(I would rate this entry as wholly imprudent, yet entirely impossible to resist writing.)
Allow me to present, in their original format, some highlights from the “Interests and Activities” sections of some of the 500+ resumes I’ve reviewed over the past few weeks:
• Whittling
• Beer snobbery
• Historical photograph preservation and cataloguing
• Erstwhile racer
• Cooking: reinterpreting old New England favorites
• Thrill rides
• Award-winning chili
• Going on walks
• Supporting causes in sub-Saharan Africa
• Passed seminar: “Negotiating for Success I”
• Exercise
• Real Estate
• Opera (performance)
• Proficient (actively working to become fluent!) in Spanish
• Citizen forester
• Playing euchre
• Wine Tasting
• Travel (12 people)
• Jane Austen
• Sewing hats
• Internet savvy
• Marathon (personal best: 3 hrs. 45 min)
• Satirical fiction
• Avid reader (9 people)
• Antique shopping
• College and professional football enthusiast
• Pet lover
• Own an epiphone acoustic guitar and play it almost daily
• Album collector: have a collection of over 200 folk albums
• Published a letter to the editor in the Dallas Morning News
• Entrepreneurship
• Intramural basketball
• Boy Scouts of America [is that an interest or activity, do you think? - Ed.]
• Learning about other cultures, past, present, and future
• Online poker
• Antiquity
• Sports memorabilia and model railroading
• The family BBQ sauce business
• Woody Allen films
• Hobbies include teaching and learning
• Fluent in English
• Playing all styles of guitar and violin music both professionally and recreationally
• Sky Diving, Bungee Jumping, Rappelling, White Water Rafting, Scuba Diving, Canoeing, Hiking, Mountain Biking, Skiing and Live Jam Band Music.
• Amateur paleontology
• Irish History 1914-1916
To anyone who might currently be on the job market, take note: we do read the interests and activities section, and if it’s totally ridiculous, we will share it with our friends and coworkers. And the internet.
January 28, 2008 at 6:06 am
I firmly believe people should not have a “Hobbies” category on resumes. They only serve to make people look like idiots.
Reading other people’s resumes is so much fun.
January 28, 2008 at 2:15 pm
I totally agree with the commenter above me. Also, I don’t like objectives on resumes unless you are posting it on a job board. If you’re applying for a specific position, it’s pretty clear that your objective is to obtain that position. Actually putting an objective on your resume can only hurt you because odds are your objective won’t match perfectly with the position and that can only make you look worse.
Or is that just me, and everyone else things an objective is imperative?
January 28, 2008 at 3:49 pm
I never realized the extent people are willing to share personal details on professional documents. That is a very funny compilation!
January 29, 2008 at 1:01 am
I too am into beer snobbery. I never considered it a hobby before.
Antiquity?
January 29, 2008 at 2:54 am
I love them all dearly, but the last one is the best. Irish history ONLY 1914-1916 and not a *second* before or after! The other stuff about Ireland is crap!
January 30, 2008 at 4:09 pm
WHAT??!! Who writes all this insanity? My favorite is the guy who trains for the eco-challenge on a weekly basis with his: Sky Diving, Bungee Jumping, Rappelling, White Water Rafting, Scuba Diving, Canoeing, Hiking, Mountain Biking, and Skiing with Live Jam Band Music pumping on his iPod.
February 12, 2008 at 11:06 pm
please tell me you hired the whittler.
April 2, 2008 at 1:36 am
This is hilarious. Have I ever told you my theory, which is that anyone who actually IS an avid/voracious reader will not use either the word “avid” or the word “voracious” to describe it, because they READ SO MUCH they know those two words are overused? That is my theory.