Geographically accurate tube map
Found here, of all places: http://www.sabre-roads.org.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=26696
A geographically accurate London Underground map; showing platforms, sidings, crossovers, opening dates etc etc.
Do you wonder where the actual tunnels go, instead of being satisfied that they run somehow between stations X and Y? Then this is for you.
There are also similar maps on that site of the Paris Metro, Barcelona and other places.
Attention, jobhunters
At the moment I have a job on offer so I have been sifting through CVs, doing interviews etc etc. Having seen a large number of job applications recently, I thought I'd share a few basic tips to help anyone reading this to actually get a job; instead of sending thousands of applications off to people who just click 'delete', perhaps after chuckling a little.
DON'T put or do these things on your CV:
1) A photo of yourself. I am not interested in seeing you looking like either a convicted paedo or a mail-order bride. I'm not employing actors, I'm employing mechanics. I don't care what you look like.
2) Your 'personal goals' to excel thoroughly in everything you do, climb Everest, watch every Rocky film back-to-back or whatever. Irrelevant vacuous bollocks.
3) Tell me in great detail about lots of irrelevant yet highly paid jobs, while the one job you've had similar to the one you're applying for is a footnote from 10 years ago. This tells me "stopgap job, he'll sod off very quickly".
4) Overuse 'power words' or marketing speak so your CV ends up reading like some scam webpage advertising a pyramid scheme. I mean FFS.
DO put or do these things on your CV:
1) Tell me about what similar jobs you've had, AND WHAT YOU ACTUALLY DID IN THEM. "Worked for Company 2001-2008" is OK, "Worked for Company 2001-2008, responding to breakdowns across X area, carrying out routine servicing at so-and-so, carrying out engine overhauls on XYZ , sourcing parts from a variety of suppliers, dealing with customers..." is fantastic and would stand a good chance of getting you a job. Even if your only job was working at a burger chain, and you're applying for a job as a shop assistant, tell them WHAT EXACTLY YOU DID. It shows at least that you know what you did there.
2) Put down RELEVANT qualifications. If the fact that you're a fully certified H&S forklift inspector and you were trained in advanced CANBUS troubleshooting is buried in details about your swimming certificates and your highest break in snooker, your relevant qualifications might not be noticed.
3) It's a good idea to summarise why the hell I should give you a job at the top of your CV. When applying for a mechanic's job, a paragraph or two saying "I am a highly experienced and skilled mechanic, who has carried out a wide variety of work from X to Y, on A, B and C machines." can work wonders.
More DONT's:
DON'T phone up every 2 days chasing your application. Some people recommend this; but I'm actually quite busy and chasing your application all the time is going to piss me off.
DON'T apply for jobs you're hideously unqualified for. By 'unqualified' I don't mean 'doesn't have a degree', I mean 'has so little of a clue about what the job involves, they dont realise that "forklift mechanic" might involve skills that you don't get simply by working in a place that has a forklift'. I've been on planes, that doesn't make me a plane mechanic. By appying for jobs you couldn't even be bothered to fully read the description of, you're wasting everybody's time.
*I wish to point out that this post represents my personal opinion and does not represent any official opinion of any company, anywhere. If you have applied for a job recently and you have done all of the 'donts' listed here, it is entirely coincidental and this post is in no way based on you being a tool.*
Units of measurement
Now, here's something I picked up via The Devil's Kitchen
The Royal College of Art's graduate show has opened, and this year, the show-stopper was a plug. Min-Kyu Choi impressed every passer by with his neat, apparently market-ready plug that folds down to the width [FNS: surely you mean 'thickness'] of an Apple MacBook Air. "The MacBook Air is the world's thinnest laptop ever. However, here in the UK, we still use the world's biggest three-pin plug," says Choi.
I'm so glad that the thickness (10mm) is expressed in terms of Apple Macbook Air™-Thicknesses; I would find it incredibly hard to visualise the extreme super-cool sleekness of such a plug without the universal yardstick of a Macbook Air™ to compare it to. I have at least a dozen Macbook Airs™ on my desk, on hand in case I need to measure something about half an inch thick*. Although, I have heard of a fantastic new invention that can be as little as 1/4 of a Macbook Air™-Thickness, which surely must make it at least 4x as super cool as a super cool Macbook Air™.
I'm also incredibly glad that someone has tackled the decidedly uncool and un-"now" unfreasibly large BS1363 UK 240v plug. I often look at the plugs I have in my life and think "to hell with safety and practicality- I want plugs to look cool, yeah!". Indeed, a flimsy sleek fold out plug will come in useful to me every time I'm lugging electrical appliances or chargers around and could use the extra few cubic centimetres of space so freed up to carry, I dunno, one of my fleet of measuring Macbook Airs™?
PS: They could give the plug a super-cool "now" name like iPlug, or something. That would make it absolutely perfect.
*or just to have a wank over the sleek perfection that is absolutely anything with a fucking Apple™ logo on it. Fuck yeah.