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Internet Airball #1: “I’m Your Content Calendar for Your Online Coaching Business, and I’m Going on Strike”

There are some jobs that I just have a hard time taking serious. That’s not to say I’m right, you understand. For a long time I refused to accept Social Media Manager as a vocation, and now it’s how I pay the bills.

But then there are times that I am right, like when people who sell make-up online (and try to get you to sell make-up online) call themselves “business owners”. They are not. That is not a real job. That is a pyramid scheme. You can call it an MLM, but MLM stands for pyramid scheme. Sorry. I don’t make the rules of how things work.

In addition to being blissfully incorrect about their employment status, they are also still living in 2019. Pyramid schemes are so yesteryear. In 2020, the new thing is being a Life Coach. In a time where we’ve all discovered that nothing is manageable, a select few have decided that your life is and they’re the ones to manage it for you. You know what they say: those who can’t do, teach. Heehee.

The worst part is this “job” is starting to get recognized as an acutal thing. For real. Here’s my proof.

You see! Life Coach. And they’re all over the place. Everyone is an expert on life management now. For $499 a month your life can suck a little less, as claimed by someone whose life you only know from Instagram. It’s maddening because, essentially, you’re just paying for validation for your actions, and you don’t need that – you’re an adult. We became adults so we can eat cereal for breakfast, lunch, and dinner if we want and no one but our low self-esteem can make us feel bad about it.

Obviously, I am not a fan of this term or “job”. And I don’t think I’m alone, which got me thinking: “maybe the content calendars that these people use hate them, too.” Which led me to write this piece from the brain of the content calendar. It’s also my first rejected piece! Enjoy!

I’m Your “Online Coaching Business” Content Calendar, and I’m Going on Strike

Hi, it’s me! The trendy $9.99/month content calendar you had to have to make your “online coaching business” a “success”.

Not today.

Today, I’m making like an Excel Spreadsheet and shutting shit down – I’m going on strike.

I can’t take it anymore. The inspirational quotes that you steal from memes; the lists of happy things and not-happy things; the stories about how you used to be a loser like your followers but now you’re better and for $300 a month they can be too, accompanied by a joker-esque photo of you grinning maniacally.

Every week I’m roped into helping you make people think you can turn them into “rockstars”. How does someone deciding to eat ice cream on a Tuesday make them a “rockstar”? I’m sorry but I don’t recall Bohemian Rhapsody being about Freddy Mercury’s fearless consumption of Ben and Jerry’s.

And the questions. My god, the questions. “Do you have trouble with time management?” “Do you find making decisions to be hard?” “Are you tired of wannabe influencers telling you what you ‘should’ do?”

Yes, I am. So today, you’re “life coaching” on your own.

Life coach. Back in the day, you had to have some sort of education and/or training to be able to tell someone how to run their life. Now all you need is a Brené Brown book, a trust fund, and a content calendar and BAM!, you’re a life coach.

Except for today. Today – UH OH! – your digital memory is experiencing technical difficulties. Best of luck “deciding” what to post because you can’t remember what you told me. Hope you can remember those time management skills you keep bragging about because today, YOU’LL be posting at different times for all 13 of your platforms.

Maybe I’ll work tomorrow. I haven’t decided yet. Or, maybe you should upgrade to the $19.99/month plan that comes with more storage so you never push me to the limit and risk me “crashing” again. I mean, according to Thursday’s post, we could all use a little more bandwidth.

Internet Airballs

For someone who is filled with anxiety and self-doubt and is irrationally self-conscious, I am really making some big things happen… in my head. If you ask my imagination I’m practically a best selling author and everyone wants to work with me. I also just hosted Saturday Night Live with Jake Gyllenhaal. Did I mention the horror screenplay I wrote is currently in production? You may not be hearing from me for a while, I’m needed on set.

These are just some of the things that I daydream about all day. And if you think those things are a reach, wait until you read how I imaginary arrived at these pretend scenarios.

Let’s start with my most recent stunt. In April (approximately 24 years ago in 2020 time), I published what I thought was an incredibly inspirational story: a girl I had to help do math inspired me to never be a teacher and then I encouraged people to follow my lead. It sounds better when you read it.

Anyway, I believed my life-changing career advice story was the one the would get me noticed. In a time when we all need encouragement and stories that make you do things and whatever, I thought this would be it. With this story I decided, fuck it, I’m going to shoot my shot and the person I’m going to shoot my shot with is the writer who inspired me to do so with his tweet “shoot your shot”. That writer is Mr. Shea Serrano.

Based in San Antonio, Shea has an amazing writing career: staff writer for The Ringer and best-selling author, and he never even intended on being a writer. A combination of talent, perseverance, and hard work got him to where he is, so who better to get my work in front of?

I composed my tweet, included a link to my brilliant piece, and off it went. I’d done it. I had put myself out there. In my head, Shea was going to read it, message me to invite me in for a meeting, and then hire me to write jokes for his next book. I’m not making that up, it’s genuinely what I envisioned. And do you know what happened?

Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Not even crickets, I think they were repelled by the stench of failure. I laughed, because this is typically how these scenarios go for me. Every time I think I’m going to encounter a certain outcome, the opposite happens and it’s usually not in my favor.

I’ve dealt with rejection my entire life, like the time I got yelled at by Greg, the receptionist at Jive Records, because I didn’t understand how the music business worked or the time my crush deleted his entire internet presence so he wouldn’t have to respond to my MySpace message. A lot of my rejections have been for things I didn’t even want. And every single one of them have led me here, to my happy place, where I tell you about my multiple, multiple failures.

Every rejection is another chance to get better. It’s another chance to work towards what you really want. So if you’re riding the rejection train right now, keep going. And if you need some encouragement, tomorrow I’ll be sharing my most recent piece that has been rejected by both McSweeney’s and Humor Darling. Not only am I sharing this rejection but I’m sharing what got me rejected. I hope you like it!

If you don’t, I’m OK with that too. You wouldn’t be the first. Not only will it not hurt my feelings but I’ll just keep on writing more pieces until you and McSweeney’s and Humor Darling DO like them. And THAT, my friends, is how you achieve goals. Fail on!

60-Year-Old Kids Do The Darndest Things

Here’s one for you.

So my husband decided to invite my FIL (you’ve been reading long enough to know that FIL stands for Father-In-Law, right? Cool) to dinner. Fine.

He comes over and is all nice and has been being all nice lately and you want to know why? It’s because he’s in a fight with JDF (girlfriend’s initials that I kindly gave her).

So we’re sitting down to dinner and then he and my husband start talking politics which I HATE because nobody knows what they’re talking about. NO ONE. Not even politicians. Nobody knows anything. BTW, that will be my campaign slogan when I run for president in 2032.

I digress. I want to shut the conversation down so I look at my FIL and say “hey, so I hear you and JDF are in a fight.” The story I had heard was that she was pissed because he didn’t want to do yard work and wanted to watch TV instead. Cry me a river, JDF. He literally threatened to move because we asked him to help mow the lawn.

Anyway, it turns out that no, that was not why.

Apparently, a friend of his sent him a video with the caption “I got tested for COVID 19 times” (because people are sooooooo clever) and it was a video of a nurse stripping. Because I’m old, I immediately think “uh, that was probably spam and now your phone is fucked, wake up.”

Then he continued with the story.

He decided that a good time to watch this video was at his girlfriend’s house while she was out of town. Well, as he describes, “at the exact moment that the nurse was slapping her ass against the camera” JDF’s twenty-something year old daughter walks in and catches him watching it and, understandably, freaks out.

Fortunately for my FIL, she didn’t call the cops. Unfortunately for my FIL, she called her mom – his girlfriend.

JDF promptly called him and reprimanded him for watching porn in her house. And you want to know what his defense was?

He told her, “was I naked and jacking off?! No! Because it wasn’t porn!”

It made me think of the time I was a freshman in high school and I got in trouble for being on the phone past 10pm and my defense was: “at least I’m not on drugs like my friends!”

Anyway, he ended the story by saying “I’m not apologizing. I always apologize and this time I’m not.” You know, what any teen says when they’re pissed at a parent.

The moral of the story is if you made your parents miserable when you were a kid (like me), you’ll have and/or inherit someone (like my FIL) who will repay the favor.

So if you’re an asshole, fucking stop it. Typical Jenn 2032.

Dress For Whatever Job

If I had to use a story to adequately depict my life, it would be the one about the time I was in high school and had a huge crush on a guy named Albert who was super popular and a star varsity basketball player but had to settle for his twin brother who was the chubbier version of him and played JV basketball. Or, the time I wanted Rainbow Brite for Christmas but got Murky and Lurky (the villains – typical) instead. Things are always a bit B-team for me.

Take my job. After deciding that I needed a job that would help me pay the bills while I write, I landed a marketing/admin position with a company that basically serves as the Ask Jeeves of the Medicaid world: instead of Googling how to get Medicaid we do it for them.

Yet, I take it seriously. Or at least I dress like I do. However, on Thursday I learned that’s not what gets you ahead at this place.

So I’m sitting at my desk doing actual work for once when my overly-caffeinated chain-smoking boss walks in with a guy he introduces as James – a confusing moment for the guy because he recalled introducing himself to my boss as Chad. His name wasn’t important (to me or my boss, apparently); what I couldn’t help but notice was his appearance.

Chames (mashup because who knows what his real name is) walked in wearing a t-shirt, cargo shorts (the kin with an elastic waistband), a haircut that would make the 90s jealous, and plain white tube socks. If I sound like an asshole I do not care – this guy was in the office for an INTERVIEW.

Chames and my boss walked into the conference room – which is 2 steps away from where I sit – and their meeting commenced at hushed volumes. I was being so judgmental that it never occurred to me that Chames was probably just undercover or that this was probably his schtick.

As I continued to judge his attire and wonder what the hell was so secretive that they had to talk in a high school girl whisper, I officially quit what I was doing and started thinking about the other time I was in a situation similar to this one.

Back in the day, I did marketing for a motorcycle dealership and one of our annual events was a bikini contest. In the event’s sophomore year we made the rookie mistake of hosting it during a national holiday so our entry list was pretty minimal. In an attempt to conjure up some contestants I was sent to the local strip clubs to try and entice strippers to participate.

OK, we held the contest at 7PM. There was no way we were going to get A-team strippers to compete in a bikini contest where the prize was probably a fraction of what they usually make. 2nd string strippers (you know the kind) was our best case scenario.

Regardless, I went strip club to strip club speaking to club managers and building my immunities by posting flyers in the stripper’s dressing rooms. While waiting for the manager at my last stop, a girl walked in wearing sweats, her orange/blonde with black roots hair up in a messy pony tail, and no make-up.

At first I thought, “oh shit, she’s looking for a stripper and it’s about to go down.”

Then she opened her mouth.

“How do you become a stripper?”, she asked with a twinkle in her blood shot eyes.

There’s no fucking way she’s serious, my expression said. This is just a cover. She’s trying to find an in and then she’s going to beat up the stripper that her boyfriend used their beer money on.

No. She was 100% (as the kids say) serious. The hostess was a true professional; she was even dressed like a strip club hostess (or dressed for success the way I saw it) and politely explained that the girl needed to come in looking presentable and ready to audition for the club owner.

“You handled that very well,” I said to the hostess, to which she replied “that happens all day long.”

That day I thought 2 things. 1) I did not realize there were that many aspiring strippers out there and, 2) “dress for the job you want, not the one you have” is very good advice.

Or at least it was in 2010 when this happened. In 2020, nothing means anything anymore, and I have proof.

The day after my boss’s top secret meeting, he let me go. And you know who’s replacing me?

Ol’ tube socks. Chames is a salesman (clearly) and my boss needed to free up money to hire him.

The moral of the story is this: like the girl inquiring about stripping (who I gave a bikini flyer to BTW because I was desperate), we’re all just trying to figure things out. My ex-boss (who pulled a ‘me’ because he is also desperate) is trying to figure out how to keep his company afloat, and I’m trying to figure out who used my credit card to try and buy a hooker on OurTime.com and bullshit on Vista Print a couple of days after I used my card to pay for my MacBook on my work computer.

Yeah. My ex-boss fancies himself an IT pro so I found it interesting and not the least bit coincidental that a couple of days after I used the work computer for my purchase, my card got hacked. Could it have been him? I don’t know but I’m in the process of figuring it out.

Yup, in 2020 we’re all just figuring it out. Update coming soon.