I was awkwardly dancing with a middle-aged man to rockabilly in a subterranean Tokyo club called Oldies (located in one of the red-light districts) when I asked myself: “What am I doing here?”

The rockabilly band, all sharp suits and pomaded coifs, launched into a slow jam, which my partner, Tomo, took as an opportunity to wrap an arm around my waist and dip me backward. I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirrored wall and cringed: a twenty-something gaijin slow-dancing with a man old enough to be her father.

It’s so obvious I’m a hostess, I thought to myself.

Tomo was wheezing from his efforts on the dance [...]

"They're for the man who has everything," she said.

- Your first job is obviously babysitting, which you are forced into by your parents even though you yourself doubt the wisdom of making a teenager responsible for the lives of other people’s children, which is why you contrive to shorten the danger period (the time during which the children are awake and mobile) by turning all the clocks in the sittee’s house ahead by an hour or two upon parents' departure. You rebuff attempts by one Long Island mother to enlist you in the service of selling her custom knitted "penie warmers."

- Next, work in the [...]

Two friends of mine moved to Qingdao, China, a few weeks ago to teach. The school gave them an apartment, where they discovered a notebook with this list on the first page and nothing else. The previous occupant, a woman, had been teaching at the school but had left abruptly a couple of weeks earlier. (Proper nouns have been changed.)

2011 – 2012

-Get married to Guillaume.

-Build and sell Emerging Market Strategies LLC.

-Become fluent in Chinese, French, German, Portuguese.

-Maintain a youthful, gorgeous appearance.

What are three of the most ridiculous things people have asked you at restaurants (or in otherwise sommelier-appropriate settings)?

A) Are you like a wino? (To which I  invariably answer, "Only on laundry days, man.") B) One of the most common types of questions is that of the "wine forensic" type: "My husband and I went to this little restaurant in Emilia-Romagna and it was so beautiful and we tried this wine that went so well with the meal. I think it had like a picture of the winery on the label and the label was in Italian. Do you have it?" I always ask whether the wine was red [...]

"Well, this is probably cheating but I would take my computer — with Internet access — and … have access to millions of art objects and written material about them on the Web. Yes, definitely cheating…" —The Association of Art Historians asked cheater Frances Follin (check out what time her day starts!) and seven others 10 questions about their field, including which piece of art they'd take to a desert island. Sharon Hecker played by the rules and said the Mona Lisa. Hm.

The summer after my junior year of high school, my parents decided it was time for me to get a job. I agreed, actually, but fun fact about the labor market: no one wants to hire 16-year-olds. There are lots of restrictions about the number of hours they can work, they have no experience, and they're very hormonal. So despite hours of trudging around submitting applications in my favorite short-alls (#1 in Outfits That Will Guarantee Unemployment), I was jobless.

I’d resigned myself to a summer of backyard burning-but-not-tanning when one of my teachers emailed me to saying he’d heard about a lawyer who was looking to hire a [...]

Given the choice, would you opt out of your current work schedule for the No-Hour Workweek?

Rachel Winard makes a line of natural beauty products called Soapwalla, and one of those products is a natural deodorant that changed my life. Is there a way to say that without sounding like a crazy person? I don't know, but it's true. Apply directly to the armpit, apply directly to the armpit.

I'd wanted to avoid the aluminum in traditional deodorants/antiperspirants (even though it's not scientifically proven to be harmful), and because I am a sweaty, smelly person, I'd been looking for a good, actually functional natural deodorant for years. (I found one that was all right, and have chronicled my obsession on this [...]

For men, the results were as expected. Hunks were more likely to be called for an interview if they included a photo. Ugly men were better off not including one. However, for women this was reversed. Attractive females were less likely to be offered an interview if they included a mugshot. When applying directly to a company (rather than through an agency) an attractive woman would need to send out 11 CVs on average before getting an interview; an equally qualified plain one just seven.

Before you go getting all "people don't think women can be smart and pretty at the same time," the folks who conducted this study [...]

SO, I have kind of an issue. I think I have a pretty decent face, well I've been told I have a pretty decent face, but I can't seem to keep a guy long enough to actually DO anything, if you know what I mean. I think its because of this super awkward mole I have, I don't want to say exactly where it is, so I'll leave that up to you to decide. But I think its really putting guys off. I mean I keep everything else in that general area pretty well kept, but its like the moment they see it they just lose all interest. I [...]