Sunday, November 27, 2005

In Heaven there is no beer...

In Heaven there is no beer
So we better drink it here

Hmm. Makes you wonder, how and why in the world did we let beer into our lives?


Ye-es. Must say that beer is an interesting social instrument. It's the oil or lubricant that gets the conversation going between different people. Gets you just nicely high without going overboard. For most people, you can drink quite a bit (coupla' bottles, say) and still be coherent. Couple of bottles won't even make you feel heavy or sleepy.

Beer isn't like hard liquor. No need for mixers. You could drink them out straight from the bottle. When you drink beer, you don't end up inhaling it via your sinuses. Beer doesn't kill your brain cells as fast. With beer you don't end up wasting half the night feeling wasted with a bucket to throw up in, nor do you end up next morning with a massive hangover and wondering what happened the night before.

Beer isn't like tea or coffee. Beer doesn't keep you awake through the night. Beer doesn't excite you, give you the jitters nor does cause butterflies in the stomach. Beer isn't strong-tastingly bitter. You don't drink beer hot. You don't have to waste time making the beverage.

But then again, I'm not really too much of a beer person. See, being a bit of an extremist at times, I tend more towards hard liquor and the baggage it carries (voluntary helicopter spins, Walls of Jericho, inhibition breakdowns, next-day post mortems). But here's one who is:

Thursday, November 24, 2005

Newfound love

Okay. I'll cover two unresolved issues I left out in my previous posts in one go:


Ta-daa! Spent some time editing Magic: the Gathering cards and fitting pictures of friends inside instead. Whatmore I just hantam some generic mechanic for the abilities. After all I just try try only what. The crazy thing is that for the first few cards I edited, I spent completely ages repainting over the logos so that they were pale enough not to obstruct the text. Once we'd installed Adobe Photoshop however, things were a breeze.

Secondly, we've finally gotten our iPod! Have you seen it? Here, let me show you...Yes. Am suffering from showoffitis, a serious affliction that can cause social ostracism if left unchecked. But seriously, it's like my new SO. It's been sleeping with me...well, not really sleeping as it's been keeping me totally awake in bed.

Had actually buggered the fellas at the Apple Centre MidValley to the point where I was about to withdraw my deposit on Thursday to buy the iPod Video from the store next door (hmmm interesting point, all MacAsia and Apple Centre stores have no stock but smalltime store do, why?). Am told that stock would come in the following day and so I waited. Come Friday I'd rushed over to MidValley from 1 Utama to see if stock has arrived...only to have found my trip there wasted. But the fellas told me stock will just be arriving late and they would send it over to me at 1U! Wah! Talk about customer service! I also impressed. Ask me to deliver medicine to your house I already give you a one kind of look la. Stuff like this can buy customer loyalty from soft-hearted people like me one. Maybe. After all MacAsia is in 1 Utama leh.

Tuesday, November 22, 2005

Fri Nite Board Games Session!

Oh yes. Our Monopoly night. Here's Starbucks, The Curve and us (guess where are we): lad, 'Vin, Puddy and otousan.

This until da waiter nicely informs us it's closing time. We'd to return the coffee cups and transfer our bevvies into paper ones before we were turned out.

Sorry-la my camphone is pseudo-cam only. No flash. Cannot take impressive night shots ya. This is around 1am already. Few people about, quite cool, mosquitoes biting, and free music from the bars above. Game went on with us ganging up against otousan until we ourself felt blah as we were definitely...'not winning'. And then we lost:

Scotty (us) died...got crashed in front of hotel by Car (otousan)...

We learn more mottos when it comes to Monopoly:
Otousan: "The rich gets richer and the poor gets poorer!"
Puddy: "Everybody has a price!"
SooJ: "In this game there is no boyfriend or girlfriend."
'Vin: "Lau sai!" Well...not really a gaming motto there.
Then it was time for Pictionary (everyone too paiseh for Twister).

Picture of the day by Puddy. Why? Because of what the pic is suppose to be. Heh. Here's the details:
Category: Difficult.
This is her full pic. No added bits anywhere else. The answer was guessed when someone was shouting, "Zues! Zues!", and then she drew a sword in his arm.

Can you guess? We'll tell in a couple of posts time.

Saturday, November 19, 2005

Fruitful Week! (Part 2)

Thursday, 17th November 2005.
Spent the whole day editing Magic: The Gathering card frames and putting other pics and such inside. Shall post them up someday.

Must admit obsession with getting the video iPod has been growing on us! Can no longer wait...especially since the shop next to the Apple Centre MidValley had stock! Wanted to withdraw our deposit but the fella told us that stock is definitely coming in tomorrow, if it did not come in then we could get back our deposit then. Being ever so hopeful (hey we feel it much safer to purchase our iPod from either the Apple Centre or MacAsia, we're that brand-conscious you know) we thought, okay. By tomorrow we're getting our iPod one way or another.
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire! Must say that this show rather disappoints and satisfies at the same time. Like getting splashed with cold water the way they just neglect some scenes. Might as well had made it a 3-hour movie like the first two, with more scenes. Oh well, hope they have an extended DVD in the works like The Lord Of The Rings.

Friday, 18th November 2005.
Work today was rather interesting as we met quite a number of familiar faces...old schoolmate, batchmate, seniors! Made work fun. Whatmore, was planning to spend some quality time with our new iPod as there wasn't any plans for tonight, until otousan texted to say that we were gonna go for yamcha. Yamcha turned out to be: board games at Starbucks The Curve! Bah! Have problems posting pics. Shall have to open up another post for it.

Fruitful Week! (Part 1)

This week(end) can be said to be quite fruitful. Have been working at Guardian 1 Utama again (yay it's good to be home!) and this time as a locum. Ahh the irresponsibilites. Of course there're less recognizable faces but the promoters are still all here, some executives are still here, and the other pharmacists are still here...for now. Anyways.

Must gripe about new parking fees at 1 Utama. Why? WHY? Extra RM2 per hour after 6 hours! And one of 1U's selling points is its' RM1 parking fee per entry! It chases their loyal customers that just love to indulge in a lazy day's lepaking lounging. If they were thinking: more customer turnover, why not just set the parking fees for the weekend a la MidValley? My options: (a) park at lad's house and walk to work, quite feasible provided weather is cloudy and windy and we're not late for work; (b) drive out during my break and back into 1 Utama again; (c) get someone to fetch us there; or (d) apply for employee's parking and park at the open air parking. Among all our options (d) is definitely not one option we'll ever entertain seriously.

Oh yes. Fruitful week. How?

Monday, 14th November 2005.
Was our off day (ah bliss) and had planned to queue up early at GSC MidValley for tickets to Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire! After ages of waiting and much teaser trailers it's almost here! After all, book 4 is considered the best among the lot (inclusive of Half-Blood Prince) and so there's much to be expected from the movie: Quidditch World Cup, Beauxbatons and Durmstrangs, Triwizards Tournament, Voldemort...
Had noticed that Certified Drug Pusher was trying to reach us since 8am but we were asleep. Managed to call her back while in queue only for her to tell us that her friend couldn't get tickets today, reservation starts tomorrow. And 2 seconds later we'd the fella at the counter tell us the same thing. Gah! Wethoughts reservations could be done 3 days in advance? Had we known we'd had taken Tuesday off instead! Anyways, was at IT World browsing Nintendo DS games when disaster struck.

Probably you can see it creeping up on you...if not the sound of workers shouting, "Call maintenance! Call maintenance! Oi! Oi! Aaaah!" would have attracted interest. Yeeurgh...brown water...

Tuesday, 15th November 2005.
Morning shift at 1 Utama. The plan: to rush to MidValley during our lunch break and snag tickets immediately! Takes what, 15 minutes to reach MidValley via Kerinchi Link? Must get tickets for 9pm Thursday show before lousy seats are left!
Success! Tickets snuggled safely in wallet. Starving now however. Snickers...yum.
After BodyCombat 'twas time for Domino's Pizza. About to leave Fitness First DU when lad noticed 8 missed calls...only to find out that Mario Kart DS is out! Alright then, lad gets pizzas, we get games. Meet at our place. Domino's Aloha Chicken and BBQ Beef...yum. Mario Kart DS...good.

Wednesday, 16th November 2005.
Huzzah morning shift at 1U instead of afternoon! We meets Kay for the first time! Yet another IMU P1/97 senior! That makes: Certified Drug Pusher, Boss-GPL, AiM, Chrstphr, and Kay! Whoa not bad 4 out of 5 working in Guardian.

Monday, November 07, 2005

Stress Test

It boils down to this: stop working for the day if you start scolding a perfectly innocent customer wanting to get his medication because he has already missed it for some days. Had to sit in the car and shout before we could do anything else.

It's been a long day now and it's no walk in the park to just dispense the entire day to all sorts, taking very late lunch breaks and working overtime to finish whatever paperwork accumulated during the course of the day only to have to deal with more customers that cause more paperwork and the vicious cycle continues...some more we cannot sit by the side to do our paperwork leaving the other poor pharmacist to handle the entire queue while we're still able to help clear said queue.

Stress continued to build up as we rushed off at 7pm hoping to reach The Curve in time for Bodycombat (yah a bit immature to not be able to place priorities right and to get all grouchy because we were late for class). Instead of relieving the stress by punching air the stress build up even more! By the end of the class our head was so heavy all we wanted to do really was just place it on the floor and curl up there. Had to settle for placing head on tabletop.

Thankfully tomorrow am not working. Need the rest after working throughout the holidays.

Sunday, November 06, 2005

Work Work Work

Well now. Have been locum-ing for a month. Must say that working in various branches is rather...fun. The variety makes it that we don't really get bored of a place too fast (we would still gripe somehow).

Store check:
Guardian 1 Utama - Our 1st store! Busy but lots of staff so it was nice!
Guardian University Hospital - Very small store but busy due to UH!
Guardian MidValley - Another crazy-busy store! Can dread the queue if you're working alone!
Guardian Bangsar Shopping Centre - Waaa this store very affluent crowd one...all angmohs!
Guardian Damansara Utama - Quiet store on weekends.
Guardian Bandar Puteri Puchong - Giant-Guardian (think Tesco-Apex) branch! Unfortunately crowds come in at night which we don't like to cover.
Guardian Sunway Pyramid - Okay crowd. Shocking man the amount of students coming in for Postinor 2!!!
Guardian Tun Perak - Our current store! Quiet weekends that allow for rest. Pet peeve is the fact that we have to commute instead of drive, which means we spend more time travelling (and pay more).
Guardian Endah Parade - The only reason we covered this branch for Hari Raya 2005 was because as an IMU student it would be embarassing to not know this place, whatmore a student that has stayed in Vista Komenwel for some 3 years! Since we were familiar with the branch we didn't mind trying out for the couple of days. Only scary bits were the hearsay of nasty Chinese customers (which we didn't encounter).

That's 9 stores we've experienced working in in 1 year man! Of course 5 of those branches we only worked 1-2 days la but hey, most people are just stuck in one store for years man! The variety seen from store to store makes the job more interesting. 1 Utama and MidValley are crazy-busy branches at times such that the hours just fly by, while DU and Tun Perak on Sundays are great places to take a break from the hectic pace while at work. UH branch is fun because you get to deal with Group B drugs and prescriptions!

Also ya, working as locum hor, can be more irresponsible flexible compared to working full-time. Hours more open to negotiation ("Can only work till 5pm today ya."), don't do any much paperwork, work days also rather free ("Can't come in today ya."), and job description more focused towards dispensing/consulting only. Be the envy of the full-time pharmacists.

So, work as a locum must make sure work enuff hours to ensure got enuff cash to pay for everything in the month, must whore ourself to many store managers to find slots for us to work because our primary branch doesn't really need us much, must adjust to different store layouts so can find where most things are, must make sure we don't fall sick because got no MC or claims from panel doctors, must make sure got enough cash to survive if go on holiday because got no public holidays or annual leaves that are paid for, must make sure our contract will be renewed next year, must make sure HQ sends the required letters so enforcement don't come fire us all ways...

Work work work.