I have sad news. If you get a great job after you graduate college, you’re still going to be poor. Ok, cue the sad trombone noise. I can’t believe I’m being this depressing on hump day!

But, I’m being serious and honest. Even if you get a entry level job out of college, money is low, low, low, low (and you won’t be buying boots wit dah fur, if you catch my drift). A few months after graduation, I got a fabulous job — the one I had dreamed about all throughout college. And it was the real thing! I had a salary, benefits, Monday-Friday gig and a huge smile plastered on my face. My paychecks were strong and lovely and I could officially afford my own apartment.

Get ready for another sad trombone noise.

Unfortunately, making enough money to make a small living after college was an incognito reality check for me. After spending my life living on an hourly wage or no wage at all, making that much money made me greedy and unrealistic. I started spending my paychecks freely. I shopped a lot (and not in the clearance rack) and when I started having to pay loans, I hardly had any money at all. I’d cringe whenever I filled up my gas tank, curse when I signed my rent check and had a bad mood if I ever had to pay extra for utilities on my apartment.

Basically, if you get that big girl job after college and start making real money, you don’t have any money at all. In fact, I should have had the mindset that I was more poor than before. Because I finally had the means to pay off the four years I spent sleeping and taking pop quizzes.

With all of the spending I was doing, while paying loans, while paying rent, while paying for my cell phone/groceries — saving money wasn’t even an option. At least it didn’t seem like it was. I could never catch up. I could never have more money in my bank account than I had the month before. Nothing was working. I couldn’t even swear off the mall and save some dough. Having money seemed impossible! What is this real world business? I can’t even go to Pottery Barn and buy fun stainless steel utensils for my kitchen!

Stop the sad trombone noises and see the glimmer of hope. I have some advice. As a warning though, you may need to swallow some pride. Because not having any money is a huge ego check and a sign you need to make some sacrifices to save the ching ching.

My first bit of advice? Move home for a year. YES, it seems embarrassing and awful. It seems like you would never have a social life again. But you will. And I’ve heard from many different people that not moving home at a young age was the worst decision of their life. Their life! Think about it. After college, all you need to do is catch up with your bills and how is one suppose to do that when they are writing a $700 rent check every month? Besides, it’s better to move home now than in your 30′s when you’re hundreds of dollars deep in credit card bills? Just sayin’.

My second bit of advice? Put aside envelopes for saving money. Label the envelopes: Coach purse, Spring Break, Car Insurance. Every paycheck, take out some cash and put $10 into each envelope. Then, instead of spending freely, you will know the means of money that are available to you for each perk. Credit card payments, no more!

Finally, live within your means and be realistic. The first three years of our careers are the hardest ever for money. Just because we have real jobs, doesn’t mean we can live like we’ve had real jobs for ten years. It’s all part of growing up.

“If one more person raises their hand in class and asks what time the final exam is as it is written in the 80 page syllabus, I’m going to vow to never eat a scone from the caf ever again. And that’s serious.”

“I think somebody farted in class today and I hope it wasn’t the hot dude. I really like looking at him and that would totally ruin things for me.”

These aren’t conversations I have anymore. In fact, I can’t even believe I used to have them. They are completely pointless, entirely stupid and absolutely glorious.  Ok FINE, I wish I still talked about this kind of stuff on a daily basis – but things have been a little different in my new post grad life. I never said people don’t fart in meetings rooms, but they aren’t sexy and I won’t tell anyone about it.

I’ve noticed a huge shift in my conversations lately. They’re like, slightly grown up. Flash Notice: I still talk about sex, flatulence, snot and totally gross 5-year-old boy things – just bare with me while I try to sound cool and old. Here are the top five new things I’m chatting about these days (that I’m not quite used to yet):

1. Work

Work is by far the most popular post grad topic to blab about (partially because you don’t know what else to think about and partially because it’s all you know to think about). People at work. Arguments at work. Mistakes at work. Failing at work. Having a “semi-good day” at work. Secret work crushes. You ate lunch at your desk at work. You spoke your mind in a meeting at work. You drank a lot of water at work so you’d waste time going to the bathroom at work. Everything I talk about nowadays is fogged with that ‘w’ word. Work, work, work, WORK.

2. People getting married/engaged/pregnant on Facebook

Vanished are the days that I can look at Facebook and point and laugh at the embarrassing pictures of people getting hammered in public. This happens at least once a day for me. I open up Facebook, glance over the news feed and look up from my computer to screen to my roommate that yet another high school classmate popped out a baby and took the baby daddy’s stupid last name.

3. Not making enough money

I don’t know how long THIS one is going to last but it’s already getting old. I get a big girl job and suddenly think I should be making enough money to shop at Pottery Barn and J Crew on a weekly basis. Not really the case people. I have a paid salary ego and it’s gotta go.

4. Stress.

This is a conversation topic spawned from the work topic. After spending all day talking about how I’m not married, single, not making that much money and dealing with everything at my job – I can’t help but to talk about how many zits I have because all I do is stress eat and pick at my face.

5. The future

In college, all I talked about was…college (and where we were spending thirsty Thursday). The future was a dark blob that sat in the corner of my mind, untouched with minimal regret for feeling that way. Now, the future lays out in front of me like a fresh tar highway that I am being forced to drive on at top speed. And all I want to do is talk about it with my friends! “Where do you think we’re going to be in a year? What happens if I make this decision, how much will it effect the next few months? Will I lie in a box in two months because I want to quit my job and the economy is bad?”

Who knows. And that’s the beauty of it all.

[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.]

So you’ve made it to the real world and you got yourself a real job. Congrats. Oh, and just a quick head’s up before you put in that order for business cards. You’re overqualified for your job. No matter what it is, you’re overqualified.

How do I know?

Because almost every entry-level position requires the bare minimum in terms of skills — especially if you went to a specialized school for a specific major. So forget what your professors told you about the industry and get ready to roll up your sleeves and be an intern-plus. What makes you an intern plus? You’re going to get paid to do very elementary work.

That’s right. Despite graduating Summa Cum Laude from a top university, no one trusts you yet. They don’t know you. They don’t know if you can handle a big project. But they do know that they need that spreadsheet made and they need those clients followed up with and they need you to stay on top of their calendar.

Wait, what’s that? Your job title says associate and not assistant. Think again. You’re a glorified assistant for a little bit. Like a year or so until you get promoted and someone new comes in under you. I know what you’re thinking. It’s not fair. You have the skills to do more and you can do more and you WANT TO DO MORE.

And that’s good, you’ll get a chance to show off those skills soon enough. But for now, just accept the fact that you’re going to be working a little below what you’re capable of accomplishing. Oh and accept that fact with a smile, because you want to be promoted, right?

Come college, however, the best times usually happen during the semesters, not between them. You’ve heard it before — especially if you’re a regular CollegeCandy reader – high school friends tend to drift apart, hometowns suddenly become boring and living with your parents…ick, don’t even get me started. The idea of a blue popsicle and a trip to the local pool sounds borderline painful when you could potentially be at Dollar Beer Night with your campus besties.

And so the concept of summer quickly loses its luster. Facebook newsfeeds are clogged with “Get me back to football season,” “Miss my [insert school name] girls!” and “Counting down to move- in!” sentiments. Because seriously, who wants to be stuck at home with nothing to do but get their nails done and shop and maybe stop by a part-time job a couple times a week and then go back to shopping and free lunches with mom and….

Oh wait, was my jealousy showing?

Yeah, that’s because I’m no longer in college. As a graduate, I work five days a week, most weeks out of the year. When the employed want time off, it’s never in three-month chunks. Typically, it’s a sick day here, a long weekend there. Having graduated in 2009, I’m still fairly new to this Real World business, but, unfailingly, each July it hits me- wait, where’s my summer break? Why am I still expected to wake up before 8 a.m. and remain sober on weeknights? Don’t these people know about Thirsty Thursday!? I just want a vodka soda and a bendy straw (…she said through sobs).

To the undergraduates out there, I offer this: Embrace the boredom. Watch as much reality tv as your mushy brains can handle. Attend Kegs and Eggs before dawn on game day. Hell, while you’re at it, attend that CEOs and Secretary Hoes mixer, too. Nothing good will come of it, I promise you that, but years later that same mixer will revisit you in the form of an office Christmas party. But in the future version, there’s a twist ending: you’ll be the only one blacked out with your shirt unbuttoned. Get it out of your system now to save face later. Trust me here.

As for my fellow graduates: It’s almost quittin’ time. Who wants to grab a drink?

I cleaned out my refrigerator. I even used Windex.

This is what I would like to call a “grown-up moment.” Times like these (where I clean out moldy chicken salad from my refrigerator door) are small adult moments. And trust me, I have big ones too. Why do I want to share them with you? Well, when I was in college – where washing a single dish, “tweaking” my resume between naps and considering the gym were all labeled hard work – I thought I would never grow up to feel big adult moments. But I already have! And so many of them. So, let’s get serious. I’m going to show you my top five:

1. Getting my first real job

It really can happen people. You will have a job, someday. I’ll be honest – when I was offered my job, I danced in an office with my boss with glee, got in my car and started crying. Crying tears of…joy. And for the record, tears of joy aren’t salty – they taste like cotton candy. And I swear the clouds were pink that day. I remember feeling so complete and accomplished, I could have stuck a rock up my ass and turned it into a diamond. I was that good. All of my worries about making everyone proud diminished.  Because I was making myself proud.

2. Seeing my hard work pull through, and getting credit for it

The next step after getting the job, is turning it into a great experience for everyone involved. I wanted to work my little tushy off every moment I was spinning around in that office chair. I wanted to prove to everyone that believed in me that I was worth what they saw. One of my colleagues recently told me she keeps a ‘warm fuzzies’ folder in her e-mail where she stashes all of her e-mails that make her happy and prove her success at the job. Now, I have a warm fuzzies folder of my own – to slip all of those small bursts of credit whenever I work hard.

3. Cooking my first recipe from scratch

Yep, I did it folks. The other day, I went to the grocery store and bought weird ass ingredients for a Strawberry Shortcake cookie recipe and cooked a batch from scratch. That, to me, is a huge burst head-first into adulthood. That sudden craving to stand and stir a weird mixture in a bowl and bake it is not a weird quirky craving. I cook for pleasure and stress-relief all the time now. I smell dinner and adulthood.

4. Giving advice to undergrads

I don’t want this one to sound pompous because I definitely do NOT have a large flock of college kids running towards me dying for job advice. But once or twice, I’ve had an acquaintance of mine ask me for advice and that alone makes me feel all grown up inside.

5. Paying my first loan

Aw, there it is. The first check. The first check that you write out slowly and painfully – while you constantly think how it could buy you a pair of Britney Spears tickets on Groupon or five pairs of Jessica Simpson pumps. You’re writing a check for a loan you used to learn occasionally in between long cat naps in college. But it’s fine. When I sign my name for my loan checks now, I make it look extra professional and stylish. Because I am a lovely little adult. And the reason I can pay it, is the reason I went to school for anyway.

I don’t know who I want to succeed more, me or Justin Beiber.  The fact J-Beebs sold out Madison Square Garden at the ripe age of sixteen puts me in a really difficult position with my personal standards.  And the fact I’m comparing my life to a pre-pubescent child puts me in a really difficult position with my personal reputation.

All throughout my college life, I felt like I was being shoved into a giant, human cannon.  I was constantly finding ways to shove myself, my tasty thighs, my college-ego, my giant boobs, my reputation, my GPA, into a compact space.  That’s a lot of bullsh*t to squeeze inside something that is eventually going to catapult me into the real world unprepared.  Thanks a million, life cannon.

After being shot into the real world, I picked up a dirty habit. While being thrown into something I was totally unprepared for (ehem, hey real world!  It’s a pleasure!) it became nearly impossible to find any satisfaction in my life.  I was so overwhelmed with emotions and goals, I became an angry, judgmental girl. And who saw the brunt of all that negativity?

Me.

Lately, I have become increasingly hard on myself.  I never acquired this nasty habit while I was in college – I was completely self-involved with surviving day by day, enjoying every moment, and not giving a shitake mushroom about what people thought of my sexy time hair while I walked past church service on Sunday morning.  Did I just give a shitake mushroom shout-out in this post?

Regardless, since graduation I’ve been insanely hard on myself.  With everything.  Because I haven’t attained any life goals yet as I expected and hoped, I’ve had a hard-on for perfecting my every action, relationship, personal flaw and situation.  To top it off, I’ve been constantly trying to please everyone that is involved with my life; friends, family, co-workers…

A few of my girlfriends moved to Spain to teach for a year.  Although I know they will always love me, I never want to let them down by failing to communicate with them enough.  Since I’m not surrounded by my friends on campus, I pressure myself to communicate with them as much as (and probably more than) humanly possible. Still, I never feel like I’m doing enough and wake up in a cold sweat, afraid that they’re mad at me or have completely forgotten about me.

And that’s only the beginning…

I’m starting a new job and as yet another thing at which I want to excel, the thought of screwing up at all scares the pulp out of me.  I’m always nervous I’m going to trip, make a mistake or misjudge something.  I understand we all make mistakes but I can’t help thinking that during this point in my life I can’t make mistakes.  I can’t get it out of my head that even the smallest glitch in the process could screw up a friendship, a job, an opportunity…anything.  Somehow, I’m hard on myself because in order to please me, I have to please others or the goals others expect me to reach. Doesn’t that seem silly?  Why do I feel like I need to go through other outlets to find personal satisfaction?

In the whirlwind brain slosh that are my worries, I rip myself apart on a daily basis.  I have so many stress zits, and the skin on my fingernails looks like a battlefield.  I’m constantly holding my own personal evaluations, judging how well I’m doing.

I think the constant pressure to be perfect has something to do with being truly independent for the first time.  In college, I was surrounded by others.  Although I thought I was all on my own, I really had a collective group of people to help define who I was.  After college, I have myself and it’s up to me and me alone to make my now and my future happen.  That puts a lot of pressure on one young and ruthlessly determined human being.  I no longer have others to aid in accomplishing goals; I have my single self to worry about and that’s the scariest thing in the world.

I recently learned about the French tradition to celebrate what other people consider your flaws. They can be physical flaws, or even emotional flaws.  For example, if you’re short you should wear flats and embrace something others don’t necessarily view as beautiful.  When I do this and embrace my flaws, I no longer worry.  I no longer waste my time and emotional energy to consider what others think about my differences, constantly try to change them, or feel the relentless need to please others with my accomplishments and decisions.  I shouldn’t be afraid to have flaws or admit them;  they define who I am, not anyone else.

We learned this in grade school, peepsies. Take it from Alice and Wonderland:

“You cannot live life to please others, the choice must be yours; because when you step out to fight that creature, you will step out alone.”

On that note, when you’re finished reading this, run over to the nearest mirror you own (or pick up your iPhone…my personal mirror of choice) look at yourself and say this out loud: “You’re doing the best you can. Good job, b*tch!” Take it from me, if you do that often enough, eventually you’ll believe it. And that makes for a much more pleasant and stress-free existence.

Read more about the ups and downs of Brittany’s post-grad life and empathize with her here.

Whether you’re graduating this spring or you’re hunting for a summer internship, you’re probably stressed about acing your interviews. To help alleviate some of that stress, we reached out to the experts from Excelle and asked them for their tips on making a great first impression. Check back every Thursday for more helpful career tips and articles!

You may look good on paper or in your suit, but if you’re looking to nail your big interview, looks aren’t everything. How you sound is often more important. But many job seekers let careless speech habits sink their chances of landing that plum job.

The Bottom Line: You don’t have to study elocution to speak well. Simply slow down, take time to pronounce all the syllables, and leave slang at home.

Companies want job candidates who are well-spoken and articulate, and recruiters won’t represent a job candidate if they don’t match the client’s profile. According to Lori Zelman, vice president of human resources at Strategic Workforce Solutions in New York City, “The people most highly sought after are the ones who are succinct in the explanation of their work experience.”

Here are six common language mistakes and how to keep them from sabotaging your interview or meetings with clients.

1. Non-Words

Filler words such as “um,” “ah,” “you know,” “OK” or “like” tell the interviewer you’re not prepared and make you sound like a Valley Girl (or Boy). A better strategy is to think before you speak, taking pauses and breaths when you lose your train of thought. Everybody utters an occasional “um,” but don’t let it start every sentence.

2. Up-Talk

A singsong or rising inflection at the end of every sentence creates a tentative impression and makes it sound as though you’re asking a question instead of making a definitive statement. You need to speak with conviction when selling yourself in an meeting. Bring your intonation down when ending a sentence to avoid talking up.

3. Grammatical Errors

The interviewer may question your education when you use incorrect grammar or slang. Expressions such as “ain’t” “she don’t,” “me and my friend” and “so I goes to him” aren’t appropriate. Be sure you speak in complete sentences and that tenses agree. The interview is not the venue for regional expressions or informality.

4. Sloppy Speech

This is a guest post from our friends at Excelle. Excelle is the premier online community for female professionals in the United States. Empower yourself with high-quality content relating to workplace issues and career advancement. Forge connections and network with other working women in our interactive forums. Join our community of intelligent, highly-motivated career women here: excelle.monster.com.

I have a strong belief that this column is about being extremely honest – even if my reputation as a stable human being is on the line. So, you wanna hear a depressing story? (Note: I think the following confession may have something to do with having to listen to Fergie squak for a ten-minute halftime show on Sunday.)

I woke up this morning at a ripe 6AM to put on my face and go to work. I felt like someone had poked me in between the eyes with a two-by-four and sat on my face the entire night.  I really need to stop assuming I’ll have the energy of a type A spider monkey after going to bed at 12AM.

Anyways, I slowly slithered into the shower, let the beads of hot water run down my face and….cried. I started crying in the shower. Good. Lord. (And no, that’s not me in the pic. I didn’t invite someone in to take pictures of this most lowest of lows.)

Contrary to popular belief, I’m not depressed. Although it may seem that way since I was crying in the shower on a Monday morning, it’s nothing like that. I’m very happy with my life. I’m a very lucky person and to top it off, I’m young and have great hair.

So, where is the crying on command coming from, you ask? Allow me to put on my fake doctor hat for a moment and do a little self-diagnosis. What I have is ‘Why-am-I-Here?’ syndrome, a post-grad condition that starts with a waiting game and ends with a waste of time.

I believe ‘the syndrome’ happens to all of us (at least I hope it does for the sake of my well-being). I constantly put myself in a place where I need to know that what I am currently doing is correct. I need to know that I am in the right place, on the right path, not wasting any time. And all the while, I’m anxiously waiting for that next big thing.

In high school, it was deciding which college was going to help define me. In college, it was deciding which occupation was going to make me happy and fulfilled.  But suddenly as a post-grad, a freakish hole in the system exposes itself.  Suddenly, once school and occupation have been discovered, I’m left evaluating these choices.  Did I do the right thing?  Is this what I’m suppose to be doing with my life?  What if I did this instead?  What if I could do something else?

Options, which seemed so wonderful before, have become the enemy.  There are so many things I can do with my life and the sensory overload makes my feel somewhat alone.  Isn’t that crazy?  How, when I am finally bombarded with choices galore, do I only see the opportunity to make the wrong one?

I moved out of my parents’ house, I got myself a job that I authentically enjoy, and I can’t help wondering if I’m doing the right thing.  I’m constantly questioning myself and constantly waiting to become a person I ideally want to be.  In my head, I’m always a few steps behind of where I imagined I’d be at this point in my life.  I’m constantly questioning myself and wondering if I want something different now, something that’s easier to attain so I can fulfill my goal quicker and find that content version of myself I’ve always craved.

The most frustrating part is that I seem to be waiting to become some ideal, unrealistic version of myself.  I ask, ask, ask, ask ‘what am I doing here?‘  I wait to become, smarter, more organized, thinner, more successful…and all the while, I’m sitting in my shower alone.  Crying into my shower head.  Doing absolutely nothing about it.

I’ve come up with a mind medication (if you will) for my ‘why-am-I-here’ syndrome diagnosis.

In the end, (not to sound like a sappy mess) it is all about the moment.  Rest assured if I focus on that, I will remain happy.  I waste so much time worrying about who, where, and what I’m supposed to be.  And most of the time, it’s for other people – not even myself.  If I focused on the moment at hand and didn’t let moments flash by unnoticed, I think I would be a lot more content.

As a post-grad, I want to stop wishing moments away solely because I want my ‘waiting game’ to end.  Why do I think that who I am will be defined by others on someone else’s clock? Why can’t who I am be who I am right now? I’m ready to stop waiting and asking.  I’m ready to stop letting time pass in order to answer some stupid question.  And most importantly, I’m ready to let my post-grad life truly begin.

See what else Brittany’s been dealing with since graduation right here.

I think it’s interesting how when you are younger people tell you that you can be anything you want to be, or anything that you will set your mind to. Although we all wish this was true, that’s not always the case. Come adulthood, people get caught up in stereotypes and expectations. Salaries and “good” jobs. What (they think) you should be.

And quite frankly, I’m sick of it.

Since becoming a post-grad, I have heard so many people question my aspirations. I’ve seen it happen to my friends too. Parents, professors, friends, significant others, and just about every extended family members start with questions: “Why do you want to go abroad and live in South Africa after graduation?” “Why do you want to go to school at that school?” “You got your degree in economics, so you should go to grad school for that — or else you wasted four years.” In my case, I’ve heard a lot of “Why did you major in English if you don’t want to be a journalist?” and then “You were born a writer — you shouldn’t pursue law school.”

Um, while I appreciate the input, I just can’t help but find myself irked when statements like that are made. Unless I’m asking for career advice or making a life-altering decision, there is no reason why the things that I want to do should be in question. It feels like I can’t make my own decisions, or that people aren’t 100% with me. Or that, oh the horror, I’m making a terrible decision that I will regret for the rest of my life and I should just start over from scratch. Seriously, people, I’m fragile right now; I need support, not someone to question my choices!

Luckily, I haven’t been experiencing this my entire life. Some people are told from the beginning of their childhood “you will be (insert some kind of profession here).” And their parents plan accordingly, never letting the kid figure out what they want. But maybe those kids are better off? Their lives are on one specific track, decided by mom and dad. They don’t need to question anything; they simply just have to go with the flow. Me — not so much. It’s my path to choose, whether I want to go to law school or become a writer or move to Africa and build schools. It’s all up to me… and having all those choices is scary.

So, here is my plea for myself and all other post-grads out there: Butt out. No post grad, especially in this economic climate, needs to be doubted or told to redirect themselves. If we want advice, trust me, we’ll ask. But if I’m just doing my thing, I don’t need to hear your opinion. I spend so much time second guessing myself and sorting out the prospects of my future, I don’t need anyone else getting into my head and making it worse.

But really, from now on, when people ask me what I am doing or what I want to be, I’m going to say one thing and one thing only: “Happy. I want to be happy.” Being happy may not be an answer that people want to hear in terms of “What I want to be,” but at the end of the day, I think it’s the end-all-be-all of trying to figure all this stuff out anyway.

And if nothing else, at least it will shut them all up.

Wake up, babe.  This isn’t dreamland.

The “real world,” as some of you may have found out, doesn’t really care if you want a career or a steady salary.  It doesn’t matter if you went to Harvard or Podunk Community College- record numbers of graduates are finding themselves jobless these days.  If you want to throw a statistic out at mom and dad (because of course you moved home after school) tell them this:  Not only are you competing against 1.6 million other degree-toting candidates, but the Huffington Post says the youth unemployment rate is at 19.6%, the lowest on record since 1948.

Take my friend Matt Grant.  Okay, he’s not really my friend but aren’t we all brought together by hard times?  Anyway, Matt went to Ohio State University, graduated in 2009.  He was a chemical engineering major and scored three internships as an undergrad.  Basically, Mr. Grant’s a smart guy.  Please, ask me what he’s doing now.  Go ahead, ask me.

He is a waiter at a Clarion Inn.  And that’s the best job he could find after a year of searching!

Well, friends, when life hand you lemons, isn’t it best to add tequila?  Here’s a little sunshine to cut through all the doom and gloom of being unemployed.

1.  I’m going to state the obvious and say that if uber-qualified Matt can’t find a job, don’t sweat it if you can’t either.  The numbers don’t lie; these are genuinely tough times for everyone, so cut yourself a little slack.

2.  Now you can squeeze out one last summer vacation. Wake up late, peruse the Internet for jobs poolside…there are worse ways to get by.  Plus you’ll have a great tan for when you eventually do get that amazing career.

3.  Think of this downtime as the perfect opportunity to prepare for the busy schedule of a working woman.  Fill your days with appointments!  1:00 Starbucks date with the BFF, 2:30 mani/pedi, 5:00 happy hour…

4.  Network!  Go to the mall often enough and eventually the sales people will start to recognize you.  Be kind to them and maybe they’ll give you their family discount.  You are, after all, still living on a college-size budget.

5. Those tennis lessons you always wanted to take?  Go for it!  Want to help out in your community?  Volunteer!  Have an itch to travel?  I see a mother-daughter road trip in your future!  When you’ve got extra time on your hands, you might as well do whatever you’ve always wanted to.  While snoozing a little longer in the morning is good some days, think of ways you can keep your head in the game, stay positive, and have a really amazing answer when those future employers ask you, “What have you been doing since graduation?”