Top Ten Tuesday: Kiersten's Powerpoint Slides

Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. Here at We Live and Breathe Books, two of us choose five books each week. This weeks topic is...

Top Ten Kiersten Powerpoint Slides
(This week was a freebie and we chose this topic because Kiersten makes extremely thorough, detailed powerpoints for basically everything ever (because she doesn't believe we can handle ourselves on our own) (which is a lil true) so we thought we'd let you behind the scenes and share some cool slides)

Noor's Picks

Preface: Why The Powerpoint is Crucial 

If our blog was a religious movement, the Powerpoints would be the scripture. They contain Everything: all knowledge, all potential knowledge, all the information you did not ask for but probably needed anyway. However, there are some who are blind to the ways of the Powerpoint, who create situations that would be very clearly avoidable if the Powerpoint had been read. This is a different category from ~reading the Powerpoint, understanding it, and choosing to ignore it~ (which I myself occasionally have done, as you will see). This is pure ignorance. So, before we start I thought I would share with you what happens when you don't read the Powerpoint like you're supposed to. 

Scene: 2014. City of Heavenly Fire book signing event, NYC. Kiersten has graciously made us a Powerpoint detailing location, transportation, and event hours. Enter: Marlon's girlfriend, who is living with him because she didn't look for an apartment before moving to NY. She has not read the Powerpoint, clearly, and the following conversation ensues. (Marlon's phone was either broken or lost, which is why she had to contact me)

 

I don't really know why she got super defensive and rude, because I was making a very legitimate suggestion: read an informative Powerpoint already open on a computer in a room you are in rather than keep messaging me while I am trying to pay attention to the event that is going on, but I didn't care enough about her to fight her. I think I was very gracious, tbh. Anyway, I know this is a little long for a preface and I promise I'll keep it concise when I talk about the slides, but I just wanted to include this as a warning about situations that can occur if you don't peruse the Powerpoints. Moving on to my actual Top Five Slides:

1. 

So, this is from the BEA 2015 Powerpoint, which is 49 slides of pure gold. This is one of my favorite mostly because, the previous year, I overslept for BEA 2014 in the worst form of karmic retribution. We'd been catching really early trains and I was SO SO stressed that Amrutha and Marlon wouldn't wake up. I kept annoying them over and over again to set alarms, ask for wake-up calls, make sure they were awake. It was eating at me that they weren't gonna wake up. And THEN, on the final day, guess what happened. I. Overslept. I woke up to Kiersten ringing my doorbell and calling me over and over because they were outside my house. I honestly was going to tell them to leave and take a later train but that was the day we planned to wear our WLABB shirts so I didn't need much outfit planning, so I literally got dressed in two minutes (it usually takes me 1.5 hrs) and bolted out the door. It was wild. When I saw this slide on the BEA 2015 Powerpoint, I knew I could not take it lightly. It was a mandate from the God of the Blog herself. 

2. 

This is also from the 2015 Powerpoint, but here's another story. In 2013, when we went for Power Reader Day (now BookCon) and not BEA itself, there was talk of hydrating on the Powerpoint as well as a suggestion to bring a snack. I did neither. I was never all that big on hydration -- I currently drink like one (or fewer) glass of water a day because I believe I can get my hydration from coffee and ice chips -- but my body was slightly less deteriorated in 2013 than it is now so when I ignored that section of the Powerpoint, and we had to walk to Penn Station from Javits with our tote bags full of books in the June heat (also I wore a black dress and a blazer so I wasn't helping my case), it was not a good experience. I didn't pass out, which was cool, but it would've been a very very thin line to cross before I did. I'm used to walking in the city, so I wasn't expecting to feel myself die of heatstroke and dehydration, but there we were. After that, food became mandatory. 

Note from Kiersten: Actually, Noor kind of did pass out. I mean, not full on unconscious pass out, but she was about to give up and lay down on the sidewalk prepared to die. Of course, this being our first year at BEA, we didn't bring suitcases and were carrying countless tote bags of books. At this point, I force fed Noor my extra bottle of water and snack and then proceeded to carry 80+ books in tote bags to the train station while shouting inspiration to get her moving. I stand by this powerpoint slide, and honestly it's probably not even the most Aggressive one about eating in the Powerpoint.

3. 

I love this slide because it really shows who Kiersten is as a person. Not only did she plan each one of our schedules for us, but decided we needed two copies of them, one that we printed and one that she printed because honestly I don't think she had enough faith in us to trust we would know how to work a printer. I'm amazed at the thoroughness of this planning honestly. If I had been planning this on my own, I would have just screwed the schedule and winged it, but this was much more efficient. 

Note from Kiersten: I'd like to point out that on one of the days Marlon actually did forget to print out his schedule.

4. 

This, similar to the last slide, shows off how thorough Kiersten is: we cannot even be trusted to properly pick our clothes without an informative Powerpoint slide. My favorite part is the last bullet point, because even though we can wear whatever we want, our sweatshirt MUST match our outfit. Like, what if I wanna mix it up, Kiersten!!!!! You aren't the boss of me!!!! (Untrue. Kiersten is the boss of everyone.) Also, I'm not sure what kind of shoes qualify as "comfortable" but I don't think any of the ones I own fit the bill. I don't believe in wearing sneakers unless you are being physically active, and I'm definitely not an athletic person, so I only own one pair. Other than that, all my shoes are purely aesthetic-based. I don't remember what shoes I wore, but to my credit, I didn't show up in like 8-inch Lady Gaga heels. Although, next year, I definitely am wearing heels because I enjoy towering over people and feeling like the Alpha, and honestly I've worn heels to conventions before and pulled through. I'm a very ~ignore the pain and power through~ person (probably in a really unhealthy way) so I don't have a problem walking long distances or many hours in most of my shoes, which is why I like to ignore this part of the Powerpoint.

5.

This is from BEA 2015 and there was a slide for #WLABBtakesBEA and a slide for #WLABBtakesBookCon but they say the same thing so I just included one. I like the idea of an aggressive twitter campaign because the words give me a mental image of me holding someone up against a wall, demanding they favorite my tweet. I like that this slide includes "look like you're having fun." Like, just in case we secretly hate BEA/BookCon and only go to torture ourselves, we need to pretend to be having fun. For the social media. I think next year, I'm gonna look solemn and on the verge of tears in every picture. Maybe I'll even pre-run my mascara, for a nice just-finished-crying effect. Look out for Kiersten's next Powerpoint telling me why I should not do this.

Amrutha's Picks

Preface: Cont. 

Kiersten rules everything we do. If we did not have the powerpoints, we probably wouldn't still be here.

1. On the Train (For Amrutha) -- Book Expo America - A Powerpoint 2013, Kiersten Kozbial

Ah, 2013 - Our very first Book Expo America. If you're wondering why I have my very own train slide, it's because I had to take the SATs the day of BEA. Of course I took them and came to the day at like 2pm when all the books were basically gone. Anyway, mind you, I was taking the SATs so I was like, almost 17 at this point. Old enough to know how a train works. Old enough at least, to know to sit next to someone that seems mildly friendly. But regardless, our girl Kiersten was kind enough to give me some advice as to where I could find seats or if I was forced to sit next to someone, how to find someone who wasn't a serial killer to sit next to.

2. When on the Train -- BEA Ppt. 2015, Kiersten Kozbial

More train powerpoint slides, helpfully brought to us and now, the general public, by Kiersten. Two years later, having been on trains with us multiple times, Kiersten still needed to tell us not to be loud or disruptive on a train at literally 5am. Shout out to Kiersten for keeping the world safe from us. However, if you've never been on a train before, these slides could honestly be really helpful to you. Take notes. **Special favorite because of the sticker usage. I also really love this though, because now, looking back on all these critiques I have made, we might have actually been loud on the train had Kiersten not chastised us in advance. Also, we all brought books to read on our way to getting more books because of this slide. Thank you, Kiersten.

Note from Kiersten: Amrutha may not know this because she was taking the SATs that morning, but the morning of BEA 2013, aka our first time there as Power Readers, Marlon and Noor were so loud on the train that everyone kept glaring at us and I almost killed them both. Given that we were leaving even earlier in 2015 than we did in 2013, it was a Necessary precaution.

3. Then We Leave -- BEA Ppt. 2015, Kiersten Kozbial

"This was self explanatory," she says, with 4 bullet points below it to explain further. This is one of my favorites because while it's in the 2015 powerpoint, it's also in powerpoints before it. Kiersten never forgot to command us to get ready for awesome and print the schedules and hash out exactly what leaving will be like. Noor mentions the schedules and printing in another slide, but can I just say the very first day we had schedules I printed my own and a copy for everyone else and Kiersten had already made a small stack for us??? Like I tried to be prepared one time and she was just so much more prepared that since then I realized it is best to follow the directions exactly as given in the powerpoint.

4. Talk to People! -- BEA Ppt. 2014, Kiersten Kozbial

Here we have another beloved "just use logic," slide -- "just use logic" is mentioned many a time throughout the course of the BEA & BookCon powerpoints, but never once does it not have at least 4 bullets thoroughly explaining what it is exactly our logic should look like. In my opinion, this is the most Kiersten of all the Kiersten moves. She tries to trust us but then, she realizes, she can't. So instead she tries to be nice about it and let us believe we're doing this on our own through our own logic while subtly giving us the advice and skills we need for the future. Thanks, mom. 

5. HAVE FUN! -- BEA Ppt. 2015, Kiersten Kozbial

I honestly think this unicorn sticker speaks for itself. Quick side story: once upon a time, when Noor and Marlon and Kiersten were friends and I was just a lame junior in their AP Lang class, I was sad about a thing. Kiersten was quick to make up the rainbow unicorn coalition, an imaginary club with a lot of real heart. The rainbow unicorn has since become a small reminder of when we all became tight (we all started sitting together and lunch and then planned BEA 2013 and the blog and everything blossomed from there) so it makes me laugh especially to see it on the have fun page. Also, I hope you found this post informative of what goes on behind the scenes here at WLABB -- basically Kiersten does all of the staging and informative preparation necessary for us to even be humans, much less have a blog.

Note from Kiersten: The Rainbow Unicorn Society isn't an imaginary club. We have letterhead.

Which slide was your favorite?
Let us know in the comments!