What's Your Seduction Style ?

Saw this from LMD .... Not sure how accurate this is ... but hey.. I was bored.. :P

Celebrations

Christmas celebrations are finally over, and I'm already back in the office. Although there really isn't much people here. Some 'No-Shows' and even my manager decided to call in sick for the day. Which means I could probably go shopping now (yes.. shopping) ... But since I only just got here, I might as well stay for a bit.

For some reason, something always dies (in the data center) when I slack off and leave early.

This is probably my first Christmas which I didn't end up flying back home to spend with my parents. It felt kinda weird actually. But my friends and my cousin here kept things busy.

We started Christmas Eve celebrations at a one of Pete's friend's place. But I was all doped up on Panadol, I spent most of my time talk to people but not really hearing what they were saying. I wonder if anyone else there actually knew what I was talking about - because I didn't.

Note to myself: You cannot cure a hangover with another hangover.

When they started the 'Ghost Story' telling part (when people try to out-do one another with scarier tales one after another). I wanted to leave already. Everytime someone starts telling ghost stories, it makes me think back to my childhood. Yes, I've had encounters. Although I'm not totally sure, I would like to think there is a medical explaination for everything I felt. But as much as I hated it, I can still remember how until the age of 14, I would never take a shower unless someone else was sitting in the bathroom with me and talking to me the whole time, or the reason behind why I still leave the lights on when I sleep.

Maybe one day I will tell my own ghost story encounter ... but not now.

Something else that was different was that I actually ended up cooking on Christmas day. We ended up with 8 people at our place, but I think I might have cooked enough for 12 people. It was kind of a last minute thing, so we had to grab whatever was available from the chinese shops (the only shops which were open), and cook whatever was left in my pantry and refrigerator. We ended up with BBQ Whole Fish, BBQ chicken wings, roasted veggies, pasta, fresh prawns and salmon sashimi.

We spent the whole of Boxing day just recovering from the night before, and trying to finish off all the leftovers. We managed to finish all the pasta, but I think it will take me another week to polish off the prawns. (Pete is allergic to them).

Oh... and I realised that Fashion magazines are evil. While I was waiting for my turn on the Wii, I picked up a magazine and started flipping through the pages.. which left me with totally new shopping list. Must.Find.Earrings.Shoes.. Must.Buy.. !!

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year Everyone ~~~~ !

iCush

The iCush - 100 Gaming chair ..... *drools ~~

Well... really no need to drool anymore... because I've got one !!

And it is truely amazing. It brings a whole new perspective to my gaming world and to my iPod. I've just spent the morning enjoying my new massage synced to the tunes of Red Hot Chilli Peppers. Even SHE's 'IO IO' song was magnified to totally new heights. (Think Simpsons episode when Homer gets addicted to this massage chair). Oh... and attached to my laptop... playing a round of AB in World of Warcraft is ... WOW ~! I could truely feel it every time someone landed a hit\blow on me.

Probably the only downside to this product is that the connection cables are a bit short (distance between TV and sofa). But it is incredibly simple to use. I guess all we need to do now is go out to buy the perfect arm chair for our iCush. (I use the word 'our' is because it was originally intended to be for Pete's christmas pressent).

If you are in Sydney and want to get your hands on one of these babies, just to let you know, Dicksmith powerhouse stocks them for $199 - but they have mostly been sold out (can be ordered). However, we managed to find ours at Harvey Norman (Moore Park Outlet) at a reduced price of $169 - in the furniture section.

Somehow when we asked the people in the Computer \ Gaming sections they had no idea what a iCush was ?!!

Directions

As I was coming out of the train station today, I was stopped today by a lady who asked me if I knew mandarin chinese. Funny thing is that she actually asked me in mandarin chinese if I could understand mandarin chinese.

I already knew what this would lead to. Directions.

I told her I knew only a bit .. (i den den.... I replied in my bad chinese).

Then with a relieved look on her face, she asked me if I knew where the supreme courts were. (or atleast thats what I think she asked).

I then tried to explain to her that she had to walk past this traffic light, to the next traffic light then turn left, walk past another two buildings then it would be on your right -- all in mandarin chinese. (to my dear friends out there who personally know me and are laughing right now ... Don't.)

I think I did ok with my broken-mandarin-mixed-with-a-bit-of-cantonese giving those directions. Atleast she was heading in the right direction when I left her.

Kind of reminds me of the times when I was in Singapore, and for some reason I would always have old ladies coming up to me and asking me for directions in Hokkien.... Yes ... Hokkien.

Or the numerous amounts of time when I was in Hong Kong and I would have Aunties and Grandmas coming up to me to ask for directions in MTR stations.

I can't even read the chinese words on the MTR station maps. And no, I don't know Hokkien. (Swear words don't count right !?)

By the way, 'traffic lights' in Mandarin Chinese is supposed to sound similar to 'traffic lights' in Cantonese Chinese ... right ?

Maintenance Day ?!

I finally received my ADSL2+ router ~~~~~~~~~~~~ ! Yay !

For the past two weeks, I've been feeding my WoW addiction through a dialup internet connection.

I don't actually know what is worse.. Not being able to play WoW at all.... Or playing WoW on a painstakingly slow dialup connection and lag like mad.

But anyway, I'm glad its finally over.

I rushed home yesterday after work to setup my new router... only to realise when I logged into WoW that all the realms were offline.

Tuesday = Maintenance Day

Arggh ! Damn ! Need.. to.. wait.. one.. more.. day.... Must.. do.. battle.... Get.. more.. hk.... Must.. get.. GM.. gear...... Arggh !

Honey I did the washing...

I arrived home today to a very proud boyfriend who happily declared that he did all the washing.

-- Proof that he isn't spending all his spare time playing PS2.--

All the washing ?! (I asked)

All the clothes and dishes... and they are all dried as well (came the reply.. and continues to play on PS2)

I eyed the pile of clothes on the sofa. I supposed I should do the folding...

That was until I saw my white silk top, Cue pants and other woolen tops which now resembled something along the lines of a withered branch or the output from a meat processor.

"You do know that some clothes cannot be put in the dryer... right !?" (I picked up my now shriveled white top). "See the tag.. it says 'Do Not Tumble Dry'... !"

"Is it ? I thought you always just put the clothes in the dryer"

"Then why do we have clothes hanger on the balcony ?????????"

"Oh..... sorry" (continues to play PS2)

Seriously, sometimes I feel like I'm dealing with a 5 year old.... must.calm.down.must.calm.down.must.calm.down.must.calm.down.must.calm.down.must.calm.down.must.calm.down.must.calm.down.must.calm.down.must.calm.down.

Saturday Night Wii

Instead of going out to party on Fridays and Saturdays now, my friends now are more than content to come over to my place, to do battle on Wii.

And should our hands get too sore from all that Wii-remote swinging action. We'll just take out a deck of cards and play some poker instead. Yet no game is fun without some kind of wager, so to try to keep track with our newly found healthy lifestyle, we settled with using water instead of alcohol.

Instead of topping up the bowl with alcohol everytime someone wants to increase the bet, we topped it up with water instead.

After skulling 3 bowls (filled to the rim) of water, my body started to complain.

All I can say is by the end of the night, I had to frequent the toilet atleast 3-4 times - and I was one of the lucky few which didn't actually lose that many times.

Funny how I can last up to 1/2 dozen of beer without needing to go to the toilet and still feel great, but can't do the same with water.

Atleast I can say I've made my quota of drinking 8 glasses of water a day. But if we ever decide to play with water again, I rather volunteer to go out and pickup a carton of beer instead.

Trading Matters

One of my semi-full-time-share-trading friend gave me a couple of tips a few days ago. The type of financial advice which can be classified as 'All Care and No Responsibility'. The type which if i get burned then I'm not allowed to go and blame him.

He told me to buy a particular share at 23c. (It was at 24c when I wanted to submit my offer, and it had already dropped 0.005 for the day). So I thought I'll put it in at 22c - hoping it would drop a bit more. My semi-full-time-share-trading friend told me this one was set to double - within the month.

So I put in my offer at 22c yesterday and waited for it to drop.

23c..... 22.5c....... BUT NO 22c ~~~~~~~~~!

ARghghhhghhghh...... I just checked the price of it 5 minutes ago..and it was at 26.5c ~!

(Even bigger ARghghhhghhghh...........)

Me and my stingy fingers... :(

My Granny's Advice

I had a great chat with my granny last night. I think its great how a conversation between a grandmother and her granddaughter (which originally started with her complaining about when would I ever get married.. nag nag nag..) can transform to something that resembled a typical conversation between two sisters\friends.

Before I knew it, I was unloading all the current problems in my relationship and disclosing all details to my grandma. Shock horror

And when I did eventually finish, my grandma gave me only one advice - which left me slightly speechless.

"Give yourself a deadline.. 2 months.. 3 months, and if things don't change - leave him."

(My grandma can sound really fierce sometimes).

Then she proceeded to explain to me how it would do me no good wasting my time on any guy. And according to her, I've already wasted enough time. Apparently she was 24 when my mum was born and that was already considered to be late.

Although its hard to imagine it now, but I know that my grandma was once a young girl too. She has definitely 'been there and done that'. Maybe its time I do decide to take some of her advice in to consideration. 'Cos I for one don't really know what to do anymore...

greenhouse effect

The weather has been a bit topsy-wopsy today. One minute is was hot and humid, and the next thing I know I see a 'Severe Thunderstorm Warning' message popping up in my inbox. Its a bit uncanny though, there's strong winds, rain, thunder and lightning outside, but the inside of my apartment is ridiculously stuffy and hot. By this I mean really hot.

And I can't open my balcony slidng doors either. I tried, but the wind is so strong that for the 5 seconds I had my sliding door opened, I spent the next 10 minutes trying to pick up all the debris scattered around my lounge room.

I feel like I am living inside a greenhouse.

I did leave a slight gap open, just enough for some air to get through and not the rain. All I can hear now is the sound of the howling wind forcing its way through the gap of my sliding door.

Even Bunny is crouched in a corner of his hutch.

I got home today to one wet Bunny. (We usually leave Bunny outside to roam around - especially on hot days). I had no trouble getting Bunny inside once I opened the sliding door, but he did object slightly when I threw a towel over him and started blow drying his bum to dry him up a bit.

And I know for sure now that hot air definitely rises. It is so much cooler downstairs. The ledge between the stairs and the bathroom downstairs both look pretty appealing at the moment for sleeping arrangements later tonight. That's if temperatures don't cool down.

Still I think we only hit a max of 30°C today ... (certainly doesn't feel like it at my place)... but Melbourne recorded a high of 42°C today.

Can't really imagine what I would be doing if it was 42°C and I was stuck in my apartment.

Probably would call in sick, jump into my bathtub filled with cold water & topped up with ice cubes and stay in there for as long as I can.

No Internet Land

Just realised I've spent one whole week without internet. (See. Enough is Enough). After a week, I'm still stuck in no-man's land. The missing link that occurs when you change your Internet Service Provider.

I spent the first few days devouring through all the movies and TVB series I had previously copied off my friends. The contents of my 250g hdd didn't last very long. Then I realised that one of my neighbours didn't know how to secure his wireless internet connection. Joy ! When I discovered that, I felt like I had just discovered my bank account suddenly had three extra zeros at the end of my statement. (I need three extra zeros to turn the amount in my account to an amount I would be able to use - or withdraw).

It was also that night I realised that my neighbour secured his wireless connection by turning off his modem. The connection was only available after 6pm (when he\she got home) and was disconnected by 10pm (when he\she went to bed). 4 hours is not enough to warcraft. And 10pm is definately not the time I go to bed. I never thought I stoop so low that I would be leeching someone else's Internet connection just to play Warcraft. Sigh

Unarguably the most primative and the most secure method ever. Sigh

On the bright side, I've started cooking again. On Monday I made pan-grilled chicken breasts (wrapped in bacon & cream cheese) with dijon mustard sauce and did a creamy carbonara pasta was the left overs last night. Got to go think about what I want to cook tonight now.

Feeling so domesticated...

Never tell your clients...

I called up my vendor today to ask about the status of one of my cases. And also if they required any additional information. The usual diagnostic reports and whatnot.

But first I asked to be put through to my case's owner. (TSE or technical support engineer).

The guy on the end of the phone let me know that the TSE I was looking for was currently on another call. He asked me if I wanted to hold for a moment, and he would go and see if he could forward my call onto him. I told him to do so.

A moment later, the guy came back on the phone and told me that my TSE was currently busy on another case (apparently some other guy's system had died) and that he would give me a call back later today or tomorrow.

To all the tech support guys out there, please do NOT tell your clients, that the person responsible for your case is too busy to look\work on the case for you.

You can tell them that you are still currently working on the case..... Trying to reproduce the problem... Testing the new patch... ANYTHING .... Lie to them... But never say that you were busy on someone else's case.

No client is going to be happy to hear that.

I certainly wasn't. And so I asked to talk to their Manager instead.

I told the manager that my case issue was lodged a full week ago, and even though its not a priority 1, it still is important to us that it gets looked at. I also told him that since we have provided all the requested information already and that the current TSE was too busy, I would like the case esculated to the next support level.

The manager was very.... obliging. He was 'ok' with everything I asked for, and promised to keep me updated on the current case status. Although I know that once he put the phone down, he would be calling me a B**ch. How do I know this ? I'm a support engineer too. And I know I'll call her names too if I was on the receiving end of the phonecall today.

Reserved ?

A guy comes over, sits next to me and asks:

"So.. are you reserved?" - as he places a 'Reserved' sign on my lap.

I can't say I have heard this one before. But apart from laughing, there really wasn't much I could do. Atleast not while my boyfriend was sitting next to me.

Train Trip

While on my train to work today, I could think of ten things I could bitch rant about, each of which adds to my displeasure of of my train ride.

• Why do the guards of the train insist on closing the door on you, even though they can see you clearly run for the doors ? This isn't Singapore or Hong Kong you know. The next train does not come in 4 minutes. In fact, it would be amazing if the next train came within 10 minutes (and this is in peak times).

• Why do women have to do their makeup in the train ? And take up atleast two seats with their makeup bag and 'other' bags. And even if you stand right up to them, they refuse to move their bags to one side (to make room), and continue to do their makeup as if you were transparent. This is a train.. not your room !!!

• The support poles on trains are supposed to be shared. Everyone in their vicinity should be able to get one hand to it. Unfortunately, I couldn't this morning, because some idiot was leaning all over it. I really want to slap him and tell him that... One - You're not a pole dancer... and Two - It's NOT your pole !!

• Why does the train when stopping at Central station need to stay there for a total of 5 mins !? There obviously was no one getting off and no one getting on either. Nothing can be more fustrating than a train that is not going anywhere.

• If Airconditioning in trains isn't recognised as a necessity, then some other kinds of ventilation really should be employed. A combination of a hot day, packed train and no ventilation really doesn't smell that good.

• Ipods. I use my one too. But if I can still hear the music from another Ipod when I'm listening to mine - then somethings not quite right. If you really want to blast your music and blow out your ear drums then do it at a place where you can use speakers.
  

• Getting off trains. If you are standing in the doorway, move out then after everyone has gotten off, move back in. Simple. Don't make the people getting off the train have to squeeze past you and jump over your sports bag at the same time.
  

• On this matter of convenience, if a senior citizen or mother with a pram gets on. Give them your seat. They need it more than you. I'm sure we've all heard about this little etiquette rule before.
  

• Sharing the train with noisy teenage highschool kids who are on their way to school is still acceptable. But I''m sure the rest of the train passengers were not one bit amused by the talks on which guys are considered to be hot in school - or for that matter 'who has been doing who' and 'who is good\bad'. Are highschool kids supposed to have a sex life !?
  

• Oh... and to that woman who was talking ever so indiscreetly on the phone... I really don't want to know what you got up to last night !

And all this from one train ride this morning.

Enough is Enough

After suffering from major latency issues on World of Warcraft for the past week, (12000ms time outs), I finally phoned my Internet Service Provider to abuse them about the pathetic connection I have had to live with for the past week.

However, not without doing some thorough testing by myself first.

I'm in I.T. as well. I know how long it would take if I would have to do all these tests again when on the phone to another tech support person. I would have to go away, do the tests, and then call them back. The additional time wasted by being on hold everytime I would have to call back really doesn't appeal to me

I found the existing connections to the World of Warcraft (WoW) servers from my laptop though a Netstat (command to show connections on all ports). And then I did Tracerts (tracing the connection from source to destination), to those ip addresses. And lo and behold, I found that on the 7th hop it would time out and show me an * on 3 outta 5 tests. The other times it would have a lag time of about ~300ms.

Hop 7 had an alias of Sydney.Telstra.net... which really does seem a bit suss.... I mean if it had died at something.us.net then I might be barking up the wrong tree in thinking that the issue was with my ISP and not with another external source.

Just to make sure, I even went a step further to isolate the ISP from my WoW game play. I took my laptop to a friend's house which I knew was using a different ISP to me.

It was wonderful. No lag. My latency bar was green and not red. I even managed to squeeze in two games of AV before going back home to call the tech support line.

The first call I made, the guy asked if I had problems with the Internet in general, to which I replied 'No', then he asked if I had issues recieving emails, to which I also replied 'No'. When I told him what was my exact problem, he said in terms of their policy, its not something they look after.

I told him the main purpose of me getting ADSL was to enjoy playing WoW on their fast internet connection. Something I wasn't getting anymore. After debating for a bit more, I asked to speak to someone else who could understand a tracert (this guy had no idea), I was put on hold for a further 20 mins. By the time I managed to talk to a 3rd person (the 2nd guy didn't know what WoW was), my cordless phone ran out of batttery.

I had no choice but to call back on my mobile (yes.. costly I know). 15 minutes more, and I've had just about enough. By this time I had made it to their level two tech (or so I was told), he advised that there wasn't anything he could do for me, but I could try send ing through all the outputs from the tests I had done and construct my case in an email and mail it to them.

Why couldn't they tell me this 1++ hr ago ?!??!?!

For that matter, after hearing me blabble on for an hour... couldn't they lodge a case for me !?

I.T. support personnel are supposed to be 'Helpful'. (I try to be helpful to my users and clients). This however, was anything but that.

3 days later I called again to check on the status of my case. Apparently nothing else had been done to it. I asked to be put through to the sales department. But they couldn't transfer me through, and asked me to call the sales number directly myself.

Once through to the sales department, I requested for my Internet to be disconnected. When asked for a reason why, I simply told them I've had enough their crappy tech support. The 'disconnection' call took about 5 minutes. But I had lost count of the amount of calls I had made to the tech support people, and the amount of time wasted trying to troubleshoot their problem for them.

Damn, I can feel the value of my telstra shares dropping already.

So thats it folks. Until my application with iinet gets completed, I'll wont be able to post as often as I would want to. Fingers X that I'll get my new internet connection sooner rather than later!

Bunny's New Playpen

Bunny (my pet rabbit), has a physical attachment to all of Pete's architectural models. He loves to nibble off their corners, remove columns and walls so that he could turn it into his new cubby house. So when it was time to find Bunny and to put him back to his sleeping hutch for the night, we weren't all that surprised to find him enjoying himself in this....

Somehow he managed to find a nice cosy spot on the supposed 2nd level of the model.. he looked so cute hiding in there I couldn't resist not taking out my camera phone to snap up some quick shots.

This is Pete's model from his design of a 5 lvl apartment. (although with some parts chewed off).

*sigh.. Bunny looks so chubby now.

Probably should try and put him on a diet. His favorite past-time used to be crawling underneath our couch and nibbling and scratching the pieces of corrugated cardboard we put there for him. He used to be able to stay there for hours, until we lured him out with a carrot. Now he struggles to get his bum through the gap between the couch and the floor.

The model was from one of Pete's ex-projects (he has learned the hard way to keep things out of Bunny's reach). At the current rate of destruction, it would probably take Bunny another week or so to turn it into something which will no longer resemble a model.

Bravo Alpha Charlies...

One thing I have realised since joining this team is that everyone here speaks in the International Radio Operator's Alphabet.

Alpha Bravo Charlie Delta.... etc

(*They use this in an attempt to make ourselves clearer over the phone when trying to convey server names or directories).

Which is all fine, except I don't know it.

So on a typical day when I pick up a request call over the phone, I will hear this guy starting off by saying... "User is somehow getting denied access to November, Sierra, Alpha, Uniform, Victor, Charlie ..... ". While I am on the other end trying to frantically write down what he is referring to by decoding his words. Sierra caught me a couple of times, for some reason, I thought Sierra started with a 'C'.

It kinda feels like I'm working in a airport control radio tower... :P

Previously when I've tried to spell out stuff over the phone, I just say something along the lines of "M for Monica, P for Peter, J for Jeremy, B for Boy, U for Umbrella....". It seemed so much easier when I was just using my friend's names and throwing in the occasional 'B for Boy'. But now, the people around me doesn't seem to understand if I say 'P for Peter' instead of just 'Papa'.

But as they say, When in Rome, do as the Romans do. So if you would excuse me for now, I've got to go and learn some alphabets.

Sugar Mummy ?!

Somehow I get the feeling that I'm turning into his sugar mummy... and its not a good feeling. The feelings are especially strong this week since I've slaved away the whole of Sunday at work.. while he was out with the boys. Then last night he climbed into bed at 3am - apparently he had been up all night on his PS2... and thats after the indoor basketball session he had with his friends.

And how do I know he climbed into bed at 3am ? Because I woke up.... and I stayed up.

I feel like a walking zombie at the moment. Severely lacking in sleep.. and just generally tired.

Tired at the whole 'I'm-so-enjoying-my-life-just-bumming-around' fiasco. For the past week he has gone to play golf, basketball, soccer, a weekend out with the boys and spent all his other spare time continuing his never-ending sessions on the PS2.

I don't mind the sports or the outings with the boys. Its something I actually encourage.. because it gives me time to do my own things as well. But the bumming around on his PS2... that really gets to me...especially since it means he is just at home sitting around playing games and not helping out with things at home.

Ok.. he is on holidays. But atleast have the decency to help out with the chores at home. None. All that greeted me when I got home was a bed piled up with unfolded clothes - albeit washed ones. No prizes for guessing who folded them.

Is it really that hard for boys to become men ?! Or is that just an illusion ? and that boys will never become men... ?

Just a touch of maturity and responsibility.. or is that too much to ask ?

Sunday @ Work

Just spent my whole Sunday at work. Which somehow didn't turn out as bad as I thought. I had another 5 of my colleagues with me. All of us just decided to take our laptops (instead of sitting in our separate cubicals) and shut ourselves inside a meeting room to work through the implementation together.

From 10am till 6pm. I never felt or been so productive on a Sunday.

It actually went pretty well. Although somehow 'The Bank' didn't seem to recognise that anyone would be working on weekends, so there was no airconditioning available. Which with 6 laptops.. 6 perspiring bodies..all in one small meeting room...don't not make a nice combination.

My tummy had been growling the whole day (happens when I skip breakfast). At first no one seem to pay much attention. But after awhile, the noise was quite audible. And the guys had started to chuckle everytime my stomach decided to complain. So on one of my trips out to get some fresh air, I went to the vending machine in the corner of the kitchen, and paid $1.60 for a packet of chips.

I probably finished about 3/4 of my chips before everyone else decided to go out to get some lunch. But ended up forgetting about it after lunch. However, I did remember to take it with me when we were packing everything up. So atleast I can finish it on the train.

That was when I noticed this.

17 Nov 2006 ??????????

Today is the 19th ~~!!!! I'VE BEEN MUNCHING ON OVERDUE CHIPS THE WHOLE MORNING ?!?!?!

Worse thing is I got it from my company's vending machine ! OMG.. How long have I been munching on expired goods from there?!

Grrrr... I probably still would have eaten it ... afterall its only really two days overdue (and I was extremely hungry). Btw...Does that mean its been sitting in that vending machine for over a year ?! I mean they can't possibly be loading the vending machines up with expired goods !? I feel like the time when I was eating this piece of bread which turned out to be all green and furry on the other 'un-buttered' side.

But all the other junk food I've been eating from there...ahhh... Don't even want to think about it anymore.. :(

Finished

I did my last exam yesterday... (Yay !) ... feel so free now. I orginally had big plans for this weekend (drinking.. partying.. more warcraft.. and maybe mahjong). However, as soon as I got into work this morning, I realised my manager had put me on with another contractor to do the implementation this weekend. On this Sunday.

Work should never be scheduled on Sundays. Ever. Its just not right.

The implementation starts at 10am. Fook. I don't know how I'm going to be able to get up to get to work before 10am on a Sunday. Not if I want to go out on Saturday night anyway.

So my whole weekend is going to be screwed.

The lifts were out of action this morning. And I had to climb up eight flights of stairs to make it into the office. I knew I should have just turned around and gone home to call in sick.

Must make mental note to remember to listen to my 6th sense more. Oh.. and to start going back to the gym. Those eight flights of stairs nearly killed me.

Why Men Never Ask For Directions ?

Why is that men never ask for directions ? Never admit they are wrong ? Never think that they are a bad driver ?!

Or should I rephrase that ?

Why isit that men always think they know the right way... alway think that they are a professional car driver (and\or racer)... and are always right ?!

First he took the wrong road going to my cousin's place. (After I repeatedly told him its the wrong turn). Then sped all the way to my cousin's place to make up for lost time. (I hate it when he speeds.. I feel like I'm in a car driven by a lunatic). Then on the way home, he nearly runs though a red light. And only jammed on the brakes because I yelled out.. 'STOP..RED LIGHT'.

A car oncoming from the intersecting road drives past without stopping, and I see a glimpse of my life flash before me.

He yells back and told me I don't need to yell at him.. and that He would have managed to stop in time.

Stop ?! What Stop ?

I told him to just admit that He didn't see the red light. And said that from the force I felt when the seat belt held my body back... if I had not said anything.. he would have just gone straight though the red light..and we would either have a 'near-miss' or hoped we survived the crash.

He may have had an extra inch more before he could still jammed on the brakes, and not crossed the white line. But he would still need to jam brake. Not stop gracefully at the lights. Doesn't that already mean that he didn't see the red light in time ?!

Is it really that hard to admit that you are wrong ?! Or for this matter, is 'Sorry' really that hard to say ?

The Quest - Findings 1

In an attempt to try to complete our quest of finding the 'best steak' in Sydney. We stumbled along this restaurant in Northern Sydney (courtesy of Google search). Gaucho Grill in Kirribilli is an Argentinean Steak house offering steaks which are.. to die for... !

The house specialty is the 'Baby Steak' although at 500g each, there isn't anything 'baby' about it. The restaurant is pretty small, it has about only 6 tables. No bookings are taken, so its on a first-come-first-served basis.

Note: This place is for serious carnivores only !

The house specialty is only available from 'blue to medium-rare'... So its either oozing with blood or just slightly on the red side.. red not pink. I normally go for medium-rare anyway, so its fine for me.

Oh.. and the Chimichurri sauce. Which is this paste made out of herbs, chilli, parsley and garlic (available in hot or mild), goes really well with the steak and chips. I couldn't finish off the 500g steak (pete ended up taking over), but I still managed finish off my remaining chips by dipping them into the sauce. So yummy ~~ !

Overall 8.5/10 .. but so far its the best I've had in Sydney. We'll probably go try the GPO place next, but this is one place I will definitely go back to.

The Quest

After watching The Devil Wears Prada last night, all we could think about after getting out of the cinema was to go and eat a thick juicy piece of steak. (Like that the one which Andy threw into the sink).

So began our quest to find the best piece of steak in Sydney.

A quick search on google showed that there was a supposingly 'best steak restaurant' in North Sydney and another one at GPO in Martin Place. (or if anyone can suggest something better?)

But it was 9.30pm already. Which meant we'll probably have to settle for KFC or Macdonalds and go to sleep dreaming about the steak instead. But how can you eat fastfood when all you crave about is steak ? So we went to sleep with empty tummies instead.

I so can eat a cow right now -- and I hope I do so tonight ... :)

And Yes.. before anyone asks... I know its kind of wierd that after watching all those bags, dresses and shoes parading around.. all we can think about after watching that movie was that piece of steak.

New job.. New people

I've been so busy at work these past few days, I only realised the Melbourne Cup was today when my ex-manager called me to check up on me - and if I could, then to meet up with the old gang at the Martin Place TAB. (A temporary location thats setup so the city people can get their horse bets in). But unfortunately I couldn't make it.

I haven't even heard of the horse that won the Melbourne Cup today. And I'm not so sure the rest of Australia had either before today - Japanese horses took out 1st and 2nd placings. Grats to them... it was a great race to the finish ... :)

I guess I'm still having issues adjusting to my new environment. The people are really nice. However, I get this feeling that I'm not sure what I am supposed to do here... yet. There are heaps of projects (or so I've been told). But I guess I still have a lot of paper work to get through before I get to touch anything.

I did get to go to the data center today. Its the biggest I've been in so far. I had to go in to change a failed disk. But the disk enclosure that was dispatched didn't fit into the array. (Yes... wtf ?!?). Reminds me of my first day in my previous job when the vendor sent some rail kits that didn't fit into the racks. It was about 1-2cm too short. It doesn't sound like alot, but given that its steel.. you can't really stretch it...so even 0.5cm is alot.

Just my luck I guess.. hope they send the right parts out tomorrow. (fingers X)

Something Wrong ?

You know something is wrong when the boyfriend decides to take you out for a nice Italian dinner and you both stare at each other struggling with the small talk .. in an attempt to hit a subject that would break into a conversation.. he asks ...

"So... hows your Warcrafting going ?"

Have I really been playing that much Warcraft ?! Or is he trying to tell me something... ? Either way... something is not quite right.

Countdown - Day 2

Two days left before I get out of here. I've spent most of today going through my Inbox trying to clear out my junk email (mostly from friends) and other stuff which are totally non-work related.

Been doing the same with the My Documents folder. Didn't know I had so much junk.

I did find something interesting though. Check these photos out.

These are taken from my office on lvl 43 of ASQ

Feels like my office is in the clouds.. :P but unfortunately its not like this everyday

Yep.. I guess we have a fog issue in Sydney too.

Oh and this one below is a panorama attempt from my SE phone

*sigh** I know one thing already I will definately be missing... my office views.... :(

Countdown - Day 3

I lost count of the number of times I sneezed this morning until now. Its my 3rd last day left at my current job, and if it wasn't because I still had so much stuff to hand over to the current DBA (so he can pass it to the new Systems Admin) then I would have pulled another sickie and stayed at home to recover from my Hayfever.

Since I'm too lazy don't have enough time to redo all the KVM cabling in the server room (the guy thats going to get paid $800 a day can do it), I've decided to spend the last few days at work doing my Uni assignment which is due next Monday. Atleast it looks like I'm doing my documentation.

I swear that someone has hid some fresh flowers or something like that around the office. There is no way I'm still sneezing this much indoors !! I've already taken my Claratyne. But its not working ... :(

Rapid 24 hour relief my foot !!!

Interviewing - Part 2

I had to get early to get to work before 9am this morning to interview another applicant for my current role. For the record, morning meetings and early morning interviews should just be banned. Nothing that requires my brain to be fully functional should be scheduled before my 10am coffee break.

But in this case, I had no choice in the matter, my manager wanted to see this guy as soon as possible (I only have 4 more days in my current role), and if he was the right guy, we would get him in straight away so I can start my 'Handover' process. Apparently the last guy I recommended didn't go too well with upper management. The feedback I got was that he "Wasn't mature enough.. and didn't seem to be as technically competent". (see. The 4th guy in interviewing)

Mature enough ?! I find that actually quite funny. I asked my manager if he thought I was mature when they decided to hire me... and if I was anymore mature now ?

Mature is probably the last word I would associate with myself. And being the youngest member of my current team has nothing to do with it. I mean the last two sickies I pulled were so that I could make a Raid with my guild in Warcraft. How mature is that ?!

Techical competence... I couldn't really argue with that, I knew he wasn't that strong technically, but he atleast did better than the others I interviewed. And I believe he could learn. After all, if you knew everything when coming into a job, you wouldn't end up staying long and would just leave after a short while, because you would be bored.

I don't know if lack of coffee had anything to do with my patience levels with the guy I interviewed today. But I pretty much lost it after question 1. I asked him what are some of the different types of RAIDs that exist and what are the differences between some of these. He told me there were many. So I asked him to name some or even one. After about 2 minutes of silence, he told me RAIDo, RAID1, RAID5.

Great !! (Or so I thought, atleast we got someone here that can name atleast 3 different types of RAID !).

However, when I asked him what was the differences between them, and in what circumstances would each be best used for, and he took another 2 minutes of silence and told me something that didn't make much sense at all. So if you could imagine the whole interview (we told him it would be a technical interview), everytime I asked a question, it would be followed by atleast 2-3 minutes of silence, which was sometimes accompanied by some "uh.." or "umm.." which seemed to make the interview drag on for eternity.

I mean if you were told it was going to be a technical interview, shouldn't you atleast try to prepare a bit ?

The part that really pisses me off is that the guy is a contractor. Which means, the company is hiring him at about $800 a day.

Fook... I don't get $800 a day.

I'm half minded to quit my new job if they still can't find anyone after 3 months and offer my services back to my current company as a contractor. $800 a day ~~~~~ *sigh

That Dreaded Letter

Finally got the letter I've been dreading about for a year now.

What dreaded letter you ask ?! ....... No.. its not a letter saying I've been fired. People don't do that over here. Its Australia. We can go sue their butts off if they do something like that. And I would probably get enough compensation to ensure I wont ever need to find a job again.

Its a letter from my real estate agent. Advising us that they will come and do their routine inspection this Tuesday. Tomorrow.

Its Tomorrow !!!

Well, we actually got the letter three days ago. (We aren't really that diligent when it comes to checking our mailbox).

No prizes for guessing what I would be doing tonight. The state of the apartment, to put it in better words, is a Pigsty. Well its not dirty. It just isn't very tidy.

I'll need to vacuum the apartment, wash bathroom, mop kitchen and generally just tidy and re-organise everything. Everything is just everwhere at the moment. Thinking about it gives me a headache.

I'm lucky that I actually went to wash the toilet last week. Atleast thats one thing I don't have to clean by tomorrow afternoon.

And Bunny ? (see the cute white blob on my flickr) .. I'm pretty sure that although my rental lease agreement specified no dogs and cats, I doubt my Agent would be very happy to find a rabbit sharing the premises.

Now to find a temporary home for Bunny ... any volunteers ?!

In the Hotel room

Last night MC flew in for an overnight stay again. As is customary, everytime MC flies in with the SQ crew, our highschool bunch in Sydney will try to go out and have a quick get together.

I was probably the first one to get off work, so I went to met up with MC at her hotel room and tried to decide where to go and have dinner while waiting for the rest to arrive. MC suggested that if everyone was too tired, we could just order from the restaurant downstairs. I didn't mind, afterall I still haven't managed to try out the restaurant ever since Hilton reopened in Sydney. She threw me the menu from her room and asked me to flip through it while we waited for everyone else.

And I saw this....

Lasagne - classic - lots of meat and tomatoes -- $30.00
-served with leaf salad and bread

Nasi Goreng
Vegetable fried rice with fried egg and chicken satay -- $34.00

Lasagne for $30 ?!?! More importantly ... $34 for a Nasi Goreng !?

"I think we should go out and find some place to eat... I don't think we should eat at a place which sells Nasi Goreng for $34"

Fooked if I'm going to pay $34 for a Nasi Goreng

Ok, I know its the norm for Hotels to charge ridiculous prices for their food, but $34 for what is essentially just Fried Rice ?! Does traditional Nasi Goreng even come with Chicken Satay ?!

We ended up getting take away from a Ramen noodle place downstairs instead and bringing it back up to the hotel room. Which turned out quite nice, as we could all just lounge around on the king size hotel bed, as we updated each other about our current endeavors, our current bf's long and shortcomings and generally just talked about anything else under the sky.

If only I didn't have to work the next day, I would have raided her mini bar and switched to a much more 'interesting' cable channel.

Well.. what do you expect when you put a bunch of highschool girls together ?!

6 more days

Just realised I have 6 more days left at my current job before I move to my new company. Funny thing is that I no longer feel excited about leaving here anymore. At first when I finally got past the 4th interview, I was ecstatic. Over-the-moon type happy, and could not believe I had finally landed a job which I didn't completely believe I was qualified for. Yet now, when its time to leave, I'm not that sure I want to leave anymore. I guess its because I know I will severely miss everyone here.

On another note, I met up with my cousin for lunch yesterday. As a lunch session with my cousin would not be complete without a subsequent shopping session, we hit the Pitt Street mall after finishing off our salad. (Yes, I had a salad. Wednesday is 'healthy' day for me). I'm not a shopaholic, I would much rather spend my weekends playing Warcraft than go out with the girls for some retail therapy. But somehow, out of the limited amount of times I've gone shopping with my cousin, I always manage to return with something. This time was no different. I got a new shirt for work, and a skirt.

Yep, my first skirt purchase for this year.

At first I was reluctant. I know that the last skirt I had brought, I had only really worn it once. And I really didn't want to spend $139 on a skirt that I would wear only once a year. When I told my cousin this, she replied that she had seen me buy a $300 pair of jeans, so why not a $139 skirt !?

Since my cousin is an Accountant, I gave my reply in accounting logic terms:

"$300 for a pair of jeans which I'll wear for about 300 days of the year, which equates to $1 a day, but $139 for a skirt which I may only wear for one or two times a year ? .. the maths don't much up..."

"Well.. I think you look good in it"

I don't know about any of the other girls out there, but when someone says this to me when I'm trying on something, I usually end up buying it. I'm a sucker for lines like these. After a quick call to Pete, I was sold. He seemed even more excited than me that I was deciding to buy a skirt.

The only thing he didn't know yet was that it was a 'Balloon skirt' (Yep, the dreaded balloon skirt... but I think it looked ok when I was wearing it). Anyway, its a design that he absolutely loathes. And I can't say this little piece of information didn't add to the deciding factor.

During my gym session last night (I do try to make the most out of my Healthy Wednesday), I had a good look at my legs while doing my stretching exercise to cool down. I guess I would have to do something about them to be able to confidently wear that skirt out. Well put it this way, I never thought it was bad enough for me to do anything about it. But doubt I will get away with it if I'm going to be wearing a skirt.

So.. a question for the girls... Shave ? or Wax ?!

Another day

Its been a rather unproductive day in the office. Actually looking back, I think I've been more productive during the last two weeks compared to the past 6 months.

I've managed to zoom through my last few projects on my To-Do list at record speed.

Since I've been able to use my "Its-going-to-be-my-last-week" excuse to full potential, I've been able to get my hands on resources I would normally have wait a couple of months for. Its amazing what you can achieve when people stop ignoring you and actually go out of their way to help you.

My manager has decided to take the whole week off, and with no one else in the office willing to pass me any work, it leaves me with absolutely nothing to do. Since I'm sitting here twiddling my thumbs anyway I decided to go back to doodle on my Artrage.

Here is my latest...

I was just playing around with colours.. and somehow it turned out like this. Right...Off to do another one.. :)

Interviewing

After spending 2 weeks being an interviewee trying to secure my new job, I have been spending the past week being the interviewer trying to find the right person to fill my current position.

I don't know which is worse. Being the interviewee and being grilled non-stop by the interviewers in the room. Or being the interviewer and having to put up with the interviewees. I mean its great if you have good candidates, but not if you have to put up with idiots.

I've interviewed 4 prospective people for my current position already. Some of which look really good on paper (their resumes). And I mean really good. One of the guys I interviewed had his MCSE, CCNA and has 10 years experience contracting in the industry. I seriously thought he was over qualified for the role. But since my manager has this thing about interviewing people who are willing to work at a much lower salary, I agree to do the interview. (see: Why should I hire you?)

Personally, I would probably never agree to an interview with a guy who is over qualified and is willing to work at a much lower rate than the industry standard. I mean, doesn't that just spell the word... W R O N G... to you ?! The second word that comes to mind would be 'Desperate'. Either way, something is obviously wrong. I mean if you are that qualified and why would you still want to be applying for such junior roles which pay at a much lower salary rate ... ?!

As expected, the 10-year-experience-guy was totally crap. He couldn't answer any of my technical questions. (and they weren't that technical either... e.g. the difference between RAID 0 and RAID 5... any reasonable Systems Engineer should be able to comfortably answer that). But he couldn't. The only 'standard' answer he gave me was, "You know, I've worked at very big companies before, and I know the answer, but I just can't say it at the moment." or "Sorry, I wont be able to answer that properly unless I'm in front of the server".

To which I said.. "The role requires a great deal of troubleshooting remotely over the phone, so how would you handle situations like that ?"

He's answer ? = *silence**

The second guy I interviewed wasn't much better. His only answer to any situation was to reboot the server.

Which is probably a valid point in any server environment with a Windows system running on it. But wouldn't you atleast look at the event logs or maybe check out what is wrong first ?! Nothing. And when I asked him that we have strict SLAs to conform to, which does not allow for much outages during the day, to which he would have to do something to try to keep the system running until he can reboot the server. And so with this situation I asked him what would he do in this case... and his reply was ? Nothing.

By the end of the 3rd interview, I was ready to knock myself unconscious against the wall and then proceed to throw myself out the 43rd floor of my building.

The forth guy was interesting. He's hobby is snowboarding and he has worked as a bartender before. Is a cool, bright, easy going and willing to learn type of guy. Technically, he is probably borderline. He couldn't answer half of my list of questions, but atleast he tried. I could tell that Friday night drinking sessions would not be boring with him around.

Well... when in doubt go with the one who is going to be fun to have around and will be an active member of the after-work-Friday-night-drinking-session gang.

Vegemite

We're happy little Vegemites
As bright as bright can be.
We all enjoy our Vegemite
For breakfast, lunch, and tea.
Our mother says we're growing
stronger every single week.
Because we love our Vegemite.
We all adore our Vegemite.
It puts a rose in every cheek!

Vegemite. The Great Aussie Icon.... Has now been banned in the US. And as this newpaper reports, "To the point of searching Australians for jars of the spread when they enter the country".

Isn't that a bit..errm.. silly ?! I mean I know Vegemite is something either you love or hate, but why would anyone want to ban it ? According to the report, it turns out it is due to a technicality. (I don't understand either...read the article to find out more).

As a kid I used to hate vegemite. Well, I disliked anything that didn't taste like it was super-saturated in sugar syrup. But I too have gradually learn to enjoy my vegemite & butter on toast.

Too bad the people in the U.S. won't know what they are missing out on anymore.

My Comfy Purple Crocs

Having spent a week in heels, I decided to wear my comfy shoes to work today. The newest blister on my little toe definitely helped with this decision. I got my purple Crocs two weeks ago, and I must say that these are the lightest, comfiest shoes I have worn for a long time. I have worn them everywhere... almost everywhere.

I luv my Crocs !!!

Although after today I realised there is a slight drawback with wearing my Crocs to work - even on a casual Friday. From my walk to the train station, the whole train trip (peak hour traffic), the walk to my office, into my building to the lift to my floor, I felt that everyone I walked passed would look atleast once at my feet. Actually, I didn't feel it. I saw it. Everyone that was in a visual vicinity of where I was, was staring at my feet.

Not sure if it was the bright purple colour, or was it that they have never seen a Croc before, but it wasn't really a nice feeling. I think after today I will think twice before showing up to work in my Crocs.

And there is one really important factor I had forgotten to consider :

That is if the bouncers will allow me into the bars\clubs for afterwork drinks tonight while wearing these... ?!

Forgetful We

Those who know me personally, will know that I have a really bad short term memory. When I mean bad, I mean amnesia type bad. I have a tendency to leave things in a place, then 5 minutes later forgot I had left it there. As a result, I have lost jackets, bags, phones (lots of mobile phones), keys, security passes and wallets.

(notice how every item is written in plural form)

And before anyone makes the suggestion that it is because I've killed off too much braincells by my constant consumption of alcohol. Then you're wrong. I have always been this forgetful. My grandma always used to say I would loose my head if it wasn't attached to my neck.

To get through this little shortcoming of mine, I depend quite heavily on my other half to remember to pick up these loose bits and pieces. The handbag or phone I always leave behind, a spare set of keys when I forget to take mine.. the usual stuff. Only I realise this doesn't always work out. Not when my current other half is just about as forgetful as me.

Take this morning for example, Pete wakes up, gets ready to go to work, leaves, then suddenly comes back and wakes me up asking me where his wallet is. He goes to work a whole hour earlier than me, so I normally get an extra hour sleep. I get out of bed, ask him how it is possible for him to get home last night without his security pass - which is in his wallet. Thus meaning it has to be somewhere at home. We turn the whole room upside down. Rummage through the living room and his sports bag but still no wallet. I take out my wallet and pass him $50 so he can survive through the day, tell him he is late and we'll look for it later tonight while I crawl back into bed.

I wake up, realise I'm 30 mins late, get change, grab my bag and leave.

Only to realise I don't have my wallet in my bag, and no keys either as I had left them on the coffee table. (or so I hope).

I still have my coin pouch though. But realise I'm about $1 dollar short for even a single train ticket to the City. I call Pete up and tells him what happened, we both laugh at each other for a while, then realise we have no means of getting back into our building, let alone into our apartment.

Luckily for us, we have a housemate who is nothing like us. Without her, I don't know how we would survive.

Oh... and thank you so much to the nice guy at the train station who gave me $1. Thank you !!!!

Sugar Hit

October is Good Food Month in Sydney, which means that for $15 you can go to any participating Hotel and try out their dessert plate accompanied with a glass of dessert wine.

Last week we went to the Sofitel Wentworth which had the 'Chocolate Assiette' on offer.

Chocolate assiette - a delicious tasting plate consisting of white chocolate crème brulee, Valrhona bitter chocolate parfait and praline and a berry & milk chocolate terrine, with Brown Brothers Botrytis Reisling

Sounds good ?

Well... It looks good too... :p~

Mid Autumn Festival

Last week was Mid Autumn Festival, and if it wasn't for Mrs Ang reminding me about it, I would have forgotten the whole thing all together. Since I have resigned from my current job, I have been kept as busy as humanly possible, or so thats what my manager thinks. (emphasis on 'humanly').

I feel like they are trying to get their last dollar worth out of me... (by working me to death thus making me worthless to my next company). I am serious, I spent the last weekend working for 11 hours straight completing an upgrade of the SAN. I guess that alone proves my point.

I think this is the first time I didn't attend any Mid Autumn Festival dinners or celebrations in relation to this chinese custom. I missed out on two planned dinners and gatherings. One with Mrs Ang (sorry!) and another with my WoW group (sorry!). Normally I'll try to keep to my chinese roots and celebrate these festivals with friends and family. But I guess this time, work got the better of me.

Two more weeks to go, and 1 more exam then I should be more free. (I think).

SINsational

While blog surfing in the office today - yes.. a Saturday - I came across this: SINsational

Its a little survey of sins by which you total up the amount next to the sin you have committed.

1. Smoked pot-- $10
2. Got drunk, passed and don't remember the night before-- $20
3. Went skinny dipping-- $5
4. Had sex in a pool-- $20
5. Kissed someone of the same sex-- $10
6. Had sex with someone of the same sex $20
7. Cheated on your g/f or b/f -- $10
8. Cheated on your g/f or b/f with their relative or close friend--$20
9. Done oral-- $5
10. Got oral-- $5
11. Done / Got oral in a car while it was moving --$25
12. Prank called the cops-- $5
13. Stole something-- $10
14. Stole something worth over more than a hundred dollars--$20
15. Had sex with someone 10 years older-- $20
16. Had sex with someone under 21 and you are over 27--$25
17. Cried yourself to sleep-- $5
18. Cried during sex--$20
19. Been in love-- $25
20. Been in love with two people or more at the same time --$50
21. Said you love someone but didn't mean it-- $25
22. Went streaking-- $5
23. Went streaking in broad daylight --$15
24. Been arrested-- $5
25. Spent time in jail --$15
26. Peed in the pool-- $0.50
27. Played spin the bottle-- $5
28. Done something you regret-- $20
29. Had a crush on your best friend--$5
30. Had sex with your best friend --$20
31. Had a crush on someone at work --$5
32. Had sex with someone you work with at work --$25
33. Lied to your mate --$5
34. Lied to your mate about the sex being good --$25

I got a total of $240.50.... just under 1/2 of the max amount possible. Not too bad I guess. But if I had to pass a list like this to get into Heaven. Then I doubt I would be able to make it in.

And before anyone asks....

Yes, I've peed in a pool before. (Hasn't everyone ?!) The toilet is always situated too far away from the pool anyway.

Freezing !

I've just spent the whole morning inside the server room rebuilding one of our old servers.

I guess since I'm leaving this place now, my manager has assigned all the boring tasks to me that no one else wants to do.

There isn't really anything wrong with that. Apart from the fact I have to come into work this weekend, and I have to deal with the one bad aspect of a data center.

Its blarrddyy freezing !

I've got 30 mins left before I have to go back in to kick off the next stage of the installation.

30 mins left to de-frost my butt.....

Where's a bum warmer when you need one ?!?

Subconsciousness

Last night I enjoyed a quiet night at home infront of the telly, eating the previous night's take away as dinner. Pete had crashed out already by 7.30pm. He had not slept for about 2 days in a row trying to finish off his project, so I decided not to bother him at all and just let him sleep his heart content.

In between commercials I went inside the room to check if my AV (alterac valley) queue had come up (the waiting time was 40 mins). That was when Pete stirred in his sleep and said ...

"Dear... umm.. can you shut the baby up ?"

*slightly shocked... wondering what baby he was referring to .. was it his subconsciousness speaking... or was he just having a bad dream ?! **

Then I realised it was coming from the T.V.

Trying hard not to laugh, I told him that it was from the T.V. And added that we should never consider about having kids.

He murmurred that he thought it was the neighbour's (fat chance), and asked why I said we should never have kids.

*Sigh... I thought the answer was obvious already....

"Simple... Because when the baby cries ... every two hours... you will probably just stick a sock down its mouth.... Thats not going to work honey... "

Nope.. definitely not going to work. >.<

Gone !

My new baby has gone ...

Some sick b@stard stole my mobile phone today ~~~~~~~~~ !!!!

Grrrrrrrr...... Can't believe it happened right under my nose as well. Was eating at the food court downstairs at work, and I had put my mobile next to me while I was reading my novel and eating at the same time.

And when I had finished and got up to leave, my mobile was no where to be seen !!!

Argghh ... my new SE K800i ... *sob ***

SO. DAMN. PISSED. OFF ~~ !!!!

Finalised

I've finally handed in my resignation letter and signed the contract for my new job. For now.. I think... I can finally breathe again.

I still have 4 weeks left at my current job, but I already know I will deeply miss everyone here.

After my manager announced my resignation, my Inbox was bombarded with emails from my colleagues. The head of Trading even asked my manager that if it was about money, then maybe Trading can do something about keeping me here.

But its not about the money. The new job I am taking on, is one which I hope would help me path the way to achieving my goals. Or to put it simply, what I would want to be doing in the next 5 years.

And for me, 5 years is my set target timeframe at the moment. Because if I'm not 'successful' (in my terms) in the next 5 years then I might as well stop trying and just settle down with a husband and start popping out the kids.

Anyway, it is nice to know that I have made a difference in my current company.

And the 'popping out the kids' scenario... lets hope it doesn't come to that.

Melbourne Trip : Chocolate Heaven....

Here are some of my much promised pictures from Melbourne. I was only down in Melbourne for 1 day. I stayed the night and left the next afternoon as I had to get back in time for work the next day.

not sure which building it is, but i was staying opposite it, on Spencer st.

The main reason why I flew down there was to meet up with my drinking buddy from Perth. He was in Melbourne to attend a friend's wedding, and came up with a proposition to lure me to Melbourne on the promise of a good night out and free drinks. And before anyone thinks of anything naughty, we did nothing of the sort - well.. other than drink to our hearts content.

I haven't been back to Melbourne since setting foot in Sydney. The only thing I really remember is the weird weather. But since it was spring, and Sydney was hitting 34°, I decided to pack light, and bring only one spare top and shorts I can sleep in for the night.

Melbourne had a high of 14° that day. By night time I was freezing my butt off.

one of the many shopping centre's in melbourne, i think this was at the GPO, all these bird cages actually had real live Canaries in them. Which I found a bit disturbing, I'm sure they were properly fed and such, but it just didn't feel right using live animals as decor

And I had already picked up a jumper while shopping at Melbourne Central. And even though I had been stuffing myself with Chocolate throughout the day didn't seem to help either.

Talking about chocolate.....

my lunch @ Max Brenner.. oh and i had a thick hot chocolate to go with it as well.

I only just managed to finish the waffles by myself. And after finishing the hot chocolate, I felt like going back to the hotel to sleep it off. Bad thing was that when I glanced around at the other tables next to me, I could see a table of 3 sharing the same waffle I had by myself. Felt like such a pig.

An hour later, my drinking buddy and our other friends called me to let me know the reception was finished, and that they would be heading over to Koko Black for drinks. Koko Black, turned out to be another Chocolate Bar \ Cafe.

More Chocolate.

3/4 of the tasting plate @ Koko Black - I already started eating b4 I remembered to take a photo

I shared the tasting plate with my friend which included another hot chocolate. I wasn't disappointed though, the hot chocolate was very good, but because it was so rich (and I was already up to my neck in chocolate), I only manage to finish half of it.

the hot chocolate @ Koko Black

I was so completely stuffed with chocolate that I managed to skip dinner, and still felt quite full when I went out for drinks that night.

*Sigh... looking at that hot chocolate now... *drool... anyone want to drive down to Melbourne with me ?!

Grilled

I've just come back from my last interview. It lasted over an hour.

I feel like I've just had my brain taken out and grilled for an hour, X-Rayed and put back inside.

I've already made up my mind that this is the job I want. Although I wont really be getting a pay increase (unlike the other two).. I would have a chance to work with real technical guru guys.

Now all I have to do is wait for the magic phone call.... (Fingers X)

-----------------------------

Update : I got the job.. :)

Dockers Game

I actually did the draft for this post ages ago. The Dockers game was on the 22nd of September. And now it's October and even the AFL Grand Final is over already. But I've been really busy ever since. I'm trying to change jobs at the moment, and juggling attending interviews with my current job and getting my uni work done wasn't as easy as I thought. I've already been through 3 interviews from just one company, yet they still want another one. I swear if they don't just hire me after this one, I'm just going to give up and choose someone else.

But since I've already downloaded the photos from my phone, I might as well just post it.

Oh...For those who may have watched the Fox Sports channel (and ended up seeing last years game instead), the Eagles won by 1 point. Apparently only the free-to-air channels had exclusive rights to the Grand Final broadcast, so the people who had Fox Sports, somehow ended up watching a replay of last years game instead.

Anyway, here are some photos taken with my SE K800i at Telstra Stadium on the night of the Sydney Swans Vs Fremantle Dockers game.

we were sitting right behind the goals. premium firing-line seats.
I spent half the time trying to avoid having the football torpedoed at my head

the game wasn't as interesting as I thought it would be. without the commentators, this is what I saw majority of the time. at these times, I just focused on that little screen on the right hand side

With an attendance of about 50,000 people, lets just say the vast majority of them were Sydney Swan supporters. We were literally flooded by a sea of red. The reception wasn't any better when the dockers lost and we were stuck with the crowd on the way back home in a train. Actually, I can't really imagine what it would have been like on the way back if the Dockers had won.

I couldn't resist not taking this shot. So cute !!

Go West Coast Eagles !!!

Our father, who lives on the West Coast

Football be thy Game

Thy Eagles come

Thy game be won

At the MCG as it is at Subi

Give us this day your freakish goal

And forgive us our poor passes

As we forgive those

Who give free kicks against us

And lead us not into the pocket

But deliver us down the corridor

For Finals are the Kingdom

the G awaits our Glory

for ever and ever

Amen

What more can I say ? Go the West Coast Eagles ~~~~~~~~~~ !!!

Its going to be a Grand Finals re-match. Sydney vs West Coast (Perth - My hometown). And I still remember what happened last year. Well... I remember the aftermath of what happened after the Grand Final match last year. (see. 10 Stitches).

Lets see if we can avoid a trip to the hospital this year.

Small Talk

Question. What constitutes as cheating ?

Is it only considered to be cheating when you have physically cheated on your other half ?

Or the moment you fall for another person when still engaged in another relationship ?

Or isit acceptable to just periodically 'Mind Cheat' ?

Don't get me wrong, I don't believe there is anything wrong with looking at and admiring attractive people. If I couldn't, then there would be no purpose for me to go and watch movies anymore.

But where do you draw the line ?

Could you accept that your other half will flirt with other people he occasionally meets at pubs and clubs. Or vice versa ?

I don't know where I stand on this issue. Mostly because I don't want to appear to have double standards. But I can safely say, I have never physically cheated on any of my ex-boyfriends (and including the current one). But that is physically. And mostly because I would just end the relationship before starting another one.

But what my heart feels is another entirely different issue.

For example, I know that whenever I speak to Him, I would forget all else and can just happily chat the night away. But I have learnt through experience, that your perfect soul mate may not be the person you hold most dear in your heart. And I am old enough now to know I should not just 'move on' based on feelings alone.

As to double standards, I'm yet to find out how I would feel if my other half had a similar 'friend' in his life. At the moment, I feel that I give him as much freedom as I possibly can simply because I want to expect the same amount of freedom back. In the end, I guess it is all about Trust. And the 'line' (which waits to be crossed) differs with the amount of Trust that exists in a relationship.

And the perfect soul mate ?

For me, at this moment, it's finding that special someone to bend our heads together over a Sudoku puzzle... to share my paper with on a Sunday morning... who'll steal my blankets on a cold night... console me when I've drunk too much alcohol, picks me up and hold my hair back when I spew... lies to me when I ask 'does my butt look big in this?' and takes my side on everything ... except maybe when it comes to football.