Today I spent all my morning unpacking the boxes in my new cubicle and setting it up. The new cubicle is located on the east side of the building and because of that I found the temperature is hotter than my old cubicle due to sun shine in the morning. One of the first thing I do is to look for the temperature control and make my side of the building cooler. Alison, whom I went to Waterloo with, walked by saw me fixing the temperature control and made a comment. She said this action is so remarkably Horace such that I am already changing the AC setting before settling in. In lunch time, we were talking about the new Audi A3 a colleague just bought. The A3 has a new gear box system, which has two gears instead of one, so the time between shifting is reduced. How the system is one set of gear controls odd gears, and the other set controls even gears. When the driver shift from 2nd gear to 3rd gear, the other gear already pre-fetch the 4th gear for the next shift. After hearding the explanation, I naturally pose a question on how the computer know which gear to pre-fetch. When the car is runnin gin 2nd gear, how does the system know whether the next shift will be 1st or 3rd gear. The others heard my questions, just assume I like to stress test anything I come across. Apparently, they never thought of this scenario. Sometimes I wonder, am I born too curious or have I been working in verification for too long?

This weekend I am taking CSIA level 1 again. I took it two years ago and failed. After two more years of practice and a lot more mileage, I think I am more prepared this time. Moreover, my instructor last week told me to give it a try. Althought, the CSIA course in Cypress is $150 more expensive than the one in Seymour, it really worth the money. In Seymour, we had only 1 instructor for 20 students. In Cypress, we have 3 instructors for 24 students and we rotate instructor every day so we get to see different teaching style. I have more attention from the instructor and better skill improvment in Cypress. I did pretty good yesterday, the instructor said my balance and stance is pretty good, he can see I have been taking lessons. Today I did not so good. Normally I only edge my shaped ski to turn so I am not good at privoting. That gets me a bit worry about whether I will able to pass. When I woke up yesterday and today, I have a feeling that maybe I don’t not really want to do it, I shouldn’t register after all. I think this feeling came from my fear about failing the course. Since a little kid, I am always good at exams. The CSIA course is probably the first exam I failed miserably. I guess unless I conquer it this time, I will always have a shadow in my mind.

I have a friend who recently quited PMC, moved back to China joining Huawai as a marketing engineer. The job description seems pretty normal when he applied and interviewed for the job. Before he starts, he was told that he will have a two weeks long orientation training. This still looks pretty ok up to this point. Since he is from Canada, the company provided him accomdation as part of the benefit and he gladly stays there until finding a better place. On the first day of work, he was waken up at 6a.m. in the morning. Instead of normal boring meeting with powerpoint slides introducing the company, he was sent down to an assembly hall with 300 hundred other new comers. The company make them sit straight and take attendance in military style by standing up and yell at the top of your lung. Then after the attendance, they was sent to court yield to pratice marching, running laps and do push ups. At the end of the first day, my friend feels something is really wrong and flee back to HK. He contacted the HR department and found out they put him into the local orientation instead of orientation for foriegners. I wonder what kind of company makes its employees literally go through a boot camp? Maybe it is not that surprising since Huawai is funded by the Chinese Army after all. Now, I am curious on what kind of orientation will the foriegners have.

I just recived a move cubicle notice today where the move is tomorrow. They only give me 1 day notice to pack my stuff. It really throw my work schedule off since it pretty mcuh costs half a day to pack and another half a day to unpack. I prefer to have at least a week of notice so that I can plan my work accordingly. I have checked out my new cubicle. This is one of my primary concern. The new cubicle is closer to the rest of the project team and everyone in the verification group will sit in the same aile. The location is as good as my existing cubicle, the area is not too noise. The only obvious draw back is I am sitting far away from the team lead right now, so no one really knows when I come to work. After I have moved, I will be sitting right next to my boss, so I probably have to come in more on-time, say 10a.m. every day. In my company, there is an unwritten rule on seat arrangement. The boss gets the windows seat, then more junior you are, the closer to the aile exit. I am moving into the 2nd cubicle to the window. I think that is a good sign, or maybe I am just thinking too much.

Tonight I cooked in my new home for the first time. I have been too busy to cook for the past two weeks since I moved in. Although what I did was really cook rice and vegetable and heating my food supply left by my mom’s last visit. I am a bit sick of eating out every night. I ran out of ideas where or what to eat and got tried of food court or resturants around my area. Moreover, I don’t like the MSG taste and all the grease served in those places. Eat simply at home can also save money while staying health at the same time. Since I am the only customer of my cooking. I can determine the trade off among complexity, look, taste and convinience. The main goal of my cooking is easy to prepare and speed, all the rest can be sacrifice.