Fortune Cookie Update

Over a year ago, I posted this which was a fortune cookie saying that I'd be crossing ocean waters.  In case you were wondering, that fortune did not come true.  Now, I will be going to another country soon (for vacation), but no ocean waters will be crossed.  (My destination is even in the same time zone.)

I'm kind of disappointed because other coworkers have had reasons to go to China where we have some manufacturing.  Not that I would have anything to do over there, but it'd definitely be an experience.  And my boss asked me early on if I had a passport, so I had been hopeful. 

Oh well.  It might be a good thing anyway.  If I spend too much time with my coworkers, I might let slip how ridiculous I find my job and my company. 

Anyway, probably not going to post here for a while since I'll be gone for a little while. 

SOTD - Mr. Cellophane

I received this e-mail today (a little doctored up to make everything anonymous).

I noticed that you have [meeting room] booked in the afternoon on [date].  Unfortunately, the group that is in there before you, won’t be done until 5pm.  Sorry to inconvenience you, but this group will be in here until 5pm as mentioned.

Thank you and once again I am sorry for the inconvenience this causes you.

Warmly,
--------------

First, the extra comma between "before you" and "won't be" is the sender's and not mine.

Second.  Warmly?  Are you kidding me? 

Anyway, the second thing I did (after first sending a snarky response) was forward it to my wife with the comment that this is another sign that I don't matter around here.

So Mr. Cellophane from Chicago popped into my head.  (Obviously, I'm referring to the movie and not the band.)




People sometimes ask me why I don't like my job.  And it's things like this.  I feel like other groups have a complete lack of respect for what I do here.  Sigh.  I'm still disappointed about not getting the other job.  Maybe this was a good salesjob by them, but in the interview, I felt like I would matter there.  And I'm not sure that I would ever matter here.

E-mail Account Hacked

So my Gmail account was hacked (my real one, not the e-mail address you see on this site).  As I've received e-mails from random people saying they got this random iPad spam from me, it dawned on me that all sorts of prospective employers from over the last five years received this e-mail from me.  Kind of weird.  Well, it's not like any of them were planning on sending me a job offer anyway.

But it's weird who decides to tell you that your e-mail has been hacked.  I just heard from two people I haven't talked to in roughly six months.  And these are people I actually want to keep up my networking with so it was nice to hear from them. 

So to all you unemployed people and/or job searchers, keep up with your networking.  If you can't come up with anything to say to the person you haven't talked to in a while, send a random spam mail and maybe they'll just get back to you.

And I guess I should recommend that you update your password and all that to stay ahead of the spoofing and stuff like that.

SOTD - Morrissey - Such a Little Thing Makes Such a Big Difference

So I didn't get the job. And at times when I'm feeling sorry for myself, I turn to Morrissey.



Apparently, the funding that would have made hiring me possible wasn't there. So of course that trickles down to my not getting hired and still having to be at this job. Apparently, they're still going to keep me in mind if anything comes up in the future, but I've heard that before. Sigh.

Not really sure why this was the song that popped into my head after hearing the news. After thinking about it, Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now would have also been an appropriate choice.

Pretty soon, I'll have been at this job for a year. Geez. I hope it's not that much longer.

SOTD - Billy Joel - Keeping the Faith

Keeping with the current optimistic faith theme (weird for an atheist), today's song of the day is Billy Joel's Keeping the Faith.  I haven't heard back about my job interview yet, so I'll be waiting I guess.



But really, this song is about getting old and memories.  I had a recent moment where I felt kind of old.  A friend of mine is a musician and was recently in town for a show.  He got tickets and backstage passes for my wife and I and left them at will call.  The young girl at will call was a little a surprised (as was I) that there were backstage passes in there and as she gave them to me, I said, "It'll be like Wayne's World".  And I kinda held up the pass as Wayne does in this scene. 



But no look of recognition on her face.  And then I realized that movie was from like 20 years ago (1992).  I guess that was a really dated reference.  Oh well.  I guess I'm getting old.

Pooping at Work and Sensitive Toilets

Side note: the other day,  I pooped twice, but neither was at work.  I was very disappointed. 

But at work though, I never use the third toilet out of the set of four unless it's the only one left.  Everything in the bathroom works automatically and has a sensor to sense the presence of your hands or in the case of the toilets, your ass.  But the third toilet, at least in my experience, is the most sensitive.  Whenever I use it, I try to stay pretty still or else there's a flush.  And that just doesn't feel right.  You try to stand up a little, but really you can't.  And then you can feel some of the water splashing up.  Not a good feeling.

Having worked with these kinds of sensors before, I know there are fairly simple ways of changing their range and tuning their sensitivity.  I think it'd be nice if these things could be tuned for this when installed.

Anyway, most of the time, I pick the last (fourth) toilet and when I notice someone in the stall next to me get an extra flush, I point to them and in my mind, I have a silent Nelson Muntz "Haw Haw".  That makes for a nice happening during my day. 

SOTD - George Michael - Faith

Today's song of the day is George Michael's Faith (not the Limp Bizkit version, though that version's not terrible.)



I'm choosing this song because very soon, I'll be going on the interview that I talked about earlier. Back in my unemployed days, I had identified this company pretty early with salesman friend and I kind of interviewed with them, but I guess they didn't have anything at that time, but I guess now they do.  Let's hope all goes well.

It was only recently that I figured out that the organ beginning to the song is Wham's Freedom.  I thought that was interesting trivia. 

Anyway, time to get in a suit again.

Pooping at Work

I've long been thinking about doing a set of posts on pooping at work, so here's the first one.  Don't worry.  I'm not going to talk about anything gross. 

Why do I want to talk about pooping?  Well, it's like a (very) mini vacation from work.  Obvious sign that I hate my job: I perk up a little when I have to poop.  I think "Oh good.  I can take a break."  I think my body's adjusted to this and I'm now a slower pooper, thereby increasing my break time. 

I used to have a somewhat regular schedule, but I think that all went out the window when I was unemployed, so I'm really not sure when it's going to happen.  While I do perk up when the urge comes, if it happens like right when I get in or before lunch or something, I feel like it's kinda wasted.  The perfect time is always the middle of the morning or afternoon.  Am I the only person that thinks about this?  I'm guessing I am amongst my friends, but I thought I'd throw it out there because, well, I don't really know.

I kinda wish I had a smartphone so that I could blog while I'm in the bathroom, but oh well.  It's nice enough just to get away.

Believe it or not, I have lots more to say on this subject.  Maybe in a few days.

Song of the Day - David Byrne

So I have another job interview this week and I thought I'd start posting again.  To catch up, I, obviously, didn't get the job in my last post from February.  Actually, that interview went very very poorly.  That was too bad.  But with my upcoming job interview, I'm feeling optimistic, so I'm posting "A Million Miles Away" by David Byrne. 

Share A Million Miles Away by David Byrne

Unfortunately, there are no videos of this song anywhere on the web, which is too bad.  But the first line of the song is "I ain't gonna work here no more."

This song wasn't a big hit, but it was the theme song for a show called Flying Blind, which I actually remember watching back in the day. 

Atlantic Starr - Secret Lovers

To kick off the week before Valentine's Day, let's listen to Atlantic Starr's Secret Lovers. (Fast forward like a minute in for the music.)



I guess this is kind of an anti-Vday song, but I'm posting it because I'm going to kind of cheat on my current company.  If you recall from a few posts back, I said that I sent my resume out again.  And can you believe it?  The company I sent my resume to thought I was good enough to bring in.  And they didn't even care that I had just started a job with my new company.  I'll let you know what happens during my interview this week.  (All my boss knows is that I'll be on a long lunch.  Shhh.)

Can you believe the outfits in this video?  Wow.  That might actually be a fun halloween costume.  I feel like if I were dressed up like that, I'd also do the lines from Say Anything.  "Hey my brother, can I get a copy of your hey soul classics?  No, my brother.  You have to go buy your own."  I can only find this commercial, which is similar.



On the wikipedia article, there's a reference to the Steve Harvey Show, where two guys sing, "Secret Lovers.  Oh no we're not."  I for some reason remember this clip, but I don't think I've ever actually watched that episode before.



Anyway, I should go study up on this new company.  I'll post some actual Valentine's Day songs later this week.

Comments

I just noticed the other day that some people actually left comments on some of my posts.  Now, none of these comments are actually relevant.  They're more like ads for other sites. 

Unfortunately, a couple of the comments were for nsfw type websites.  And also, nothing on those sites was in English, so it's not like it would have been a good site for any of you anyway. 

Not that it's important, but I did remove the really bad comments, and I'm now going to be notified when people leave comments so that I can check things out and delete as necessary. 

The Rembrandts - Just the Way It Is, Baby

At work today, I learned about one of their processes and it's the kind of thing companies would have done 10 or 15 years ago.  The person telling me about this also used to work somewhere that was with the times, but that's just the way it is, baby. 



They didn't really say that, but I thought it was a decent lead in.  I guess I could've picked Bruce Hornsby, but this was the song that ended up in my head most of the day. 

You may remember the Rembrandts as the group that did the Friends theme song, but Just the Way It Is, Baby was their first hit.  On wikipedia, I just learned that one of the Rembrandts is from Duluth, so I thought was kinda cool.  I actually own their second album because I like the song Johnny Have You Seen Her and I found it cheap at a used cd store. 

I also learned that Blender magazine ranked I'll Be There For You #13 on the 50 Worst songs ever list.  Now, it may not be considered a great song, but it was ranked worse than MC Hammer's Pumps and a Bump but just under Bette Midler's From a Distance.  (Now that's an awful song.)

Radiohead - Creep

From now on, I'll just post the artist and song title for my song of the day in anticipation of some day when I'll actually repeat a band in my song of the day.  (Actually, I have, but I hadn't yet adopted the Song of the Day title format yet so I'm not really counting that.)  Anyway, we're going with Radiohead's Creep. 



I just spent like 5+ hours in meetings today.  And it was awful.  Really really slow.  It's already going to be slow because of my current lack of understanding of anything so I can't really contribute, but it was a long day.  I'm going to have to bring snacks or something to these meetings to keep myself going through the day.  Anyway, in the worst meeting for today, I just thought to myself, "What am I doing here?" so that brought to mind this song.  (I didn't pick the song for the weirdo and wishing I was special lines, but you can read into the song choice however you want.)

But really, I don't know what I'm doing there.  Yesterday, I sent out my resume again to a company.  It's been a while since I've done that, like before my family was visiting for Christmas.  I kinda went into this knowing that this job would be different, but it's harder than I thought. 

Song of the Day - Level 42

In honor of my hitting level 42 in Farmville (ooh, big accomplishment for the formerly unemployed guy), today's song of the day is Level 42's Something About You.

Isn't that a weird video?  Nevertheless, this is a classic 80s song. 

The girl in this video is Cherie Lunghi and I was looking to see if she's done anything interesting and she once did a movie called 'Tis Pity She's a Whore.  I've since learned this is actually a very old play and it's actually really weird and freaky.  (Go read the wikipedia synopsis.)  And then you consider that it was written in the early 1600s.  Wow.  I can't imagine a screenwriter today trying to shop his script around saying, "So there's a brother/sister incest thing and then she marries someone else and then all this Shakespearean/Greek tragic stuff happens."

Song of the Day - Pet Shop Boys

I've been a fan of the Pet Shop Boys for a very long time and today's song, Being Boring, is definitely not the one I had imagined posting.  I had thought Opportunities (Let's Make Lots of Money) or What Have I Done to Deserve This would be more appropriate.  But this song happens to be the favorite for a lot of other PSB fans (just not me), so here it is.



I just spent the past week in a super boring training and this is only one of two songs I could come with off the top of my head about boredom, though I guess the lyrics for the song aren't really about boredom at all.  (The other song that came to mind was Green Day's Longview, but I'm not sure I wanted to go down the path of talking about that song.)

One thing on the video.  The actual video is somewhat NSFW for some very beefcake-y stuff and also not embeddable, but here's a link if you're curious.

Anyway, today's training actually finished by two.  With the hour lunch and the late start to the class, I was really only "working" for 4 hours today.  Maybe I should've gone back to work, but who would know, right?  But after 5 days of training, the class never really got very interesting and I'm not sure if we covered anything I might actually use at this job.  Oh well.  The company just spent thousands of dollars for both the class and my salary this week.  They wouldn't just throw money like that away, right?

Song of the Day - Will Smith

After the last tirade here, we'll go with Will Smith's Just the Two of Us.



This was chosen because of the line "Hate in your heart will consume you too."  (We'll ignore the line before about god dealing with the things they do.)  Readers that don't know me, and maybe even ones that do, may be surprised at the bitterness in my last post, but I guess I am.  And it felt good to let that out here.  The alternative would have been to yell at the people talking to me, but that might have felt good too.  But I guess I value their friendship and decided to lie and act (possibly poorly) for an hour.

During that time too, what also kinda sucked was that they asked (of course) about the new job, and I lied and said it was good.  They had told me how great things were back where I used to work, and I didn't want to say how ridiculous I consider my new job so far.  Even though it gets you through the moment, it hurts later, you know.  And the knowledge that I might have to keep this up for a while until things actually get better sucks too.   

One more thing on the subject.  I'm pretty sure I'm guilty of the same thing with another friend of mine that was let go a year before me.  I feel really terrible about that now that I've been through the same thing.  Probably explains why I've only seen him a handful of times in the past couple years.

Anyway, I should follow this song's instructions and try to not to be negative about stuff.  My friend told me to read The Brain That Changes Itself so maybe that'll help.

Advice on Talking to a Former Coworker

I'm in a really boring training right now, so I might as well write a little, right?  (shh.  Don't tell me boss.)

So, if you're ever talking to a former coworker, and you still work there and they don't and not by their own choice, here's some advice.  Now, I might be meaner and/or less caring than the next person, but at least keep this in mind.

I don't want to hear about your work christmas party.  I don't want to hear about someone there having a baby.  I don't want to hear about some contractor the company hired that's now doing what used to be my job.  I don't want to hear about any of it. 

Rant over.

Song of the Day - Simply Red

Today's song of the day is Simply Red's Holding Back the Years.



Based on stuff in the last post, I was trying to think of songs that are about being a visitor or about things not making sense.  However, for some reason, I felt like the "I'll keep holding on" chorus kinda fit too.  I didn't really know what this song is about though.  I guess I assumed it's about relationships, but apparently, he wrote the song as a kid about his parents' divorce, but the lyrics are pretty general about everything though.

Also, this is likely to be my only post about Simply Red on this blog, so I'm going to post this Family Guy clip, which I thought was great.

How Was Your First Week?

I'm getting asked this question a lot and my answer is, "It's OK."  I don't know if I have a great impression of my new job right now, but I realize it could be worse. 

One of my first impressions is that there are going to be a lot of meetings.  My former manager always believed that meetings usually become a waste of time, but that's definitely not the philosophy at the new place.

I still don't really know what I'm going to do here and it worries me because from what I've seen so far I'm not sure that my background will give me immediate success in my new job.  It'd be nice to be seen as someone who can immediately contribute and blah, blah, blah.  The opposite of being seen as someone who's going to require tons of training and will make mistakes in the beginning is not as appealing. 

I had a former coworker a few jobs ago who was hired as a software/firmware engineer.  However, I learned that he was more of a hardware guy, but took the software job anyway because that's what was offered and he didn't have any other prospects.  He was gone from the company within a month.  From what I've been told, I guess I'm surprised he lasted that long. 

Not that I feel like a firing is imminent or anything, but the time frame for getting up to speed might be shorter than what might be appropriate for me so that scares me.

Here's a fun story that I've told several times now:

I'm at the water cooler and another guy approaches.

Friendly Guy: You look like you're new around new.
Me: I just started here this week.
Friendly Guy: Oh.  Where were you before?
(I give a description of my last company and my last job.)
Friendly Guy: What happened?
Me (not wanting to talk about it, but probably didn't hide it well): You know.  Things.
Friendly Guy (immediately interpreting with the money gesture): Oh.  I know things.
Me (acting in total agreement): Yeah.  You know how it is.

My wife likes to imagine this conversation with any number of sexual gestures instead of the money gesture. 

A second story:

Setup.  This week and throughout the next few weeks, I'm going to have individual meetings with other engineers in different departments so that I can have an idea of how all the groups work together and all that junk.  This was one of them.

Other Engineer: What's your job title here?
Me: Technology Development Engineer
Other Engineer: So what group are you in?
I answer.
Other Engineer: What did you do before?
I give my short interview spiel on my last couple jobs.
Other Engineer (realizing that my spiel is completely different from the group I'm assigned to): So what technology would you be developing for this group?
Me: I don't know.

For me, that conversation pretty much sums it up.  I've had lots of meetings and tagged along with other engineers now, but nothing really makes sense yet.

What Will Happen to the Blog?

A few people have already asked me what will happen to this blog.  Well, as you may have noticed, I've now changed the title to "Formerly Unemployed in MN" and my blog name is now engineermnguy and I have a new e-mail engineermnguy (at) gmail (dot) com.  Of course, no one e-mailed me at the unemployedmnguy address before, but it's easy to set up all these accounts anyway, so whatever.  But I guess the URL was set a long time ago, so that won't be changing.  Oh well.

I'll keep on writing, but I'm sure less often.  I guess I hoped I'd stumble upon something I could passionately write about, but I guess this blog has been a weird mishmash of stuff, hasn't it? 

OK.  That's it for now.

Farmville

One thing I learned during unemployment is that Farmville is a really good timesuck. 

So I start up my farm my first week of unemployment and after three months, I'm now at level 40, several levels above friends who started months before I started.  This isn't like some great accomplishment or anything, but I'm home all day, so I might as well harvest berries as often as possible, which for me is 2 crops of berries during the day, then rice overnight.  I actually haven't missed a harvest my entire time.  It's actually a nice way to regiment the day.  Usually, I'll harvest at 10:30, work out at 11, and then have lunch. 

What's nice about Farmville is that there's a way to quantify progress.  When you're networking or sending out resumes, you can count things like number of jobs applied to, but you really have no idea if actual progress is made; if anything is going to happen.  At least here, I know my experience points and level and coins will all go up in a nice predictable way.

I once told some friends that without Farmville, I wouldn't have a reason to get up.  Now, I was joking, but it's kind of nice to have something with consequences.  Like if I don't send out one more resume or something, I really have no idea if that would have any effect on my job search, but I absolutely know that if I don't harvest crops on time, I'll lose them. 

We were discussing Farmville with some friends a few days ago and after a while, I said, "Did we just talk about Farmville for like 20 minutes?" 

It'll be kind of a relief to not farm so much.  I'll actually switch over to crops that take days to grow.  Weird.

Lessons Learned

Some random things I've learned during my unemployment:

Networking works.  And I guess you really have no idea what person you meet will point you in the direction of the job you eventually get.

NPR has some interesting things on during the day.  I learned that I like the debates that they sometimes play at noon.

Some of my friends are way way too good at Bejeweled Blitz, like always scoring 300k+.

Sometimes, it's good that my computer is kind of crappy because I'll be playing Bejeweled Blitz to beat the aforementioned friends and then my computer crashes.  It probably stops me from playing longer.

Some companies just like interviewing  people not necessarily because they have an opening, but just in case they do in the future.

I apparently have a headshot good enough to get me in a local commercial.  That'll be little regret of mine that I wasn't able to make it to the casino commercial.  And this last lottery commercial audition that I did.  If they want me and they shoot during the week (likely), I won't be able to go because of the new job.

I don't think I'd make a good retiree.  Boredom sets in very quickly for me.

It's possible to have a catalog of companies as big as any recruiter's. 

Recruiters are generally useless.  But they're fun to blog about.

Poker Tournament

Let's momentarily change the subject.

At one point, I had thought about making Lady Gaga's Poker Face the song of the day, but decided that song gets too much play anyway.  My wife suggested Kenny Rogers' The Gambler, but I will probably never highlight a country song on this blog. 

So since I'm feeling a little less cheap with my upcoming job, I decided to go to a poker tournament.  But I am a cheap person, so I went to the cheapest poker tournament in town and that's a $30 No Limit Texas Hold 'Em tournament at Running Aces.  I didn't even know this place existed until I started looking for local poker tournaments.

I took some notes with my phone while I was there, so this might be a fairly detailed post. 

First off, it's not terribly big.  Maybe half the size of Treasure Island, which is the only other casino I've been to in Minnesota.  However, it was really busy.  There were at least twenty tables that were full and probably more like thirty.  And there were probably 20-30 people at the bar and in those little booths watching horse racing.  Considering it was around 1 in the afternoon, I wonder if all these people are unemployed or something. 

The tournament didn't start until 2, I had some time to kill.  I decided to watch the upcoming horse race.  I've never bet on horse racing before, and I'm probably not that likely to, but it's kind of interesting to see.  There are some guys there with notebooks and all this junk.  After watching them parade each horse in front of the camera, I decided that if I were to bet, I'd pick "Posse in Effect".  I just liked the name.  The horse was in second for a while, but faded down the stretch.  The winner was "She Loves You Now."  I wonder if someone has named their racehorse "He Hate Me" or something like that.

I take my seat at the table about quarter to 2.  People slowly take their seats soon after.  Of course, it's all guys.  I probably only saw a handful of women at any of the tables, and maybe 20 tops in the casino.  I learn that they don't have enough dealers for all the people that are there and there's a really long waiting list.  So as we play, whenever anyone's eliminated from the tournament, someone's there ready to take their place at the table. 

I'm used to playing online where the blinds go up fairly slowly (10/20 to 15/30 to 25/50) but they need to move people through and the blinds double every 10 minutes. 

To make a long story short (too late), I survive for about an hour, but then I was dealt Ace-Queen and I went all in, but the guy that called me had Ace-King.  I didn't get a queen or anything that helped and that was it. 

But if you're free on a Tuesday or Thursday, a $30 poker tournament isn't a bad way to spend an hour (or hopefully more), though it's probably not a great investment.   And Running Aces is only in Forest Lake, so it's not that far away.

Song of the Day - Sundays

For my last song of the day as an unemployed person, my pick is "Here's Where the Story Ends" by the Sundays. 



I've always liked the dreamy voice quality of this group.  Out of all the songs called "Summertime", I would place their song at the top (yes, even above DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince.)

A couple lyrics I want to highlight:
"I can see how people look down.  I'm on the outside."
It's funny how some people don't want to talk about unemployment.  I don't know, like it's a disease we're afraid of catching or something.  And maybe in some ways it is.  I do feel fortunate that not everyone's like that. 

"So I cynically, cynically say the world is that way.  Surprise."
Those of you that know me know that I'm a pretty cynical person.  And to get a job after only 3 months of unemployment, I should probably be less cynical.  But maybe later.  We'll see how the job actually goes.

How I Got My Job

There's a regular thing in the St. Paul Pioneer Press where they interview some random person and the random person tells you about their job and how they got it.  So let's imagine they're writing an article about me. 

What is your new title?
Technology Development Engineer

Tell us about your responsibilities.
I have no idea.

How did you get this job?
I went to an engineering society meeting where I met someone who just met someone looking for experience with a specific software package.  Then, I interviewed for the position which was definitely not what I wanted, but I lied and said I was interested in a stepping stone position.  Fortunately, they changed the job (and probably pay) and I was enticed to take it.  (Can you imagine them printing this in the Pioneer Press?)

What song title would characterize your life right now?
"Here I Go Again" by Whitesnake. 
"No I don't know where I'm going, but I sure know where I've been."  "And I've made up my mind, I ain't wasting no more time."
(This daily article would be so much more interesting if they interviewed people like me.  The people they interview give the most boring answer to this question.)

Song of the Day - Steve Winwood

I'm finally going to make Steve Winwood's "Back in the High Life Again" today's song of the day.  In my first post about songs, which was just the third post here, I said that I hoped to some day pick this song, so here it is. 



Some thoughts/trivia:
Does anything say rock and roll like Steve Winwood holding a small mandolin?

Steve Winwood is known as a "blue eyed soul" musician.  Who knew that they had a category for white artists in soul music?  This kind of makes me want to watch The Commitments.  I'll add that to the queue right now.

Apparently, the backup singer on this song is James Taylor.  Who knew?

Read on for why the song was chosen.

I Have a Job

So the big news is that after my last interview, I was sent a job offer and after a little bit of time to mull things over, I decided to accept the offer. 

During the last interview, the hiring manager said that he had to look at the budget and get that approved and all this junk first before making a decision on hiring.  Then, the next day, HR called me with the offer.  Why even say something like that?

So after meeting all these people from the company and having all these interviews, I'm actually not quite sure on the kind of work I'd be doing.  It doesn't help that I'll have the completely amorphous title of Technology Development Engineer.  But I liked the people I met and I'm really interested in the products I'll be working on and that's what counts, right?

I start on Monday so my time of being the unemployedMNguy is going to end soon.  I'll have more posts on this soon too, but first, I ought to go shovel all of today's snow.

Wordle

I just learned about the website Wordle, which makes a fun picture out of all the common words you use on your blog or website.  So, in my case, I use the words: like, really, just, and guy a lot.  Kind of fun.

A Real Audition

I had an interesting day yesterday, really, only the kind of day one can have while unemployed and searching for anything weird that resembles an adventure. 

I see an ad in craigslist for a commercial and I send in my head shot.  Just a couple hours later, I get an e-mail back asking me to come in to meet them.  I'm there an hour later.  Their office is around the corner from the Gay 90s.  I was kind of creeped out in the building.  Basically when you walk in, there's an elevator and a door (which I would later figure out are stairs).  Right then, a black guy with a little dog (like a pomeranian or something like that) walked out of the elevator.  The guy reminded me of Darnell (the black guy) from My Name is Earl.

Anyway, I follow the e-mailed instructions and take the elevator up and then all that's in front of me are a door and a set of five doorbells.  I was told which one to press, but in general, it just felt weird and creepy.  Actors must put themselves in all sorts of slightly weird situations like this in search of their next gig.

A girl answers and leads me through the door and past a hallway (where I presume the other four doorbells lead) and into their office.  Very New York Soho loft kind of place (like the apartment in My Two Dads).  There are modern looking couches on the first floor with a pretty big kitchen and a loft second story above the kitchen.  In front of the couches there's a big empty space, but with a movie projector screen rolled up in the corner.  My wife and I guess they gather on the couch to look at pictures or films (or play an awesome game of multiplayer Mario Kart).  There are posters from various fashion shows on the walls and modern looking desks with Macs on the second story.  Way more chic and cool than any place I'll ever work in. 

Anyway, I sit on the couch and I'm given a small form to fill out.  I was also asked to bring in a headshot.  As someone who really doesn't care about acting, my headshot was printed on regular paper minutes before.  No way I'm spending money on a real photo.  I'm asked my age and then the girl goes upstairs.  If you ever want to go into acting, it would be a good idea to know all of your measurements, like it asked for like my suit measurements and my neck and all this stuff, which the Men's Wearhouse salesguy magically took care of earlier for me.  So I fill out the form pretty quickly.  One reason this post is so long is because I had time to take notes (and a couple covert pictures) while I waited.  To them, it probably just looked like I text a lot.

Some music came on the speakers.  It was the original "Baby Where Did Our Love Go" and then went on to other pop music.  After waiting a while, a trendy guy walks down the stairs and introduces himself.  He's wearing very tight pants and a hoodie and a sportcoat.  He's also wearing a piece of cloth around his neck kind of tied like a bowtie.  I'm never around people like this.  He explains that they're a modeling agency, but they're helping to cast a commercial for the Minnesota Lottery.  He thinks I'd be good for the part and asks if I can audition today.  I say yes.  He goes upstairs and I wait some more.

Then, the black guy with the dog from earlier came in and went upstairs.  The dog spent of its time really scrutinizing me.  This is probably a coincidence, but the music switched to all rap/hip hop after that.  Then, the trendy guy comes back down.  The dog follows him but then goes back upstairs after playing with a toy for a minute.  I'm given a sheet and told the audition is around the corner in 45 minutes.  He wishes me luck and tells me we'll talk about money if I get the part.

The sheet tells me where to go and a little more about the commercial.  It asks that the man casted for the part be "Not a model by any means.  He's interesting looking in the fact that he's very ordinary."  (After showing this sheet to my wife, she said, "No, you're extraordinary to me."  Aww.) 

I get lunch in Block E (there are still places open in there?) and then go back to my car which is in a nearby lot.  Unfortunately, I only paid for one hour of parking which was $4.  I put in more money for another hour.  I could have saved $2 if I had known ahead of time I'd be there for two hours.  Oh well.  It must suck being an actor and driving to random places and paying for parking all the time. 

The audition for commercial is a block over in the Wyman Building.  This is much nicer than the building I was in previously.  I go into an office where there's a older guy and older woman.  Another woman just walked out of a second room and had apparently just auditioned.  I'm given a form to fill out (again, they ask for all these random measurements).  I'm also directed to another sheet that storyboards the commercial. 

So I have just bought a scratch game and I'm in the car scratching.  And then a really tall guy gets into the car (Simpsons reference: "This is the largest automobile I can afford.") and the other guy throws confetti at me, but I'm so engrossed in the scratching that I don't notice him.  And then a thing comes up saying that the Minnesota Lottery is huge.

I'm led into the other room.  There's a still camera and a  printer and then a videocamera and a monitor.  A still is taken of me and printed out.  The woman explains that I'm going to sit in front of the videocamera and act like I'm scratching a ticket.  We practiced a few times and I had to be reminded to keep my head up so the camera can see my face.  My instinct was to lean over.  Anyway, she films me and then I act like I won $10 or something and my face lights up.  And that was it.  Really, I felt pretty stupid throughout the whole thing.  I doubt I'd ever make a good actor.  I'm not really sure if any emotion made it through to the camera.

Anyway, that's it.  I'll hear back on that next week.   That was fun though.  I think this is also my longest post.

Song of the Day - Huey Lewis and the News

I recently had another lunch interview with the company that I've chronicled recently here.  (This is the company where I've had multiple interviews and then they contacted my references.)  When I got in my car after the interview, the song that was playing on the radio.  I thought this was strange because it was the first song I heard after one of my other interviews with this company.

I had no idea that this song was a remake, which had been done a couple years earlier by a band called Exile.  They were a pop band that would later find more success as a country band.

This song is on the album Sports, which the main character from American Psycho praises as having "really come into their own, commercially and artistically."  There are a lot of hits from this album actually and I believe it was in the first set of CDs I ever ordered from BMG.  Did I just date myself there?  Can you imagine any kids today ordering CDs through BMG or Columbia House?

A Thought While at the Dentist

I'll get away from the foodie topics for a little bit.  

I was recently at the dentist.  (No cavities, yay.)  But I just had a random thought while I was there.  I happen to have an eye phobia type thing.  I'll probably never get contacts or laser eye surgery and I don't even like seeing things happen to eyes in TV.  Like there's an episode of Family Guy, where Death accidentally gouges everyone's eyes with his scythe and I shiver or something.  ("Mufasa...")


Anyway, so the hygienist is cleaning my teeth and using those hook/pick things.  Now, those are double sided and I wondered whether there's been an accident and they accidentally drop the tool and for some reason the other side gets at the patient's eye.  That would be awful.  A google search didn't bring up anything, but I assume it might happen at least once.  Like there's an earthquake while you're getting your teeth picked at.  Fortunately, I wear glasses.

Standing Rib Roast

I've been getting Good Eats DVDs from the library and one of them was an episode where Alton Brown wants to make a special occasion meal and the butcher suggests a standing rib roast.  Of course, it looks really good in the episode and we thought we'd make it our Christmas dinner.

We have a Von Hanson's not terribly far away and it's kinda cool to have a real butcher, you know?  We got over a pound per person and that kind of adds up at $13/pound.  Just like Alton, the butcher there suggested we let the roast sit in the refrigerator before cooking.  And just like in the episode, I bought a big plastic container (only $3) and drilled holes in it for air circulation.  And we put the roast in there for 3 days.

There were some brown spots afterward, but we were assured by the butcher that any brown spots were fine to serve.  It would have been interesting to weight it before and after like he did on the show to see if ours would also lose a pound or something after aging.

In the episode, he puts the roast in a terra cotta planter, but we thought that might be overkill, considering we just bought a plastic container that, with holes in it, is pretty much only good for future rib roasts.  We do have a pizza stone so we put that in the oven under the roast.  At 200 degrees, it took less than 4 hours to cook to medium rare. And then it cooks at 500 degrees for a half hour and then that's it.

The first cut into the meat was really scary because a lot of blood came out of the meat.  I mean it was like they just cut off someone's arm in Kill Bill.  My brother-in-law was really excited and I would learn right then that he prefers meat "Bloody as hell".  My mom on the other hand would like "Burnt to a crisp."  (That's a Pulp Fiction reference.)  (Shh.  We cut off a piece on the end and microwaved it for like 3 minutes.  In Anthony Bourdain's Kitchen Confidential, he says they do that at his restaurant.) 

A quick wine reduction sauce with the pan drippings with some sage made a really great sauce.  Everyone got a fairly thick slice and everybody really enjoyed the meal.  We served some asparagus (some it wrapped with leftover prosciutto) and mashed potatoes using America's Test Kitchen's recipe and I think we had a really great Christmas dinner. (And some really awesome roast beef sandwiches the next day.)

Anyway, go give this a try next time you want to make something really cool.  Definitely worth the money.

Steamer Clams from Coastal Seafoods

My brother-in-law is from the east coast and suggested that we get steamer clams while everyone was visiting the unemployed guy's house for Christmas.  If you're not aware of what steamer clams are, I would describe them as somewhere between quahog clams (the big white ones) and mussels.  

They did this for Christmas last year, but ordered them online.  When they came in, lots of them were dead and of course you have pay a little bit extra for shipping so that they're really fresh.  I told them that there's a store here that can get everything.  For instance, my wife and I have gotten fresh Alaskan king crab from there (not frozen at all); this is a fairly rare item. 

So we were able to reserve 15 pounds of steamer clams (it was definitely an entree and not the appetizer that it usually is in New England restaurants.)  Coastal Seafoods got them in from their distributor and we didn't pay shipping and before we paid, the guy there sorted out the dead clams so we didn't have to pay for those.  I thought that was great so this post is a little plug for them.

My brother-in-law did the cooking, but I seem to remember you steam them for like 5 or 10 minutes.  What's interesting is that after getting the clam meat out, you dip it in some of the water used for steaming.  This helps clear out some of the sand and stuff.  And then, of course, it goes in the butter.  We also served artichokes in and it was all butter delivery that night.  But it was a very nice Christmas Eve dinner.