Past News Archive: September 2008

September 29, 08

Today is a bit special as I turn a year older.  Personally, I don't really care as it makes me look back think as old I'm getting & turns me into a geezer.  So, let's not talk about it.

In my workplace, we aren't doing too well.  The big reason is because of the economy making a big dip.  So, our GM is going to cut the number of front desk agents at the desk to one now.  Aside from the fact of not needing another person at front, it's more of a cost saving move since dropping revenues are affecting our profits.  With the upgrade & changes to the hotel, that will decrease the overall profit more.  Cause of this, my management focus will be lower as the desk is more important.  My GM already told me that my front desk skills are excellent, but my management is lacking.  How would I be doing that if I'm always at the desk even if downtime occurs?

Updates this week are anime reviews again.  Small amount though.  Up are Code Geass - Lelouch of the Rebellion R2 & Nogizaka Haruka no Himitsu.  Although it's small, best thing is that these reviews are from more recent anime shows.

September 22, 08

This past weekend, my cousin came over from Hong Kong for a connecting flight to Calgary.  He's going to be studying there for high school.  Grade 10 I believe.  He was there last month to see how the place is.  I heard he didn't like it, so I don't know what made him change his mind.  Although I haven't seen him for who knows how many years, his personality hasn't really changed much.  Still a shy guy.  Makes me wonder if he'll fit in his school which he's starting today.  But he could be the fact he had jet lag since it was a long flight & he did looked tired.  Either way, good luck to him in his school life in Canada.

From personal life to work life now.  We have this new front desk agent who has experience in the field for three years now.  However, it felt like she was totally new.  Probably mentioned this way back somewhere, but she took over the desk on her first day of work.  Technically, you should be watching on how the company runs first.  Basically, an orientation of the place.  Instead, she got to the guests & answer calls already.  Personally don't like this even though if the person has experience.  To me, experience is having some background on the field of work.  It doesn't mean you know everything & assume everything is the same everywhere you go.

Anyways, the new agent create mistakes with some being minor & others being critical.  Luckily, we managed to resolved the critical ones with a sour taste in our mouths left behind.  The critical ones were forgetting to set wakeup calls.  This is a problem for hotels if a guest miss their flight as hotels would be paying for them.  Nobody wants to be stuck in a place that they aren't home in.  Although our GM has mentioned to her about these mistakes, she continues to make them again.  But worse as the number of the same mistake increases than decreases which is very bizarre.  But she was given one more chance when our GM called her to tell her not to come to work on Friday.  Funny thing is that no mistakes were made the previous night, but the next day they popped up.  Not surprisingly, the same ones again; but minor ones.  As much as I want to protect people from losing their jobs, I did help her out by giving tips to her.  But I don't think I want her here as the corrections would be coming to me & I don't like doing them.

Enough ranting, what's new here?  Updates are mainly anime reviews with one collectable.  Got up are CLANNAD (TV) & Sekirei.  For collectables, up is The Art of Shunya Yamashita: Mirei-san (Blue Abyss Ver.) under the Shunya Yamashita section.  Not much again since I've been tired out.  Then again, ain't I always?

September 15, 08

Last week, I decided to put away some figurines as they have been displayed for a long time.  Reason for it is basically because I've got tired of them or the leaning effect has gotten worse.  When I was doing this, I decided to write up something about this for the Collectables section.  I'm still writing up this article as time hasn't been nice to me.

Also last week, I got my Fate/Tiger Colosseum Upper Megamori Box pretty fast.  Came on the day of last week's update a couple of hours later & it was my lunar birthday too.  Lucky me.  But I only played it the next day as I was preserving it to take pics.  Fun game, but it took me awhile to remember the system as it has been a long time.

Also on that day, I got my SE W580i back after sending it for repairs under warranty.  The problem that people can't hear me on the other line while I can hear them clearly.  But it seems the problem never got fixed as it's still there!  Back to the repair center it goes!  If it still doesn't get fixed, I'm going for the Nokia N95.  I know N96 is coming out very soon, but got no money for it & it's just a small upgrade over N95 I heard.  I personally like the W580i & I know it's cost very little now.  But I would get something better even though I don't play around with cell phones a lot as I mainly use it to talk.

In anime news, FUNimation licensed Kaze no Stigma.  For some reason, that company is really loaded.  If you haven't noticed, they have been re-releasing a lot of Geneon USA's DVDs.  Most of them are series that were near the time when Geneon USA pulled out.  Also, FUNimation has been releasing box sets for many series.  Best part about them is that they will continue where Geneon left off in some series that were left in the middle/incomplete.  They are continuing with the same pattern/trend that Geneon wanted to do by releasing constant volumes.  Now, I can finish my When They Cry collection without worrying about breaks or restarting my collection.

Updates this week are still minimal.  Worse than last week.  Hard to find time to work on this place.  Up is an updated review of Kimikiss pure rogue as I saw the DVD extra episode recently.  And that's it.  I'll see if I can do better than this.  By the way, happy mid-autumn festival to those that celebrate this occassion.

September 8, 08

As some of you may know, my online store tamago-toys is gone.  I decided to close it by letting the domain expires last month.  As mentioned in the forums there, people may contact me if they want something that was available there.  That is if I still have whatever that people are looking for.  Prices are the regular ones that were listed there which I don't remember.  Will check them up when asked.

Lately, I've been thinking about getting a bunch of PSP games.  Why?  Cause the upcoming games interest me & most of them are imports.  Technically I should get more PS3 games instead since I usually play video games at home, but they are hardly any titles out there that interest me right now.  I mainly got the MGS4 bundle cause of the backwards compatibility.  I don't have a PS2 & there are some games I would like to play with.  Another is the fact that I still have so many PSP games in still in packaging.  Most of them are RPG games too which makes it more worse. 

Anyways, the PSP games that I'm getting, preordering, waiting to get are Fate/Tiger Colosseum Upper Megamori box edition, Macross Ace Frontier, Mobile Suit Gundam: Gundam vs. Gundam, Yggdra Union, Valhalla Knights 2, Star Ocean: The First Departure, & Ikki Tousen Eloquent Fist.  Bleach Soul Carnival is on my maybe list.  It looks ok, but seems short.  It's just a weird feeling I have on the game.  But it looks kind of fun.  Man, if I didn't get my sick leave last month, I wouldn't worry too much about spending a lot of money.

Enough chatting, here are this week's updates.  Not much though.  I got up a review of Kimi ga Nozomu Eien OVA ~Next Season~ & Saishū Shiken Kujira OVA.  For books, got WILD FLOWER: Shunya Yamashita Illustrations #2.  Hope to get more next week, but seems unlikely.

September 1, 08

It's now September, so August 2008 goes to the Past News Archives

Last week, went to work after around three weeks of absence.  Things weren't too bad as the new front desk agent didn't need much training since she has been in this field before.  Only thing was minor stuff like learning our system & the Wyndham Rewards program that our hotel uses.  I mainly supervised her & worked as team.  The first two days were these & it didn't feel to bad.  But when my GM went out of town for the long weekend starting Friday, things really came crashing down on me. 

Aside from the paperwork that was waiting for me, I had complaints & inquiries of getting past bills & other stuff come at me.  Since I was out for long, I know nothing about these situations & I mainly got dumbfounded as I go "huh?"  I really need to see what was going on & study from it to understand the situation.  Basically these are things that my GM either didn't have the time to do them or forgot/ignored.  Most of it are at least a week old.  But I had other stuff as well that are fairly new & knew about since it happened when I came back.  I was seriously thinking that I shouldn't have come back & took another week off since I'm still not well physically.  All this stress may cause my healing process to delay longer.  Thankfully I got the day off today & it's Labour Day.  Supposedly get paid since it's the law or something.  I don't really know since I used to work on Mondays & Fridays & a lot of holidays fall in those days.

Enough of work, what's new for this new month?  Got up are mainly complete anime reviews.  While I was resting, I finally took the time to watch a bunch of anime to get something to review.  Up are Druaga no To: the Aegis of Uruk & Ghost Hound.  Updated completed reviews due to DVD extra episodes are Moetan & Zombie-Loan.  In the Artbooks & Illustration Books section, got up PEACH-PIT Sui-Mitsu-Kyo Artworks & Tetsuya Ohno: Pussy Cat.

I hope to get some other reviews done & up (mainly the PSP ones since that's really out of date).  PSP games are first priority provided that Ican finish my games fast.  Second are collectables provided that I do some adjustments like creating space & switching figures with another.  Anime reviews are most likely last since I got a bunch to watch & there's a lot of them up on the site.  Anyways, I'll see what is convenient with me in terms of time.