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Yay!

So, the Redwings won the Stanley Cup!

Also, I might possibly have an opportunity to have a job working for Valentine Robotics, probably with their Scorpion Vision products. Which will be FSCKING WICKED SWEET!

Or, if that falls through, I also applied for a position with the Best Buy Geek Squad. I know, tech support...but it may carry an employee discount, and it will pay money. I mean, at this point, I've pretty much exhausted all possibilities for robotics, computer service, computer design, IT, prostitution, networking, security, and computer infrastructure in the Rochester, Rochester Hills, Auburn Hills, Sterling Heights, Pontiac, and Troy areas, by electronic means, by phone, and on foot. Grr... stupid "trying-to-get-a-summer-job-in-an-area-where-you-weren't-living-back-in-December-when-all-the-local-kids-applied-for-the-jobs-you-want"...

Also, the fact that, due to the recession, adults are competing with us college kids for the minimum-wage jobs that used to be our sole domain...

And, in addition, CURSES TO YOU SCHOOL SYSTEMS THAT TEACH JAVA BEFORE INDUSTRY-STANDARD LANGUAGES LIKE C AND C++!

OK, I think I'm done ranting, for now.

So, we found two houses that we kind of like. One is a 1400-1500 sq. ft. house (our current one is 1051), with a basement of equal size. The difficulty with it is that it smells. Badly. Of cats. There's one corner of the living room which is roped off by the EPA as a toxic waste area. Seriously. Actually, not, but it'll need new carpet. And paint. Walls are dirty and peeling in places. But, it's a pretty nice house and it is priced well within our range, so we put an offer on it, though there's another bidder already...

The other house is priced considerably higher, but still within our range. It is very well laid out, though it's smaller than the other one, and the basement is only a half basement with a crawl space for the other half. Also, all the windows will need replacement, as the wood is rotting out and water appears to be getting in. And, the house has wood shingled outside walls, so we'll likely want to get that redone with vinyl or aluminum siding. And, to top it off, during the storm(s) this area saw last weekend (Monday morning or so, actually), the basement filled with water, though it has two (2) sump pumps on independent circuits. Weird, and the realtor doesn't know why that happened.

House shopping is so fun...especially considering that, had this move happened just four years later, we could have gotten some nice lake property for $100,000, due to not having to worry about my brother's schooling. As it is, we have to think about the high school the houses are in the district of, because we missed school choice back in March (?) and so, we're kinda stuck right now...

On the other side of the lake, things are being packed up such that we can show the house. It (might) be on the market as soon as yesterday, depending on how long it takes the Delphi relocation company (SIRVA) to sign their own damned papers.

In other news, I have been pointed to two amazing groups. One is Within Temptation, a Dutch group. The other is Nightwish, hailing from Finland. Sadly, their music is not for sale on this side of the Atlantic (oh, and I tried, quite hard, actually), and so I had to um, "acquire" it from (ahem) "other sources". I have compensated the group, however, through an online donation system, so... I feel better about it.

The two groups fall into, I guess, the symphonic-Gothic-rock genre, kind of like Evanescence, and Within Temptation's lead singer actually sometimes sounds like Amy Lee.

I'm in the middle of re-reading His Dark Materials, the trilogy the first of which is The Golden Compass, which you may remember as having been a pretty damned good movie maybe six months ago or so. I had read the trilogy, oh, back in middle school. I am thoroughly enjoying them again.

Oh, and, I finally heard back from Brittany! She's spending the summer in Japan, though she was kind of vague as to why. I surmised it was something to do with a study-abroad program.


Comments

jon787
June 5 2008, 21:32:37

I'm all for java bashing when it is warranted, but I don't see anything wrong with learning java first... I also don't see how it isn't an industry standard language, lots of places use java.

agmlego
June 6 2008, 04:04:14

Industry defined as the industry I'm going to be working in, that being robotic control systems. That's primarily done in C, C++, or a scripting language, like Python.

jon787
June 6 2008, 04:14:20

While C is definitely the dominant language, java is not uncommon there. Although it won't be like any java you have ever seen :)

agmlego
June 6 2008, 15:34:50

Well, OK, this is true. I've worked with Lego robotics in Java on a few occasions, but my point was that Java is considerably rarer in the robotics industry than C/C++, Delphi, and scripting languages. Thus, it doesn't really suit my purposes to have been given four years of experience in it, and very little experience in one of the others.

frostcrystal
June 9 2008, 11:25:24

They actually teach C before Java in Malaysian universities... or at least, I was supposed to take it in that order. What with schedules and all, I wound up inverting it and taking Java before C. My boyfriend did C first, though. It's not a terribly tough language. xDDD You could probably self learn.

Also, I have nearly every album Nightwish has ever released up until about last year. (My most recent is the Black Halo.) You could just have asked. xD Try Kamelot as well.

agmlego
June 9 2008, 18:24:34

Oh? I suppose I should have asked, but they're such a rare group here in the States I didn't even think about it.

I have a little C from my time working with FIRST and all, but it would have been nicer to have a more concrete foundation in C before trying to get a job based on a non-academic knowledge of it...

frostcrystal
June 10 2008, 06:38:30

One of my friends is a die hard fan. He decided to send me through my failing Internet connection all their albums.