Prayer of Saint Francis

讀協記既應該都好熟呢首 hymn, 呢首係其中唱得最多既一首。一直都覺得呢首 hymn 既 melody 好好聽，但就其實一直都唔知佢講乜，唱咗咁多年一直都係唸口枉。
兩個星期前既一個 sunday service, 再唱返呢首詩歌，發現ｄ歌詞原來寫得好靚。再加上嗰日既 sermon 同呢首歌好呼應，聽完 sermon 再唱呢首歌真係好正。

Make me a channel of your peace,

Where there is hatred let me bring your love,

Where there is injury your pardon Lord,

And where there's doubt true faith in you.

Make me a channel of your peace,

Where there's despair in life, let me bring hope,

Where there is darkness, only light,

And where there's sadness, ever joy.

O Master grant that I may never seek,

So much to be consoled as to console,

To be understood as to understand,

To be loved as to love with all my soul.

Make me a channel of your peace,

It is in pardoning that we are pardoned,

In giving to all men that we receive

And in dying that we are born to eternal life.

其實好多時唱詩既時候，都冇乜留意歌詞，其中一個原因係因為好多時我連首歌都唔識唱，我淨係顧住唱準個音（尤其是我呢Ｄ五音不太全既人）都已經用去咗我大部份既 processing power, 邊有時間去留意歌詞？但間唔中當你有機會睇睇ｄ歌詞既時候，就會發現原來好多既詩歌ｄ詞真係好靚好正。當你明白一首歌既內容之後，再歌落去都會有味道，有 feel 得多。

In Old Office Again

Love to go back to the old office. No blocking of websites. Not many ppl around. Bosses are not around most of the time. Pretty free.

The only problem is that it's almost impossible if I actually wants to do some computer work here since my own computer is in the new office and a lot of the softwares that I need to use is not on this computer. Rather annoying indeed cos I do need to do some work.

It's nice to be in the old office though. Nice and relax. And I don't have to dress up for it. A lot more comfortable wearing t-shirt and sweat pants than dress shirt and dress pants.

And there's this incident in the new office that made me all paranoid now. I found mice shit on my desk the other day. Gross. And I have to clean it up.... ew... I think it's bcos I ate crackers on my desk and I left crumbs everywhere. Sigh... I guess I won't keep any food in the new office. It's a gd thing in a sense that it means I eats less snack so I won't get as fat. But at the same time, I do like having snacks around so that I can eat when I'm bored or when I'm tired. I don't have much choices now. I don't wanna clean up any more mice shit... >.<

I was actually very surprised that there're mice in the new office. If anything, I would think that it's the old office that would have mice. The old office is dirtier with lots of dirty equipment from the field and that the cleaning lady only come once a week instead of everyday in the new office. Really don't understand how the old office has no mouse.

So now, everyday I go to work, the first thing I do upon arrival is to check if there's any more mice shit on my desk. Luckily, there hasn't been any more two days after I clean up my desk and remove all the food items from my desk. But still... I wouldn't reuse my cup and bowl and fork and spoon without washing them. I have this feeling that even though there's no more food on/in my desk, the mice are still coming to poke around and leave all kinds of disease on my dishes and cutlery. >_<

嘩眾取寵

我未睇，但係我個妹同我個表妹睇咗，仲有小鬼維圍喂都去咗，超勁羨慕。再加上佢舊年既男磨坊多人多無得睇，更加之羨慕小妹同表妹。唔知會唔會出碟呢？

聽聞今次既 format 同之前幾次都咁上下，有少少失望。我呢幾年其實都等緊佢一次既破格，well...其實我既要求唔係好高架咋，就係佢唔好再用某一句格言然後就話呢句格言可以應用 喺呢度呢度同呢度，佢第一次咁做既時候係好新鮮好搞笑，第二次都仲可以，但再係咁落去就唔係好得喇，覺得有少少自己翻炒自己既感覺。同埋叫ｄ觀眾儲埋一齊先拍手舉都係，可唔可以唔好再講？翻炒俾我既感覺就係佢交唔足貨，我會有少少覺得被搵笨咁。

話雖如此，我仍然咁支持子華啦。前排睇完絕代商驕，好空虛，就上utube搵佢既舊作睇去填補我既空虛，有好多真係第二次睇既時候先至知佢究竟想講乜，而且第二，什至係第三第四次睇都係咁正。

ｄ人對今次呢個show 既評價好壞參半，我會盡量唔去存有太大期望，反正期望越小， enjoyment 越大，但我仍然好期待十一月既來臨！

Half Dead

Work is hell these days. My cheap ass company only have 1 license of a certain software (apparently the license fee is expensive for us to have more than one). It has been like this for a while. Most of the time it's ok bcos usually only one person needs to use it at a time.

But it had happened before that me and this other dude needed to use it in the same period of time for different projects. My boss came up with this fabulous idea of having one of us working another shift. Since the other dude has 3 kids at home, I volunteered at that time. And once you 開咗先例, every time it happens I became the automatic choice to work off hours. My boss would say things like, "Well... It just means that Olivia have to work shift." THANKS FOR ASKING FOR MY PREFERENCE!

Most of the time it's ok, cos the my projects are usually quite small and that I don't need the software for too too long. I don't really have to do the shift work, just came in a little earlier and sneak some time to use it while that guy is eating lunch or something. And really, most of the time, we can share among ourselves, each person gets a few hours everyday and it's usually sufficient.

But this time, this guy (in reality, it's only me and that guy who uses and who knows how to use the software in the company) has this big project that is totally killing him already. (well... once again, thanks to my boss who disregarded the fact that it's virtually impossible to do it in such a short period of time and the objection of that guy and agreed the deadline that the client requested, just to satisfy the client) Anyway, this guy is doing a lot of overtime already. And he has to finish before the deadline which is this friday.

And me, I just got this small project that I need to use the software. But really, there's another old software available to do the work but bcos the company hasn't paid for the maintanance plan, after I installed the software, I was unable to use it. Contacting the technical support and they told me that the company has to pay $450/3 hours support fee first. Being as cheap as the company has always been, we decided not to pay the money and decided that I should share the software with this other guy instead.

Fine. And of course, I am automatically elected to do the shift work. But one thing that my boss never really take into account is that I _DO_ have a life outside of work and that I can't just all of a sudden reverse my life schedule just to accomodate my work. For instances, the church's ESL classes new semester has just started, my regular ultimate game, + occassionally church meetings at night etc. I can't just drop everything else and work for him. So for the past week, I have been getting up at 4am to go to work for a few times. Chi ma gun. And it's not like I can get off work early either. This is something else that my boss never takes into account for. I have other work to do also.

It's not like I can do these things during off hours. For example, this pain-in-the-ass client have been contacting me this whole week and I have to reponse to his request pretty much right the way. So during those hours that I don't get to use that software, I work on other stuff. And of course, more than one old work came back to me at this appropriate time as if I have nothing else to do.

Another thing that upsets me was that on Tue, I didn't go in early cos I could not go to bed early the night b4 bcos of ESL class. So, I planned to stay late so that I would work after the guy went home. And then at around 7pm, he came back to the office after having dinner at home and asked me to hand over the license. WTF man... I know that u have the super tight deadline and that your client is much bigger than my client. But y do u always have priority before me? Also, you know that I'm working around ur schedule. Can't you have the courtesy to let me know that you were coming back to work so that I can adjust my work plan accordingly? Nice communication skills, man!

Speaking of scheduling, I remember another incident. So I went in early on Monday. When I got to the office, I found that the stupid license is not there. He brought it home over the weekend! I mean, I appreciate the fact that he worked so hard but he had clearly told me b4 that he never takes the license home bcos he didn't want to lose it and having to be responsible for this expensive license. I was like, "FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK". What was I going to do there? Sleep in the office? And then, despite the fact that it's 4:45am, I call him (luckily I found his phone number) on the server and told him that I was going to come pick up the license. Another lucky thing was that he lives super close to work (you can tell from the fact that he could go home and eat dinner and then come back to the office). But still, waste of time and gas.

Oh, forgot to explain how come I have to compete the license with him so much. Not surprisingly it's my smart boss. So he agreed on the client requested deadline for the other guys project. Ok fine. You want to make the client happy, be that way. But then he decided to schedule a meeting with my project client on the SAME freaking day. I mean, if you know that we have only once license and you know that the other project has already scheduled a meeting on that day. Why the hell did you schedule the meeting of my project on the same day??? What kind of project management is that? 好明顯係想我死者。

Well... I finally finished my work this morning, at least enough for the meeting tmr. I'm sure I will have more to do after he comes back from meeting, probably after agreeing on some other deadly deadline. And the "other" work that I have been doing was also close to finish. So I left work early today (I have been in the office since 5:45am this morning so I think leaving at 3:30pm is quite justifiable).

Also, the new office's policy makes it virtually impossible to get the 1.5 overtime pay so I won't even attempt it. It's not worth it. Even though I really need money these days, I would still rather take some time off instead. So, I'm going to stay home on Monday. Have an extra long weekend.

So what's the end results of this intensive work schedule for me since last Thursday? It means that my immune system is super weak right now since I haven't had enough sleep almost everyday. Probably averaging 6 hours per night or less. It's not helping me, especially in the allergy season. And I cut the corner of my mouth flossing the other day and now it's all infected. 腫咗一舊咁，好樣衰啦。Not that I look gd normally, but I really don't need this rotting mouth to add to my ugliness.

Also, going to work early means that I have been driving most of the week. I hate myself for it. But I have to say, traffic is so gd at 4:30 in the morning. Anyway, when I work weird hours like this, I have a very bad habbit (have been like this since UT era). I eat a lot of junk food, drink pop and coffee and keep eating and eating to stay awake. It work but this + the lack of cycling, I feel like I gain like 10pounds. Together with sitting in the office over 12 hours a day, I can totally feel that my ass is trying to double its size. Given the fact that my ass has never been a small one, the thought of it doubling it's size is a scary one. I really should start going back to the gym (haven't been to the gym for almost the whole summer, what a waste of membership fee). Maybe I''ll go on Monday during the day. I gotta stop the growth of my ass!!!

突然得閒

今日完左團契返歸，詹占又唔喺屋企，突然間好得閒．

Well... 其實係好多野做，又要洗碗，又要洗衫，又要為聽日既 refreshment 準備，又要準備星期一開始既 ESL 班既 material，屋企仲係有好多好多嘢未執．

I did a quarter of those and now I'm watching my 2nd movie of the day while typing this instead of continuing the work/errands that are on my plate. I know that I'm going to regret it but I really don't feel that productive right now.

Maybe I'll finally upload some of the long promised pictures of the house if I still don't feel like working after this.

The Latest Results

Of the war between me and the bus.

Since the new office is closer to home, I'm tempted to cycle all the way home whenever I'm cycling. Only ~25km compared to 31. This also completely ruled out the possibility of saving money with Metropass.

The new office is pretty much located on Woodbine. So instead of going down Don Mills, I tried VicPark the other day. In terms of comparing to the speed of the bus, I think I can pretty much win every time if I go on VicPark cos it was completely jammed up near 401.

Also, since Don Mills is not a straight road, it's actually shorter go to with VicPark although it seems a bit out of the way. And VicPark is a lot flatter then Don Mills. The overall average slope is probably similar but Don Mills has a lot more ups and downs. I don't really like cycling uphill, although downhill is a lot of fun. But usually 有咁耐風流，有咁耐折墮, the more downhill u get, the more uphill is waiting for you.

On the other hand, Don Mills has this diamond lane thing that only buses, bicycles and cars with more than 2 persons can use. With the amount of ppl carpooling in Toronto, this lane is a lot less busy than the rest of the lanes. I feel a lot safer to cycle on Don Mills. Also, last time I said that the road on Don Mills is quite crap with holes and stuff but compared to VicPark, the road condition along Don Mills is actually not so bad. VicPark is not bad north of Sheppard but south of it, it is a disaster.

So I've decided to stick with Don Mills for now.

Back to the racing part, excluding the 1st race, I raced on VicPark once and Don Mills twice so far. VicPark is a definite win (without the diamond lane, the bus got stuck with the rest of the traffic). Surprisingly, I also won the races along Don Mills. First, I pass the bus stop where I would get on the bus and within minutes, a bus caught up with me. But I managed to stay with it before it has to go into the Sheppard station. And after that, it did not catch up with me.

And yesterday, the bus came out just before I reached the bus stop. I caught up with it near Finch and passed it before Sheppard and again, it didn't catch up. I was lucky both times though cos I managed to pass a light while the bus got stuck. And both days has slight wind from the north. 天助我也.

In any case, these all lead me to believe that it's faster to cycle than taking the bus. Honestly, I don't cycle too fast. Another cyclist passed me with ease yesterday. I think my average speed without counting the stop time at lights is around 24,25km/hr. That means that the average speed of the bus is less than 26km/hr with all the stops and all that. Seems ridiculously slow considering the fact that the speed limit on the road is 60km/hr.

Anyhow, let me continue to make more tree trunk legs more tree trunk-like.