Weird vs Romantic

Yesterday one of my coworker told other workers including me about his love life, I won't get into the detail here because it's somebody else's life. But his story made me told them about ams and I, how I ask what ams want before I bought something for his birthday present and how I told him what I want before he asked me :P. Also how we buy things, if he wants to buy expensive thing then he must make me buy another expensive thing for myself first before I let him.

My coworker said, "you, weird couple". Ho ho... are we? Maybe we are, but some of my friends thought that we are romantic, in a weird way maybe.. ha ha.

Like one afternoon... while i was still working at steel pipe factory, I told Patrick via Yahoo! Messenger about how lonely and bored I am without weird people around me. Patrik was one of the weird people :P. And I said, "even my husband become less weird now :((".

And the night came, I've already asked ams to pick me up but he made me wait and I had empty stomach. Waiting itself can turn up the angry srilas, so can the hunger. Waiting + hunger = furious srilas.

So, when ams finally arrived, I was no longer a nice wife, I became a sharp-tongued witch.. "what took you so long? You know how long I've been waiting? Where've you been? I'm really hungry! bla bla bla bla bla bla bla. I want to eat now!!!" And the cool husband said, "Where do you want to eat?" -- "I am hungry.. I cannot think anymore!! You should know that!!" -- "...". At the first intersection he asked, "left or right?"(Left=home, right=the city) No answer, because I was also too hungry to say something :P. And apparently he grew tired of my attitude. He too no longer said anything along the way. He hope when we passed by an eating place that I like I told him to stop. But, again, I was too hungry to say something, and he was too tired to ask me. And we just went and went until we crossed over Cilegon border. The road became narrower and darker but he didn't stop the motorcycle. I knew he was tired. He moved his shoulder up and down several times. I was so afraid that he would loose his control over the vehicle... he drove it slower and slower so it became unstable and sometimes it ran over the gravel for a while before it came back to the road. But I was so angry I couldn't say anything to stop him, I thought, "if you want to make me afraid, bring it on!!" instead.

And we reached Serang but suddenly he turned around the vehicle, hu hu I really thanked God when he did that, I didn't want to eat anymore. I was so cold and tired, I just want to sleep peacefully. But he was no longer cool husband, he was crazy. Contrary to how he drove the vehicle before, he made it ran so fast now. Really really fast. I was so afraid, and so cold but my mind was busy thinking what it was all about and I thought things that could make him stop. So, when we reached the city again suddenly I took his helmet off, hihihi. Oh I won!!! He stopped because there're so many officers along Cilegon main road.

I asked him, "What do you want?"

"Nothing", he said.

... ... ...

I said, "I won't give it back to you if you don't tell me something"

"Okay."

... ... ...

Thing is, he stopped near a sleeping mad man. Later he told me he did that on purpose because he knew I am afraid of them. The mad man made me nervous. I want to get out of that place right away, so I said,

"If you don't say anything, I'll just go home by angkot and I will bring these helmets."

"Okay"

So, I went home alone, bringing two helmets ha ha. Later he told me he must go back near Cilegon border to buy another helmet first before he came back to the city.

What a night!!! I reached home at 8.30, so cold and trembled. But thank God I was tired, so I could sleep easily. Ams didn't return home until early in the morning. When I went to work he was still sleeping.

So, when I went online and saw Patrick was online too, I sent a message for him, "my husband is not weird anymore... he's getting crazy."--"Why?" he replied and I told him everything. Funny, in the end he said, "oh..that kind of romantic..."

Ho ho, what Patrick said kind of reminded me why I love ams, because he is ams he he, who's so different from any other men. So I called ams and told him, "sorry..." and he said, "me too". Then our life back to a normal and simple life. You tell me, are we weird? or romantic?

Piyo vs Miyo

My mother called me, "bla bla, take care of yourself and the... bla bla, if you want something go for it... bla bla, I told mas Raul to give you whatever you want and he said okay..." Aha! I called ams right away, and I said, "Why don't you tell me your promise to my mother?" - "E he he he.." - "bla bla bla... remember your promise to my mother, okay? bla bla bla... remember your promise to my mother, okay? bla bla bla... just remember it!"

Hu hu hu.... actually I don't want any strange or rare things. I only want to see ams as much as I want plus a pillow and hot water, just that.... hu hu. And if I said I want the red lion--he calls it singo edan--ams already knew it. And he bought me a red cat instead. It's okay ams... thank you :* But my mother told me not to play with the cat for a while.

Nice Guy vs Nice Buffalo

Heart is a mysterious thing. What inside the heart can change so easily. You hate someone so much and at a moment your heart flip over itself and you're in love. This is what happened to me yesterday. Aheeem... Did I fall in love?

Every evening, on my way home, I have to do something so dangerous... crossing the street. Laugh as hard as you can, but it is a very creepy one >:P. It's a fine and wide street (8 lines). A perfect street to drive through with full speed. It's busy all the time, especially on after-office hour. That's the time when I have to cross it over.

And yesterday when I timidly stepped back and forth at the side of the street, waited for a pretty clear and save path for me to walk through, there came a guy at my right side. He was gonna cross the street too. And when he did it, I was so amazed, he did it confidently, gracefully, no stepping back. So, he made thing easier for me because I could walk along with him safely. And we got into the middle of the street successfully. And we turned our sight from right to left, where the vehicles came from. And suddenly the guy walked behind me and stood at my left. Woa, at that very moment I felt something warm in my heart. How nice! So, he'd set a safe path for ME again? Yes, he did.

Did I fall in love? Too bad, this story is not that fabulous a.k.a ridiculous. All I want to tell here is that how a very simple gesture can touch my heart. I'm not falling in love but I hope to meet him again, every evening. I hope he'll always be there when I need him, to help me crossing the street ha95x.

Talking about crossing the street... back then when I was in Cilegon... if I had to come home late at night... ams and I must watch the street ahead carefully because sometimes there's a herd of buffalo lazily crossing the street of krakatau industrial estate. Their grey color, matched with the color of the night, can trick our eyes. I don't want the same accident happened to me. The accident that happened long long time ago... me and my father, on a motorcycle, we crashed a big buffalo that was crossing the street at dawn time. You may think that was funny, but it was not. I fell down so hard. It hurt both my stomach and my pride. And the buffalo just ran away.

Surprise!!!

I got a message at my cellphone from Aswin, my ex coworker at the previous company that I worked for, "Why don't you reply my message at YM? They placed me at CM 1, no internet there you know!!!" (=He went online with struggle)
Ha ha, another victim of the proxy that make me looked online after I already sign out and exit from YM.

I said sorry, bla bla bla, and then he told me, "You got annual bonus, if you don't want it, I'll also take yours for myself ha ha!" What? Bonus? What a surprise. Let alone its amount, the fact that they still remember me kind of touch me, hu hu.

It reminds me of a similar situation, it was when Sofi, a finance staff of my other previous company called me two months after I resigned, "Are you keeping your old BCA account?" - "Yes, why?" - "We're gonna transfer Rp xxx into your account. It's the reward for your article." Ho ho, what a surprise... though arose a wicked thought: "that article I wrote at the stone age?" hu hu hu, sorry, I really95x appreciated that kok. Like my wise ams said against mbak Meja: It's not all about the money.

Two Questions

This posting is partly inspired by diBond's blog. In one of her posting, she wrote about questions that she hates the most, she likes the most, etc. These are the questions that I dislike the most:
1. Why are you moving from Cilegon and from KHI?
2. How long have you been married? Why don't you get pregnant or have a child?

Number 1, believe me it's a long story. I don't like to answer it because it'll only lead to another questions, or rather as judgements. Many people said, "too bad, KHI is such a big company, and it's better than other members of KS Group (read: higher salary)."
One said, "and you're gonna live separated from your husband? Ah, you're youngsters... you live your life without a plan." W..what? I'm not younger than you, we're graduated from high school in the same year! Ha ha! And furthermore, I made my decision of leaving KHI after 3 months of frowning forehead, disputes, and sometimes tears.
So, if you ask me question #1, now I tend to answer it shortly, "I don't feel comfortable working and living there." Yet, for this simple answer, one said, "ah you say it so easily!!"
Oh God, please let them know that in this world there's a thing called "tenggang rasa", consideration. Ha ha, please give them P-4 course again!

Number 2, that's not a long story. But I'm tired of that question. I'll simply smile, and when they force me more to answer it, I'll only say, "Please, pray for us."
For some people, that short answer is as useless as the long one. They'll still give comments like,
"don't prevent your pregnancy!" - We don't, I've already told you that.
"Having a child is cool! Like me, I want many children." - He he, get married first please.
"I tell you, you're not doing enough 'efforts'..." - Ow you're saying that having children equal to good in bed? Well, congratulation then. But I don't want to hear any of your "bed stories".

I wish everybody was just like my mom. Concerning to that questions, she's the most wise person. Despite the fact that she's the happiest person to know that I was working for a BUMN... when I told her that I was moving, she said, "Oh, wherever you live, wherever you work... it's OK, as long as you're happy." And I know she'll be the happiest person to have a grandchild from me but she doesn't ask me, "are you already pregnant?" cause she thinks it'll hurt my feeling. Actually, I'm just bored to that question :P and yes, some comments do hurt me.

How To Delete Your Friend on Friendster?

Finding how to do that was not an easy thing for me. First, I tried to figure it out by myself, using common user interface logic. I failed. Then I searched it on Google, found this. But I couldn't find the OBJECT delete!
Hmm, I wonder if friendster do this on purpose. Make it so hard to do, because naturally someone doesn't just delete a friend.

Finally I got the way by searching friendster's FAQ, and how is it?
1. Open your personal profile
2. Click Edit Friends, the application will show your friend list
3. Find the person that you want to delete, then click X button on top right of the person summary box (with pic, send message link, and last login info).
4. Click Yes for the confirmation.

Gosh, I've never seen that X button before 8-}.

Nodame Cantabile

I was crying watching this dorama. The music is so touching... I know nothing about classical music, but it's so beautiful.
So, everytime Nodame cried because of the music, I cried too.

KaSaCiMa

So today, I'm listening to this song... KaSaCiMa. Ha95x.
KAsihku SAyangku CIntaku MAnisku.
It'll make us easier to call each other, sacima sacima...

A positive song for us, AMSku.


Happy Anniversary.

How Lucky I Am, How Stupid I Am

I have a friend, let's just call him MAS. Don't get puzzled. MAS is not AMS though they share a character: being SMART MOUTH.
Yesterday afternoon at my office, in the middle of the quietness of working and drowsy situation suddenly my coworker shrieked, "Awwww what does MAS mean, telling things like this!!??!"
"Hee... what things?" I said. He pointed his finger to his computer screen. A chat window. Aha! His wife told him whatMAS said to her before, "X was doing really really well for choosing you as his wife." X here is my coworker.
Wahahaha... Then I sent an instant message to MAS, told him that I knew what he said to X's wife. He just laughed. And I asked him, "why you never said to me so... Why you never told me that ams did the right thing for choosing me as his wife?"
He laughed and laughed and said, "well, in your case... I should say you're doing the right thing for choosing m raul as your husband." What??? x(
Well, actually I do think so. MAS was perfectly right. But why oh why he did not kindly say it the opposite way, that I am such a blessing for ams? Just to make me happy? Ha ha, if he said so, I certainly would laugh... not because I was happy but because I'd think that he was ridiculous.

And let me tell you what ams thinks about whether we choose the right partner for the rest of our life.
When I do something stupid, when I make mistake, I'll say, "Haa how stupid I am." And when ams is around, he'll say, "yaaa you're so stupid, indeed." Oh, I won't be mad at him because I know after that he'll say, "you're so stupid for choosing me as your husband." And he know that I'll say, "silly, of course I chose you... you're the smartest man I've ever met in my life." The conversation already become our ritual. Now, don't vomit please.

Poor Ams

Poor poor ams... left by his uncaring spouse, must live alone in the deserted dusty city. Stay at home alone. Do all the household activities by himself. Cleaning, laundering, cooking (instant noodle only)... and also keeping things safe from mice attack.

Last night he said he must attend an important meeting with some ministry officials. Hurriedly I said, "don't be too lazy not ironing your clothes!!" Haa! I know exactly he doesn't like that activity and he doesn't mind wearing wrinkled clothes. He just laughed, right away I was sure he won't iron his clothes.

Today I got a short message from him. "So embarassed, eat at Sari Kuring and I got a hole at my toe" Ha ha ha ha.

If only I was there, live with him... :(( But what's the point? He'll still wear the same sock!! Ha ha... I won't care about what sock he wears :D:D:D.
Yes I am, I'm an uncaring wife.

First Post

This is the first post I submit from my new place.
I hope everything is gonna be better.

Last Posting

This is the last posting I submit from my current office. Because next week, I'm not gonna be here anymore.
Oh, good bye all.
I'm sorry.
Thank you.

No regret, no more anger.
Let me walk away from here with a wide smile.

Incubus on The South Pearl

Last weekend, ams and I went to Temanggung, Jogja and Bandung. I am not going to tell every detail of that trip here, I'll just tell the part while we moved on from Jogja to Bandung. We took a train called Mutiara Selatan (The South Pearl), business class :|. It was the end of a long weekend, other -better- train is fully booked :(. The South Pearl is a night train, departed from Jogja at 22.10.

Inside the train, it was like hell, everybody was smoking :((. Not everybody, but so many many MEN were smoking in the train. The root of the problem was a group of teenagers. There were so annoying. They played their 'kind of music' from a cellphone, loudly. You know how a cellphone speaker producing sound? Not good!!! And some of the song are hard-core kind. They also talked loudly, laughed loudly, and of course they smoked too.
That made everybody else on the train couldn't sleep. The women could do nothing but frown, but the men smoked to chase away the annoyance.

I am a woman, I frowned and I talked, almost yelled, to ams, "how can I sleep with all this smoke!!" Ams a man but he didn't dare to smoke, ha ha, not in front of a calm srilas or an angry srilas. He only could give a wry face, a wry smile. I started blaming ams for choosing this train and for having this plan, went to Bandung first before we went back to Cilegon. But that didn't solved the problem. All I could do was calming myself down.

To be honest, some of their music were familiar to me, some were my favorite. Like this song, Incubus' I Miss You. While they were playing that song, I even sang it along.... in my heart, :D. Sang it loudly would only encourage them >:P. Suddenly one of them asked with Sundanese language and thick Sundanese dialect, "lagu naon ieu?" ("what song is it?"). And there came the answer, "incubus... incubus..." Ha ha ha ha, I couldn't stop laughing. They spelled cu in incubus like choo in choose. Ams laughed too, he said, "they think they're the coolest people in the world, turn out they're only some ignorant ones."

Thanks to that laugh, I could sleep after that :).

More About Cat

First time I came to the factory, there was something that tickled my mind: cats inside the factory. Seems that nobody cares seeing cats running around the coils and the machines when I think that they are creepy things I don't want to get near them at all :D. Or maybe some factory staffs have already tried to chase them away but they were getting tired because the cats keep coming back, oh cat... oh cat!
I talked about this cat phenomenon to my friends. I said, "no wonder people say cat has seven souls. I mean, they don't wear safety shoes, helmet, or this thick and heavy clothes, arrrgh....! And what are they looking for here? Foot? Are they gonna eat steel and flux?"

But this morning.... Oh I don't know how am I supposed to feel... but I really want to tell the cat, "I told you!!!" Hwa hwa, okay okay.. I should feel sorry for the cat.... One of its feet is limp. Poor poor cat, it maybe struck by a piece of steel. From what I saw, I'm sure the limp foot has no bones anymore :((. But why is it still running around the coils? How can I tell the cat that it's a very dangerous place? Oh, I wish I knew cat language :|.

The Origins of Genius (Darwinian Perspectives on Creativity)

(Special Name for Dearest One, episode 2)

No no no, it's not about this book although I want to have the (e-)book. What I want to tell you here is about how I call ams and how the calling evolves into some silly ones. Evolve - evolution - Darwin - Darwinian Perspectives - The Origins of Genius, see? I hope it explains the way I think, how I relate one word into another, oh how I love association. In fact I'm ridiculously genius at that kind of thing >:).

ams, that's how I call my husband in our daily conversation. It evolves from the word xxx. The clue is I also like to scramble characters/syllables in a word, sadly I say, ams do this much better than me :((. He invented sophisticated words like senaparan, sorry I forget what else :(.

Back to the evolution of call:
Sometimes I also call him kamu.
ams + kamu became kams.
kams became kam.
Someday, when I was mad at him, I added some characters into kam. It became kamPT (read: kampete), an abbreviation from an ugly word :(. Soon I regretted it, so I turned it into a much funnier word: kamtempe hi95x.
The most recent call for him now is kam kun, came from Sakaki kun of My Boss My Hero.

It's not just him that I call with weird calls. Usually I do this to persons that so close to me, like my sisters, my nephew. Sure, only special persons who deserve such creativity of mine. So if I start calling you with weird or even embarrassing calls, be proud of it, because it's a sign that I put you in a special place of my heart :*.

Lazy Weekend

Saturday is not a weekend for ams. Even Sunday sometimes becomes his workday too. But after working for 24 hours, no break, ams had no spirit left. Although his big big boss, Mr. Fkmr, called him several times, he let his phone rang and rang until it stopped, without any intention to pick it up. So, this weekend ams had a lazy weekend. As for me, it's always a lazy weekend he95x.

We watched our newest dvd collection, My Boss My Hero, My Name is Kim Sam Soon, Curse of The Golden Flower, The Devil Wears Prada, The Prestige, Dead Man Chest. Argh, he made me watch Dead Man Chest for the third time :((.

Let me tell you Fact#1, if he likes a film then he won't mind watch it over and over again. First at a theater, then later when he happens to know that other theater still show the same film, he'll ask me to watch it again with him. Then when I go buy some dvds, he'll ask me to buy the dvd version of that same film. Then if he knows that a TV channel is going to show the film, he'll make sure I'm willing to remind him about the show time, because he's too forgetful :P. He does this until he remembers the scene sequence of that film.
Like one night, he accidentally found out that a tv channel show Rambo X, I don't remember which one :P. Of course he watched it then and of course I complained x(. But he persuaded me to watch it by telling me what happen next to the currently shown scene. Yet, I kept scorning the film... and him :P. Until the time when he acted so confident, I almost believed him.
"This one... this one! It's very interesting after this one!"
"Really? So, what will happen?"
"Just watch... It's really unpredictable you know!"
* current scene was Rambo attacking his enemies after his lover is killed, I was waiting, so curious *
"It's time!!!"
* Rambo, covered with mud-standing quietly-blinking eyes, suddenly attacked one of his enemy who walked pass him. I almost cried in despair, so touched by his camouflage technique, :(( :(( *
Even now, I still want to cry just recalling the scene.

Back to the dvds, My Boss My Hero serial is very funny, soon it became ams' favorite. Fact #2, if he likes a serial then he'll watch its episodes one after the other until its finale episode, of course in the dvd or downloaded version, not the TV show version. His reason is if he doesn't watch it sequentially without a break, he'll forget the story. Hwek, bad reason from a person who remember the scenes of Rambo X >:P.
So different with me, even though I like a serial very much, but I’ll get bored if I watch it without a break. My strategy was… agreed to watch several episodes of the serial, but when the time to change the dvd came, I changed it with other serial or film. If he complained I said, “don’t be greedy, I’ve let you watch 3 episodes of it.” Problem was, he’d mock the film, no matter how good it is. When he was tired doing it, he’d sleep. Worst, he’d go and say, “I’d rather go to my office and work overtime than have to watch it.” :(( :((.

Okay, two facts are enough for this time. Btw, The Prestige is good, you must watch it. Time to open Wikipedia and find out about Mr. Tesla now….

Dementor

What do you call someone who suck out all positive things from you, your happiness, hope, dream in each of his presence... Every time he's around you, you'll feel nothing but numb....
A Dementor?

So, what my patronus will be? Ams said, it must be in a form of wild grass, hooo, ilalang?
I think the best form of my patronus is... myself :|.

How to set a background in my Excel spreadsheet and Word document?

That's a question from ams. I gave him a short tutorial using Office 2007. I'm publishing it here as a starter post, hoping in the future I can post useful things for others :P. Sorry, it's a very simple tutorial on a very simple subject :P. Hey... at least it's useful for ams.

MS Word 07
1. Get ready with your document, either you create a new file or open an existing file.
2. Click Insert tab.
3. Click Picture button, the one with a picture of two mountains and a sun... a very familiar picture, yeah? We should sue Microsoft for using our childhood drawing without our permission.
4. Here comes an open-file-dialog. Browse and select an image file that you like as a background of your document.
5. Now, you have the picture in your page. Next thing you need to do is set its Text Wrapping property. You can do this by doing right-click on the picture and clicking Text Wrapping menu or you can simply click Text Wrapping button inside Arrange button group. Then choose Behind Text option.
6. You can add the text you want ON the picture. If you think that the picture is too dominant as a background, you can recolor the picture. All you need to do is right click on the picture, select Format Picture. After Format Picture dialog box is showing, select Picture menu at the left panel, click the button next to Recolor text, click a less apparent cloud-picture-button, and then click Close. If you still don't like it, set the transparency of your pic with your image editor before you insert it into your document.

MS Excel 2007
1. Get ready with your spreadsheet.
2. Click Page Layout tab.
3. Click Background button. Yeah, I know I know, we're gonna sue them for sure.
4. Browse and select the pic you want in the open-file-dialog, then click Insert.
et voila, your background is ready. Btw, don't use the Picture button inside Insert tab because there's no Text Wrapping property in Excel. Don't worry, Background button also use the same two-mountains-and-sun scenery that we love so much.

Cat Spirit

Let it haunt all of you.....>:)
I love the color, though the dead cat we found at our backyard is white :P. I don't know what color is the one slaughtered by the demon dog.

Related stories:
Mysterious Dog
Dear Neighbors,

All The King's Men

It almost be a great movie, but there's something missing, I couldn't figure it out... It's maybe the ending. Why did he shoot him? No strong background, not strong enough. So let me blame it on the bad script. And let me give the praise for Mr Sean Penn, a great actor indeed. I almost fell asleep watching the film and Willie Stark's oration kept my eyes wide open. Stark's smirk, Stark's eyes, Stark's walk, Stark's ... Stark's ..., all about Stark. Only the gestures of his hands that disturbed me. I couldn't help imitating it.

How about Mr Jude Law? I'm really sorry to say, his acting here is kinda plain :((. Sorry... :((. Still, I love his voice when he give the narration. I can capture the emptiness there, the sadness, the nothingness.

It could be a great movie, really...

Mysterious Dog

Sunday morning, while ams and I were working at our backyard I heard some women screamed. "Look! Look! The dog eat a cat."

... 5 minutes earlier.
"Uff! uff!" *a dog, barking*
"Ams... your friend's calling you" *me, smirking*
"Meow! meow!" *a cat, meowing*
"They must be fighting, hihi, it must be funny, oh oh reminds me of cat-and-dog" *me, thinking*
I looked over my fence and I saw a white-light brown dog. I don't like dog but I thought that time, "hmm, pretty cute dog". The owner must've just brought it here for I've never seen it before.

... back to the screaming.
Oh, terrible terrible... I wanted to see the horrible sight but I din't have a heart to :((.
A woman said, "The cat is already dead before the dog eat it. I'm sure of it". I wanted to yell, "No!!!!!!!! I heard its meow before. I didn't think that was a scream for a help, an SOS signal. Huuu, wished I know cat language or dog language". Poor poor cat, I'm sorry I didn't save you at the first place. Oh the spirit of mother cat, you won't be lonely anymore, here comes a new spirit of cat :((. Readers, read this post to know who mother cat is.

And who is the owner of the dog? Why didn't you show up? How awful! I bet you hide inside your house, grinning and thought, "let the dog take care of its problem."
Mind you, it's just an animal! Eating a cat is its instinct. It's you who supposed to give it a collar, not let it out until you're sure it won't bite people and their pet.

... the night after.
I heard howl of a dog, so near, and other dog, rather far. One after another. In my drowsiness I was convinced the one I heard very near was not a dog, but a wolf. And it ran in front of our house. Suddenly it became so quiet, horribly quiet. I was so afraid, hu hu. I had a feeling that this time I was the cat, I was its victim. Hu hu... I woke up and made sure ams was by my side. My foot seek his and touched its skin. I always do it in my childhood, when I was awake in the middle of the night and I was scared, I would sleep next to one of my sisters and made sure I touched their skin, even it was just my foot thumb that touched their skin :P. By doing that, I won't feel lonely anymore. I will feel secured.
Well, when I was sure that the dog has already ran into another area I felt relieved. Strangely, the quietness ended, in fact, it became unordinarily noisy with the sound of frogs and crickets and other night creatures, as if they're celebrating the moment that the demon has already gone.

Should I Quit My Job?

Hi95, I'm a coward... I hide the explanation of level 69%. It's 4 points higher than Joey's but it's basically in the same level ;)).

Your Job Dissatisfaction Level is 69%

Your job is a total bummer, and probably the worst job you've ever had. Your co-workers stink. Your boss is a jerk. And your company is probably in trouble. Think about finding a new job quickly, even if it's just a not-so-great transition job. You've got to get out of there as quickly as you can!

Should You Quit Your Job?

NH Dini's La Grande Borne

It's the latest episode of "Cerita/Serial Kenangan" of NH Dini, firstly published at the beginning of this year. It tells us the dark episode of Dini's life. She almost lost her spirit of life after she got a bad news about her lover, "the captain". Her misery brought some illness to her body. The health treatment and also the pain in her heart made her almost neglect Lintang and Padang who, meanwhile, were growing into self-reliant children.

I admire the way Lintang and Padang were brought up. Padang went to Trans-en-Provence from Paris by himself when he was only six years old! Of course his mom escorted him to the train and somebody was waiting on him at the destination station. But still, it's very young :P.

Now I'm waiting for the next book in this series. Lintang and Padang have become my favorite. Emm, I'm really sorry, Bu Dini... it's not that the story of your own life is not interesting for me anymore but would you put some more stories about them in your next book, please :">.
Bu Dini, I hope you stay healthy and continue telling us the beautiful story of your life.

Sayangku-Cintaku-Manisku (My Darling-My Love-My Honey)

(Special Name for Dearest One, episode 1)

That is one of some special calls we use in our relationship. Again, I remind you, Ams and I is not a romantic couple. We use the words as a teasing. But after for a while, it will be irritating only when ams use it in front of other people. As far as I can remember, it happened twice. Once, in front of his colleagues. The second, in front of his mom.
The one with his colleagues made one of them blushed, the others pretended that they didn't hear it. And I just scowled, imagining they said to themselves, "jadi pengin malu."

The second made his mom laughed and said to me, "Nggilani yo". O yeah mom, your son is definitely silly and ridiculous. I only gave a wry smile. Possibly his mom said to herself, "jadi pengin malu", :((.
And I, I never have enough courage to use that call in front of others.
Now, I will tell you where that call came from. It started when srilas watched Fenomena. It's a TV show. Mostly about sex-related lifestyle, like prostitution, triple-x massage, gigolos, and similar stuffs... Sometimes they had an informant in their studio, had the informant spoken out the stories of his/her dark world. Usually they set the light very very low so the audience cannot see the face clearly, and they edit the informant's pitch, make it lower or higher, make it sounds either like the chipmunks or patrick star :*.
But the one srilas watched that time was an on-the-road edition. With hidden cameras, their crews went to a street with a lot of hookers on its side. They slow down their car and the hookers started approaching them. One of the hookers said, "why don't you drop in... c'mon, sayangku-cintaku-manisku...." Ha95x srilas thought it was very funny, the way the hooker seduced the crew.... One love-expression word was not enough, she used three expressions at once. She even used the word "ku"(="my")... my oh my! And the way she recited it... as if they're one single word. Ha95x.
She told her husband about it later, and he also thought the same way. Unfortunately, it gave him an idea! After laughing for a while, he called srilas with that funny words. Hu hu hu, of course she got mad. But if you know srilas' husband.... You'll know that the more annoyed srilas get the more excited he is, so he do it again and again and again...

Oh somebody, help me.

Dear neighbors,

It's true that we don't stay at home so much. It's true that we're such a bad neighbor, we don't give enough effort to mingle with you. Looks like we love the companies too much 'til you can't meet us in the daylight. "But where are you on Saturday and Monday?", some of you ever asked me that question and I already told you, :"> I'm sleeping while ams's working. Hi95x.
We're sorry for being so anti-social. Still, that doesn't mean that you have to be so mean to us... Hu hu hu.

That banana tree grew in your backyard but the leaves and the fruits are over our backyard. It was no problem with us to clean up its drying leaves that turned into a monster at night, waving its hands and rustling when the wind blew, disguising a man inside its shadow, hiiiii... But we didn't have any intention to clean up the fruits as well. We were glad that you picked them. But why oh why did you leave the remains of your tree at our backyard? You think it's a garbage dump?

And we know that our fence is covered with ilalang. We've tried as best as we could to conquer the mighty ilalang but there hasn't been any significant result. We know it doesn't look nice. But why oh why you spoiled the view even more? Again, you think our fence-side is a garbage dump? Once, you leaved some coconut stalks there, and now you dump some dirt. WT*?

Now, for you... neighbors who don't have banana trees at your yard. It's fine for you to get some banana leaves from our backyard when you need to make lontong, arem-arem, pepes, etc, but please bring the stem along with the leave or else you should put the stem at some proper place, either our garbage dump or yours or other neighbors' if they don't mind.

And then, for you... who have childrens. We know we have some mural at our walls. Cute, ain't it? Po, Tingky-Wingky, Dipsy, Lala... they remind us of our joyful childhood. But, let us tell you here... our home is not a playground. Oh, don't blame us for having that mural. You know it's not us who painted it. Hey, don't get us wrong, we like children a lot, especially children who don't throw away some litters at our front yard.
Okay okay... your children can play there. Your chicken and cats can play there, eat there, and do anything animals do, although it's so noisy when the cats do that thing... What??!!? It's fighting! :P
For you who have the cats... Please do notice if one of your cat is missing. It's probably dead in our backyard :((. It's enough to use it as a playground, don't make it a resting place too. Oh, cat spirit... don't haunt us, don't you know that it is ams who bury you? We don't want to adopt your child as ours, so we leave your child outside, hoping somebody would take it, sorry... :((.

Last but not least, our frontyard is not a place for gossiping, especially about your own neighbor, more specifically about a neighbor who want to sleep peacefully in the weekend, a neighbor who owns the frontyard. What? Sure it's me!!

We're completely aware that this place is not ours, we only rent it. But we think, it won't hurt you if you give us a little more respect and privacy.

Thank you.

Special Name For Dearest One

Eeew, I almost vomit just writing that title... 'dearest one'? Huek... Who's that supposed to be? Of course ams :x.
Ams and I are not a romantic couple. We hate being romantic. We often make fun of each other by being romantic, err.. correction: by pretend to be romantic. We're giggling everytime we saw (what supposed to be) romantic scene in the movies, specially in all those sinetron, and together we say, "Jadi malu sendiri" (help me with the translation here, guys... :P).

This morning Joey asked me, "what is ams exactly? Is it an abbreviation from some words?" Ooo, not at all... I told Joey what 'ams' is, but I won't tell you here. If you're really want to know it, then ask me personally. Isn't it a big secret Joey? Hi95x.
Joey's question leads me to my old idea about writing a series (of blog posting) about special name we used in our relationship. But that's not starting today.
I'm writing this post just for the sake of Valentine day, 'dearest one' is soooo Valentine, right?

Pandeglang Trip and Kitchen Tragedy

Last weekend Ams and I roamed around Pandeglang by motorcycle. Our route was Cilegon – Serang – Pandeglang – Pari – Menes – Jipit - Labuan – Carita – Anyer – Cilegon; something like 200 km. Can you imagine how exhausted we were?

Too tired, I almost collapsed in our kitchen afterward. That night, we were too worn out to go buying some food but too hungry not to eat. There’re only one potato, three eggs, and cabbage in the fridge and inspired by the food we ate at alun-alun Pandeglang, siomay, I decided to made “siomay minus siomay” :P. I thought it was simple, just boiled all those stuffs and made the sauce. Turn out it was not that effortless because I made the peanut sauce from scratch. The heat, the hunger, the despair made me so weak, I yelled, “Ams!! I cannot take it anymore. Go wait for this potato’s done by yourself, I need to lay down.” He was doing a schedule that must be delivered immediately but he hustled going to the kitchen because he wouldn’t mess up with a hungry srilas. O yeah, she’ll be as sensitive as girls on their PMS.

He he, I made the food voluntarily at first but as my clothes became wet from my sweat and seeing ams stayed cool while doing something with the computer (I doubt he was doing the schedule, but I was wrong :P), I thought, “hu hu hu it’s so unfair… this sacrifice is just too much.” So I yelled again, “Oh, I won’t even eat it!!”
I was so sleepy at the same time. It was no longer my eating hour, 10 PM, and usually at 10 PM I tend to ignore the hunger and try to sleep instead. But as he started eating I crept out of the bedroom and said, “May I eat one egg, please?” Here I tell you the fact: need only one egg to tame the hungry srilas hi95x.

About the trip itself… there’s a mountain that caught my interest. It’s just a small mountain, or maybe it’s just a hill, a big one. The forest on its side is pretty thick. There’s no sign of people track, even though at its base there’re some villages with beautiful terraced rice field. I hardly believe there’s such place in Java. People cut down all the trees typically.
Is it a conservation area then? Does the rhino live there? Oh no no, it’s not Ujung Kulon :P, or some tigers maybe? Or is it a sacred place… a place where some spirits live… Uuuuu, uuuu… the mist that covered its top made it even scarier.

We brought nothing from the trip, although there were lot of manggis displayed along the way, together with some durian, petai, banana and cempedak. Durian at Cilegon was disappearing but we still could find it in a large quantity at Pandeglang.

- cold day, the sound of my empty mind -

Loser

It's overheard in New York:

Frat boy #1: Dude, when do you graduate?
Frat boy #2: Like, next year, man.
Frat boy #1: How long have you been in school, man? Like, five years, right?
Frat boy #2: Anyone that leaves college in less than five years is a loser. It's like someone who leaves the party at 10:30 -- things are just getting started!

He95x. I'm not a loser! Are you?

Btw, I really want to have that kind of blog... but overheard in Cilegon? It's just a small city and I'm not moving about so much here.
Okay, what about overheard in the office? Won't work too... Hi hi hi, there're only two person in the IT room, that's including me. Maybe I'll overhear lot of interesting stuffs if I do what my general manager suggested. One day he asked me, "Why are you always stay in your room? Don't you get bored?" ...grumble, grumble, grumble inside but big smile on my face. He told me then, "You should wander around the factory sometimes". Oh! He just doesn't know that I'm wandering at a bigger world than the factory, :P.
Actually I've ever tried to stay in the coating area, I was looking around and thinking, "What is this? I know nothing about this. Okay, I should ask someone". Then I asked my friend, "What is that (...black, greasy, dirty...) thing right there doing?". Not a word from his mouth, only a frown. He was looking at me as if I was a creature from outer space, not an intelligent one. So, next time I go there again and also to other areas in the factory, I'll make sure I already have a degree or certificate or whatever on mechanical thing, I'll only be a dummy otherwise :|.

Hmm, maybe I should create overheard at home, :D. It will contain the conversation between me and ams, me and myself, me and things he95x....... sounds interesting?

- clear afternoon, sound of the uncoiler -

FAQ

Why a new blog?

As I mentioned in my previous blog I want to have a blog with a layout I can play with. I’m a “tableless geek” wannabe 8-}.

Why do you decide to use the same blog service as the one you used a long time ago?

I take Joey's recommendation. In Joey we trust.

So, why don’t you just update your old blog?

I feel that my old blog is just like my worn-out clothes. I don’t want to throw them away from my closet, yet I don’t want to wear them anymore because… well, because they’re just too old.

Why srilas?

“Why do you use ‘i_lalang’ as your yahoo-id?” just before I created this blog a colleague of mine asked. I just smiled. Actually I’m kind of bored with that question. Years ago I might answer, “I don’t know… I just picked out the id from my friend’s suggestion”. The friend here is Hilda. Just about a week before I created a yahoo mail id, we, Hilda and I, went for a walk at some plain covered with ilalang. We thought it was beautiful… Well, I always think that spread of blooming ilalang is beautiful unless it’s in my own lawn :P. But I didn’t choose i_lalang because of that reason, simply have no other idea, that’s all.

Same thing here. Before I created this blog, I was chatting with Gary about an actor I like recently, Silas Weir Mitchell. He’s the actor who plays the role Haywire at Prison Break. I wondered if he’s a real wacko or he just acts really really good for that role. I read from imdb that he’s a smart and hilarious person so I think he must be a real good actor. Better than Wentworth Miller :P. Hi hi, come on girls, don’t be mad at me…

The name Silas is very familiar to us, Gary and me, because we liked to talk about the role Silas in Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Code. Gary has a big sympathy for him while I don’t :P. Apparently it bothered her so much…. she named me srilas then :|.

So, when blogger asked me what blog name I will use and after three attempts are failed… once the name srilas came across my mind I just typed it and I clicked continue… et voila… srilas.blogspot.com. Remember it, add it to your google reader, bookmark it, set it as the homepage of all your browsers, tattoo it on your skin--specially you... Wenworth Miller fans or Guy Pearce fans--, spell it three times a day, paint it on your walls, and… update your link to my blog…. wait, I don’t think there’s somebody out there willing to link their blog to mine hu hu hu. O yeah… only a couple of great persons do that ;) thank you….:P

Yeah, srilas.blogspot.com… be quite, I can read your mind! But no worry, I also think that that URL sounds ridiculous. Grrr… Gary!!! I swear I’ll mention your name a lot here and it will always with a nasty grin at my face every time I type your name.

Now that I’ve explained it to you, don’t you ever ask me why I choose srilas…. or i_lalang.

You said you want to play with the layout, so why do you still use a template?

That's a tough one... All I can say is... just wait and see. Although you probably must wait for a very long time :P.

Are you an English native speaker?

Certainly not... :P So, feel free to give some correction about my language :">.

- night, the sound of cricket and frog -