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November 27, 2006
The Strictest Meaning of the Word
When people misuse the word "literally" it's always completely 180° wrong.On the radio this morning, they interviewed people who were upset about some road closures because of the resultant travel delays. Apparently, these people were so upset that they were "literally shooting daggers out of their eyes".
What a fantastic superpower.
Labels: Rant
November 24, 2006
Boyz n the Hood
I'm beginning to wonder where we've planted ourselves in moving to the project. In the past two days there have been two higher profile incidents within a stone's throw of our area. The first involved a high speed shootout on the 401 after an incident at a "social club" at Finch and Dufferin. The second, I heard this morning on the radio. Apparently the police were going into an apartment complex that had caught on fire a little while back to bust five grow ops they knew about. They ended up finding finding 22(!) of them.How concerned should I be?
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I talked to someone recently and she echoed my sentiment about hiring practices for companies to bring in motivated talent. She told me of some of the perks that her husband had on the job because it actually costs the company very little.
In the interest of fairness, I can concede that company HR departments have a difficult position as well. It takes a lot of work to ensure that people across an organization are equally compensated. It's like buying airplane tickets. Though I'm ultimately powerless to do anything about it, I know I'd be slightly peeved to find out that the person in the seat next to me paid a few hundred dollars less for his ticket.
I do still wonder about the state of things though when a company asks employees to pay for morale celebrations when it can also afford to collect already grossly spoiled sales staff from across the country for national meetings at posh resorts. It's really not the money, rather the principle of the matter. The treatment of sales across Pharma is intrinsically at a higher level than that of other functions in the company - Top sales talent tends to require top of the line rewards. It's also a function of brinksmanship between companies, like the bloated salaries in professional sports. I'd like to see better acknowledgement for other functions though. There has to be some method of rewarding other functions in a way that is equal to the treatment of sales. There is a symbiotic partnership between sales and "support": One cannot survive without the other. That should be recognised.
This equality is probably incredibly difficult, if not impossible, to realize right now given how the industry has been structured. If nothing else changes however, I'd like to at least feel that sales deserves the rewards they're given. After hearing about the state of our bonus based on sales targets and head office savings though...
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After working for a bit with Lotus Notes calendars, I've found that it's actually productive to have things scheduled. I've tried Google Calendar, which I find great in spite of the lack of support for different time zones. Now that I have my Mac (that I'm in love with, by the way - more on that some other time) iCal is serving my scheduling needs well. The only issue is I can't access my calendar from outside of my Macbook Pro. I'm hoping for big things from Spanning Sync. I'm kicking myself for missing the sign up for their private beta; I hope they release a public one soon.
Maybe someone from Spanning Sync will see this post and find it in the goodness of their hearts to grant me access to their beta? I promise to be an incredibly active participant in the testing, On top of singing their praises, I'd report every single bug I run into to make sure their software is as amazing as I would hope it would be.
November 21, 2006
Get your kicks on Route 66
This is what 4 sets of headlights and horseshoes up your ass can get you.
November 17, 2006
A Milestone
So today's my last day as a consultant at Oxygenix.
It's been a stellar experience - I've learned lots and met some fantastic people. I also hope that I've had a positive impact.
Best of luck to the company in the future. I'm sure we'll stay in touch.
Like the Kids Do Nowadays
I've been playing around with Skype and I don't have a clue about whether or not it's working for me. Mainly because people have told me that they've authorized me, but I don't see any difference on my end. On top of that, I haven't a clue who's actually online when I am.Someone wanna add me and show me how this crazy thing works?
November 16, 2006
Just When I Thought I Was Out...
It's been a movie filled couple of weeks for me. Borat, The Departed, The Prestige, Stranger than Fiction. All were very good. All get the Wincent seal of approval. Coming up, I think Casino Royale is going to turn out well. Daniel Craig is much closer to Connery's bond than the foppish Remington Steele will ever be.I had meant to post something far timelier around the Election last week in the US. Life and laziness seem to take over a bit easily though. To rectify that, the ballot measure that I really gravitated towards was that of Stem Cell Research in Missouri. I think the potential from the research is massive. We have examples from right here in Toronto of some of the exciting new work in this field. I even read some thing in the paper this morning about heart valves being grown from stem cells and symptoms from muscular dystrophy being amelioriated in dogs. I understand the concerns of certain groups around this research, especially in regard to the issue of potential human cloning. Instead of straight opposition though, wouldn't it be more productive to provide guidance to reach some middle ground? Science itself doesn't provide a moral framework. It is as it is. It would be nice for other groups to see this as a potential opportunity for a partnership - helping provide the compass that science lacks.
Oh, and it's official. I will be joining Lilly again on November 20th. It was an interesting and slightly surprising process for me. I appreciate the effort and respect I was shown. I'm also amused that almost every time I've gone through this process, someone bringing me in has remarked that he/she: 1) has learned something new and 2) hopes that it never happens that way again.
November 15, 2006
w00t (I r 1337)
I found tickets!Oilers vs Canucks - Section 119, Row 5, Seats 4-5.
Say hi if you're at the game. I'll buy you a beer.
November 14, 2006
You Gotta be Kidding Me
Oilers tickets for December and January went on sale at 10:00am today MST.I pulled up the atomic clock to make sure I had the exact time to grab my traditional holiday game tickets for Sister and I.
Acting right when the hour came up, I selected 2 tickets from ticketmaster - any price, best available.
Two standing room tickets came up.
I thought to myself: "I can surely do better than this." So I released them.
BIG MISTAKE.
I've tried and I've tried and I've tried. No more tickets.
Within 5 seconds of them going on sale.
...
November 09, 2006
It's not a comeback
jfung so crazy!Labels: Misc
November 04, 2006
We was ROBBED!
What terrible officiating at the Oilers game last night!One could argue that, being an Oil bleeding Edmonton fan, I may be slightly biased in the favor of my home team. The video evidence is right there for everyone to see. It's clearly an interference call and there was clearly no hand pass.
I can't stand these refs who think they have celebrity status; their egos detract from the game. The guys that always irked me are Mick McGeough and Kerry "You all need glasses" Fraser. You could see their egos from the pre-new CBA era when refs weren't required to wear helmets on the ice. Most put them on for safety's sake, but nope, not McGeough or Fraser. They had to be pretty for the camera.
Grr...