Carl's Notes

Not that I was here very much in the first place, but I have fewer distractions at the moment, so I may as well comment on my current situation here.

I used to work as a sewing machine technician, gave my notice late September of last year and haven't found any further work since.

To be honest, I'm actually quite glad to be out of that job. The pay wasn't all that great, and it wasn't all that great for me psychologically either. It was a small shop, so didn't have much in the way of staff, and the boss was far too worried about actually turning a profit (which he insistently claimed he was already on the knife edge of) than actually caring for the staff.

To make matters even worse, I was moved to one of our smaller locations (they only have about a dozen staff members spread over three locations) for a few days a week, but without training.

And the boss then wondered why it wasn't doing so well afterwards...
(and this despite insisting that, just because I was 35, I should already know how to run a store by myself)

I quit shortly after that, though not before the boss installed remote security cameras without informing the staff (ie, me) beforehand.

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Anyways, right after that I got involved with that year's pantomime show, seeing as I actually had Saturdays free again. That was fun and got me out of the house. But these last couple of months I haven't been out very much at all, and my bank account will tell you the same thing. Mostly because it's so empty I can't afford to...

As I mentioned above, I haven't been able to find any further jobs, which isn't helping anything at the moment. One of my credit cards is well past due, and I'm getting phone calls every single day about out, which is why I've finally silenced it. Granted, to be honest about it, I can't tell the collection calls from scam calls, so haven't actually received very many actually valid calls in the last two months.

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In far more positive news, we moved early last year, which gave me the opportunity to rearrange my room. The first thing I did was use my tax refund to buy myself a new bed and more bookshelves. I'm finally up to a double bed instead of a tall twin, and it's far more comfortable than my previous mattress was, so that was money well spent.

I've managed to avoid getting boxes piled in towering pillars around my room, but I haven't unpacked enough of them to be actually free of them entirely yet.

I have managed to cram my desk into the closet (which required me to cut a corner off the desk's top to make it fit properly), and I've managed to install things like LED strip lighting, my desk lamp, an audio switch (more about that in another post, or at least in the comments), and I've arranged my laptop, one of my two tablets, and my PC's various accessories across the top of it.

I'm actually having a bit of fun arranging things on it. Though I'm very surprised that the LED strip lighting isn't sticking to the underside of the desk and monitor stand without some extra help.

Since it's been a bit of a while since the last time I posted an update on current happenings around here, so here's another update.

Part 1: Education
My graduation application was accepted, and I'll be graduating on June 17th with a BSc (Bachelor of Science, Computing).

I've confirmed that I'll be attending the ceremonies, now I just need to rent the regalia for the event.
(so far I know that they'd prefer you to use a credit card online, and it costs exactly $30, tax included)

Part 2: Open house
This Saturday (May 28th) is the nearest campus open house, and I'll be presenting a software program that I hope will get used to teach first-year students programming techniques.

So far, I have two problems that I need to have dealt with before then. The first is that the program is nowhere near done enough to present, and the second thing is that I don't know when I'm off for lunch.
(supposedly I'm off at 2pm for lunch, and have to be back by 1pm)

Part 3: Mom's birthday on Sunday
It's only a few days until mom's birthday and I think all I have is a card just yet.
(I'd picked up a CD for her of the Irish Tenors, then found out she doesn't like tenors)

I got her a $50 gift card for her favourite fabric store and a bottle of one of her favourite bubble bath brands, but I wouldn't feel right doing the same again.
(plus I don't have $50 spare for another gift card)

Part 4: Job opportunities:
As I was involved with the ACM's international programming contest a few years ago and have a profile on LinkedIn (a Facebook-like site for professionals), I was sent a message by a representative at Google wondering if I'd be interested in hearing about job opportunities.
It took me a bit to figure out what to say, but eventually I did respond in the positive and had a fairly positive phone conversation with her.

I need to send her a copy of my latest academic transcript (which states which courses I've taken and what grade I received) and a copy of my resume.

She's going to pass them along to their Waterloo and Montreal locations (with Seattle a lesser possibility), so I need to ensure my resume looks as good as I can get it.

If I do get to work at Google, I'll have to move, no matter which branch I'd work at.
This'll be rather interesting...

Part 5: DVDs recently acquired
Somehow my dad managed to find copies of all three released Animaniacs volumes in a dump bin for $12.50 each!
(ordinarily, they're around $40 each, and that's at the cheapest place I could find it at, too)

So far, I've watched the firs two disks from the first volume, and have thoroughly enjoyed it!
(I'm going to limit myself to one disk a day so I actually get other stuff done)