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02/01/09 - Happy New Year! It's that time of year again, where Christmas ends, Easter begins, and everyone looks for some fresh direction in life. Though it's only two days in, I'm not feeling much different than before. Though I worked quite a number of hours, I did absolutely nothing with my free time last month, and I don't think I'm prospering in constructively filling my free time this month either. And although I'm working for the next ten days straight, I may struggle with attempting to fill even more free time, as overtime at work may become more scarce, now the busy Christmas season is now over.

So basically, my first New Year's Resolution is to make better use of my free time, whether that be working on my website, trying in some way to get teaching experience, or by fulfilling my other New Year's Resolution; getting rid of all my stuff. I've had an account on ebay for atleast a couple of years, and have done nothing with it. I just want to get rid of all these pointless material possessions, so I can lighten the load when I eventually gain independence; I really don't want to have boxes full of jargon shipped to Malaysia, and I'd rather they weren't gathering dust at my parents' house. I'd rather sell it or give it away (I don't like disposing of things), so it's someone else's problem.

I enjoyed the Christmas and New Year celebrations at the Palmers Green church, though I was quite shocked to see a middle aged guy get a brief kick-in from some youths just opposite the church, just before I arrived for the New Year's service. I don't see a lot, living in my tiny bubble between my house and Tesco (distance of about 200m), and I almost forgot about how hideous this loathsome country is. Anyway, the New Year's service was good, though I was a bit disspointed the sermon was still going as it passed midnight; it wasn't till atleast ten past that 2009 was actually acknowledged. I'd just like to thank Prathees and his family for having me stay over twice the past couple of weeks, and for the shirt and tie they gave for Christmas.

I had a long gossip with several people in Malaysia just before the New Year. Jyothi, who was heavily pregnant whilst I was on holiday, had a baby boy on December 23rd, Rebecca's slowly making a measley income through network marketing, and Anita, who claims she's been having visions of me, wants to start learning to use computers. I just realised a couple of days ago that I still have a weeks holiday entitlement, which I must take before April 1st. Well, June is still a long way away, I'm sure one short holiday wouldn't break the bank balance, would it?

09/01/09 - After anticipating last week about the prospects of going on another short holiday to Malaysia in March, that is unfortunately not to be. Just as the idea got ticking in my head, I was allocated my remaining holiday by my manager, so didn't get the chance to book it on the fixed dates I wanted. I guess I should be happy that I've saved myself several hundred pounds not going on another holiday, but unfortunately I have nothing exciting going until June, when I'd be going again, whether I travelled in March or not.

In fact, two of my three days off are next week. There were concerns that there would be no over time for next week too, due to the company (as a whole) giving too much overtime over Christmas, but fortunately I'm heavily booked up with work for next week, which is fortunate, as my mother's home all next week as she's off sick. I should have just booked my next Malaysia trip for next week; I witnessed snow and frost for the first time in four years this week, having been in Malaysia the past three winters...

Despite having plenty of hours of work, I'm still trying hard to fill up my free time with anything that doesn't feel like a waste of time. I've started playing The Movies (a month after Lionhead Studios decided to close their online community site for the game), the first game I've bought in years that isn't to do with The Sims (though it's similar enough). Hopefully I can get some more content on the rather quiet Productions section of the site...

16/01/09 - Another week passes, and after a busy Christmas (at work atleast) I'm back into a standard routine, which is basically working as hard as I did during Christmas. I enjoyed my day and a half off of my allocated holiday; it wasn't two whole days, as I actually worked four hours on my day off. I made some use of the time, by making a start on clearing out my room, and I finally updated the HuckoolPhotography.Com Themed Albums, which I last did fourteen months ago, just before I went to study in Malaysia.

Talking of study, Tesco have an open day in a couple of weeks to study for an NVQ in Retail Management (I think that's what it is). Though I could start working now as a teacher in Malaysia, I would rather build myself up to have a second career option out there, just in case one of them happens to not work out. But for now, I just have to keep working hard and keep saving my money, as with the state of the world at the moment, I'll need to keep as much as I can get... Happy Pongal, by the way, to any Tamil, or anyone else, who may have celebrated it.

23/01/09 - This past week has been a very long week, forty seven hours of which were spent at work. Two sevenths of a whole week spent inside a supermarket? Well, after receiving my first wage packet of the year, and receiving some very good feedback from my manager, it's just more motivation to keep piling on the hours, though the next couple of weeks will be more moderate compared to this week. I hope that I can really prosper with my work this year, and this upcoming NVQ should lead the way.

I decided to give the Wallington Tamil Church (where I visited a couple of months ago with Mercy, who I met at Tesco) another go on Sunday, but I think I was right the first time in that the church just really isn't for me. I can usually pick up whether a place is right for me or not, and I knew that the Palmers Green church was the first time I visited there. I really don't think I need to attend two churches anyway, and it's far too stressful to be attending both each week. Sunday's should be a time for me to relax, with one simple journey to one church. The stress can begin when the Sunday School classes start...

And finally this week, marked in every piece of news, was the inaugiration of President Barrack Obama. Based on first impressions, Obama seems like a very honest and good hearted man, who definitely looks like he wants to take the United States, and the rest of the world, forward. But if Obama is this model world leader I've always wanted, I wonder if any assinations attempts wouldn't because of his skin colour, but because of him being too good a president, such as punishing these egotistical, millionaire bankers, who's greed is destroying economic order throughout the world...

30/01/09 - The first month of 2009 is coming to an end, and the Chinese New Year has just begun, my first outside of Malaysia (since I started caring about celebrating it). I also saw Elizabeth for the first time since Christmas, and had a long chat together on Tuesday, then I helped her on Thursday, carrying a microwave for her that she needed to exchange. I also attended my first prayer meeting in Woodchurch, after being invited by Mercy, and met Rev. Dr. George Thevarakam, a Tamil Evangelist from Malaysia, who has preached at the Community Of Praise churches.

I also bought my first language learning CD for learning Tamil, which I ordered from the EuroTalk website. Had I bothered to look around on the internet, I could have got it £10 cheaper from Amazon, so after sending an e-mail to EuroTalk to attempt to cancel my order, my wait of 'up to ten working days for delivery' suddenly turned into two... So, quite a number of firsts this week, though unwisely wasting money isn't one of them...