Resolutions anyone?

Location: Home (Latrobe), Melbourne

Time: 8:25pm BKK, after midnight local time

Feeling:... restless

Resolutions for new year... Hmm... Just thought of starting to make a list...

1) Fiscal responsibility. Has to be. As suggested by colleagues to whom I'm now obliged to submit bi-weekly finance report... I cannot comprehend how I can remain in such a financial sh!thole with a steady income. Where the hell is it going?!? Sure I may shop, but am I really spending that much on shopping?!? Is it the travel? Random expenses that arise out of travel and convenience related stuff that I spend on because I don't have time?? I don't know... But i'm supposed to be keeping track now. And now more shopping... (excluding the necessities of course... Like 17 pairs of Leona Edminson stay ups... I need those for work... I stock up)

2) Get in shape (well get back into the correct shape. ie pre-work state)

3) wouldn't mind dating a bit more. but i think this one is out of my hands. I can't even begin to formulate a practical plan...

That's all I've got for now... I think i need to add more... #3 is not really a realistic one anyway...

qantas sux

Location: Latrobe St Home, Melbourne

Time: 11am (BKK) - not sure about Melbourne...

Feeling - tired

Just thought I'd make a list of bottom 3 things that happened to me in the last 24 hours:

1) spilled hairy lemon on my laptop. Emergency unplugging, drying and non-utilisation for the next few hours...

2) had my visa skimmed in Thailand. Had to cancel.

3) spent 3 hours waiting for my cabin luggage at the airport in melbourne. after they wouldn't let me take it into bus class and decided to send it to melbourne a few flights later. i had to guess what actually happened as no one would farken tell me anything. "yeah... why don't you wait and see if it arrives on the next flight" did not inspire confidence in Qantas baggage handling. I have subsequently cancelled all of my upcoming Qantas flights and now flying Thai airways to BKK next time. Farkers.

Are we there yet?

Location: Client office, Rama III, BKK

Time: 13 Dec 2006, 8:13am (BKK time)

Man.... I wish Xmas hollidays would just START ALREADY....

Other than that I have nothing of interest to say other than lah lalalalallaaaaaaa lalalalala

Lalalala Laaaaa Laaah LaLaLaLa

Tried to come into the office early so that I'd finish that reference for Harvard Bus School for Chris. Find myself procrastinating.... Possibly waiting for Xmas...

Sigh

Back to it.

Hothothot

Location: Home@Latrobe St, Melbourne

Time: 1pm (Melb time), 9am (BKK time)

Man it's hot. This is same as Bangkok weather. Except in BKK I have air-con. Sigh.

Trying to work and it is just NOT happening. Well, it's not work exactly - trying to write Chris's Harvard Bus School reference. Having flashbacks to writing all those wanky questionnaires when looking for grad job.

Monday tomorrow. Which means airport time. I just SO CANNOT be bothered. 2 more weeks in Bangkok before Xmas break. I am OVER it. I want the break now. I want to be home. I don't want to fly anywhere... whinge whinge whinge. Feel a bit better now.

Monday, yellow Monday - Part 2

I've also decided to start compiling list of top 3...

1) (so far anyway, given it's the only one on the list) Arthur's Brazillian sayings - so far 2 gems: "When it's raining dicks, pick the smallest" and "If you're getting raped, you may as well enjoy it". I think it's possible something gets lost in translation, but geesh I love it when he starts his sentence with "You know, in Brazil, we have a saying..."

Monday, yellow monday

Location: Shearton Grande Sukhumvit, Bangkok

Date: Monday 4 Dec, 10:14pm

As I was walking to get photos for Thai work permit, I was trying to pick my bottom 3 of the day... Now that I'm back (4 hours later), I seem to have forgotten the second one...

1) December is the Yellow-shirt month due to King's b'day. Everyone has to wear yellow. So far it's been only every monday. Now it's every freaking day in December. Lets just say, I'm not blending in...

2) is the one I forgot. I bet it was interesting.

3) My client counterpart draining my existence. Enough said.

Sunday lounging

Location: Sheraton Grande Sukhumvit, Bangkok

Data /Time: Sunday 2nd December, 10:41AM

Another sunny day in the steamy Bangkok. Trying to make small talk with room service as they try to clean my room (I take advantage of the fact that room gets cleaned twice a day - things stay where they fall... yess... most people will have no trouble believing that one) - and basically doing anything and everything that postpones me doing process maps and thinking about work in general.

Have already done shopping on strawberrynet, done some packing, bought subscription to 2007 ballet season, answered emails and even (gasp) hung some of my clothes up. Now updating my blog as this, again, postpones process mapping for a little while.

Sigh.

I gave up on small talk and wild gesticulation and gone back to pondering what I need to say to get a flat white coffee (this time I got a large pot of black coffee - close but not quite).

Had some success yesterday with Anna's wedding present. Thoroughly regretted my moment of stupidity when I promised a Thai fertility statue (I don't think there are fertility deities in buddhism... it's just Buddha...). Anyway, managed to get a non-buddha statue that could potentially be a fertility statue if you are drunk and squint. Most stutues here are either wood (bad for quarantine matters) or bronze (farken heavy). So it's a bonus that I managed to find one that I can check into luggage and can even lift without assistance. *clap clap for me*

I guess I should really do some work. I'll try to motivate myself - finish 3 process maps that I need to email out tomorrow morning and I can go shopping.... I think another reason I find work distasteful is that one of my client counterparts keeps referring to me as "lovely Olga" and it is freaking me out (as if...!). Eww. Quadriple Eww. In fact, ewww to the power of infinity. I already feel like i need to shower.

Sigh

Process maps, here I come. The Master of THai Commercial Banking Process Maps yay... Really, I'm one step away from Master of the Universe...

oh yeah and...

9) Asking whether a restaurant has something is equivalent to buying it. I once asked whether they have absolut (with a view to maybe having a shot) - next thing I know there a full bottle on our table. However, my genuine shock at this occurrence did facilitate people thinking that I did not foresee it happening and therefore am not an alco. And we got to drink the bottle... Those Thais can drink!

Bangkok - the land of process maps

Location: Room 2103, Sheraton Grande Sukhumvit, Bangkok

Time: 12:28 AM (BKK time), 29 Nov 2006

It's been a very very very long time since I've written anything here. Especially in the light of my constant promises to friends and roommates who wonder once in a while where the fark I am and when I'm coming home. Apparently, if I'm not careful I could miss the sale of our apartment by landlord, one roommate going to UK and us moving out to a 2BR place. God knows what I've already missed. (eg potential life forms breeding in my room... gotta watch those teabags)

Aanyway... Right. Bangkok. It feels like much much longer than 3 weeks that I've been here. I'll summarise the lowlights and the highlights... (leave up to you to decide which is which...). In no particular order...

1) Weekend at Koh Samui (the airport is actually a shed with no walls... AND they made us pay an airport tax of 300 baht... what the hell for? repairing holes in the roof due to coconuts falling?)

2) xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (editing..... )

3) Anna's hens night (not in bangkok): mmm panther...

4) Looking for Anna's wedding present. What the hell was I thinking when I promised Thai fertility statues???

5) Process mapping... god... process mapping...

6) **#*#*@())@__!!!#$#%%%%***************************** (more stuff about work and client that I've had to edit due to the memo we got from Ralph. Apparently we are not allowed to diss the firm anywhere - which includes drunken conversations and blogs... HRMPH!)

7) ummm... I thought I had more to say but I'm kind of stuck now. A bit retarded today after just spending 3 hours banging my head against a metaphysical wall of non-english speaking (and not very bright) people.... I allow the possibility that they may come across smarter if I understood more of what they are saying... Actually.. maybe not...

8) Mondays - are yellow shirt days in Thailand - in honour of the King (some sort of anniversary... maybe 50 years since coronation I think). At first I thought "geesh, yellow is popular", then I thought it must be some sort of uniform... Now I have a yellow shirt. Have worn it once. Moved on to wearing a yellow tie instead.

Hm Sleepy now...

still mushrooming

It's interesting that I seem to need to be in a fairly depressed mood in order to have interesting thoughts and ponder the meaning of life and the like....

Maybe I'm just tired. Very tired.