american breakfast at home(yew tee)

this was saturday's american breakfast at home,yew tee. hehe. i think bb liked it quite alot and it was very easy to make. =)

i feel like a million dollars

i got my confirmation today! yayyy.. an early one. probation is 6 months but i got my confirmation on the 4th month.

had a good talk with my boss and there is really so much i can learn from her. she is really one gem boss to have. Interestingly, i was emailing with my 2 ex-colleagues and 1 of them who is still with the company ranted about my ex-boss. She will be the last of our three-some gang to leave the company, coming start of next month.

my current company is small, not very cash-rich and not some big mnc. but i give thanks i have a good boss and nice colleagues. =) so that's really something to be grateful of..coz i have been through worse days with my ex-boss.

I made another $27 from equities. I was too fretful to hold it through the weekend. not too bad, enough to bring dearie and mummy for a treat to celebrate my confirmation.

I'll be trying out a new recipe tonight.. istimewa..on my guinea pig dearie.

Ah... i feel like a million dollars! (or maybe, 27 dollars)..

better person

For 4 consecutive days, we pressed on. We were out before 6am and we ran. We ran for 4 mornings in a row. I’m so proud of us!

It takes a few repetitions to get the hang of it. I’m enjoying the morning runs. Actually I kind of prefer it over evening runs. I am usually very tired after a long day at work. Often, I have to work overtime and that will disrupt my runs. By the time I get home, run, have dinner, wash up and finally settle down, it’s already 11+pm. The night is too short for so many things. If possible, I will love to stick to this new routine. Let’s see how long we can hold this off. =)

Dinner has been very healthy too. After the yummy chicken and veg dish we had on Tuesday, we had veg and eggs yesterday. We skipped the rice, cutting down on the excess carbo.

Ahh..i’m feeling better as a person already! Hahaha.. I want to cross that 40k mark this week. It has been far too long since I've last done so.

i'm never alone

I had a long day+night at work yesterday. I dragged myself home at 915pm, feeling lethargic. When I got home, I smelled the fragrance of cooked garlic. Stepping in, dearie dished out a plate of colourful stuff which I could not quite make out what it was. When I sat down and rummaged through the colourful pile, I found generous chunks of chicken with carrots, garlic and onion. I loved it, every bit of it. Thank you for the wonderful dinner, dearie. It really brightened up my entire day.

He has been very forgiving with the things I do, though he does not always agree. I made some wrong decisions but he still stood with me through it.

He made a trip down to lot 1 to get me some tonics, knowing the monthly ordeal was tormenting me badly.

When I have a bad day, the one thing I crave was a hug from him.

I cannot imagine a day without you. =)

blue monday made blue-er

i am angry with myself. i accidentally deleted my entire investment folder from my thumbdrive last friday. it's gone. all gone.

i tried to recover the files with the file recover software. the first one could locate the deleted files and seemingly recovered them but all were not able to be opened.it had some file format error message.

then i downloaded 2 more file recover softwares but running the scans, the files were not located at all. =( it might be due to the first software?

i don't know. i feel so lost. i hate that feeling. now i got to start from scratch again. our bond investment calculations. our shares investments. my mum's investments. all the calculations were inside. all my formulae. all. gone.

ahhhh..what a lousy way to start the morning and week. oh man. someone give me something to smile about..please =(

mum, run, holiday

Yesterday was mother’s day. dearie and I went to the shop to have dinner with her. i’m glad we went there despite of the heavy rain because I think spending time with her was the least I could do.

Happy mother’s day, mummy.

We went for our run this morning, instead of doing so in the evening. I like the coolness of the morning and sleeping early the night before meant I actually felt pretty fresh. I’m not too sure if dearie enjoyed it because he kept perspiring profusely after the run. He continued to drip even after we got to the mrt. We do need a huge freezer to cool him down after the run and stop him from perspiring so much.

We will be joining safra jurong for its launch run this coming Sunday. I am looking forward to run with other people. It is also a motivation for me to speed up, as I know I have slowed down tremendously since Tokyo marathon. My runs have become slow jogs these days. Good thing about jogs is I don’t sustain injury from them. I don’t feel my muscles tangled up in a tensed mess.. I don’t feel my knees in pain. =)

I think we will see some familiar faces in the crowd..and it should be more leisure than competitive to join safra. It’s a good change for us. A new group to join. New friends to make. Maybe gain some momentum..and have like minded people to push the distance with. With safra jurong not too far away, I am also tossing with the idea of joining them for the weekday runs too. Not too sure if dearie will want to do so..but we’ll join Sunday and see how it goes.

I am planning for a holiday next year..but it seems that to plan for one is hard. I have to consider about audit.. agm.. quarter reporting.. conso.. all the stuff I need to do at work. Eliminating all those, I have barely much days left when I will not be strapped. Ahhh..i’m going to plan for one nevertheless. Taiwan.. korea..anywhere. I deserve one holiday every year!

hippo and her waist

oh no oh no..i need to lose weight! dearie bought me new dresses..and they are pretty small..i'll cry if he brings them back and i can't squeeze into them. =(

hippo needs to find her waist.

i can imagine the horror i'll be getting after i get my weighing machine and step and them. -braces herself-

i'll buy a weighing machine tonight. i'm going to step onto each of them..and try them out. the one which reflects the least weight will be bought! =P (i live in the world of self delusion)

pink lipgloss

I lost my pink lip gloss on Saturday. It just disappeared and I can’t find it.

I sold them off today, shoring up lesser than what we could have gotten last week. But it was a gamble. Either we got more or lesser from it. But thankful at least we got some.

The other one is on a downhill slide. I’ll just hold it for now. It will take a long while before things turn around.

I made mistakes at work and I feel unhappy about it. Stupid tricia. Just when I thought I made one step forward, I took two steps back.

I feel engulfed with flesh. I want to get a weighing scale to help me start getting back in shape.

I want to go for a long run tonight. Just run till I’m tired so I can quickly fall asleep. The bed feels so empty without dearie.

I’m trying to imagine I’m at Disneyland too.

shhhhh

my staff commented my teleconversation were highly audible. i better learn to keep my volume down..and those things that should not be discussed in office and during working hours, i must remind myself to keep quiet about them.

shhhhhhhhhhh...

better stick to emails, sms and msn for now. =P

3.5 mths review

I missed doing a review of my 3rd month with this company. Doing a late 3.5 month one instead.

There were a couple of learning opportunities given by the director. I have taken them on, with an effort to get the best out of them. Nonetheless it can be daunting at times; dabbling with things I have not done before. But I am thankful for a supportive boss.. a demanding but still relatively reasonable director..and good colleagues I can share woes with.

The overall performance of the company remains unimpressive. The quarter in red will land the company in a sub-optimal financial position for the whole year. There is a whole lot to catch up on for the next 3 quarter. As we begin 2nd quarter, I am still not seeing the light. The management is getting all jittery about it. I am finding the peformance demoralizing because it will mean the company will have less to reward its people with. It will mean more cost cutting measures too. I am trying to not let the monetary issue get in the way and turn my focus on the learning opportunities and growth. The six months mark to confirmation still seems far out of sight.

The target is still set at 2 years for the moment. I have completed almost 3.5months out of 24. 85% or 20.5 months to go.

Dearie had finished his exam yesterday, finally marking the completion of his 2nd term. We have just 1 more year to go and we know it will be worth all the time and effort.

finding reasons..to go on.

I realise it is about finding reasons to go on.

I was on the verge to throw the towel in...but dearie reminded reasons to go on. Why am I here in the first place? What did I set out to achieve?

No matter where I go there will be challenges. There will be bound to be difficult people which I will have to learn to deal with. Everyone makes mistakes. What makes us stand out from the rest is how we pick ourselves up and learn from the mistakes.

I have a long way to go. And for now, there is no giving up.

P.S: I like this photo of the tree at the hill around Lake Kawaguchi. Aww..i miss Japan!

laptops & leaps

The whole ordeal of using a sluggish laptop has driven me up the wall. On final resort, despite not wanting to lug my own laptop to and fro, I brought my own today.

After switching on the laptop and using it, I wish I have done so earlier. It would have saved me from a lot of frustration. I have voiced out on several occasions about my unhappiness with the company’s laptop. Nothing was done. I received some sniggles instead. I felt it was totally uncalled for.

I think it is only fair that the company provides its staff with decent tools. Obviously the laptop is not decent. It is almost comparable to the 10 year-old desktop I used in my previous company. Call me impatient, but when you are pushed by the management to produce timely reports and quick responses, the slow laptop can really top the frustration off.

If I am being questioned why I am using a personal computer at work, I will ask them to look at the laptop allocated. Perhaps they can have a go on it and see if they will like working with it. If the company is not doing anything about it, I am.

I’ve been feeling irritable at work. I have issues making sense of the disclosures and segregation they want to make. There are also many things I am still coming to terms with.

After working through my Sunday, I submitted the report only to be returned twice with changes. Not because it is wrong..but because it has to be presented in other ways.

I remind myself I am learning. I need to adapt. I have to follow. i need to get the hang of it. In these times, I tell myself, there is an end to this. Another 1 year and 9 months. Let’s hope the next leap will be a better one.

small speck big world

I received my namecard yesterday. Looked at it for a moment and just felt mildly pleased that I have attained that title placed beneath my name. As I put the 2 boxes of name cards back, a vendor’s name card lied nearby in my drawer. I imagined how perfect it will be if my name was imprinted on a namecard from that company. To add the cherry to the icing, maybe with his title beneath my name. tax director. Haha..that’s dreaming beyond my league.

Shuts the drawer. End of dream.

My thoughts were diverted to some unhappiness of pay disparity in the company. It happens everywhere. I am just learning to come to terms with it; that there will always be some who are favoured. Some who can wriggle themselves into good positions without truly having the capabilities. Some who can get away with things. Hard work is like Chinese medicine. It is slow to effect.

Dearie is right. Albeit feeling unjustified, I will choose to continue to work hard. Give my best to things so my conscience is clear. So that I can be blameless in front of those who assess me. So that i can be proud that I made it to where I am with what my capabilities and what I can offer to the company. I will get there. It is a matter of time. And time will prove capabilities.

I started to think how else can I add value to my work. Would going for a financial modeling course help? How well will getting a tax accreditation sit into my career? Would getting the cfa add more value to me?

The whole investment thing I’ve been trying to master is still a big blur. I stared at the charts and wondered what should I be doing? I read my book and still found no answers. There is a sea of counters out there. So which one? When? How much?

I still have a lot of questions to answer and things to find out. I found it somewhat startling to realize how little I know.

cervelo no more

I am looking to sell my cervelo bike soon. It is sad that I have to price it so low but 2^nd hand bikes don’t seem to have much value. In this affluent society, used items are not in demand. People can easily afford new bikes.

I feel sorry because the condition of the cervelo surely deserves a lot more. Yet, if I don’t depress the price, I won’t be able to sell. I do not use it at all and leaving it to hang there is such a waste.

I do not think I will ever find the discipline to be out biking at 4am. There just isn’t a need for me to do so.

Price not right, don’t sell? Or just price it cheaply and sell it off? I’m caught and torn.

investing?

I read about a one-eyed investor who shorted against sub-prime mortgages, profiteering millions upon its collapse. Shrewd I would say. He is like the less publicized Warren Buffet, who saw what others couldn’t see. He had an autism like disorder though and somehow attributed to his obsession with facts and justice. I liked what I read but wondered if I can one day become like him.

But to imagine going through prospectus of asset backed mortgages, each bearing a hundred pages with jargons. I am not sure how I could survive that. And his mantra for investing is in simple terms: when people go A, you will choose B. Easier said than done in reality. On books it makes total sense but not many can hold on this path.

Somehow it sums up to me that I have to learn to devour information around me. It is important to make sense out of news I read everyday. What does it signal about the market? What impacts are made? How can I profit from it? What are the tools available for me to do so?

On the flipside, I think we must realize that all’s but a zero-sum game. The investor may have profited, but there are others who have lost. When you buy, someone has to sell. Your gain is someone’s loss. What we can hope is our gain is from someone who could afford to lose.

dreamer

This is soon going to be a monthly routine – review of the month gone by. Today marks 2 months into the new job. Audit is soon coming to an end (finally!). I have sent in the draft accounts and hope the finalized copy can be out soon.

I am still clearing my February reports, consolidation reports and presentation for the stewardship meeting next Friday. With all that done, I should be more or less on time and close clearing the back log.

The load is easing out, most definitely, and I am slowly getting the hang of being chased for reports and multi-tasking. There are still issues along the way I am learning to handle and still processesI must get into the flow of. I am giving myself duration of 2 years, during which I will persevere in this company.

The graduation ceremony will be held this Saturday. Apart that it marks completion of a milestone, it also serves as a reminder I must “recoup” the money and time I have put into studying. I have dug deep into my savings to finance through my studies and committed 1.5 years of my "youth" into it. These are not done for fun but in hope to yield increased returns from this self investment. To me it is an extra oar in my hands to paddle myself against the tide. I cannot turn the tide but every skill and knowledge I pick up is that added strength against it.

i have been a dreamer all my life. During my last job, I dreamt of having a seat with a window.

My boss and supervisor back then had their own rooms and windows. My seat, along with the rest in my department, was within the building, window-less. I told myself then, "I want to have my own personal cubicle with window."

And now I have. I’m in this nice cosy backend cubicle, right next to the window. I like looking out and spending moments staring blankly at the expressway..into the greenery and thinking, "it’s good to be able to see so much from this level. I will be able to see more if I climbed higher."

Now I have started dreaming again. I relish in the thought of being in the position of this director in my office. He is in charge of investments. I noticed he has 2 laptops - one of which shows charts and graphs; I think he constantly monitors market changes. I wish one day I can be competent in investment management that part of job scope is to analyse market changes and make sound investment for the company and myself. At the same time I look at financials and consider what it is reflecting of the business and its environment. That’s the kind of portfolio I hope to gradually get into. Someone with a macro view of things. Someone who can make wise decisions in the benefit of the company. Someone who is sought out for sound advice to the management.

Sounds like a big dream, isn’t it? dreams are like stars.. we can’t reach them but we use them to chart our way.=)

new pursuit with UOL

After coming back from Japan, I tossed with the idea of learning the Japanese language. The whole experience of learning continues to intrigue me, even as I just close my maf chapter.

I searched for a new goal; perhaps you can say it’s something to fill my time. Training has ended with the marathon. Work has gained some momentum. There was still spaces of time I was wondering how I could effectively utilize.

Training for another race doesn’t seem like something I was excited to do. I couldn’t be too bothered about all the ironman photos friends have posted on fb, to think it was once what I hailed the sole goal of my life. maybe I lack discipline to train everyday, to fuss about what pace and how much mileage I am clocking.

I run now, because I want to. Not because I am going to have a race. I run because it makes me feel good.

Until yesterday, I found a new goal in life. I want to learn how I can make our money work harder.

There was an interesting business model dearie could have ventured into, only if we had that financial independence to. But we did not. I felt helpless because I wish I could tell him, if this is what you feel is right, then go and try. However, I couldn’t. because I know we still needed his steady stream of income to keep things going. I am not able to handle all alone.

Take up a part time job? Go back into tutoring?

It made me think about the knowledge I have gained from maf. What am I doing with those skills gained? How am I going to use those skills to work for us?

We have little to spare but we have to start somewhere. I have always shoved the idea of investing aside because I felt we needed that liquidity. However, to think about it, if I don’t start now, I will never start.

How much liquidity do I actually need to be comfortable? I keep saying liquidity but I never quantified how much. Is it not time to sit down and review where we have parked our money at. How and where do we want to park the future income? What is there around us which can help us grow our money?

Time to get out of procrastination and start work. I gathered from an ex-classmate that I will need to do a lot of groundwork and reading. With the little I have, I can start with penny stocks.

This is the new goal for me – learning how to make our money work harder. To read up to compute to analyze. To understand. To try. To start.

Now, that’s something a new pursue with UOL; they call it the university of life (quote from ‘an education’).

hello tokyo

I have not got the chance to pen down my thoughts about our Tokyo trip since I returned last sat. work has been hectic; which I had foreseen coming. I am stealing moments off working hours now to write down some thoughts, before I get all too lazy of doing so.

The trip to japan opened my eyes; widened my horizons. I see a league one par above us. Their culture, their attitude, their lifestyle.

Holidays for us is more than mere having fun. It’s a time to observe how other people work, how their lives are organized and how all of that is different from ours.

We are full of praise about japan and Japanese. The only thing we can perhaps rant about is the barrier of language. Japanese pride themselves of their language, which binds them to their identity.

Despite the language barrier, they still extended their hospitality to non Japanese speaking people like us. Vending machines with photos, which we could just press to order food in food outlets. Strangers who despite not knowing what we meant, still took time to help us locate where we wanted to go.

The marathon was fantastic; best I’ve been to so far. Organization was great. There were crowds of people cheering us on throughout the ENTIRE race. I mean entire race. It was 3.8deg celcius, raining and yet the public cheered us on. It is simply amazing.

The rain got the better of me and I didn’t perform as I have expected. Nevertheless, like dearie said, it was a good experience. And of course, I learnt a valuable lesson on race preparation.

We took long walks around lake kawaguchi. We shopped down ginza, shibuya, Shinjuku and harajuku. We learned to hop from train station to train station without getting too lost. It was one week of holiday I truly enjoyed.

Next stop for 2011, korea. Time to save up again!

1 month

Today marks 1 month and I am still struggling. My head droops down and my shoulders hang low. Yesterday night I broke record and left last in the office. Insomnia plagued me and my nose so stuffy I could barely breathe.

How am i? if I could truthfully answer, I would say terrible. I try to tell myself it takes time but the torrents keep washing me backwards. A couple of times I wept, wondering where all these is going to get me to.

I hate this unhappiness that’s gnawing on me and it’s taking its toil.

How long can I hang on? Barely a month? Am I not a fighter?

3rd week

I have hit the end of my 3rd week with my new company. The work burden has been heavy; with last year’s back log and audit to deal with and also the new year’s reporting to be done.

At several junctures within the 3 weeks, I was close to giving up. Dearie’s constant encouragement kept me going.

I often come to office with a heavy heart, wondering how late into the night do I have to work into. Which having done that, I still can’t clear many of the outstanding on my plate.

I miss having time to clean our house and cooking for dearie. I miss having time to run and let the endorphins rush through my body. i have traded much of that to be in a position higher than before.

Perhaps my capabilities are not sufficient, because I find myself struggling with the yoke clumsily. They say it takes time to accustom to the new environment and expectations. Yet again, I feel less than competent.

When I get home I am often dead tired. My mind says I want to go for a run to refresh myself, but my body just wants to sink into the couch. My mind says I want to cook a nice hot dinner for dearie to come home to, but by the time I get to leave office, it has past dinner time.

I still need time to come to terms with a new lifestyle. I am bearing some hope that things will get better after I clear the backlog and audit.

I really yearn to start work this year right. I want to get things right. I hope it is not that difficult.