its 8pm and i'm stuck in the office. not because of work this time, but because i'm looking out the window and all i see is a sea of stationary brake lights. i hear the duta bridge is flooded and semantan isnt moving at all. just hoping my trusty penchala is still going

not that it makes a difference anyway since with Tun Razak it would probably take me the rest of the night to get there.

anyway now that I'm officially transferring to iP Holdings, I should decide if i want to joint the management office or join global consulting. this is actually going to be a tough one, because i've spent a good portion of my rational-thinking life knowing that I wanted to go into software engineering, so I've had a lot of time to think and plan that. but now its a different story. do I want to delve in depth into something, or do i want to be a jack of all trades .. although then again arent most consultants more or less that anyway.

one thing i do know, I want to work on projects. i dont want be doing the same thing everyday. i need change. i get bored easily.

its funy how quickly things change or people change. for 4 years i *knew* i wanted to be a developer. i'm far from it now ..

mwahahahahaha, i am NOW able to SCREW your blogs up by posting mine on here, heheheh :p

ok need help, I need a job title and I'd rather come up with one myself before the bosses give me something weird ... i'm thinking _____ Consultant, the obvious would be Business Consultant but that sounds boring (and a girl said that would turn her off .. so i need somethng sexy sounding ;) .. I sorta like Strategic Consultant, but there's no way EH will buy that heh.

ok gimme suggestions!!

in contemplation

i keep saying i'm gonna blog after i get done with work, but when you're only done at 330 am and gotta be at work at 8am after that (although alrite i come in at 9 but whatever i think i earn that) sleep takes precedence and priority. blogging suddenly becomes an unnecessary luxury one can't afford to indulge in

yesterday was supposed to be my sleeping night and today my party night, but J decides he wants us in on saturday morning. its 6pm and i just left the office like maybe an hour ago.

man my life is sad. iPerintis gathering at bon ton last friday was my social event of the week??

makes you wonder .. where are we at, where are we going, what are we doing with our lives. it was different in college, in school sure you had midterms and papers and deadlines, but you ere doing so many different things ... or could do so many different things that it sorta makes you feel you are living to an extent. except around midterms and finals.

now its just work. after which i neither have the time nor the will, or even the energy to go out and do something

thats why i admire and envy E's life, you could argue that she lacks that stable career path, but then again when you consider her field (or multitude fields ;) of expertise, its not the same sort of progression or career destiny that you find in mine.

i envy the inherent freedom and flexibility built into her chosen lifestyle. and I admire the adamant courage and boldness she manifests in embracing and challenging the inescapable uncertainty that would have many others tremble

so where are we at?
seek us our wretched desires and embrace us our uncertain destiny?
or take charge so as not to succumb to the whims of probability?

Where are you and I'm so sorry
I cannot sleep I cannot dream tonight
I need somebody and always
This sick strange darkness
Comes creeping on so haunting every time
And as I stared I counted
The Webs from all the spiders
Catching things and eating their insides
Like indecision to call you
and hear your voice of treason
Will you come home and stop this pain tonight
Stop this pain tonight

well i'm having drinks with some people from a particular company (which i'm not gonna name but starts with an 'M' and they make software .. go figure) .. and we're leaving and we all walk outside to get into our cars ... one walks into her Audi A4T, another into his alpha romeo, and another into her VW Beetle (yes, the new one).

and i'm sulking back to my beat up old wira with plastic bumpers and a crack headlamp hoping no one saw me and thinking to myself, "man i work for the wrong company"

as the malaysian work force we are used and abused by corporations, simply because they know they can. i look with scorn upon anyone who exclaims with glee "oh its so good to be in malaysia, cost of living is so low!". yeah sure, you can get your teh'o limau for RM1 at a mamak .. but i can't replace engine oil with teh'o limau or use 'roti kosong' as brake pads.

we are not fortunate, we are abused. i am abused for having to by a sub-par quality car at over 2-yrs worth of my salary, whereas my fellow college graduate can buy a USD15k car, a mere 1/4th of her salary. and since when is "living frugal" a requirement of a low cost of living? if thats the case i could move to London and live off saltine crackers and tap water and call London a city of "low cost of living"

so what have i learnt from reading all my roman historical novels? what are the three things i have learnt about life, based on readings on roman politics and military strategy:

1) Never underestimate your enemy, give due respect when waranted. Countless Roman generals and consuls have been overrun and hordes of roman lives have been lost thanks to the arrogance attributed to supposed patrician blood and disdain for "barbarians". Incidentally, the word "barbarian" comes from the Greek word "bárbaros", or "the sound foreigners make". The greeks originally used it to refer to all races of non-Greek origin; it later evolved into the rude sub-human, uncivilized definition we have today.
2) Information is everything. Not just information but information of information. Know your enemy, its strengths, its weaknesses, its strategies, its whims and fancies. Know your battlefield, know your own forces and resources, and know how to muster and motivate them. And know and control what your enemy knows.
3) Always have a backup. Never throw all your resources into a battle, always have fresh reserves.

i still remember what my roman history professor told us on the first day of class (and reiterated again and again, both explicitly, and implicitly via example and demonstration) .. Rome was not just a city with its temples and its senate, it was not just an empire. Rome was an idea, it was a vision, it was an ideal, a dream. A vision of a civilized world standing in the darkness that was the ancient world. And like all such human indulgences, the vision held and lasted long after the physical manifestations crumbled, be it to corruption or power struggles or external influences. And that's why it prevailed so long, long after the empire crumbled, long after the temples collapsed and the marble stolen, the idea of Rome still lived on in the minds of many. i think this is part of the answer of how Rome became what it was, it was loyalty and commitment not just to king or emperor, but to the vision of Rome that drove men.

Kings die. Dreams live on.

apparently F's brother hooked up with some hot girl and had a little something something at our version of boot camp. man i wanna go for that now, sounds like a real party