I’ve been interviewing for a bunch of jobs lately at places like Microsoft, Telus, and IBM. They’ve been more work then your typical interview as I need to make sure I’m ready for the technical questions that come up. I’m confident I know my stuff, but in the world of software there’s just always more to learn. I love it.

Hopefully I’ll find a company to call home in the not so distant future and won’t have to worry about job hunting come April.

*******************
As for my $100 NHL/NFL challenge, I lost my last bet. I must have missed something because I actually have an extra $20 in my account, maybe a bonus was released. Anyway, the current balance is $163.87.

Tonight I’m betting $20 on PIT Penguins to beat BOS Bruins (sorry Uncle Rob). I stand to win $40.10.

Go Pens Go!

This post is from Ryan Price’s blog.

Busy Times

Even though there was lots of things to do there, we opted for a relaxing weekend. The extent of my activities included the hot tubbing and tubing (and by tubing, I mean getting my ass handed to me by Alex as he demolished me on the water).

We flew back on Tuesday morning. Unfortunately we had another plane with no entertainment on it (exactly the same as the way out to Calgary). With WestJet advertising so much about their satellite TV you’d think more planes would be equipped with them.

We’re back into the swing of things at school now – its good to have roommates again! The first few days always involve standing in lines for outrageous amounts of time. I’m still in the process of working out what classes I can fit into my schedule and where. My first semester is pretty light right now so I want to add a couple more classes if possible.

We are officially registered for volleyball and softball so far. Ball hockey should be done soon. If you’re reading this and go to Western with me let me know if you want to play softball as we need more players (we’re good for volleyball though).

Thats it for now. This weekend should be fun – there’s a large get together happening at our friend Amy’s place on Friday which should be fun. Other then that I’m hoping to spend most of my time getting some more website work done.

This post is from Ryan Price’s blog.

Beginning of School Update

The Main Level:

My Room:

This post is from Ryan Price’s blog.

Silent Tour of the New House

Unfortunately we still had to set everything up. Last night I polished off setting up my room; its nice to be reasonably settled in now. Matt and Maggie also have their rooms mostly set up, although Maggie needs to move her bed back to St. Thomas because she got the job she applied for there.

Our place this year is much larger then the one I was in last year (I scored a walk-in closet in my room). I also upgraded to a nice double bed for the low price of $100 thanks to Craigslist. Don’t worry though – my leopard print theme is still going strong. In fact, Bev even managed to spot a leopard print shower curtain when we were out and about on Tuesday. I don’t have any pictures yet, but when I get a chance this weekend I’ll do another quick video so that you can see the place.

For my family back home, here are the ugly mugs of my roommates this year:
Maggie and Matt

Matt, Jeremy, Myself, and Chuck (Chuck isn’t living with us)

Since Jeremy is in Germany over the summer he sublet his room. We have a girl named Jenn staying over the summer. She just got out of first year (taking Health Science) and is nice and laid back, so she should be a good fit.

This post is from Ryan Price’s blog.

Lovin’ the New House

There’s been so much hoopla over the April Fool’s issue this year it makes me sick. First of all lets remember two things.

1. The Gazette is run by students. Most students have a sense of humour.
2. It was an April Fools edition. If you’re going to let one edition of the paper get away with something, its this one

Apparently there was a town hall meeting called over the issue, and it looks like they’re going to force some censorship on the paper.

What really turns my crank (yes, I used that expression) is the fact that its almost always these douche-bags in women’s studies or political science who feel the need to make a big deal out of nothing. Those of you who read The Gazette’s letter to the editor section on a regular basis will know what I’m talking about.

Here is a clip from the article that blows my mind.

“How much is spin and how much will change?” said Catherine Burr of King’s University College’s Department of Political Science.

“I didn’t hear anything about equity and the people they hurt.”

Although many spoke angrily of how the spoof issue damaged the university environment, others went further, insisting that the Gazette matter was symptomatic of the overall climate for women at the university.

“The Gazette represents what our society is doing,” said Anne Skoczylas of the Department of History.

Many speakers described how the article was only the latest in a long history of objectionable Gazette articles, saying the paper has been out of touch with students and does not reflect attitudes on campus.

Symptomatic of the overall climate for women at the university? I’m not sure what university they’re speaking of, but its certainly not the one I’m familiar with. Perhaps this type of person thrives on the thrill of protesting similar to Lindsay from Arrested Development. I don’t really know.

Out of touch with students and does not reflect attitudes on campus? I wonder if these people have any basis for this or if they’re just bored and need more to complain about.

Our student paper, from my experience, is one of the most frequently read by the student body compared to other universities. I read it because its entertaining and the serious articles are usually informative and useful (sounds pretty out-of-touch to me…). There’s been several events taking place on campus I would’ve never known about if I wasn’t reading The Gazette (things such as tax help, career/job fairs, etc). Not everyone walks through the UCC on a daily basis, so knowing about these things ahead of time is useful.

Similar to large businesses it is often the small percentage of unhappy clients that are much more vocal than the large percentage of happy ones. Hopefully Davenport and Dolan (presidents of UWO and the USC respectively) will realize this so we can go on enjoying the humour that is The Gazette.

This post is from Ryan Price’s blog.

Unclench Your Assholes

I got home, downloaded Limewire, and started going through the slides getting all the songs that he quoted in there. I got through about half of them but then had to stop. It was about 11:30 and Chuck shows up at my place, and by show up I mean stomps down the stairs, falls into the door and then proceeds to knock very slowly. I get up out of my amazingly comfortable lazy boy and open the door.

He comes in, takes off his shoes and begins to try to tell me something. He’s so cold and tired (apparently he ran from Barking Frog to my place) that he only spoke in one-word sentences. “Cold” “Kicked out” “Barking Frog” “Alex’s friend” “too drunk”. It was funny.

“Have you been drinking?” I ask Chuck

“No!” he replies, obviously insulted by the question but at the same time reeking of booze. “I also don’t smoke!”.

“Chuck, were you smoking tonight too?” I asked after he gave up the information out of nowhere.

“Don’t tell my parents… they don’t think I do either!” he says half-laughing and half-concerned. Then he mumbles something about how I never realized he had a Hello Kitty bedspread. I informed him that I don’t spend much time looking at my roommate’s linens. On top of that, why does any man have a Hello Kitty bedspread?

At this point I ask where Alex and his friends went. An innocent question I thought.

“I have rights to this place!” Chuck angrily informs me as if I had intentions of kicking him out. After feeling better about asserting his rights to our place he gets up off the couch and marches toward his old room. I thought he was going to stake claim to his room to emphasize the point that he “still has rights to this place”. That was until he turned and went into the bathroom. He then threw up quickly and came back out.

“Feel better?” I asked.

“I didn’t throw up” he stated, clearly lying.

“Uh-huh” I said.

“I still have rights to this place! I pay rent!” he exclaims out of nowhere. “I have rights to this couch!” Again, I assure him that I have no intentions of sending him out into the cold.

At this point I give Alex a call to find out where he is so Chuck can have a bed to sleep on. He picks up, and proceeds to tell me the same story I heard from Chuck not 3 minutes earlier. He then tells me that they’re at The Keg and that we should come immediately. I told him I wasn’t coming out but that I’d pass the message onto Chuck.

So after hanging up I tell Chuck where they are. Naturally, he doesn’t believe me for a second. I give him my phone and he calls Alex back. I put it on speaker before giving it to him so I could hear Alex’s side of the conversation too. Alex was reasonably sober at this point.

Alex tells Chuck to come to The Keg. Chuck makes Alex promise that if he runs there that they have to be there. Not a problem, they’re just about to order. Chuck then makes Alex promise again, and he does. This cycle continues like seven more times until Alex gets frustrated and I take the phone from Chuck. The conversation ends with Alex telling us that he’s just ordered both of us a steak and that we need to come to The Keg immediately.

I hang up and assure Chuck that Alex is at The Keg and that if he goes Alex will be there. After informing me again that he has rights to our place I finally convince Chuck that Alex and his buddies will be there. As Chuck is getting ready to leave, I get a call from Alex.

“Yo, you guys coming or what?” he asks.

“Chuck is on his way, but I’m heading to bed” I said. At this point I was pretty confident that Alex was just saying he ordered steaks to get us there.

“You need to come too, I ordered you guys steaks!” he says. I’m still not convinced, but I agreed to meet them there for a bit. This also put Chuck’s mind at ease that I wasn’t going to lock him out of the place that “he had rights to” in case Alex wasn’t really there.

So its now just before midnight and I’m suiting up to hike through the cold with Chuck to go meet Alex and his buddies at The Keg. On the way there Chuck points out various spots including where he stood in the cold waiting for the bouncer to bring him his jacket after they got kicked out. He tells me that while he waited he talked to a cop that told him he was going to freeze if he waited much longer. Chuck then informed the cop how manly he was and that his jacket was on the way.

It was a female bouncer grabbing his jacket. Chuck said that “she’s scary, but I’d do her”. I ask why she’s scary. He tells me that its because she’s trained to kick ass, but at the same time he’s also pretty confident he could take her. He then reassures me about how violent he can be when he drinks and reiterates that he’d do the bouncer even though she’s scary.

We cross the street around where Taster’s Burger/Tim Horton’s is and for some reason Chuck feels the need to run the rest of the way. In his excitement he completely over-shoots where The Keg is and almost runs right into Molly Bloom’s. I could’ve stopped him but it was too funny and I wanted to see how far he’d run before realizing he missed the turn.

Once we got into the Keg we joined Alex’s buddies Matt and Ryan. Ryan was exhausted from the drive (they came from Winnipeg) and Matt was doing everything he could to not pass out from too much boozing. It turned out Alex really did order us steaks, along with a bottle of champagne for the table – what a classy guy.

We ate the delicious steaks while trying to keep Matt from breaking things on the table. After chatting and laughing for a bit they all headed back to Alex and Chuck’s place to get there in time for the booty call Alex got while we were eating.

I hiked home and went to bed. It was certainly a more exciting night then I had planned for myself. Way to go Drunkleberry Finn

This post is from Ryan Price’s blog.

Drunkleberry Finn

The exam went fairly well in my mind. Either that or terribly wrong and something went completely over my head, as I was the first one out. Hopefully everyone else felt pretty good about it too. Let’s hope my last two go that well too.

I’m finally fully set-up at work with all the access I need to maintain the RD&S website. I had an especially good day yesterday, as I found out it was the company Christmas party that day.

We got to leave work at 2:00 and went to Palasad for wings, nachos, beer, and pool. My kind of Christmas party.

I also got myself all set-up with dual-monitors at work. It’s pretty nice having that kind of set-up and there’s really nothing to it. I’ll likely be addicted to them shortly and not able to live without them the next time I buy myself a PC.

If you have an extra monitor laying around, then I highly recommend setting yourself up in a similar fashion.

This post is from Ryan Price’s blog.

Exam Time

Matt’s House and Car before any work is done

The “secret tunnel” to Matt’s car.

Almost there, now to just un-bury the car…

Yep, those are cars

Well, you get the point. Ya Snow Day!

This post is from Ryan Price’s blog.

Snowstorm

Today we had another ball hockey game at the campus outdoor arena pond. It was wet. Very wet. Very very wet. Lets hope that it gets dry enough for a decent game Wednesday night.

I’ve just finished my three assignments due tomorrow. Two of them I got done today. Typical me you say? Well, they were both done before 11:00 at night so no, its not. I’ve been a little better this year (for the most part).

One of them was a 33-page group assignment that we were actually ahead of the game on. We’re creating a software program for CHRW (the campus radio station) that will automate many of the DJ and music director’s tasks as well as provide users with a “What’s Playing Now” line on the site. Users will also be able to generate charts for the week/month/etc on their favourite type of music so they can see what’s popular. All that had to be done this weekend was piece together the individual parts into the whole document and ensure everything was co-ordinated.

Tuesday I have my first mid-term, and the rest of the week is just as busy. I should get back to studying for it.

Until next time, stay fit and have fun.

This post is from Ryan Price’s blog.

So far, So good

Second semester has started up at Western, and its keeping me fairly busy. First semester went reasonably well with the exception of my circuits class, which I successfully bombed.

Enough about school though. Our last 26er party was a huge success and so we inevitably decided to go bigger and better. If you haven’t heard, and I seriously don’t know how that could’ve happened – we’re having another bash this Saturday (Jan 21).

TROPICAL TIKI BIKINI BLENDER BENDER
Jan 21st – 247 Trott Drive – Dress Tropical

Oh ya. As usual, everyone is expected to bring a 26er. If you’re not sure what to bring, get in touch with me and I’ll let ya know what we’re after. See ya there.

This post is from Ryan Price’s blog.

An Update