I'd like to contribute to this topic that the new Israeli chick on NCIS is motherfucking hot, as, of course, is the goth chick.
Is there someone besides Zeva or are you watching series 3 in oz? Yes, I have all of NCIS on DVD. Waiting for the next series due out in a month or two Abby also has a blog on the internet, though it has gone a bit quiet since the writers strike.
Most people would probably be surprised that Goth chick on NCIS aka Abby (Pauley Perrette) is actually 39 years old. She scrubs up pretty well.
I'm looking for some advice here... I'm shopping for a new pair of headphones, and wondering if anyone can reccomend me a pair. These are only for listening to music on my Mp3 player, not any sort of technical or audio work. In the past I've used earbud type phones, but I'm a bit sick of these. The last pair (which I've lost, hence the post) I owned were a pair of Shure earbud phones that my brother got me in the UK - these were easily the best earbud headphones I've ever owned, so Shure would ceratainly be a brand I'd be shure(!) to buy again. I'd like a set of earmuff type headphones, but nothing ridiculously over the top Also, I listen to music quite loud. I know it's bad, but I make sure to limit my listening time to reduce the risk of hearing damage, so something that can handle loud volumes and bass is a necessity. I'm happy to spend a couple of hundred bucks, but that's about as much as I'd go. Anyone got any recommendations?
Be careful with that, hearing doesn't grow back when you start losing it and it gets worse when you get tinnitis, a constant ringing in your ears - it never goes away. There is no braille version of music for deaf people. s
I've got to go far a basic skills aptitude and basic excel capibility test tomorrow. What is a basic level of knowledge when it comes to excel? I'd say i have intermediate to advanced knowledge, but i'd like to know what i'm meant to know.
Basic to me usually meant that you could write a simple formula, create a table... nothing hard at all really
I'd say not much knowledge apart from how to add, subtract and sum cells, construct a few tables, etc. I did a course that was apparently advanced - Business III level and there was no formulas, macros or VB script taught so advanced to most people is what an office secretary with possibly HSC education would be up to speed on. I'd say you'd do alright if you think you are intermediate to advanced. s
I specialised 2 units of my HSC on information processes and technology, so that gave me a pretty big insight into database work and all of those office programs among other things - it's just a matter of remembering it all!
My work sent me to heaps of fuckin Excel courses and if they're looking for basic aptitude, they just wanna know you're not computer illiterate. Just rock up, you'll smash it.
This probably belongs in the 'what pisses me off' thread, but it seems relevent to the conversation here. So i turn up to the testing, and it turns out that it's all interactive flashed based and not 2007, but 2003. Okay, no big deal really, there isn't a huge difference. It turns out this test must be aimed directly at people who graduate from the tafe based business excel course; becuase you have to do things a certain way. I'm used to doing things MY way, which creates the same answer in the end. So i try and go about it my way, which apparently you can't do becuase you have 2 chances to click the right button, and the 'flash' version picks up every button you press which isn't in-line with how you are supposed to go about the problem. Epic fail on my behalf. I was used to finding out things through my own means, and not used to the set tought method that this program demanded. Major flop, and i don't feel too good about the test at all. Then there was 40 of those sentence maths questions in 7 minutes (you know the ones; where you have to gather all the required info from reading a sentence (I.e. jenny is smaller then fred, fred is 1/4 taller than sam, sam is 5/6 shorter than emma, who is taller then bob.)) and my brain felt like mush, i haven't DONE maths in a year. Either way i got nearly all of those right, though didn't finish all 40 just. Overall i don't feel too confident about it at all! For someone who finished both maths and IPT in band 5, i left feeling pretty lousy. Unfortuntately i was under the impression they would just through some written work at me and ask me to put it in a table, maybe show some sums and maybe even a pie graph of the date... you know, simple stuff, for 'basic knowledge of MO'.
Man, don't feel too bad about it, that's totally fucked and ridiculous. To think that college-programmed robots are more qualified to use a program than a relaxed, comfortable user is staggeringly bad. There was the old example back in the day of how many different ways you could perform simple tasks in the Windows 95 environment, like 30 ways to shut down, etc. The same is true today, in any Windows application. You should call them and explain this to them, an HR department is just going to look at what they've got on paper and when they see you are under 60 and flunked that test they're going to assume you have learning difficulties. Just hearing over the phone that you can speak properly and have all your marbles could change their minds.
That's just stupid. There are hundreds if not thousands of different ways to solve a single problem with Excel. Requiring someone to solve it in one particular way is like requiring people to all speak exactly alike. E-learning (and testing) is great for saving companies money but it really does leave a lot to be desired.
Just letting you guys know that i made a pre-emptive call to the recruitment agent, specifying what i thought about the test, e.g. that my results dont fairly represent me becuase i wasn't given the opportunity to solve a problem in excel using my own means, and that the test was aimed specifically at a certain approached education of excel; rather than allowing free roam and other methods. Luckily even the agent related, becuase she had done similar tests. We'll see how it goes.
