Out of Job; Back to Warcraft

It is now 3 weeks after I left my job at SMART taxi. The last few days at SMART had been pretty relaxed for me as I mainly handled simple filing and report-writing duties as part of the handover to the one that was replacing me. Incidentally, fellow colleagues started leaving one by one during those days and after I had left. It somewhat made me feel good that I was abandoning a sinking ship and several others shared my view.

I am back to playing WoW and have reprised my role as main tank for my guild. Our progress have been steadily improving with the recruitment of new raiders. It looked like the days of being stuck with insufficient raid classes is finally over. I would say our progress is pretty good.

I guess I'll be enjoying myself for quite a while again before I resume job hunting again.

The Countdown Begins

I am feeling kinda relaxed as I am typing this because I am planning to take MC for Wednesday. I know it is quite evil of me (my colleague will be all alone) but I'll just treat it as 'compensation' for the second week where I had high fever but tossed my MC aside.

Anyway, I have began counting down to the day that I would be leaving my company. That would be the 23rd of May which means I have completed one month. I actually made the decision last week. It was a Tuesday when I woke up and felt very heavy-hearted; I have stopped looking forward to every new day. I got to work, still feeling sick due to my fever, then, within the first hour, the phone rang and some retarded driver had an accident. I felt angry and sad at the same time. And so, I spoke to my department head, Siti, and told her that I would resign at the end of the first month.

I had wanted to keep a low profile then leave quietly on the last day. But as days went by, more people from other departments began to realize I was leaving. They started talking to me, mostly offering me encouragement (some even asked me if I had any job recommendations because they wanted out, too!).

I'll be looking forward to my freedom again coming next week.

Fever is Killing Me

I have been sick for one whole week. Somehow, I feel that this was not the typical flu that strikes me every year. I have been to two different doctors so far and the fever & headaches simply won't go away. Every night when I get home, I would just go to bed striaghtaway. If I don't get well soon, I think it may be time to get myself checked into a hospital.

What I do know is that part of my illness is probably due to work stress. The number of people working in my department had been halved ever since two of them transferred out. Right now, it's just me and Faritha. Okay, I would consider us as 1.5 (with me being the 0.5) since I am still new and pretty clueless as to what is going on. Both of us now suddenly have 50-100 more cases under our names since the other two bitches left (the least they could do was to tie up their last few cases and organize their files before leaving). And the irony is that, everyday, I see other departments getting new staff even though they already have like 3-4 people. Where is the love for our accident/claims department?

Seriously, I have been hating my job ever since my workload suddenly increased ten-fold for no good reason at all. I can never seem to finish whatever I am doing and then I suddenly get even more work to do. I am normally a very sporting person but falling sick because of work (and being unable to recover) is probably an indication to me that I have reached my limits. I imagine what would happen if I were to quit the job and then there will be only one person left to do the work of four. Maybe then the department heads will wake up.

Welcome to the Working Life

I have been meaning to blog about my new work but every time I think about it, I am overcome by sadness. Oh, well, here goes.

I received the phonecall last Monday from SMART taxi saying that I was hired. I was quite excited, though, so I just agreed to the job offer and cancelled my other interview with a 'feng shui' company.

On Wednesday, I began my duty as a Operations/Claims Assistant (that's what the appointment letter says) in the Insurance & Claims Department. My working times are 9 pm to 6 pm for 5 & a half days every week. To summarize what I do; I am in charge of doing accident reports, which includes everything from interviewing the driver to finally engaging a lawyer for them. It's actually a lot of work and since I am still inexperienced, I have to keep asking my colleagues for help. Every day, I pray that that the roads are safe so that I don't have to handle any accident cases. Unfortunately, I learnt that Singaporean drivers are very careless. So far, the accident record has been: WED (1), THUR (4), FRI (0)

What really came as a shock to me was that, on my first day of work, I was made by my colleagues to handle one accident case already. I felt it was inappropriate since I was still new, but come to think of it, such 'arrowing' has always been viciously prevalent everywhere, even during NS days. And so, I now already have numerous cases on my hands. I find it even more appalling that one of my colleagues is getting transferred out next Wednesday and she happily told me that she will be handing over all her cases to me. What the 'F' is wrong with these people?

Anyway, I also cannot really say that I like my job for now. True, I was quite happy initially that I have gotten a proper job at last (after 18 months!), but come to think of it, I was job hunting just because it was deemed the typical thing for most people to do. If given the chance, we would all prefer to idle at home everyday, doing the things we want to do. I already miss playing WoW reguarly. Now I only have about 5+ hours to myself every night when I get back, then it is bed time or else I'd be too tired to handle the stress from work.

I hope that I will be able to get used to it soon. I am guessing my current state of depression is due to the my body's adjustments to the new lifestyle. In the meantime, everyone should keep on praying that our country's roads are always safe so I don't have to handle any accident cases. I am already looking forward to Tuesday because it is Labour Day.

A Surprising Wednesday

I was up on the whole of Tuesday night because I couldn't get to sleep. I just idled in WoW, chatted with all those that were up and dueled a bit. I hope it is not insomnia again. Before I knew it, it was 8 am on Wednesday. I had a McDonald's breakfast then went to sleep.

I was awakened by my phone ringing at around 12 noon. It turned out that I was asked to go down to Tampines for a job interview at 2 pm. I tried to remember which job this was for but it was impossible since I sent over 10+ applications over the past week. I was grumpy from the lack of sleep. I went to print out my resume and prepared my results slips before going to lie on the bed a while more. It was soon 2 pm and my mother offered to fetch me to the Capital Building at Tampines since she knew where it was.

I found out that the company was SMART. I just know they have something to do with taxis or something. The receptionist gave me a form to fill out and I noticed that there were other applicants queueing for the same admin assistant job. And they were all ladies. Doesn't look good for me being the only male.

When it was my turn for the interview, a guy invited me in. He was quite a lively and cheerful person. And as with all my previous interviews, the first thing he said was "you are over-qualified for the job". The only difference was that he didn't say it in a chiding manner; it was more like he was surprised. This guy was different. We chatted and had a few good laughs. He was looking for someone who could handle accident reports and going on-site to talk to people. He said some of the taxi drivers were real rough and the job required some working under the sun. I felt that this was the best time to mention my Military Police experience. The interviewer seemed pretty pleased with what he was hearing and brought me to meet another lady to take down more of my particulars. She said they'd call me back in a few days.

For a moment there, I think I have a pretty good shot at the job since the rest of the applicants I saw outside were ladies. Oh, well. The interview left me in good spirits for the day.

I arrived home at around evening time and collapsed on the bed. I woke up at 8 pm, thinking I could attend my WoW raid but I felt totally lethargic by now. I apologized to my raid group, saying that I had totally no sleep at all for the day. Then I went to bed. Before that, I continued watching Code Geass and chatting a bit on MSN. I didn't want to feel like I didn't do anything on the computer for the day. hehe.

The Jobless Penguin!

I was considering seriously hunting for a new job after my birthday. I thought I could take my time with the resume-sending but it looks like I now have to step things up a little.

I think I am out of work. The office haven't called me down for 3 weeks already. So these pass 3 weeks I have been idling at home. I only called on the 3rd week (I was enjoying life as a free man for the first 2 weeks, thinking it wouldn't hurt) only to learn that the boss was overseas. I still do check the company's e-mail from home and, from what is going on, I believe that their e-mail account got hacked. I wonder how did a SingNet Business mail account got hacked.

It's back to mailing my resumes again. I'll pick up the Straits Times every Saturday now and look out for Admin Assistant positions. If anyone knows of any job openings that does not involve too much people-to-people interaction, let me know.

Birthday Weekend

Saturday was the 31st of March. It was my birthday. I didn't really plan to celebrate it, though. What I was really looking forward to was the Dark Portal Sneak Preview on Sunday. So I stayed home and played some WoW. Our guild got pwned by the Curator. That defeat, coupled with my excitement over the sneak preview, made me couldn't sleep all night.

I surfed the net till 8 am then prepared to leave for Suntec. I joined the first flight at 9 am with most of the gang. It has been a long time since I have been out of the house. I saw a lot of familiar faces and marveled at the new cards. I managed to go 3-1 in the first flight. We then decided to break for lunch.

This was when I suggested Curry Favor. I actually came across it while surfing some forums. The place was a little... underwhelming, I would say. The atmosphere didn't really match the prices on their menu. Nevertheless, I was yearning to try some Japanese curry and this was probably the only place I know of in Singapore that serves it.

After lunch, we returned back to Suntec and prepared for the last flight at 5 pm. It was pretty much worth it as the organizers always gave out extra products for the last flight. I scored 3-1 again. Everyone enjoyed themselves for the day.

As for me, I was totally exhausted. It was only around 11 pm when I got home but I took a quick bath and went to sleep immediately.

WoW: My Week in Karazhan

The past week had been a very fun and exciting experience. Our guild was raiding Karazhan and, for one such as myself who have never raided before, I was totally looking forward to it.

For those reading out for curiosity and wondering how come a game can last for one week, let me explain. A raid dungeon resets every Tuesday (maintenance day) so it means we are given around 6 days to attempt the dungeon, during which our progress will be saved.


Day 1:

We started off with Attumen the Huntsmen. He wasn't very tough since we had attempted him several times on previous trial runs. It took one try to down him.

After that, we made our way to Moroes. We weren't very sure if we were able to take him out this time because we were unsuccessful during our trial runs. Fortunately, we were well-coordinated this time, and after one wipe, we were soon dining with Medivh's undead house servant at the dinner table.

We were feeling lucky and decided to try out the Maiden of Virtue. We cleared our way to her room but got got thrashing. No hat trick for us. We called it a night and went back to read up on her.


Day 2:

We attempted the Maiden again, mixing up several strategies in the middle of the fight. The 10-second Repentance was the killer. The healers figured it out and we managed to down the evil slut. It was not a complicated fight compared to the Moroes encounter.

We began clearing the way to the next event, the Opera House, which was a random boss. We got the 'Wizard of Oz' parody. Needless to say, with four bosses running loose on the stage, chaos ensued and it was a wipe. Reclearing trash wasn't fun so that was it for the day.


Day 3:

Everyone started throwing ideas in guild chat before the raid begin. The GM came up with a plan and we decided to follow it. The roster for our raid saw a change we got a Warlock in this time.

And so, we went to attempt the 'Wizard of Oz' again. The character react like that children's tale. The Warlock feared the cowardly lion; the Warrior sundered the tin man till he was rusty enough for the Frost Mage to kite; the Fire Mage kept burning the straw man to keep him disoriented. One by one, they fell. All that was left was Dorothee and her puppy, Tito. We tried to take Dorothee out first but we accidentally killed her puppy. Hell hath no fury like a girl who lost her puppy. We soon got her down and then the wicked witch appeared. Everyone was in high spirits as we dodged her spinning tornado of doom while focusing all dps on her.

When all was said and done, it was curtains for the evil Crone. We were surprised that we managed to clear the Wizard of Oz event so smoothly.

We began moving on to our next destination, the Guardian's Library. It was there that we would meet the first real challange in Karazhan, the Curator (Did I mention that he drops tier 4 gloves?). Unfortunately for us, the Curator owned us bad. We only got him down to 70% at best. We decided to call it a night.


Day 4:

We attempted the Curator again. I was told to dps while the Protection Warrior tanked. It made me very happy that hybrid Arms Warriors like myself have a place in Kara (kudos to Blizzard). We did better but no cigar. Everyone was demoralized and the 20+ min trash respawns were adding insult to injury. There was no progress for the night.


Day 5:

This was the last day we could do Karazhan before the reset. I blew a lot of money to get my dps gear properly enchanted and bought all sorts of buff potions from the Auction House (byebye epic flying mount). I noticed all my raid members going all out at the Auction House, too. It looks like everyone was determined to down the Curator on this faithful day.

And so, we cleared our way in and it was time to try our luck again. The battle was fast & furious as everyone was going after the flares to dps them down before they overwhelmed the raid. Things went out of control for a moment but we soon got it back on track. I could feel that the tension was thick and everyone was totally immersed in the battle. Around 6+ minutes into the fight, the Curator enraged. He was down to 15%. This was our cue; everyone went ahead and wailed on the boss. I walked in and started spamming Execute. I didn't even know what was going on around me. All I remember was hearing was the constant yelling on ventrilo and seeing the damage numbers from my Execute. Then it was over. The Curator went down and everyone heaved a sigh of relief. Everyone celebrated over the guild's first tier 4 drop which was awarded to the other tank. After the celebrations were over, there was one last thing to do for the night; the Chess event!

We started clearing up the loooong stairways in the Guardian's Library as we ascended up Karazhan. It was probably like 2+ hours worth of trash mobs. Along the way, we passed the rooms to all the optional bosses (Illhoof, Aran, Nethersprite). We finally made our way to the chess event, right before Prince Malchezaar's room.

It was a fun and casual game of chess with a WoW twist. We could attempt it again even if we lost. When we finally beat it, it was two free epic loot. By then, it was already 3 am. It was a nice way to conclude our last day in Karazhan. So that's it for now until the next reset. Let's hope we get further next time.

How I Spent My CNY

I had the entire week off for this Chinese New Year. Things were not as hectic as the previous year as I only had to visit my father's side of the family this year. There wasn't even the usual reunion dinner on the eve cos' of grandma's back problem. This simply meant that I had more time to myself. As always, my brother took overtime to skip all the visiting; he simply can't stand visitng relatives to this very day.

As usual, I spent most of the time at home playing WoW. I would've made plans to go out but somehow, I felt lazy. I really wanted to watch Epic Movie but it seems that it is getting terrible reviews so not many people would want to watch it. I still would like to watch it, though... in any form.

In the middle of the week, my WoW guild did a trial Karazhan run. We just wanted to try out the first boss for fun to see if we were properly geared. I was quite stressed being the off-tank and it was very exciting yet nerve-wrecking. I just knew I felt very elated and relaxed after we downed the first boss. Sure, Attumen is pretty much a pushover encounter but this is my first raid in WoW so I thought I'd savour the moment.

Sometimes when I was bored, I'd dig through my cupboard and found my Tuxedo Gin comics. I re-read the five books that I had and realized that I had wanted to purchase the full set but kept putting it off. So on Friday, I made a trip to Bugis' Absolute Comics to buy the remaining ten issues (at a discounted price, too). I felt somewhat delighted that I managed to

Other than that, it's mostly WoW again. And next week I gotta go buy the top-up card.

The Burning Crusade

Last Tuesday was very exciting for me. I went to Suntec to collect my Burning Crusade with everyone. I had planned to go at 1 pm to pick the game up and go home to play. However, we didn't expect such a massive queue that trailed out of the building. We couldn't decide on how to pass the time so we just ended up joining the queue. Nearly two hours later, I picked up my game and went home.

I am glad that the game installed and patched without any problems (I kept reading about defective CDs online). Before I knew it, I had joined the millions of gamers online venturing into the Outlands for the first time.

It has been almost a week already. I think everyone is very pleased with how the expansion turned out. The new zones and its inhabitants are interesting. The quests are refreshing. My main complaint is that the reported leveling time from 61-70 had been greatly exaggerated; it is not that long at all. I was hoping for at least 3 weeks before I reach the new endgame content but I feel it can probably be accomplished in less than that amount of time.

Nevertheless, TBC really lives up to the hype. Happiness to WoW players everywhere.

It's 2007, The New Year~

It's now 2007!!!

New Year's celebration was a simple dinner at Fish & Co's with Brainy, Alvin, Akira and Kyo. I was just planning to stay home that day and play more WoW until Brainy suggested it in-game. And then Himura SMS'ed me for a movie outing, so well, it looked like my day had already been planned out for me. I had always wanted to try Fish & Co's and I was pleasantly surprised; it tasted great! I watched Death Note: The Last Name which was real nice, too, even though it was very different from the original.

I don't really have any New Year Resolutions since I always cannot stick to them. So I would rather say, I have some wishes for the New Year.

1: I wish the key necessities of my life, namely my computers, my Internet connection and my WoW, will always be working for me.

2: I wish to go out more with friends instead of being cooped up at home. It's kinda contradictory to the above, I know.

3: I wish I can find a proper job. I am perfectly aware that it is kinda tough now since I have lost the drive to do. But still, a wish is a wish.

Oh, well. I don't really have much to look forward to every new year since I don't have to go to school or stuff (just... reservist.). I guess everyone else has a lot to look forward to. Here's wishing everyone else a happy new year.

Slow Surfing~

I was playing WoW early Wednesday morning till around 2 am when I got d/c'ed. Following that, I realized that I could not surf any websites properly. Thinking that it was just Starhub free upgrade plan being put into action (all current Starhub users get a free plan upgrade this week), I decided to go to sleep.

I woke up the next morning only to find that the situation was worse. I panicked a little, thinking that both my computers got hit by viruses. It was then I went over to Hardwarezone and realized that everyone was experiencing the same thing since an Earthquake in Taiwan knocked out some Internet cables.

This is the second day already and things are slightly better. Though there are certain times of the day where I simply cannot surf or play WoW (possibly during the peak/busy hours). MSN is still a problem, though. There are times when I simply cannot log on.