Potstickers

So Kristen asks me today what I want from the grocery store. And I think of two things.

Potstickers

AND

Sushi



I currently feel like my insides are eating themselves. Ever crave something so bad your entire body wants it? No? Nobody cares.

This is how I feel about these items:

That's all I really have to say. Back to fixing SCCM.

Flavored Crap

So I'm a big guy and I require lots of liquid nourishment. I usually drink a substantial amount of water every day, just for health's sake (plus I work out a substantial amount). I need to stay hydrated for my intense workout sessions with my brother - who usually kicks my trash with his godlike endurance. Just the other day as we were returning home from one of our nightly body thrashing sessions I was unusually dehydrated. We decided to stop by Kroger - as we usually do- on the way home to purchase a few items of food. While we are walking around Kroger my thirst pains me. I think to myself

"I'm going to die"
"Not really...this watermelon looks good"
"Maybe I really am going to die, I can't swallow...there's no saliva"
"Oh look, some tomato and fresh mozzarella salad, yummy"

As we leave for home, I realize that I forgot to purchase anything flavorful to drink. And YES I know that I need to drink water but honestly I want something with some flavor. I want juice.

Now normally we are, at the R household, avid juice consumers. We like our flavor and our sugar and we're proud of it. I assumed that we, being the avid juice consumers we are, will have some sugary concoction to consume at our chambers. I was only partially correct.

I arrive home and peer into the fridge like a bear rummaging through someone's trash

This is me feeding.

I am about to devour what we have left in our usual juice vessel when I taste the most horrible taste in my life. I am perplexed as to whom could have made such a horrible tasting mixture, and, like the bear, I begin to search for the source. And I find it.

THE MOST HORRIBLE TASTING SUBSTANCE ON THE PLANET

And our pantry is full of it! Normally we buy the nectar of the Gods, namely Welch's frozen juice concentrate.

Nectar of the Gods

But, for some reason, we have abandoned reason for madness. Hope for hopelessness. Joy and happiness for pain and agony. I think you get the picture. Let me give you an argument against Crystal Light, other than the given fact that it tastes somewhere in between crack cocaine and baking powder.

Phenylalanine and Aspartame - The miracle sweetener. In our quest to become thin, we have invented things to "sweeten" our beverages that contain little to no caloric value. A little Google search for Phenylalanine yielded me THIS website, which lists 92 different side effects of the miracle sweetener.

You can have it! I'll take the extra calories, at least my fruity beverage won't taste like poop and kill me at the same time.

The job interview

So I work in the IT field. I'm what, what we would call, a "Junior Systems Engineer". I'm going to translate that as "I know what I'm doing - sort of". I don't paint myself to be any better than that to the world because it sure would be scary as hell to be put in front of something I've never worked with in my entire life - or even worse - be expected to then tell that server to do something.

But I'm not an idiot either.

I learn very quickly, given the opportunity. I love a challenge and I love complex heterogeneous environments. I build Windows servers on virtual machines on a monthly basis. I play with VMWare and SCCM when I'm bored. I build installer packages from AdminStudio just for the hell of it. I read slashdot, wired, packetstorm, and sans on a daily basis. I love IT - it's my life and my passion. I'm TIRED of desktop technician jobs and although they bring in money to eat they are way too easy; and if you think I whine too much as it already is try getting me on a day where Sally can't open her email because she deleted the icon to Outlook.

I've recently been in a string of contract jobs where i'm extremely undervalued. It's a lot of "plug this in" and "install this" on some PC. It's a lot of "reimage this PC" and "jump through this hoop" and "do this completely pointless task so you'll look busy for hours on end". Most of the time I'd just get on facebook and slashdot and watch the flamewars on YRO and then go eat something from the cafeteria. It wasn't horrible, but I was always envious of the server team or the network team beacuse they were doing the jobs I know I could do (given the chance). I think what killed me the most was that everyone I worked with on the Desktop team was happy with what they did. I hate to say it, but for most of them, it was the limit of their mental capacities and efforts. They didn't love what they did, most of them just fell into their positions from other jobs a long time ago. To them, it was just a job.

So as the contract ended I began to look for another job. I'm getting married soon and I'd like to make some extra money before I start school again. I look around on Craigslist, dice, monster - and find close to nothing. This economy makes me want to choke a cubscout. I apply to a few positions, most of those positions being a little above my qualifications but I don't try to hide that fact.

So a day later I get a phone call from IDR Resources asking me to come in for an interview for a "Network Engineer" position. They listed some pretty basic reqirements for the position (with networking experience, oddly enough, not being one of the requirements). I fit all of the requirements except for two: I don't have any real life Server 2008 experience and I don't have any VMWare ESX server experience. I don't tell them I do and my resume doesn't say I have any. They have a phone interview with me and talk to me about the position a little and ask me about my experience and go over my resume. They ask me to come in.

I think, great! I'm going in for an interview and I have a chance at landing this job!

I think I forgot I was nobody.

I went in to their office over off of Elm Hill Pk. where every other IT recruiting office on the planet is to meet my new IT overlords. I wear a nice shirt and tie and my best slacks. I walk into the office and it looks like every other freaking IT recruiters office I have ever stepped into with your standard cliche wall plaques like:

Our mission is to blah blah blah be the best
Our goal is to blah blah who cares be the best
Our whatever blah blah blah we are no different than anybody else

Then I tell the receptionist, who looks like she hates her job just as much as I hated my last job and I tell her I'm there to see (name redacted).

He comes out and he's NO OLDER THAN I AM. I think to myself "who is this tool" and "how is this fool going to judge me and my knowledge" while I quietly shake his hand and introduce myself. At this point I'm going to admit a mistake - I didn't fill out one secion on their "IDR Resources application" because it asked for information that was already on my resume. It wanted job history and references - which I conveinently include on my resume so I don't have to effing regurgitate it every time I apply for a job. He then tells me I have to regurgitate this information for him by hand and that he will be back when I've completed this waste of my time.

He returns shortly and I'm not completely done with my copypasta when he sits down and asks me the same questions he asks me on the phone. "Do you have any experience with Server 2008?" and "How well do you know VMWare ESX?" I tell him I don't have any experience, which I TOLD HIM THE DAY BEFORE AND IS CLEARLY MISSING FROM MY RESUME. This giant Douche then tells me that his manager told him that they NEED somebody with skill in Server 2008 (which isn't much different that server 2003, if you know what the crap you're talking about) says they probably aren't going to get me the job.

I wanted to shoot this guy in the face. I drive 30 mintues across town, wake up early, prepare for an interview, and then I'm given 5 minutes with a guy who knows NOTHING about IT and what its demands who tells me that I don't have what it takes to perform on the job. I want to tell the pretty boy to go back to MBA where he came from and let me talk to the guy who knows what the hell they're talking about. I want to talk to their client and tell them I'll work my ass off for them. I want to sceam this at the world. I want to tell the world that I have what it takes and to give me a chance and I'm DEFEATED by the 24 year old college graduate that gets paid 30,000 a year to recruit IT people when he knows nothing about the field.

I leave and go see Kristen. I'm happy again. I remember that I'm nothing special and I feel comforted.

Intro...

Why do people write blogs? I think most of my attempts to write anything meaningful, or even useless (maybe they're one in the same), have been pathetic at best. I spent some time contemplating the reason why that is and I've come to one conclusion:

Nobody really cares about what I think.

I'm just an average middle class what guy. I have to work just as hard for what I want in this world and have to deal with the same crap everybody else does and it sometimes this realization pisses me off. Granted, I've been given a lot - and lets not take this mindful ranting to be some failure to recognize the good things I have in my life - but I find still that some things piss me off and this is my place to do it. Don't like it? That's why they gave you one of these (I think you know how to use it):



I want my "blog" to mean something to me. I want it to express what I feel and how I see the world - no matter how ridiculous that may be. I don't care if you read this and you become offended. I write what I feel, not what I think I should feel. What I feel may not be appropriate, deal with it. I have to.

I'm going to whine, complain, exclaim, proclaim, and RANT MY TAIL OFF. And I'm going to be the only one reading it.