Guest Post tag

[Guest Post] Reunited and it Feels So Good

[editor’s note] I am hesitant to post the following essay from good friend Jack Borgo only because I hate to be the second best writer on my own website. I spent the previous weekend in my old stomping grounds, Madison, WI, to watch my football team disembowel the #8 team in the country, and more importantly, to catch up with old friends. Jack was the first person that I met up with. Little did I know he was leveraging my friendship merely to further his writing career. Just kidding. Not really. In all sincerity, Jack, thank you for the kind words. Your enthusiasm for the great outdoors was an inspiration in my undertaking. And, please, keep writing.

Jack Borgo

Jack.

Last weekend I was reunited with one of my closest friends, Zach Davis (aka “Badger” to his trail-mates, “Good Badger” to his readers and “Undeliverable Address” to child-support collectors), at our former education/inebriation grounds at the University of Wisconsin. Though excited for 48 hours of bad beer and worse decisions, I was also pensive.

I knew and loved the pre-trail Zach Davis; a perpetually witty, easy-going Chicago sports fanatic who preferred a coffee-shop and laptop to “wilderness”. This Zach was so ill-equipped for time in the woods that if you asked me to list his Top Skills Essential to Survival in Nature, “an affinity for bandanas” would have been #1. Despite this outdoorsy ineptitude, when Zach told me that he had decided to hike the A.T., I knew his determination and love of exploration meant inevitable success.

However these conversations, coupled with postings on his blog, were also unnerving. For 5+ months Zach would trade his Apple for the Appalachian, baristas for bears. He was embarking on a potentially transformative journey…did the beginning of Badger mean the end of Zach?

Read more →

Goodbye, Me.

So I’m leaving for a six month hike.  Today.

And I squeezed in one last guest post at the buzzer.  EHhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

Jen Friel – a super awesome human, lifecaster, creator of Talk Nerdy to Me Lover, and the one responsible for getting the ball rolling with all of our sponsorship, suggested swapping guest posts prior to my becoming a vagabond.  She’s good at ideas like that.

You can check out mine below:

Goodbye, Me.

5 Ways to Network Without Feeling Dirty

(Good Badger Note: Today’s guest post is written by Justin Kownacki, the self proclaimed “Armchair Sociologist and Perpetual Contrarian”.  I stumbled upon Justin’s blog during one of my innumerable conquests through the Interweb, and have made his site part of my regular rotation ever since.  If you’re a fan of witty insights and sarcastic humor, I strongly encourage you to check it out. [Since you’re here, I’m guessing you prefer mediocrity?]

In the past I’ve hinted toward my disdain with the concept of “networking”.  Since The Good Badger spends most of his time 4,000 yards under a bunker anticipating the impending apocalypse, I went in search of a more qualified candidate to tackle the topic.  Justin was nice enough to comply.  Without further ado, Justin Kownacki now presents you the “5 Ways to Network Without Feeling Dirty.”)

When The Good Badger asked me to write a guest post about building relationships, he mentioned his aversion to the word “networking.” To him, “networking” has a selfish, impersonal connotation.

And I agree. But that’s probably because the people most likely to use the word “networking” in a sentence are the same people who have a webinar or a time-share scheme that they can’t wait to sell you.

At its core, networking is impersonal. It’s a strategic expansion of the people you know well enough to ask for favors. And if that’s not selfish and impersonal, I don’t know what is.

The real problem is that we have our priorities backwards. Read more →