u/EnvyEpson

Greetings all. I’m new to IF. I have an iPad Pro and Xbox controller. Where can I go to learn the ropes and setup my system. Thanks for your help!

A friend of mine (Lance McGonigal) wrote a book that is available on Amazon. It’s call Don’t Apply. Connect! He discusses his 40+ years experience with unemployment, finding a job, and how to keep from being unemployed in the future.

I used it and I have the following to report:

1. I was unemployed since Dec 2025. I worked in IT and have a Masters.
2. I filled out 85 online applications from LinkedIn and various sites of companies I am familiar with. In those I received 1 AI interview. It was the most dehumanizing thing I’ve been through and decided I wouldn’t do it again. I was telling Lance about this and he knew exactly what I was going through. We discussed ghost jobs and inventory apps. We started discussing my entry path into companies through my friends and acquaintances. We discussed 2nd and 3rd party connections and how jobs really come through 3rd party connections.
3. I did what he suggested and I compiled a list of people I knew. I followed his recommendation about telling them what I wanted (the exact kind of job I was looking for) and asked them specifically for help.
4. I started communications with them in May of 2026. Today is Jul 29th. I accepted an offer, turned down an offer, and cancelled 2 interviews for this week.

The moral of the story is to use your relationships. The people you know may not be able to help you but the people they know might. Both the offers came from friends of friends. I can’t stress this enough, build and maintain relationships. Filling out an online application and talking to recruiters should be the end of the process, not the beginning.

Good luck and I hope you land something soon.

I sat on a private school board in Little Rock from 2012 to 2016. This was before vouchers were on the table in Arkansas, but we could see them coming, and we had to decide in advance whether we'd take the money. I voted no, and I wasn't alone. Here's the thinking:

1. Public money comes with public strings, and it should. Our policies exist because of who we are as an institution. A private school is free to be built on principles that differ from the public system; that freedom is the entire point of being private. But the moment you take taxpayer dollars, you invite taxpayer oversight, and rightly so; it's the public's money. You can't cash the check and still expect full control over the culture the check was meant to fund. For a school built on distinct principles, the honest move is to not take it in the first place.

2. It doesn't lower tuition; eventually, it raises it. Private schools price the way hospitals and colleges do: not at what the service costs, but at what the payor can bear. Hospitals lean on insurance, colleges lean on loans and grants, and once vouchers exist, a school has a new payor to price against. It's only a matter of time before the state sets aside special funds for disadvantaged students, and those funds arrive with more rules attached. The families already sacrificing to be here end up absorbing both the cost and the regulation.

3. Our results come from demanding parent involvement, and money can't buy that. Tuition is the smallest thing we ask for. We expect parents to show up, and when a child is failing and the parents won't engage, enrollment is on the line, and we've held that line. That standard is a big reason our outcomes hold up. Vouchers change who's paying; they don't change what actually makes a school work. My worry is that they let people believe otherwise.

I'm not against school choice as an idea. I'm telling you what taking the money actually does to a school, from the inside.

Good morning. I would like your thoughts about using AI as a ghostwriter. I would like to write a book about my professional experiences, drawing on my stories, thoughts, and outcomes. I don't possess the gift of prose, and I've had several false starts. I've mentored a couple of young folks, and they've said I should write this stuff down. My approach would be to do an outline, give a story about an experience, what I drew from the experience, and summarize my thoughts. Thanks.

My 14yr old wire fox terrier is starting to decline. I want to prepare for his peaceful departure. I'd like for him to be in our home when his time comes.

Do you have any recommendations for a vet who will do home euthanasia with cremation? I appreciate your help. Thanks