Locked Out

Oh damn locked out of my house I hate it when this happens now I either have to find a way in or something to do.

DIlbert Watch

So I have started to take notice of how many Dilbert comics there are around the labs. Now I have only just decided to do this and have already spied two comics. Understand, I enjoy Dilbert it's a funny comic about the mediocrity of engineering and software firms, so it's kind of funny sometimes. My problem is that hanging Dilbert comics in your cubicle or around the office, especially one like HP, seems a little cliche. I mean I can picture a programmer in his cubicle here hanging up a Dilbert comic laughing to himself and thinking "It's so true". They just seem to common place for this office. So I'm suggesting a comic that doesn't poke fun at the bureaucracy of technical firms I am suggesting a more low brow approach. More along the line of the absurdity in the work place. A comic where no one can relate to and if you can I would love to hear that story. Something a long the line of a guy making copies and then he's mauled by a bear or a T-Rex wearing a fedora trying to stick an apple into the disk drive of a computer. It would be a horrible comic that very few people would like but I think it would address the problem at hand.

Dilbert Comics - 3

Update I

Well now that I'm working again I'm not really posting to this as actively as I once was. But here will be update one of two or maybe more. Anyway I started work for the first time again on Monday. The commute isn't to bad I ride my bike over to the 22nd Caltrain Station and take that to Palo Alto and then ride my bike to HP labs. At HP the project I'm working on has three programmers. My friend Ben, my semi sorta boss Tim and another guy James. They are all nice people. It also has a marketing person, Carol, and to two QA testers who I forget there names but I don't have to worry about it because they work in another building. So on Monday they all took me out to lunch to celebrate my finaly being hired. It was an amazing chinese food place.
Other then that I've just been settling into work. I had to figure out how to get my badge so I could enter the building and not have to depend on Ben every day to get me in. I didn't get that till Wednesday. I don't know if you can see it but the camera they used squished my head a little.
Let's see what else. I got my actual work computer on Wednesday so now I have a legal HP computer connected to the network. So to deviate a little, at work they have me testing this software and how it will run with pop-up blockers and firewalls. So I have a Red Hat server running in my cubicle and a straight out of the box HP PC running as a client. The only problem is that we're not supposed to do this. The IT people need to install HP Lab specific software in order for any computer to be on the HP Lab network problem is we're supposed to be testing this software on right out of the box HP consumer PC's. Being as how we couldn't find any way around this problem I was told to just hook the computer into the network and use it till I get caught. If I do get caught that means I'll either have to go to the other HP office in Cupertino to work or work from home possibly. I like the later better.

I Met Myself Yesterday

So yesterday I had lunch with myself. Another actual person named John Meehan. A while back a third John Meehan sent me a Face Book message asking to be friends. I accepted being as he had the name John Meehan so automatically he is cool. A couple weeks later the John Meehan who I had lunch with yesterday discovered me in John Meehan three's profile and asked to be my friend through Face Book. I agreed for the same previously stated reason.
Any how when I got out here I was on Face Book one day and passed his entry and remembered that he lived out here as well. So I sent him an email asking if he ever wanted to get some lunch. He replied within a day or two and we set up to meet for lunch yesterday at a mexican food place around the corner from my apartment called "Me Tate". He turned out to be a really outgoing friendly guy and it was a good time. I was afraid that there wouldn't be anything to talk about and there would just be one long award silence but that was not the case. In the end it just proved my point that John Meehan's are some of the finest people on this planet.

The Moral of the Story

SO being as the doctor who was supposed to be reviewing my drug test results never called me when he was supposed to I took it upon myself to call my hiring woman/person. She said she didn't know why the doctor hadn't called me yet and that she was going to call up and ask what was up. About an hour later she calls me and says that everything is fine and that I'm ok to start working. I guess I'm not going to be talking to the doctor and not going to find out what caused the false positive on my drug test. Maybe it was all some cruel joke on the new guy, maybe they realized how dumb they were and told the doctor not to talk to me to save face. Well whatever it was I start work Monday and this whole stupid situation is finished with. So the moral of the story is if you don't do drugs then everything will be fine........nope that doesn't work. Do drugs this way when you're caught positive on a drug test you know it's your fault, no that one doesn't work either. How about this, do as many drugs as you want and have fun, just make sure to cheat on your drug test so you can safely work. Well I guess there really isn't a moral to this story after all.

Odds & Ends

So here is just some stuff that I have yet to mention in any of my posts. Just genral stuff.

This is where I'm crashing for the time being. It's a small extra room in Carrie & Ben's apartment which they have been nice enough to let me use. It's nice and cozzy and I like the neighboorhood they're in a lot. It's the Mission District and it's a large latino community so theres some great food around.

A couple of days after I first got into town I bought this bike from a guy off of Craigs List. Since I don't have a car and don't want to continually use the bus system I decided to get it. So far its held up pretty well. The brakes work its light weight and it has ten speeds and has helped me get places faster and easier. Right now I'm trying to come up with a name for it but haven't thought of anything. Any one have any name suggestions for me.

The Morphines Wore Off

So it's 11:52 on the west coast and the doctor who was supposed to be reviewing my results hasn't got back to me. I'm tired of just waiting I think it's time to take a more proactive approach. This timid waiting crap just isn't working for me. I'm at a point where I don't care what happens. Sure it sucks and I still want the job but why should I jump through hoops for some company who's telling me who I am with a stupid test. Which classifies me in a not so pleasing light wrongly. No I think I'll be fine. Well that brings me to point number two. If I'm not able to get this job what then? Well I think I'll stay the month in December here in San Francisco but after that I'm not sure. Any opinions or ideas on what I should do with my time if I don't get the job are more then welcome.

LAS VEGAS

New years eve is just around the corner and I'm expecting more scenes like this!

Waiting

Waiting truly sucks especially for something as important as whether or not I can stay and keep my job.

Day 2

So I have 72 hours for the doctors to prove that my positive on my drug test was a false positive. So it is now day two. I woke up early this morning to call my doctor and talk to him. I told him what was up and if he had any ideas of what could have caused the false positive. He did not but was just as suprised as I was that I tested positive for morphine. I asked him if he could send the doctors reviewing my results my perscription history, he agreed and said all he needed was a letter from me saying that it was ok to fax the records. He also said that he would send a note explaining that I had no prior drug addictions or exposure to morphine. I rode my bike over to a Kinko's and faxed over the note allowing the release of my records. Now it's just a waiting game. I need to wait for the doctor to get back to me either today or tomorrow. So right now I'll sit and wait and try to plan my next move in trying to get this taken care of.

The Universe Throws A Curve Ball

So that drug test I was waiting for to start actually working finally came in and it happend to be positive. WHAT? They called me up when I was at work and told me that it was positive. I asked what did I test positive for they didn't know cause it turns out those results are confidential. So I asked what I could do, I was told to call the woman's supervisor and ask to fight the results. So I called up and was told that a medical work up and inquiry would take place. Meanwhile the woman who was incharge of my hiring got an email saying that I had failed my drug test. After I got off the phone my boss and the hiring lady told me that I couldn't stay in the office being that I had failed my test. I was accompanied out of the building by my boss Tim (who was really nice about the whole situation and gave me his views on the subject of drug testing which turned out to be a little more liberal than I had thought) and rode my bike to the train station and thought hard of what I could have tested positive for . Shortly after I got home I got a call from the lab and they proceeded to tell me my lab results. Apparently I had tested positive for morphine use. That's right people morphine use. What the heck!? I now have 72 hours for the doctors to show that it was a false positive. And now the time starts ticking.

Work

I started work today although I'm still not technically hired. They're still waiting for the results of my drug test which was only supposed to take 24 hours to get back but is now taking longer. I have a cubicle to myself which was a pleasant suprise. I'm working on a software team at HP which consists of four other people and myself. I have three computers. One Linux box acting as a server, one run of the mill HP consumer machine to act as a client and one HP Pavilion to be my computer for e-mail and what not (maybe posting to this if I'm bored). I was able to screw up already and crashed Windows on the client computer and for some reason couldn't restore it. So I had to find a Windows CD and re-install Windows. Other then that it was a pretty uneventful day. Tomorrow I go shopping for routers and software packages.


P.S. Be wary of getting HP computers. I say this because they don't include Windows or other backup CD's. They instead have the HD partitioned and you can do a "Destructive Recovery" from the HD if something fails on your computer.

Started Work

Well I started work and I get my own cubicle

Funny Quote

"Daniel's going to shit a fucking midget."

San Francisco

Well I'm San Francisco and I'm starting work at HP tomorrow. I'll post some pictures when I get some time to. I have to start looking for an apartment very soon so I'll have some place to stay when I get back from the east coast for christmas. Other than that the weather is great and I don't much miss the snow. :-)