Interview, Viewers

I was going to respond to Cel’s comment with a comment, but the answer grew far too large. And so we have a new post.

But first, a comment:


To my reader in the Olympia, Washington area–We’re curious to know who you are. We know how you first found my website, and that’s probably the most intriguing thing to Cean and I. Who are you? We’d like to know.

If you would, post a comment, email me (nathan AT nathanoliver.net) or otherwise get in touch with Cean or me. We’re curious.


And now, on with the story.

To be brief, the interview went well, and I expect to hear from them sometime around the end of this week as to whether I got the job. At the time I interviewed, they had no other applicants, and the guy who had done it last year had to quit because it was too much work. (The responsibilities for this position have been reduced this year.) It’s a contract position, so I’m paid for 8 hours work/month, regardless of how much work I do. Shouldn’t really be a problem, though I expect to run through the hours for a few months all in the first few weeks, getting things back in shape. At the end of the interview, they mentioned that they’d had one other person express interest in the position, so there would be a delay before they made the hiring decision.

The people doing the interview (the station manager, and the student media advisor) seemed generally impressed with my experience, although I (and I told them this) don’t have much experience with server side stuff. But (and I also pointed this out) I have no training in HTML either, and was able to (in the manager’s words, make a site that “looks professional.” At any rate, a web tech who can do some web stuff is better than having no web tech and an outdated site (as they have now).

Katrina

Shortly after the storm, I discovered that there was a blog being maintained by some people that were still in New Orleans, staffing a data center. They have also been out and about, taking pictures of the casualties.

This picture really speaks volumes.
Katrina's Aftermath

When you first look at this photo, you see the water lines on the car, and realize how high the flooding got. But look beyond the car, to the building. Not only do you see even higher water marks, but there is an orange X on the building.

It’s hard to make out unless you look at the large version (474k) of the photo, but under the X, there is the number 6.

This is from the searchers in the city. A slash means all clear, an X means bodies found. The 6 is the number of bodies.

This picture taken from this gallery. Many more photos here that express the magnitude of the event.

Arrr, Me Mateys

Okay, so the title is lame. But this post is to mark my participation in International Talk Like A Pirate Day (TLAPD), for the first time ever.

I became aware of it in 2002, the first year it was publicised.I missed it in 2003, visiting a college with my dad, and managed to miss it again in 04, as I was out of town for my cousin’s wedding. Being in Villa, there’s no chance of missing out on the day.


This post will have to stand in for a much longer post that I had half written. I left it open, and FireFox crashed, taking the post with it.

In the meantime, I will mention that I (as expected) did not get the position of Peer Leader, but did browse the campus job listings (turning up “Hydro Ceramic Technician“, among others). I applied for Web Engineer at KDUP, our campus radio station, and have an interview tomorrow.

When I start thinking about the interview, I get nervous, perhaps because I’ve never done a formal interview. When I interviewed at the grocery store, not only was it not for a terribly important position to them, but I had the store owner (who I knew before I applied) pulling for me already. In fact, I was called in, even though they’d lost my application, and they spent the first few minutes trying to re-create the app, while looking for the original (which eventually turned up accidentally tucked inside someone else’s app).

I have no idea how I stand tomorrow. The person who held the post was a Sophomore last year, which means that I’m not too young, in their eyes, but also that he’s still around on campus. I have no idea if he applied, but if he did, he’s got an advantage over me. Still, the e-mail to schedule an appointment opened with the line “We were impressed with your application for the web tech position at KDUP.” (But that could well be a standard line used when calling people in to interview.) At any rate, I’ll find out soon enough.

Stible Buddy, right now, so I’m off.

Good Mood

I was going to start out this post analyzing how I feel really good about things today, and just the other day was feeling a little stressed, and generally not so good. That said, once I started thinking about reasons for the change, I came to the conclusion that I shouldn’t be feeling this way. So I’m not going to think about it anymore, and stay happy for no good reason.


I talked to my grandma (I’ve always called her Grammie) today on the phone. I called her once or twice last year, but at least one of those times, my mom was down there to visit, and I was trying to reach her. I need to get in the habit of calling her more often. We had a good chat, and all.


I’m having mental problems right now. There’s one girl here at UP, and I keep mistakenly thinking of her by the name of another girl here. That’s because she reminds me (for personal reasons) of a girl I knew in high school, who happens to share the same name as another girl here. Don’t worry if you don’t understand this, I don’t either, but somehow I felt compelled to post it.


It looks like I’ve picked up another somewhat regular reader. For a while, I was down to one regular (now irregular) reader. I don’t know who you are, and you are welcome to remain anonymous. I know well that anything on this blog can be read by anyone, and don’t mind if anyone reads this. If you want, go ahead and leave a comment.


The dorm has been quiet all day, until just recently. This weekend was the Freshman Escape, which took about 150 freshmen and 30 upperclassmen (as mentors) on a retreat-like camp out last night. My roommate got recruited to come as a guitar player, and lots of the people that I know went along as the mentors. At dinner, there was just 2 (later 3) of us from the usual group.

They seem to have had a good time, although I haven’t had much of a chance to talk to them yet.


On a completely unrelated note, I did something this afternoon that I have been too chicken to do for over half a year. And no, I’m not telling. I’m too chicken.


I do declare that this post has rambled enough, and it shall be over.

Circuits in the Sun

Dr. Inan teaches Circuits in the SunWhiteboard

Today was a very sunny day, and so Dr. Inan decided to hold class out on the steps of Franz, facing the quad. He is my new favorite professor.

Unfortunately, at web-friendly resolutions, the whiteboard is illegible, so I present it separately. I found myself wondering during class, “What would a random person think of this diagram? It makes perfect sense to me.

Hydro Ceramic Technician

Ok, now even I say it’s gone too far.

We’ve all heard of trash collectors being called “Sanitation Engineers,” and have long known that there were many other job titles out there that were like that.

I was browsing the job listings on campus today, and noticed that there was a listing for a “Hydro Ceramic Technician.” See if you can guess what it is before I tell you the job description.

 

 

 

 

 

Got it?

 

 

 

 

Responsibilities: Help out with keeping all of the dishes clean.

Up Late

Stayed up until 5 am to see Sheena R. off to the airport on her way to Salzburg. She’ll be over there all year. A long night, but well worth it. And I don’t have class until 11:30, so I’ll still get a decent ammount of sleep.

Finally, a post!

I’ve been meaning to post for quite some time now, but haven’t managed to take the time to do so yet. All in all I’ve been quite busy, what with moving in, serving on Saturday, organizing the room, meeting the new people (as well as some returners that I never met), going to classes, and actually starting on homework, and getting the tech situation all figured out.

I guess I’ll start from the top. I got here Saturday morning, and looked for somewhere to check in. No-one knew where for me to go, so I just went ahead and moved in, as I knew that I was cleared to do so, and Cean was already there, so I had access to the room. Later I went to get the key, and Tommy (the new hall director) went to see what information he had. I saw him checking e-mail, and on the phone, but I finally got my key. Apparently while Fr. Brad had gotten word from res-life that I was cleared for move-in, something wasn’t finished on their end, and the Hall Director never heard about that.

But in the end, all was good. I served the mass, and that evening, Cean and I spent the better part of two hours moving furniture, over and over, trying to determine which layout worked best. I’d brought a boockase he didn’t know about, and we have the couch that my RA Jake had last year, as he now has a futon. So the arrangement Cean had done beforehand had to be scrapped, but we eventually found a layout that really seems to work well. We have bunked beds, and the desks arranged in an L shape, under the window.


I’ve been slowly adding on to this post for the lasst few days, but in the interest of actually posting something, I think I’ll cut my chronological narritive short and just jump to the more interesting stuff.


I’d been planning to work on campus a bit this year, but I’m not too sure that’s going to happen. I applied at the front desk here in Villa, and found out today that (big surprise) I hadn’t gotten the job. I found out about the time they were conducting interviews that the way the quotas for freshmen versus returning students worked out, and how many of last year’s workers were coming back, I was somewhere around one of 18 applying for 2 positions. And I don’t have federal work study, so that was a strike against me to start with.

I got an offer to peer lead the calculus portion of the integrated Calc-Phys, and have responded with interest for that. I talked to the professor who teaches the class, (coincidentally, my Diff EQ teacher as well) and he said that they had already selected one leader, but would see if they had the need/funds for two. I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that I’m out there as well.

So now I need to assess if I want to work anywhere, if so where, and see if anyone is still hiring, of if it is all done with. But off to bed, in time for my Diff EQ class. I just love math at 9:15 in the morning.