Occasional Ramblings

Our company just launched an exciting program designed to attract mature talents into its workforce. They plan to do this by offering rewards to employees with successful referrals from our friends and family (yep including family). The reason why it is so exciting is that the company will give us lots of freebies and wads of cash in exchange for these talents. There are certain conditions however before you can get that reward. The applicant should stick to the company for several months and the employee should still be employed with the company at the end of that period. The offer is limited only to technical positions in the company (engineers, geologists, chemists, etc.) and not other positions such as Human Resources, Marketing, Accountants, and IT. Apparently, IT professionals and Marketing staff are a dime a dozen these days. Clever huh? The HR department found a way to make the employees do their job for them and the employees are all buzzing with excitement. Of course, the

Saving up for Christmas

Piglets and smiley Originally uploaded by Jepster . I was in Toy Kingdom during the weekend and I spotted these nice piglet coin banks. They looked so cute that I impulsively decided to buy a pair. Here they are on top of the television set with my smiley stress ball. The stress ball was a gift from last Christmas. As you can see it still looks quite new. It must be a sign that I am relatively stress free. Haha. I remember my nephew’s stress ball looking all battered and worn out. I also seem to recall a few bite marks as well… Oh wait! That wasn’t the stress ball. I was thinking about the fake… Oh never mind. *snicker* I hope I can fill them up in time for the holidays :D

Duolingo quietly got rid of community discussions on individual exercises

A green owl holding a knife while gesturing to be quiet by holding a finger to his mouth. Image generated with the assistance of Dall-E3. In a Reddit announcement posted about 3 months ago, Duolingo announced that they are dropping the community discussions on individual exercises. I admit that this was only brought to my attention recently and not while using the app but in a totally random algorithmically recommended video by Evan Edinger I stumbled upon while I was browsing through YouTube. I have been an obsessive Duolingo learner for about 4 and a half years now and am currently proud of my 1,470-day streak. I am a big fan of gamifying any learning experience and I think this method of having leaderboards, experience points, gem rewards that can be exchanged for cosmetic improvements, and login streaks are just brilliant. I have used the community discussion feature a few times. I have to admit however that I could think of fewer than 10 occasions that I have visited and co

Saving up for the new year

Piggy Series Originally uploaded by Jepster It's a fresh new year and I'm still trying to pay off the expenses I incurred during the holidays. That is why for this year, I have resolved to be more budget conscious (no more impulse buying *sob*) and hopefully finish the projects I have started last year that I was not able to complete because of lack of funds. The biggest of these projects is of course my flat which after more than 2 years since moving in still looks like a storage space with a small clearing for the bed and a small table. Things that I should spend less on: * Eating out -- I used to cook often but lately I have been eating out a lot. I hope to change that this year. The downside is that I tend to get fatter when I do my own cooking :p * Buying overpriced coffee -- Ok I admit it, I have probably spend a whole lot of money on coffee than I should have just for the months of November, December and January. All because of a lousy planner that I have just

A very happy new year to all!

Sparkler star Originally uploaded by Jepster . It's been a while since I last updated this blog since the early part of December. Hmm... strangely enough, I started that post with these very same words. It's not that there's nothing interesting going on in my life, it's just that between the time I spend playing online games, doing heaps of backlog work at the office, and time spent in the new mall which opened in the neighborhood, it's very hard for me to make the time to write in this blog. I just hope that none of you loyal readers thought I was kidnapped by aliens or something like that... (that..) hmm. that's strange. I thought I heard an echo... Hello! (hello...) Anybody there? (there...) Echo! (echo...). Hmm... makes me wonder if anybody still read these posts. Most readers probably got bored of all that WOW talk in the last few posts hehe. Anyway, I would just like to greet everybody who just might be reading this a very happy new year!

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