Fumbling Through College

Some of the best date ideas are possible in the winter. I am going to give you five date ideas for this winter. 1. Go Skiing Now I should put an asterisk next to this one. The number one rule in skiing is to not teach your wife/husband/girlfriend/boyfriend/significant other how to ski. Trying to teach them to ski will usually end in tears because they will fall and blame you that you fell. So you have two options here, you can take your significant other on a lesson, or just date someone that already knows how to ski. 2. Go Ice Skating Ice skating could also be heaven or hell. If you don't take it seriously then you will have fun, but if you fall all the time, it will be no fun.  3. Stay inside and Watch Netflix This is a great idea because it takes almost zero effort. All you have to do is make some hot chocolate and maybe a snack, and also have a movie to watch, or an entire TV series. Most likely the best idea on this list. 4. Go See a Show A show is

This week Facebook is releasing a messenger app specifically designed for children. The app was designed to try to limit kids contact with bullies and strangers. This works by connecting each kid account to their parent's account. After this, if the child wants to talk to someone, the parent must approve of the connection. Artifical intelligence will scan conversations and let parents know o any harmful activity. I think this is a great app for children. I remember it took months of prodding my parents to let me get a Facebook account. If this existed when I was a kid I know my parents would have been way less stressed about who I'm talking to and what I'm talking about. What do you think about the new app?

Winter break has the possibility of being the best time of the year. You do not have to worry about school, and you get to spend time with friends and family. I am going to share with you some of my favorite things to do during winter break. My favorite thing to do during winter break is to go skiing. I haven't been able to go skiing much in the past couple years mostly because I am afraid to injure myself for the lacrosse season. This year I actually have a trip planned to visit my roommate who lives in Breckenridge, Colorado to go skiing there. I am super excited about this because I've never skied out west. Another fun thing to do is to work out. The winter is a fantastic time to go to the gym for many reasons. Coming out of the gym when it's cold is one of the best feelings in the world because you go from extremely hot to extremely cold, I'm not a meteorologist or anything but I think they cancel each other out and it ends up being about sixty degrees

This past week was Thanksgiving "break". I put break in quotations because I'm pretty sure I was more busy at home than I am here at school. Between Friday and Monday, I spend time with my friends that I haven't seen in a while, and also just hung out with my family. On Tuesday and Wednesday, I worked a combined sixteen hours. On Thanksgiving, we drove out to my cousins and had lunch/dinner with my family. Then Black Friday came. I was pleasantly surprised when I looked down at the register and realized it was already noon and I was halfway done with my shift. There were not too many people that were being rude so that was very nice. My shift was done and I decided to go to the outlet mall with my mom for a couple hours. It felt like freedom when I got off work, but I know it was going to be short-lived because I had to be back at work for another seven-hour shift the next day. And then, just like that, it was already Sunday and I was packing to go back to school. Wha

Many people do not see nonprofit organization as businesses. Actually, business relationships are even more important in nonprofits than in regular businesses. This is because nonprofits run on volunteerism and goodwill. Because relationships are so important, you need to be measuring these relationships. There are many steps involved in measuring these relationships, but I believe the most important is using your mission to define our objectives. A good objective gives you something to reach for and will help keep your organization driven. The goal should be a specific number. An example of a measurable goal would be to increase donations by 15% over the next year. Have you ever worked for a nonprofit before?

If you don't like basketball or politics you may not have heard this one. Last week three UCLA basketball team members were taken into Chinese custody on suspicion of stealing from the Louis Vuitton store.  LiAngelo Ball was among these three. President Trumps said that he intervened and had them released. LiAngelo's Father, Lavar Ball said that the president didn't have much to do with the situation. The president then goes on Twitter to express his thoughts. Now I don't know what you think, but I think every thought you ever have should not be on Twitter, and maybe especially every thought from the president of the United States. I could rant about this for hours, but I won't. What do you think? 

If you have ever worked retail before, you know that there is one day out of the year that you hate more than any other. This day is Black Friday. I am here to tell you that Black Friday does not have to be the worst day of the year. I have a few tips that can get you through the busiest shopping day in the United States. You do not want to watch the clock all day counting down time, you're going to drive yourself crazy. It is much better just to accept the fact that you are going to be working and nothing is going to make time go faster. Stay busy as much as possible. The more downtime you have, the more you are going to be looking at the clock and getting anxious. If you are busy, you won't have time to look at the clock and time will seem to go faster. My last tip is to pack food instead of buying it. You won't have time during your break to sit in the long line to get food, so it is better to bring a meal. Let me know what your favorite Black Friday tips are.

This chapter was all about avoiding a crisis and how to respond if there is a crisis. According to Grunig, Grunig, and Dozier, there are four principles of a crisis period. The Relationship Principle says that an organization can deal with a crisis better if it has a good, long-standing relationship with the public. The Accountability Principle says that the organization should accept responsibility even if they are not at fault. The Disclosure Principle says that, during a crisis, an organization should disclose all known information. The Symmetrical Communication Principle says that during a crisis, an organization should consider the public interest to be as important as their own. In short, an organization should listen to the public and try to take steps to avoid a crisis in the first place.

I'm sure by now everyone has already heard about the new character limit on Twitter. The character limit on Twitter has been changed from 140 to 280. Many people don't really understand why they changed this. People are now able to say more in their tweets. I think that this is a bad move on their part because it kind of takes away from what twitter was made for, which in my opinion is short little tidbits of information that can be viewed quickly. This change isn't that big of a deal, and I would be that no one really cares how many words you can put in a tweet. At the end of the day, Twitter is still fun and easy to read. What do you think about the new character limit?

Finals are quickly approaching us. Before you know it you will be calculating exactly how bad you can do and not drop a letter grade. I will be sharing with you some of my favorite tips on surviving finals week. 1. Live in the library This is not a joke, just spend all your time in the library. You don't have to be studying the entire time, but it will help you get into the mindset that you are there to study.  2. Load up on your favorite form of caffeine When you spend at least eight hours a day in the library, you're going to need to stay awake and focused somehow. The only time I ever drink energy drinks is during finals week. They are absolutely terrible for you, but trading that for a good trade is a trade I'm willing to make. 3. Allocate your time well It is important to study in advance and use your time wisely. Let's say you need a 20% to keep your current grade but a 98% to get the next possible letter grade. The chance of you getting less than

This week the reading is all about interacting with influencers. Influencers are everyday people. As the book states "It can be someone with 10,000 followers on Twitter or 500 friends on Facebook." When you interact with influencers you want to engage in a two-way conversation instead of shoving a message down their throats. You want to quantitative way to measure your relationship with influencers so that you can build a database to push your company in the right direction. First you want to define your goals. These goals should be measurable. Next you want to define your audience. Next you want to define your benchmark. This means looking at other companies to see hoe they are doing. This step will help you greatly in reaching your goals. On the fourth step you want to define your key performance indicators. These should be what measurement you use to figure out how you're doing. For the last step, you should select your measurement tool. This can be as simple as Mi

Vlogs have been around forever. It seems like everybody these days are making vlogs. There is one fantastic vlog that I think should be an example for everyone. His name is  Lucas Cornelis van Scheppingen, better known as Laidback Luke.  Laidback Luke is a DJ and Producer. You may not be very into his music but his vlogs are top notch, and here's why. He has a very good mix of content, from tutorials to interviews, or just what he has going on that week. I really enjoy how he has the same exact intro to every video he makes. He also encourages fans to discuss in the comments and will shout out the top comments every week. He has a great mix of clips of him talking to the camera and also B-roll.  I recommend checking out his videos, he is a very interesting guy with many interests and lots to talk about. Here is a link to one of his good videos. Let me know what you think! 

What is going on here? Did we just skip all the actual fall weather? This week it went from sunny and 70 degrees to cold and gross and today we're dealing with a possible tornado. I should probably understand Ohio weather at this point, but I still don't. I should have probably gone somewhere with more consistent weather for college. I've got an idea, let's just start a new university with the same students and faculty but in Florida or California. Is that possible? What are your thoughts?

This week the book talks about the seven steps to the perfect measurement program. Measurement is important because you need to grow as a business, and to grow as a business you need to figure out what you're doing wrong and figure out what you're doing right. There is one step I see to be the most important when going through this process. The first step is to define goals and objectives. You must create goals because in any part of life, you need to be working toward an objective. This is because if you are working to get to an objective or a certain level, you are more likely to succeed. You will be more driven and care even more.

I'm sure everyone here knows what a geotag is on Snapchat. If you do not, It is a custom sticker for Snapchat that can be accessed when you are in a certain area or in a certain area during a certain time. As of a couple months ago, now you can actually create your own geotag right on Snapchat. Before if you wanted to create a geotag, you had to have the skills to actually create one, and then send it to Snapchat for it to be approved. Now you can actually create a custom tag and then pay for it right there on the app. These custom geotags can be very useful for things such as sports games or weddings, but you'll most likely see them during a sorority event. Have you used a custom geotag?

Alright let's be honest, Halloween is in the top three for best holidays of the year. Only competing with groundhogs day and of course Leif Erikson day. Halloween is one of the best holidays because you can do so many fun activities involving it. Going to the pumpkin patch is probably the best first date idea ever, let me explain why. It is usually cheap, so you can easily pay for your date. The main reason it is the best first date is that you don't even need to think about a second date idea. You just picked out some pumpkins, and obviously, they're gonna need carved! Let me know what you think!

This week we learned all about review websites such as Google and Yelp. There are some great tips on how to use these review sites. One good tip is to not take reviews to heart. People who leave reviews are usually the unhappy customers. The happy customers do not usually leave customers. Another tip that seems to pop up often is to reverse engineer what good companies are doing. I think a huge theme in social media is to figure out what the great companies do and make it your own. Don't copy it but use the skeleton of what other companies do.

This week I made a video of fun things to do in Ada. My favorite thing to do is to watch TV, movies, and play video games. I used an app called Magisto to make the video. I thought the app was easy to use but did not let me customize my video how I wanted to. You can find the link to my video here .

It's around this time in the semester when it feels like you're going to drown in your schoolwork. Your days are filled with homework, projects, presentations, and exams. It can seem like a lot to take on but I have ten study tips that should help you. 10. Start studying a couple days before the exam 9. Schedule your week and figure out when to do what 8. Go to the library to do work 7. Make flashcards 6. Don't bring your phone 5. Listen to some good studying music 4. Work with classmates 3. Ask for help if you don't understand something 2. Give yourself breaks 1. Don't stress too much

I'm sure you all have heard of Pinterest. Now I know most of you are probably thinking that Pinterest is where white girls get ideas for decorating or what to cook. While most of you are probably right, there are also many other great ways to utilize Pinterest. Pinterest is basically an idea board for anything you can imagine. Things such at what to dress up your dog as for Halloween to decorating your dorm. The easiest way to succeed on Pinterest is to find companies that are doing Pinterest well and reverse engineer them. Companies also want people to contribute to their boards and also share boards. This will get you maximum engagement. How do you use Pinterest?

This past month YouTube has made some serious moves in its advertising department. Companies found out that some videos that featured their ads could possibly be offensive. To combat this, YouTube has started to flag videos that use offensive language or graphic visuals. When videos are flagged, ads from companies that are concerned are taken down. With ads being taken down, YouTubers are making less money on their videos. This sounds like possibly a good idea, but the problem is that the system is automatically flagging many videos that are not offensive such as educational channels or video game channels. This system needs to be enhanced to flag videos that are actually not offensive. There are hateful videos on YouTube, but most of the channels that are losing money from this, are not hateful. What do you guys think on this issue?

Friday night marked the last day for the lacrosse team to practice until the spring. Our coaches drafted an orange team and a white team to play each other. We played under the lights, with referees and also fans in the stands. It was cool to see everyone put on eyeblack and get ready like it was a real game. As a program, I feel like our team evolved throughout the short month of practice. You could see in the last week of practice how much potential we had because we all started to care more about our program. The juniors realized that they only have two more seasons left in their college career, which is insane. I am super excited to see the team work hard in the offseason and help us reach our goals in the season.

This weeks chapter was about YouTube, and how to use it properly. YouTube is both a content hosting website, and also a social media platform. YouTube features its own searching bar, which you can use to find a video on anything you want. You can also filter your search by upload date, type of content, length of video, features, or sort the videos. YouTube also has a feature where you can look at the video data of competitors, which I think is very interesting. They key to having a successful YouTube channel is to add emotion. For most businesses, the best emotion to use is humor. Humor can encourage sharing, without having negative consequences. If your video is funny, it will be shared purely because people think it's funny, then people will look ath the product and consider it.

Starting a couple weeks ago, Spotify announced that a Hulu membership would be added to any Spotify student membership. The Spotify student membership is only $5 a month. The base price for a Spotify account is $9.99 a month, and for Hulu, it is $5.99 a month. You are essentially saving $11 a month by using the Spotify discount, which is fantastic. I personally never used Hulu, mostly because I already have Netflix. But after seeing on twitter that I can get Hulu for free I thought, why not? I like Hulu because it has some shows that Netflix does not. I don't think I see myself ever choosing to use one over the other, I would probably just use both because they do have different show lists. Are you taking advantage of the offer? How did you find out about it?

This past weekend was fall break. I was super excited to get home and see my family. I spent my weekend doing everything I like to do, which is to do nothing and to shop. My sister, mom and I went over to Easton and spent a couple hours walking around shopping. I always dread going into American Eagle because I work there over the winter and the summer, and I'm afraid that my managers will try to make me work. Sunday I went and helped out at the Ohio Machine game. The Ohio Machine is the professional lacrosse team in Columbus. The Ohio Machine Scrimmaged Ohio State, which was really cool to see. I interned there over the summer, and plan on continuing this internship through next year. This gameday was a little different because the social media girl just kind of gave me the Instagram and Twitter password for the Ohio Machine account and told me to have fun. It was a little scary tweeting and posting pictures knowing that thousands of people are going to see it, but I think I d

This week we read all about how to use Twitter. A lot of this information seemed to be general knowledge about Twitter, or something we learned in the last book. However, I did find a few things in this chapter very helpful. I believe the analytics section of Twitter can be extremely helpful. This will show you information such as which tweets are most popular, how many followers you gained, and much more! Another good overall tip is to just engage with other people. You can engage with tweets, hashtags, mentions, retweets, likes,  and replies. If you're trying to get a tweet the most engagement, you should research what exactly gets retweeted in your field. This way you can gain the most amount of interaction with your tweets.

Last night there was a shooting at a music festival in Las Vegas. It was very interesting to see how the media chose to cover the event. It seemed like many new stations relied on social media posts to figure out exactly what happened and to find pictures and videos. There were many videos of people trying to hide from gunshots. It was extremely disturbing to see everyone laying on the ground because they had nowhere to run. This was an extremely intimate point of view because it was coming directly from people that were there at the time. It was also interesting to see how Twitter users posted about their loved ones that they could not contact after the shooting.  All these posts had thousands and thousands of retweets. This is one example how I believe social media is changing the world for the better. What do you think about the social media posts on the shooting?

This weekend my family and I decided to take a spontaneous trip to Cleveland! I met my mom, dad, sister, aunt, uncle, and my two cousins at a hotel in downtown Cleveland. We started off the night by going to Barrio, which is a make your own taco place. After we ate, we walked over to Progressive Field to enjoy the Indians game. They lost, but it was still a great time! Sunday we took a trip to Cedar Point. This is a great thing to do during the fall because they have haunted houses and everything is Halloween themed. Surprisingly, there was almost no wait for any roller coaster in the park. We managed to ride almost every coaster there! I was tempted to ride the Millenium Force more than once, but I wasn't sure if my stomach could handle it. As the night winded down, I said goodbye to my family and started the sunset filled road trip back to Ada.

This week's chapters are all about Facebook and LinkedIn. There is an absolute ton of information in these two classes. Since there is so much stuff to talk about, I'm going to take my favorite tip from each chapter and talk about that. My favorite facebook tip is to be sentimental. Bing sentimental can be posting about puppies, kids, or about a holiday! Let's be honest, who doesn't want to post about puppies. Being sentimental is a great way to engage with customers. The best tip that the LinkedIn chapter has to offer is to treat it like a 24/7 networking event. This is because you are always interacting with professionals. You never know who may like or share your professional articles that could give you a big favor in the future. Are you active on LinkedIn?

This week I live-tweeted about the Ohio Northern homecoming football game. I had a lot of fun with this assignment and thought it went extremely well. It felt very natural to live tweet and make it interesting. I was surprised with the amount of engagement I got from people outside of the class. I even got a reply from someone saying how excited they were to watch the live tweets. I have my Storify linked here which compiles all the tweets with #ONUHomecoming17.

This week was the first week of fall ball lacrosse for the ONU Men's Lacrosse team. We started on Monday and we practice for two hours a day, four days a week. It always seems a little hectic getting back into fall practice because we usually have a month or so first where we just lift and have study hall, so by the time practice comes around, we are used to having a lot of free time. The loss of free time can seem like a lot, but I believe it actually makes my time management much better. I seem to do better in the classroom when we are practicing than when we do not. All summer the team dreams about getting back out onto the field. Playing over the summer is always a blast, but nothing compares to playing with the teammates you've spent countless hours sweating and bleeding for. It is also always a blast to see how the new freshman are looking and to start showing them how we do it at Ohio Northern. I am extremely excited to keep practicing for the next month and get better

This weeks reading throws a lot of information at you. I believe the most important parts of this weeks reading is "Party On." Jason McDonald states that in many ways, marketing on social media is like throwing a party. The invitations are the same as a promotion, entertainment is the same as content, and hosting is the same as on-going management. McDonald also suggests monitoring other parties to see what you like and dislike. I think this is a great idea because many people would post what they feel is right instead of actually going out and doing research on what works and what doesn't work for other companies. McDonald goes on to say how a party should seem effortless. In reality there is a ton of work going on in the background to make the whole thing come together. I think that analogy really encompasses social media as a whole. Do you think social media is like a party?

This week I read an article written by Rachel Arthur titled " How Brands Used Instagram Stories During New York Fashion Week." Arthur published this article in Forbes, but she has had pieces published in Wired and The New York Times. She focuses her writing of fashion. The article focuses on the importance of timed reveals, detailed shots, and shoppable influencer content. She uses Ralph Lauren as an example because at the top of every hour they would post "insider" content such as what food was being served at the event and also what celebrities were attending. Marc Jacobs did a great job using Instagram Stories to post up close pictures of their jewelry. Michael Kors had a great Instagram story by letting the viewer buy exactly what they were seeing in the story. I think using Instagram Stories as a way to update your audience in real time is a great idea. It also could show followers exactly what happened at the fashion show if you couldn't make it. What

Family weekend was this past weekend at Ohio Northern. It's the moms favorite weekend because they get to see their kids. Parents weekend kicked off with our lacrosse banquet. It's always great to get all the families together, have a good meal, and talk about our accomplishments from the past season. We started off Saturday at a tailgate with all the lacrosse families before watching the football game. After the game, I said goodbye to my mom, dad, and sister before they made the drive back to Columbus. I love when my family visit for many reasons. Number one is that they bring me food. We most likely won't have to get groceries for a couple weeks. All joking aside spending time with my family is my favorite thing to do and I know they love seeing me. What did you all do for family weekend?

Reading for this week was all about tips for individual platforms, and also a case study on a hypothetical book launch. However, the tips for individual platforms were far more helpful than the case study. A couple tips that really stood out to me were to use Facebook Page insights to help promote your posts. Using IFTTT is an extremely useful tool for twitter also. Kawasaki used the example of integrating IFTTT to make your posts on Instagram and Twitter happen at the same time. I also found it interesting how Kawasaki uses Marques Brownlee as an example of how to make intros and outros. I personally watch Marques Brownlee on Youtube and all his videos are beautifully edited. The case study is helpful because it helps you get the idea of a timeline that should be in place during an event. What do you think? What tips from this chapter seem most helpful?

For my podcast, I decided that I should interview an average college student on their social media usage. I used an article titled " How Much Time Do People Spend on Social Media?" which was written by Evan Asano. This article features a great infographic on how much time the average person spends on each social media platform a day, and also their lifetime.  I thought it would be great to interview Charley too see if his usage matched up with the information that Mr. Asano collected. This is because many people believe that a college student would spend most their time on social media, and I wanted to see if this is true or not. How much time do you spend on social media?  I have added the show notes and the podcast to this post. Interview With Charley Hi, I’m Mack Calhoun and you’re listening to fumbling through college. I’m here with Charley Peoples here today hows it going? Go ahead and introduce yourself We are going to be talking today about our socia

If you go to Ohio Northern or live in Ada, you probably know about the black swans that roam around campus. This week I learned about them too well. As I walked back from class I took the last turn to walk into my room and there they were. I now was face to face with both swans. I could feel their eyes looking into my soul. I panicked and backed away until they walked away. This was not my only encounter with the swans of death this week. Saturday night after dinner we were walking home. The sun had just set. As soon as I let my guard down, the swans came out of the shadows and started hissing at me. They were only a couple feet away and were camouflaged perfectly with the darkness. I barely got away this time, I may not be as lucky in our next encounter.

This week textbook reading provides some great insight on how to socialize events and also how to use Google+ Hangouts on Air. I thought the chapter on how to socialize events could be one of the most helpful chapters so far in the book. The chapter describes how to set up an event to create a huge buzz on all social media.  There are two points I found to be the most informative. The first is to create a short, generic hashtag for the event. The second is to provide a place for guests to take pictures. Creating an easy to know hashtag is essential. If you make it easy and memorable, it will be shared across many outlets across social media. If your hashtag is long and complicated, viewers may ignore the post and less people will share. Having a dedicated place to take pictures is a great way to spread the word about your event. There must be good lighting and a good backdrop that has the logo of the event on it. A backdrop makes guests feel important and gives them their "1

This week an app called "Polgygram ;)" was launched by clipo inc. Polygram allows you to put real time filters over your face, much like Snapchat. Polygram is unique because it uses Artifical Intelligence and facial recognition to let you see what your friends really think about your post. The app uses facial recognition to pick an emoji based on your reaction, it then sends the emoji to the poster. This app seems like a good idea but there are some flaws. First of all who puts a ";)" in the title of their app? Anyway, it seems like a rip off of Snapchat with the face filters. I could see how this facial technology to send your reactions could be a great idea in apps that are already successful but I don't think the idea is clever enough to have a standalone app.

This weekend a couple friends and I took our long awaited trip to Breakaway Festival in Columbus. This year was the second year of the festival.  As we parked you could already hear the bass booming and hear the voice of performers. The first night started out with Super Duper Kyle, who put on an upbeat and happy set. By the time Travis $cott came on we got pushed all the way to the back of the crowd, but that didn't matter to us.  He gave a great performance that ended with him playing the hit song "Goosebumps" three times. Oddly, it wasn't annoying that he played it more than once. If you went to his show in Cleveland over the summer, you heard him play the same song thirteen times, which set a world record. However, I was more excited for the second day. We managed to get about twenty feet from the stage when Playboi Carti started performing and didn't move until the end of the night after Diplo's set. The feeling that you have at a concert or music festi

I found the readings this week very informative. There is some extremely useful information. Two points from the chapter that I found interesting was that when you post, there should always be a visual of some point. The other point I liked was the "Go Three Rounds" when interacting with a commenter. Kawasaki and Fitzpatrick recommend that every post you put on your social media should include a visual. The visual can be a picture, graphic, or video. Total views go up by 94% when a visual is included, according to a study by Skyword. I never really thought about how much more I'm inclined to click on something if there's a picture. I then realized when I go on Reddit I almost entirely skip posts that are only text. What do you think? Could posting a visual with every tweet or status update get annoying? The Go Three Rounds rule is perfect for social media. It basically says that if someone comments on your post being bitter, you can reply, let them reply, then i

Earlier this month, the creators of a popular TV show called "Rick and Morty" received a very interesting package in the mail. There is an episode of Rick and Morty where they go to another dimension and go to McDonald's to get a limited edition sauce they had called "szechuan sauce". This sauce was made for the release of the movie "Mulan". It was supposedly the best sauce Mcdonald's has ever created. After making the episode, the "Rick and Morty" Twitter page tweeted a picture of a jug of the sauce with a letter written to them. They also stated they had some to give away. I think this is a really cool thing of McDonald's to do. It's interesting to see big companies like that interacting with the creators of this popular show on twitter for the world to see. It's also a great business move and creates interest in both the TV show and in Mcdonald's. Maybe after watching this show I'll shoot McDonald's an EMail a

Move in day is one of the most exciting days of the year. College is the opposite of high school in that in high school, summer is the best time of the year and no one wants to go back to school, but in college, the best time of the year is when we are at school.  Saturday my parents drove up to ONU with me and helped me move in. I'm actually extremely surprised we were able to fit most my stuff in my little Honda Civic. After my parents left, my roommates and I got back to doing our normal sitting around and doing nothing. When my stomach started rumbling, I was reminded that I was going to have to cook for myself for the first time in my life. We took a trip to Wal-Mart that lasted about two hours too long, but after multiple phone calls to my mom, I felt confident that I had a cart full of food that I could cook up into something good. When we got home, however, I was quickly reminded of my terrible cooking skills. I ate the saddest stir fry of my life and then did the dishes.