My Mortality

Accidents - you never really give much thought to them until it happens to you. I didn't get into one and never have, but a recent tragedy in my neighborhood prompted me to think twice about accidents.

On Tuesday earlier this week, when Alex and I were driving home from work, we noticed that traffic around on Bothell Way, the main street to our house is unbelievably heavy. The next day, we noticed that the corner of 73rd and Bothell Way was sealed off by a metal fence and flowers were placed. Alex actually saw two women standing at the corner, crying. This made us curious; we googled the street corner to see what had happened and we found this - on Tuesday at about 4pm, a group of pedestrians waiting to cross the street were hit by a utility truck. One of the victims was pushed by the truck and pinned between the truck and a light pole. She died instantaneously. Another passenger was thrown 20 feet; one was thrown underneath the truck.

Accidents - it could happen to you. I could very well be one of those people hit. They were just getting of the 522 bus, waiting to cross the street to the park and ride. Had I not come to Microsoft, 522 is the bus I take every day to and from work. The park and ride they're heading to is the same park and ride I would use every day. It could have been me standing at that corner, crushed to death, remains splattered. The most frightening part of this tragedy is that these people were not doing anything deemed dangerous or risky. Two cars colliding is common, but a standing pedestrian struck, crushed and pinned is not.

You can argue that one of the drivers wasn't paying attention and this could have been avoided. But to me, accidents seem like the doing of fate. I could wake up one day and that could be the last day of my life. There is no way of telling. I panic a little at the thought of this. I panic a lot at the thought of this happening to Alex or my mom. It makes me realize how vulnerable we all are and how little control we have sometimes.

Accidents - I wish I had an answer for them. I wish I could say believe in God and all will be answered. I wish I could say it will never happen to me. But I can't. All I can do is pray that it doesn't happen to me.

My Life Without Access

Week two and still no access. Someone please entertain me.

Apparently there is some problem with the employee requisition system or something here and I am suffering as a result of it. As of today, I still don't have email or intranet access. Last week I was able to kill sometime by installing software and getting my machine up and running. I don't know what I'm going to do this week to pass my time at work.

I am starting to wonder if people forgot about me. Hopefully they won't forget about paying me. Not getting paid would suck.

My First Week at the Evil Empire

It's official. I've gone to the devil's side. I have joined the evil empire. I'm a member of their cult now. I am a Microsoft person.

After over a month of legal and immigration work, I finally started my new job at MS on Monday. First was one and a half days of orientation. Let the brainwashing begin! Maybe I'm just a little resistant to Microsoft, but the name was just everywhere! On the podium, in the slides, on the shuttles. The orientation is basically one giant session to glorify Microsoft. How employees love it here; how the company has evolved to cater more to employees. There's employee testimonials shown, statistics about human resources trends drawn, facts about Microsoft which rank it as a top company to work for displayed. I've never seen a company work so hard to make you like them.

Maybe they know they have a rather poor reputation within the geek world. Maybe they want new employees to be pumped and excited about their new jobs. Or maybe they just really really really believe in Microsoft. It's probably a mix of all three maybes. Some people here are really true champions of Microsoft. They believe in the company and they sell it. Scary, isn't it? I really hope I don't get brainwashed to that degree.

For now, I just want a job from which I can learn and grow. I haven't thought too much about my future career paths yet. We'll take it one day at a time.

My Last Day at Amazon

Last Thursday was my last day at Amazon. After merely eight weeks at the online retail giant, I packed up my things and left. Even though I had been looking forward to this day for a long time, when the time came to say goodbye, I was still a little nostalgic. It's really a shame that things didn't work out there.

I expected to just sneak out of there quietly, since I really hadn't been there long enough to know people well and make friends. So I was surprised when my manager treated my coworkers and I to a goodbye lunch for me. We went to this Japanese Fusion restaurant in the International District. In the middle of our lunch, we saw two employees who had just left our team for another team. My manager told them we were having a goodbye lunch for me and they look quite astonished. I believe one of them even said "Already?"

I had seen people at Motorola quit their jobs before. They would always make the rounds on their last day and say goodbye to everybody. In my case, I didn't think it was necessary for me to do that. First, it was kind of awkward that I was quitting after only a few weeks there. I think that sends a pretty clear message saying I don't like you to the rest of my team at Amazon. Second, I really didn't know anybody yet. So after lunch, I quickly packed up my stuff and sneaked out of the building.


Goodbye Amazon! Goodbye!