The Chair, the Desktop and the Dog

A few months ago, I got myself a Secret Lab Chair, I had been planning to get one for a while because I needed to get a new chair and figured since I am on my computer almost all the time when I am home, I should invest in a proper computer chair.



It took me a few months before I decided to make the purchase because it was expensive and I had to really mull it over, but I did eventually confirm the order and the chair arrives a like a few days later in this relatively huge and heavy box, it was a real bitch to set up but reading all the positive reviews online written about it by a bunch of users, I figured it was worth it, I was under the assumption that the moment I sat on it, it would feel like I was sitting on a cloud, that it would just envelope me and I could sit there forever since this chair was being marketed as being extremely ergonomic.



Well, it didn't feel like a cloud, it was firm as fuck and it wasn't as comfortable as I had envisioned it to be, build wise it felt solid, comfort wise it was way too fucking solid.



After a bit of research, I come to find out the reason why there are so many positive reviews about the chair online is because if you write a good review online, the company will extend your warranty, so essentially if you want an extended warranty, you are required to leave a good review online, whether you think the chair is good or not, that means all the reviews I have read online are "fake", which is great marketing but it is also kinda feel like I have been indirectly lied to.



My honest opinion about the chair is that it is pretty shit because for a $500 price tag, I expected a lot more, it is simply not as comfortable as I was lead to believe and turns out, there are actually quite a fair bit of negative Google Reviews about the chair, huge fail on my part for not noticing them until now, those reviews are mainly pointing about the peeling leather after a year of use, and not so much what I am currently complaining about, so fuck my life I guess that is what I am going to have to expect happen next year to my chair. 




A few weeks back, I also made another huge purchase, I got myself a new computer to replace my 5 year old Aftershock laptop, which has honestly served me really well. I was planning to get a Microsoft Surface Laptop for a really shallow reason, aesthetics, but realize that I am not earning enough to warrant aesthetics as a valid reason to shell out $2000 for a laptop with mediocre specs worst than my current Aftershock laptop, I needed an upgrade, not a downgrade.



So I decided to take a look at a few Aftershock Products, go back to the brand that had served me so well for the past 5 years, and see what I could get with my budget and all the available options were pretty much upgrade from my current build, but there was one huge issue, they were all too heavy.



The reason why I was considering the Surface Laptop, aside from the aesthetics, was also because of it's lightweight, so if I got a new laptop, I also needed it to be lightweight and anything close to 2kg was going to be blacklisted.  Almost all the laptops Aftershock had were bordering on 2kg, the light ones they had were "workstation", which I was not interested in because if I was getting an Aftershock brand, I was going to get one of their gaming laptops.



Getting a "workstation laptop" from a brand that specializes in gaming rigs is like going to a Duck Rice store and ordering a plate of Chicken Rice, I did that once, I was an idiot because I didn't even want Chicken Rice or Duck Rice at that time.





Anyways, since I couldn't get what I wanted, I thought fuck it, go big or go home.



The whole point of me wanting a lighter laptop is so I can lighten my bag load when I go back and forth from home to office, but what if I don't have to bring my laptop back and forth, what if I just left it in the office.




So I got a desktop.

But I didn't get from Aftershock because unfortunately, they were not responsive and their delivery date was a little bit iffy. On the website, it states they could deliver within 5 to 6 days, but when I read other customer's experience, there are some who stated that they were told they needed 2 weeks, others said they needed a month and I really didn't want to wait that long. 

I reached out to Aftershock on their chat system, hoping to get some clarification because they had a few pre-built models that could be delivered on the same day, no response, was literally waiting for them to reply, only to get a bot message telling me it will take a while, that I should email them if it was urgent.

While I was waiting for them to get back to me, after the bot message, because they literally had a counter of how many people were before me and I was suppose to be next in queue to chat with their guys, I started googling alternative companies and found a newer company called Dreamcore.

They pretty much had the same business model as Aftershock and also a ton of positive reviews, but they were newer so they had a faster delivery date, and like Aftershock, they also had some models that they could deliver on the same day when you order, the best part about it is I can customize the specs and also add in additional items, with Aftershock, I couldn't do that.

I have been using a Laptop since 2007, so the main item I needed when I got a new desktop was a monitor and I wanted to purchase that together with the desktop otherwise it is a bit pointless for me to have the same day delivery option, Aftershock's same day delivery model didn't provide any option for add-on, Dreamcore does and Dreamcore is also cheaper, so I mean at this point, it was a no brainer which one I should choose.

This was $2000 with a 27" Monitor, cheaper and more powerful than the laptops I was looking at, of course zero portability but the fact that I don't have to lug my 2.5kg laptop to and fro the office anymore really sparks joy.

Speaking of things that spark joy, here is a picture of my sister's puppy. 

He is no longer my room-mate and has moved to my sister's room.

A more recent pic now that is has grown bigger. He needed to be kept in his pen for potty training because little doggo would shit and pee anywhere he pleased, but he has improved over the past few weeks so now he has more freedom and isn't placed in his playpen very long anymore, little bugger still bites and chew everything he sees though and is hyperactive, so I am wondering if he is doggy special needs or something.

No New Projects in Sight.

Even with the recent "Covid 19 Circuit Breaker" in place, my company is still issuing customer leads to us designers and boy have I been getting a handful of really useless ones, the clients are either unresponsive when reached out to or have unrealistic budget, but most of the time, it's a mixture of both.



My job hunt was a huge bust, that's why I am now back to taking leads from my company, that being said, I am still actively seeking and applying, and the timing now is actually perfect for me because of how many projects I have on hand right now, which is close to zero.



For the first time in 3 years since I joined the company, I can actually see myself run out of projects to do, in the past, I would always have a few on the back burner, waiting to start months later, but this time, I literally have none, after I am done with my friend's project, I will no longer have any new ones that will be tying me down to this company.





A few days ago, a client I had met in the beginning of the year suddenly reached out to me and requested to meet again, I was a little surprise because the last time I met up with her and her husband, it was 3 months back, I had prepared a quote for them and ran through everything in person that time, and for me, the way I work is simple, I will give you all that you need for you to make a decision as a homeowner, you have my quotation and you have my proposal, I have done my part, if you are interested, then you will reach out to me, if not, then it was just not meant to be. I am not the type who will give the customer a call every few days to ask if they have made their decision yet because that is generally how a lot of Interior Designers in my line of work do things, just keeping in constant contact with the customer until the project is clinched or they get rejected. I try not to do that because I just find it very irritating, if I was the customer and the 5 interior designers that I have visited kept messaging me on a daily basis asking me to keep them updated on my decision, I will probably block their number, so I didn't do that to most of my customers unless I really really want to take their project, which honestly speaking only happened once and that particular customer ended up becoming a great source for new referrals, but anyways, because I wasn't reached out by them after the last meet up for 3 months, I pretty much dropped them as potential customers and deleted their number from my phone. I even vividly remember the last time we met, they were really interested but said among themselves...

"The price is a bit too high though..."

... so I also kinda knew that if I wanted to get their project, I would have to lower my price, which I wasn't willing to at that point because my price is the market average, I am not charging them higher than usual, the problem isn't with my quotation, the problem is with their budget.





Anyways, when the wife messaged me again recently, I had already deleted her contact so I had no idea who it was, luckily, the wife had a picture of her face as her display picture of her Whatsapp, so I instantly remembered who she was and she requested to meet on site with her husband. Their apartment is in the East, I live in the West, so location wise, this project was already sounding like a huge hassle to me.




My personal rule when it comes to doing projects that are located at an inconvenient location is simple, I don't take them.





I am a worry wort, I get stressed out very easily, when a client messages me about areas in the renovation they are unsatisfied with, my first instinct is to drop everything if I can and head to the site to assess the situation myself, if a sub-con tells me they have an issue that requires my clarification, even if it can be discussed over the phone, I would rather go to site and talk in person, happens all the time. They would call me and ask about something, I will tell them what they need to know, sit around at home or in the office for 15 minutes, mulling about whether I should head down to site to make sure everything is okay, and then pack up and head to site to make sure everything is okay in person, even though the sub-cons already have the answers they need to proceed with their work.






Anyways, because I really like these two clients as individuals, I agreed to the site meeting,  we are able to click really well and they share the same sentiment, that is why despite the fact that they were able to find other Interior Design companies who were able to quote them at a lower rate than me, they still came back to me and requested a meet up.




So I don't take project that are located at an inconvenient location, but if I were to do it, there were certain conditions that are needed to be met.



1. I need to click really well with the customer, I need to like them enough to make me even want to consider taking on the hassle.




2. I needed to earn a generous amount of commission from it to make it worth the hassle.



... over the course of the last 5 months, I have met 2 clients who have projects that are located way too far for me to even consider, and those 2 were both equally unpleasant, one was the brick walls I met back in December and the other is actually Mr Antoinette's friend who was just demanding and very unpleasant to talk to via Whatsapp. If you are getting a free quotation, you don't get to have the privilege of giving me a deadline, it just reeks of entitlement, and I fucking hate that smell on clients who haven't sign a contract with me yet.


The brick walls actually reached out and wanted to meet, but I had to find an excuse to turn them down because I would just be looking for trouble if I actually took on their project.



Mr Antoinette's Friend went so far as to create a Whatsapp group, the only people who do that are the ones who are sure they want to engage me, I honestly am not sure where they were with their decision when they created the group chat, but that group chat has been silent since I updated the quote back in January, once I have gotten the Antoinette to pay up the final payment and officially complete that project, I am going to remove myself from his friends' Whatsapp group to let him know indirectly that I am not interested to take his project, because if I were to actually take on the project, I don't need to have good foresight to know that the Mr Antoinette's friend is going to be a complete and fucking utter nightmare to work with.


Anyways, I digress.




So the two clients showed me the quotations they had gotten from other Interior Design firms and they were all cheaper than mine, all the firms they had visited and receive quotes from are firms with huge reputations, my interior design firm is also pretty big as well, so this was not about which company is the best, but purely on who they liked more and they obviously liked me a lot more than the other Interior Designers they met from the other firms because otherwise, they wouldn't have bothered reaching out, they could have just signed a contract with one of the other design firms.




I took a copy of one the quotation from the other design firm to bring back to study, I could tell that the clients really wanted to engage me but my price was "too steep" for them, so I told them I will do my best to match the price and hopefully within a few days, can present them with some good news.





Well, attempting to match the price proved to be impossible.





The price was way too low and I was not comfortable going that low, especially because the location of the apartment was not exactly ideal for me. I tried to go as low as I could but my figures were still a few thousand dollars short, if I actually matched it figure for figure, my personal commission will be taking at least a $1000 cut, which I am simply not willing to sacrifice.




I also believe that the other design firm will have some sort of trick up their sleeves to earn that money back after the client signs up with them because once the homeowners are locked into the contract, the designers can and will very likely start adding in additional items, also known as "hidden cost', looking at the quote they shared with me, I already noticed a few key items were excluded from the quote and labelled as "optional", all in an attempt to lower the final figures.




I actually prepared my quote based on what the other design firm quoted them, and also did what they did by taking out key items and listing them as optional, I then send the quote to the client and wrote that I had already done my best but simply couldn't match, and then highlighted the issues I had found with the other design firm's quote.




No response, no word of thanks, just double blue ticks and that was it, that was about 2 days ago, so I decided to delete the chat and drop her and her husband as a potential customer for the second time. I am not going to reach out and ask her about her decision because I am now selling them at a price that is bordering towards "not worth my time", if she reaches out and request to go even lower....sigh, if I were to really think about it, I might actually agree because I do really like the both of them, but I shouldn't and I won't!




What I REALLY need is to look for a new fucking job!

Entitled Cheapskate

Not too long ago, I was on this website called Qanvast looking for design inspiration when I came across this a rather negative review left on an interior design company's profile.



So many times, when a client leaves a negative review, the company will have to be the one who has to pander to the client, even if the clients are the one in the wrong. It can be really frustrating because I have colleagues who have gotten unfairly reviewed by clients before and all my marketing department can do is write the generic...

"We apologize that you feel this way and value your feedback."

... response, which is just infuriating.



That is why when I saw how that company responded to that particular client, it just felt so immensely gratifying. The client's review was written very passive aggressively and the company actually responded in a similar fashion, displayed a fair bit of sarcasm in their response and then essentially called the client out for being a cheapskate.

Gotta have respect for the company for actually standing up for their employee, if a customer is being difficult during the renovation and then have the audacity to actually write a negative review after the renovation is complete and blame their bad experience on the designer, then they deserve to be called out for it.



*UPDATE*

The review has since been taken down. I actually know the homeowner who left the nasty review because he is actually my friend's friend, so I went to check his instagram and realize that the company actually send him a cease and desist letter.  

He left a few permanent insta-stories on his instagram, trying to call the company out for their lack of professionalism with screenshots of his conversation with them, and then saying the matter isn't over. 

If the company was truly in the wrong, they wouldn't have responded the way they did.

If the company isn't confident about winning a potential lawsuit against a customer, they wouldn't be sending a cease and desist letter.

The matter is so fucking over, it is only a matter of whether he wants it to be over the easy way or the hard way.

more update:

I came across the review posted by the homeowner on his own Facebook after the ID Firm took legal action and had him take his review down.

... I came across his Facebook after I was looking through Qanvast's facebook page and notice there was one angry reaction on their post...

... I honestly wasn't very surprised when that the "reaction" was from him because he must be feeling extremely bitter about getting threatened with legal action from the design firm, so I saw his Facebook profile and almost everything was private aside from that post.

From what I remembered about the reply by the company to his extremely passive aggressive review.

1. The person who was paying for the renovation works was not actually him but his partner, who actually had no complaints about the entire renovation.

2. The design firm gave him a lot of discount because he was a "cheapskate", the company actually used this word to describe him at one point in the review, which was insanely awesome. This also shows that the company probably didn't wasn't that interested to take on his project because he isn't their demographic customers, which are customers who are willing to fork out money for design. I think he must have been extremely persistent to work with them and pressured them into removing the design fee as well.

3.  The company even said something about him "stealing their designs", I assume he wanted to take the design proposal the designer had prepared for his project and pass it to a contractor to do, but because the designer wasn't going to give her proposal, he couldn't do that. This is exactly why I do not give my proposal to non paying clients, I believe the designer from that design firm must have prepared a pretty extensive proposal as well seeing how they are a boutique firm that charges a design fee.

4. He got his own tiles and did not go through the company's supplier and the tiles he actually bought were cheap tiles from China to save money, so the tiles actually had cracks after they were laid on the walls and he pointed it out as poor workmanship. You buy cheap stuff, then don't expect good quality, simple as that.

The company also called the client out by his full name in their respond because this client called the designer out by her full name a few times in the review, it was so satisfying and honestly such a pity that the review was taken down.

Also just to bring up one of his point...

This is the plastic edging he was talking about and YES, this is standard practice! I am also extremely skeptical about his claims that the tiles he had gotten were "pricey Italian tiles", this dude is a cheapskate, no way he actually paid for real Italian tiles, but anyway, the designer wasn't lying, this is the standard, if he wanted 45 degree edging, it does cost more because the tilers will have to file down the side of the tiles to do that profile, and the designer herself probably didn't bother bringing that up as an option because the customer is a cheapskate, so what is the point of bringing up a premium option he was either probably going to request be done for free or be given a heavily discounted price.

Him calling out the designer for not "sharing the industry's best practice" is a fucking joke, dude, you are a fucking low baller, the fact that the company even bothered working on your project is a fucking miracle, sharing the industry's best practice should only be saved for customers who are willing to pay for the industry's best practice because sharing those with you is like playing the harp to a cow, a waste of saliva.

The fact that the boss didn't bother to reply to his messages and whatnot shows how much of a nightmare this low baller customer must have been. I have seen the way the company replies to negative reviews on their Qanvast page and they are very professional if they are in the wrong, so the fact that the response to his review was actually extremely sarcastic and as passive aggressive really goes to show the type of customer this low baller really is, truly an Entitled Cheap Skate.

This is the "Design Centric, Budget Friendly" customer type that I absolutely abhor getting. 

Second Interview

The Antoinette's renovation permit is coming to an end this coming Friday and I honestly feel like I will end up be paying the penalty fee to extend it.



I have already calculated my profit margin in an excel sheet, listing down my selling prices against the cost price, adding in all the discounts I have given them, the free items I have offered them out of goodwill, the penalty fee that I will most likely end up paying and after all that the calculation, the final figure doesn't look good. I am still earning that's for sure but the amount is not a justifiable figure for the time and effort I have put into the project and the stress and anxiety the project has put me through, especially during my reservist, which according to my friends who were with me, was one of the most relaxing one we have ever attended, we were comparing it to staying in a chalet, that's how comfortable it was and I am feeling extremely bitter that the Antoinette's Project had to ruin the whole experience.




My biggest gripe with this project right now is that is feels like it will never end, Mr Antoinette has marked out the problem areas already, so it's just a matter of touching up those problem areas, but the problem with Mr Antoinette is how nit-picky he has suddenly gotten because a some of those areas have already been touched up once, he just can't accept it and is requesting for it to be touched up again, and when those areas are fixed to his standard for approval, he will find new problem areas, thus this whole defect checking becomes a never ending procedure.




This is honestly the worst, all I want is for this project to finally be done so I can move on with my life, so I can stop glancing at my phone every  5 minutes to see if it will vibrate with messages from them or constantly have to tap on my phone to see if there are any Whatsapp messages from them that I missed out, I was a slave to my phone during reservist because of this and have been in this constant state of unease for the past month or so ever since the defect checking started.





But putting the current bane of my existence aside and on to a less stressful topic,  I went for my second job interview today at the furniture company and the whole interview just felt so much better than I one I went for yesterday because I knew the company I was applying at and did my research on them before actually applying for their job opening, the 2 interviewers who met me today did have a phone interview with me first and more importantly, I was the one who applied for the job position, a position that I know I am qualified for, and not some random recruitment agency.



The interview itself was alright, I was a little early, so I was offered a cup of tea and then told to walk the grounds to take a look at what the shop had to offer first, I spotted a few items that were quite nice but my one complaint about the selection that they have is everything looks really similar to one another, so even though they have a lot of different pieces, it feels like there isn't a lot of variety.




I was 15 minutes early, so I walked around the showroom for 15 minutes, holding the cup of hot tea they made for me, sipping it every once in a while and wondering if I am making the right choice applying for the position because it honestly is a downgrade from my current position as an Interior Designer, my current job responsibilities will go away and I feel like I will definitely be in a more relaxed state working in this furniture store because what made my current job so stressful is the responsibilities of having to manage multiple sites and sub-cons and clients, whereas in this furniture store, my responsibilities will be the upkeep of the showroom, attending to the customers who walk in and not have to commit to their project for months, reply to some emails every once in a while and most importantly, no project management, which means I won't get disturbed by clients after working hours.





So anyways, after 15 minutes of aimlessly walking around, one of my interviewer invites me to sit down on one of the many dining tables they have on display and we started our interview, there was the usual explaining what my current job is, what my current responsibilities are and then the interviewer ask me to explain my job in detail because he was really interested in how a home renovation actually progresses, so I kept talking and talking and talking and realize I am talking way too much but continued anyway because I was trying to fill the potential silence that will come after I stop and I could see the interviewer was really struggling to stay interested at my yapping, but I eventually did stop and he went on to explain to me the job position, the working hours, the company's history, the job responsibilities and the salary.




$2500 per month is pretty decent for me, I mean compared to what I am making now, which is probably less than $1000 a month, $2500 works, so I shared that I don't mind starting at the amount and the interviewer was surprised at how I was willing to start so low, and I realized I could have asked for more and fucked up, but at that point, I couldn't take it back and tell him I wanted $3000 per month, it would look weird, so I told him that I will start low first, prove myself through my actions and once the company deems me worthy of a pay raise, then we can take it from there.





Once he was done with me, he tells me to wait so he can get his partner over, and the partner comes over and starts talking to me as well, asking me what kind of environment am I expecting to work in, and I really didn't know how to respond to that, I mean the showroom felt pretty chill and relax, so I told her that the current environment of the showroom feels great to me, we then talked more about my current job, I start yapping again and at one point, the partner started to yawn but she managed to stop herself mid-yawn and that was when I knew it was time for me to stop talking, the interview ends after that and I was soon ushered out of the showroom.





I like the environment of the showroom, I like the location of the showroom, the pay is decent, the working hours is from 9am to 6pm, which is pretty average and because it is only a 20 minutes bus ride away from home, I will be able to reach home everyday after work before 7 pm, and I don't have to get up too early to reach the office on time.



But it has been a very long while since I got a job with regular working hours, so I am not sure how well I will take the 9 to 6 lifestyle, if I will eventually get tired of it and go back to Interior Designing for the flexible working hours.



This transition is going to be a lot harder than I thought. The interviewer told me they will update me on Tuesday about the position, I am actually having second thoughts about even accepting the job if they offered it to me because I have worked in my current company for 3 years and have grown a bit of an attachment to it, to the company and my colleagues, not to my clients, although I do really enjoy Interior Designing, which sucks because of the stressful project management aspect that comes with it.






UPDATE:

I just realized the last time I was put in this position of going for multiple job interviews and contemplating to quit, it was right after my reservist in 2018.


 At that time the last project I worked on was for Sly Fox and he was a pain at the end of the renovation.


This feels like a repeat of 2018, except this time, instead of Sly Fox, I am dealing with the Antoinette, and I am also fresh out of my reservist.



The only similarity that hasn't happened yet is me deciding not to quit, staying in the company and then getting a message from Sly Fox/Antoinette months later, informing me that something majorly bad has happened at their site and needs my immediate attention that will then take weeks to rectify because my tiler doesn't want to take responsibility. 



If I choose to stay and history does repeat itself, I might end up getting a call from the Antoinette months down the road about a potentially major problem.



That time with Sly Fox, the issue came about from my tiler's worker having poor workmanship and doing a shoddy job, this time, the issue also came about from my tiler's worker, the very same one who worked on Sly Fox's project, for poor workmanship and doing a shoddy job. It is the same guy, I feel like history is repeating itself and the only way I can change it is to make the decision to leave my current company and work in the furniture store, to not have to worry about the Antoinette bothering me months from now because if they do,I can simply say...

"Sorry guys, I don't work there anymore, call the company directly."

The idiot goes for the interview....

This morning, I decided I didn't want to waste my time going to the job interview for a job that I did not want, so as a basic courtesy, I called the recruitment agency and told the person who scheduled the interview that I wanted to withdraw my application and cancel my interview.

I explained to her that the job wasn't what I wanted, that it was my fault for not reading the job scope thoroughly before agreeing to the interview and initially she was a bit hesitant to cancel the interview because I think it wouldn't look good for her company, so she tried to get me to go for the interview anyway and ask me to ask the company if the position offers any design related responsibilities, she sounded really desperate and her reasons for asking me to attend the interview was honestly not convincing at all, if anything, her uncertainty makes me even less interested that I already was, so I told her I really didn't want to waste the company's time interviewing a candidate who was clearly not interested in the position and that cancelling would be the best way to go for everyone involved, to which she begrudgingly agreed.

After that was done, I felt instantly more relaxed, but then a few minutes later, I get a call from a number I didn't recognized and upon picking it up, the person started to introduce himself as the recruitment firm's team leader, turns out they really didn't want to cancel the interview at all, so he went on and on about how the company I was being interviewed at was a huge Japanese company, that it had all this amazing employee benefits and at the beginning I found it a little bit irritating because he wouldn't stop yapping, but then he goes...

"Actually the company is very excited to meet you because you are the only candidate they picked for the position, they even called us this morning to check if you were coming, they are really excited to see you."

... and being the gullible idiot that I am, I believed him and agreed to go for the interview, expecting for the company to entice me to join them seeing how I am the only candidate they had selected for the interview process.

3.30pm comes around and I set off for Downtown, I got my resume ready and reached the office at about 4.25pm, immediately got send into the meeting room and was soon joined the interviewer James, James shakes my hand and tells me that the boss will also be sitting in for the interview and about 10 seconds later, this older Japanese gentleman comes in and introduces himself to me, I literally couldn't catch what his name was because his accent was so strong, so I just smiled and nodded at him like I heard him and we all sat down.

James then ask me to introduce myself, which I did, I shared with them about my current job as an Interior Designer, my job scope and there really wasn't much to say because everything I am sharing is already written in my resume, plus a lot of the skill set that I currently have really doesn't apply to the job I was interviewing for, so as soon as I was done, the room was just filled with this awkward silence and James broke that silence by going...

"Based on your resume, it seems like you don't have the proper experience for his position. Maybe you can share with us why you decided to apply for this position?"

... and in my head, I just sort of went  blank, this is literally what I tried to convey to the recruitment agency in the morning, that I was not right for the job, but they still insisted I go down for the interview anyway. I thought the company would have been aware of this but turns out they weren't, and I couldn't help but got a little annoyed at the whole situation after that because this has clearly gone in a direction that is clearly going to be a waste of everyone's time.

I came into the interview thinking the company was going to share the benefits their company could offer me as an employee, explain the job scope to me in person and then sell the position to me since according to the recruitment agency's team leader, I was the "only shortlisted candidate"

The company on the other hand came into this interview expecting me to share why they think I should be hired for the position and what I can offer the company, even asked me why I decided to apply for their company as if I had done thorough research on them and had personally send my resume in, so I was really confused because they should have been very aware that this was done through the recruitment agency.

That little smidgen of interest that I originally had for the position instantly went away the very moment James asked me the questions he ask me about my knowledge about the company and why I wanted to join their company, because I didn't want to, I was under the impression that I was there for them to convince me to join them, that they needed my current skill set for the position, I had clearly been bamboozled by the team leader from the recruitment agency.




At that point, I just didn't give a flying fuck anymore, I knew the company was not going to hire me, I had no way of trying to sell myself to James and the boss to hire me because I have zero interest in the job, so I told James that I was going to be extremely blunt and honest with him and his boss, and proceeded to tell them straight to their face that I didn't actually apply for the job, that it was done through the recruitment agency so I have never actually heard of their company before,  I could barely even google any information about them and the boss just gave a dry laugh and agreed with me.




 I then told them to excuse my bluntness once again and confessed that I wasn't actually interested in this position at all, that I had actually attempted to call the recruitment agency earlier this morning to cancel but they insisted I come anyways. I told them I wanted a position that had more of a designer responsibilities, not a sales position, that I didn't want to waste their time with the interview anymore because if they, for some reason, ended up hiring me, I might probably quite in a month or two due to the nature of the job not being the one I wanted.

James was a little surprise at how honest I was being and went...

"I was actually giving you the opportunity to try and sell yourself and convince us why we should give you the job, but from what you have shared with me, it seems like you are not the right candidate for the position."

.... and I agreed with him, he then tells me that he is very surprised at how honest I was, that he found my honesty refreshing to see in a candidate, but that my honesty also makes me not suitable for the sales position, and I agreed with him wholeheartedly. 

I didn't want to work as a Sales Executive, and the position was as a Senior Sales Executive, I was clearly under qualified for the position, I have no fucking idea what the recruitment agency was thinking when they got me the interview and I have no fucking idea what the company was thinking for even agreeing to meet me for an interview, the whole thing was a bloody mess.

When I was getting ushered out, I could tell from James' body language when he pointed me the way out that he was probably also a little bit bumped out about the interview ending the way it did, he tried to start a bit of small talk as I was coming out of the meeting room and ask me if residential project was more difficult, so I wanted to share with him a little, but the moment I stepped out of the room and past him, barely even finishing my first sentence, he immediately points me to the door, clearly not interested to listen to me talk any longer and just waved goodbye at me. 

After the interview, I called up the recruitment agency girl who arranged the interview for me and she was surprised at how quickly the interview ended, so I told her I was very honest with the company, that I was never interested in the position in the first place, that I had told her in the morning already that it wasn't a right fit for me and I think that was when she finally accepted that I really didn't want the job at all.

Sigh, it was such a huge waste of time everybody's time and I have the team leader of the recruitment agency to thank for making sure that everybody's time was wasted today.

I'm an idiot.

I have a job interview tomorrow and I think it's going to be a waste of time. 

This is a job opening I did not personally apply for, it was applied for me by a recruitment agency and it was introduced to me while I was doing my reservist and feeling really angsty about my current job, the stress it was causing me made me agree to let the recruitment agency send my resume in on my behalf.

When the position was intially explained to me, the main information that stuck with me was...

1. Basic Pay

2. Office Furniture

3. Sales Related

... and the starting pay was about $3000, so I was all for it. The lady who called me up then send me the company's information and the positon information and I thought it sounded good, mainly because the salary is quite generous compared to the peanuts I am earning right now.

After a while, I decided to look through the position information again and realize that this position had nothing to do with Interior Design at all, it was purely sales, so what I am expected to do is cold call potential customers, come up with strategies to get more leads, sales this, sales that, there was nothing about it that was design related.

I was a little confused at the position because on my resume, it clearly states that I am an Interior Designer, I have a diploma in Interior Design, my main scope should be Design first and not Sales. I immediately lost interest in the position and hoped that the company that put out the joblisting will actually do some background check on me and realize I am not the right person for the job.

The position is Senior Sales Executive, I'm a fucking idiot for not just looking not at the jobscope properly, I didn't even look at the job title properly, I'm an idiot, and to mantain my stupidity streak, when the recuirment agency called up to share the good news with me, that I got an interview, I stupidly agreed to it. I mean what the fuck was I thinking? I didn't want the job at all and I still agreed to go for the interview. The recruitment agency lady then briefed me again on what the position required and what I should share about my last job experience, asking me to focus more on the sales aspect than the interior design aspect. I don't even know what the company is thinking, asking me to go for an Interview. I am not the right person for the job! 

I'm an idiot. 

So tomorrow, I will be wasting everybody's time by going for the interview at the CBD area at 4.30pm, which means by the time the interview is done, it will probably be peak hour. 

I cannot emphasis how much of an idiot I am. I will view tomorrow's job interview as a trip to explore the CBD area, where everyone who works there probably hates their job because that is literally a place where everyone is just going through the daily grind. 

On the brightside, I will have another job interview the following day near my place, I actually applied for that position on my own so I am definitely more interested in that one. It's at a furniture store as a sales executive, basic pay as well, not as high but the location is so much closer to my place and also potentially less crowded during peak hour. A little more optimistic about it but I will say, that urge to leave this current job is slowly starting to wear off and I am afraid the cycle is starting to repeat itself again, so I hope the job interview for the furniture store will really offer me some awesome work benefits to make it impossible for me to turn down.

End of Sixth Cycle

My 6th Reservist Cycle is officially over and I will say this is by far the most relaxing and also most stressful reservist I have ever attended.




The Reservist itself was great, my friends and I got to spend almost all our time in an air-conditioned room either playing games on our phones or watching a lot of Netflix, I managed to bingewatch Hellsing Ultimate, The Good Place and Locke and Key within the 3 weeks, right now I am in the middle of the first season of Brooklyn Nine Nine. It honestly felt like a vacation for us compared to the majority of the ICTs who were stuck doing Guard Duty under the hot sun, everyone of us agreed that we got extremely lucky.




We had quite a few time-off during that 3 weeks, so my friend who drove took us out to Changi Village multiple times for dinner, we even went to Changi Jewel in an attempt to have Shack Shak, we had assumed that the queues were no longer existent with the Wuhan Virus scare, but unfortunately the queue was very much there, so that idea was immediately aborted, but we had a decent curry meal elsewhere, I got a cup of Bubble Tea from the Alley and then we went back to base, it was pretty great, although we were only allowed to go out that night because the active commanders required us to do a bit of Guard Duty for them the next day, which wasn't so great, and that is the most shitty part of the reservist, I mean fuck, we were so fucking lucky that that was the worst part for us, none of us had the cheek to even complaint about the additional Guard Duty because we knew it would sound bloody ungrateful. The active commander even thanked us after for being willing to do the additional guard duty for them.





Unfortunately, due to work, I was not able to fully enjoy the 3 weeks "vacation" because I was literally having anxiety the entire time in camp from the myraid of issues that suddenly came up at site during my 3 weeks reservist, I have never wanted to quit my job asbadly as I did during those 3 weeks because it was literally ruining my every waking hour, the only time I felt truly relaxed was when it was late in the night and I had a lower chance of my clients messaging me, they have texted me as late as 12.30 midnight before so I can't say they confirm won't disturb me because fuck my sleeping schedule amirite, otherwise, it was just full on anxiety from the anticipation of their messages. I could feel my heart skip a beat everytime my phone buzz with a message and when I realize that the message isn't from my clients, it's like I can feel my heart beating faster for that second from relief,  and then when it is really from them, well it's just normally a sense of dread. I can't even ignore the messages and just think, "Fuck it, I won't look", because then, the message will be all I think about and I can't function properly.





All of us in the "vacation" team also ended up getting sick because we were stuck in the aircon room for days, we were complaining that the aircon was too cold, who the fuck complaints about the aircon being too cold for their reservist, I mean the whole thing just feels bonkers to me, we were literally complaning about being too comfortable, but anyways, it was really too cold so someone got sick, took MC and then infected everyone else, so my friend and I actually completed my reservist today with a block and running nose, will most likely visit a doctor tomorrow to get a default 5 day MC, if it is even more serious, then hey, quarantine me so I can have a legit reason to pass this ongoing project to my manager and have him handle everything for me.




After outproning from ICT today, I went home to put my items down, had a quick lunch and immediately went to the project site to check up on the situation, I don't even get a day off to rest because this project has officially joined the shit pile and it's main purpose right now is to suck all the joy out of my life, it is currently the bane of my existence.




Problems started piling up as I was preparing to leave my house, subcons were either not responding to me or telling me they can't make it, I was calling other sub-cons for help and they also can't make it because it was too last minute. I felt like I was very close to having a mental breakdown when I was at site because nothing was going according to plan.




This project was suppose to end in late January, it was suppose to end before my Reservist started, that was what I told myself and my ICT friend who is also in the same industry during our last cycle, that for my next reservist (which is this current one), I don't want to have any projects on hand because it's mentally exhausting to deal with, and then there I was, dealing with that site from camp literally everyday I was in camp, either through Whatsapp messages or Phone calls with the sub-cons and clients, sub-cons pushing blame back and forth and my client telling me the renovation has been a disappointment, I wish I could emulate one of those scammy interior contractor who could just tell the clients to go fuck off, call the clients up on the phone and tell them to not be so fucking ridiculous with their demands for perfection, ask them to kiss my ass instead of having to personally apologize to them and getting guilt trip into absorbing the cost of an additional work they requested.




This project is not worth it, the clients are not worth it, the commission I am getting from this proejct is not worth it, all the effort I have put into this project is worth shit because all this project has given me the past 3 weeks has been a tremendous amount of stress and anxiety. Working 5 months on this project has been a fucking joke, this project has gone on for 3 months too long, I am seriously starting to lose my patience.



I have a job interview next Thursday, if I can ace that job interview, then I am going to quit this current one in April, after completing my friend's house, and be done with this career, if this husband and wife are still not happy with the state of their house, then they can settle it with my company. That is the only thing that is keeping me sane, the idea of me just completely letting this project go in April, if it really gets to that point, and if it really does get to that point, then the problem honestly lies in the homeowner because I have never ever had to work on a project this long before.