After I found my receipt for the tax cut from my working place, I went on to report my yearly expense tax. Today is the last day, and being not informed enough about where to submit the report, I went on to my area’s tax office.

Arrived on 07.00, there’s already about four peoples who came earlier than me. The staff, as a public service officer should be, is late; we don’t even have anyone to give the queue number.

But knowing that there will be a lot of peoples coming, one of us made suggestion to set our turn by who came earlier. That way, when the staffs came, there will be no feud. We kept that rule to the 25th or so report.

When the staff came, the rule we set keep most of us in order.

So much for civilized act, although we came earlier, so we have higher respect and lower selfishness which ensure that the rule can be held. In probably less than 15 minutes, the report is finished (after all, we only need to submit paper works).

Then, I need to get back to office. Only one bus, no switching, that same bus where I’m asleep when going home and it took me all the way to the train station.

Never realized it’s taking long turn to Mangga Dua area though. Arrived on 09.14 on my desk.

For those using the intermediary version of IE8 packaged with Windows 7 Beta 1, there is a different behaviour than the RC and final bits in the InPrivate mode.

In the final version, InPrivate session is sepparated.

But in the version in Windows 7, it can read cookies that are saved by the normal session.

I use this as follow. I login to websites that I needed login for, thus saving the cookies. After that, I browse using the InPrivate session.

This means, I can browse to the sites that needed login, but IE wont save any cookies nor update the information in those cookies.

Anyway, if I had any request for IE9, I’d like an address black listing option that will allow IE to refuse any specified URL pattern, so I can block certain cookies, banners or scripts easily. And also a white list options to specify “block all but”.

Indonesian general election committee decided election day would be on April 9th.

The same day as the celebration of Jesus’ last supper. Well, Christian are rather minority, although there are protest from some Christian majority area asking for the date to be postponed because they must prepare for the ceremonies.

But I think there’s another problem too. The percentage of peoples who’s not that interested in casting vote is not negligible.

The election day will be a national holiday, or at least half work hour (most office workers can go home after lunch). The next day, commemorating Jesus who die on the cross, is always a national holiday. That means, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, four days straight for vacation.

For peoples who’s not interested in the election, they might take the chance to take early leave to neighbouring country, or out of town for vacation. Going after election risked the traffic getting congested, so I guess they’ll go before that.

Less voter again. Oh how I hope the abstain votes could get seats in the parliament too, so everyone can see how legitimate our government is.

I kept my online address book synchronized with my phone’s address book, which resulted in quite a lot of peoples. These includes peoples I often interact with online, offline, up to number for fast food delivery service and peoples whom I already forgot where I get that name and number.

This is from my All contact in 11 pages that probably have many irrelevant contacts. Quite modest actually, compared to peoples with contact with quantity comparable with a medium sized business’ whole CRM database of contact.

Compare with this, shorter and contained the subset of contacts I want to actually check.

Why putting category ? Well, the easiest part is to sort them. I had many contacts I only interact with in the internet and they use nickname (privacy reason, self-esteem reason, their own business anyway) and I tried saving contact with real name (in case I had to call to their home phone). So, how to recognize who’s who ?

One of the easiest way is categorizing. I had category for each online forum, and I can put them in the category. It helps in remembering the nickname because, figuring someone’s nickname among a limited group is easier than guessing among the whole people you know of.

But that’s not all of it. Category can be used for many useful things too. For example:

If you only want to send mail to everyone in a certain group, you could send it to a category. For example, I want to spam my campus friends, I could use the Campus category I’ve prepared, rather than picking them one by one, or spam everyone in the list.

Another use is for setting up permissions. Windows Live have the fine options of managing which profile information are shared with the public.

The information can be shared with Everyone, Network, Messenger Contacts, or categories (and combination of it).

So, if I want to share that contact information with certain trusted peoples, I can allow categories like Family, Friends, or Trusted. This way they can see the information, but everyone else can’t.

So, when is the best time to start categorizing? As soon as possible. Categorizing hundreds of peoples is a tiring process and I’ll suggest using Live Mail application rather than do it online.

Also when adding new contact, there will be option to put the person into certain categories.

Multiple categories are OK too. After finished, press the Save button.

Weird dream. I dreamt of… something like Hollywood action movie.

Parts I could remember are about terrorist attack using missile in the beginning (and family fight in a seemingly high-ranked military officer caught in between).

The main characters are just back from mission or something, they then got sent in rescue mission to save that high ranked officer’s family, including their child daughter.

The main characters is a pair of military psychologist, apparently because that girl has some problem (and I admit, in the staring contest scene, she does looks really scary).

The story is cut midway when the main character talk with the father in a tent, and one of the terrorist (probably east European, or ex military) came and read the notes (nothing dangerous).

Typical plot line actually. But why this dream ?

Today is a Hindu holy day. For most of us, it’s a national holiday, but for area with majority of Hindu believers, they stopped activity for the whole day (longer than an hour, and annually).

But lets get to the activity part today. Since I forgot to take the original copy of the translated book yesterday, I went out for a short lunch. (^-^)

Well, would like larger portion, but had  a nice moment, although I admit since that day I think I got carried away easier.

There’s a lot of new books in the book store too… want to buy… but too expensive for now. They charge almost twice the Japanese Yen current exchange rate for the books.

Then, cute thing by the end of the noon, after a short heavy rain, there’s a lot of sparrows on the street. There’s no car passing by the other lane, so they gathered around pecking something from the asphalt. Maybe leftover rain water ?

End my day here, until tomorrow.

Is it wrong that even though I graduated from IT major, I’m not interested or learned in programming (specifically coding)? My current job is really different from that.

I hate listing such complaints in diary like this even if it’s private because I feel like keeping negative energy in my treasure box of memories, but really, this is making me depressed lately.

As mentioned in my previous entry, my father bought an SMB and want to fix it. One of the move he want is repairing the recording system for purchase and sales (too many money got corrupted). He then ordered me to make a solution for it, part for money saving, part to put pressure on me (he added, show him the value of money he used to put me in university).

Deadline is closing, but I kept having troubles in even putting up concept for the flow.

Other than body that felt more tired recently, last time I check I got more teeth in yellow alert. This afternoon, I even chip off another piece when biting a half-cooked pop corn. Had to go and take photo of my wisdom teeth for surgical removal too, but I still got worried often, because if I go with him, that means I’m trapped in car with him for hours and had to listen to all those preaching.

*sigh*

If just my permanent employment came earlier (with the raise), I might be able to keep this problem longer.

The sky today, I mean.

Because I forgot bringing meal from home today, it means going out for lunch. Majestic clouds at one side, and menacing clouds in the other side, but overall the surface world is as bright as enough to be used as a heavenly stage set.

But see the bright side, seeing trees made me realize, or at least feel that HDR actually exist outside the over-exaggeration of plasma TV chips.

Done eating, local style soup with milk added (that’s fat) and tasted salty enough to make peoples in tight sodium diet faints.

Just as I get back (plus minus an hour), the luminosity of sky in 1400 is enough to be mistaken for 1800. We starts to get worried about storm-like rain by the time we’re going back home.

Again, luckily it has settled down. Only light drizzles left. Then from the bus, the sky is still coloured with clouds above, and bright below. Imagine… like the glass of ice tea when I pour in the milk.

Home… kind of lazy, That work is not progressing. Seems like programming is not part of my character.

A dream of bugs ? What the hell is my head turning to ?

Doesn’t remember the beginning, but it’s something about having a pet bug (or bug size cats, damn, can’t remember).

But one day, it’s almost got eaten by a spider. Had a shaving razor damaged trying to ruin the thick web too.

Don’t know how many months, or years after, we returned and look for the place where we used to keep that pet. In the thick web, there’s a pen-like box, time capsule ?

Maybe it’s a metaphor for something.

For this weekend, my brother is not home \(^o^)/

He left his headphone though,  Logitech branded, seems to be for gaming. Well, don’t really care other than it’s usable. Plug it into the sound card and… starts listening to my collection (of various MP3 and FLAC).

Hasn’t done that for long time since I broke my last earphone. Those are expensive, especially if we account how fast it breaks (maybe just me).

Really felt different than speaker. I don’t like to turn the volume up too high, and there’s TV nearby.

In short, the music is more impressing for me. Could listen them a lot clearer.

*laughing out loud and rolling on the floor*

This month (or maybe last month’s) instalment of Hidamari Sketch comic by Aoki Ume starts with Yuno having her first try of using computer and internet.

First experience of seeing the hourglass cursor, and looking for their teacher’s name to find a love consultation site.

The one at left… *still holding back laugh*
IE’s rendering problem that seems to show up randomly if the computer load is high. Experienced that usually in office (using XP).

BTW, the person in the picture, the principal, his head is already vertically long, but the chin is not that long.

*back and laughing again*

For yesterday, I went to pick up my subscribed Dragon Age magazine (edition 2009-03). Hasn’t read all of it yet, but I didn’t follow all the titles in it too.

After that, find some time to type, but then I found out later, I’m losing two sub-chapters from my file. Earlier the previous day, I also lost two files.

My prime suspect for now is Live Mesh. Recently I re-added my phone to Mesh (after hard reset) and add back the folder in my memory card where I kept copy of my files. Maybe Mesh made a mistake in interpreting the versions and overwrite my computer’s.

Doesn’t have much mood afterward.

Before going back home, I take a turn to the old city area to take pictures.

As usual, the place is crowded, especially because sun is setting and the weather has become cooler. Other than peoples taking photographs (the place is popular for pre-wedding photos), there’s also local residents who spend the afternoon in the plaza.

There’s some buildings that can be accessed. I entered one yesterday, an old building that gave me creeps, like there’ll be something showing up suddenly. But the top floor is beautiful although dirty. The roof has collapsed, so I can see the sky from there. At the corner, there’s a what’s left of a tree that roots firmly to the wall, down to the lowest floor.

Just in time for sunset, the sky turns red gradually. (^ー^)

Until this time, the iPhone is not sold in Indonesia, officially, at least. The units that could be bought from shops and online sellers are black market units without any warranty.

As in other country, Apple want to distribute the phone through operators, something never happened here to phone of that class. The only phone I ever seen got subsidized is low end devices, not high end.

The operator in Indonesia is Telkomsel. According to the press release, the pricing is as follow, in a year including plans.

Government tax not included and national bank’s exchange rate at yesterday’s market closing is IDR 11’990 per USD 1.

That means it cost US$ 935 for unlocked iPhone 3G 16G. As an illustration, here in Indonesia, that much money is enough to buy a new motorbike (IINM) which is in all way, a lot more useful as an asset compared to a phone even if it has that all-holiness Apple sign on it’s back.

By the way, the data plan is limited to 500 GB. Yes, tariffs sucks here.

A site, Agustinus.net also made a table, describing the nett price of the iPhone per plans. Telkomsel also gave bonus of free talk time and SMS, but these are confirmed to be valid only to other numbers of the same operators.

From reaction in various online forums, the operator is really throwing freezing water into the enthusiasm. Many quickly backs up and even say that’s it, lets starts talking about Blackberry Bold.

Most importantly, the shock. The price is terribly high. The monthly rate, even the cheapest plan is more than twice the monthly price for Blackberry Internet Service (which by the way, is becoming trend in the recent year). The IDR 733k plans… we’re still not used to getting contracts that expensive, and it’s better used to pay for boarding house rents.

But market are weird. The launching is on March 20. Telkomsel said they already have 17k peoples in the queue list, but how many will stay to buy it ? And most importantly, how will the market change in the next months, especially the second hand price for unlocked devices.

Internet connection is really best for use when monopolized isn't it ? Today, many peoples in the office seems to be away. The folks from the production department is gone somewhere almost the whole day. Editors for the comic magazines is gone too, on which one I knew like to download things. The result is excellent. I could open various sites, Windows Live, Twitter, even the bloat-load of Facebook. 平和っていいな～ (＝＿＝)

In the other hand, my work doesn't really move. (^_^;)
Slacking off too much perhaps.

In the other hand, I posted again in that forum. It's a specialized theme forum about gadgets. I don't have big enough spending as them, so I can't really keep up with their discussion. Being playing in forums for a long time, I felt like I kept losing interest in posting less meaningful thoughts and engage in social junk posts like I used to do in my earlier days.

Friday, Friday! Had a planned big spending in Monday, so I hope I could get enough money to offset that expense from selling my used stuffs.

We finally get the blank form for reporting list of volumes that we already got publishing contract, working copies and translation. This is for reporting to the higher ups about how we can't edit scripts because there's no scripts to edit. But unlike what's suggested previously, planned publishing date is still there. Lets just see how it came up.

From comment in a Facebook group today, just another obvious thought about how quickly we got bored.

These days, in time of fast news (Twitter, anyone?) how long is our patience ? In my issue, it's about time between press release and product release. When a product is announced, it sparks huge flame of buzz. Then before we knew it, it has become yesterday's news, a B or C rank news that doesn't deserve headline anymore.

Anything new! We're so damn bored we need something new to talk about. In a few seconds the whole world knows about it and we need new things to oogle about.

There...

Today, we had a briefing about how to fill our tax report. The deadline is by the end of this month, and we have to send it to the tax office.

Everyone, from the new employee to higher managers came (except those high and wealthy enough to hire tax consultant perhaps) came for the briefing.

Seems like the article is right. I’m just sleepy and can’t think straight before around 1100.

Anyway, the form is sent by e-mail and just waiting to be filled. I guess tomorrow I’ll go to the bank to print my account books first.

Been getting off that data transcribing job by taking home my own work. Not really doing so good, as I fell asleep in half hour doing it. Maybe I’m just too tired ?

Anyway, boss is not in so great mood due to the declining product quantity. Just yesterday, me and a fellow editor got called by the manager (3 hops above us) and ask again about what’s our problem. We describe the meeting as “called to the principal’s office”.

The solution I have is of course, lower the job demand, let us breath and finish all the mess first before starting new. Of course, we know we’re dreaming if a higher executive would accept that solution which would hamper income for a while *laugh*

Had a translation script in today, so I can turn that in tomorrow. Sent the rest of the copies I had to another translator and is waiting for her to do it. Although I asked for a week, kind of feeling sorry too. They do this as freelance and often they also had other work. One translator asked to quit because she had children to take care too (and she had high work load IINM). Well, if this time the translation quality increase, maybe I should appeal for a rise ?

Then… ah, I think I wouldn’t bring back editing or proof reading work back home, but instead focus on restarting my review freelance job. Need some extra money recently.

Three days of long weekend. Had my plans ready although as usual everything got changed midway.

Saturday is rather tiring and a bit frustrating. Half of it it sparked by being unable to find public place with power socket and wi-fi. Call me cheap for lounging hours in free hotspot, but there’s just some works I couldn’t do at home, couldn’t get the mood to do it.

Sunday is fun. Although I hate heat, but walking out like that made me feel really refreshed.

There’s also a happy moment after that, so it’s a great day in my opinion. That’s a chance that might not come until god know when.

The only regret I had is that I asked to be picked up when going home. I should’ve just taken the bus although it’ll be more tiring to me. But the sacrifice is worth it, rather than getting preached in a confined space with no chance of escaping.

Today, well, I’m helping my father to track back some reports from his business. The reports are inconsistent, same product listed in different name, different price, even the clients has several different names.

Spent the whole day transcribing the paper report to Excel and played with filter and pivot table. Access would work better, if just everything is set straight. Oh how I remember my short time in lecture of introduction to database concept.

I want my vacation back!

Is it because of my environment that I fail to understand each and every time, just how effective is a cause, petition or any form of strike will do good ? Same thing as how I would never see the light about what’s the correlation between someone who would run naked around the city to “raise awareness” of something.

If any, I only see moment of fame, or the fun of having yourself an “identity as a group”.

Why so sudden ? Well, in other media, lately particularly at Facebook, I did get invites for causes. It’s presented as if we have millions of peoples writing their name there, then it will miraculously happens. But where’s the real program ? I for one believe the only way to make bastards follow what we want is doing it their way, find a way that will make their life miserable if they don’t comply. If not, what do they have to lose ? As far as they know, they might lose more if they bend to the will of the group.

10 millions of names in a cause against deforestation, but they still use the same amount of papers because it’s more convenient (and cheaper). How would that do any good ? The cause will only be one of yet another hundreds of similar things.
Raising awareness ? Everyone might just join because those pin collecting is fun. I remember time when rubber wristbands are fashion item more than the cause behind it. When others sees it, they see an item of fashion, and never ask what that means.

Same as petition. If we have, say… 25 thousand peoples signing the petition and send it to a company. If the company refuse, what will that 25 thousand peoples do ? Just sit down and life goes on ? This is especially true for online petition signed by peoples that for me is a bunch of faceless anonymous.

Then again, this could be the local culture. We don’t have news like in the US where we often heard about class actions from a group against something, which has any chance of success.

For some case… but not all case.

Yesterday, the cloud is thick all day long. Around 1500, finally it rained down, hard. An hour or so, finally the rain subsided, then continued with slight drizzle and about average rain.

Rain shouldn’t be much of problem, but the drivers here lacks of discipline. Too much cars, and everyone with their me first mentality. To add more pain, drainage system is poor in some location and this caused local flooding, which again caused bottleneck to the traffic.

Tired of waiting for the bus, I went home by taxi instead. Cost me 10× compared to going by bus, but didn’t regret it because the street is so congested.

Well, there is another alternative that I took a bus to where the cars stops, then walk until the end of that bottleneck, to continue with another public transport. But it’s raining.

Nevertheless, I like the rain though. It made colours a lot prettier and sharper than a bright shiny day.