Sunday, November 25, 2007
Landed in London
Well I've just arrived in London. I rode my bike down today and I start work tomorrow. It's not the most conventional living situation. I've moved into Jules' place but Colin hasn't moved out yet so I've got a few weeks of couch surfing ahead of me. Hopefully it all goes well and we can survive with us all in the flat otherwise it could all go wrong. Oh well, I'll let you know how it goes so check back in a bit.
Friday, November 9, 2007
It's all happening
Well it's been an eventful day. I passed my motorcycle license and have accepted a job. I had an offer from a consulting company for a job where I would be placed at their client, Ford, and work on powertrain control systems. I've had the offer for a week and just needed to sort out a bunch of suff before committing to it and now I've finally sorted everything. My start date is on November 26th so I've got two weeks to get my life sorted and start working. The job is based in Essex but I'll live in London, which is part of the reason for the bike license. Running a car in London is a nightmare so I'm getting a bike instead. Plus bikes are just awesome. So in the next couple of weeks I've got to buy a bike, move to London and start work. Easy. Except that the room I'm going to live in is currently occupied. So I might only half move and get myself down there, start work and get going before moving all my stuff down later when I have the room. Anyway, for now I think I'll just have a brew or two tonight and see what happens next. Working for the man, oh well, it had to happen again some day, and just when the snow is starting to fall in Colorado.
Thursday, October 11, 2007
Photos
Well I uploaded some pictures of Camp Jules but in other picture news I've been looking through some myspace photos and came across a truely great photo that highlights how far I let my beard go. Check it out:
London
I went down to London for the weekend. Matt GA was having a leaving do on Friday because he's getting shipped out to Iraq in the next few days, I haven't seen my cousin since before he got married earlier this year and I organized myself an interivew for Monday. So I headed down on Megabus on Friday and went straight to Matt's house. It's been about two years since I last saw him because he's been stationed in Germany so it was good seeing him and all his family again. Dave was also there since he's come over to England to work. Again, I haven't seen him in ages and since he only got to England right when I was leaving at the end of last year I didn't have time to catch him then. So it was reunions all around and good fun. I knew about half of the people who came for the leaving do from running into them over the years while hanging out with Matt so I wasn't totally lost but they definitely were not a group of close friends. The whole night was good with the highlight of the evening occuring around the piano. Rory (I think that's his name, sorry) was banging out the flight of the bumble bees and doing it very well. I was listening with Mackey from the beginning and halfway through Matt's mum comes in to listen behind us where Rory can't see her. Then after finishing he turns to us and says "It doesn't half tire out your wanking muscles." as he shook out his hand. I don't know if it went straight over Matt's mums head but she didn't bat an eyelid. I crashed at Matt's house for the evening and stayed the ext day to watch the England rugby match. We beat Australia and it was brilliant. The ozzies where out. As it turned out the French also beat the kiwis so it began to look like we might have a chance. All I know is that the England v. France game this weekend is going to be good.
In the evening I headed across town to meet up with my cousin and his wife, who had not even met yet. I ended up being half and hour late. It was partly my fault, I didn't leave enough time to get across London, but I was also delayed in leaving Matt's house. Anyway, it was quite similar to the last time I met up with my cousin in London when I was coming from Matts house again and was more than an hour late. So next time I'm going to have to be extra careful to ensure I arrive early. Anyway, we had a couple of drinks at a bar. I was just looking around and Mike Fitzpatrick walks in with some friends. A completely random encounter but we caught up a bit before he went off to join his friends. After a drink or two we headed for some dinner at a great Moroccan place. It was really nice to catch up with my cousin and finally meet his wife and we had a great time talking away over dinner. I ended up crashing at their place for the night and after some breakfast in the morning I headed down to meet up with Jules.
On my way down I had a stop at London bridge and had a look around to see where my interview was and then kept going to Jules' place. We just chilled out for the evening, cooking a Sunday roast chicken and playing Wii all night. On Monday I headed over for my interview. Now after the shocking performance last time round I was a bit apprehensive as you might imagine so I was going to do my homework. I called up a friend who works for them and asked what to expect inthe interview. He said it would primarily be on my work in my PhD so I was ready to study up on my thesis. The problem is that my computer has been dying lately. I think it has an intermitent hardare problem with the memory, but I'm not exactly sure since I've run the hardware test and it came up with an error the first time but not the second time I ran it. In any case, every now and then it just crashes. I get a message that pops up and says "You must restart your computer" and I have to shut it down. Then it doesn't always want to start up again ... sometimes. So I've been soldiering on and until it has a predictable fault I'm going to leave it (since I don't really have the money to replace it). Anyway, before the interview my computer started acting up. I didn't have enough space in my bag for a hard copy of my thesis so I was relying on my computer. I know this sounds silly considering that I should have brought a hardcopy to study for the interview but I didn't find out that tehinterview would probably cover my thesis until I was already down in London. Anyway. the bottom line was that my thesis was on my computer, which didn't want to start up, and I wanted to read through some of it. Not the best situation. Finally I convinced my laptop to play nice and I got a couple of hours looking through my thesis. As it turns out, this wasn't as necessary as I thought. I went for the interview and just talked with the business manager. I would have a more technical interview at later date and also an interview with the MD of the company. So it was quite alright after all. The interview went well this time around. The company is a consulting company so after the usual this is what we do, tell me about yourself, we discussed a few opportunites that might be a good fit for me. It was quite strange because he was talking as if I already had a job at teh consultancy. Saying things like "We've got this and we've got that. Here are some things that we think you'll fit in quite well with" and going on about it also saying "Well if this isn't exactly what you want to do then we can wait for something else to come along." Which all sounds great but at the same time I didn't have a job yet and I didn't work for them. I guess he was just good at his job. He was making me feel really good about the company and giving me all sorts of positive options to keep me interested in the opportunities that they had. Trying to reel me into the company. But it was all quite strange, like meeting with a recruitment agent but being in an interivew instead. But I guess thats what a consulting company is, some sort of recuitment agency. They have to fill their books with good qualified people and keep them on the line while they also go out and find jobs to match them. In any case there are a couple of interesting jobs going and it went pretty well. I might even be back down in London fairly soon to meet some clients to see if I fit what they want. Then I might actually have a job.
I've been thinking about it a bit and it's not the dream job that I've been looking for. It's not working on racing cars. But at teh same time, consulting work is quite interesting. You get to work on a bunch of different projects and gain a lot of experience. And if you want to push your career in a particular direction then you just have to push for those projects. Also, if something better does come up then its fairly easy to get out of in between projects. So it does look pretty good and since I don't have anything else on the table right now then it looks really good. So the interview went well and I crashed at Jules' place again on Monday before heading back up to Leeds on the Megabus on Tuesday. I must say I'm quite happy with Megasbus. Last time I used them they had normal double decker buses but they were using proper coaches this time so the trip was pretty comfortable, especially since I managed to get the double seat to myself. So I'm back up in Leeds now and playing the waiting game again and I'll let you know if this job comes through.
In the evening I headed across town to meet up with my cousin and his wife, who had not even met yet. I ended up being half and hour late. It was partly my fault, I didn't leave enough time to get across London, but I was also delayed in leaving Matt's house. Anyway, it was quite similar to the last time I met up with my cousin in London when I was coming from Matts house again and was more than an hour late. So next time I'm going to have to be extra careful to ensure I arrive early. Anyway, we had a couple of drinks at a bar. I was just looking around and Mike Fitzpatrick walks in with some friends. A completely random encounter but we caught up a bit before he went off to join his friends. After a drink or two we headed for some dinner at a great Moroccan place. It was really nice to catch up with my cousin and finally meet his wife and we had a great time talking away over dinner. I ended up crashing at their place for the night and after some breakfast in the morning I headed down to meet up with Jules.
On my way down I had a stop at London bridge and had a look around to see where my interview was and then kept going to Jules' place. We just chilled out for the evening, cooking a Sunday roast chicken and playing Wii all night. On Monday I headed over for my interview. Now after the shocking performance last time round I was a bit apprehensive as you might imagine so I was going to do my homework. I called up a friend who works for them and asked what to expect inthe interview. He said it would primarily be on my work in my PhD so I was ready to study up on my thesis. The problem is that my computer has been dying lately. I think it has an intermitent hardare problem with the memory, but I'm not exactly sure since I've run the hardware test and it came up with an error the first time but not the second time I ran it. In any case, every now and then it just crashes. I get a message that pops up and says "You must restart your computer" and I have to shut it down. Then it doesn't always want to start up again ... sometimes. So I've been soldiering on and until it has a predictable fault I'm going to leave it (since I don't really have the money to replace it). Anyway, before the interview my computer started acting up. I didn't have enough space in my bag for a hard copy of my thesis so I was relying on my computer. I know this sounds silly considering that I should have brought a hardcopy to study for the interview but I didn't find out that tehinterview would probably cover my thesis until I was already down in London. Anyway. the bottom line was that my thesis was on my computer, which didn't want to start up, and I wanted to read through some of it. Not the best situation. Finally I convinced my laptop to play nice and I got a couple of hours looking through my thesis. As it turns out, this wasn't as necessary as I thought. I went for the interview and just talked with the business manager. I would have a more technical interview at later date and also an interview with the MD of the company. So it was quite alright after all. The interview went well this time around. The company is a consulting company so after the usual this is what we do, tell me about yourself, we discussed a few opportunites that might be a good fit for me. It was quite strange because he was talking as if I already had a job at teh consultancy. Saying things like "We've got this and we've got that. Here are some things that we think you'll fit in quite well with" and going on about it also saying "Well if this isn't exactly what you want to do then we can wait for something else to come along." Which all sounds great but at the same time I didn't have a job yet and I didn't work for them. I guess he was just good at his job. He was making me feel really good about the company and giving me all sorts of positive options to keep me interested in the opportunities that they had. Trying to reel me into the company. But it was all quite strange, like meeting with a recruitment agent but being in an interivew instead. But I guess thats what a consulting company is, some sort of recuitment agency. They have to fill their books with good qualified people and keep them on the line while they also go out and find jobs to match them. In any case there are a couple of interesting jobs going and it went pretty well. I might even be back down in London fairly soon to meet some clients to see if I fit what they want. Then I might actually have a job.
I've been thinking about it a bit and it's not the dream job that I've been looking for. It's not working on racing cars. But at teh same time, consulting work is quite interesting. You get to work on a bunch of different projects and gain a lot of experience. And if you want to push your career in a particular direction then you just have to push for those projects. Also, if something better does come up then its fairly easy to get out of in between projects. So it does look pretty good and since I don't have anything else on the table right now then it looks really good. So the interview went well and I crashed at Jules' place again on Monday before heading back up to Leeds on the Megabus on Tuesday. I must say I'm quite happy with Megasbus. Last time I used them they had normal double decker buses but they were using proper coaches this time so the trip was pretty comfortable, especially since I managed to get the double seat to myself. So I'm back up in Leeds now and playing the waiting game again and I'll let you know if this job comes through.
Camp Jules
So the other weekend I headed back up to Camp Jules. I got a lift up there with Jules' parents on Thursday night and Jules was coming up from London with Colin and the two Chris' after work on Friday. I spent Friday poking around the boats for a while playing with my new digital camera. I was taking a bunch of arty shots of the rigging on the 14 and playing with the depth of field. Check out the pictures at my picassa site. After enough playing with the camera I realised the wind was up and time was ticking away so I rigged up the laser and went for a spin. I got on quite well and sailed up to the sailing club and then had a run back down the lake (the wind was coming from the north which is a bit unusual). I was doing alright but it always felt like there was more speed in the boat given the wind conditions. I just wasn't quite getting it. Maybe I was sailing too hard up into the wind or maybe I didn't have the sail properly set for the wind. What ever it was, there was something not quite right, which is always a bit frustrating but oh well, I had a good sail anyway. Jules and everyone else got into camp a bit after midnight and we looked forward to teaching the two Chris' how to sail.
Saturday came and the wind wasn't really blowing. There was enough movement on the water to get the boats around but not much more. So we rigged the two merlins and got Jules and beardy Chris in the new boat while I took out vegy Chris. Colin jumped on the laser and had a little float with us. We managed to beat up to the sailing club again but the wind was dying. We turned around before it got too calm and started heading back. We had to jump from one patch of wind to the next, getting caught in flat clam in between. Colin was just sitting out in the middle of the lake going nowhere. We put up the spinaker and tried to catch a bit more wind with the extra sail but just ended up going round in circles as the wind floated around with no apparent direction. At least we did better than Beardy Chris who was helming the boat when Jules dropped the spinaker pole. The pole went with the excellent auto-retrive rigging and shot straight back into Chris's forehead. It was a perfect shot. On our boat, I lost the spinaker pole once but thankfully it didn't have quite as good aim and missed Chris. So we all got back to camp after a bit of a float. Adey had made it up for the weekend but not in time for a sail so we all went for a wander through the woods. It was really nice and calm in the forest. It was full of trees and moss that really deadened the sound and gave it a great sense of peace. It just looed amazing with all the lush green in the late afternoon light under a cloudy sky. It reminded me of why I enojy being outside so much. After getting a bit hungry we headed back to camp for dinner then cruised into town for a pint in the pub.
Sunday was even worse than Saturday for sailing. There was almost no wind. We ended up taking the tents down and cleaning up camp a bit. Then in the afternoon it looked like a bit of wind was picking up. I rigged the new merlin and went out with Colin to gauge the conditions while beardy Chris got ready to sail the laser. As it turned out the wind didn't pick up, it died quite quickly which left Colin and me floating around in the middle of the lake and Chris just sitting on shore watching us with Jules. So the weekend was a bit of a failure for sailing. I felt bad for the Chris' who had rented a car and come all the way up from London expecting to learn how to sail. As it was they did get out on the water but it wasn't like it should have been. I remember my first weekend up at the lake and the brilliant sailing we got in, racing away in the 14 by the end of it. But I guess they did get out of the big smoke and had some fresh air and countryside, which they really did seem to enjoy. So it may have been worth it for them but knowing what it could have been with some good wind, I still felt a bit sorry for them.
Camp Jules
Saturday came and the wind wasn't really blowing. There was enough movement on the water to get the boats around but not much more. So we rigged the two merlins and got Jules and beardy Chris in the new boat while I took out vegy Chris. Colin jumped on the laser and had a little float with us. We managed to beat up to the sailing club again but the wind was dying. We turned around before it got too calm and started heading back. We had to jump from one patch of wind to the next, getting caught in flat clam in between. Colin was just sitting out in the middle of the lake going nowhere. We put up the spinaker and tried to catch a bit more wind with the extra sail but just ended up going round in circles as the wind floated around with no apparent direction. At least we did better than Beardy Chris who was helming the boat when Jules dropped the spinaker pole. The pole went with the excellent auto-retrive rigging and shot straight back into Chris's forehead. It was a perfect shot. On our boat, I lost the spinaker pole once but thankfully it didn't have quite as good aim and missed Chris. So we all got back to camp after a bit of a float. Adey had made it up for the weekend but not in time for a sail so we all went for a wander through the woods. It was really nice and calm in the forest. It was full of trees and moss that really deadened the sound and gave it a great sense of peace. It just looed amazing with all the lush green in the late afternoon light under a cloudy sky. It reminded me of why I enojy being outside so much. After getting a bit hungry we headed back to camp for dinner then cruised into town for a pint in the pub.
Sunday was even worse than Saturday for sailing. There was almost no wind. We ended up taking the tents down and cleaning up camp a bit. Then in the afternoon it looked like a bit of wind was picking up. I rigged the new merlin and went out with Colin to gauge the conditions while beardy Chris got ready to sail the laser. As it turned out the wind didn't pick up, it died quite quickly which left Colin and me floating around in the middle of the lake and Chris just sitting on shore watching us with Jules. So the weekend was a bit of a failure for sailing. I felt bad for the Chris' who had rented a car and come all the way up from London expecting to learn how to sail. As it was they did get out on the water but it wasn't like it should have been. I remember my first weekend up at the lake and the brilliant sailing we got in, racing away in the 14 by the end of it. But I guess they did get out of the big smoke and had some fresh air and countryside, which they really did seem to enjoy. So it may have been worth it for them but knowing what it could have been with some good wind, I still felt a bit sorry for them.
Camp Jules
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
Failed
Well it's official, I failed to get the McLaren job. The crappy thing is that although I only interviewed for the controls job, the vehicle dynamics people decided "not to take my application any further." Maybe this would have been the case regardless but I know that the control people talked to the vehicle dynamics people and I can't imagine they gave me any positive reviews. Like I said it kinda sucks that interviewing for the control job, which I wasn't really expecting to get when I applied in the first place, ruined my chances of getting the vehicle dynamics job, which I was more comfortable with and better qualified for. Oh well, there isn't anything I can do about it now. I've been to the promised land and I firmly slammed the door in my own face with a horrible interview. God I wish it had not been my first interview. Why couldn't some other company I didn't want to work for give me an interview first. Well, back to finding more jobs. There have been a few nibbles here and there but nothing very concrete yet. So hopefully I can sort out something good in the next week or so.
The problem with a performance like the one I had in the McLaren interview is that it introduces all sorts of self doubts. I began to think that despite thinking of myself as reasonably intelligent I actually don't know anything. That I managed to squeak through my undergrad with the bare minimum of work and no actual knowledge retention. That I also pretty much sailed through my job in Detroit without having to think and again did just about the minimum required of me to not get fired. And that my PhD was a load of missguided research that looked quite nice because I managed to write it fairly well but actually didn't contain anything that someone in industry would find remotely relevant or interesting and has about as many holes in it as swiss cheese and once again I pulled it off without actually retaining any knowledge. I'm not sure if this really is the case. Although I can think of all sorts of holes in the research and looking back on it I can think of a million ways of improving it and giving it some credibility, patching holes etc, from what I hear, pretty much everyone who has done a PhD says the same thing. I guess you never really know what people mean when they say their work was rubbish and it could have been better by doing a few things and how that compares to how rubbish your own work was. So maybe it's not that bad. However, what I do know is this. First, I have passed my viva and handed in and completed everything I need to do so unless something goes horribly wrong, I'll get the degree. So at least three other people have read my work and consider it good enough, in fact they keep saying its actually very good (but I'm not sure if they are refering to the writing and presentation or the actual work). And second, I don't know enough to hold my own in an interview so I've got a lot of work to do in revising and studying a bunch of stuff that I should already know (and claim to know) so that I can actually understand everything properly and defend myself in an interview. Basically, fill in all the background for what I've implemented in my research so I not only understand it but can explian it to people who don't know what I've done.
So plenty of work ahead of me, and plenty of time to do it since I have nothing else to do. I just have to get of the internet and actually apply myself. So on that note, I'll see you later, once I've filled my brain with knowledge.
The problem with a performance like the one I had in the McLaren interview is that it introduces all sorts of self doubts. I began to think that despite thinking of myself as reasonably intelligent I actually don't know anything. That I managed to squeak through my undergrad with the bare minimum of work and no actual knowledge retention. That I also pretty much sailed through my job in Detroit without having to think and again did just about the minimum required of me to not get fired. And that my PhD was a load of missguided research that looked quite nice because I managed to write it fairly well but actually didn't contain anything that someone in industry would find remotely relevant or interesting and has about as many holes in it as swiss cheese and once again I pulled it off without actually retaining any knowledge. I'm not sure if this really is the case. Although I can think of all sorts of holes in the research and looking back on it I can think of a million ways of improving it and giving it some credibility, patching holes etc, from what I hear, pretty much everyone who has done a PhD says the same thing. I guess you never really know what people mean when they say their work was rubbish and it could have been better by doing a few things and how that compares to how rubbish your own work was. So maybe it's not that bad. However, what I do know is this. First, I have passed my viva and handed in and completed everything I need to do so unless something goes horribly wrong, I'll get the degree. So at least three other people have read my work and consider it good enough, in fact they keep saying its actually very good (but I'm not sure if they are refering to the writing and presentation or the actual work). And second, I don't know enough to hold my own in an interview so I've got a lot of work to do in revising and studying a bunch of stuff that I should already know (and claim to know) so that I can actually understand everything properly and defend myself in an interview. Basically, fill in all the background for what I've implemented in my research so I not only understand it but can explian it to people who don't know what I've done.
So plenty of work ahead of me, and plenty of time to do it since I have nothing else to do. I just have to get of the internet and actually apply myself. So on that note, I'll see you later, once I've filled my brain with knowledge.
Thursday, September 20, 2007
The job hunt, or should that be with a 'c'
So here I am, working away trying to pull the fleece over employers eyes, trying to convince them to hire me, and then it happened. I got a response from someone that wasn't a small, one page letter saying:
Dear applicant,
Thank you for your interest. Unfortuantely, due to the large response and quality of applicants we have not given you the job but we will keep your records on file and if something should come up in the future we'll give you a call. Now go fuck off and don't come back.
Sincerely,
Cockblocking assholes.
or something along those lines. So I finally got a response from someone. Well, that's a bit of a missrepresentation because it wasn't just someone, it was McLaren. Who you might ask? Oh wait, they're a Formula One team, yeah, that's right, one of the most successful teams out there, the one thats also made the McLaren F1 supercar and the McLaren Mercedes SLR, oh and hang haven't they been in the news lately? That's right, one of their employees was being supplied top secret information from a Ferrari employee and they got busted for cheating with the biggest fine in history ($100 million) and kicked out of the constructors championships. Well that last bit isn't so flattering but I won't go into that, there's already plenty of crap on the internet discussing that and it really doesn't bother me too much in my quest for a job. They are a fantasitc company and dspite the actions of a few bad apples they will fight on a continue to be a top F1 team.
So I got a response (did I mention it was from McLaren, you know F1, anyway) it was just a nibble at first. They wanted a phone interview for a control job I applied for. I had also applied for a vehicle dynamics job with them which is more my specialty, but never mind I did some controls as well so lets go. The phone interview went well and I was pretty happy with my performance. Then I got another nibble. They wanted a phone interview, and I was going to be interviewed by the same two people. Now This wasn't what I expected. In the first phone interview I had mentioned I had also applied for a VD job (vehicle dynamics you dirty minded bastards). They said that was fine, it was a different group but they talked. So when I had a second phone interview with the same people it didn't make much sense. So I asked the HR person if it was for ths VD job and she said yes it was. Ok what ever. So I was dilligently waiting by the phone, waiting for my second phone interview ... just waiting ... by my phone. Time was ticking by and I wasn't getting a call. Not the most reassuring feeling, not a good feeling at all. Then twenty minutes after the interview was scheduled I got a call,. Hey, a bit late but no big deal, feeling good now. However, it wasn't the people who were supposed to interview me, it was the HR person, which sent the feeelings down again. Damn this job hunt thing is a rollercoaster (if only I knew about the following week). Anyway, I figured I should heart out what the HR girl had to say. Wait, what was that, there wasn't any point in conducting two phone interviews so why don't you come down for a proper interview at the McLaren factory (which I was to learn wasn't a factory at all. It was the McLaren Technology Centre and it is a thing of wonder and amazment). So the nibble had turned into a good bite and I was on my way down to Woking for an interview, no more bad thoughts, just high spirits.
So it was that I found myself on the train down south, reading through some things, trying to study up on some control stuff and the VD stuff as well. just getting my mind in the right frame for the interview. I got down to Woking and grabbed a cab to teh McLaren Technology Centre. Now I should say that it is absolutely phenomenal, I was completely blown away by it. Now keep in mind I have already visited the Renault F1 Factory, which was amazing but this place, wow, it's just on a different level all together. We got to the security gate and the security shack was no shack at all. It was a circular glass building that wouldn't look out of place in a comtempory design gallery. So I signed in. The guard gave me a pass card and one for the cab. He told me to be dropped off at Rotunda B/C, go inside and down the steps, along the corridor, up the lift to Level 1+ and go to the racing reception. Ok, no problem so I got back in the cab and gave the driver his card and the directions. He dropped me off at Rotunda B/C, which was just a small circular glass building at the back of the main building. Oh did I mention, all the transporter trucks where parked right between me and the main building. They had jsut come back from the Belgium GP at Spa, pretty cool. Anyway, I wasn't there for the sightseeing so I swiped my card by the door and went in. There wasn't anyone there. Here I was, inside a top F1 facility belonging to a team just convicted of a major cheating afair, and they just give you a pass card and let you loose. Well not entirely I had a stair case in front of me. So I went down the stairs and got ready to "go along the corridor to the lift" like the guard at the gate told me. But this was no ordinary corridor. It was a gleaming, white 200m of perfect, underground corridor. It looked like it was out of a spaceship, maybe from 2001. It was fantastic. There were some doors but they were flush with the wall so you didn't even notice them. I was impressed toi say the least. But no time to dilly dally, I didn't want to get caught gobsmacked when I was here trying convince them I actually belonged there. So I wandered along, quite casually I thought, to the other end of the corridor, which just had a circular white pillar in the middle of the circular room. The lift entrance was around the back. So I got in the lift, but it was really disorienting. It was a glass lift but in a black chamber so it was all super reflective and you couldn't see anything. It took a little while to find the buttons to hit 1+. Before I did though, I looked up. Through the black hole was a white light at the top. I hit the button and started to move towards the light. I came up out of the floor and moved up to Level 1+. Now Level 1+ was a floating level, or at least the part I was on was. I had been brought up straight out of the ground and up to these floating walkways. I got out of the lift and looked around. How about right, oh there are a bunch of race cars that Bruce McLaren raced back in the day, including his first ever race car. Oh and check that out, there are a bunch of McLaren F1 super cars and behind them there's the work shop where they make the McLaren Mercedes SLR. Not too shabby. How about we look right. Oh, a bunch of F1 cars and whats the name on the side, just Ayrton Senna, no big deal. And beyond them, just the current F1 cars in various states of build. And guess what, there's not a single drop of oil anywhere. Everything was pristene and perfect. Did I say this place was absolutely phenominal yet? So I managed to get my feet moving and looked for anythign that could be Racing Reception. I saw a floating circle with a desk in the middle with a lady. I went over there and it turned out to be Racing Reception. Result, I had made it. It was a good thing I was a few minute early because that let me calm down and get used to the place. By the time I got called for the interview I felt pretty good and relaxed, which is good because that feeling wasn't going to last through the end of the day.
So I met the guy interviewing me and he briefly showed me around before we headed into the interview proper. Everything went nicely to begin with. There were two people interviewing me and they were nice and friendly. They started off giving me a run down of what they did and the job they had open, which was actually three positions and a bunch of work that needed to be done. After that we got into some more technical stuff, but that was fine because we started out just talking about my research and what I had done. This went well and I was quite happy and comfortable talking about it. But they certainly looked at it all with an eye for the control stuff and I got caught a little bit here and there trying to explain the control stuff in the terms they were familiar with. So not entirely smooth sailing but no big drama, yet. We ended up getting caught up with one thing in particular, sliding mode control, which I had trouble understanding myself and with an eight month break I was having trouble understanding it again and trouble explaining it again (as you might imagine if you don't remember it yourself). So we moved on. Maybe not the best if you can't fully explain work that you claim to have done. But like I said not a big deal, just a little slip. So we moved on, like I said. Fine, I was quite happy to no longer be interrogated about my own work, and fail to explain it properly, or thats what I thought.
"So I'm going to give you an example problem and just see how you do it. If we have a valve here and the flow rate is proportional to ... blah blah blah ... (stuff that's not really interesting to 99.999% of the people reading this)"
As he was saying all this he was drawing out a diagram of a hydraulic system. I hadn't even looked at a hydraulic system since my undergraduate days, about eight years ago. Ok don't panic, it's really not that complicated, actually it's about as simple a system as you could create. Even if I can't remember anything I should be able to at least just think logically and think my through this.
"... blah blah blah ... so what's the relationship between the current and the position of the piston, x?"
Ok, don't panic. Just think this one through ... right so we've got i, Q, x ... I need A so I'll introduce that ... then there's this ... oh wait not sure I need that ... how about if I do this ... hang on, this isn't going well ... ok, stop, this isn't that hard, just think, you can do this ... nope not getting it ... come on Nick!!!! ... right start again ... ok so you've got ...
And it just didn't get better. My brain froze up and I may as well have been sitting there drooling on myself, scratching my balls and farting. After some proding and a little help I fumbled my way through it, very poorly.
"Ok, so now whats the response of this system to a step input?"
Ok, put the last failure behind you and, wait, don't say failure, we need positive thoughts. Put that behind you and crack on with this ... ok, so its a first order system ... erm ... um ...
So once again I was fumbling around, and with a little guidance I managed to get to what could have been the right answer. I'm not sure if it actually was the right answer because they never really gave me any positive reassurance to that effect. Well shit. I was sitting there in a pool of dispair. I was embarassed by my performance, it was humiliating. It's not like they had asked me a really tough question or posed a problem with a tricky aspect to try and catch me out. They had given a problem that was about as siple as possible that was a direct representation of the work I would potentially be doing, or not as teh case was beginning to look like. Anyway, they had beaten me, or maybe they hadn't beaten me, but rather I had beaten myself up over my complete incompetence. Well they moved on and we had a few HR type questions, whats your salary expectation? when can you start work? etc. Things got a bit better and I did manage to move on from the previous suicide attempt and get back in the grove of talking confidently again. It did end with a more positive feeling. I asked about the jobs available and it did seem like they were suggesting things that I could do, and that they were thinking of were I might fit in. But in any case I had already committed suicide and the job was gone. I left the interview and walked out with my head down and my tail between my legs. If I was them I wouldn't hire me, in fact I would wonder how I had managed to graduate from university let alone got a PhD. I left the promised land ashamed and thoroughly dejected.
I headed back to London and was staying with Jules for the night. He tried his best to cheer me up. We all know you are your own harshest critic and maybe it didn't go that badly? No, I'm pretty sure it was that bad. Well, who knows what the other applicants are like? Good point but if they have a pulse they'll probably get the job over me. I suppose maybe I was being harsh on myself. First, everything went well until the final part of the interview, my resume/CV and therefore my qualifications got me the phone interview. So they must have liked the PhD and thought I was a good candidate. The phone interview went well and I did present myself well (until it all went wrong). I wasn't a control engineer, I was a VD engineer that did controls and I did bring this up. I never had any formal controls education. I had just taught myself what I needed to know for the PhD and it was a very well received piece of work. The fact is that no matter what job I end up with I'm going to have a steep learning curve, but just like my PhD, I'll get stuck in, learn what I need and get the job done, I just need some one to give me a chance to show what I am capable of. On top of this is that it was a controls job, not the VD job. The VD people would contact me separately about that job if they wanted to. So the VD stuff is my specialty and what I want to do, but the controls stuff is still very interesting and it has a much broader scope. It can be applied to almost anything so it would give me more opportunities in the future, unlike the VD stuff which would be more limited to the automotive industry. So maybe I would have a tough time getting going with the controls job but it would still be an amazing job. It just sucks that my first interview, which you always tend to fuck up since you have no idea what to expect, was with a company and job that what I've been dreaming about for years, its the whole reason I'm here now. And it killed me to fuck up the interview so badly when it was all actually easy stuff that I shoul dhave been able to do. The other crappy thing is that I thought I was also interviewing for the VD job. If I had know it was only the control job I was interviewing for I would have tried to sneak an interview with the VD guys while I was already down there. Oh well, they only told me that after the interview. Not much you can do about it at that point. I just hope that any negative feedback from this interview doesn't work against me for the VD job. So maybe it wasn't all bad, just 99% bad. Well Jules was trying to cheer me up. Needless to say we hit the pub and ended talking to a bunch of people I really didn't want to deal with when I felt so shitty.
Well I woke up the next day, feeling shit from the booze and feeling shit from teh interview. I didn't really think that a night getting drunk would make me feel any better about royally fucking the interview but it worth a try. Actually, the hang over probably made me feel worse about everything, which is generally the case. Anyway, I got up and moved out. I jumped on a train, not back up to Leeds, no not yet, I was heading out to Salisbury. Why might you ask? To visit Kirsty. She had broken her back at the start of summer and being down south and so near, it would be criminal not to visit. In any case I wanted to go down and visit, see how she was doing and try and brighten up her day. She had an incomplete spinal which means that its not complete paralysis. She can feel everything down to her knees and then after that she still has sensation but its a bit strange. She is recovering well and generally cruises around in a wheel chair but I was around when she had some physio work. She managed to walk around the building, about 100m, very slowly and with walking sticks. For someone with a massive spinal injury this was amazing. She is having to teach herself to walk again and it's amazing how well she is recovering. We also headed into town and got some lunch and a drink. It was awesome to hang out with her and jsut chill. We were sitting in the pub and it was like there was nothing different for when I saw her last. But then when we left and she wheeled away instead of walking it brought it back again. But she's fighting hard and I have no doubt that she's going to keep improving and getting better and she will walk again. It was a good day and I'm really glad I took the time to go and see her. It did put a few thigns in perspective. Here I was moaning about doing poorly in an interview, which really did mean a lot to me, but here was a really good friend and what she was going through just put all my trails and tribulations to nothing. So my job hunt (or cunt) isn't going too well, but I don't really know, maybe they will offer me the job. If they don't, there are more jobs out there and I'll get one sooner or later. I'm just thankful that I have a sound body and mind (at least for now) and that I have all the opportunities open to me because things could be very different, there are many people out there without the opportunities that I have and they are fighting on with more strength than I could ever hope to have.
So I potentially didn't get a dream job with an F1 team but come on, I've really got nothing to complain about. I'll let you know how it goes when I hear back and till the next nibble or bite on the job front I wish everyone well and I hope in particular that both Kirsty and Marco have speady and full recoverys, my thoughts are with you.
Dear applicant,
Thank you for your interest. Unfortuantely, due to the large response and quality of applicants we have not given you the job but we will keep your records on file and if something should come up in the future we'll give you a call. Now go fuck off and don't come back.
Sincerely,
Cockblocking assholes.
or something along those lines. So I finally got a response from someone. Well, that's a bit of a missrepresentation because it wasn't just someone, it was McLaren. Who you might ask? Oh wait, they're a Formula One team, yeah, that's right, one of the most successful teams out there, the one thats also made the McLaren F1 supercar and the McLaren Mercedes SLR, oh and hang haven't they been in the news lately? That's right, one of their employees was being supplied top secret information from a Ferrari employee and they got busted for cheating with the biggest fine in history ($100 million) and kicked out of the constructors championships. Well that last bit isn't so flattering but I won't go into that, there's already plenty of crap on the internet discussing that and it really doesn't bother me too much in my quest for a job. They are a fantasitc company and dspite the actions of a few bad apples they will fight on a continue to be a top F1 team.
So I got a response (did I mention it was from McLaren, you know F1, anyway) it was just a nibble at first. They wanted a phone interview for a control job I applied for. I had also applied for a vehicle dynamics job with them which is more my specialty, but never mind I did some controls as well so lets go. The phone interview went well and I was pretty happy with my performance. Then I got another nibble. They wanted a phone interview, and I was going to be interviewed by the same two people. Now This wasn't what I expected. In the first phone interview I had mentioned I had also applied for a VD job (vehicle dynamics you dirty minded bastards). They said that was fine, it was a different group but they talked. So when I had a second phone interview with the same people it didn't make much sense. So I asked the HR person if it was for ths VD job and she said yes it was. Ok what ever. So I was dilligently waiting by the phone, waiting for my second phone interview ... just waiting ... by my phone. Time was ticking by and I wasn't getting a call. Not the most reassuring feeling, not a good feeling at all. Then twenty minutes after the interview was scheduled I got a call,. Hey, a bit late but no big deal, feeling good now. However, it wasn't the people who were supposed to interview me, it was the HR person, which sent the feeelings down again. Damn this job hunt thing is a rollercoaster (if only I knew about the following week). Anyway, I figured I should heart out what the HR girl had to say. Wait, what was that, there wasn't any point in conducting two phone interviews so why don't you come down for a proper interview at the McLaren factory (which I was to learn wasn't a factory at all. It was the McLaren Technology Centre and it is a thing of wonder and amazment). So the nibble had turned into a good bite and I was on my way down to Woking for an interview, no more bad thoughts, just high spirits.
So it was that I found myself on the train down south, reading through some things, trying to study up on some control stuff and the VD stuff as well. just getting my mind in the right frame for the interview. I got down to Woking and grabbed a cab to teh McLaren Technology Centre. Now I should say that it is absolutely phenomenal, I was completely blown away by it. Now keep in mind I have already visited the Renault F1 Factory, which was amazing but this place, wow, it's just on a different level all together. We got to the security gate and the security shack was no shack at all. It was a circular glass building that wouldn't look out of place in a comtempory design gallery. So I signed in. The guard gave me a pass card and one for the cab. He told me to be dropped off at Rotunda B/C, go inside and down the steps, along the corridor, up the lift to Level 1+ and go to the racing reception. Ok, no problem so I got back in the cab and gave the driver his card and the directions. He dropped me off at Rotunda B/C, which was just a small circular glass building at the back of the main building. Oh did I mention, all the transporter trucks where parked right between me and the main building. They had jsut come back from the Belgium GP at Spa, pretty cool. Anyway, I wasn't there for the sightseeing so I swiped my card by the door and went in. There wasn't anyone there. Here I was, inside a top F1 facility belonging to a team just convicted of a major cheating afair, and they just give you a pass card and let you loose. Well not entirely I had a stair case in front of me. So I went down the stairs and got ready to "go along the corridor to the lift" like the guard at the gate told me. But this was no ordinary corridor. It was a gleaming, white 200m of perfect, underground corridor. It looked like it was out of a spaceship, maybe from 2001. It was fantastic. There were some doors but they were flush with the wall so you didn't even notice them. I was impressed toi say the least. But no time to dilly dally, I didn't want to get caught gobsmacked when I was here trying convince them I actually belonged there. So I wandered along, quite casually I thought, to the other end of the corridor, which just had a circular white pillar in the middle of the circular room. The lift entrance was around the back. So I got in the lift, but it was really disorienting. It was a glass lift but in a black chamber so it was all super reflective and you couldn't see anything. It took a little while to find the buttons to hit 1+. Before I did though, I looked up. Through the black hole was a white light at the top. I hit the button and started to move towards the light. I came up out of the floor and moved up to Level 1+. Now Level 1+ was a floating level, or at least the part I was on was. I had been brought up straight out of the ground and up to these floating walkways. I got out of the lift and looked around. How about right, oh there are a bunch of race cars that Bruce McLaren raced back in the day, including his first ever race car. Oh and check that out, there are a bunch of McLaren F1 super cars and behind them there's the work shop where they make the McLaren Mercedes SLR. Not too shabby. How about we look right. Oh, a bunch of F1 cars and whats the name on the side, just Ayrton Senna, no big deal. And beyond them, just the current F1 cars in various states of build. And guess what, there's not a single drop of oil anywhere. Everything was pristene and perfect. Did I say this place was absolutely phenominal yet? So I managed to get my feet moving and looked for anythign that could be Racing Reception. I saw a floating circle with a desk in the middle with a lady. I went over there and it turned out to be Racing Reception. Result, I had made it. It was a good thing I was a few minute early because that let me calm down and get used to the place. By the time I got called for the interview I felt pretty good and relaxed, which is good because that feeling wasn't going to last through the end of the day.
So I met the guy interviewing me and he briefly showed me around before we headed into the interview proper. Everything went nicely to begin with. There were two people interviewing me and they were nice and friendly. They started off giving me a run down of what they did and the job they had open, which was actually three positions and a bunch of work that needed to be done. After that we got into some more technical stuff, but that was fine because we started out just talking about my research and what I had done. This went well and I was quite happy and comfortable talking about it. But they certainly looked at it all with an eye for the control stuff and I got caught a little bit here and there trying to explain the control stuff in the terms they were familiar with. So not entirely smooth sailing but no big drama, yet. We ended up getting caught up with one thing in particular, sliding mode control, which I had trouble understanding myself and with an eight month break I was having trouble understanding it again and trouble explaining it again (as you might imagine if you don't remember it yourself). So we moved on. Maybe not the best if you can't fully explain work that you claim to have done. But like I said not a big deal, just a little slip. So we moved on, like I said. Fine, I was quite happy to no longer be interrogated about my own work, and fail to explain it properly, or thats what I thought.
"So I'm going to give you an example problem and just see how you do it. If we have a valve here and the flow rate is proportional to ... blah blah blah ... (stuff that's not really interesting to 99.999% of the people reading this)"
As he was saying all this he was drawing out a diagram of a hydraulic system. I hadn't even looked at a hydraulic system since my undergraduate days, about eight years ago. Ok don't panic, it's really not that complicated, actually it's about as simple a system as you could create. Even if I can't remember anything I should be able to at least just think logically and think my through this.
"... blah blah blah ... so what's the relationship between the current and the position of the piston, x?"
Ok, don't panic. Just think this one through ... right so we've got i, Q, x ... I need A so I'll introduce that ... then there's this ... oh wait not sure I need that ... how about if I do this ... hang on, this isn't going well ... ok, stop, this isn't that hard, just think, you can do this ... nope not getting it ... come on Nick!!!! ... right start again ... ok so you've got ...
And it just didn't get better. My brain froze up and I may as well have been sitting there drooling on myself, scratching my balls and farting. After some proding and a little help I fumbled my way through it, very poorly.
"Ok, so now whats the response of this system to a step input?"
Ok, put the last failure behind you and, wait, don't say failure, we need positive thoughts. Put that behind you and crack on with this ... ok, so its a first order system ... erm ... um ...
So once again I was fumbling around, and with a little guidance I managed to get to what could have been the right answer. I'm not sure if it actually was the right answer because they never really gave me any positive reassurance to that effect. Well shit. I was sitting there in a pool of dispair. I was embarassed by my performance, it was humiliating. It's not like they had asked me a really tough question or posed a problem with a tricky aspect to try and catch me out. They had given a problem that was about as siple as possible that was a direct representation of the work I would potentially be doing, or not as teh case was beginning to look like. Anyway, they had beaten me, or maybe they hadn't beaten me, but rather I had beaten myself up over my complete incompetence. Well they moved on and we had a few HR type questions, whats your salary expectation? when can you start work? etc. Things got a bit better and I did manage to move on from the previous suicide attempt and get back in the grove of talking confidently again. It did end with a more positive feeling. I asked about the jobs available and it did seem like they were suggesting things that I could do, and that they were thinking of were I might fit in. But in any case I had already committed suicide and the job was gone. I left the interview and walked out with my head down and my tail between my legs. If I was them I wouldn't hire me, in fact I would wonder how I had managed to graduate from university let alone got a PhD. I left the promised land ashamed and thoroughly dejected.
I headed back to London and was staying with Jules for the night. He tried his best to cheer me up. We all know you are your own harshest critic and maybe it didn't go that badly? No, I'm pretty sure it was that bad. Well, who knows what the other applicants are like? Good point but if they have a pulse they'll probably get the job over me. I suppose maybe I was being harsh on myself. First, everything went well until the final part of the interview, my resume/CV and therefore my qualifications got me the phone interview. So they must have liked the PhD and thought I was a good candidate. The phone interview went well and I did present myself well (until it all went wrong). I wasn't a control engineer, I was a VD engineer that did controls and I did bring this up. I never had any formal controls education. I had just taught myself what I needed to know for the PhD and it was a very well received piece of work. The fact is that no matter what job I end up with I'm going to have a steep learning curve, but just like my PhD, I'll get stuck in, learn what I need and get the job done, I just need some one to give me a chance to show what I am capable of. On top of this is that it was a controls job, not the VD job. The VD people would contact me separately about that job if they wanted to. So the VD stuff is my specialty and what I want to do, but the controls stuff is still very interesting and it has a much broader scope. It can be applied to almost anything so it would give me more opportunities in the future, unlike the VD stuff which would be more limited to the automotive industry. So maybe I would have a tough time getting going with the controls job but it would still be an amazing job. It just sucks that my first interview, which you always tend to fuck up since you have no idea what to expect, was with a company and job that what I've been dreaming about for years, its the whole reason I'm here now. And it killed me to fuck up the interview so badly when it was all actually easy stuff that I shoul dhave been able to do. The other crappy thing is that I thought I was also interviewing for the VD job. If I had know it was only the control job I was interviewing for I would have tried to sneak an interview with the VD guys while I was already down there. Oh well, they only told me that after the interview. Not much you can do about it at that point. I just hope that any negative feedback from this interview doesn't work against me for the VD job. So maybe it wasn't all bad, just 99% bad. Well Jules was trying to cheer me up. Needless to say we hit the pub and ended talking to a bunch of people I really didn't want to deal with when I felt so shitty.
Well I woke up the next day, feeling shit from the booze and feeling shit from teh interview. I didn't really think that a night getting drunk would make me feel any better about royally fucking the interview but it worth a try. Actually, the hang over probably made me feel worse about everything, which is generally the case. Anyway, I got up and moved out. I jumped on a train, not back up to Leeds, no not yet, I was heading out to Salisbury. Why might you ask? To visit Kirsty. She had broken her back at the start of summer and being down south and so near, it would be criminal not to visit. In any case I wanted to go down and visit, see how she was doing and try and brighten up her day. She had an incomplete spinal which means that its not complete paralysis. She can feel everything down to her knees and then after that she still has sensation but its a bit strange. She is recovering well and generally cruises around in a wheel chair but I was around when she had some physio work. She managed to walk around the building, about 100m, very slowly and with walking sticks. For someone with a massive spinal injury this was amazing. She is having to teach herself to walk again and it's amazing how well she is recovering. We also headed into town and got some lunch and a drink. It was awesome to hang out with her and jsut chill. We were sitting in the pub and it was like there was nothing different for when I saw her last. But then when we left and she wheeled away instead of walking it brought it back again. But she's fighting hard and I have no doubt that she's going to keep improving and getting better and she will walk again. It was a good day and I'm really glad I took the time to go and see her. It did put a few thigns in perspective. Here I was moaning about doing poorly in an interview, which really did mean a lot to me, but here was a really good friend and what she was going through just put all my trails and tribulations to nothing. So my job hunt (or cunt) isn't going too well, but I don't really know, maybe they will offer me the job. If they don't, there are more jobs out there and I'll get one sooner or later. I'm just thankful that I have a sound body and mind (at least for now) and that I have all the opportunities open to me because things could be very different, there are many people out there without the opportunities that I have and they are fighting on with more strength than I could ever hope to have.
So I potentially didn't get a dream job with an F1 team but come on, I've really got nothing to complain about. I'll let you know how it goes when I hear back and till the next nibble or bite on the job front I wish everyone well and I hope in particular that both Kirsty and Marco have speady and full recoverys, my thoughts are with you.
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