more!!

Came into the office yesterday and was approached by colleagues who just came back from their week long breaks telling me that they had heard about my little book sale stint last week and asked if I had any more books to sell. Yup... I really thought that I had already closed shop but since there was a demand... yup, I re-opened shop today. Don't want to let my colleagues down. Books are a good thing and it's always nice to know that there are people who share my passion for reading.

So yes, it looks like the little book sale is still on folks! :)

bOOk SaLe --- Mine!!! :) :) :)

A few days ago, I came up with this bright idea of selling my paperbacks at the office. I thought that since I am done with reading the books and really, just how many books am I going to re-read again and again and again??? None! So, with that realization, I thought, I might as well hold my own itty bitty "warehouse" book sale and make some space for more new books in my home library! I'm selling my books off dirt cheap but I figured that since I am done with reading them, someone else might benefit from them now and for less bucks too!

I wasn't so sure how the girls at the office would take to my sale so I brought in a sample of 12 books to the office today just to see how they would take to the them and surprisingly, they did quite well. More than half were picked up and many of my colleagues were surprised that they were "so cheap". Now, all I've got to worry about it collecting the money from them!!! Pray hard that they pay up quickly!!

It's not easy parting with those books since I spent hours and hours selecting them but there is no point in them lying around at home not doing anyone any good (I'm tring to convince myself that I am making the right decision!). Sigh...it's so difficult for me to see them go. I hope they will be as enjoyable and enlightening to the people who take them home and I hope they are treated well...

Oh no, MNG is on sale!!!

I dropped by the shopping mall on Thursday after work thinking that I was going to do some grocery shopping and discovered that MNG was on sale --- oh no! So, in I went, browsing for stuff that I really didn't need.

The store was busy when I got there but it wasn't jammed packed with people. The que for the fitting rooms was snaked around the store and so was the que to pay. It was a relatively small store and with that many people in it, it was soon very hot (the halogen downlights didn't help either).

I picked up a few items, joined the horrendously long que for the fitting rooms, found that nothing really fitted me, gave them back to the girl manning the fitting rooms, went back out and picked up some more stuff which didn't fit me either, picked up some bags which I thought were nice but as the store got warmer and warmer, I kinda started feeling faint (must have been all the heat generated by all those people and the lights in the store) and I started asking myself if I really wanted that bag badly enough to want to stand in the VERY long que that was snaking around the store to pay for it.

In the end, I took one look at the bag and thought --- "I just bought a bag that I REALLY wanted last week and this one, while it would be nice to have, would not really be something that I have to have" and with that thought, I put it back where I found it where it was quickly snapped up by someone else.

I am happy to say that after an hour and a half in the store, I emerged from the sale with NOTHING!!! :)

lazy tuesday afternoon

Tuesday afternoon and I'm in the coffee shop watching the birds pck at left over food on the ground...ahh...life is so nice and blissful when I don't have to go to work. There should be more days like this where I can just sit in the shade and be lazy as I write my blog. This is certainly a nice break from the circus.

I should make more time for myself to unwind... I need more days like this one.

playing God

Been spending the last three days with the moderator. It's a new guy moderating my modules this time around. He's not new as a moderator but he is new at moderating my modules and God, is he a tough one! A third of the grades have been adjusted. Okay, I do admit that my teachers have been kinda lenient when marking but can you believe it that NO ONE and absolutely NO ONE made an A? Yup, like I said before, this one's a tough one.

I have my reservations about him though. These modules are communication modules and he is not of language training. I wonder how fair it is on the students to have someone like him (whose background is architecture) to moderated communication modules. The moderator who usually moderates these modules of mine is not down here this time around. He too is of architectural background, but he is not as tough. I believe that he has a better understanding of the modules than this new guy.

The new guy is a second language speaker himself. I always find that second language speakers are harder than native speakers --- they are more critical of their own kind. It is almost as if they have something to prove (whatever that may be).

Sigh... it's so sad to think that even my best of the "bestest" (if ever there is such a word!) students has been pushed down from an A to a B+ :( :( :(

updates

It's been a loongg time since I was last here. I always mean well, you know... always mean to write posts often but work always seem to get in the way :(

Anyway, updates. Been working late for the past weeks --- it's the end of the semester and I have to finalize the students' grades (AND decide their academic fates in what seems like endlessly long and boring meetings -- did I mention that I dislike going to meetings???), need to organize the students' work for the external moderators from Australia and then need to sit in yet ANOTHER long and boring meeting to finalize the moderated grades. Ah, so much for "quality control".

Yesterday afternoon, J, my boss announced that she had tendered in her resignation.Yup, tendered in her resignation after six months. I was hoping that she would last at least a year but I guess, she's doing the right thing --- she doesn't belong in this place and it's really no use wasting any more time here.

I have to give it to her though --- I have seen many bosses (and believe me when I say MANY) and out of all of them, I deem her to be the most professional one and the one that I can relate to the most. She makes decisions and knows her stuff --- that's what I like about her. On top of that, she acknowledges the problems that we have in the office. I suppose, that is the other reason why she is leaving --- we have a team mixed team of people who have different agendas. Unfortunately, very few are willing to slog it out and get things happening.

So...where does that leave us now? Oh, there is this other "boss" but we have no confidence in him. He seems to not know ANYTHING and half of the time, seems to not want to know anything. Yup, I'm stuck with clueless as boss. Sigh...one more year to my masters and then I'm a FREE woman!!! .