The little things

I've moved!

2011-06-23T23:18:00.001+01:00

It's been fun, blogger, but we're here now

http://ruyen.posterous.com/

The road home

2011-06-17T00:07:00.001+01:00

Weekend with the parents

2011-06-12T14:07:00.004+01:00

Tea at Fortnum's

Rainy day dim sum

Victor of the dog's affections for the day

Sleepover!

2011-06-10T23:43:00.001+01:00

Thursday is the new Friday

2011-06-10T00:15:00.005+01:00

W: You have compulsive reporting disorder, you need to tell your mother everything...

- on my need to tell my mother everything

P: So your brother has a tiger mother and a tiger sister, huh? Poor sod."

- on how I help prepare my brother for the real world

C: Mum is really excited about the cars!

A: There are really nice ones in the lobby of my building

C: No, Mum only likes the ones with eyes

- on the Disney Cars cartoon mock ups at the Motorexpo in Canary Wharf

M: So what's the bet?

A: Mum, it's Monopoly Deal..

- on playing Monopoly Deal

AV woes

2011-06-08T16:28:00.002+01:00

Why aren't these things plug and play? I'm starting to tire of the same unhelpful blue screen that presents itself. That baleful and unrelenting colour returns every time I dive into the mass of wires, resetting, connecting and disconnecting in every configuration imaginable. Even my TV is fed up of me furiously, and I mean furiously, flicking through all of its inputs and modes that it's stuck on ATV and refuses to budge. I was reminded of how little sympathy Weng has on 6 hours of sleep when he wryly commented that it simply expedites the new TV process. My team mate at work merely asked if I had read the instructions -_- I'm so unclued-up on AV stuff that I didn't even know how to start Googling the issue.

So, under much stress and emotional distress, I resorted to basic consulting instincts and threw Visio at it in an attempt to impose order on the chaos. I'll see if my new, tidy schematic will help me tonight, otherwise I'm calling the cavalry.

Update: Visio clearly works, the PS3 and amp is online! Now for the finicky challenge of the BT box...

Consulting101: wireless networking

2011-06-05T21:53:00.001+01:00

Easy Sunday

2011-06-05T14:30:00.001+01:00

We've started to add touches of green to our apartment - fingers crossed for germination and baby seedlings over the next week or so. We've compromised on chillies, flowers, tomatoes and no fake grass.

And then some tennis with the crew. Ice cream and strawberries, anyone?

Nesting, much?

2011-06-03T20:27:00.006+01:00

Our new home is almost there sans blinds and beds - two fairly crucial bits of furnishing if you're a) not planning on waking up with the sun (now rising at 5.30am, thereby negating my wakeupyou'remildlydepressed clock) and, b) if you don't like sleeping in the draft.

I cannot believe what a joy it is to come home to a view and a shiny new flat - so bright that you have to squint at the T.V. (which is now too small!) from the hours of 4pm to 7pm. We still need things like paintings and plants and pictures and an extra armchair and a bench and folding chairs and a some new lamps, but that's ok, at least we have internet now.

I think we're due a first clean soon even though I've been neurotic with spills and fingerprints... I might fall a tiny bit out of love then.

Our new home

2011-06-03T20:18:00.002+01:00

A toe in the water

2011-03-29T20:42:00.007+01:00

Let's give this a shot. Blog resurrection take #1.

I'm on the verge of adulthood, or in the midst of it. It's hard to tell because it's a fierce battle between the reality of things such as my 26th birthday, recently passed, and the things below, and adolescent denial.

1) Four weddings, four more weddings and eight engagements

My Facebook feed is choc-a-bloc with beautiful pictures of brides to be, grooms to be, brides and grooms, and congratulatory messages. I sigh and aww very loudly at rings and happy couples, but then chicken out when Weng says to go and get my finger sized.

2) Findaproperty

We are jumping onto the property ladder with the help of my parents' massive generosity. It is a mind numbingly large amount of money, which we'll pay back of course, but still, a huge amount of money to owe for a significant amount of time i.e. most of our lives.

3) What do you want to do with your career?

What? I have a 'career'? Apparently it's no longer ok to say, 'I dunno, I'll figure it out when I get older', because I am. now. old. and I needed to know, like, a month ago, when I was supposed to have submitted my 'development plan' for the year with my carefully balanced and considered ambitions. To that point, what ambitions?

4) The noobs are SO YOUNG

They're like my brother's year. My brother is still picking his nose and eating it in my head, not nearly old enough to hold down a real job...geez.

The only upside of getting older? I can (just about) afford a lavish 2 week holiday to Peru this autumn. Woohoo!

Q2 2010 cheat sheet

2010-06-22T09:03:00.017+01:00

March saw my birthday come and go, marked with 10 of my nearest and dearest crammed into our tiny living room, playing Buzz the entire night. We're a competitive bunch. I almost forgot that I was struggling with a bad cold the whole night.

Aaron and Young made the trip down and we aboslutely love it when they do because it means we can whip out SingStar first thing in the morning, and what's better than SingStar in your PJs?

April brought Just Dance to the See-Lee household, introducing even more minutes of hilarity, and I say minutes because that game is actually really tiring and we're really not particularly fit or coordinated.

April also brought Weng's brother to London for his annual visit ('because Cambridge is FAR, okay?') and we decided to venture down to Greenwich.

And then he turned 21 at some point during one of our Settlers of Catan marathons (we played that game over and over and over), so we stopped to whip out a Gu brownie, clotted cream, and requisite candle. Apparently, it's not a good idea to put a wax candle in a hot chocolate brownie.

May flew by in a flurry of job interviews, visits from relatives, birthdays, and Matlab training (yes, I got the t-shirt and everything), as well as a long overdue visit to Hampton Court Palace.

June rolled around with the highly anticipated (and highly televised) World Cup, (Ferragamo sale!!1!!), Wimbledon, and what I expect to be a grossly overblown electricity bill for the month. I think our TV needs to rest.

I think that brings us to now.

Old and forgetful

2010-06-03T16:03:00.001+01:00

My day went a little like this:

Got dressed, packed for work and netball afterwards, and left the house. Sat down at my desk and opened the drawer where my laptop usually lives and it was nowhere to be found. Cue forehead-smacking moment #1. Went all the way home again to get it.

Smoothie time came around and I stood at my desk checking I had enough money then made for the lift lobby. As the lift dinged at Ground, I realised I hadn’t taken the right purse-thing (i.e. no cash), forehead-smacking moment #2, so immediately went straight back upstairs.

Grabbed the correct purse, thought ‘Aha! Needed to bank that cheque anyway’, and merrily went on my way without my security pass. Forehead-smacking moment #3: Realised the lack of access to the office only after banking in the cheque. Some would argue this is a good thing in 20 degree sunshine, but having only started work at about 10.30 this morning, I ran back to HSBC to look for it. Gave up when it dawned on me that security at the branch wouldn’t appreciate someone a) leaving an unattended item, or b) searching under tables and between ATMs like a maniac, so gave up quickly. Decided I REALLY needed the smoothie after this, and then had to sheepishly sidle up to reception where she called the cavalry (and my manager) to come get me.

And that’s not the last of it – last week I managed to magic away our spare electric toothbrush refills because for once I bothered to actually put them away responsibly and then promptly forgot where I had put them. There was a lot of looking high and low after that too.

And I was reading today about early onset Alzheimer’s also -_-

Wordsmithing

2010-03-07T10:28:00.002Z

Here's another hack of a post, but it was particularly entertaining given that I'd had received it while dealing with persons 2. and 5. for much of the day.

The Washington Post's Mensa Invitational once again
invited readers to take any word from the dictionary, alter it by
adding, subtracting, or changing one letter, and supply a new
definition.

Here are the winners:

1. Cashtration (n.): The act of buying a house, which renders the subject financially impotent for an indefinite period of time.

2. Ignoranus : A person who's both stupid and an asshole.

3. Intaxicaton : Euphoria at getting a tax refund, which lasts until you realize it was your money to start with.

4. Reintarnation : Coming back to life as a hillbilly.

5. Bozone ( n.): The substance surrounding stupid people that stops bright ideas from penetrating. The bozone layer, unfortunately, shows little sign of breaking down in the near future.

6. Foreploy : Any misrepresentation about yourself for the purpose of getting laid.

7. Giraffiti : Vandalism spray-painted very, very high

8. Sarchasm : The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.

9. Inoculatte : To take coffee intravenously when you are running late.

10. Osteopornosis : A degenerate disease. (This one got extra credit.)

11. Karmageddon : It's like, when everybody is sending off all these really bad vibes, right? And then, like, the Earth explodes and it's like, a serious bummer.

12. Decafalon (n.): The grueling event of getting through the day consuming only things that are good for you.

13. Glibido : All talk and no action.

14. Dopeler Effect: The tendency of stupid ideas to seem smarter when they come at you rapidly.

15. Arachnoleptic Fit (n.): The frantic dance performed just after you've accidentally walked through a spider web.

16. Beelzebug (n.): Satan in the form of a mosquito, that gets into your bedroom at three in the morning and cannot be cast out.

17. Caterpallor ( n.): The color you turn after finding half a worm in the fruit you're eating.

The Washington Post has also published the winning submissions to its yearly contest, in which readers are asked to supply alternate meanings for common words. And the winners are:

1. Coffee, n. The person upon whom one coughs.

2. Flabbergasted, adj. Appalled by discovering how much weight one has gained.

3. Abdicate, v. To give up all hope of ever having a flat stomach.

4. Esplanade, v. To attempt an explanation while drunk.

5. Willy-nilly, adj. Impotent.

6. Negligent, adj. Absentmindedly answering the door when wearing only a nightgown.

7. Lymph, v. To walk with a lisp.

8. Gargoyle, n. Olive-flavored mouthwash.

9. Flatulence, n. Emergency vehicle that picks up someone who has been run over by a steamroller.

10. Balderdash, n. A rapidly receding hairline.

11. Testicle, n. A humorous question on an exam.

12. Rectitude, n. The formal, dignified bearing adopted by proctologists.

13. Pokemon, n. A Rastafarian proctologist.

14. Oyster, n. A person who sprinkles his conversation with Yiddishisms.

15. Frisbeetarianism, n. The belief that, after death, the soul flies up onto the roof and gets stuck there.

16. Circumvent, n. An opening in the front of boxer shorts worn by Jewish men.

Return of the netball junkie

2010-02-19T17:41:00.001Z

Another cold cold night, zero out, and what I'm wearing would, quite frankly, shock my mother. (Only because IT'S COLD.) Which brings me to want to examine the awesomeness that is social netball:

1. Work grief. What healthier way is there to vent your rage at an incompetent colleague than by exacting physical punishment on yourself and everyone else in an enclosed space

2. Tactile addiction. The dimpled, slightly tacky surface of a ball in all its size 4 rubberized glory

3. Court plays. The glorious satisfaction of all those clever 1-2s that see the ball hurtling down the court

4. Court markings. The familiar lines that divide this sometimes manic, overbearing world into 5 neat, controllable segments.

5. The swoosh of the ball as it catches 'nothin' but net'

3. Winning.

Reconnecting: world, here I come!

2010-02-10T14:33:00.002Z

After concluding rather stressful negotiations for an upgrade with the moneypinching entity that is O2, I finally received my new bb and it hasn't left my hand since. I'm like a new parent, jumping at every single buzz and blinking light, managing the boyfriend's gentle stirrings of resentment. Now that I have a connection on the go, I finally understand twitter and that texting and walking is still ill-advised. Reconnecting with all the friends and family scattered across the globe has totally been worth early warning signs of carpal tunnel.

I've downloaded every conceivable chat platform known to man AND run out of people to harass online, so here's one of the last to-dos on my list: resurrect the blog.

Bits of home

2009-09-10T16:47:00.002+01:00

me: omg omg the new ipod touch is HUGE! 32Gb!!! when you go to sg, can you pls buy me the new itouch?
Cheryl: with what? i don't have that much in ang pow money :(
me: haha, er, ask mum?
Cheryl: okay. she'll shoot the messenger you kno. i'm putting my life on the line for you. could die
me: ok so the idea is, when you go to sg, get bry's crappy ipod then go to the apple store, ask if they do the 10% off the new ipod if you bring in an old ipod deal and then buy me the new itouch 32Gb :D
Cheryl: she just gave this smile. how much is it do they do student discount can't i get that can't i get stud d/c in london - is it not cheap enuf
me: you cant get student disc on ipods i think coz they're not for study
Cheryl: dad asks what do you plan to put on this 32 gb drive? do you even have that much to put on mom says you're a spendthrift
me: games and music. my music's at 8Gb already. it's for the long arduous commute :)
Cheryl: WOW WHAT A LONG COMMUTE. it's like going to singapore
me: i dunno. btw, who's sayin all this stuff? you or mum and dad.
Cheryl: combination. dad says perdy wants to know
me: yes, perdy, i REALLY need this ipod
Cheryl: mum says dog and plants at home want to know
me: wah, i get the 3rd degree when i want to buy a new gadget...but bryan's had like 5 ipods and i've had two. too bad i dont break mine in time for the next release
Cheryl: mom says no bryan hasn't bought since the last wshing machine one. dad says when bryan wants a new ipod, he washes it so he gets a clean one from the washing machine
me: our parents should do stand up. tell them they're funny. they like that
Cheryl: yes tey're thinking of doing a show next month. mom's watching tennis on record so she's fastforwarding it to every break point
me: damn that's efficient television

A noteworthy distraction

2009-09-09T11:42:00.002+01:00

This is one of the best forwards I've received in ages, but I'd recommend not reading the rest of this while drinking something really hot and/or in the vicinity of electrical equipment. I'm also rather shamelessly using this as a filler because I'm acutely aware I haven't written here in a while. So zoom in, push back your chair, and enjoy.

Random thoughts from 20-35 year olds

- More often than not, when someone is telling me a story all I can think about is that I can't wait for them to finish so that I can tell my own story that's not only better, but also more directly involves me.

- Nothing sucks more than that moment during an argument when you realise you're wrong.

- I don't understand the purpose of the line, "I don't need to drink to have fun." Great, no one does. But why start a fire with flint and sticks when they've invented the lighter?

- Have you ever been walking down the street and realised that you're going in the complete opposite direction of where you are supposed to be going?

But instead of just turning a 180 and walking back in the direction from which you came, you have to first do something like check your watch or phone or make a grand arm gesture and mutter to yourself to ensure that no one in the surrounding area thinks you're crazy by randomly switching directions on the sidewalk.

- I totally take back all those times I didn't want to nap when I was younger.

- Is it just me, or are 80% of the people in the "people you may know"
feature on Facebook people that I do know, but I deliberately choose not to be friends with?

- Do you remember when you were a kid, playing Nintendo and it wouldn't work? You take the cartridge out, blow in it and that would magically fix the problem. Every kid did that, but how did we all know how to fix the problem? There was no internet or message boards or FAQ's. We just figured it out. Today's kids are soft.

- There is a great need for sarcasm font.

- Sometimes, I'll watch a movie that I watched when I was younger and suddenly realise I had no idea what the f*** was going on when I first saw it.

- I think everyone has a movie that they love so much, it actually becomes stressful to watch it with other people. I'll end up wasting 90 minutes shiftily glancing around to confirm that everyone's laughing at the right parts, then making sure I laugh just a little bit harder (and a millisecond

earlier) to prove that I'm still the only one who really, really gets it.

- How the hell are you supposed to fold a fitted sheet?

- I would rather try to carry 10 plastic grocery bags in each hand than take 2 trips to bring my groceries in.

- I think part of a best friend's job should be to immediately clear your computer history if you die.

- LOL has gone from meaning, "laugh out loud" to "I have nothing else to say".

- I have a hard time deciphering the fine line between boredom and hunger.

- Whenever someone says "I'm not book smart, but I'm street smart", all I hear is "I'm not real smart, but I'm imaginary smart".

- How many times is it appropriate to say "What?" before you just nod and smile because you still didn't hear what they said?

- I love the sense of camaraderie when an entire line of cars teams up to prevent a dick from cutting in at the front. Stay strong, brothers!

- Every time I have to spell a word over the phone using 'as in' examples, I will undoubtedly draw a blank and sound like a complete idiot. Today I had to spell my boss's last name to an attorney and said "Yes that's G as in...(10 second lapse)..ummm...Goonies".

- What would happen if I hired two private investigators to follow each other?

- While driving yesterday I saw a banana peel in the road and instinctively swerved to avoid it...thanks Mario Kart.

- Obituaries would be a lot more interesting if they told you how the person died.

- I find it hard to believe there are actually people who get in the shower first and THEN turn on the water.

- Shirts get dirty. Underwear gets dirty. Pants? Pants never get dirty, and you can wear them forever.

- I can't remember the last time I wasn't at least kind of tired.

- Bad decisions make good stories.

- Whenever I'm Facebook stalking someone and I find out that their profile is public, I feel like a kid on Christmas morning that just got the Red Ryder BB gun that I always wanted. 546 pictures? Don't mind if I do!

- Is it just me or do high school girls get sluttier & sluttier every year?

- If Carmen San Diego and Waldo ever got together, their offspring would probably just be completely invisible.

- Why is it that during an ice-breaker, when the whole room has to go around and say their name and where they are from, I get so incredibly nervous? Like I know my name, I know where I'm from, this shouldn't be a problem …

- You never know when it will strike, but there comes a moment at work when you've made up your mind that you just aren't doing anything productive for the rest of the day.

- Can we all just agree to ignore whatever comes after DVDs? I don't want to have to restart my collection.

- There's no worse feeling than that millisecond you're sure you are going to die after leaning your chair back a little too far.

- I'm always slightly terrified when I exit out of Word and it asks me if I want to save any changes to my ten page research paper that I swear I did not make any changes to.

- "Do not machine wash or tumble dry" means I will never wash this ever.

- I hate being the one with the remote in a room full of people watching TV. There's so much pressure. 'I love this show, but will they judge me if I keep it on? I bet everyone is wishing we weren't watching this. It's only a matter of time before they all get up and leave the room. Will we still be friends after this?'

- I hate when I just miss a call by the last ring (Hello? Hello? Dammit!), but when I immediately call back, it rings nine times and goes to voicemail. What'd you do after I didn't answer? Drop the phone and run away?

- I hate leaving my house confident and looking good and then not seeing anyone of importance the entire day. What a waste.

- When I meet a new girl, I'm terrified of mentioning something she hasn't already told me but that I have learned from some light internet stalking.

- I like all of the music in my iTunes, except when it's on shuffle, then I like about one in every fifteen songs in my iTunes.

- Why is a school zone 25 km/h? That seems like the optimal cruising speed for paedophiles...

- As a driver I hate pedestrians and as a pedestrian I hate drivers, but no matter what the mode of transportation, I always hate cyclists.

- Sometimes I'll look down at my watch 3 consecutive times and still not know what time it is.

- I keep some people's phone numbers in my phone just so I know not to answer when they call.

- My 4-year old son asked me in the car the other day "Dad what would happen if you ran over a ninja?" How the hell do I respond to that?

- I wonder if cops ever get pissed off at the fact that everyone they drive behind obeys the speed limit.

- I think the freezer deserves a light as well.

- Even under ideal conditions people have trouble locating their car keys in a pocket, hitting the G-spot, and Pinning the Tail on the Donkey - but I'd bet my ass everyone can find and push the Snooze button from 3 feet away, in about 1.7 seconds, eyes closed, first time every time…

Join the club

2009-06-22T17:31:00.004+01:00

I was looking back through my posts wondering why I hadn't yet ranted about the state of the job market. How unlike me...or perhaps I was still too sensitive about the fact that I had been made redundant. It's a huge blow to the ego, but when you retrench management consultants at a 'top-tier strategy firm', you're touching the realms of clinical depression.

Friendships have been tested, networks have been, well, worked, and we've run the gauntlet of head hunters, case interviews, (in)competency interviews, and enough CV/cover letter reiterations to decimate a forest. It ain't over yet.

It's been a complex journey. There's a perverse sense of security in not knowing how good the other guys are, but at the same time, if we weren't there to offset each other's cycles of doom, I'm pretty sure we'd all be living at home with our parents.

Autostalking edit: Cubicle confusion, the anti-9-to-5

2009-06-22T17:18:00.005+01:00

There are probably many like this out there, but this one's quite cute for all of its non-offensive, gently lyrical descriptions of cubicle-life, and charmingly persistent lack of attention to grammar and spelling, of the sort you only get when you're brain-numb by 10.30am.

The cynic in my past, employed-version of me says appreciate the 5pm finish, but I'm hardly in a position to comment.

P.S. I've demoted Blobdot because its last post was over a year ago. Some of us clearly have better things to do.

The minor inconveniences of life #1

2009-06-18T15:34:00.002+01:00

Why is it that when you have to take a really important call, you're in any of the following places:
a) in a store that plays clubbing music
b) on the street in a crush of people
c) on the street in a crush of people with a convoy of buses rumbling past
d) on the street in a crush of people with a convoy of buses rumbling past and a line of vespas trying to out-gun them
e) on the street in a crush of people with a convoy of buses rumbling past, a line of vespas trying to out-gun them, and the street-cleaning machine very metticulously scrubbing the pavement right outside the phone booth you've ducked into?!

Unravelling the mysteries of life

2009-06-16T17:25:00.000+01:00

Ever since Facebook enabled their quiz-publishing platform, there's been a flood of some of the strangest 'need to knows':

What's your name meaning?
How many girl/boyfriends before your marriage?
What does your birthday say about you?
What is your true age?
Your ideal job.
When will you die?
How will you find your wife/husband?
What's your swim stroke?
When will you get married?
Who will you marry?
How boyish/girlish are you?

My feed is now probably about 60% test results accompanied by some inane comment about whether the test taker agrees or not. I can imagine them sitting there shuddering with every eerily accurate result and denying anything they didn't want to know. Human beings can only survive that way.

I guess we're all seeking some sort of Greater Confirmation. Having said that, I don't fully understand the implications behind what swimstroke matches your personality. There wasn't really ever any doubt on that matter - your coach just yelled at you until you figured it out.

Other quiz results, however, could potentially be life-changing, and it was all a matter of self-awareness. What better than to lead our lives according to the appropriate "What Disney princess are you?" Code of Damsel-in-Distress Ethics.

I'm Belle and if I were a Starbucks coffe, I'd be a latte.

High summer in the city

2009-06-15T16:40:00.003+01:00

I'm back by popular demand. Let me qualify that statement for all you skeptics out there.

A grand total of three people have clamoured for more writing, followed by the sentence "I've run out of things to read when I'm supposed to be working!". Thanks, you guys, it does a lot for my self-confidence and budding writing ambitions when I now know that I fill that all-important procrastination zone between your 9am start and your 6pm deadline.

I'm back, but only for a little while, because this outlet also serves me as a bit of a time waster, and I'd rather not fill out job applications on a glorious Monday afternoon when I have a glass of wine with my name on it two streets over. 4.15 is apparently a little too early for a tipple, but 4.45pm is much more socially acceptable, if just barely.

We've also been frantically busy. The CFA came and went with the usual brain-rape-type trauma that leaves you second-guessing all 3 multiple-choice options. Some people walked out way before the bell while others had to have their pencils and calculators forcibly removed. You can never really tell how well you did.

Then we moved to a beautiful flat near the Wharf. It was a long, exhausting weekend, made even more so by the morons that pulled up underneath our window at 6.30am on the Sunday morning and proceeded to have a radio war at maximum volume. Our final trip from the old flat to 'pick up the bits leftover' which turned out to be almost 30kg of washing detergents and other various odds and ends has left Weng broken.

We're now struggling to unpack in any kind of systematic way. Maybe Weng was right and we shouldnt've set up the TV first, but we really need to get going otherwise we'll be eating 2-minute microwaveable oats for the rest of our tenancy.

I've also been trying to determine the X-factor that makes a celebrity blogger a la Mr. Brown and Kenny Sia. It seems like a fairly cushy job - make witty comments about the world and get a heap of free things (for instance, I could really do with a Panasonic LX-3 right now). I suppose the main difference between me and them, if I had to pick just one thing, would be a fanbase. Hmm, I really need to get me one of those.

But maybe not right now. Right now is for making like the locals; when in Rome hey?

Shorty get low

2009-05-09T22:47:00.004+01:00

Last weekend, we hit a club in Mayfair for a birthday and some more-atas people watching than the usual high-street fare. Expecting some high-class posing, waiting to catch a glimpse of well-paid escorts, and other general social posturing, all we really saw 'neath the strobe lighting was the throbbing one-ness of about forty people bumping and grinding in time (more or less) to the bass.

The one that thinks she can dance
Always the first one to hit the floor, brave enough to take her martini glass for a good shuffle on the parquet.

The one that doesn't want to dance with the one that thinks she can dance
A moment of clarity hits and/or feeling like a very lonely, bopping muppet, she drags her friend along. Reluctant friend is obliging her dancing friend's shenanigans and hand holding like a drowning man clutches a lead weight.

The one that dances because people are watching
Furtive glances around the crowd, amped up body gyrations when someone looks her way, copying other styles that seem to be getting more attention.

The one that dances only because people are watching
Not wanting to be the wallflower or the alcoholic at the bar. Note the forced smile and the halfhearted attempt to earn social acceptance. On the verge of becoming the one that thinks she's a chicken.

The one that thinks she's a chicken
There's a strange no-man's land between actually dancing and just not dancing. It's like you don't want to put your hands up because that would just make you feel way too self-conscious or maybe you didn't shave. So you dance all elbows and knees, half finished, half arsed, and looking, well, like a chicken.

The one that went for dance classes and is determined to use the moves no matter the music
You don't salsa to R&B the same way you don't pop to big band.

The one that learnt to dance with Paula Abdul
There are some moves that were never brought to the 00's because they belong to the 80's. For example, Paula Abdul's 4 minutes of almost-lucidity on American Idol.

P.S. I'll try not to leave you with a picture of a squirrel before disappearing next time. I apologise.

Suburban squirrel

2009-04-30T15:58:00.003+01:00

God help the NHS

2009-04-30T12:54:00.006+01:00

So to add to the horror of tube travel, we're now told that it's essentially a massive petri dish, providing the perfect conditions to ensure the spread of swine flu in the capital. Imagine discovering this on your first reintroduction to society and public transport in a week.

As I read through the article in the free London Paper (every literati's publication of choice), I became increasingly aware of each sniff, hack, and cough that reverberated around the crowded carriage. Do you know how difficult it is to discreetly (because we are still English, pandemic or not) lean away from someone in a confined space and not touch anyone else?

I could add agoraphobia to my growing list of London-induced conditions: claustrophobia, mysophobia, obesophobia, toxophobia, and entomophobia. It would make anyone build a bunker, disinfect it, seal it off, and wait for the apocalypse, but then I wouldn't be a Londoner. So we'll just doff our hats to the riots, terror attacks, protests, strikes, viral infections, and financial meltdown, and carry on, wot?

Time to think

2009-04-28T15:23:00.003+01:00

Dishes have reached critical mass in the sink but we're still resiliently working around the issue. It's much more fun improvising plates and cups than actually washing them.

Road tested the PS3 last Friday with Streetfighter and spent most of the weekend with really sore forearms and potential nerve damage. I also stood in front of the PS3 game offering at HMV and struggled to find more than two I'm really excited about. I think it's time to concede that I'm not a 'serious' gamer and that neither the Wii nor the PS3 really cut it. The opinion may be revised when we move to E14 and are in sore need of entertainment on the weekends all transport links to the Wharf are severed. I heard there are a lot of water fowl in the area though, and we have bread.

I've recently lost more than a couple of friends to the phenomenon that is 'going steady'. They go to ground and you never here from them again except on Bank holiday weekends. Springtime.

I've perfected my made-from-scratch pancake recipe but now I don't think I want to eat anymore. On the topic of breakfast, Weng made a half packet of instant oats, surmising that that since it's half a packet, it only requires half the time in the microwave. It, in fact, does not, but he ate it anyway. So far, his oat-eating experience has been less than appetising.

Learning French is great. There's nothing like group humiliation to make you learn your vocab! For once it's not me, which is even better. But seriously, the teacher is really good, or maybe I'm still haunted by memories of Mr. Yao and mandarin tuition. Did you know, I used to win 'don't smile' competitions because of him - I'd just call up the memory of his face and the grin would drop like a hot potato. Victory always came at a cost.

I'm just looking at my bookshelf now. Amazon has been too good to me. Then I found Amazon Prime and there's been no turning back since. Now I need to figure out where I can get a truck big enough to move it all come June, particularly since I've been shopping by a certain minimum number of pages. I can't bear to sell any of them either.

Singapore Day 2009

2009-04-27T14:03:00.003+01:00

It's a lazy, lazy day because summer's gone, and I've done all the most procrastinating things I can think of. A nap will be next on the agenda I suspect, as soon I've written about Singapore Day.

So the Singapore govt's reportedly spent many dollars in a time when we're all stretching our last ones to bring a little piece of the city-state to the several thousand Singaporeans (and friends) in the UK. They couldn't've picked a better or cheaper time to host the event, actually, especially since the Sing' dollar appears hell bent on destroying my spending power when I go home.

They set up a formidable array of tents, stalls, and a massive stage a little ways from Hampton Court Palace, and then filled it with free food and more freebies than you could reasonably carry. Does our gahmen know us or what?

At first, I didn't really understand why we were being handed silicone breast implants at the entrance (apparently you can use them as heating pads when it gets cold), and then laughed at the ERP gantry that went 'boop' everytime someone passed (I should really check my bank account), and saw the shiny white tents, the colourful stalls, the rows of barricades, and my patriotism only skyrocketed from there.

Our goodie bags were so practical: wet wipes, a picnic mat, a rain mac, toys, muruku. The food on offer was insane: hokkien mee, laksa, ikan bakar, chwee kueh, carrot cake, chicken rice, prata, kway chap, char kway teow, nasi lemak, rojak, muah chee. If you weren't constantly thinking about your stomach and in the queue for food, you could also go around collecting all the other free things at the various booths: army rations, frisbees, bottles of satay sauce, soya bean milk, bottles of mineral water, t-shirts, personal planners, Mindef caps, and more toys.

The acts were great, of what I could understand and what I watched when I wasn't chasing the next craving. The porta-loos were spotless and there were enough of them, and there was none of the mud you'd expect from hosting something in a giant field with lots of generated waste. Phwoar, how did they do it?!

Currently employed as: Lady of leisure

2009-04-24T16:39:00.006+01:00

So none of the Big 4 firms' consulting practices want me, which is fine. It's just occurred to me that there's probably a difference in the way they define 'consultant' (3 years + managerial experience) as to the way we define consultant (not a partner). I think I was supposed to have been looking at 'business analyst' (a.k.a. data gimp) vacancies instead. Ah, we live and learn. Either way, I guess He knows how frustrated I'd probably be running implementation programs with disillusioned backoffice people, so it could be a good thing.

I'm enjoying the life - long lunches, netball, no rush hour tube madness, but I should really get back on that job thing before the money runs out. My dad told me I've got time so I should write a book, be the next JK Rowling. I can barely hang onto a single idea for long enough to spin it past one paragraph, much less into a 600 page novel. It would be a really short book. My mum said she was kinda expecting I'd be back in KL by June, high hopes regarding my employability indeed.

My job aspiration this week is to be a commercial planner, so I spent today and yesterday getting excited about that. Also had big hopes that I'd get more studying done today, but looks unlikely. The CFA burden is heavy. Literally, and more specifically Book4 (Equity Investments and Alternative Asset Valuation), very heavy. I've been lugging it around London the entire afternoon.

Having said that, it's a beautiful day to make like a pack mule. The sunshine has dulled the edge on my pedestrian rage, and lunch was cheap. I'm almost afraid that this unnaturally warm April is pretty much all there will be to summer. Every day this year seems to be record breaking in some way. Global warming, the financial crisis...we live in interesting times.

Off to game on someone else's PS3!

Why the flu in spring?

2009-04-23T01:24:00.004+01:00

I've been so out of everything for the last week and a bit. The flu seems reluctant to leave, flaring up on only the sunniest and most summery days of the year. So I've been home, with a CSI playlist, my CFA books, and the FX markets.

The first looks after itself. Sina.com is amazing, these people who compile season after complete season of couch-potato heaven need to be given an award. I don't even need to touch anything except play, and occasionally pause, when my body demands a toilet break or another tissue box. Did you know we apparently produce 1.5l of snot everyday*? And that amount doubles when you're ill. Someone should call Guinness because I think I'm close to breaking the record. If you dissolve and distill all of the snot out of my accumulated tissues, you could verify that. Can you distill snot? We should ask CSI, they can trace ANYTHING.

My CFA books are guilting me. I keep them close because at some point during the day, the guilt reaches breaking point and I stop everything and crunch through four pages before the steam and the panic runs out.

The FX markets cannot be beaten, as Weng found out today. You'd think that even without reading up on the news, one could just guess and the odds would be fair. There are only two outcomes, either go up or down i.e. 50%. How is it then, that in 8 out of 10 trades you post, the graphs immediately ticks very far the wrong way.

I've been getting some sun, on the way to the tube station, getting myself to netball games. Introduced Weng to mixed versatility today, which is essentially five-a-side netball in a small hall, with no outs and a lot of barely-contained aggression. Just to confuse everyone, you move positions every time you score so the zones you're allowed in keep changing. It was fun and well fought, but too much excitement for me I think, coz I'm still awake.

*BBC Three late night TV, on a programme called Bizarre ER. There was a lady who had her finger ripped off by a dog leash, but I didn't hang around to watch that segment.

The power of prayer

2009-04-09T13:15:00.000+01:00

This emailed story got me teary eyed half way through a chapter on discount dividend models. Believe what you will, but I think we all need a little encouragement sometimes.

Written by a doctor who worked in South Africa.

One night I had worked hard to help a mother in the labor ward; but in spite of all we could do, she died, leaving us with a tiny, premature baby and a crying two-year-old daughter. We would have difficulty keeping the baby alive; as we had no incubator (we had no electricity to run an incubator).

We also had no special feeding facilities.

Although we lived on the equator, nights were often chilly with treacherous drafts. One student midwife went for the box we had for such babies and the cotton wool that the baby would be wrapped in.

Another went to stoke up the fire and fill a hot water bottle. She came back shortly in distress to tell me that in filling the bottle, it had burst (rubber perishes easily in tropical climates)...

'And it is our last hot water bottle!' she exclaimed. As in the West, it is no good crying over spilled milk, so in Central Africa it might be considered no good crying over burst water bottles.

They do not grow on trees, and there are no drugstores down forest pathways.

'All right,' I said, 'put the baby as near the fire as you safely can, and sleep between the baby and the door to keep it free from drafts Your job is to keep the baby warm.'

The following noon, as I did most days, I went to have prayers with any of the orphanage children who chose to gather with me. I gave the youngsters various suggestions of things to pray about and told them about the tiny baby. I explained our problem about keeping the baby warm enough, mentioning the hot water bottle, and that the baby could so easily die if it got chills. I also told them of the two-year-old sister, crying because her mother had died.

During prayer time, one ten -year-old girl, Ruth, prayed with the usual blunt conciseness of our African children. 'Please, God' she prayed, 'Send us a hot water bottle today. It'll be no good tomorrow, God, as the baby will be dead, so please send it this afternoon.'

While I gasped inwardly at the audacity of the prayer, she added, 'And while You are about it, would You please send a dolly for the little girl so she'll know You really love her?'

As often with children's prayers, I was put on the spot. Could I honestly say 'Amen?' I just did not believe that God could do this.

Oh, yes, I know that He can do everything; the Bible says so. But there are limits, aren't there? The only way God could answer this particular prayer would be by sending me a parcel from the homeland. I had been in Africa for almost four years at that time, and I had never, ever, received a parcel from home.

Anyway, if anyone did send me a parcel, who would put in a hot water bottle? I lived on the equator!

Halfway through the afternoon, while I was teaching in the nurses' training school, a message was sent that there was a car at my front door. By the time I reached home, the car had gone, but there on the verandah was a large 22-pound parcel. I felt tears pricking my eyes. I could not open the parcel alone, so I sent for the orphanage children. Together we pulled off the string, carefully undoing each knot. We folded the paper, taking care not to tear it unduly Excitement was mounting. Some thirty or forty pairs of eyes were focused on the large cardboard box. From the top, I lifted out brightly-colored, knitted jerseys. Eyes sparkled as I gave them out. Then there were the knitted bandages for the leprosy patients, and the children looked a little bored.. Then came a box of mixed raisins and sultanas - that would make a batch of buns for the weekend.

Then, as I put my hand in again, I felt the.....could it really be?

I grasped it and pulled it out. Yes, a brand new, rubber hot water bottle. I cried.

I had not asked God to send it; I had not truly believed that He could.

Ruth was in the front row of the children. She rushed forward, crying out, 'If God has sent the bottle, He must have sent the dolly, too!'

Rummaging down to the bottom of the box, she pulled out the small, beautifully-dressed dolly. Her eyes shone! She had never doubted!

Looking up at me, she asked, 'Can I go over with you and give this dolly to that little girl, so she'll know that Jesus really loves her?'

'Of course,' I replied!

That parcel had been on the way for five whole months, packed up by my former Sunday school class, whose leader had heard and obeyed God's prompting to send a hot water bottle, even to the equator.

And one of the girls had put in a dolly for an African child - five months before, in answer to the believing prayer of a ten-year-old to bring it 'that afternoon.'

'Before they call, I will answer.' (Isaiah 65:24)

And one for you:

Heavenly Father, I ask you to bless my friends reading this. I ask You to minister to their spirit. Where there is pain, give them Your peace and mercy. Where there is self doubting, release a renewed confidence to work through them. Where there is tiredness or exhaustion, I ask You to give them understanding, guidance, and strength. Where there is fear, reveal our love and release to them Your courage. Bless their finances, give them greater vision, and raise up leaders and friends to support and encourage them. Give each of them discernment to recognize the evil forces around them and reveal to them the power they have in You to defeat it. I ask You to do these things in Jesus' name. Amen

That's the spirit

2009-04-08T22:34:00.003+01:00

I like writing when I'm on a warm buzz from an alcoholic beverage. I'm so much more inspired to spout and much more articulate in my ramblings, at least from the fuzzy view over here.

Today's been a mixed bag. I bought that sweater I loved - found a UK stockist for Dace in Norwich somewhere who do free UK delivery, yay! (Weng says I is naughty)

I decided my outfit worked, although there's a definite inconsistency in the feedback from the mirrors around our flat and whether or not you stand on something when you're looking into them.

My mock fit interview went well although preparation was minimal. My coach said I was articulate and well spoken. When I watched the video, I was completely fixated on (and utterly horrified by) my completely mangled accent and the dork on screen. Then I bombed my case interview because I couldn't remember the 3 C's or the 5 forces or the 4 P's or any other arbitrary number of letters, and I couldn't add without a calculator or an Excel spreadsheet.

Liverpool lost in the C'League, which really sucked. At home, which sucks even more. To Chelsea, gaaaah.

Came home to find that my net position on my new and very adult portfolio of investments was down 0.19%.

Ok, so in retrospect, the day started well but ended in the potty (like the stock market), only it doesn't feel that bad because I'll have a beautiful new sweater in a couple of days and because I think that one G&T might have inadvertently been a double, thank you mister firstdayonthejob bartender.

Desperate for Dace : how to lose an entire morning

2009-04-07T09:43:00.005+01:00

Automated websurfing
Check all of your regular sites - email, facebook, blogroll, twitter. Then find something interesting in your twitter feed to click on, like notcot.org, courtesy of Rudy in this instance.

Notcot.org
Great site for feeling creatively inadequate. The grid view's like being in a candyshop. Look around at all the things that catch your attention - you'll have to be selective here or risk your soul to eternal websurfing, then look up and sigh quietly at how the clocks have zipped forward an hour and a half. Mosey on over to notcot's sister sites and stumble across Notcouture.

Swallow the prejudice and all other words associated with 'couture'
Whoever put this site together should set up a shop and be a fulltime buyer. Almost every image is captioned with a very perky "I love...!!" or "Perfect...!!", and then shed that poor-person's cynicism and agree that every piece makes your clothing want list look like the catalogue of the British Library.

Begin the obsession
Pick a piece and decide that you really can't live without it.

And reset!

2009-04-06T11:14:00.005+01:00

It's Monday. I wish that mattered to me the way it once did. And it's a four day work week here, again, missing the excitement that comes with one of the 8 Bank holidays a year.

I now think job applications are actually fun. I love stalking job ad sites, so my CFA studying's been relegated to the bottom rung at the moment.

I've also been hanging around a lot of photographers, and once they start talking, I want to buy a 'proper' camera. The ones that are big and bulky and not automatic. They'd also set me back about £500.

Talking about cash or the lack thereof, our Wii vs. PS3 debate has turned into Wii vs PS3 vs X-Box. Thanks for stirring the mix.

An assault on the senses

2009-04-04T22:51:00.004+01:00

The smell of fried onions wafts around the stands, the roar of voices raised in team song, the thundering underfoot when the impatience of that elusive goal translates into a reverberation of clapping hands and stamping feet.

We only hit the woodwork four times, so when that extra-time goal slammed home, coherent thought was impossible. We screamed, pumped out fists in salute, celebrated like that ball had come off our own boot.

And then there was Weng standing quietly next to me, thinking about the kind of hill Man Utd would have to climb tomorrow.

Five days of aggravation

2009-04-03T22:59:00.003+01:00

Monday: Realised that the possibly fastest-ever job application was only made to THE best digital media agency in the world, crappy cover letter and all. Score.

Tuesday: Discovered that aspiring copywriter/journalists don't get paid enough to actually live in London. Dragged myself to a totally uninspired chat with a headhunter on why I'm an amazing quant (because i<3 financial services and montecarlo simulations). Then travelled an hour to get crushed by the opposing team. Got repeatedly sat on by the goalie (netball is a strange game) and gave up fighting the 40in ass that kept body checking me.

Wednesday: Waited at Buckingham Palace for 5 hours (ah the joy of being jobless) for Obama to rock up - saw the Mexican president twice, Camilla, someone in the Navy with things on his shoulder, several black limos and entourage-bearing Vianos, and the back of Obama's Lincoln when it finally nipped in on the right when we were looking left. Then rushed across London for versatility only to run hard, but still lose.

Thursday: Rushed to French class in the morning, then spent the rest of the day entertaining myself and thinking about the quickest capitalist-driven way to blow my ISA money.

Friday: Blew my ISA money in fifteen minutes while sitting on the couch in my pyjamas. Hurried to an assertive behaviour workshop only to be reminded that I'm not successfully assertive in any way, just aggressive and reactive. Spent most of the evening listening to the awesomeness of 1088 only to never make it there in the end.

Birthdays are a lesson in opportunity cost

2009-03-28T21:23:00.002Z

So it was my birthday recently. My wish list is so long I'd be too embarrassed to use the wish list gadget and put it in the margin. That and the fact that there wouldn't be enough margin for the whole thing. So when it comes around to that once a year event when your friends are obligated to chip in for a present, there comes the inevitable question, "Sowhaddyawant for your birthday?"

At which point I have to thumb through the index of all the things I want, ordered by period-in-my-life (Barbie dolls through to puppies), sometimes simply just by period (chocolate, and a large box of tissues through to padded cell and straight jacket), and then cross-referenced by degrees of practicality through to straight out space-tourist-scale extravagance, and then reign it all back in with a huge piece of Asian upbringing and mumble, "Er, I don't know...Seriously, I really have no idea. It's not a big deal anyway."

So after a massive meal of (more) barbecue last weekend, I was kindly given the Complete Collection of Calvin and Hobbes to truck home. Weng sacrificed his gift idea to our friends (because I'd already twisted his arm into buying me a very specific bracelet) so Tish could wield his Amazon Prime wand and get the 30 tonne literary marvel delivered to his suburbian mansion.

It is terrific! I don't use that word often, but it seems fitting somehow, given the gravitas of everything Calvin and Hobbes represents to the world of comic writing. It also has family heirloom written all over it - one for each of you, Flopsy, Mopsy, and Jo. (My dogs, not my kids.)

Singapore Day 2009, Hamptons Court, London

2009-03-18T10:24:00.003Z

You are all cordially invited to Singapore Day 2009 at Hamptons Court on April 25, 2009!

It'll be awesome (because my government says so). Where else would you like to spend your Saturday than completely immersed in brilliant Singaporean culture: food and excessive use of Singlish. And Hamptons Courts in springtime is already a good excuse to rock up.

Give us a chance to brainwash you! Just register at the link below and after entering an inordinate number of personal details (because we're like that), you'll get your e-ticket (because we're super advanced that way) to print and bring on the day!

Cooking utensils: weapons of mass confusion

2009-03-14T17:58:00.008Z

We have recently convinced ourselves that we were in sore need of these:
And since it was 3 for 2 at M&S, we also got this:
because we didn't need a lemon zester, pizza wheel cutter, a single egg poacher, or a honey twirler, and couldn't just leave the free thing be.

Product description reads "Soft grip skimmer, an essential for every kitchen". What does it really do? If it's so essential, why didn't I look at it and go "Ah! My life is now complete."

Damn, I just saw a stainless steel garlic slicer on M&S online, now that's something I really need. Knives are so last year.

Because we don't get to do this all that often

2009-03-14T17:42:00.003Z

From the moleskine: the first week of spring

2009-03-14T00:42:00.002Z

The title is misleading, it's not really about the first week of spring, but I didn't want it to say 'week commencing 14 March 2009' which would've been more accurate but less poetic. It's been pretty hugs and kisses this week, so it'll stay in the underlying theme of spring and all of its hopefulness.

Here's how it went down.

Visa application: posted!
Major panic attack when the postman took it, and I was hanging onto it tight enough to leave embarrassing damp finger prints on the edges, but so glad it's off my list.

Netball Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday: Almost-win, win, win, win, and win!
I was beginning to wonder what that felt like. In the words of my teammate, it wasn't nice being spanked every week.

Champions League: Liverpool many (i.e. 5), Madrid nil
Pacey, up-tempo, stylish game, or so the commentator said. A little hard to discern the quick passing when we had to watch a series of stills every single time the ball got near any goal. Why does the internet always do that?!

Champions League: Arsenal win on penalties
I got home in time for the shoot out and didn't miss a second. I was really rooting for the youngsters. (Arsenal are still relatively young, aren't they? I've been so out of the loop)

Serious CFA studying Thursday and Friday
Pensions accounting is not hot stuff, but at least you can sit around in your pj's in hopping distance of your duvet all day.

Raving Rabbids rawks
I turned down poker on the basis that it would keep me at the Wharf far too late and then discovered the wonderful bunny-bowling, cow hurling, warthog racing world of the Rabbids!

Man Utd vs Liverpool tomorrow lunchtime
Bring it.

Fwd: Ground control to pilot

2009-03-12T17:51:00.004Z

Tower: 'Delta 351, you have traffic at 10 o'clock , 6 miles!'
Delta 351: 'Give us another hint! We have digital watches!'

Tower: 'TWA 2341, for noise abatement turn right 45 Degrees.'
TWA 2341: 'Center, we are at 35,000 feet. How much noise can we make up here?'
Tower: 'Sir, have you ever heard the noise a 747 makes when it hits a 727?'

From an unknown aircraft waiting in a very long takeoff queue: 'I'm f...ing bored!'
Ground Traffic Control: 'Last aircraft transmitting, identify yourself immediately!'
Unknown aircraft: 'I said I was f...ing bored, not f...ing stupid!'

O'Hare Approach Control to a 747: 'United 329 heavy, your traffic is a Fokker, one o'clock , three miles, Eastbound.'
United 329: 'Approach, I've always wanted to say this..I've got the little Fokker in sight.'

A DC-10 had come in a little hot and thus had an exceedingly long roll out after touching down.
San Jose Tower Noted: 'American 751, make a hard right turn at the end of the runway, if you are able. If you are not able, take the Guadeloupe exit off Highway 101, make a right at the lights and return to the airport.'

A Pan Am 727 flight, waiting for start clearance in Munich , overheard the following:
Lufthansa (in German): ' Ground, what is our start clearance time?'
Ground (in English): 'If you want an answer you must speak in English.'
Lufthansa (in English): 'I am a German, flying a German airplane, in Germany . Why must I speak English?'
Unknown voice from another plane: 'Because you lost the bloody war!'

Tower: 'Eastern 702, cleared for takeoff, contact Departure on frequency 124.7'
Eastern 702: 'Tower, Eastern 702 switching to Departure. By the way,after we lifted off we saw some kind of dead animal on the far end of the runway.'
Tower: ' Continental 635, cleared for takeoff behind Eastern 702, contact Departure on frequency 124.7. Did you copy that report from Eastern 702?'
BR Continental 635: 'Continental 635, cleared for takeoff, roger; and yes, we copied Eastern... we've already notified our caterers.'

One day the pilot of a Cherokee 180 was told by the tower to hold short of the active runway while a DC-8 landed. The DC-8 landed, rolled out, turned around, and taxied back past the Cherokee. Some quick-witted comedian in the DC-8 crew got on the radio and said, 'What a cute little plane. Did you make it all by yourself?'
The Cherokee pilot, not about to let the insult go by, came back with a real zinger: 'I made it out of DC-8 parts. Another landing like yours and I'll have enough parts for another one.'

The German air controllers at Frankfurt Airport are renowned as a short-tempered lot. They not only expect one to know one's gate parking location, but how to get there without any assistance from them. So it was with some amusement that we (a Pan Am 747) listened to the following exchange betweenFrankfurt ground control and a British Airways 747, call sign Speedbird 206.
Speedbird 206: ' Frankfurt , Speedbird 206! clear of active runway.'
Ground: 'Speedbird 206. Taxi to gate Alpha One-Seven.'
The BA 747 pulled onto the main taxiway and slowed to a stop.
Ground: 'Speedbird, do you not know where you are going?'
Speedbird 206: 'Stand by, Ground, I'm looking up our gate location now.'
Ground: 'Speedbird 206, have you not been to Frankfurt before?!'
Speedbird 206: 'Yes, twice in 1944, but it was dark, -- And I didn't land.'

Old in so many way

2009-03-12T11:11:00.007Z

With time to finally catch up on relevant culture, I find out how far behind the 'now' curve I really am. Previous indicators, such as "How do you not know what song this is?!", not knowing how to download using torrents, and getting excited about the iPhone in the last couple of weeks should have given it away.

Working for the last 18 months has left me in the metaphorical dust physically, emotionally, and technologically. So these are the things I've done over the last week:

1. Learnt about the new Blogger dashboard and gadgets. Admittedly I had to first blow the dust off this site, but I then sat through a Youtube video introducing me to the wonderful world of blog technology, and then wrote that whole post marvelling at all the new things I've added.

2. Discovered Twitter. I don't really see the point in this given that I'm too cheap to pay for internet on my mobile, I'm largely homebound anyway, and I'm soon going to be deprived of the social interaction and a job to make snarky, real-time gibes about. And then there are the other mediums from a bygone age: the Facebook status, email, and SMS. I'm now stuck with the conundrum of how to coordinate coverage.

3. Learnt about RSS feeds so I could combine items 1. and 2. and be like Rudy and put my Twittering on my blog so that my ego is now complete. And because what Rudy has, Ash also wants for most part (money, yes, a cool job he loves, yes, that way with words, yes, the wit, yes, the girls, less so).

4. Got on Google calendar, only to be reminded of the lack of social life by the acres of blank white space.

I feel the pressure of keeping up, reading all those FB notifications about 13-year-olds adding the application to their iPhone/Blackberry. I look at magazines telling me the 80's are back for spring and I'm thinking, Damn, of the few things I can recall nowadays, I actually remember that decade the first time it came around.

I feel embarrassed when I take out my notebook and pen (yes, they still exist) and try to sort out of my life. Teenagers scare me - I try not to make eye contact when I pass them in the street, and I use cuss words like 'poop' and 'oh my goodness'. I swear I say 'dude' just to feel a little bit cool, and get the urge to start speaking the speak, only to find out that they don't use those words anymore.

Gosh, I am old.

The week looks like netball

2009-03-10T14:44:00.003Z

In its various guises:

Mixed versatility tonight
Ladies versatility tomorrow night
Mixed netball the night after.

Now I hope the ankle holds up.

Under current job market conditions

2009-03-10T14:41:00.001Z

Getting tech, booyah!

2009-03-08T17:31:00.011Z

Because our attention spans are no longer capable of outlasting a 8-line block of text otherwise known as a paragraph, I feel the need to write either in lots of pictures or in numbered lists. Rudy was quick off the block on this one - his last 5 posts have involved lists, then again he's probably just catering to his target demographic. Since the first requires far more effort than I have on a Sunday afternoon, let me use the second medium to introduce you to the changes that have happened down my right margin.

1. Visual of the day
I like photos. I particularly like photos without people mugging for the camera. I know that reads antisocial freak, and while I do have lots of pictures of friends, let's try take the 'stretch opportunity' and be slightly artistic here. Also, Mum feels pity for Weng when we go on a family holiday and then I get back and make him sit through a 'What I did on my holiday' slideshow that goes big building, same big building from a different angle, same building from another building, same building from the inside, or mountain, mountain, mountain, lake, lake, lake, and sheep, so I'm subjecting all of you to that very slow death. It also provides a distraction for those who would rather not die an even slower death reading my latest rant.

2. Autostalking
I didn't actually know what this did until I put it up. I thought it was another version of a list of links, but I realise it's even cleverer because only those who update regularly stay on this list.

3. The Annals of Ash
Slightly narcissistic, I appreciate that, but that's essentially what a blog is. Anyway, I actually used to be a better writer before financial modelling sucked the joy out of my life. It's hard to be creative when your space is restricted to the light grey confines of a cell. Ha! Pun! (If you hadn't already noticed, I'm also more easily amused, so expect that there will be much less censorship on this. I will find cheese blog-worthy soon enough.)

4. Followers
A portal for you to show public support (and updates will appear on your blogger homepage, I've also noticed. If you get the sneaking suspicion that I don't really know what the gadgets I've added actually do, you're not far off.) I only have two followers at the moment and I had to do some arm-twisting to get them to sign on. One can hope though...

5. Count
More people visit, I write more/better. Even more people visit, I write even more and even better! It's a vicious circle.

Running out of crap(per) things to do

2009-03-07T15:51:00.008Z

4. 6. ~~Flat hunting~~
As we established last time - still too early for that, but Canary Wharf Central is looking highly likely. Pseudo-suburbia, here we come!

3. 5. ~~Financial budgeting~~
I have an accounting system in Excel that guilts me for making every single purchase, even the necessary ones. Did you really need that slice of blackberry and apple crumble?

2. 4. ~~House cleaning~~
It was hairnets and clingwrap booties in this house until later that night, when Weng boiled some barley that bubbled over and glued the pot to the stove. I'm largely unamused about that particular transgression because 24 hours later, it is STILL glued to the stove.

3. Study for CFA II NEW ENTRY
International Parity Relations (LOS 19f. for those who care, you know who you are) with a side of American Idol. "You can see that these relationships are concerned with the differences between spot FX rates, expected future spot FX rates, Ryan Seacrest, forward FX rates, interest rates, and the 13th Top 12 finalist...huh? what?! aaaaaiieeee!11!!"

2. Tier 1 visa application NEW ENTRY
My bank statements have finally arrived, I can waste one more day, checking, photocopying, panicking, and running errands.

1. Job hunting

From the moleskine: Tube musings and a bum ankle

2009-03-05T22:07:00.003Z

Ok, so maybe you can't learn everything from Google. My taped ankle is working to the extent that it's letting me hobble up and down my street as fast as I can limp. I married the techniques of two expert opinions and then ran out of tape. However, I am a little nervous about the fact that there's a growing coldness in my foot that could be attributed to the following things:
a) The 8 degree weather
b) The fact that I'm favouring one ankle thereby keeping it quite still
c) The tape's done up too tight because you can't really discern degrees of pressure from a youtube video

Maybe that's why I think the tape's working - I can't actually feel the sprained ankle. Might have to go home and Google this one also.

I also dropped my pen on the tube. A lame ankle doesn't quite generate a rush of guilty looking people standing up to give you a seat, so I'm perched on one of those strange blue rests at the end of the carriage that are fixed a strangely dispropotionate height - if you're tall enough to comfortably place your posterior on the cushion, you could also brace the back of your skull on the roof. Tim Burton must've drawn up the ergonomic tables for these trains.

Anyway, dropping your pen on the tube usually illicits two responses. The germophobe in me took the first and was ready to write off that now unusable and highly contaminated instrument (it was free anyway, I stole it from my career centre). The second was the very nice man standing next to me who IMMEDIATELY swooped down to pick it up and return it with a smile. The action shocked me to my core so I threw my best fox-in-headlights impression back at him before remembering to grab at the shreds of my manners, accept the proffered pen, and mumble a thank you, all the while fighting the germophobic cringe. Take two lessons from this: London is actually not a cold place and gallantry is not dead.

What are we going to do tonight, Brain?

2009-03-05T10:24:00.005Z

Once upon a time, there existed a type of person: the uber-Googler. The experts in manipulating booleans and synonymical tenses to extract the most obscure pieces of information from the internet. As the art form grew so did the realisation that logic operators were much too complex for the other 98.3% of the internet-browsing population and the average vocabulary size is only about 6,000 words (and declining), so the smart search engines reacted accordingly and got dumber.

Now the average Joe merely has to find a Google box and enter their question exactly: how to tape an ankle, how to grow weed, how to build a nuclear reactor. And in the event you struggle to frame your query, the field will come up with suggestions for you:

Procrastination nation

2009-03-03T16:28:00.003Z

Being unemployed has it's perks. I'm completely up to speed to almost all of the relevant TV Hollywood has to offer and I've even started on the backlog of Kim Possible episodes from 5 years ago - they're on Season 4! What super-hero cartoon has a season 4! How many times can she kick Draken's ass?!
Answer: 68 times. so far.

Then there's the threat of getting lost in the couch for the rest of the day, especially with the cold snowy front threatening to descend any moment now. The disincentives are piling up quickly. I'm so unmotivated about job hunting that I'd rather flat hunt and I'm not due to move until JULY. People should make their list of inverted priorities and run your life backwards based on tasks you'd rather not do - you'd get a lot of those relatively less nasty things done. So far mine goes:

4. Flat hunting
3. Financial budgeting
2. House cleaning
1. Job hunting

Too bad I've finally met my career coach. Pfft to the motivated version of me that booked this meeting last week. She lectured me on having too many disparate ideas on what I want to do next, forced me to focus, let me talk myself into downplaying the copywriting dream, and told me to go through these self assessment tests, apply to these companies, and report back to her within a week. So after running the above exercise and ranking everything in order of least hated task, I went with the self assessment exercise. I tried the one which matches you to a career based on your likes and dislikes:

1. Do you like working with children? NO
2. Do you like working with older people? NO
3. Would you like being in a career that involves providing support and counselling to others? NO
4. Do you like working with numbers? Indifferent.

Fairly straight forward, and because I didn't want more trouble from my coach on what I should be doing next, I tried to massage the results - give consistent qualities that would make me perfectly suited to management consultancy i.e. yes to problem solving, written communication, and travel. Because as a real life job, management consultancy is about as close as I'll get. 70 questions later and a quarter-way warning telling me I was being too positive about everything, I got my result:

1. Advertising copywriter
2. Pet behaviour counsellor

Ta-daa.

Don't test my patience

2009-02-28T16:29:00.002Z

Swing, Swing

2009-02-28T15:34:00.009Z

As a firm believer in the higher power that governs iPod's shuffle, I thought the following exercise would be blog-worthy but not Facebook-note-worthy, because that would just be a little too embarrassing. (Is that wrong, that I immediately assume less people will read this and those that do will know me well enough to think I'm still sort of cool after it all? Rhetorical question.)

Your music selection says a lot about you. For example, when Green Day's American Idiot sits next to Kate Perry's I Kissed a Girl and is sharing a room with 84 Chopin compositions (oh yes, classical music shopping definitely ticks that 'value for money' box), you either have ecclectic tastes or borderline schizophrenia.

Momo, don't fail me now. (Momo is my iPod's name. The set up asks for a name and Momo is way better than "Ashley's iPod" or Y:/)

I've included the instructions for authenticity and I promise I've followed the upper case text, because upper case text really scares me. My mum used to write sms' in CAPS because (she says) she didn't know how to switch to lower case but really because "COME HOME NOW" would make any sane person wet their pants - far more effective.

1. Put your music player on shuffle.
2. For each question, press the next button to get your answer.
3. YOU MUST WRITE THAT SONG NAME DOWN NO MATTER HOW SILLY IT SOUNDS!
4. Tag 10 or more friends who might enjoy doing this as well as the person you got it from.

IF SOMEONE SAYS "IS THIS OKAY" YOU SAY?
Nocturne No. 8 in D-flat
ooh. snap.

WHAT DO YOU LIKE IN A GUY/GIRL?
Something Stupid - Robbie Williams and Nicole Kidman
That's the idea, keep them tractable. Kidding.

HOW DO YOU FEEL TODAY?
Do it alone - Sugarcult
Weng will agree I should carry that warning label or something of similar ilk 3 of 30 days.

WHAT IS YOUR LIFE'S PURPOSE?
Flying Home - Benny Goodman
Ha! Another sign!

WHAT IS YOUR MOTTO?
Frame by frame – The Honorary Title
"Drifting through in the frame by frame, I'll walk the same path, stay the same line"

WHAT DO YOUR FRIENDS THINK OF YOU?
Trouble Sleeping - Corinne Bailey Rae
Or maybe just trouble.

WHAT DO YOU THINK OF YOUR PARENTS?
Kettle's On - The Feeling
I refuse to read anything into that.

WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT VERY OFTEN?
When it comes - Tyler Hilton
Yea, not much goes on in my head at the best of times.

WHAT IS 2+2?
Summertime - Sublime
English weather makes you obssessive.

WHAT DO YOU THINK OF YOUR BEST FRIEND?
Barbara Ann - The Beachboys
"you got me rockin' and a rollin', rockin' and a reelin' Barbara Ann". Wheeeee.

WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THE PERSON YOU LIKE?
Run - Snow Patrol

WHAT IS YOUR LIFE STORY?
Hey Now Girl – Phantom Planet
Ironic.

WHAT DO YOU WANT TO BE WHEN YOU GROW UP?
Creepin up the Backstairs - The Fratellis
That's ambition for you.

WHAT DO YOU THINK WHEN YOU SEE THE PERSON YOU LIKE?
24 Preludes, Op. 28: No. 8 in F-sharp minor – Chopin
Our relationship's a lot like that.

WHAT DO YOUR PARENTS THINK OF YOU?
Stay - Lisa Loeb

WHAT WILL YOU DANCE TO AT YOUR WEDDING?
Look through my eyes - Phil Collins

WHAT WILL THEY PLAY AT YOUR FUNERAL?
Baby, now that I've found you - Allison Krauss

WHAT IS YOUR HOBBY/INTEREST?
Black Balloon - The Goo Goo Dolls

WHAT DO YOU THINK OF YOUR FRIENDS?
Because of you - Tony Bennett
Awwww...

HOW WILL YOU DIE?
Where or when - Rod Stewart

WHAT IS THE ONE THING YOU REGRET?
New Soul - Yael Naim
Eh?

WHAT MAKES YOU LAUGH?
Harder to Breathe - Maroon 5

WHAT MAKES YOU CRY?
I Don't Wanna Miss a Thing - Aerosmith

WILL YOU EVER GET MARRIED?
Geek Stink Breath - Green Day
Nice.

WHAT SCARES YOU THE MOST?
A Girl Worth Fighting For - Mulan OST
I can see this is starting to really break down.

DOES ANYONE LIKE YOU?
How Great Thou Art - Charlie Hall
At least one.

IF YOU COULD GO BACK IN TIME, WHAT WOULD YOU CHANGE?
Over My Head – Sum 41

WHAT HURTS RIGHT NOW?
Heard Em' Say - Kanye West
Just about everything.

WHAT WILL YOU POST THIS AS?
Swing, Swing - All American Rejects

It's beautiful in London today

2009-02-21T13:18:00.002Z

From the moleskine: Rudy says

2009-02-17T23:37:00.013Z

Rudy says*:
Blog please -_-.
I miss reading your blog.
You should blog more.
I've started blogging again.
Here's an early birthday present, a moleskine**.
You need to start writing again, get those creative muscles working.
We'll work on your portfolio when you're free...
Write, dammit.***

And so I've started again, because Rudy says, because of the overwhelming need to rant about the injustices of the world, under the influence of alcohol, on a very long bus ride home, on the verge of a quarter life crises, and because I might actually need to turn this into my next career.

I am a victim. The latest in the toll of those fallen under the crushing wave of the behemoth of a financial crisis that has engulfed the world in economic despair, panic, and many apologetic but still very wealthy bankers.

And it's not a bad thing. I mean I'm not nearly as wealthy, but we all need a reason to leave something comfortable and predictable (i.e. the next project was always going to hurt more with even less thanks, particularly in an industry that was quickly falling down around our knees and increasingly hated), be it a near death experience, unemployment, or the discontinuation of a favorite icecream flavour, so this was simply my swift kick up the ass to get a move on and find something else to get me out of bed in the morning.

Conveniently, and on some supernatural cue that's fast becoming a fixture in my Brownian-motionesque career path, Rudy's filled my head with dreams of copywriting. What is that, you ask? I didn't know either until two weeks ago, so I feel somewhat honoured that he's introduced me to what feels very much like a grown-up secret society. Part of the appeal must be in the fact that very few people actually know what copywriters do, much like my previous job. As I understand it, it has something to do with writing and hoping like hell that you get good enough at it to make a living.

It is, therefore,with great relish and excitement that I grab my shitty severance pay thankyouverymuch in my grubby little hands, shove it under my mattress (because they don't build banks like they used to) and pee into the wind of uncertainty.

*the following text has been paraphrased, condensed, and fudged for dramatic effect and want of a better introduction. It is merely a representative sample, and by no means an accurate reproduction, of the content of one the longest running themes of the daily conversations between myself and the uber-nag behind this post.

**For all of the similarly uncultured sods like myself, this beautiful but unassuming little black notebook is the stuff of history and legend, having been the much loved and used companion of artists and thinkers alike (courtesy of the little information card in the back pocket, which was likely placed there for this very specific educational purpose)

*** This one's entirely made up

Recalled

2008-09-24T21:59:00.002+01:00

Heading back to London on the 2015 flight from here tomorrow night to land Friday morning, ready for a full day of work!

I didn't get to see a single penguin or elephant. /sob

A quiet weekend in Jozi

2008-09-20T13:09:00.003+01:00

The blindingly good night out on Thursday meant most of Friday was spent wandering dazedly around the office not doing much work. Saying goodbye to the other team was heartbreaking - no one to plan more frantic weekends, no one to use the English language as only a non-English speaker can, and no one to do the monkey dance. You guys are already being sorely missed.

So much so that I went to bed on Friday night at 10.30pm, passed out for close to 10hrs, had a two hour manicure-pedicure where I fell asleep again, and now I'm knocking around bored as hell.

This weekend is nothing like the last, when we got off the plane at Cape Town raring to go at about 10.00pm, stalked the streets for for the next five hours, in and out of clubs, and then got up again st 5.30am to go shark diving. 8 hours later, a quick shower then the sunset and wine on the beach, a massive drunken dinner, and more partying til about 3am. The morning passed unnoticed and everyone got rounded up at about 2pm slightly worse for wear while the hotel called around to ask if we would kindly check out already. Another long lunch under grey skies, and back to Jo'burg by 9pm, bed by 10pm.

Oops, off to lunch and Mandela Square!

BA versus MAS

2008-09-09T20:27:00.003+01:00

BA economy seats are squishy and small, which doesn't make sense because British people are large. (-1)
BA air stewards don't bring you water at all during the flight unless you ding them (-3)
BA business class is basically economy seat + footstool, and the privacy screens make the entire set up look like coffins (-10). MAS business class makes you feel like a king! (+10)
BA might lose your bag (-5)
BA smells like MAS, that nauseating lemon spray laced with several thousand types of body odor. It hits you like a wall in the boarding tunnel. (-10)
BA screens are touch screens, which are genius - how many times have you got out of a MAS seat only to be very nearly castrated by the remote control wire wrapping itself around everything and then trying to shoot itself very viciously back into its hole (+5)
BA food trays are so messy. I don't know which one's my salad or whether it's actually the dessert, especially when the loser in front of you has not put the seat in the upright position when everyone is eating whatyouthinkyouowntheworldah?! (-1billion)

BA (-1billion and 4) on my highly accurate marking scheme, MAS (0).

No wonder MAS and SIA have like the best cabin staff in the world (and they don't lose your bags) - they aren't up against all that much.

The traumatic 10hr45mn flight to Jo'burg left me so tired, I watched my bag go around the carousel THREE times.

Industrial strength shopping

2008-08-25T17:48:00.003+01:00

Bank holiday by myself saw me at an eerily empty Oxford Circus at 9.45am. Moped around outside Nike town waiting for it to open and blazed through to Covent Garden via Oxford Street in a whirl of changing rooms and shopping bags the second the clock struck 10. I didn't spend horrendous amounts of money, but the rate at which my bank account ticked down was scarily efficient. I was back at Earl's Court by 3.30pm with heavy bags and a persistent shoe-shaped hole in my heart because everyone knows that you never find what you initially set out to buy.

I can't help but feel that all British highstreet brands are pretentious and really not worth the blinding amounts of money they charge for what is clearly Chinese merchandise. Take, for instance, a pair of £140 pumps at Russell & Bromleys that maybe, sorta, kinda look like last season's Salvatore's. Without a second's thought, I would definitely pay that extra £100 for this season's originals, except for the fact that my conscience forces me to wait for the Boxing Day sales to make the guilt-ridden acquisition.

There's nothing to watch on TV now that the Olympics are done. The closing ceremony was as awe inspiring as the first. I felt the slightest stirrings of resentment in defence of the mother land when some British anchor person on TV pointed out that the IOC president didn't say that the Beijing games were the best ever, just 'truly exceptional'. More amusing, however, was the reiterated message about how hosting the Olympic Games is not about putting on the most expensive show ever. The London Games will have a budget of £9Bn compared to the £22Bn tab the Chinese have racked up, and based on inflation rates and the spiralling economy, that'll be something like £40 and a tin of baked beans by the time 2012 rolls around.

Anyway, I'm out of here. Weng is napping on the cushion next to me (very stressed out about not being stressed out about his impending exams, go figure) and is giving off an uncomfortable amount of heat in our sweltering 22 degree weather (there is no aircon!).

Fantasy Football: Arghh

2008-08-18T19:49:00.002+01:00

It's back to the new EPL season, the first weekend of which was overshadowed by Britain's unexpectedly good medal haul in Beijing. After being out of touch with the Premiership for the better part of last year and most of the transfers over summer, I completely bombed the first weekend of Yahoo! Fantasy Football through a mixture of injuries, poor choices, and unfamiliarity with the new layout. Anyway, I'm sitting cozily at the bottom of the table, a real positive start to the season.

Couch potato eventing at -7 Beijing time

2008-08-14T20:12:00.003+01:00

The Olympics is owning me. I eat, sleep, and breathe live text updates. Because of a horribly twisted confluence of technology-related circumstance, we cannot stream anything from anywhere in a time when all of the biggest television providers are raving about their 100s of hours of live coverage now available online. The rest of England, however, must be streaming every second of the Olympics because our connection speed is horrendous. Live morning finals for the convenience of the American public and us sitting in that awkward timezone between Beijing and the eastern seaboard have conspired to leave me fighting unconciousness for the rest of the day.

Having been inspired by the swimming feats in the Water Cube, I finally hit the gym last night. It was a really good feeling for the first six hours while my body was in shock from the sudden onslaught of exercise; less welcome was the ravenous hunger that made up all hours between breakfast, tea, lunch, tea, and dinner today, and even less welcome, the deluge of guilt following my high-calorie cravings, all of which have finally been sated after a huge KFC dinner. In the words of the immortal Donald Duck, "Ah phooey."

On other fronts, I am getting better at foosball and will one day beat the German and the American.

One idiot always starts it

2008-07-30T20:53:00.005+01:00

I've just seen the fourth "please return my power pack" email go out to all London staff in as many days. It's anarchy, I tell you. Times are desperate when you have to remember to unplug the adapter and lock it away. I wonder who started the chain - look at all the victims! We've also taken to hoarding those spiral bound notebooks. As part of the cost cutting regime, office services are refusing to restock. Word on the street is that you can get one if you know the right people.

Our gym and swimming pool look amazing - much better than I initially thought, so I think a one-off payment of £40 is great value. I promise to start exercising already. In my head, I've got an hour's long run-cycle-swim thing, but we'll see what materializes, probably just some splashing and then more eating. I'm ever the optimist.

My sister has kindly gotten me my Christmas party dress already, and only RM80, which is like £0. No lah, but definitely way less than what I'd have had to pay if I'd got it here, and it's pretty. Nothing is better than finding an amazing dress for very little money.

Weng is crushing heavily on his accounting tutor who apparently looks like Kelly Brook, which does very little for my self-esteem as I am starting to look like the Pilsbury dough boy's Asian sister, char siew pau girl. He has also studied the length of her necklace very closely, started explaining his observations, and then struggled to talk his way out. Needless to say, he remains at the far end of my dining table/couch/imaginary stick.

I almost bought the CFA level 2 study notes today. Almost. I'm in a firm full of masochists as I am not the only one talking about it already. I feel incomplete without having an exam to study for, but that'll be another £200ish that I won't see for at least a year, or potentially longer.

Why hello there, stranger

2008-07-29T22:20:00.004+01:00

Yea, I know, long time. Well in that almost-month-long hiatus, my bank account got raped by the new flat security deposit (money hemorrhage) and then the summer sale (money flood) and then the 32 inch LCD TV (future money flood). (Don't worry, mummy, my savings are still intact and untouched.)

Then there was lots of grief because my bank account was empty and it was still a couple of weeks to pay day, the old flat wasn't going to release the deposit sharpish, I wasn't sure if more money would be forth coming from the CFA, and my beautiful new TV couldn't even get freeview.

And then pay day came around (money in!), I actually passed CFA level 1 (some more money in!), we should get the deposit back by next week (lots and lots of money!), and I won't have to eat jam and bread for the next six weeks.

But when things are picking up, there's always something to gripe about. Like how today, the second it struck 2pm BST, the CFA website crashed: think 7,000ish over-achieving, banker-wannabes all trying to get their results. The pass rate was 35%, not pass mark, pass rate. Or how the weather's been too hot, which makes me cranky and Weng, slow, and when Weng is slow, I get even grumpier.

On the social scene, Aaron and Young came to visit for a weekend. That was wonderful even if it was an extended WoW pitch about how it can develop all your soft skills and make you a better manager/gimp/CEO/king of everything.

Cheryl went home and has become the new communicative channel between my parents and myself, bringing messages about the family and our aging dog and guilting me at every chance they get for a) not going on the Alaskan cruise this fall, b) not visiting home enough, and c) not permanently moving back to Singapore / KL. I will be home soon.

The only thing that's not rapidly changing is my location, I must be the most stagnant consultant in the world, and my desperate yearning for a (couple of) Maltese puppies - two girls please. I want to name them Theo/Po and Smudge/Mercutio. I've not decided on names yet, maybe I should get FOUR puppies, then I won't have to choose!

Bring on the bubblewrap

2008-07-05T22:01:00.003+01:00

We're moving soon! About 20 minutes down the road.

I also need to take my camera out more. Text is boring, and since the light's been so great the last couple of weeks, I should really take more pictures. Maybe I should start documenting the week in pictures.

We've lost Weng to his studying for this last weekend, so he's been really quiet.

I need to go and handle some really mundane things like bills and debt collecting.

A hundred degrees of boredom

2008-07-02T11:38:00.001+01:00

I'm so bored. I'm not free, I'm just bored and lazy. I'm so bored, I've eaten half a kilo of fruit everyday this week (I love summer berries, don't you?) and refreshing BBC's Wimbledon live text every 20 minutes. My discipline is inversely proportionate to the blueness of the sky and the fluffiness of the clouds that scud across my skylight, and then there's the discontinuity because when it's completely overcast, I cannot be bothered to work at all. The time crawls up to lunch and then ticks with heartaching slowness towards dinner.

I want to go biking in southern Italy or Bhutan (backroads.com makes it look so awesome) - who's up for it? See, I couldn't even be bothered to properly link that website or think of anything particularly insightful to say.

Tomorrow's Friday

2008-06-26T21:48:00.002+01:00

It's a little bit stressful when every other IM that pops up on your screen is someone wanting to talk about who's gotten 'outcounselled', doubly so when you know that everyone's mid-years are around the corner, and that every single review counts that little bit more amidst the current financial crunch.

Then there are the 20 odd interns that have started this summer. Keen beans that walk in infinitely better dressed than me, hogging the printers with white papers on risk that they read in their spare time while waiting for that life-defining meeting with our staffer.

But onto other things. Like the beautiful weather. Someone remarked the other day that he must bring luck to London. I asked, why? He said, because the weather's been pretty good for the last 9 months he's been here - no where near as depressing as he originally thought. I wonder what he prepared himself for because January through to April were pretty miserable.

Cloudy days are so quickly forgotten though in glorious 20 degree sunshine, I almost got a sunburn sitting under the skylight today, almost. My only gripe is that every morning I wake up at 6.30 and panic because it's too bright outside to be 6.30, it must at least be 9, and I must be late for work. I know I'm going to wake up one morning, winter will have crept back in, and it will be 9am and pitch black outside and I'll just go back to sleep.

The weather today made me duck out of the office to get cash, and on the way, I walked slowly past all the shops on sale, bought nail clippers, and went to get a frozen yoghurt, then finally made it to the cash machine.

Wow, a whole two paragraphs about sunshine. It must be Friday tomorrow.

Spain's in the final also. I love the spanish team, they're beautiful to watch, so beautiful.

A change is gonna come

2008-06-23T22:57:00.004+01:00

My new layout is awesome. Cheryl made it for me because I'm a complete html noob. The pictures are three of my favourite things: my dog, the breakfast room at The Great John Street, Manchester, and a Parisian sunset. The colour scheme reminds me of the light brown coffee swirls in the foam of my latte every morning. My coffee dependency is getting worse, so I only thought it fitting that the life blood that is caffeine is also represented here. I think things should change with the weather, even if the recent passing of the summer solstice means we're on the way back to winter already. I've even developed a brand new obsession with accessories.

Otherwise, work's been pretty quiet. I'm on 'the beach' (oh, the irony). I usually update when I'm sitting around twirling my thumbs but after getting caught up in the entire first season of Greek on youtube, I've decided to start looking at how deep the water is for CFA level 2. I took up a whole hour of printing time this morning at the office, generating a queue of consultants who clearly had more value-adding printing purposes than mine, which was highly probably illegal anyway. Looks like part 2 is starting out well already.

We're almost thoroughly sick of football and our relationship is slightly strained, but you know that when Euro 2008 wraps up, we'll be huddled on the couch, flicking through the channels, waiting for a glimpse of a black and white football. Good thing there's Wimbledon to fill some of the gaping void, and then the Olympics, but that's on a weird timezone and I'll probably miss most of it anyway.

We're also moving really soon. Cheryl's nursing her beat up right foot from her beachfootball week in Zurich to get ready to trundle back and forth with our brand new platform sacktruck. Good thing she has a lot of friends to help this time around.

I'm really tired and I have to think of intelligent questions for tomorrow, so I think that's it for now.

Football and freedom

2008-06-08T19:33:00.005+01:00

I sat the CFA level 1 exam yesterday with 5,000 other candidates, two pigeons, and a massive bumblebee. None of the wildlife actually completed either of the two 3 hour papers. The pigeons entertained themselves by running races down the aisles and swooping low over our heads, while the bumble bee fought free from the flourescent proctor's bib that an enthusiastic volunteer had thrown over it in a fit of panic. Oh right, and 5,000 candidates with varying degrees of preparation coughed, guessed, and shaded their way through 240 questions. Results are out in July.

Passion World Tour:London on Thursday was phenomenal. If you can make any of the other legs, go!

Manila :: Aug 1
Kuala Lumpur :: 3
Jakarta ::: Aug 5
Johannesburg ::: Aug 9
Cape Town ::: Aug 13
Mexico City :: Oct 3-4
Vancouver :: Oct 6
Seoul :: Oct 10-11
Tokyo :: Oct 13
Hong Kong :: Oct 16
Sydney :: Oct 21

Watching the David Crowder Band live is out of this world. We were sitting three or four rows from the front, next to the amps. We left with our ears ringing and Weng still struggles with deafness (although that was there before we went for the concert), but the love and light for Jesus was so powerfully renewed. I was buzzing the whole of Friday and well into Saturday.

Then Euro 2008 started and football, football, football for the next three weeks (and no more studying!) yay!

Consumerism: These are a few of my favourite things

2008-05-22T19:43:00.006+01:00

Abercrombie & Fitch: The uberfussy shopper in me has finally been satisfied, trust it to be a sea, sand, and surf-type brand. Their clothes fit the strange proportions of my body by some stroke of genius in design and fabric. I can't wait to go back there in search of a perfect pair of jeans, and maybe flip flops, and that polka dot bikini, and a hoodie maybe...The next step in my diabolical plan is to set up an A&F pusher who lives in the land of half-priced American clothing with access to a post office and my eternal gratitude - any takers?
Boulevard Deli, Covent Garden: The most amazing roast chicken sandwich lives here. Half a roast chicken, hand-smashed and deboned, stuffed into a soft, freshly baked bun on a bed of lettuce and tomato with any sauce you can think of. The best part is that you can get two whole meals out of that one sandwich. There's a roast pork and crackling version that has Aron obsessing while he works on his due diligence. The anticipation of lunch time suddenly got a lot worse.
Sony Ericsson's W910i: The feel of the sliding screen is like a cup of Max Brenner's hot chocolate, I can't stop thinking about it. I'm still trying to justify the ownership of said instrument on the back of a phone plan that I don't really need at the moment. Weng doesn't really buy 'But when you slide it open...phwooaoh...' and he's a Nokia fanboy so everything else is crap.
Book shopping on Amazon: Even though Cheryl always beats me to opening my delivery (and sometimes tries to stick the box back together), there's nothing more exciting than coming home to a delivery of books that you'd totally forgotten about ordering. Since you don't engage in the physical act of handing over cash or card to pay, and we all know that entering credit card details online isn't really paying, it's almost like Christmas.
My Birkenstocks: I've wanted a pair for the longest time, but how can you spend almost RM250 of your parents' money on a pair of slippers? So I went out and a pair on my November paycheck (London prices put everything in a totally different context), in the middle of winter, and I haven't looked back since, even if I have had to wait almost three months for the right weather.

Let's go boil the ocean

2008-05-20T16:16:00.004+01:00

I've had a run of really unstructured projects. How does one manage to be proactive and value-add when you're not sure what you're supposed to be adding-value to? Clients always want to get more than what they paid for.

I walked to the tube station this morning at around 7.20 thinking the only thing good about really early starts is that the tube will be really empty, I mean who goes to work before 8am? As it turns out, quite a lot of people.

I've also realised that I suffer from tourist rage. I hate tourists that get out of the train, and stop. get out of the lift and stop. get to the top of the stairs, and stop. Wander onto the busiest street corner and STOP. IN THE MIDDLE. gah.

Time for...baby clothes!

2008-05-19T22:07:00.002+01:00

A few months ago - 6 to be exact, I received an email congratulating me on conceiving and telling me that my baby is the size of a peanut. Thereafter, I've been receiving regular reports comparing the developing fetus to various bits of fruit and vegetable and remarking on the development of fingernails and eyelashes. Apparently now it's big enough to wear baby clothes.

For those who know me, I have the maternal instincts of a steak knife. Little children and babies smell the fear and sense the anxiety and start screaming - bless their God-given survival instincts. Good thing Weng has enough nurturing talent for the both of us, he's like a kiddie magnet - little girls fall in love with him and little boys try to head butt his favorite parts when they rush in for a bear hug.

I'm not sure where I'm going with this post. It's late, I'm hungry (how much air can a being digest?) and I'm still at the office, trying to help with damage control on a project scope that's threatening to condense six months of work into ten days. Then there's that 7am memo review tomorrow, face to face.

Bring on the booties and jumper suits, I say.

No, joking only lah.

Everyday should be a Friday

2008-05-16T17:03:00.005+01:00

Now that I've finally stopped procrastinating on getting things in line for the International Firm Day weekend (but only because I was procrastinating on something even worse and it wasn't studying), I'm excited.

I'm also thinking about all the summer wear I get to buy in anticipation of Spanish sunshine. Weng would probably read this and roll his eyes, because my shopping success rate is something like 5%., which doesn't make for highly efficient time use. Knowing my luck though, the rains will come rolling in that weekend, effectively ending the drought and any hopes of a tan.

On the topic of spending scary amounts of money, it's a toss up between a tote that'll hold my laptop and everything else I need or a Wii. I haven't found a bag that doesn't look like it doubles up as a windbreak or costs less than my conscience allows. Weng might have a hard time sharing the Wii considering his current savings strategy is to put 70% of his pay away, and Cheryl owes money if anything.

Cheryl has reached all new lows: stressing about not stressing. Being a student is pretty overrated at times.

Anyway, I'm off to happy hour. 15 minutes late, the wine isn't going to drink itself!

Monday once again

2008-05-12T13:56:00.005+01:00

I think Pret completely abuses its position as the lunchtime go-to for stressed, unimaginative professionals, but it does include very cute extendable chopsticks with its sushi boxes.

I seem to have developed a very strange allergy to something spring-time that manifests as a large, angry hive-looking lump under my eye.

My laptop backpack is far from chic, and being the only chest-high tortoise on the tube during rush hour is very embarrassing.

The warm weather is great for romantic, billowy skirts and gladiator sandals, but less so for the corporate look - conscious efforts to avoid sweating only accelerates the process.

I felt bad not wanting to go and watch Iron Man with Weng, and he's so excited about the movie, so we're going tonight.

I'm still thinking about the space between the trees. Rob Bell's Nooma series on how Christianity relates to life is probably the most effective teaching tool I've ever tried. I usually struggle to pay attention to, much less remember, these things for any longer than 11 minutes (which is how long the clip lasted). Miracles do happen, it seems.

Three inches of heel and two inches of sunshine

2008-05-01T17:15:00.001+01:00

Second day in a small, windowless room, sitting at a dining table from the 80s, 10 meters away from floor to ceiling views of St. Paul's cathedral on the River Thames. The printer averages a page every 5 minutes, or 2-to-a-page every 10. It too is obviously a throwback from a similar decade. Our 3G cards struggle to work in sync with our email clients, the latest failure of one or both announced with a soft tired sigh of resignation. We threaten to turn in our malfunctioning laptops with a well aimed rant, but also know the humiliation when it purrs like a kitten for those in tech. Yet we persevere, typing up minutes in Power Point, diligently taking notes as the interviewee sits there deciding whether telling us the truth will get him fired. Thank goodness it's Friday tomorrow, thank goodness for Scala pasta sauce and canned sardines.

On other more positive fronts, I finally made it to Alpha. I even sacrificed watching Liverpool's valiant exit from the Champion's League, but it was all that the testimonies promised and so much more. It hadn't even properly started yet (although Weng made every effort to answer everyone's questions), but I left refreshed and am eagerly awaiting next week's talk. Our other achievement this week was that we beat insane DoTA AIs 2 vs 2. Oh, geekdom.

Out of the blue

2008-04-24T17:07:00.002+01:00

Lucky if I can so much as manage a single post every quarter. That's pretty pathetic. What's more, without the frequent updates that force me to put thoughts to type, I can hardly recall anything that's happened over the last two months without confusing events/people/places.

I know at some point we visited Young and Aaron in Birmingham and had an amazing time eating nonstop and getting ripped off at their local fruit and veg market (in our own excitement). Then we flew to Amsterdam the next weekend to look for Tom in his pretty little town, where we we got assaulted by bad weather and got given lots of really random directions to Vondelspark once the map stopped making sense (one canal looks very much any other). I didn't get to try any spacecakes, which was disappointing, but I think I'd take slight disappointment over Weng's glaring most days.

I also know we definitely gave Ben a rousing send off because a) I was still feeling the adverse effects of that all-nighter a week later, and b) 'Rousing' for Ben since he spent most of those 8 hours scolding Evan for dying so much. Needless to say, when dawn came, I wasn't really my sleep-deprived self and proceeded to run around the house taking photos of everything.

Cheryl came back from her Easter holiday the Monday after that weekend and showed me a slideshow she had made which featured 15 minutes of photos of Perdy, who's looking pretty good for an 84 year old, and Joel came back a week after bearing my new laptop (for which I will be eternally grateful). My new toy has fancy graphics all over the cover which makes it look like it should belong to a 16 year old MTV-addict type person, but I adore having a laptop that is entirely mobile, weighing less than a Hummer, and one that turns on without having to do the hokey-pokey and wave it all about. We fully tested its DoTA capabilities on the first night and it passed with flying colours.

There, I think that's approximately in order.

I'm still based in London, which is great, because I really need to study. I've started to have small panic attacks at the thought of my impending exam. Weng's settled into his month of college quite quickly, although he is much less fun than he used to be. Now that he's net positive, he's a lot more serious and less inclined to all night gaming sessions and other youth-related shenanigans.

We're also due to say bye to Evan this weekend, when he goes back to good old KL to figure out what he wants to do next, which really sucks.

Dinner's at Shanghai Blues tonight. You know that if it's a Chinese restaurant with an English name that doesn't read "Mr. Harry's authentic Chinese restaurant - real Peking duck!1!!" and qipao-clad waitresses that look Chinese but speak English, then it'll be horribly overpriced and have none of that good kitchen floor flavor.

I want to be a zoo keeper

2008-03-08T13:16:00.003Z

I'm really tired, really, really tired. Short tough projects one after another without enough downtime has run me into the ground, so I called Weng on Monday night and in between gulps of air, told him I was in the wrong job and wanted to be a zoo keeper. He reassured me that I was just going through a rough couple of months, but if I wanted to be a zoo keeper, he would support me, only he said that zoo keeping at Zoo Negara probably wouldn't be ideal. He's always so practical, even more so when I'm throwing a hysterical fit.

So I got back on the horse on Tuesday, we watched Man Utd host Lyon that night, so that helped a little. Wednesday and Thursday were generally getting better, then Friday hit with a really nasty cold. It just doesn't end.

Basically I was asked to go back to Manchester this week to support the other team until their project ends. My total contribution was largely negative this week - Monday was wiped out by having to take the 6.20am train after really shit week and Friday was spent fighting through cobwebs and cotton wool to form a coherent thought. I feel for the job manager.

Back on the beach

2008-02-22T21:51:00.002Z

Manchester has finished for me, for the next three weeks anyway. We failed to achieve two main objectives: 1) Go on the Manchester wheel, and something else, I forget. I will definitely miss the hotel - the decor was so relaxing. Once I got used to the silence, sleeping by myself and not keeping one eye on the staircase, it was a room I was always glad to get back to. The Wii nights were also really cool.

This week'll mostly be a whole load of tedious wrapping up to do but at least I won't have to start Mondays at 6.30am for the next week. I'm hoping I'll be able to get away with hiding out at Kingsway and not contacting staffing so I get a couple of weeks to study. Either way I'll be on the beach while everyone else starts making their way back into the big financial world and the office will be a graveyard once again.

We're watching American Idol and my sister, younger by three years, is complaining about feeling old as a bunch of 16 and 17 year olds take the stage. I'm growing further away on the wrong side of 21, with another marker in a month's time.

Weng's goofing off in KL. Actually, goofing off isn't fair, he spends a lot of time in his car and running around with his parents. He's such a guai zai, a well fed guai zai.

Valentine's Day in a bucket

2008-02-16T19:51:00.003Z

I'm still looking for all those lost hours every day - there are never enough, and I've potentially shot myself in the foot by signing up for the CFA level 1 exam this June. Pathetic that I could only go 8 months without something to study towards. The kiasu-ness runs deep.

With one week left in Manchester, I'm in two minds about whether or not to try and stay on or move on. The city has definitely grown on me and the Great John Street is now a second home, a very comfortable one.

Valentine's Day on Thursday was economically celebrated with a 3 piece Colonel's meal and American Idol with Cheryl. I know Weng ate better than I did. I didn't even get a flower, just a really big serving of chicken rice the next day - I shouldn't be complaining, really.

I've spent most of Friday and Saturday determined to make a dent in my 35 hour sleep debt. Weng occasionally remembers he has a girlfriend and tries to hassle me out of bed. I think I have only been awake about 7 hours so far, and the time I have been awake, I've been catching up on pop culture: Juno has amazing chat.

Manchester, week 1

2008-01-26T16:50:00.000Z

I'm finally on the road. We were told that we'd be spending about 50% of our time outside of London. By my calculations, I'm going to be spending the rest of this year on the road. I've been consigned to Manchester for four days a week for the next four weeks. I think I will eventually manage to leave the country.

In Manchester, old Victorian architecture rubs shoulders with modern monstrosities and several blocks of grim concrete buildings, a throwback from the 70s. Drunken women on a night out in this town have a similar fashion sense.

The first week has been hysterical. The team is hilarious. We've been working hard but the social time and drinks afterwards more than make up for any grief during the day. Good company, great times. My hotel room is possibly bigger than our flat in London, but more importantly, has significant Wii party potential.

Let's go again this season, guys?

2008-01-13T16:24:00.000Z

The skiing was brilliant. If you're on Facebook, which I'm sure you are, our pictures are on there. We're still waiting for Aaron and Young's photos. They've got more action photos because Aaron, being a confident skier, tagged along with Young and I in our significantly less confident group, which meant he had time (and sufficient control) to take out his camera.

We are definitely old now, though. It would have been worse, were it not for my Forest Gump-esque knee guards. By the time we had stopped hurting from the unaccustomed exercise, it was time to head home. We're going to start snowboarding before we get too old.

So that really bad project finally ended the first week of January. I was working on the eve and got straight back to it on the 2nd. I can definitely say I learnt a lot, but I'm undeniably thankful that it's over.

I've started a new project already, although we're technically in week zero and will have another week zero starting Monday. Being on a week zero generally means being tagged to start the project, preliminary prep, and going home by 7pm. Being tagged also saves you from being put on nasty beach work that could potentially keep you in the office late - all the slogging, none of the credit. This job manager totally kicks ass too, it's going to be awesome.

Weng's started his interviews. I can't wait to find out what God has in store for us both this year. Exciting times. I hosted the second batch of first round interviews, which involved a lot of sympathetic nodding and grimacing as candidates filed in and out. I really don't ever want to go back there - interviews, I mean, not hosting, hosting was great.

I also bought a Nespresso machine in somewhat premature anticipation of my bonus. I no longer have to pay extortionate prices for coffee at Starbucks. We calculated that I'd have to drink a cup everyday for 9 months to break even, but I'm well on my way. It does the usual espresso shots, longer coffees, hot water, froths milk for a latte or hot chocolate, and collects the mail. I can make a perfect latte at the touch of a button and, more importantly, clean it at the touch of a button. That was my splurge and my very first appliance.

I've also become obsessed with my iTunes coverflow. After a week of Googling and uploading album covers, I am only at artists beginning with 'R'.

Otherwise, I've been busy adopting other people's flus. My sinus cavities are currently hosting a viral orgy and all I get is dehydration and a chapped nose.

Bleargh

2007-12-10T19:53:00.000Z

Shame on me for quarterly posts, but I will try to stop the backslide.

It's been frantic. The second project was frantic in an "I'm a retard with Excel" kind of way but the third one has just been plain frantic in a "Yes, please waste an hour of my life telling me what I already know/you're clearly just as confused as I am" kind of way.

After working on a couple of kickass projects, this one feels like a really bad hangover that just won't go away. The workload has been poorly estimated all around in terms of timing and basic execution, and actuaries are anal, and it's been extended three whole days. I almost cried when I knew.

Over the past month, I've realised that a single espresso doesn't do it anymore, but a double shot at 4pm will crush me the next day.

On the bright side, I know what not to do when I'm finally let loose with a first year of my own and what industry I will never touch with a ten-foot pole. Even brighter still, we're leaving for Tignes in 12 days. I've had three months to practice saying it so I don't completely embarrass myself.

I'm having Oreos for dinner, courtesy of Tom and Nat.

Also, I love the random fact generator - I could sit and refresh it all day, but my html-genius of a sister couldn't get it to fit in my sidebar, which would've been much cooler. Ahem. Cheryl, you know what you have to do. This morning her factorizer read "The first draft of the Lord of the Rings featured Cheryl instead of Frodo Baggins. It was five pages long. Cheryl round-housed Sauron's ass half way through the first chapter." Totally made my day. I really need rescuing.

Bad juju

2007-10-16T21:37:00.001+01:00

Weng has bad bus juju: The bus will speed away just as we're coming up to the bus stop no matter how fast we run.

Cheryl has even worse bus juju: The bus never comes.

I have bad baking juju: My oatmeal cookies come out of the oven fused into a single sheet of biscuit, and my fairy cakes look like this.

Like a peach

2007-10-14T19:01:00.000+01:00

I've finally gone paintballing and I've got a story. I hope to finally go clubbing at some point too, and I'm sure that'll be another entertaining story, but for another time.

Paintballing is basically a good excuse to shoot things at your friends. It involves little yellow balls of paint that squish deceptively easily underfoot, but when fired out of a pneumatic gun, cause so much pain that when I was dealt my first stinging shot on the shoulder blade, I actually froze midstride, which earned me two more bruises. Paint ball guns are phenomenally inaccurate, that's the only way you actually hit someone - sheer luck - and you can be pulling away on the trigger as someone charges you from 20ft away and watch in vain as the little balls veer to the left and right.

I've got a couple of visible bruises I can wear fairly proudly, and I'm sure I would've had at least two or more had I not been shot in the head twice by vagrant paint pellets. I'm sporting a spectacular bump, but my hair's in the way, so it's not as dramatic. Here's a summary of my bruising:

Left quad x 1
Inner thigh x 2
Left arm x 1
Right shoulder blade x 1
Skull x 2

It's probably going to hurt more tomorrow when the adrenaline and post-paintball half pint wears off.

The Office

2007-10-09T14:29:00.000+01:00

It's amazing how incredibly aware you get of the person sitting next to you. It's not like we're jammed in shoulder to shoulder or anything, in fact this desk is bigger than anything I've ever had through my four years at Uni, but all the same, I could sit back in my stylishly ergonomic chair with my eyes shut (time and work permitting) and know exactly who's doing what. Ringtones are easy but the rhythm of someone's mouse and keyboard gives away almost as much.

We also have a tin of cookies in the office. Some 'premier selection' or other that involves a lot of chocolate and some biscuit in various shapes and sizes. When I first got here, I thought it was awesome, and it would magically refill every time it got empty. Six weeks on and I shudder to even look at the cupboard where boxes and boxes of this stuff is kept. We also get fruit delivered twice a week, but you gotta be quick, or you'll be left with the last, most dessicated looking orange in the pile, and even that'll go by lunchtime.

One of the upsides I can think of working in a firm that's largely male is that there's never a queue for the bathroom. Although whoever designed the toilet paper dispenser and the toilet roll should be shot. There is too much tissue on the entire roll (you'll probably never hear that one at home) and it rests against the inner wall of the dispenser such that you can only ever get the paper out square by square, because the perforation isn't strong enough to withstand the entire bulk of the roll. Worse still, when you have to twist your arm up into the dispenser to find the end of the roll, and then proceed to pull it out square by square until you've collected enough.

Network printing is another thing that is beyond me (Regressions, I can now handle). You need to remember to set up two-to-a-page, double sided (because trees are good things), and tell it to collate so you're not the idiot sorting through reams of paper. Then you have to choose one printer out of about twenty three, choose which pages you want and how many copies you need and finally hit print. You then walk all the way to the printer of your choice and stand there waiting for it to start, only it doesn't. You dash back to your computer, thinking you've probably sent it to one of the other twenty two printers, and run around the third floor printers hoping that it hasn't gone to the second floor instead. Then it starts all over again.

To be fair though, I haven't been all that desperate for Fridays. Still eager.

When your knees buckle, but your belt won't

2007-10-07T17:53:00.001+01:00

Random parts of my body are aching, often those associated with encroaching age. We only played a couple of hours on Saturday, which made me feel fantastic for the rest of the day. Then Sunday morning rolled around; every movement was accompanied by a grimace and I found my hands involuntarily supporting my lower back.

So I also tried updating my iPod this weekend, but got confused, so Cheryl helped. Then she kindly went through her collection, playing me song snippets that suddenly sounded all too rock. Looks like I'm going to have to start turning to Tish. I've joined the grey side.

Still lovin' it

2007-10-04T22:08:00.000+01:00

I'm a month in and still enjoying myself. I was blessed with a very understanding and an incredibly patient job manager who told me I didn't need to come in on time every day. After spending a week worrying about protocol, I've finally relaxed and my brain is no longer in a blank state of panic. I think I've moved a little past the moron mode, although the IRC know my name and probably think I'm an idiot for sending the wrong data request twice. The awesome part is I can wear jeans into the London office. I heard, in Spain, you can even wear a t-shirt. I love this firm. And there's a guy working here that looks like Mr. Anderson. Our part on this project is wraps up tomorrow so I'm waiting to see what's next.

Eager beaver

2007-09-10T20:21:00.000+01:00

Finding an unsecured network that barely hooks up on one bar is almost as thrilling as watching the Rugby World Cup kick off; owning a laptop that isn't tethered to the wall or a router, even more so. This job is turning out to be incredible. True, we haven't actually started proper work yet, but it is so awesome just being part of it all. I'm a happy bunny.

Slow, fast, fast, slow.

2007-08-29T20:38:00.000+01:00

Slow: The first five days of our two week long holiday in New Zealand complete with rain, hail, and a bad cold.

Fast: The last nine days of our holiday in New Zealand, struck dumb by awesome natural beauty time and time again and lots of mini golf.

Fast: The three days between New Zealand and London were only 8 hours long.

Slow: The jetlagged way the clock is ticking over to bedtime.

My first tag

2007-07-25T10:47:00.000+01:00

I think Sarah is the first ever person who's tagged me, so I can't possibly ignore it, for fear of the Sarah-ness.

1) Each player must post these rules first.
2) Each player starts with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
3) People who are tagged need to write on their own blog about their eight things and post these rules.
4) At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names.
5) Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged, and to read your blog.Here are 8 little known facts about me:

One: I love baby food, but only the fruit type, too bad it comes in such tiny bottles.

Two: I saved my sister from drowning when she was about 10 months old and about half my weight. I was 6 and could barely keep myself afloat. I frequently used this to garner favors, until I accidentally tried to kill her 18 years later by locking her lazy butt in the car.

Three: I saved my brother from getting beaten to death by my sister. He was barely a couple months old, but Cheryl already wanted to beat him bloody. She was two. He never fully appreciates this, no sort of leverage works on the boy.

Four: I cannot speak any language other than English, despite what my CV says.

Five: I really hate peas. They give me goose bumps and make me retch. Oh, and carrots, cucumber, and coriander.

Six: My boyfriend tries to force-feed me the above vegetables, except the peas, he also doesn't like peas.

Seven: At the moment, I'd rather have puppies than children.

Eight: I still believe in monsters.

Back in KL

2007-07-22T14:17:00.000+01:00

I got back by the skin of my teeth, barely making my ride home at 5.30pm. I sat with Godwin at the visa agency for what felt like an eternity before they called out my name, each of the twenty long minutes sank me further and further into despair. I was expecting to wait until everyone else had been served before being told that my passport hadn't been returned yet, but when they called me name, I was out of there like a shot.

So the week I was in Singapore consisted of a lot of grief, namely the visa agency, the weather, and how quickly the taxi meters tick over. I was so stressed out getting my application together and then waiting for it that I've developed a twitch in my right upper eyelid. However, I am ever so grateful to Godwin, Phin, Lester, Viks, Ming, and Chris for entertaining me. It was so good meeting up with them. I now have a new favorite place to go to in Singapore besides the ice cream place on 6th Avenue - Chocolate by Max Brenner serves orgasmic hot chocolate.

It was also wonderful spending some time with my Grandma, trying to scratch together a few sentences in Hokkien. It was a pathetic attempt for someone of my ethnicity, but a huge victory for me when, for once, it wasn't met by a completely blank gaze or side-splitting laughter. My cousin, on the other hand, has reached that age where meal times have all the volatility of a war zone.

Now to start another week of yoga and relaxing. My weeks are disappearing so quickly. Eeee.

First prize for thinking

2007-07-17T13:48:00.000+01:00

Visa lady: Can I see your passport?
Me: Sure (Hands her a Singaporean passport)
Visa lady: Can I see your IC?
Me: Um...is my passport not enough? But okay... (Hands her a pink Singaporean IC)
Visa lady: Ah, I see you're Singaporean. (In a moment of revelation.)
Me: -_-

She then asked me to go and photocopy my IC to submit it along with the rest of my application tomorrow to make "doubly sure". Apparently the passport doesn't really count. She's right, they were just handing them out at the door.

Before I go

2007-07-15T16:07:00.000+01:00

Buffets are the most entertaining times to people watch, when they have to wrestle their gluttony in the public eye. Like that guy that grabbed the nearest thongs and tried to dive into pile of salmon sashimi, only to be stopped by the chef and told to use the long fiddly chopsticks instead, or the woman who picked up every single piece of fish on the plate to check its underside. I wasn't sure what she was looking for, but Cheryl said to tell her that 'the gold is underneath the tuna' the next time I saw her.

I'm totally addicted to Michael Buble's 'Everything'. It makes me so mushy feeling. That and 'Before he cheats' by Carrie Underwood. I'm waiting for Malaysian radio to ruin those songs for me though, through a severe case of overplaying; the way Elliott Yamin's voice triggers an immediate finger on the presets.

I'm off to Singapore tomorrow morning. I'm seeing how quickly I can get in and get out, preferably with my entry clearance in tow. Hopefully they won't stop me from re-entering Malaysia, thinking I've just ducked into Singapore for 48 hours to refresh my visitor's pass. Not that I want to be completely antisocial and not see anyone, in fact I've already got a dinner booked for Monday night and lunch on Tuesday, but I'm so desperate to just rest at home before the great New Zealand adventure kicks off in two weeks or so. Holidays abroad with my family always seem to feel like they go at breakneck speed, especially when Mum's idea of sleeping in is 8.30am (9 O'CLOCK ALREADY! GET UP!).

My summer is running by as fast as a good book.

I just don't understand

2007-07-11T10:35:00.000+01:00

How can someone who goes to church every week, has been baptised no less, and calls himself a Christian turn his back on the very thing he is supposed to uphold and lie to his parents? Let's not talk about the fact that the lie was about skipping class (again). His completely hypocritical actions make me sick to my stomach.

We stood in line wondering if we should go to the trouble of buying him and his friends movie tickets because that was where he was supposed to be after school, instead of at a cyber cafe during class. We thought of calling but checked the time and thought he would be in class and therefore not a good idea to distract him. The fact that Mum even let him go out on a school day is something we would never have even dared ask for.

Fine, we can sympathise - it's hard for a boy to grow up with two older sisters, so the special dispension he's been getting his whole life maybe makes up for that. Like the way he was given RM400 the very same morning to buy an iPod Nano, while Cheryl still hangs onto her disc player; or the way he's already thinking about replacing his six month old phone, and I'm still clinging to my four-year-old Nokia that sparks exclamations of surprise that anyone even still has that model.

It's not as if he works outside of school hours and let's not talk about the huge amounts of grief he caused us by spending more time on WoW than actually studying during his last exam session. His grades aren't stellar, although he certainly doesn't lack for brains. He's the sort who thinks he can pass math without lifting a finger outside class to practice. He has to sit through hours of tuition so someone can babysit him, at the age of seventeen, and makes sure that he studies some. Computer every night for four hours is apparently not enough, although we were barely allowed two hours during our A levels, he cuts class without flinching to go to a cyber cafe despite repeated promises never to go again during term time.

When Mum was interrogating him this afternoon, I could not for the life of me think why she would keep on asking the same questions. I wanted to jump in and stop her. Obviously she knows her son better. Lies. All lies. His empty promises amount to nothing.

How can one boy showered by so much love and generosity do this? We've been taken for fools, the leniency we show him only gave him a chance to take advantage of us. The betrayal is intense. It felt like I've been sucker punched, flooded by waves and waves of disappointment. The glimmer of hope I hang onto that he's finally grown up gets slimmer and more distant every time. I can only imagine what Mum is going through.I don't know what to think of him anymore.

Fluffiness

2007-07-10T11:38:00.002+01:00

I've slept 20 hours over the last couple of days trying to fight off a flu that Weng generously gave me. That's a lot, considering I've only averaged seven hours a night since getting back. I've just been lying around all day today too, looking at everything through a super fluffy haze. I hate being ill on a holiday, there's just too much to do.

Good news came this morning. My work permit's been approved and is on its way over. Now I just have to get my butt down to British High Commission in Singapore and all should be good for the September start.

I'm also really looking forward to the Kim Possible movie this Saturday. It's going to be followed by two back to back episodes of the new season!!1! I kid you not, I've been waiting for two whole weeks! But I'll be at Wings, so I'll have to set the VCR. Ah, technology.

Oh, and the people at the Massimo Dutti store in Bangsar Village are snobby, pretentious twerps. Actually, the lady sitting at the information counter in Bangsar Village is a ... grumpy bum.

Shiokness

2007-07-09T10:54:00.000+01:00

There is a reason that one of my yoga classes is quite simply called "Hot". They close all the windows and the door and turn on the heaters, then you proceed to do a series of poses where you're completely distracted from the pain by the rivers that course down your face and gush off the tip of your nose. Some poses are impossible because you just cannot get a grip on the sweat-slicked limb(s) involved.

I also got a new baby. A beautiful Canon IXUS 850. I haven't been this thrilled with a camera since my last IXUS that took a walk somewhere between Southampton and South Kensington three years ago. I'm going to guard this one with my life. Given my rather limited photography talent, I love how you can just point and shoot with this camera and the picture quality is amazing.

I finally have an excuse to put up pictures. Here's half the youth from CBC - there are so many of us now, it's fantastic.

After lunch on Sunday there was torrential rainfall, so much so that Joel commented that our church was now waterfront property, blessed by a raging river flowing down the hill on it's right.

Contentment

2007-07-03T14:01:00.000+01:00

Being home is bliss. The good food, clean house, comfortable bed, and loved ones all around more than makes up for the chores. I don't have to worry about what to eat next, and we haven't had to so much as look at soy sauce chicken, leeks and chicken, oven chicken, or steamed egg. Thank goodness.

Popped down to Singapore last week, just as the flu was setting in. I must've passed it to at least the half of the country that crammed themselves into Orchard Rd. The new things I bought distracted me sufficiently though, so all was well in the end I suppose.

Other than that, it's mostly been a flurry of important things like facials, food, threading, food, pedicures, food, and yoga to counter the eating. Oh, there was also the small issue of finalising things for our place next year. Weng and Cheryl managed to secure one in the last week they were there, which is excellent news and buys me another week of home time.

I want to stay here forever though.

Chasing

2007-06-22T14:21:00.000+01:00

I chased HR to get started on my work permit application, who chased their lawyers. A lawyer chased me for transcripts. I chased my registry for transcripts. The lawyer chased me for more information. I filled in the blanks and then chased them back to hopefully get it in time for the Singapore trip. They chased me for transcripts again. I chased the guy doing the transcripts for my transcripts. Now that the transcripts have finally been sent and they have all the information they need, the lawyer and the HR person are on leave for the next week.

We're also chasing flats, but it's more like: Chase the agent, make an offer, wait with baited breath. Get out bidded.

Premenstrual

2007-06-21T10:21:00.000+01:00

I should probably apologize in advance to everyone I might speak to over the next few days.

Up the mountain, down the mountain

2007-06-20T02:17:00.000+01:00

We went running today on the hill in Taman Tun. 'Running' was a little over ambitious, we ended up walking most of the narrow tarmac road as it wound through the rainforrested hill.

The whole forty minutes or so was very much based on the motto 'What goes down, must come up'; my thighs welcomed the downhills, but my mind was very much focused on the fact that there would be another uphill bit soon after. I think my body was also a little overwhelmed by the sheer volume of fresh air and oxygen.

Mr. "I'm so fit, prepare to lose" couldn't keep up with us or many of the groups of aunties that passed him, and we lost him around a few bends, so Mum kept calling his name really loudly to try and get him to walk faster. The whole hill and all of its daily walkers now know who Bryan is.

Early in the morning

2007-06-19T22:13:00.000+01:00

I made dinner for my dog yesterday, a wholesome blend of canned dog food and white rice, and then I dropped her bowl and it landed the wrong way up. My dog sat there and looked at me, refusing to touch it until I had scooped it all back into her bowl. It's impossible to scoop mush off the floor and she's a dog.

The house hunt is getting exciting. We're getting there, I think. Weng is getting stressed and tired, Cheryl's washed her hands of it and has started her manufacturing course, and all I have to do is get up early for the report every day.

My brother beat me in Scrabble yesterday, although Dad still beat us even though he was trailing most of the way. A late game rally saw him pip Bryan by one point. So anyhow, my brother now has bragging rights. Not like anyone needed to give it to him though, because his ego's kind of self inflating anyway.

My back muscles feel a little battered, but it's so great - goodbye back fat! I <3 yoga. I'm so hungry, going to find something to eat.

Good pain

2007-06-19T07:24:00.001+01:00

There was a yoga class this morning where I basically subjected myself to muscular torture for 60 minutes, discovering that all my tendons and ligaments feel two inches too short. I staggered to the car to get whisked off to a massage, facial, and pedicure.

The lady giving the massage was crazy strong, and I was involuntary tensing whenever she pushed too deep into a muscle, which only made her push harder. It was a downhill battle. I chose a nail colour in a state of exhaustion and relief that the massage part was over, but when I next convinced my abs to tense enough so that I could see my toes, they weren't that colour. The colour choosing part must've been some sort of formality, but they did have pretty tiny flowers painstakingly drawn on. I felt really bad that someone had invested so much time in nail art when I'm probably going to be a clumsy oaf and chip the paint in a few days' time.

I could, though, really get used to this sort of life.