It’s been a while since my last blog. It’s been a busy week, with lots of bug-fixing, researching, head-cracking, brainstorming and such. Thankfully, the weekend has finally arrived, and now I can rest and relax a bit before the next busy week begins.

As I’ve mentioned on Facebook and Twitter, I attended the Microsoft Server Launch Wave 2008 with my product leader, Edward, on Thursday (21/2/2008). We were given a glimpse of the soon-to-be launched Windows Server 2008, SQL Server 2008 as well as the recently launched Visual Studio 2008. It was a spectacular event, well at least the breakfast buffet was very spectacular. Ed and I ate to our hearts content. Compensation for making me wake up at 5:30am and leaving my house before the sun rose, so that I can arrive at the convention centre at 8am. The product demos were pretty impressive, but apparently it didn’t impress our CTO much when Ed reported to him about the seminar. I enjoyed myself at the seminar, where I also met 2 of my ex-classmates, both of them MVPs (Microsoft Most Valuable Professional) and regulars at events like this. We chatted a while and introduced Ed to them. Ed and I then visited each of the partner booths at the seminar, where I happily handed our my business card in exchange for freebies. I ran out of business cards that day and I made a mental note to bring more the next time I attend such an event.

That day was also the 15th day (and last day) of the Chinese New Year octave or yuan xiao (元宵), also known as the Lantern Festival or deng jie (灯节) as there were often lantern shows in the evening. It marks the end of the Chinese New Year festivities and is also traditionally known as the Chinese equivalent of Valentine’s Day in the west, because back in the old imperial days, it was the only chance young women had to get out of the house and to meet young men and fall in love. I met the bf for lunch, since I was in town for the Microsoft seminar. Ed joined us as he didn’t want to carry my heavy bag of freebies back to the office for me alone.

In the evening, I celebrated yuan xiao with mom by eating tang yuan (汤圆), or glutinous rice balls, a traditional dessert eaten on yuan xiao. It signifies reunion/unity and “sticking” together in times of good and bad. That same evening was also the night where the results of the S$10,000,000 lottery were announced. Just as most Singaporeans, I also bought some lottery tickets in the hope of winning something. But alas. none of my tickets won. Sigh.

I’ve picked up a couple of new podcasts in the past few weeks, and I’ll talk about them here probably in the next entry, so keep a lookout!

Tags: life, musings, rant, technology

Hi all. First and foremost, I’ll like to wish all of you a belated Happy Valentine’s Day! (Well, at least it’s belated by my time) Hope you all had an enjoyable time with your loved ones.

I took the day off yesterday (Valentine’s Day), hence my lack of Internet presence. I was doing last-minute gift-shopping in the morning and managed to find a short-sleeved polo-shirt for the bf. We then met up and had Korean food for lunch. It was a first time eating at a Korean restaurant for both of us. The food was good and the price was reasonable. In fact, I’m considering bringing my mom there this weekend.

We then moved on to get my gift. I’d suggested last weekend, that perhaps I should chose my own gift to save him the trouble of trying to guess what I want. We agreed on a budget, and I told him what I was thinking of getting. I’m getting a new handbag, since the one he bought me for my birthday last year is starting to wear and tear. Now it’s just a matter of picking the one I want and buying it. I chose the design I like, and he chose the color for me. I had a store card and was entitled to 15% discount on the bag. The final bill was still within his initial budget (with lots of change to spare), and I got a new bag. 2 happy customers. Yeah!

I then went to the education center I’m enrolled in to settle some enrollment issues and to pay fees. Lots of paperwork to do, so the bf waited for me at a fast food center nearby. When I had everything settled, we went to Gloria Jeans to enjoy some coffee with the discount voucher I brought along. Honestly, I prefer Gloria Jeans to Starbucks. Can’t explain it, really. I just feel that the coffee at Gloria Jeans tastes better, although I must admit Starbucks plays better music.

This morning, I was pleasantly surprised at the pile of parcel/letters on my desk. Apparently, much of the stuff I was waiting for arrived through the mail yesterday while I was out of the office. (Yes, I have most of my mail directed to the office since I’m at the office 80% of the time, and the local post office/postman near my home has a tendency of losing my mail 90% of the time) What I got through the mail:

• My brand new pocket Ignatius Catholic Bible, which I ordered from Amazon.com
• My newly applied credit card
• A new bank card for the credit line, which comes with the credit card
• An insurance bill

Lot’s of work waiting for my attention. More next time. kthxbai..

Tags: life, musings

We’re in the middle of the Chinese New Year “octave“. Tradition has it that everyday in the this 15-day period has a different significance. Today is the 7th day of the Chinese New Year, also known as ren ri (人日）, or the “day of man”, which is treated as the common man’s birthday, or the day when everyone gains a year in age. So “Happy Birthday” to you!

The highlight of the celebrations of ren ri is eating yu sheng (鱼生), a practice also known as lo hei in Cantonese. This practice is thought to bring good luck and prosperity. Our company is also having a company lo hei dinner. However, I will not be attending the company dinner tonight. I must say, I’m a little anti-social when it comes to gatherings like that.

Instead, I’ll have a simple celebration with Mom tonight at home. There won’t be any yu sheng, since we already had it on New Year’s eve. Just some of our favorite foods for dinner. Followed by a marathon of Korean drama DVDs of course.

Bumped into an ex-classmate this afternoon. Apparently, she’s now working near where I’m working. So we agreed to meet up for lunch some time soon. It’s nice to see old friends every once in a while.

Meanwhile, I’ll be thinking of how to celebrate Valentine’s Day tomorrow. Most likely a simple lunch, gift exchange and just plain hanging out together. We may squeeze in a movie if there’s time, although I don’t see anything that’ll interest me enough to wanna step into the cinema. Actually, I just wanna spend some quality time with him, it doesn’t really matter where we go or what we do. Just having him by my side already makes me very happy.

Tags: life, musings

Today’s the first day of work after the long Chinese New Year break. Ah.. now I feel all charged up and refreshed!

Here’s a brief recap of what I’ve been doing the past week. On Wednesday evening (New Year’s eve), I had reunion dinner with Mom and her old friend’s family. We had steamboat and Yu Sheng, a popular Chinese New Year dish that’s some sort of raw fish salad. Tradition goes that we’re to toss the salad (literally) as high as possible to bring good luck and prosperity for the new year. After dinner, I watched Kung Fu Dunk with mom. It was a hilarious movie about a teenage orphan’s adventures in a school basketball team after getting kicked out of the martial arts school that he grew up in and we both enjoyed it very much.

Mom and I spent the first 2 days of Chinese New Year at home watching Korean Drama DVDs almost non-stop. The drama we were watching was Dalja’s Spring, a light-hearted look at a 33-year old career woman’s life as she searches for romance and falls in love for the first time.

On the third day (Saturday), we finally left the comforts of home to go shopping. Some departmental stores were starting to have post-CNY sales, and we both left the stores as satisfied customers. I took Mom to try out Fish & Co for the first time, and she loved it. We also went grocery shopping and then had steamboat (again) for supper.

We stayed home again on Sunday to (what else) watch Korean Drama DVDs. This time we watched Which Star Are You From, a touching story of a famous movie director who lost his beloved girlfriend in a traffic accident. After a hiatus of 3 years he is asked to produce a new movie by an old friend. In the process, he meets a village girl who bears striking resemblance to his dead girlfriend, and they fall in love with eachother. They then discover to their shock and horror that she is the long-lost sister of his girlfriend.

Many of my colleagues are still on leave today. Some of my Malaysian colleagues have gone back to their hometowns to celebrate the New Year with their families. At least half of the upper management is not around too. “No government day” as we call it.

I managed to catch the recording of CST#74, but the video and audio was rather choppy. We had a great time in the uStream chat, but I got cut-off before I managed to finish answering Mac’s question on the chewing gum ban in Singapore. Oh, my love-hate relationship with uStream!

Well, my project leader (who unfortunately isn’t on leave) has just dropped some work on my lap, so I better get going. See y’all next time!

Tags: life, musings

This week is gonna be really short for me since Thursday and Friday (7-8th February) are the 1st and 2nd days of the Chinese Lunar New Year, and hence are public holidays for me. I took leave on Monday to help Mom with spring cleaning, and I’m taking another day’s leave tomorrow, which is the eve of Chinese New Year (all because my company’s management is trying to be secretive as to whether they’ll release us early for the day). So in short, today is my one and only working day this week. Woo hoo!

Since this is the only working day for the week, I promptly popped over to the Ikea near my office to do some last minute shopping for Chinese New Year goodies and to check out their daily special, which happens to be Sambal Fish today (just right for my early start in Lent). Luckily I managed to grab the last bottle of Nonya Love Letters before they were completely sold out. I also got myself a bottle of Pineapple Tarts. Phew!

I just received a Red Packet from my manager (surprise surprise), so it looks like this is gonna be a good new year for me. Better be good and get back to work.

Meanwhile, Happy Chinese New Year and Happy Ash Wednesday (does anyone say that?)!

Tags: life, musings