First look at Costco

They have everything in Giant and Gianter sizes. If it's not huge, then there's a lot of them!

Why we wrap presents...

As we get older we're lucky to get a gift - and as a giver, the bastards should be grateful that they're getting anything at all, god forbid they complain about the wrapping!

But sometimes it is necessary to go that extra length to give it a good candy-covered shell to give the receiver a glimmer of hope.

Hope that the gift inside is something nice;

Hope that they won't have to grimace and pretend to like it; and

Hope that they can take in back to a store and exchange it for something else.

The wrapping also provides the recipient a consolation gift - the wrapping paper - if the recipient unwrapped it nicely :)

Chilling under the bridge...

A day in Pitt Town and surrounds

Work's great when we're not working!

Summer in winter

Today was a beautiful summer's day... for mid-August!

Fish n chips at the beach :)

Life is good on a non-work day!

My bad for the day

Tiramisu cupcake.

verdict: a helluva good bad :)

Turmoil Tuesday

The workday after a long weekend is always difficult to wake up to!

I think a lot of people are probably feeling like the blue dude on the left... (it's Mr Forgetful if you didn't know...)

Just this morning I observed a queue of people at the station, obviously displaced by the long weekend... I think most of them missed their train.

Then there was the Fort Street kids who realised that today was Tuesday and they had assignments due. Oh, I know that feeling too well... The poor girl was going to go home but her mother offered to deliver it to her, so she spent a good portion of her train ride instructing her mother how to print the assignment... once that was out of the way, she started on a second assignment =_=; Good luck!

I think the shittiest thing today was the LACK OF WATER in my house... I pumped some soap in my hand, turned on the tap to find NOTHING coming out of the faucet... Luckily we have water on hand... so I used that for the 'morning routine'.

On my way to the station we noticed a massive gush of potable water rolling into the drains and down the street. Some f***wit broke a pipe at a construction site down the road. I sure hope they get fined!!! A Council truck pulled up at the scene provided a little comfort.

All that water from the past few days of rain, wasted down the road of Fourth Ave, Berala.

Gutful of the 'family unit'

Incidences today and leading up to today has broken all my faith in the concept of a 'family unit' or at least, the extended family unit. I am dubbing it a useless and unneccesary rule of society that, with time, falls apart and dissolves, rendering it non-existent.

I may sound like a sceptic or a teenager in angst, but from what I have observed and experienced, 'family' and other terms related to the unit (such as mother, father, sibling etc) is just a label of obligation which ties people with other people.

Sure, a husband and wife or spouses can be considered as a 'family' unit, but I believe that this relationship works because of their friendship.

A young family with kids works because the children are dependant on their parents and it seems to be a rule of nature that something people 'create' or choose to have in their care are unconditionally loved... sometimes I wonder if there are exceptions to this rule.

As a family matures, flaws are exposed, the true nature of each individual is realised and subsequently, the ties are loosened.

I think the reason why the family model is flawed is because of the depth of a person you get to know someone. As the saying goes "you can't choose your family" but you can choose your friends, and if a bond of friendship isn't established, you have a meaningless relation kept together with the band-aid: family.

A lot of the times, a 'family gathering' is an obligation surrounded by issues of 'face' and 'respect' - but society has become the time of the 'I', should the concept of family keep up with the times?!

I'm not saying that people won't be able to get along with all of their family members, I think you can establish a relationship with those you have become friends with.

The HSBC's study which surveyed 2500 riches people in Sydney, Hong Kong, Singapore, Shanghai and Mumbai showed that Sydney-siders saw buying property before family.
First, I'm not rich... nor do I intend or expect to be, and I can tell you that my way of thinking did not come from living here. Could these rich Sydney people think the same way as me because of what they've seen too? Or are they just dickheads... I think it might be the latter...

Gees, need to get ready to go out... I'm sure a few more pars can be churned out...................

I'm just sad to see efforts wasted in vain and that my previous way of thinking is merely a pipe dream and reality is that its a dog-eat-dog world.

Still not fucking home

Need I say more? Just check the time stamp.

Seeing red with 3!!!

** the following text was too long to write on a mob. I know a picture speaks a thousand words, but no picture will be able to replace my anger... well, no picture deemed appropriate to publish on a family-friendly blog... enjoy :) **

I signed up for a service with 3 at the beginning of February, ported a
number over from Voda, all was good.

I signed up for a 2nd service on Friday 9th of March along with ANOTHER
porting request, this time from Digiplus/Optus, or whatever it is now. I
did a recorded verbal agreement and all that.

The phone arrived on Wednesday 14 March, the couriers were great! I was
told to call Customer Care when I received the phone so the porting could
be done.

I talked to someone who fluffed around for 10 minutes and then told me to
do ANOTHER recording or go to a store to authorsing the port.
I made it clear to the operator that I had already authorised the port,
and just to do it. She then told me that if I already put in a request,
it would be done...

A week later, and after many harrassing calls, nothing was done.
Everytime I called they mentioned the other porting request -- that is,
the one which was successfully ported with my FIRST service. I keep
telling them that porting of that number was fine, just port the other
one!

They promised to call me back by Friday afternoon or Saturday but I
didn't hear from them! Saturday -- I was fed up and decided to walk into
a 3 store in Chatswood, I filled out the porting request form thinking,
GOOD, now it'll be done... how wrong was I!

Tuesday 20 March, after 48 hours since filling in the form (give them
time I suppose), nothing had gone through. Customer care calls the store
to make sure the fax went through... they get cut off...

I was sent to a 'customer care' operator (I thought they were ALL
Customer Care!) after I got very narky and demanding answers to why
nothing has been done.

The 2nd operator tells me that she has escalated the case and will have
someone call me. Sure enough, someone calls me, while I'm in a meeting! I
was told to call them back... on the generic number 133 320.

I call them back hoping to get stuff done ASAP, but instead sat there
repeating my story to some other operator and wasting another half an
hour of my life! The operator tells me that he'll have someone call me
back on Wednesday (21 March)...

surprise surprise -- NO CALL.

It wasn't until I called them just now, REPEATED MY STORY AGAIN and got
extremely infuriated (couldn't shout cos I'm in the office). This poor
guy who got the shit end of the stick said he'll get someone to call me
back today...

Luckily for him someone did!!! This guy did ANOTHER verbal authorisation
and sent the request on the spot to Digiplus...

I found out that the prob was the account number... When I did my first
request, the girl told me that the account number I gave her was
incorrect cos there were letters in front... fine, gave her a different
number and she said that was good...

The account number was in fact the one with the letters. The recorded
message says: If there is a problem with a port, we will call to let you
know...

WELL thanks 3 for letting me know after I increased my blood pressure 10
times what it is normally!

It seems that nothing will be done until you go insane.
I hope this is the last time I need to depend on customer care!!!