Realized, to my annoyance, that i need to move my CPU to connect the hard drives. it's fixed in place with not much wiggle room (thanks to the assorted power and display cables), so i need to find my portable hard disk housings in the sea of boxes. don't quite think that i'm up for that at the moment, so i'm going to put a pin in that plan for now. i will set a deadline to get it done by the end of the year, just to keep myself accountable.

the chalet was (mostly) a success! despite the lower turnout this year, i had a good time. we may have gone a little overboard on the drinks, but i think having excess is better than there not being enough. i was happy to see how some of our members are progressing through stages of life - we have people who joined us in NS, but have since ORD-ed, graduated from university, and are already working! i had interesting conversations with some of them, including this kind of awkward guy who i sometimes also see at my company events (he's in the broader IP industry, we don't work in the same company), and my in-game neighbour (we have houses close to each other). there was also one guy who became WAY more handsome as compared to when i saw him last year. i think it's both that he got a glow-up, and my taste in guys got broader. he reconfirmed that i have a thing for smaller eyes and nice smiles!

apart from the smaller-scale interactions, we were also caught up on some interesting characters in the guild. nothing that requires our immediate intervention, but good for the leadership to know. i dozed off midway through that conversation and only caught snippets, but i suppose i can be asked to be filled in if the need arises.

my initial plan was to leave before midnight to have the guy over, but i ended up staying until 4. the guy was also updated, and we agreed to meet up again after i came back from china. took a grab back (had to wait for more than 10 minutes for the booking to be confirmed, but thank goodness there was a driver nearby at all), and slept for another 5-6 hours. feeling neutral as of now, maybe just the slightest bit below baseline. was supposed to discuss booking trains with the china group, but my friend said he'd handle it for us. small blessings, since my brain still isn't at 100%.

so, as for why the chalet was "mostly" a success, i think we went too large-scale for the number of people. see, we used to have upwards of 50 people attending in previous years. but due to reasons such as less commitment to the game, the guild being not as active, people having their own lives, last-minute withdrawals, this year's turnout was smaller. and i could be reading too much into it, but i got the feeling that the leader was not too happy with the effort-to-payoff ratio. perfectly understandable if that was indeed the case, because i kind of feel that as well. not sure whether it was in annoyance, tiredness or if she was 100% sincere, but she said "next year i'm not organizing this any more". i don't think it's meant as a declaration that there wouldn't be a chalet or chalet-like event next year, but more like "if you want to have one, do it yourselves". if it became up to me, i don't think i'd do a chalet next year. maybe book a function room or hangout spot, and make it an evening/night thing with no stayover option. something to think about.

on a more emotional level, i felt a kind of melancholy as we were saying goodbye and leaving the chalet. fewer people showing up, nobody staying over...it seems like things that define the good old days are slowly disappearing, and the guild is not as bonded as it was before. realistically, it's been going on for a while (since at least 2 years ago), so i should be sufficiently mentally/emotionally prepared by now. i guess yesterday was a more in-my-face reminder of it, which is why i felt it more. as much as i know that the "correct" answer is that i should be grateful for the fun times, friendships made, and wonderful memories, a part of me can't help but want to relive them. logistically impossible now, of course, but the heart wants what it wants. i'm at least thankful that my friendships with the core guild members when i joined are still going strong.

during the conversation, one of the members (a lawyer) said something along the lines of "people will do anything to solve a problem, except put in the required effort". that hit a bit close to home, as i realize it applies to my weight loss journey. in fairness, the required effort is usually hard for people who are weak at the thing. for a related example, my tuition kids need to sit down and get the ions into their heads. it was easy for me even back in sec 3, but apparently not so for these kids, which i think is why they're just less/not willing to do it. just like it's probably easy for them to maintain an active lifestyle as compared to me. as a point of reflection, i should do better to put the required effort in.

thank goodness today's a public holiday; i don't think i could have made it to work after staying up so late last night. it's been a nice, relaxing day so far and i'm also looking forward to call it an early night. 3 more days of work, and i'm off to china. just need to make time to pack over the next few days. i also looked through the contents of some boxes, and saw some birthday cards from my late uncle. i guess i packed them up and brought them along during the move to defer the decision of whether to throw them away or not. now that i've had almost a year to settle in, i think i can start devoting brainpower to making these decisions. somehow i'm quite sure that if i don't dispose of them, i'll just end up taking them with me in subsequent moves by default without ever looking at them. can probably work on a box and my luggage in parallel.

-random thought of the day: Need more quality human interaction.-

Close to an hour more before my guildmate comes to pick me up for the chalet. let's see, i've prepared the stuff to bring (need to get the coke out of the fridge), know what i'm going to wear, and confirmed the time. all that's left to do is shower and change, which i can do in like, 5-10 minutes? should be all right.

the past week was pretty routine; working from home on tuesday and wednesday (had the opportunity to head out for brunch with some of the old boys), then in the office for thursday and friday. there was a company-wide meeting on friday too, where we were kind of prompted to think about future career directions. no, we're not being downsized or experiencing layoffs, and my job doesn't appear to be at risk for at least the next 3 years. even if a job is considered an iron rice bowl, i think that at least some thought has to be given to career planning. for me, it's more to check in to see if i'm stagnating or getting bored, which might impact my mental health as the JET experience showed me. thankfully, that doesn't seem to be the case yet; i'm still feeling challenged and engaged by my work.

in line with this theme, the chairman gave a speech about his life and how he got to where he was. i don't have a super favourable impression of him, because he's not as well-spoken as i'd expect a person of his level to be (lots of rambling and not much stage presence), plus he spoke about his achievements for over an hour. credit where it's due though, his life story is quite amazing, helped by some uncanny coincidences. imagine being allowed to sit for A-levels just 4 months after sitting for O-levels, and passing all subjects! my interpretation of his message is that if we make decisions according to our moral compass, things will work out. while it's good advice, it seems a bit idealistic. and he's definitely an outlier, so i don't expect what worked for him to work for me as well. i'll probably do a deeper reflection at year-end, but it's something i've been thinking of a little bit even before the talk, and now even more so after the talk.

another thing which has been on my mind recently is another missed financial opportunity. my cousin told me that his ex-boss benefited from the surge in micron share price. i read up on it, and saw that the price went up 10 times in 18 months across last year to this year! it's since fallen to around 70% of the highest value, but still! if i'd liquidated everything i had and went all in on micron, i'd probably be close to a millionaire now. that's the second chance to make a ton of money that i've missed out on. from another perspective, it's easy to say that now, in hindsight. who knew how the market would go in early 2025, in view of the volatility caused by america? and no rational person would do the all eggs in one basket thing, especially for investments. looking at my portfolio now, i'm at least grateful that i started investing. even if the things i put my money in don't give me 10X returns, i'm still in the black and am not investing money that isn't mine. i think i would feel worse if i hadn't invested at all!

had another new kid join my tuition class yesterday. she's quiet (to be expected), and at least seems interested to learn. the thing i'm not too thrilled about is that she was reluctant to ask questions. because if you don't ask when you don't know, you remain in a state of not knowing! could be the first-class shyness, so i'm planning to give it a bit more time to see if it improves. because of the china trip, i'm missing tuition for the next 2 weeks. the disproportionately large sense of joy/relief i felt really signals to me that it's time to move on from tuition, both this assignment and in general. i don't know if i'll ever truly stop (in case friends or relatives ask me to tutor their kids in future), but at least for now i think tuition is not something i want in my life. still, i have to be responsible and see these kids through to their O-levels first. or it's apparently called SEC (secondary education certificate) now? i believe my current kids are the first to be under the new system. whatever it is, i have 3 more classes this year. can't wait until the year-end break!

tomorrow's a public holiday, which would be the perfect time for me to have the guy over (and he asked, too). the past few times he was here from friday night to saturday morning, we've had to get an early start to the day because of the alumni gathering and whatnot. so i was thinking that since tomorrow is a public holiday, we could have a more leisurely morning. issue now is, i'm not sure i'm up for that kind of human interaction! think it's due to the recent mental state and related things. well...i figure that i'll see how i'm feeling in the evening, then confirm with him. thankfully he's easygoing and adaptable enough, and just needs about 3 hours' notice because of his travel time. i mean, it would be nice to see him again! but i don't know if i'll be good company.

slightly further into the future, i should do the hard drive/e-waste thing tomorrow afternoon. working from home on tuesday and wednesday, then in the office on thursday. i expect my mentor will return me a few cases, and i intend to submit maybe 1 or 2 more this coming week. after that, it's off to china on friday! reminder to myself that i should set aside time to pack. let's not do the last-minute packing thing for longer trips again; one scare per lifetime (long ago, for one of my australia trips) is enough!

-random thought of the day: Chalet time!-

Increasingly, i'm thinking that i should adopt a new life motto, the motto being "i can't abide stupid people". today's most memorable occurrence was this woman on my morning bus commute who didn't press the bell, but tapped her card and stood expectantly at the exit door as if the bus driver should know to open it for her. if i were driving the bus, i'd have continued the journey, just to teach her a lesson. but that's easy for me to say, because i don't have to deal with the consequences of the passenger possibly complaining, causing a scene, or otherwise being a karen somehow. there were the usual idiots who pressed the bell again for the same stop after someone had already pressed it. to me, it's a sign that people are getting more self-absorbed. i blame wireless earphones. but even then, there's a big lit-up sign in front that says "STOPPING". surely it isn't too much to expect people to look at it before they decide whether to press the bell or not? given the state of society these days, it may very well be.

the next thing impinges on my weird thing for fairness. remember that M18 treasure hunt i blogged about in the last post? the organizer posted an update that the object was picked up by someone else on accident, and asked us to state our best guesses as to where the location was. i thought i had pretty good guesses, and hence a chance to get it right. but he revealed that the location was somewhere that the clues did not explicitly point to. sure, the clues brought you to the vicinity, but nothing there would tell you to search in the particular location where it was originally placed. and this does not sit well with me.

see, the whole premise of a game is that the player has to have a fair chance to win. that is a different consideration from it being easy. the difference between the clues and the final location felt like this video:

it's nonsensical! even then, i honestly do think i could have found the object had it not been moved, because i did poke around the correct location, but it wasn't in my top few guesses. we'll never know, since the thing wasn't there when i poked around. and i should state for the record that although the feeling of losing sucks, i can accept it if i were beaten fair and square. obviously, i don't feel that that's the case in this scenario.

how does this tie into stupidity? the organizer is stupid, in that he set stupid clues and could not justify or explain them well. not only that, he was deliberately misleading. i asked if the item was in plain sight, to which he answered that it was subjective. but then, it was completely covered by something. how is that "in plain sight!?". i feel that he got defensive, as he resorted to the "i'm not a professional game designer, don't play if you don't like it" thing.  i guess some people can't take criticism. and he didn't even offer to make things better by at least doing something to acknowledge my effort. i'll also say here that (1) he is not obligated to do so, and (2) i participated willingly, but some recognition beyond "thanks for playing" would have been nice, even if there was no M18 element involved. thankfully i wasn't really in it for the reward, otherwise i think i'd be even more upset. i wasn't super attracted to him to begin with, and the attraction has basically fizzled out now. 

to be fair, it did stretch my brain a bit, and in a way that is quite directly relevant to my job! see, a huge chunk of IP is this thing called claim construction. the root word for construction in this case isn't "construct", but "construe". so claim construction is basically how we interpret a claim. example: let's say it's 1900, and someone invented the e-ink tablet way before its time. if he applied for a patent with the claim being "a device comprising a surface capable of receiving and displaying an input, and an object for creating said input on the surface", that patent would not get granted as the claim could be construed to cover things known at that time like paper and pen, or clay tablet and stylus, or even a finger and sand on the beach, just to name a few examples! so, it's part of our job to think laterally or out of the box, to make sure that the patent has a broad enough scope, yet is not overly broad. guess getting some practice in counts as a positive for me, which should help to ameliorate the negativity a little.

good thing that happened today was that i finally had lunch with gym guy again! work and the renovations for his new place have kept him busy for the past 2 weeks. we hadn't met up since that time at the gay bar, and our texting frequency also took a hit. was nice to catch up with him and get updates on everything going on with him. we ate at arnold's at city plaza. my first or second time having arnold's fried chicken, and definitely my first time eating at the place itself. it was good, if a little bit heaty. i can feel something in my throat despite drinking almost 3 litres of water since lunch. we the went over to kinex to get coffee (him) and dessert (me). had the pandan cheesecake again, and it was good! pandan flavour/aroma was a little lacking this time compared to previously, though. i also bought a red velvet + cream cheese cookie for an afternoon snack. nothing to shout about, unfortunately.

mild digression. our lunch set came with drinks. in this kind of scenario, i usually choose mineral water if it's available. and it tends to come in a bottle. so, i recycled the bottle at a BCRS collection machine after lunch, my first time ever doing so! the process was smooth, thankfully, don't even need to orient the barcode in a particular way. i got the 10 cents for recycling the bottle credited into my paylah wallet immediately, no fuss at all. happy with the positive first experience, but i'm still against the whole scheme on principle.

sometimes i wonder if the timing at which things happen are truly coincidental and i'm reading too much into it, or if someone from a higher plane of existence is trying to give me a sign. see, i just blogged about my earphones not working, and my company is organizing an e-waste disposal drive. so, i can bring the earphones as well as my old laptop for disposal. OR...i could just throw them into the e-waste disposal bin at the block next door. i really should spend an afternoon to hook my hard drives up one by one and see which ones are still readable and have data that i still want to keep. no point lugging them with me for subsequent moves if i never touch them again, right? something to do by this year.

on the topic of waste in general, i realized that i might be due for a wardrobe refresh...a part of it, at least. because i only have to wear formal attire less than 5 times a year, some of my shirts have developed orange mould stains. at least, that's what i think the stains are. some other shirts have also yellowed quite significantly. considering i got those shirts made in early 2019, it seems to be about time for a change. or maybe just a cull without adding anything new, since i don't wear them all that often anyway!

-random thought of the day: Feeling a bit better.-

Somehow got my cardio in today, using two unexpected sources. ok, one is debatable, but the second one is definitely unexpected. the debatable one is from tuition, where i had an above-average class! i was contemplating whether i'd be justified to use "amazing", but it doesn't feel right yet. what did go well, though, was the 2 distracted kids actually focused! the weaker one, especially. based on our interaction last week, i think he didn't know what he had to know. like, he sounded quite pleased with himself when he told me that he'd already memorized the chemical symbols for the elements we commonly use. that's fine and all, but i need him to know the ions they form as well. i told him that last week, and he seemed to get it better this week. i also want to recognize the way i handled that conversation. i read that a good practice for high-stakes situations (eg. hospital emergency room), is to focus on what was done right rather than what wasn't done or done wrong. like say, a senior doctor asks a junior for an epi-pen, the patient's files, and a wheelchair, and the junior doctor brings 2 of the 3 things. instead of getting angry and going "where's item #3!?", a more constructive approach that the senior could take would be "thank you, now go get item #3 too, please". it focuses on the task at hand, and doesn't make the junior feel (as) bad. so in my not exactly life-threatening case, i told him "that's good, now i need you to level up and know what ions they form as well". going by how he was this week, it seems to have paid off! hopefully it persists, and is not a fluke.

whoa, digression. so the cardio was basically from me being on my feet for the whole 2 hours, walking around, and using my voice a lot. at the same time, i also have to focus a bit more on the guy who's been here longer; he was extremely distracted by his phone today. but all in all, i'd say it was a good class! if only all my classes were like this. something to hope for and strive towards, i guess.

the unexpected source of cardio today was from walking up and down flights of stairs. full disclosure, it was some up, majority down because i cheated and mostly took the lift up. and it's for the stupidest thing, too! by the way, this experience has reconfirmed for me that exercise isn't hard with enough motivation. the problem is that my demotivating factors usually win out. as for what today's motivation was...to avoid going too far into TMI territory, i'll just say it was an M18 treasure hunt. so the organizer posted cryptic clues and photos about an object's location, and whoever found the object would get an M18...favour/prize from the organizer. seeing as i recognized the building that the object's supposed to be hidden in from the clues given (it's a place i know fairly well), i tried my luck to see if i could find the object. in the process, i walked up and down the aforementioned flights of stairs, because i would interpret the clues differently, check different locations, or think of another interpretation of a clue and check the same location again - multiple times! didn't manage to find it in the end, unfortunately, and i'm waiting to see if the organizer will explain his thought process for the clues. i'm mildly confused, because i think i exhausted all possible reasonable interpretations of the clues, but still no luck.

more than the potential reward of sexy stuff, i was a little surprised to find that i considered solving the clues to find the object to be a greater reward than whatever M18 thing that i might win. guess this means i need to rethink my strategy for motivating myself to work out. how can i make intellectual fulfillment the final objective/reward for physical activity? something to consider. i actually wonder if this concept could be expanded to a business as well?

other events: D&D was nice. i wore formal attire down, and mildly regret not thinking of a costume for the theme ahead of time. my lead went as sherlock holmes (maybe a sherlock/einstein hybrid?), complete with fake eyebrows/moustache, pipe, and iconic sherlock attire. the kind of sad thing in my opinion was that most of my batch didn't go. i think there were maybe 3 to 4 out of the 10 of us in attendance? i got a bit...wistful/FOMO, perhaps, when i saw the newbies (and even the seniors!) put so much effort into their costumes. but it's fine. not like it REALLY matters in the long run, anyway. guess i can remember this feeling for the next D&D, 2 years later!

got home late-ish and slept for only 4-ish hours, because i woke up early for alumni gathering: sio bak revenge. woke up later than i intended to (again), but i was early enough today to finish both stages of cooking, let the meat cool before slicing, and then pack it into the tupperware. that made all the difference; the skin was still crispy when i unveiled it at the gathering! granted, less crispy compared to fresh out of the oven, but that's expected. i'd call it a success! just for reference/remembrance, here's the recipe, going with an M theme:

meat

desired weight of pork belly (i went with 1.5 kg), get skin-on 三层肉 from the butcher, avoid frozen

marinade

60 mL shaoxing wine

30 g brown sugar (adjust to taste, i found it a bit too sweet)

10g five-spice powder

5 g salt

miscellaneous

aluminum foil (not an ingredient, obviously)

vinegar (either distilled white or apple cider)

salt (again, we're doing a salt crust!)

cooking oil

marination

- poke holes in or otherwise score the skin side of the pork belly (i think this is optional, pending further testing).

- mix the marinade ingredients together, check that salt and sugar have fully dissolved.

- rub the marinade all over the pork (even the skin side).

- leave in the fridge, skin side up, for between 8 hours and 2 days (or more, depends on you, as long as the meat doesn't go bad).

- halfway through the marination time, wipe the marinade off the skin side only (i think this is optional as well).

before cooking, check that the skin is dry and has gone a little hard/rigid.

method of cooking

- preheat oven to 180 °C, top and bottom heat.

- make a container for the pork out of aluminum foil. it should be open at the top but all other sides should hug all sides of the pork. all the walls should be a little higher than the height of the pork to keep the salt crust in.

- lightly brush vinegar over the pork skin only, and place the pork in the foil container so that the skin side faces up at the top of the container.

- cover the skin side with a thick layer of salt, don't overflow the container but leave no skin visible. don't worry too much if some salt falls down the sides, but try to avoid that.

- cook the pork in the oven (middle rack) for about an hour minimum, add 10 mins for every 100 g above 1 kg. here's where you can try using a meat thermometer/probe. if in doubt, cook for longer rather than shorter.

midway point!

- after the full duration has passed, take the pork out.

- change your oven mode to broil and crank it to the max.

- remove the pork from the foil container, and remove the salt crust that should have formed. also remove big (visible) salt particles from the sides.

- make a new container out of foil similar as above, but this time the height of the container should be about equal to the height of the pork.

- place the pork in the new container same as before, skin side up.

- return the pork to the oven to crisp the skin. watch it constantly because it goes from golden brown to black/burnt in literal seconds.

- remove from oven when skin has puffed up to your liking, LEAVE IT TO COOL TO ROOM TEMPERATURE (or slightly warmer, should be able to touch and hold it comfortably). guide: err on the side of cooling it for longer.

- slice it up (easier to lay the whole thing on its side and start the slice from the meat to the skin) and serve!

one last thing. my right sennheiser earphone stopped working well. like, it's responsive to the touch controls, but it doesn't output sound at all. remembering sennheiser's (lack of) customer service, i decided to just cut my loss there and get new earphones. went with sony's previous generation one, because the internet says the slight increase in specs from the previous to current generation doesn't really justify the increase in cost. looks like i'm migrating all my wearable audio needs to sony now, considering i already bought their headphones in japan earlier this year! plus side is, i'll only need one app to control them both. i'll miss the sennheiser app though - it's the only app i've seen so far that gives me the option to change the icon to an LGBT flag theme. i realize that i've only had it for 2+ years of actual use. i originally bought the previous generation sennheisers in japan during black friday 2023, but only tried to use them in may 2024, after coming back to singapore. the first time i tried them out, they couldn't even be turned on. i contacted the customer service, and the rest is history. don't remember how much i paid, either...if i had to guess, the yen equivalent of 300 SGD? just checked my amazon order history, and it was close - 28 900 yen. so that's about $300 for about 30 months of usage...or $10-ish per month. ehh, that's ok, i guess? i should be thankful to them, for the ANC function especially on flights. but our time together has come to an end. i'll send them off, then it's on to better (i hope) things!

-random thought of the day: Excited for guild chalet!-

Like the meme above alludes to, it happened again. this time, it's Patrick Stewart. this one came completely out of left field because he'd always seemed healthy, taking on acting roles (albeit more minor as he aged) even getting compliments about his body in recent years. so to wake up and have that announcement be the first thing i see...honestly, i'm still having some trouble processing it now. there's been a weight in my chest all day, and talking to jedi master earlier on kind of alleviated it only slightly.

i don't know why this one's hitting me hard too - i didn't even know him personally. my first exposure to him (as i suspect will be the case for most millennials or later) was watching the x-men movies. not the later, more polished ones, but the initial ones from the early 2000s that were the precursor to modern-day superhero movies. i was a major x-men fan in my teenage years, firstly because of the cool powers, and secondly because i got older and found out that the mutants depicted there were a metaphor for LGBT people. then, as i read more about him, i realized he's also a major LGBT ally in real life. so, it's like he's been fighting for our rights as both professor x and himself!

my next exposure to him was as captain picard when my late coach introduced me to star trek: the next generation. i'm not a religious trekkie or anything, but i am aware of some of the character's major story arcs and habits. that, and the whole controversy (at that time) about a classically-trained shakespearean actor doing something more mass-market friendly. word is he was contemplating leaving the show. i'm grateful he decided against it, because he brought a different dimension to the character. plus, he fulfilled his objective of appearing in star trek, in that it got more people wanting to watch him perform and thus, interested in theatre. unfortunately, i never had the chance to watch him on stage. there were other things he featured in, of course. voice acting roles, mostly. his voice was was immediately distinguishable, and i loved hearing it unexpectedly. i also loved that he didn't let his ego stand in the way of taking roles that would be considered beneath him (poop emoji, for instance).

still not sure what that weight in my chest is. i mean, it's sadness/grief for sure. rather, i suppose the more important question is why it's that heavy. could be because i think he was a good person, and good people always die way too young. it's also a loss to the world at large, particularly in the communities where his influence/presence was the greatest. but i am grateful that his vast body of work means that there will always be different recordings of him to discover and rediscover. don't know if it's strange for me to say this considering we didn't have a personal relationship, but i'll miss him.

in other news, nothing much to report. one case away from hitting my goal for the year, which will give me a second shot at promotion if the first one flops. i should say that this would definitely not be enough to hit next year's goal, so i kind of have a feel of how much harder i'll need to work next year. not exactly looking forward to it, but i'll deal with it when i get there.

calorie tracking is coming along well too; i've been pretty consistent about it since i started earlier this week. apart from the obvious benefit of knowing my input vs my calorie ceiling, another significant benefit which i did not expect was that i now have a better perspective of how much (in terms of physical size) of something contributes to how much of my calorie allowance. like, an oat and dark chocolate bar from my office pantry comes in at close to 200 calories. 9 of those, and that's my allowance for the day gone. that's mad! it's also helping me be more conscious in choosing smaller portions, which is in contrast to my typical mindset of (1) small portions might leave me hungry, and (2) i can finish the big one, might as well go for it. while things look good for now, it's only been a week-ish. need to see if this is sustainable long-term!

-random thought of the day: Got a haircut for the company D&D.-

Facing a couple of bad mental health things recently. nothing serious and no need to worry for me, but considering how they're making me feel, i think it's best that i get a handle on them sooner than later.

before that, weird dream log! i've been having them for the last 3, 4 days in a row, but these dreams which i had on friday night to saturday morning left enough of an impact for me to want to record them down. there were 2 dreams, and i don't know how linked they are to each other. 

dream #1: another weird maths dream. It was JC time and my uni friends and i were studying for a-levels. weird, because i didn't know them in JC! we had to solve a problem that read something like "john took part in a spelling contest. if he spelled the same 3-letter word as his opponent, they both advanced. if their words were different, they both didn't advance. the first person to advance for 3 rounds wins. what is the minimum number of rounds john needs to advance to win?" looking at it like that, the answer is just 3, isn't it? or a more sensible question which would also explain the rest of the dream would be "what is the probability that john wins after 3 rounds?". i remembered calculating probability using 26P3, but not having much idea what to do after. My friend calculated for 50P3, using 50 for the number of letters in the alphabet as opposed to 26. i thought maybe it was because the japanese alphabet had 50 letters (well, 47 by right, or more than 50 if you count all the compound letters; but it's commonly referred to as 五十音 - "50 sounds"). don't remember how this dream ended.

dream #2: i was back in secondary school, close to morning assembly. i was walking around and met my sec 3 and 4 form teacher, who was shorter and rounder in the dream than i remember. also ran into my sec 1 and 2 classmate T, who was a basketballer. although we went to the same JC, we weren't in the same class and had zero interaction over those 2 years. he was retaking his O-levels to meet the requirements for a new job. maybe secret service? i went into the music room to find the alumni people there, who wanted me to sing a song. i don't remember what song i sang, or if i even sang at all.

mental health stuff now. a bit of it is due to work, because i don't feel at the level that i think i should be at. it's partially brought on by recent comments on my cases, because i feel that i'm receiving comments for mistakes that i shouldn't be making at this stage. and as time goes by, i'm losing the so-called newbie buffer zone. i also realized that the newest newbies have moved up to join us in the main office today, which is a sign of their progress and indirectly means that i should be progressing as well. on the bright side, i'm only about 1-2 cases away from getting enough points for the year. if i'm fast enough, it would mean that i can slack off for december! not that i plan to, because having a month of zero output would be very suspicious indeed. oh, i think i haven't mentioned it yet, but it was announced at the last meeting that targets for people around my level will have the usual increase next year, then remain frozen for 2028. it's good, because it means that doing the masters won't be as taxing. things seem to work out somehow!

the more significant contributor to the not-good mental health is that i finally felt bad enough and did an in-body analysis at the gym. the results were not good, let's just leave it at that. long story short, weight gain that is mostly due to fat. it's kind of shocked me into taking more concrete steps, such as setting interim and long term goals, as well as starting to use chatgpt to track my calories and progress towards those goals. today's only day 1, and it's been good. expected, i'd say. the challenge will be keeping to the plan long-term. sucks that i gain weight so easily. i know somewhere out there, there'll be a stick-thin person envying this particular ability of mine. believe me, i'd transfer it to whoever wants it if i could. that leads to something which i want to talk about in more detail, but not yet. it might even be my theme this year!

i'm sure that this is just a temporary dip in mood, which should get better as i focus more on the healthy lifestyle thing. now that i don't have to turn in as many cases as earlier in the year, i can rebalance myself a little more. also, there are a bunch of events in the next 2-3 weeks, including the company D&D this friday, organization-wide meeting next friday, guild chalet next sunday, deepavali holiday the monday after, and flying off to china again that friday afternoon!

-random thought of the day: Looking forward to another trip!-

Qingdao was a great success, despite some minor hiccups and the relatively short duration. scary JC friend and i were just saying how odd it was that we'd never travelled together in the past 20 years of knowing each other, but had already gone on 2 trips this year with another potential one in the works (more on that later). i suppose it's one of those things that happens in its own time, because to really enjoy travelling together, there has to be a certain level of mutual trust and comfortability/acceptance. even more so because her mum was there! i'm happy to say that we got along well, and i would definitely travel with her again if the chance arose. lets do a chronological-ish recap of the trip, starting from where the last post left off.

day 0 (packing + travelling to the airport + airport things)

got everything packed, and decided to call a grab instead of my original plan of taking public transport. the grab ride started off a bit negatively, with the driver saying, "i almost didn't want to come, the fare now so low". he then complained a bit more about the general private-hire job market, before dropping this gem - "recently my luck very bad, but later i want to go to the casino". when i asked him why, he replied that he wasn't earning enough, and wanted to win some money at the casino. that left me quite puzzled, as he didn't seem to be a professional gambler. also, the entrance fee/levy means that singaporeans are already $100 down even before placing their first bet, so it's even harder to come out on top. through a bit more conversation, i found out that he's been driving grab for almost 10 years, and felt stuck in life. worse, he doesn't have the confidence to pivot to something else due to his age (50) and lack of educational qualifications. i got a very defeatist vibe off him, plus he doesn't seem to be making wise life choices. while i could have probed deeper, asked him more about himself and tried to suggest other possible courses of action, i felt that it wasn't worth my effort in this case. so i just wished him luck at the casino as he dropped me off at the airport.

during the ride, i also realized that i'd forgotten to pack my water bottle. seems like i'm always forgetting one thing every overseas trip! at least this was minor, and i planned to buy a bottle of water or something at the airport. problem is, BCRS was also implemented on the airside part of the airport. for context, BCRS stands for "beverage container return scheme" (i think). it charges an additional 10 cents for canned or bottled drinks, and consumers get the 10 cents back when returning the bottle or can to designated return machines, supposedly to encourage recycling. there are similar programs in other countries (germany for one that i know), so it's not exactly revolutionary. the problem here is, the scheme is implemented so badly. i won't go into detail about examples outside the airport, but within the airport in particular, there are no return machines airside! so there's no way to return empty bottles or cans. i suppose one COULD carry the empty bottle for the duration of their trip, then come back and return it...but then what about the people who are just transiting or leaving singapore permanently? i sent feedback in, and got a generic reply that didn't say anything useful at all. i really think that some idiot government official just blindly rubber-stamped the proposal. for all the talk about how it was considered over a long time, the sudden exclusion of drinks bought at the F1 race from BCRS, as well as its poorly thought out implementation in the airport (reminder here that singapore prides itself on having a top-class airport, hence there is even less excuse for such a glaring lapse in planning), makes me doubt the government's competence and intentions. in the end, i consciously chose not to buy a bottle and just drank from the water coolers...which i suppose achieves the greater goal of eco-friendliness in the end, albeit with some inconvenience.

day 1 (photoshoot, brewery, atas dinner)

the flight itself was uneventful, and i made it through customs just fine. went to our accommodations by subway and a bit of walking. the weather was so good! literally air-con temperature, and i made sure to take extra-deep breaths of the haze-free air. i made it in time to put my stuff down before we were out to the first stop of the day - a photo studio where scary JC friend had booked a photoshoot. the entire process (makeup, wardrobe, photo-taking, image processing and selection) took about 4 hours, which was also how long i waited with her mum. thankfully, we're both not the super sociable type and were capable of self-entertaining, so we mainly kept to ourselves with occasional conversation here and there. i think i fell asleep for a bit too, which is not surprising considering my interrupted sleep on the red-eye flight over. anyway, i checked in as they finalized which photos to keep. the studio staff remarked, "是不是感觉到娶了明星啊?", which translates to "don't you feel like you married a star (celebrity)?". i didn't reply in time because it didn't register in my head! you know, us being the furthest thing from romantically involved. scary JC friend came to the rescue and told the staff that we were just friends. minor awkward moment, but we laughed it off. the base package which she opted for comes with 3 free pictures and costs SGD 60, with additional charges for more pictures (which is also where they try to get your money). she ended up choosing 14 more pictures, and the studio gave her 2 for free, for a total of 19 pictures and a total cost of 800 SGD(!!). guess i don't see the value in it, because my first thought was 'that's mad!'. but well, it's her money and it makes her happy.

we then headed down to the tsingtao beer brewery/museum, but there was a long queue due to it being a minor chinese festival (重阳节, which is like 敬老の日 in japan). while we didn't go in for the brewery tour, we had a small bite at an eatery across the street, consisting of a shared a plate of a kind of clam that is shorter and thicker than a typical razor clam, and cooked so it's still a bit raw inside; and sea urchin steamed with egg and a large steamed oyster with minced garlic just for me. the clams were amazing, everything else was underwhelming. we agreed that we'd been spoiled by japanese sea urchin. although the brewery tour was a no-go due to the crowd, we went into the gift shop and bought beer nuts. they had a gimmick where you paid RMB 39 for a ziploc plastic bag, and you could fill it with as many packets of nuts as possible with the condition that the bag had to be sealed when the staff inspected it at the end. we managed to get 31 packets in thanks to careful organization and packing, so that works out to a little more than RMB 1 (or SGD 20-ish cents) per packet. awesome deal! one of the iconic sights in that area is roadside stands with machines that look like a wall with a row of taps, and each tap dispenses a different beer. we walked by one, and the promoter told us we could have free samples. helped that he was cute, too! we tried several beers, including lychee (a bit artificial-tasting), grape (tasted almost like sparkling juice), strawberry (no strong impression), 原浆 (fresh beer, unfiltered, unpasteurized, no preservatives, short shelf life), and 黑啤, which is this dark beer that defies the stereotype of dark beers. it smelled like rye bread and chocolate to me, but was not bitter at all and very easy to drink. thank goodness i don't live in qingdao, otherwise my beer consumption would skyrocket! i think that it's the first and only dark beer that i like. we bought a bottle each of 原浆 and 黑啤 to take back, and i mildly regret not buying more. the promoter also asked us about life in singapore, and he seemed to be under the impression that people earned more here. we told him that while earnings were higher, costs were higher too. was half tempted to ask him to come live with me to experience it, but my brain won out in the end.

last engagement of the day was dinner with one of the old boy's chinese contacts. they treated us to dinner in a seafood restaurant, and overordered as is the chinese way of showing hospitality. there were at least 10-12 dishes, and the ones that i can still remember are the clams (same type as before), marinated raw oysters, 海肠饭 (google translates it as "spoon worm rice" - the chinese name sounds WAY better), fried cicadas (surprisingly mild-flavoured with nice texture), steamed prawns, raw sea urchin (unfortunately still lacking in flavour). and don't forget the beer. gosh, the chinese sure can drink! i was also kind of aware of my limited chinese language ability, as i had some difficulty following the conversation at some points. need to brush up! it was a very fulfilling meal, and it'll be our turn to host them when they come to singapore, probably next year.

as we were walking back after the dinner, scary JC friend and i had interesting conversation about the cute beer promoter and my recent gay bar adventures. she says it's nice that she can talk to me (a guy) about more M18 stuff, because there are only a small group of people who would be attracted to both of us, meaning that we're not "competition" for each other. i feel the same way! the topic about travelling together also came up, and there's a chance that she may be interested to go on the upcoming china trip with my guildmates too. that's pending confirmation by this week. i think it would be nice to have her along!

day 2 (laoshan, boat ride, regular dinner)

laoshan is the local "cultural" tourist spot, and it's also where the water used to brew the local beer comes from. my initial impression was that it was similar to bukit timah, and we'd see everything in maybe half a day or less. turns out the sightseeing route is 28km long, which is definitely more than half a day's worth. we opted for the short route and hired a guide to come with us. while i'm normally more of a self-explore kind of person, having the guide with us to give us background info, historical stories, and trivia points was nice. in case you weren't aware (like i wasn't), laoshan is a significant site for taoism. we paid our respects to the various deities there, and i mainly asked for good health, success at work, and happiness. figure that's not too unreasonable, right? the guide also told us that in taoism, coming back to offer thanks after your wish was granted is not necessary, which is different from buddhism. we also had a light lunch of the same clams again (fried a little more as per scary JC friend's mum's request) plus fresh mushrooms fried with pork. as with most of the food we had, it was very fresh ingredients cooked simply. i enjoyed it very much! we also had a tea-tasting session, accompanied by dried seafood. i bought a bunch of dried stuff...squid, scallops, and this fish that they call 薯条鱼 (french fry fish) because it was light and airy. i should have bought more of each item!

the contacts from yesterday's dinner also arranged for us to go on a boat ride, which was basically just a loop out to sea and back. it was nice to see the city skyline from the sea, and we even caught a light show that used the faces of the buildings near the seaside as screens. cool the first time, but i don't imagine it's fun for the residents/tenants if the show repeats every day. there was also a drone show, which seems to be becoming increasingly popular these days. all in all it was a good experience, but i don't think i'd have voluntarily paid to go out on a boat. dinner was a mix of takeout and order out. i got 牛肉烧饼, which was a bready flatbread stuffed with beef. the interesting thing is that they used chopped up tendon together with meat, giving it an element of gelatinous-ness which i really liked; as well as 全羊汤, which was mutton and organ soup. the shop staff asked if i wanted sheep's blood in the soup, to which i answered that i didn't know as i'd never had it. she gave me a few pieces to try, and they tasted slightly gamey. would not go for it again. scary JC friend ordered 麻辣小龙虾 (literally "mala little lobsters", though google suggests that they might be called crayfish instead), and taught me how to get the meat out. too fiddly, in my opinion. they went great with the beer that we'd bought the previous day, as the beer helped neutralize the chili heat! still feeling like we could go for more, we topped up with an order of 蒜香小龙虾 (garlic-flavoured little lobsters/crayfish), which i liked much better. then, it was a bit more conversation before an early night as we had to be at the airport at 6 am.

day 3 (back in singapore)

nothing really remarkable about the trip back, except we paid a visit to the airport lounge. a credit card which i've had for 7 years or more (definitely before JET) gives me 2 non-stackable lounge visits per year, and i've never used them before this trip. the lounge was...ok i guess. the food options weren't really exciting, but i grabbed a couple of bottles of water for the plane trip. the sofa-style seats were comfortable though; i fell asleep for a bit after eating. on the way to the gate, we passed by a shop selling 原浆 for something like 4 times the street price. debated buying some anyway, but the realization that our flight was on last call made us scrap that plan. i came back, settled down, and took a walk to the office to get my laptop so i could work from home today. no regrets.

overall thoughts

china seems like it's worth visiting more. i found that while there was the occasional loud person, most people were polite and friendly. as i mentioned back in 2019 when i went to yunnan for my friend's wedding, 2 things about china are disconcerting for me. first, camera flashes at traffic lights. not really because i'm afraid to have my photo taken and the whole "big brother is watching you" thing (though that does play a part), but because it's so startling that i'm not sure how i'd react if i were driving. suppose i'd get used to it eventually, but i don't know. second, the presence of propaganda. like, they're not even trying to be subtle about it. it gives cult of personality vibes, which i suppose is a feature of a communist system. don't like it, though. all that aside, the relatively cheap prices and amazing convenience with the wechat and/or alipay apps (bonus: their QR codes can be scanned by our local OCBC app too) make it a place worth considering for a holiday. i'm now even more excited for the upcoming trip with the guildmates, and even more so if scary JC friend decides she can come along!

back at work today, and i sent 2 cases out. taking it a little bit slow since it seems i'm way ahead. this week's goal is to clear the last 2 cases from the previous batch of files...i feel like they've been stuck with me for too long. i have an appointment with dentist friend tomorrow, just for a cleaning and general check. also have a discord call about the guild chalet at night. nothing on friday, i don't think? might consider a gay bar visit. hybrid tuition on saturday again, and another discord call on sunday to discuss hotel bookings. even more excited for the next trip now!

-random thought of the day: Messing around with AI a bit more.-

Birthday post! will i revive the tradition starting from this year? i'll only find out next year, depending on whether or not i write one. at least i've given myself a start this year, so it's up to future me.

this past week has been quite eventful. everything i mentioned happened (and more!), but there were some timing rearrangements. long story short is i got everything done. 10 sentences or less recap for each major point:

aunt's place

met my aunt, uncle, nieces, nephew, cousin, and cousin-in-law. had nice conversation with each of them. the kids are growing up so fast; my youngest niece is speaking so much more clearly now. my uncle is into watching AI-generated shows on youtube, i don't get the appeal. dinner and cake (because of birthday celebrations) were both great. confirmed, i'm perfectly happy without kids.

meeting my cousin

arranged to meet up for drinks and to catch up; i realize we don't meet up nearly as frequently as before. he's using AI really creatively, to help him in his work and to analyze our family dysfunctions. the results were surprisingly insightful! we're still working through our different traumas in different ways - him with a therapist and AI, me with blogging and reflection. i might want to see a professional sometime down the line. he also just quit his job to start his own business...i could never do that. i think studying in australia really unlocked something good in him. mentioned about potentially investing in the business, but seems like i'll need $100 000 minimum. something to keep in mind.

weird dream

dreamt that i'd mistaken all my maths periods for break periods in JC, and as a result, not attended a single maths class in 2 years. for all the maths i learnt during that time that i still remember now, that might as well have been true! makes me wonder how deep my JC maths trauma actually goes. i mean, it doesn't affect my day-to-day life - like i don't break down when i see an integration sign or anything like that. but it obviously means something, that i'm still having bad memories of something that happened more than half a lifetime ago!

gay bar visit

gym guy invited me down yesterday, to meet doctor guy and his partner (IT guy). doctor guy got me a souvenir from taiwan! so nice of him. IT guy is pleasant too, and i'm looking forward to meeting him again. i had a better time with them than i did with someone else who was also there and who was more physically attractive/my type, but less so in terms of character and personality. well, nothing of value was lost. also made the acquaintance of someone who was there for the first time, and he seems nice too. not to mention cute bartender was not scheduled to work, but went down anyway! i'm happy/grateful that i seem to keep meeting him there.

tuition

one of the kids is on home rest due to a knee operation, meaning that i had to run a hybrid class this week and for the next 3 weeks. mildly annoying, but got it done somehow. i realize that i should familiarize myself more with zoom and how to write on PDF. decided to give myself a birthday treat (also for reasons which i'll explain below) and grabhitch home. thankfully someone accepted my booking! took 25 minutes, instead of the usual 65. is a 60% reduction in travel time (plus added comfort, not needing to hear morons press the bell more than once, and getting dropped off right under my block) worth paying about 800% of the bus fare for? not always. but it was today.

and the reason it was worth it today is because i'm due to leave home for the airport around 9pm, AND I HAVEN'T PACKED YET! well, at least it's a short trip, so i'll only need my small suitcase and maybe another bag as a personal carry-on. need to pack umbrellas and a spare jacket for scary JC friend's mum. don't think i'll need anything else? i figure as long as i have my passport and can board the plane with no issue, anything else that i forgot or didn't think to bring can be bought over there. but still, i should start packing before it gets too late. knowing myself, i'll probably need to spend extra time looking for random things whose whereabouts i've forgotten. well, better get started, then!

-random thought of the day: Escaping the haze!-

Midway through using the toilet earlier, i had a kind of premonition/feeling that something would happen to my towel rack, located directly to the left from my position at the time. that thought had barely finished forming when one of the suction cups came loose and one end of the towel rack fell. thinking back on it, i'm actually not sure which happened first - the thought, or the towel rack actually falling. but whatever the case was, i was able to shoot my left hand out and catch it before it fell to the floor. makes me wonder if a parallel universe version of me did the same thing before...or after? who knows, with whatever spacetime things.

recent happenings have made me realize that my thinking and attitude towards relationships have changed. background info: i started talking to this singaporean guy who's currently living in australia. he's quite keen on getting into a long-term relationship, and he seems to have decided i could be the one after about a day's conversation. previous versions of me would probably be jumping at the opportunity, but present me is a bit more...realistic, i guess. it is a bit refreshing though, to be the one being chased instead of the one doing the chasing. i'm not sure how it'll go, for a multitude of reasons, but i will at least meet him once when he's back. he's also indicated that he wants to be monogamous with his future partner, and i'm not sure how i feel about that now. well...no use worrying too much, i think the best thing to do is to just let things happen.

got a few engagements this coming week. first is going to my aunt's place tomorrow to pick up some letters. dinner with the guildmates on tuesday (don't forget this time!). gym guy might be coming over on wednesday. nothing special on thursday; might go visit the judo elder if he hasn't been discharged by then. there's a unit meeting on friday where management is supposed to unveil measures to improve employee satisfaction. the spoiler i've heard is that nothing's changing. need to pack my smaller suitcase for qingdao after tuition or preferably on friday night, as i'll be going to the airport on saturday night and flying off in the early morning on sunday. must admit that it still feels a little wasteful in a sense, as it seems like i'm spending a disproportionately large sum on money on a short trip. should remind myself that i can afford it, and it's ok to use the fine china once in a while!

-random thought of the day: Finish vacuuming!-

Haze got worse this week. there's a general silent hill-y vibe in the air, and people have been increasingly posting about the terrible air quality. apparently, the air qualities of singapore and malaysia are the worst in the world right now, beating out places like india and china. what's worse is that the government has been dead silent about this issue, i suspect in view of the F1 race that's scheduled for this weekend. the party name should be backronymed to "profits above people".

my day off on wednesday went really well! things didn't go exactly according to plan, but i still got everything done anyway. first was TCM treatment, where the physician did some massage and cupping therapy. she said i might have torn or strained a tendon/ligament in my shoulder. but even if it's a tear, it's minor as i can still move my arm and exert force...not to the level of my right arm, of course. the entire thing (consultation, massage, cupping) lasted an hour-plus and cost $115, which i put in an insurance claim for. it's still pending, i should know the outcome by next week.

then, went to harbourfront to get my flu vaccine. the clinic was crowded, with an estimated 90 minute wait time. not having the time to wait, i asked about the queue at ARC, which was the next-nearest venue. they guessed it would be about the same or longer, but i decided to try my luck anyway. glad i did, because there were less than 10 people in line! even better, they called my queue number next - i guess to get my easy case out of the way fast. best part, it was company-sponsored, so i didn't pay a cent.

lunch with friends (scary JC friend, mentor figure, plus 2 other old boys) was nice. we had fish and chips at mentor figure's regular place at holland village. good food plus excellent company, what's not to like? round 2 (dessert and drinks) was at the holland v food centre. i hear the laksa there is to die for, but didn't get to try it as they literally sold their last bowl for the day right before i approached them! sorely tempted to make a detour there after tuition, but we'll see how i'm feeling tomorrow.

my original plan after that was to go to a montblanc boutique (either takashimaya or MBS) to buy a pen refill for the teacher who still goes to the saturday gatherings, but the other old boys said that getting it off pinduoduo would be much cheaper. the boutique sells a pack of 2 for $33, whereas a knockoff goes for about 70 cents per refill. so the plan is to get it online, although it will mean waiting for a few weeks. in spite of that, i still ended going to takashimaya with scary JC friend for a makeup/cosmetics sale. seriously, the price women (and probably some men) pay to look pretty! she bought 3 or 4 small bottles of goodness knows what...i think one was a mascara? anyway, the total price was over $100. thankfully the level of care i have for my appearance isn't enough to make me spend that much. we also dropped by her old workplace (perfume shop), where i was able to resist the temptation of buying 2 small bottles of perfume that she passed me samples of last week. figure i'll do it later this year, as a promotion reward for myself or something. should also remember that they sell out quickly during the holiday season.

at the perfume shop, scary JC friend made conversation with the staff on duty there. i'll never understand how she's able to engage random strangers so effortlessly. anyway, it seems like young people these days (gosh, that makes me sound old) are also unsure of where they fit into the world. the staff was telling us about her internship as a recruiter, which she hated. well...she's only 20, and still has plenty of time to figure things out.

we weren't feeling hungry enough for a full meal, so we went and did a free sample tour of the stalls in the takashimaya basement. ended up buying mikan (orange the fruit) jelly, and i also got one in drink packet form for the judo elder. we parted ways after that, and i went to the hospital. the judo elder was in good spirits, his surgery went well and he should be discharged in a week or two. we talked for about 2 hours, partly reminiscing about the old days (man, i really am old, huh?) and partly making plans to catch up for a good meal after his discharge. he's been in the hospital for what - almost a month now? definitely way overdue for a meal that isn't hospital food.

so that was my wednesday. some small hiccups, but mission accomplished by far and large. the next 2 days were boring by comparison...just doing cases in office. managed to get my mentor's guidance on a couple of cases that i'm working on, so that's good. seems like i still need to get a better sense of how to assess cases where the other party has had a chance to explain their perspective. it'll come with time and exposure, i suppose.

had lunch with gym guy today, and told him about the japan thing. he seems happy for me, which is good! he also gave me some tips to navigate potential office politics (eg. jealousy), but i'm hoping i won't need them. i think he's quite fun to be around...something i think i want to look for in a potential partner. crochet guy ended up not feeling like coming over, so we had dinner at paya lebar instead. he said his performance review is next week, and if he didn't have any pending cases to show, he'd probably be out of the company. don't know why, but my batman sense has been humming in the background during our past few meetings. i guess for good reason, because he tried to subtly shift the topic to me signing up for a policy. age/life experience really gives you the courage to just speak your mind. i told him straight up, "if your intention is to get me to sign a policy before your appraisal, i can tell you that's not going to happen". i'm noticing that he's been bringing this topic up during our last 3 meetings at least. as a result, the association between "meeting crochet guy" and "being asked to buy insurance" is forming...which gives me a disincentive to meet him. from his end, i don't know if the constant rejection will make him resentful of me. really makes me wonder how good insurance agents get their clients. maybe they have the same success rate, but just cover more ground. like 5% of 100 is 5, and 5% of 500 is 25. well...i honestly think a change in job might not be the worst thing for crochet guy. but as he said, let's see how things go.

oh, about the japan thing. i am more or less confirmed to be going for it, because the coordinator emailed to check my availability! unfortunately, it's scheduled for february, which means it's going to be a bit colder. but it's nothing i haven't lived through! i'm quite eager for things to move along, though logically i know i can't rush the process. guess it's the same idea - do what i can in this time. things i can do include deciding what clothes to bring, getting (ideally bilingual) namecards printed, finding my singapore flag pins to bring over as souvenirs, finding out if it's possible to extend my stay (and if it is, decide whether to visit my town). exciting!

-random thought of the day: Taking it slow for a change.-

Tiny bit annoyed today because things didn't go according to plan, plus i found out i made a minor error in finances.

so my plan was to get TCM done today. problem is, out of the 3 clinics that are within a short walk from my place, 1 was missing (or maybe i didn't look hard enough), 1 only opens for half-day on tuesdays, and the last one takes tuesdays off. really, something something proposes and disposes. but it wasn't all bad, i caught the reception staff as they were closing, and managed to make an appointment for 9am tomorrow.

with that development, tomorrow's schedule should be:

9:00-10:00 latest (hopefully) - TCM

10:00-11:20 latest - travel down to harbourfront

11:20-11:45 - flu vaccination

11:45-12:20 - travel down to holland village

12:30-3:00 latest? - lunch

3:00-4:00 - travel to MBS, get pen refill

4:00-4:30 - travel to hospital

4:30-6:00(?) - visit with judo elder

not sure what i'll do at night, but this should cover all the important events. considering that i'll get most of the important stuff out of the way by the time my leave is over, i'm not too upset at not getting TCM done today.

the next thing, however, really annoys me. so as you know, i'm due to fly a fair bit over the next few months. and that necessitates buying plane tickets. so i happily charged the purchase to my UOB card, with the thought that i would be getting a ton of bonus points. when only the base points were credited, i went to do a bit more digging, and realized that air travel isn't counted as a bonus category for online spend charged to that card! so whatever bonus points i could have got for both my china trips just went 'poof'. i should have used the DBS card! not the end of the world, and it'll teach me to read the fine print more closely. can't help but feel irritated, though.

so, based on what i'm reading, it seems that i need to streamline my spending strategy. for anything ordered online: DBS card. shopping in-person: OCBC card or UOB card if the final sum is a multiple of 5, with a condition that i need to hit $500 on the OCBC card for bonus interest, and an additional $300 ($800 in total) to qualify for cashback. i should also cancel some cards after i redeem the points there. something for me to think about in the near future.

ending the post on a better note, transformation kink guy dropped by for activities. he's teaching me that i value connection over physical attributes. don't get me wrong, he's a nice guy. but we're kind of at different places in life, plus we're not super compatible in the bedroom. i mean, our interests overlap enough so that we both enjoy it, but i've had better. probably not a good idea to compare in that sense, but you know what i mean. well...not being fixated on physical appearance has been a lesson i need to learn many times over. and although i think i'm more or less past it by now, having occasional reminders is good.

well...that's it for now. nothing really new since yesterday, but i just wanted to get those minor annoyances out of my head, which will help me enjoy tomorrow's lunch to the fullest!

-random thought of the day: The char kway teow at the newly-opened shop downstairs is not bad.-

Walked out of the office at 5:30pm today, which is the earliest i've left in a while...a few months, at least. i should be clear that this is not an expression of resentment at having to do tons of overtime or whatnot. i usually go home later voluntarily because i arrive later as well. and i'm definitely not drowning in work; a more fitting description is that i'm comfortably swimming through the work with my head well above the so-called water level. on the way back, i noticed that the sun was looking a little dimmer due to the haze. probably wasn't a good idea to forego the mask today!

applied for 3 days of leave over the next 2 weeks, 2 for the qingdao trip with scary JC friend, 1 for lunch with mentor figure and a few other friends this coming wednesday. considering i usually work from home on wednesdays, i was planning to just go and be back in time to continue working. but then i realized that i could get other errands done if i had the whole day off, such as getting my flu vaccination, seeing a TCM therapist, and visiting a judo elder in hospital. also, it makes me feel less guilty about dipping out! not like i'm short on leave, anyway - i haven't even touched my annual leave this year. so yes, this is one of those times where i have nothing to gain and everything to lose by not doing the right thing.

yesterday, gym guy asked me out for dinner with 2 of his friends, then a trip to the gay bar. one friend is singaporean, the other is taiwanese who's here to ride the train, of all things. the two of them were originally supposed to go see model trains after dinner, but decided to come with us to the gay bar instead. considering i was feeling a little tired and planned to rest/rot at home, i had a better time than i thought i would! cute bartender was there, so i also took the chance to wish him a happy (albeit belated) birthday. he still does my heart so much good. i'm realizing gym guy does too. and to be clear, i'm not falling for him. i think it's like, he's filling a role in my gay social circle. for me at least, one-on-one friendships with gay guys is infinitely better than trying to fit into a gay group, with all the associated politics and drama.

figure i better do some optimization to see how i can fit events into my day off (and other days as well). the current idea is:

tuesday (tomorrow, working from home)

- see nearby TCM therapist during lunch break

- maybe do a quick grocery run

- transformation kink guy coming over in the evening (haven't heard that name in a while, right?)

wednesday (day off)

- flu vaccination at harbourfront in the morning

- lunch with mentor figure and friends at holland village

- maybe stop by MBS to get a pen refill (not for myself)

- go to outram community hospital to visit the judo elder (or do hospital before pen refill)

thursday (in office day)

- submit 1 or 2 cases

- email HR for masters sponsorship

- gym (depending on how TCM goes)

friday (in office day)

- bug my boss for more cases if he hasn't assigned me any yet by then

- maybe submit another case?

- crochet guy maybe coming over at night

seems like a fairly normal week. even though i've hit the promotion target, i can't say that the pressure is completely off yet. but i can say that this quarter is probably going to be easier, because i need 5 points or less per month. but i'll still try to keep a comfortable pace. next year's target is going to be horrible, and i need to get myself ready for it.

-random thought of the day: Really looking forward to a break!-

Possibly because of the lack of sleep last night or the mild panic/big rush this morning, i'm currently feeling a little unequilibrated. disequilibrated? one of them, at any rate. so let me tell you about my ideal plan, and how the actual situation played out. for context, i planned to make sio bak for the alumni gathering this morning.

ideal plan: have the guy over on friday night, go to sleep early. wake up at 5:30am to preheat the oven, then put the meat in. have...activities with the guy while the meat cooks over the next hour and a bit. finish broiling the skin, let the meat cool while we both get showered, slice the meat, and be out of the door by 8:20am.

actual situation: had the guy over on friday night, went to sleep early. woke up at 6:45am because i set the alarm time but didn't turn the alarm on. jumped out of bed (the guy somehow slept on), preheated the oven, and put the meat in. had...abridged activities with the guy while the meat cooked for an hour and a bit. we both showered, then i finished broiling the skin, getting sweaty again due to the heat from the oven and the meat. sliced the meat while it was hot (i know it's not recommended but i was really short on time), and was out of the house by 8:20am.

not a bad recovery, if i do say so myself! thankfully an old boy lives near me and was willing to detour to pick me up. the not-so-good thing was i had to transport the meat there in a sealed container so as not to let the smell escape and linger in the car. and as a result of that, the water vapour released by the still-hot meat made the skin not crispy any more by the time we reached the venue. but all things considered, it was a decent success! mostly good reviews, although the lack of crispy skin was mentioned. wouldn't have been an issue if i'd woken up earlier and gave the meat time to cool! well...that's something for next time. i'm increasingly starting to believe that scoring, poking holes, or otherwise perforating the skin is important. did i mention that the skin is actually tougher than i thought? no wonder i see some butchers using craft knives to do it!

i've got a whole reflection on love vs. intimacy and what insights into my own psyche my encounters so far have given me, but that's deep/lengthy enough to be a post on its own, i think. for now, i'll just say that the big lesson for me is that maybe there is no "the one" for everyone. to be clear, i don't mean it in the sense like i'm going to grow old and die alone or whatever. i mean it more like...everyone has a threshold for what they'd accept in a partner. and it won't be just one person who fits the criteria. for me in particular, i realized that each guy i've done stuff with has at least one thing that i'm really attracted to. even then, i wouldn't necessarily want them as partners. something to expand on another day, i guess.

back to today, tuition. 4/5 kids have finished their exams, and the last one will finish this coming week. could be for the reasons mentioned in the first paragraph, but i felt my fuse burning up faster in class. didn't yell or do anything that would result in an ugly scene, but the urge was there. i'm currently having 2 issues, the more serious one being the 2 new guys are not paying attention, the less serious one being the remaining guy is clueless. we are 10 months into the year, and the fact that both aqueous solutions and gases use the same units for volume seemed to be a huge revelation to him. i'm grateful that the others don't have this issue, otherwise i'd seriously question my teaching ability. anyway, there are only 10 more weeks to the end of this year, where there will be a 2-week break before launching into 2027. my goal is to end this year well, and to have a good next year too.

speaking of how i want to end this year, my lead invited me for a chat this past week. it's something he does once every quarter or so, and i think it's just to touch base and see how i'm doing. he updated me on the masters sponsorship situation, which has now been restricted to the june intake, and is more popular than anticipated. i think he was managing my expectations that i may not get it this round. not the worst news in the world, and waiting half a year till january 2028 (assuming that's the next sponsored intake) is something that i can live with. might actually be better, considering i won't have to worry about tuition then. but we'll cross that bridge when we get there. right now, the plan is to apply for next july's intake anyway, and see if i get it.

next update was on the japan thing. i understand that my lead has put my name up, and it's more or less in the bag. also it seems that a different senior from the one i was originally told will be going instead. seeing as how this senior is mentoring my batchmate and not me, i don't have a relationship with her beyond small talk in the lift or when we bump into each other in the office, which is not at all often. good thing that we're all friendly (or at least cordial, as a baseline) with each other in the division!

third thing: promotion. i told him that i'd hit the required numbers already, and i guess it'll be set into motion once september's points are consolidated. also communicated my concern about quality, and mistakes made. he said that it's normal at this point in my progress, so i'll just take that and run. interestingly, he seems to think that i've been in this job for longer than i actually have! like, he thought i had already cleared 2 years of service, when the reality is that i'm about 3 months shy of that milestone. so there is a possibility that i'm performing at a level that suggests that i've been here longer...or he's just got too many things on his plate and cramming small, not-really relevant details like each individual member's length of service into his brain is not an efficient use of brain space.

another interesting encounter i had was with the chief executive. it was completely unplanned; i was heading down for lunch on thursday, and he was the only other occupant in the lift that came. as luck would have it, the lift made no other stops from my floor to the ground floor, so we had about 30 seconds of small talk. mildly awkward, but survivable. he remembers that i speak japanese due to JET, and asked me if i'd kept up with practising. i have not, and told him as much. but somehow, i think that after 3.5 years of constant daily use, it's somehow ingrained itself into my brain. granted that there will be rust from disuse, but i think the forgetting will be more in terms of vocabulary words or kanji readings instead of grammar patterns. by the way, he spent over 10 years in japan, so he's definitely fluent as well. it occurred to me that the "japan guy" reputation seems to be taking root! scary JC friend mentioned before that one way to build a personal brand is to lean strongly into an angle. this might be an angle worth exploring for me!

remember what i said about becoming stir-crazy from sticking to the routine? well, scary JC friend invited me to go to qingdao in a couple of weeks, and i accepted. we'll be travelling with her mother, whom i've met, and who is scarier than her. thankfully, i seem to be in her good books, or at least not in her bad books. it's been a while since i last saw her though...maybe 2 years or more? i should also thank her for helping me to accept delivery of the socket modules for my power strip. it's set to be a 4-day-3-night trip, but i'm flying over a day later due to tuition. there's no itinerary; the plan is literally "walk and eat". i think it'll be fun.

what's not so fun is that i've noticeably gained weight. like, my jeans feel tighter. the feeling SUCKS - both physically, and in terms of self-confidence. i know what i should/need to do, it's the doing it that sucks. but if i don't do something, nothing improves, and i'll hate myself even more in the future. it's weird that i think i'm capable of waiting for delayed gratification, but i'm failing at it when the reward is more abstract. i was going to say "intangible", but i realized losing inches off the waist and having clothes fit better is quite tangible! or maybe it's a timescale thing. like, i can do it for a week or a month, but 3 or 6 months is a different story. actually you know what? it's not delayed gratification at all. delayed gratification means passing up on short-term rewards for a greater reward in the long run, so your baseline state is neutral. this healthy living thing (including working out) is actively suffering for a reward in the future, so the present state is negative, or worse than baseline. might need to reframe my thought process and attitude to this.

-random thought of the day: Deadlifted and squatted 100kg!-

6 hours or so of rain caused temperature lows today, which meant that it was perfectly conducive for doing nothing. would i trade 6 hours of rain a day for cooler temperatures? probably, if i could decide the raining hours and rain intensity. while i spent almost the whole day in bed, i managed to muster enough energy to clean the filter of the air-con unit in my room, and go get some groceries. the filter was dustier than i'd thought it would be. the app recommends 720 hours of use between cleanings. i use the air-con from 11pm to 7am the next morning (8 hours a night), so it seems that i should clean it every 90 days, or 3-ish months. i'm mildly ashamed to admit that this is the first time ever i've cleaned the filter...6 months too late! it does seem that dust accumulation on the filters is proportional to how heavily the individual air-con unit is used. i checked the living room unit's filter (i turn it on for an hour a week just to let the system run, and whenever i have guests, which is not often), and there was barely anything there! i expect the common room unit's filter to be in a similar condition, so i decided to put off checking it.

might as well do the quarterly check-in now. since it's not over yet, i'll write in present tense. Q3 is good in general, but there were problems carried over from previous quarters. i think the best aspect is work, in that i met the promotion KPI target in spite of the change of file management system, and even got my lead's approval to request sponsorship for the masters course. i will say that i'm still not very confident about the quality of my work, but that's another kind of translucent criteria as i've mentioned before. still, i'm reassured as i seem to be meeting my mentor's expectations most of the time.

sort of work-adjacent, but tuition is going ok. the kids are having their year-end exams this coming week, so the stressful period is almost over for them, as well as for me! this change of location is really a push factor away from continuing with tuition. to be fair, it isn't the only one. other push factors include giving up half of my saturday, and having kids who don't seem to be responding well to me. but well, i promised to follow these kids all the way to O-levels. if next year's schedule is similar to this year's, the last class for sec 4 chemistry should be in end-october. just a year and a month more to go!

on the social front, i maintained my interpersonal relations quite well, i think. having interactions with gym guy, crochet guy and the other guy both in and outside of the bedroom, plus making a new friend in the form of doctor guy. i'm supposed to be introduced to his partner soon too, which i'm quite looking forward to. not much progress with cute bartender, but i think that wasn't going to work out from the get-go anyway. well, at least we're still on friendly terms, and seeing him does my heart good. i think it was a good decision to reduce my gay bar visits (also partially due to COVID), as it helped me focus more on and deepen existing friendships. as mentioned in the last post, i've got some thoughts about romantic relationships and partners which are not quite yet ready to see the light of day. all in good time.

the biggest problem with Q3 is in the health/fitness realm. COVID plus a lack of motivation and a wonky left shoulder meant that i was away from the gym for quite a while. yes, i'm aware that it's an excuse. i'm still trying to figure out how i can be more active after work or on weekends. worse than the reduced activity, my intake seems to have increased as well. kind of makes me wonder if i should see a nutritionist/dietician or even a psychotherapist to figure out what else i can do, because willpower doesn't seem to be cutting it.

looking forward to Q4, it's basically more of the same. still need to hit an extended KPI target by december, just in case something goes wrong with this round of promotion. i don't foresee that being out of reach, as i need another maybe 12 points in 3 months, which is very doable. i'll want to go higher to secure a good performance grade, though. i figure that i shouldn't worry too much about the numbers, and just keep my current pace. big events in november include the guild chalet and china trip, which will be welcome breaks from work. the idea of going to qingdao is also being floated by a few people in the alumni group. would be nice if i could make it. i haven't even touched this year's annual leave allotment yet (been using the leave i carried over from last year), so i can definitely take time off. for health/fitness, i'll try OMAD, or "one meal a day". should reduce, or preferably stop snacking in the office too. i'll also set a gymming frequency of 2 times minimum per week with at least one improvement in some way, be it in terms of weights, sets, reps, or form. something to think about in the next quarter...do i continue this gym membership? i believe i have to inform them by 19 december if i don't want to continue the contract.

since i was in bed for most of today, i went to google people from my past. it was a mixed bag of results some had not updated their linkedin for years (career history stopped in the early 2020s), while some people are doing amazing things. one of the judo juniors from SJI was sent over to the US by his company, and another one in a different company appears to be in paris. 2 of my juniors from CJC judo got their phds (one in physics, the other in engineering), and are now in postdoc or industry positions. there's one other male junior from CJC i know by virtue of his twin sister being in judo. this guy is apparently a lieutenant colonel in the army, and he's only 35 years old! he's flying so high, he's practically in orbit. that's more or less the path to become chief of army, if not the entire defence force. i'm so happy that people i have good impressions of are generally doing well. interestingly, the people i don't really care for or who left a poor impression are either just surviving in what i'd call dead-end jobs, or can't be traced. not saying that i'm a good judge of character or anything, but the data seems to suggest it. could be coincidence, for all i know. i kind of want to reconnect with some of them, but i'm not exaggerating when i say it's been close to 10 years since we last met. wonder if they'll agree?

-random thought of the day: To a good Q4!-

Festive occasions are normally a time for auspicious thoughts. unfortunately, last night's mid-autumn dinner got us (or maybe just me) thinking about death for a little bit. see, there's normally a sponsored table for former teachers at alumni celebration dinners. up till now, the 10 seats of the sponsored table have always been filled quite easily. this dinner was the first time that only half the seats were filled. and it wasn't for lack of trying, either! some teachers who used to be regular attendees are now less mobile than before, while others have passed away. among the latter group is my science teacher for sec 1 and 2, who passed away a few months ago. it was quite a shock to see her obituary in the alumni facebook group, as she seemed to be still in good health (albeit a little more frail) the last time i saw her at the CNY dinner in february. mentor figure also mentioned that some teachers who were invited asked the old boys to provide transport for them, either in the form of driving them down or sponsoring taxi fare. quite entitled of them, if you ask me, especially considering that their share of the dinner is already paid for! so, he's decided to stop organizing a sponsored teachers' table for future dinners within our group. can't say i blame him, actually.

probably a coincidence or some form of confirmation bias, but i've been thinking about the concept of impermanence recently. like, nothing's going to be around forever. and even if something by that name survives through time, it would have undergone some change that makes it not the same as an earlier version of itself. real world examples: the evolution of languages, the fall of england's oldest bank during a relatively recent financial crisis, or how national borders changed after the fall of the USSR. fictional example: how the signs representing the 4 elements changed in the most recent season of avatar (master of all 4 elements, not tall blue aliens). i've only seen the trailer, but i'm excited to catch it when it premieres! but as i was saying, nothing lasts forever. there will come a time when nobody on earth will have had any interaction with you, or remember how you look like (unless you're famous, like say einstein or hitler). i guess that's why some people want to leave a legacy, be it good or bad. i'm sure there's a deep, philosophical conclusion somewhere, but it escapes me for now.

i took the bus with scary JC friend after the dinner (she was going to meet her boyfriend at aljunied, and i was heading home in the same direction), and we talked about several things during the ride. i was telling her about the recent happenings with crochet guy (i linked them up a while back), and she thinks he's not suited for a sales role. i have a similar opinion. we both agreed that his heart's in the right place, but he's approaching it from the wrong direction. like, his immediate concern is focused on meeting his sales targets, instead of what value he can provide to his clients. thing is, it's very easy to pick up on. worse, it looks like he's using the people he talks to as a means to an end, which makes people question his sincerity. paradoxically, using people as a means to an end is kind of what sales kind of is! just that good salespeople provide value for their clients at the same time.

i can kind of understand/empathize with crochet guy's difficulty from my experience in looking for tuition students just after NS. what i did was that i asked mentor figure (who i wasn't as close to at that time) for help to find potential students among the alumni network in the form of old boys' kids. looking back, it wasn't appropriate of me to ask, since one of they key rules is that the platform is not for personal gain. but he was gracious enough to send a broadcast email out. i think he saw me as a young person looking to take on some financial responsibility, and wanted to help me get a start.

another thing we talked about was AI-assisted fortune telling. she told me that she input the relevant details into chatgpt, and asked it for a 八字 (eight characters) reading. the principle behind 八字 is that a person's fate is affected (or maybe governed/decided) by their date and time of birth. specifically, i think the 8 characters are split into 2 for the year, 2 for the month, 2 for the day, and 2 for the hour of birth. each of the characters is then assigned to an element, and the relative proportions of each element determines the personality, strengths, and weaknesses. it's so important that a superstition says never to divulge your 八字 to anyone, because others can use it to control you. it does make me wonder though, if 2 people born at the exact same time will be similar in that way even after they're grown up. odds are no because of the nature vs. nurture thing, plus there are other complementary branches of chinese fortune telling like numerology, elemental study, etc. which help to balance out a person's elements using the number of strokes and element radicals in the name they are to be given. i tried it myself, and got some surprisingly relevant results. of course, i will acknowledge that it could be cold reading and me finding my own meaning in it. at the same time, it says that my theme for this and next years is putting my knowledge to practical use, and avoiding burnout. that's quite specific and directly relevant to my job! well, i guess we'll see how close the next few years are to the readings.

pleasant surprise today, in that gym guy messaged me as i was on the way home from tuition. he was in the area, and we arranged to meet up for...activities. he also wanted to go to audio house (near my place) to look at stuff for his flat, and i tagged along. was quite a good trip; some induction cookers and water heaters caught his eye. happy that he has some alternative options now! interacting with him makes me think about what i want in a relationship. while he's a great friend to have, i'm not sure if we'd be good as partners. different level of expectations, after all. it also got me thinking about what i actually want in a partner, while some ideas are floating around in my head, they're not quite well-formed enough to post yet. maybe as part of the year-end post. one thing i want to expand on is the thought that people tend to focus more on how much value a potential partner can add to their life, as opposed to how much value they can add to a potential partner's life.

sunday tomorrow! might use the free day to do my quarterly check-in, seeing as september is ending this coming wednesday. i don't think i have any more social engagements at least until the founder's day dinner next month (which just so happens to fall on my cousin's and several friends' birthday), where i believe mentor figure will form at least one table. that's in 2+ weeks, so i have a break where i should aim to eat less and move more. not sure how successful i'll be with that!

-random thought of the day: Looking forward to a break from tuition.-