2/28/13

Can't believe it's been 2 months since the year started and just a few days away since I started working.

My work's getting heavier lately as days pass by and I got to be honest that quitting has brushed through my thoughts quite often lately, not just because of the workload but because of my chronic back pains. But I am really trying to keep it together. I need to have the experience and skills at least. But I heard the company's trying to hire more people so that's good news. I think we need at least 3 or for more people on the team.

Now I don't want to keep on talking about work so..

This weekend, our television broke!I don't know what caused it but it just stopped working. But my mom bought us a new TV as soon as she found out. Now we have a new flat screen TV!Yay!

The only problem is that it switched up the channels so I'm trying to find the right line-up of TV shows. I thought I would find it easily on the net but it seems like I'm wrong..

2/23/13

I want to spend this Saturday to rest but I have a lot of things to do.

1. Study Google AdWords. In preparation for the seminar/exam, our boss gave us some learning materials and it's quite lengthy to read and I haven't started yet.

2. Write,write,write. Though these tasks aren't necessarily supposed to be done at home, I prefer doing these tasks ahead since I know it's going to take a lot of time for me to do it at the office. I have been writing about certain topics repeatedly over the last two weeks and I'll have to continue doing so in the next months. I do hope I won't run out of creativity.

Those two are my top priorities this weekend but I also have some minor tasks to do. I feel like they're not meant to be hard but I put so much pressure on myself. 

In other news, our cat gave birth today! Also, I received my copy of The Lumineers' self-titled album. I haven't had the chance to listen to it yet due to my schedule but I love their music so I'll have to find time to listen to it. 

2/21/13

In a previous post, I wrote about one of the newly hired employees in our company not showing up. It turns out that he was just absent for the day and our supervisor was kidding around.

However, one of our team leaders and fellow writers announced that she was leaving the company by next month due to reasons pertaining with her family so it's understandable but that means her workload will be passed on to us. Aside from her, our two interns are ending their stint on the company by tomorrow which means we'll continue to be smaller.

I really want to keep this job for at least two years but it seems whenever I step on a company, it gets smaller. Am I bad luck? I do hope they find replacements soon cause I don't want to be swamped with responsibilities that I can't handle. My body is already giving me a hard time and I don't need more pressure on my back.

2/20/13

Ahhh!I haven't posted any update for a few days now. I've been so busy and sleepy when I'm at home:( But nothing much is new. My back is aching so bad for two weeks now. I need some rest!

2/16/13

I feel like I've never appreciated the weekend like this in such a long time. Work is really starting to tire me out and a break is what I want right now.

I even found out that one of the employees we just hired this week stopped showing up and might not come back again. It's a shame cause he didn't look like someone who backs out easily. I guess he succumbed to pressure easily.

I'm going to handle 4 accounts already and I expect to have a harder time to manage them but I am looking forward to learning from it and developing my skills.

Speaking of learning, our boss is sending me and a colleague to the Google office to study Google Adwords after receiving an invite. We'll be taking it by the end of the month but we have to study by next week. There will be exams and I need to pass it to certify. If I pass it, not only will it add credibility to the company but will also boost my confidence and a nice addition to my resume. During these past two weeks, three companies have contacted me and I had to turn them down. How I wish they would have called earlier. As much as they are bigger companies, I can't just leave the one I have right now.

2/14/13

Happy Valentine's day!

It has been a week since I started working and my body is already taking a toll both physically and mentally. My workload is bulking up in a rapid pace and I do hope they won't add any more for now. They need to hurry up with the recruitment.

I like the people I work with and I am trying my best to persevere and stay in the company for a long time.

I also found out that they gave salaries on the 10th and 25th and not every week as I thought. Also, my colleague told me that my boss prefers to deposit our salary in BDO and I have one so I'll probably use that one.

My back has been aching so bad for a week now. I must have broken a bone or something. I pray that it won't get any worse.

2/10/13 - Miles Away From Anywhere

Here is an album by another discovery from 2013. I also found out that this is their 3rd album though I have yet to listen to their previous ones.

When I first heard their songs, I find the singer's vocals to be very similar to Kris Allen's which is a good comparison. 

The whole album is full of good tunes. It doesn't have that particular direction but they blend in quite well. It gets to a point where it sounds too monotonous so maybe they have to shuffle up the tracks a bit.

I am very interested to hear more music from them.

My top tracks: Don't Forget To Breathe,Stratosphere and American Beauty

2/9/13

My first week of work is over! It went really well.

I'm glad that even though my body clock is still adjusting,I haven't arrived late for work. I even spend time on Mini stop beside the office building to kill some time. Although it really is still discouraging to go to work early due to the heat and long waiting lines to ride the jeepneys which seem to appear less in the morning for some reason.

It seems like my worries of working in a small office space was answered, when I arrived on the office unit last Wednesday, it was almost empty and found out that they were already moving items to transfer in another unit so that took some time to set-up everything. However, we had some problems with the internet so all of us had to work in the old office unit. I found out the company owner was also handling another company which is an architecture firm which I'm not surprised since he graduated from a university that is known for its good architecture courses, although, he took a different course.

Anyway, they gave me a new account which is a client from Australia. So far, I  find the job manageable. It's only difficult because it takes too much time for different tasks and also the reports but I can live with it. It's better than my previous job where I was clueless.

My officemates have been great so far!They're friendly and likes to have fun!I do hope that they're not annoyed with me yet since I tend to depend on them everytime but I'm trying my best to learn everything at a short span of time to be in stride with them. I know I should work double time since I will be given another account by this coming week which will take most of my time. These past 3 days, I've been leaving the office on time since I finished my tasks early. I even had at least an hour of freedom but I don't think I could leave the office early without having a penalty or deduction in the salary. I also like that our company follows casual Fridays which means we can dress down every Friday and I can still wear my t-shirts and sneakers, which will be convenient for me especially if I have somewhere else to go afterwards.


I started having back problems though. I don't know if it's because of my workout last Wednesday or from sitting at the office chair for a long time but it was so bad that I had to buy Salon pas at the drugstore and apply it for the first time. It's still hurting as of right now and I hope it will be gone by this week.

I am still baffled about the policies though. My supervisor never got to talk to me about them during the orientation and no contract signing. We have a new employee coming this week and I heard them talk about a contract and other policies. 

I was even surprised that our salary was given already even if it's only the 8th of the month! Also, I was surprised with the amount I received, despite for working with them only 3 days so far, I've received a decent amount of salary already! I can only assume that they give our salary every week. It was given in cash which I prefer but I was still encouraged to create a bank account. I guess I need to work on getting some government IDs soon! I have an account from security bank which is the one I used in my first job but I'm afraid that it's inactive already and I also forgot my pin number!

I have to get used to going home late though especially on days where I work out. I'm expecting to leave the office at a later time in the coming days but I do hope that won't happen.

As a reward to myself, I promised myself to buy something nice and decided to buy Foster The People's Torches album. After all, I need a motivation to keep me hyped up for work.

I still have to keep working on my writing skills and a lot more but I'm looking forward to share more stories with regards to my work in the future.


Happy Chinese New Year!

2/6/13

1st day of work is over!I am so tired but I feel so happy that I made it through! My officemates are friendly so far and I think I would last in this company long enough unlike my previous ones.

2/5/13

I am officially starting my new job tomorrow!I'm feeling butterflies in my stomach and I just wanted to make a post in this blog for my last night of being unemployed. I really hope to do well in this company!

2/3/13 - Looking For Alaska

So I finally finished another book this year. I actually started reading this last year but only got around to finish it yesterday since I want to start on a new book by the time I start my new job.

Looking For Alaska is a story of a boy named Miles, or later known as Pudge, and how he meets a girl named Alaska upon stepping into a boarding school. Alaska is not described as a typical diva type of teenager but she's one of those girl next door who likes to hang out and would pull off pranks often. Miles falls in love with her despite her being in a relationship. He also meets his roommate which everybody calls the Colonel because of his instinct to lead others. He doesn't force others to follow his command but his friends do since he is the one who takes charge and even comes up with the funniest jokes. Miles is known for his unique fascination of remembering last words which is discussed thoroughly in the story. During his stay, he experiences what it is like to be in a circle of friends which he didn't have before that, and he learns how to have fun and most of all, his world is changed when he met Alaska. I don't want to spoil what happens but the book touches into deeper issues of existence and life and death later on in the story that gives the reader some thoughts to ponder on.

It's a decent book but I won't call it my favorite. It's probably one of the reasons why it took me some time to finish it. It felt a bit dragging but it picks up when the climax happens later on. But I can somehow relate to Miles and some of his behavior and outlook in life. It also possess a good combination of humor and drama in the story and some romance which is almost a must in these type of books.

I'm about to start reading another book by John Green and I hope it can be better than this one!

2/2/13

As mentioned in my previous post, I got accepted in a new company and had an orientation the other day. I have no starting date yet and there's still time for me to back out if I want to but I don't want that to happen, not now.

While I do feel good that I finally have a job, I still have some apprehensions about it and it scares me that I may fail yet again on this new journey and what's terrifying me is that it;s not the job that will prevent me from being successful here but it's my own fears.

After experiencing a fairly tough job at a printing/advertising agency last 2011, I have since struggled to find another full-time office-based job and even found myself stuck at home trying to get employed. I got myself an online web content writing gig that allows me to work on my own terms in terms of schedule and workload but that didn't really allow me to experience a normal job and did not compensate as much as a normal job so that was left stagnant for a while aside from being a filler on my resume and a disguise to my timid ways.

This new job will force me to adopt to new schedules and drop my lifestyle and maybe vices if you call it. My vices are not necessarily smoking,drugs or what the usual society dictates and labels as vices.

-Sleeping habits. These past few months, I've been sleeping really late. I sometimes even sleep right when our helpers wake up to get my younger siblings get prepared for school the next day.  I think that it's just my mechanism to excuse myself to be active the following day because I anticipate another unproductive day of being unemployed. It's the reason why I need to change that not just because I need to wake up early for my new job but I feel my health is getting affected too. My eyebags are getting puffier and my skin is breaking out. It's also not good for my bodybuilding since I need my body to have a lot of rest and working out when I'm tired is not good as I feel groggy at the gym.

-Media. If there's one major proponent that's taking my time, it's all the TV shows and movies I watch and my usage of the internet. I have been following a bunch of TV shows since I was young, even around high school and it grew in college and even after that. I have tried to keep it down lately but I can't just drop a show that I've invested my time weekly especially since streaming has made it easier for me to follow these shows. The only solution I can think of right now is watch 1 show every weekday and just catch up the remaining shows on weekends. I could also just wait until TV season ends and buy DVDs of the entire season of these shows like I usually did before in my college days. I don't want to fully abandon watching TV shows since it's entertaining, I learn something new, it can show aspects of life that I can relate to and it can be relaxing too. I think it's better than partying every night or spending too much money on shopping. Of course, it's also gonna be taking time away for me to watch concerts but I have been blessed these past few years to watch a lot of them so I should just be thankful I got those opportunity to go to them.

-Work-life balance. This is a major problem for me, now that I've talked about how my time for watching shows is affected, I guess my entire time for myself is greatly affected. Spending at least 9 hours for work for five days a week and it's not even limited to that. During my orientation, I saw the employees' log sheet which has the time in/out and I saw most of them are having overtime everyday! I'm not sure if I can handle that on a long-term basis but I do hope I can accomplish my tasks on time. I'm also worried about having most of my entire day stuck in the small office. Not that I don't like working in small spaces but the fact that everyone can see my every move and we're all congested in one are with no partition at all could affect my work habit.

-Gym. I plan to continue working out especially since I don't want to waste the money that my mom is paying for. Working out is also a stress-reliever and I hope that my work won't take much of my time and will let me have enough time to spend some time st the gym.

-Work location. Though the office is just in Makati, right where I want to work, it's still in the far end of Ayala ave. and I would have to walk there all the way to and from Greenbelt since I don't want to take another trip with the jeepney and save some money and also use the walk as my exercise to compensate for my cardio workout. I really hope that my trip will be safe especially at night and it's gonna take most of my time everyday.

-Compensation. The pay is not as high as some other companies may offer but it is higher than the salary I have from my 2 previous companies. The good thing here is that overtime will be compensated and it can still increase in the future though the details of that haven't been discussed yet.

There are possibly more problems that I see myself facing with but that will be reserved for the future. However, I still see a good outcome from this job.

-It is something new. I can learn a lot from this industry and I can even enhance my skills to prepare myself for a better job in the future, not that I'm already thinking of another job but I'm just preparing myself for disappointment. I know this mindset should be changed but I have to be realistic.

-I have something nice to share. I don't want to be arrogant especially since this is not exactly a prestigious or high-paying job but at least I can say that I have something to do in my life that other people may find some worth. My relatives always ask me about where I work and I'm lad that I have something to answer this time around. Though I may not get to see them as much this time since I'll be pre-occupied for work but then again, I've always told myself mentally to have a period of hibernation and get used to being alone and independent from my loved ones. I don't even see them a lot on a daily basis but I'm still stuck in some mentality that I need a lot for them but I need to put myself apart and take some time for myself first.

-It's gonna provide me an opportunity to mature and learn how to handle clients effectively. I've had experience of handling clients in my previous job but I did not handle them solely without supervision and while I'm still supervised on this new job, they're already going to give me an account to handle on my own.

Overall, I'm just worried for my work-life balance and I hope I can adapt to a new lifestyle smoothly ASAP.

I think this entry is quite long enough so I'll post some extra thoughts in the future.

2/1/13

I have some good news! I am now employed!

I don't have a starting date yet but I have officially been introduced to the entire team as a part of the company. I underwent an orientation yesterday for the whole day and I felt quite overwhelmed but I think I can learn it in time.

I do have a lot of mixed feeling and anxiety towards this new journey but I'll save that for another post since I'm tired.

Meanwhile, I also had an appointment with my dentist to have my cleaning and fluoride treatment and have a look at my wisdom tooth. My gums in the area of my wisdom tooth has been hurting this past week and my dentist told me I have to take an x-ray first in my next appointment. I'm scared of the thought of having a tooth extracted but I think I have to do it to avoid further pain in the future.