Fast Intervention

1.
The F1 season is going to start soon. This year, I am just lucky to be called again to be a member of the marshall car drivers. The "format" is a bit different this year. Everybody will have to know each position and operation area of all cars - the fast intervention vehicles and the small medical cars. Time trial will be part & parcel of the training. Only towards the real race day we will be officially assigned to a specific position.

The first training last weekend went well. I did not do well though - could have done better maybe. Not too sure what the official timer recorded but I have a feel I did not manage to get within the assigned time frame to complete the circuit without a scratch on the expensive car (don't be fooled, it looks like a Waja but its not quite a Waja...not at all!), Anyways, I was happy I managed to attack the turns and curbs better than I did in the morning of the first day, when I got to drive Da Damn BlingMobile!! (A Perdana which is not actually a Perdana...cannot reveal much here!). It was almost like riding 200 horses with wheels! We'll see how it goes next weekend lah. Should not be a problem since I have covered all positions in the circuit from the last couple of years. Even if I get to be a reserve driver, that would be fun this year....I would have more time to spend at race area rather than being in the car all day long!

Age has conquered me...and responsibilities to my loved ones too. I don't actually fancy driving very fast anymore (yeah I have a couple of summons up my sleeve....stupid summons, those!). But nevertheless, attacking the turns of SIC in the expensive rig is something really different. Never boring. I'd just sneer at them rice boys everytime I saw them screeching past me on the road. Brainless bunch of wannabees!

2.
I wish I could spend more time with the kids last weekend, maybe for a picnic at the park or a cool dip at their favourite stream. They have been very noisy these past few weeks. Need to pay more attention to them....I am sorry Alisya, Naufal & Aliya. Last week I had to come to office over the weekend. This week I was at the race track. Next weekend too. Then I will be at the track the whole week. Gheezzz.....I must find time for them! Aliya is growing very well. Already 5.5Kg that little girl of mine! She's starting to listen to what we say with enthusiasm. My baby girl is growing fast.....today is never going to be the same like tomorrow. Well.....when the F1 weekend is over in this country, we'll do the stream ok kids? That's a promise!

3.
The monthly sharing session went quite tense & fiery towards the end. I shared my piece of concern, like the others involved. But in the end, I would just conclude, its back to square one. I might as well build my comfortable fortress again and do what's necessary to get over the working hours and not spend a minute more than expected. Its not my company anyway. A colleague made a good point, the ownership of our effort is not ours, in the end the bosses will have the full ownership. No use to be so enthusiastic about it, not in this set-up I am currently in. I was carried away with the enthusiasm & responsibility of getting things done for the best of the organization, which was a waste of my energy actually. Dedicated to my team, yes. Dedicated to the unit set-up, I would not be that naive now. Why should I bother anyway. The shitbrain leaders have just too much of it up their brains....the shit. If by any chance any of you are reading this blog of mine, I will just be as frank like I have always been - you are too stupid and don't deserve to have us as subordinates. You are just too stupid & full of ego. Well, we are already making on our way out of here anyways. Good luck, stupididiots. I am not going to apologize to anyone of you bastards, you deserve the words, its the reality, so swallow it, or die trying. I don't care what you have to say, just say it to your hand if it really matter much to you!

4.
Why stay long in yet another shit hole? Have to work out a complete & quick escape route. Fast intervention! Back to the drawing block....

[Listening to Foo Fighters ~ All My Life.....giving a day off for Rammstein!]

Field Trip

1.
The Twins have been very very active. Alisya has improved so much in her already good "public relation" ability, while Naufal has improved in expressing his thoughts/ experience enthusiasthically. Alhamdulillah. At the same time, they have been creating bigger & louder havoc when they are fresh after a short nap, back from skool!

Today, in about 3 hours time or so from the time I wrote this, they will be experiencing their first field trip - to an Army Airbase - organized by their skool!

Initially, I was not too sure whether to allow them or not, Mama was inclined towards not allowing them cuz there will be jetfighter demo and other big & noisy stuff, Alisya is a bit penakut with these kinda things. So, the past few days (well, nights actually....my entitled daylights are spent in the zoo up on the higher levels of the TwoTowers) I have been talking to them about airplanes, jetfighters and stuffs that relates to the field trip and see how they respond to it.

They seems excited.

Frankly, I am a bit worried cuz I have never let anybody bring the twins anywhere without me or Mama being with them, without being worried! I guess that is really my personality - I treasure everything that I have, especially the most precious gift that anybody can get from the AllMighty. But after mulling over it, I decided that they should go, this is their skool's first field trip, there will always be the first time for everything in their life, so why not.

I wish I can be there, it must be an amazingly cute event to witness, a bunch of smallpeople grouped together, treated as VVIP by the army people!

To Alisya & naufal: You two be good and don't go create havoc at the airbase ok my babies?

2.
MAC OS X V10.4.5 already in Yoda's system....so far so good.
For those who know what they wanna do with their machines and have been contemplating on making the jump: GET A MAC & MOVE ON!

3.
I really hate it when others who try to impress the stupidbigboss makes the life of the working level (real do-ers) more complicated. Actually wrote something about the raucous I did due to tolerance overload towards incompetent imbeciles that earns 3 time more then me and seems to have hardly 10% of the braincell of a dead sloth, but decided not to put it up (yet?!). All my working years, with the bosses I had, if I think they are not doing the right things and not being a teamplayer, or being utterly stupid yet arrogant, I will say it to their face - politely or fiercely depending on the situation. Its's ugly but it's the right thing to do so that these oldbastardos may start thinking, their time is up already, they should just shut-up & move on. But despite the minor helter-skelter, Alhamdulillah everything went well yesterday and hopefuly today, Insya-Alah. I guess my years of doing stuffs down the line made it easier for me to appreciate and be comfortable & user-friendly the do-ers. We'll see how it goes! It's not their company anyways and I surely did the best I am capable of for the interest of the organization....and arsekissing + trying to look intelligent has never been my modus operandi, am not going to allow it, ever. whatever rating I will get I don't care, there's only one ultimate rating and it will be coming from my GOD.

Well, anyways, my life is dedicated to my kids & family, nothing else.

What time is the meeting?

These....not for meetings!

1.
Last week, a colleague sent an e-mail to everybody in the office about setting an appointment/ meeting/ discussion with him after the end of official office hours. The e-mail was not that lengthy but done quite elaborately. Any person with a correct mind would concluded that this friend is telling everybody to manage their time better. If there is a need to have any sort of meeting after the official office hours, it must be an important one that it cannot be post-phoned and it must be short & precise, focused, not long winded and inconclusive in the end. To cut short - do not waste other people’s time. We have our priorities and as far as work is concerned, we must treat it seriously and prioritize it accordingly. The colleague was like suggesting if the meeting needs to be held after office hours, he’d be glad to participate, if and only if its done after 10pm! Reason being, he has allocated the time after the official office hours to other stuffs & people that deserved very much to be prioritized after the official office hours, including working out office matters for about one our at home. That’s how he put it, though I am not too sure how committed he is. So, for somebody to say he’s not committed for not wanting to attend a meeting after 5pm, that somebody is not making a good judgement. 10pm, and we have a deal!


I actually replied the e-mail, only to the sender....I am not the kind of person who’d love to reply to all (depending on the context & situation) and let the world know what a great thinker (read: what an idiot!) I am. I agree with his views & requests.

2.
There was one company I worked in, couple of years back, where meetings were held in short notices, scheduled long after official hours ended and at times may continue to almost the time for the tv to sing the national anthem. The company must be full of excellent staff....DUH! “If you cannot give your commitment, you should not be here..”
Like...well Mr & Mrs/ Ms arroganto bastardo, if you cannot manage your time & priority, you should have monkeys & piglets reporting to you, not human beings with family and respectable lifestyle.

3.
We have people who luuuurrrrvee to make others stay back....that’s one extreme.
The other extreme - people who luuuuuurrrrrve to make others do work early.....because they think they are the early burds, and early burds will get the bigger fatter worms. Well too bad, BigBurd...the bigger fatter worms are deep in slumber and only skinny sissy worms are awake....apa aku mengarut ni aaaa....?
You arrive in the office couple of minutes after some people. The next thing you know, before you even had the chance to plug that bloody unreliable machine into the network, heck, even before you had the chance to sit on that ugly looking overpriced ergonomic chair, some people has started to make things crushing down on you!
These people, most of the time would be your superiors but on certain occasion it may be other people than them. Regardless whoever they are, you should have the guts to tell them this....
“Do me a favor, help me to try to learn something useful today!”

4.
How?
Suggestion: Just ask for 30 minutes to 1 hour allocation to do your stuff before running the rat race in the office, everyday.(....been doing this for almost 10 years, maybe that’s why I am still not a CEO!)
So, you come into the office, grab a cuppa, sit down, clear your minds, read your e-mails and plan your day/ check your schedule. Any meeting before 9am, is a waste of time - go back to the 70's and join the gomen lah, meeting awal pagi konon. Chances are people would be more interested to know what are being served on the table instead of concentrating on the real intent of the meeting.
Its better to spend the time from 9am to 10am to read books or articles, to enrich yourself with some other stuff then what you are already built with. If an hour is too long for you to concentrate, then just do 30 minutes. If 30 minutes is too long, then you should have not learned to read at all. Waste of your time!

First meeting of the day should only start at 9:30am. And if you have any other meetings throughout the day, at least you have learnt something for that 30 minutes in the office....cuz chances are, in those meeting you are in, you will only learn that some people will go all out trying to impress some bosses with smart sounding phrases (with pathetic slang sometimes!), re-stating the obvious, rephrasing what others have said, or conclude what others have been yakking about, with the outcome of delegating whatever have been discussed to some other poor souls get to do the donkey job......cuz the “meeters” in the meeting have no time to do real job! The “meeters” will instruct the “doers” to do the real job.....and get rewarded? (itu....sendiri fikir lah!)

5.
So, “meeters” or “doers” if you come to office early, please help the human race - use the suggestion mentioned, and you may end up not wasting other people’s time! They have family & life to live.....do you not have one too?

6.
Oh ya...the human race would also be grateful if some people who are not invited to a meeting but decided to invite himself/ herself into the meeting can get the habit out of their system permanently, PRONTO! Obviously, either the person has nothing better to do or trying to look important/ resourceful or appear important/ resourceful so that he will be noticed as.....erk....important and resourceful(?!)
Somebody give that monkey a banana please!

The (real) end of the "long weekend"

The Kids trashing it out on their imaginary stage
...definitely better than any of those idols show!

It has been a very long break....almost a full week if I took leave on Friday but I did not, since there are things to be done back in the office & since Alisya & Naufal have to go to school, I decided not to take that one day leave.

We “continued” the long weekend with some action at the parks they have been going since their first year of life. Now I can be a bit relaxed at the playground - this does not mean I can just let them play without any supervision - cuz they know how to handle the things at the playground, just need to be reminded from time to time so that they do not get over creative and do harm to their little bodies.

They now go for the highest slide in the park....with helah masing-masing to tease each other....
"Let me push you, yer adik...hehhehe!"

The playground sessions starts in the morning and will end slighty after 12 noon with a visit to the hypermarket or any store of their choice for some refreshments of their choice (and newspapers for Mama). They know to choose either Giant, Tesco, 7-11 or Kedai Mamak and they will say what they want and at times they are more demanding than ever, but being me, I will follow their wishes up to a certain extent.....just to train them that we cannot get everything we want - easily/ everytime. One day, during the long break we went to the pasar for some ingredients for Laksa Sarawak. We saw an old lady sitting at the corridor of some shop near the pasar, eating some french fries from McD in a plastic bag. People passing by seems to not pay much attention to her. I told Alisya & Naufal to look at that poor Makcik and I said kesian dia, no place to go, no money to buy proper food, sitting at the kakilima near to the parit, panas etc. After a while Alisya said "Kesyiaan. Syiaan kan Ayah kan?". When Mama came back from pasar, she told Mama what she saw....plus: "Dia jatuh, masyuk parit Mama, car langgar...." Pandai betul dia buat cerita drama swasta pulak! And We laughed....

Not to self: Next time let Alisya & Naufal give some Rm to some poor people at the kakilima.

Aliya & Auntie Shikin

Aliya had visitors through out the long break too...Mama's office mates, then Aunties Farah & Fazleen & cousins. She is growing well and seems to be more and more attached to Mama.

Aliya & Aqiff

I'm tired Mama...

The twins on the other hand is starting to seek more attention from me (at least a bit more than before). Alisya insisted to sleep with me in our visitors bedroom these past few nights. The main thing is because of Mama’s rempah-ratus treatment - the twins just cannot stand the smell, Alisya actually threw-up once when Mama came down from her room! “Naik atashhh, Mama busyuuk laah!”

Otherwise, they still love Mama as always lah, no doubt about that!




P/s: I wish we have long break like this every month...heh hehehe! Rasa malas pulak nak run the office tomorrow....aargh....

Customer is always right?

There’s a shop in KLCC selling tech-gadgets and stuff next to some shops selling bags - specialized bags for mobile MACs (well....ok laa, to be fair...for MS laptops & other digital devices too). Very easy to notice this shop if you are in KLCC. The salesmen and outlet manager of this shop are kinda like know my existence in this world, the manager especially, since I have introduced so many people to buy stuffs from that outlet. No commission for me, I just want to help them and the buyers in getting what they want. By doing so, I kinda establish a good rapport with this outlet and we became quite like buddies.

The mantra “ Customer is always right” is part of the pre-requisite of becoming a salesman, but if you are a customer, you are not smart if you insist you are always right. Let me explain why I said so.

The people behind the counter of this outlet (or any shops for that matter) can play two different roles - he can be a good staff to the company, selling off whatever they have and be a pure salesman - sell sell sell! OR, on the other hand, he can be a good advisor to the customers, asking them their requirements and suggest items that will fit the requirement and the budget of that particular customer.

Now tell me, as a customer, which one would you prefer that guy to be?

The staff of this outlet will “boraks” with me whenever I dropped by, if they don’t have customers to attend to. At times, if I was there and their hands are full, I would help them by casually entertaining the customers, just for the spirit of helping friends....just like what I casually did when I was shopping in a CompUSA outlet @ Galleria Houston Tx, x-number of years back (that's another story I will tell later later lah!)

So, one day when I dropped by the KLCC outlet to say hi, chat a bit about tech stuff updates & try some new stuffs I read in the forums I frequent, the manager told me that they would really enjoy their job more if all their customers are like me. I was like....HUH? Why suddenly you say like that one la brother?! He then told me that they had just have a bad one from a snobbish customer. He admitted that most of the customers who buys stuffs don’t really know what they want and more often then not will treat the salesmen as if they own the company....that's my polite version of saying - macam company tu bapak diorang punyer! You buy a couple of thousands worth of toy and you start to think you own them as your slave....how can lahhh weii!

The people who came to that particular outlet are mainly “the locals” - people who work around that area. Reason being, that outlet is close enough for them to drop by for any trouble-shooting services needed.

Trouble-shoot. The magic word.

Minus the fact that some softwares/ hardwares are buggy compared to some others, trouble-shooting any issues is a must in order for the owner of the device to enjoy using the device. The problem with some (if not most) of the device owners is they do not bother to read the manual what more to do prior research & fact findings on the device they have. All that matters most to them is they need the device to do their stuff - including using flashing it around as status/ fashion items. The guys behind the counter can do trouble-shooting for you but if you treat them like you buddies they can do more....you can even get a better deal and full support from them like forever! All you need to do is treat them like your friend and ask questions politely, if you don’t know or you want to know more about stuff. Don’t shoot them for not being able to give all the answers that you want cuz into the end they are just human beings like us also whaaat?

In a sentence, what I am trying to convey is: Even if we are the customers, even if we fart money, being polite & humble to the people behind the counter is not wrong, it may even lead us to a better bargain/ deal.

The choice is ours, in the end, the seller only sells, its us who will be paying to own & use the items.....

So perhaps next time we can try to be a good customer? No?