Translating an interview.........

I did an interview yesterday for an open position in our group. The girl that interviewed was super-smart despite only having 5 years of experience. The one problem that was evident was that she had a very heavy Indian accent which created some communication issues. We did manage to get through the whole interview and get a general feeling for her skills. A couple of notes from the interview...........

1. Folks, before you ever enter an interview, be prepared to cite a couple of weaknesses that you have in your skills. Everyone has them. The candidates that fail to cite a weakness (i.e. they claim to have never made a mistake) or cite a weakness that could also be considered a strength are usually candidates that you question whether they answered the other questions truthfully.

2. One word responses to questions are never a good idea. If an interviewer asks if you have, for instance, Java programming skills, do not respond by saying 'Yes'. While the answer may be accurate, the interviewer is likely to question your communication skills if you don't expound further on your answer.

I'm torn on hiring this individual. She has all the technical skills you could ever want, but her personal skills were terrible. Also, the communication gap makes you wonder if she fully understood the questions that were asked. Hopefully, a better candidate blows the socks off the group in the next interview.

The loud divorcee strikes again.........

First off, let me state that the stuff I overhear at work can be a bit wild at times. I have a woman on one side of me that speaks to her friends/family in Persian. The woman on the other side of me speaks to her friends/family in Mandarin Chinese. Culturally diverse workforce I suppose.

My favorite divorcee who often speaks far too loudly on the phone when discussing personal matters has resurfaced. Here are just a few of the snippets I overheard during her latest phone conversation......

"Well, he and I had worked out that we we're going to be peaceful and try to get along. Then I hear that he's filed another motion in court against me. That's not peaceful by any stretch of the imagination"

"Well, he's just being a jacka$$ and all of this make nice stuff was a load of bull. I could kill him right about now."

"There's certainly no way he's going to be seeing his daughter this week. He can kiss that visit goodbye."

Divorce, ain't it grand?????

Kali 0.9 sits in a family heirloom.............

My parents still have the high chair that Kali's great-grandfather used nearly a century ago. It may be an old, worn chair, but it still worked just fine when Kali was ready to eat.........

We're #1!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This is a day that I'll be telling my grandkids about 40 years from now. The Mizzou football team played Kansas last night at Arrowhead Stadium in a matchup of top 5 teams. The winner would clinch the Big 12 North division title and remain in the hunt for the National Championship. The loser would finish the regular season and be out of a chance at a BCS bowl bid.

We arrived at the stadium a couple of hours before the game. We headed over to a tailgate of about 500 people and grabbed some food and a few adult beverages. We then went into the stadium as the bathrooms outside had enormous lines fueled by the fact that people had been drinking and partying for over 3 hours in the parking lot.

Once in the stadium, it was pretty obvious that it was going to be a special night. Fans were standing up pacing or bouncing up and down in their seat. No one could sit still. Fans kept themself busy by screaming when players from their team appeared on the field and booing when the other team's players came out. The stadium was split right down the middle (claims by the KU AD that the fan split would be 70/30 were horribly wrong).

Before the game started, I headed outside to the concourse one last time so I wouldn't miss a play. We had a couple of fans nearby our seats. As I walked out, I walked over to talk to the two security guys in our section.......

Me: I just wanted to let you all know in advance where the problems may be in our section. There's two beakers right down there (pointing towards the seats).

Security #1: (confused) There's a what down there?

Me: I said there's a beaker in our section!

Security #1: (still confused) A what?

Security #2: He said there's a BEAKER down there.....a Jayhawk!

Security #1: (laughing) Oh, OK.......we'll be sure to keep an eye on them.

The rest of the game obviously went the way of the Tigers, capping a great big-game atmosphere with the win that I wanted to watch. Below are some pictures of the game........

Black and gold on the left in the stands and crimson and blue on the right.........



The Tigers line up in the tunnel, ready to burst onto the field..........



Split down the middle and ready for the opening kickoff..........



The Tiger offense lines up for a play.........



Touchdown Tigers!!!!!!!!!!!



Marching Mizzou at halftime.........



Touchdown Tigers!!!!!!!!!!!!



Marching Mizzou is rocking and the Mizzou fans are going nuts.......



Go figure. The beakers are behind in the 4th quarter and half their bandwagon fans have already left the building........



The Tigers celebrate on the sideline after sacking the KU QB in the end zone to seal the win.........



Beaker fans in the foreground with long faces as the MU fans celebrate their victory over the hated rival..........



MU fans hold up a single finger in the air, chanting "We're #1!!!! We're #1!!!!".......



The scoreboard says it all while the Tiger fans rejoice.............

Kali 0.9 builds her immunity..........

Ah, yes. The joys of parenting. Kali 0.9 has followed up her first cough/cold with an ear infection. I'm guessing at this point that I shouldn't have bragged about how healthy my child has been thus far. That has all gone down the tubes in a big hurry. Got to build up your immunity at some point I suppose. Hopefully this means that the rest of the year should be a bit less eventful.

Today is the final workday before the long holiday weekend. There's lots of people working from home today or not working at all. The ladies that did come into work today organized a 'food day'. Basically, that consists of them bringing in all sorts of snack food and just grazing all day while working. I personally don't see the purpose of eating a bunch of food on the day before Thanksgiving, but as long as it makes them happy, I'm good with it.

New week, new tricks........

Kali 0.9 has racked up a couple of new tricks over the weekend. She learned how to clap on her own about a week ago and is now clapping constantly. My parents reinforced the clapping this weekend, so she's got it down pat now. Mrs. Lime has been clapping to 'If You're Happy and You Know It' for some time now, so it was only a matter of time before the clapping started.

We've also done a lot of pointing to direct Kali's attention towards various people or things to look at. She's evidently figured that out as well. This weekend, she started pointing at various things. I'm not sure that she's figure out the exact purpose of pointing, but she definitely has the motions down. Hopefully, we can start working on ways for her to actually point at something for a reason rather than just to point at something.

Coke, Murder, and California high schools.......

While in Vegas, I had a male and female player sit down on either side of me at the same time. They were both in their early 20s. They were chatting with each other and it was pretty obvious that they knew each other at some level.

As we were playing, she was on the cell phone for quite awhile talking with someone. Here are some of the comments I overheard:

---Wait, so you're telling me that Jim is a coke-head now? Geez, he used to be such a hottie. Now he's nothing but a pile of sh*#.

---Yeah, I actually had heard that Shawn was serving life in prison. Serves him right. I don't know why he was so intent on killing that guy. Only thing worse than killing the guy was the fact that he wasn't even successful and now has to spend the rest of his life in prison for an attempted murder that he botched.

The girl was pretty bossy and demanding most of the time at the table. She always had something to complain about and was always telling her friend what to do. She was bored at our table because there wasn't enough money flying around and wanted to go to another table. Rather than getting up to talk to the poker room manager or asking for him to come over to the table, she berated her friend several times to go and get a seat for her at another table because "she didn't want to miss a hand".

After a few minutes, she was finally called over to the other table. I struck up a conversation with the guy once she was gone.

Me: So, what's the deal with all of her friends being on drugs and killing people?

Guy: (Laughing) Yeah, it's a mess.

Me: Are you all boyfriend/girlfriend or what?

Guy: I suppose we're kind of boyfriend/girlfriend.

Me: I was just curious. You seemed a bit miffed at her when she was bossing you around.

Guy: (smiling) Yeah, you could say that.

Me: So why aren't your friends as messed up as her friends?

Guy: Well, they're actually friends of both of us. We went to the same high school in California together.

Me: Oh, I see.

Guy: Yeah, it's actually pretty common in California to hear stuff like that on a regular basis. You just get used to people doing stupid things.

Me: It would seem you have a girlfriend there who will allow for plenty of excitement, that's for sure.

Guy: (Laughing) Thanks, I suppose.

He was a really nice guy and we chatted for most of my time at the poker table. I do hope he moves on to greener pastures because that girl was bound to drive him crazy (for all the wrong reasons).

Bless you........

When we were in Vegas a couple of weeks ago, I had an interesting exchange while at the table. The poker room staff was getting ready to open up a new table right next to my table. The poker room manager turned on the microphone to make an announcement......

Manager: We're ready to open a new 1/2 No-limit table. Will the following people please report to table 22: Bill, Tom, Jake, A-choo...........

Me: (talking to guy next to me at table) Did the manager just call 'A-choo' to the new table?

Guy: Sure sounded like it. I was ready to say 'Bless you' after I heard him say it.

Me: Yeah, I didn't know if he sneezed or actually called a name. But I think he was calling the name 'A-choo'.

Just as I said 'A-choo' again, an Indian man turned and looked at me from the new table.

Me: Are you 'A-choo'?

Indian man: Yes.

Me: Ah, OK. Just was curious.

I tried to feign interest while steadfastly trying to keep a straight face. I took a peek up at the waiting list for tables. In the 1/2 No-limit game, the name 'Ashu' was listed. Evidently, that's pronounced 'A-choo'.

Mystery solved.

The root (?) of all evil..........

We went to an Italian restaurant yesterday afternoon. They have all kinds of good stuff, including various veggies. I got two stuffed zucchini for dinner, while Mrs. Lime had the lasagna.

Mrs. Lime: (looking at my plate) Is that all you're going to eat?

Me: Yeah, two of these zucchini is plenty for me. I love the veggies they serve here: stuffed zucchini, stuffed eggplant, spaghetti squash......it's all good. When I was younger, we'd eat stuff like this all the time. We used to eat zucchini and eggplant pretty often.

Mrs. Lime: I guess so. You like all of those 'root' veggies.

Me: Ummmm, squash, eggplant and zucchini aren't the roots of a plant.

Mrs. Lime: (brief pause) They aren't?

Me: They all hang from the stem of the plant. They're definitely above ground.

Mrs. Lime: Oh.

Proof that Mrs. Lime's green thumb isn't exactly up to snuff.

The Scooby-Doo motivation factor........

Ever wonder what happens when you put a 9 month old baby at one end of the table and an animated Scooby-Doo 7 feet away at the other end of the table? Watch and learn........

Scooby-Doo video

Veteran's Day

I went to the Chiefs' game yesterday afternoon. They did a great job of honoring the veterans. Before the game, the Chiefs' GM walked to the center of the field with an older man. His name was George and he was dressed in full military uniform. He fought in WWII as a pilot and was shot down over Europe by the Germans. He survived a year in a German prisoner camp and was liberated by Patton and his forces in 1945. As his achievements were listed by the stadium announcer, the roar of the crowd grew until the list was complete. At that point, a HUGE roar came as a standing ovation of at least one minute was given to George. You could see the tears coming from his eyes as he kept saying 'Thank you'.

Following that, the national anthem was sung by a Marine who had a wonderful bass voice. He sang the national anthem slow and steady without any fancy ad-libs, just like it was meant to be sung. As the anthem neared completion, the west end of the stadium (the opposite end from where our seats were located) began to roar in excitement. We looked up to the sky as that meant only one thing......a fly-by. Over the stadium roared a B-2 Stealth Bomber. We're very lucky in the midwest as many aircraft are based in this region, so we get to see a lot of fly-overs. This was the 3rd time I've seen a B-2 bomber fly over a stadium. It's always impressive as you can't hear it coming until it's right over you. It's impressive to watch and I'm surely glad that plane is on my side and not someone else's side.

At halftime, they played some tribute music and rolled a set of images showing some soldiers from the KC metro area who had lost their life in the line of duty in Iraq. Everyone stood and watched for several minutes in silence as the list rolled by. It was tough to see the number of people listed, but as previous war veterans would tell you, war isn't pretty. You just hope for as few casulties as possible.

Moving stuff around.........

Mrs. Lime and I just recenty bought a new bed and mattress for our bedroom. As a result, the guest rooms in our home have received the hand-me-down beds, which actually are still quite nice. So future guests in our home should notice a substantial upgrate in the comfort department.

We switched up the mattress selection this time and picked up a mattress that is made to provide additional support. It's basically a really large sponge with varying materials to providea additional support. It's also wonderful because there's no springs in the mattress, so if one person comes to bed late or is stirring a lot in bed, it doesn't make any noise and won't wake the other person. It's a stealth mattress!

In related news, we're getting some new bookshelves built for Mrs. Lime. She's got a lot of medical books that are very large and VERY heavy. The stand-alone book shelves just aren't cutting it anymore. It should allow for a lot more storage space in our house.

Kali 0.8 is in the final stages of her first cold. She was feeling much better yesterday. The congestion is the worst part as it often wakes her up when she's not able to breathe really well through her nose. She usually just spits out the pacifier to remedy that problem, but it often causes her to wake up as well. Watching her drink her bottle is a bit amusing right now as well. She'll take a few drinks and then turn her head to the side to get a few breaths of air before returning to the bottle for a few more drinks. She's actually the system down quite well. If we could just add a snorkel to the bottle, she'd be doing even better.

Great news.......

I mentioned that my co-worker's son was in a bad accident last week.

Link to post

I found out today that his son is breathing on his own, has full range of body movement, and is talking to his parents. He'll be moved out of the ICU very soon. Wonderful news.

Vegas trip '07...........

I took a trip to Vegas over the weekend with the family, including the first Vegas trip for Kali 0.8. Let me first get Kali 0.8's impressions of Vegas out of the way......

---Flashing lights are very pretty and make me laugh.
---Dinging sounds when people win money are very pretty and make me laugh.
---Lots of people in the casino mean plenty of people to wave at and flash smiles.
---Having my aunts and mom take me around Vegas is tons of fun.

That sums her thoughts up. Now, on to the trip.

We got in early on Friday morning. Kali 0.8 did well on the flight until the last 20 minutes. 3 hours is a long time to ride on a plane, so she did awfully well. We checked in and found that our room wasn't ready yet, so we walked around to the various hotels for awhile. Mrs. Lime's sister, Blondie, got in around 10 AM and we met up with her along with Mrs. Lime's uncle and ate at the restaurant at Ellis Island. It's a small joint off the Strip where you can get enormous dinners for a cheap price in a place that looks like a 1970s-era restaurant. Always good food.

On the way back to our hotel, we got word that our room was ready. We got everything moved into the room. Mrs. Lime, Blondie and Kali headed out to check out the town. I headed down to the poker room in the Venetian.

Really fun table. I played $1/2 No Limit Hold 'em. Most players had between $100 and $200 in front of them. There was an Asian man who kept the table lively with constant banter and lots of bluffs that he wasn't afraid to show off. We also had a girl who looked like a poker player. She wore a cap, sunglasses, and an iPod. She had all her bases covered. The only thing she forgot to do was learn how to play poker well. She didn't raise enough when she had a good hand and got into too many pots that she never should have been in.

I profited off her bad play when she only raised to $5 on a hand and I called with 5/6 of spades. The flop came down Q94, all spades. I had flopped a flush and had two other players in the pot. I gambled a bit and made small bets to keep both of the players in the hand, hoping a 4th spade didn't hit on the last two cards. It did not and I raked in a $120 pot. The girl that had only raised to $5 had AA. Had she raised a bit more, I would have never been in that hand. Instead, I raked in a monster pot and she lamented just how bad my call was with 65 suited. I just chuckled and agreed with her, when in fact, the only bad play was her first raise which set up a big loss.

After a few hours and up $80, I left to go eat dinner with the girls at a steakhouse run by Emeril of Food Network fame. Great food and Kali was well behaved. Blondie had champagne and a cake ready for us when we got back to the room since we were still celebrating Mrs. Lime's birthday. Great strawberry cake that I'd love to try to make myself at some point. My sister and brother-in-law later arrived to finish off the champagne and eat some cake and then everyone headed to bed.

Saturday morning was a bit of a jumble. Everyone slept in late except Kali, so I got up with her and played for a few hours. She was on Central time and we were on Pacific time, so she woke up around 5:15 AM ready for action. Everyone else slowly got up and I headed over with the girls to the Forum Shops at Caesar's. First thing I noticed was that Pete Rose is still there. He has this deal with a sports memorabilia store where he signs autographs 5 days a week for about $35 a signature in addition to a flat fee that he receives from the store. Many of you know that Pete Rose was banned from baseball for sports gambling. Evidently, old habits die hard as I found out from a poker dealer. Pete still goes to the Rio and Palms casinos to gamble a few times a week.

We ate at a Wolfgang Puck restaurant in the shops. After that, I headed over to the Wynn to meet my sister and her husband while the girls did more shopping. Mizzou was playing against Colorado and I wanted to get in a bet. We sat down next to some people who were Notre Dame fans and watch the game with them. Great game that Notre Dame lost in 3 OT's. Once the Irish game was over, we took over their seats and watched the Mizzou game. Mizzou laid a beating on the Buffaloes, winning the game 55-10 and winning me $20. Lots of fun to watch all the games at the same time on the various TV's.

Afterwards, we went to dinner at an Italian restaurant in the Venetian. Kali managed to charm the pants off of several Italian waiters. They also had musicians wandering from table to table, playing whatever music was requested. They walked up to our table and started playing the 'Barney' theme song, which Kali loved. She laughed at the violin player during the whole song. After that, they played a song which everyone was singing, which Kali loved as well. I think the musicians didn't even need a tip after enjoying Kali's reaction to all the music and singing. But we tipped them anyway.

I took the bullet for the team (since I was tired) and stayed in the room with Kali so she could go to sleep. Everyone else headed out to a bar. They evidently had a band performing there that was lip-syncing lots of Bon Jovi songs. Evidently, it was so bad that it made for good entertainment. I also got a text message from my brother-in-law that he was sitting near Johnny Unitas. Blondie headed over to get an autograph for her boyfriend, and the guy reluctantly gave an autograph. Mrs. Lime pulled up a picture of Johnny Unitas and the picture did look like the guy, but the website also noted that Johnny Unitas had died 5 YEARS AGO. So evidently, it wasn't Johnny Unitas.

The group also went to a nightclub in the Venetian called Tao. Evidently there was a lot of dancing and drinking. The report from my brother-in-law was that he "saw a side of my wife that he never knew existed." I enquired about this comment with my wife later on. Her only response was that the group wanted her to dance on the bar, but she refused to do it unless the whole group did it. So, in other words, it was just Mrs. Lime behaving normally.

Sunday, I headed down with Kali to get a reservation for dinner that night and get some breakfast. We happened to run into a man who was obviously from Britain who was a bit confused about the breakfast menu, so I helped him out with the ordering process. He sat down near me to chat while eating.

Brit: Thanks for helping me out with the order.

Me: Not a problem. You hear on business or pleasure?

Brit: Business, though I do plan to have a bit of fun too. Does this casino stuff go on all day and all night long?

Me: Yep, 24/7.

Brit: (laughing) Bloody hell! You Americans are crazy! The time change is about 8 hours, so my clock is a bit off.

Me: Well, that's the beauty of Vegas. Sleep when you get tired and when you wake up, there's bound to be something to do no matter what time it is.

Brit: So true.

We chatted about his family and his job. I also gave him a few pointers on stuff to do. He thanked me again for the conversation and shook my hand. I finished up and took Kali back up to the room. I then headed back down to put some money on the pro football games.

I went over to the poker room to watch the Chiefs game, as it's non-smoking. The Chiefs ended up losing, so that wasn't all that great. Had fun at another good poker table. I lost around $30 for the whole session. I did manage to make a couple of good plays. In one case, I noticed a guy who was severely on tilt (i.e. he was mad about losing and was betting recklessly in anger on the next hand). I called his raise and his following raises. He shockingly went all-in on the river. I was shocked because I had hit a straight on the river card. He flipped over a pair of 6's and I took down a $200 pot. I made another good play when I had AQ and there was an ace on the flop. I thought I had him beat and made a small raise. He called. The next card was a jack, which worried me quite a bit for some reason. I bet $25. His hand began shaking violently. As he reached for his chip stack, he knocked it over and then bet $75. I just laughed and said, "You just hit two pair! You have AJ, don't you?". I folded my AQ upright so he could see my fold. He smiled and flipped over........AJ. Great read. I lost money on that hand, but it could have been much worse.

Mrs. Lime brought down Kali and I went outside to watch Kali for a moment while Mrs. Lime took care of some stuff. Kali and I learned a shocking new trick. If you are a man and you stand at the bottom of the escalator with a cute baby who smiles and waives at everyone coming down that escalator, there's a good chance that you're going to get a lot of attention from a lot of women. If I was single, Kali would have easily landed me 15-20 dates over the course of 20 minutes. Who knew? Mrs. Lime was not surprised in the least by this revelation.

We had dinner with some friends who had recently moved out to Vegas on Sunday evening and then headed back to KC on Monday morning. Lots of fun as always and we'll likely be back there again relatively soon.