My God is a miracle worker :)

Kai just informed me today that the rest of the girls were pissed off because I didn't show up for lunch. I didn't because I had to work, and as usual, it was to meet deadlines and more deadlines.

When Kai told me how she felt bad because she didn't show, I told her that it's not really bothering me because I've already texted them an apology, and I really did think that they would understand. Maybe it was the unpeturbness of my voice but when she hung up 10 minutes later, I felt like I just alienated another friend. Maybe I should have sounded more apologetic and stressed over everyone's displeasure at a no-show, but when you've been in this industry for a while now, you don't take anything personally. I wish they will realise that it's not personal if I don't show up, it's just that I more often than not have no control over my working hours. Something could be urgent in a span of half an hour, and that's really the problem, you'll never know until the very last minute.

Maybe this is why lawyers almost end up having friends in the same field. Sure, we start out with plenty of friends in diverse jobs, people whom you've bonded so well over secondary school and who were there for you every step of your growing up years, but will they always be so forgiving if you cancel last minute? You can tell if your friends are lawyers when they call to cancel 5 minutes to lunch time or even 10 minutes way past the supposed meeting time, and the friend will just say "it's alright. I understand". No questions asked, just sympathy because the other person is obviously trapped at work and anybody would be sore missing out on life because you were stuck at work.

I find myself in a really hilariously painful situation. I don't particularly enjoy or love my job, but I find myself having to justify my no-show by defending my job. Now how bizarre is that?!

Friends in the industry that I've spoken to tell me that their friends just stop asking them out after a while because we're either always busy, or we've stood our friends up one too many times. I was supposed to meet the girls again next week for lunch but Kai says she's not sure if that's still on.

When I told the others tonight at CYL's birthday party, TGH remarked that "your friends are not lawyers right". Yes that is true, but I still wish sometimes that it doesn't have to be like that.

I took the train and bus home today!
(Read: not cabbing home means left office before 10 p.m.)


Actually, I left the office way before that - at 730 p.m. Niceeeeee :)

Life has been pretty uneventful of late - Chinese New Year came and went by in not too much of a flash. I spent the festive period stuffing my face with pineapple tarts, stuffing my brains with trashy Korean dramas, stuffing my body with wine and generally, feeling very happily stuffed. Reporting to work again on Monday after the long weekend was therefore understandably….. tramautising.

The most eventful event since the (Chinese) New Year would be the cab ride back from Hong Kah - Don't get me started on why I'm there, I am particularly sore about the fact that the main purpose of the entire exercise is to advance someone's political career. Anyway, I got into this yellow top black cab, and there was this super old uncle, around my grand-daddy's age behind the wheel. And then everything Alvin Chan said about yellow top cabs just came floating back to memory. As Murphy would have it, everything he bitched about previously was spot on - the cab was super old, unmaintained, smelt suspiciously like a storeroom (of dust probably). I can still live with that, but then I think he embarked onto some personal mission to get us to as many close shave situations as possible. We spent the entire half an hour cab ride tailgating vans and lorries in the extreme left lane, when we could have easily gone at a much faster speed in the right lane. It was pure torture starting and stopping (really hard!) in the rickety cab, and when you see normal cabs zooming down quickly on the right lane… man, the frustration….you know somebody up there has got to be laughing very hard at the entire situation. The cab skidded twice trying to stop, and then a couple more times before I got home in one piece. I swear I saw my life flashing past more than a couple of times that night.

I don’t think I've ever darted so quickly out of a cab before. Mental note to self: Remember to always strap up in the cab next time.

*****

It's finally midweek, and mid-Feb! Where do I go from here? God please please give me an indication soon.


*****

Intelligence is very sexy. Completely random but true :)

How many 12-hour (or more) work days can I go on for before I decide to throw in the towel?

I'm back from Perth, with tons of pictures to show and tell. It's been a fabulous 13 days, and seriously, it is possible to amuse yourself for that longgggg in Perth.

I was going to blog about 2006, about Perth and more Perth, but since:

1) I had to wake up at 6 a.m. this morning to catch the PER-SIN flight;

2) I have to go back to The Office tomorrow;

3) I have to muster up the frame of mind and stomach to step into The Office all over again tomorrow; and

4) No more sleeping in till 12 p.m. tomorrow,

I shall post 4 personal favourites which best sum up my holiday.

Having not felt the sun on my skin for such a long time now, it felt wonderful to be outside, breathing in the salty air, feeling the cold waves rush up to tickle my feet, and just feeling.... so alive.




AA, the seagull chaser. I really love how the different shades of blue in this picture all blend so beautifully together.




The glorious Perth sun! (This was before the temperatures rose up to 44 degrees celsius in the days leading up to Christmas)



The brilliant sunset. It's like something just exploded in the sky no?

Mcdonald's delivery charge has increased to 3 blardee friggin dollars.... And I'm paying for it anyway because:

1)I'm too lazy to walk 2 streets to get it;

2)I have no time to even walk down to get it;

3)The queen will freak out and have my head if she sees that I'm not around, maybe even hyperventilate and start to wheeze a little; and

4)None of my friends are staying late today. The ones who are have eaten and the ones who aren't, well duh, who wants to stick around the office much longer than necessary?!!

It's Friday! -- this translates to only 2 more work days left before I leave for my 2 week holiday :D

I need a holiday from:

-Work
-Work; and
-more Work.

I got so excited that I even prepared my out-of-office reply:

"Thank you for your email. I am currently on leave, and will return to the office on the 2nd of January 2008. I will not have access to emails during this period when I am out of the office. For urgent assistance, please contact my secretary, Ms X at xxx. "

Ahhh the taste of sweet liberation and freedom. Yes, anytime now.


Now that the holiday is finally in sight, and half of today will be gone with the Christmas party this evening, and another half of Tuesday gone with the department Christmas Lunch, I am finally feeling the festive spirit :)

Merry Christmas to you and you and you!

Hey you, it must be tiring being so two-faced.

That's why sometimes, I alternate between being impressed by your stamina, being disgusted by your fake vibe and then really, just being thankful that I have not stooped to such a level.

From the movie 2 days in Paris, by Marion:

"It always fascinated me how people go from loving you madly to nothing at all, nothing. It hurts so much. When I feel someone is going to leave me, I have a tendency to break up first before I get to hear the whole thing. Here it is. One more, one less. Another wasted love story. I really love this one.

When I think that its over, that I'll never see him again like this... well yes, I'll bump into him, we'll meet our new boyfriend and girlfriend, act as if we had never been together, then we'll slowly think of each other less and less until we forget each other completely. Almost. Always the same for me. Break up, break down. Drunk up, fool around. Meet one guy, then another, fuck around. Forget the one and only. Then after a few months of total emptiness start again to look for true love, desperately look everywhere and after two years of loneliness meet a new love and swear it is the one, until that one is gone as well.

There's a moment in life where you can't recover any more from another break-up. And even if this person bugs you sixty percent of the time, well you still can't live without him. And even if he wakes you up every day by sneezing right in your face, well you love his sneezes more than anyone else's kisses."


FL and I were in town today, and admist lunch at MOS burger, over too much oil burgers and too little salt fries, she said how it's difficult to start anything because she is not the kind of person to expose herself and her vulnerabilities. To which I very calmly said "Well the other person is also exposing himself to you. That said, it just dawned on me that we don't always find it easy to live by our words.

*****

Sometimes you might have thought that you've moved on from something, but really, the truth could be that, that something has moved on and you're just in the very same place where you started. Too tired to think, and maybe just don't want to either. This state of feeling apathetic, I'm not sure how else to treat it but to slowly embrace it.


*****


I'm tired out from the year, tired out from pretending that it matters or from pretending that it does not matter. And somewhere in me I'm still working up the guts to say cooly, with the resolute gaze "it's not my problem no more." I believe I do dream/fantasize of it from time to time.

I need a (friggin superduperlicious scrumptious good good) holiday :)