The Difference Between Good and Bad Employee

I worked hard for more than a year and half on this damn project and dealt with every fucking fool inside and outside  the company with the hope that:

1- I could get my contract extended and become an employee.

2- The concepts of Quality and roles of Quality Department is known and understood to everyone so I can apply the theories I had learnt or the ones that I was in process or learning.

3- I would have job satisfaction.

The motherfucker ignorant who is my superior officer, at the beginning helped me a bit but then appointed someone else with no knowledge and experience as someone that now I have to listen to in the new project! I gained the first goal but know I am so fucking bored with this new assignment that in the past two weeks alone I just simply passed on the works without even looking at them! I thought to myself what the difference would be? They only kept me because 3 people had quit and 1 had been kicked out. They did not keep me because I know things better than all of them in the department or speak and write much better, they simply kept me because they thought I would be more beneficial than a newly hired guy. And now everything that we built in the previous project is ruined. We work less productive, we create more crap and we have more rework! That is a great management. I knew that for a fact that a company would evolve after doing a few projects, learn from the past mistakes and would have better outcome but seems that is not the case with this company and its dickhead management. So what's the point of getting so excited? Now that we are a point that the project is at its final steps and we don't have that much to do, I spend most of my time on my studies with the hope that I can beat this upcoming exam of ASQ for CQE, just the way I did the recent one, unless I get a new position. If there is really no difference between a knowledgeable, experienced, dedicated employee and a useless fool and people are selected to work based on their nationality and closeness to current employees, why would I work hard for nothing!?

Accuracy and Inaccuracy of Hollywood Movies

There is always discussions in the media about the accuracy of the movies that Hollywood makes. At times the critics claim that the filmmaker altered that part from the book or exaggerated this part from what had happened just to have better impression on the audience.

I share my experience in that regard:

1- Papillon - 1973.

Papillon has been always one of my top favorites. I watched a censored version years ago in the old country and then bought the book. Here I rented the DVD in 2006 when Blockbuster still existed and eventually bought it a few months ago. What attracted me the most was not only the great performance of Steve McQueen and Dustin Hoffman but also the efforts that the real character of movie Henri Charriere made to free himself. After all these year, the news is very disappointing: The story is completely fabricated and Henri Charriere might have even been somebody else! There are big questions in the movie as how he survived all of the miseries in all those years. He survived two long-term solitary confinements,  a two-year and a five-year(!) while his much younger buddy almost died after the second one. He survived after visiting a leprous colony, being shot at by guards several times, being shot by native Central Americans using a Blow Gun and many more incidents. The funny thing is even the author of the book, whose his identity is not confirmed, claims that 75% of the story is true. So you can easily conclude that most of the stories in the book and movie as well is nothing but what a prisoner who had nothing to do, has made up! You know how boring could get in the prison, have nothing to do but talking about nonsense! What if I make up stories and publish them after I got out of here, he must have said to himself. I can make lots of money. Many books actually are written in jail time. Hitler wrote his My Struggle when he was doing time. The book is kind of forbidden in North America and may be Europe and other countries as well and I can't tell what he has written because I have not read it but it's a book. Anyway I'm going far away. Hitler is the subject of the next movie! Nevertheless it's very strong and touching movie.

2- Valkyrie - 2008.

Valkyrie is based on a failed attempt to kill Hitler just less than a year before he commits suicide when Berlin was surrounded. It's probably one of a few movies that there are as little exaggeration as possible in their story. However in my opinion the movie could be much longer than 01:50 hours. If it was Oliver Stone who had made the movie, he would have made it longer for sure! Valkyrie is a good movie overall and I enjoyed watching it. I guess Tom Cruise is the only one whose act is a bit shaky! All the other actors which are mostly British veteran ones, deliver excellent performances even the one who briefly appears as Hitler. But the story, editing, music and direction takes over the acts. I mean what makes the movie attractive is not only because Tom Cruise is in it. It's everything else and most importantly it is true. Another thing which could add to the value of the movie was having the actors and actresses speaking German. As I said most of the main characters are portrayed by British and Americans actors and actresses and there are a few Germans and other Europeans as well. If the movie had been dubbed in German and had English captions, it would have been much stronger in my opinion. The same I had with Das Boot. This movie is available both in English and German and when I put it in German, it just sound more natural, I would say.

3- The Shining - 1980.

This movie is probably one of the most controversial ones, at least to my knowledge. It is based on one of the most famous writers/novelists Stephen King's story of the same name  but has been changed so much that it's almost unrecognizable! King showed his dissatisfaction about the movie. Although it is not based on a true story and doesn't require accuracy or inaccuracy but there are parts in the movies which you practically don't understand what's going on! Are does people ghosts or the main actor, Jack Nicholson, recalls memories? Nicholson, by the way, delivers an awesome act. I almost didn't understand what Kubrick wanted to say in this movie. Is that the same message that King wants to convey or he is trying something different? I need to read a few reviews on that but the movie is great, the direction, sound and music, acting and story except for the scenes that ghosts-like creatures are seen. We know that Danny has this power of seeing things in advance or seeing things which has happened before and that's what the Black fella, the chef, who actually was a great actor himself, calls Shining but even that explanation does not help to understand what Jack sees because we know Jack does not have the Shining power. One of the weirdest reviews I once saw (not read) about the movie was a clip in Youtube which claims that The Shining is about the fake moon man landing by the US! The narrator points at several signs which if put together, in his opinion, show that Kubrick wanted to say the Apollo 11 Mission was a hoax! So I don't know! 

(Photo, top: The main characters of the failed attempt to kill Hitler in the summer before he commits suicide beside his wife, in Berlin. Von Stauffenbug, the Colonel who loses his right hand, left eye and two finders on the left hand is portrayed by Cruise) 
(Photo, middle: One of the several strange scenes in The Shinning: Shelley Duvall, as Jack's wife, desperately looking for help, opens the door of one of the rooms and encounters this: a creature  in a sort of bear suit and with an animal-like face is having oral sex with a man in a suit, looks like a hotel staff(!) What the hell does this mean?!)

A Night in Flooded Calgary

I wanted to have a walk in Downtown to see what was going on after 2 days so I left home at around 22:45 hours. I first wanted to get on the train but I was not sure if the train was in service. Besides that I wanted to have a walk because I have had so much during the day. 

So the west side of the downtown was almost OK and the closer I got to the east the darker it got. Police cruisers were seen here and there with the officers watching for the opportunists, the fucking looters. 

When I got to Eau Clare Market I the entire area was blacked out and I am not sure if residents were in their  apartments or not. There was a police car parked at a corner and I guess as soon as they saw me they directed their light at me. I quickly rouse my hands and started walking the other direction but the car started coming to me so I turned around and walked toward them. After greeting they asked me what I was doing there. I told them that I was checking to see what was going on. Then he asked me where I worked. My prompt answer was a good sign that after a few more minutes I said goodbye and added that I was going to a train station to go home.

Water is being pumped out of the residences adjacent to Bow River. This was around 23:45 hours last night

Just 3 blocks away from where I saw the first pair of officers another cruiser just stopped in front of me and after exchanging a few words and answering a few questions I carried on. It is really good that CPS has everything under control because there are lots of people who are just waiting for something like this to loot the evacuees belonging. Just remember Katrina in New Orleans a few years back or the recent disaster in the US where looters took people's belonging and looted stores. By the time I got home it was almost 00:20 hours.

(Photo: On Louise Bridge looking at west, it's easily seen that half of downtown is experiencing a power outage. The C-train is not in service and will not be for the next 2 weeks or more due to damages to two or more station in McLeod Tr.)

Good Beef

When we went to Innisfail, we also wanted to get Peas and Organic Beef. Peas, we were told that would come up in July but Beef was available. A heard of cattle was grazing in the little woods nearby, in the farm. We tried to get close to them but they seemed not very friendly and ran away. We expected to get fresh, not-frozen Beef but what they had at the times was in their freezer and looked OK so we got two pack.

We fixed the first one, the Ribs a few weeks back and the bigger piece just last night and it was really good. It, as can be seen in the above photo, is a big piece, mostly meat, not much bone and we paid some $18 for it. It makes four meals if it's eaten with side items. It's an oven roast piece but this is how we cooked it:

I made a few holes at both sides and filled them with cloves of Garlic. Then chopped two medium Onions in our pressure cooker, added salt, pepper and a little bit of herbs and secured it. When the steam came up and I turned the heat down, the meat was half-cooked so we added 2 cups of pre-soaked White Rice to it, turned the heat all the way up and let it steam and then turned the heat down to minimum and let it cook with the steam.

The result was fantastic. Of course it would have been much better, if I had used Red Rice because it's whole grain but F. F. doesn't like that. I had made some Aubergine meal earlier so together they all made a very good lunch.  

Cows can be seen in trees. This little wood is adjacent to the farm  but separated  by  fence to keep the animals away from crops. I guess they are not used to see human being as this was as close as possible we could get.

(Photo: The Main picture shows the big chunk of meat out of the pressure cooker. I will be soon chopped after this and makes four really tasty meals)

Flood in Calgary: Night 2

The second day of flood alert has passed peacefully but there are still road closures in the City. I wanted to go for jogging and considering the situation I thought I'd be better go to Nosehill but then I reconsidered going to the Bow River Path. So I crossed the river over the Louise Bridge and parked somewhere at the north side of closed Memorial Dr. and went to the path.

parts of the path at both sides of the river were still under the water but I managed to run for a few minutes. In the afternoon we had a stroll around the east side of Downtown. Most of the roads were closed and most of businesses or may be all were closed as well. There was no electricity for the traffic lights and I assume for the residential and commercial buildings as well.

We checked both Safeway and the Company of Over-rated Pirates. They were fairly empty of customers for a Sat. afternoon. Some of the sections in Co-oP were half empty meaning they had not received their supply. We were there for fruits mostly but found nothing worth spending money on but a couple of Pears, a few Royal Gala and pair and Bananas. Some jackasses were seen carrying bottled (tap) water but City of Calgary has indicated that the quality of water is good and there would be no need for boiling water. So the situation seems going back to normal gradually.

(Photo: Memorial Dr. and Downtown Calgary in a beautiful sunny day is shut down. You can clearly see that the level of water is so high. A cruiser can be seen at the westbound blocking the traffic)

Flood in Calgary

The amount of rain in Alberta this year has been significantly increased compare to the all previous years that I can recall. It started even before we went to Innisfail. I wanted to have a post and say how it looked like B. C. here but postponed it until all the rainfall resulted in flood. 

So at work today more than 80 per cent of the people were missing. The level of water both at Bow River and Elbow River was so high that the City ordered mandatory evacuation in many neibourhoods around the two rivers. I got a chance to walk by Bow River shortly after 01:00 PM yesterday (Fri.) and it was amazing how fast and up the river was. Memorial Dr., Crowchild Tr. and many other roads to the Downtown were shut and the C-Train service was cancelled. I guess we are among a few Downtown neighbourhoods which were not included in the evacuation plan. 

High River I heard has been even worse and in the City again it is said that the Saddledome and the entire Stampede Park has been drowned! I try to see what I will see this morning. 

What shocked me the most was not the flood or the amount of rain. It was the way that people were reacting to that. At work people sending e-mails and had the radios turned on. One of them sent a map of the City indicating the road closures! My answer to that was that I would be paddling my Kayak back home and neither of the road closures and flood would not affect me.The other one was talking about storing clear water and in fact I saw an idiot with plastic bags full of bottle bottles when I came back to the apartment!  I eventually told one of the colleagues that they just were making too much of it and I added that I never had left were missing were landing in my hometowns years ago and this flood was nothing compare to that. 

(Photo: Bow River, the bank where Memorial DR. follows it and Louise Bridge. You can see the set of stairs on the bellow left of the photos. The stairs leads to the pathway where I usually run and it is completely hidden under the water in this photo. The photo was taken between the hours of 13:00 and 14:00 of yesterday)