Tuesday, June 02, 2009

Long Time, No Blog

Not sure what I've been so busy doing since Friday that I haven't found the time to blog, but it hasn't made me money or gotten me a job, so it couldn't have been too important. Today we walked downtown so I could check up on a couple job leads. I've noticed something that seems to be common practice that I wish companies would stop doing: claiming to have job openings on their web page when in fact there are no job openings. Filling out an on-line application is very time-consuming, especially for companies that use the totally crap-tastic Kronos software on their web sites (which is most of them) and ask stupid questions like, "Does it make you angry when criminals get off on a technicality?" What that has to do with working a cash register at Lowes is completely beyond me. Then to find out that I've just wasted my time really pisses me off.

And no, the job hunting thing isn't going well.

Anyway.

GM is gone. Michael Moore has some thoughts about it. I agree with some of what he says, but retooling a car factory to make tanks is a very different proposition than retooling a car factory to make solar panels. Not to mention that there isn't enough silicon to appreciably increase panel production anyway. But at least he makes more sense than the granola crunchers cruising around in their Prius Smugmobiles. I haven't seen Flint since the day I quit Hurley and nothing Moore has to say makes me ever want to. The city I grew up in is dead and buried; best to just leave it.

When someone that is really smart points out flaws in your security product, you can either fix the flaws, or you can try to shut them up. You won't need to read the entire article to guess which approach the manufacturer of what are supposed to be the best locks in the world is taking. But read it anyway; it will remind you of every encounter you've ever had with a corporate bureaucracy. If I was running R&D at Medeco, I'd have this guy on my staff instead of trying to piss him off or shut him up.

When governments started paying private companies to hang red-light cameras at intersections, those of us who said these would be used to monitor every car on the road were accused of being tin-foil hat wearers. Well, guess what?

To end on a more up-beat note that normal, what happens when you hook a video camera on the back of a hawk? Video that is as awesome as it is nauseating. Watch full-screen to get the full effect.

Well, I think today's batch of photos are finally done uploading after 12+ hours. I really hate asymetric internet. When the job situation is straightened out, I'm looking into different options. This is just nuts.

3 comments:

GreatMatt said...

LOL. We use Kronos here at work. Right now, it's just our punch clock, but it wouldn't surprise me if they expand and use it for other stuff as well.

And that hawk video was cool. I'll have to watch it all in full screen (22 inch baby!) when I get home. :-)

Ric said...

We tried Kronos timeclocks at Hurley. Granted, Hurley was unique, but all that was in the RFP. Then after we sign, every single thing we needed Kronos to do: "Can't do that." Every monthly meeting was all-new people because all the others had quit. Then we hacked into the "database" and it was a steaming pile. Kronos would just buy or take over a company and bolt their software onto the rest with no attempt to normalize data. We found dozens of fields for last name and they were all different lengths. Three years and $5 million later, employees were still punching in with paper time cards.

Aunt Debbie had to walk away when I had the hawk video running full screen on the 42" TV. Aunt Debbie says you should watch it at Michael and Melissa's on the projector.

GreatMatt said...

It would be sickening on the projector. Awesome, but sickening. LOL