Weblog

Tuesday, 18 June 2013

  • Origin Story

    I joined Xanga on 8/30/2003. I don’t remember why I joined, probably cause everyone at the time had one. I knew my cousin Chris had one, and I even copied his profile’s naming convention (his was cbunggay, so I named mine ebunggay). I really wasn’t much of a writer, let alone a blogger, and it’s quite evident on my first couple of blog entries. My first entry was in June 2004. I remember that I started to write because I had just graduated from college and wasn’t quite ready to look for a job yet, and was bored, a lot.

    I was an infrequent blogger at first, mainly complaining about my life. Then I got the job in Roseville, and started to write almost everyday. Looking back on those posts, I don’t remember a lot of what I wrote, and then I remembered that one of the reasons that I started writing is so that I would remember all the little things that happened in my life. If it weren’t for those posts, I would’ve never remembered what “taking the monkey” or “going to Disneyland” actually meant.

    The reason I started reading my old posts again was because I just found out that Xanga might be going away for good. With their revenue & user base declining, they can’t afford their host servers anymore. So they started a crowdhoster (very similar to kickstarter) to raise funds to migrate their service to something like WordPress. They want to raise $60k, and with less than a month left, they’ve only raised $27k. If they don’t get the full $60k, Xanga will be shut down forever & ever. Sad face single tear drop (I find it funny typing out emoticons instead of using the actual emoticon).

    And for some reason, because of this, I’m going to start writing about stuff again. My writing lately has been very infrequent, and I haven’t been voicing any meaningful opinions. I’ll try to write more and write things that I actually think & feel. And if Xanga does go away for good, I’ll start writing on Blogger or WordPress or wherever.

Monday, 10 June 2013

  • Chris & Chrissy's Engagement Party Weekend

    I didn't take any pics this weekend, so I had to get pics from the fam's facebook or instagram.

    Friday

    - drive down to SoCal (w/ Jaymi, Jacqueline, Tj, & Kimmie)

    - stopped by Porto’s in Glendale to pick up flans & fruit tarts for Chris

    - stayed in Ontario / Rancho Cucamunga area

    - Comfort Suites receptionist being shady about # of people in room (ended up not being an issue, but still kinda had to )

    - Gameworks - waitress was nice, but kind of ditzy, 1hr unlimited gaming, stayed till closing

    - Tj locked keys in X5, luckily AAA was close. Took a while to work the flex-rod, though. kind of like drop-claw arcade game.


    Saturday

    - Met up with everyone at Chris’ hotel in San Bernadino. There was maybe 35 of us. We caravaned it to Chrissy’s house.

    - She lives on a steep hill. Not fun walking up that, since we parked at the bottom since we were in the back of the caravan

    - Their piece of land is pretty big. They have a big koi pond in the front, a swimming pool & basketball hoop in the back. Then the side of hill, they have a walkway that snakes up the hill, and they have hella plants & fruit trees. They plan on making a gazeebo at the top. It’ll have a great view.

    - the engagement party traditions didn’t take too long, maybe 20 mins. but since everyone was inside the house, it got hella hot up in therr.

    - groomsmen had to do a video interview (John, me, Shann, & Tj). John’s was funny but probably inappropriate. I honestly didn’t know what to say. As everyone knows, I’m not much of a talker. I brought Chris slipping in the fountain during Jacqueline’s cotillion video. Shann’s was funny too, and he brought up the knee incident on the cruise. Sounded like he gave good advice too. I don’t remember what Tj said cause I was thinking to myself, “why didn’t I give good advice like Shann?!?! i’m soo stupid!”

    - super-sized jenga was fun. yeaup, I toppled the tower


    - 1st round of rage cage sucked cause the ping pong balls wouldn’t bounce right

    - 2nd round was way better, on a different table, but was still awkward cause then it was late and wasn’t a lot of light

    - hope their family doesn’t think we’re alcoholics cause our fam went straight for the beer when we first arrived, then played rage cage & beer pong. They had to make another beer run cause we killed everything.

    - uncle elcid, lol

    - a couple of Chrissy’s cousins are cute, but kinda younger, like 19-20 ish. then the older ones were with someone already. but they all seemed cool

    - Albert lost 2nd round of rage cage, & did not look good. thought he’d be the one to yak. but it ended up being Chris. good thing i happened to be holding zip-lock bags, which were originally meant for Albert. Side note: smart thinking with the zip-lock bags, Chrissy! Way, way ,way better than a regular plastic bag, that is, if you can aim the yak into the bag.

    -Chrissy’s bro Charles los the 1st round of rage cage, ended up yakking & I think passing out for a bit before coming back later in the evening

    - I’m not sure if we wore out our welcome. Party started at 2pm, the older fam left around 7ish. We ended up staying till about 11pm.

    - In-N-Out drive-thru only - wait was hella long

    Flip Cup - Bride vs Groom. We killed both rounds.



    Sunday

    - Chrissy’s mom’s homemade pho. BEST PHO EVER!!! I had to ask for no noodles, though (panaramic pic by cliff)


    - Porto’s on the way home. They're not all mine, I swear!


    - I Love Teriyaki for dinner

Wednesday, 29 May 2013

  • I Guess It Worked Out

    This morning, I arrived at my desk with a blinking red light on my desk phone, indicating a new voicemail.It was the Department of Industrial Relations (DIR) in Oakland asking when I would be available for an interview (and they also sent an email). I had applied for that Staff Programmer Analyst position a week after I applied for the same position here in my office (which was 5 weeks ago). My interview here was almost two weeks ago and hadn’t heard back from anyone yet. Before responding to the DIR, I wanted to check on my status of the position here first.

    So I ask one of the people who interviewed me, and they tell me they’d go look into it. Maybe 10 minutes later, that person, along with my boss, come to desk and officially offer me the position. Of course I accept, and a few minutes later, I’m signing the duty statement of the position. My official first day in this new position is this Friday.

    So I send an email back to the DIR, telling them my situation and respectfully declined their interview request. So now, this sets other stuff in motion. I didn’t want to start looking for a house up here until I got the promotion or didn’t hear back from the DIR (since they are in Oakland, I would’ve preferred to work there since it’s closer to home, and I could go to way more A’s games). It would’ve been nice if the DIR had moved a little faster with their interview process. I would’ve liked to have had the opportunity. Technically, I still could’ve gone on that interview, but I didn’t want to second guess myself or constantly ask myself “what if....”.

    I’m sure things will work out for the best. I’m still relatively new to the state, and could always try to transfer to other departments later on. But for the foreseeable future, I’ll be in Sac.

Tuesday, 21 May 2013

  • F U, iPhone

    Apparently my iPhone doesn't want me to call or text anyone cause it keeps on deleting my entire contacts list. This is the 2nd time in 2 weeks, the 3rd since March. Thank God for backups, but it's kind of a pain in the ass to restore from old backups since I lose recent pics, texts, calendar entries, phone logs, etc. Most inconvenient.

    So now I'm seriously considering android or windows phones. I'm due for an upgrade and was eying the HTC One and the Nokia Lumia 920, but have been hesitant because there was nothing really wrong with my iPhone and I have been trying to cut down on unnecessary expenses. But that's no longer the case, since now it's been frequently effing up. I'm hoping that this problem just magically stops. If it doesn't, I hope that my iPhone will hold up until they announce/release the HTC One Mini or the Samsung Galaxy S4 Mini. I want the mini versions cause the regular ones have huge screens, and I'm used to the iPhone-like screen size. We'll see.

Monday, 20 May 2013

  • This Can Go Only One of Two Ways

    So I had an interview on Friday for an open promotional position in my office. I was told there were 3 other interview-ees. I think I did well. The 3 interviewers were people I know and work with, so I felt comfortable talking to them. I wasn’t really that nervous at all. I was super antsy the hours before the interview. I was just anxious to get it over with than anything.

    I feel like my body of work thus far has proven that I deserve this promotion. The feedback from everyone that I work with and for all indicate that I deserve this promotion. The lead interviewer told me straight up “this position has your name written all over it”. If I somehow do not get this promotion, I can not take it any other way than personally. I will feel slighted, wronged, etc., and will go into silent rage spite mode. I will put the “it’s ok” face on and act like it’s all good, while applying for any & all positions in all the other departments/offices. I won’t do anything evil to the system that I support, because well, I’m not evil. But I totally could.

    So in a few weeks, or however long it takes for them to make a decision, I’m hoping that I’ll be in a happy place, a higher pay grade, and receiving congratulations from other coworkers. If not, they will learn that spite is one hell of a motivator.