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Another overdue update.
Apr. 8th, 2006 12:17 amWe'll start with Wednesday, and get the bowling report out of the way. We did not have a good night - personally, my scores were 146, 121 and 159 - all three games below my average.
One of the weird things about the playoffs is that you don't stay on one lane all night - you change lanes for the second game, and again for the third. Because different pairs of lanes have different oil conditions, the ball behaves differently and you have to adjust. In the second game, it took me six frames to figure out that if I threw the ball down the middle, it wouldn't hook. Before that, it was veering wildly off to the left instead of coming into the middle.
Alas, my teammates also had a rough night - they each only had one good game. So we're not last going into the second week, but we're a good 300 pins out of first. (We're actually in competition against every other team in the consolation round, not just the team we're sharing a set of lanes with. And all we have to do is get into the top half to advance to the final.)
Oh, and just so that nobody will ask the inevitable question... since I'd gotten there early, and one of John's teammates usually arrives early, I decided to ask her if she knew whether or not he was seeing someone. Her response was, "I don't think so... if he is, it's not serious." There was a "small world" aspect to the conversation as well - I happened to say that part of the reason I've been hesitating is because I don't have much time to socialize these days. I specifically mentioned that I haven't even been to the bridge club in several months. She said, "Oh, you play bridge? Do you know of the Kate Buckman Studio?" Know it? I'm a member there. "Do you know Barbara Seagram?" Know her? I've known her for over ten years. She once offered me a part-time job as a game director, but I wasn't really all that interested. Anyway, it turns out that John's teammate works for Barbara's publisher, and designs her bridge books. As I said... small world.
Backing up to Wednesday afternoon, I had a call from a headhunter regarding a 16-month contract position out in Mississauga. I asked him for a day to consider it, and then I spent most of Thursday trying to navigate the Mississauga Transit website to determine how I would get out there. Unfortunately, their trip planner page needs work - it has a set of drop-down menus, where you can enter your starting location, your ending location and the time of day. Locations can be entered as landmarks, addresses, intersections, or stop numbers. However, the drop-down would just say "loading landmarks" (or whatever I was entering), and sit there for ten minutes. It was timing out, but not coming back and telling me. When it did come back, it was only displaying ten results; I'd have to click on "show more" and then wait another 10 minutes.
Eventually, after about three hours of messing about, I found a couple of ways to get there, but the fastest would take me about an hour and 15 minutes from Islington station (which is about 45 minutes from my apartment). Most of the possible routes (including taking the GO bus out to Mississauga and Mississauga Transit from there) assume that people live in Mississauga and work in Toronto, and so they don't run in the opposite direction in the mornings. I called the headhunter back and told him that it would be tricky, but I would be willing to go for an interview to see how long it really takes. He asked how many years of experience I have with DB2, and I told him, and then he asked, "And how many years as a DBA?"
Excuse me? This is a DBA position? He never mentioned that until that particular moment... so I spent three hours trying to figure out how to get to a job for which I was completely unqualified. (As a developer, I'm an expert with DB2... but I have no credentials to do a DBA job.)
Fortunately, he took full responsibility for not having previously told me that it was a DBA job, and apologized.
The funny thing about it was that this headhunter's office is at 40 Holly Street. What's the significance of this, you may ask? Well, here's how to get there from my place:
( Click for a Google Earth satellite image. )
My apartment building is actually the white one below and to the left of the green car icon. So all I would have to do is walk out the back door of my building, across the courtyard, down the steps and across the street.
We could probably conduct the interview by Semaphore, or tin cans and string. I'm just glad he hadn't phoned first thing in the morning and woken me up... I wouldn't have wanted him to look across and see me standing in my living room naked, on the phone with him. That could negatively impact my employment potential.
I also had another call from another headhunter, for pretty much the same job I held at Manulife. It's amazing how many headhunters are calling me based on my online resume about the job I was fired from. I guess I was a pretty good fit there despite my manager being a twit.
Then, last night, I went out to the First Thursday pubnight. I had some Gaylaxicon stuff for our treasurer, but she wasn't there, as she (and her husband) are still recovering from Ad Astra. However, it wasn't a complete loss...![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
mvt treated me to gelato afterwards at a lovely little shop about a 20 minute walk from my place. They give you four scoops with the large cup; I had pistachio, lemon, hazelnut and Twix (yeah, I know, that's mostly just hazelnut too... but it had chunks of chocolate in it). It was delicious.
Today, I mostly read and sent email. I had a visit from Michael W. around 8, dropping some stuff off - I'd been expecting him at 6:30, so I hadn't had dinner yet, and so I'm about two hours behind, and there's some stuff that I had intended to get done today for Gaylaxicon that I still haven't gotten to. On the other hand, I've gotten lots of other stuff done today, so that's good.
I have a complaint for the people at Showcase. They're advertising a new series, a comedy about a bunch of young lawyers, called Billable Hours. It stars Fabrizio Filippo, so naturally I have to watch it. The problem is that it airs Sundays at 9:30pm, smack in the middle of Desperate Housewives. Dang it all, not counting hockey and baseball games, I watch three hours of television per week - four when Doctor Who is on - and they have to put a show starring Fab on opposite one of my other shows? Someone at Showcase needs to be slapped.
I should probably try to get to sleep at a somewhat-decent hour tonight, as I have a Gaylaxicon concom meeting tomorrow, and then two TT meetings on Sunday that mean I will have to be awake and alert at the crack of dawn, as opposed to falling asleep at the crack of dawn...
Assorted memeage ( behind the cut. )
One of the weird things about the playoffs is that you don't stay on one lane all night - you change lanes for the second game, and again for the third. Because different pairs of lanes have different oil conditions, the ball behaves differently and you have to adjust. In the second game, it took me six frames to figure out that if I threw the ball down the middle, it wouldn't hook. Before that, it was veering wildly off to the left instead of coming into the middle.
Alas, my teammates also had a rough night - they each only had one good game. So we're not last going into the second week, but we're a good 300 pins out of first. (We're actually in competition against every other team in the consolation round, not just the team we're sharing a set of lanes with. And all we have to do is get into the top half to advance to the final.)
Oh, and just so that nobody will ask the inevitable question... since I'd gotten there early, and one of John's teammates usually arrives early, I decided to ask her if she knew whether or not he was seeing someone. Her response was, "I don't think so... if he is, it's not serious." There was a "small world" aspect to the conversation as well - I happened to say that part of the reason I've been hesitating is because I don't have much time to socialize these days. I specifically mentioned that I haven't even been to the bridge club in several months. She said, "Oh, you play bridge? Do you know of the Kate Buckman Studio?" Know it? I'm a member there. "Do you know Barbara Seagram?" Know her? I've known her for over ten years. She once offered me a part-time job as a game director, but I wasn't really all that interested. Anyway, it turns out that John's teammate works for Barbara's publisher, and designs her bridge books. As I said... small world.
Backing up to Wednesday afternoon, I had a call from a headhunter regarding a 16-month contract position out in Mississauga. I asked him for a day to consider it, and then I spent most of Thursday trying to navigate the Mississauga Transit website to determine how I would get out there. Unfortunately, their trip planner page needs work - it has a set of drop-down menus, where you can enter your starting location, your ending location and the time of day. Locations can be entered as landmarks, addresses, intersections, or stop numbers. However, the drop-down would just say "loading landmarks" (or whatever I was entering), and sit there for ten minutes. It was timing out, but not coming back and telling me. When it did come back, it was only displaying ten results; I'd have to click on "show more" and then wait another 10 minutes.
Eventually, after about three hours of messing about, I found a couple of ways to get there, but the fastest would take me about an hour and 15 minutes from Islington station (which is about 45 minutes from my apartment). Most of the possible routes (including taking the GO bus out to Mississauga and Mississauga Transit from there) assume that people live in Mississauga and work in Toronto, and so they don't run in the opposite direction in the mornings. I called the headhunter back and told him that it would be tricky, but I would be willing to go for an interview to see how long it really takes. He asked how many years of experience I have with DB2, and I told him, and then he asked, "And how many years as a DBA?"
Excuse me? This is a DBA position? He never mentioned that until that particular moment... so I spent three hours trying to figure out how to get to a job for which I was completely unqualified. (As a developer, I'm an expert with DB2... but I have no credentials to do a DBA job.)
Fortunately, he took full responsibility for not having previously told me that it was a DBA job, and apologized.
The funny thing about it was that this headhunter's office is at 40 Holly Street. What's the significance of this, you may ask? Well, here's how to get there from my place:
( Click for a Google Earth satellite image. )
My apartment building is actually the white one below and to the left of the green car icon. So all I would have to do is walk out the back door of my building, across the courtyard, down the steps and across the street.
We could probably conduct the interview by Semaphore, or tin cans and string. I'm just glad he hadn't phoned first thing in the morning and woken me up... I wouldn't have wanted him to look across and see me standing in my living room naked, on the phone with him. That could negatively impact my employment potential.
I also had another call from another headhunter, for pretty much the same job I held at Manulife. It's amazing how many headhunters are calling me based on my online resume about the job I was fired from. I guess I was a pretty good fit there despite my manager being a twit.
Then, last night, I went out to the First Thursday pubnight. I had some Gaylaxicon stuff for our treasurer, but she wasn't there, as she (and her husband) are still recovering from Ad Astra. However, it wasn't a complete loss...
mvt treated me to gelato afterwards at a lovely little shop about a 20 minute walk from my place. They give you four scoops with the large cup; I had pistachio, lemon, hazelnut and Twix (yeah, I know, that's mostly just hazelnut too... but it had chunks of chocolate in it). It was delicious.Today, I mostly read and sent email. I had a visit from Michael W. around 8, dropping some stuff off - I'd been expecting him at 6:30, so I hadn't had dinner yet, and so I'm about two hours behind, and there's some stuff that I had intended to get done today for Gaylaxicon that I still haven't gotten to. On the other hand, I've gotten lots of other stuff done today, so that's good.
I have a complaint for the people at Showcase. They're advertising a new series, a comedy about a bunch of young lawyers, called Billable Hours. It stars Fabrizio Filippo, so naturally I have to watch it. The problem is that it airs Sundays at 9:30pm, smack in the middle of Desperate Housewives. Dang it all, not counting hockey and baseball games, I watch three hours of television per week - four when Doctor Who is on - and they have to put a show starring Fab on opposite one of my other shows? Someone at Showcase needs to be slapped.
I should probably try to get to sleep at a somewhat-decent hour tonight, as I have a Gaylaxicon concom meeting tomorrow, and then two TT meetings on Sunday that mean I will have to be awake and alert at the crack of dawn, as opposed to falling asleep at the crack of dawn...
Assorted memeage ( behind the cut. )
