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| Wage slave blues |
| 06.23.05 (6:23 pm) |
Yup, it is payday.
I'm savouring the feel of money in my account before I surrender it to the Hounds from Banker-bills. The issue is not that we should have more money but rather we should spend less. I'm one who is guilty of buying stuff I don't need. I believe it's genetic, my dad has a nack for buying stuff that seem totally useless.
Like the day he bought a massage-pillow that was battery operated. It's portable and it promotes healthy living; right at home. Furthermore it was good money spent since it was for my mum who has some minor joint problems.
Gave it to my mum, she turned it on. Looks good, feels good and then the batteries run out after 40 minutes of continous usage.
"40 minutes? The salesman said the batteries can last 6 hours?" says a surprised Dad. Queer look from Mum to Dad, who is know realizing that maybe, just maybe the claims are not true. Flip the thing over and the instructions are in chinese. Friends, noone in my house reads chinese so acting like you understand the instructions will not work.
"6 hours, thats what the guy said", Dad continues to defend himself...Mum is not amused.
Dad, hook it up to a car battery and maybe I'll believe it'll last 6 hours.
The Battery-Operated-Portable -Massage Pillow has since joined the ranks of Ryan's toys.
I also have the habit of buying more then one (1) item of the same category. Like I now have 5 hand-phones, 2 digital cameras, a gizillion hiking bags, several pcs and at one time I use to own three cars. I will not even mention the small stuff, I tend to buy DVDs only to find out later I've already bought it.
Absent-minded or merely addicted to the thrill of buying stuff?
Anyway, as I sit here contemplating things that could have been, wishing that I could have done things differently like saving-up by getting that cute pink piggy-bank, I'm reminded by what Donald Trump said about us needing to have an opinion about things regardless of what others may say. So my opinion of myself...I'm Broke!
Laughing insanely, all the way to the bank.
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| Happy Father's Day |
| 06.19.05 (9:05 pm) |
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I'll never trade this task for anything else or to anyone else. This is a responsibility I'll carry with pride through-out my life...
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4 Comments
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| A week off-line and in reality |
| 06.19.05 (8:42 pm) |
The last week I have been catching up on chores.
Yup, after a break early this month, I was hit in the face with chores that got stacked up. Talk about managing stress...
Anyway, I've had to re-configure a new work-pc (yippe!) which replaced my cd-deprived (note: a cd blew up in the tray...don't ask) web-developer machine that I've been using for the past year or so. I now have a machine that has linux and xp installed.
It sure makes good conversation when you tell your friends, "My office pc has two Operating Systems running on it...cool or not?" though most of the time I'm only using XP.
So I spent a day to back-up 4GB of data, took another day to move it to a fileserver, then took two days just to re-install software and to restore my 4GB of data. All this and I still got to attend to meetings and briefing sessions with my new boss.
Oh, this week we got a new boss. Her term is for two years until my previous boss comes back to Malaysia.
This week also I watched/observed Insane-Girl attempt to take control over some resources in the office but her efforts were stop by the Office-Manager. Office-Manager has Insane-Girl in his radar just in case Insane-Girl goes out of control. As for D, well D is sitting back and watching the show.
Thus, continues the on-going saga for dominance in this Office, a battle between the forces of good against the insane energies of the dark Side; of which this Oracle will faithfully blog about.
Anyway...
Wifey is busily planning Ryan's 1st birthday-do. Yup, Ryan will be 1 year old this coming sunday (26 June). It's funny but the parents get all work up and excited about it and the little fella probably won't have an idea of what's going on. He'll probably run around while mummy and daddy blows the balloons, book the cake, send out the invites, call the caterers, etc,etc.
I'm a semi-fanatice race-fan and I find the US F1 race a clown event.
Poor Schumi having to win his first race of the season in such a fashion...
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| Office politics |
| 06.09.05 (10:24 pm) |
Everyone wants to get somewhere.
I hate office politics...well, I'm not that comfortable with politics in general.
Lately, things have not been that rosy at my work-place. I get the generic response of "We are a team, we should work together" (crap) from the powers-that-be when bringing these issues to light. This luke-warm response to crisis will never get any organisation or even the nation moving forward. At times, the best approach is the hard one, shock and awe. Shock them up and watch in awe as they scurry into their burrows. So why can't we face this issue of office politics head-on? Why can't we just stamp it out at the source? Whats all this talk about working together? Man, thats like telling Mike Tyson to go easy when he bites your ear off after he knocks you out.
Anyway, where was I? Em...office politics. The on going saga of D and Insane-Girl.
It is plain obvious that D and Insane-Girl are not talking to one another, let alone look at each other. This time Insane-Girl took her complaints to Bossy. Obviously to prove a silly point that she is in control of the situation and that we should not mess with her. Seriously, I think the situation is spiralling out of control and there is no need to mess with her since she is pretty messed up.
Well, Bossy called D and gave a rather luke-warm explanation to D about office integration and negative view-points. How they have to get along and put the accusations behind them, yada...yada...yada.
Huh? I say just fire Insane-Girl or transfer her elsewhere and lets just get on with our lives. For the record, I only talk to Insane-Girl on a need-to-talk basis. Why? She tends to get the wrong ideas about practically everything from bits of conversational information that she picks up here and there. Like the other day when she thought one of the office staff was using money as wallpaper and wanted to visit her home to see how she managed that feat. Don't even attempt to figure this one out.
All this action and I'm having a slow day today. No, I'm not going to buy shoes - did that on Tuesday. After a round of Luxor and then FIFA 2005, I contemplated taking a nap. Putting that idea aside, I resigned myself to just hanging out at the pantry which was probably the best decision I made today.
Why?
Cheesecake! Me and cheese are like bosom buddies. I'm into cheese as much as I am into chocolate. Regardless of brands or type, I'll dig into them. There's nothing better then to spend a slow day eating cheese.
Slow day? Eat cheese.
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| All my wishes...all my dreams. |
| 06.08.05 (6:55 am) |
Today was slow. I mean reallllllly slow.
It's just one of those days when nothing much happens and you are left to make things up. During the long, heavy days you wish for days like this but when it comes around you wish otherwise.
It's strange that as humans we tend to wish what we don't have. Why don't we wish that we are content with what we have?
I believe that will solve a lot of problems. We won't have to work so hard to pay off debts cause we don't actually buy beyond our means. We won't break the rules because we're happy that they are in place. We won't even grab that seat from the old lady in the bus cause we're content on standing.
But then, the economy may never grow cause everyone buys just enough. We'll all wear the same coloured shirt since, we're happy wearing purple with yellow pokka-dots. We'll comb our hair in the same direction, listen to the same music, watch the same commercials (over and over again) and stay in the same job since we don't have the urge for promotions.
Doctors are out of jobs since stress-related problems will be close to nil and bankers...well lets just say they'll be crying themselves to sleep.
Hm...not an ideal setting for Utopia.
So what do you do when things are slow?
For me, today I went and bought myself a pair of shoes. Not just any pair of shoes. Indoor soccer shoes! (Cause I've got a game this coming thursday-got excuse mah!)
For me buying shoes is an adventure. Why? Well, for starters I have small feet. UK size 5 1/2. Having small feet is both a blessing and curse.
I can buy shoes on a discount since most 5 1/2 size shoes are considered odd-size thus hard to sell so slash the prices and hope yours truly comes along. It's a curse cause I don't have a wide variety of shoes to choose from.
So, I tend to just wear a UK size 6. At least wearing a size 6 makes me look kinda normal. Anything larger then 6 and I'll look like Bozo the clown. A size 5 will win some chuckles from the ladies and nothing more (sigh).
I'm also picky and specific. I buy shoes according to what I'll use them for. I have driving shoes; modelled after the ones they use in F1, I have working shoes; only use them to the office and I have shoes that I'll use when I'm wearing jeans; the skater-boy look.
Ironically, most of the time you'll just see me wearing slippers.
Now, think about this. The feet are the most neglected part of our body but they're the most used. So why compromise on what we put on them? At least use proper shoes for different situations in order to avoid damaging them.
Shoes are built differently to cope with different surfaces and stress-levels. You don't use tennis shoes to run the marathon. Tennis shoes are flat, firm and heavy; you'll probably get a bad back.
Slow day? Go buy shoes.
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| Serendipity...in the real world. |
| 06.07.05 (4:40 am) |
I'm enjoying this week no matter what happens.
There is a silent war going on in my office and I happen to be sitting in between the two armies. As usual I tend to miss out watching the fireworks display whenever I am off on holiday.
For my regular fans (all six or seven of you...sigh), you all know that I've been putting up with this semi-insane office-mate. The girl whom I believe aliens will never abduct for their cross-breeding program due to her ability to out-dumb Forest Gump.
Anyway, she has decided to grow up and pick a fight with another officemate. Accusing eveyone in the office (including yours truly) of giving her a hard time and, in particular, my office-mate (lets call him D) of backstabbing her.
She had the smarts of challenging D to show her proof that she had made mistakes during the course of her work. D refrain since he did not want to embarass her in front of the other work-mates or get into a stupid argument that might give him a heart attack.
I told D, that given such a chance, I would spill the beans on her.
Ladies and gentlemen, this lady needs no bad-mouthing. She practically proved it to everyone that she is a nut-case.
She was the one who kept her credit card at home, thinking that she can purchase items using a photostated copy of her credit card. Much like how she carries a photostated copy of her identity card rather then the real one.
She was the one who wanted to attend a Kursus Perkahwinan when she's chinese and proclaims to be a christian.
Kursus perkahwinan is a course for muslims couples who wish to tie the knot.
She was the one who got pregnant and went around telling people, "I've got good news and bad news". Huh? What's the bad news? Her courtship, engagement and wedding was under 11 months and almost 10 months later out pop junior.
She was the one who sat underneath an umbrella in the office because the airconditioning vent just happened to face her desk. That umbrella was her shield against the elements. What's so hard about turning the airvent flaps up or to another direction?
Friends, nut-case or what?
Now, D refuses to speak to her cause all she does is elevate his stress-levels. So me, by virtue of being the guy in no-mans-land, is passing on messages and job-tasks to her from D. All this and the airconditioning decides to break down. In Malaysia when that happens, its like a day at the beach.
Apalah dosa ku yang aku diperbuat begini?
Translate: What sins have I done to be dealt like this?
Now, I can choose to be sucked into these things but instead I choose to enjoy the simple things in life. Like chatting to friends, emailing new acquintances and spending time with wifey and Ryan. These things are what colour my life and I thank God for those moments.
Serendipity happens when all things seem bad...or just go purely insane. You just need to change your state of mind.
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| Meeting the Elders. |
| 06.05.05 (7:44 pm) |
Last week I went back to visit my grandfather on my mothers' side.
It is a custom for the grandchildren to ride on their grandparents shoulders. It's a symbolic gesture saying that they have carried them.
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Ryan on my grandfathers shoulders.
We had a pleasant surprise when my great grandmother was at the longhouse. She is the sister to my mothers' grandmother. So Ryan also went onto her shoulders.
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Ryan on his great great grandmothers' shoulders.
Family ties are important in my community. We treat every relative with great respect especially the elders. Coming from a big family like mine knowing your elders is really important.
My grandfather is the seventh out of nine, of which only one has passed away. From the nine within my grandfathers siblings, I've met two. Both of them still walking about. Truly, they all have been blessed with longevity. I have lost count of the number of relatives I have, much to the err of some relatives who proclaim that I've forgotten my roots.
Now, getting to my mothers hometown requires that you get a ride on a twin otter. That in itself is an experience. It's free seating, hot and noisy. Thank God, the trip is only 15 minutes.
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This is a Twin-otter - I've no idea how it got that name.
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The view from the inside, you get to see the pilots.
For a small town airport you should check out the weighing machine. My brother had a great laugh over this one and asked me to take this picture to remember that moment. I've seen the same machine being used to weigh rice and lifestock.
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Yup, they also use this to weight the people that get on the twin-otter
We then headed off to visit my dad side of the family. Both my grandparents on my dads side have long passed on. So Ryan turned his attentions to my fathers' cousin.
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Ryan with his grand-uncle
Meeting my elders was a great experience. I do not know when I'll meet them again. At least they had the chance to see the latest addition to the family. Bear in mind the above elders are in their 70s and 90s.
I couldn't help but the notice the tattoos on some of my relatives. They don't do tattoos like those anymore. It's actually tradition that young men in my community have tattoos to tell the stories of their travels. Much like a walking pictorial of their adventures, wall paintings to show what they've seen and heard. Mine would involve a twin-otter and probably a computer thrown in somewhere.
What would yours be?
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| Akademi Fantasia 3 |
| 06.04.05 (10:19 pm) |
Yup, the biggest reality show in Malaysia has started.
Here its bigger then Malaysian Idol. After the first concert, which pulled a twist by bringing back 2 contestant from the brink of forgotten land into the fold, the shows ratings are over the moon. I can almost see the executives at Astro counting their bonus for this year.
This show is more a popularity show then a talent show. The talent is there but the survival of the 14 contestants is dependant on the SMS votes of the viewers. There were some contestants who couldn't sing a note right but managed to hang on till the later stages due to this fact.
Will these new found talents lift the current music industry in Malaysia? Not sure, since that is something that Astro has yet to fully ponder.
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| Step back into reality |
| 06.02.05 (5:33 pm) |
Back from a long holiday. Went to visit my grandfather and fellow relatives at the longhouse. Pictures will be posted soon, once I download them off my camera.
My previous posting has generated some comments from fellow friends. Thinking back at my comments, I have to say that it made me sounded like a buddhist. Fear not, I've not shipwrecked my faith in Christianity. Anyway, I'm back from that trip from the edge of my reality.
But I can say one thing. No matter how you argue such matters you'll always come back to two things. Its a negative and a positive.
One, either you totally believe that there is no absolute truth and reject the notion of God and move into a life of self-dependance or;
Two, you accept that there is only one absolute truth - that God is above all and move into a life of inter-dependance.
It seems rather odd that after all the thoughts and intellectual debate we have over such issues. We only come out more confuse, irritated and mentally exhausted. It seems futile to debate such things via words and fancy arguments. Rather, what we eventually end up with is to put our faith in action.
We put faith in Someone who controls all. Rather then justify it on a intellectual level, we accept it on a faith level - without argument.
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