Workaholic Anonymous

I had only worked at the office for around a month when a guy on the sales team teased me about being a workaholic.

I was instantly confused. Mildly resentful. Slightly flattered.

Me and my work. My work and I. Kind of sounds like a bad holiday blockbuster about a master and his dog. Not quite sure which one I am though. I am often entangled in an emotional relationship with my work. Too much passion, self-esteem, guilt, obligation, and pride involved. So much so that sometimes I just don't have much left over energy for my family and close friends, let alone myself.

But since graduation, I've tried to reorient my life. I stop waking up at 5 am to start plugging away at a project. I only stayed at the office till midnight once. I'm hopping on trains to other cities every weekend. I'm reading again for the sheer love of words. I'm even enrolled in a yoga class where they make me slap my butt for five minutes ("to stimulate blood flow!") and close my eyes while the teacher forces me to lay still ("Relax your toes. Relax your knees. Relax your uterus!"). 

And now I'm making skype dates with all the friends I've been neglecting. So um if you get an email from me about skyping and catching up, please say yes? I need a good excuse to take a break from that yoga class. My butt is kind of sore.

Knock Knock

When I first moved in, I thought the apartment was haunted.

I kept hearing knocks on the front door, only to find that nobody was there in the dim corridor. Then there were the coughs. Two in a row. The kind that you make not because you've got phlegm in your throat, but the artificial sort to let somebody know that you're there.

There were the occasional anguished wails as well.

I thought I was going crazy because sometimes I heard these noises when I was alone in my office cubicle. 

Finally, I told my roommate what was going on and asked if we could get out of our contract. She just laughed.

The knocks and the coughs came from her computer. Well, more accurately, they came from her QQ, China's MSN equivalent. They're the default sounds for somebody logging on and somebody adding you. I guess that also explained the noises at the office because I just signed up for a QQ, something that my boss made me do so I could communicate with the colleagues.

But the wails? Those were definitely not part of QQ.

She smirked. That's the ring tone that she had set for her parents. 

Immune. What a funny word.

Official countdown to Kenya: Ten days. 

Or rather a bunch of shots. Hepatitis A. Typhoid. Yellow fever. I also took a ton of pills for cholera and whatever else today. I got chatty with the nurse and so she pulled up my recent health check up report. Part of the screen started flashing red. She looked at me and then started asking questions about my health. Apparently I had more than normal level of Hepatitis B antibodies. So she thinks that I must have recently gotten the virus but, luckily, didn't contract anything.

Well strike one copperhead bite, strike two Hepatitis B virus, strike three  . . . mauled by a lion?

That would really hurt.

Anyhow, for better or for worse, I'm now immunized against Asian guys.

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I notice that one of my older colleagues sometimes sneak photos of me with his phone while I'm doing my own thing. Like today, I was on a conference call and I looked up because of the flash. He later said that it's because I looked good talking on the phone. This wasn't the first time I caught him. Am I just being weird about it or is it kinda creepy?