another year to add to my age

had a busy and interesting weekend. firstly, yours truly went out on saturday and did not bring the ez link card. after i was dropped off and was supposed to continue my way home myself, i opened the bag not finding the card. lucky i had some money so just hailed a cab and went back.
brother came back on saturday night. he was supposed to get home tonight. it's a good thing i did not apply for the half day leave. was thinking of taking half the day off to spend time by myself though, but then decided to spend it at work instead.
it's therapeutic to spend my time working (with a few stolen moments blogging too). at least it's time well spent. going out will mean spending money and i can't afford to do that at the moment. got a study loan to pay so have to spent whatever money i have really wisely. what better way it is than going to work and earn more money...heheh...
ok i'm talking crap now. better get back to work now. still another an hour and a half to go...

i'm very happy today

i'm very happy right now. just heard the very good news that the girl that i was helping out with her revision (september's blog) just passed her primary school leaving exams.
promised her to treat her anywhere she likes and now i will gladly do that. almost flunked my own assignments just to help her out. but now after hearing the good news, it's all worth it.
that's all i want to say today. here's something for your reading :

Many years ago in a small Indian village, a farmer had the misfortune of owing a large sum of money to a village moneylender. The moneylender, who was old and ugly, fancied the farmer's beautiful daughter. So he proposed a bargain. He said he would forgo the farmer's debt if he could marry his daughter. Both the farmer and his daughter were horrified by the proposal. So the cunning money-lender suggested that they let providence decide the matter.
He told them that he would put a black pebble and a white pebble into an empty money bag. Then the girl would have to pick one pebble from the bag. If she picked the black pebble, she would become his wife and her father's debt would be forgiven. If she picked the white pebble she need not marry him and her father's debt would still be forgiven. But if she refused to pick a pebble, her father would be thrown into jail.
All the villagers were standing on a pebble strewn path in the farmer's field. As they talked, the moneylender bent over to pick up two pebbles. As he picked them up, the sharp-eyed girl noticed that he had picked up two black pebbles and put them into the bag. He then asked the girl to pick a pebble from the bag. Now, imagine you were standing in the field. What would you have done if you were the girl? If you had to advise her, what would you have told her?
Careful analysis would produce three possibilities:
1. The girl should refuse to take a pebble.
2. The girl should show that there were two black pebbles in the bag and expose the money-lender as a cheat.
3. The girl should pick a black pebble and sacrifice herself in order to save her father from his debt and imprisonment.
Take a moment to ponder over the story. The above story is used with the hope that it will make us appreciate the difference between lateral and logical thinking. The girl's dilemma can not be solved with traditional logical thinking. Think of the consequences if she chooses the above logical answers. What would you recommend to the girl to do?

Well, what she did was :
The girl put her hand into the moneybag and drew out a pebble. Without looking at it, she fumbled and let it fall onto the pebble-strewn path where it immediately became lost among all the other pebbles. "Oh, how clumsy of me," she said. "But never mind, if you look into the bag for the one that is left, you will be able to tell which pebble I picked."
Since the remaining pebble is black, it must be assumed that she had picked the white one. And since the money-lender dared not admit his dishonesty, the girl changed what seemed an impossible situation into an extremely advantageous one.

MORAL OF THE STORY: Most complex problems do have a solution. It is only that we don't attempt to think
Impossible is a word only to be found in the dictionary of fools.

something i need to bitch about

saturday was a fine example of why i dread the season of Hari Raya nowadays. my uncle (mother's elder brother) called in the morning to declare (note : declare, not tell) he's coming over to our house in the evening after he knock off work. so mother said ok not knowing father wants to go visiting the same evening. a bit of chaos happened when father woke up and declared we are going out visiting.
as expected mother started panicking and grumbling. sister sms to cousin saying we are going out. if they insist on coming they are to give us a call first. a few hours later, the uncle called again and by a stroke of (bad) luck mother answered the call. he still insisted on coming over. she said please call first before coming.
when we were at another of mother's elder brother's house, cousin called sister and told us they are on the way. at the same time, elder cousin (the sister) sms me to say they are on the way. if we are still not home then they will not come again and will probably come only next year.
so what's the problem? mother started panicking again. feels so bad since it's her brother. says he's definitely angry at her and will never come over to our house again. well it's their problem right? we are not responsible to what he wants to feel. if he's not coming over again then fine. means 1 less family to entertain. he even called my aunt (his' & mother's youngest sister) to come home from where they were just so that they can visit her house. is this the way to visit other people's houses. demanding them to come home just because you want come over? like the world revolves around you just because you are the elder one.
if there is nobody at home or wants to go out, then go somewhere else or just go home then. anyway, do you have to wait for Hari Raya to visit your own siblings? what about the other ordinary days? this is not the true meaning of Hari Raya. true, it's the time to strengthen ties with both family and non-family (friends/colleagues/etc). but you don't have to do it only during this time. you can do it anytime. just because you are the elder it also doesn't mean you can demand those younger than you to respect you. you have to earn that respect and i'm sorry to say i've lost a little bit of respect to my uncle due to this. don't get me wrong. i will still greet him and show him respect as deserved to an elder, but what i feel towards him will not be the same. same goes to the cousins.
ok finally got that out of my chest now. take this with a pinch of salt. this is only what's in my mind. what you perceive of it may not be what i'm trying to say.

it's friday!!

how time flies. it's friday already. engine's still not oiled properly yet. i'm still in a holiday mood. note it's holiday mood, not Hari Raya mood.

lots to do at work but it's not done yet. everytime i get to doing it i'll start procrastinating yet again. and the new project engineer's not making things any easier. thought the current engineer is bad, the new one is starting to make my life a living hell all over again. he's trying to apply the private sector's method to the government sector. for this to work you have to start slow. he's trying to implement everything at once. i admit, the end result will tremendously help in our filing system, but only if the auditors will give our project a miss for now. just hope and pray that we won't get audited. this will definitely give us much more time and energy to implement it properly and not give us a headache. heheh...

ok need to ZZzzzZZ a while now. it's lunchtime already, and lunchtime is the time for me to do what i want. now what they want. that's the purpose of lunchtime right...

back at work

i'm back at work now. almost felt like taking another day off after being on leave for so long. but then if i were to feel this way everytime then i won't go anywhere right :)

spent the first half of the day clearing off my mails. even with my out of office notification turned on i still receive soooo much mails from friends. the same attachments sent from at least 3 different people. don't you understand the meaning of being out of office. i'm sure you wouldn't want to receive such huge mails when you are not in. i have to sort out the personal and official mails before i can start clearing them. sheesh...

Hari Raya was ok. lots of houses i went to had lesser cookies than last year. and will you all please stop with, i quote, "Bila nak makan nasi minyak?" or "Ada bau nasi minyak ke belum ni?". you think it's easy nowadays to find a man? looking for fish in the market is much easier than looking for a life partner. i'm very happy as i am right now. why brood over something that you don't have? it's much better to be happy as you are, be it being single or with someone.

ok back to work now. happy working!!

it's the last day of Ramadhan

it's the last day of Ramadhan today. what have i done the past month? hmmm...sad to say not much. anyway, no use brooding over what's past. reflect on it and do better next time.

anyway to all muslim brothers and sisters : SELAMAT HARI RAYA, MAAF ZAHIR BATIN, if there has been any mistakes on my part.

haven't done anything

the purpose of taking this whole week off is to help clean the house to prepare for Hari Raya. so far, all i've done is just sweep the floor every other day and now i'm sick. it's really dusty here and i have got a major nose block. started off with the sore throat associated with too much sneezing and now i feel like pulling off my nose off my face.

my sister coming back doesn't really help either. she just brought even more chaos into this already messy house. it's 5 days now and her stuff are still lying around here and there. finally started to cut the cloth to make the bottom of my Hari Raya outfit. hope to finish the whole suit by today. decided not to make any cookies or brownies cos it's too much of a bother now. didn't get any stuff ready and i can't be bothered to go and buy them now.

*portion deleted*
(what was i thinking??!!)

anyway, this is only what i'm feeling now. i'm entitled to be feel whatever i want. don't say anything cause it won't make any difference. i am what i am.

4 down...12 more to go

finished exams for this semester. took only 1 module so i'm free till the next lesson that starts on 24th Nov. so that will give me about 3 weeks of free time to relax my brains.

lots to do now. first is to sew the bottom of my Hari Raya outfit. next clean the house. then maybe i'll consider baking cookies for Hari Raya. don't have the celebration mood to celebrate Hari Raya anymore nowadays. it's just not the same as last time. maybe it's all the stress from work and night classes, i don't know.

anyway, will be free from work till 16th Nov. clearing my annual leave. now that i can't commute my leave to receive salary, might as well clear it now. it's the best time. can spend it resting during the fast.

:(:(:(:(

i have a swollen gum right now and the right side of my head feels like there's something/somebody pounding on it, inside and outside.

what a timing. i want, or should i say, i need to study now. i have an exam paper to take on thursday and i'm not finished revising. really wish the pain will go away :(

on leave from tomorrow

another 16 mins and i'm out of here. will be on leave and will come back to work on 16th Nov. no more mood to do anymore work for the most difficult person i've ever met.

said there'll be an audit on the quality file next week. well go and do it yourself now since u said i'm not systematic. i don't know how systematic you want it to be. never had any problems with other engineers. anyway there's a new engineer here who's very knowlegdeable of quality filing. hope he's not as fussy as this guy.

ok that's all for now folks. will update again from home if i feel like it...heheh..