I suppose I should be working right now. Instead, I'm devoting what little time I have to making a record of my continuing career decline.

It's like this: I'm working as a writer in a country that hates writers. Or at least keeps them around long enough until they're totally defeated, then spits them back to their dumpster of origin. (Mine happens to have 7,000 islands and not a sane person in sight.) Where I could be writing the "Great Asian Novel", I'm reduced to writing sad mockeries of prose for an industry that could well be gone in the next dozen years.

There are people out there who are making less than I am, and feel like they're making a real difference in people's lives.

Instead, I'm out there telling people why they should be deliriously happy that 7-Eleven's selling two bottles of pop at the deliciously low price of S$2.00! Isn't that amazing?

If I start to feel any sorrier for myself, I'll probably check into the Adrian Mole Centre for Writers With Inflated Egos.

Must repeat after me: "It's only advertising... it's only advertising... it's only advertising...."

It's only a career. It's only my sanity. It's only my life.