Today is a ’leap day’, 29th Feb of the leap year 2008.  It makes it great time line ’measurement’ on the ‘developments’ in our lives.  Honestly I have very vague memories of how I was faring on 29th Feb 2004, exactly 4 years ago.  I think I was quite happy back then; working in a typical job, in a typical workplace with nice and friendly people.  The economy was picking up then.  Now everyone roughly knows where the economy is heading to. 

To some people, 4 years may be long and to others, it is short.  I find 4 years rather long and quite a lot can be accomplished within this time frame.   As such, I definitely want to run a major review of my life progress on 29th Feb 2012, exactly 4 years later.  If I follow my current plans and take consistent disciplined actions on the strategies that I had learnt in the past year, I should be leading a very different life compared to now and definitely to 4 years ago.  Hence besides my monthly and yearly progress updates, I shall set every subsequent 29th February to be a major milestone ‘measurement’ of my life progress! 

February is drawing to a close and looking back on this month, some schedules and plans were adjusted because of mini ’setbacks’.  Nevertheless overall, things are going as planned and there were also unexpected ‘bonuses’ received along the way that helped to enhance my ongoing journey to my goals.  I had to put in more efforts in most of my work because at times, my emotions ‘told’ me to ’slow down’ and I ‘gave in’ a bit. 

The key to success is consistency and keeping a constant pace throughout the journey.  This is easier said than done.  At the end of the day when the results show, I will know if I had progressed as planned; or digressed as tempted by my emotions.  It is still a long, hard and sometimes, a lonely journey for me.  Endure I shall, if it is the way that leads me to where I most badly want to go.  Hence my journey continues…

I had always wanted to consolidate the numerous toy and cartoon videos on YouTube for easy and convenient enjoyment, without having to search through tonnes of many other unrelated videos.  My early attempts were done last year at Blogger.com and also on dedicated pages at this website early this year.  However, the sourcing of videos and scripting turned out to be too tedious and time consuming.  This morning, my dream came through in the form of Toy and Cartoon Videos Central which is also now one of my permanent links on my navigation bar on top of this website.  Once you go to TCVC, you are bound to spend hours there!  This can be your new favourite haunt to visit during the ‘dry’ periods of your toy collecting hobby, enjoy!

Now that the daily Justice League animated series on my local Cable TV will come to an end by this week, I will be less exposed to Justice League related stuff with effect from next month.  Perhaps I will finally be able to make my decision on whether to let my collection go.  I will surely miss them but my life will still go on, with or without them in my possession. . .

I looked up my Cable TV schedule for Mar 08 and realised that the Justice League animated series will not be shown daily next month.  I was a little disappointed as this is one of the few TV shows I watch daily to relax.  Nevertheless on the bright side, I can devote more free time to my studies and take consistent actions towards my goals!

While I was out window shopping today, I saw many shopping malls having very attractive sales on all items, including toys.  There were many great deals everywhere.  Although I did not need to buy anything today, it dawned on me that that it was not always necessary to spend every cent in my ‘Play’ account every month. 

It may be tempting to spend impulsively each month when I know I still have some funds in my ‘Play’ account.  However if there is nothing I want to buy this month, I can roll over any remaining ‘Play’ funds to the next month and so on.  If I ever chance upon a fantastic sale on the toys or other fun things that I desire, I will likely to have sufficient funds to sponsor them by then.

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Some people might be wondering what has money management got to do with with their toy collecting hobby?  Well, managing your finances, whether you like it or not, will always be part of your life, no matter what hobby you have or do not have.  Collecting toys ultimately needs fresh regular funds to sustain it.  You may sell some of your toys at times to free up some funds to acquire new toys but most collectors prefer to keep their toys than to let them go, that is why they are called toy collectors.

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As usual, I always have many toys and other things that I desire but I have to follow a tight budget.  I can only use whatever funds that I have allocated to my ‘Play’ account each month.  About 10% of my monthly income goes into my ‘Play’ account for my expenditures on ‘fun things’.  It took a little more effort from me at the beginning, to start the habit of distributing all my income into different accounts for various purposes.

To be continued tomorrow…

I spotted Justice Lord Hawkgirl in the stores yesterday and today again.  I am pleased that she can still be found here.  I did not find the 3-pack containing Stargirl though.  That was supposed to be the other 3-pack released around the same time as the 3-pack containing Justice Lord Hawkgirl.  The Justice Lord Hawkgirl that I bought weeks ago has a very slight painting imperfection at her eye.  The Cyber Superman and Batman that were packaged with her also had some slight painting defects.  Fortunately I got this 3-pack at a 20% discount, considering that I only want Justice Lord Hawkgirl and not the other 2 variant figures.  By the way, she is still MOC and I have decided to leave her this way for now.

I had been following the ongoing Justice League cartoon series on TV for a the past several months to re-watch and catch the episodes that I had missed previously.  The episodes ‘Starcrossed parts 1-3′ were shown last week, and this story line marked the ‘end’ of featuring just the core 7 members of Justice League team only. 

The story line was supposed to continue in a new season called “Justice League Unlimited”, featuring many other new superheroes members as ‘guest stars’.  I had really looked forward to watching “Justice League Unlimited” but after showing only 2 episodes, the Cartoon Network channel reverted to showing the very first episodes of “Justice League” called “Secret Origins”.  It was a major letdown.  Well, at least this frees up my evening times to monitor and trade in the US market.