Ogakijin Blog

Finally replacing!!!
Bought a pen case at famous stationary store ITO-YA (yesterday) - to replace worn-out Montblanc pen case.
I had been looking all over the world for more than a year!!! (really)



Very soft leather



from left:
St. Dupont
Montblanc (146)
Cartier



Very soft... so you can hold like this.

Today, I submitted an application to extend my passport. Wait... does new passport come before my departure on 12th? Sure hope so!

Yeah, this is my favorite brand for shirts... this is the 5th one in my collection.
This is new design just came out!

Oh don't even consider me a gay even though I may wear feminine-like dress!!! Hehehe.
Yes, I am DARN straight! Got it?!



shirt @ JPY19,900 (about USD200).
Yeah, this is brand shirt... no wonder still somewhat expensive.

Finally (?) --- turned to be 35 years old! Yeah, darn old man!!! I want to keep my soul younger, though!!!
Perfectly surprise to myself... my client - staff members pitched some money in... bought me a famous Yoroizuka sweets.
Yeah, famous patissier, Mr. Yoroizuka made those cakes:





Man, these are surely expensive!!! Never eaten one before in my entire life!
People fly into Tokyo from all over Japan to buy one Yokorizuka sweet at Tokyo Midtown! (No kidding)



I selected this one. Man, so yummy!!!

At night, had dinner with two female friends to celebrate my BD.

Also...

Kazem sent me a BD message via Email.
Anshu gave me a call from India.
Tons of friends from, mostly, T-birds wrote me a message via Facebook.

Thank you, everyone!!! I am so grateful for sure! Great BD it was.

What's up? Somehow I came to get a free lunch. Very rare to happen that to me.
Plus, not even easy food at all this time. Rather, it was quite Japanese from famous restaurant.

Hirata Firm's deep-fried pork bento box for lunch today!





Great stuff. Loved it.
You know, the restaurant located in the Tokyo Midtown always has a line of people waiting for foods. Really? Yeah, really.

Never had any dish from that restaurant before... This was worth it for sure.

Wow, didn't lose any boll throughout the round today!!! Another lucky day for me!

Received two prizes from the single round today!

Score: 53-51 = 104
3 pars I got.

7th place out of 20 entries
and most importantly...

"GREENIE"

It was 12th Hole - 147 yards... made the closest shot to the whole!!!



Got 3,000 yen (USD30) gift certificates. Not bad, huh!!!

Presentation material production... got complete before the deadline!!!
Thank God!

Meaning, today's work got normalized? Not so fast.

I had to deal with client's initiatives for coming fiscal year. Wait. Not even Q4 started yet. Hmmm.
That wasn't that tough... because it was merely high level (not in detail).
Though, I had to create supporting document by noon.

Yeah, by noon!!!
Created several slides in PowerPoint. Made it at noon. Yeah, I barely made it. Hehehe.

Well.

Everything got normalized in the afternoon? Sort of. However, I have to take care of headache... not physical one. Pain from the project. Some proposal has to be made by next week or so. That requires, of course, decision, which is extremely difficult. Really.

Oh boy. Better concentrate.

Well, decided to leave the work early... came home around 3pm.
Sick? Sickened and tired of working? Hahaha.

Totally untrue. Don't have such luxury!!!

Somewhat expected to support the presentation material. Data collection got complete yesterday or so and I received the result this morning. Deadline? Originally I was told, "Thursday."

Not much time.

However, this story came to the sudden change. Totally unexpected.

Got a call from HKG lady... she asked me to finish my work "by tomorrow (Wednesday)."

Proposed, noon on Wednesday. NOPE. Negative. Not good enough for her who owe report to her boss immediately.

So she said, "Can you make it by 9am - your 10am?"

Hmmm. I hadn't even started that work yet. Really. Though, she is my client... have no space arguing with her.
Thus, my answer is... nothing but YES.

Left work for home right after lunch. I wanted to have "secure" environment to get that task done.
Since then, I have been working like crazy...

Difficult to deal with...
Deal with what?

"Education."

I have two youngsters in the group for the project. They're still green like new grad. Surely, entry-level consultants.
Well, better say, "analysts."

One has a bit of business experience.
The other is right off the graduate school.

For me, very difficult to spend much time with them for the education.
Thus, I have to tell them what to do time to time.
I don't expect that they can work catching up with the speed that I go. Though, I really want them to build business fundamentals quickly. Though, very difficult to raise them. Hmmm.

Because of such business environment and expectation set by client, I have no luxury. You know what I mean.

Unfortunately, they make same mistakes over and over. Why? Just because they're young and still immature in this profession.
How much time I should give to them? How much patience required?

If this were some job other than consultant, I may have been much easier.
This job doesn't allow much time... every three month... some "outcome" required. If two out of four in the project team are slow... the other two have to go really fast to make the deal.

This is annoying...

Somehow different movie title in Japanese.

"Fixer" is the title here.
Title in English is "Michael Clayton."



Oh yes, this was good movie. Liked it!
I can give A-.

Maybe, the Japanese title should be "Janitor" rather than "Fixer."
Janitor sounds much accurate to this story.
Of course, Michael himself admitted it.

Because the work lasted till 3am or so last night (this morning?) - didn't have many things done today.
Woke up quite late... Didn't plan to sleep in, though.

Three books bought at nearby bookstore this afternoon:



"Great thinking"



"Great debate skill"



"How to sort out problems and analyze them"

Okay, now should have reading session!!! Don't want to waste money buying those, huh!!!

Oh, didn't go to the event, "Pen Trading in Tokyo 2008." Hmmm.
Well, I guess that I am not that geek like you think!

Would better say to myself, SUCK IT UP!!!
Seems this is the dead end. Really. This means that I have already come to the dead end and no turn around. Too late? Seems to be so!!! Hmmm.

Anyway, better come with something bright...
Oh yeah, I recently got this:



The Pen Catalogue 2008! Publication for distributors only!!! Wow, what a luck!

Already got new Cartier pen this year... means no more for 2008. Plan changed? Hehehe.

Marlen could be my next one like:



or this one...



What do you think? Call me GEEK! I do admit am!!!

Did you see this movie yet? Don't miss it out - at least I can tell so.
It was dizzy-inducing movie... you know what I mean? It were like the "Blair Witch Project."



Cloverfield... I liked it.
Probably it was only me while first part of the movie... way before crazy stuff happened was on... I kept laughing.
Yeah, that party scene. It was darn so funny to me... reminding me of all party stuff...
It was so typical. American comedy like. So funny.

I can give A- to this movie. Well, didn't like the end. Too sad.

Golf day for me. 2nd time in this year.
Fuji Health & Country Club was the place for today's round.

Wait. HEATH in the name?
Forget it!
It wasn't healthy at all! Course was well-designed for sure.
Too many beaches!!!
Too narrow fairways!!!

No one in entire 13 people from my firm participated in today's competition did play well.
Everyone felt so awful with the result.

I shot 55-60 = 115. Miserable. Somehow at 4th place.
I was the 2nd most popular player expected to win! Hmmm.

Anyway, perfect weather for golf it was.