Job Hunt: Successful!

The last few days have been full of excitement for me, all on the job hunt front. First, I talked with the recruiter from AeroVironment. She said that they really liked my background, but they were essentially waiting to hire someone to be my boss before they made a decision on me. That was heartening, since it's been three weeks since I interviewed with them and I hadn't heard anything.

Next, Google flew me out the Googleplex on Thursday and put me up at a very nice hotel for a series of interviews on Friday. I had a lot of fun there, got a short tour of the campus and really enjoyed the people who interviewed me. Those interviews went better than any I've done before because...


The Googleplex!View Larger Map

I got a job offer on Thursday afternoon from DreamHost! They'll pay well, give good benefits, and they're really laid back. Since their downtown office is a block and a half away from a metro stop, which in turn is 3 metro stops away from Union Station where the trains come in, I can take public transit (real public transit, not buses which are a wholly unacceptable mode of transportation) in to work from almost anywhere in LA, I think. That makes this offer, in addition to a very good offer in its own right, an ideal safety net: if my girlfriend gets a job in one of those "anywhere's" that I can get to work from I have a job that I can take as well even if I don't get any other offers.

Of course, Edwards Air Force Base (remember the whole "Middle of Nowhere" thing?) is one of those not-almost-anywhere's from which I probably won't be able to get to DreamHost in any acceptable length of time. But AeroVironment in Simi Valley is even closer to Edwards than Pasadena (the nearest place I thought I might be able to get a job) and now I have a bargaining chip. I would be completely amazed if I got an offer from Google (they're in the middle of layoffs, so they can't be hiring many "Nooglers"). But hey, all I need to do now is graduate, and what can I say? I'm Feeling Lucky.

~KMarsh