公司不大。上周寄了簡歷後，HR 就讓我今天去面試。 我的簡歷很簡單。 2003-2005 兩年 半的工作經歷 (technical support)， 2005-2008 讀書 (online英文碩士)。 1966-2003 (BA in English, 6 months of math, assistant supervisor) 經理不錯。 也是英文碩士畢業。 和我談的很投機。他問我online英文碩士都學什麼課程。 我對他講我學 english literature, american writers, poetry, writing, fiction, non-fiction etc. 他看起來挺高興。 但到了第二個人時， 完了。 這個人問了三道智力測試題。 其中一個是: two cows ran in a 1000-meter race. when cow A reached the finish line, cow B was 50 meters behind (lost). then they ran again. this time, cow A started 50 meters behind the start line. the question is this: if both cows ran at the same speeds as in the first race, who won the race? 當時腦子有點亂， 沒答對。 第三個人的問題更難。 又問了三道。 一個是這樣： ‘calls to the tech support center arrive in a poisson process with a rate of 20 per hour. the time for a tech support person to serve one customer is exponentially distributed with an average of 3 mins. there are 3 people in the tech support center to answer the calls. what is the probability that a customer gets delayed service?’ I copied everything down. then only heaven saw the anguish in me for the next 20 mins. i tried and tried and tried. after running out of paper, i said: 'sir, the probability is 1'. 'one?' he was surprised. then i was trying to explain it to him: ' when i was working as a tech support, i always kept people waiting'. 'why so?' he wondered eagerly. 'because there is no water for drinking when there are 3 monks around'. 'what are you talking about?' he became a little hysterical. 'sir, have you worked as a tech support before?' i then left.