snow day

"Oh the weather outside is frightful, and my dear it's so delightful. And since there's no place to go...let it snow, let it snow, let it snow..."

Tis the season to crack open the hot chocolate, put on some ski pants and pick up a shovel for some heavy duty snow removal! As many of us survived (or possibly not) the snow fall on the weekend, we didn't know if it would be possible to face the elements this morning. The road conditions were treacherous! I was saying that to myself this morning as I dug my way out of the garage. Having broken a sweat from shovelling a path for my car to weave it's way out of the garage, I was shivering from my wet pant legs. Time for some booties!

I gave myself almost 2 hours to get to work - what a keener eh?! As I traveled along my merry way, sipping on some Starbucks coffee and contemplating if choosing the Highway 1 route was really a wise decision, I discovered that people in Vancouver just don't know how to deal with snow. People either drove way too slow or were tailgating each other. I made it into work in one piece and with minimal road rage. I park 5 blocks from work - which mean it was a good hike through unshovelled streets. By the time I got to my desk I had already composed a list of "necessities" - including a new toque, mitts, scarf, booties and longer coat. :-) An excuse to shop?! The day passed by uneventful. Only a handful of my department actually came in. Darn those with kids! Just cause it's a Snow Day for all kids doesn't mean that the parents get to stay home too. Yes - I know...it's hard to find a babysitter at the last minute. I need to find an excuse to take a day off because of Mui Mui. She's like my child...I should start reaping in the parental-benefits!! :-)

On the way home I noticed that Jerry had made a snowman - he was no where in sight. Maybe it's too cold to stand outside all day and wave to drivers. I quickly dug out my camera from my bag as the car was coming to a halt (yes - I'm not a cautious driver). I frantically snapped a shot before having to speed up again to make the left turn onto Hastings. A "drive-by-shooting". The picture is blurry but you get the gist of it.

winterland adventure

This afternoon I went to see Disney On Ice: The Incredibles in a Magic Kingdom Adventure with my mom, sisters, Angelina and her cousin. I got these tickets for Angelina for her 7th birthday last week. The reaction on her face when she got the tickets was the best. She screamed out "tickets to Disneyland?!" Unfortunately for her I'm not made of moolah - so Disney on Ice here we come!

We went down to the PNE an hour earlier to find that the line ups were already long and the usual parking-vultures were trying to get us to park at their houses for $5. PNE parking is $6.50. We went with the safer choice - PNE.

I've never seen so many kids gathered in one place. After relocating each other and being rejected for wanting a cool kiddie wrist band, we headed over to our seats. I was really happy that we weren't in the nose-bleed section and a pretty decent view. You never know with what sections the Social Club bought (I didn't manage this event). So we sat with a whole bunch of other ICBC employees. The girls wanted toys that were being sold by a very seductive guy. Everything for this show was $10+. My mom got suckered into getting twirly-toys for the girl - at least they lit up (because each plastic toy was $22 bucks!!). I bought a $10 bag of popcorn and passed on the drink as the show hadn't even started yet and we were being milked for every piece of cash in our wallets. PNE really knows how to get kids to want stuff from the sellers.

The show itself was spectacular. The skaters very talented. My favorite was Buzz Light Year - his boots shot out flames and they had him suspended in the rafters for a bit. At one point the show resembled a Cirque Du Soleil show with the arials, music and pirotechs. We weren't allowed to take pictures during the show but I still saw many flashes go off in the dark. What I liked about the show was that they made it interactive. Near the end the Incredibles asked all the children stand up and use their wristbands to help save the day. The wristbands were given at the door to the PNE to all kids. They are equiped with lights - color depends on the button you push on it. So in a sea of blackness - there were red lights flashing from all the little wrists. Reminded me of the Cold Play concert when everyone used their cell phones instead of lighters to croon to the music. Would have made a cool picture. I snuck a picture of the girls "saving the day" though (turn the flash off so that I wouldn't get yelled at by the other parents). See the show here.

After the show, we walked out into a winter wonderland. Big fluffy flakes of snow was pouring down. This proved to be a challenge. Getting out of the PNE parking lot without hitting a child was interesting. It's still snowing right now. I can't wait to for tomorrow - snow is so pretty!

there's a serial killer at work

So I've had this twitchy eye problem the last 2 weeks. It's my left eye. Every now and then it twitches. Makes me feel a bit psychotic. No - I'm not going crazy. It's just a symptom of stress. Do you suffer from stress? Here are the signs.

I'm getting near burnout (again) and haven't put time into just relaxing. If I haven't had time to talk to you lately, here's what I've been preoccupied with...

• applied for 3 different jobs at work (all in different fields)
• got notified that I didn't get one of the jobs (problem management department)
• pretty much guaranteed of the one at the Help Desk because of my recent nomination by Help Desk BC
  
• hosted a go karting event on sunday (lots of prep work for that)
  
• wrapping up the movie ticket event and Disney On Ice event (this saturday)
• doing last minute preparations for the 2 Social club events in December (adult and children's christmas parties)
  
• build marketing campaign boards and media for the Social Club (at night and on the weekends) to show off at the events
  
• tested (technical and customer service wise) for Help Desk Analyst of the Year with a panel of judges --> very nerve wracking as you couldn't prepare
  
• attended the Help Desk Analyst of the Year award ceremony and did a speech --> didn't win but ICBC won anyways which is still awesome!
  
• wrote a term paper for school --> was a collaborative piece of work therefore required many conversations and meetings with my group
  
• created a PowerPoint presentation and pamphlet for class today
  
• group meetings 2/3 times a week in prep for the class project and paper
  

How I'm going to relax: I intend on spending tomorrow night watching Heros. It's a new TV show and I've never seen it before. I basically follow whatever KA is watching. She like CSI, I grew to adore CSI. She became a Desperate Housewives and Grey's Anatomy fan, I did too. I think it's a matter of convenience. She tapes the shows that she likes. I'm not much of a TV watcher. I have no loyalty to any show so I watch whatever is available and that means KA shows. I heard Heros is a good show so I'm looking forward to my TV night!!

With school coming to a near end. I can fully devote my life to the Social Club. I think my whole life revolves around it. I spend all my weekends working on stuff for it. The only gratitude is that when I see how happy people are with the Club (as it was a sinking ship before I joined) I'm happy too. I totally believe that people mirror your attitudes. That some of the Club's executives were so negative about the Club in general that they were poisoning the others. Members are drawn to happy and excited people. We're suppose to be social right?! I totally believe that there are members on the executive who are burned right out (not their fault as there's so little help when it comes to planning and hosting events) and because of that they are grumpy, agitated and irritable. They try to spread this contagion to the other executives and that makes me mad. My cure is to get rid of those that don't truly want to make a difference. Lol - 2007 is going to be when I am going to force the Club to flip it's executive positions. Phrase for 2007: "You're fired!" :-) I'm not being bossy for the fun of it. I want progress and genuinely care about the Club (hence the numerous personal hours spent doing promo stuff for them). I've worked hard in the last few months and don't want any leeches sabotaging what has been accomplished or the potential for growth.

Ah...I sense a disturbance in the force....and that disturbance is going to be me!

molson canadian

Tonight was my last "real" class for Marketing. It was time to hand in the term paper and do our presentation. I had quite a busy couple of weeks and realistically didn't do the presentation till today. My group buddy wanted many things and she's so lucky that I'm pretty proficient with computers! As I don't think many people can throw stuff together on the fly.

I took the day off intending to get up early and build the PowerPoint presentation. What actually happened was that I was enjoying the aspect of not having to get up at the break of dawn and slept in till noon. After that I had lunch, watched a bit of cartoons (as I thought I still had a few hours to spare) and then fell asleep on the couch. I'm sleep deprived so I fall asleep easily...in front of TVs, at meetings, while driving, etc.

Waking up late, I panicked and slapped together a half-ass presentation. Nothing that I would be proud of. :-) But it was good enough for our purposes. My partner then thought it would be cool to hand everyone a pamphlet - so she told me to build one, I told her to get me content. In an hour we had our tri-fold pamphlet ready to go. We were presenting Molson as our project. I've never drank the beer before and to top it off am not a beer fan at all. So that was the greatest challenge for me - not the public speaking part but the task of trying to sell/promote a product that I have zero interest in. :-) As you can see I didn't pick the topic.

I convinced my team mate that we should go first. She was a bit freaked out about having to speak and gets flushed when people look at her too long. Poor kid. I had tested the equipment prior to class, copied the files over to the Cdrive, ran the presentation a couple of times to make sure the embedded video clips worked and checked the slide transitions/timing. If we lost marks in content, we would at least get full marks for organization! I told Christine that going first for any kind of group presentation has it's advantages:

• if the clas is allowed to evaluate the presentations...going first means that there's no one to compare your presentation against (unless you have a spectacular show that will capivate the audience - you're better off going first)
• it'll be over and done with, so you anxiety levels won't increase as you await your turn
  
• there are 14 groups presenting therefore the interest/attention levels of the class will deplete with each presenter

The teacher asked how we wanted to choose who goes first and last. I shot up my hand right away and roared out that my group is going first. That made it easy for other groups as I saw some of them their eyes away when she said the words "who wants to go first". So I kicked off the presentation in my loud and cheerful manner - I'm pretty sure people didn't have problems hearing me. I blabbed on about beer, Molson, hockey and alcohol in general. I think there was more BS in my speech then facts - thank goodness for slides (which did have facts on them). I don't like reading straight from slides - that's very boring as people can read it themselves. Add spice to your talk by using "fillers"! Over all I felt that we did well. Our presentation wasn't too long and it hit the major points. I was proud of Christine for keeping her cool - though she was bright red by the end of her section.

I think being so actively involved in the Social Club has greatly improved my public speaking skills. I may not have anything interesting to say but I can definately talk loud and for a long time! :-)

the Oscars

On Tuesday I went to the awards ceremony for the Help Desk Analyst of the Year. It was a spectacular event. I was super excited and pumped full of caffeine. I worked that morning and grabbed some comfort food (McChicken meal...mmm..."I'm loving it!") and headed over to the Holiday Inn at Metrotown.

When I walked through the doors the room was decorated like the Oscars. Black tie event. Lol - thank goodness I made the correct fashion decision in the morning and wore a comfy yet "professional" outfit. :-) I wasn't in suit mode and didn't want to appear as if I'm off to a job interview. The committee had asked the finalist to arrive a bit early so that we can get aquainted with others and get our question beforehand.

I was thrilled when I found out that each of us would get different questions. Ahem...yes...I believe in world peace and kindness to women and children... Seriously - it felt like a beauty pageant. We then signed waivers that would allow them to post our pictures, bios, etc on their websites and in the paper. Lol - that's right baby...Kimmi is going to be in the paper! Under what section?!? Who the hell knows. :-) I chucked and said to the photographer that he need to airbrush me well as I'm going to catch myself a man! He laughed and said that the only guys that would be reading this story would be geeks. Duh!!

Having had a can of coke (as Burnaby and North Van are still under water restriction - all beverages come in cans) with my McDonald's meal. I proceeded to pour myself a coffee...which later turned out to be 2. This would later turn out to be not a wise choice.

The main reason we were doing this event was that it's PR stuff for the organization. Realizing this I felt for them - as we're going through the same advertising/marketing struggles with our own Social Club. I was super nervous when it came to walk up. The agenda was that they would announce all nominees, introduce them one by one then call each of the finalists to the front separately and in alphabetical order. From there the MC would read a bio on us, we'd each give a speal about the company we represented, the MC would read us our question and then we'd answer it. Simple enough eh? ICBC had 2 finalists therefore I was counting on my partner in crime to do a lot of the ICBC stat stuff.

Chris - my coworker went up first. He's a good speaker and charismatic. I think it's funny that the 2 people selected from the Help Desk are former psychology majors. :-) Just goes to tell you that personality plays a big role in the techie world as well. Chris did his thing up there and I sat at my table wishing I could slow down my heart rate. I always get a blast of super stage fright before having to talk to any crowd. :-) Though I may seem smooth and calm when giving speeches, etc...deep down inside I just want to throw up. So I used refocusing techniques to gather myself. So what did I refocus on?! My need to go pee! After that it was just downhill. I could no longer concentrate and told my supervisor who was sitting next to me. He burst out laughing. This was super inappropriate as another finalist was up on stage and doing her thing. She was struggling already and we were making her feel worst with our giggling.

Then it came time for me to march up to the front. I walked by the 7 foot screen with my name blasted across it (ah...the glories of powerpoint). I should just be thankful that they didn't have an old picture of me pasted for all to see. :-) I was still giddy from trying to conciously work on not doing the got-to-go-pee-dance while standing next to the MC. The crowd was silent and when I looked over, the MC was short! There was a photo op and the photographer pointed at us to smile. I was taken off guard and must have made a funny face at the height difference as I bent my knees so that the MC and I were closer in height for the picture. Darn those high heels! The crowd laughed at my unconcious move. It's an ice breaker. I appreciated the laugh though as it made me feel more at ease. I didn't have anything prepared so just spoke freely. I thought I did well and it appeared as people were listening (that or they were secretly leaning forward to check their blackberries!).

The winner was announce at the end. Chris won and I came in second. I was super thrilled for him and for ICBC in general. We kicked ass! Both of us jumped up and down in excitement. When the MC asked for the envelope please...*drum roll*...we all smiled at each other and gave the other 2 girls a "good luck" whisper. When Chris' name was called out he was stunned and I was bubbling over with happiness. I think I might have pushed the girl next to him to one side in a mad dash to hug him and say congrats. :-) Then there was a flurry of flashes. We were blinded, someone rushed Chris forward to accept his award and the rest of us were pushed to one side so that we wouldn't be in the pictures. :-) Wow - this is a long post. Going to stop here. As you can tell I'm still pumped about the event and look forward to seeing the pictures when they are released.

Kim's Krazy Karts

On sunday I hosted (on behalf of my social club) a Go Karting event at TBC Indoor Racing. There were 85 participants and 12 teams. Chicky, Chris, Toshiki and Brian were on a team called "Kart" (yes...the creativity oozes out of them). The other teams had great names (such as Road Ragers, Dragon Driving School, etc).

The skill levels ranged from "new" drivers to those that brought their own race helmets. The age range was vast too. My youngest drivers were 14 and oldest were 50+. One team (the Power Rangers) consisted of 16 years old who were celebrating one of the driver's birthday (their mom was mooching off the club's event). Good thing she didn't have cake for him as I'm sure the other drivers would have raised an eyebrow to that.

There was a lot of organizing and time put into this event but I was REALLY happy with the results. I've received a lot of positive feedback and the club's image has gone up (which is part of the goal of this event - advertising for the Club). Things that went well and added icing to my cake:

• the pizza arrived on time (as I had multiple conversations with Panago last week about the delivery time and date - as Panago doesn't officially open till 11am but I needed 30 pizzas to be eaten by 11:15am). I was a very demanding customer and didn't take any of their crap. My conversation with them even stirred comments from coworkers about my assertive/aggressive mannerism. Lol...just part of being a dictator!
  
• All the participants arrived on time! I was actually flabbergasted to see that the majority of them were there before 11am (as the facility was not official open till then). I had spoken to the manager about letting "early" people in first. I turned out to be "late" (though I was technically 15 mins early)! This really struck a sentimental chord in my type A personality. :-)
• no one melted in the boardroom as it was small and getting warmer and warmer by the minute - thus making attention spans shorter and my ability to convey the necessary information harder
  
• Brian came to my rescue as there were no other Social Club executive members to help me out with the set up, food, drinks, etc. Brian is an executive member and made an awesome pizza box cutter.
  
• everyone coordinated they own driver changes without mishaps, collisions or arguments
• no one got seriously hurt. The only injury was from Pete's daughter who took a hard hit to her kart and then said her neck felt funny. She soon regressed to not being able to turn her head. I pulled her off the course and had her watch for the rest of the race from the stands as even the spectators on the floor were not safe from the karts!
  
• No one got black flagged and asked to leave. Yah! But many drivers were given lectures from the staff about aggressive behaviour. Some teams were out to win at all costs.
  
• Chicky's team came in second - which I didn't doubt at all. I figured they were going to be first but then I met the drivers of team "Drift Kings" and they turned out to be the guys from my old location (all professional drivers). Pete is roundy-bout driver, Jeff is a drag-race boy and the other 2 guys are motorcyle fanatics
• I didn't lose my voice from all the "talking" (more like screaming) that I did throughout the day. I'm really happy that there are people in the world that can whistle really loudy to get the attention of 85 people.
  

I took pictures from the event and have posted them here. I didn't post everything as most of the pictures are dim (due to a lack of an external flash). While shooting pictures I thought about how wonderful it would be to have an SLR. Especially when it came to taking action shots. I missed many spectacular crashes because my camera was trying to "focus" on the target.

pushing up

Just got back from my marketing class. As usual I was staring at my cell phone and wondering when the torture would end. :-) Just kidding - that's an exaggeration. Every once in awhile my little-brown-humorous-teacher gets WAY off topic (this tends to happen as the night progresses and as the number of students in the class "all of a suddenly" diminishes after the first break). In marketing we spend a lot of time discussing advertising - what works and what doesn't.

Tonight's mindless wondering brought us into the lingerie business. In her bantering I learned that Victoria Secret had bought out La Senza for $710 million this morning. Shares in La Senza soared and so did my consumer excitement. I was thrilled! This would mean that I can get those nice lotions that I like at Victoria Secret now without having to deal with the border line ups. The delusion came crashing down when my teacher said that Victoria Secret would keep La Senza as is (meaning they would not merge product lines) - boohoo!

The funny part of this whole conversation in class were her analogies. The events which lead up to this merger came out of a lawsuit against between the two companies. Back in March this year Victoria Secret was suing La Senza for a million dollars over the copyright of a "wireless push up bra". The companies went from enemies to lovers shortly after that. As Padma puts it: "Victoria Secret was a shark and La Senza said "hey...I'm a shark too! I just look different." So instead of trying to kill each other, why don't we go after all the other little fishes in the pond together?" Padma is full of wacky analogies. Maybe it's her foreign sense of humour that amuses me. Or her accent and facial expressions when she tries to imitate people or products. Brownies...got to love them! She's like my own little Thursday night Borat! show.

lazy long weekends

Enjoying the relaxing long weekend. I didn't do too much - well anything productive that is. I went to Frank's birthday on Friday night. He had it at the Banana Leaf in Kitsilano. I've never eaten at this location but the food was good and they had a party room which suited us well. After dinner we went to Rev's Bowling in Burnaby. The line ups were horrendous but we did manage to get a few lanes. Bowling was really fun - I managed to get near 100 each time. :-) Check out the birthday pictures.

The rest of the weekend was mostly dedicated to sleeping. It was Angelina's birthday on Monday as well. She turned 7 - what a big girl! On Saturday the kids came down and we got together with Betty, Hanif and little Michael for a game of poker. During poker we discussed pregnancy and birth (as Betty is getting closer to giving birth). Poor Chicky was sitting in the middle of the girls so he was bombarded with the gruesome details (nothing like 2 nurses and a pregnant woman to gross you out). The interesting part is that Betty's got a new game with her baby. When her baby sticks out, she pokes at the bulge on her belly and sometimes it pokes back! Lol - a bit freaky but cool at the same time.

assession

If you have not heard - Vietnam has been accepted as the 150th member of the WTO today. This was exciting news for me as I'm proud of my country of origin and like to hear positive news about its people or economy. Plus my parents close friends are all entrepeneurs in Vietnam and it will be good for their businesses now that the country's economy is improving. Now Vietnamese folks won't be known for their yummy Pho noodles and infamous poker playing skills (go Johnny! - World Poker Series). Lol - but what will this all mean later on? Will I still be able to go there and get a bowl of pho for $0.35?!? No...don't let the Dong catch up to the Dollar. "Third world" country status still has its novelties. :-)

give us an example of when...

Behavioral interviews: inescapable elements of the working world. I had my interview for the Help Desk Analyst of the Year award today. I felt that I was disoriented as many other things were happening at work today which had me distracted from the main event. Inevitably I went into the interview hungry and irritable - as I had missed lunch due to another appointment.

The interview was done by a panel of 5 judges. Each with their own cryptic question. I tried to answer as best as I could but I found myself sucuumbing to the use of "ums" and "uh" a lot. Not a great way to portray confidence. I was happy that none of the questions had a technical spin on it. I think the questions were the same for the other contestants. The real challenge was to invoke a sense of confidence and determination over the phone. The whole interview was done via teleconferencing. Fortunately or unfortunately they were not able to see my facial expressions.

After the interview I was informed that when I go to the seminar on November 21st, they would ask me another question for the audience to "experience" the process of the award selection. The silly part to all of this is that they will announce the provincial winner prior to the 21st. Therefore all the "losers" will still have to play the game and go through the motions of a "pretend" interview at the seminar. Yipee...not! It's like one of those WWF wrestling matches where the wrestlers knows who's going to "win" but they still have to pretend that they don't know and put on a show for everyone. I don't think I'll be selected as my counterpart finished his interview and sent me an email saying it went really well for him. I didn't share the same kind of enthusiam after mine. But I'm hoping that an ICBC person (him or I) do win as it would be a very prestigious recognition for our Help Desk. Putting us up to the "industry leaders" level!

kareoke girls

I went over to Carol's house today to fix her pc. I set them up on the internet and got them all the essensials such as torrents, msn messenger and burning software. The wireless connection was a bit tough to pick up in some parts of the house (cold spots). Baby wanted to be set up in MSN too as her classmates are all online. That's just crazy - I never realized how technologically advanced the next generation is. When I was 6, I didn't own a computer and definately didn't trade email addresses with my friends. After it was all set up, Baby sent her friends her first email. None of her friends were online though.

After playing on the computer, we monopolized the TV with some good old kareoke fun. Baby really likes some singer called "Trish". I don't think Trish is "known". But it beats singing kiddie songs. Her favorite song is "big big world" - I think we sang it 5X. Trish sings english, vietnamese and french songs. I like the cordless microphones though - makes "back up dancing" much easier! I don't know any of the songs so I'm her backup dancer! Baby's birthday is next week, she's going to be 7. I can't believe time has pass so quickly. It feels like only yesterday when we were sharing baby cherios. Now we're fighting over which song to sing to. Time is flying by. Before I know it we'll be discussing the latest fashion or her latest boyfriend.

meaning of life

This week's audio book was the Dalai Lama's "The Meaning of Life", excerpts from his lecture series. I thought the audiobook would be a nice change from my usual genre (self-help and thrillers). I found that not only did the audiobook was hard to understand (circular reasoning) but also contributed to my falling-asleep-at-the-wheel-syndrome. Don't get me wrong, I did learn much about Buddist philosophy and the meaning of the Karma, etc but I would probably recommend that this book be read instead of listened to. As some of the concepts are cyclic and normal comprehension is unfeasible.

Sort of related to the Dalai Lama...here's a personality test sent to me by a coworker that has quotes from the Dalai Lama. Take it and see what you're true inner self is like. I was pleasantly surprised with the answers. It's true - Chicky (to me) is "somone that you will remember for the rest of your life".

On a more fun note - I started another Dean Kootnz (my favorite author) book. I'm now listening to "The Husband". Much more entertaining as I'm at the part where the wife's kidnappers are going to chop off her fingers if the husband tells the detective that someone has kidnapped his wife. I think I enjoy the fictional audiobooks more as they don't require that much concentration and the most of the storylines are good. Unfortunately my only mode of listening to them is burning them to disk and loading them into the CD player. A bit of an inconvenience as after I listen to the audiobooks, I have ot store the CDs somewhere. The probability of me re-listening to an audiobook is minute therefore I need another form of media to store it in. I've got to figure out a way to hook up the iPAQ to the stereo system. That or get an IPOD and FM receiver. Ah...more gadgets...

5 bucks and I'm all yours

I received an automated voice message from Telus on my cell phone today. The electronic voice of the lady informed me that they have reviewed my last call center experience and are sorry that I was not happy with the service. That was an understatement!! So to make up for their slow response time - they are giving me a credit of $5 towards my next bill. I was thrilled! All evil thoughts aimed at them in the last couple of days have been dimished by the hopes of meager earnings.