Decisions, Decisions

The plethora of interviews was over early on this week, and the various interviewers have had the opportunity to judge me. Now it's my turn, and I am stuck.

There were four offers, two of which need not be discussed. Of the remaining two, one was expected. The other one was a pleasant surprise.

In no particular order:

First: certified analytical lab
The company is, in part, an analytical lab that sells its services to customers in particular industries (e.g. testing environmental samples for compliance). This is the job where I said the interview went fairly well until I said I probably wanted to go to grad school. There are several things I like about this position: relatively close to home (so I can mooch off of my parents), plenty of gadgetry (ooh, HPLC*), and I'll get to see how a certified lab (which has a certain glamourousness to it) operates. Also, it's very much relevant to half of my major. However, I won't be allowed to use all the instruments (reasonable, but aww, it'd be cool to run the ICP-MS!), and this job will probably get repetitive after awhile. Also the company is hiring two students, and I have no clue who the other person is. Might be awkward. And then there's LIMS. Grr, LIMS. Especially when it's buggy, which it invariably is.

Second: applied research
The company is in the energy industry and has one major product. The position involves researching on the properties of the product and optimizing it for various applications of interest. The interview for this position went quite well overall. Since this company is relatively small and new, even I as a student should be able to get quite involved. Also, this being a research position, it should be less routine than the usual analytical work. That said, this job is a little far, making living arrangements difficult. Also, it is more "engineering" than "chemistry" (of any subdiscipline), and I don't know how much chemistry will I actually learn on the job; it'll look out of place on the resume as well. Not sure about how many toys do I get to play with, either. The most unfortunate part is that the interviewers don't know how an XRF works, and that makes me very sad.

Now...pick one.

There are other decisions to make as well, but those are minor for the most part. For example, hmm, what should I make for supper next week?

As a random aside, I need to be reminded to make a post on representations of groups so that I can mentally clarify to myself what the professor was talking about today.

[Edited]
Parents: "Take the one closer to home!" Me: *meep.*
And as one of my acquaintances have dryly pointed out, my parents are so going to kill me if I don't pick the one closer to home. But then again...

*It's probably easy to tell that I am somewhat enamoured with chromatography of various forms. It's one of the most important analytical techniques in current use, and I am not familiar with it. The novelty will wear off if I spend some time using the instrument on a regular basis, which I might or not depending on which job I pick.

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Today is Not My Day

Today is not a good day.

I've had (I hope) my last two interviews of the term, one of which is also the worst interview I've ever had. And I had to miss inorganic to go, too! (and they were covering group theory, *sigh*)

It's easier to talk about the second interview first. It's an in-person interview for a more-or-less routine analytical position. Basically, it consists of a "verbal obstacle course" whereby the interviewer fires questions at me. Because the position is on something somewhat outside my field, I can't answer all the questions as confidently as I should, but overall it was fine. I liked the fact that they had an IC, though.

The first interview, though, was very bad. Phone interview for a research position. The interviewer and I had alot of issues trying to understand each other. The interviewer also can't seem to figure out that I give a little background information as context before answering the question, and am not trying to dodge the question. In the end I just answered yes/no to his questions, which is not conducive to explanations. Of course, there were some "epic fails" that were entirely my fault, also. They did have some cool gadgetry (electron microscopes, GC-MS, fluorescence spectrophotometer, and the like), but there's no way the interviewer will offer me this job, and no way I will take it even if the offer was extended.

Another problem is that I keep forgetting I have analytical tutorial. Which means I've skipped quizzes that I shouldn't have. Dammit! Must remember to go to tutorial! (I've now scribbled numerous notes and stuck them all over my desk; I hope this will help me remember for next week...)

Thirdly, I have my real analysis midterm 2* today. It was alright, I guess. I am sure one of my solutions is wrong because it didn't use a stated condition, but we'll see what happens. At least I remembered Baire's Theorem (for open sets) and its proof, which happened to be the first problem on the exam. Oh well, what will be, will be.

Lastly, I didn't do as well on my differential equations midterm as I've hoped. Three marks off: one is a completely idiotic mistake (copied the answer wrong, imagine that!), while the other two involves a stupid graphing problem, and I can't do curve sketching properly (with Euler's method and suchlike) for the life of me.

To come: organic lab (Fischer esterification, which has failed for me every single time I've done it), analytical midterm (which might actually be fun), organic midterm (eep!), and possibly getting back my first thermodynamics midterm so I can start studying for the second one (which is next week). Also, I'll be able to see which employers have officially rejected me after the interview, late this week. Woo.

On the bright side, I'll be using a GC sometime this week! Whee, GC! I wonder what the detector is, though. Guess I'll find out.

[edited]
As if to top everything off, I just found out that one of the jobs I wanted (and I think might get an offer for) got cancelled - the employer isn't going to hire anybody. That makes me sad.

[follow-up]
Thermodynamics midterm was ok, I guess. I didn't expect them to solve a particular problem that way. Oh well. And I totally forgot about biochemistry midterm, which will be back soon, also (meh, biochemistry).

[Thursday]
Biochemistry midterm came back; it was not particularly good. Then again, it's biochemistry. Analytical midterm was surprisingly easy; I don't think I can say that about organic midterm tomorrow (eep). Oh, and the GC has a FID detector (analysing for organics, not surprisingly). It was kind of cute - manual injection!

*Remark: for such an exam, a graphing calculator is completely forbidden, and completely useless; this is fine by me because graphing calculators are evil, expensive creatures whose main actual uses are 1) AP Calculus BC exams and 2) playing Tetris.

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More on Interviews

Just because an imaginary reader might not have gotten sick of me blurbing about my interviews. And other random things.

Yesterday, one interview. Pharmaceutical/analytical. In-person. I liked this job, because, ooh, HPLC! But I don't think I stood out to the employer, so I doubt I'll be getting an offer.

As for today...

First interview: another nanotechnology-related position (Well. Vaguely nanotechnology-related). Unfortunately, it was a phone interview. The interviewer had something of an accent. I stopped paying attention. Oops. It goes without saying that well, that's not good. The remainder of the interview did not really go "downhill from there" per se, but it wasn't particularly good, either.

Second interview: straight up analytical chemistry, dealing with method development. In-person interview. I started talking when out-of-breath (running up a few floors to the interview room, in a skirt and heels, is never a good idea), but things settled down after a few minutes. The interviewers are very well-scripted. They asked all the standard questions (including those "psychological" ones); nothing surprised me. Which is nice, of course. There were also several chemistry questions, but those were a little shallow. They tend to be those sorts of questions where there are two answers: one is the expected, standard "high school" answer, the other is a more complex, "realistic, if you are really fussy" answer. For example, dilution problems: yes, add this volume of liquid - assuming volumes are additive and there are no temperature fluctuations that will change your volumes. Masses generally are more accurate than volumes, anyway. (Hmm, maybe I should've said these things *during* the interview.) And goodness, if I don't know what a MSDS* is by now, I shouldn't be allowed anywhere near a lab.

One slightly amusing thing is that one of my peers are also being interviewed by this company, and we used the exact same example because that's the topic our analytical professor was discussing for the last few lectures. (Beer-Lambert law as an example of a calibration curve, in case you were wondering.) A little deja vu for the interviewers, I guess.

I am a little sad about this second interview because I lost the interviewers' business cards and now I can't send them a thank-you email.

Third interview: the position has to do with "applied research", if there's such a thing. A little more "chemical engineering" than "chemistry" per se, but a fairly, um, lucrative field. It's also a little far. Phone interview, two interviewers. Probably because it's my third interview and I am pretty much incoherent by this point, I started out terribly on this interview. Mind went blank and so I cobbled together some crap about my communication skills (oh, the irony).

There are several things of note during this interview.

1. Trivial chemistry questions. As in "how much of a 10 M solution would you add if you want to make 500 mL of a 5 M solution". See my previous note about "realistic" answers; I see a trend here.

2. Either the interviewers were testing me, or they didn't know how (in general) some very powerful and fundamental instruments work. Example: X-ray fluorescence. Or maybe I am just being biased because I like the XRF. Or maybe this is just because the interviewers spent too long outside of school. They also got curious and asked about a somewhat more unusual instrument**, which was fun.

3. One of the interviewers asked me about my "mechanical abilities". And by this I don't think they mean lab skills. Um. I can probably use a socket wrench. Probably. Dammit, I am not an engineer.

4. Apparently, the company was thinking of purchasing a set of equipment that I've worked with (same manufacturer and all - it seems to be the "canonical" brand to use), and the interviewers asked me about them! That, was really odd. I forgot to tell them that the instruments have very specific diagnostics programmed into them for troubleshooting purposes, kind of like a debugger that can run code line-by-line. Oh well.

You can tell that I had more fun at my third interview than the other ones, can't you?

Interviews aside, I also had differential equations midterm yesterday, and biochemistry midterm today. For the former, aside from "stupid curve sketching", there's nothing for me to say (the exam is aimed at a very "standard" level). For the latter, well. It was biochemistry. Fortunately, the professor was quite generous, and the exam was easy (which is important because I spent only one hour cramming).

I received my inorganic midterm back today as well (the TAs and the professor are unnaturally efficient). It was bad, with dumb mistakes galore. The class average is even worse. Don't ask me about that one.

Onwards! More assignments, more interviews, more midterms!

*Materials Safety Data Sheet, obviously. On the other hand, "WHMIS" seems to be a Canadian thing, so I guess maybe that's not so obvious...
**Of all the people I've had interviews with this term, only one person knew what it was (which means, of course, he knew how it worked, as well). Most people use more powerful techniques to get the same results, because this instrument can detect only two elements.

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Three Interviews...

...and three predicted rejections.

Usually, if one is to be rejected during the interviewing stage, one can tell even before the interview has ended. And this is happening three times. Just the thing I need during midterms.

First interview: employer asks about synthetic and nanotech experience, of which I have none. Organic lab doesn't deserve a mention (partly because my yields are, um, fascinatingly horrible, all the time).

Second interview: I actually thought the interview went pretty well, possibly because the position is another analytical chemistry one, except the employer asked about my future prospects and I said graduate school, which might not have been the right thing to say. It was fun talking about instrumentation and QC's and such, though. I was shocked and a little sad that the company threw away all their volumetric flasks (!) because they weren't accurate enough (volumes are intrinsically less accurate than mass).

Third interview: In contrast to the second interview, I probably seemed too "industrial" or "applied" to the interviewer - very little research experience, and none at all in the employer's areas of interest. Sad.

Thus far, I have a total of seven interviews listed. The four to come are: one on Monday (analytical), two on Tuesday (another analytical one, and a nanotech/materials one), one the Monday after (environmental/analytical). Of these four, I am highly interested in two of them (and not-so-interested in the other two). We shall see whether I get rejected by all seven possible employers or not. Seeing the trend so far, the answer will probably be "yes".

Meanwhile, there are two midterms tomorrow. Hmm, guess I better study.

[Edited]
I now have three interviews in a row on the same day (and at the same time) as my biochemistry midterm. The professor will be most displeased...

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Reminder to Self: Job Search Edition

Despite the fact that sometimes the work sounds interesting, remind me to never apply to another government job again.

Stupid security check forms. I am going to have to call in some favours to fill out some parts ("hey, you want to help me prove that I am not a sociopath, and be my reference? I will need your home address." *brightly*). And I don't really want that job anyway if I have a choice. *Sigh*

There are more woes associated with jobs and interviews (midterm conflict, anyone?), as well, but I'll save those for a later post.

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What's With the Paperwork?

And I thought university admissions were bad.

Companies and their security checks...certified copies of (numerous) legal documents, references (two out of three of which said they would help but have currently disappeared), and all. Some of the documents they wanted are literally over 4000 km away from me, too; how am I supposed to make certified copies out of them? I have no idea how to resolve some of these issues...*sigh*.

One company even wanted a physical, which caused me to miss an entire day of classes due to commuting. On the plus side, I now know my current height and mass; having confirmation that one is vertically challenged and plump, is some cold comfort.

Whatever other pain they may induce, at least midterms don't have so much red tape associated with them - student ID and number, that's it.

Did I mention that I will have another interview tomorrow, at such a time so that I have to finish my midterm early, and run like Boreas to make it? And that this interview will cause me to miss yet another class?

Of course, I can take the easy way out to avoid the paperwork, and refuse the offers, but that would mean accepting a tedious, menial job for the next four months. That's no good.

To say that I am in a foul mood right now is to put it mildly.

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A Perchant for Distant Shores

Next Friday, I'll find out whether all my job-search efforts have resulted in anything useful to me, i.e. a job. Some employers have contacted me for random information and seem to be edging towards an offer, which is all to the good. But...

All but one of the jobs that are decent/cool, and have not outright rejected me yet, are, shall we say, distant. As in, literally 500 - 1500 km away, in the middle of nowhere, in the middle of winter, type of distant. Maybe that's why they seemed willing to offer me a job, eh? And for the one decent job that's relatively close by, well, the interview didn't go too well. I have one more interview tomorrow, and the job seems quite fun, but the position is going to be far away, in a place where language barriers are going to be a problem (assuming that they are willing to hire me in the first place).

In contrast, all the jobs that I applied for "for backup" are relatively close-by and convenient. *Sigh*. But I won't take those jobs if I can help it, mainly because I have no idea how to write a "technical report" on say, tutoring.

The funny thing is, I have no idea what the salary will be like in any of the jobs I am interested in. Too shy to ask at the interview, heh, and now it's too late.

I don't know what to say: do I look forward to next week, to see what offers I get? (And be torn by them?) Do I dread next week, because that's when the deluge of finals begin to drown me in earnest?

Ok, no more grumbling. Back to reviewing for midterm tomorrow. And calculus. Oh darn, I still need to do laundry...looks like it's going to be another sleepless night.

Random aside: I have a tendency to miss important phone calls, for some reason. I've missed two of them this past month. And I only got 3 phone calls so far this month.

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numInterviewsBotched++

I had an interview today, for a decent, if technicial, position. A chemistry one, of course. But...

It can't be a good thing if I spent all 30 minutes of the interview defending my previous company's (lack of) standardization procedures, right? Unfortunately, I certainly spout faster than I think. *Sigh*.

(In case you can't tell from the title, yes, I am doing a CS assignment right now. Along with my calculus assignment, and organic, too. Stuck! Ack.)

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I Cannot Resist Posting This

Something I saw while looking through job descriptions:

Physical ability to hike 5-6 km per day, day after day, in the bush, and like it.

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I need sage advice and wise counsel!

Job rankings open. Indecision begins.

I have 3 offers. Yay! Except...which one to choose?

(In chronological interviewing order)

Offer 1
- Editorial position for math textbooks in a small company.
Pros:
- Pay is good
- High confidence in doing the job extremely well (lots of experience doing something similar)
- Friendly environment (judging from interviewers)
- Personal vested interest: I want to help improve textbooks so I won't see another crappy one in use for high schools. As in the following...
- if I see "The Frog Book" (students in a certain province will know exactly what I mean), I'll laugh at the irony, annihilate it with my stash of red pens, and (in honour of my high school math teacher) put a snake on the front cover eating the frog. It'll be fun!
Cons:
- Probably not too challenging; high school math texts == picture books, these days. That being said, alot of my peers did mention that they will be more likely to read an attractive textbook (e.g. ?) than a plain one (e.g. Spivak)
- Finicky! Due to the political correctness required, I suspect.
- Usefulness on resume is fairly low unless I seek a similar sort of job (editorial/teaching/tutoring/TA-ing). I think that can be said of pretty much any non-CS jobs. CS/Finance dominates almost everything in terms of mathie-positions, these days...*grumpily*

Offer 2
- Developer position for applications in a particular CAS (interactive problems, also for math textbooks). Moderately-sized but famous company (how many CAS companies do I know, anyway?).
Pros:
- Reputedly, good pay, but didn't ask so no exact numbers
- It'll be challenging and hopefully fun because I am a crappy programmer
- Looks good on resume: good company, interesting and CS-related job
- Relatively close to the university, so I might be able to meet some friends I miss from last term. Math Parties (and afterparties too)!
Cons:
- Confidence in doing job well is medium/low-ish because of the coding part, but I am very solid on the math itself/explaining it (which is supposed to be the hard part right?).
- Personally, I don't like the CAS. Actually, I hate CAS's in general, except that they crunch numbers well and produce really pretty plots now and then.
- Also personally, the interviewers (which are the managers/supervisors for the project) are rather intimidating. Of course, they Were interviewing me, so there's a bias in that judgement.

Offer 3
- Chemistry Technician position in a processing facility: making solutions, monitoring reaction conditions using analytical equipment, and the like. Rather large company. Astonishingly beat all them second years.
Pros:
- In my opinion, the most interesting/fun job of all. I would love to be on this job!
- Good experience if I want a lab position, which I do (e.g. with a professor: a frosh with experience is better than a frosh with none)
- The interviewers were great... gotta love chemistry problems on an interview!
Cons:
- Might not be a good idea, considering that I am officially in Math not Chemistry
- Looks good on resume iff I stay on chemistry-track and not math. But, the number of lab jobs are few. This is not too much of a problem if I go to grad school, but it is a problem for future terms.
- Least confidence in doing job well due to the plethora of (expensive/fragile) analytical equipment (er... so how do I use an auto-titrator?), lack of supervision, and the extremely fast-paced environment
- Somewhat lower pay
- Must get safety shoes, somehow.

Random: disturbingly enough, no classes are in session both last evening and today due to snow/ice. Damn the weather! (Spent all night doing thermodynamics for nothing...) However, I am somewhat grateful too: more time to work is Always good! Math contest/orchestra rehearsal postponed though. *Sigh*.

More random: it's March...Putnam results should be out soon... do I want to see the 0?

Things to do:

• Chemistry lab (need to do discussion; what to say, what to say?)
  
• Test/debug CS assignment. Need to code a "build" method; how irritating.
  
• Physics, which I totally forgot about...again...
• Algebra, due Wednesday. Haven't started yet *cough*
  
• Stats, the forever neglected one. Midterm 2 coming up, too.
• Make a decision about them jobs. Soon. As in before Monday, which is when the deadline is.
  
• Nag general chem prof - by electronegativity arguments, perchloric acid is stronger the perbromic (which in turn is stronger than periodic [<-- I think the compound "per-iodic acid" has been made fun of a few times...])! (Anyone knows where I can find their kPa, along with those of chloric/bromic/iodic acids?)
  
• Nag an arbitrary general chem TA, because I have a messed up equlibrium problem. Or I can just take the marks and run away with it...but that won't resolve my problem.
• More review of thermodynamics won't hurt.
• Calculus bonus...must...solve...

Note: Title comes from novel - The Philosophical Strangler, by Eric Flint. There are some sappy bits (not unusual), but there are brilliant parts, as well. Go read! (On the other hand, it is not the most edifying piece like say, Margaret Atwood's works tend to be.)

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A deep breath before the plunge

Midterms begin (for me) next week, starting with algebra on Monday night. Did I mention that I am in no way prepared?
This weekend shall be dedicated to studying Algebra...typing up proofs and such on Saturday, and practicing problems on Sunday. I shall have to cram in as much statistics as I can, as well, since that midterm is also coming. Not to mention calculus. And chemistry.

*Sigh* It is astonishing how much time the job-search process consumes. Two calculus lectures, gone. One chemistry lecture, gone. And there's a mandatory job fair coming up - that'll take all day, depriving me of every class from Thermodynamics to Algebra and Organic Chemistry - even Calculus tutorial! (Oh nooooo!)

There is a sense of futility in all this:

• Interview 1: It went (optimistically) fairly well, although the primary interviewer actually seems a bit shy (ironically). One weird question - "what flavour of ice cream do you like?". (As long as it's not a "psychological" question, I think I'll be ok on that one...) Of course, the interview was also short. I sincerely hope that I did not come across as arrogant. Erk - I like this job, too. And I forgot to ask for their business cards! (Ended up writing thank-you notes by hand. With alot of luck, they won't mind...)
  
• Interview 2: Maybe it was due to sleep-deprivation, but this interview went Very poorly. First: 3 interviewers, 1 me. Second: they asked questions like "suppose you are a consultant and a client comes in with an ill-defined question..." - note that I have never had any intention of becoming an consultant and thus had never thought about it. Although I like this job as well, I have a strong feeling they will reject me. Also, I forgot to ask for their business cards on this one, too. (Yep, more hand-written notes.)
• Job fair to come: one day of lectures, all gone, in order to "network with employers". Lovely calculus...algebra...statistics...organic chemistry... *sad*
  
• Interview 3 to come: I have no idea why I got selected for this interview ("process technician")...better brush up on my analytical chemistry skills - I really don't know how to use a auto-titrator and similar apparati, even if I can use a spectrophotometer and can set up a traditional chromatography column (i.e. pour in silica gel slurry and bang the column alot).
  
• Interview 4 to come: Another "I am so doomed!" interview to come, since this involves a 90 minute programming exam. That is all very well, except I don't have a clue on how to program using a "functional" mindset (versus object-oriented)...and I am illiterate in VBScript/JScript, which the employer likes. Oh well, at least I don't have an attachment to this particular position.

Enough interview woes for the day...back to thermodynamics, then CS assignment. Oh, and I better read the physics lab and sketch a report outline in advance too. Not to mention one more application package I need to put together (need to remember to get a reference's address). It is probably understated to say "I can't wait until reading week".

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*Insert Infantile Screams of Excitement Here*

I got an interview! I got an interview! But...
As this is going to be my first interview ever, it would be an extreme understatement to say that I am excited and worried at the same time. However, why oh why does it have to occur during my CALCULUS class, and through to my GENERAL CHEMISTRY class? (Yes, those subjects are important enough to merit loud shrieks.) I can live without a general chemistry lecture (as long as the professor is not going to talk about the more interesting derivations of rate laws), but calculus is near and dear to my heart, since I learn more new things in that class.
On a more positive note, the calculus course notes are online, so I can look them up, but that's utterly different from actually attending a lecture. *Resigned sigh* Fortunately, I can still make it to Linear Algebra. To miss that class would result in unimaginably horrifying consequences.

Now there are a few more things to do this weekend (that list never really becomes empty, does it?):

• Read up on job descriptions and company information. Again.
  
• Purchase something "conservatively formal" for the interview, since my current clothing is a different sort of "formal" (i.e. not a suit), if they are formal at all (t-shirt and jeans to an interview, anyone?)
  
• Review resume, and perform a "self assessment". Learn to shake hands properly...?
  
• Practice those "classical/behavioural" questions. Erk. (Did I tell you I failed my first one? At least the marker had constructive feedback this time - can't talk about physics, heh...)
  

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