28th November 2007 marks 1 year of Oyen being with me. I first adopt Oyen on Tuesday, 28th November 2006 after about 7 days of giving Oyen’s food at my doorstep.

Having him around is so much joy to me, and is one of the best thing that happened in my life, where 1 year flown just like that. I really love him, and my other 3 cats too.

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Jet lag, also jetlag or jet-lag, is a physiological condition which is a consequence of alterations to the circadian rhythm. Such alterations result from shift work, daylight saving time, altered day length, or as the name implies, transmeridian travel as on a jet plane. They are known as desynchronosis, dysrhythmia, dyschrony, jet lag, or jet syndrome. The condition is generally believed to be the result of disruption of the “light/dark” cycle that entrains the body’s circadian rhythm. It can be exacerbated by environmental factors.

The condition of jet lag generally lasts many days or more, and medical experts have deemed that a recovery rate of “one day per time zone” is a fair guideline. Good sleep hygiene promotes rapid recovery from jet lag: in fact sleep, relaxation, moderate exercise, and sensible diet seem to be the simplest recovery methods.

However, since the experience of jet lag varies among individuals, it is difficult to assess the efficacy of any single remedy. Age may also be a factor on the severity of jet lag, as younger people will suffer worse jet lag than older people would.

Sigh! I’m still suffering from jetlag, and I guess this is the worst ever that I have faced. My trip to London last time didn’t affect me a lot (London is 7 hours back Malaysia time). This time, Chicago is 14 hours back of Malaysia time. And it’s really the opposite over there – night time in Malaysia, day time in Chicago, daytime in Malaysia, night time in Chicago. No overlap.

You know, I have a very organized sleep pattern. Sleeping late at night is not my thing, and I can never do it. Believe me, I never put an alarm clock when I sleep. Every morning at 7:30am, I will wake up automatically. I guess after 6 years having this routine (i.e waking up for work every single morning), my body has developed the circadian rhythm.

Last time, my first day at Chicago office, 9am Chicago time, which mean 11pm Malaysia time – my bed time already. I was so sleepy that day, and sometimes feeling like fainting. After 2 weeks there, my body has kinda adjusted to Chicago time, but now back to Malaysia time. It’s been 6 days already I’m in Malaysia, but I still feel sleepy during daytime, and my eyes wide awake at night (around 3am).

So last night, I went to bed around 7:30pm (I can’t stand it, and feel so sleepy), and woke up at 4am this morning. And at the moment, I feel so dizzy as of I don’t have enough sleep. Well. Hopefully for 1 more week to come, I’ll recover from this.

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It’s school holiday, and what else malls in Malaysia to do rather than having sales. The Pets Wonderland in Mid Valley is having sale now – to attract more children I suppose.

I’ve been visiting Pets Wonderland last Thursday, and something that is on sale catch my eyes. It’s this Katty Cat Furnitures. So I took the catalogue to browse at home.

So I have decided. I want to get something new for my cats. I’m going to get them a new furniture to play with. I always fond of big and tall furniture, as I think my cats will love climbing it. It is cat’s nature anyway having fondness for settling in high place. I’m getting that model 4007-AEE and the scratch mouse toy.

Been seeing this kind of furniture at various places already, but all of them having quite a high price tag which I can’t afford. Below are the furnitures that are on display here – and the prices are quite reasonable (after discount).

Finished with the shopping, had the dinner at Carl’s Jr – newly opened place near the cinema. Oh my gosh. It’s so expensive. I’m not a burger/hamburger fan myself, so I found paying RM20+ for a burger is really expensive. But maybe those who likes burgers/hamburgers will find there is something special with this one (charbroiled) and something worth to pay RM20+ for.

Quickly got home after that. I’m so eager to has this new furniture assembled. So, here is my shopping list for today.

The moment that I’m waiting for, unboxing the furniture, with Oyen being the model of the unboxing for today (as always for my unboxing procedure)

Here are the furniture parts, out of the box. Now it’s Ebot’s turn to get curious with that the hell of thing is that.

So, lets the assembly begin. This is the diagram showing how the unit to be assembled.

And after a while, this is the semi assembled unit.

And finally, this is the finished product looks like. I put all of my 4 cats on it for photography session. Seeing only 3 cats in the photo below? Look again…

Wicked! They seem to like it, and I feel so happy looking at my cats playing on this thing. Here’s the video that I manage to record.

Well next, need to decide where to put this. I guess I’ll think it over once I have tidied my house.

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I’m back to Malaysia folks. My journey back is still tiring one, but it it is better than my journey out of Malaysia 2 weeks ago. As usual, I request for an aisle sit everytime for my long journey flight. It’s easy to get out if I need a toilet break. This time, I happened to sit next to a family again, with the wife of the family seperated at different seat. They requested to sit together. So the flight attendant ask me if it’s ok if I move to other seat. I told her that it’s fine, as long as I get an aisle seat.

After the seat rearrangement, yes, there are several empty seat, so I moved to a new place. What best about that is, the next next to me is empty. Oh. How lovely. I feel so free and relax in this 15 hours flight. I can stretch whenever I want, I sit comfortably with having that cramp seat feeling. The flight stop at Taipei for 1 1/2 hour since there are a few that has Taipei as final destination, and a few more will embark on the flight to Kuala Lumpur to Taipei.

So, after the transit, I’m back to the original seat. The family is gone (they stop at Taipei). Alhamdulillah, the seat next to me is till empty this time. So another 5 hours cramp-free moment on the flight to Kuala Lumpur.

Reached KLIA at about 12:45pm, gone through immigration, claim my baggage, and I’m getting the Airport Limo to my home. Well, I can claim after all. Hehe.

Got home, my 3 cats are all waiting in front of the door, except Uneng which my housemate help me to send to vet for neutering. When I was in Chicago, I heard that Uneng getting wilder, where Uteh is the victim. The vet doctor said that it is a time that a male cat will show who is the strongest amongst other male cats. Since others are all neutered, so Uneng obviously the fiercest one. Pity Uteh. There are lots of scratches on his ear, face and body. Well. I really miss my cats so much.

There are a bunch of letters for me too. Well, as usually, all are bills at the time like this, except this letter.

Kinda curios what’s inside, and once the letter is opened, it’s my first Google AdSense check.

Wow. What’s another nice thing that happened today. My hosting and Flickr Pro account are expiring anytime soon. This is just came at the perfect moment. Well, I started putting Google AdSense to my blog on September 2005. Took me 2 years to accumulate the earnings before I’m eligible for the first payment. Geez. I’m so bad at this kind of money earning thing.

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Well, it’s not shopping really, but I just went for sight seeing at this world class shopping, dining, lodging and entertaiment at this Magnificent Mile area. Here I am at the intersection of East Chicago Avenue and North Michigan Avenue.

The whole street is full with malls and shopping centres. The view is kinda nice here, and it’s quite a busy place. We can think it as Bukit Bintang area, where there are always people walking around. But everything kinda expensive here. What I did just window shopping.

My niece just sent me email 3 days ago, telling that I would be her birthday soon. Hhhmm.. Very opportunist. Well. Got to find something for her I guess. So my window shopping session has become a little shopping session for me.

Went to The Disney Store to get plush toys for my niece. And I also can’t believe there’s another thing that I’m getting for myself – a brand new 160GB iPod Classic, and a hard case for it.

Was walking around this area, when I found a very big Apple store here, which I have to get in. There are many of Apple products on display here, which you can play around with it. So this is the first time I look at iPhone live, and have a chance to play around with it, and first time that I can lay a hand on the brand new iPod Touch. I blog about new iPod lineup a while ago.

I just got the urge that I really want to do shopping today. So, which one to get – iPhone, iPod touch for the new iPod Classic. Well, iPhone might not work yet in Malaysia as it’s already locked to service provider here. There’s a forum around about unlocking iPhone, but just too risky for me to get. iPod Touch is really cool. You got to see it in action, and you’ll be amazed. iPod Classis is something worth to get too. 160GB – double the size of my current iPod, and it also got a new interface, which is a lot nicer than previous version.

Believe me, I spend 45 mins there, playing around with the products as well as deciding which one to get. Apple TV is quite cool too, but this is a worth buy if you have HDTV. So, I’ll pass this first until the time I can afford to buy HDTV.

After a long thinking, I decided to get 160GB iPod Classic. iPod Touch really awesome, with with 8GB/16GB, it’s far too small for me. I like to bring all of my MP3s, rather than selecting which MP3s that I want to store in my MP3 player. Furthermore, the new iPod Classic has new interface, has cover flow – so much new things compared to previous version, which is worth to get.

Well, what about my previous 80GB iPod Video, which I just bought 6 months ago? Luckily I manage to find a buyer for my iPod already. Well, I won’t be making a decision to buy a new iPod after all if I can’t find the buyer of my previous iPod. Can’t wait to go back to Malaysia, as I will do the unpacking of my new iPod ;)

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I’m staying at Chicago Marriott O’Hare hotel, which is 15 miles from downtown Chicago. And that’s about 24km. The person here can’t find any hotel that is in downtown area, which closer to the office that is available for the period of 2 weeks. So that simply means that I have to do a bit of travel everyday to and from work.

Being a public transport user myself in Malaysia, I guess it’s in my blood already to quickly adapting to the new transport system at a new place. What I did was to get the train system map from the hotel, and just plan my journey a day before, getting familiar with the name of the station, and which lines that I have to use. The system here is less complex compared to London’s underground system. In Chicago, they call it elevated train, for just simply ‘L’.

As last time, Google Map has help me a lot during my planning. It seems that I have to stop at Clinton station on the blue line to get to the office.

Luckily, the train station is just a walking distance to my hotel, and it’s a blue line. Meaning I just hop on the train, and I’ll reach Clinton station without the need to change train. Here’s the photo of the hotel that I take from the Cumberland train station. Pretty close huh.

My first day here, Bob, the manager that organize my visit here show me around the office. Wow. I got to say this place is awesome. Just look at the programmer workstation here. They are getting 2 wide LCD monitors, to increase productivity when doing programming. The furniture is very Ikea try, and very comfortable.

This is the employee longue area (Malaysia office call it pantry). The area is huge, with microwave ovens, free flow of coffee, tea, sugar, ice maker, big fridge and vending machine.

That’s not the best part yet about the employee longue. Apart from the table to sit for eating, there is also several couches with LCD tv connection to cable. How cool is that. And this longue got the best view. Really a good place to relax during break time.

As always when people from different countries gathered together, we started to exchange stories. Here, office hour is just from 9am to 5pm, with 1/2 hour lunch break. People do lunch pretty quick here. Get down, get sandwich, bring back to office, eat and continue work. Back in Malaysia, folks at my office always having 1 1/2 hour lunch (LOL).

The salary here is paid every 2 weeks. They quite shock to know that we are paid once a month. I guess it’s true too. How often this thing happen to us, after we receive the salary, during the third week, we broke already and counting the day for the next pay day. Here, you get 1/2 salary first, spend it for 2 weeks, then you get another 1/2 of the salary on third week.

Well, many other new things that I get to know. I glad I’m here, seeing my self how American people way of living. There are good things, and also there are bad things that they are practicing. It’s such an eye opener to see the many personalities that American people have.

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Been going through my Google Reader list the other day, when I stumble upon Bro Shy’s entry. He surely doesn’t write for such a very long time. Then my heart ticks. It is the same thing that happened to me too. Then I started to feel the same thing too – I miss my blog so much.

Sorry for not writing for so long. I’ve been stressed out with work since the middle of Ramadhan

• 2 of my staffs away for 1 week training. Really hell of the time jumbling up the workload handled by both of them to the other people. I got to get my hands dirty also doing some of their work
• 1 of my staff resigning. Another trouble of arranging the workload passed over to another person.
• Most of my staffs will be away for 1 week Hari Raya holiday (including me). How about the work handled by them?
• Preparing the 1 week training course on Dimensions IOM, TOM and data cleaning, plus I have to be the trainer. My boss just can’t wait
• Getting ready for my 2 weeks Chicago trip while I was conducting training – this is cracz

I was scheduled to visit the Chicago office 1 1/2 weeks before hari raya, which I so reluctant. I told my boss earlier that please keep Ramadhan away from sending me anywhere. I’m glad that this didn’t happened, and will happen after raya. That’s a relief.

After the raya, there’s another crazy idea from her, asking me to conduct the training for Asia Pacific delegates for Dimensions IOM, TOM and data cleaning training. At the same time, had discussion with Chicago office on when will be the best time for me to visit. Since the thanks giving is just around the corner, and most of the people will be away at that time, there are 2 options

• 5th Nov until 16th Nov
• 26th Nov until 7th Dec

My boss ask me which one I prefer. I prefer the later (for the reasons that I will write later) but she insisted on 5th Nov. So, why ask me to choose at the first place?

Why I prefer the later?

• I will be conducting the training from 29th Oct until 2nd Nov. And I still haven’t applied the visa to US. That will take a bit amount of time. I just can’t concentrate much on that training thinking about all those things that I need to prepare for the trip.
• To be there at Chicago on 5th Nov, that mean I have to fly as early at 3rd Nov. That’s my birthday for god sake. I don’t want to spend it on the flight
• The period is the last week of Syawal, meaning I will miss lots of my friend’s Hari Raya open house
• I’m just too exhausted. At least, I need some rest first after the tiring week of handling the training

But all those nightmares came to reality. I did actually ask my colleage to take over the training for 1/2 a day since I have to be at US Embassy for my US Visa application. Alhamdulliah, my visa is approved without much trouble. The interview went really smooth and quick. I don’t look like terrorist after all I guess. Believe me. If you ever to look at me live, you’ll meet the ‘geek’est look person ever. Hahaha.

Talking about US Visa application, believe me, it’s quite complicated. The application can only be done online. And there a non-refundable fee of RM367 that you have to pay. Meaning, if your visa is not approved, it’s gone. Luckily I can reimbursed this amount from my company. There are quite lenghty forms that you need to fill, and if you are male, there is an additional form that you need to fill that asks questions like – have you received military training, have you ever handle fireams, have you been arrested and jailed before etc.

The interview is not that long, but waiting for your turn is pretty long. I had to wait for nearly 3 hours before my turn. As I said earlier, my interview went really smooth. 5 mins duration I think (around that). There are people that had a longer interview.

Anyway, it happened also that I have to travel on my birthday. That really sucks. I left my home as early as 6am ON MY BIRTHDAY to catch the flight. And it’s a tiring one, 26 hours in total. 17 hours flight to Los Angeles, stop there for several hours, then 5 hours flight to Chicago. Once I reached Chicago, I just can’t wait to reach the hotel. I really need a good sleep. This is my room. Who can resist jump into this comfy king size bed.

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