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It’s been a day and a half and I’m seriously tired of the passive aggressiveness. Look, I tried to ask what the matter is, if you don’t want to tell me, so be it. It’s not difficult for me to remember that you don’t care. Why do people treat friends like shit? Well, the answer’s obvious: because they’re not really your friends.

So this whole thing got me down today. Sometimes I think about better living through chemistry and wonder if I can get my doctor to prescribe me happy pills. On a whim, I called up the apartment complex and asked how much it’d cost if I wanted to move in early. The answer was, I can pay $200 for the first 15 days. Wow… that’s hard to turn down. Of course, as SO rightly pointed out, the move in date was never a problem. I’m depressed about other things.

Luckily, work does provide the best distractions.
I hate to admit it, but whenever Cameron drops by to chat, it just brightens up my day immensely. It’s actually a bad thing to look forward to, because he’s completely undependable as a cube visitor. I’m about the last stop on his list, if he even makes it that far. There’s Sid and Yufi’s cube, always an excellent choice being right next to the chocolate bowl and across from John. There’s Wolly, whom Cameron can go through an entire play-by-play cricket game with when that odd sport is in season. All in all, if I want to talk, it’s best just to go find him instead.

Had an extremely shitty afternoon, so we won’t get into that. Now, dinner… that’s a whole other matter.

I was looking at the cleaning instructions for one of my shirts. It reads:
“Hand wash cold separately, do not bleach, do not wring or twist, reshape while damp, dry flat, cool iron if necessary, do not soak.”
How am I suppose to wash this without soaking? After washing it, how am I suppose to get it from wet to damp without wringing or twisting? And, this one always perplexed me, what exactly is a cool iron? Would a heavy book do the same job? I mean, if you’re not turning on the iron, it’s just a block with a handle, right?

Mo got a slice of pizza for lunch, and both Sid and I stared intensely at it. There was a generous amount of meat on the pizza, dark brown in color with a hint of red in stripe form. It looked appetizingly enough, but “bacon” came to mind even though the shape wasn’t right.
“It’s beef, right?” Mo asked, in a way that showed he was perfectly confident in his assessment.
Sid looked dubious. I wasn’t sure what to tell him either, so I picked up a piece and popped it in my mouth. It was undoubtedly pork. It had that chewy texture and the slightly sweet taste, same as BBQ ribs. Besides, who’s ever heard of beef pizza?
By this time, Mo already took a huge bite out of the slice. “Tastes like shit, but it’s beef,” he blurred out while chewing.
This just raised all sorts of questions in my mind… If you never tasted pork, how can you be so sure? Of course, since it’s Mo we’re talking about, the guy who seems to always be eating pork despite his best intentions, maybe he can tell the difference. Also, what would you say now? “Dude, go spit that out”? Would he have to? If you already bought a slice of pizza, and you’re hungry, but the cafeteria is right there, and they have cheese pizza, and you have money in your pocket, would you be required to go buy something else? Even more importantly, would I try harder to stop him if I wanted BBQ pizza and he hadn’t touch his slice?

Daddy got me a new bike!! I’m going to be the coolest kid in the neighborhood! There are definite perks in being the favorite child.

I need to do all my laundry before I move out, including all my sheets and towels, because I won’t be getting free electricity when I move. Also need to scan and sort out coins that are lying around, otherwise they’ll definitely all be lost after the move. Not to mention putting the passports back into my safe deposit box… we can all remember that fiasco.
Meeting with the designer again tomorrow… Still debating my choice of sofa.

I almost had a heart attack when our manager pulled me out of a meeting to tell me about the safeguards drawing that was roaming freely on the client’s site.
Kippy just deplaned in Dullus, so I got to handle this hot potato like a big boy. I think I did alright, except for calling the client manager Bill instead of Bob. We were extremely lucky in this case since the drawing was classified under a blanket assumption and there was no actual safeguards information on it. After talking to the security folks for half an hour, it was agreed that this was a case of misclassification. I got some minor rebuke from the clients and there was no CR written - best case scenario.
When that was all settled, I called a team meeting to go over the excitement of the day. By quitting time, we were still arguing on how to retract this mistake. Danny (in typical Danny fashion) said that there was no way he was staying late to fix the problem. This was when I ranted out a passionate speech on how I expect the team to support any due date I personally committed. To my surprise, it worked… all of the team stayed over, including the ones who weren’t needed for the job.
That’s where all these 13 hour days come from… After work, I grabbed dinner with Bill (the real Bill.) Tomorrow, I’ll get to tell Kippy all the things that I personally committed the team to in the schedule meeting. He’ll love that.

To protect the innocent, the above post is fictional. Any resemblance between the characters or events is purely coincidental.

Spent an evening playing Go with Seth. I got slaughtered… ended up with negative points. I didn’t even know that was possible.

I told Steve today that I was going to spend more time on NI than Security and he was devastated. I was surprised that he took my words to heart, right away, and tried to do some of my jobs on his own. It turned out that what we do are mutually exclusive. I have idea which gate is going into which DCP version, but he has no idea which folder the clients go to look for the documents either. Watching him trying to navigate through the client system was heart wrenching. I wanted to tell him, “don’t worry about it, Steve, I’ll always been here for you (to transfer files from one folder to another.)” But those would seem like harsh words to someone who’s trying his hardest to adapt to the inevitable.

I’ve been so wrapped up on purchasing furniture lately, didn’t even get a chance to think about packing. When my landlady asked what my plan is for April, I used my thick Asian skin to the up most advantage and told her I wasn’t moving out till the Sunday of that first week. March is going to be super busy… I’m almost tempted to spend a few hundred dollars just to move into the apartment early.
I know it’s going to be a pain, but I’m kinda looking forward to moving day. SO and I move everything ourselves, and it’s nice that way… Everything will be removed, loaded, carried up, and stored away in an orderly fashion. Won’t need to worry about ex-college kids making “distress marks” on my furniture, nor will I need to worry about the food expense afterwards.

I explained the sofa situation to 3 people, and only one of them followed me through. So, here we go, just one more time:
I started out with EA, because I like their design consulting service. The sofa, with the fabric that I like, priced out around $2000 (we’ll call this Sofa1.) Of course, that’s a bit crazy to pay and I’ve been looking around for alternatives. One that I found was in a consignment shop. The sofa is the exact same style, in pristine condition, for $450 (we’ll call this Sofa2.) However, it’s got a royal blue and gold pattern and I’m not sure that’s what I’m looking for. I thought, with that price, I can reupholster the whole thing. So I went to a furniture repair shop to get an estimate. To reupholster Sofa2, the cost is $650, and that’s only with a cheap fabric. The repair shop owner showed me another sofa, same style, in his shop. This one’s an antique, but torn completely apart (we’ll call this Sofa3.) He said he can sell it to me for $800 plus the cost of fabric. However, I had to swear complete secrecy to the knowledge of Sofa3 because the repair shop owner and the consignment shop owner are friends.
So now, the goal is to get Sofa3 with the fabric of Sofa1. With that in mind, I went back to EA and told my designer that my friend (imaginary) thinks it’s a better idea for me to purchase the consignment shop sofa, Sofa2, and reupholster it. I told her about Sofa2 because I had a picture of it in my phone. It turned out that my EA designer is also friends with the consignment shop owner… the worst part is that she wants to call the consignment shop owner for me to see if Sofa2 is really a solid buy.
Somehow, I’ll have to work Sofa3 into the conversation next time, otherwise I’ll look like a total nutcase purchasing 14 yards of upholster fabric without buying either sofa. Not that it matters, nor is that conclusion wrong.

I’m meeting with my interior designer tomorrow. Being an engineer, I spent around 10 hours in the library, researching the methodology of living room planning. Then proceeded to write a two page spec, complete with room dimensions, estimated maximum capacity, list of activities with associated % usage, and preferences on ambiance/color schemes/furniture/lighting/accessories.

I told dad (Kippy) today that I want a new bike (Acrobat 9 Pro). Dad (Kippy) said, “go talk to your mom (IT manager)” I said that I talked to mom (IT manager) already and she (he) told me to talk to dad (Kippy). Dad (Kippy) asked what was wrong with using the neighbor’s (client’s) bike (Adobe Acrobat) when he knows full well that the neighbor’s (client’s) bike (software) is too slow. Plus, I have to go all the way to their house (client’s website), knock on their door (log on to the portal), and half of the time they don’t even let me borrow it (the computer crashes). I told dad (Kippy) that I’ll be extra good (… can’t translate this one) and do my homework (compile DCPs). Dad said that I’m supposed to do my homework (job) anyway. He added that he wants me to have a new bike (Acrobat 9 Pro), but all the other kids (remaining 100+ people on the project) will want one too… In the end, dad (Kippy) promised that he’ll think about it (take an action to bring up this issue in the next department meeting.) Dad’s (Kippy’s) the best

I learned something today: furniture makes a boring topic. The only people who cares, aside from the future owners, are the ones with something to sell.

I’m trying to figure out what’s a healthy lifestyle for a workaholic. Here are a few given factors:
1. On average, I work around 11 hours on weekdays and 4 hours on weekends when I’m in town.
2. I can live with 6 hours of sleep, but I really prefer 7.
3. At a minimum, I need an hour to cool down before going to bed. I can happily wail away a while, but I’d hate to be alone over a 4 hour stretch.
4. I’d like to hit the gym at least 3 times a week. I’d also like to hang out with friends 3 evenings in a week. However, I think I should have a couple of days during the week to do chores and run errands.
5. Every month, I spend one weekend in NYC, one weekend in MI, and one weekend reserved for SO’s visit.
Listing the criteria is really the tough part, I’ll finish up the thinking tomorrow…