Many many things happened during this missing period. Though they took place in a smooth and peaceful way, who could imagine, even if in half a year ago, that all this would happen to me. Maybe I should say that I am settling down in this country now. As a matter of fact, I even had a thought of buying a property here. The problem of surviving always haunts me. I am really tired.

Suddenly I become homesick. I was so sentimental that I actually broke down in the middle of my phone call on the New Year's Eve night. Apparently my sister in the other end didn't notice it because the line wasn't quite clear. I miss mum.

David asked on the air whether I would be acting as the spokesman for the small group of Stirling staff who were suddenly trapped in loads of troubles. I have no choice but to take that role especially when both Max and Kat are off today and tomorrow as well.

Lying in the couch I could not help but pondering what I should speak if I actually get a chance to discuss with Paul, the manager superior to Delphine whose acts and words are not understanding to me.

The first controversy comes from the alternation of condition about transportation. Over the past 16 months, we have been getting paid for the half of hour spent on the way back home. Last week, however, Delphine abolished this policy by simply sending us a so-called reminder via e-mail. The fact is that none of us was aware of this in the first place. Personally I think regard it as a fundamental modification of terms which was supposed to be consulted with us beforehand, and to inform us as early as it takes into effect.

We find it very difficult to understand and get along with it because in general we are doing much better now than the time we just started. But as a result we get less paid. And this change of policy is obviously opposite to Hotel's plan to motivate staff by recent pay increase from which the incremental wages we can obtain are overwhelming offset by this negative alternation. I have to say that it is very domotivating and because of it we feel that we are punished for some reason which we would like to know if they do exist.

This is our main purpose of this meeting. i.e. to seek a reasonable explanation if this change has been justified already by the management. The other issue we wish the management to be aware of is relative to the time of signing out as well.

Recently there have been a few occasions where we were asked to sign out earlier than the sheduled time. A problem would occur if the taxi company was too busy to come to pick us up at the time just decided by the headwaiter. For exmaple, the taxi is not able to come till 20 minutes after we signed out. According to Delphine's, we Stirling staff cannot get paid for this 20 minutes simply because we are not working.

It is just too unfair. We already suffer loss in the sense we were expecting to earn more than we actually made because of the shortened shifts which we think result from managerial misjudgement. We are absolutely sorry for this and show our undertanding by agreeing to sign out earlier. The supply of transportation is the keystone of our contract otherwise no Stirling staff would come to work in Gleneagles. If there was anything wrong with the taxi, the Hotel should take the responsiblity to sort it out and we Stirling employee should be free of loss incurred since it is only in cases of changing finish time where delay of taxi will possibly happen. As far as this issue concerned, we think our sign-out time should be the time when taxi comes.

I have been thinking about this letter for more than a week. First of all I apologize for my selfish decision to discontinue the study, and for all the trouble I have brought to you.

Recently it has been increasingly difficult for me to motivate myself to reach the goal you might have expected me to get. On the other side, the desire to go for accountancy as my future career has swallowed me, which has been in my mind since the first day I started.

Before further into reasons, I would like to thank you for offering me a chance to imagine a life that could be completely different. I also wish you know how much I am grateful to your tolerance in my incompetence which I will remember for ever.

If possible can I have a short meething with you for saying good-bye.

LAUSANNE, Switzerland (AFP) - China's Liu Xiang set a new 110 metres hurdles world record on a stunning night in Lausanne.

Liu scorched to the finishing line in a time of 12.88sec, beating the old mark of 12.91 that he shared with Britain'sColin Jackson and which had stood since 1993.

Two fantastic finals were held today, Wimbledon Men's single and World Cup Final. It was supposed to be exciting for someone like me who was into all kinds of sports so much that he chose it as career.

The day started with my first worship since the Easter, which was encouraging enough for me to tell my parents that I was in church. There were a few occassions where I deeply missed parents and the rest of families. The shock one sister of mine had when I told her that I was no longer a student brought me down to the sadness. Several days ago when I informed my mum of this decision I could hardly hold back the tear. She was so proud of me in the sense that she has been regarding her sole son a gift from God to whose face he eventually led her. There is no doubt that I let her down, however. Probably she has told each of her brothers and sisters that her son was doing the highest possible academic degree in a foreign country.

The feeling that I live for someone else has stopped haunting me for years. Today it came back. For the first time in my life I notice the meticulous approach to my own life which is unfortunately not acceptable to them. I lost in pursuing my future. What I can do at the moment is just working like a mule in Gleneagles instead.

Apparently I have more chances to enjoy the freedom I have obtained recently after a decisive resolution was made on the basis of frustration, self-examination and reconsideration.

One friend of mine asked whether I would repeat the history given the very similar context I am facing. So ridiculously. Even I have to mock myself. How can I do this over and over? I am indeed looking forward to my new life which I have found already.

It is so silly for anyone who just sit in the office doing nothing but killing time by blogging meaningless stuff. Only half an hour is left before another tedious adventure in Gleneagles starts. I want to say Goodbye to my past.

I am in love, eventually. Though Max still throws the word "miserable" on me, I just no longer feel it. I am very happy indeed.

We are planning to have a day out in Glasgow, which is expected to push our relationship even further forward. Just in a few days only, I have had so many first experiences.

I will keep myself away from blogging indefinitely.

Prior to its official release, the film, The Da Vinci Code, has attracted plenty of attention for the reason of alleged plagiarism etc. It reminds me of Mel Gibson's The Passion of The Christ. The common element of religion produces controversy, even among christians. On the other hand, an invisible force emerges pushing huge number of people into cinema. While materialism prevails people lost interest in churches and hope to understand their faith with the help of artistic works.

The Chinese version of Dan Brown's original novel has been reportedly published in China. Perhaps it claims bestselling there as well. What is Chinese readers up to? The majority of Chinese christians is above the age of 35 and they are too busy to unlock the Code.

Nowadays young people are dying for being a fashion leader. I believe more and more youth consider religion a type of fashion. Some even think homosexuality to be fashionable as well. That is odd.

There is a gap between modern young Chinese and me. It is widening hopelessly. As a matter of fact, I sort of expect this tendency to continue as it would stand me out from loads of mindless fellows. Odd thought too.

By the way, I have downloaded a digital copy of Brown's novel in original version and am expecting myself to take two days to obtain a copy of the film after its release globally on the same day, 19 May 2006.

It has been months since I stopped seeing counsellor. Someone I would like to share the rest of my life with has showed up and we has been in a very good relationship. I had thought that after all this I have become used to the fate of seeing you off out of my sight. However, everything came back after a quick and common conversation between you and me in the afternoon.

Having returned to my flat, I spent hours thinking of you, which was the only thing I could do. We are still tied in a special occasion. You asked me to join your Monday's meeting. There were a few cases in which we pushed each other into embarrassing position as the introversion and courtesy we both have led to inadequate communication giving rise to misunderstanding. I cannot tell whether or not I am ready for or willing to present Monday.

This week I worked a lot. Four night shitfs very much exhausted me. My research is consequently again left behind the timetable. You might notice that I did not even respond to your praise for the progress so far I have achieved no matter how negligible it was. I actually felt shamed when the word EXCELLENT came out from your mouth.

By the way, I realized how come you were confused when I tried to tell you that I forgot to bring the mouse with me. I pronouced the mouse as mouth. Aha. How can I possibly leave my mouth home?

I came across a joke given below which inspired me of some thoughts which I would like to record and share with you.

Friendship Between Women:
A woman didn't come home one night.
The next day she told her husband that she had slept over at a girlfriend's house.
The man called his wife's 10 best friends. None of them knew anything about it.

Friendship Between Men:
A man didn't come home one night.
The next day he told his wife that he had slept over at a buddy's house.
The woman called her husband's 10 best friends.
Eight of them confirmed that he had slept over,
and two claimed that he was still there.

Some people comment that this joke reflects that women like to see her girlfriends being caught in trouble to stand out her happiness. Maybe it is not that objective. I would say that comparing with men, women are more meticulous and prefer to avoid messing things up. Obvisouly men define the friendship in a broader way than women do. However, because of that, men are more likely to push things in the way against their original wish.

From the above case, the wife could still argue she stay with another friend while the husband is doomed to be tortured.

"No relief is available for trading losses in accounting period on one side of (before r after) a change in ownership of a company if the losses making accounting period is on the other side of (after or before)the change in ownership....."

OMG. I couldn't believe that it nearly took me half of an hour to get the point of the above sentence. Agnes is right. Language is one of factors impeding my research progress that I should never overlook. The specialty English is killing me.

Now it seems to be too optimistic about my capability to pass the ACCA exam without taking tuitions that most of students do attend.

Any non-native English speakers but who are interested in learning English are recommended to visit the USINGENGLISH.COM.

In case that you are puzzled by some phrase which I run into very often, a forum is constructed up there in which you are free to raise your question and a lot of qualified native English speakers would like to offer their help.

If you don't mind spending a couple of minutes registering as a member, within every regular interval you would receive an email consisting some test paper by which you are able to examine where you are in terms of the English language.

Have a try if you wish to improve your English.

I did not go to church yesterday. There was no excuse at all. I just felt that this time I better put my study before the faith.

There is a good sign that I spent less time lingering across the Internet and setting aside more hours for doing preliminary spreadsheet work. One idea came up this afternoon. Before the crude oil eventually reaches the end users, it goes through three stage, discovery, prodcution and transportion. They are not formal terms. Therefore, it may be worthwhile categorizing news by reference to the stage to which each piece of news is linked. One point is that it will be helpful to find out how the oil price responds to events featuring with the specific process. Anyway I can then use event studies to find out what factors matter with the variability of oil prices. The final setp is to modell the effects on oil prices of these factors.

Hopefully I am walking in the right direction. My faith inside is so weak that I cannot even feel it. I don't know how to tell my parents my trouble without destroying their hope that I could take care of myself well. I wish to speak with certain reverend or someone who is spiritually eligible to guide me through. Hopefully!

Research is so boring. Forcing yourself to stick to it is even worse.

Nearly three months after the Dunblane conference, I found myself nailed by similar mistakes at the same point. No matter how meaningless the idea I put forward is, you always encourage me to go ahead without suggesting me of a second thought.

During the tedious process of selecting and inputing news into a spreadsheet, more and more problems come out which compels me to question, to doubt our plan. You start to use WE more often. Yes. I do notice this.

What a pity! I cannot avoid myself being the person that let you down and bring you embarrassment. Do you really think that stock prices of oil companies can be a sound proxy of oil prices when we intend to investigate the impacts of all kinds of news on the latter? Have you realized that news which is positive to oil companies might well be negative to oil prices? Such as the new discovered reserve the effects of which you are interested. New discovery appears to bring oil companies more profit but will lift the pressure on the suppy of oil. Maybe I can use a dummy to discriminate these two different types of news, and hence may be lucky enough to find a way to proceed.

Much more problems must be there, waiting in my way to the degree. I am so worried. You must have lost patience and trust on me. I wish that next time you could say Don't worry I am still around.

I found a very good BBS which provides the downloading of original Econometrics textbooks and some statistical software packages. The only cost I have to pay is the cyber money which can be earned through your help by clicking this link.

Don't worry. It is a safe link that will bring you to the Economic forum of Renmin University of China. I could accumulate 10 units of cyber money from each of your clicks. Basically 30 units of cybermoney is the cost of downloading a copy.

Please note multiple clicks from the same IP at the same day will be counted as one click only.

I appreciate your help very much.

It was about two years ago when I first told this lie. I did the same thing a couple of times to two very respectable persons, BUT I would consider them one lie only. The lie, however, is big. It is unacceptable and unforgiven given the content and the audience of the lie.

The former is about my parents and the latter is two father figures.

I decided to make up a lie when I screwed up my first ever formal job interview. During the interview, a very handsome guy asked me in English to talk about my family, which is the last question I would like to face in such occasion. My hesitation and reluctance to responde it highlighted my awful spoken English. I knew it was gonna be a fail. The company was called Dow Jones. I was 20 years old.

Surprisingly, I never had a chance to use this lie until 5 year later. I feel shamed about myself for letting them becoming the victims.

Before it happened, signs told me that something unfortunate was coming. I got an email from Dana. What she put there very much disturbed me in that my problem was highlighted in her mail.

I couldn't do anything properly. I entered the bathroom, then found the shower's curtain was fallen off. Though I managed to fix the pistol of the washing basin, so many broken stuff slashed my mood into gloom.

Later Hanif got up and we started to fix the curtain. Then it came. I put my left hand's middle finger near the hinger and forgot that the door would bounce back automatically. I felt the hurt, looked back and saw the door's edge banging my finger which started to bleeding. Both of us shouted out "SHIT". Hanif ran to fetch a plaster for me. I turned on the tap and let the water wash away my blood. The first flash of idea was that I would not be able to write my thesis till days after. Damn it. I just booked an appointment to meet my supervisor on Thursday. This injured finger may be a good excuse for no work having been done.

Just before I thought things would not go any worse, I felt the hurt was actually reaching my heart and controlling my mind. "All ten fingers are linked to the heart". It is a Chinese saying. It was so hurt that I could not keep standing. I rushed back to my own room, lay down on the bed, and prayed for God's help instinctively. My right hand pressued the injured finger to hold back the blood, but I was aware of the weakness. At one point I suspect myself to pass out, which would be pretty scary.

Thank God for helping me get through with it. It is still bleeding, even eight hours after the injury. But as you see, I can type. And I don't have to cancel Saturday's 12-hour shift.

Do you want to know how much you know about me? Well. Here come the chance.

Click HERE and then answer the questions I made. Your score will be showed right after the completion. You can also check the ranking which sort of indicates the degree of your familiarity with me.

Have a fun!