I did not see this coming… A few weeks ago, I was contacted by a New York Times reporter who was writing an article on college students and frugality. She was on a tight deadline and I wasn’t even sure my advice was good enough to make it into the article. And then, a few days later, I found my name (and my book!) mentioned in the Sunday edition of the New York Times. Here’s the link, on the off chance you’re curious enough to read it: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/27/fashion/college-students-find-creative-ways-to-make-money.html?_r=2#

On the face of it, it’s not such a big deal – just a short paragraph on page 14 of the giant Sunday edition. The symbolic value of getting mentioned in the NYT, however, is immense. First of all, I now have a new great pickup line – “Have you ever met a NYT-featured bestselling author? Would you like to?” (which would probably work better than “Excuse me, does this smell like chloroform?”). Then there’s the fact that I went from a fresh-off-the-boat immigrant who sounded just like Borat to an NYT-recognized author in only eight years. If that’s not uncanny, I don’t know what is. And then there’s the potential for future projects with people who learned about me from the article… As one of my friends likes to say, “Things are happening.” It’s about time.