October 2004

I’m at work, with the Waja in a workshop in Bangsar Utama. When I collect it, I’ll be 300 ringgit poorer.

Why? Because Proton Edar’s service crew failed to diagnose the problem properly when the car was still in service. As a matter of fact, they even made things worse.

Their lack of compassion in their work, even giving excuses as to how they cannot rectify the problems they themselves created by either poor manufacturing or shallow knowledge of their products, leads me to lose all confidence in our local brand. Never again shall I purchase another Proton car, unless I’m freaking desperate.

VTEC all the way.

I know I had a lot of things I wanna put here right now, but I just can’t remember what exactly. Must’ve been the food.

Speaking of food, consultants treated us to break fast at Tropicana. The spread wasn’t bad, but I’m pretty sure it was much smaller than last year.

Suddenly, there’s a huge pile of clothes in the laundry basket, contrary to what I expected earlier. Seems that my sister saved up all those clothes, waiting for us to either get a new washing machine or fix the old one. College students, sheesh!

Well, both my sibs aren’t around now. Left for JB with my dad this afternoon. Finally, I have the PS2 all to myself! Boogers to those Dynasty Warriors addicts. It’s Lovage time!

Looking for someone to fix your home appliance? Look no further.

Kedai Elektrik Cheah, just delivered our 8-year old Indesit washing machine after taking only 1 day to fix it. Yep, it’s 11pm.

Their people skills are also top-notch; they’re still smiling after a long day of deliveries and pickups. They’re also concerned whether they could park right up the front porch, or wear shoes along the rear balcony.

Cost: RM 260 all inclusive of parts, labor, and transportation.

A totally far cry from the previous 2 repair people who either overquoted the cost or tried to con me, I’d definitely go back to Cheah for any further repairs.

Now, if only they could fix my car.

Ugh… staring at screen and tiles all day is awfully tiring.

The rewards for queueing up for 20 minutes for a good nasi briyani is worth it. 🙂

I need bonus.

myuucon, my web-based thingie mentioned in my Tech section, is underway. I’ve just managed to get the initial login process done. Then I have to work on the actual panels. And the taiko face is somewhat distracting.

For non-Jap speakers, if you truly want to enjoy GITS: Innocence, then I suggest you play it back at about 75% its original speed. Too many subs. @_@ It’s tough being a fan of a very philosophical universe.

Um, no, not me.

Two of my favorite mangas have finally hit the motion screen. BECK, whose theme song is as the title of this post, and Yakitate! Ja-pan!

One, about a great band in the making, and second, about a great baker in the making. Both are great stories at the opposite ends of the manga spectrum.

Went washing-machine shopping today at SS2. Leaning towards a top-load 10kg Panasonic one for about 1.3K. Or we might risk getting American-made Whirlpool, which has hot water.

Long time no post! Reason being: Star Control 2! Nope, not a remake, merely a port from the original DOS source code to modern operating systems like XP and Linux. Ahh, those were the good old days, and the storyline is still top-notch!

Was playing this all night and a good part of this afternoon. Only reason I stopped was cuz it crashed. 😛 Well, it is an alpha release, after all.

Check on the timestamp link for more snapshots.

On another note, it feels good to be praised by your bosses on jobs well done. But what if it goes on till you feel that you’re being overly favored? I know rewards come with accomplishments, but some may think that, after continuous success, that I’m a “project manager’s pet”. Should I be worried that others might envy me and provide less cooperation in the future? I hope not.

Oh well, in times of uncertainty, it’d only be wise to perform the best I can. At least till they figure out this performance-based culture thing. After that, I’d have to be better than my best. Scary.

Whee. Work wasn’t so bad today. A little running here and there, a few meetings left and right, and the day was over before I knew it. At least for the moment, there’s no one rushing me for deadlines.

It’s nice being the one to put pressure on others. 😀

Like yesterday, I stopped by Bangsar’s pasar juadah to buy back some food. Pasar juadahs are basically a group of stalls selling food, mainly for Muslims breaking fast. The food they sell aren’t the normal type either; all are somewhat themed towards Ramadhan. For example, you can’t get ayam percik or briyani gam at any mamak place.

Juadah basically means spread. Of food. And that’s a noun. 😛

The selection in Bangsar’s is pretty good, and even when I’ve got my list of things to buy, it still takes time cuz there’s usually more than one stall selling the same food. There were 3 stalls selling briyani gam, and none of them looked like the real thing. Real briyani gam is served with the meat/mutton/chicken mixed with the rice. I think it is also cooked that way, which gives it its rich aroma and flavor. But I bought one for myself, just thinking about it.

True briyani gam can be found in Batu Pahat, Johor, along a row of shops in town. Sorry, but I only remember how the location looks like. Don’t remember the stall name either.

My mom tells she heard there’s a stall in Taman Tun selling it, and there’s usually a long queue for it. Well, there’s a lot more days in this fasting month, so we’ll probably drop by there sometime.

Indeed, this movie is hilarious, and very interesting. Watch it, when you can.

… don’t wanna spoil anything. 😛

MT 3.12 released! I hope they fixed the bug I reported.

And tomorrow… back to work. 🙁

Was thinking that I shouldn’t wait till Thursday. Stayed back a bit last night to finish off a few tasks. Was almost late for break fast at the surau.

After that, made a short stop at TMC to buy milk, then headed down over to where the guys were having dinner. A call from Az prompted us to leave for War.net, where we played Far Cry all night long.

All hail the Red Team! Let’s just say, Az, Henry, and I creamed the rest. 😀

And Nestle Crunch ice cream is oh-so-good!

Going back to the surau part, it was a bit awkward having being my first free buka puasa event for the month. First of all, being late, I had to endure being stared down by the 400 students who were already there. Fortunately, a colleague who was an AJK there, pulled me into a little room where they had their own spread.

Secondly, it felt odd looking younger than some of them students. 😛

I felt guilty leaving right after prayer too, but I shouldn’t keep the others waiting. I’ll just have to redeem myself in the next few days.

Now, I just have to figure out how I can escape home to watch Sky Captain this Wednesday.

No work for me today, hurray!
Cuz I’m at S A P training today!

Gotta learn up the systems,
and make those users like em,
cuz it’s in my job description,
to give em misinformation!

Not looking forward to the piles of work I have to do on Thursday.