by my life and my love of it

I swear – by my life and my love of it – that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine.

Taken off the fb status of an acquaintance. Well-put, ain’t it?

Parkinson’s Law

An excellent generalisation of Parkinson’s Law, as taken from Wiki, is as follows:

The demand upon a resource tends to expand to match the supply of the resource.

The law applies to time, money and pretty much any other unlimited resource in the world. The amount of work always expands to fill up the available free time. The list of expenses always add up to leave you penniless by the next pay day.

***

My life’s becoming more aimless these days. I’m contented lying in bed watching yet another episode of simpsons/csi/house/jdorama on my laptop before drifting off to dreamsville.

The list of to-dos remain as long as ever while I can’t seem to muster up any energy or resolve to achieve any of them. What has a year of work done to me? Ironically, ambition has been drained out of me at a time when I need it most. I miss school. I miss the hours of free time spent daydreaming of a better future. Now, I spend my free time immersed in tv shows instead because I don’t want to admit to myself that the rest of my life might be just this. Nothing fancy. Nothing exciting. Everything routine and mundane.

I don’t want to give in without a fight but the fight’s gone out of me.

Cost per hour

Got reminded of an interesting time-saving & money-saving concept by an article.

Always think of costs in terms of how much time it’ll take you to earn it back.

If it’s a recurring subscription, do you have enough savings that generates enough interest to cover these expenses monthly? SG savings accounts are paying a measly interest rate (max of 0.5% if I remember correctly) right now.  What is the level of savings needed to support that costly gym membership or cable tv subscription every month?

How does this save time? By paring down the amount of Stuff you accumulate, you can effectively save more from every dollar you earn from work. This can give one the choice of working in a lower-paying job with shorter hours (and potentially more job satisfaction) or even retiring earlier!

If you’re a parent, does your work keep you away from your children? Does showering them with the latest toys and fancy enrichment classes really make up for your absence? How much are you willing to pay to spend an extra waking hour with your children each day? The next time you get besotted with your latest Object of Desire, think of how many hours with your child it’ll cost you.

***

I’m really tempted to get the Panasonic Lumix LX3 and get started on my dream of practicing travel photography but in terms of hours, it’ll take me about a work week (yeah, now you know how badly paid I am). Is the thrill of having that new prosumer camera really worth a week’s worth of slogging?

And just to clarify, I’m not against spending on creature comforts. I detest SG TV dramas so I think every single cent I spend on my subscription to VV Drama is worth it. Self-deprivation (or torture) is not my cup of tea, really.

aching like an old lady.

I signed up for a gym about a month ago and the membership offer came bundled with a discounted package of 3 sessions with a physical trainer.

My 2nd session (skipping, lunges, squats, free weights, weights machines) on Tuesday has left me aching endlessly. I can barely walk up or down staircases without yelping in pain now.

It’s a sign of how badly I lack exercise ever since I’ve started work.  

***

Went with YJ to watch a play (The Complete Works of Shakespeare abridged)  last night. It was much better than expected and I spent most of the play doubled up in laughter. I hope they’ll bring in “All the Great Books (abridged)” to SG the next time they’re in town!

Attempting to resurrect this blog.

I fear looking back at my old entries though. There’re memories that I’ve made myself forget and I’m not keen on reliving them.

Suddenly, I remember why I left this blog to languish in cyberspace. I can’t deal with the judgments by friends, passerbys and most of all, myself.

Some things are not meant to be recorded.

in constant pursuit of knowledge

it’s been a somewhat emotionally tumultuous 2 weeks as i struggled to get used to new situations.

constant ups and downs as the smallest things made me changed my mind again and again regarding it. i’m happy to say now though that i am extremely thankful for landing this chance and that it’ll be a great time for me to brush up on my specialty while enjoying a balance in my life.
at the end of the day, i believe it’s what you choose to make of circumstances rather than choosing to “victimise” yourself.

Same thing, i guess, goes for a recent altercation. Say what you want but I’m not interested in feeding your victim complex nor lie to make you feel better about yourself. Que sera sera. I’m not interested in defending myself because my conscience is clear.  Choose to push the blame all to me if you think that’ll make you feel better. I really can’t be bothered anymore.

Just a mere sidetracking from the main topic… Anyway, I vented a lot in a previous post about work but I’ve come to realise that I can’t change what some of the colleagues think about me, prejudices or otherwise, except by proving them wrong. Besides, they are right to a certain extent. I am way weaker in finance than in my preferred field of logical reasoning (quote leonard: “You can nag logically”. lol). I need to brush up on my chosen field of expertise if I want to stay long and excel at it.

This resolution resulted in my burying myself in textbooks for the past week and possibly for the next few months. I know I can catch up as long as I put in the effort to do so! This time round, I’ll make sure I understand and remember all that I learnt instead of the “de gui qie guo” method I used to smoke through uni. Grade inflation? I agree with you. Grade inflation = we’re not smart? Logical fallacy. =P

Summing up the fortnight, I have a soft spot for my extremely amiable, kind, fatherly, cute and adorable boss as well as the other new hire. I’ve found a regular group of lunch kakis and endless upcoming lunch appts as my friends are starting/started work in raffles place. My work is challenging (in terms of requiring constant comprehension of new concepts) without being overly stressful. There’s a nice guy who’s taking the place of resident not-very-cute eyecandy (oxymoron =P) in the office for me and the other 2 noobs. I get to leave work on time most days and can easily meet friends after work for dinner/shopping/other random pursuits. I’m finding the motivation to learn new things that I have avoided in the past (econometrics, anyone?).

Counting my blessings and giving my thanks for all the little mercies in my life. I shall choose to be contented with my lot (without being overly contented and stagnating). =)

Hold your judgements.

But don’t presume to know shit about me
‘Cause I don’t know myself
From one day to the next
And I don’t pose perplexities purposely
‘Cause it isn’t a game
It isn’t a test, oh no

~ Geek Love by Nerina Pallot

One week down the road…

It has been an interesting first week spent on navigating the first job in my life.

What have I learnt thus far? (do note that this is a preliminary one-week “report” and subject to change after i accumulate more experiences)

1 ) There’s no pleasing everyone in the world. Best thing you can do is just to live and let live.

2 ) The somewhat crude chinese saying “jian ren shuo ren hua, jian gui shuo gui hua” is absolutely true. No matter how open someone tries to act, they’ll always rather you step on the well-worn, trodden path.

3 ) There’s no escaping the culture of wayang-ing even after leaving a university which prides itself more on wayang skills than actually technical skills. It’s embedded in human nature – the need to impress and the need to keep up – whereby both factors act synergistically to form an unpleasant result.

4 ) My university is making a huge mistake by emphasizing more on style than substance. A “decorative flower vase” can only stay “pretty” for that long and even the most beautifully-presented fluff will be exposed for its vacuousness sooner or later. There’s nothing bad about being socially adept and eloquent…. as long as it is backed by actual substance.

5 ) It’s unpleasant to face a black-face daily. No matter how nice the person actually is, it gets tiring when you have to deal with a “i couldn’t care less” expression on a daily basis. It’s normal to get a little preoccupied when busy with work but the Libra in me frets endlessly at the thought of what may lie beneath those still waters. I guess it just takes a little lot of getting used to.

6 ) I have somehow devolved from being a “cheena kia” to a “kantang kia“. I apparently speak English with an accent too. I would have assumed that accent to be fully Sgporean (lah, leh, lorh, meh and the works) but apparently it’s not local enough. Have I unintentionally turned into one of those awful pseudo-non-locals with fake accents without even realising it?! Oh, the horrors! >_<

7 ) I hate condescending tones from people who have no right/authority to judge. It’s fine if, someday, my boss thinks I’m screwing up things cuz he is in charge of warning me when I start lagging behind. Not you though. I know my technical foundation is akin to crap as of now but I am by no means dumb at all. Give me a little time and I’ll be the equal, if not the better, of you.

8 ) I’m probably sinking into cynicism by this point in time but I lost faith in the old adage of “Ask when you don’t know”. It probably should be edited to read “Ask people whom you know will help you without judging you when you don’t know”. -resigned shrug-

***

I think I focused too much on the negatives but being lessons for takeaway, I guess the negatives always have a way of sticking around in your mind longer than the positives.

After all has been said and done, I really do love this job nonetheless. People are generally nice, the office is generally politics-free and my love for my function has not decreased by any bit at all. If anything, everything I’ve seen has reinforced my initial choice (minus a little unpleasant cha1 qu3 on Day 4).

Now, if only they would agree to send me to more courses to satisfy the nerd/geek/bookworm/academic-wannabe in me. I NEED those mugging sessions to make me feel like my brain cells aren’t dying out. >_<

Needs & Wants

And you can’t always get what you want, honey
You can’t always get what you want
You can’t always get what you want,
But if you try sometime, yeah,
You just might find you get what you need!

~ You Can’t Always Get What You Want

fear.

fear is the main motivation force acting on me right now.

i know i get a tad neurotic and whiny every time an exam arrives despite my endless, boundless, all-conquering love for studying… but this time round, it feels different. it could be the fact that i’ve currently chalked up 2 failures in sample tests so far (41% & 50%… 70% needed to pass.) or it could be that i’m forcing myself to learn things which has never came naturally to me before, 4 years of brainwashing notwithstanding.

i need to convert all these nervous energy and fear-fueled adrenaline into my brain to stay focused on my notes before i screw up in the one thing that matters so much right now. it’s less of the exam itself and more of the expectations by myself and (perhaps) by a certain somebody.