Interview number 1

Not sure why I'm numbering. It's the first time in four years. So.

Anyway. I'd moved my mind to other things. So when the call came, it had that out of the blue feel to it. What to wear. I'd previously thought of attending interviews in t-shirt and jeans. But there is no clean pair of jeans in sight, and it's too late to start washing. It's 4:30pm. Probably wouldn't dry anyway with the current weather. So it's got to be a suit. No tie. Decent enough compromise. Next day. Apparently the coat has a tendency of munging the shirt if you don't have a tie on. Oh well. I tried.

A couple of hours later and the IT manager ushers us [we're several by now] to some room. First thing that catches my eye is the laptops. I haven't written .NET code in like a year. Terror starts to creep in. After a small pep talk, the guy unleashes some stuff from some folder. No. Surely not. Swiftly followed by the distribution of "writing materials". It's going to be a written exam. Now I'm not so sure if those laptops were such a bad thing. At least there's intellisense.

First question. Looked like what is a database. Immediately, and for some unknown reason, my mind starts thinking about B-trees. But, obviously, my mind was getting ahead of itself. The question read "explain a database to a young child". You certainly aren't going to have a discussion about B-trees with any sort of child. You actually don't want to be having such a conversation with anyone. I look around and start getting this twilight zone feeling. Am I really here. What am I doing here.

Among the other gems prepared for us... "what is the reading on the following spring balance". The brave new world of interviewing.