[Life after college is hard. Like really hard. But it's not so hard that you should curl up in a ball and watch E! marathons all day long. Not only are we covering the experience from a first-hand perspective, but we're now covering it from a how-to-survive-it perspective. Every week, we're going to bringing the best advice to getting through your first post-grad year. Because sometimes, your grandmother's "just go to law school" advice just doesn't cut it.]

I know how the scenario goes. They put that college diploma in your hand on graduation day, you walk across the stage with your head held high and you think, “This is it. I made it.” Fast-forward to two months later, you’re sweating bullets selling ice cream cones at the town pool’s snack bar. And they said you needed a degree for this?

It’s true. Sometimes the path to achieving your dreams is filled with potholes and pit stops. One of the hardest lessons they don’t teach you in school is how not to lose hope when the going gets…questionable. Surely you know you can’t just wake up and become a best-selling author/award-winning scientist/brilliant businesswoman. These things take work, of course, but they also take time. And a lot of that interim time is spent taking care of the here-and-now. You know- the bills that don’t pay themselves, the post-grad internships and part-time jobs that are often necessary (albeit frustrating), the living with Mom and Dad (again).

Anyone will tell you, the road to becoming J.K. Rowling or Marie Curie or Martha Stewart isn’t an expressway. (Repeat that to yourself every time your successful future feels too far away.) You’ve got a lot of dues to pay before you can reach the top. So what if you’re biding your time babysitting for spare cash? Who cares if you got roped into an internship that isn’t quite in the field you’d like to work?

Jim Carrey used to be a janitor. Chris Rock bussed tables at Red Lobster. Jennifer Aniston got cursed out on the reg as a telemarketer. Rachael Ray worked behind a freakin’ Macy’s candy counter.

Clearly, it’s not what you’re doing, but what you’re taking away from it. Think discipline, responsibility, work ethics and amazingly hilarious stories about the fat kid who belly flopped onto his little brother. Much like Rome, character isn’t built in a day. When you’re up on stage accepting your first award years from now, you’ll be glad you’ve got a substantial library of jokes to reference about the good ol’ days.

The following post is written by Tandra Haycraft of the College of Notre Dame of Maryland, one of our many friends at Uloop, a student powered marketplace. Read more great posts in their blog.

Let’s face it — there aren’t a whole lot of uber-desirable job options for college students. The current economy, a student’s weird availability, and a lack of experience can mean sometimes only the basest jobs are out there for the taking. Don’t get discouraged, though — any job can teach you a lot and give you an opening into your desired career.

I got my first job during my freshman year of college. I had federal work-study job and worked for 10 hours a week in the graduate admissions office. I filed, a lot. When I wasn’t filing, I was making copies. If I wasn’t doing either, which usually only happened Friday afternoons, I was there to answer the phone and direct prospective students to the right place for information sessions. Needless to say, it was pretty boring. I quit after two semesters.

At the beginning of my sophomore year, I moved to another campus job, at the information technology help desk. I hadn’t thought that my filing job would get me anywhere besides intense boredom and a headache, but, in fact, it was a boost. I had learned to use an industrial copy machine, change toner in laser printers, clear jams in the equipment, and work with a multi-line phone. Being able to tell my trainer that I already knew these basic skills was a boost. Being a self-starter was a necessity as a filer, and a plus as a help desk assistant. Paying attention to how technicians solved some of the most common technology problems, earning a reputation as being motivated and friendly, and volunteering for special projects eventually moved me farther up to working directly with one of the technicians.

I won’t lie — it’s not all wonderful. I still get paid minimum wage, my workload has doubled, and it’s often thankless or boring work (sometimes both). But it isn’t a dead-end job from which I’m only getting a paycheck.

To use a job as an opening into a career, the most important thing to do is to pay attention and learn everything you can. You never know what skill sets employers will want from you, or what they’ll be interested in seeing in their applicants. At the end of every semester, my direct boss has me sit down and design the work schedule for his group of student workers for the coming weeks. If you’ve ever had to do this, you probably know it can be one of the most frustrating and tedious tasks ever.

Having to do it, though, forced me to learn several things — like how to be organized, for one. Also, how to compromise in a group — no one wants those hours, so you have to find a way to balance fairly and give everyone a little bit of what they want. I also had to learn to write in a professional manner when I composed emails asking for availability, and how to work with difficult people without being unprofessional or losing my temper.

Organization, patience, compromise, and a few technical skills, as well as the ability to properly construct a sentence, will be vital skills employers are going to be searching for in their applicants. Being able and willing to learn from those higher up than you is always a plus. Learning to show enthusiasm and motivation for even the most boring tasks will show your employers you’re flexible and easy to work with. Developing a good rapport with your current employers will give you a leg up when you need references for more serious job applications.

That ability to write clear, concise emails and showing self-taught knowledge of the Microsoft Office suite landed me another great opportunity — my boss recently asked me to write a set of instructions on how to use the email system for new students. I see this as practice for being a technical writer, the job I really want to get into.

The following is a guest post by our (nerdy) friends at Hack College, the #1 tech site for college students. Check ‘em out.

As hopefully all of you know, LinkedIn is a professional networking website that allows those looking for jobs, especially college students, to create profiles and look for business and career opportunities. It’s a really fantastic service, and if you haven’t signed up yet, you definitely should. LinkedIn caters to 80 million users worldwide and is an easy-to-use tool that may help you find a job or career after college.

To add to its professional networking services, LinkedIn recently added a new feature to its site called Career Explorer. The new feature will allow college students to essentially map out their desired career path and visualize how they can attain this path. Students are able to look at career paths that those before them have taken in order to understand what steps they must take to get to their goals.

On LinkedIn’s press page, the chief executive officer of LinkedIn Jeff Weiner said,”LinkedIn is about connecting talent with opportunity at massive scale. Career Explorer is the latest example of how we make that possible by providing one of our fastest growing demographics, students and recent college graduates, unique and valuable insights enabling them to develop the optimal career path. We’re excited to be launching this product in partnership with PwC, one of the largest and most forward thinking recruiters of new graduates.”

Other features that LinkedIn Career Explorer offers include:

Connections – allows students to seek out those in their field of interest as possible sources of information or career opportunities

Statistics – gives users stats about different careers

Jobs – alert students to possible job openings and possible networking opportunities to help them attain those openings

Follow Potential Employers – acts kind of like a Twitter feed for LinkedIn businesses as it sends students information and updates about businesses that you follow

Currently Career Explorer is being offered to a select 60 universities (which are not all listed) across the country. However, on-campus demonstrations and events promoting LinkedIn and Career Explorer have begun at several larger universities. If you attend New York University, Boston College, Brigham Young University, the Ohio State University, the Pennsylvania State University, Syracuse University, the University of Florida, the University of Illinois, the University of Maryland, the University of Southern California or the University of Washington, look for LinkedIn events happening on your campus. These universities are obviously part of the 60 universities to which LinkedIn has limitedly released Career Explorer, but gradually, the service of Career Explorer will be offered to more and more universities.

For more information, head to the press page regarding Career Explorer.

What do you think of the idea of Career Explorer? How useful do you think it would be to college students? Are you eager for the release of the service to your university? To those who have access to the service, what do you think of it?

[LinkedIn Career Explorer via TechCrunch]

When walking around campus, you see her. She’s rocking the casual look like it’s nobody’s business. And she’s doing it well. Her bootcut jeans are accompanied by a perfectly worn-in t-shirt layered under a zip up hoodie. She’s wearing black Converse or a pair of well-worn sneakers, the laces tight enough to keep them on, but loose enough to allow her to slip in and out of them easily. Her haircut is low maintenance, but totally chic.  She’s rocking plastic rimmed glasses, no contacts; a watch, no jewelry.

You don’t know her, but you want to.

This is one co-ed who has got it together. She is the kind of girl who is naturally pretty, has a killer body and is completely oblivious to it. She is friendly, kind, and her easygoing, low maintenance attitude makes it easy to get along with her. Even her professors are drawn to her, always chatting with her before class and helping her after.

She has a large circle of friends, filled with a variety of different types of people. Girls love her, guys love her, nerds love her, athletes love her. And though you don’t know her, you kind of want to love her too.

She is funny without being raunchy, boyish but not butch. She prefers drinking beers in a pub to shakin’ her thang at the club.  She’s comfortable at a Death Cab for Cutie concert, but has no problem listening to The Beach Boys or the Avenue Q soundtrack.

She rocks her GPA, has a hot (yet totally down to earth and awesome) boyfriend, and seems to excel at just about everything she puts her mind to…without getting frazzled.

In short, this girl just exudes cool. And as she walks by, you aren’t sure which you want more: to know her or to be her.

[Photo courtesy of Wild Rose on Flickr]

I mean, in America, the stereotypical retiree will move down to Florida to spend their time lounging by the pool in a gated community or playing a few holes on the golf course. Lame. In Japan, adult films for senior citizens, aka “elderly porn” is growing into quite the profitable franchise, according to porn producing giant Ruby Productions.

While America’s economy is declining, many entertainment venues (including golf courses) are taking a hit. In Japan, at least one retiree is cashing in on the entertainment biz. Shigeo Tokuda, 73, is the Ron Jeremy of elderly porn.

CNN correspondent Kyung Lah describes Tokuda as “the star of his movies in every way, romancing his co-stars, no matter their age, no matter their needs.” And apparently, his films are no-holds-barred, much like anything Jenna Jameson has appeared in.

This human interest story might come as a shock to American citizens, but as a nation, Japan is home to the world’s highest percentage of people over 65. Who says the greater populace can’t have a little fun? Tokuda isn’t some pervy old man, either. He’s been married for forty-four years, and his wife supports his new career path. Lah reports that he’s a polite and humble man, and though it’s not easy to watch Tokuda’s raunchy scenes, “it’s a little like watching your grandfather in a situation you never dared to dream.” Aww, that’s sweet. Or creepy.

In any case, Tokuda can be considered a retirement legend. I’m sure there’s plenty of guys half- or one-third his age who would love to achieve such celebrity status. And if he can chase his dreams at 73, I can’t wait for my own retirement.