The Logies

“The time has come,” the Walrus said, 

“to speak of many things; of shoes and ships,

and ceiling wax; of blogs and awards and things."

- Lewis Carroll

Ode to America

Here we stand, at the end of it all. 

12 weeks in total, it’s been a ball. 

I’ve laughed, I’ve cried, it changed my life. 

But now I dread to hear, “That’s a knife"

Because it means that I am then Down Under

When my reaction to returning is to hurl and chunder.

America, you suck; your laws are just dumb, 

but my goodness your land is sweet as a plum.

You have crime, guns, death and pain, 

But it merely spits when you call it rain.

Your president has not one bad habit;

which is more than I can say for our dear old Abbott.

Not one animal has tried to kill me here,

and every man and his dog brews their own beer.

So despite Imperial, Fahrenheit and your racist rednecks, 

I’ll always be endeared to my large paychecks. 

Your land is sublime; the mountains are great;

to die amongst them may well be my fate.

But for now I must leave; I cannot stay;

however my heart your nature forever will sway.

It’s over.

My last day, just after the presentation of my projects (which were about as late as they could put them - 3pm on Friday arvo), after it was all done and dusted, everything was finished, my mentor came up to me, stuck out his hand, and said, “Well, I’ll be the first to tell you … you’re fired."

This is it. 

The end. 

I feel sad.

So, now that we are here, at World’s End, I feel that thanks and a mention are owed to a few people who made a difference to my internship. 

Thus we come to the Logies. 

To the Americans who may not know, Logies are these funky Aussie awards for movies and such, and I feel like some people deserve one for their involvement here. 

So here we go:

To Wen Jia, who in 2013 nagged me into interviewing, and to Karl, who in 2014 referred me to Microsoft, I award the Logie for Most Helpful Friend. Seriously, guys, thanks heaps. 

To Jasmin, my second cousin/third cousin once removed/some relation, you helped me on my first day to get everything sorted, and gave me family for Christmas. I award thee the Logie for Helping An Obscure Relative. I am grateful.

To Microsoft, for giving me mad do$h and a job, etc, I award the Logie for Rich and Powerful Company. 

To the Kiwis: Jenna, Harley, Chris, Shay, Matt, Anna, Frank. You guys took me under your wing as a fresh intern. You raised me, cared for me, nurtured me. You taught me to hunt, and helped me make my first kill. 

Then I turned on you and slaughtered you all. 

For not learning from the mistake of the Aborigines, the American Indians and the Maoris, I award you guys the Logie for Most Trusting of a White Person in a Foreign Country. You’re welcome.

To Sarah, who did not trust me one bit after I took the time to convince her of drop bears (and then she got me to convince her officemates and friends). You were wary of literally anything I said or did after the drop bear conversation and branded me as untrustworthy, especially after all the spiders, and immediately suspected me if even the slightest thing seemed amiss. You also organized and ran each of the fantastic intern events that we had, and put up with our antics during them. 

You copped my pranks well, and then got me back fair and square, and what made it all the better was that I did not expect it. When I pranked you you were but a learner; now you contest with me for the title of True Master.

For learning from the Kiwis about trusting me, enduring our behavioral idiosyncrasies and us paying out your language and geographical knowledge whenever we could, for planning a return prank patiently and almost perfectly, to thee I award the Logie for Best Meta-Actor, because you acted like you acted like you cared. 

To dear William, my fellow Aussie (yeah, there were more, but his office was closest to mine, and we both hung out with the Kiwis a lot). We played cricket together, we played squash together, we beat Shay at both of these together. I award you the Logie for Best Supporting Stunt-Double, because you replaced me as the group’s token Australian idiot when I wasn’t there. 

To Travis, my dear mentor and Jedi Master. You accepted me as your padawan and taught me the ways of the Force. I will never forget your wise teachings like “When I eat an animal I want to be able to taste its soul”, and “We’re on the bleeding edge here, and there is so much blood."

I may have been annoying, bugging you about my build system every few minutes, and bugging your office by covering it in cockroaches and spiders, but you took this with grace, and called me a “lovable scamp”.

Despite all I did to scare you with the spiders and cockroaches, despite all my weird antics throughout the internship, the one thing I did that genuinely got was simply turning up to your office when your back was turned and standing in the doorway, and that was enough to scare you.

You were sufficiently weird that I actually had a hard time trying to out-weird you. You have taught me well, master. For this, you receive the Logie for Best Co-Star.

To my lunch team: Austen, Peter, Lui/Liu/Whatever, Harnoor, James, and The Other Guy Who Also Had Glasses. You guys got the gift you never knew you wanted: an Aussie intern. I think back to all the fun times we had - me paying out your retarded vernacular, you pointing out that actually it was me who was weird. Think of all that you have learned about Australia. For all the fun times, you lot receive the Logie for Best Supporting Actors, cos you at least acted convinced at the Aussies jokes I made.

To Omair, my dear roommate. You cooked for me, cleaned up after me, changed my nappies, tucked me into bed and kissed me goodnight. For this, you receive the Logie for Most Unnecessary Coddling of an Adult. Seriously, dude, I told you to stop. 

To Lachlan Ford, who at one point had facial hair not only rivaling but surpassing, yes, dear readers, surpassing, mine. 

Then you shaved. 

I award you the Logie for Greatest Betrayal To One’s Own Species.

That was a fine mo’, man. It could have been framed. 

To Jess, the full-timer from Middle Earth who works down the hall from me. I give to thee not a Logie but a legacy - you’re from the “same region” as me. Continue my work of correcting their backwards language and sports, and making lunch time conversation as weird as possible.

To all of you, my dear readers, you have willingly put up with all my anti-American vitriol, my anti-Australian egalitarianism, and my awful jokes. I’m not going to give you an award, because you didn’t need to read this. If you feel like reading this blog deserves a medal, then go and stab your hand with a fork and buy a trophy for it. 

And now, the Golden Logie for the 2014/2015 Microsoft Internship goes to ...

...

...

...

Me. 

Cos I went and did the internship, that’s why. 

I wrote all those semicolons.

I did all that skiing and snowboarding. 

I visited all those funky places. 

I dueled the Unipiper.

I wrote every blog post and thought up almost every joke.

I got my own feature in Windows 10.

I met the Master Chief.

I drank all that juice, and reconstructed the Battle of the Pelennor Fields.

So stuff everyone else, it’s mine. 

(not that it means anything, of course)

Now here we stand at the end. 

I have no more to say … 

The internship is over. 

Go on, Australia - make my day.

The Fresh Pranks of Bel-Red

Now this is a story, all about how

My office got pranked, turned upside down.

And I’d like to take a minute, just sit right there

and I’ll tell you how I got pranked by Sarah Fisher

Western Washington, born and raised, 

Sarah Fisher was a manager during the Second Age. 

Chilling out max and making our events, 

she was pretty darn good, at making fun make sense.

Then a couple of interns, who were up to no good,

started making trouble in her neighbourhood. 

They canned her one little office and Sarah got scared;

she said, “This means war, and your office won’t be spared."

The Good, the bad, and the Pranks.

Pranks have been played left, right, and centre, this internship, and most of the big ones have involved me somehow. Here’s the story of how I grossly underestimated Sarah’s threat level, and how well she could play this game. 

It all started when one dev on my team, Kyle, was away until new years, and Travis, my mentor, wanted to prank him. 

The plan we eventually went with was printing out many copies of Travis’ face and hiding them around the office, in obvious spots and many non-obvious spots - Kyle will be finding these for years to come. 

Then Travis went to Thailand for 10 days, and there was no question as to whether I would prank him. Of course I would. 

My idea for Travis was to print out a whole lot of pictures of huntsman spiders, red-back spiders, and cockroaches, and hide these around his office in the places where these animals would hide in real life. 

For this, Travis called me a “lovable scamp”. 

Then things started to ramp up. 

Prank Wars: Sarah v. David

(Chris was also involved)

So on Sunday, I thought it would be funny to get my remaining to A4 pages of spiders and hide them around Sarah’s office, cos she would probably be more scared of the spiders than Travis (this turned out to be reasonably correct).

Chris and I were talking about this, and had just finished our can competition, and then came up with the hilarious idea of lining all our 341 cans out on Sarah’s office floor. 

So, that night, at 11:30, we went to our offices and collected all 341 cans, and the many spiders and roaches left. 

We went to Sarah’s office, and I went to town with the spiders, leaving some in easy-to-see spots, like on her laptop keyboard (closing the lid first, so that she would open it and be frightened), in harder spots (each in one page of a set of stickies), and in incredibly obscure spots (inside a box of tea bags). 

We then arranged the cans on her floor, as per the picture, and closed the door. 

Time: 12:15 am

Later that day, I sat in my office, waiting for the reaction. It was not long before I receive a message: “Oh you are so funny"

Excellent. 

She had found the cans. 

But not all the spiders. 

To add to this, later that day, after Sarah had cleaned out the cans, she came back to her office from lunch to find all the cans back on her desk, covering it entirely. 

She immediately blamed me. 

Funniest part: this wasn’t me. It was her coworkers, who had said to her that it was “that Australian hooligan”. 

I was told this later that day during a games night. At the time, I was wondering how to enact a prank of Harley’s design: rig a koala toy to drop on her when she opened her office door. Now, Sarah had already told me that she locks her office at night, and I was wondering how I would set this up during the day without her noticing. I needed a suitable distraction ...

Cue Sarah showing me a Facebook comment by her coworker, naming and blaming me for their work with the cans on her desk. 

I immediately thought, Thanks, Sarah. You just handed me your head on a plate.

I now knew his full name, and how to find him on Facebook, and that he was currently online. 

Whilst Sarah played a board game, totally unknowing of my actions, I messaged this coworker, whom I shall call ‘M’, and planned the time and distraction necessary. 

Come wednesday, and I’m hiding in the men’s toilets of their building, and M is waiting for Sarah to stop yakking so that they can innocently go on a coffee run ... and I was then alerted by M as soon as they left the building - "ok, we're out, go go go!".  

She finally leaves, and I set to work, rigging this blasted koala up (with fangs I’d added).

She returns, opens her door …. and misses it entirely. 

Why?

She was too damn short. 

Ugh. 

All that planning, wasted. 

Then … 

I come into work the next day, not expecting a thing. 

...

Actually, before I go on, read these excerpts from Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality. 

Before this, Harry does not believe Snape to be any sort of intellectual threat.

>>>

A smile crossed Severus's lips. "Dear me, and I thought you were supposed to be perceptive. Are you truly so incapable of understanding your classmates, Potter, or do you dislike them too much to try? If Quidditch scores did not count toward the House Cup then none of them would care about House points at all. It would merely be an obscure contest for students like you and Miss Granger."

It was a shockingly good answer.

And that shock brought Harry's mind fully awake.

In retrospect it shouldn't have been surprising that Severus understood his students, understood them very well indeed.

He had been reading their minds.

And...

...the book said that a successful Legilimens was extremely rare, rarer than a perfect Occlumens, because almost no one had enough mental discipline.

Mental discipline?

Harry had collected stories about a man who routinely lost his temper in class and blew up at young children.

...but this same man, when Harry had spoken of the Dark Lord still being alive, had responded instantly and perfectly - reacting in precisely the way that someone completely ignorant would react.

The man stalked about Hogwarts with the air of an assassin, radiating danger...

...which was exactly not what a real assassin should do. Real assassins should look like meek little accountants until they killed you.

He was the Head of House for proud and aristocratic Slytherin, and he wore a robe with spotted stains from bits of potions and ingredients, which two minutes of magic could have removed.

Harry noticed that he was confused.

And his threat estimate of the Head of House Slytherin shot up astronomically.

<<<

and 

>>>

"And perhaps I have been in Dumbledore's company too long," said Severus, "but I cannot help but wonder if that is the Cloak of Invisibility."

Harry immediately turned into someone who'd never heard of the Cloak of Invisibility and who was exactly as smart as Harry thought Severus thought Harry was.

"Oh, possibly," said Harry. "I trust you realize the implications, if it is?"

Severus's voice was condescending. "You have no idea what I'm talking about, do you, Potter? A rather clumsy try at fishing."

(Professor Quirrell had remarked over their lunch that Harry really needed to conceal his state of mind better than putting on a blank face when someone discussed a dangerous topic, and had explained about one-level deceptions, two-level deceptions, and so on. So either Severus was in fact modeling Harry as a one-level player, which made Severus himself two-level, and Harry's three-level move had been successful; or Severus was a four-level player and wanted Harry to think the deception had been successful. Harry, smiling, had asked Professor Quirrell what level he played at, and Professor Quirrell, also smiling, had responded, One level higher than you.)

<<<

So, in a manner similar to Harry, I believed Sarah to be a one-level player, and myself a level-two, because despite M’s inability to keep secrets, I still managed to keep Sarah double-guessing about how I accomplished some of my antics. Also, I did not have a very high threat level for her, because she behaved so innocently, as befitted an intern manager.  

Then I got to work this morning. 

Firstly, on the way, Chris messaged me, blaming me for the swathe of cans covering his desk. 

I assured him it wasn’t me, and suspected perhaps his office mates …. until I saw my office. 

Yeah. 

Only one person on campus had that many juice cans. 

Sarah Fisher. 

Well played, Sarah, well played. 

Not only that, but she didn’t do it with the other people I suspected. 

Not only that, but she’d actually been planning this for days, choosing the right day so that I wouldn’t suspect. 

Thing is, I didn’t suspect anything, because I had been modeling her as a level one player, and not nearly devious enough to try anything like that. She knew that I wasn’t in my office the night before, since I’d told her earlier that I’d be out with family. She picked an associate. She stored the cans. 

These were all techniques I’d just used against her. 

Damn. 

I tip my hat. 

However, that’s not the end of it. 

When she taped up all those cans in my office and expected me to be inconvenienced, she forgot one very important thing, mate. 

I’m Captain Jack Sparrow. 

And her biggest mistake?

Doing it wednesday night. 

See, if she’d planned it for thursday night, I would have no chance to respond, since I turn in my badge Friday arvo. 

But she gave me one last chance to get back. 

Which, of course, I did. 

Thursday night, another person (call them 'Q') and I got all those cans from my office, and ... returned them. 

With interest. 

See, Sarah hates spiders, as I'd already noted. 

So ...

We barred her sliding door closed with cans, and all those white bits of paper? Spiders. 

I left a note on the door, saying Gimli's line from the battle of Helm's Deep: "I'll have no pointy-eared Elf outdo me!"

And the best part?

She can't get me back. 

Now, she surely expected me to do something, and I know she knows I know this, but hey. 

I am unemployed after this - she can do nothing back. 

Sarah, you played well, you were an unexpected plot twist and you very nearly won. 

My final prank was not as subtle, had far less finesse, and frankly could have been better. 

So despite the fact that spiders are still hidden in your office, I'll call it a draw. 

The Intern's End

Well, I’ve got about 2 more blog posts left for this internship, maximum. Man, it’s been a whirl. 

ABC News 24

‘Nuff said.

It's been known for years

ProgChal Night

Microsoft held a coding challenge night for the interns, where we formed teams of up to 3, but no less than 1, and solved programming problems. 

Our team was the venerable Thunder Down Under, formed of me, Wiz, and some intern called John. 

In two hours, out of six questions, we answered a total of 4, gaining us a total of 8 points, and with a jump of 4 points in the last 3 minutes we tied in 2nd place with PotatoBattery and lost to String.Empty in 1st place with 14 points. 

This was actually my first coding comp, and I have to say, it was both reassuring and distracting to have Harley, a couple of seats down from me, constantly talking to his teammates: 

“What the-? Guys, what’s the python method for [insert functionality here]?"

“The **** is my code doing?"

“I’ve solved most of [problem A], but I just need the regex part"

for example. 

Whenever I voiced a syntax question aloud, though, he would answer, which was helpful. 

And I think an amusing addition to this would be a quality sports commentator, commenting on the progress of the teams. The dulcet tones of The Chaser’s Chris Taylor come to mind. 

I really enjoyed this night, especially the feeling of getting something right in the last 3 minutes and then appearing on the leaderboard.

Guess which team we were

Things around the office

Gandalf visits sometimes. We employ him as security. When someone forgets their keycard at the door, he just tells then that they cannot pass.

I am the Servant of the Secret Repo,
and the Wielder of the Sacred Bash Script!
Go back to the Abyss, Flame of Apple!

Boeing

We went on a tour of the Boeing factory in Everett. Unfortunately, I have no photos of this, because we were not allowed phones or cameras on the tour. Something about “security”. Neither were we allowed weapons, and as the security guard was mentioning this to us, I was tempted to make the joke of “Sorry guys, I’ll just go put my knife in the car” or something like then, then I remembered that you don’t do that here, because they take security seriously. (Despite the fact that they seem to be attacked by their own countrymen obeying their own laws more often than not)

Anyways ...

The factory floor was enormous. 

It was too big to comprehend all in one go. 

Picture an assembly line for cars. Think about how big the surrounding factory has to be for that. 

Now replace each car with a 747.

Yeah. 

That’s not entirely accurate, but it gives a decent picture. 

Virtual Sports Apocalypse Laser Tag

Holy cow. 

Sorry, Zone 3, you just lost. 

So in Australian laser tag, or at least the ones I've played, you have plastic guns, bulky packs with large zones to get shot in, or you have three tiny dots and you're impossible to hit. 

This ... this was laser tag perfected, or rather,  a hell of a lot better than Australia. 

Firstly, only in America are the laser tag guns actually repurposed M4 carbines!!

Secondly, we had tag dots all over us, on vital points. 

Thirdly, the guns had recoil, cos they had CO2 canisters to provide a burst when you fired. Firing came in single, burst, or safety (none). 

You had a base in which to respawn, and reload. 

The arena was a maze reminiscent of CoD, and they had several game types - we played team deathmatch and Control Point.
Here's my scorecard: http://barracks.icombat.com/Tactical/Player/Overview/102644

They also had ..... Zombie Survival!!!!!!!

Oh man ....

The Kangaroo and Kiwi

Once a jolly madman camped by a billabong, 

under the shade of an akubra or three.

And he sat as he waited for his lemon, lime and billy to boil ...

oh, who’ll come a waltzing Australia with me!

The Kangaroo and Kiwi is an Aussie/Middle Earth bar we went to after laser tag. This just looked and felt like home:

Unfortunately the staff were not Australian, but they certainly tried with the food:

And I think this list actually describes some Aussie politicians:

The first is Bill Shorten
The second is primarily Abbott, but also many others
The third is Pauline Hanson
The fifth is Palmer
The sixth is Ruddock

I had a classic meat pie, with baked beans and chips, not fries but chips:

Mate. Maaaaaaaaate.

And a lemon, lime and bitters, with extra tomato sauce.

The classics

My Nameplate

I finally got a real name plate!!

They even spelt my name right

Until now, I’ve had to improvise:

I advertise bush trips, and warn of their dangers

They are an endangered species.
Not enough people believe in them

Cos I'm T-N-T!!!

It's true

The Can Competition

So at the end of week 1, Chris and I started a competition for who could drink and collect the most fruit juice cans at work, since we both loved the little juice cans supplied to us by Micro$oft. This was Chris’s idea.

The person with the fewest cans, by Friday week 11, could only drink tomato juice in week 12, of the fruit juices. So milk, fizzy, etc, was allowed, but no fruit juice except tomato juice, at a minimum of 1 per day. 

This progressed over the weeks.

I have to say, I have had far more variety than Chris. 

Originally, I started out just lining the cans up according to flavor: 

But then I had some more interesting ideas:

This made it easier to count, because it was just the sum of the first n squares. 

Then I got creative. 

Just a standard castle was not enough for me. Those who knew me in my teenage years will remember the other can fortress I made. I couldn’t just do something normal, now, could I?

So I started building Minas Tirith:

When that was complete, I added trebuchets, and legions of Orcs:

"You are men of Gondor, and whatever comes through that gate, you will hold your ground"
"But what if cans come through?"

And then, to cap it off, I added Grond, the Hammer of the Underworld:

GROND! GROND! GROND! GROND! <Please insert Disc two>

Now, for the winner ...

Chris actually had more. 

He had 172, I had 168.

However, we started out with a difference of 9 in his favour. 

So, subtracting 9, we get …

VICTORY FOR ME!!!

And before someone suggests that we should have cheated, we both did. We are both filthy cheaters. 

Now, Chris? Get started on that tomato juice ...

The Rise of the Blog of the Planet of the Unipiper

Multnomah Falls

This is something like one of the tallest waterfalls in the country. 

Unfortunately, it rained and was overcast on the day we wanted to do all the outdoors stuff, so these photos are not as good as they should be. 

It's hard to see, but this is actually really really tall

But it was still a spectacular waterfall, and looked fantastic from the bottom and from halfway up. 

The fall from the bridge

Looking down at the viewing platform

The Fellowship of the Internship

The Unipiper, Part 2

So las time, I left off having just kept Portland weird. 

After this, we went to the Moda Centre, where the ice hockey had been the night before,

and there I met the legendary Unipiper … either that, or Vader was just having a day off: 

He has a stressful job; he needs to chillax sometimes

I must’ve done something to annoy him, because he got really forceful at one point: 

He was a pain in the neck

We tuned up together: 

And played together:

This is actually really hard to do, giving that we usually keep time by foot-tapping or watching people’s fingers, which whilst unicycling is … difficult. 

But we had fun, cracking out Game of Drones, Star Wars, Scotland the Brave, Auld Lang Syne, and more. 

Hi five!

He is an incredibly good unipiper, and has arranged some songs that I did not think possible to be played on the bagpipes. I will not spoil them cos he hasn’t released them yet, but my goodness, he is excellent. 

So, in terms of the duel … 

Victory to the Unipiper!!

I take my hat off to him - he is far too skilled for me.

This guy, eh?

This made the Portland trip.

It was otherwise good, yes, but I’m not into shopping. I didn’t care for that part.

Multnomah Falls was good and free:

Voodoo doughnuts was good and cost about $13:

But traveling across the world to meet the world’s most prominent unicycling bagpiper … priceless.

A video is still to come - I plan to pass it by my editors to give them a chance to do it up.

And now to start my own career in Australia as … The BagCycler!!! Or any other better name that I can come up with.

Anyone in Maroubra, watch out. Jack Sparrow’s hitting the eastern beaches walkway.

Coming up next time on Bagpipe Duels: The Bagcycler vs. The Badpiper.

I shall challenge one of our own.

Watch this space for more. 

Also, we stopped off at a Macca's on the drive back, to hit up the dunny, and we also ordered some chips. Not fries, chips. Whilst ordering, the lady behind the counter asked where we were from, and we gave the appropriate answers. During the conversation I mentioned that we called McDonald's "Maccas", like any sensible human being. 

And the lady serving us went berserk. 

“Hey you guys, you know what they call McDonald’s in Australia? Maccas! How funny is that?” she yelled to everyone in the vicinity.

Oh America. 

How quaint.

In other news, 

Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups

We don’t have these Down Under. 

We also don’t have Sloppy Joe’s, the food. It’s basically a bolognese burger. 

Weird.

Anyway.

Reese’s.

It’s alright, but meh. Kinda weird. 

7/11

I probably should have figured this out by now, but … it seemed so obvious that I never thought of it. 

Friday was National Froyo Day, which meant I could get six ounces of frozen yoghurt for free …. however much 6 ounces is. 

I was wondering why this was so, and then started thinking about free slushies at 7-11, and the date.

See, free slushies happens on 7th of the 11th, which is, of course, 7/11.

Not here though.

Here, it happens on the 11th of July … because they write their dates backwards.

Seriously. 

It makes sense on one level, but also seems … wrong.

July 11, free slushies … no. 

November 7, 7/11, free slushies … much better. 

Backwards country. 

Food Tour

This was our final official big intern event (there’s a games night coming up, but I don’t call that big).

It was fun. 

The idea was that we would go to several restaurants and eateries in a row, trying different things, and then check out some cool things in Fremont. 

So we piled into a pair of buses to go to restaurant #1 … and discovered that our bus was the party bus. 

Nice and open, side seats, light show, strobe, lasers, pounding bass … the necessities.

First place was Tavern Hall, your standard swanky restaurant. 

It may not actually have been swanky, but I consider going to takeaway Thai a big deal for eating out, so my standards are very low.

I did enjoy it though.

Then we headed off to an organic sandwich shop, which had good BLTs and tomahto soup. This place was everything organic and homegrown and magical and environmentally friendly and anti-big corporation, anti-governmental meddling … basically unAmerican. Which is totally cool. 

Then we split, and our bus went to this troll under a bridge, and a big stone statue that he stood on: 

If you missed the joke, I'm the troll

Then there was hot cakes. 

Not pancakes. 

Just little cakes that were hot.

It packed a punch

And my goodness were they rich! These things were richer than Bill Gates and Satya Nadella put together! It was like military-grade chocolate, it was so powerful. 

But they were nice. 

That night was pretty fun, and somehow Veronica, Bren and Sarah managed to put up with us. As a former youth group leader I’ve had to deal with difficult and annoying groups of teenagers, and I have to say, this was fairly similar, except that you couldn’t just shut people down as much, cos they are actually adults. So it was harder. Kudos, recruiters. 
Credit and thanks to Sarah and Harley for the photos.

Master Chief

So this guy showed up one day:

The winner of Master Chef: America

And he drove some sort of jeep thingie:

It kinda hogged the road

Valve
We had a tour of Valve!!

Now I'm thinking with Portals

Their offices are pretty cool - very spacious, with lots of room for fun and games. 

And somehow they manage with a flat structure - no hierarchy, which I find weird, but cool.

Lamarr! Lamarr! Oh, where has she got to?

Continue testing

Om nom nom

Building a sentry!

This turret will not threaten to stab you because
it cannot, in fact, speak.

I'm Gordan Freemon

One mute with a weird gun against another

Cirque du Soleil: Kurios

I'm just gonna go ahead and spoil the plot twist of their storyline: 

Dumbledore kills Snape.

I BET YOU WEREN'T EXPECTING THAT TO HAPPEN.

CdS was excellent; I really enjoyed it. 

Juggling, acrobatics, balancing on various things, comedy ... all the standard circus things, packaged around an understandable yet still wacky storyline. 

And they went overboard on the props department this time. 

However, I could still see the performers steeling themselves before some of the tricks, which takes away from the magic of it all - regardless of nerves, as a performer on stage you are not allowed to show that you can possibly make a mistake. 

They almost did stuff up though. 

But this guy at the door had amazing facial hair:

What a mo ... what a beard ... 

The Internship

I hate that movie. 

There are only two weeks left … 

We’re all getting nostalgic … and getting more suitcases to fit all our extra stuff in.

Sad times … 

The end is nigh ...