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March 14, 2008

The conversation somebody had with me...

...or rather, AT ME, today. Now, bear in mind this all happened without me saying a single word, I was just sitting at a table at my desk while my trainees were at break: Nor did I say a single word during the conversation:

"Hey, heard you and Andrew are a couple. Hope it works, how did you meet? Was it the internet or do you club? I've always wanted to go to a club, but I never know what to wear. Nudists have it so easy. Well, talk to you later."

I am still not quite sure what say. They didn't even let me answer the questions... they just kept talking instead of leaving dead air for me to answer... It's more like they had this cryptic series of sentences they felt needed conveyed to me.

I think this may be a flaw in my hiring philosophy which was, until this point, that you should ask a job candidate just 1 question. "Are you willing to take a bullet for this company?"

If they reply "Yes" you don't want them because they are clearly psychotic and would no doubt raise health insurance costs.

If they answer "No" then you also don't want them because they are not likely to be dedicated.

If they answer "Maybe, let's talk about the benefit package." That's your candidate right there! They are willing to be dedicated but only if it pays well and comes with some sort of branded frisbee expounding the benefits of the 401K plan. That my friends, is a manager's dream.

However, the side affect may be that they are prone to a random outburst of psychotic side chat. That's really not too bad a drawback though so I still say, you could save time and effort and get better results from your hirings with this one simple question: "Are you willing to take a bullet for this company?" God, I should be paid for these brilliant ideas.

Posted by Decemberice at 06:29 PM | Comments (1)

March 06, 2008

And to think...

... I almost wasted $300 last night.

So, I have to admit that I have been working a lot of hours lately. I'm not so proud to admit that I've put in almost 50 hours this week and it's only WED. Last night, I got so tired of working insane hours that I decided I need to be able to do some of this work from the comfort of my room. My company has issued me a laptop to lug around but I don't really want to go through the whole ordeal necessary to sign into our secure network each night when I get home. Then it struck me that most of my job revolves around responding to emails. If I just glance at my inbox from time to time I would probably avoid needing to sign in at all.

Sadly my iPhone doesn't do Microsoft Exchange without the same secure network login process, and even then I have to use web-based email. If you've ever used Exchange web access, you know my pain in that.

I was all geared up to actually drop my iPhone in favor of a Blackberry or WinMobile device last night, the only thing that stopped me was that I had a bad headache when I planned on going so I didn't.

Imagine my surprise when I am catching up on Engadget on my lunch and find that Apple is adding Corp Exchange Push Mail support to iPhone in June. I can handle the wait as long as I now know that it's in the works.

Exchange and Activesync support were the only 2 things holding up the show for me. I love everything else about my iPhone (well maybe I'm not so much a fan of the limited capacity of 8GBs but it's not horrible. So that's that. The iPhone is now the perfect mobile device. I can work, I can surf, I can rock out. What more is there to ask for from a phone?

I also heard tale that Apple was adding support so that 3rd party developers could make software that runs on the iPhone and you can buy and install it directly from the iPhone itself. This is common in WinMo phones and Palms but the iPhone had been so locked down that if it wasn't available in iTunes you pretty much couldn't have it. I'm glad to see Apple trend away from that. That being said... it's not necessarily unlocked. Looks like they are limiting developers and taking a hefty chunk of the profit if the developers decide to charge for their product, but at least we iPhone users will now be able to enjoy something other than what Apple decides we want.

Posted by Decemberice at 09:31 PM | Comments (2)

March 02, 2008

No Iran for me...

...at least for now.

So many of my friends made me promise not to go to Iran with an Irish college to protest the genocide of homosexual people. They said that not only would I be dead as an American, but to take on an additional cause that everybody in the region despises I would be double-dead. While I contimplated what double-dead might mean, I thought that perhaps I would be of more use alive than dead. But nobody said anything about not going to Bahrain.

I mean, after all, they took Michael Jackson in after not one, but two of his court extravaganzas. So, I've been wondering what my options are for setting up an amnesty asylum in Bahrain for refugees of homosexual murder. Obviously I'm years away from anything like that. First off, I'm pretty much alone in my cause since everybody seems to ignore the plight of gays in the middle east. Maybe since certain middle eastern areas are such hell holes to begin with, just surviving is a priority. Beyond that people are probably on a quest for things like water, housing, stable government... well, that's understandable. All of these things have to come before there are human to take advantage of human rights... I just think that Iran, having all of those things, is about due to consider the way they are slaughtering people, young and old just for being different.

From Islam, a belief system that, believe it or not, it built around a peaceful way of life- this is pretty much contradictory.

For everybody else in the boat who doesn't get the connection between religion and state, the UAE and surrounding areas are not run by political parties they are run by religious groups that represent through political parties. As opposed to Republican or Democrat, the region would have Sunni or Shia representation through various parties.

Depending on your perspective, the separation of church and state in America (though it often blurs) is the best or worst thing to happen to our government. I tend to believe it's made us stronger as we have to look at plight or need with unbiased eyes. At any rate, I'd love to see a foreign body make a religiously powered state work. Bahrain is coming close to putting human rights at the forefront without compromising their belief system. Women have the right to vote, many different religions are represented, there are distinct classes void of prefisposed caste systems... Maybe the successes there will influence much of the Middle East. Then again, it is widely believed that Bahrain is the site of the biblical Garden of Eden, which would make their folks a bit infamous for hungering for that forbidden fruit... perhaps that is represented through their more liberal government and belief system.

Oh, and it should be noted that yes, I would sure as hell go see Michael perform. I don't care what he's been accused of, the man is still the freakin' Prince of Pop. You all can't tell me that you don't still think his earlier stuff is all that.

Posted by Decemberice at 07:08 PM | Comments (1)