On Friday, I hopped over to Prisons for a field work interview and some debugging work. Met up with previous supervisor and had lunch with her (actually, she forgot our meeting so it was a long wait with JJ). So odd to be walking in CPC again. Anyways, the meeting went well (I thought), and they had pretty serious issues that would be perfect for us to tackle. Anyhow, the jury is still out, pending our group meeting and lecturer consultation. Going to send out my resume once we embark on this project.

Found out on the way home that one of my friends has dropped out of school. Didn't find out directly from him though... so this is the only way I know how to say "Hang in There"!

Singnet's connections to the US nodes went dead around 5pm. My anti-virus software couldn't connect to the update server, and I couldn't access sites like yahoo.com and amazon.com, unlike the SG sites. Being a SoC student, I immediately thought up of a chain of apocalyptic events that ended with my laptop being sent to spare parts heavens. Never occured to me that Singnet ADSL was the problem, even though the NUS dialup was working fine. Some SoC student huh. In one of my worst case scenarios, I assumed that the anti virus software's update server was attacked, and hence I uninstalled AVG and downloaded a new one that was also free. Of course, I found out later that AVG's update server was doing just fine. In fact, I couldn't connect to Avast!'s update server, even after Singnet sorted out its problems. After reconfiguring my firewalls and what not, I finally gave up and reinstalled AVG. And so now it updates properly. Gah.

Spring cleaned room today to 2 reruns of Pretty Woman. Gere and Roberts make such a perfect couple...

Took me 2 days... but I finally revamped my SoC website... more colourful now. One thing I do not like are the fragmented jpeg files... it's like watching a jig saw puzzle piece together when the website loads. The fragments do help in loading speed though. hmm. too bad i'm not trained in these sorts of stuff to know what to do... plus it's my first time building a website starting with photoshop... those damn web slices are not exactly intuitive. I end up cutting up jpegs into many slices. Plus with a gradient background, a lot of those jpegs cannot be removed. Oh well. I might consider replacing the main banner with a 1 piece one so that it loads altogether... as for the rest... when I'm more free :)

Have started searching for internship placements in the upcoming summer break. Among major consulting firms like McKinsey, PwC, BCG and Accenture, only Bain & Co. are looking for interns... The other firms have not started seeking interns although they will at a later date.

Hopefully, I won't move too fast and end up with another lousy/ low-paying internship. I guess I can always follow the masses and ballot for internships via NUS when the time comes... but it reeks of crowd-mentality that I do not like. Furthermore, some companies like Bain & Co. end their recruitment in March/ April, which I believe is before the balloting period.

Anyhow, this means that I'll have to update and polish my CV, actively seek out internships these two months...

CS4253 has made me realized the importance of keeping your contacts up to date. In my search for prospective consulting clients, I have dragged out all the name cards that I used to blithely dump into storage. It's pretty surprising that I should have contacts, since I pretty much think of myself as an isolated person. Unfortunately, I've let most of the contacts lapse, such that I do not even know if they are still in Singapore. I guess the time for cold-calling them is coming soon. God, I'd feel stupid if they don't know me... this will teach me not to maintain contact. I think I'll start emailing them e-cards. The CNY is coming around and it's a good excuse to play catch-up.

Sigh... I so do *not* enjoy cold-calling people.

... that you are taking level 4000 modules when your To-Read pile topples over on the first week of school.
... that your lecturer is plain crazy when he assigns you to read 28 chapters from 3 textbooks for the first week, on top of 8 articles and project work.
... that your social life will suffer when your lecturer tells you to suck it in and take the tough work and 2am nights in stride. For the next 20 years or so.
... that your priorities are pretty much screwed when you'd rather spend $40 on a preowned Ninja Gaiden rather than The Advice Business: Essential Tools and Models for Management Consulting (Fombrun and Nevins).
... that you are screwed when you spend $40 bucks on both.
... that you are screwed squared when your peers raise their brows and bid you goodbye when they hear your module list.
... that you are screwed cubed when you blog rather than reduce your To-Read pile.
... that you need to change your major when your parents warn you not to wake up too early in the morning, not knowing you haven't slept.