Making Up or In Search for Lost Time?

Firstly TGIF and for once I am aiming to leave work on time this week to join my friends for drinks or at less head to the gym before supper.

Seriously, it has been really a challenge week for me. Thankfully for time sheets logging at work, I manage to track my working hours. You see I had been the first to arrive in the building and the last few cars to leave the car park in the evenings.

There is this one SIMPLE project that I thought I could handover to my colleague to perform a certain task, I expected him to deliver but instead I found silly mistakes, it really surprise me why we still keep him around. Now I had already spend 30 hours over the last couple of weeks coordinating the changes requested by the clients, only to find out that I end up spending another 40 extra hours this week revising every single mistake (lucky for us the clients are patient and nice people). Looks like I have to put in extra hours to meet my own datelines next week.

This is why I hate it when other people's incompetence affects my job. Sometimes I wonder if my peers hate me so much that the reason for their existence at work is to make my job difficult everyday.

Standard industrial laws in Australia mandate that workers enjoy 4 weeks paid annual leave per year, leaving most people working only 48 of the 52 working weeks. Minus the 10 days of public holiday annually, this average us to 1725 working hours per annum. Just last year alone, I work extra 18 days of overtime, that is 3.5 weeks of extra holiday (not including sick leaves). When the figures add up and it is pretty scary if my employers did not offer time off in lieu, would I be expected to work for free? Instead of living 12 months I am actually working towards 13 months. Am I a genius, unexpectedly creating time? No.

I am searching for lost time. Things have to definitely change around here to make up for it.

Imagine there is a bank account that credits your account each morning with $86,400. It carries over no balance from day to day. Every evening, the bank deletes whatever part of the balance you failed to use during the day. What would you do? Draw out every cent, of course? Each of us has such a bank. Its name is time. Every morning, it credits you with 86.400 seconds. Every night, it writes off as lost, whatever of this you have failed to invest to a good purpose. It carries over no balance. It allows no overdraft. Each day, it opens a new account for you. Each night, it burns the remains of the day. If you fail to use the day’s deposits, the loss is yours. There is no drawing against “tomorrow.” You must live in the present on today’s deposits. Invest it so as to get it from the utmost health, happiness, and success. The clock is running. Make the most of today.

If you have the time, I encourage you to watch this movie called The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel (for the Elderly & Beautiful).

Based on the 2004 novel These Foolish Things by Deborah Moggach, the film stars an ensemble cast, consisting of Judi Dench, Celia Imrie, Bill Nighy, Ronald Pickup, Maggie Smith, Tom Wilkinson and Penelope Wilton.

A group of British retirees have outsourced their retirement, attracted by the less expensive and seemingly exotic India. They are enticed by advertisements about the newly restored Marigold Hotel and given false dreams of a life with leisure. They arrive to find the hotel a shadow of its former self. Although the new environment is less luxurious than imagined, the retirees are forever transformed by their experiences.

Throughout the show, you will notice Sonny keep repeating "Everything will be all right in the end... if it's not all right then it's not the end."

After watching that somewhat humorous movie last night, I am hoping I would be able to wrap up this project today. Fingers cross.