No Show

Another day another interview. Although today... didn't.

I showed up at the oil and gas place where an agent had arranged an interview. Nice offices. Nice offices. Having enough cash seems to improve the decor.

The guy who was supposed to interview e comes in with a very sheepish look on his face. He explains that they hadn't had a chance to defineany roles or positions due to a by out of another company or something. And he was late for a meeting.

No interview and I had time to kill. So I wandered around downtown a bit. Gods, I love summer. Capa can explain that one for ya.

I'm, again, miffed although only slightly. Like I said, there's an offer on the table, and another (I hope) coming quick. If that weren't the case "slightly" would become "greatly". But I'm being very zen-like about it. Shit does happen, even at the best run of companies.

Still...

Long weekend and Stampede coming up. Which means I really should leave town if at all possible. The noise around my place has gone from loud to cacophonous and it's only Thursday.

Besides, I think my PS2 has gone to console heaven. It was a good four (five, maybe?) year run though. The newer ones are much smaller and cheap like borscht. Not red like beet soup though.

And I've officially started meandering here. Again. So I'll go now.

What The?

Er, I'm hoping this looks okay because the Blogger interface is currently in Kanji... one sec.

Okay that's fixed. Domo arigato, Mister Roboto.

So anywho. The job front has been quite interesting this week. I had an interview Monday with the folks over at (well I won't say at the moment) for a six month contract. I thought I did okay in the interview. When I asked when they would be making a decision they had said sometime next week. The next day they offered me the contract.

Between the interview and the offer, I got a call from another company, who are actually number 2 on my "ideal places" list for a second interview. We booked for Friday, which was supposed to be before the first guys made a decision. So I had to tell the agent who set up the first interview that I would like to wait until that second interview results were in.

I hate it when it when I'm spoilt for choice. History has shown that as I try and make the best choice, all the options fade away. So I'm hoping #2 gets back to me mid-week next week.

And I got yet another call from a different agent about a job application I had forgotten about. They wanted to talk to me but felt my price was too high. Now my rate of pay for me is always negotiable but not until after an interview. I base a great amount of how much I'm willing to give (or not give) based on the interview. There's tons of literature out there that says a person going into an interview is also checking out the position, the company, the environment etc. Someone wanting to haggle on price even before a face-to-face throws up red, ragged, bloody flags. And besides, nobody else has complained. I've done a lot of research on pricing in the here-and-now. And I also give a number of ranges depending on what kind of position it is (dependent on both technologies and responsibilities) so there is a lot of leeway given up front.

Yeah I was kind of miffed that the first question they ask is "Can you come down on your price?" when they haven't even seen the product yet.

Ah well. Interview tomorrow at yet another oil and gas outfit (which reminds me, gotta do the research), the big interview on Friday. Long weekend next weekend and (with any luck) back to work next Monday.

It's been two months of unemployment. Once in a long while it's boring. Most of the time it's enjoyable. But all of the time, there's no cash coming in.

C'mon lottery ticket....

More Agents Than Jobs?

I'm beginning to wonder if there is actually just a half-dozen or so programming jobs out that and about a score or three of agencies trying to fill them.

It's a pain: each agency will change the description slightly and not tell you what company the position is for. So you don't know if you are applying for the same job three times. Add to that, a lot of places will just trash your resume if it comes from different sources, meaning no chance in aitch-ee-double-hockey-sticks of even getting an interview. So you need to work double time in your job hunt trying to keep this crap organized.

Whatever happened to the days of just marching from building to building with a stack of paper resumes in hand?

Monster, Workopolis et. al. don't help. The agencies use them. Not to mention I saw a print-out of what one of those sites thinks is my resume. Man it gets butchered! Turns out they have a cap of 2000 characters (!) per work-place entry. And I missed that little bit of fine print.

So yeah, the job hunt is annoying. But it's not nearly as bad as working at the last place.

On the other hand, Laroo and myself kind of half-jokingly looked at houses this past weekend. The first was a gorgeous Victorian brick five bedroom currently used as a abed and breakfast. The electric is all up to code, plumbing looks great etc. Apparently it was a used as a nurses residence about 100 years ago. So alot of rooms and very little "living space" which is why they can't sell the place. That and it's $600k. Still I love those old buildings.

The other place we looked at was considerably less, three years old and acres of room. Also in High River. But people like Capa do the commute every day, so that's nothing I can whine (loudly) about.

So yeah, things are good with Laroo still. In the end we decided it's a little soon yet. She needs to fix up her place to get maximum profit from the sale and I need to find an income. Poor baby: the end of the school year is near and she's going nuts, and sick to boot. We had our six-month semi-anniversary this past weekend. I got her flowers and chocolate, she got me cookies and Lego.

It's no wonder I love her madly.

Oh and speaking of Lego, this will be the end of me.

It's Never Easy

Well, just got notice from my landlord that he's ending the lease at the end of August. Which means I have to have a job by then (which was planned) but it means there's no way I can take a tropical holiday this year.

Frig.