Goodbye 2018, Helloooooo 2019!

Hi guys!

Just as I usually do on 31st Dec every year, I'm writing a reflection on what 2018 has been. I know I didn't write much this year, and it's to do with all the web novels I read when commuting XD but I still wanna write this one for a quick 2018 summary :)

2018 was full of TV series and web novels lol In total, I've finished 10 TV series this year. I think my mandarin should have improved a bit from watching all those :P I also attempted to sub last 15 min of Yanxi Palace on Youtube as I couldn't wait for someone else to sub it. After doing it, I now have respect to all those freee subbers out there. Even if English and Mandarin are their main languages, the translating, editing and timing takes A LOT OF TIME. So guys, please don't be a jerk and get mad when the subbers miss the schedule time. They have real life to do and it's good enough that they spare a lot of portion of their life to let you enjoy those dramas.

I think the drama that I liked this year was The Eternal Love. It's light and funny and made me feel happy and forget all my worries. It was low budget, but the crew did their best and it was very enjoyable. Another one would be Ode to Joy 2. I think it was comparable to the 1st season. It was realistic and kinda opened the can of worms of things that people kind know not to do, but still do anyway. Hopefully that show can touch the hearts of some of the people and make the world a little bit kinder place to live in. When a Snail Falls in Love was good too, I liked it better than Love Me If You Dare. It's good to see Wang Zi Wen play a role that's total opposite of Qu Xiao Xiao (eventhough I really wish I could be more like Qu Xiao Xiao). She's really an underrated actress. The King's Woman was so so, but Zhang Bin Bin was refreshing to my eyes lol Not that handsome, but still eye candy lol

None of the web novels I read was finished this year. I'm currently reading The Concubine's Daughter is Poisonous, Princess Medical Doctor and Rebirth of the Malicious Empress from Military Lineage. The Concubine's Daughter and Malicious Empress are GREAT! I really enjoy them. Malicious Empress is nearing the end, and I'd be sad when it ends :( The Concubine's Daughter translation is of very high quality. Again, respect to all those translators and editors :) Thank you.

We finally had our second trip to Japan this year :) We visited Tokyo, Nikko, Yokohama, Takayama, Shirakawago and Gokayama, Kanazawa, Tsumago and Magome, Kyoto and Osaka. I tried the Onsen too!!! And surprisingly I enjoyed it so much! If I go to Japan again, I'd like to go onsen again hehehehe... I also went all out in Disneyland and USJ. I didn't get on outdoor roller coasters, but I did ALL of their indoor dark roller coasters!!! I'm very proud of this hahahaha... And we got on almost all rides we wanted in Disneyland on a 50k visitors day (the red indicator day)!!! VERY, VERY proud of this achievement too hahaha... and we tried the night bus from Tokyo to Kanazawa. It was very comfortable :) This time in Japan, we splurged more. Afterall, we're all still single and we usually are thrifty anyway. So I let myself buy more cute stuffs, Conan stuffs, Sailormoon stuffs and tried more expensive snack food lol XD No regrets!

My cousin got married this year, and I got to help her set up the wedding hall. That's an achievement you know! From blank canvas, we transformed the hall into what my cousin had in mind. The end result was an on time really gorgeous wedding :)

Honestly I felt I was really lazy this year. We had a cold winter. Even it started getting really cold in Autumn. So I pretty much hibernated from Apr - beginnging of Nov :/ and that's how I managed to watch all those dramas XD Hope I won't hibernate that long in 2019!

Work.... a lot of drama in terms of the work itself, and in relationship department. It ended up in eruption just 2 weeks ago. I'm still a bit down if I remember it. Hopefully there's a way out for me next year. Someone please save me... I'm too scared to leave eventhough I know I should leave. So please save meeeeeeeee

I did help someone for a weekend for his website. So I kinda had a feel of freelancing. Man it was hardwork. I don't think I wanna go down that path. I like my weekend reserved for refreshing!!! A local bus driver mentioned that he wanted to have a website and may ask my help for it one day. Oh man, I was SO SCARED of bumping into him! I even went as far as to go earlier to gym, and walked home to avoid his bus! Unfortunately, all those exercises didn't do much help to my figure >>>>___<<<< My weight stays the sameeeeeee TT_______TT

This year I'm more lenient towards myself in terms of money and things I want to do. Some people I know, either personally or through someone else, were affected with cancer this year. They were all young, probably only few years older than me. It kinda shocked me that it can happen to anyone anytime. Therefore, don't always think about the future, of course future needs to be prepared, but don't always think about the future and not enjoying your present. We all hope there's a future for us, but at least if there isn't, you won't regret it at the end of your life...

Not much craft, not much language learning. As I said, the cold winter made me snuggle in bed for months, so forget about getting my fingers to do craft :P I did start listening to Audio books for language learning, and they actually work. It gets your brain to actively work even when you're walking on the street. I'll continue doing it.

I had the opportunity to experience the power of teenagers in social media. My 13 years old cousin, actually managed to make me one of the winners of photo competition by getting her friends to vote for me!!!! It's pretty astonishing how easy it it to get her friends to vote for me, someone who they don't know, for a photo that's just okay, to end up being in top 3! I'm still dumbfounded until now. But thanks my dearest cousin *muachhhh*

I met my cousin and his wife who I haven't seen since 10 years ago in Melbourne. It was not planned. We just happened to be in Melbourne at the same time and I checked in on Facebook. He saw it and arranged to meet up. We ended up meeting for breakfast and dinner and now talk to each other sometimes on whatsapp. What a great coincidence :) For that, I truly grateful...

And last memorable thing this year was the game I am recently hooked on, Royal Chaos. What started from just curiosity, ended up giving me headache and joy and refreshment when I need some distraction from real life. I've got into a great community that's fun and supportive. Most of them are youngsters though, that sometimes make me feel old. But they are all very nice people and we can just talk about random stuffs or bitch about our common enemy XD I remember there's this list about what people should do to enjoy their life, it's to spend time with the elderly and kids. But I think spending time with people a generation younger than you is great too. It makes you see life in lighter way and not to take things seriously ALL the time. But man, I also didn't think that game can have so much dramas and politics too!!!! Sometimes I'm wide awake at 1 in the morning because of the drama or fights we have with the other party -_- But I won't wish to not get involved in this game in the first place.

So that's it for 2018 reflection. I need to prep the dish for tonight's dinner!!!

Bring on 2019 and please be kind but exciting and memorable and HAPPY!!!!!

Happy New Year 2019 guys!!!!!!! *hug hug kiss kiss*

Pre-Christmas Drama

So, Christmas is in 2 days time. But this year's Christmas is filled with drama in the week leading to it. Let me tell you what happened this week.

Last Monday, Strawberry Cheesecake resigned. We, the girls, were so worried for her. As my readers would have known, my boss who shall not be named, has never ever ever ever ever handled resignation well. But surprisingly, he actually handled her resignation so well and even very supportive! The girls who saw her entering his office was confused as 1. the meeting didn't take long. And 2, where's the yelling???

Even Strawberry Cheesecake herself was confused. She said she couldn't remember much of the meeting as she was thinking "why he's not angry? Why he's taking it so well???" during the talk.

So it was good for her, and we're so happy for her.

Mon arvo, Prick came and talked to Creamer and Lao-er. Straight after, he dashed out angrily and went home. Creamer then asked me about the status of a task, to which I replied, I was working on it. He then said "It's due today". As typical of prick, always comes the minute it's due and angry coz its not done. Anyway we tried to do it, but it was too complex to finish in 1 hour so we left it.

Tue morning, just when we finished the stage 1 of yesterday's task, Taizi Fei came and told us that a bunch of emails to the new audience were sent out that morning. Shit. Creamer and I looked at each other and wondered how it could have happened. We went live with something yesterday yes, but we've gone Live 2 weeks ago with the same thing and all was fine.

The problem was, the client specifically requested NOT to send those emails to this new audience. We can't send ANY emails to them as we haven't officially launched it to them.

I straight away checked the code that sent out those emails, and I found that the code was correct. However, the placement of those codes was WRONG! Those emails should not be sent at that point in time!! I showed it to my Creamer, his face turned grave and said "This is bad, Purple Lady..." I said, "I know, but at least we now know how it happened". What I didn't know was, that it was going to be THIS bad.

You know who was extremely upset when he heard it. He was blaming everyone on how could the wrong code could go into the Live site. The person who coded it was Barbie's boyfriend. Not sure if I've mentioned it before, but he quitted some time ago. I can't believe how lucky he is.

However, the people who could have gone live with it were me, Water Tap and Creamer. But honestly, and this was confirmed by the 2 of them too, no matter whoever goes live with it, he/she won't notice this issue. As we only code review the changes, not the original code.

Creamer had to run around explaining to the one who shall not be named, and Lao-er. And who knows if superexcited actually got what the problem was. After all he's not an IT guy. Just an old man who thinks he's very knowledgeable. *sigh...

Anyway you know who was very angry. And he wanted to have a meeting with the whole IT department re this issue. The meeting didn't happen on Wed, not Thu either. Honestly, me and Little Missy were feeling safe when it didn't happen on Thu. But who knows Fri just b4 lunch, we were all called for a meeting *sigh

It turned out better than I thought. Superexcited seemed to listen to our issues and suggestions. Yes he still ranted about the incident. But it was way better than me and Little Missy expected. So we thought all is fine.

However that night, Creamer said to me, "I know you like to talk to everyone. And I know you can't keep a secret(WTH????). But you have to keep this one. You cant tell anyone" I said, "O.. Kay..? ". He then said, "I've just resigned". First thing I said was, "No... "

He then said that he's been thinking about it for a while. And he's been trying to talk to Lao-er for a month, but Lao-er was so busy and couldn't talk with him. He said this week's issue wasn't the only reason, but it was the deciding factor. He said he's doing 5 ppl's work and felt not appreciated. Everytime someone's PC breaks, he's called. When someone only has 1 monitor, he's to blamed. When Crown Prince's personal laptop breaks, 5 times, who did they call? Him! He's a manager, but doing web developing and IT support as well.

He said he's so fed up with everything. He said, during today's meeting, this was what annoyed him the most.
Super excited: "New guy, do you know why we're here? Do you know the problem? "
New guy: *turned to Creamer*
Superexcited: "don't look at Creamer. He doesn't know the answer. Look at Water Tap, he might know the answer. Look at Little Missy, he might know the answer".

He's had enough. He doesn't think superexcited understands what the issue was. How it could happen to anyone who went live with it. How there is no bug free software. He just doesn't understand.

He said sorry to me, for leaving me behind with the websites that are still not 100% done. And he's sorry for all the time he dumped stuffs to me without properly explaining. He said he wanted to explain, but he didn't have the time. And he knew I would figure it out in the end. He also regretted, not supporting Water Tap's idea that much before.

If it wasn't because of the one who shall not be named, he'd have stayed on.

I don't know how many times I've heard that now. So many good employees have said that when they left. The best people we've ever had.

I think about things a lot. I was down a whole day yesterday thinking about this. There's nothing I can do, but I just can't help thinking.

I hope I can still have peace this Christmas.