If you're wondering why it takes Congress so long to move forward with even the most popular legislation, look no further than the extension of unemployment benefits that passed the Senate yesterday.

It passed with 98 votes but the popularity of the final vote doesn't reflect the shenanigans that the measure had to endure in order to get there.

According to Huffington Post's Ryan Grim, first the Republicans tried to festoon the extension with unrelated amendments -- some of which having to do with further sanctioning ACORN, which, let's face it, isn't worth holding up unemployment checks for hundreds of thousands of jobless Americans.

What do you make of a guy who doesn't want to go to work so badly that he stabs himself in the leg? And then calls the police to report that he's been knifed? All so he can avoid working his shift at Blockbuster Video.

The Denver Post reported earlier this week that when 29-year-old Aaron Siebers walked into Blockbuster at the start of his evening shift, he claimed he had been attacked by three people -- skinheads, he said at first. Indeed, he had a deep wound in his leg and several lesser cuts.

A manhunt soon ensued, complete with police dogs. Then the police started finding holes not just in his leg, but his story, For starters, he claimed to have been attacked near a Target, but the cameras didn't pick up the incident or show any suspicious activity.

Siebers eventually recanted and admitted that he had abducted himself at knife point.

On this week's "Your Job Will Come" podcast, WalletPop's Aaron Crowe talks with branding and networking expert Thom Singer about how to network while you're company is undergoing layoffs, and how to network after losing a job.

Among the tips are staying positive, networking early and not saying anything bad about your company after a layoff.

If you lost your job, right now you can get a 65% subsidy from the government to help pay for a continuation of your health benefits under COBRA for nine months. The Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act may be a weird name for a bill about health insurance, but it's basically the law that requires companies to let people pay to remain on their group health insurance plans for at least 18 months.

But that could end shortly. Congress passed the 65% subsidy as unemployment rose in this country, but it's due to expire Dec. 31. A bill to extend the subsidy for a total of 15 months was introduced last week by Rep. Joe Sestak, D-Pa. Originally, the subsidy was available for nine months. So someone who began collecting the subsidiary on March 1 would run out of help at the end of November.

Perhaps Janis Joplin said it best: Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose. While there have always been people who, when handed a pile of lemons find a way to make lemonade, this recession is proving that we may indeed be a nation of lemonade-makers.

The unspoken motto: Make unemployment, funemployment.

Some use the time off to travel the world, visit friends in faraway places or just chill. But others see the break from the daily grind as a chance to chase a long-deferred dream, take a gamble with starting up their own business and test the limits of their creativity.

Saul Friedman has written a column for the Long Island, N.Y. daily newspaper, Newsday, since 1996. But recently, his weekly column on aging, "Gray Matters," became restricted behind a paid subscriber wall. As a result ,Friedman, who is the winner of journalism's prestigious Nieman Fellowship and who roused enough rabble to land on a list of Nixon political opponents, quit in protest.

Friedman's reaction may well be justified. Only subscribers to Newsday, which is sold in Nassau and Suffolk Counties, and in New York City, can now read his full column online. In fact, Friedman, who lives near Washington, D.C. and isn't in the Newsday circulation area, can't even read his own columns online now. Customers of Cablevision, the company that owns Newsday, can also access Newsday online free of charge, but the rest of the world outside New York City's five buroughs and Long Island, has to pay $5 a week for the privilege.

Looking for work, any kind of work? Have you considered direct sales? My friend Shira did. I got a Facebook announcement from her over the weekend: "I've decided to become an Avon Lady!"

"Wow, those are still around?" I asked myself. Sure enough, Avon sales reps are worldwide, and the company touts the job of selling its cosmetics as an easy, breezy way to do business. You can earn up to 50% commission, work from home and be your own boss. You could even be the next Debbie Davis, an English woman who turned to selling Avon cosmetics five years ago after losing her job and was just crowned Britain's top Avon lady for earning more than half a million dollars (U.S.) a year.

Jay Leno's move to prime time was viewed by some as a savvy show business decision. A popular, well-known comedian, the former host of the Tonight Show would provide NBC with a cheap, talk-show alternative to the network's previous line-up of dramatic programming, which is costly to produce. Or so it was thought.

With ratings numbers continuing to fall, however, NBC affiliates aren't feeling nearly as sanguine as the network itself, the New York Post reports. After a solid start last month, ratings have a slipped to a quarter of what they once were. That has local news programs nervous, as they count on viewers of 10 P.M. shows to stick around for the 11 P.M. news. (Unless you're in the Central or Mountain times zones, where everything is on an hour earlier.)

Half of U.S. workers are women and there are about 10.1 million businesses owned by females, according to the Shriver Report. Those companies employ about 23 million people and earn a combined revenue of $3 trillion.

But only 3% of businesses owned by women in the U.S. actually have revenue of $1 million, compared with 6% to 7% of companies owned by men, according to the Center for Women's Business Research.

In fact, 75% of all women-owned businesses in the U.S. have annual revenue of $50,000 or less.

Nell Merlino, president of Count Me In for Women's Economic Independence and creator of "Take Our Daughters to Work Day," said in an interview that there are several reasons many women-owned companies struggle to break past the $50,000 level.

With unemployment closing in on 10%, many Americans are taking the time -- perhaps unexpectedly -- to reassess their careers and future. For some, that has meant rethinking their choice of professions entirely since certain industries were hit hardest by the recession while others appear to be flourishing.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, sectors that saw the biggest losses were areas like construction, retail and the government. Sectors that show enormous potential growth include health care related professions and technology oriented jobs.

In this monthly series, those who've made the decision to start over again share their stories with WalletPop.

Amy Berryhill: Writing her own a digital future

Amy Berryhill likes to take risks. After graduating from the University of Texas at Austin in 2004 with a degree in advertising, she briefly took a job at a company that specialized in the little known area of search engine marketing and search engine optimization. When she saw in 2008 people getting laid off at her current workplace, Conde Nast Digital, she started plotting her exit strategy.

Are you in your 40s and trying to decide how to reinvent your life, as well as rebuild your 401(K) in time for retirement after its been devastated by the recession? You're not alone.

Many women in their forties are now trying to restart careers, whether it's because of a job loss, it's returning to work after taking time off to have a family or it's deciding to put your career first after your husband built his.

I definitely fit into the last category. With my first marriage, we had to decide whose career would come first. My husband got the priority and I had to move with his career moves. My resume was filled with a lot of dead end jobs as I moved every three or four years.

I needed to jump-start a career at the age of 39 and decided to go back for my MBA. Finding work in my early 40s wasn't easy, but with the MBA I was able to restart a career. Now I've got 25 books on the market and my own business. Going back to school allowed me to find and fulfill my passion.

If you're looking to restart your career, you're probably wondering what you should do next? What jobs should you consider? WalletPop was given an exclusive look at an upcoming story in More Magazine on Oct. 27 about the best career moves for women over 40.

Call it a testimony to the times. A Salt Lake City trucking company's quest to fill a $13-an hour administrative assistant position at its Indiana driving school generated nearly 500 resume hits from all over the country, according to a New York Times story.

The job entailed data entry, copy making and assembling paper work at the Burns Harbor, Ind. school. Interested candidates ranged from a former IBM business analyst, a former bank manager to a veteran Deloitte & Touche alum.

Normally, C.R. England posts jobs for 30 days before starting the hiring process. But in this case, the company shuttered its doors on applicants after the third day. "It was just such a high volume -- we never got that many for one job," said Stacey Ross, head of corporate recruiting, in a telephone interview.

Think your kid's college bill is pricey? Think again. For the second year in a row, Sarah Lawrence College has the dubious distinction of being the nation's most expensive place to attend college -- a whopping $54,410 for the current 2009-10 school year, including tuition, plus room and board, according to data compiled by CampusGrotto.com.

Of course, for that price, students get the distinction of attending one of the finest colleges in the country. Most of the colleges in the 100 most expensive colleges ranking are private liberal-arts universities in the Northeast.

CampusGrotto notes that while the current school year saw one of the smallest increases in costs in decades, expenses still rose 4.3%. By contrast, the annual rate of inflation in the United States fell 1.3% in September. Many of the colleges on the list now cost around $50,000 a year to attend.

Do you want to make a career change but don't know how? Listen to Aaron Crowe, WalletPop editor specializing in careers and the job search, and Libby Gill, author of "You UnStuck: Mastering the New Rules of Risk-Taking at Work and Life" (Travelers' Tales/Solas House), talk about the first steps to take to be on that new career path.

Don't be afraid to seek advice and mentors, urges Crowe. Sit down and figure out what you're good and the market will bear, says Gill.