Monthly Archives: January 2017

CREATURE FEATURE SUNDAY: 50 Thoughts While Watching Sharkansas Women’s Prison Massacre

Posted in Watching by

I can’t remember who told me about Sharkansas Women’s Prison Massacre (2015), but here we are. I think this one might actually hurt.

  1. Let’s jump right in. Fracking activity seems to have unleashed a spiny prehistoric swamp shark from the depths of the earth.
  2. The Arkansas Department of Corrections has opted for tiny denim shorts and little white singlets as their prison uniform of choice.

    sharkansas01.jpg

    White and denim is the new orange is the new… oh, you get it. Source.

  3. “Ain’t a real man deserve a brewksi?” #scripting #acting #fracking
  4. That’s what you get for drinking on the job, bucko. Shark 1.
  5. Traci Lords is a cop with a newbie sidekick. I predict he will be the first ‘character’ to go.
  6. They’ve stumbled upon bodies inland. Let us speculate over cause of death.
  7. There’s a survivor! He says shark. I think. His ‘traumatised’ acting is awful and incoherent so it’s hard to tell.
  8. Let’s introduce the prisoners – not with names but with a list of their crimes. One of them is in for bootlegging movies. You wouldn’t steal a handbag, you guys.
  9. I am unclear what the purpose of the prisoners’ hard labour is, except for there to be a cleavage-filled digging montage. What are they digging for? We’ll never know.
  10. When you cut your arm and go wash the wound in muddy swamp water… #justbmoviethings
  11. Oh well. Better death by prehistoric shark than septicaemia I suppose.
  12. “Let’s hope this is one big misunderstanding.” What, you mean the whole movie?
  13. So this is actually a mass break out attempt.
  14. With lines like “to be continued, sweetheart – we’re in the middle of a felony here”, this may be the worst thing I have ever seen.
  15. Can the sharks just eat everyone? Please?
  16. Better change clothes out of those really obvious prison uniforms.
  17. One of the guards has made a break for it. Shocking chase scene editing (legs / other legs / legs / other legs / legs / other legs).
  18. Run, Guard dude, run as fast as you can away from this trainwreck.
  19. Aww no. There he goes.
  20. They are literally heading to a cabin in the woods.
  21. Let’s all argue about how terrible this plan is. What a good use of movie time.
  22. They keep calling the Asian prisoner ‘Soy Sauce’. I wish I was lying. What. The. What.
  23. Weird scene about a vintage glass coke bottle? “None of this plastic. It must have been here 80 years.”
  24. In a movie with a couple of porn stars, the line “let’s have a hot bath before bed” did not result in nudity of any kind.
  25. Where the hell are these goddamn sharks in this goddamn massacre?
  26. Oh wait.
  27. They can SWIM THROUGH LAND.
  28. ….
  29. THROUGH LAND!
  30. I think, if I was to make a trashy horror movie drinking game, ‘blood cloud in water’ would be a definite drink.
  31. Hmmm. Must make trashy horror movie drinking game.
  32. Peaches and beans?! Is that a thing?
  33. I googled. It’s a thing.
  34. Geologists are here to save the day / explain situation / be weirdly dressed like a cuban detective.
  35. They’ve been monitoring vibrations. “You mean like ‘good vibrations’, the song?” (Still no nudity).
  36. So, to sum up: Professor Geologist reckons the nearby fracking activity has opened a SUPER HIGHWAY between the earth’s surface and a vast underground ocean.
  37. Sharkosaurus. He just said sharkosaurus!
  38. “Do you think we can make it?” We, the viewers? Not a chance.

    sharkansas-2

    ‘Protect yourselves from these great shark effects!’ Source.

  39. Love is blossoming, you guys! Him: “What do you do when you’re not fleeing prehistoric monsters?” Her: “Five to ten”.
  40. They’ve found a secret cache of weapons and Professor Geologist has filled them in on a range of useful shark facts (guess he had a double major).
  41. The plan seems to be to go underground. Even though the sharks are from underground.
  42. Um, so, the sharks talk to each other like whales.
  43. Hey look, I’m all for character traits and whatnot but having this chick continually say “crap on a cracker” does not equal characterisation.
  44. Where the heck are these sharks? Not nearly enough people have died to call this a massacre.
  45. Are these cops doing anything? What even is this storyline?
  46. Far out. This movie is still going.
  47. This inflatable raft doesn’t seem like a terrible idea AT ALL.
  48. We’ve nearly escaped with our lives so let’s start shooting at the guard who saved us for some reason!
  49. Blood cloud! (Drink!)
  50. Annnd the guard is letting the Asian prisoner go. Probably because they were heaps racist towards her.

Honestly, and my standards for this sort of thing are pretty low, you would think busty women fighting land sharks would somehow be more over-the-top and stupidly fun, right? It was just a bit safe and a bit boring. And those sharks only killed about 10 people. Where was my schlocky gorefest? You promised me a massacre!

Sharkansas Women’s Prison Massacre rates 1 out of 5 blood clouds in water.

‘Til next time,

Sig

Reference Checking: pet hates and phone tag

Posted in General by

I work in HR and I think reference checks are balls. There, I said it. I’m sorry. I know it’s an unpopular opinion. Send the HR police. I will surrender my badge.

In places I’ve worked before, ref checking has been treated in turns as anything from a box-ticking exercise to the ultimate be all and end all. The intent is of course to verify the truthiness of the candidates skills and experience. But here’s the thing: no one with half a brain is going to list a referee who is going to give them a bad wrap. And if they don’t have half a brain, how the heck did you miss that in the early stages of the recruitment process? That’s on you, kids.

The best referee, in a lot of cases, will be a candidates current manager – especially if they have been in that role for a long time. That might obviously be awkward: not many people want their boss to know they are looking to throw in the towel asap. So right off the bat, I’m speaking to someone whose knowledge of my preferred candidate’s work performance could be 4 or 5 years out of date.

So maybe my candidate lists someone else. The number of times I have played phone tag for two days with Dave, only to find out that Dave wasn’t Melanie’s manager at all – he was just a colleague. Nice chatting, Dave, but you’ve been no actual help.

And obviously there was that whole thing from last year when Hamish and Andy asked a random guy to act as a referee and he actually did a pretty good job of faking it. They called him ‘the best bloke in Australia’ while HR peeps and recruiters cried quietly into their coffees.

job-hunt

So if everyone is only listing good referees, or non-manager referees, or even fake referees, is there really value in the reference checking process? Are they a waste of time? Maybe. Are they going away? Probably not.

And that’s kind of sad, because it can be a very time consuming process that, if your questions aren’t effective, may yield very little reward. I know plenty of candidates who received glowing references and then turned out to be problematic or unproductive employees. I think value would be better added through more stringent screening processes and better interview questions which really probe for detail. But ref checking doesn’t seem to be going anywhere.

With that in mind, if you are an applicant, there are a few things you can do to make this step in the process a smooth one. Help me out, you guys.

  • List relevant, work-related referees.
  • Ask before you list. Give your referees a heads up that you would like them to act as a referee, checking they will be ok with that.
  • Don’t list personal referees (unless you are a school leaver with no work experience) – honestly, no one cares.
  • Do indicate where you worked with the referee. Don’t just say “Mike Smith on x number”. Context is key. Say “Mike Smith, former manager at Woolworths, x number”.
  • If you interview, give your referees a heads up that they may get a call. It helps them prepare, it helps HR people get phones answered, and even if we don’t like ref checks, we like that.

phone

‘Til next time,

Sig

 

 

 

2016 To-Do List Challenge Part 3: Partial Credit

Posted in General by

Full disclosure: I did not complete all 12 items on my to-do list. Gosh darn it, you guys. I KNOW.

After the success of the first six items, I was keen as mustard to crack on. And then… I didn’t really crack on. I made moves towards completing all the remaining items but didn’t get any of them quite over the line, which is disappointing. But [partial] credit where [partial] credit is due – I had a lot to try and squeeze in. The key message seems to be doing something/anything/a bit is better than doing nothing. Right?

Item #8: Invent own cocktail and serve to friends

Why was it on the list? I had visions on Tom Cruise-esque shaker-flipping and fancy-pants colourful drinks with punny names and high alcohol content which I could whip up and serve with a flourish along the lines of “why yes, this is my signature drink, the Gin Weasley”. Or, in other words, I don’t really know. The ‘serve to friends’ bit was important, because it meant the drink had to be drinkable and not just a random mix of whatever spirits happened to be in my cupboard.

Achievement? I admit I gave this one a red hot go. I researched cocktail making, learnt about a thing called ‘the golden ratio’ that is apparently key to cocktail flavour success.

I turned a little bit mad scientist and got really, very drunk in ‘the lab’ (my kitchen).

I did not nail the cocktail. At all.

(They were all terrible).

Item #1: Go horse riding

Why was it on the list? Duh, because horse riding is ace.

Achievement? Research only. I know where to go, what is costs, and what I need to do to make it happen – I just didn’t get it done by year’s end.

Item #11: Take a short course

Why was it on the list? Learning is fun.

Achievement? Turns out December is not the time to try and do a short course of any kind. Who would have thunk it, right? Partial credit though, because I will be knocking this over in the first couple of weeks in January. I’ve got plans.

Item #9: Play cricket in a park

Why was it on the list? I’m what you would call indoorsy. This seemed a good excuse to get outside. Preferably with a side of picnicking and beers.

Achievement? Purchased cricket bat from op shop. Did not use.

Item #10: Road trip

Why was it on the list? Road trips are the best.

Achievement? Created road trip playlist. While that is important, not much progress here at all. Trying to squeeze in a road trip and a bunch of Christmas catch ups simultaneously is not easy. Perhaps if I had driven somewhere slowly? Like, really slowly?

….

Item #12: Walk Lofty

Why was it on the list? God knows. Do I want to walk up a mountain? No, no I don’t. But I feel like I have failed as an Adelaidean by having never attempted old mate Lofty.

Achievement? I could say the Christmas heat wave thwarted this one, but that would be a half truth. I had tentative plans to smash this out with a friend, and weather and scheduling did prevent that, but in all honesty, the catch up was always more likely to be beers than mountains. Sigh.

beer

Beer > Mountains

So there we have it. Not quite a success, not quite a failure.To be honest, the best lesson from the entire exercise was that there is time. There is time to start, to try, and to complete a lot. 6/12 is better than 0/12, and the remainder will probably (maybe) be polished off early this year now some of the wheels are in motion. If you know anything about cocktails and can save me from myself, the Gin Weasley still needs to happen.

‘Til next time,

Sig