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Well I'm back from my Japan trip, refreshed, ready to take on the world, blah blah blah. I don't really want to divert away from this blog's primary topic (which for the time being is "anything somewhat related to finance"), so I won't say much about it except that it was an awesome experience, made even moreso by the fact that the Japanese yen seems to be in out of FX favour at this time. Sadly, even high demand for Nintendo Wii's and Sony PS3's aren't enough to prop up the big JPY.

Anyway, I walked in to work last week, and before I even sat down, I get a call from my director:

Him: "G'day how are you this morning?"
Me: "Great, I just got in. What's up?"
Him: "How's your calendar looking for today?"
Me: "I have no idea, I haven't opened it yet, and you guys don't want to give me a Blackberry." (OK, not the last bit. But I thought it.)
Him: "OK well I want you on these two deals. The first meeting is 9am, then another at 10.30am. I'll see you on the ground floor of [address of IB] and we can grab coffee 20 minutes before."
Me: "OK. Let me just check if I've broken my record of most unread emails during my holidays, then I'll come out."

No rest for the wicked.

In other news, I was talking to a couple of friends of mine, Mr JJ and Ms CC (I didn't realise that until just then...). Ms CC is at a rival bank. She's thinking of quitting. Hours are too long, and the team is too small to handle the deal flow. Plus spreadsheets can get kind of boring. (HERETIC!!!) Mr JJ, her partner, got offered a job in an IB, which he turned down because of the hours. They're slightly ahead in the "stages of life" cycle, so I guess for them it's about finding a comfortable routine, building a foundation on which to start a family and raise a few little rascals.

I guess I'm in a slightly lucky position where I think I can afford to make the sacrifice right now. I don't have any kids (that I know of). I don't have a mortgage, and am quite willing to travel for work. But I haven't quite decided if I'd be willing to do this down the track. I haven't quite figured out where I could go if I do decide the change tracks, either. Plus, sitting around at a desk all day makes me fat, and I don't like it.

I had a chat with someone today (who was sussing out my interest in joining a rival bank's team), and after the usual chat about how grossly underpaid I am, he goes "you're in a good position anyway, in 6-12 months you'll have more experience, then I assume you would want to naturally move to a larger IB". And I nodded, but in my head I thought, do I?