Banking On It

ah i'm slipping into old habits with this whole blog updating thing (or rather non-updating :p) ... but i've had a very busy 3 weeks!

I just got back from 3 days away at ingleside. I was there with workmates, going through strategy for my team, and business unit .. it wasn't exactly exciting, but i did start to understand some stuff better ... we also worked on a national tour we'll be doing, going around talking to different areas about our products. I am on *standby*, so I may be going around --> prolly NSW, but if by some luck, maybe interstate? who knows really, i'm not sure if i want to go or not, but it would be a good experience ..

good things about the time away was:
a) it was fun - good team building experience and i got to know my team a lot better
b) free food and drinks :o) everything was free ... u don't get that in the IT areas that i've been/know of, i really like it in the business :p

Phil was also staying at the same place, though only for 2 days ... I didn't really see him that much, except in the mornings .. i was envious - his room was nicer than mine! it was the same layout, but his bedspread and stuff looked newer, and his shower had a door .. mine didn't, which i later realised was cos my room was designed to suit wheelchair bound ppl ... oh well, it was still a decent place to stay - it was like a hotel, with air conditioning/heating, tvs, kettles, irons etc in each room ..

I didn't spend a lot of time in my room, except to sleep .. the first night, half of my team were working till 11pm .. I wasn't needed, so i got an *earlier* night than the others, which meant finishing work at like 8:30-9pm .. I was beat, so I had a relatively early night because I knew that there was another day of work ahead ..

Second day was a little more relaxed and didn't go as long .. We spent the night after dinner drinking (i realised rather late that all the bar tab was being paid by work :p) and hanging out in the rec room ... hehe a couple of my workmates (the younger ones) were extremely disappointed that the bar closed at 11pm :p they kept going back until 11:05 when they were turned away :p We had also been stopped from ordering multiple drinks at once for others, and had to go and get our own drinks :p The rec room had a pool table, stereo, ping pong table, tv (there was also an adjoining gymnasium - dang i didn't bring gym gear!) ... we played table tennis and pool whilst watching the cricket .. lots of fun, v relaxed ... i was one of the last to leave --> i challenged my workmate james to a game (hehe a lot of sledging was going on), and so in the end we had a girls vs boys match .. i partnered up with one of our girls and james partnered up with simon .. we ended up winning which was great :p (we haven't let james forget it :p) hehe we didn't quite deserve it .. we were looking like losing badly (simon kept sinking all of his balls whilst we weren't sinking much), esp when one of our balls was near one pocket and being blocked by the black ball (we had to be careful not to get the black ball in when hitting our ball) ... by luck though, i managed to get one of their balls inbetween our ball and the black ball, so they were more likely to knock the black ball in should they attempt to hit their ball .. and alas they did :p hehehe ... some of them also had a chair race around the building (hehe you'd think we were back at school again!) .. it was definitely a fun night :p

i stayed up late that night, because we didn't have work to do today .. instead, we spent the whole day at the golf course :o) i haven't really played before, and it was rather frustrating .. but it was a nice day out and quite fun .. we got to use the golf buggies, my workmate wasn't impressed with my driving :p i almost had a bit of crash at one stage, when i was going down the hill waaay too quickly and kept putting my foot on the accelerator instead of the brakes :p but my driving wasn't that bad, just a bit fast for my workmate :p we played ambrose style, which meant that you go in groups (max 4) and you all keep taking shots, and you hit the next shot based on the best shot from your group .. I had some flukey shots, but most weren't that great/didn't have much aim/direction ... i would like to try it again, but the game is rather slow and you need a lot of patience .. it can get really frustrating :p We came 3rd, but we still get a prize (wine i think?) --> 1st and 3rd teams get a prize :p it was quite an eventful day though ... many balls were lost, lots of buggying, and my workmate almost got into a fight with these guys all over a ball (they claimed it was theirs, but it was definitely my workmates!) :p quite funny really :p

2 weeks ago, i went away for bank holiday to melbourne ... alan wanted to go to melbourne, and as we both had a long weekend, we decided to go at the v last minute (ie we booked the flight 14 hours before we were to go down!) ... bank holiday is the best holiday around though - ah the perks of working at a bank :p it's good cos it's not school holidays and not everyone will be going away so the roads aren't so busy ... melbourne was okay, v cold though! (feels like the past couple of days!) ... i went shopping on bridge rd and bumped into mel! small world! Alan + I had been commenting that the chances of bumping into someone in melbourne from sydney were slim, and then there was mel .. she was enjoying shopping though, unlike we were :p we bumped into her shopping partner further down the road, who was also bored too i think :p we got lost quite a bit, but i did get to practice driving a manual car on our rented car (argh it's frustrating :p), saw the penguins at phillip island (so cute!) and went to hanging rock (nice but too many kids there!) ... i was glad to get back to sydney, it was nice to be away but sydney is waay better :p

we've managed to win our last 2 frisbee games, which has been pretty good .. the players have been getting it together lately, and the fact that we've had another experienced player playing with us really helps ... i dont know if we'll make it to the finals this year, but at least my team can say they have improved ...

i saw Bewitched the other day with my sista ... it was um .. okay .. i dont think kidman should choose those sorta movies, they just dont suit her and even though it's not a remake of bewitched, but a movie about remking bewitched, having a wussy character as the main character really sucked (even though it was the point .. she was meant to be wussy, but the idea of samantha from the original show is meant to give her strength) ..

hmm i'm off to bed now ... i've had a lot of fun the past couple of days, but i'm really tired now ... good night!