UltraCrepidate

There's a new phenomenon emerging as the use of online journals become more and more widespread. It is great and convenient to record the great events of your life for your friends while attracting new people with similar interests.

At the same time it creates an easy access to details that you normally don't have access to. So a stranger may show up one day knowing more about you than your best friend. It is also the perfect breeding ground for stalkers.

A stalker is often created after you deny someone of something. Most often “love” will create such stalker. I believe that repetitive exposure to certain thing will make that certain thing important to the person. Just like saying “shit” all the time will just make that habit even worse as time goes on, until one day you realize that you can't get it out of your vocabulary. This type of behavior, the feedback loop, exists everywhere in nature. Once you've reached a tipping point it is hard to turn back unless you encounter a similarly strong force. Take the island of Micronesia for example. This island started out peaceful and value harmony higher than anything else, yet they have a suicide rate of 0.25% amongst their youths, twice as high as that of the states. It all started with a romantic story where 2 youth committed suicide in a noble act. That one initial action made the rest more susceptible to the same act until it is committed often enough that it became acceptable as a form of solving problems.

Let’s get back to the topic of online journal creating stalkers. Say the person is denied this access to you, but knows that you have a journal online. It's as easy as 1 click for that person to access your most intimate thoughts. Once that act is committed, it takes a person of iron grip on their own emotions to stop repeating something as easy as 1 click of the mouse, especially when that action is driven by the 2 most fundamental emotions of human nature: love and jealousy.

All is fine and dandy until that 1 click becomes 1 every week, then 1 every day until you constantly click on it as a reflex when you are online.

I've come to the conclusion that things become important to a person emotionally not because it has great value or because it's wonderful. They are important because of how much time and exposure the person has to it. For a more conscious way of living, it is important for us to do a complete and thorough examination of value and decide at initial contact to have more or less exposure.

Matrox called and made an offer. I accepted and partied with my roomates on a silly Monday night. I have a grin on my face that is embarrassingly obvious and no matter how hard I try I can’t hide if it means the death of me.

Wow.

3 years I’ve been trying to get into the field of engineering in Canada. I started out with cold calls to engineering companies to get past the secretary, get past the admin assistant and talk to some managers. That was fun for a while until I got nowhere near the RD field that I want. It’s usually companies with some relationship to High tech R&D but in sales or legal domain that agrees to meet me. The real RD companies aren’t really impressed by me. At least talking to them give me the confidence that I can do this, I can cold call people I don’t know and get that 15 minutes I needed to meet the important people.

My problem was, I wanted to get into pure RD. Missed out alot of chances because of that. What can I say? I was young, cocky and I had a dream that I didn’t know I didn’t want.

For a year or two, I’ve been applying for every Matrox job that got posted. Fred and I got to know each other around this time. Looking back at my storage, there must be 10 different Resumes/Cover Letters created for Matrox. I gave up several times, depressed at not even getting a reply, but Fred kept me going by updating me with new position possibilities when I am too weary to look, urging me to send in resume when my life is a mess and I am struggling to pay the rent. Thank you Fred I am so getting you a Mont Blanc.

A month ago I got a call for a position that I applied about a month earlier. I’ve already given up on that one and Matrox completely. Was recovering from the loss and scouting out companies elsewhere… they called, I grabbed on to the chance and harrassed them with phone calls. Played alot of phone tags, got depressed, jumped in joy, slumped in depression, jumped and slumped a few more time untill today.

This long hard struggle helped magnify the joy I am feeling. Suddenly, alot of things became irrelevant and alot of other things became important in my life. I can afford some of my superfluous pursuits and buy things that are actually of good quality so I don’t have to spend time fixing them all the time.

This gave confirmation to the last 8 years of my life.

Phone interview 15 minutes,
Interiview with HR, Expert, TM, 2 hours and a half
Interview with big boss, 30 minutes
Phone tags ~20
Amount of consecutive time the stupid grin is showing on my face: 12 hours and counting.

I had the chance to train someone older than me that worked at bell's 2nd level support. There are quite a few facts worth remembering. She's a stoid, by the rule lady who've gotten used to ordering people and telling them what to do. I am a nice asian fresh blood out of school who knows nothing about the real world… NOT!

It started out with her trying to catch my mistakes and tell me what to do until I started explaining to her the ins and outs of why I did it in a particular fashion. Then I turned the table by having a discussion with her about the current call I was on while I was troubleshooting the client. Of course I have to show off a bit that I am doing more than she know, so I skip the explaination and just went straight to point on what I did. Then asked the question: “What do you think?” Putting her on the spot and showing I am confident enough to ask.

It worked wonderfully and immediately allowed me to gauge her technical skill. As a former bell employee, she's used to all the powerful tools that they have access to and is ignorant of the basics. She's going to be a great addition to the team, but her need to tell people what to do will be a problem.

They called my references!

New Zealand!! I used to do this dance when I played rugby with the schoolboys there. It's a ritual. It set you into the Maori Warrior state and give you strength.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3788249896856764811

After seeing videos of the tourette guy http://www.tourettesguy.com/
things got really interesting in my apartment as we all started swearing at each other. Calling each other whores and bitches without restrain.

It's a refreshingly new approach to the social restrain of our current society. When taken with a light hearted humour and fun memories together, the most obscene words can turn into morning aubade. Ahhh such a pleasure

Open mutiny happened today on my team as management told us courtly to handle all overflow from all the other teams. We've been doing this for a month now and they've recently fired 8 people and is suffering from the consequence of that.

“They are running this like McDonalds” A senior colleague of mine said, which I agree whole heartedly. You can't just fire people and expect the new people to fill in the gap with no need for transition. What's going to happen is that the workload will be shifted to the more experienced people.

I keep wondering what could be done by upper management to help with this. They could come by and thank our effort, or ask us to help with the flow control. But no. Why not? I asked myself, is there a reason that they aren't?

Of all the type of people I talk to at work it is the scientists that I enjoy the most. They show an appreciation to have a conversation with someone, probablly due to being locked up in the lab for too long. The lawyers just give an impression that you are an issue to be dealt with while most of the education/HR people try to manage/manipulate you with their conversation skills they've learnt.

Some of the worst people to speak to are the programmers as they become very condenscending if you don't show that you know what they are talking about. Which i agree, I'd be impatient if I am calling the helpdesk and they are just askin the wrong questions. But they are ok once they know you are knowledgeable about what they are saying.

Still, the chemical scientists just have a special connection with me that others don't. Maybe I should study that.

Bugs.
In MMORPG world, the most powerful people are the admins who can do anything at will. Then there are the programmers who gave the admins their tools.

It is rarely that a player can do anything but play by the rules they setup until the player finds a critical bug in the system. I have found such a bug in the MMORPG I am immersed in and am facing alot of dilemnas right now.

As people are already aware, cyberworld money are traded via paypal. Does it break the law if I exploit a bug in the system and get real money out of it? As I understand the sytem more and more, I started seeing how the codes are written and integrated. It's easier for me to find the bugs and use them to my advantage. It feels like Neo while his powers are just awakening. Knowing how to do something but not good enough against the matrix. A little bug in the system, but if the whole matrix knows and can do it, the matrix will have to go through the trouble of changing.

Me:” Can you enter your password and press 'Enter' please”
Client:” Where is 'Enter'?”
Me: Mute button quick can't find it.

I've been getting praises from people every second day now. i.e. they think my performance exceeded their expectation.

Strangely, it's not those client whom I had a great fun conversation with that took the time to fill out a survey to give me that 11/10 grade. It is those whom I spoke with only for a few minute and solved their problem right away that grade me as such. Most of the time I can only remember that it was a simple problem and can be solved in 2 minutes.

I think people value time more than what happened in those time.

I took some time to remember the achievements in my life so I can further affirm that I am not a worthless pile of flesh. One of the memories that immediately got conjured up was that of my high school english class.

I keep failing english tests because the exam was in french. Not only do I have to learn the words in english, I also have to learn the words in french at the same time. What end up happen most of the time is I just forced myself to remember the sound of the two words without knowing what they mean. That makes me pass vocabulary… then comes comprehension. Listening in english and translate to french, that was what made me fail the class.

The worst thing in my english class is the fact that it's english for beginners, so the teacher gave most of the lecture in french and I spend most of that time drawing.

Math at least was easy because I understand the symbols and doesn't need to understand the teacher's explanation. If I run into a problem all I have to do is try to find out how I can manipulate the numbers before to get to the end result. Still failed a few math tests because the procedure I used for division is not right (Yes there's a french way of doing it).

From that to where I am. I've come a long way and I should not despair from a minor setback.

It seems that I've lost my way.
Knowing myself I learn by emersion the best.
Things I want to improve on:
Writing
Aggression
Conversation skills
Leadership skills

I need to start with reading books as that is an easy way to ease into the new change. Use 1 new word per day in my writing.

Conversation skills can be improved at work as there are alot of dead air while troubleshooting client's problem. Those UK people are fun to talk to anyway. I want to tryout saying outrageous things and see what their response is.

Leadership skill need to be improved by starting something and getting people to join.

Aggression need to be worked on as it's always been an issue with me. It can be categorized as one of my biggest shadow. I feel bad for my opponent when I beat them in a head to head encounter. So it was never satisfying enough to keep me going. I feel ashamed for beating others at something and I feel bad that they feel defeated. Which brought me to dancesport where I don't have to defeat just one person, where the shame is spread to alot of people making winning acceptable.
I need to force myself to beat others and enjoy it. To win in a head to head encounter and doesn't feel ashamed of it. Even in games with an alternate personality in an alternate universe I cannot bring myself to do it.

Looked at my post and think it's pathetic. I just whined and wrote about problems I am facing.

On a great note. My manager requested that I make my borwnie for the departure of certain co-worker. I am getting recognized for something.

The first MMORPG I played and hooked to. A space shooter real time RPG. It's about to go 3D and I am getting interviewed to become one of the developers. Just want to capture this moment as how pathetic the graphic looks like.

Its community's net user growth is at 30 per month right now and we are experiencing problems we didn't encounter before with server load problem. After the graphic overhaul in order to compete with the recent games, we'll need to take a look at how to make this work on a distributed network.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4073001161426067580&q=video+game

Received a call from a client saying his car broke down in the parking lot. He said he knows who we are, but we are the only people he can call now as the site security isn't there and it's “Bloody 12 AM here”. We do give people that sense of reassurance of always being there. Heck, before long they'll be calling us for their familly issues. As one of our boss said :”I made the mistake of sending out emails with my address attached, now I know more about people's husband and wives than their siblings or parents know.”

Another funny one is a client's nanny calling to find someone who hired her so she can go home. It was a familliar voice that I dealt with everyday at my previous job. One of those demanding person who talks with a rapper slang. My colleague couldn't handle her so I took cared of it. It's comforting knowing that at least some good came out of that period of my time. Talking with prisoners and scammers while having fun doing it takes a different kind of attitude.

Then there's the complete opposite of attitude in corporation. Some people will try to abuse you as much as they can, but when you show them that you can take it and still help them they stick with you for the rest of your life. It feels funny when a client refused 3 people's help because “I already have Peter helping me with this.” It brings another type of stress.

For some reason, all the people I work with from the Legal departments are asshats.

For another reason, the secretaries relies on their IT department to do their work for them.

I sat down beside one of the homeless people at downtown's burger king for lunch and listened in on his conversation with his imaginary friend.

It was an intelligent discussion about politics on a wide range past/current political issues. I can guess the reply of the imaginary person by the response of the raging lunatic. In a sense, that imaginary person existed during those short period of time that I listened in.

Reminds me of “A beautiful mind” and “Waking Dream” what happens when your imagination becomes self conscious? When one part of your brain succeeded in completely isolating from the other part in order to create a seperate consciousness?

Sadly the discussion eventually reverted back to mumffled rambling of a lunatic. Maybe next time, I will confront the imaginary person.

I had an in depth view of differen't people's religious belief at work today. I feel sad as they all belief in the same god but the story the believe in is different. The seperation lies in how they believe they are going to be saved. What they must perform in order to reach salvation.

There's also an immediate exclusion of other religious belief that sounds very repulsif. Through this whole time, I kept remembering this girl I know who told me “I will only mary a Christian, because I can only establish that connection with another person when they believe in god as much as I do.” Yes, that deep connection can only be established when you've decided to exclude others in the first place.

My view is probablly tainted by my culture that is buddist based. Although I've never participated in buddhist religion, its belief in everything belonging to one has strongly veered my liking to them and in the process, allowed me to accept all religion.

A man I respected once told me ” Religion is created by men, therefore if you belief there's a true belief, religion cannot be true.”

Called back and reach her.

In my eagerness, I forgot to ask her how she's doing as well as inquire if she's busy…. Things I need to watch out for when pushed to the limit.

It’s official, I got the winter blues.
Even though I try hard not to acknowledge it, not getting the callback is hitting me really hard. Especially after I got to the final stage and met the big boss. i.e. 50/50 chance cause usually it’s one or the other at this point.

It’s harder to brush off like this as this rejection is more complete than if they didn’t even call me for an interview. It’s a rejection of my whole experience and skill.

I tried to call, but the phone system was really weird. Direct extension gets me to a voice message saying I can’t dial to this extension directly. The switchboard operator was not available during the 3 times I tried. Morning, noon and afternoon.

I think I did all I could and I am just getting ready to face the truth.

On a side note, my dance teacher called saying there’s a partner who wants to dance with me. The day after my ex partner also called. Boy, I do not want to deal with the world of dancing right now.

I've finally figured out a way to walk on my toes without appearing to be a weirdo. The trick has always been to mimic the normal walking stance so that others don't notice. But how can you fake using your heels to walk while you are always standing on our toes?

The answer lies in all the small muscles. I could never have done this without my dance training. Before when I tried to do this, i just end up looking like I was hopping up and down because instead of going heel toe, the transition between the two foot goes directly to the toe.

The trick is to use every single muscle in the foot to smooth the transition in between. That means grabbing the ground with the toe, push with that foot, put the other foot in front and catch your own weight.

Normally when we walk, we only do one thing and that is to push with our heel. Now you not only have to push, you have to control the strength and do a similar cancellation force with the other foot so that the total motion is back to null. Then start again. 4x the effort. 4 times the fun.

I tried it for a day and my legs were shaking by the end of it. Today is the 2nd day after and I am still sore in the deep muscles that wraps directly around the bones. I enjoy this feeling. Weird no?