When it all comes together

I was heading up to Denver for my interview. I couldn't eat breakfast, I was nervous. My phone interview with some of their managers the other day seemed to go very well. I wasn't sure what they were going to throw at me other than the fact that they had some issues with developers not being able to work from home, and replicating the source code (software under development) to India (why do companies keep screwing themselves over by contracting shops in India. Their telecom sucks which means sending data back and forth is not reliable).

I was told that it was a 6 month+ contract to hire. I was going in for 2 interviews. One was a technical interview with a developer, a manager, and a guy that I guess I would be his manager if hired. The second interview was going to be a management interview with a senior manager. This position isn't technically a management position, but it is a very important one. I will have 1 guy and possibly another under me, but I would not have specific employee management responsibilities (I kind of like it that way).

These 3 guys in the conference room were throwing some of their problems at me. I was able to give them a number of viable solutions we could implement (if I am hired... hehe). It was pretty clear that their processes are fairly immature, and that they were needing a number of improvements in both process and infrastructure (more servers) right away.

They seemed to like me. We joked a lot about how developers can be lazy. I felt pretty comfortable. They didn't have much of a problem with what I was saying. My answers just seemed to spur more questions. I was in with them over an hour. It felt good that I wasn't possibly going into a place that had problems I was not familiar with. Some of the solutions I suggested were new to me, but it just meant I would have to learn even more about the tools that I am already extremely comfortable with.

Once they passed me off to Bob I kind of felt like I had things fairly well covered. Bob asked me some of the same questions, but some were totally different. I think Bob has some plans that the rest of the guys are not aware of. He was pretty easy to talk to, unlike the interview I was on a couple weeks ago.

One thing that came up that threw me was that Bob was refering to this as a permanent position. I was under the impression that it was a contract to hire. I showed him the e-mail from the recruiter. He said the recruiter probably just screwed up. He told me they were trying to get away from hiring contractors. I had already decided that I was ok with a perm position in Denver prior to even starting the interview process. Then he asked me what my salary requirment were.
I was quickly trying to rewind my memory to what I had told the recruiter. I remembered the conversation, but forgot the number. I threw out a number about 10 percent higher than what I was making at Agilent (hey, I deserve a raise). He response was "I think we can work with that without any problems". Which I replied, "Well that was too easy for you, make it {____ +$15K more}". We both laughed, but in truth I was thinking "Damn it! I should have pushed higher". He said that there are scales they need to stay in.

He said there was another guy they were interviewing and that they should have word back to me in 1 or 2 days. I have been dealing with people unable to make decision to hire after weeks and weeks. I was relieved to know I didn't have to wait long to know.

I left feeling really good about this interview. I phoned my recruiter on my way to the interstate and let him know how it went. He asked me "When do I start"? I told him about the other guy they were going to interview. He said he knew about the other guy and that he was from out of state. He said they've been trying to nail down a date for him to fly in for a face to face. It sounded like my wait would be more than just a couple days. He said he would get back to me as soon as he heard anything.

When I got home I got online and over the next hour or so I let the few friends I saw logged in know that it went well. Mel and I were discussing the interview, and some movie stuff. Then Lee, one of my Agilent co-workers came on asking me how it went, and was bitching about some of the crap they are trying to get the people that are still on the project do before their end dates. I had just told her that I was hoping to hear in a day or 2... then the phone rang. They offered me the job!!!

Not only did they offer me what I initially told Bob, but they threw in a $5000 sign on bonus. KA-CHING!!!

I start August 7th

5 Things

5 Things always in my purse/briefcase/backpack:
1. Keys
2. Sun glasses
3. Pens
4. Headphones
5. VPN/SecureID Card

5 Things always in my wallet:
1. Driver's license
2. Credit Card/Debit Card
3. Cash
4. Receipts
5. ATV Ownership Card

5 Things always in my refrigerator:
1. Diet Dr. Pepper
2. Beer
3. Fruit
4. Cheese
5. Many Expired Items

5 Things (at least) always in my closet:
1. Pants/Shirts/Shoes
2. Maxim & Playboy Magazines
3. Ironing Board
4. Spare Cell Phones (I probably have 5)
5. Fire Safe

5 Things always in my car:
1. CDs
2. Garage Door Remote
3. Blanket
4. No Doze
5. Credit Union Envelopes

5 (or more) Things always on my desk: (at work)
1. Laptop/Mouse/Keyboard
2. Notepad
3. Blank CDs/DVDs
4. Altoids
5. Juggling Balls

5 People to tag
1. Chrissie (I have to tag her... it's a tradition)
2. Terry (She's moving up in the world. We have to keep her humble)
3. Wicked (Got to get her to post somehow)
4. Grace (It's about time I tagged her for something)
5. Laurie (Because I didn't get to meet her when I was in Michigan)

If you don't want to do it I'll TRY to forgive you

Is getting exercise really worth it?

Grace is craving me...

OK, maybe I'm overstating things a bit.

This has been a slow week. I am not feeling like myself. The job situation is still bugging me.

I had a phone interview yesterday (Thursday) that went VERY well. I talked to a VP and an engineering director for a company in Denver. I seemed to have all the right answers and fit as far as the job requirements go. If I get the position I would have one guy "reporting to me". It is not really a management position, but I would own my portion of the software development process (meaning if something goes wrong, it's my ass). They seemed open to making some changes.

When I go into an interview I don't just see it as they are checking me out. I am also checking them out. Early on in my career I took jobs because they liked my qualification. I didn't ask too many questions about their operations. This lead to me having to learn a lot, eventually being unhappy. Now I scrutinize the companies a lot more. I have turned down jobs in the past because it sounded like they didn't have a clue what they were doing.

Well, they liked me enough to now schedule a face to face interview in Denver for Monday. I am pretty excited about it. They scheduled me to be there from 11:30 to 2. Do these people not believe in taking a lunch break? Just something else to consider when making my decision.

=====================

It seems to me that there are a lot of people dropping their blogs lately. Some are switching to other blog sites while others are fed up with the drama.

Hmmm drama...

Yes, life is full of drama. I have had some people say some relatively nasty things about me this past year and a half in Blogger. This amazes me, because I think most of what I have to say is pretty mundane. Maybe it's just me, but I tend to let those negative comments just go away.

I used to play on an on-line game service (Pogo). The games were fun for the most part, but the people were fairly interesting. I met a few nice people there. I even met one of them in person. The drama there was amazing. People would flirt with each other all the time. Sounds like Blogger quite a bit, huh? The jealousy and drama was more than I could take. There were guys threatening me because I would flirt with a woman they wanted. It was so stupid. Eventually I tired of it. Most of the people were in their 30s, but they sure acted like a bunch of teenagers.

I hope this place doesn't end up like that.

My kids get back from Chicago tomorrow and MS gets back from Europe Monday. I hope that livens things up around here.

I AM SO BORED! Not even my normal hobbies have any appeal right now.

I think I'll head out to ride my bike. I hope you all are well.

Weekend stuff

I am tired, but i can't sleep. Forgive me, but I would guess that this is going to be one of those long posts that jumps all over the place.

I had 2 interviews this week. One of them was at an agency up in Denver. I drove an hour and 20 minutes to their office for a 30 minute interview, then an hour and 20 minutes back. I tried to hook up with some old work friends from up there for happy hour, but no one could make it.

The agency liked what I had to say. They called me about 30 minutes after I left to inform me they were submitting me to the client. I am not too hopeful since I am a relative expert on one tool and they use others that I will have to learn. But who knows.

The week had passed and the biggest thing I had planned for the weekend was getting together with a few (former) work buddies and play a game or 2.

Saturday came along and I had to prepare for game night. It was my turn to host. It was going to be a low turnout because one of the guys was camping, and another is getting ready to get married next week (and he wouldn't let us throw him a bachelor party). MS has been included in the last couple board game nights, but since she is in Europe I guess she misses out on all the fun (yeah, right).

Everyone started showing up around 2 p.m. Dan wanted to start earlier than usual because he had a new game that was going to take a while to learn and play. The name of the game is Descent. It is very Dungeons & Dragons like, but is not considered a role playing game because it doesn't continue on and on like D&D would. I would say it is like the computer game Diablo 2, but in a board game. I am clueless when it comes to this sort of game, but since only Dan knew anything about it we went long. We started playing around 2:30 and got very involved. We had planned on barbecuing some chicken, but forgot until about 6:30 in the evening.

We were only about half way through the "dungeon". Dan was right that this could take a while. We took a break to prep the chicken. Jason works as a volunteer EMT in one of the nearby small towns, so I guess he gets some cooking ideas from the firehouse. On the menu tonight, whole chickens cooked upright with a 24 oz beer can shoved in the opening.

It was quite a site to see. Jason prepared the chicken with olive oil and a poultry rub. I got the grill warmed up, then watched as he violated these chickens with the beers cans. The chickens stood straight up sitting on the beer can. My grill is fairly large, but the lid is not supposed to be closed when you cook on it. Whenever I forget about that I burn whatever I am cooking, even on low. We had to cover the chickens a little so that they would cook better, so I propped the grill lid open enough to accommodate the standing chickens. I wish I would have remembered to take pictures. Jason figured that since we couldn't close the lid entirely it would take longer for the birds to cook. We went back to playing the game but kept an eye on the grill.

We rotated the chicken about every 20-30 minutes. After about 90 minutes we decided they were probably done. Extracting the beer cans from the orifices was a 2 man job, but we did it without spilling anything. The chicken tasted incredible. I guess the beer boils and steams the inside of the chicken while the grill does the outside. It was incredibly juicy and fell right off the bones.

After about a 30 minute break to complete dinner prep and eat we continued on with the game, which lasted until around 11:30. Yes, that's right 9 hours of gaming including breaks. Dan said this was one of the smaller dungeons. I just checked the web site. It states that it takes 1 - 3 hours to play. BULLSHIT!!! WTF people? Over all it was a fairly fun game, but that is just way too much time.

My brother was coming by to borrow my truck on Sunday. His friend Jay was in town and Jay needed to buy a new stove for one of his rental units that he owns. Mike called on his way over and I hear Jay talking in the background about bringing over some mushrooms for me. I told him no fucking way.

Tonight my brother was having a barbecue with a bunch of his friends, so I headed over there for a bit. As soon as I arrived Jay started telling the story of when I tried mushrooms at a huge camping party we had in the mountains a couple years ago. Some of the people at the barbecue witnessed me at the party, while others were hearing about this for the first time. Everyone had a big laugh. That was quite embarrassing.

I hung out, had a brat and a few beers and talked to my brothers ex-girlfriend, Jackie. They are still friends. She was a bit shocked to hear that I did any kind of drugs. It's not really a proud moment in my life. She then asked me how the job search was going and has someone that she is going to hook me up with for a possible job lead. Always good to have an inside "friend".

Friends of my brother are always surpised at how little they see me around. A lot of them don't even know I live in the same town. I don't go out drinking very often, and I am certainly not "in" with this crowd. They are all nice, but they are my brother's friends, not mine. I guess Jackie had heard about my big relationship blunder last summer. She didn't know any details so she asked me to fill her in. I don't really like thinking about that, but gave her enough to make her jaw drop.

She then started asking me if I was still doing the Internet dating "thing". I didn't want to go into any big details. Chris, one of the other ladies there at the barbecue had recognized me a while back on a site I was using about 3 years ago and wanted to get together. I turned her down at the time which makes it twice that I turned her down. Previously she had hit on me (about 5 years ago) when she was drunk at my brother's bar. She gave me her number. I tried to tell her no at the time, but she was too drunk to understand. I think she is too embarrassed about the whole thing. She doesn't talk to me much anymore.

That reminds of a funny incident. A while after Mike and Jackie stopped dating when I was at Mike's bar. Jackie was there, and a bit drunk, being jealous because Mike had a new girlfriend. Jackie proceeded to hit on me. I turned her down just on principle.

So I'm sitting there talking to Jackie at my bother's house tonight, and she starts telling me about another lady on the other side of the deck from me, Melissa. Things like Melissa goes to a lot of these parties and barbecues, and tends to leave with someone she meets there. Was Jackie suggesting I cozy up to Melissa so I could be the next one she takes home?

Melissa is a VERY pretty lady, and maybe in other circumstances I would have gone for it, but I felt wierd about the whole evening already. I ducked out around 11. My brother gave me shit because "it's not like I have to go to work".

WOW, my prediction was right about me jumping all over the place. Maybe I shouldn't drink before I post.