Alas the fool was played
A concrete wall but a gossamer dream
Whom art thought a bright star forth
Cheerful! Passionate! Divine!
Nevertheless an empty void
A lonely soul crying for help!
Was there pain behind that mask of smiles?
Did ever sadness cloud past those angel eyes?
Alas the fool was played

A lot of the time, we only see what's on the surface and take it as we see it. But well... sometimes what we see is just the facade after all isn't it?

If not, why the heck would people even write articles about feigning confidence?

If you look carefully, it's quite simple. Really.

There are real people who live their everyday lives doing what they need to do to survive yet another day without fainting at every little thing :)

Like... erm... what have I been up to lately?

Books... (I kinda juggle my reading if you notice the below list) a) How To Be Good by Nick Hornby ---> done b) Stupid White Men by Michael Moore ---> just started on it c) Business at the Speed of Thought by Bill Gates ---> erm... kinda lazy to finish it... been months and I'm just past Chp.1?!! Sure tells you how interested I am on this one d) Chicken Soup for the Soul at Work by J.Canfield, M.V.Hansen, M.Robertson, M.Rutte & T.Clauss---> someway through this one

Movies... a) Princess Mononoke (DVD) ---> Nice! Loved the artwork... the myth... and the cute but rather freaky looking little Kodama b) The Prince & Me (cinema) ---> lighthearted fare. Call it a modern fairytale. Loved this one anyhow... no matter how surreal and predictable the story was... I'm biased because I love watching Julia Stiles' movies. But anyways, watch out for Soren... the Prince's aid. He lends some comic moments to the movie... hehehe... c) Spiderman 2 (cinema) ---> Predictable? Yes... especially since we did kinda grow up reading the comics. However, the movie has some moral high-points. More details below.

ONE: Kids should eat green veggies (OK, this one was a sneaky one by the scriptwriters... but I'm gonna have a good time throwing this line back at some veggie-haters... hehehe...) TWO: With great power comes great responsibility and sacrifices. THREE: You might want to spare the one you love from hurt by pretending not to love them... but you can't stop that person from choosing to be with you since everyone has a right to make their own life choices. ;)

p/s: I managed to get off from work ETA 6pm for 3 days in a row this past week!!! Mon, Tues, Wed!!! Whoooopiiieeeee!

Looking back on the week just passed, I'd say I am drowning in my work. Normally, I'd be supporting my team of 12. But since Monday, 5-Jul, I was supposed to support an additional 12-13 people.

Why so? Those 12-13 people had just lost their team lead due to her resignation.

Now I have at least 25 people under my wing should they have any issues with the processes or the system.

My job is
(a) to be the walking encyclopedia of all matters covered under our daily job function;
(b) guru at troubleshooting for the root cause of any issues

It can get tiring when so many things come your way in quick succession. Is there ever a space to breathe? At the moment, I would say there barely is any space for me to come up for the sweet scent of fresh air.

By the way, did I mention that for the whole of last Monday & Thursday that I had to support yet another 12 people? Oh yes! That's a total of 36 or so people. Why?

Their team lead was out of office - she was at an offsite training on Mon and on leave on Thu.

Am certainly not looking forward to tomorrow either. Their team lead will be on leave again on Monday.

I can only just pray that nothing major happens... and even more so that people haven't sabotaged their own system entries out of carelessness.

Oh trust me on this. It doesn't matter if people have been longer experienced on the job or not. A lot of the experienced staff can still do mistakes that are normally done by rookies... and they do those mistakes at the same rate that the rookies do.

I can only quietly bang my head on the wall for these people since I'm too tired to repeat the mantra to them. But what am I talking about?!

I still have to repeat the mantra in section XYZ pertaining to the issue at hand, regardless. It comes with the job.

Broadcaster of crisis command central, gatekeeper, investigator, motivator, team lead, troubleshooter, tutor, walking encyclopedia... I'm seriously overworked and underpaid.

There's always a first time for everything. Without a doubt, there always is.

Today started out just like any other work-day. Was doing follow up for a particular mini-crisis.

It started with an email that I had sent out last evening to make sure that there was written proof that I was aware of the issue. Had also seeked confirmation with one of my favourite colleagues if a formal escalation ticket had to be logged.

The answer he gave me yesterday and early this morning was, "It's OK. You don't have to do that. :) I'll handle it from my end."

Thus I left it at that and went on to look into other matters. That was until before lunch time.

He had email to say "Please log a call :)". Not just a direct reply to my earlier inquiry. He was responding to someone in my team who had asked about the progress of the issue.

Now why didn't he just tell me to do the escalation thing earlier on?! Wasn't I supposed to be the gatekeeper/collection point so that he doesn't get a barrage of direct inquiries from the grassroots?

I can't believe it happened and what made him trip up like that. And that really pissed me off. Oh yeah! That's the first ever time I was truly and absolutely angry at him.

I told him so and I told him off. We are all overloaded but that doesn't mean that we can screw up on something so simple.

2 odd hours later, I had calmed down and told him I'm cool about the whole episode now. The response he gave me displayed sheer relief.

You see, I wouldn't expect his response to be any less than that. It's just that everyone knows that I don't get worked up easily.

Thus if my temper erupts... it means that someone had crossed not just an inch over my tolerance level - they have gone past it for more than a mile.

The best challenger to beat is always your own self

It's no use comparing yourself to others. I'ts always better to challenge yourself to do better.

For example, I feel GrReeEeaAAT that I finally managed to take an extra 2x50m lap swim today in the same time I used to take my usual 10 laps.

Will raise my target slowly but surely... but for now... over-exerting would mean jelly-legs when I get back to walking on solid ground...

This means that should I be overly ambitious, there would be a very high potential that I'd fall flat on the floor... NOW THAT WOULD BE PAINFULLY EMBARRASSING!!!

Hmm... so adorable are the lil' critters... yet always such painfully tragic endings do they meet... and who would have thought cartoon shorts can be more violent than South Park?

Meet the Happy Tree Friends!