In which BPN returns to the land of the living (at least for now)
When I was a kid we had a Peanuts coffee-table anthology that I enjoyed reading, even when I didn't always get the jokes. I distinctly remember one story line where, after going crazy for a week trying to find an overdue library book, Charlie Brown finds it in the refrigerator. He goes off celebrating down the hall, prompting Schroder to remark, "There's nothing quite like the feeling of being let off the hook."
I know exactly how he feels.
About two weeks ago I was this close (holds his index finger and thumb about a millimeter apart) to having to make some extremely unpleasant choices stemming from my prolonged inability to find a job. That day I got an email from a recruiter in Florida. Usually I ignore those because many of them seem to think I live somewhere near the Washington on the east coast, or that I'd be interested in leaving Seattle to go work a three-month contract doing Java development in South Carolina (wrong, wrong and wrong), or some such thing, but this guy worked for a company I'd had an excellent contracting experience with before, and the job description sounded like something I both could handle and enjoy, so I pinged him back and asked him to tell me more.
After a brief phone conversation, on Monday he sent me a link to a questionnaire designed to assess my skill with computer concepts in general and Linux in particular. He said there'd be about 30 questions and it'd take a couple of hours. OK, I enjoy doing that sort of thing, so I started and answered the first question . . . and the next . . . and the next . . . and the questions just kept coming and coming, and for the most part I kept answering them and kept answering them. Four hours later I had provided answers to 55 of 59 questions, everything from "How do you list the files and folders in the current directory, including hidden ones?" (very easy) to "Have you ever compiled your own Linux kernel? What are the steps to do so? Why would you do it?" (moderately technical). I sent the questionnaire off and went back to job hunting.
This was on Monday afternoon. That evening the recruiter called me, told me the client had been impressed both with my answers and the way I answered them (conversational yet in some depth, and indicating I had had experience with the topics rather than just reading about them), and wanted to know if I could meet him for a face-to-face interview the next day.
Ummmm . . . yeah.
So my daughter drove me to Redmond and hung out at the library there while I met with the client. We hit it off well and the next day I had a job offer. I just finished my first week of work, and I am very, very happy.
Want to know how happy I am? A couple of weeks ago the good people at VCon invited me to be a panelist this year. I'm glad they did, because for a couple of years I've had to decline for budgetary reasons (couldn't afford to go) and I was afraid they'd think I'd gafiated or was mad at them and wouldn't invite me back. So since I was still unemployed at the time, I told them I'd be glad to attend if I could afford to, and would know more as we approached October.
I just reserved a hotel room for VCon. That's how happy I am.
I am so happy to look forward to leaving the SNAP benefits (food stamps) behind for others who will need them more than I will.
I am so happy that I'll be able to spend $10 to buy a fellow filker's CD. Actually, I'm happy I can consider paying $10 to buy a CD without worrying about whether I should keep that money for bus fare.
But above all I am happy that finally someone, somewhere, has decided my skills and experience are valuable and has said so, both monetarily and verbally. I am happy that I'm not being forced into retirement with no assets to speak of, because I know what lies at the end of that road, and I'm not ready for that yet.
Did I mention I work less than five minutes away from a Coldstone Creamery? (Yeah, I know, I have no business stopping there very often, either calorie-wise or money-wise. But when my first paycheck comes, I'm gonna splurge just a little. Maybe a milk shake.)
Did I mention that I wrote a new song not long ago? It's only a first draft and needs major revision, but it's the first one in over six months.
Did I mention that my lead told me I was doing well so far and I wowed him with a script I wrote that did an inventory of some of the systems we monitor? That might be the best part of all.
OK, enough of that. I'm going to bed with a smile on my face.
This entry was originally posted at http://banjoplayinnerd.dreamwidth.org/23090.html. Please comment there using OpenID.
I know exactly how he feels.
About two weeks ago I was this close (holds his index finger and thumb about a millimeter apart) to having to make some extremely unpleasant choices stemming from my prolonged inability to find a job. That day I got an email from a recruiter in Florida. Usually I ignore those because many of them seem to think I live somewhere near the Washington on the east coast, or that I'd be interested in leaving Seattle to go work a three-month contract doing Java development in South Carolina (wrong, wrong and wrong), or some such thing, but this guy worked for a company I'd had an excellent contracting experience with before, and the job description sounded like something I both could handle and enjoy, so I pinged him back and asked him to tell me more.
After a brief phone conversation, on Monday he sent me a link to a questionnaire designed to assess my skill with computer concepts in general and Linux in particular. He said there'd be about 30 questions and it'd take a couple of hours. OK, I enjoy doing that sort of thing, so I started and answered the first question . . . and the next . . . and the next . . . and the questions just kept coming and coming, and for the most part I kept answering them and kept answering them. Four hours later I had provided answers to 55 of 59 questions, everything from "How do you list the files and folders in the current directory, including hidden ones?" (very easy) to "Have you ever compiled your own Linux kernel? What are the steps to do so? Why would you do it?" (moderately technical). I sent the questionnaire off and went back to job hunting.
This was on Monday afternoon. That evening the recruiter called me, told me the client had been impressed both with my answers and the way I answered them (conversational yet in some depth, and indicating I had had experience with the topics rather than just reading about them), and wanted to know if I could meet him for a face-to-face interview the next day.
Ummmm . . . yeah.
So my daughter drove me to Redmond and hung out at the library there while I met with the client. We hit it off well and the next day I had a job offer. I just finished my first week of work, and I am very, very happy.
Want to know how happy I am? A couple of weeks ago the good people at VCon invited me to be a panelist this year. I'm glad they did, because for a couple of years I've had to decline for budgetary reasons (couldn't afford to go) and I was afraid they'd think I'd gafiated or was mad at them and wouldn't invite me back. So since I was still unemployed at the time, I told them I'd be glad to attend if I could afford to, and would know more as we approached October.
I just reserved a hotel room for VCon. That's how happy I am.
I am so happy to look forward to leaving the SNAP benefits (food stamps) behind for others who will need them more than I will.
I am so happy that I'll be able to spend $10 to buy a fellow filker's CD. Actually, I'm happy I can consider paying $10 to buy a CD without worrying about whether I should keep that money for bus fare.
But above all I am happy that finally someone, somewhere, has decided my skills and experience are valuable and has said so, both monetarily and verbally. I am happy that I'm not being forced into retirement with no assets to speak of, because I know what lies at the end of that road, and I'm not ready for that yet.
Did I mention I work less than five minutes away from a Coldstone Creamery? (Yeah, I know, I have no business stopping there very often, either calorie-wise or money-wise. But when my first paycheck comes, I'm gonna splurge just a little. Maybe a milk shake.)
Did I mention that I wrote a new song not long ago? It's only a first draft and needs major revision, but it's the first one in over six months.
Did I mention that my lead told me I was doing well so far and I wowed him with a script I wrote that did an inventory of some of the systems we monitor? That might be the best part of all.
OK, enough of that. I'm going to bed with a smile on my face.
This entry was originally posted at http://banjoplayinnerd.dreamwidth.org/23090.html. Please comment there using OpenID.