First week @ work: Orientation & Training!

Gallery
First thing to note, I got a Flickr account, right here. It's probably a much better idea since the database was taking up a lot of space on my webspace. I must complain though that I absolutely hate the interface and whoever designed it is a nut. I got the pro account though since I'm saving myself a hell lot of space.

Work!
My Mom was all excited and took a picture of me on my first day of work at like 5 am in the morning. I was so tired but hyped up at the same time.

1st Day
I forgot to put an umbrella in my bag. So when I got off the Go Train and was walking along Front Street I was freaking out since it started to rain. I asked some people to share umbrellas with them and kept on switching to other people's umbrellas until I finally made it to my workplace. I still got wet though since umbrellas are useless during a downpour.

Anyhow, they served me breakfast, yum yum yum :) After I met with the CEO. He was IBM Canada's president and now he's our CEO. Wow what a wonderful speaker. He just came into the room, sat down and just spoke for like 45 minutes with no powerpoint or anything. He explained and drilled into my brain the 5 huge goals that the company is focusing on and the strategies and how we will be contributing to those goals. I also met the CIO and a bunch of managers and SVPs all in the first day.
Ooo and they fed me lunch too ^^
Near the end of the day the Resource Manager came in and gave me a lap top. Umm I wasn't expecting this lol Neeeat lol

They will be giving me a VPN when I come back to work in August. I was really surprised that I was the only one out of the new recruits to be given a VPN...I guess I'll be working 24/7 eh??? They don't give Blackberrys to everyone and I'm scared that they are going to give me one. Everyone was hooked onto their Blackberrys and I don't want that lifestyle of checking my phone like every 5 minutes :(

2nd Day
Served breakfast again, am I spoiled or what? Set up our lappies and went through training on Lotus Notes, Kronos and other corporate applications. I set up a meeting with my Resource Manager already and added people to my SameTime (corporate MSN).
They gave me more toys. They gave me one of those mini mice for laptops, but it was even more cool because it had the company's brand on it lol. And they gave me a company branded leather notebook and waterbottle. Geez. Nice addition to the collection I already have of company stuff.

We played "The Apprentice" by dividing into teams to order pizza for lunch. We had to approach it like a project and consider stakeholder requirements, costs, time, etc. lol My group won :)

3rd Day
An executive taxi picked me up from my house and took me to work, paid by the company. I was totally surprised since the taxi looked like a mini limo and the driver was wearing a suit. Dang lol
Met the CTO and looked at the company's facilities at the different sites. What a giant company...lol We had a lovely dinner at a $ Italian restaurant at downtown Toronto, but paid by the company of course. Ohhh dinner was delicious but my meal was like $50 lol I'd never go there if I had to pay for it myself geez lol. Then I took a taxi home...paid by the company of course =p My neighbors saw me coming home and asked about why I was taking the taxi so often lol

4th Day
More meetings with important people and a look at another facility. They let me go home early. Exhausted I came home and just crashed. So sorry Andre that I didn't go to your bday celebration...seriously I was just pooped.
I went out to Tim Horton's with Janice since she just came back to Toronto and we had a nice chat.

Impressions: I'm glad that they allowed me to meet all of the important people of the company, despite their busy schedules. It shows that they really care about their employees. Not many people get this star treatment when they start working. I'm really lucky and pretty darn happy :)
I get super pay, amazing benefits and awesome treatment. I'm very happy.

Laineylains Time of the Month #2!

Here are the pics.

So the end of the story is:
1) Heap Sort runs in O(nlogn) time.
2) Hash table runs in O(1) or constant time.

I'll never forget those running times for the rest of my life.

All kidding aside, the focus of our conversations have changed from venting our frustrations on the horrible world of Computer Science to...work. Whether it be about what we are doing at work or interviews. It's crazy on how much things have changed within a month!

After banging around Rock Band and sucking like crap, we went to some fobby bar where of course Calvin knew people. Unfortunately Jason didn't pick up any girls, so the race between him and I finding someone is still on =p
I don't like beer and I suck at drinking games. But Tao is the worst =p

Happy Father's Day!
You didn't forget now did you? Hope not =p

Convocation is THIS WEEK
I still haven't gotten a pretty grad dress yet. Bloody hell. I'll go look for something cute tomorrow. Sooo last minute :(
I can't wait to throw my degree onto the living room wall beside my sister's. There has been an empty spot there waiting for me for ages.