Sunday, November 2, 2008

Conflicts - Spa/Murders/Pudding

Friday night our friend Lisa organized a murder mystery night. We all came in (unrelated) costume, we were assigned characters, and there was a murder that we had to solve throughout the night. I have to say that I am very happy with the fact that we have nine friends who are willing to play funny games on Halloween night. And we're adults. It was extremely fun.

I got murdered. I came back to life. I drank a lot.

Saturday I had an opportunity to use a gift certificate at a spa. When I stayed with my friend, Pam's kids, she got me a gift certificate that is expiring. It was for two hours of amazing treatments at a fancy shmancy spa in Singapore. I made this appointment weeks ago, and I was so looking forward to it. If I did not use it on Saturday, I would not have had the opportunity to use it before it expired.

The spa had three parts: some crazy bath, a scrub and a massage. The bath was shaped like a person, and there were jets that came out from all places they were stronger and weaker at times. They sometimes had cold water, sometimes it was warm. It was nuts, and it was so relaxing. After the bath (in paper panties, which I had to ask four times before I understood the words "paper panties"), I had a full body scrub. It made me crave the Turkish bath that I have craved a few times since I started sweating in Singapore. Then there was an hour Balinese massage. It was awesome. I loved it all. I have never done anything like this in my life. Matt and I have had a few cheap Thai massages, but I have never been in a spa and done something like this. What a treat.

The reason I didn't enjoy either of those as much as I should was that I felt EXTREMELY guilty during both. Remember - If I didn't arrive at the murder mystery on time, I would not have died, and there would be no mystery to solve. If I did not use the gift certificate, hundreds of dollars of spa wonderfulness would be wasted. I didn't like those alternatives, so I chose to do them.

I chose that against the option to work with my group on a marketing assignment to analyze the pudding with topping market in Europe in 1999. When I left on Friday night I had already spent more than eight hours on it. I thought we were on our way to being done, but it turned out that they talked to the prof after we left, and they found out we were focusing on the wrong thing/s, so they re-did it all. They stayed there until late on Fri and then went back for hours on Saturday. I really felt horrible, and I worry that this will change the great dynamics of my group. Clearly I will pull my weight in other projects, and I haven't really ducked out on things before, but it's not a great feeling. I am just way more flexible on weekdays, when I try not to make any plans. Weekends are hard since I live so far from school, and I have a whole life in Singapore previous to INSEAD.

Rough decisions...

The good thing is that my group will benefit from a more relaxed Melanie on Monday (and hopefully Tuesday, Wednesday, etc.). It really did make me chill for a while.

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