Last Saturday, I was lucky enough to be able to attend the Silicon Valley Web Builder's OpenSocial Hackathon part II. I think that it is interesting that I always end up getting something I think is really valuable out of every meeting I go to. This time, I didn't just learn a bit more about OpenSocial, I met some great people and got a chance to help out with the event. Seeing as I'm looking to get into event planning and execution, I really need both.

The previous Tuesday, I helped organize an event on campus at CSU, Chico where we had around 60 students in attendance to hear from five local tech companies. The tech companies are having a problem right now recruiting talent, which they find to be strange, considering that we have a university right here. It turns out that our graduates are unaware of local prospects, and so always end up leaving town. They also have a problem recruiting to Chico, unless the prospective employee has lived in Chico at some point. At the end of the event, I got up in front of the students and did a quick overview of my own, pointing out that none of the companies at the event were a single technology shop. There were companies using ASP.NET for the front-end, Java for the middle tier, and SQL Server for the back end, shops running Linux and Windows Server, virtualizing both, and even a shop running Cold Fusion. The point was is that if you refuse to use a technology, you'll find a very difficult time getting a job. I also asked the students in attendance how many of them had heard about these companies for the first time at the event. Over three quarters of them raised their hands. Another interesting thing I heard at the event was that between the five companies present, there were 70 job openings in IT, Development, and Quality Assurance.

I covered a intro programming class for one of my teachers, who was out after a surgery on his foot. We went over some code for a linked list, specifically, how to delete from the head of the list, the tail of the list, and how to delete a specific value. My favorite part was when I was covering the special case for the delete value function where the value that you are going to delete is at the head of the list. A student asked if it wouldn't just be easier to call the delete head function rather than rewriting the code for it. I double checked the code to make sure, and he was quite right. I let him know that that was a great use of OOP, and let everyone know that I thought that it was a great idea. My second favorite part was when I was finishing up, a couple of students in the class actually came up and thanked me, and told me that the lecture was very clear.

I've actually wanted to be a teacher for a long time. I first wanted to teach in Jr. High, although at the time, there weren't any computer classes available, so I wanted to teach math. Once I got to High School, I actually did teach a couple of classes. I taught QBASIC in my Freshman year in the Advanced Topics course, and HTML and QBASIC in my Hardware Software Troubleshooting class in my Senior year. My actual goal right now is to become a Developer Evangelist. It seems like the perfect job for me, because it's extremely people facing, and I get to keep up on all of the latest tech, to the point where I can introduce it to others.

By the way, did I mention I'm looking for a job?

Back in December, I took the JLPT level 3. I just got the results back, and I totally passed it. I did best on the listening comprehension section, as I suspected. I also did well on the reading comprehension, but I didn't do as well on the grammar/vocabulary. It makes sense, really. Nobody really tells you when you say something wrong, so you don't catch your mistakes, but you have to make sure you understand them. I think that I did well enough on this test that with the advanced reading and writing class I'm taking this semester, I might even try for level 2 this year instead of waiting for next year's test. We'll see if I have enough time to study before December.

I'm getting ready for an event tomorrow I've helped plan on campus where some businesses will be coming to campus and talking to our students about the local tech industry. I'm going to be recording the event for anyone who can't make it and to put on my blog, so I needed to get out the recording equipment. I grabbed a wireless mic from my dad because I haven't bought the mic for the student organizations yet. I'm having a bit of trouble with Audacity for recording the audio, but I should have that fixed by tomorrow. I'll post a video as soon as I get everything done tomorrow.

I'm going to Mashup Camp.

Last summer, I went to Mashup Camp 4 and had a great time. I learned quite a bit about Mashups, and even built a couple of my own using QED Wiki from IBM. One of them allowed you to type in any keyword, then mashed together Upcoming's search with Google Maps and gave you pushpins for events matching your search. Another gave you the ability to put in a Zip Code, and get a list of GeoCaches for the area along with the upcoming weather, so you could plan your caching accordingly.

This time around, I'm looking forward to having some more in depth conversations with some of the companies I met last time, like eventful and Bungee, and, seeing as I'm graduating this semester, maybe find a place to work.

I'm heading down from Chico, probably Sunday night, but I could do an early Monday trip if it came down to it. I know that Abdel is riding with me, and Justin could be going as well. That means I've got one or two seats available in my car for the trip. If you're interested in ride sharing, let me know.

On my way walking home today, due to a flat tire on my bike I was able to take in the glory that is Chico. It was a little after 3:00 on a Friday, so of course, it was drinking time. I passed countless outdoor couches with shirtless guys holding red Dixie cups and four games of beer pong, three of which were on a single block. My favorite part of the trip, though, was when I came across a dollar bill on the sidewalk. Score. I reach down in mid stride and pick it up. Once it's in my hand, I notice there is a bit of resistance. I followed the fishing line with my eyes back to a group of shirtless guys on a couch with a fishing pole. They hadn't quite got the whole reel the dollar in when they bend down bit, but they were trying. This was the first time I'd ever seen someone try to pull this off. I gave them a big grin, and released the dollar. Hopefully, they fix the kinks in their plan and have some fun.

I just installed Windows Live Writer on my laptop. I tried installing it on my desktop, but apparently it doesn't support Windows XP x64. I can't think why not. Looking around online, I read that it works fine on Vista x64, and that you can get it to run on XP x64 if you download a version with an MSI installer. Weird that they haven't fixed it yet.

Anyway, I'm going to try this out for a bit. So far, I like it.

I gave blood yesterday. They were on campus, and my brother's class was canceled, so he suggested that we go over and donate. Of course, by the time we found out where they were at, he didn't have enough time before his next class, so I ended up going it alone. It had been a few years since I donated last, so I was glad to see that they're getting better at this whole thing. The bit at the beginning where they poke your finger was my least favorite part, but this time, the guy took the sample from the side of my finger, and I could barely feel it. The needle was still big though. I looked down as they were about to poke me, and got a good look down the barrel of the needle. A little creepy, but overall, I'm thinking that the next time they come by, I'm going to donate again. As an added bonus, I was told that my blood pressure is pretty low.