work life balance, literally

this is gonna be long. ghad, i missed my blog! =P

work

i've had episodes of "shampooing" my hair twice coz i forgot i already "shampooed" it... i was so lost in thought on what to do with my work ticket. it was that bad.

i should have listened well to Ma'am Tabora when she was discussing ethernet headers, ip protocols and udp header and data back in college, back in the days of the most dreaded Operating Systems class. *sigh* who would've thought it will come handy at work? i have a degree in Commerce, not Computer Science. =P

i've taken on the challenge of picking up work for our POS (point-of-sale) controllers. when you go to the grocery stores and the cashier scans your item, that beeping machine, that's the beast i've taken on. understanding and troubleshooting the data that gets read, sent, and written, with just a beep of a scanner. i've never looked at cash registers the same way again. instead of price, i began thinking in hex and data packets and all that crap. i never thought that a simple scan of a bubble gum could generate as much as 200 lines of hex data saying that yes, it's a gum that costs 50 cents. early developers apparently didn't know the phrase "keep it simple".

so anyways, i survived. i've officially been baptized by fire. the original senior developer who used to handle those problems dropped by my cube carrying 7 books on networking and protocols and data packet composition. i almost passed out.

it does feel good to be "speaking the same language" as that senior though. we talked about my findings on a bug, and wow, we are using the same terms, and talking about the same thing, and i was not completely lost. =P my eyes used to glaze over when he starts talking about technical stuff. but not this time. nice. i'm learning something new. bring it on! (or maybe not.)

life

nothing much except that lately, we are seriously considering getting a new car, and accepting our defeat in the real estate market.

first, the car. Itim (my black acura integra) is showing signs of aging. he needs new tires (all 4!), and he's been chugging down gas faster, it seems. i thought an oil change will fix the gas problem, but it didn't. and with the gas prices continuously climbing up, i say it's time to go green. a hybrid car is not a bad idea, provided i get a nice one. hubby je started looking online for reviews. Toyota Prius is leading the pack, but as far as power is concerned, nakatulog na sya sa pansitan, so to speak. hehe! Honda Civic Hybrid is the next choice. pretty expensive, but hey, nothing comes cheap nowadays.

whatever type or model we decide on, hubby je wanted to get a brand new one. i don't mind driving second hand cars. back in pinas, Lance is the only car we've had straight from the new-car dealership. we usually get a second hand car with low mileage. but hubby je would hear none of it. =P well, tatanggi ba ko? hahaha!

secondly, the house. well, it is sort of falling apart. hahaha! we have a leak in the roof, near the french doors opening to the backyard. and the guest bathroom "sometimes" takes its time draining everything down. we noticed that when you flush the toilet and you have the shower running, that's when the problem starts. weird isn't it? but anyways, just to avoid any further damage, we're using the bathroom in our bedroom na lang.

so anyways, we stopped all home improvement projects na muna. the flower bed, the backyard, the county space out in front of our property. we've finally accepted that in order to attract buyers, we have to drop the price. considerably. we'll wait for august, then do it.

if all goes well, we'll move to an apartment muna, until we find a new house that we really like. we don't want to be pressured into getting a new house just because we need to leave the one we're in right now. after all, equity doesn't build up that fast, so we might as well be better off with a villa or a condo muna. it's also a nice excuse for me to start throwing away old stuff of hubby je. separation anxiety is so much easier to deal with than lack of space in living quarters. =P

balance

we got our Wii Fit game! woot woot! grabe, sobrang nakaka-addict. one time, hindi talaga ako natulog until i cleared a stage in a game. if you are the competitive type, make sure you play in the afternoon and not after dinner... lest you find yourself awake at 4am. hehehe!

so many nice games to choose from... although i would say the Yoga and Strength/Building exercises are lame. games are supposed to be fun. you can do yoga without the board. hopefully other games will be developed with the Wii Board as the game controller. on my wish list: surfing and skateboarding. well, they might be in the Wii Fit na... may mga unlocked games pa rin kasi kami eh.

the board is sturdy, solidly built kumbaga. hindi mukhang tutumba ka pag naka-tapak ka. the Miis are very animated, and the games are family-friendly. from hubby je's 8-year old nephew to my 49+ year old mom-in-law, bentang-benta yung Wii Fit. hehehe!

anyways, to bring back balance in my life, gotta get back on exercising na. i wanna fit into my swimsuit pagdating ng december. hell yeah, gotta hit the PI beach!!!! =D