Let's resort to a life of crime

So, as you may know, I just started an internship at New York Magazine. Here's how it happened: In late September I sent in a cover letter to NYM, and a girl named Melissa wrote me back say she was in receipt of my application. Then, nothing. I forgot about NYM, applied to a bunch of other places, got a few interviews, but remained unemployed. Then out of the blue, Melissa wrote again in late October to apologize for the long delay and ask if I was still interested in the internship. I said yes of course. For the interview, I had to wake up at 6AM to get from NJ to NY by 8:30 (that may not seem like a big deal to some of you, but beLIEVE me.... in those days I was waking up around the time regular people take their lunch breaks). So I went down to the NYM office in SoHo, all dressed in black because in New York you can't go wrong in black. After about 15 or 20 minutes, my interviewer said, "Well. I don't see a reason to draw things out any longer. Do you want the internship?" I sat back in my chair, completely nonplussed, and said something like, "Wow! I mean, thanks, gee! Wow!" I couldn't say yes immediately because I was still waiting to hear back from the Jenny Meyer Literary Agency, where I had interviewed for the position of foreign rights assistant (selling U.S. book rights abroad). So I spent the next few days in a horrible state of suspense, not willing to make any decisions about the internship until knew for sure I wasn't going to get the foreign rights job.

And I didn't get the job. So I accepted the internship.

Of course I'm happy to be at NY Mag (happy to be anywhere at all). And as far as internships go, I'm paid pretty generously ($7/hr). I'm working in the advertising department, which isn't ideal. But the people are nice, and I get unlimited free coffee and sometimes free pizza, and I have a company email address, Hana dot Silverstein at nymag dot com!!! (but don't send me anything there, I'm really paranoid that my supervisors have access to my account and will read my mail for fun). What else... I share a cubicle with Nathan, who's currently my favorite of three supervisors (or is it four? five? I don't even know, I report to everybody). Nathan lent me a coffee mug and told me to keep it for the duration of my internship. He's also the only one who seems to care whether or not I learn anything there. He explains the magazine biz to me and encourages me to ask questions, whereas the others just give me papers to file, copies to make, envelopes to lick. Granted, they do so apologetically and self-consciously ("I know this sucks ass, but it would be a huge help if you stapled these two forms together for the rest of the day"). But they don't care if I know what I'm doing or why, so long as I do it like the little stapling monkey I am.

But as my friend Megan says, the day isn't wasted if I learn something from the experience. And I do try to learn at least one thing each day before sinking into folding, stapling, licking oblivion.

For example, I now know that advertising is where the money is at. Contrary to what we were led to believe during high school magazine drives, subscriptions don't actually do anything to the magazine's bottom line. It's the advertisers who care about circulation numbers. They want to reach as many potential consumers as possible, and they pay more to place ads in magazines with higher circulation rates. So, magazines try to hike up subscription numbers to impress Prada and Nissan and Sony and the rest. That's why magazines can afford to offer crazy deals like "24 issues for the low low price of $14.99!"

Also, I learned while filing invoices and records that alcohol companies are really, really strict about ad placement. Absolut reserves the right to pull ads placed alongside "inappropriate or questionable editorial," including but not limited to wars, disasters, scandals, gross-out humor, personalities under 21. Hah.

And finally, a cautionary word: don't put your address on ANY mailing list unless you know and trust the organization or publication. These people will sell your information to other organizations and publications, who will subsequently send you junk mail for the rest of your life. Consider yourself warned.