The word of the day is: "umami" (check it out, folks, it's a doozy)

I wish I could ascribe my absence over the last few months to something noble like fruitful labour; or something glamorous like a yachting cruise around the Ardennes,
or something ascetic like withdrawing to a mountain cave to meditate on the fruits of samsara - or even simply the dogged willpower of channeling every ounce of spare energy into getting a better job, not sparing myself even the slightest iota of time or expense to anything other than the desperate search for better employment....

The plain fact of the matter is, I actually have been having a reasonably entertaining time(outside of work - the World Cup, partial repayment of my debts and the consequent greater financial independence, more aggressively driving to strange new restaurants, Nick Hornby and Anthony Burgess reading binges, more computer games, anime shipments, etc etc...). The crumbs of spare time that aren't devoured by irritating social obligations to family outings, family dinners, family-bonding-in-living-room-sessions, the occasional late night tete-a-tete with my cousins, perfunctory attempts at exercise through swimming, all-night ICQ chats, etc etc - the time that remains is fanatically rationed for the satisfaction of my entertainment interests as pursuant to my new lifestyle goal of "As Good As It Gets."

So, without further preamble - I should launch into the base facts: I have now changed jobs - doing some analysis work at a local merchant bank(as opposed to the previous job where I was an account-opening-monkey in a consumer bank). The observations reaped here are of personal interest/significance, but not the sort that would engender much interest were I to share them in a public fora such as this one.

Most of my soundbites, if I had any, would revolve around the fairly tumultous emotional states of mind I go around these days, as well as numerous personal and social observations about life at large, working in the city, and career/future ruminations. But this blog has an implicit "no-angst" moratorium which I will respect, and my daily harvest of experiences(thus far) lack the dry soundbite value of Gabriel's NS recollections, or the surreal esotericism of my previous job. Still, I expect some things of interest will surface for Pepysian recording, in time.

End transmission.