[benbreen]

I commented earlier that I thought about applying to that classified job in 2007 - as it happens, in 2008 I briefly worked as the personal assistant to a personal assistant at D.E. Shaw. I was working alongside Harvard business school types, but doing the most trivial things. I literally had to run across midtown to deliver a six pack of Diet Dr. Pepper to one of Shaw's executives at one point. Half the people I met there were humanities PhD dropouts. I applied to humanities PhD programs while working there and sort of did the reverse.