Fellow Interns

MARKThis is Mark (Michigan), He was the first of our group to leave. Always had some amazing story that could be backed up or proven by Google video. We also found out he had a girlfriend like a week before he left.

VINCE and MICHELE
Firstly its hard to get a good picture of Vince (Toronto) alone. I didn't get to know Michele (Italy) very well but he was cool, he was on his cell phone a lot when he was around. Vince is the original GDictator.

VINCE and ADAM

They were quite a cute couple. Vince made for a pretty good instigator, getting all the guys to take their shirts off on a number of occasions. He always seemed to end up in compromising photos.

ADAM

Adam (Montreal), constantly amazed by the personalized free stuff that Google gives away. While he was here he had the best Salmon EVER. He also became quite famous after the exercise ball incident.

MIKE

Mike's engaged! and not to the naked statue! I have many embaressing picture of Mike (Scotland). Most that shouldn't be shared. He's always good for a laugh and he gets to stay longer than the rest of us.

BRIAN

Brian (Minnesota) lived in the same complex as I did tho I only saw his apartment once. He gave me a ride to work the first few days and the rest is history. He was in general pretty quiet, except for that one time he was drinking....

JON

Jon (Waterloo), goes to the U of Waterloo and is a pretty typical Canadian. Didn't hangout all the time, but it was always fun.

SEAN

He's not an Intern but he sure is cute! He is a really great roommate and luckly he fit in well with the rest of the interns so it wasn't weird when we were all together.

Okay So this is not all the friends I made here this summer, but these are the ones i have the best pictures of and probably are the closest to. They are a pretty good crew to hang with all summer.

ME

Congratulations Mike and Anna

I'll add the picture later but Mike (a fellow intern) and Anna (his long time girlfriend) got engaged over the weekend. Congratulations guys. The post has been delayed cause I wanted to get a picture first but that hasn't happened yet so I'll do it later.

Still 99% done my work term report. Waiting is hard to do but I'm slightly less nervous about it now. My calendar is already getting filled up with meetings for the fall which is probably okay cause at least I'll be busy then. I can't wait to see everyone but I'm sure going to miss Sean and Google.

Still to do this week: I need to clean up my desk and the apartment. We need to move stuff into Sean apartment and need to find him a bed. Tomorrow night were going on a double date to the cheesecake factory which should be fun. Uh... I'm also observing a new study this week and taking some notes... which is cool!

One Week

7 Days till I fly back to Ontario and leave California behind. It has gone by so fast and the summer has been just great! With some luck I'll be able to come back next year. Sean has found a place to live here and is looking at a one year lease. If you would have asked me at the beginning of the summer what would happen in September I would have been way off. Anyways, this seems to be the way it is. I'm going to save my sappy summer post for later, it will give me something to write on the flights home.

Today is one of the last days that both Sean and I have off together. Not sure what the plan is ... but its noon and Sean is still snoring. hehe... I'm going to wake him up soon. We'll probably just end up eating somewhere...that seems to be what this summer is all about... I can't wait to get back to the gym in the fall. I hope its not too busy.

On another note: I'm currently 99% done my co-op work term report. Its currently out of my hands and being read but Googlers to ensure I have protected their confidentiality. Needless to say the paper is pretty vague. I hope those marking it will be understanding of the constraints placed on me.

Short Update before Werk

So while I eat my breakfast (HN cheerios, banana and coffee) I thought I should update on what I did this past weekend before it turns into next weekend.

So. On Friday after Sean finished work the remaining group went to see Snakes on a Plane. Which as you know was just awesome. There was hissing and screaming and good time was had by all. Saturday was pretty low profile, watched some dvds at Google. All preparing for Sunday

Sunday, Adam Mike and I took a road trip to see some more redwoods and to cross the Golden Gate bridge. It was pretty cool I wore the wrong shoes but at least I didn't ware a skirt this time. Then we tried to do some shopping downtown SF but it was pretty busy and it didn't really work out that well. There was a HUGE old navy tho and it was awesome. I can't wait for the port huron weekend back home where I don't have to worry about trying to get stuff packed and on a plane. And I get to see my family agian.

There are some decent pictures of the trip most of which were taken inside the car.

My Internal OS War

So its Monday again, meaning I'm not just ready to push myself to work on my last bits of work here yet. So here we have another Blog update. This weekend I did some work at home on my work term (herein after referred to as WT) report. Not a lot of work but probably about a page. Now at one point my computer starts to freeze up for whatever reason and I think. Oh Man, I have to save all this stuff. So quickly I save the 12 tabs I have open in FireFox and I save the copy of my WT report. Shut down and restart, didn't really think anything of it. This morning I think, o crap I have to email it in so that I can continue working on it here at work. Only to find that I "saved" in the temp directory without warning and now my work is lost. (I know there is probably a way to get it back but I can probably type it up faster than trying to figure it out.)

"A refund for defective software might be nice, except it would bankrupt the entire software industry in the first year."

• Andrew S. Tanenbaum, Computer Networks (2003)

This is not the first time that something like this has happened. I do use word and many of the Office programs and for the most part I do enjoy them. I also like using Windows. I'm used to the system and I've found a variety of ways to customize it to my need. I like having my pick of software to use and games to play. However I still can't help but wonder if I'm missing something by not really paying attention to the other operating systems. I'm sure there will still be a list of annoyances with any of the systems but is there a value that I'm not seeing. Macs look pretty sexy but my Dell was pretty sharp when I bought it... and the flat monitor never goes out of style.

Maybe the OS doesn't matter anymore cause the Internet is the Internet right. If you can get online with a reputable browser the best of the Internet should be accessible to you. With products like writely and spreadsheets popping up anything is possible online. Where do you place your trust on your computer or in the server. Should I just feed my online addiction more. Who reading this can really go more than 24 hours without at least wanting to check their email? Assuming you haven't checked it about 50 times a day. I can't really say I get that much email but I'm usually pretty prompt about responding to it.

I'm at a point where I'm now commonly see people not use Windows as their main OS. Where CS people and engineers will pick up and use other systems regularly. A few years ago I would hardly know anyone who wasn't using windows. But I don't think it is that Windows is "losing the battle" I just think my phase in life has changed. I'm not sure where this blog was going, and now I'm not sure how to end it. I'll post about my trip to the city later this week.

Links of the Day

Some interesting things that I've stumbled over today.

• Haley Joel Osment charged with DUI and pot possession
• Isn't he still 7?
  
• Airline Policies Re: Snakes on a Plane
• Really funny blog post
  
• Talk Sex With Sue Johanson
• Her name has come up a lot lately... it was even on the radio this morning
  
• Cookie Monster Laptop bag
• Probably not as cool as I think it is
  
• Tenacious D in the Pick of Destiny
• Saw the preview... it looks AWESOME
  

Fear of becoming a Hypochondriac

I spend a good chunk of yesterday limping around and slowly straightening my knee because everytime I let it sit still for too long it started aching and then once I did get it straight it would "pop" and slowly start to feel better. Last night, I woke up twice almost in tears because I was having one of those muscle cramps in my calf muscle... first one leg then the other.

A bout of severe leg cramp may cause damage to the muscle. Fibres of the muscle may be torn due to the shear strength of the muscle contraction. If this happens the muscle will be painful for some time afterwards.

Earlier this week I spent the day somewhat motion sick because I was so dizzy. But thankfully the shaking has stopped.

Now for any of these things I could go to the doctor but on their own they are fairly harmless and could be result of any one event in the day. There is a fear in my head that a. I'm making it all up (psychosomatic) and 2. no one is going to be able to do anything for it anyways.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypochondria

Anyways, Last night was the Google Cruise. It was beautiful and I think I managed a few good shots that I'll put up later tonight. But now I'm pretty tired today and found a whole bunch of work waiting for me when I got in this morning. Yippy.

Blogger Beta

Woo. New blogger beta, and I actually got access.

It's surprisingly not that different with small exceptions. The tool bar at the top has a post new button... and thats reason enough to upgrade for me. and there supposed to be a new way to change templates but if i do that I lose all the changes I've made already ... and I kinda like my page as it is so we'll see. If i get bored i'll work on changing the template.

If you can you should start a blog and try it out. http://www.blogger.com/start

Humm... and apperently the feed is somehow different, now my posts don't show up in GIntern. How odd.

Procrastinating again....

So I had the whole weekend off, Sean was working and the interns who are left were looking forward to a low profile weekend. I was thinking I would get some work done on my report and as many co-op students are starting to complain and the like its just more fun to procrastinate it. I have a good two weeks to do the report from start to finish and I should take that long if I'm doing my job right. (I also found out I can work on it at work) So instead this weekend I did a whole bunch of nothing and it was awesome! Last night we did all end up going to Google and watching some arrested development which was pretty funny. I haven't seen the first season in a long time.

Now I'm back at Panera. Sean should be done at 6 but theres a pretty big line up out the door and it doesn't look promising that he will be on time. No worries... I have my laptop and my DS I'm good for hours.

Titles Suck

So.
This morning I've bought a ticket home on Sept 3. Hopefully security calms down by then and it won't be massively delayed.
This morning I also paid fall tuition. It almost makes me feel like I haven't made any money this summer. (luckly I have two paychecks left)

Those are all my updates... Back to report writing...

Work Term Report Rant

So its been an odd week for me so far. My brain just doesn't want to function and when I try to work nothing comes out. I'm close to the end of my work term but relative to everyone else I still have a lot of time left. I'm not sure if I will get a new study again before I leave for home I haven't really asked. I'm currently working on finishing my last study and then working on my work term report for school.

I realized that I don't know if there is a good way to do my work term report that won't make me look foolish. For school, I know the level they are expecting and the amount of front end details that I will have to put in, such as,

"Usability is a term used to denote the ease with which people can employ a particular tool or other human-made object in order to achieve a particular goal. Usability can also refer to the methods of measuring usability and the study of the principles behind an object's perceived efficiency or elegance."

However, I also know that this will be read by my mentor as well as the head of user experience research at Google. So either they will think I'm slow for dumbing it down so much OR I'm going to screw up and they are going to be like, what the heck!? this girl doesn't even know what usability is.

The interesting part is that I think my topic is going to be something that they are very interested in right now and will either a. love my ideas and implement them or b. be able to contradict everything I say with some journal that they read that I never heard of.

On an almost unrelated note, I'm considering graduate school, so I can get my master in HCI. The tricky part is I don't know anything about the processes and I haven't thought of schools yet. I'm looking for one of the programs that is geared towards industry and not towards phds. I've heard good things about CMU, GA Tech, and Stanford. For Canadian schools Calgary apperently has a good program. I need to do more research.

Going ons: Last night was the Google Dance, Friday is the company picnic, tonight is Vince and Brian's going away party. I'm addicited to Starbucks frappuccinos, and I have to book my flight soon.

Munday Morning Update

My brain refuses to function at the moment for any large tasks, such as for analysis of my lastest study. So I'm going to attempt to update my blog while I drink what will probably be the first of many coffees today.

The weekend was pretty decent, got to do some shopping bought a new pair of jeans that I needed pretty badly. Sean and I also got brand new DS Lites if you know what those are then yay, if you don't know then you will probably be making fun of me or lecturing me when you find out. Either way, we have them and are pretty excited!

Also on Saturday the group of us went to the Winchester Mystery House. Which was my recommendation to the group because Michelle told me I had to go. It was a pretty interesting, I felt very clostraphobic at times and found it pretty funny that they were setting this up as a great attraction that cost $20 for the tour but you don't get into the house without a tour guide. They also managed to force you through the gift shop about 4 times. There are some interesting pictures posted as well.

Thats about all I have to update about... going to get back to my coffee now.

They are gone....

I finally got fed up this afternoon and I bit off all my nails.

I'm going to soak the est of the manicure off tonight or tomorrow and I need to file the nails properly but MAN does it ever feel good to be able to type again. I swear i was typing at about half speed all week.

Feels nice.

Angel Island Offsite

So its been a pretty crazy week here.

Tuesday after work there was a nice farewell to all the UER interns

• Very well done, with good food in Mountain View
• Thanks to all the UER full timers
  

Wednesday after work there was an Intern open house.

• Not a bad event
• The food was not at a good google level, not very impressive at all
  

Thursday all the UI Designers, UERs and the Web Group went to Angel Island.

• This... was really cool.
  
• Talked with the famous Dennis Hwang
• Got some really awesome pictures (in the web album)
  
• Didn't have to work
• Went on a tram ride around the island

Pictures!

The extended Weber Family
Sean, me, Dad, Mom, Amy, Jake, Julie, Andrew

Jake and Amy

(actually from yesterday but whatever)


More pictures will be available in my web album soon.