes white and very creamy. This may take several minutes. Add 1 teaspoon lemon juice and 2 tablespoons plain yogurt. Taste and adjust seasonings as necessary.

Adapated from several recipes. Tested by Susan M. Selasky for the Free Press Test Kitchen. Analysis with Tahini sauce. 489calories (28% from fat), 15 grams fat (3 grams sat. fat), 42 gramscarbohydrates, 46 grams protein, 623 mg sodium, 104 mgcholesterol, 3 grams fiber.

Tabbouleh

Ingredients:

1 cup bulgur wheat

1 1/2 cups boiling water

2 medium tomatoes, seeded and diced (about 2 cups)

1 large cucumber, seeded and diced (about 2 cups)

1/2 cup diced red onion

2 cups finely chopped parsley leaves

1/3 cup finely chopped mint leaves

3 tablespoons olive oil

1/2 cup lemon juice

1 teaspoon grated lemon zest

1 teaspoon ground cumin

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Here are my ingredients before I began:

The first thing I did is cook the couscous.  This is about 2/3 of a cup of uncooked couscous:

According to the package, you bring water, salt and a bit of olive oil or butter to just a boil, then put the dry couscous in and let it sit for five minutes, then stir.  This is what it looks like when it’s done:

According to Ellie Krieger’s recipe, place the bulgur in a large, heat-proof bowl.  Pour boiling water over it, stir and cover lightly with plastic wrap.  Let sit for about 15 minutes, until the water is absorbed and the bulgur is tender.  Drain any excess water from the bulgur.

On to my other ingredients – chopped parsley:

Chopped mint:

Chopped, seeded and diced cucumber:

Chopped, seeded and diced tomato:

Sliced green onions:

Stir the bulgur (couscous) in with the tomatoes, cucumber, onion parsley and mint.  In a small bowl, whisk the olive oil, lemon juice, zest, cumin, salt and pepper:

Pour the dressing over the bulgur (couscous) mixture and toss to combine:

Cover and refrigerate for at least one hour.  Serve chilled.  Makes six 1 1/4 cup servings.

Doesn’t it look yummy?  It’s in the refrigerator chilling now, and as it is past midnight I won’t be having any tonight.  But I did take a taste and it is very good!!  There are only 175 calories per serving so it’s not a diet buster ( 8 grams fat, 4 grams protein, 25 grams carbs, and 6 grams fiber).  Serve alongside a grilled chicken breast, and you’ve got a great, healthy meal!  That’s probably what I’m going to do tomorrow.

Hearing strange noises coming from my car always makes me nervous.  My car is nearly 12 years old and has almost 140,000 miles on it.  She’s getting old, and I know that sooner or later I am going to have to get a new one.  I’m hoping it’s later because at this point I really can’t afford a new car.  Or even a used car.  Sucks.

My car history is brief – we tend to drive our cars until they die.  Because of that, I’m in my 40′s and am only on my third car:

Not the actual LeSabre, although this is pretty much what it looked like, but with a red roof.

Buick Le Sabre – My first car, a hand-me-down from my mom.  I got it in 1987, and it had about 36,000 miles on it.  It was a 1977 Custom model that we bought brand new, tomato red inside and out, with a tomato red vinyl roof (hey, it was the 1970′s!) and tomato red crushed velvet seats.  It was a boat.  So huge.  So much so, in fact, my dad thought it could pull our 23-foot travel trailer, which we got in 1977.  On straight roads it was okay, but going to northern Michigan and trying to get up the hilly areas near Boyne Mountain? Not so much.  So my dad bought a Suburban.

This is what my Beretta looked like, but darker blue.

Chevrolet Beretta – In 1991 I traded in the old LeSabre for a Chevrolet Beretta, a blue metallic sporty coupe.  It was brand new, and it was all mine.  The first car that I picked out and paid for on my own.  I loved it.  It was so cool.  It felt like a sports car, and sometimes I’d pretend it was a Porsche.  It was the car my friend Lori and I took on our Great Canadian Adventure of 1997.  Unfortunately it got totaled in an accident – I’d had it for 9 years and it only had 77,000 miles.  Yes, I was sad.

My car, but not my car - this is a dealer pic I found online.

Dodge Stratus - Only the second car I’ve owned outright.  Growing up I had a friend whose father worked for one of the Big 3 and it seemed every year they were getting a new car.  My folks had the same cars the whole time I was in high school…AND college!

My Dodge Stratus was a fleet car, and just under a year old when I got it, with 17,000 miles.  It felt like a luxury car (and still does!), because it had leather seats.  I discovered I really like leather seats. It’s kind of like my mom’s 1999 Chevrolet Malibu in that the design of the car is nothing to write home about, but it’s a nice, solid, good car.  I have been very fortunate with it, in that I haven’t had any major repairs in the 10 years that I’ve owned it, except for a complete overhaul of my air conditioning (knock on wood) so I’m hoping I can squeeze out another year or two out of Ol’ Betsy.  It still feels like a luxury car and looks great inside, but is starting to rust on the outside and some asshat keyed the whole length of my passenger side, so it’s got a long horizontal scratch from just behind the headlight all the way past the rear door.  She’s got some nicks and dents, and may not be the prettiest or newest car around anymore, but still drives great, and that’s all that matters.  To me, anyway.

Yesterday on my way to work I was at a stoplight behind a white car.  The woman driver stuck her head out the window and hocked a loogie, right on to the road.  It’s disgusting when guys spit, but even worse when a woman does it.  So gross.

Photo by Graur Codrin

Every once in a while as I’m driving home from work, I notice a woman in an older green Chevrolet Malibu behind me.  Why do I notice her?  Because she’s yelling at me and gesturing to me wildly to get out of her way!!  Of course I can’t hear her, but I can see in my rearview mirror that she’s screaming and really peeved at me.  However, it’s not like I’m doing 55 in the fast lane – I’m only going as fast as the person in front of me will let me.  Sometimes it’s the speed limit of 70, sometimes it’s less (sometimes it’s just a smidge more…lol).  But hey, it’s rush hour on eastbound I-696!!  Eventually Ms. Green Malibu passes me, but not before showing me her middle finger as she does.  The funny thing is, I know what exit she takes to get off the freeway – Woodward Ave. – because we usually end up there at the same time.

Image by Luigi Diamanti

For the life of me, I cannot figure out how I made it to my age without getting married.  Or having an actual serious relationship.  You know what I’m talking about – where you look at the guy (or girl) and think hey, s/he could be the one?  Someone who makes you all tingly inside.  I’ve never been tingly.  And it makes me sad.

My senior photo, 1983

My friend Lauri, whom I have known since kindergarten, informed me that yesterday was 28 years since we graduated from high school.  A few memories from that day:  I was listening to Duran Duran‘s “Is There Something I Should Know” as I got ready – it had just come out!  I recall that I wore this lilac dress with white lace trim and white high heels, which was a bad idea since the commencement was held on the school’s football field.  I also recall our choir director wouldn’t let us sing our class song, “Changes” by David Bowie, because he objected to Bowie’s lifestyle.  I think we sang Chicago’s “Old Days” instead.  A few friends and I went to another friend’s house to have an ”anti-prom” instead of going to the senior all-night party.  And oh yeah, my parents forgot the camera, so I have no photos of my graduation.

Keurig Mini Plus

I LOVE my Keurig single-cup coffeemaker!!!  LOVE IT!  I love flavored coffee, but no one else in the house does, so it’s perfect for me and because you’re only making one cup at a time, there’s no waste.  Bonus – it also makes tea!  Tea is my first love so I am very picky with my teas, and let me tell you, the Keurig gets it right.  I buy their Twinings English Breakfast Tea K-Cups (what they call their coffee/tea pods), and in two minutes I have a perfectly brewed cup of tea that tastes like it came from loose tea leaves.  To make iced tea I just pour it over ice.  Yummy and refreshing!!

Schwinn Lakeshore Cruiser

I want a bicycle.  But not just any bicycle – I want one of those retro-style beach cruiser-types.  In fact, the exact bike I want is the 7-speed Schwinn Lakeshore Comfort Cruiser, which I’ve seen in purple and white at our local Meijer store for $169.99.  I actually have two bikes but neither one is really rideable anymore – an old blue 3-speed that’s easily 35 years old and a red 10-speed I got for my 14^th birthday.  My dad sometimes rides the blue one around the block a couple of times – flat tires, tattered seat and all, but the red one has the type of handlebars that force you to hunch over to ride, and because I have a bad back, that is not good for me.  The Lakeshore lets you sit in a more upright position, which is better.

Image by Getideaka

I recently started taking vitamins and supplements again.  I used to take a multivitamin rather religiously but for whatever reason I stopped.  So now in addition to my thyroid meds (two pills because they don’t make a single pill in the high dose I need), I now take a multivitamin,  two calcium tablets, a high-potency vitamin D + probiotic, a vitamin C, a vitamin B12 and two fish oil capsules.  That’s a lot of pills!  But they’re all good for me, so I don’t mind.

I think that’s it for this week’s ramblings.  Time to go figure out what to make for tomorrow’s lunch.

Well, I’m still here.  And so are all of you.

Regardless of when it was supposed to happen – 12 noon, 6 PM or 9 PM, all of them have come and gone and no Rapture happened. In fact, it is now May 22^nd, so the entire day has gone with no Christians flying up to Heaven.

For those who don’t know what I am talking about, California-based preacher Harold Camping predicted, based on a convoluted Biblical mathematical code he supposedly cracked, that today would be the start of the end of the world. Known as the Rapture, all the good Christians were supposed to be lifted up into Heaven, while the nonbelievers and ungodly are left behind to suffer through a period of tribulation, until the earth and everyone who is still remaining is destroyed.  Despite a volcanic eruption followed by earthquakes in Iceland on Saturday and an earthquake in an island chain near New Zealand, nothing happened.  May 21^st has come and gone without so much as a trumpet.

Now, I know about the Rapture.  I’ve read the Book of Revelation. I’ve read the Left Behind novels.  I go to church.  And while I believe Jesus will return to the earth someday, one thing that the Bible tells us is that no one – not even Jesus himself –knows when that day will be. The only one who knows is God, and apparently he’s not telling.

But Harold Camping’s arrogance – yes, arrogance – got the best of him and he became convinced that he knew, without a doubt, that the world would end today.  He was so certain of it that he wouldn’t even entertain a thought of what might happen if he was wrong.  I watched a television interview with him Friday where the interviewer asked  him exactly that – what’s going to happen if the end doesn’t come? – and his response was an emphatic “It is going to happen.”  When pressed further, Camping responded again, with more conviction, “It is GOING TO HAPPEN.”  But, as a man of God, he should know that in Matthew 24:36 in the Bible, Jesus says no one knows the date.  How can Camping – or any other doomsday prognosticator – be so arrogant as to claim he (or she) knows something that no one, including Jesus, knows?

So Camping – and not unexpectedly, Christians in general – becomes fodder for jokes and humor.  And there was some pretty funny stuff on the internet today.  I was following @RaptureHelpDesk on Twitter (“You should see @Jesus right now… he has been messing with his hair for the past hour…#SoNervousAboutMakingASecondFirstImpression”) and checking out various photo pages with pictures of clothes laid out as if their wearers just disappeared out of them.  But I do feel kind of feel sorry for Camping.  This is the second Rapture date he got wrong and you have to wonder about the mental state of someone who was so absolutely, 100% certain of something, only to see it not come to pass.

The fact is, people have been trying to predict the End of Days since, well probably since time began, and as a result May 21, 2011 becomes just another in a long line history of failed apocalyptic predictions, and we put it behind us and get on with our lives. Until December 21, 2012, anyway.

Photo by Suat Eman

What is it they say about best laid plans?  Well, I had every intention of getting this blog going, but I got sick and the last thing I wanted to do is sit in front of a computer at night and write.  I just wanted to be a slug on the sofa…well, when I wasn’t running to the bathroom, that is.

About two months ago I figured out I am lactose intolerant.  Not a big deal, really, and actually quite a relief – I had been getting really ill after dinner nearly every night for the last  several years and couldn’t figure out why.  It would start about an hour or so after dinner and last for a few hours, but sometimes it would continue all night, even after I went to bed.  I thought I had IBS and it was just something I was going to have to live with.  One evening, during one of my “episodes”, as I came to call them, I was googling my symptoms hoping to find…well, I don’t really know what I expected to find, since I had googled my symptoms many times before, which is what led to my self-diagnosis of IBS.  One of the web page summaries caught my eye because the symptoms were exactly what I was experiencing - especially the rolling and gurgling feeling in my abdomen.  It was the summary for a site about lactose intolerance.  I had never thought about it before, but then it was like a lightbulb went off in my head -  the one thing I have nearly every day at dinner is a big glass of milk! 

The next day I bought lactose-free milk and lactase tablets to take when I eat anything with dairy, and it was like a miracle.  For the first time in years I wasn’t sick all evening long!   It’s amazing that with all the time I spent trying to figure out what food I might be eating that would be causing such gastric distress, it ends up being something I have been drinking just about 95% of the days I’ve been on this planet.

Everything was going along swimmingly until a month later, when I got sick again.  This time I knew it wasn’t because of milk because I was faithfully taking the lactase tablets and drinking the lactose-free milk.  It actually felt like a stomach flu coming on. so I took the day off work and waited to get knocked off my feet, but it never happened.  But the stomach issues continuted and eventually got so bad I was spending most of my time in the bathroom.  It was really disruptive at work and I became nervous when I had to be in a car for any length of time, like, say, my daily 30-mile (one way) commute to and from work!  So off to the doctor I go – she said it might be a virus or food poisoning (!) and ran a bunch of tests, which ended up showing…nothing.  Zip.  Zero.  Nada.  Everything came back negative!  According to the tests, there was essentially nothing wrong with me.   My doctor couldn’t explain why nothing showed up on the tests, but didn’t think there was any reason for more invasive tests at that point.  She said if it doesn’t go away in a few weeks to come back for more testing.

Last week I finally began seeing a light at the end of the tunnel.  I’m still not 100%, but I am much, much better than I was.

I still have the topics in mind that I did before I got sick, and I’ll be writing on them over the next few weeks.  I promise.  Really.

Photo by Jeroen van Oostrom

David Bowie's 1971 album, "Hunky Dory", the one with the song, "Changes"

Just a quick update post – I’m making a few changes here, starting with a new background – kinda nice, eh?  I may also mess around with the subtitle of my blog.  I changed it slightly but I’m still not sure if I’m going to keep it like it is.

Anyway, I started this blog with the idea of it being a PR/Social Media blog but, honestly, I kind of got bored with it pretty quickly.  So I’ve decided to open it up to any and all subjects.  You may see posts on everything from sports to product reviews, politics to fashion, book reviews to beading, music to religion, and almost anything in between. I’ll write some pretty personal stuff, too.  In fact, I have a couple in the planning stages now, and even though they’re personal, they’re on subjects to which we can all relate.  And of course, there will be posts on PR and social media. 

A new post should be up this weekend.  Meanwhile, feedback on the new look is appreciated.  Yes, I know it’s a freebie WordPress theme, but I kind of like it.  It’s called Elegant Grunge.  Kind of like me.  LOL

Last year there was a story in the news about a woman who called in sick to work one day so she and her friend could spend the day at the beach.  Her friend took photos and posted them to the woman’s MySpace page; the woman’s boss saw them and she got fired.

Frankly, when I read some of my job-hunting friends’ tweets and status updates I want to cringe – they’re too personal, too graphic, or too blue (as in language).  Job seekers need to be aware that potential employers can – and do – look at social media sites when investigating employment candidates.  Recently a study showed that 45% of employers checked out prospective employee’s social networking pages.  Remember, unless your Facebook profile is private and your Twitter updates are locked (and sometimes even if they are), the world can see your updates, and on Twitter, anyone who knows your user name can see your tweets.

To help my friends and readers avoid such pitfalls, here are some tips for job hunting via social media.  They’re really more common sense than anything else – as (mostly) grown-up type people, we should know these things already.  But sometimes a refresher course is necessary.  Now, keep in mind these tips are just my opinions based on observation – I am not an expert, nor do I play one on the internet.  On to the list:

1. Don’t post “oh, woe is me” or “my life sucks” status updates.  It’s okay if you’re having a bad day to say “I’m having a bad day” or something like that, but leave it at that – don’t go into details, and keep such posts to a minimum.  Nothing is a bigger turn off to an employer than a depressed prospective employee.  Try to keep things positive, or if you can’t, find an interesting link and post it.
2. Watch your mouth!  No, I’m not your mom, and I have been known to use a four-letter word or two on occasion, but try to keep them to a minimum on social media sites, especially if you like dropping “f-bombs.”  If your status updates and posts would get bleeped out on TV, choose different words.
3. Think before you post photos.  The photo your buddy took of you mooning out of the car window is hilarious and the one commemorating the time you drank large quantities of beer out of a beer bong may be impressive, but it might hurt you in your job search.  I recently read if you wouldn’t want your Grandma to see the photo, don’t post it.  Good advice.
4. Try not to get too personal.  Chances are you have followed or friended people who are in your profession.  They don’t really need to know that you threw your boyfriend out last night after a four-hour knock-down, drag-out fight or that you just had the best sex of your life.  With Twitter, you can create different accounts for personal and professional use (apparently many people have several Twitter accounts for different reasons, just like email accounts.  Who knew?).  Facebook is a little tougher because usually your real name is on your account, but there is a setting to create a limited profile, so if you post a lot of personal stuff, you might want to consider that for professional contacts.  Remember, every professional contact you have is a potential future boss or colleague.
5. Look for relevant news stories or blog posts, and post links.  My friend Jamie is really good at this – she scours the internet and finds links to articles, almost too many – she once posted so many links that Facebook locked her account!  The idea is to get people interested in checking out your page to see what you’ve found.  This will show future employers that not only do you know how to do research, you’re up on current events and know what’s going on in your field.
6. Start a blog.  Okay, I admit I’m a little behind the eight-ball on this one myself, but it ties into #5.  Blogging will show people that you are interested in things going on in the world around you and that you can put coherent thoughts together.  It also shows that you can write, which in my opinion, is becoming a lost art.  Employers value an employee who can write well.
7. Lern too spel yer werds korectly.  No, you have not just wandered on to the LOLcats site, I just deliberately misspelled a few words to make a point.  If you are not good at spelling and you’re not sure of a word, look it up.   This doesn’t really apply to Twitter, where you are limited to 140 characters – oftentimes shorthanded spelling is necessary to fit your thought in the space allowed.  Also, proofreading is your friend!  Re-read what your wrote before hitting “post.”  A friend of mine went for years spelling “convenience” as “conveyance” until I proofed a document for her.  She was mortified – apparently she never knew she was spelling it wrong.

There are more good tips throughout this article from Career Builder, via the Oregon Business News – 45% of Employers use Facebook-Twitter to screen job candidates

Social media and networking sites as job hunting tools are  still a relatively new phenomenon and I’m sure the rules are getting rewritten all the time, probably even as I write this.  But common sense never goes out of style.  Just remember to exercise some when posting online, whether you’re job hunting or not.  If companies are looking at prospective employees social networking pages, who’s to say your current employer isn’t looking, too?  Just something to think about.