Starting Anew

This could well be a major turning point in my life...

- Looking for a job elsewhere meant that I wanted more and felt that i could do more
- Getting hired in a company other than Accenture meant that I am actually worth more than the JSE that i was hired around 3.6 years ago...it means that although Accenture taught me everything i know about IT..i was able to translate it and make it my own

Just a few days left until Feb 4 when I move to a new company. I have no reputation whatsoever except maybe as the experienced hire from Accenture. Then again, all new hires are experienced hires in RCG...

I hope to recarve my niche in testing...that's it for now, i don't want to pre-empt anything or expect too much on my first few months :)

Credit Card Lessons Re-learned

I already knew this before but somehow forgot after some time of not using my credit card.

I wanted to earn lotsa miles and forgot about how finance charge was computed.

I thought that paying before the cut off date is enough to cancel out my payments (fyi: i still have a stagnant sum that i haven't paid off) but i thought wrong.

I forgot about the average daily balance computation! How stupid of me!

Average Daily Balance. This is the most common calculation method. It credits your account from the day payment is received by the issuer. To figure the balance due, the issuer totals the beginning balance for each day in the billing period and subtracts any credits made to your account that day. While new purchases may or may not be added to the balance, depending on your plan, cash advances typically are included. The resulting daily balances are added for the billing cycle. The total is then divided by the number of days in the billing period to get the "average daily balance."

So i spent around 33k during my billing cycle and paid these off around 2 days before my cut off date...then i checked my online account and saw an unusually high finance charge despite the fact that i paid out what i bought...

Sigh..now i understand! I should pay on the day I buy... in other words, for me, I shouldn't buy if I don't have immediate cash on hand!

I am putting this under my lessons re-learned...NEVER AGAIN!!!

Last 30 Days in Accenture

I missed blogging!

Anyway, the cat's out of the bag! I have passed my resignation from Accenture effective Feb 2, 2007. So my last day is Feb 1. That's still 3 loooong weeks from now!

3 loooong weeks where I'd still have to review Test Conditons and Test Scripts of Chicago peeps! I pray that it'll be easier this time around hehehe

3 looooog weeks where I'd have to transition every single thing i know to other people. Hmmmm, I hope that's enough time!

I am looking forward to certain more exciting deadlines

• Jan 14 - deadline of my articles for the GP2W Newsletter - a feature on the CIO Christmas Fair which my floor won and a travel feature of my Star Cruise experience
• Jan 18 - deadline of my Leadership book review for Manila LeAP about The Wizard and the Warrior, leading with passion and power
• Within January - Ops Teambuilding @ Red Box!
  
• Jan 28 - Lunch out with Start Group for my last 'monthsary' with them in ACN. It's also my farewell treat for them. We'll be eating at AMICI
• Feb 1 - last day of work! woohoo!
  

Ohhhh i so wish that PT deliverables would be bearable... i wish that our APM has transitioned what to do well to the PT Planners...i think this would be my biggest challenge before i go.. wish me luck!!

I'm Freakin' Excited!

Wala lang..hyper ako! Galing kaming Krispy Kreme ni Aldrich sa may Greenhills and we had those donuts below. I had Cappuccino while Drich tried the Hot Choco. Word of Advice: their hot choco tastes weird - McDonald's is better; ask sugar for the cappuccino or throw in a candy santa to do the trick!



Anyway, I just want to say that I'm freakin' excited! Doors to close and new ones to open! I super thank God that everything just fits perfectly... i really can't believe it's happening! I hope everything will go smoothly...I'm so grateful! God loves me!!!

Destressing..

My Offical vacation started today!!

I felt that i needed to do something to mark this day so I gladly went with my family to Rockwell and shopped :) I bought myself a shiny red blouse at Limited worth Php850. I plan to wear it tomorrow during christmas eve dinner, noche buena, as well as chinese new year's eve...hmm and maybe any other occasion that requires me to wear red! hahaha!

I set aside 1500 for a gift for myself this christmas and i still want to buy a bag, that is if the budget still fits.

*******

I so wish that I'd won Php1000 Rustan's GCs instead of SODEXHO! I also still have 1600 worth of Celebrating Performance points but there's no Rustans' gift check there..just SM, Bayo, Chicco..sigh~

Where can i exchange gift cheques for cash???

November Rain

I realized that i haven't blogged for a long time.. and now it's december! Time flies so fast...


What is this, a Status Report?
November was quite hectic for me at work since it was the start of our first big operations release. I also had to transition my beloved Product Testing to Tier 2 since top management wanted it that way.

It's a big challenge to transition something over the phone, i think there's still a long way to go and more focused resources are needed in order to build the testing knowledge-base in Chicago. After all, it also took Manila a considerable amount of time before our work for testing became efficient.

Good luck to me. I still have one last transition to do and a lot more transitionary reviews to complete.


A Chinese Birthday Celebration
Oh and it was also my Dad's birthday last November 23. He's 70 years old based on Chinese lunar calendar and belief (68 in roman calendar) so we had a big celebration for him last Nov 18. My task was to help design the invitations, create the presentation and also have a birthday banner done.

According to tradition, the birthday celebrant should have birthday noodles on the exact date of his birth for longevity. So my brother took care of this by bringing the adults in the family to the Jumbo Palace restaurant in Roxas. It's actually the ship brought by Stanley Ho from HK that was supposed to be used as a casino. But since it was riddled with too much intrigue and politics, they just turned it into a restaurant instead. The food was really yummy - even sitaw and tofu were extremely tasty! Or maybe, it's just a case of dieter's taste buds haha. It's but right that we enjoyed the food coz it cost a lot!


Of Turkeys and Butterflies in the Cold
On a personal note, i was finally able to visit the nice spots of tagaytay last november, namely

• Leslie's
  
• Picnic Grove
• Sonya's Garden
• Bag of Beans
• Paradizoo

Tagaytay is great and the weather really cold! From my last trip, the most unforgettable event was the attack of the turkey in Paradizoo! I've already been there during my 4th year in HighSchool, so i think the animals, especially the turkey have grown old and grumpy. It was very territorial and attacked the girl who came after us. Good thing the caretaker appeared and shooed the free-roaming turkey away.

Bag of Beans was a pleasant surprise with is cute garden setting and birds around the area. I liked the taste of their Shepherd's pie better than the steak and mushroom. Aldrich preferred the latter, but his favorite was the apple pie! He even ordered another one! The Hot Chocolate drink (Tablea) was yummy too but guilt-laden for me (South Beach Dieter) to completely enjoy.

I tasted the best pesto in Sonya's Garden! This was the highlight of our mini-food trip and i can say that it was well worth it @ P560. I guess im a sucker for variety and there were just so many spreads and dips and sauces laid in front of us to spread on that freshly baked sesame bread. The pasta was great too especially when mixed with chicken in mango cream sauce..mmmm..i can almost taste it in my mouth. Aptly, after the very filling entree and main course, they gave us some kind of tea to aid in digestion. Then they served dessert, which in our case was a sliver of dark chocolate cake (hooray for me) and some turon and camote. Although we were surrounded by different kinds of plants and flowers, what what made me feel really one with nature was the comfort room! It had only a screen on the other half side for you to truly feel comfortable. I think it was more "refreshing" than the pitcher of dalandan juice with a leaf inside the glass.

Too bad we didn't stay long enough to enjoy the 'harem mattresses' strategically placed all over the garden since this was the day when typhoon Mina was supposedly gonna hit the the southern region. Supposedly being the operative word.

It was really a trip to remember, and oh, i just can't get over the uber-soft comforter that Tagaytay Country Hotel had in their rooms. There's me cocooned and waiting to metamorphosize into a beautiful butterfly!

Tester Babble

Ariba or Testing?
Ariba or Testing?
Ariba or Testing?

Why can't i just test Ariba???

Testing is fun!

I am a test addict!

I am experiencing withdrawal symptoms...

Like House to Days without Vicodin.

There's still so much to testing that i don't know about.

Automation!

Test Director.

Interesting!

I guess it's something that i can grasp, i can understand.

A Non-IT graduate person like me.

Quality Assurance (a.k.a nitpickiness, meticulousness)

Welcome to the wonderful world of testing.

When others have a passion for development and programming...

I have a passion for testing.

So sue me.

To each his own!

Power Struggle

There seems to be a struggle for power at the top

One who has been placed there because it is his time and the other because it is but right

Yet even if the appointed one's passions lie elsewhere.. his merit surpasses his heart's desire and he still emerges victorious in the battle albeit unintentional

The other, while rightful, is unnatural for the throne.

such is the story untold...

Trapeze Swinger

Trapeze Swinger
by Iron & Wine

Please, remember me, happily,
by the rosebush laughing
with bruises on my chin, the time when
we counted every black car passing
your house beneath the hill, and up until
someone caught us in the kitchen
with maps, a mountain range, a piggy bank
a vision too removed to mention

But please remember me, fondly,
i heard from someone you're still pretty
and then they went on to say that the Pearly Gates
have such eloquent graffiti
like: “we'll meet again” and “fuck the Man”
and “tell my mother not to worry”
and angels with their great handshakes
but always done in such a hurry

and please remember me, at Halloween
making fools of all the neighbors
our faces painted white, by midnight
we'd forgotten one another
and when the morning came I was ashamed
only now it seems so silly
that season left the world and then returned
and now you're lit up by the city

so please remember me, mistakenly
in the window of the tallest tower
call, then pass us by, but much too high
to see the empty road at happy hour
gleam and resonate just like the gates
around the Holy Kingdom
with words like: “lost and found” and “don't look down”
and “someone save temptation”

and please remember me, as in the dream
we had as rug-burned babies
among the fallen trees and fast asleep
beside the lions and the ladies
that called you what you like and even might
give a gift for your behavior:
a fleeting chance to see a trapeze-
swinger high as any savior

and please remember me, my misery
and how it lost me all i wanted
those dogs that love the rain, and chasin' trains
the colored birds above there runnin'
in circles round the well, and where it spells
on the wall behind St. Peter
so bright on cinder gray in spray paint:
“who the hell can see forever?”

and please remember me, seldomly
in the car behind the carnival
my hand between your knees, you turn from me
and said the trapeze act was wonderful
but never meant to last, the clowns that passed
saw me just come up with anger
when it filled with circus dogs, the parking lot
had an element of danger

so please remember me, finally
and all my uphill clawing
my dear, but if i make the Pearly Gates
i’ll do my best to make a drawing
of God and Lucifer, a boy and girl
an angel kissin’ on a sinner
a monkey and a man, a marching band
all around the frightened trapeze-swinger

nah nah nah, nah nah nah nah …

Partial to Butterflies

I love butterflies and pink and white and violet!


I went to Debenhams last Satrurday and they're carrying a line called Butterfly by Matthew Williamson.




It' sad because 1) I love butterflies 2) I can't afford anything in the store


Here's one of the bags that i really, really, really like...but it'll be marked as The Bag I'll Never Have...



Chocolate pleated shoulder bag

- £60.00 [GS Php 4150]

- Item No.: 0890105044

- Popper fastening

- Pleated design to outside with pink butterfly bag charm to handle

- Zip fastening compartment, zip fastening pocket, mobile phone pouch and key ring to inside -
[GS Pink butterfly design inside the bag]

- Two handles

- HWD: 24 x 36 x 14cm/9.4 x 14 x 5.5"

- 100% leather

Because I'm Always Broke

How to save $200,000 in 6 months

The Women in Red Savers find that tucking away cash is a lot easier -- and more interesting -- with an audience.

By MP Dunleavey, taken from www.MSN.com

Many years ago, when I was breaking up with my then-fiancé, I needed to find my own apartment. But I had no idea how I would be able to afford it.

The problem, plain and simple, was that I didn't have a dime in savings. OK, maybe a dime, in a dusty tray on my desk, but that was it. I hadn't even signed up for the 401(k) plan at my job.
Then one day, as if the Money Fairy had heard me crying, a credit card appeared in the mail!
The credit limit was $6,000. I felt as if someone had handed me a bag of gold. Here was my moving-out money! Here was my freedom!

And there went my financial sanity.

Caught in the debt spiral We have all heard about rising consumer debt, but the flip side of that sad story is the plunge in the national savings rate in recent years.

In a 2006 report, only about 18% of middle-class families said they had three months' expenses saved, according to the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank in Washington, D.C.
Worse, nearly 60% of people 44 and under didn't even have $500 set aside for an emergency, according to the Federal Reserve Board's 2004 Survey of Consumer Finances.

Small wonder that many people feel they have no option but to use plastic in a crisis.

You can trace the downward spiral from there: You start with no savings cushion, you stumble into debt, and your paycheck has to stretch to make ends meet and pay off the debt, so how can you save?

Save your sanity Lindsey Garver, a graduate student in microbiology who lives near Washington, was concerned that some of the Women in Red members were so focused on paying off debt that they were overlooking the protective power of savings.

In January, she helped to launch the Women in Red Savers thread, a message-board support and discussion group for anyone who wants to save for any reason, including those who don't think they can.

Many people start at zero, Garver says, and some add only $10 or $20 a week or even each month. "Some go slower, and some go faster," she says, admitting she falls into the tortoise category.

"The main purpose of the thread is to get people excited about posting even a small amount," Garver says.

Andrea Holder, who joined in February, agrees: "With the Savers, you can say, 'I just saved $27.63!' and people will give you thumbs up. You can't even do that with your best friend."
Some people join with a finite goal: a wedding, dental work or a down payment. Some want to increase their retirement nest eggs.

But many women, Garver says, set up multiple savings accounts to cover a host of life's expenses, from holiday gifts to car insurance to property taxes to an unexpected home repair.
To save is to give yourself a margin of sanity, Garver says. "On a grander scale, it's not about being able to pay your property taxes -- it's about the security it brings. You're not worrying because you've got things covered."

Focused on the future Andrea Holder is building that peace of mind at steep odds. Holder, a waitress and hostess at two restaurants in Shelby, Mich., says she works 60 hours a week and her husband 40 hours, not just to pay off $50,000 in credit card and car debt but to save for their futures, too.

After their son was born early last year, "I had an epiphany," she says. "Wow, we're adults now; we're parents; we better get this together."
Neither her parents nor her husband's have saved enough for retirement, Holder says. "I don't want to end up like that."

Holder says that if she and her husband focused only on aggressively paying down what they owe, they could be debt-free in about three and a half years. But she didn't want to do that.
She knew they'd need a cushion to keep them afloat while they paid off their debts. "And if we're saving for those three years, the money is earning money, and by the time we retire, that adds up."

Holder set up savings accounts for a home down payment, an emergency fund, a holiday gift fund, a savings plan for their son and a vacation stash. She also opened a Roth individual retirement account and intends to save more in her company's 401(k) now that she is eligible.
Since joining the Savers, Holder says, she has paid off about $9,000 in debt and saved $2,000.
Sometimes she's discouraged that she hasn't saved more. But mainly she is amazed by the way saving has changed their lives.

Before, Holder says, she and her husband would have put many expenses on a credit card. "Now, if we need new tires, we discuss how we're going to approach it: 'OK, if we put away $20 a week, we can get them by the end of summer,' " she says.

"Instead of owing more, we can just save for it."

The secrets of savers According to Garver, about 60 women have joined the Savers since January, and altogether they have saved $200,000 and counting.

As with the Women in Red Racers, who are "racing" to pay down their debts, the Savers say community support is a big reason they keep saving.

Amanda Bellamy, an avid saver who works for the city of Mission Viejo, Calif., says she had never told anyone about all of her savings strategies and goals. "It's not the kind of thing you talk about."

The Savers do. But it's not just a cheerleading squad. Savers inspire each other by swapping all sorts of tricks and tips:

1) Divide and conquer. Many Savers swear by the power of multiple savings accounts. When funds are earmarked for, say, house repairs, you're less likely to tap them for your cell-phone bill, Garver says.

2) Let yourself "find" money. Garver says that one big surprise for women when they join the group is that "there's a lot of 'found money' out there -- money that would otherwise trickle away," she says, referring to the bits of cash that float through our lives (a refund from the telephone company, for example, or $10 you find at the bottom of your purse).
Rather than ignore a mini-windfall, she says, "Now they're excited to hang on to it."

3) Do what works. In the six months she has been monitoring the group, Garver says, she has seen people employ many different successful saving methods. There's no "right" way, she emphasizes. Some strategies:

- Set aside a fixed amount or percentage each week or each month.
- Start with a goal of saving $2,000, for example, and break that down to an amount you can manage each month.
- Save only the extras: refunds, overtime pay, interest earned, gift money, bonuses.
- Some Savers try to live on one biweekly paycheck and save all or most of the next one.

4) Don't succumb to savings blues. The trouble with saving, Garver says, is that most of the time you end up spending the savings on a designated goal. "A lot of people go through some disappointment when they see that money go," she says. "It can be a downer."

To stay on track, Garver advises, it's important to acknowledge that the money you spent was spent wisely -- and then to keep on saving.

5) Play games. The Savers I talked to emphasized that saving, especially in a group, can and should be fun.

Bellamy puts aside $5 every time her boyfriend does something sweet, such as taking her out to dinner.

My husband and I save all our $5 bills. That's our mad money.

Holder separates her spare change in different buckets, to make it easier to roll. "I think I have $100 that we can put toward our house fund."

Bellamy gets 26 paychecks a year but has learned to live on two per month, so the "extra" two checks each year go toward her car loan or other goals. Thus far, she has paid down a $13,500 loan to just $1,500. "It will be paid off in August," she says.

And last but not least:
6) Put your money on automatic pilot. The oldest new trick in this high-tech era is still one that most Savers swear by (including yours truly): Use automatic transfers to save.
That's because, as we all know, money left in your checking account is magnetically drawn to the inside of your wallet. Put it out of immediate reach.

Holder has peace of mind in the present, and she looks forward to the future: buying a home, sending their son to college and one day retiring in comfort. "You have to be able to live life," she says.