I picked up a book, What Should I Do With My Life? by Po Bronson,
the other day at a Salvation Army for eighty cents. I thought it was a good price for some casual reading. As you may know, I’m in a bit of a transitional stage in my “career, and I find a guilty pleasure in picking apart the ideological work that goes on self-help book. Perhaps an eighty-cent book might help me help myself, at any rate.

What Should I Do With My Life? is not a self-help book, although I suspect its audience – real or imagined – is largely the same. I might call it inspirational literature. It consists of short vignettes that describe folks who have found careers through paths both tortuous and torturous. It reads a little bit like lefty portraits by the likes of Barbara Ehrenreich except each of the subjects find a job they can tolerate that pays the bills.

I doubt that Bronson intended the book as a conservative response to Mother Jones or The Texas Observer, but halfway through, the theme of the book seems rather conservative. Bronson notes that he chose the somewhat deterministic title question intentionally – it suggests individuals have a particular role in society or family to perform. Unlike many career guides which encourage readers to open their minds to a broad swath possibilities, its case studies relate how others have leveraged existing interests or experience to move on to a new career stage. While this provides a nice antidote to the cheeriness blue-sky career books, it presents something of a grim vision for a reader who has regretted some past career choices. The message of the book so far seems to be “stay where you are and be content until the next opportunity comes along. You are where you are because you’re supposed to be there.”

The book’s portraits certainly acknowledge particular careers can be bad fits for particular people, but I think its emphasis on circumstance, rather than self-discovery comes off as a bit too preachy and perhaps a call to mediocrity.

It looks like there are two movie related rummage sales* in Austin this Saturday. I’m not sure if there are bargains or even useful items to be found at these sales, but it’s an interesting coincidence nonetheless.

Up on 51st Street, Austin Studios is having what appears to be a periodic clean-out sale, where shoppers can dig through leftovers from pictures shot there. It looks like the studios is selling furniture and props, which may not be cheap. The blurb says, “These items have been featured in movies such as “Spy Kids”, “Secondhand Lions”, “The Faculty”, “Varsity Blues”, “Beerfest”, “Friday Night Lights”, “Grindhouse”, “Man of the House”, “Perfect Game”, “Sin City”, “Texas Chainsaw Massacre”, “The Hitcher”, “There Will Be Blood”, “Tree of Life”, and Others.”

Down on campus, it looks like an MFA student is scrapping a bunch of stuff from a recently completed movie. If you’ve ever wondered what was inside the ominous Big Black Box on The Drag, here’s your chance to check out the RTF and Journalism studios where I taught for several years. The lockers may be very useful to someone, but, otherwise, I suspect most of the stuff will only be useful to other artists, or, in this day and age, scrap metal vultures.

*I thought I would call these rummage sales both because I’m finding it increasingly charming and neither of these seem to be actually taking place near a garage.

One of the joys of hitting the garage sales is that it gives me the opportunity to try out items with minimal investment. For example, a few months ago I was interested in getting a rice cooker. I shopped around a bit, and I worried that the twenty-dollar special at Target might simply be a piece of junk. While I was still pondering this purchase, I spotted a rice cooker at a garage sale that was new, still in its box. I asked one of the newly minted graduates how much she was asking, and she told me, “Uhhh, five bucks,” and then added that her mom had bought it for her, but she had never used it. Good fortune had befallen me, and I gleefully snapped up the secondhand appliance. It works like a charm, and spending five dollars, rather than twenty or more, it was easy to try out a new gadget.

Today I spotted a Camelbak hydration pack at a garage sale, priced at five dollars. Five dollars seems like the perfect price point for taking a chance on a potentially useful item. I’ve eyed them at sporting-goods stores, but thought the price point was too high for something that might not be terribly useful. The low-end ones like this one start at about twenty dollars and approach a hundred dollars. I inspected the bladder, and it didn’t seem too gnarly. I reminded myself that a regular bike bottle costs about five dollars at the bicycle store and that the bladders can be replaced, so I decided to take the plunge. I’ll have to see if it’s something I’ll use, but at least I didn’t spend too much money.

I’ve spent a decade writing and editing professionally or grading papers as a grad student, so misspellings and typos quickly pop out at me. This means I should probably stay away from Craigslist entirely, but I torture myself reading about some semiliterate’s “Garage Sell” in Cedar Park.

One piece of terminology that sticks out to me on Craigslist is “ventage,” which is often found in the bike ads. I’m sure my initial interpretation was that of most readers: the poster did not know how to spell “vintage.” Seeing “vintage” misspelled is often quite amusing because the word “vintage” suggests a certain amount of cultural capital, knowing enough about bikes to know whether a frame is quality or collectable, while misspelling denotes a lack of cultural capital.

Despite this, I’m starting to think “ventage” is a specific term of art on Craigslist. While “vintage” implies a bike is older, but of quality construction and perhaps collectible or at least stylish, “ventage” means “old, crappy, and overpriced.” I think a quick search of “Ventage” bikes will demonstrate this easily.

One of the hobbies I’ve developed over the past year is cruising garage sales and swooping up others’ failed purchases. It’s getting a little out of hand, but I think I’ll document my scores here. Here are some highlights from this Saturday’s haul.

• Sony SDM-HS53 Flat-panel monitor: $15. I’ve wanted a second monitor to watch DVDs or internet video while using the computer for a while now, but even a used monitor for $159 at a resale shop seemed like too much of a luxury. Having a second screen for $15 seems entirely reasonable, though. It’s only 1024×768 and the color quality isn’t the best, but the enclosure looks slick, and, hey, it was fifteen bucks.
• Alexander Von Schlippenback: The Living Music: $1: I grabbed this CD purely because it’s on the Chicago label Atavistic which specializes in reissues of classic avant-garde music and contemporary experimental noise rock. I have a hard time spending full-price on Jazz and modernist music because I’m so rarely in the mood to listen to it, but finding LPs and CDs second-hand is almost always rewarding. This is a good listen, with lots of woodwinds in a variety of registers.
• The Flaming Lips: At War With the Mystics: $1: I went to college outside Oklahoma City, so I have a pretty substantial appreciation and sentimental attachment to The Flaming Lips. I’m glad that I only paid $1 to hear this CD.
• Steel Cheese Grater: $1: I’m not happy with my old cheese grater, but I mostly bought this because I enjoyed talking to the young woman who was moving to England for a post-doc in astronomy.
• Bodum French Press: $1: I misplaced my old French press when I moved last August. I didn’t use it much, but I’ve felt some consternation when I’ve wanted to make some yerba mate. Last week, when I wanted to make some, I told myself, “You’ll find a French press at a garage sale soon enough.” I had no idea one would turn up so soon, but this was certainly serendipitous. This one isn’t as nice as the old one – the plastic base has some dishwasher heat damage, but, hey, it was only a buck.

I also got a folding chair for reading by the pool and a stack of books. All in all, it was a good haul.