2 more sleeps to go..
til my graduation. again. (and no, not because I failed to graduate the first time hehe)

This time around I guess theres not as much excitement and anticipation as the first time, as there aint much difference, besides a wider band of colour on my hood (gold and blue).
No friends, no other family (besides nanna) and well .. just me and who ever else is graduating.
Although I think I'll end up spending as much as the first, with buying photos, plaques, framing et al a once in a degree-time opportunity.

This, of course, is an open-invite to stalkers friends who would like to come along and take some happy snaps *flash* with me on the day (just so I don't feel and look like such a nige hehe).

Oh, I guess time and day would help too.
2pm. Friday. At the oldest university in Australia.

*fingers crossed* that the weather ain't as bad as last time, with the weather right now going bonkers, just hope it ends up boiling hot(!) rather than storms.
and *fingers crossed* dad puts the film into the camera properly and the digicam doesnt stuff up.

Labels: uni

plantin a foot in the door
There ain't been much seriousness postings from me in a while, probably cos there hasn't been much to post about, so I've never bothered with any updates.

I've been looking for work for the past 20months or so (off and on during uni time) which may seem like a long time (and it is). Ever since I graduated from my Bachelor's end of 2001, right at the time of the internet crash, the bubble bursting, which didn't seem to be a good time to look for work. I initially managed to impress an employer with my skills during that time (early 2002), however never ended up getting it as he wanted someone with more commercial experience at that present time to work on projects they needed, so that meant I wasn't offered the role. Never fear, there would be plenty of other opportunities to come.

And come they did. Never to offer me any more than the first round interview. That goin on for about 6months, til I decided to enrol in my Master's degree, which I completed June this year. Not knowing what else to do at the time, doing the Masters degree seemed to be my only option (probably a little push and shove by my parents as well heh). Completing that, I don't know if it has helped. Still getting the same knockbacks as before, still hoping for a chance to come.

3 interviews last week (2 initial, 1 follow up) and all rejections. I've learnt never to get my hopes too high, as I once did, as it lessens the impact. I've learnt to deal with it all, easy come, easy go, nothing to worry about.

Til dad starts questioning you what is wrong.
Was doing the Master's the right choice?
Did you study the wrong subjects?
Is there something thats causing this to happen?
What other options are there for you to do? Study something else? when 10minutes before that hes telling me not to waste more money on study again (!)

He gave me that talk after I got rejected for a job last week. Ironically, he gave me that same talk 2 weeks before that when I told him I got a job interview for that same company, after being rejected by another one on that day.

I, as I always do, just sit there.. take it in .. and ignore it, not giving him the replies or just my typical I. don't. know.!
It's probably one of those asian parent worries, wanting to see the best for their child(ren). To succeed where they could not. To provide a better future for generations to come.

All these rejections stem from a catch 22.
Not enough experience
How is one, a fresh graduate, suppose to gain experience, when they don't give a chance to. ergh.


More news in a few hours hopefully.

[Update] (2hours later)
Call back from one of the telecommunication companies regarding a job I applied for a month and a half ago. One bad thing about applying to those big companies is that you dont know if you're still being considered for a position cos they take so bloody long to get through applications and reply to you (if you're lucky to get a reply that is!). Interview next week. Just hope theres not like another 3 rounds to do, cos .. that just sux even more.

Labels: job hunting, life, uni

YAY!
After waiting for soooo long, my exam results are finally out. I can't complain.. 2Ds 2 HDs after thinkin I'll stuff half of them up considering I did stuff one of them up having to do an exam and a quiz and screwing that. but yes, its all over now and I can graduate. yay!

Labels: uni

All Over Red Rover
Finished all my exams tonight. Yay! Probably could've done a bit better but I think I'll manage a pass, considering the last question was worth 50marks, half the exam.. so hmm yes wait and see. Damn Manning Bar was closed, we thought it would be open but first week of exams, guess they couldnt be bothered opening, so went to The Rose instead. We being myself, another guy in class and the lecturer hehe Good to have a good relationship with one of the lecturers and all, considering he knew who us 2 were, and wants to keep in contact heeh... ahhh now I can relax and enjoy myself for a lil while heeehe.

Gripe
Just a minor gripe. Blogger was down this morning/arvo (Australian EST) due to them upgrading the accounts to the new Blogger code dano. This was apparently 11AM PDT or something US time. Okay.. I know this might sound a little weird, but hello?! 11AM local time to perform maintenance? I know there was warning on the main page (not that I read it til it was during down time), but why perform maintenance in mid-morning when people would be using the system. Fair to say to take it down at night local time so it affects less local users, even though Blogger is any and all internationally, just doesn't seem to be good ideology to do it during the day. Anyhow thats my gripe.
Now I'm on the new blogger code dano, it looks weird. So much screen space. The title thingy is good for posts and having the archive name as months as well now isntead of jus the dates, so people dont have to write a javascript function to change it hehe but I'm too lazy to change that now.. oh well. If it's Wynns it works.

Labels: uni

3 Down...
1 to go. Well that was quick. Only two days ago it was the reverse and now I can hardly wait for tomorrow night's exam. Lucky last exam I'll ever have to experience (again) for university. I remember the first time round, during my undergraduate degree, after the final exam I was excited to leave uni and saying that I'll never have to do another exam again. Boy did I eat my words - a friend reminded me of what I said that day when I started this Masters degree hehe. Hopefully (being verrrrry optimistic here) it will be my last exam tomorrow and it will be time for some R&R. These past few exams haven't been as bad as I thought it would be but its easier to say how easier they were than expected in hindsight since I know what was in them, but now coming up for tomorrow I don't know what to expect. Pass is good, anything higher is better.

Currently blogging studying to:
Barber's Adagio For Strings - William Orbit
[Open Space Classic Chillout Album Disc 1]

Labels: uni

1 Down...
3 to go. Exam(s) tonight (last night) wasn't that bad, well not as bad as I thought it would be. I had a 30 short answer exam and a 20 short answer quiz. Thought I was goin to stuff up the exam and go well in the quiz, but it ended up being the other way around. Damn that duplicate question in the quiz as well, think I'll lose those marks there. I'm scraping for a pass in this subject's exams so hopefully that'll make me just make credit or higher upon scaling heehe.
Just spent rest of tonight finishing off the assignment due today but it aint properly done but it works if you don't input wrong data. Maybe fix it up later on if we're allowed to before we demo it.

Numbering thieves!
On Saturday, sis went out up north in Mosman. Parked her car somewhere and comes home. Next day we went out to pick my aforementioned uncle from the airport, whos come up for business meeting for a few days, and he notices when he puts his luggage in the boot that the number plates are missing. He only told us when we were driving back home to go yum cha. I had a look and indeed, the spot where the plate is spose to be was totally bare. Only the 2 screws that hold the plates up remained. We all figure it was from when sis went out on the weekend, some bastard(s) of a thief ripped the plates off and most likely using it for illegal activities (or just plain bored). Such a hassle to get everything fixed. Special (new) plates from the RTA, more $$ spent on replacing and for rego and for insurance and everything else. We dont even know if we'll be able to get our old plates back, have to wait and see. Hopefully. We've had our personalised number plates for over 15 years if I recall and our car looks weird with yellow plates. My Dad came home and kept saying he couldn't find the car and where he parked it, cos he only recognises the car by the number plate heehe. Yes its a bitch.

Labels: uni

I don't know why but I seem to be lacking the motivation to study. Well not no study, but study hard. It's like I'm having short study span just like short attention span. Study for a lil while and I'm off doing something else, maybe its the damn comp, but I need to use it to look up material so turning it off aint gonna help. gah. I know I should motivate myself more as I have all my exams in a row unlike previous years but I'm in the train of thought that it doesn't matter what I do I probably wont do as well as I shall. Added to the fact that me and my partner for the assignment due next week decided that we shall work on it a little a day to compensate for the study we will need to do but I don't know if thats gonna suffice considering its hard enough trying just to study and trying to work on an assignment as well, well that just throws things outta whack. Something or someone please motivate me! *waits*

Labels: uni

I must really start to study. I'm here an hour later not doing much. I have a knack for trying to get outta study. Was just cleaning my room and my desk for the past half hour or so and I'm here blogging again heh. At least now I have room to actually study at my desk without having to dig a hole in the midst of my junk.

Always nice to have a convo with a relo that you havn't seen or spoken to for a while. Uncle in Melbourne just rung, we talked about life .. study and the job market (what job market?) ... in English .. heehee hes a funny one that. We seem to start out in cantonese then suddenly its in English for some reason and its nice hearing the chinglish accent heehe. I hope the job market does pick up quick, its at least better than what it was when I first graduated last year. More opportunities, more jobs, more people. Now just a matter of time of when I get a job ... fingers crossed that I pass my exams.

Labels: uni

Joyous to the maximus. Finished all my assignments bar one, which I have to start, but I have nfi how to do, neither does my partner. We need to hand it in and also demo it to the lecturer after exams are over as well, so thats gonna be good fun.

Time passes so quickly nowadays, or maybe I'm jus getting older... or not. But really, this semester has flown by. Maybe because I've had so much work to do I havent had a chance to slow down and relax, besides the hour or two of catching up on 24 which I have not yet missed an episode. yay for me. Now I'm just sitting here waiting for time to pass when I should really start studying. 2 days per subject shall get me through hopefully.

Can't wait til its all over, gonna need a 24hour sleepathon. Anyone else up for one? :)

Labels: uni

I'm feeling lazy this morning since I only got up about an hour ago and waiting for brunch to arrive so I'm blogging about nothing. Nothing really. Not much at all. (If you stop reading from this point onwards :)

I've half assed completed part of an assignment (coding in C++ is so much fun!) now I gotta write a report about it. Then to continue my other one and hopefully get that done on time and prepare for the demo. I was suppose to have an 'online meeting' yesterday, ie chat via ICQ, with a friend for this project we are suppose to do thats due during exam week, but he wasn't on and I have no other means of contacting him.. so I guess I'll wait til I see him next. We should really get started on it but I just dont seem to have the time to do any more work. Think I'm gonna burn out these next few weeks. I've always been the one to say that I don't stress out. What is stress really? Too much worrying, tension, pressure, grittiness? I always take the 'no worries' approach (but I figure quite a lot of people do too) to things, if I can't do it now, do it later. Worrying about it more ain't gonna help. But I think I'm starting to worry about these exams and if I got the time to study for it all. You get out of it what you put in, and I don't think I'll be putting much in from the looks of it so we'll see what eventuates. Ah think about it all when I actually do start studying. No worries mate.

Yesterday my dad told me to grow my hair back to what it was before, as when I look for jobs and have interviews it might give a bad impression with what I got now. I don't know if that would be the case. Employers arent suppose to discriminate. Well not against race, religion, sex and few other things. But hairstyle? hmm. short (long) spiky (bushy in the morning) hair.. now what's wrong with that. I only got this hair do cos the hairdresser I've been with for the past hmm 7 - 8 years got tired of cutting it the way I've had it before (a "blend" cut, like "step" but blended so there is no defining line between the top and bottom parts of the hair, if you know what I mean) and asked me to go for something new. He actually asked me that a few times before that, but those times I've said no, cos I didn't want the change or I had an interview lined up and didn't wanna look too outta place heeh but now, I really dont care as much. One bad thing about my haircut at the moment.. is the price I gotta pay eevery time I get it cut. $15 every 2-3 months when it grows too long (like it is now hehe) whereas before I would only need to go every 4-5 months. Thats just too much to spend for having a cut (compared to female cut I guess its cheaper heh), but I cant be bothered goin anywhere else, since elsewhere they cut it crap (for me anyway :) *ponder* Good thing about having it long and leaving it long now is that its bloody cold in the morning and my ears are freezing and its keeping my head a bit warmer hehe I think I might be going to the snow as well in July, if something gets planned by then. Maybe I shall just grow it alll the way so I can stay warm mm snow. ski. tree. cant stop. *splAt*

I suppose I do want to get a job but the way I've been going lately doesn't seem to be happening any time soon. I've probably been too picky looking at jobs to apply for, but really, if I don't meet half the requirements stated on the job then I usually don't apply. That and also I should update my resume so I delete out quite a lot of useless stuff I've had for the past 5 years and maybe update my cover letter. Regurgitating the same one for a few years might be getting to them.

Labels: uni

Busy busy busy. Too bad it wasn't busy doing work. Well not the whole time anyway. When I should've started doing my assignment due this morning (Monday 9am) over the weekend, I got stuck into playing isketch and I think I got too addicted to it. I think I need to brush up on my drawing skills first heehee :) But I still managed to finish it (my assignment that is, not drawing heh :), albeit 6 hours later and 9 hours after I actually did any real work on it, so not too bad overall, although effort put into it was hardly much, I just needed the damn thing to work! Now another 3 more to go .. crappidy crap crap.
Jus hoping final exams wont be too hard, although from tonights subject .. the tutor said it took her a whole week to answer 40 sample exam questions.. of which usually the lecturer picks 20 out of .. so if I only have a one week stuvac, wif that exam on the first day, and 4 subjects to study for hmm i think i have about 2days to cover a weeks worth of work .. joy!
4 more weeks til I'm outta this mental institution. . i Hope .. or am i goin crazzzzy

Labels: uni

My draft examination timetable is out . .and it ain't looking good.
* Monday exam 6pm - 8:40pm
* Tuesday exam 6pm - 8:10pm
* Wednesday exam 6pm - 8:10pm
* Thursday exam 6pm - 8:10pm
arGH! All 4 subjects, all 4 exams in the very first week of exams. One thing good about it is that I get it over and done with quickly. Downside to that is I won't have time to prepare for it all. My exam study preparation is study for the last exam first and work my way back.. but with only 1 week of stuvac, and assignments due in stuvac and one assignment to hand in on the day of the exam .. it wont give me much time, and there aint time to start now with assignments due in 2,3,4 and 5 weeks time. I guess some will say that theres always time. . its a matter of how you manage it. . but I guess that's where I'm lacking at the moment. Time.
I was considering goin to Bic Runga in stuvac too hmm maybe not .. why does she always come during exam time.. gah

Labels: uni

Back.
Not that any of yous missed me or anything hehe
Might update this post later on ... first up .. gotta finish these assignments due 14 hours ago!

I will be back.

Update [8/5/03]
Back again. I decided it was time to update this entry cos I couldnt be bothered creating a new post so its just an update hehe
Sunny (as if!) tropical Queensland, well far north queensland in Cairns. Sun. Rain. Sun. Rain. Sun. Rain. you get my drift :) Surprisingly the first day we got there it was perfect weather .. too bad we got there late in the arvo so there wasnt much to do. We went to the Casino to kill some time.. Reef Hotel Casino it was, I didn't even know Cairns had one. But they got an International Airport there so I guess they must be pretty busy heh. First time I've ever played the pokies (yes we were that bored) and I won $14! woohoo. Only cos I doubled up when the bet was like 400credits. Mum called me a crazy stupid idiot or something along those lines for doing that heehee but honestly, I didn't even look at how much the bet was, I just hit double up ehaha Beginners luck? Maybe. hehe

Day2. Trip to Moores Reef. One of the Reefs of the Great Barrier Reef. Man was that a rough 2 hour ride. 25knot winds and after a big breakfast, stay well away. I managed to hold it in til near the end when one of the big waves hit the decks and it was outta there :c~~ I duno if it was just me, but the expectation of the Great Barrier Reef was something "great", but snorkelling the afternoon away it seemed like good ol' coral and tropical fish, nothing too exciting. Trying to help my mum snorkel was an effort and a half, she didn't dare venture away from the pontoon, she was having trouble trying to breathe using the snorkel, so she just sat there heahe

Day 3. The usual touristy sight seeing kinda thing. Went on the worlds longest gondola ride, the Skyrail, which goes for 7.4km. Nice tropical rainforest .. all these variety of flora and fauna, 500 year old pine tree, spiders, vines .. the lot. There was also a trip to the Wildlife Park, where there were koalas, kangaroos and crocs and whole lotta other wildlife. The guide mentioned that they have the worlds only suspected gay crocodile in captivity heehee. Over the years they've given him about a dozen or so female crocs to try and mate, and hes killed every one of them. Guess they just dont do it for him heehee. Take a look at it here, does it look gay to you? hehe :)

If you ever fly Virgin Blue, bring your own headsets. sif pay $2.50 for a Virgin Blue headset when using your own will work just as good hehe Luckily I brought my MD along so I could listen in. Although after an hour or so it repeats itself, so you know its time to change the channels. Also bring your own food n drinks. If you drink beer its gonna cost you $6!! even nuts cost $3 bux .. along wif the softdrinks. eesh. Keeping the air fare. We rip you off up there. That's their slogan! hehe

Think thats it .. probably more but i've forgotten most of it. . and the pics dont look too great either haha of me anyway :)

Labels: holiday, life, uni

Got a whopping 3 hours sleep this morning since I would be leaving for Qld in about 2 hours, goin to the airport in about 40minutes. Figured I'd post before hand since I got nothing else better to do. Cant bluddy submit my assignment cos the dumb uni web server is down. *.usyd.edu.au is fricken Unavailable sitewide. The University of Sydney Web Server is temporarily unavailable. We regret the inconvenience. Of course they regret it. They will be regretting it if I could go there and just rip the damn webserver outta the room and take it home so I can use it myself gah.

Time to pack my bags and get ready to go.

Peace. Out.

Labels: uni

98/100
woot. I think thats the highest mark I've gotten in an exam that I recall during my life at uni. As I mentioned previously I wasnt hoping for much but I guess I did better than expected. Losign the 2marks on one question. Exam's worth 20% of assessment so not too bad. But then when it gets converted its only like 19/20 .. which is like a lil quiz thing but hey think I did alrights .. now back onto more stressing things. Like 2 assignments due on Monday and I've only got til thursday to finish it all. Need to start the other one tomorrow or later tonight ....
WhY Thursday? Cos I'm going away on Friday til late Monday evening.. good ol family trip up to Cairns and Port Douglas to the Great Barrier Reef... I duno why it had to be in the middle of my semester and not in the break, but sis got forced to take some holidays and they planned to go on this trip. Had been brewin up for a few weeks, but since I got lazy in the holidays I didn't do any work. I'll be glad if I manage to get some sort of report going that gets me some marks.. *fingers crossed*
Me coming back on Monday also means I'll be home alone for an extra 3 days til the rest of em come home Thursday.. hmm now what can I do hMmMmm

Think I shall head off home .. finished tute work and cant do work here.. crap windows 98 piece of shite slowass comps!

Labels: uni

Had the ADS assignment on XML tonight .. didn't seem to be as bad as I thought it would. Although writing a whole heap of DTD and XML Schema made me get writers cramp, along with a brain cramp trying to think :) all in all ... i think i did okay .. hoping for around 75% at least hehe maintain that average so far.

So now since i've got extension for another assignment, I gotta start ecommerce .. designing GUI wif jsp n stuff i guess. so much fun!

Careers fair tomorrow .. gonna be getting more freeeebies heeheee time to catch up with people too hopefully.

Lets see what I can get :)

Labels: uni

w00t. i think i use w00t too much nowadays. must cut down on w00tage usage. yes. must.
anyhow, i think ive managed to finish me C++ assignment now too hehe wasnt tooo hard overall just a bit of thinkin with stats and how to calculate proper mode n median. yay. 2 down 2 to go aRGH! the worst 2.

still duno why the damn first archive link is like that. grrr.

Labels: uni

Managed to "complete" the first assignment .. on databases .. it works properly .. except for the form validation. bugger. duno how the damn XSP form val works so it wont properly do it .. damn complicated .. all this based on the MVC architecture .. making a simple 1 page html file into a 3 page xsp/xml file! and the lecturer decided to extend the due date til a week later .. so tha tmeans i got one assignment due each day. argh.

damn enetation gone down, so commentin links wont work. wonder what happend to them hmmm

might as well wish christine and shezza a happy birthday since it is their birthday today, but they wont b readin this .. but it's the though that counts :)

Labels: uni

Damn. I don't know why the first archive link on the right only goes for 1 week and not for the month i set it too. Probably from the original setting and it wont change back. Jus hope it wont lose my archives from mar16-30 blehh

On other notes, I got my first assignment for C++ to do. Due in 2 weeks along with 2 other assignments which I have yet to do. I dont know how im gonna plan this out . ARGH!

Labels: blogging, uni

Watched Daredevil yesterday. Another one of them Marvel comics turned into movies, was prettay goodo. Not because of Ben Affleck, but Jennifer Garner of course. MMmM :D I don't think that red spandex suit suited Ben Affleck .. not quite sure if he really fit the role of DD, but anyhow .. JG as Elektra .. what more could you want :) Now I can't wait til they bring back Alias..and the better. Knowing Ch7, they'll probably screw us around left right and centre before they do. Heard that they gonna be making an Elektra movie now with Jennifer Garner. If that's the case, I can't wait to see it .. probably be a while before that happens anyhow. Only one thing screwed up the movie, and it wasn't the movie itself. Some asshole decided to light up in the cinema and smoke! Friggin not once but twice. The first time, I could only smell cigarette smoke .. and I was wondering whats the smell and wheres it coming from .. but the second time, I actually saw who it was when they decided to light up. And I'm like .. oh piss off .. a cinema is a non-smoking area .. I so wanted to get up and tell him off .. but that would ruin my movie. They should put smoke detectors in the cinemas. bleh.

I gotta start to learn J2EE real soon. Damn coop bookshop outta stock of the text book I need for one of me subjects, reserved one for when they come in next week hopefully, the guy said theres 10(!?) on the way .. wonder why so lil .. maybe cos everyone else has got em and i'm jus late hehe. But yeah.. all this reading up on the net gettin me tired, and so dont want to do this work. Oh well, put up with this for another 3months and hopefully I'm outta here. Managed to bump into an old high school friend at Uni, saw him from behind, and shouted out to him .. after letting him pash his g/f of course :) He was surprised to see me and wondering what I was doing there .. I don't know why that would be since I'm the one that goes to USyd when he graduated from UNSW and he was at MY uni heheh but he's doing his MComm and im doin my MIT so it all works out.

My 3rd year straight at applying for graduate programs at big azz companies. Wonder if luck will prevail this year. I am getting tired of thinking of answers to these BS questions. Especially ones like these: Given current market conditions what do you think <insert company name here> should do to remain competitive? (Max 100 words). Its like .. what the hell you expect us measly ol graduates to do, keep up to date all the time?! .. especially when all I want is a job with a reputable company that I believe I can offer my services and they offer me their rewards in return :) Its not too much to ask is it? So here I am, applying for jobs on the day they are due. Should be able to finish em in time. Then to other conquests. w00t

Big long rant today .. makes up for none during the past week? What did I get up to in the past week. Hmm. Damn this short term memory loss I seem to have gotten the past few years. I can never remember things I need to remembenr when I need to, and remember em later on when I don't want to. it sux bigtime. Dad says to go and get some prescription sunnies tomorrow. Wonder if the opto has any good ones to get. Been wearing the same ol ones for who knows how long.. 7 years at least.
Report due monday, duno whats going on with that. Luckily not assessible but it would be good if i had an idea of what i was doing.

Okay.. nuff of that .. i'm ranting more and more ... save some for later :)

Labels: movies, uni