It takes guts. It takes heart. It takes hard work. It takes a blog that knocks the socks (if any) or tiny ankle hairs (if any) right off the reader. It takes the ability to discard relics of meatspace like financial ambition. And it takes, apparently, a job application that looks like this (illustrations added for blog-illustrative purposes only; do not take internally or mix with other liquids):

Greetings to the illustrious Manolo, whose growing empire rivals those of the Ottomans and Romanovs, except better-dressed and without the bloody revolution part.

To say that I was excited by the blog job opening at Teeny Manolo would be to understate the case to a near-criminal degree. I am a longtime acolyte of the Manolo (and grateful recipient of the Manolo‘s linkie luv) as well as a highly experienced blogger, blogging instructor and consultant, and former nanny and retailer of clothes for teenies. During my time in the totwear trade, I was sometimes delighted by clever, practical, and attractive clothes, but more often (it must be confessed) I was appalled and shocked into bitter sarcasm by the vast tide of bogswill being passed off as proper clothing for youngsters, boys in particular.

What did little boys ever do to get stuck with SAILOR SUITS for Tinky Winky‘s sake? And cheap, shiny nylon sailor suits with scratchy seams that make the baby Jesus cry, or would, if he had to wear those instead of the lovely robes that Mary picked out for him on that trip to Jerusalem.

Please accept this application for the position of Teeny Manolo Blogger. Currently I have three active blogs: raincoaster, for my bitter ravings; running through rainthe Shebeen Club for students of my courses on blogging for personal growth; and , for my literary group (who would love to host the Manolo for an evening, should he pass through Vancouver). I average between four and twelve posts a day, and yes, I can modulate the snark at will.

I hope to hear from you soon: if you need an old-skool resume, just let me know. You can also check out my profile on LinkedIn.

Now, this application got me the job. That is all ye know, all ye need to know. But I’m going to take it around to a few of the job hunting agencies anyway and see what they have to say about it, A) because it will be payback for a lot of fascist, pointless make-work that they put me through for no other reason than that they had to do something with me and didn’t particularly care what it was (see the Operation Orwell tag) and B) it will probably give me something amusing with which to feed the blog. If you think I should feel guilty about wasting their time, I refer you back to A.

So far, the most perceptive comment comes from Mistress Cowfish, herself rather senior in the bureaucracy, who takes great delight in recognizing we are very, very 21st Century lately, in that a winning job application may now contain the expression “old-skool.“

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