I got so fed-up of sitting with nothing to do at work that I finally went to Big B to ask him if there’s something I can help him with on Monday. He had loads of stuff to do, which meant I was pretty busy doing some interesting stuff for most of the week.

I’ve had some more vivid dreams this week – the first one had me with GG at some temple, maybe somewhere near the Himalayas and the temple looked to be a Shiva temple. I dream that I am praying and asking Lord Shiva to quickly call me to Mount Kailash (which is in present day Tibet/China and is in my bucket-list). I then start reciting the Hanuman Chalisa and wake up reciting it. I saw the time and it was 3 am then, which some people call the Brahma muhurat which is supposed to be a very auspicious time.

In the second dream I was in a car travelling some place quite far from home (not sure if it was Singapore or Mumbai). I come to a large temple which is set on the side of a busy road and is reached by a long staircase. I don’t remember much of this dream as it is quite fuzzy. Just before I slept that night, I did have one of my random conversations with my ishtadev and this could be the reason I dreamt of the temple.

Other than that, the week was ok with work politics happening as usual…

I am going to enjoy my CNY break so that I can get back to work with a refreshed and clear mind!

Today is the first day of the Chinese Year of the Fire Monkey so Gong Xi Fa Cai and Xin Nian Quai Le!

One down and eleven more to go….I meant the months!

This week was the usual week in terms of work, essentially meaning that I don’t have much to do at the moment. On Monday, I was supposed to meet Big B in the morning which was moved to the afternoon. So we spoke and he had rearranged the jobscope I had given him earlier to tweak it a bit which was good as it now had admin right at the bottom which was what I really wanted. He reworked some of the other stuff I had written to make it a bit sexier, so that was also good. I also suspect that he spoke to my ex-boss as some of the things Big B spoke to me sounded suspiciously like what ex-boss said!

Now he needs to make a case for me and for the higher ups to decide if they want to keep me. Let’s see what happens. At this point, I am pretty ambivalent about things, on one hand, it will be good to have a permanent position in this organization and I do not need to start all over again in a new place. But then, a chance to start new is also quite tempting. I have sent out my resume to a number of positions that were interesting on a couple of jobsites, but there’s no news yet.

In this organization, those like me who are on contract are treated as second class citizens and this is something that irritates me no end. I’ve done a bit of protesting in my own way, but I seriously doubt anyone will even bother!

The recruitment company also sent through my appraisal that Big B did for me and I suspect he has lowered scores after we discussed. I don’t like it one bit! Big B gave me a much lesser score compared to what I’ve been getting and so this affects my bonus! The places I missed out on was on relationships and liking my job. Not liking it one bit!! Guess I need to up my social skills aspect if I am to stay on here, especially with Big B around.

Anyway, all this is in the past and hopefully things settle down well and good and things work out for the best.

I’ve also read 14 books this month, which is roughly 11% of my total books for the year. If things go on as they are, I will probably up my reading challenge later so more books to read. I’ve also decided to read one non-fun or serious, non-fiction book per month. This means I will read 12 such books in a year. Quite achievable I think. This could include anything and everything I am interested in with the exception of what I usually read so this excludes fiction and travel books. I’ve bookmarked some interesting books, now I need to find them in the library and borrow one of these. I may also read them through the overdrive app.

The week started on Monday with Big B changing my yearly appraisal meeting to later in the week. Then the recruitment company where I am nominally employed wrote to me saying that Big B has not yet confirmed that he is going to renew my contract. The whole week I was in pins and needles thinking about this this. At one point, I even thought that Big B was just sitting out my contract which is due to end in 2.5 weeks since I was having no work to do as it is!

After the appraisal, which to my surprise went well, I am even more confused. Big B is very satisfied with my work and I’ve gotten mostly 4s and 5s on the different parameters (on a scale of 1-5 with 5 being the best). The only criteria where I didn;t score was relationships. Apparently the people here don’t think I am a happy camper. I need to up my ante more on the office politics (something which I loathe) and as Big B put it, “When you are in a situation where you need to get get approval to get on board permanently, it helps to have more people on your side”. I agree, but I don’t like it!

Apparently since I am in this role for three years now, Big B is being pressured to either regularise my employment, which means making me permanent or let me go and this job will be done by one of the executive assistants as an enhanced role. They are still mulling over what the final decision will be, so in the meantime they will extend my contract for three months. I actually asked Big B “What would happen if they didn’t get the green light for my extended appointment and so does that mean I will be without a job after three months? Should I start looking for a new job now?” I think he was a bit taken aback at this, but he didn’t tell me what, just said he didn’t think it would come to that. So now I am to write a new job scope for myself which takes into account my current role as well as an enhanced version of what I want to do. So I guess my plan of action is to do that and at the same time start seriously looking for a new position.

On the home, we finally put the plans we had to renovate BB & GG’s rooms which we had not done when we shifted here around seven years back. The carpenter will take out the existing furniture and then pre-fabricate the new desk and book shelves in his factory and during the March holidays, will come over to fit it. In the process BB’s bed will have to go as it’s part of the existing built-in furniture, but we will replace it with a single bed which converts to a double one, so this will be useful when we have guests over.

After this, one after the other, my washing machine and laptop have also given up on me. After thinking we need to replace the washer since it’s almost eight years old, I spoke to the company customer service and tried to see if it could be repaired, but it was a no-go as the technician could only give a three months warranty and the repair job would cost slightly less than a new machine. So we went and ordered a new machine and happily, they delivered in less than 12 hours, so now we’re all sorted in that department!As for the laptop, I now need to take it to the service centre to get it repaired once again!

Because I don’t have much work in office, I am reading more than ever! I came to the Goodreads app a lot later than I care, but last year when I got in, I started the yearly reading challenge. I challenged myself to read 100 books in 2015 and completed the challenge just after Christmas. This year’s challenge is 125 books which this time at work helps. Reading fluff books (romances, chick-lit etc) will help me reach the goal faster. According to my calculations, I need to read 2.5 books a week or 10.4 books a month. I am currently ahead in the challenge and I need another 3 books to reach my January mini goal, which should be by the end of next week….

Have a great week people!