Major corporation contacted me this past monday while I was in Colorado (Helped
a friend move there!), and unfortunately they do not think they have a place
for me on their team.
On the 15th of January I had my first interview with the corporation, and
unfortunately I really think I didn't get hired because of that interview.
During the interview I was extremely nervous and was unable to calm my nerves
as I was unable to gauge the feelings of the guy on the other end of the phone.
The connection quality was extremely low and there was much static as such I
had to repeat much of what I said during the interview multiple times, and had
to ask for the interviewer to repeat the questions. During this same interview
I also completely blanked out and mixed up seven different programming
languages. Afterwards when I was able to think clearly again I realised how
easy the question was and implemented what the interviewer had asked for in
minutes.
The second interview came an hour later. This one went extremely well, best of
all the phone connection was perfect so I was able to understand the
interviewer and him me. He was interested in some of the projects I had worked
on in the past and was able to get me to loosen up and feel more at ease. The
programming questions he asked me were easy to implement and I did much better,
this time writing almost valid C++ programs without any significant issues. The
guy was much more easy going, and we even had a pretty good conversation over
email after the interview was over regarding the Near Space program I was a part of.
As mentioned before, I did not get the job. I was really looking forward to it
as it would provide some very unique and interesting challenges that I wouldn't
have been able to find at any other workplace. Great perks and benefits and I
would have been amongst some of the smartest people in the world. I'm
attempting to put it all behind me. I've been firing off my resume to all kinds
of different job opportunities. If you happen to know anyone that is hiring a
computer programmer/software engineer with experience in Unix based operating
systems and a big interest in hardware design (electronics) please contact me
using bertjw@regeer.org as my email address.
--
Before I went on vacation I decided to purchase a Flickr Pro account to upload
my staggering amount of pictures to the internet so that I could more easily
share with my friends and family. Please feel free to peruse my Flickr Photostream. I took
some pictures while I was on break in Hoboken from across the Hudson towards
New York, I personally find them to be absolutely fantastic, so please take a
look at my
pictures of New York during the day and night. I've always loved doing
night photography of cities and towns, but never really get the opportunity to
do so. These pictures were taken from the balcony in my dads apartment, which
is right on the river.
--
In closing I just wanted to link to the XKCD comic that was just published a
couple of hours ago: Spirit. Now, generally
XKCD's comics are funny, however this one just hit close to home as I have
always thought of the robots I have built as beings, as equals. The first
thought that came to mind was Fry's dog in Futurama. It is by far one of the
saddest scenes in Futurama invoking some very powerful emotions. Randall does a
good job in personifying Spirit in this cartoon! I really have to stop cutting
onions while browsing the web!