Wednesday, March 29, 2006

Goodbye my car...

For some really ridiculous technicality of law the family household car now has to be sold. It's not a worth buy considering current car prices and COEs are so dirt cheap. Unless of course you want the security of being able to scrap the car in case of accident with no monetary loss to you (i.e. COE car).

It doesn't really matter what price I sell it at as long as its a little above scrap value. Here are the details if anyone is interested.

Scrap value
Open Market Value(OMV):
$14,507.00
PARF Eligibility Expiry Date:
26 May 2009
PARF Rebate Amount:
$15,957.00

COE rebate (Cat E)
QP Paid:
$35,890.00
COE Rebate Amount:
$11,258.00

So its scrap value as of April 06 is about 16k+11k=27k

If you do drive the car till its COE expiry in May 2009 you'll get back about 80% of OMV ($11.6k cash) after that.

Thus, the net cost of ownership is about $422 / month after factoring in this cash rebate, before considering interest charges from the finance company (usually about 2k on top of loan amount)

If nobody wants it (and that's probably the case - who wants to pay $600/mnth in installments for a 7-year-old car?) then it will be returned to the financier, auctioned off (probably at scrap value) and that would be the end of the matter
-----------

So there you have it. Goodbye. I will miss it. I thought it would have at least lasted till it 2009. But apparently God thinks otherwise.

It's not a problem. I've lived without a car before....... I don't even use it on a daily basis now anymore!

Anybody wanna stay hall with me next sem?


~God bless~

Jerry

Sunday, March 26, 2006

One expensive boating trip

Saturday was my first Dragon Boat outing! It was church YF and 21 of us split into 2 boats for a quick crash course including drills on holding and synchronizing as well as how to use momentum to move the boat without touching the paddles!

Needless to say it was a super-xiong thing and I got crappy abrasions on my rowing arm at the part of the hand which grips the paddle. There were plenty of beautiful bodies including one whole gang of like, army or navy people with ripped washboard abs that sort of like emerged out of a cage under the nicoll highway! eeeewww! They were just taking the their paddles from the store but the fashion in which they moved (single file whereever they went) showed clearly they were on some form of training. Typical babes in tank tops stuff too.

But anyway, there was plenty to learn about team work and moving as part of the team as you can feel it when 1 person starts to slack (including the steersman who once sent the boat moving rapidly in circles)

The actual rowing action seems to be like some sort of ploughing or digging into the water and I think it might be a good way to train up the non-master arm (which in my case was pathetic as I found out) although I'm sure there's some gym exercise that sort of replicates it too (hence the reason competitive rowers goto the gym to train too)

But yeah, when you're at full swing the urge to give up and slack is always there - just like how I'm sure many a Christian brother or sister has at times felt - to either let little white sins creep in, to dwell a little longer on thoughts that you know ought not to be in your system.

Trust in Christ and push on!

Sunday, March 19, 2006

Fitting in.

Yesterday was my church's "Family games day" which included an afternoon of games and then a BBQ.

I had taken my class 4 heavy vehicle driving test earlier in the morning and failed it by hitting the curb on the way back into the test centre carpark.

Needless to say that made things very miserable and I had to spend most of my afternoon queuing up at BBTC to get another test date. But I guess if my driving is very unsafe then I deserve to have to practise more. Unlearning some of the bad habits is difficult and for long vehicles there are absolutely essential additional safety checks and 'best practices' that need to be adhered to.

I feel asleep after finally reaching home from some driving my mom here and there errands and ended up waking at 7 instead of 6 so by the time I got there the entire event was more or less over. Ruth had actually messaged me at 6 telling me that the food was running out but I guess I was too engrossed in sleeping.

Being late and not having participated in the games it felt sadly awkward to be there but I guess that's the punishment you get. I still feel too old for such like, fun motivational games and all that but hey that's probably just my character you're talking to someone to hates things like school camps and those kinds of things.

Perhaps I'm stuck-up or jaded or whatever. Or maybe its the social environment I don't feel comfortable with. Whatever.

But I want to not just leave it at whatever. Because I somehow feel compelled to at least make an effort to mix around more in church, going for mid-week and all that, and I know it's only natural people stick to their own clique and feel more comfortable to interact amongst themselves. We feel the same way too.

It's hard but sometimes I try my very best to talk to people but sometimes its difficult when you hit a blank wall on the other side or either that it's just polite conversation but then suddenly it's all over and that's it.

Do we really have to adopt the interests, lifestyles and behaviour of others just to fit in? I've never believed in that because I'm very sure Christ accepts every single individual the way he or she is. But to qualify that statement we need to try to talk, and sometimes I feel caught in between the 2 'groups' of people of my age in church. Why is my usher team leader always so skeptical about church things? He always seems to have a rebuttal to the pulpit after every sermon ... not that all preachers preach appropriately or contextualize correctly but such an attitude without paying attention to the essence of what was (or intended) is not healthy.

I'm not trying to play a you-fault-my-fault kind of thing, but with our conviction we need to always want to strive better and not let anyone, especially in our own church, be left behind, like some unwanted child. I feel like that sometimes. It can't be a case of our church being too big I'm sure.

To be honest I've always talked more and felt better accepted by the 'alternative group' in church and I'm thankful for that, but I want to try and interact more. So far with my brother Dom and the guys its been not bad and I also am thankful for that.

Ha - I sound like some really immature adolescent sorely lacking in the PR department... but I don't know - I rarely bother to say anything unless I feel it really matters. I've met too many people in life who are friendly, polite and talk much but then it ends there.

Could I really overcome this issue? I pray for the strength to do so. No the Bible isn't some self-help book on how to improve your social life. In fact, I don't even think its fair to say that we expect all members of a church to behave the same and like the same and do the same things. "To be of one mind in Christ" is not the same as being homogenous robots.

But I believe what the Bible, together with the grace of God and the Holy Spirit's conviction can do, is to see us through and sustain us till the end and in spite of such things. Such is the power of God that the impossible is possible (see how daunted I feel?)

I was about to sign off with a list of people I'd want to say hi to but I'd really hate to have inadvertedly left someone out.

Take care all you! Keep your eyes on the prize!

Here we have no continuing city; but we seek the one to come. - Hebrews 13:14

Wednesday, March 08, 2006

LAg

hey its been almost a month since I blogged! I am still alive you know!...

Work has been quite busy though we've been learning to take things in our stride and try to get the most out of it for ourselves... we know that's its quite a lost cause to do any real full time writing

But at least God has sent our godmother Doris to watch over us. She's meticulous and picky with work, but she stands up for us when the boss scolds us unreasonably. Part-time operations manager. What kind of a cost-cutting measure is this?

Also, staff turnover has been really high, 2 accounts people and 3 admin people have left... and this is an office of less than 7 people including 2 of us interns. Sad.

I don't want to go on about my boss and supervisor.

Also, Prof Brenda came to interview us just yesterday. Seems like nothing can be done given that the scope of operations of the company has little to do with us.

Just get the best out of it

Going for dinner

God bless!