You just love the ability of being able to have a free ride by tapping out before 0745H. It's a privilege reserved for those working within the town area which you have sorely missed. Your love-hate relationship with public transport is something which many commuters can relate to.

From packed trains to frequent breakdowns, its only the free rides before 0745H which makes the ride more bearable. Notwithstanding that, driving to town for meetings and paying exorbitant parking rates (even though its claimable) goes against your principle of saving money for the company. While the car remains a necessity due to the need to visit the various work locations and out-of-way journeys, public transport still remains the choice if you are heading to town.

You can catch up on your reading, daydream or "enjoy the scenery" as you commute to work. In fact, the public transport can be faster than driving your own car at times. Take for  example your commute back to the office this afternoon after your work in Corporate HQ. It just took you 30 mins to reach office compared to driving. Not to add that you don' have to battle idiotic drivers, traffic jams and the ERP. As one of the authorities' advertisement has said; "I can daydream because someone is driving".

Well, like you said, the love-hate relationship with the public transport continues and you will still keep the car.

Work often gets bearable when you are over at the Corporate HQ. It's akin to a home-coming where the colleagues are like family to you. Besides catching up on the usual gossip work issues, you are able to gain insights into HHQ's thinking and strategic considerations.

Notwithstanding this, you were humbled by their recognition of your limited abilities by requesting for your participation in a talent development project team. By seeking one's voluntary participation instead of coercing, you have further learnt the art of human resource from the experts; the importance of making someone feel valued in order to commit their best.

After having survived the organisation for a year plus and comparing to the HQ, you have come to realise the antiquated mindset of your own business unit; a lack of ownership within the people and a lack of big picture mindset amongst the select members of the management. While you hope that the restructuring and business process review will lead to a more efficient organisation and removal of deadwood , you are already hearing feedback that some power-hungry HODs requesting for additional headcount due to the increasing workload.

Sometimes you can never understand the mindset of these group of people. With the perception of your industry and an ageing workforce, you are already facing an uphill task of recruitment, retention and increasing productivity. In order to do more with less, one has to utilise the power of technology to automate the work processes and create capacity for high-value tasks. Unfortunately, the use of technology literally comes with a hefty price; the high initial Capital Expenditure or CAPEX tends to put off the leadership despite the high productivity gains. 

Indeed, flying is much more easier than doing what you do these days.

Well, enough of the complaining. Perhaps you are in need of a holiday or a stay-cation to de-stress and decompress. But, what is these little stresses compared to those who are working their guts out and mugging for exams on top of managing the family commitments? Your thoughts drift to J as you wondered how she is coping given that her exams are just around the corner. But you know that everything is going to turn out fine for her as you always have had full confidence in her abilities. 

Such wondering and worrying is longer under your purview for there's a better person fulfilling this role. Sometimes you do wonder if she thinks of you along these lines too. Better not as her processing and emotional capacity can be better utilised for more important matters.

After looking at the organization's earnings last year and coupled with news that your oil & gas counterparts are not doing well, it doesn't take a genius to decipher that the quantum for this year's performance bonus would be reduced.

It's disappointing when you have put in so much effort only to take a reduced quantum because of the need to take one for the TEAM. Like the rest of the colleagues in the know, you wonder on a personal note why this is necessary as they have not always been a team player. In fact animosity runs deep between the various elements as both are separate listed entities yet under the same umbrella. 

Unfortunately, these politicking are beyond your pay-grade and the decisions made by the senior management would sometimes be an insight of the things to come. In your own view, its just a matter of time before across-the-board business processes review takes place and redundancy exercises are executed. The only thing one can now do is stay relevant and employable through constant skills upgrading.

Sleeping has become difficult as the brain goes into overdrive mode in preparation for the exams. You resort to having a glass of wine to make you sleep better, but it doesn't help for the stress remains.

It gets more frustrating when you discover both the lecture slides and study guide are not coherent. It results in plenty of time wasted as you try to sense-make and bring structure to the chaos. But you realize that you are not alone in this struggle. 

Through the group chats, you discovered that your classmates were also facing the same challenges as you. So through the power of many (and technology), all of you managed to help each other by sharing information and discussing about the potential exam questions. Despite all these help, it reached a point where you really felt like tearing up the lecture slides and notes. 

It's that point when you yearn for a tight hug and comforting words; one assuring you that everything is going to be alright; that you just have to do the best. In the absence of all these, you resort to exercising to release that pent-up frustration. That exertion from the pumping of iron felt good but it's still not good enough. Perhaps you should start running again and seek that zen which calms you down.

It's never easy but you know that through the will to succeed, you know that you would be able to do more than the extra-ordinary. 

Exhausted, totally drained from the many work demands. These are the times when the temptation to open a bottle of reds/whites become high. This is also the time where that "I miss you" alarm sounds in the back of the head; where a stress-busting hug would suffice. But succumbing to such temptations is tantamount to emotional suicide.  

Since you would rather to keep everything to yourself, an outlet is needed to vent off the frustrations.Where exercise was a preferred option to destress, you can't do anything strenuous for now as the body heals. You miss pounding the tarmac in your running kit with sweat dripping down the body and the "high" from completing a long run.You miss the muscle aches from pumping the iron at the gym.  While waiting for the body to recover, writing is now a preferred way to destress, to vent your frustrations and to articulate your thoughts. 

Now you understand why pilots hate flying a desk.

What you thought to be an extinct problem has resurfaced and made its presence felt. The agonising moments of stiffness coupled with tear-jerking pain makes you feel so "alive". It made you wished that you could had address the root cause when you were younger and not suffer the consequences now. 

Despite the doctor's orders to stay immobilised and rest as much as you can, you laugh at the irony of it. What is rest when a multitude of deadlines are staring at you in the face, screaming for your attention? You have been out of the exercise circuit for coming to 2 weeks and the fats are starting to roar with glee as their enemies (aka muscle) is being converted. You wished that you could be out at the gym or running or even swim laps. But alas, it's better to err on the safe side than to aggravate the pain.

You just hope that with a proper diet coupled with adequate treatment will resolve this painful episode and not degenerate into something more serious. Ok, enough of ranting. Time to head back to the wonderful world of school work.

Sometimes it's a challenge to find a solution that fits everybody's requirements. Finding a solution is like crossing a minefield as everybody has their own interests and agenda. You can either thread carefully through it with a minesweeper or you can use demolitions to blaze a path across. But the career costs incurred can be prohibitive and a weak-willed person will think twice before attempting to do anything stupid.

 

Not yours truly.

 

You feel compelled to stand up to some senior management's personal agenda for the betterment of everybody yet you do not want to make it ugly. Perhaps age has tempered your trail-blazing days and hence you don't want to create any more trouble than you have already done. But if nothing is done, you cannot live with your conscience.

 

Sometimes you just have to make a stand and do the right thing. If one keeps dwelling on the "what ifs", they will never be able to move forward. You make a decision based on the prevailing information and do your best to mitigate the potential risks. If the decision is wrong, can you live with it or would you execute your exit strategy?

 

At the end of the day, no matter how much you do, how much effort you have put in, all will come to a nought because of someone's personal agenda, someone's fear for the unknown, etc. But does anyone even care about how you feel in the first place?

 

Guess not.

 

Because everyone is busy worrying about ensuring that their own interests are kept intact, that their current comfortable life is not affected. You are just a pawn on the chessboard or a tool for them to attain their goals. If you are gone one day, no one will realise it nor even shed a tear for you. It's been tested and proven so many times that you have lost count of it.

 

Thus it's better for you to strengthen your fortress so that no one can breach it and cause you so much frustrations, hurt or disappointment. Sometimes its better that way. Why stick your hot face on a cold butt when it will never be reciprocated?

Sometimes you wonder whether it's a blessing or curse for your ability to craft policy papers. While your purported paper writing skills makes you big boss's the "go-to" person when there's a need to revamp papers to the board's requirements, it's taking you away from your core functions.

Instead of being hired to alleviate your own department's workload and revamping the system, nothing has changed. Despite feeling honoured by big boss's assignments to such "co-curricular activities" as part of the total learning experience, the fear of creating some green-eyes of jealousy may be coming true. While snide remarks would not have reached your ears, you can feel that there are many people who can't wait to see you fail. Hence, only by strengthening that mask and staying on your toes will your path through these treacherous waters be safe.

It's often times like this that you rather be up in the wild blue yonder flying an aeroplane than flying a desk. Indeed you miss the simple joys of flying and the exhilaration of climbing towards the Heavens. Surfing among the clouds and leaving contrails across the blue skies sets you free from the treachery of office politics, which you try your best to steer clear of like those turbulence-laden CB clouds. Oh well, you just hope that one day you will take to the skies again and relive the joys of flying again. And of course, taking J with you for that long-promised flight.

For now, a walk along the beach and the cooling sea breeze is the best substitute to de-stress. Even though walking by the beach is different now without J, you just have to get use to it. Gone are the days where physical touches like hugs and words of affirmation were what got both you through the stresses of life and work. But such is human nature that you tend to take things for granted when you have them. Only when you have lost them for good will you regret about it.

At least dreaming about it will keep you going. And dreaming is what you will do now. Good night. 

The conversion training on the Airbus A320 has been so intense that I have not been able to get any proper rest. With a punishing schedule of 6 hours in the simulator (alternating between PF and PNF, pilot jargon for Pilot Flying and Pilot Non Flying) coupled with study time up to 10 hours a day, I have basically no life and not enough sleep.

It's tough going but it will be over by next week once I clear the scheduled checkride. The priority in order of importance these days has been; Simulator, Study, Sleep with eating being the least of the priority. If given the choice between sleep and eating, I will just sleep as I am totally exhausted. But no matter how exhausted I am, I am still making time to check on J as I know that she is also equally burnt out. 

Even though we are no longer together, I am still worried about her as she tends to push herself hard and there ain't much of an outlet for her to vent her frustrations or provide a listening ear. I hope that the bf is doing what he is supposed to do to take care of her well being. As much as I wouldn't like to compare myself with him, I would definitely pick her up after work, give her a big hug to take all the stress away, plan a surprise getaway or even a staycation to let her recharge her batteries.

But I am not him.

Well, there's alot which I wish I can do to alleviate her stress. Let me see what I can do.