On Sat. D and I had a “date night” that consisted of dinner at Volcano Burger, jazz concert at my old high school and Starbucks. D had never been to Volcano Burger, so since it is right across from LAHS, I thought it would be a good time for him to try it. For those of you who don’t know, Volcano Burger:LAHS::Peach Pit:BH 90210. Heh.

After freezing outside in line, we watched the middle school band, LAHS Jazz I and The Gordon Goodwin Big Phat Band. I was impressed with the middle school…watch out for them in a few years. They played charts from the same composers that we used to use…Bill Liston, Tom Kubis, etc. Ah, the memories. It was good to see Mr. Wackerman teaching for his 49th year–amazing! The GGBPB was enjoyable. They all seemed to really love what they were doing. They played a nice range of music, and even poked fun at their all-white-male-ness by playing their own arrangement of “Play That Funky Music White Boy”.

The concert ended at around 7:30 and the night was still young so we went to the Cypress Starbucks and shared a grande Marble Mocha Macchiato. We saw all these Asian kids studying and it made me glad to be past that stage of my life.

Usually when people ask me what teams I follow, I respond with Cal Football & IU basketball. This is mainly due to the fact that historically IU basketball is really good (3rd most chmpionships beside UCLA & Kentucky, and 20 Big Ten champioships) and their football team is bad (all time win record is under .500). Cal on the other hand is pretty even with their football and basketball. Both in the top 5 in the Pac-10 historically but not great in either. However, I like college football better than college basketball.

However, I got interested in watching Cal basketball especially during the Pac-10 tournament. I was pleasantly surprised how well Cal did. The semi-final game against Oregon was crazy. It ended just before midnight, which is 3 hours past my bedtime. I was kicked out the the bedroom and watched it in the freezing family room. (L won’t allow us to turn on the heater. Further, I don’t know how.) Leon Powe did a great job. I hope they can win a game in the NCAA tournament.

As for IU basketball. They beat Wisconsin and then lost to Ohio State in the Big Ten tournament. Not too bad. The Hoosiers record were not as good as Cal, but the Big Ten is better than the Pac-10.

Just found out…
No. 7 California (20-10, 12-6 Pac-10) vs. No. 10 NC State (21-9, 10-6 Atlantic Coast Conference)
No. 6 Indiana (18-11, 9-7 Big Ten) vs. No. 11 San Diego State (24-8, 13-3 Mountain West Conference)

I think IU has an easier time getting to the 2nd round.

I always seem to be behind in my updates. Just wanted to comment that I was glad that Crash won Best Picture last Sunday. It was one of the few movies that I had actually seen. My goal is to watch every movie that has won Best Picture. The only others that were nominated that I had seen were: Chronicles of Narnia, Star Wars III, March of the Penguins (I liked the guy speaking penguin) and Murderball. D and I will be watching Enron: Smartest Guys in the Room tonight. I seem to be liking documentaries recently.

This past Sat. D and I ventured down to Dana Point for their annual whale festival. The night before I accidentally cut my toe open, so I wasn’t sure if I was up for walking around, but I managed.

First, we walked around the docks, where artists were selling their paintings/photographs.

Then we ate lunch at RJ’s Cafe (50% Entertainment Book discount). I had “The Gobbler”, turkey (they roast their own) sandwich with cranberry sauce. I originally fell in love with this combo at Togo’s. It came with a side salad that I had ordered with blue cheese dressing (house-made) on the side. That was the best blue cheese dressing ever–creamy, and not too pungent. D ordered “The Hole in the Fence” omelette, with mushrooms and sausage. It was quite large, and he could not finish it.

Then we waited for the shuttle to the actual whale festival, as suggested to us by the Dana Point Visitor’s Center. (We felt very Rachael Ray-ish stopping by there). However, after a lot of waiting, no sign of a shuttle, and people who had just returned from the festival on foot claiming that the shuttle was imaginary, we decided to hoof it up Golden Lantern to PCH. Of course, just as we got there, we saw the shuttle arriving. Hmph. I wasn’t too impressed with the festival…it seemed kind of junky to me. Not to be snobby, but this is Dana Point, where we saw three Porsches, a Ferrari, and a Rolls Royce just in the short time we were in the parking lot, as well as waay too many overly-pampered dogs. I expected it to be classier, I guess.

On our way back down the hill, we joked that these condos are probably considered the “slums of Dana Point” since they are right across the street from some mansions. Of course, they are actually really nice, and look at their view!:

Who’s that guy that you hear yelling whenever an American is about to start a downhill ski event in the Olympics? I guess his job is to pump the skiiers up, but D and I always start cracking up. He has a really gruff voice and yells things like “Kill it!” or “Come on [fill in the skiier’s last name]…hammer it!” He does a good job of mixing it up. Maybe he has a notebook to keep track of new phrases to use. I want to see what he looks like, but they never show him.

I have been searching for a job for about 1.5 months, and last week I landed a contract to permanent position at this company in Cypress. I am going to be in a contract positon for 2 weeks because they wanted me in there right away, but I should become a permanent employee in about 2 weeks. At least I got a verbal offer for the permanent position. God is good. Not only because I found a job, but also that He answered my prayer in terms of being at peace in which position I should take. My journey, while not too long, was very interesting.

I first went to an outplacement service called Right Mangement Solutions, and they helped with difficult decisions, such as; 1 or 2 page resume?, should you provide personal business cards?, and what to say during a 30 second “commercial”. This helped me get into the right mind set. It was funny that the only parking they validated at this place in Irvine, was valet. And you are suppose to tip the valet guys! (Hello, you are unemployed!) Also I noticed there are a lot of wealthy people there.

I interviewed at many companies including, Disney, Taco Bell, Carl Karcher Enterprises, Coca-Cola, Beckman-Coulter, Black & Decker, Hines Horticulture, SM&A, ConAgra (Phone), & Mazda (Informational). The Disney one was interesting because you go to this “casting” area, where employees of all levels are interviewing. Taco Bell has a drive thru menu by the lobby of their building on the 2nd floor. Coca-Cola had a full on fountain drink area with slurpies in their kitchen area! Hines Horticulture is in a large nursery, that will soon be handed over to the Irvine company so they can make more homes. And Taco Bell and Coca-Cola employees get off at 1 p.m. from Memorial Day to Labor Day.

At this company in Cypress, a recruiter called me and told me they had a contract opportunity and they wanted me to send my resume. Then they set me up for an interview on Wednesday, and I interviewed with 4 employees. However, they liked me so much they wanted to bring me on full time. But since someone was leaving next week, they wanted me to contract for 2 weeks because it takes them that long to do the paperwork. They make you take a physical & drug test. But I wanted to contract there for a month, and then decide where I would work depending on where I got offers from. However, they knew I was actively interviewing, so they told me we want to know if you are really interested because they didn’t want me to work for a few weeks and then have to find someone else all over again once I left.

I was struggling in my decision to take this position or wait for another position that I had a first round interview with. This Cypress company offered good pay, title and was 2 miles from my house, however I thought that a large Fortune 500 company was calling my name. I remember when Abraham of the Old Testament sent his servant to find a wife for his son Isaac. The servant thought of this character test. The woman who not only offers the servant water but also offers to water his camels as well, would be the woman for Isaac. In the end she was a relative of Abraham, which was good, menaing she was a believer, and the servant found the right wife. So I was thinking of a “test” that would show that God would show me that this position was the right one. Since I couldn’t really think of a good one I prayed that God would let me know and give me peace. My wife asked me if I had peace about the decision and this other guy said peace was one of the 3 things to look in deciding if this was what the Lord wanted, along with being in line with the scriptures and that the circumstances presented that opportunity. Well in the end, I was able to talk with the CFO of the company the next day and he alleviated my fears of if this company was as profitable as the hiring manager led me to beleive. In addition after I said yes to coming in and contracting for this position, I found out that this Fortune 500 company mysteriously changed their minds. Also it was weird that before another Fortune 1000 company didn’t hire me because supposedly 2 recruiters were claiming that they sent my resume into the company first. And the company was afraid of litigation. I was bummed, but was confident that it was not the right opportunity for me. L also mentioned that is it weird that I found a job only 2 miles away from the home that we bought 6 months ago.

Some people might think this is random, but I don’t. God is soverign.

D-