Frustrated.tv

Okay, so I’m a couple o days behind schedule.  Not like I’m getting paid to keep track of what day it is right now…

So – Happy Caturday!

So yesterday wifey and I took off to go a see a movie! Novel concept eh? Married people getting out and having fun (lolz).

Daughter loves it when we go out cuz she gets the house to herself. No Mom/Dad to bug her, nag her and to make sure she does her homeschooling work. We love it cuz we don’t have any kids to bug/nag and we don’t have to worry about her getting her work done – she always does by the time we get back.

Went to see From Paris With Love.  Wifey’s a big Johnny fan (no, not Travolta, the OTHER Johnny in the movie (think Tudors)) and I just like hanging out with her.   The movie was in no danger of being an oscar nominee, but neither was it in any way a bad movie.  Good action, clean plot with only a minor twist, the odd thing blowing up, people getting shot, car chases and absolutely no “it was all just a dream” ending.  (I hate those types of movies).   And after a mere 1hr32mins my arse wasn’t asleep in the chair.

Bonus – $10.00 for both of us to get in.  Though it’s hardly $2.00 Tuesdays like we had in the olden days (lol), it still beats $13.50 a ticket full fare.

Ahh the joys of self(un)employment.

Cheers and Happy Hump Day

Not quite the same when you’re in between contracts, but I still hates them.  I still can’t sleep in..unless I go to bed a 4:00am, then I sleep til 10:00. Ooooo.

So the teachers Union have given their strike edict and now nobody knows what’s going on.  My professor had no clue if part time/evening courses were even going to be affected…guess I’ll wait and find out tomorrow.  Not like the school is communicating to the students…

I hate Mondays

On a positive note, Monday 9:30 and I have 2 interviews lined up this week already.  No word on last week’s.  One was a complete waste of time and the other I kinda hope I get, and kinda hope not.  Perm position with benefits and vacation that allows me to do at least some work from home…but the pay is nothing like consultant pay.

Ahhhh…Mondays.

I Don't Like Mondays

Hope y’all have a good week.

Friday indeed.  Even when yer lookin for work its nice to make it to Friday.

Interview in 2 hours and its going down to -19° today.  Wheee!

The Official Canadian Temperature  Conversion Chart

50: Fahrenheit (100C)
Californians shiver uncontrollably.
Canadians plant gardens.

35: Fahrenheit (1.60C)
Italian cars won’t start.
Canadians drive with the windows down.

32: Fahrenheit (00C)
American water freezes.
Canadian water gets thicker.

0: Fahrenheit (-17.90C)
New York City landlords finally turn on the heat.
Canadians have the last cookout of the season.

-60: Fahrenheit (-510C)
Mt. St. Helens freezes.
Canadian Girl Guides sell cookies door-to-door.

-100: Fahrenheit (-730C)
Santa Claus abandons the North Pole.
Canadians pull down their ear flaps.

-173: Fahrenheit (-1140C)
Ethyl alcohol freezes.
Canadians get frustrated when they can’t thaw the keg.

-460: Fahrenheit (-2730C)
Absolute zero; all atomic motion stops.
Canadians start saying “Cold eh?”

-500: Fahrenheit (-2950C)
Hell freezes over.
The TorontoMaple Leafs win the Stanley Cup.

You can form your own opinions.  Mine say “Shoot them all.”

Cick on the image below….

Bahahahahahha.  Gotta love politicians from other countries covering their asses as much as ours do….

The_Front_Fell_Off1

Happy Hump Day!

Ahhh…the government matrix.

Dunno what other countries/provinces/cities are like, but here if you want to consult with or work for the federal or provincial, and in many times private  sectors you need to fill out a matrix.   What is a matrix?   To quote one of the recruiters I work with “They are the tools of the devil”.

Basically a set of mandatory and desireable skills/experience the client is looking for.  You know, that stuff they put in the job description when they post it.  Well now – mostly because organizations cant afford an HR person who actually does hiring.  That’s mostly because HR people now know very little about the company for which they work.  As a result, they couldn’t tell the CEO if the person being hired was qualified.  Nor could they read a CV and tell the difference between Oracle and SQL database experience, let alone tell you what a “squirly database” was (an HR director at my last job uttered those famous words)…thus, the birth of the matrix.

The matrix has user-friendly instructions:

• Number each project in your resume in descending order (ie Project 20 being the most recent.) – HR people can’t count apparently…nor can the hiring managers…
• In the matrix, provide the project number, organization, your position, start date and end date and the cross-reference to the page in your resume where that project appears – heaven forbid they actually read your resume and learn a bit about you..if they could ask for digital numbered tabs that read the referenced entry for them they would.  These tabs which would then have to be attached the the page at the paragraph and the exact line referenced and read to them the entry in dulcet tones.
• Your resume must address everything that the question asks - this means that if the job requirement states “Must have experience digifying knobulators in unyielding conditions”, those words have to appear in your resume in exactly that order.
• Please tailor your resume to best represent your skills for this requirement. – you need to TELL people this?!
• Experience gained during formal education is not to be considered work experience. – So even though you managed the university network while taking computer science, that doesn’t count as actual “experience”.  That was just a waste of time.And they wonder why the university educated can’t get jobs that require experience….

The matrix also has hundreds of little boxes like these that you have to fill out with the following directions above each box

Please provide bullets below describing your >ten (10) + years experience working in the IT field and in a LAN/WAN environment<. Please be sure to use these words and ADD to the description with an explanation.  Please in order to make the evaluation process a bit easier, copy the bullets you place below for substantiation to your CV and please place the criteria number ie. {XX} in bold/brackets BEFORE the bullet describing how you meet the criteria.

So…basically you start yourself off with a blank resume, add job titles and years experience based on what the job needs, copy and paste descriptive text from the matrix into the resume and vice versa and tada!!  You’re done…and you have a document that describes absolutely nothing you’ve done for the past 22 years.  But at least it meets the client requirements and then you have the remotest possibility of actually getting an interview…..where you can tell them what you actually did…..because this document is never seen again once the hiring process starts (shaking head slowly).

Welcome to the world of contracting in Ontario you say?  No…this one’s for a permanent position.  Now you can’t escape it no matter what you’re applying for.  I’m certain MacDonalds will adopt one soon.

Oh – here’s your chuckle for today.   Mostly cuz I can’t imagine PMSing and filling one of these out…

Happy Tuesday!

Well, it is for us unemployed.

Between contracts right now so here’s this week’s Internet Find.   Odee is a great site for inane objects of interest (and confusion, and sometimes disgust) that proliferate this great society of ours.

I’m a geek.  Likely have been since I was 11, but that’s debatable.   This is my favorite one of the above finds

Do you know how many times I get asked?

My second favorite is

if you don't know what a dbAdmin is, you won't get this

But that just REALLY proves who much of a geek I am.

Speaking of which, back to job hunting.   Interview for a contract on Wednesday so far….and got called about a potential permanent  position today.  So do I go with more money each month with definite vacations, or less money and a paycheque every 2 weeks – and my daughter’s braces covered by benefits..