Shit-management

The nature of a System Analyst's job is that it is closely tied to operations. We not only analyse the system, we take care of the system and provide bug fixes and data patches as and when necessary. In fact, we spend more time patching the systems than analysing them at my side.

Raising forms to get permission to update database records when users make a mistake. Procedures to be followed only so that management has visibility of what we are doing. Routine tasks can be streamlined and automated as much as possible to reduce human intervention and hence the amount of mind-numbing repetitive work I have to do. For the rest of it, the nature is so ad-hoc that there is no way to cater for all and automate all such work. You still need an experienced human being to make decisions and judgments. Many such small investigations that take up a lot of time and sap much energy. Much as I dislike the drudgery of such work, this is the nature of the job that I am being paid for.

To think that I had doing mostly maintenance for more than 3 years when I hate the nature of such jobs. No wonder I feel numb, no wonder the future looks bleak. Too highly paid to make a switch to the kind of job I want to do without a significant paycut. I should do my sums and see how much of a paycut I can live with, once all this mad rush is settled down. Life sucks when you are chained down by finances.

I console myself with the fact that work is frequently "shit-management". You are hired only because there is work that the person who hires you do not wish to do it himself. And unless you are highly skilled (in which case it will be value-creation that your bosses are not able to do themselves), you are destined to do shit-management. Shoveling the shit that people in power do not wish to do themselves. Such is the fate of those who want to stay out of the power struggle. This description excludes those in power who relish the power they wield, who can control the kind of work they do. They are not shoveling shit. This also excludes those who create value.

When you create value, you will not be just another count in the statistics, but will be someone they depend on. You will then have some leverage and be able to negotiate your terms. Management likes to tell the story of 3 brick-layers, one who sees himself as laying bricks, one who sees himself as building a wall, and one who sees himself as building a cathedral. This is a good story to tell those you have hired to lay bricks. But more often than not, the brick-layer finds himself building a small divider wall on a crumbling building, or shoring up the poorly-built foundation that he did not design.

People shovel shit willingly because they get paid, because there is something they look forward to after work, because the consolation that they get from that something is worth the shit that they have to shovel. For some people, that something is their family that they love and provide for. For some people, it is their hobby or lifestyle that their "day job" is paying for. For some people, it is simply something that they do, because going to work is part and parcel of life.

What motivates you at work?

It is a blessing to be able to find such a job that can provide for your needs, and which you can work at willingly. In any case, shit-management is a useful skill that will come in handy all through life, because life is full of shit. Shit should be managed and controlled, rather than just endured, if the gems in life are to be unearthed.

Dengue-free zone

Dengue fever is on the rise, our standard measures to control the population of the Aedes mosquitoes are not working very effectively. Hence let me introduce a way to avoid being infected with the Dengue virus.

Stay near the ends of bridges of popular shopping centres in Singapore, such as Suntec City and HarbourFront Centre. There will be smokers puffing away just outside the exits during the opening hours, putting up a smoke screen that mosquities dare not penetrate. Where the mosquitoes cannot venture, they cannot bite you there and you cannot be infected. Let's not waste the efforts of the voluntary foggers who pump out smoke by sheer lung power.

My Science teacher taught us that insects get drowsy in smoke, as the oxygen content is lower. Unlike humans, they do not cough when they inhale smoke. They just slow down and lose interest. Yes, I may cough when surrounded by second-hand smoke from smokers whenever I am forced to walk through their smoke screen, but it may just save my life. Dying from tobacco fumes will probably be later than dying from dengue fever.

I may get desperate enough that I may want to join in. That is, if I find people around me dropping dead like flies. It may justify such desperate measures.

The Myth

Watched the Jackie Chan movie last night after work. Must be getting old, or overworked. Found the 9pm show to be pretty late.

It was different from his usual city-based action flicks in that all the action took place in ancient tombs, temples or out on the battlefield. He's still wowing fans with his monkey-like climbing abilities, but there is a lot less of the super-fast fighting scenes now. And Jackie Chan had 2 female co-stars instead of 1. So greedy. Or just practical? One's from Korea, the other from India. Everybody is going towards India now, even Jackie Chan's movies. Citybank Visa's latest advertisement shows Richard Gere in India, probably to win over the growing Indian market. But Jackie Chan raiding an Indian temple, dueling with Indian pugilists and helped by a Bollywood starlet? He returns to China eventually and fights a Taichi master who did not give him the chance to use his usual props in street battles. So the India trip was just an arc from the main story.

Not everyone can create a legend successfully. Miyazaki's Spirited Away and Princess Mononoke were highly acclaimed but just did not strike a cord with me. Not the way LOTR and the Matrix did. Or maybe those films just raised the barrier so high that all films will always pale against them.

This reminds me of something my secondary school Chinese teacher said, "Shen Hua (Myth) is Shen jing ping ren jiang de Hua. (The nonsense spouted by mad people.)"

Oh, nice barge though. I also want to live in a house with a rooftop that can scroll back at the flick of a button.

Smokers' toilet

There is a toilet with a window view which is frequented by smokers. I get pissed off when I see the window open with the warm wind blowing in. I think the smokers like to open the window and let the smoke escape so that they don't choke in their own fumes.

Now I have nothing against smokers, as long as they don't force me to breathe in their waste product. Some are very fine people in all other aspects, but like to adopt open air corners as their own smoking point. This is fine as long as they choose some ulu spot where non-smokers keep away from. I mean, if you are in the toilet, you have to put up with the stench of my bodily waste, but if you're out of the toilet, you shouldn't have to smell it. So why should I smell cigarette fumes when I did not choose to go near a designated smoker's corner? Why should I have to endure smokers who gather along bridges, at bus stops, who walk in front of me, who smoke in toilets?

Those who do not want to breathe in their own waste will open the window and start smoking, and neglect to close it back. Sure, the higher air-con bills are not your problem because your company pays the rental, so it is something cannot care less about. That's very nice of you. I don't like to pee in a warm toilet and come out sticky with perspiration, but I guess you cannot care less also.

Have the decency to go congregate on roof tops or multi-storey carparks to smoke please.

Quidam

This is the 3rd time that the circus is touring Singapore, the show that they are putting up this time is called Quidam. Deciding not to be a country bumpkin anymore, I tried taking my family to watch the circus. Not everyone was willing to go, but no matter, I bring whoever is willing.

The acrobatics were breathtaking, the feats of strength and balance stunning, and the clowns were hilarious. They even pressed a brave local girl into joining in the mime on stage (sound effects provided by their live band) and she gamely played along. Another girl and three guys were later pressed into another mime. I think the participation made the evening very much unforgetable for them. Especially the first girl whose hair was totally messed up at the end of the show. What a sweet temper. I think those clowns were experts at judging from a look whether the person could play along well with them.

World Of Warcraft

I had an hour or so to spare, so I wandered around Sim Lim Square. There, I came across a shop selling WoW at WCG price! Just what I had been looking for! The fellow selling me the game wanted to give me a poster of the Orc, but since he also had the Night Elf poster, guess which I chose?

Installing the 4CD game took 45min, so pathetically slow. Blizzard tends to bring everything down to the lowest common denominator so that those with lower-end game machines can still enjoy their games. And what good games they make too! Even when designed for lower-end machines, they still rock. It takes a lot more than flashy graphics to make a good game, and Blizzard has got most of it right. Their games can be very very addictive. But installing the patch (1.7.1) was an obstacle to overcome. 230+ MB to be downloaded took me 3 hours over my maxonline connection. Blizzard says that a 56K modem is all you need to play this online-only game, but how are you going to download 230MB over a 56K link? I'm glad I'm a little above the minimum requirement.

And now let the much anticipated gaming begin once again.

webhosting - again

Frustrated at my company's Internet applications failing yet again, I sent an email to my boss on how professional webhosting companies can provide more reliable service for a fraction of what our own guys will cost. The response from him? Interesting, any guarantees?

Oh yes, their SLA is high enough to satisfy ours. Their data centre is just as secure as ours, with disaster recovery, which we are still struggling with. For the price of half a man-day a month, we can get a dedicated server to host our lighter weight applications, whereas our own guys will charge in multiple man-days. With a dedicated server, we can install the necessary software packages to run our applications. I can already think of ways to test out the feasibility of this idea, migrating the less critical systems over first. There are ways to overcome our backend linkages with our internal systems. Data centres are a commodity these days, it is frustrating to be bound by our own inefficiencies and incompetencies.

While compiling a summary for the boss, I kept an eye out for a cheapo plan to host my own site. After all I do not expect to be making money from this, and so I should keep the cost low. The minimum requirement to fulfill my needs.

http://www.vdomainhost.com.sg/valuehost/vlite.php
$70 a year for my own domain name, 50MB of disk space and 5GB monthly traffic limit, multiple email accounts and subdomains should be more than enough for personal use. Only with gmail's 2.6GB (and growing) email space downloadable via POP3, the tiny email space available on this kind of hosting seems pathetic. Well you do get your own email address at your own domain name for people to send to. You can set it up to forward to gmail for storage, and send out from your domain name.

Mambo looked good as a portal tool, until I found drupal, with all the necessary features already bundled in without needing to go for extensions. But I suppose it is a question of whether to take the bare minimum and add extensions as you need, or take a tool with more built-in features so you need not spend time looking for extensions.

Overkill?

Night cycling

It was such a relief to be cycling again after a few months of busyness.

I never feel more alive than when I'm on my bike, feeling the strain in my body and pedaling towards my destination on my own power. I found myself laughing while coasting down a gentle slope, my cares left far behind. I passed an old army camp that I thought was disused, but the roads remain free of fallen leaves and the lights of the top level bunks were on. I finally cycled on the new road that connects Queensway to North Buona Vista Road. I made it to my new flat and found a bunch of young men training with a punching bag at the communal area. My new apartment remains mostly empty and very peaceful.

I'm easy to please, just give me a few hours to ride by myself on quiet roads where traffic is light. It releases stress and loosens my muscles. No need for therapy or massage to recover from the demands of work. No need for cars, gym or club memberships, or condos. My material needs are simple, but my need for personal space is huge considering I live in a city. Perhaps I will be easier to please if I migrate to a more laid-back country with more roads and shorter working hours.

I must make it a point to go ride around more often in future. I will probably live longer and life will feel like it is more worth living.

Mustafa

We went hunting for home appliances at Jalan Besar and ended up at Mustafa, where we heard the prices are cheap. Call us suah-koo, but we have never been here before and did not realise how much merchandise they can pack into so little space and still get them sold.

Several interlinked buildings where you can walk from the basement of one building and find yourself across the street, then take the escalator to the top floor and walk over another road to a third building before realising that we were on a bridge. Ok, the space is not so little. They must have started from one building and bought over others near it when they expanded. It was like a colony of mushrooms expanding from a core and occupying the spaces beside them. They sell all things from toiletries to gold to cars to airplane tickets. I have never seen toiletries and jewellery being sold so close to each other, and I have never seen a supermarket above a store selling clothes.

They have more variety of kachiam-puteh than I have ever seen in other supermarkets. Hardly surprising considering they are run by Indians. There is a Sony digicam booth just outside one of the buildings, curiously staffed entirely by Chinese guys. No Indians as far as I can see, no girls either. There is no food court or eatery inside the buildings, but no lack of prata shops along the streets outside. Not a place to hang out, but a place to get bargains. And they are open 24 hours a day. Maybe I will make another trip if I have a sudden craving for kachiam-puteh in the middle of the night.

Testing frameworks

There is a new Java testing framework, TestNG, that is slowly replacing JUnit. I'm appalled at how out of touch I am with development work these days. I barely have the time to pick up JUnit as it is, and now developers are talking about how this new framework does not have the weaknesses of JUnit that I did not even think about? I have not used it often enough to notice the weaknesses much. I don't even know what JDK1.5 is all about, when we are still using JDK1.4 officially and really using just the feature of JDK1.2. Pathetic.

I seldom have the chance to get my hands dirty doing development work right now. My work consist of managing a few programmers and gathering the requirements, managing the versions, testing, answering emails, doing migrations. Unit testing is something I am not intimately acquainted with, though I need to know enough to guide my programmers. Therein lies the problem - how do you lead if you don't know? When I first joined the company, I was miffed by how little our managers really knew about Java, though that is the language we use, how unwilling they were to learn new things and try promising new tools and techniques that can potentially ease our burden. I find myself becoming more like them with the passing of time.

It takes something uncommon to go against the path of least resistance and to do a better job than is common. The uncommon had always been more interesting, and holds the possibility for improving on what we have. To be common had never appealed much to me, except those times when being accepted was more important to me than pursuing my dreams.

To be able to spend time doing hands-on development work and be paid for it will be wonderful therapy for me and will ease some of the troubles on my mind. To be paid the same rate as what I am now will be like a dream job to me.

Anyway, I really need to read up on what TestNG is all about and the weaknesses of JUnit that I did not really have the time to find out. I won't understand everything, but it is a jumpstart.
TestNG: Catch the Testing Fever
Test Framework Comparison
New features of JDK5
Under the Hood of J2EE Clustering

Gay Swimming Pool

I had suspected for some time that the neighbourhood swimming pool I frequent is a gathering place for gays. Today, I had the fortune or misfortune (depending on how you see it) to confirm my suspicion.

I was on leave today and decided to go swimming in the afternoon. It is usually therapeutic for me to exercise, as the physical exertion is a good change from the usual mental exertion that my job requires. The water turned out to be disgustingly salty and full of fallen leaves and twigs. I swam only half the number of laps that I usually do. Along the way, I noticed that there was only 1 girl in the pool, the rest of the swimmers are all solitary males, one wearing his white trunks low enough that his butt crack is showing. Good grief. I know that speedos are low, but I don't usually see them so low at the public pools. Then again, I seldom swim here on weekday afternoons.

Showering in the common bathroom, I saw this guy behind me who was looking around. Ok, some times I also look around, but I'm either checking if anybody is touching my bag (potential thief) or ogling at me (potential gay). I thought he was normal. Until I finished my shower and walked away to get changed. Then I saw that he had been masturbating. I don't usually pay attention to how other guys wash their genitals, but I don't think they spend so much time washing just that. And they are usually not in an aroused state. Never mind, quickly walk away.

Public male toilets tend to be a bit "open-concept" and guys just get changed at the benches. A towel is usually all you have to protect your modesty. I took care to make good use of the towel to not to expose anything more than I have to when I got changed.

Then I realise that the guy next to me who is holding his handphone in his hand is looking at me from time to time. Shit. He's one of them! He's not sending SMS but using the camera to take photos or videos of that other guy masturbating in the shower! At least I don't think he's aiming it at me. I will whack the shit out of him if I catch him pointing it at me. They chatted after that. I don't know if this was prearranged or if they were just picking each other up. I don't think I really want to know also.

This is all quite disturbing. Fortunately, there is another neighbourhood pool I can go to. It will be nearer my new apartment, and it is quieter, the water cleaner. And I hope I will not find gays there.

On branding, anniversaries and discounts

A common marketing practice is to give discounts during the anniversary month of a company. For example, during the 25th anniversary of a departmental store, they may decide to give a 25% storewide discount to thank customers for their support over the last 25 years. This helps build goodwill and customer loyalty, essential to a store's survival.

The recent decision by the government to retain the name "Marina Bay", after spending $40k to find the best name, was insulted by many parties as a waste of taxpayers' money. They claimed that any Tom, Dick and Harry could have told you to retain the same name, and would cost far less. They also questioned the effectiveness of this branding.

To me, one effective way to build goodwill and customer loyalty is to give discounts during the anniversary month. If a 40% discount is given on HDB flats bought during the anniversary month of August, there will be a stampede to be customers of HDB. Perhaps that would be too steep a discount, perhaps they can use this opportunity to sell off those unwanted flats that have been accumulating dust in the more ulu parts of the island. You know how retailers try to give steep discounts for old stock so they can free up their inventory space and get some value for their investments, far better than to let it rot. Even a 40% discount off the HDB loan for the month will be very welcome.

SBS and SMRT can also give a 40% discount for all rides during the anniversary month. ERP discounts is another way to help the man in the street get by. All of these are ways for the rulers to show that they care, by giving discounts through GLCs that will help the common citizen. But they did not do it during the recession years, and they will not do it now that the economy is picking up.

Help yourselves, they said. Lower the land pricing and the lives of the people will be easier.

No energy

Haven't been blogging lately. Too tied up and not much energy to reflect or write. Used to blog a lot more, but that was when I had little challenge at work and blogging was a hobby. Time there still is, but the energy has all been sapped up by my work and wedding preps.

When my mind was on blogging, I would tend to think in terms of what I can blog about. Things that happened will be reviewed in terms of how I can blog about it, how I would phrase it. Now that every hour of the working day is spent on following up, chasing people, servicing requests, tracking progress, checking to see if things can be done in parallel, I can hardly spare the brain juice to think of reviewing my everyday life.

I have collected the keys to my apartment, shortlisted the contractor, the design is almost finalised, the list of helpers starting to be drawn up, the indoor photoshoot over and the outdoor shoot rescheduled because of the rain, 2 of the 4 pieces of jewellery have been bought, and I did not record down any of it.

Perhaps I should have just spent 10 minutes a day writing down whatever I could, just so that it would be recorded somewhere and not forgotten. But that would not be very meaningful without some reflection, and is without joy, end up as another thing to followup on instead of something I enjoy doing. Meaningless. There are enough things to do as it is.

Sometimes I envy the bloggers who manage to take time out to blog properly despite their tight schedules. Though they do not get enough sleep, they will still squeeze in the time to write a short entry that is at least coherent and properly worded. Perhaps words come easier for them, or they are just more disciplined. Then there are those who have amazing amounts of time to do what they like to do. Lucky bastards. Or did they just choose the right jobs?

ICQ5 allows you to create your own status and messages. I have created a status that says, "At work: paying off my housing loan" and 2 colleagues have found it terribly amusing. I am going to be 29, and I will be bound for the next 30 years. And I will have perhaps 15 years after that to retire, more likely find some other job that I will enjoy doing. Perhaps I will finally get to write the whole day. If my CPF can stretch that far, or if I discover a talent for writing that people will pay for.

A person must have something to look forward to, whether or not it is realistic. Just don't dash your last hope. For now, it is to look forward to the day when I can move into my own apartment. I'll worry about my career prospects half a year later.

Permanency

My old blog is gone. After months of inactivity, the hosting company has decided to remove it. I had wanted to copy out my entries and store them on my wordpress-on-a-thumbdrive but had not gotten around to finishing the job. 20% to 30% of the entries are now irretrievable lost. And it will not be long before I have forgotten those experiences myself.

Why do I blog? See Ah Lim's reasons for blogging.
I don’t know, but I guess I blog because I want to announce my existence. Because I feel that we human are so fragile, so fragile that we never know when we are going to die. Because I want my life to not go unnoticed and if I die tomorrow I know I had shared the good things, the bad things, and even the mundane things with someone, somewhere, out there. They might not remember, but at least they get to witness my life’.

On hindsight, maybe I should have paid for a single month of subscription, around SGD$5 and exported everything one-time when I decided to call it quits over there.

I blog for a sense of permanency. Kinda like I'm suffering from Alzheimer's disease.

Maybe not that serious, but how long can a person retain all of his memories? What was I doing on this date? When was it when I last met up with a particular friend? What the heck did we do for anniversary donkey years ago? What was going on through my mind at that time? There is lots of information that will be lost forever if not recorded down. Sometimes there are things worthy of remembering, but it takes too much effort to write them down…

One way to overcome this is to become a cult leader and be worshipped by faithfuls who will record down everything I do and say. Or a celebrity who gets hounded by paparazzi, who will record every single foul-up for posterity. Or get indecently rich so that I can hire my own scribe to write it from a nicer angle. A more feasible (and much less evil) way is to wait for technology to advance enough so that I can run my own blog on a PDA with a integrated keyboard. Then I can bring it everywhere and record everything. The blog server must be web-based with a database that can be easily exported and saved offline. Current technology is still too slow and I hate to wait for computers and PDAs to respond. The price will probably drop to an affordable level within the next 2 years or so, but the speed must pick up.

For now, what I can do is to get a camera phone, take lots of photos of lots of things that happen, upload them to a blog server running on my pc when I get home, so I can put minimal comments or keywords so the stuff is searchable. Minimal use of brainpower on those days (pretty common) when I go on autopilot after work. If only there is a simple way to record down everything that is happening, for searching later on, maybe years later. I have read about a project by this guy who was building a portable device to take photos every minute or so and record onto a 40GB hard disk.

That still doesn't solve the most important thing that I wish to record: my thoughts and insights, what I have learnt. Before I lose them to time.But sometimes what is the point of remembering everything? Inability to let go is a liability. I still don't attain to the heights that I wish to reach. I wanted to start a new life, but unable to let go of the past, I remain who I used to be.

The Engineering Mind - a danger to themselves

During the time of the French Revolution, many people were beheaded for "crimes against the state." One day, a Priest, a Drunkard and an Engineer were led up to the guillotine.

Before being placed in the guillotine, the priest requested the he be allowed to lay face UP so he will be looking toward Heaven when he dies. When the blade of the guillotine is released, it comes speeding down and suddenly stops just inches from the Priest's neck. The executioner takes this as divine intervention and releases the priest.


Next the Drunkard comes to the guillotine. He also decides to die face up hoping that he will be as fortunate as the Priest. When the blade of the guillotine is released, it comes speeding down and suddenly stops just inches from the Drunkard's neck So they release the Drunkard as well.


The Engineer is next, and he too decides to die facing up. Just before releasing the blade of the guillotine, the Engineer exclaims "Hey! I see what your problem is...."

---

NASA was interviewing professionals to be sent to Mars. Only one could go, and he couldn't return to Earth.

The first applicant, an engineer, was asked how much he wanted to be paid forgoing. "A million dollars," he answered, "because I want to donate it to my alma mater."

The next applicant, a doctor, was asked the same question. He asked for two million dollars. "I want to give a million to my family", he explained, "and leave the other million for the advancement of medical research."

The last applicant was a lawyer. When asked how much money he wanted, he whispered in the interviewer's ear, "Three million dollars."
"Why so much more than the others?" the interviewer asked.
The lawyer replied, "If you give me $3 million, I'll give you $1 million, I'll keep $1 million, and we'll send the engineer."

---

A man drifting in a hot air balloon realized he was lost. Reducing altitude, he spotted a guy on the ground and descended to shouting range. "Excuse me, sir," he shouted. "Can you help me? I promised a friend would meet him a half hour ago, but I don't know where I am."

The man below responded: "Yes. You're in a hot air balloon, hovering approximately 30 feet above this field, between 40 and 42 degrees North Latitude, and 58 and 60 degrees West Longitude."


"You must be an engineer," responded the balloonist.


"I am," said the man. "How did you know?"


"Well," said the balloonist, "everything you've told me is technically correct, but I have no idea what to make of your information, and the fact is I'm still lost."


Whereupon the man on the ground responded, "You must be a manager."


"That I am," replied the balloonist, "but how did you know?"


"Well," said the man, "you don't know where you are, or where you're going. You've made a promise you have no idea how to keep, and you expect me to solve your problem. The fact is, you're in the exact same position you were before we met, but now it's somehow my fault!"

---

A pastor, a doctor and an engineer were waiting one morning for a particularly slow group of golfers. The engineer fumed "What's with these guys ..... we must have been waiting for 15 minutes!"

The doctor chimed in "I don't know, but I've never seen such ineptitude! "

The pastor said, "Here comes the greenskeeper. Let's have a word with him."

"Hi George. Say, what's with that group ahead of us. They're rather slow, aren't they?"

The greenskeeper replied , "Oh, yes, that's a group of blind firefighters. They lost their sight saving our clubhouse from a fire last year, so we always let them play for free anytime."

The group was silent for a moment. The pastor said, "That's so sad. I think I will say a special prayer for them tonight."

The doctor said, "Good idea. I'm going to contact my ophthalmologist buddy and see if there's anything he can do for them."

The engineer said, "Why can't these guys play at night?"

---

There was an engineer who had an exceptional gift for fixing all things
mechanical. After serving his company loyally for over 30 years, he
happily retired.

Several years later the company contacted him regarding a seemingly
impossible problem they were having with one of their multimillion
dollar machines. They had tried everything and everyone else to get the
machine to work but to no avail. In desperation, they called on the
retired engineer who had solved so many of their problems in the past.

The engineer reluctantly took the challenge. He spent a day studying the
huge machine. At the end of the day, he marked a small "x" in chalk on a
particular component of the machine and stated, "This is where your
problem is."

The part was replaced and the machine worked perfectly again. The
company received a bill for $50,000 from the engineer for his service.
They demanded an itemized accounting of his charges.

The engineer responded briefly: One chalk mark $1. Knowing where to put
it $49,999. It was paid in full and the engineer retired again in peace.

Changing a leopard's spots

... might be impossible, or maybe it just need more work.

Changing my blogging identity and making some effort to change my style is not just not enough, I am still not that different from who I was a year ago. Less angry, but still cynical and jaded. I cannot believe how much tension and pressure can be released through a simple 4km run after work, and the feel-good lasted 24 hours and made my next working day easier to live with. I can change the way I write, my outlook in life and my viewpoints, but the things that push my buttons remain the same. I am still who I am.

Having pioneered the use of blogs in my department as a communication tool for the project team, I was tasked to set up a wiki for knowledge sharing. I had previously set up 2 proof-of-concept wikis to demonstrate the benefits of wikis, but I had not bothered to really put in the content and made my pitch to the department. And so I lost to someone who was better versed in claiming credit, whether due or undue. By transferring my proof-of-concept into a linux server, he got a more reliable environment and sold the idea as his own. By setting up a new server, he could sideline the old and pretend it never existed and so made no mention of what has been done before this. Give credit where due, give respect where due, damnit!

There are many kinds of people in the world. There are techies who will give due credit when building upon other people's achievements. Then there are the management type who will build on it as though it was entirely their idea in the first place. The evil M$ type who buys over and absorbs within themselves with no trail of their history left behind. I hate playing these games. The only way to stay on top in the pecking order is to stay constantly vigilant and guard against bloodsuckers.

That time when boss was asking about the wiki, I had ignored the bloodsucker's request for help and presented my achievements directly to the boss. I could see the bloodsucker's disappointment and perhaps some fear of losing this chance to promote himself. And I can see his unease when he hears me telling people that I was the one who pioneered and set up the first blog and wiki, that I explained the concept and benefits, that the bloodsucker only moved it into a new server. He knows that his achievements pale beside mine, and he is not comfortable to be found out. I mean, if he has nothing to hide, would he fear being found out?

Such tactics can be used, but what for? If I'm still asking questions like this after a period of 5 years in this company, perhaps it is time to move on to a place I am more suited to, where I don't have to ask such questions. A place more worth striving for. Or perhaps I'm not using such tactics because I am not an imbecile with the pressure of a house, baby and a car to feed, so I don't find it worth resorting to such underhanded measures to stay on top.

Are they worth changing my spots for?

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Sometimes it is convenient to associate one thing with another to achieve your objective. For example, something that brings good feelings can be associated with something that you are trying to sell. The good thing you are associating with it has very little to do with what you are selling, but the advertiser knows that associating them together helps nudge the potential buyer into opening his wallet. And as the saying goes, a fool and his money are soon parted.

KFC is known for deep fried chicken that is delicious, but terribly oily and fattening. Oily and fattening are 2 words that will never appear in KFC's advertisement, for they will only remind diners of what is bad about them. Instead, you will find other words such as delicious, finger-licking good and great taste. That is still ok, at least they are being truthful and attracting the customer with direct attributes of their product. But when they start mentioning that one of the secrets to a healthy lifestyle is to use fresh food in their ingredients, it seems that they are stretching it quite a bit.

Healthy lifestyle is one of the phrases I would not normally associate with fast food. When I eat fast food, I know that I am committing slow suicide, but I do it willingly and happily. They have found a way to overcome this stigma by linking their fried food to the freshness of the ingredients. How much of the nutrients in chicken will degrade in slightly less fresh chicken, I wonder. I only know that this is a more important issue in fresh vegetables and fruits, which are painfully lacking in a typical KFC meal. The only issues I know regarding fresh meat is taste, not nutrients. It takes a leap of imagination and creativity to link healthy lifestyle with KFC. Must have been one long brainstorming session.

Are there any who dig in happily thinking of the benefits to health that they are reaping from their deep fried fresh chicken?

Seen on a car's windscreen

Be kind to animals, go vegetarian.

I've got a better one - Be kind to vegetables, don't eat. Be kind to your fellow men, stop cannibalism.

I like these better:
Baby on board
Child of God onboard
If you can read this you are too close
Sex instructor, first lesson free - you still win even if your lesson is lousy

They are among us!

I saw an Autobot today. The logo was on a black Hyundai driving towards Orchard Road. I have been seeing guys walking around in Decepticon t-shirts for months, but did not take them seriously. But there is a vehicle with that logo! Is there a secret war going on in the midst of us and we are just now aware of it? This is after all the year 2005, the year when the Autobots would win the war and reclaim Cybertron.

Will we be seeing fighter jets with Deception logos soon?

Autobots Decepticons

Get to know yourself better

Interesting quiz, found the link on Tetanus's blog. Go try it yourself.
http://quizbox.com/personality/test82.aspx

Your view on yourself:

Other people find you very interesting, but you are really hiding your true self. Your friends love you because you are a good listener. They'll probably still love you if you learn to be yourself with them.

I listen. But good listener? Dunno.

The type of girlfriend/boyfriend you are looking for:

You are a true romantic. When you are in love, you will do anything and everything to keep your love true.

That is simple enough and true enough.

Your readiness to commit to a relationship:

You are ready to commit as soon as you meet the right person. And you believe you will pretty much know as soon as you might that person.

Yep, though I don't believe in the one person destined for me, I believe I know a good match when I see one.

The seriousness of your love:

You are very serious about relationships and aren't interested in wasting time with people you don't really like. If you meet the right person, you will fall deeply and beautifully in love.

It's not just about BGR, but with friends in general. Either deep or nothing.

Your views on education

Education is less important than the real world out there, away from the classroom. Deep inside you want to start working, earning money and living on your own.

I enjoy my study days, but independence is much more important.

The right job for you:

You have plenty of dream jobs but have little chance of doing any of them if you don't focus on something in particular. You need to choose something and go for it to be happy and achieve success.

I know what I want alright.

How do you view success:

You are afraid of failure and scared to have a go at the career you would like to have in case you don't succeed. Don't give up when you haven't yet even started! Be courageous.

Sigh. I'm trying. Half a year more and I will shoot for it. 30 years of housing loans. How?

What are you most afraid of:

You are concerned about your image and the way others see you. This means that you try very hard to be accepted by other people. It's time for you to believe in who you are, not what you wear.

Why is this so?

Who is your true self:

You are mature, reasonable, honest and give good advice. People ask for your comments on all sorts of different issues. Sometimes you might find yourself in a dilemma when trapped with a problem, which your heart rather than your head needs to solve.

That sounds like me, or who I think I am. Maybe I should get someone to do a test that evaluates what they think I am. Forget it. See 2nd last point.