barely fatal

The following letter was an explanation demanded by the people at the Jobcentre following my voluntary dismissal from a job I had a while ago. No one really believes I actually did this since it requires putting principle ahead of profit but this story is indeed real…

Its been edited to replace the companies name (so that this doesn’t come back to bite me on the ass eventually ) but besides that it’s the original version.

This hapened a while ago by the way, i came across the letter while doing garbage collection on my PC … enjoy

After having applied and attended interviews for a position as a junior engineer “Cetrab” decided against creating such a position altogether. Instead deciding that extra help was required in there manufacturing side. The position of technician was offered to me on a temporary basis.

During my first 3 months of employment, attempts were made by a certain person to reassure me that a position within the R&D department could be found were it not for the objection of management to creating such a position. As time went on however I began to question the validity of such claims. Obviously not out loud, since questioning the truthfulness of the head of R&D would have likely got me fired on the spot.

Following a 1-month break from my employment, during which time I did not claim any benefits, I returned to work at “Cetrab” under a new 3-month temporary contract. At which point I found that the position that had been denied to me had been filled by an acquaintance of the head of R&D. This fact did not sit well with me, but for the duration of the contract I did my job. To what I was led to believe was a satisfactory standard.

With the possibility of further developing my engineering skills squashed. Growing daily harassment from another member of the production staff, which had been reported to management but not acted upon in any effective manner. And a daily 3 to 4 hours spent travelling to and from work; the prospect of continued employment became less then appealing each passing day. Nonetheless I did my job until the last day of my contract and with all legal obligations completed I left “Cetrab”.

It is true that 1 month prior to the end of my contract I was approached and informed that after the end of my current contract a further 3-month temporary contract would ‘likely’ be available. With growing concern that I would eventually be pushed to the point were the continued circumstances would result in me doing or saying something that could jeopardise any chance at a good reference, and having no assurance of continual employment, I chose to take my leave at the end of my current contract.

While I was employed I did stop looking for a job during the first few months, as I believed that I would eventually be allowed to develop my engineering skills in “Cetrab”. Eventually I realised I was more valuable to the company as a technician then a junior engineer. Being more concerned for my future then “Cetrab’s” profit margin I restarted my job search as soon as possible. Unfortunately the contract ended before I could ‘secure’ further work.

In conclusion and to reiterate, I left “Cetrab” at the end of my agreed upon contract. I also provided a clear and timely notice, stating my intention to leave.

So there you have it… strange yet true

Pardon my French, but that’s what she is: Gothic 3 is a bitch. She has the looks, she knows how to make you love her. But there’s a catch: she likes to tease. It’s the unfriendly, annoying kind of teasing.

The following screenie only shows one of the fairly small annoyances, see the bow going right through the leg of the Nameless? I don’t care. Clipping problems here, a misplaced graphic there, a missing dialog – those are the things I can forgive. You find those in all role playing games, they are just too big to playtest every inch, every pixel, every option.

No, Gothic 3 has this particularly annoying memory leak. After some time, the higher your level the worse, you can’t save anymore, the game crashes. And eats your save game. It’s gone. You have to go back and re-play everything starting from the previous save game. Now it has become that bad, the game crashes even when I walk around too fast.

This is one of those A-category bugs that should stop every game from being released. I am amazed they missed it. I mean, I am a Quality Specialist, I know how to test software. And how to not get fired on the first occasion. There are workarounds, each one more complicated than the other, and not one practical. I could return the game (you can do that in Germany if there are A-category bugs). But then, do you return your little sister? Or your girlfriend/wife, just because they don’t let you watch football? No, you wait for the patch … uhm, well you know. ‘Cause you love her.

’nuff said.

It took me two nights – TWO nights – to fix my XP. Something – probably the HDD cloning – broke my DCOM+ and System Restore services. Along with that I couldn’t install any Windows updates anymore. I had to comb the registry back and forth, register DLLs and whatnot. What a waste of time! Especially when Windows kept telling me that a certain fix wasn’t working when it actually was. Bleh.

I’m writing this using Internet Explorer 7. So it finally can do tabs. And RSS. Gee, I’m amazed. I miss my Extensions, so back to Firefox for now.

And Vista, have you heard about/read the License agreement they want to sell it with? My biggest complaint: You can change your hardware once. ONCE. Then, to re-activate Vista, you have to buy a new copy. I regularly update my hardware, usually I exchange my processor every two years (at least). Do you really think, I will buy Vista twice? If you could, you’d see my finger now.

Gothic 3 is great. I even got used to the combat system. If it wasn’t for the mentioned OS troubles, I’d be playing right now, but it’s too late already. When you compare the graphics to Oblivion I’d say it’s a draw. You can see farther in Oblivion, but Gothic’s woods and hand-build cities look much more ‘real’ and not half as cold and static. Gothic also spares you some work – no equipment decay or complicated lockpicking, I prefer it that way. Quests are fun and the guilds play much more dynamic and also deeper – your actions have much more noticable consequences. The game feeds on hardware, granted. But no loading zones, yay! I’ll post a few screenies soon.

One more day of work, then I’ll spend the next two weeks with, hm, playing games, sleeping, more sleeping, and even more … sleeping. And I’ll travel the world. A bit. And sleep. Yay! Ohmegosh I’m so boring.