Friday, July 28, 2006

here wishing that I get that job. After a behavioural assessment, and an aptitude test which took me about 6 hours plus to mull over. I'd better get something. It'd would be my ideal job too. More on it if I get it... no point blogging too much about it if its gonna become spilt milk.

dead bored now. don't feel like playing games, and don't have any anime to watch. When I have nothing to do... my life really feels dreary. I don't like the weekends as much anymore. Especially since theres no sharemarket pricing to watch over the weekend. Aihs..

Wednesday, July 26, 2006

been a week since my last post. i actually want to get on with playing Titan Quest (a Diablo-esqu game), so its just a short updated. I'm still temping at the same place. Its a pharmaceuticals company btw. They extended me till end of the week. Still doing the same things though. Processing credits & orders, and lots of filing. Their filing system is absolutely horrendous, or more accurately, the lack of it. And I was thinking that things couldn't be much worse than my previous company. They were actually pretty organised compared to this mob.

Today's work was slightly different. I was put in the marketing dept to help out for a while. Mostly sending stuff out to reps & clients. I was packing football memorabilia as well! They had a World Cup promotion going on previously, and winners get the $150 Addidas Teamgeist ball, a Socceroos jersey, and a soccer magazine. Pretty neat. Felt like taking one of the balls home ^_^

I've got an interview lined up tomorrow as well, for a proper job this time. Wish me luck. More on that in a later post.

Wednesday, July 19, 2006

its a nice change having actual work to do. Data entry is pretty damn simple for me :) I cleared out the entire credit backlog in one day. Am I efficient or what? Well... being IT-savvy enough to think of creating macros to automate half the work helps ^_^ I did the work in half the time... although I did twice the amount of work, so doesn't make much of a difference in the end.

2nd day... nothing for me to do but filing docs in the morning. And booking couriers for credit returns. Mind numbing job... can't imagine having to do this everyday. But I really love the fact that the place is so damn near. Its only 2 streets away! Takes about 10 mins walk to reach there! Never worked so close to home before. Bloody convenient. I can come back home and have lunch! That is...if I had any food at home. Almost totally out of food at home. I think I only have a can of tuna left, and a 1/4 pack of spaghetti.

I've actually been having trouble sleeping lately. I've been getting pretty vivid nightmares the past week or so, and I woke up in the middle of the night paralyzed as well. Couldn't move or make a noise. I tried to force myself to scream, but nothing came. Managed to croak after a couple of seconds. Bloody freaked me out, especially since Thos told me about his 'experiences' a couple days ago. Aihs.

Anyway, theres nothing supernatural about the episode. Supposedly a case of stress or sleep depravation. Your body enters a state of paralysis when you enter REM sleep i.e. when you dream. Sleep paralysis occurs when your brain is awakened, but your body is still in the paralysis state. Wiki knows it all! :)

Time to sleep! Tomorrow is another exciting day...

Monday, July 17, 2006

interview this morning, start work tomorrow morning. its nice when things are so simple. Finally got a temp job, although its only for a week. Pay is pretty standard. About $18 or so for data entry work. But best thing about is that its about 10-15 minutes down the street. Get to save on transport fare. Sweet!

The bad thing? I still have to continue searching for jobs and sending in applications. A bloody pain. I just put in 5 applications. I don't know if its actually a lack of jobs or what. Some ppl seem to be saying that IT has lots of jobs now, but really doesn't seem that way to me. Maybe on the upper echolon of the spectrum... but kinda hard to find something for a person who isn't a total noobcake, nor an expert, namely me.

Oh well. At least, this data entry role is good enough for the moment. Its short enough so I can still keep a lookout on proper jobs. And gives me a little money towards paying bills. My shares are getting killed by the recent downturn in the market. And the only share that I own that isn't in the red can't be sold (i.e. no buyers). E*trade has a nifty feature that lets you see the current bids in the market. If I'm not wrong, it shows you the current buyers/sellers for up to 10 price points. Its only for orders that are sitting in the system (not sure if its just E*trades, or the actual market). But its an indicator of the prices you can use to get in or out of the market.

I don't mind the downturn that much since it'll turn up eventually. But it seems like each time I make a purchase... the entire market turns down o_O Same thing happened the last time. I'm still sitting on a $600 paper loss on that one. Aihs... my bad though. It went past my stop, which would have limited it to less than $300 but I couldn't bear selling. Now twice that amount is gone. Sigh... expensive mistake. I can have like 80 plates of siu yuk fan with that money... :'(

Wednesday, July 12, 2006

no real reason to post except to put up a pic taken with my phone. its not too bad, kinda what I expected.


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my bookshelf


the full sized image is quite grainy, but that might be cuz of the lack of light in the shot. Other than that, it looks like a typical phone camera image. Incidently the graininess (real word :p) of the image is kinda similar to what I see out my left eye. Lazy eye and all to those who don't know.

I recently reorganised my books as well, which is why the shelf is particularly neat. I've got my computer related books on the top shelf. The bottom shelf has 3 types of books. Leftmost is fiction books, which is only the translated copies of Romance of the 3 Kingdoms & Da Vinci Code (the staple of every modern bookshelf!). Middle portion has motivational/personal improvement books like Awaken the Giant Within (which is actually Thos'), and rightmost are my investment & business related books.

The shelf usually has stacks of coins and other assorted junk as well. But I've been doing some spring cleaning since I'm so free during the day. I sorted out the coins and bagged them. Plan to deposit in the bank when I remember to do it. I currently have $40 in 10 & 5c coins. I think I had about $120 when I initially started sorting them, but I've cleared them out cuz I've been using them to buy lunch & when I order pizza.

I kinda wish I have more books. A shelf looks nice if its filled with books :) I've still got 2 more books that I haven't read. The ones lying flat on the bottom shelf. I'm thinking of ordering another book online directly from the author. Save about 60% off the RRP which is a pretty good deal. Even the air freight is heaps cheaper than Amazon.

Oooo..Thos rented DVD. Off to watch it now.
been sleeping in the past couple of days. i think i'm getting more than 10 hours sleep on average now. not that I really want to, but i feel really crap in the mornings. Not having anything real to do is one of the factors, but lately its been more my hayfever. I've been getting a runny nose & sore eyes in the morning. I'm taking Telfast for that, but its not that effective nowadays. Maybe I need to rotate among the different types of antihistamines on a daily basis.

I have 24 job applications on my list, 3/4 of that probably no good already. I really don't like cold calling recruiters in regards to a job. I don't know what to say. Its worse if they are the non-responsive kind of people too. Sigh. I guess I still need more practice. I don't mind actual interviews so much, its a lot easier to talk about yourself rather than ask questions about a job. I mean, there really isn't too much I need to know about a position. Most of the time, the job ad already answers any enquiries I have. I'm not a damn moron and I know how to read, but somehow I feel that u'r still expected to have questions. Aihs.

I want to get a job and not go through this crap ever again.

Tuesday, July 11, 2006

been up since 5am this morning. its almost 8 now, wondering if i should go back to sleep. having a bout of hayfever now and the antihistamines doesn't seem to be kicking in. damn annoying. i just ate my breakfast as well. leftover pork chop & rice from last night :) kinda heavy for breakkie, but theres nothing else left. Gonna have to go do some groceries today.

I still don't have anyone calling me up for a job interview. Sigh. I applied for another 7 positions yesterday. Theres one that looks really good. Sounds like the kind of work that I want, but can't find any information about it. Theres no name or contact details. Theres a company name, but googling it doesn't turn up a website. So dodgy. The position seems pretty similar to that job offer I blew, but with better pay! Heres hoping!

oh! Theres actually another position that sounds good. Same type of thing. Business analysis & support. Would be cool if I get that too. $30-40/hour and based in the CBD. Absolutely perfect. At least this ad is more professional. See how it all goes la. Hope someone will give me a ring on my new phone :)


loving it!

Friday, July 07, 2006

feel bloody exhausted this morning for some odd reason. its not like i slept particularly late. I finally signed up at a job recruitment agency. Hopefully I can get a temp job soon. Went to the office yesterday and spent about an 1 1/2 hours doing some word & excel tests & some data entry. I got pretty good scores which was expected :) Doing the Excel test was more tricky, had to make some educated guesses on a number of questions, but still got most of them correct in the end.

I've been working on my share investment/trading plan in the past couple of days. I've completed a plan that I'm gonna try follow through. Finaly making use of my of $900 piece of charting software. I used it to backtest my plan, and it seems to be ok for a number of shares. Although I really need to test it for a longer period. Only problem is I can't get the data to advance a day at a time, so being able to see price data ahead of the date I'm backtrading is probably affecting my decisions.

p.s. just decide to re-read the manual, and figured out to advance the chart a day at a time now ^_^

Thursday, July 06, 2006

5am. asthma getting worse. stomach cramps from my voltaren and a dripping nose. Not a good false start to the day.

6am. still awake. watching Cannes Lions ads. and YouTube. This is a very smart ad imo. shall try to go back to sleep now. 3 more hours before I need to wake up.

Wednesday, July 05, 2006

sigh. the days have been so demotivating. I'm getting rejection notices left, right and center. I'm just not getting anywhere. The only thing I find fun now is learning market related stuff and finalising my trading/investing plan. I've managed to stop checking prices every 5-10 minutes which is a good thing. That seems a bit too obsessive considering I'm not a day trader.

Unfortunately my living expenses are slowly eating into the capital I've allocated for my investments. Maybe I should go on my indomie diet again. Its about 30c a pack. 5 packs a day, thats $1.50. Multiply by that by a month, and its only $45 for a month's worth of food! Compare that with my budget for $450 for food expenditures. Thats a savings of a 1000%!! How wicked is that ^_^ Although the drawback is I'll probably shave more than 10% off my lifespan among other health problems. Aihs.

Anyway, I think I've worked out a decent budget for myself. I'll need $1400 for day to day living. That covers rent, bills, transport, food and some misc monthly expenses. Another $450 allocated for optional expenses such as leisure, clothes, toys etc. So thats $1850 in total. I intend to put 10% of my income towards long-term savings & another 10% towards investment purposes. This means I'll need a take home pay of $2350 to accommodate my budget. That'll give me a $30 surplus as well. Considering that I should be taxed at 30%, I'll need a salary of roughly $3350 before tax, which is a $40K base salary.

Sighh... now I miss the time when I was getting a $50K+ package before being jobless. I guess it kinda evens out to me having a lower paying job throughout the year. OK, its past lunchtime already. Need to start making calls to job givers. Maybe I should go into recruitment, just so that I can mass email rejection notices to other jobseekers. Hmmmmm. Interesting thought.

Monday, July 03, 2006

its been a decent weekend, albeit rather expensive. Went to Kobe Jones for dinner. Its a pretty nice modern japanese restaurant. Pricey, but the food was decent, and looks impressive. The moving scenery was pretty good too ^_^ The dinner was for fatty's birthday gift, split between Thos & me. Hmmm.. Kinda unfair. I didn't get anything for my birthday, except for a twisted knee. Considering the events of this & last year, it might appear that my birthday isn't exactly a lucky event for me. Oh well.

I have to start saving money already, at least until I get a job. I've been spending too much since I stopped working. About $7K for the past 3 months. Its not too bad I guess. I've had some abnormal expenses in the past months. Theres the snow holiday which is about $700+, my investment related book & software which is slightly over a grand, and the medical related items about $200. I probably spend a little more on food since I've been eating out a lot. If I stay home, I usually go Johnny's for lunch, or just buy takeaway from the cafe downstairs. Its becoming quite routine.

I've done my usual slew of job hunthing this morning. I've started looking for data entry positions just to line my pocket already. I really need to resume work this month. A 3 month gap on my resume really doesn't look good. Ah well, wish me the best.