Interview Day

Today was the day of my interview and I know some, maybe all, of you are wondering how things went.  So without further ado….

I left the house at about 10:00, picked up the bus, and arrived in Hillsboro around 11:00.  Had Thai food for lunch, then went to a couple of used bookstores.  I had asked for my pants to be ready by 1:00 but I showed up 30 minutes early just in case there were any problems.  The pants were done, I tried them on, and they now fit fine.  I then went to the Hillsboro Max station (Max is the name of the Portland light rail) and boarded the train.  The ride to the interview place took about an hour.  Since I had about 2 hours to kill before the interview, I went to Starbucks and got some hot chocolate.

The interview time eventually drew near so I decided to go to the bathroom before I left.  Which I did (yeah, I know you wanted to know that!).  I took one last look at myself in the mirror and decided to adjust my tie.  I’ve never been particularly adept at tying ties so after about 7 times of taking it off and putting it back on without any noticeable improvement, I decided I just needed to accept it the way it was.  Then it was time to go to the bathroom again.  In case you didn’t know, I’m famous for going to the bathroom a lot.  Good thing cause it turns out I hadn’t pull up my zipper from the previous time.  

So I leave Starbucks and walk the 4-5 blocks to the State office building (which is quite beautiful, by the way).  I still have a few minutes to kill so I wonder around the lobby for a bit.  And guess what I discover?  A bathroom!  Have I mentioned that I go to the bathroom a lot.  Yeah.  So I go inside and….you’re not going to believe this….good thing I did cause my zipper is still down!!!  So I go to the bathroom while mentally chanting “pull up your zipper, pull up your zipper, pull up your zipper”.  Which I did.

I then headed up to the 8th floor.  I’m going to fast forward now and come back to the interview in a bit.  The interview itself finished around 5:00.  So I called my friend Dani and told her I didn’t need her help after all since I had plenty of time to catch the light rail to the bus.  I then walked the couple of blocks to the Max and saw a train approaching.  I frantically tried to buy a ticket.  (the fine is $110 if you’re caught without a ticket)  Unfortunately, I was having problems with the ticket machine and the train left before I could get a ticket.  I ended up trying 3 or 4 machines and couldn’t get any of them to take my cash.  I’ve read that there’s an ongoing problem with broken ticket machines….but you still get fined even if it’s not your fault.  I finally walked up to the next station and found one that took charge cards.  My ticket bought, I boarded the next train, and arrived in Hillsboro about 5 minutes before the last bus left for Carlton.

Now, back to the interview.  I showed up about 10 minutes early which turned out to be a very good decision.  I introduced myself to the secretary and she handed me a piece of paper with the interview questions.  I quick jotted down some notes on how I might answer the questions.  Two of the ten questions though, were going to be tough.  One of them, though, turned out to be a really poorly written question.  So once I understood it better I did fine.  The other problematic question asked about very specific experience that I didn’t have.  So I was prepared to essentially pass on the question.  But when they asked it, it was asked in a slightly different way and I could have stumbled my way through part of it.  I was so prepared to pass though that I gave a much weaker response than I could have.

Overall I have no idea how I did.  Maybe a B.  I’m not a good judge of how I do at interviews.  I can remember a few times in the past where I thought I bombed an interview yet I was offered the job.  So time will tell.  They’re going to have a 2nd round of interviews so I’ll know in a week or so if I’ve made the cut.