Getting Ahead

For those working at a hotel, the world literally never sleeps.

HEY, DUMMY. Get over here and stop ruining your life.

Larry Winget, the Pitbull of Personal Development and star of A&E’s short-lived reality show, “Big Spender,” says in his new book that you – yes, you – are an idiot.

DECEPTIVELY TRICKY: That could be the best description of djembe drumming. The West African drum has only, “like, six tones [to] learn,” says student Meredith Dalton, yet combining hand movements to make complicated rhythms — while someone else is drumming a different beat — requires coordination and concentration.

BLACKJACK DEALING. Resume writing. Improve your life. Make more money. Become more attractive. Turn that great invention idea into reality. Heck, is that Sudoku puzzle too hard for you? There’s a class for that, too. Washington’s source for educational seminars both serious and off-the-wall is First Class Inc., that business whose brochures are usually nestled [...]

“I’M A WRITER” is a phrase so broad it’s almost meaningless. Example: Eric Kimball is writing. He knows how his story ends and he knows how it begins, but the middle is muddled. His outline so far says “stuff happens” — shorthand for “I’ll figure out what happens here later.” He stands, sighs and goes [...]

ONE MIGHT BE TEMPTED to think that “The Adventures of Johnny Bunko” ($15, Riverhead Trade) is a joke, or at the very least, mis-shelved. What’s this comic book doing in the career section, anyway? But author Daniel Pink, who last year received a fellowship to study manga (Japanese comics) in Japan, is serious about his [...]

A GUIDANCE COUNSELOR FOR OUR TIME, author/therapist/ex-monk Thomas Moore‘s new book advocates that old cliche — follow your heart —when it comes to career satisfaction. “A Life at Work” ($24.95, Broadway) uses personal anecdotes, alchemical theory and feel-good messages to emphasize what we all learned in high school but have all forgotten: If you’re not [...]

YOU CAN ONLY READ so many books on resumes or titles like “Job Hunting for Complete Dummy-Morons” before the chirpy advice of smiling-faced life coaches make you long for relief. These three “career” books might not help you land your new gig, but they might make the search less tedious. Who knows — even the [...]