This is the first actual day of my vacation.

So far, I have managed to ignore most of my work e-mail. And I’ve only read one patchset. Perhaps tomorrow I’ll do better.

I miss them already.

Akoha
Originally uploaded by sfllaw.

Steak
Originally uploaded by sfllaw.
Dessert
Originally uploaded by sfllaw.

Say, we’re hiring!

If you know someone who’d like to do one of these jobs, send them our way!

Community Gardener
Professional Vandal / Vandale Professionnel

P.S. I’m still starving.

Tap
Originally uploaded by sfllaw.

At Akoha, we have been very, very, very busy. So busy, in fact, that Éric and I have no time to take care of the growing number of computers that we are using. We must, it appears, get some help.

Now, we're looking for someone bright, energetic, and loving in their care of Ubuntu systems. We use a wide range of interesting technologies and you certainly will not be just a system administrator.

You'll be a Unix Pipefitter!
(en français)

I've just finished doing the least fun part of interviews. Sending e-mails.

You see, I've got this strange idea in my head that I should tell people if they didn't do so well during an interview, and suggest some things they could do to improve. But this is rather difficult to do because it's pretty difficult to write a similar note a lot of times, without it turning into a form letter. Plus, one doesn't want to offend the recipient. I really do want them to improve, because I want all our applicants to get jobs.

Then again, if all our applicants were awesome, then I'd have an stomach-churning time trying to choose which ones to offer jobs to. I'd probably have to pick them out at random.

I'm back in Montréal after a grueling two-days of interviewing. I was pretty sleep-deprived, but I seem to have survived. I did, however, crash for a while in Toronto before getting on the sleeper train here.

We were pleasantly impressed with a large number of the candidates we've interviewed. The ranking forms have already been submitted and now it's up to a big computer to crunch all the numbers and match students. It's like a dating game, but where brains count.

I spent some time in Waterloo seeing people, but was regretfully too tired to meet all the people I'd have liked to. Ah well, I understand that halfwitted will be holding a party sometime this term, so this will give me a convenient excuse to go down and visit.

I didn't sleep last night.

My entire weekend was filled with geeky things. On Saturday and Sunday, I did the following things:

1. Get ALSA working properly on my television
2. Get XVideo working properly on my television
3. Get BitTorrent working properly on my television
4. Do all of my laundry
5. Compute my Federal and Provincial taxes (yay refund!)
6. Get monitor mode working on my Orinoco wireless card

Actually, that last one was much harder than it should have been. It took several attempts before I finally git a set of kernel modules that would (a) load and (b) work. Now I can finally scan for available and open wireless networks. Which is very useful if you're stuck in a bus terminal hoping to read your e-mail.

By the time I was finished, it was about 4:00. So I packed things into my giant backpack, fixed up some food and water for Timin, and then headed out the door. Which is good, because the bus wasn't running yet, so I walked to the train station. In my groggy state, I picked up my train tickets at the teller but accidentally left my umbrella there. (It was drizzling this morning.) I shall have to see if they've got it when I return on Wednesday.

I arrived in Toronto by train, then in Waterloo by Greyhound. The trip was uneventful, mostly because I was unconscious most of the time. The people on the train were very nice and left me to snore peacefully. The bus was surprisingly comfortable as well. I must have been quite tired.

I got off the bus at the Kitchener bus terminal and was assaulted by a wave of heat and pollution. I waited in the bright sun for the 7D to arrive and noticed that my chest was constricting because of the poor air quality. I miss Waterloo a lot, but some things are best forgotten. Anyway, riding the bus was pretty interesting as I got to see all sorts of people. People that you rarely see in Montréal: white suburban teenagers trying to look like inner-city gangsters, vastly overweight men who take up two seats, and lank scrawny vampires who only get cathode-tube tans.

The bus stopped outside the CECS building and I thanked the bus driver and I got off. I walked inside to find dcoombs walking up the staircase with a co-ordinator. I hurried after them, calling out Dave's name. We gave a little presentation about the job, where Dave spent most the time speaking, and I spent most of the time staring into nothing. Mostly because I didn't know what was on the slides, and also because my brain was half-functioning.

After the presentation, Dave and I went to the hotel. (Where I'm typing this, incidentally.) I checked in and got the room right beside Dave's. I took a little nap, then it was off to Ben Thanh for UltimateSpringRolls. Which were still very very good. There was so much food that we brought some back to stick in the mini-fridge in my room. This will be so much better than the "continental breakfast" they serve here.

I came back to discover that Sarge had released over dinner. Hurray for everyone. Unfortunately, it seems like everybody is too busy to actually celebrate this fact. Come on people, it's not like Debian releases every year.

I suppose the only thing to do is to run a nice bath, soak in it for a while, and get some sleep. Tomrrow will be a day where I will have to ask tough questions and expect to get good answers. I should probably collate the résumés so that they are in the correct order and then acquire a pad of lined paper.

Got to Waterloo.

Group session. Introduced NITI. I should get a more active role in the presentation.

Meeting up with sailorfrag at 18:15 for dinner. Should be fun.

Tomorrow morning, bright and early, I'll be getting on a train bound for Toronto. A brief walk after that and I'll be in the coach terminal, where I will catch a bus to Waterloo.

Once again, I'm returning to the University of Waterloo to do co-op interviews. We'll be choosing some skilled and lucky students to do a four-month stint at NITI. I really enjoy going down and talking to people about what they know and what they're doing, so I've been anticipating this trip all week.

While I'm down there, I should be available Monday and Tuesday evenings. I'll be hitching a ride to Toronto with dcoombs on Wednesday after our last interviews, and I think I'll stop at home for a couple of hours to pick up some stuff. People interested in seeing me should probably send me an e-mail, or just leave a comment here.

I can't wait.

I guess I really fell in love with that dorky college town, because I'm going back to Waterloo on Tuesday. dcoombs will be picking up the rental car bright and early, and we shall make the long drive to Waterloo.

There will be a group interview in the afternoon, and then we shall meet up with Jim for dinner. After that, I crash at his place.

The next day, we're going to interview some Human Cannonball candidates and, with any luck, we'll find people we like.

After that, I say goodbye to dcoombs and I sit around at Jim's place for the next two days. This is to force myself to get WvStreams 4.0.2 out the door. Which I've been saying for months now.

I'll be returning Sunday night. Maybe I'll be insane and splurge for the overnight?

Update: I guess I'll be back in Montréal and hopping back down. Ah well, I guess I will splurge on overnight travel then.

Update: Not going on Tuesday. I'll arrive later.

This was the most novel interviewing experience I've ever had in Waterloo. I have helped with them two times previous, but never before has the trip been so notable.

It's odd what kinds of twists life throws at you. Last week, I thought I wouldn't go back to Waterloo for years. Today, I just booked a train trip there.

dcoombs_rss went to Toronto yesterday. cloquewerk and messiahdivine left today. I will be leaving on Sunday.

We are there to interview Waterloo co-op (and non-co-op) students who want to GetaJob with us over the summer. This time, I'm not going to interview developers, although that's what I like doing best. Playing bad cop, that is.

No, this time I'm there to interview testers, because denizsarikaya is down with the flu. She's feeling pretty miserable, and deserves the bedrest. Plus, it's midterm season and students would hate us if they caught what she has. Heck, I don't want to catch what she has.

I'll be arriving on 6 February 2005 at 22:00. I'll be leaving on 9 February 2005 at 9:00. People in Waterloo who want to see me should probably comment here, and I'll arrange something. Even if I have to squeeze you into my sleep schedule. (I hate hotel beds anyway. They're always too soft and "luxurious".)

I'm heading down to Waterloo again. Sadly, I'm going to be quite busy, so I probably won't be able to make spontaneous dinner arrangements.

I found out that travelling by train isn't too expensive due to a BizPak, which makes things almost as cheap as a student fare. Yay!

Now I don't have to lie to Travel Cuts about still being a full-time student. My WatCard says that I am one until April '06. Isn't that nifty?

Yesterday, halfway through our list of ten candidates, a whole bunch of former co-ops went out to lunch with Coombs and me. We headed off to Ben Thanh Viet Thai, a place that serves the Ultimate Spring Rolls. Boy are they good.

Julie and I had dinner afterwards, which consisted of going to a "fine dining" experience in uptown Waterloo. She and I were very upset about the quality of the food, but at least they were able to cook my steak blue. As for Julie's seared tuna, the whole plate was waterlogged and mushy. I think we'll stick to our normal restaurants from now on.

Afterwards, I showed up to Julie's microeconomics class to sit around and wait for Coombs to show up on IRC. (He never did.) But I got to listen to Prof. Smith rave on about how Free Software (and other Groups of Interest) were changing the economy so that was quite interesting. Afterwards, I talked to icedrake where we had a small debate on whether user-interface people show know how to implement their designs.

I'm waking up far too early for my own good. How do I know this? It's still dark outside. This reminds me of getting up for choir practice, but this is a digression I will not take.

The reason I'm such an early bird is that we have a crop of interviews starting at 0900h, and if I don't get up this early, I'll never dig through all of my e-mail in time. Plus, I figured that I'd meet Kevin O'Keefe and denizsarikaya and give them moral encouragement. (They start at 0830h.)

Last night's information session was great. Lots of people showed up, and we got to encourage them to apply for jobs. Plus, I figure that my karmic imbalance of mooching off free food has been restored, as I have helped feed hungry undergrads. People seemed generally pleased to be there, and I hope we made a good impression on most of them. Happily, many old NITI co-ops were there, and I got to hand out drink tickets like there was no tomorrow.

I'm sitting in front of the television, beside ringzero and Dwayne. I think I'm ignoring Superman; the Space Channel is doing a tribute to Christopher Reeve.

I've just reviewed all of my notes for the interviews. Now I'm bored out of my mind. Julie's gone to do some homework and all I'm doing now is trying to hack. But failing, sadly. Maybe I should spam some forums to advertise our information session. I hope lots of people take advantage of our free food.

Here I am hacking on a manual for WvStreams, as I travel by train to Toronto. That's actually a layover for my trip to Waterloo. We're heading down there to hire another round of co-op students, this time for Winter 2005. Along the way, we'll feed and water them (for a much deserved mid-term break.)

However, I'm not really heading down this early because I like Waterloo a lot. I'm actually going down to visit some friends. Of course, I have to see Julie and she's graciously offered her couch and living room to me. Then I can also see ringzero and Adeel. I hear Kevin Fong is making a turducken for his dinner party, and I will be very happy to attend. In fact, I'm bringing some Montréal bagels to some ex-patriots who must endure Ontario bagels.

Oh yes. Before I hopped on the train, I showed Carlos around a small subset of the city. We went into some used bookstores, and he was able to procure some travel souvenirs. Unfortunately, my weakness for used books revealed itself, and I couldn't help buying a couple along the way. In my defense, they were purchased as gifts for others.

Anyway, I'll have to do a little NITI meet and greet on Monday, so if you want to see me, and don't want to tie yourself down to an actual schedule, you should show up at the University Club after 9pm. In fact, if you show up before, you can also apply to get a hacking job, or mooch off some free food.

I left for Waterloo on Monday, to interview Waterloo co-op students with dcoombs. It was an interesting experience being on the other side of the table, and I actually enjoyed it a lot!