All posts filed under: G.U.M Writer

What Happens When You Have Been Unemployed for Too Long

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The last time I was unemployed and looking for a job was in January of 2016. The project I was working on in 2015 had closed down and the whole team designated for the project was forced to look for work elsewhere. It took me four months to get a decent job, and even that was a three-month contract at a startup company doing SEO writing. Three months later, I was back out in the unemployment market. Of course, the good news was that a month after my short-term employment ended, another company was kind enough to offer me a job offer, that time a permanent one with growth potential and possibly a brighter future for me. But what if I didn’t get the short-term contract? I’d have been out of a job for almost six months and that would have been a questionable scenario for employers during my interviews. There wouldn’t be an interview. It would have been a full-blown crime-scene investigation and interrogation. I would come under scrutiny for not having found a job, or worse, accused of being …

Living at Home in Your 20s

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I have a confession to make: I’m nearly 24 years old and I live with my parents. I live in the same flat and the same room as I’ve lived in since I was five years old. Twenty years ago that would’ve been embarrassing. As far as I can tell (obviously I was a toddler at the time) most people moved out by their early 20s. People would live with friends or with their partners. By the time they were ready to marry and have kids they had already been independent for several years. If they did live at home a lot of the time they also lived with a partner/spouse and they were simply saving up money before they could get their own place.  The idea of someone, let alone thousands of people, living with their parents into their 20s and even 30s would have been weird. People would’ve wondered what was wrong with them. But now it is relatively normal. I can’t speak for the rest of the world (although recent analysis shows …

Book Review: The Tea Planter’s Wife by Dinah Jefferies

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When I saw this book on the fiction shelves in Borders, I knew I must have it. The cover was attractive enough, the back of the book told me enough to know roughly what the story would be about, and also because I’ve begun drinking tea (Lipton, to be exact) more so than coffee. Of course, what you read on the back of a book cover can barely tell you much but it can give you an inkling into what to expect from it. Where there is love and romance, there would be secrets and a likelihood of a betrayal or two. It was enough for me to pay for the book and leave. It took me four days to finish reading The Tea Planter’s Wife by Dinah Jefferies. Four days. It’s not as short as I thought, but for me, finishing a book in less than a week is a good achievement. The last time I ever recalled having finished reading an entire book in a day or two, or staying up way past midnight …

Battle of the Sexes: Male Managers vs. Female Managers

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On our way home from lunch earlier today, I was telling my husband about my new job and then I realised that in all my past and current employments (I have been working for about 3 years now), the only managers I’ve reported to, served under, and worked with have all been females. Don’t get me wrong; I don’t have a beef with reporting to a female manager but I’ve never reported to and worked for a male manager, hence I have no idea what it feels like (though I get some friends telling me that working for a male manager doesn’t necessarily mean it’s better either!). But I know exactly what it feels like to work for a female manager. Women are women, and they have their follies. Some would be menopausal and cry at the tiniest bit of dissent. Some will rule you like an iron lady. Some prefer male managers because they are less emotional and more rational, while others prefer to work for female managers because they are more compassionate and understanding. Females Over Males According …

Book Review: The Little Paris Bookshop by Nina George

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A little delayed but here is the long-awaited book review of The Little Paris Bookshop by Nina George that I had finally finished reading some time over the week. I must admit that the book was pretty damn amazing. Why? No matter how desperate I wanted to finish reading the book and keep up with my 2016 Goodreads Reading Challenge, I also wanted to take my time with it. It was quite a dilemma, indeed. What I liked about the book was the writing style. It was casually-written, injected with lots of bookish humour and dry sarcasm. The kind of dry Bitish wit that mocks your intelligence but you know they’re just kidding. They don’t mean to put you down or ridicule you. They just want to make you laugh. I also loved how literary it was, with the author leaving a smattering of bite-sized pieces of quotes in books written by dead (or still alive) bestselling authors. Monsieur Jean Perdu’s occupation as the literary apothecary, where he turned a little barge into his floating book clinic on the Seine, sealed my love for …

What to Pack for a 3-Day Getaway

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Have you ever wondered what to pack for a three-day vacation, only to realise that you have over-packed your bags despite planning early and ahead of time? Yeah, that happens to me quite frequently. Also, I don’t travel often so mistakes are inevitable. For every five websites I visited, each would tell me the necessary clothing I should bring on my three-day vacation, from swimsuits to evening gowns. But they rarely ever touch on what are the activities and/or hobby items that you can pack when you’re away for only a handful of days.

Different Types of Annoying Male Co-workers

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We’ve been working for at least five years now. There are so many personalities we’ve encountered. Although we live across the country from one another, it seems like we have a lot of similar co-worker experiences. So we’ve compiled a list with a few warnings attached. The general list was posted a few weeks back. We decided to add a few more to the list, and to add some helpful descriptions.

Play Store vs Playground

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There are at least three playgrounds within the immediate area of the condo I live in, with my husband. Every morning when I join the rest of the corporate zombies on the clogged-up highway, I pass two out of the three playgrounds. When I return from work, I pass by the third playground. Yet, these playgrounds are empty and completely devoid of children laughing and playing on them.