Dear Diary

8:40am As I sit down and boot my machine, I noticed a little sticky note on the edge of my screen. "I was here, where were you?" Hmmm. I could only speculate where the note came from, but I'm pretty sure it was the girl I was working with before. If it was her, it was a nice gesture coming from a person from the underworld.

8:47am I visited the kitchen planning to pour myself a hot chocolate drink. I notice immediately that the coffee machine was awfully quiet. The 'espresso' button was all dusty and looked unused. Oh poor button.

9:00am Munching on my chocolate cookies, I look around and find myself all alone in my pod. Feeling sad, I took a deep sip and immediately spat it out back to my cup. "God, that's hot." I say to myself. I quickly make a reach for my ocean beach tissue dispenser.

9:02am I sense distinct quake like vibrations growing louder and louder. I turn around and see Jared coming over, I quickly press alt-tab and pretend that I'm working. I quickly asked a complicated technical question, "Where is the universe expanding to, Jared?" - which unfortunately sends him running away. Ahhh, the wonders of cosmology. Works every time.

9:05am Finished my cookies and started another awesome Monday.

Now Hiring

Title: Resident Social Butterfly (female only)

Date: 2007-05-01
Term: full or part time
Pay Rate: Very Competitive Salary

Major Responsibilities:
- Interact with the team and keep them in good spirits.
- Play pranks in good taste.
- Must know how to annoy people without crossing the line.
- Organise interesting lunches everyday.
- Excellent in organising and preparing social events for the whole calendar year.

Minimum Qualifications:
- Must be excellent in sending emails about jokes, trivia, and other interesting stuff.
- Must be excellent in making fun of people.
- Needs to laugh very loud
- Should giggle in meetings
- Excellent blog writer
- Skilled in smacking people without provocation
- Skilled in hitting the baby buddha (Optional)
- Ownage of an island is highly preferred (optional)

Perks of the job include the following: Medical checkups (by Chantal), Dental, Fitness, and Metrosexual well being (by Jared), Music and Guitar lessons (by Tony), South African Linguistics (by Logan), Australian Literature and Health Advice (by Jane), Unix Training (by the 'nix nerds), Skiing, mountain biking, rough water kayaking, and mountain climbing lessons (Vicki - the resident superwoman), Leaky homeproofing (Claire), Lessons on whipping DBAs (Bridget), SA Culinary Lessons (Lindsay), Carpentry and General DIY (Michael)

The Empty Desk

The Empty Desk
as inspired by Edgar Allan Poe's The Raven

Once upon a midnight dreary, after I've finished my work for quaint Ms. Pacey.
I happen to glance on an empty desk,
the desk of Margaret, from ages before.

"Is that her desk just as empty? just like a can of coke on Chris's floor?"
I tried to consider, strained to recall, what happened from years before.

I distinctly remember, I'm sure it was in in the bleak of Febr'y
A gentle sound of ding! - of email arriving on my inbox store.
"'tis another mail," I muttered "from Rayana, the horror next door;
only this, and nothing more."

Upon reading that fortuitous email, i suddenly felt weak with worry,
"Has Margaret grown a bit weary working?"
"Working on this company's floor?"

Once I read the news, it filled me with fantastic terrors I've never felt before.
"What will happen? I say and ask. What will happen to DW Core?"
To still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating,
"Is this true, Jared? A foolish joke, nothing more?"
The answer was something I dreaded,
of where this conversation's headed,
of Jared's look and his voice all breaking.
"I'm afraid 'tis true, her notice was sent this morning."

Thus I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing,
As I tried to recall that dreaded day, nothing more, nothing more.
Her desk all empty, with Garfield all but showing.
Her broken chair, lay down lying, strewn across the floor,
Her chocolate cofee's all but eaten, sitting in Chantal's draw'r.
Her keyboard 'tis covered in dust, with nothing but her prints absorbed.

As I drag myself to exit, I steal a quick glance once more.
Across her empty and hallow desk, I mutter:
"Was so bitter to see you leave, with all our hopes forlorn.
"I just hope again it doesn't happen again, nevermore, nevermore."

Thank You

hi all

don't cry Rayana, I will finish the rest of the signs for you..
....coffee and milk will last longer coz I drink at least 2 or 3 sometimes.....
....Coca Cola will decrease vending machine sales by 5 bottles of 600ml Coke Zero per week, 20 per month, xxx per year
....Chris will become the only one writing jackets in the office during summer time...
....no more Tony-look-alike around the building, the security lady downstairs asked us if I am Tony's sister >.<
...no more altis 'gang' lunch, meeting that we secretly run off to every now and then

:)

Thanks everyone, haha, it has been great having lunches with you all, very interesting conversations all the time, despite my few comments, i kept it all in my head..hahahaha...I hope that my workmates over in the UK will be as fun as you guys, i will try to introduce beer fines, chocolate taxes, welcome cake, leaving cake if they don't have it in place!!!!!

Take care everyone
Margaret =) (aka magafei - 'gafei' stands for garfield in chinese)

What's happening?

This is how you know things are going wrong. You write more articles about someone leaving that coming.

Top 10 signs that Margaret has left us

Even less converse shoes in the office
No more Garfield images
It seems to be louder now
Rayana cannot stop crying

Oh man, someone else finish this for me please.................................................................................................................

my side of the story

6:50 Alarm goes off on my mobile phone
6:50:03 I send it flying under the bed

7:00 Alarm goes off under the bed while my dog happily munches on it
7:01 I unglue my eyes and crawl under to retrieve

7:10 Alarm goes off
7:11 I run out of the bathroom with a toothbrush in my mouth desperately trying to switch it off, before the Grump wakes up

7:50 Leave the house at full speed trying to cut off in as many spaces between cars as possible to make up for lost time.
8:30 Squash myself into an elevator and yawn all the way through to the third floor, giving nasty stares to those who stop at second

8:33 Walking to my desk I see Chris sleeping at his desk. I give him a nudge in the ribs. "What are you doing here?" He jumps up to the ceiling and then breaks down in giggles. I roll my eyes and plump down on a seat.
8:35 Log in to my machine while Chris is suspiciously eyeing me. 'How are you?' he cautiously asks. "Hmmphh" I reply in my generosity.

8:45 My machine responds to my username and password. Yes, another success! "Coffee! Coffee! Coffee!?" I shout to celebrate the successful beginning.

8:47 I manage to pick Chris up off the floor and brush the dust off his sholders. "Coffee?"

We walk 10 feet to the coffee machine, when Debs walks in in all her glory. Together: "Good morning, Debbie!". Half the floor looks up in their meercat amusement at the brief interruption. "Good morning darling and sweetie!". It takes a long while to get upgraded to Darling with Debs, so we knowingly nod and continue on our venture.

8:50 Wait for Phil to maintain the coffee machine, fill the water tank and the beans, perhaps empty the tray
8:55 get my triple espresso while smelling the hot chocolate that Chris is getting. Discuss the world happenings and news of his garden adventures.
8:55:30 Ensure Chris is safely delivered to his desk, sit down till lunch.

We are Strong

X-many signs that Debbie left the company

Words such as Darling, Sweetie and Treasure are no longer heard in the office
No more post-post-post-farewell parties at the Empire
People drink water for lunch instead of Stella
No cigarettes lying around
No one makes weird alien ship sounds: Too-doo-too-doo-too-doo
No one to sing: "We are strong"
One less person for Rayana to spam
No more free hugs for anyone
No one to tear their hair out when Intranet doesn't work
Trademe has a suddenly increased traffic and profit
The granulated coffee rots in its bin
No teradata mugs in the office
Things from her desk have stopped inching towards Chris's
No fun toys to play with, like her mailbox
No one to book outings for the team or get everyone together
The cubicle where she used to sit has cricket sounds
Security guard has chased her down the street to give her a hug
Rayana has found her tear ducts

It's hard to be someone's side kick, without a side to kick…

A typical morning

6:30AM : Woke up, took a shower and prepped to start another typical day.
7:00AM : Started the slow crawl down the freeway. I pop in my Guns n' Roses disc to ease the pain.

7:50AM : "Gotta find, gotta find, gotta find a carpark."
7:56AM : Walking down the road towards the building whistling my favourite tune "Manic Monday" - even though it's a thursday.

8:03AM : As I approach my desk, Jared - the early bird, looks me and then looks at his watch several times looking all puzzled that I came in soooo early in the morning.

"Happen to wet the bed today, eh?" He says.

Letting it go, I smile, give a big sigh and say good morning with my middle finger up in the air.

8:04AM : Waiting for my favorite OS in the world to boot, I try to clean the clutter on my desk. I find it easier to tidy up now that it's brought back memories when I was sitting next to Debbie, with her stuff slowly inching towards my side of the forest. - LOL just kidding Debbs =P

8:08AM : Logging in,I start up my favourite email client and go straight to the calendar.

"Oh snap!" I say silently to myself. "Meetings for the rest of the morning. There goes my productive day."

I sigh and click on my inbox officially starting my cleanup routine. Looking at the sender, I slowly click and delete all the junk that came from Rayana.

8:12AM : Still deleting. One of these days, I'll really set an email rule up when I have the time.

8:30AM : Naughty girl comes in looking a bit tired and with only half a smile set. (That's because she hasn't had her triple-quad-espresso shot yet)

"Morning!" I say with as much enthusiasm I could muster.

"..." She just looks at me and puts in a decent effort for a smile. She quickly plops down on her machine and starts her morning ritual as well.

"Geez Louise Papa Cheese." I think, she's probably more knackered than usual. Mental note : I jot down "nasty girl" as a future nickname for her.

8:40AM : Margaret comes in and says good morning. She's sooo quiet at times that that's usually the last word you usually hear from her until lunch. But we still like her though. =)

8:45AM : Naughty girl suddenly jumps up in hysterics and yells "Coffeeeeeeee!!! Coffeeeeeeee!!! Coffeeeeeeee!!! Coffeeeeeeee!!!"

I fall from my seat literally startled. As I lay down the floor looking at the lights my vision goes blurry and realise the noise was just my alarm clock going off.

I sit up in bed rubbing my eyes and dawned on me that I'm on leave.

Lotion Recipe

Ingredients:

1 Medium Size Dirty Cup with yesterday's leftover coffee
1 Sink with no soap
1 Squeeze of Lotion bottle with aloe vera

Filling
1 tsp of granulated coffee
1 tsp of sugar


Spill the leftover coffee into the sink. Squeeze a drop of lotion (to taste) into the Dirty cup. Rub it in for 30 seconds, with gentle swooping movements to ensure the whole cup is covered in moisturizing lotion. Smell to ensure it smells like Aloe vera and all bacteria are drowned in moisturizer. Now rinse under cold water, add the filling and mix to ensure consistency.

Voila - your drink is ready.

I think Debbie's exact words were: I'd rather have lotion than bacteria… mmmmm… oh wise owl.

----

Hmmm. We leave Debbie with her coffee wondering why it seems to have a distinct slimy aloe vera aftertaste.

A couple of minutes earlier, we caught Phil patiently waiting by the coffee machine. Phil unfortunately as we've noticed from before, has this unusual luck of having to refill the beans and/or water everytime he goes for his morning pick me up. But today seems different, with his coffee cup halfway filled, he was rubbing his hands in glee complemented with a huge grin from ear to ear.

Then the machine lets out a gurgling noise. Two beeps later, the screen says "Water Tank Empty".

"Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!......" Phil shouts to the heavens high up above.

(I'll let you imagine what happens next.)

Many many things eternal

The Owl is back and is already pulling hairs outta her head. So if I'm sick, you know why (it's cos she keeps sneezing at me!!!).

Today's lunch has been mostly uneventful, except that Chris wasn't with us, hence uneventful. Jared has had tuna and rice again and kept talking about a massive t-bone steak he's vacuumed up his left nostril on the weekend. I think his right one had to clean the bone and the leftover fish from Kate's plate.

Jane has had a massive piece of bread with some tuna (of cos!) in the middle, followed up by another gigantic piece of bread and kept complaining how big it was. Jared could have had two of those and wouldn't even feel it hit his stomach.

Tony was unusually quiet, until someone has mentioned the word BBQ.

Tony: "I've got a new BBQ this weekend and next week we will have a barbecue party."
Jared suddenly awake and chewing: "BBQ? 4 burner or a 6 burner. Ouch!", as I gave him a sharp jab in the ribs.
Tony: "Is it one of those things you turn?", mentally calculating stuff on his fingers. "one, two, three... It has three! Plus a little side thing that you can burn stuff on"
I'm quietly eating my cold pasta salad, while giving Jared a stare: "See?"

Then we went into a whole lot of advices on how to prepare your barbie (ugh, an ugly word that kiwis have invented) for the first time use, rub some onion, then some more onion, then burn a piece of meat to give it that juice and prepare you for endless tears for when you actually do burn your meat, but of course you can always blame those tears on that onion. Aha! Now i know what those onions is really for. I think Tony has managed to fit such words as "um", "uhum", "mm" into our conversation.

We gave him a few recipes to think about over a weekend, so let's see who gets food poisoning next week.

And then Chris showed up and ruined it all by taking Tony with him to the bank. Cos who else would hold his hand while crossing the street? Or Tony is probably acting as a translator for Chris, cos he kept mumbling "someing bout he morage in de back" which sounded suspiciously close to "hemorrhage in the back" and after about 4 repeats it turned into the mortgage in the bank. So hopefully Tony knows where to take him.

but it's back to normal now and waiting for The Owl to start preaching..., pardon, teaching me again on the wonders of flowchart in a campaign full of sh.. - sessions.

Please forgive me oh wise owl for being cynical, I just haven't fully enjoyed my 6 cups of espresso this morning and i promise I'd be nicer after my 3x3 espresso load.

The Great Olde One is to meet with me at 4, so better be sharp as an output file.

Lame Owl jokes

Q: What do you call an Owl with a low voice?
A: A Growl!

Q: What happens if an owl is taught by a wolf?
A: It learns to howl!

Q: What happens if an owl doesn't wash?
A: It smells fowl!

Q: What does an Owl with an attitude have?
A: A Scowl!

Q: What does an owl need after his bath?
A: A t-owl!

Q: Why does the owl call OOOO?
A: Because its a vowl!

Ramblings from The Owl's sick bed

My friends - I am so sorry that I have abandoned you this miserable Friday the 13th. And no - I am not superstitious (big word like marmalade that one).

Indeed, I have a bad cold - possibly flu because I'm achy and tired too. Well of course, I could be tired because of the training with Rayloc yesterday. She is a sponge for knowledge you know. My mind was whirring at maximum velocity trying to keep her entertained and alert. At one stage I had to retreat and fill up the water cooler device fitted to my head (to avoid possible CPU overheating & therefore motherboard and information retrieval failure). I have realised that she is a 'kinetic learner'. She prefers to learn (like I do) with keyboard and mouse in her own hands. If not - she takes on a look much like this little owl picture I have inserted. And you thought it was a picture of a sick owl probably. Oh no - that's Rayloc after 5 minutes listening without doing!

I see she has recalled learning about hubbly bubblys, a security database so secure you can't find it and the noise associated with stories of the paranormal. The only disconcerting fact is she hasn't mentioned anything about campaign management. Still, armed with the aforesaid knowledge, I feel my job is in good hands :)

Oh look - an email from Rayloc about giving birth to a porcupine. How intriguing (??) I'd better check it. Back in a moment.

Yes - pretty cute, but reminds me of Rayloc - a kind of combination of when she's bored and angry at the same time. Comments?

So possums (and bored, angry porcupine) - what's the venue for today's exciting lunch break? The sun is trying to shine way up north here after a few spells of rain. Not sure what you are experiencing there in the southern hemisphere of Auckland?

I will probably have the usual - lemsip. And maybe a small can of tuna :)

Love you all and miss you.

The Owl

PS: What do you call an Owl with a cold? Nothing - her ears are blocked.

PS2: What does an Owl with a cold say? Atish-WHOO, Atish-WHOO

ok - pretty lame, but I'm bored.

The wise words of The Owl

The wise Owl has been training me today. Here's what I learnt:

Hubbly Bubbly - the stuff you smoke when your applications start working as they should.

Then The Owl was showing me the security database that was so secure that you couldn't see nothin'. The Owl in her posh accent as a matter-of-factly: That's how secure it is!

The sound one is supposed to make when people talk about ghosts, Logan, anything extra ordinary is (ask me to demonstrate) Eeh-Uhh-eeh-ooh...

Just by showing me "the stuff" The Owl has learnt so *beep*ing much about it herself. This is a kid-safe website, so some *beep*ing stuff is edited.

When you say Taratata very loud people look at you, which could be very useful when you're in need of attention.

Losing plot - the thing you do when you are extra cautious and you kick everyone out of the server and then ask them to get back on it just for the hell of it.

and many many more things that I cannot possibly remember.

Shooshi Train

"Lonely, I'm so lonely." is what I imagine Rayana was singing to herself again when she had her lunch today. Apart from the voices in her head, she did have her tuna pide to talk to during lunch.

"So how does it feel getting out of your can today, tuna?", Rayana says.
"Would have been a whole lot better if you quit shoving me inside your mouth." The tuna answers back. "Oh, and do you mind not chewing on me when we're talking?".

Anyway, on our way to lunch, we did talk about how me and Margaret didn't seem to have too much tolerance to the cold weather. We both were wearing reasonably thick jackets, while Jared as usual had to strip down to his salmon shirt and say it was awfully hot. That brought about the topic of SNOW skiing as I've never tried that before - Tony suggested we plan a big thing during winter and just go for it. (A good idea, perhaps we should.) And this is where Jared mentions that he himself ski-ed one time wearing just a shirt and trousers. What an awful thought. I quickly tried to think of something else before Jared's hairy legs burned into my mind. *Chris shivers.

Our lunch was a quick trip to the sushi train place where your appetite is measured by the tower of plates you have in front of you. In Florence, it took 170 years to construct that magnificent tower in Pisa. Jared only took 5 minutes to construct his own version. The patrons were in awe, people actually started posing and taking photographs of this magnificent structure. Too bad they had to take it down as it was preacariously leaning toward the soy sauce.

I learned a couple of new words as well. To survive in China, I made sure I knew how to order Coke - mandarin style. I checked and it seems that that drink is pretty universal and popular there so whew! Excellent! As I don't know what will happen to me if I do get deprived of my fave drink. The next step would be to learn how to order egg noodles and bbq pork, just in case.

With Chantal building a tower of her own, I had to give up on my 2 storey mall as I really was sooo full from the morning tea cakes. I must say it's embarassing to see her eat more than me. Hmmmm... maybe next time.

It was pouring just when we got back to the office to conclude our Japanese lunch.

Team meeting

So we are at this team meeting, right? So, there's like not enough chairs in the room, and like Chris and Jared and Debs are sitting on the floor, right?
I, like, send a text message to Chris and instead of being a nice and quiet person, he's breaking into a soft giggle. And Debs gives me a stare, like, I know what you did last minute. and of course having Debs giving that all-knowing-stare and Chris bent double laughing during a very serious conversation about rated usage performance, what do i do? laugh! and cry at the same time. OMG!!! This rated usage stuff is sooooo funny...

So, ok - I read a teenager's blog during lunch and like I can't believe you can like talk this way, right?

Chopstick etiquette

Where do you put your chopsticks when you are finished? asked Chris.
Margaret demonstrates, Chris is awed by exquisite presentation of parallel chopsticks on the side of teh plate. The waiter comes by and takes Margaret's plate away as per invisible signal.

Today was the first day Jared was eating with chopsticks and we realized that it's the only way to slow him down during lunch. He kept complaining about sore fingers and food hitting his stomach one molecule at a time. As a result he had pork flavoured tea, and tea flavoured pork.

We didn't discuss much except food and food related. Something about that place never lets us go beyond food conversations.

Chantal had her dish arrive last as usual. Must be something to do with her last name starting with Z and crispy pork noodles she keeps ordering.

we also discussed how in my culture bigger women are considered to be wealthy and prosperous. So the whole way back we were looking out for rich and poor women. Jared kindly agreed to feed them hungry ones.

booooring!

I am most honoured

My dear Rayloc
THE OWL is so incredibly happy to have been given publishing rights to BAFL. Indeed, I feel truly a part of the BAFL tribe now :)
I had a toasted tuna, spinach and caramelised onion pide for lunch.
And a small carrot cake.
I didn't have any conversations with anyone - only the ladies in the cafe who only have eyes for "Jaaaa Rid".
Until tomorrow, yours wisely, THE OWL

Ghosts

Where do i start? in which parallel universe?

Jared said he had a nice weekend story.

His family was at the marae preparing for a big par-tey and his girlfriend walked in to check some stuff out and saw an elderly woman reaching for the shelves, looking for something. Kate then says: " I don't believe we've met" and suddenly there appears a cat behind a window (Kate, cat... get it?). Kate turns to look at a cat and when she turns back (instantly!) the woman dissapears.

Kate says none of the doors opened, the floors didn't squeak, the woman just dissapeared. Kate told Jared about it "I saw your ancestors in the marae". He described his great grandmother: "Old, short, white hair perhaps". "Yes!", exclaimed Kate, - "that's her! the woman i saw!".



His family said that Kate is now accepted by the family ghost and was afraid to walk into the marae.

Chris's daughter would have loved to hear this amazing scary ghost story.

What i don't get is why would someone look at the cat outside the window when they are walking towards a woman to say hello. But then, I never said hello to a ghost before and not sure of a proper etiquette. perhaps you have to look out of the window to give them a chance to dissapear, or simply close your eyes tightly while you walk towards them at a slow speed.

We shall publish some etiquette soon.

Speed Limit

*Due to some complaints that my post was biased and inaccurate (from a lady named R...), here's the revised version.

It all started when the rest of the table were discussing restrictions on highway speed limits. And how the consensus is that in some ways it's often too restricting for it to be practical. There's no point being judgemental as you're we're all guilty of breaching the government mandated requirement one way or another. But whatever reasons we have, nobody seems to be so proud of it other than Rayana.

Tim exlains with his luvly british accent : "Bloody hell Rayana, why do you always go over the limit when you drive?"
"But nobody's on the road!" "It's because I was really late and I was really annoyed with the way slow people drive." Rayana says defensively "and that's how we used to drive back in Germany. No speed limits!"

"But that's in the autobahn. Not on regular streets. Perhaps you'll attain the wisdom of speeding when you get to be as old as Jane", Tim says.

Now there are about a 100 odd things that you don't guess at a woman. Here's 2 of them "You're pregnant aren't you?" and "You look great for a xx year old.". Trust me, I know. I've been burned.

Back at the table, everybody just turned silent with all eyes fixated on Jane, nervously anticipating her reaction. This has got to be one of those "Even Jane" moments.

Of course, Jane, with her good nature and all took it quite well and exclaimed:"Where did that come from? You're decades older than me!!!".

Whew. In all honesty, I was jumpy. My hands were poised to dial emergency services just in case Jane thinks of jumping and strangling the life out of him. hee hee.

Next Chapter : Mary Poppins gives Tim some lessons.

Lonely

Lonely, I'm so lonely,
I have nobody, for my own.

Everyone else has dissappeared into the training for some stupid cubes and I'm at my desk eating lunch, talking to myself as usual.

Listening to Damien Rice..

Nobody cares I'm half-a-thousand dollars poorer today after Warrant of Fitness and registration fees for my poor car. All Chris said was "I think you overpaid for tyres" and Jared's comment was no more helpful "Of course you have bold tyres, the way you drive". This is where he imitated my driving which is in no way complimenting.

I think the exact noise he made was :

Grrhrhhhr - Eeeeeeeeh - Grrhrhrrr- eeeehhhh

I'm Bafling part 2

(Disclaimer: I missed the first part of the conversation when I was visiting my lovely friend, Ms Vending Machine - and then realised I didn't have enough change to buy my fave drink. So back to the table I went.)

(This is where I cut in as Rayana's written part 1 first.)

I see Stephen looking passionately at Jared's lunch.
Stephen : Hmmmm... tuna.
Rayana : Are you wishing you brought tuna in for lunch?
S : Huh me? No. I just love tuna. Hmmmm... tuna.

Chris : I have some leftover spam sandwiches from yesterday.
R : Was that in your drawer? Didn't it go bad?
C: Spam lasts for a long time baby.
Stephen : I just love spam, when you chop it up into squares, wok fry it and serve it with a fried egg. (Stephen pretty much describes his favorite luncheon meat recipte)
S : Hmmmm.... spam.

R : The corned beef here is nice
Jared : But it's 50% fat!
S : Hmmmm... corned beef.
S : I just love corned beef. Specially if you chop those potatoes into little squares, deep fry them in a wok and add the corned beef in.

R : I'm going to eat my savoury muffin now.
J : Try heating it up for 10 seconds, that way you get that fresh-from-the-oven taste
(5 minutes...)
R : You know, your advice sucks. Heating it too much just zapped the crispy muffin taste I was after!
J : Well how long did you heat it anyway?
R : 20 seconds
J : After I told you to heat it for 10?
R : Well 10 obviously didn't work, so I tried 20.
(This is where Jared gives me that baffled look that he's never gonna understand women.)

Stephen : Hmmmm... muffin.

Why everybody hates Chris

He's skinny. And I don't mean it in a nice way. He's not skinny cos he's trying hard. He's just skinny.

He eats Tim Tams for breakfast. Every breakfast. And he drinks Hot chocolate for breakfast, because Tim Tams are too sweet for him and he needs to finish with something less sweet.

When he doesn't have Tim Tams, he doesn't get his 400 Calories and 200 grams of sugar, he eats baked pies and/or other fat-induced-sugar-hit-food and he ALWAYS has a bar of chocolate in his cabinet.

When he doesn't he always has a bar of chocolate in my cabinet. Urgh! Don't get me started Chris.

Does it go to his thighs????? Nooooooo. He just drinks a regular Coke every day to flush it out his system with renewed sugar. This is not even counting what he eats and drinks for lunch and snacks.

Any whoooo...... This is why we hate him.

Jared got a sticker on his machine: "Do not feed. On Presciption Diet". I don't even need a sticker, people just KNOW not to feed me, I'll get it myself, thank you very much.

Do you sense anger? Pfff!

I'm bafling

Did you baffle this morning? i ask Chris.
No, are you baffling?
Yes, I might.

Stephen joined us today or rather we joined him. Jared had brought 2 tiny cans of tuna for lunch.

Stephen: Why do you have 2 small cans of tuna. You know, if you get 1 larger can, it's cheaper.
Jared: Why do you have to analyze everything?
Rayana: It's just the large can of tuna costs the same as the small one.
Jared: Well, sometimes I just don't feel like eating a large one.
Stephen: But it's so much cheaper and better.
Rayana: Why can't you just buy small AND large cans for any occasion?
That's when Jared asked us to: Zip! Didn't work on Stephen though. He kept talking about how good tuna is on salads and sandwiches, and salads with sandwiches, and without sandwiches and salads. It took him about 10 minutes to get tuna salad sandwich recipes out. That's when Chris took out his can of tuna that was a different kind to the two Jared had and we started again.

Did you know that bland tuna in water tastes like water? and did you know that the one Chris had didn't?

Thankfully, this lunch i had no tuna. Perhaps, tomorrow.

Feng Shui or no Feng Shui that is the question

Today's discussion has been long and heated. Forgot how it started. Something to do with Margaret going on her OE.

Michelle: So Margaret, counting down the days?
Margaret: Khe-khe-khe, yeeh.
Chris or Tony or someone else: you are going to get engaged and wouldn't want to return at all.
Margaret: Yeah, possible. But don't worry, I will let you know immediately to avoid rumours spreading.

(*obviously she's refering to me spreading rumours about Jenita's engagament in AU. But I was just trying to fool Jared into thinking he's not important enough to hear such news)

Rayana: Well, we still expect cake to be sent here to celebrate your engagement.

Margaret: I gotta marry a rich person to be able to afford that.

Michele obviously took that way too seriously: No, you can't marry a rich person. You'll be bored! Imagine not having to work, everyone you know is working and you don't.

Mmmmm-mmmmm... sounds of me imagining....

10 minutes later snapped back to reality and the conversation is still on about what people do when they don't work. I remembered my ex-boss' wife has not been working, while i have been a slave for her husband's company. She's been so bored that she practically hired a personal Feng Shui designer to re-design the office and make sure everyone is turned exactly X number of degrees to the positive flow of Chi.

Ex-boss's wife: Rayana! You cannot sit on that chair!
Rayana jumps from deep concentration on work: Why not?
Ex-boss's wife: It's RED! You cannot have a red chair in this office!

I dumbly look at the deep red, very comfortable chair I snuck from the main area to replace my yucky purple chair with no handles: Why not?

Ex-boss's wife: Because it's creates a negative energy flow that bounces back this red chair into the room where we've got purple chair, crawls through the plants that cannot be watered too often, because Chi wants to live there and it gets too wet for her 8 feet, etc etc.

This is nothing. I told how we were forced to have lead blocks next to us, cos we sat next to windows and god forbid we move them 3 inches to the left.

That's where conversation has got heated. Opening windows to let the spirit of air in, closing windows cos your bum freezes, hanging beads, hanging on beads, hanging yourself with beads. You name it, we discussed it.

I think the main point was for Margaret to avoid the engagement conversation. Rumour has it, she's going to UK to meet someone!!! Shhh---shhhh... don't tell anyone.