2013 Update

Woah, it's been a while since my last post. Um uh... quite some stuff happened since the end of the year.

Biggest news for me I think is that I got my ACCA results, which to my relief was relatively good, albeit once more on the borderline. Well, having the 'pass' is already it, so yea, moving on to the other papers, which once more will be mostly theory >~<. Oh well, I'll manage somehow I guess, like I did before and if I happen to fail, I'll just resit the exams. The deadline to pay for the papers is coming quickly anyway.

At work, the busy season was a little less as expected, but still as busy. I had to do quite some overtime, but couldn't charge it in January. Bottom line, I had to charge everything in February, which meant that I had a week where I charged all my January hours. One might think that I worked 24/7 that week if the saw that timesheet x3 Things otherwise have been less than expected, but as I said, there's still a lot of work as there are some 'new joiners' from the other department who joined to give a hand, but they need support which can sometimes be very time consuming. This week however, things have like completely died down. I really don't know how things will be in the next few days and my chargeable hours are dropping down.

Next up I think is PMDe. Things have been picking up in terms of activity in the group, mainly about the tasks. I began the January tasks, it didn't end too well since I lost a big chunk of the story I typed and didn't notice until after posting it to deviantArt. Oh well, I'll rewrite if for sure but it's kind of demotivating to rework on that. I started the last part of M7 (which is also the third) and it might take some time... I've been trying to have something new, but I don't know if it's good so far, character wise and I think I'll have to go over it several times in hope of getting a more or less realistic reaction (I managed to submit my first two part of M7, although it's not as good as I wish it would have been :().

I also got The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3DS which I already finished the first walkthrough ^^; I'm currently in the Master Quest version in Dodongo's Cavern, which I admit is a tad harder since the order of rooms is different (and I didn't know the roll attack could crush boxes...). I must say that I really liked the game. The last battle with Ganondorf was a bit disappointing though. There's this ledge where it's difficult to reach and Link would almost always miss it and fall down a few dozen storeys... where he could get hearts to restore himself while Ganondorf is patiently waiting for him upstairs to come back. It just doesn't appeal much to me. I don't know, maybe the central pillar should have been wider so you could jump on it easier, but still get attacked. I don't think that Link randomly jumping right or missing it relies on skill but instead on luck (Also the way the camera moved was not always desireable in such situations, or you would lose time trying to adjust it properly).

The last battle with Ganon was a bit more reasonable. That's where I actually used more of the different melee moves I learned through the game. The first was with that armor monster thing with a huge axe. I was glad Link could do backflips and side jumps then ^^. I still don't know how to get all the hear pieces though, which might change with my second walkthrough. Two points in my mind is the heart piece at the top of the Fire Temple, visible from the peaks upper entrance where smokes escapes. I don't know if it's related to the Fire Temple's east tower, which I still don't know how to reach.

The other one is in the desert temple. There's the last room before the final boss there (the twin witches) where there are the mirrors? Well, there's a chest on my map I don't know where it is, nor how to get it. And also various other hidden heart pieces and 5 spiders I don't know the location of.

I also got Pokeradar, which is quite fun, though a bit tiring after some time. The camera would sometimes mess up and you almost have to make more than a 180 degree turn to see every cloud. I've got all the legendary trio, which were quite easy to get really. Though now I need to get the english version of either Pokemon Black 2 or Pokemon White 2 ._. I guess that'll be for another time.

I also got a couple of demos from Nintendo eShop, some are cool at best, notably Kindom Hearts 3D and I think that's it... the others were not as good. I thought Castlevania and Monster Hunter would be good, but the former is lame with lame 2D moves and the latter is much too slow. The protagonist takes so much time to drink potions, or to land combos. Plus the fact that there is no HP bar really annoys me, and there seems to be limited moves.

I've been drawing a bit as well, though there're not as good as I wished I could draw them, partly because I've only my mouse to draw digitally. I wonder when I'll be able to draw with a pentablet =P.

Chinese new year was not so exciting, like last year. We didn't do much. Actually, we went on catamaran at Tamarin. Thing is, you probably know the situation here if you're Mauritian; and there's been a lot of rain. The morning was quite wet (but that wasn't the issue) and we saw some dolphins. A big storm started when we headed to the islet Ile aux Benitiers and there were lightning all around us. Not to mention the BBQ got wet... But we got back safe, so that's about it. Oh, someone had caught a Blue Marlin and hung it upside down for weighing when we got back. It was impressive. The only thing was that it spewed out a half digested fish at one point in time and what I believe was the marlin's heart then dropped down from its mouth, still hanging from its blood vessels... ugh.

That's about it I guess, until next post! ^^

December Update

Okay, I know it's been a real while since my last update since there's been a lot of things keeping me busy.

There's be considerably a lot of work, almost equal to this year's busy season, but with only me, a colleague who's been with me through that busy season, and two new joiners. The senior team members have been to South Africa on other assignments and you can imagine how lacking we were... We pulled a lot of overtimes as well, it was tiring, but it was a great experience and I'm pumped for the coming busy season in 3 days now x3.

I also had to sit the three papers I took in July and I'm pretty confident in two of those. For the third one (F9), I'm not sure if I'm getting the pass there... I'll probably have to resit that one next June. I already took the other papers in the meantime; P1, P2 and P5. P1 and P2 being already close together, I didn't want to have P3 immediately after that knowing how it went last 5th, 6th and 7th December >.>

In other news, PMDe is still going stong! I finished M7 (almost, M7 Past's epilogue is about two thirds done) and I already have some ideas for the current E7. I'm also thinking of having some side stories to complement what's going on and I'll hopefully be able to squeeze in some time between the busy season and the studies beginning again very soon.

I've got some new friends as well on deviantArt, pageviews have nearly hit 4500 since last time, wow! Also, brackenhawk have been using the excel sheet I've been populating since March to make a flash app that picks random cameos! You can find it here. It's really awesome and I admit I was flattered when she asked me if she could use the list ^///^. I was also so caught up with things that I didn't get on tumblr much... but I'm trying to change that a bit, and visit once a while, as much as I can.

Anyway, another 'thing' that happened was that I began watching some anime. Yea... little sis got some DVDs borrowed from her friends, and those had FMA, FMAB, Fairy Tail, Gundam and one or two more I didn't watch. I guess I'm about to go watch several more episodes of those soon ^^; They were not as bad as I expected, so, I'll probably be looking forward for the next episodes of those.

Next up, I got a new console system, the famous Nintendo 3DS! One of my colleagues who had to go to South Africa bought one for me and since it was free of duty, it was more affordable for me (double yay!). I haven't gotten any games on it yet (besides the default ones on it...) but I'll try to remedy to it asap. I'm playing my Nintendo DS Lite in the meantime. I've got Kingdom Hearts Re:Coded basically finished, only a couple of final optional stages to complete. I also played and finished the main storyline of Inazuma Eleven 2 Blizzard. Currently playing a bit of Yu-Gi-Oh 2011 Championship (or something like that) at the request of a friend so we could play in tag-mode. And there's the crazy 'Card games on motorcycles' in there. Oh well xD

Then Christmas came up, and with it came the internet upgrade (woo!). We now have unlimited download capacity, and wireless at home. I've been trying syncing my DS Lite with it but so far no luck. It's an Orange modem, ZTE model. If anyone can help me, let me know!

I got The Hobbit as well yesterday, and I say that it's a pretty good movie, as expected! Though I'm a bit disappointed with the ending. I didn't see them use the key of before, or maybe I'm just missing something!? ._. Anyway, I loved the thing!

Until my other update, Happy New Year!!! xD

August Update

It's been a while, I know... Anyway, I've been pretty busy lately and yeap, things are on the move. Studies are going full strength (I only got a small break today which gave me a little free slot of time to write this post, but which will be caught up next week with a 5 hour session instead of a 2.5 hour session...) and I've paid for the exams for this coming December. My exams will be on the 5th, 6th and 7th of the month... and I've got no other choice... Wish me luck! ^^;

Work's been going smoothly, until our seniors had to go to South Africa, so all the work comes down on me and my colleagues, with only me and another colleague managing everything technical-wise. And yesterday, she called a sick and I was alone having to deal with everybody at the same time T~T It worked out okay though, and there're some pressing deadlines for this Monday.

I currently also have two possible jobs for which I'll have to travel to South Africa and none of those two have fixed dates yet. One is about SQL and the other about php+html (blech). I just hope it won't be too soon 'cause I have other things to do in the meantime, studies being a big factor about it. Plus I hear that I won't have internet at the place where I'll be sleeping, unless I'm at work (which really isn't the right time for personal purposes...). I want to go on the other hand because I'll be able to visit new places, meet new people and even get to buy some stuff (electronics mainly) that isn't sold here. So, that's always good.

I've seen the first Inazuma 11 Movie \o/ Amazing effects, though the movie doesn't quite well fit in between the series in that they sort of become suddenly stronger, but still not as strong in the series... Oh well.

Otherwise, I've played some Pokemon Conquest and I must say that I liked this game a lot! I'm a little disappointed that I cannot retain some of the progress once I complete the main storyline, like I mean there are a lot of other characters I could have recruited and obtain their best link... oh well, I'm now going through the little stories post game and am upgrading the city structures slowly.

I finished the main story for Pokemon Black 2, and am at the post game storyline. Some more trainers to battle, and I think Team Plasma's HQ. Also, the PokeWood is fun! =P Got some events as well, so that the legendaries I've left to get are Celebi, Shaymin, Meloetta and Keldeo. \o/ Except there's a current event for Keldeo which is non-WiFi *grumble*.

In other news, there's a Laptop bag coming my way from a prize I got on deviantart for writing a little story involving a sad whale, cupid and a road made of bubble wrap. In case you want to read it, it's here.

PMD-E is going on smoothly. Just finished Event 6 (complete one, that is parts 1 and 2 of the event) and the teams sheet is going on well. I did the event with someone else as collaborator (this would be narelith =) ) and I must say that I learned quite a few things in the process. Definitely an experience I'd like to have again. I've also recently hit the 3000 views of my deviant profile \o/ Dunno if I'll take some more contests on dA, but we'll see.

Cheers! =)

July Update

It's been a while! Things have been really busy since my last post. Exams coming nearer, Mission 6 of PMD-E and wait... no things haven't as busy as that but I got hooked into other things as well, which have slowed down recently. The first was Avatar: The Last Airbender. I've been following the adventures of Aang and his friends through the magical world of benders overcoming the trials they faced and growing in maturity, wisdom and strength. I must say I loved the series and have been watching the sequel of the series: The Legend of Korra.

I love it as much! Here we meet Korra, the new avatar, born in the water tribe. She already has an affinity to her multi-bending abilities; water, fire and earth, with the exception of air bending, the one completely against her personality. Korra's got guts and is depicted to be strong early on with the elements she has mastered; which is already a big difference from the previous series.

Unfortunately for her, a great foe is awaiting her when she moves in with Tenzin, one Aang's son who is an airbender, to learn the art of air bending. She makes friends on her way, but also discovers the greatest enemy of benders, who might be linked somehow to Aang's death. If you break down the episodes, you might even learn a lot of things and discover the effort the creators of this show put in it. I really recommend watching this and get engulfed with this magical world where friendship, humour, action and thrill meet.

The next is, surprisingly for me, the first Japanese show I watch from the start to finish: Inazuma 11. While I'm not a fan of football, I really like how this show was made. The story in a nutshell features a boy, Endou, who simply loves football since he discovered a copybook of his deceased grandpa containing a lot of flabbergasting techniques and strives to become the next best football player. He decides to join the football club as soon as he enters junior school, the one attended by his grandpa when he was young.

Unfortunately, the school's football club is no more and, with the help of his friend Aki, he decides to re-create the club. At the start, only a few students are interesting in the sport and the notorious junior school of Teikoku Academy challenges them. The latter are known for destroying the school of teams who lost matches against them.

Endou manages to get enough players in the team in time and start training. On the day of the match though, they are all brought down to the ground by the other team. This is where Gouenji, a transfer student joins their team and scores their first goal. The Teikoku team forfeits for apparent unknown reasons and their school is saved. Join them in their adventures to get better at football and take the Football Frontier Cup and even grander adventures!

There's already a sequel to it, occurring some 10 years later I think, where football is no more the same. Its spirit has been drained and Endou once again joins the crew, but this time, as a coach.

Show and anime aside, work has been less demanding lately as we move away from the busy season. Some new people have joined the team and for a week, me and other colleagues had to do the reviewing of files before delivery. That was quite an experience but I should say that I didn't find it that much difficult. Things have been cool and fun really.

On the other hand, exams... I still can't understand how they dared put 'Centre' and 'East' in the same basket. What I mean is, they have 'North', 'South and East' and 'West' as choices for examination centres. 'North' was not a good choice for me, neither was 'West', nor 'East'. What I really wanted was 'Centre' but they somehow cannot give that.

And for 2 exam days out of 3, I had to go far away, requiring almost 2 hours of travel just to get to that examination centre D:<. Worse, it seems that the examinators pushed the level of the F5 paper 10 levels higher than it has been for the past few years. I can't really say how I did in that paper, but oh well, we'll know when we hit August.

Speaking about the future, I'm almost done with M6, couple thousand of words left and I'll be completely be done, save for the revision. I've also been participating in a Flash-Fic 'contest', if I may call it like that, which lasts for a month as from the first of July. I say, so far, I've been able to try out different writing styles, first person perspective, second person perspective and several genres: comedy, urban, sci-fi, romance (gulp) and horror so far.

It's a nice challenge and I don't have to write a lot of words! In some way, it's really easier, but in another way, it's quite hard when you want to include all the things you think are as awesome to put in, and you've got to make your characters known to your readers as fast as possible! It's my 5th day today and I've yet to come up with a new story ^^; Hopefully, it'll be ready by midnight.

I've also discovered something to help my writing. That 'thing' is called Brandon Sanderson! Seriously, this guy breathes awesomeness and just look over his blog and the youtube videos of his creative writing classes. He's just awesome! He is able to tell a lot of things that as writers, one might not be aware of but which still has an impact on the readers, unbeknownst to them even! Wouldn't you like it to know how to hook your readers and make them go 'oh, it's already over?' after making them read some 80,000 words?

Okay, I think this is long enough for now and I'll try to get another post a bit sooner than that. Plus I need to start working on today's Flash fiction. ^^;

March Update

It's more than late for another update... *sigh* In anycase, things sure have been changing a lot since last time!

PMD-E is still flowing as smoothly, I've been doing the 5th Mission writing entry and am about to start working on the Epilogue. Otherwise, I have the saved draft of the new app version which was released. I admit I'm not too enthusiastic about this new app in some ways. First, the app is supposed to give information about your team: the name, members, natures, moves and so on. Unfortunately, the new version of the app displays by default an interview with a rather difficult character, known as Callahan, the Ninetales. Well, I do understand that it's a way for the writers to showcase their writing skills, that's a good thing.

What I'd suggest rather, is that every writer should have one app, similar to the previous version and should have a link to the interview with Callahan, which then will be compulsory. Does anything change? Yes, when you are linked to an app, you get the app and not see a huge interview (which for some are, if they have so much to say and show for this brief interview). Want to see the interview? Fine, click the link in the app! Easy? I say yes.

Well, enough of ranting now ^^; PK's epilogue are all posted, the prologue for M6 has even started! Seems at first sight that the mission will be to find and help with the cooking, but we'll see later on. Another thing, I'm a little ashamed I had overlooked Shade, the Zoroark. Well, maybe Darkrai is still the mastermind behind this, only the future will tell. It's a bit sad that Sorbet became once again the rock that he was, unable to move, unable to know what's going on... but I guess it's for everyone's safety that no one can control him like a puppet.

With the release of that new app, I also started another project related to PMD-E. I've been keeping records of every new team and it's going on smoothly up to now. The only problem is that I've been busy at work and haven't been able to update the 29 art apps which are currently in the group's folder. I've been customising my bot too on irc.veekun.com and it's working good so far. I need to do some other tweaks for better search of pokemon. Searches such as 'paras' would, for instance, also bring 'parasect'. So, I'm not sure if I'm going to change the database itself or radically change the search function.

Also, I managed to find the last few movies of Pokemon and I've been watching them one after the other lately XD. I watched Pokemon 2000 The Power of One again, as well as The Spell of the Unown, then watched the ones I didn't watch. Only two more to go, then I'll get into the Unova arc.

As of PU, things are quite slow if I may say so. We got some new people to help with the pixel art, and one person for the map editor. I was promoted as global moderator, the wikia is slowly but surely growing, some members have returned as some have left... yea, the usual in a way. The beta is still being delayed to an unspecified time since there's a lot of things to be (re)done. Augh, the battle vector sprites are missing too! :( Though I did some vector logos for the factions which will be present. And I hope I'll get some time to work on them once more in the near future. I have a logo to animate, a logo to design, then I have my own PMD-E team logo to design, maybe make it a stamp as well.

I've also got a few apps I wanted to get; Adobe FlashPro and Sai Paint Tool. They're so cool I cannot describe it X3. I'll certainly be playing with them when I get the occasion, not that I get much time though. =/ Maybe I could use Flash to make my app? =P

Yeah, things on the other hand have been busy. I didn't know about the 'Early entry' for ACCA and I'm stuck with the fees of 80 pounds/paper instead of 69 pounds if I paid for before the 8th of March. I do hope the company's gonna refund that too. Because ultimately, it's still a loan, and I'm still going to refund from my salary later on.

Things are getting bulky otherwise for the ACCA papers. Law is hard to remember... I really need to find a solution for that... Management accounting is going pretty well I should say. And I really don't understand how you can call something a 'demand curve' if price is the subject of the formula. This costed me a whole 8 marks in an assignment. Tax has a flood of rules. CGT... Income Tax... so many seemingly 'random' values in there. Annual Exemption is 10,600, rates on CGT are 18% and 28%, Personal Allowance is up to 7,475 and so on. Why do they not have things like 10,000, 20%, 30% or the like? Much easier to remember and a lot less decimals to deal with!

Oh yes, speaking of driving license... I FINALLY GOT IT! WOOOOO! It was a surprise really. I did some mistakes (ugh) but turned out the policeman I got was nice. The engine didn't stop, but I forgot to turn on the flasher once in a deserted lane, I forgot to put on to the first gear at a corner and lastly, I had gone into some branches (which supposedly, I shouldn't have as these could have damaged the car, even though I'm sure they weren't hard or anything like that). There was a van on the other side, and the lane being as small as can be, I couldn't do otherwise. Only maybe wait for the driver of the van!? But yea, that was not going to happen since he was nowhere to be seen >.>

We had a hectic week two weeks ago. There was in internal audit simulation which required us to do a complete internal audit of 3 weeks into 3 days. It was a real race against time, and there was a lot of frustrating moments. My team (out of three) managed to come up second. Well, it wasn't that bad seeing that we didn't really put much effort after all. You see, the way it was, as soon as you submit a deliverable, the senior manager player would send us the 'better' files. In the end, it was easier to just send something simple and get new 'good' data to work with in the following steps and end the thing faster. Of course, that NEVER happens in real life internal audits. Oh well, if everyone around the globe is having that same training...

Lastly, I'll be working in the Data Analytics department until the end of April (sob). Oh well, I'm happy too, to be able to get to various places around the (tiny) country I live in. Maybe I could go to another hotel? =D I sure will miss the tight feasible deadlines, full chargeable hours and working fully with Excel, Access and Monarch.

Okay, that was long x3 enough for tonight I guess. I'll watch a bit of Arceus and the Jewel of Life and then, another day of work!

2012 Post

Oh woops! I really forgot about leaving a post here. I really meant to post one earlier but turned out I got involved in more stuff and got busy. Oh well, now I remembered! ^^;

Soo yea, let's start with ACCA. I got my pass on level 1! ^_^ Well... actually, I'm not too satisfied with the results though, such as for F2, I expected something better. Oh well, they say the good thing is to pass and that's about it, no need to procrastinate over it anymore but focus on the next ones. Because yes, I'm taking level 2 this semester with F4 (ugh), F5 and F6. So far, it's more or less okay, which means I have to start getting serious into those if I want to get the pass this time.

On the other hand, I've 'changed' department at work... of some sort. I won't do any internal audit for some time now, but will instead do Data Analytics. Apparently, it's the activity which brings the most money to the branch of the firm right now and I won't say it's very hard. I like the job very much. There are a lot of deadlines, for sure, there are lots of work, we have to take overtimes to make sure we don't go past the deadlines, we have many issues concerning the work itself as a lot of things we require are most of the time missing and incomplete... but I like it nonetheless. Through this, I've been able to learn a great deal more about how to use Excel and a little more Access with some SQL statements.

Surprisingly, I was able to use the things I learned in Tcl to do some of the tedious tasks given to us =P. Though I'd really like to know how to make Tcl go and edit excel/access files for at times, notepad literally gets busted by the sheer volume of data we handle.

PMD-E is going on smoothly, I didn't get a ranking, but I'm quite in the line of the winners so I am not losing hope that soon. Been trying to change my style of writing and not use so much apposition in my sentences. Apparently they make them sound weird .-. . Been otherwise doing some animations today and working little by little on the PU wikia. If you want to see it, here's the link: http://pokemonuniverseinfo.wikia.com/.

And for the resolutions for the year... get to know more Tcl and try to learn and get a better grasp of SQL and Golang. I really dunno how far this will go, but I'll try to incorporate some AS2/AS3 as well for flash.

Oh gosh... time goes fast! I also learned that there are elements associated to the chinese calendar, and this year is the year of the water dragon. Apparently, I'm a water monkey and this would be the last year which is 'beneficial' for me. I really don't care about those superstitions, but we'll see how this goes. And... driver's test this Tuesday... I really want to get this pass now after all the money they drain from us D:<

Jerry out!

Exams coming...

Well, it's been some time, but yea, the ACCA exams are coming now. And I had to reschedule my leaves so that my exams fall within the range. Yes, so much for being able to take the computer based exams 'anytime' >.> Boah! I'm worn out from those crash courses! But they sure did me well, besides falling asleep once or twice in class because of fatigue ^^; But yea, they were good in general, though I didn't quite like that teacher who did F3... So... 1 week and 3 days to go! Gosh, it's so close :o

Otherwise... oh well, I've been into more games because of my sister -_- Got into playing Digimon World DS, which has not that good graphics, okay playthrough and slow as can be dialogues. The mechanics are a little weird though and I was able to exploit something, which practically gave me a rookie digimon which could pawn Ultimate digimons with a couple of hits and without taking significant damage. No need to say how much it ruled when it became Champion and Ultimate...

And yet otherwise, I've finished with M4 of #PMD-Explorers on deviantart. Been around even making a tumblr account (unknown008.tumblr.com) and am taking on the next part, which is Event 4. I'm not sure if I'll be able to pull up a collaboration on this one but if I do, I'm sure it'll turn out great! ^_^

And... driving test scheduled to 31st of January, Christmas coming, I'm trying to learn some flash, getting used a little more to Inkscape, what more? Oh, I need to get Victini soon before the event ends. Oh and the release of PU Beta is near, so stay tuned!