Assorted Ravings of the Slightly-Weird

Forbidden Sandwich...

I have just gotta try THIS!

It sounds like a artery-clogging, fat-inducing meat fest but it looks really tasty!Just looking at it is making me drool (and put on 2 kg spontaneously!)...

To paraphrase Homer, "Mmmmm. Forbidden sandwich.... *gurgle*"

Healthy Lifestyle, Anyone?

As part of my 2010 goals I decided to give healthy living a try. I thought I'd try to wake up earlier, get in some exercise before going to work, get more sleep and eat healthier.

3 months into 2010 and my batting average's hovering around .500. Thanks to a new boss, I'm waking up earlier to get to work on time. (Sigh. Getting stuck in rush-hour traffic is NO FUN. But nooooo. I have to be in on time.) And because I have to get to work on time, there goes the option of getting some exercise in before going to work, because I'll be damned if I have to wake up before the sun rises.

I'm also eating healthier by giving up my traditional curry-puff-and-kopi work breakfast. This used to be a workday staple, but now I've switched to muesli and/or granola instead, depending on which one is on sale. It's rabbit food, no doubt, but it's tasty and I get more fibre into my diet as well... I'm still sticking to the kopis and kopi-o's though - some things, like TV channels and lucky socks, should NEVER be changed!

As for sleep, well, that's irregular. All in all, I'd say I'm getting more sleep than before, but not on a nightly basis. Over Good Friday I slept 15 hours, and that was a good Friday indeed! Of course, the nights before I averaged about 4 hours each, thanks to the perils of late-night cable and a TV that's right in front of my bed. Still, the black rings under my eyes are now a lightish-brown so I'd say I'm having some success here.

Most importantly, I've started exercising. My sis dragged us all to this PowerPlate class over at Dempsey and it's tougher than I thought it would be. Pretty good fun though, and two days after the session my arms are still achey. I love the muscle-achey feeling; it's a feel-good pain!

Next up, to get my ass back to softball training AND to finally break 90 on the golf course. Stay tuned! :D

Milk Monster's 1st Trip

Just back from a weekend getaway to Bali with the entire family.

That's right. Grandma, Grandpa, proud parents, proud aunt (me!) and Milk Monster herself. The entire nuclear clan upped and went to Bali, ostensibly for a twin celebration of wedding anniversary and birthday, but more to ogle at the star herself, Princess Milk Monster.

The villa we stayed in was amazing. Since it's currently the low season, prices were much less stratospheric and pretty darn affordable if you compared it to getting 3 hotel rooms. Located in the tiny village of Ketewel, by the beach, Villa Maya is a great choice for a quick getaway. You can just relax in the villa the whole time, or go for a walk on the black sand beaches, or hire a car and drive around. When we stepped into the grounds, we all just went "Wahhhh". I can't even describe it here so I'll leave it to the photos that will be coming up but in the meantime you can check it out here.

Milk Monster is an amazing traveller! Only 4 months old and she took to plane travel like a duck to water. The minute she got on the plane, she fell asleep (like mother, like daughter). Minimal crying, minimal fuss, both outbound AND inbound. Next up, Canada? Haha.

Yawn Yawn Yawn

It's 1740 on a Friday afternoon and I can barely keep my eyes open.

I've been sitting around for the past 40 minutes trying to look busy, and basically I'm waiting for someone to reply to an email before I can send it out and leave. How unproductive.

*YAWN*

And another. *YAWN*

And now the guy I've been waiting on has just stepped into another meeting. Wah lau, brudder, you don't wanna go home, fine. BUT I DO!

When is the weekend ever gonna start?!?!?!??

The Luxuries of Age

Getting old sucks, but on the plus side you get away with a lot more than you could if you were younger.

Case in point: I'm in the elevator at the office, and an elderly lady is in there with me. The two of us ride in companionable silence for a while, and then the following conversation ensues.

(If you can't read Chinese, too bad.)

Auntie: 哇！你的身材很好！
Me: er... 谢谢...
Auntie: 胸部要大，身材才能好... 你有胸，是自己的吗?
Me: 当然是自己的！

I swear, if it had been anyone else except an old auntie, I'd have gotten really mad. Instead, I just wrote it off to the eccentricities that plague the old, particularly the elderly female.

Ok fine, here's a translation.

Auntie: Wah, your figure is really nice!
Me: er... thank you...
Auntie: You must have big boobs to have a nice figure... Your boobs, are they yours?
Me: OF COURSE!

A Long Time Coming...

This is the best promotion ever :)

I'm now an aunt!

Yay! Hooray!

Welcome little one, it's going to be a fun ride :)

Shiver Me Timbers

My office is the coldest place on the island.

Even when it's dark and gloomy and cold outside, the temperature in here is guaranteed to be at least 10 degrees colder. It's a bone-chilling 18C here and it's a common sight to see people wearing fleece jackets in the office. Me, I have a hoodie and a shawl and a long jacket; sometimes I wear all 3 at once. When I walk out into the hot sun, it takes me a good 5 minutes to warm up to the ambient temperature.

Yesterday, it was so cold not just in the office but in the whole building that I just HAD to get out to defrost. Never mind that I really needed to pee as well, if I had had to spend another minute in this Arctic corner of the equator, I'd have frozen.

Needless to say, I then spent the next 30 minutes driving home alternately shivering from defrosting and shaking from having to hold my pee in. (The loo in the carpark is too gross for words.)

It was NOT a fun ride.

Advertising How-Tos

I'm walking along Orchard Road during lunch time, heading back to the office after a lunch run. (Food run, not an actual run.) It's a hot day, there's a nice-sized crowd on the streets.

And then I see this hoarding which says "Where luxury unfolds, where style unravels".

Hmm. I'm pretty sure I don't want to shop somewhere where style unravels. And I'm almost sure style can't unravel in the first place. Perhaps, with all the news malls sprouting out like mushrooms after a rainy day on Orchard Road, negative advertising is their strategy? After all, if every other mall is offering the same stuff, this is one kooky way to stand out.

Back

OK.

I'm back! It's been so long, I've forgotten all the html tags that I use to differentiate entries. I'll have to pull up an old entry and cut and paste :)

As to why I've been MIA, well honestly I just haven't had the mood to write. I just didn't have anything to say, and I've just spent the past few months trying to get comfortable with where I am and trying to be happy again.

I think I'm almost there...

Birthmates

Last weekend, I got dragged off to a kelong somewhere off the eastern shores of West Malaysia.

The kelong experience, summarised in a word, was grim. Communal living with about 100 other people in a large room - the entire kelong was one large room - with double bunk beds. Beds near the doors and windows got taken up in a flash, and if you were unlikely enough you could end up on a top bunk right below an overhead light that was not turned off during the night. The rickety wooden planks creaked whenever anyone walked on them, so throughout the night I kept getting woken up by people stomping to and fro, sending up vibrations to my bed. The toilets, while clean, were basically holes that went straight into the sea, and if you wanted to bath you had to scoop water out of jerry cans.

So the first hour on the kelong I spent in a state of suspended disbelief really. The next two hours I spent counting down to our departure (thankfully only a one-night stay). Then, someone broke out the beer, the fish started biting a bit and playing cards made an appearance and it wasn't that bad after all. I got a tan, I relaxed and did some reading, I played cards.

The unexpected surprise was that I met a birthmate. A birthmate, by my definition, is someone who is born on the exact same day as you. I had a birthmate in my class during most of my primary and secondary school years. Eric Chavez (3rd baseman for the Oakland Athletics) and Luke Donald (English golfer) are another 2 birthmates. And now, my fellow kelong-sufferer from Holland is my birthmate :)

We found out in the funniest way. 4 of us, playing dai dee; 2 guailos being schooled by 2 Singaporeans.
J: Oh, apparently I should not gamble according to my Chinese horoscope. My animal sign is not good... (lame excuse for poor play)
Me: Oh, what animal sign is that?
J: I'm a Snake.
Me: But I'm a Snake too!
J: Hmm then maybe it's my astrological sign. I'm Sagitarrius.
Me: Hey, no kidding, me too!
J: Haha. Must be 7th December then.
Me: YES!

Hehehe. That was the highlight of the weekend. And some interesting math: according to Wikipedia, in a group of 23 randomly chosen people there is more than a 50% chance that some pair will have the same birthday. For someone to have the same birthday as you though, the chance is less than 1 in 16 or about 6.1%.

Have you found a birthmate yet? :)

Day 2 of Sipadan

It's Day 2 of our Sipadan trip but so far we haven't managed to dive at Sipadan.

To get to Sipadan, you have to fly to Kota Kinabalu and then take an internal flight to Tawau. There, you endure a fairly long and bumpy ride to Semporna where you then take a speedboat to Sipadan and its two sister islands Mabul and Kapalai. Our speedboat ride can best be described as belly-flopping our way there because of the choppy seas.

Sipadan is supposedly one of the best diving sites in the world and in order to preserve it, the Malaysian government has mandated that only 120 licenses be granted daily for entry to the island; no divers are allowed to stay overnight so all operators are now located at either Mabul or Kapalai. With an estimated 11 dive operators in the area, it's no wonder that getting to dive at Sipadan is getting tougher everyday. Hopefully we'll have some luck tomorrow...

Hence, we've been diving at Mabul and Kapalai, the 2 nearest islands to Sipadan. The diving has been pretty good - we've seen turtles, cuttlefish, huge pomfrets (bigger than a dinner plate, and they made me think of lunch, hehe), huge groupers, a lobster, some shrimp and loads of fish; no shark sitings though. And of course my favourite nudibranchs, which I can only describe as very colourful and varied snail-like creatures without shells.

However, visibility has been only so-so, which makes photo taking a challenge. Not to mention that I haven't invested in a strobe light so most of the photos look washed out.

But there are some that are pretty successful, and I will upload them when I get home, along with the ones from my Manado trip in June.

Last diving day tomorrow! :D I'm keeping my fingers crossed for Sipadan...

Oooh! Prata for dinner! I'm a happy puppy :D Laters.

Greetings from KK!

I am in KK for the next few days. I'm here with my family to attend a wedding and on top of that we've packed in a golf trip and a dive trip as well. Which makes packing a bitch but hey, it's an action-packed vacation!

So far, we're done with the wedding and the golf, which only leaves Sipadan to go. Since it's supposed to be one of the best dive sites in the world, I'm really looking forward to it. Hopefully I'll get to see some hammerhead sharks and maybe even a whale shark or two!

Golf here was pretty fun as well. Since we're members of a golf club in Singapore we get to use our reciprocal membership so golf was free and all we had to pay was the buggy fee. 15 ringgit was a pretty cheap way to while away a couple of hours! And the food at the golf club, oh man, the food. It was SO GOOD. The watan kway teow was full of "wok hei", which made it super yummy. FYI, "wok hei" is the 'taste' you get when your wok is hot enough (2500 BTUs or something like that) so cooking on a home stove will never work.

We played at Sabah Golf and Country Club (SGCC) and at Karambunai Golf Club (KGC). KGC is right by the sea so you get both a sea view and a mountain view, which makes it a really picturesque course. But the rough is really ROUGH, if you'll excuse the pun. It's thick and long and once your ball is in, it's tough to see where your ball is unless you're almost on top of it. Seeing it is one problem, getting it out is another. Most of the time I just had to hack it out with an iron and be happy with just getting it out of the rough, much less advancing towards the hole. SGCC was a much easier course but less pretty.

Ok, gotta go pack for Sipadan. Back in SG in a few days :)

Minority Report

Everytime I tell this story, people just burst out laughing. I don't know why really, it wasn't funny while it was happening!

But anyway I figure that the masses, much like the stock markets, are always right. So, here is the story of Murphy and his unintended eye surgery. And before anyone freaks out, Murphy is just the pet moose that resides in my car and listens to me bitch everyday about lousy drivers who don't know how to navigate a roundabout.

One afternoon, I picked up my car Sam from its regular service appointment and I was on my way to get Martha Wannabe. So there I was, happily driving along the road and just as I got off the phone with MW (to confirm her exact location) I looked at Murphy and there and then I almost had a heart attack. It's a miracle I didn't get into an accident.

Murphy's eyes had dropped off. He was hideous! Staring at me with no eyes, he was horribly disfigured. I was so distraught that I couldn't bring myself to look at him, and the moment MW got into the car I made her twist his head around to face the other direction because everytime I looked at my poor blind moose, I wanted to cry.

So, I called the service centre and proceeded to have the following conversation.

Me: Hello, I just picked up my car about 10 minutes ago from your service centre.
Friendly Service Man: Yes, how can I help?
Me: Erm, you know I have a toy moose in my car? Did you happen to see his eyes?
FSM: HUH?
Me: His eyes have dropped off and I was wondering if you saw it.
FSM: Well no... I took your car out for a test drive and I think the moose still had his eyes. Oh, but I did an emergency brake so maybe it fell off then.
Me: Ok, but I don't see it anywhere in the car. Can you ask your guys if they saw anything or threw anything away?
FSM: Er, ok Miss, I will ask my guys if they found a pair of eyes in your car.

Poor guy. He must have been astounded, but kudos to him for playing along and for entertaining me.

When I finally managed to get to my destination without accident, I proceeded to search every inch of my car. Thankfully I found Murphy's eyes - they had rolled under my front passenger seat. So I reattached them with some glue, but then I decided that the glue needed time to set so I would have to have some sort of bandage.

Unfortunately the only thing close to resembling a bandage in my car was my orange floral bikini...

And this was the final result:

My Nose...

... is itching. Big time!

We have this renovation thingy going on at work this weekend so we've all been issued an executive order to clean up our tables. Only our computers and telephones are supposed to be left on the tables by the time we go home on Friday, and no junk on the floor either.

Which basically means that I am SCREWED. BIG TIME.

I have 8 years worth of junk to clear! Ok, wait, I exaggerate. As of today, it's 7 years, 7 months and 12 days worth of junk. And all that adds up to a shitload of junk. I'm filling up boxes by the minute. Who knew a person could accumulate so much paper in so short a time???

Oh well, I guess I could look at this as a golden opportunity to throw away whatever I don't need, which is great. Maybe I'll finally have one of those uncluttered desks that you see on TV all the time. If anything was ever a work of fiction, it's a clean work desk. It is impossible to keep it clean and uncluttered, unless you employ someone whose sole purpose is to file, organise and store, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Sigh. Back to packing. My poor nose...

Break My Stride

In the words of this song, last night I had the strangest dream.

The dream started innocently enough with my family and I being out for dinner, celebrating my parents' wedding anniversary. Then when I got home, I had to change out of my t-shirt. The next thing I knew, I woke up and found myself without my t-shirt on.

The dream had been so real that I actually took off my shirt in real life. How interesting! I guess I must have been getting hot under my blanket so that prompted the whole dream, but it's quite amazing that I could actually take off my shirt in my sleep.

Of course, this story prompts today's BQOTD, the first of which comes from my retelling my dream.

Me: So, I decided to put on my shirt again.
Her: Whatever for?
Me: Cos, erm... I wanted to be decent?
Her: Right. Decency. HAHAHAHAHA.

Gee, thanks :D

"Wink Wink"

By now, almost every reader of this blog will have heard of Facebook. If you haven't already, then you should consider crawling out from that stone you've been hiding under to see this worldwide phenomenon.

Of course, every social networking site worth its salt will have its share of desperados/weirdos/creeps/lonely hearts looking to meet people. And Facebook has its fair share of online personals applications like Zoosk, Meet New People, Are You Interested?, etc etc.

But people, surely time and experience should have taught you that there are surefire ways to cause a person to say "HELL NO!" and move to another profile.
Such as...
1) Profile pictures that show you with your significant other. 'nuff said.

2) Profile pictures that show you with a bevy of girls. Ditto.

3) Profile pictures that are either hideous or unflattering. The former you can't really do anything about since it's the subject matter that's deficient, so either take a photo of something else like your feet (HAHA!) or just omit a photo entirely. The latter you can remedy: stop taking photos with your webcam that have the fishbowl effect, for example. And wear a shirt, damn it, unless you have abs to show.

4) Generic opening lines - like choosing "wink wink" from Zoosk. If you don't have the creativity to come up with something original instead of the default flirt, then you deserve to be passed up.

5) Cheesy opening lines that make a girl cringe. Like, "If I tie a string around your feet, will you be my ballon?". HUH???

I suppose the silver lining is that at the very least, these are good for a laugh :)

Wooly Escapades

I'm back in SG after a work trip and an all-too-short break in the Bay Area. Boohoo. I'll blog about that when I'm ready.

Anyhow, my lazy sister finally put up the photos of my recent knitting projects so here they are! I had found a couple of great sites online to buy wool and pattern books - check out Pick Up Sticks and Jimmy Beans Wool - and went on a buying frenzy. Through Pick Up Sticks I discovered the magic of felting.

Did you know that felting is merely knitting (100% wool) that is then soaked in hot water and agitated to produce something that is dense and stiff? It's really cool! I started out with making coin purses and am now onto bigger projects like pillows.

Here's my first brush with felting!

You can felt your items either by hand or by tossing it into a washing machine. So far I haven't tried the washing machine method as my items have been pretty small. For hand-felting, the instructions were to soak the items in hot water and agitate with a wooden spoon. After about 10 minutes of beating my pouch with a wooden spoon I decided I was getting nowhere so I just started scrubbing (as if I was washing clothes by hand) and then suddenly, magically, the coin purse started to shrink and harden. It's really cool!

More photos in the extended entry...

Another project that I did was a scarf for my sister's wooden dog. Yeah you read that right - her wooden dog. He's supposed to be a British bulldog with the kingly name of Sir Wilfred Waddles the 3rd. So, I made a scarf for him with a Union Jack pattern. I'm extra proud of this one because I made up the pattern myself and it turned out to be very nice! I might make one more for myself, and because the wools that I picked (on sale at Spotlight!) were so thick this scarf was a breeze to knit. It probably only took me about 6 hours of work in total.

Here's the scarf in all its glory!

And here we have Sir Waddles modeling off his scarf:

Hehe. More projects on the way! :D

Before and after photos of the coin purse:

Agitation that didn't get me anywhere:

Back...

... in the Bay Area!

I hadn't realised how much I'd missed this place until the plane got below the clouds and I saw the Bay Area below me. Familiar landmarks like the Bay Bridge, Treasure Island and even Berkeley in the distance were clearly visible. And the feeling only intensified as I got through immigration (with much more ease than usual!), got my bags (in a record 25 minutes after landing) and got onto the 101.

It's a typical Bay Area day, which for the month of May and even for the rest of the year means that there's sunshine, clear blue skies and the perfect temperature to walk around in a tank top in the day and a light sweater at night.

Oh why did I ever leave :)

There's baseball on TV, I've got wireless and a bag of chips. This is the life. Now, if only I didn't actually have to work on this trip... But at least I do get some time off. I'm looking forward to Thursday evening when the work stops and the fun begins. Bring on the outlet shopping, the amusement park and of course the trip to Pacbell Park.

WOOHOO!!!

Hermaphrodite!

OMG.

OMG OMG OMG.

I went for a haircut last week. There I was, happily watching my hairstylist snipping and trimming away in an inspired frenzy, when suddenly I froze. Could it be? Did my eyes deceive me? Was there really a hint of 5 o'clock shadow ON MY UPPER LIP!??!

So when I got home I spent an hour in front of the mirror looking at my lip from every angle. I tweezed and plucked frantically but to no avail. The blasted shadow was still there. And by the way, when you spend that much time looking at the same thing it starts to look strange after a while.

Oh man. (Pun fully intended.)

Maybe, like fish that can't find mates to reproduce with and hence change sex, I'm turning into a man. Since I can't seem to find a single guy in SG with minimal baggage and minimal issues, my body may be turning itself into a male body and my freaking upper lip is the first sign. (How sad. A year ago I might have said "no baggage and no issues".) What's next? More unwanted hair sprouting up in inconvenient places? A suspicious bulge in my throat?

Argh. I am a freak.

Boohoohoo.

1888

So, I was applying for a credit card online today. I decided that if I was going to keep shopping at a certain department store it only made sense to apply for their credit card and get points for my spending.

So there I was on the portal doing an online submission. It's so much easier when you don't need to print out supporting documents and mail them in, since almost everything is linked up now. I was happily filling in all the required fields and dreaming of the dress I was going to buy with the new card when I got to the personal details section and stopped short.

Not because I realised that I was finally, irrevocably a "30-something", but because under "year of birth" the drop down menu went all the way to 1888. EIGHTEEN EIGHTY EIGHT. Did the bank do that for fengshui reasons? Cos otherwise there is no other semi-logical explanation for it. There can't be that many 120 year-olds running around wanting to apply for credit cards online.

Hmmmm. Either that or plastic surgery in SG has really improved!

Darn it, it looks like it's about to pour. AGAIN. What is up with this weather? Everyday the skies turn grey and red and black and it just looks like the Apocalypse is upon us. Then the skies open up and just start dumping all this water on us earthlings. Grrr. Do the powers that be not know how unglam it is for me to be walking around with an umbrella all the freaking time??

:D

Kitchen Capers

Baseball season is upon us again! So far the Yankees are 3-3, the A's are 3-4 and the Giants are 1-5. Hmmmmmm. Not a promising start, and I've been so out of MLB that the teams are barely recognisable to me now. Sigh. (And Des, you can stop snickering now...)

The weekend was pretty uneventful, except that I "taught" my first cooking class ever. Haha. A couple of my teammates came over to learn how to make carrot cake, which is about the best cake that I can make with the highest percentage of success. I've blogged about it before, I recall. Anyhow, I decided to teach my teammates how to make this cake for the simple reason that this recipe is one where a mixer is optional. All in all, I think the lesson went pretty well, and I'm looking forward to teaching more lessons!

Other notables of the week: I made a roasted pork belly roll stuffed with mushrooms and apples, served with roast vegetables and mashed potatoes for dinner early in the week. That one turned out pretty good as well, so I'm pretty happy with it. I took some photos on my phone and will put them up the first chance I get. I was particularly pleased with the stuffing where I sauteed some minced garlic and diced onions in butter, then I added a mixture of diced shitake and button mushrooms and cooked them till soft. Then I added in the cubed apples and some prunes as well, and enhanced the flavour with (get ready for this) instant chicken stock powder. Hahaha.

I'm not a purist cook. Given the constraints of time, if there is a shortcut that doesn't compromise too much on taste, I'll take it. So, sometimes I'll use instant chicken stock powder to up the taste factor; sometimes I'll use canned soup to help make a quick gravy base. If a recipe calls for a pinch of something that I don't have lying around, then I'll either substitute it or omit it. I know, Martha Wannabe is having a minor heart attack reading this as she is a) anal and b) a consummate cook. But in my defense, if I do use instant mixes I'll punch it up with something else so that the end result still comes out looking and tasting fairly original. The one thing that I will never ever use is instant mashed potato mix because I make damn good mashed potatoes and it doesn't take that much effort! :)

Hmmm. All this talk about cooking is making me think of new stuff to try :) Maybe this week I'll try making beef carpaccio and revisit my anchovy pasta! Yum yum!

Oh, and I really want to throw a pizza party. Who wants in??!

Dollar Sign Asterisk Asterisk!

Ok this is a cop-out, but the last few strips in Get Fuzzy have been so good, I decided to put them up here. I know it doesn't qualify as a blog entry, but it's good for a laugh and we all need that!

Hehehe. All pics from Comics.com.

LONG WEEKEND!!! Woohoo!

You Learn Something New...

... everyday, as the adage goes.

I learnt something new when a brief moment of hilarity ensued in the office yesterday.

We were all gathered around the phone, ostensibly participating in the daily conference call. Of course, as is our daily practice, once we were done with our turn we merely muted the phone and started talking.

Yesterday's comversation somehow meandered to the topic of balding males, when my Indian colleague remarked that he had not seen many bald Chinese men. Another colleague then said that maybe the gene for balding in Chinese men is less dominant and then she asked abt the incidence of balding amongst Indian men.

My colleague confidently replied: "Oh, it will not be a problem for me. My dad is in his sixties and still has a full head of hair!"

He was promptly informed that the gene is passed on from your maternal side.

Whereupon a look of horror crossed his face and he went "Oh SHIT."

Teeheehee. Apparently his maternal grandfather was bald as a coot. After that, he kept caressing his hair as if to make the most of it while he could.

Good thing it's not that big a problem for females! :)

Just Catching Up

Here I am, back in India again.

The land where dust seems to hang perpetually in the air, where he who honks loudest and longest has the right of way, where men can walk around holding hands like it's the most natural thing in the world.

The most surprising thing so far is the new domestic terminal in Mumbai. It's probably the most developed spot in India so far, where for a few minutes you can actually believe you're in a First World country. Hopefully they'll extend it to the international terminal soon!

Animal count so far: 8 pigs, 5 cows and a herd of sheep :)

Gotta love this country!

New Year Greetings

Happy new year everyone!

If you guys haven't already heard of this place, and it's likely that few have since this place is only 6 months old, then everyone should go check out Forest Adventures. It's an aerial obstacle course in Bedok Reservoir Park where you get to climb up trees, step on swings while 5 m up in the air and zipline down to the ground, amongst other things. The whole course, including the safety instruction bit, takes about 1.5-2 hours to complete and it is so fun! We did this for our annual family day and all, kids and adults alike, had a great time. And, it's not exorbitantly expensive at $25 per head for adults.

Other than that, the rest of the long weekend was spent the usual way - visiting relatives, getting angpows, eating Hakka noodles and snacking on festive tidbits, and gambling away the angpow money :) What is it about Chinese people that makes us such keen gamblers...

Or maybe it's just my family!

Hmmm...

Obsession

I have been obsessed the past few days with racing. Fluff racing to be exact.

It all started on New Year's Day when dear ol' Moo Moo told us about her ambitions to grow her fluff pet into a champion racer. The next day, it was slow going at work so I logged into FB and started feeding my own fluff pet. And racing. And petting. And racing some more. And then, before I knew it, I was halfway towards winning a bronze trophy and I was HOOKED.

On Thursday, after more feeding and racing and petting (quick summary: you pet other people's fluff pets to get munny, you use the munny to buy food to make your own fluff pet faster and then you race your fluff pet to improve its stats to win trophies! QED!) I won my bronze trophy and promptly set my sights on getting my Cowie a silver trophy. Cos you know, one piece of silverware is never enough for a girl.

It got to be so bad that on Friday, when I happened to wake up early for a change, I decided to switch on the computer and spend 15 solid minutes petting all my friends' pets just to make munny. If that's not a sign of obsession I don't know what else qualifies.

Anyhow, on Friday afternoon Cowie finally won the silver trophy. Which promptly sent dear ol' Moo Moo into a fit of whining at the injustice of it all, that she had introduced me to fluff racing and I had managed to win a silver trophy before she did. He he he. My strategy: I picked on the weak. I concentrated mainly on challenging those pets whose stats were way below mine and whose moods were really poor and I stayed away from any pets who had faster speeds than I did.

So now my fluff friend has not one but two trophies! And I have decided to retire Cowie from competitive fluff racing. Just because it would take too much time and energy to feed Cowie enough food to make him fast enough - my cousin's fluff friend has a speed of over 6000 whereas Cowie's is only 800, and she has a winning percentage of over 90% whereas Cowie's is only 77%.

Plus, just imagine the monumental fit dear ol' Moo Moo would have! :)

Happy 2008!

Back from vacation and facing a relatively clean desk, for once.

The vacation was great - we went skiing in Whistler, there was lots of snow and the weather wasn't too cold. I also took a day off to try snowboarding, which was fun but also tiring as I kept falling. On the last day I chickened out and switched back to skis, which was a great idea cos the last day was one of the toughest days. The only bummer about the whole vacation was that it was too darn short!

Now I'm back at work and trying to rev up back to 2nd gear at least. It's tough! I keep thinking of the snow, walking around Whistler after dark and having Cowie Wowie (one of the best ice-cream flavours EVER!). Oh, and FYI, the best pecan pie in the world can be found at Hy's Steakhouse in Whistler.

*drooooool*

Anyhow, photos of the birthday party are almost up. I was trying to upload them today during lunch but for some reason the uploader was being extremely kooky. Photos should be up by tonight here.

Okie dokie... time to head out :) Here's to a great 2008 for everyone!

Winter Wonderland!

Just a quick entry from the wintry white wilderness of Whistler, Canada.

It's been snowing for the past two days and today we hit the slopes for the first time. Pure fresh white powder all over the place with nary a skier to be seen. Absolute heaven, especially on our last run of the day where we went all the way from top to bottom in about half an hour. Wheehee!

And after skiing, there's always the pottery-painting studio to occupy my time. Almost every time I come here I head over to the art studio in the evenings to pick out some pieces to paint. It's really fun and makes for a nice gift as well. Although, I seem to keep more pieces than I give away :)

Best of all, there's cable TV. Lots and lots of cable TV. With my favourite Food Network where it's 24 hours of cooking shows and more cooking shows. Shiok!

Okie dokie, Star Trek's on TV now. Gotta go! Happy holidays everyone!

P.S.: I promise I will put up the photos from my birthday party as soon as I get home.

More Pressies and a BQOTD

I am a sucker for jigsaw puzzles. So, this looks like a great present! (HINT HINT.)

In fact, most of the stuff on this list looks interesting :) I like #5,#6 and #7.

And here is today's BQOTD.
Good friend: Ok I went home and looked at ALL her photos and she gets uglier in each photo. You have nothing to worry about.

HAHAHAHAHA.

This is why sisterhood rocks.

Material Girl

Ok people, hold your horses!

Stop all gift-buying from the wishlist!

I have seen the light, and it is good.

It is silver.
It is strappy.
It is shiny.

It is a pair of Jimmy Choo sandals that give the lovely lovely illusion of legs that go on for miles. Silver strappy sandals with 4 1/2" stiletto heels that just scream "BUY US!". Because when you wear them you look taller, slimmer; in a word, you look goooood.

But alas, the damn things are E-X-P-E-N-S-I-V-E. So much so that even I, a fervent practitioner of the "buy first, think later" rule, have had to balk and put it on hold. So for the next 3 days I will haunt the Jimmy Choo boutique at Takashimaya, looking wistfully at the silver strappy sky-high sandals with my name on it and wondering if I should just heck it and indulge myself in a frivolous extravagance.

That is, unless all you guys give me cold hard cash for my birthday :D

I hereby announce the launch of the "Get May a pair of Jimmy Choo's" fund. All donations will be greatly appreciated, in all denominations. I can just see it now, strutting up to the boutique on Saturday, opening up all sorts of angpows and paying with fistfuls of cash.

Hey, a girl can dream, can't she?

Wishlist!

I think the reason why I haven't been blogging much is because I've been hooked on Facebook. Every couple of hours I just log on to see what's going and I end up not thinking about blogging at all. And, thanks to the wonders of Facebook, I managed to reconnect with my primary school friend - my classmate from Primary 3 who I haven't seen or heard from in ages. YAY :)

But I digress. This post is supposed to be about my wishlist, since I've gotten a few questions on what I want for my birthday. Yep, the big 3-0 looms on the horizon :) I haven't really thought about what I want - the company of good friends and family would be an ideal way to spend it I think.

But, just in case there are nice people out there who really wanna get me stuff (thank you all!) here are some ideas.

1) Runway Knits by Berta Krapetyan. There's actually an outstanding order for this at Kino under my name :)

2) CDs by Micah, Rihanna, Avril Lavigne and Daughtry. Specifically

• Life in Cartoon Motion
• Good Girl Gone Bad
• The Best Damn Thing
• Daughtry

3) Golf attire. Hahahahaha. No, it's not a joke. No, I'm not mad. Yes, I've gone over to the Dark Side. My main motivation is to take part in our annual family tournament, so that's why I've taken it up. And, I have absolutely NO GEAR whatsoever except for a pair of shoes and a pair of glove that my mom bought for me. No shirts, no slacks, nada. Zip. So, all golf attire will be welcome.

4) Choya liquor. It's my new favourite drink! Yummalicious :D And the plums that come with it are oh-so-good.

Running out of ideas already...

5) Spa voucher from Benjaphan. Renewal Experience would be grrrrr-eat!

I would love a new wallet but I'm also picky about what I want.

Ok I am officially out of ideas. I suck at this!

Just Round The Corner

Christmas is almost here!

Well, that's if you start your countdown from when the decorations on Orchard Road start going up. From the looks of it, the theme this year looks fairly normal - nothing show-stopping so far. And as usual, Takashimaya has their giant of a tree which is about 3 storeys high. I've always wanted to decorate that tree! I wonder how many people it takes to put up all the lights and trinkets on that.

Gosh, this year's really just flown by. It seems like only a few weeks ago when we just celebrated the New Year and now all of a sudden it's the last day of October (happy Halloween everyone!) and it's time to start planning for vacations.

But, I suppose that if it's almost Christmas time then it means only one thing... My birthday's coming up! Hahaha. Time to start dropping hints for pressies :)

Homeward Bound!

So, I'm a couple of hours away from starting on my journey back home. I have been away since the 22nd of September so it's been a pretty long trip. Some numbers:

1) Plane trips: 8
2) Train rides: 3 (train travel is FUN!)
3) Times I had to pack and unpack: 5
4) Friends that I met up with along the way: 11
5) Books I read along the way: 5
6) Stuff that I had to leave behind and get shipped back: A TON

Hehe. And no, not all the stuff that I bought was for me. I'm lugging back 3 cake pans for my sister and that's the bulk of the added weight. They're freaking heavy AND bulky. (Martha Wannabe, if you are reading this: GRRRRR. I had better get a cake a month for this!)

All in all it's been a fruitful trip, not just because I was able to catch up with people on the company dollar, but also because of all the work that I was able to get done. I had to make a presentation which went off pretty ok - at least I think so, since I'm still gainfully employed - and I managed to get my ideas across to most of my colleagues here in the US, which goes a long way into building a good working relationship. And now at least, some of them will be able to put my face to my name whenever I call or email them.

And, from last night's dinner comes today's BQOTD:
Friend: "All ACS guys are assholes. I've never met an ACS guy who is not an asshole. Ok, well, maybe not assholes but... (pregnant pause)

Yah. Assholes."

30 more hours before I reach home! Time to while it away by adding more stuff to my already-bulging luggage :D

Russian Adventures

I'm done with the first leg of the work trip. 2 more weeks to go! Woohoo! And come 11am on Oct 5th I'll be a much happier person.

Anyhow, I'm currently sitting in some lounge at Domodedovo Airport in Moscow, waiting to fly back to London. Russia has really been an experience - I never expected things here to be so freaking expensive (a Macdonald's meal costs about 10 USD here, just as an example), and this morning's flight from St Petersburg made me want to kiss the ground when I got off the plane. Rickety airplanes and lots of air pockets do not make for much peace of mind when you're 35,000 km up in the sky. Even the simple act of checking in at the St Petersburg airport was an experience in itself since all the signs were in Russian and only a handful of the few staff on duty (since it was 5am in the morning) could speak English. But thankfully I made it back to civilisation :)

St Pete's is a really lovely city. Typical European city but much more spacious and much cleaner as well. Lots of historical significance and every other building is an ex-palace (mostly gifts from Catherine the Great to her favourites, most of whom died before the buildings were completed). And clubbing in a Russian nightclub was fairly fun, where we witnessed a dance-off that bordered on the explicit at the end. Another thing that struck me was the enormous wealth that was concentrated (and remains concentrated) in the hands of a very select few.

But the best thing about the trip was the chance to meet up with my colleagues, some of whom I only get to see once a year. It was great fun to be able to spend time with them both socially and professionally. Swapping stories, catching up with each other's lives, taking silly photos - it's almost like it's not even a work trip! :)

Funniest story of the trip: One colleague decided to change her ringtone to a "coo-coo-roo-coo" sound which I guess is the Eastern European version of "cock-a-doodle-doo". During a meeting her phone rang with the new ringtone and she got quite flustered so she tried explaining to the corporate about why she had picked it.

Her words: "I used to live on a farm and the ringtone just reminds me of home because I like waking up to a cock."

Needless to say, it didn't come out the way she had intended :)

Ok, time to rack up more frequent flyer miles! Laters.

Greetings from...

...Russia!

So here I am in Moscow - the 1st leg of my whirlwind, round-the-world work trip - after a one-night transit in London, a flight delay and a massive traffic jam.

*yawn*

So far I don't have much to base my initial observations on, just the long ride to the hotel and occasional glimpses out of the window during the flight, but Moscow is greener than I expected and less developed as well. The overwhelming impression is that of space, vast amounts of space. The streets are wide and fairly empty and everything looks orderly. It's less drabby than I imagined, although I must admit that subsconsciously I was expecting some vestige of the Iron Curtain - the stereotypical grim buildings, depressed-looking people shuffling along in their weathered clothing, authoritarianism on every street corner. But I suppose that capitalism has well and truly arrived when right across the hotel, there's a huge spanking new Zara store and the street looks like any other high street in some random First World country.

My room is HUGE, with a big-ass king bed taking pride of place. There's like 10 pillows on it of varying sizes so I'm wondering how to sleep - should I just throw everything onto the floor? :) And, the bathroom floor is heated! No more cold feet when showering :D My only complaint so far: no HBO on TV! The only English channels are news channels and so far I've seen the same news items repeated three times. Sigh. But, at least there's English channels!

8 meetings tomorrow. EIGHT. SIAO. Time to crash... Adios amigos :)

Quick One...

Am at the airport with some time to spare before my flight to HK so I decided to squeeze in some blogging time.

I had some time today so I decided to take the MRT from work to the airport, instead of hopping onto a cab. It took me a total of 40 minutes to get from City Hall to Changi Airport, including waiting time for trains. I suppose if the trains had arrived in sync with one another the travel time could have been cut by about 5-8 minutes.

Total cost: S$1.44
Hassle: none

I think I'll take this mode of transport more often, especially if I'm not in a rush and I don't have a ton of luggage.

And, I managed to try out the jjim tak recipe that I mentioned in the last post - it turned out pretty good except that the flavours weren't as strong as the one I had in Korea. Next time I'll probably cook the stew ahead of time and let the flavour develop for a while before serving. I'll put up the recipe in a later post, along with the beef rolls that I made for dinner last night. Cooking is FUN! I wonder how come I never enjoyed it this much during Home Ec classes...

Ok, time to jet. Gotta walk all the way to the other end of the airport :) Laters!

Update

Nothing much to write about these days, hence the lack of updates. I did go to the recent Gwen Stefani concert (I <3 her abs!) and my date (ok ok, I brought my sister, haha) took some great photos, which are here.

I do have a couple of trips coming up though, so it'll be pretty hectic over the next few weeks. I'm not particularly looking forward to the massive trip at the end of September when I'll be away more than 3 weeks at a go - how the heck do you pack for a 3 week WORK trip and try to keep the luggage to one small piece??? Argh. This calls for some creative mix-and-matching. Although, it would be great to be able to catch up with the various friends in London and the East Coast.

Ok time for the morning cuppa. Later, 'gators.

Thunderstorms and Lightning, Very Very Frightening

I like thunderstorms and lightning displays. I like hearing the rumble and boom of distant thunder, watching the rain pour down and seeing the lightning dance about the sky in what is essentially nature's fireworks display.

At 35000 feet up in the sky, that display is a totally different experience. If you've ever experienced a thunderstorm while flying, even if from a distance, you'll know what I mean. It is infinitely more beautiful watching lightning illuminate the clouds from within; the colours are different, sometimes a dull red compared to the silvery flash that we see from below. And the beauty and mystery is enhanced by the fact that it takes place in almost total silence so all you see from the window are silent flashes of light.

Still, it's scary to think that you're in a metal container with huge bolts of electricity somewhere in the vicinity. It's almost too close for comfort. Almost like someone is saying, yeah you can fly but I can bring you down just like that.

*FLASH*

Zhongguomei

Back in China again... This is the third time this year that I'm in China, I think...

I may have mentioned this before, but there's a toll gate on the way into Beijing from the airport and it looks like an ancient gate, all traditional-looking. And everytime I drive through it I always feel like I'm going back in time. Back to a time where men and women had long hair, wore clothing with long sleeves that doubled up as pockets and walked around most of China with these weird looking cloth shoes that probably didn't have good ventilation and, as a result, gave them smelly feet.

Then one day my illusions were cruelly shattered when my garrulous cab driver told me the gate was about 10 years old.

Sigh.

Checking Back In

Sorry folks.

I know I've been MIA for a really long time. I'm still here, don't worry. No need to call the cops just yet. Work's busy, social life is non-existent, so basically nothing much has changed. I just didn't really feel like writing for a bit.

And it didn't help that I had some photos that I wanted to put up and blog about but for some reason those 10 shots just refuse to be uploaded. I've been trying for about 2 weeks on and off to try to make them behave but to no avail. Next step is to transfer them to another computer and see if they work there. How strange. I think technology just doesn't like me.

It's a rainy Thursday. The sky's grey, the rain's coming down in a steady stream that doesn't look like it'll end anytime soon. And, I'm sleepy.... *yawn* I wish I was in bed, all nice and snug under my blanket :D

Ok. Back to work, which sucks, by the way. Office politics is a freaking pain in the ass and a bitch to deal with, especially when you're a low-life peon like me. It's possibly even worse when you realise that even your boss can't do anything.

Sian sian sian.

Hooked on Facebook!

Self-explanatory title.

Facebook's addictive man. I like playing around with the various 3rd-party applications that they have, and I especially like the newsfeed feature where I get to see what my friends have been up to over the past few days. Who's throwing sheep at whom, who's adopted a fluff friend, who's asking a question and who's been giving out free gifts... The status updates are fun too, cos you get really random updates akin to those on twitter (which I haven't been updating of late).

The interactivity is the key reason why I prefer Facebook over Myspace. Myspace is really nothing more than a personal homepage, whereas with Facebook you feel more in touch with your friends through the applications and the (almost) real-time updates. The only thing I guess it lacks is an area for blogging.

Anyway, I'm done with work for the day. The weekend starts NOW! Woohoo :) You guys have a good one.

Name That Dog!

Super random post:

Sometimes when my colleague laughs, he sounds like the dog from Hanna Barbera. The one that doesn't speak, has a perpetual smirk on his face and goes "hehehehe" in a rather evil way. (In the picture below, 3rd row from bottom, 2nd from left.)

What's the name of that dog??? And, I miss Jabberjaw. Hahaha.

Wanted: An Explanation, Any Explanation

I've been sitting here for a while trying to come up with an explanation but it's escaping me. So if anyone can make sense of the picture that I'm about to describe, drop me a mail cos I'm tired of scratching my head in puzzlement.

Walking back to the office from lunch, I saw a group of girls wearing green shirts with this strange picture on the back. It was a witch on the left sitting on a broomstick, with a pointy hat and a crooked nose, and her hands were outstretched towards a fox with its mouth tied up. And the speech bubble above the witch said: "O sweet sly fox. God, give me patience."

WTF?!?!?!?

If anyone can explain this, he/she will receive some quantity of home-made strawberry and honey ice cream! :D

Homecoming

Hi all, apologies for the lack of updates recently. Travel season has started again, coinciding with results season so the crazy is about to hit the fan.

Anyhow, the most exciting thing that's happened over the past few weeks is that I went back to my hometown in China last week. My dad's side of the family comes from a village in Fujian province, about 4 hours drive from Xiamen. (We're not Hokkien by the way, we're Hakka.)

12 of us made the trip this time around, including my 91-year-old grandma. So it was a pretty big thing for the whole family both here and back in China. Lots of firecrackers to welcome us, big (and I mean huge, impossible to finish) lunches and dinners, and many many friendly relatives. It's funny how I don't know any of them but just because we're relatives there's some kind of instant bond. Maybe blood really is thicker blah blah blah...

For me, the highlight of the trip was going back to my ancestral home and paying my respects to my great-grandparents. I got to see where they used to live, stand in the very room they used to sleep in and look at the letters and old photos that they kept. I even found old notebooks of my grandpa's, some of which we brought back as a memento.

But I'm glad my grandpa decided to uproot himself and make his way here. Else, I'd be living in some village in China, competing with tons of smart Chinese for a place in a university (they study from 5am to 1030pm 6 days a week!), and guzzling rice wine by the bottle.

BQOTDs and the Weekend

'tis the year of the Pig, so that means lots of "big 3-0" birthday bashes this year for us Snakes. There was one such celebration at eM on Friday night, which was where I got these QOTDs.

Guy: How much would you want to be paid to sleep with that guy? (Pointing at some angmoh.)
Girl: At least a million.
Guy: What? For 100k I'd let him poke my backside.

Later on...
Guy: I shouldn't be telling you all this but guys are like, when we have two hours to spare before picking our girlfriends up, we'll pay for it.
Girl: Why can't you just pick your girlfriend up and get it from her? For free!
Guy: Oh (pregnant pause while his mind struggles to deal with an alien concept)... yah.

I really have no other response to that, other than shaking my head.

Anyhow, it's been a great weekend. Hectic but great. In 72 hours, I managed to squeeze the following:

• Dinner with the folks
  
• Attended the afore-mentioned birthday party
  
• Supper with another group of friends
  
• Breakfast with my mom
  
• Made 5 pairs of earrings
  
• Hangout time with a girlfriend
  
• Had yummalicious kway chap in Joo Chiat
  
• A breakfast with my extended family
  
• Hangout time with my mom, going grocery shopping
  
• Some self-pampering time where I gave myself a hair treatment, facial scrub, body scrub AND foot scrub
  
• Chill out afternoon at the new yacht club and then by the pool
  
• A home-cooked dinner (made chicken stew)
  
• A movie

Gosh. It's no wonder I'm tired, but in a good way :)
Here's to a great week ahead!

Addendum: Here's the most interesting thing I learnt from work today, which is that the fear of Friday the 13th is known as paraskavedekatriaphobia.

Just For Laughs

This arrived in my inbox courtesy of Martha Wannabe (who seems to have dropped off the face of the earth in terms of blogging).

WOMAN'S POEM
Before I lay me down to sleep
I pray for a man who's not a creep
One who's handsome, smart and strong
One who loves to listen long
One who thinks before he speaks
One who'll call, not wait for weeks
I pray he's gainfully employed
When I spend his cash he won't be annoyed
Pulls out my chair and opens my door
Massages my back and begs to do more
O, send me a man who'll make love to my mind
And knows how to answer to "How big is my behind?"
I pray that this man will love me to no end
And will always be my very best friend

MAN'S POEM
I pray for a deaf-mute nyphomaniac with huge boobs
Who owns a liquor store and a golf course
This doesn't rhyme and I don't give a shit

HAHAHA. I love the last line.

Ok folkies, have a great weekend! Hopefully it'll be nice and sunny, unlike today. Hm. I guess the weatherman was right after all!

Hanging Out?

A couple of nights ago I was hanging out with some friends at my usual spot.

We started chatting about relationships and definitions and for the life of us we just could not agree on what constituted hanging out, dating and seeing each other. What exactly was hanging out? Was dating just hanging out but on a one-on-one basis? If you were dating, did that mean that it was casual and you could see (or hang out with) other people at the same time? If you were seeing each other, did that mean you were exclusive? And if you brought your friend home to meet your mom, would he/she then think that you guys were in a relationship with a capital "R"? (QOTD: "Die lah, now you must marry her.")

And then of course there's the whole issue of sleeping together. When sex gets thrown into the equation definitions just get a whole lot more complicated. (Aside: the worst possible time to ask the question "Are we serious or is this just for sex?" is when you're doing the nasty.)

It was a conversation that could very well have been amongst 20-somethings. And yet, the average age at that table that night was... lemme see... 34, if my math is right. You would have thought we should know better, what with experience and all but it seems like as we get older, relationships just get more complicated. Things were so much easier back in the day, like in JC where you were either dating or you weren't. Holding hands? Kissing? Going on one-on-one dates? Congrats! You're in a relationship, you're part of a couple.

I think it's the term "hanging out" that complicates everything. It gives people an out. How many times have you heard something like "Oh, we're not dating, we just hang out together a lot" or words to that effect?

Nowadays, the line is so blurred, it's a smudge. A smear. And yet, definition is everything. Well, to me at least. Definition means that you know your boundaries and you don't assume anything more or less. It just makes things so much clearer and you don't end up misunderstanding intentions.

Or maybe, the lack of definition is just symptomatic of how commitment-phobic we've all become.

IM, Therefore I M

IM.

It's great for keeping in touch with friends and for looking busy at work when all you're actually doing is bitching with gal pals. (Just be sure to Alt-Tab really quickly when the boss walks by.) It's thanks to IM that I can chat with people overseas and feel like I'm having a real conversation as opposed to email. Plus, there's all these cute emoticons to play with.

But sometimes, IM makes me want to scream out loud in frustration. It's so easy to hide from contacts when you don't feel like chatting with them. You could appear offline or just not bother replying and then blame it on not being at the computer (AFK: Away from Komputer. HAHAHA. Sorry, inside joke.) if your friend starts throwing a hissy fit.

And, not being face to face means that you never really know what the other person's thinking or doing. I was having a serious conversation with a friend the other day and in an attempt to inject some levity into our IM conversation I made a comment that I regretted sending as soon as I hit "Enter". Even though I apologised almost immediately my friend didn't reply to my apology for the next few minutes and I sat there wondering whether he was pissed off or not. With IM, you never really know if the other person's angry at you and therefore not replying or if he's just popped off to the loo.

What really gets me is when I see "XXxxxxx is typing a message" and then it disappears. Because then I know that my friend's just deleted everything he was about to say and whatever comes up next in the message window wasn't his first response. Being able to edit your response is double-edged; you don't put your foot in your mouth that often, but you're also censoring yourself. And knowing me, I'll always wonder what it was that he was about to say.

Still, it's a convenient way to keep in touch which is a blessing in this day and age, what with friends getting married left right and centre and leaving to settle in other countries, and with other friends going back to school or working overseas. If not for IM, I doubt I'd be as up to speed with stuff that's happening around me.

But honestly people, would it kill (some of) you to say "Bye" before logging out?

A Bit About Work

It's 1730 and I've just finished my first initiation report in ages.

I hate writing these things, I really do. It used to be so much easier when we had free rein to write it in whatever way we wanted. But no, as with every corporation, once you get to a certain size procedures have to be implemented and followed so that there's some standardisation. So now we all have to follow a certain outline when writing these reports and the outline is SO STUPID that basically I gave up on writing them. Ah, the tyranny of size...

But bitching aside, it's when I find nice new exciting ideas that I rediscover the reasons for sticking at this for so long. I walked out of one meeting a few weeks ago grinning from ear to ear because I knew I was onto a winner. It was at that moment that the phrase "banging the table" really had some meaning for me, and I felt reinvigorated. Fast forward 6 weeks and the model's up and the report's filed. Efficient, by my standards.

So yeah, I do love my job. Even though I bitch about it a lot and can barely drag my sorry ass in on time, I do actually enjoy what I do. Plus, the perks (one of which I will be enjoying this Saturday) are good :D

We're more than halfway through the week! Hang in there!

Inadequacy

I read this today and felt a sense of inadequacy.

I mean, this guy's not much older than I am and look at where he's at.

Let's compare:
At age 2, he learned to read. I can't even remember what happened to me at age 2.
At age 7, he attended high school math classes. I was busy pulling the chairs out from under my classmates.
At age 9, he attended college math classes. I was happily playing at recess with my classmates (not the ones that I pulled the chairs out from).
At age 20 he finished his Ph.D. I was hanging out at the Bear's Lair as a freshman.

Hmm.

Moving on, it's been blazing hot the whole weekend. The softball carnival got off to a great start - any time games don't need to be rescheduled, we consider that to be a great start. This weekend there'll be more games and finals will be on Sunday afternoons so pop by and watch if you have nothing else to do except clean the house or something.

And, I wonder why it rains only on the day I decide to go for training?

Hmm.

Sun's Out!

The sun's finally out! For the first time in weeks, I'm feeling warm and toasty. And just in time too, cos this weekend there's going to be a softball carnival at Kallang. It should be good fun and a great way to catch some rays.

The only downer is, I have to report for duty at 0730 on Sunday morning. Man. For someone who likes to wake up past noon on weekends, that is a tall order. But, like I said to my teammate, once in a while it's good to catch the sunrise :)

Since it's such a nice day, I thought I'd pick 10 random things that make my day.

1) Nice, sun-shiney days like today!
2) Getting deals at 65% off
3) Making wine charms with my sister on a lazy Thursday night
4) Hearing cheery, upbeat songs on the drive into work, and not having to deal with donkeys on the road
5) Calling people donkeys (it's got a nice ring to it)
6) Friday afternoons, with the weekend looming
7) A good bitchfest
8) Finding time to experiment in the kitchen
9) Drinks with good friends after a long workday
10) Getting unexpected phone calls

Have a good one, y'all!

Weekend Update

It's been a weekend of firsts.

First time visiting a Chinese temple to find out what the year of the Pig has in store for me, and first time changing someone's luck. My cousin clued me in to this temple near Rangoon Road where using your Chinese birthdate, they tell you what you can and can't do for the year, and try to change your luck if it's on the negative side. All for a fee, of course. And you can even do it for someone else - all you need is the name, the birthdate and an item belonging to that person. If you don't have an item, you can purchase something new, get it stamped and then give it to that person to use. I'm not sure I believe in all this so it was more of a cultural experience than a religious experience. But definitely an eye-opener. I wonder if they can change a person's luck to bad luck? Hmm... And if they actually can, then beware of people who give you nice new face towels with a red stamp on it.

(Contrary to the horoscope for this year, where Snakes are supposed to have a bad year, my forecast was actually pretty benign. The lady at the temple explained that the variations are due to the fact that they use birthdates whereas horoscopes just look at the year of birth.)

First time buying an engagement ring. Not for myself, of course - just helping a friend pick something out. All I'll say is, she's a lucky gal :) It's stunning! And, it's hilarious to see a guy start sweating profusely when he realises that he has to pick something out from a myriad of choices and he only has a rough idea of what she likes.

And finally, it was my first time shopping for lights. Who knew that lights could cost this much? I had a headache by the time I was done and I only visited two shops. Wall fixtures that have to go with ceiling lights, energy-saving bulbs vs. filament bulbs, dimmer switches, figuring out where the false ceilings are, finding the perfect light only to find that it's a nice 4-figure sum, trying to create a look that is at once contemporary and not too out there... Who knew shopping could be so painful???

And you all thought I was a shopaholic. Hah.

Making Like A Bee

Why is the day passing so slowly??? It's only just 1120 and it feels like it should be way past lunch time.

Sigh.

Here's a question for you techies out there: if you view a page via an RSS feed, does it register as a page view?

In other news, I've been crazy busy. On the scale of "busy"-ness, there's

Indian Escapades

What is the point of trying to screen calls when people use private numbers or calling cards to call?

Very sneaky, that. It totally defeats the purpose. And, it's kinda rude to hang up once you've picked up. Maybe next time I should only answer calls from numbers that I know.

Anyhow, just back in town from a quick trip to India. That country is one place that succeeds despite itself, thanks to the private sector. The public sector is a mess but companies continue to thrive and flourish despite the harsh operating environment. Basically, the best thing that the government can do is just stay out of the way and not crap out too much; this is a comment I've heard repeated from many many people.

And, I almost had to face the dire prospect of being stranded in India, thanks to flight delays and stupid travel agents. I caught my flight back home with 5 minutes to spare, just 300 seconds before the flight was supposed to take off. I swear, all this adrenaline isn't good for my heart. Enduring the slowest bus ride in the history of Bangalore International (since the fool of an agent booked me on a turbo-prop plane that had to be parked at a tarmac at the far end of the airport), mad dashes through the airport, serious queue cutting to get to the front of a line of at least 200 people, lots of pleading with various airport staff to get my boarding pass and more mad-dashing through the airport. In 3-inch heels, no less.

Only to find that when I get to the gate, there's at least 20 people in front of me waiting to board. Geez.

But, I'm glad I made it. (Although in the end, the gate didn't close for an additional 10 minutes, and we didn't take off until 30 minutes after the scheduled time.) Being stranded in Bangalore, with Chinese New Year just around the corner, is not the best way to start the year off.

Time to head out. Whoohoo :D Have a good one, folks.

And btw, here's the extended version of the whole flight fiasco.

My original flight, scheduled for 2035 from Hyderabad to Bangalore, was delayed till 2230. My international flight was scheduled for 2310 from Bangalore. So I cancelled one ticket, made frantic calls to make sure that SQ knew I was getting in and wouldn't leave without me and bought another ticket for a flight that left at 2055 and got in at 2225. SQ said, as long as you get to Bangalore by 2245 we will wait for you.

Then, later, while waiting for my flight, I realised that there was an EARLIER flight on another airline that the staff did not tell me about which would have gotten me in at 2200. It was too late to get on that one, so I stuck to my original plan. And when I got to the plane it was one of those fucking turbo-prop planes. And the stupid girl at the check-in counter didn't tell me that it was a turbo prop with entrance from the rear AND acceded to my request to be put right in the front so I could get off first.

Anyhow, I got on the plane, changed seats so that I could be right at the back and just prayed throughout the whole flight that I wouldn't be late. I got to Bangalore at 2230 BUT because it was one of those turbo-prop planes we had to park at the tarmac and take a bus. And I swear, the bus driver was the slowest I have ever seen. He stopped at every bump, every pothole. And all the while inwardly I'm screaming "GET A FUCKING MOVE ON!" and looking at my watch every second. Finally, at 2240 we reach the terminal, I grab my bag which weighed like 8 kg from all the research and sprinted through the terminal to get to the international departure terminal.

Only to find like 200 people in queue, and the security guard would not let me cut queue despite my pleas. By now it was 2245. So I asked some guy to let me cut queue, and I kept cutting queue until I reached the front of the line. I made it to the SQ counter at 2250, and of course the counter's closed. Thankfully there was a staff member in the office so I kept waving at her and when she came out I explained that my flight had been delayed, I'd been pre-checked in and I had no check-in baggage. So she said that she would try to get me on the flight.

5 minutes later, she came out and said, we can only put you on economy because we gave away your business class seat. And I'm like, you can fucking put me in cargo for all I care. So, after another 5 minutes, by which time it's 2300, they gave me a boarding pass and told me to run. With a staff member in tow to help me cut queue, I ran and ran and ran through the whole airport, in my 3 inch heels, and when I got to the gate, there were TWENTY people in line. And they said "Oh miss, you can relax now."

In the end, I got on the plane at 2305, the doors shut at 2320 and we didn't take off till 2340.

:D

Flashback

Today, inexplicably, I woke up and for the briefest moment I was back in primary school.

Uniform and all, with the white socks almost up to my knees and the Bata shoes gleaming white from the liquid paper-like substance that I had to slather over my shoes every Sunday night until the canvas shoes became almost as tough as leather. In my flashback, it was just after recess. So there we all were, crouched over the drains diligently brushing our teeth.

I still remember my cup - it was a red cup with my name labelled on it. Does anyone remember those early-age labelling machines - they were round and you fed some kind of tape into them and manually adjusted the letters? Whatever do you call that machine, if it can even be classified as one?

I digress. So there we were, 40-odd of us P1 students, brushing our teeth. Up and down, up and down. Left and right, left and right. Rinse, spit, repeat.

I have no idea why my mind chose to bring back this memory. Maybe I'm not brushing my teeth properly, and my subconscious is trying to remind me of the drills we learnt way back when. Or maybe I'm yearning for a time when life was much simpler, when all we had to do was go to school and finish our homework on time. All I had to worry about back then was remembering to bring the right books to school, and not be late. (Rather than worrying about donkeys.)

Speaking of school, I went back to my alma mater recently. Here's a cheap thrill: seeing your name up on a board in your secondary school. Hah. I went back and to my surprise, there it was, right near the main driveway. 2 boards listing the various houses that had won over the years (and satisfyingly, the board was predominantly blue) and their captains. A concrete, physical sign that for four years I was there and had, in some way, left my mark. It was so funny, I had to take a photo of myself, pointing at my name.

It's bittersweet to revisit. You go back and you remember the fun times you spent in school with all your friends, and how little things seemed so important then. You pop by your old classrooms, you visit with some of the teachers who are still there. You see the students walking around and you wonder if you were ever that small, that young, that raw. You look around with a smile on your face, a smile that is tinged with sadness because you know that you'll never be able to go back and experience it all over again.

Maybe my flashback today was just another reminder of that: that life goes forward and we go forward with it whether we want to or not. But sometimes, it's nice to remember and to relive it for the briefest of moments.

Road Trip!

It's a novel sensation to look into your rearview mirror to see nothing but a patch of inky darkness. No streetlights, no headlights of cars behind you, just pale moonlight providing some measure of illumination. And then you look in front and ahead of you, just past the twin circles that are your headlights, there's nothing you can see. At times like these you just keep an eye on the gas and pray you don't run out before the next rest stop. (Which, at certain stretches of the highway, can be few and far between.)

I'm in KL now, having driven up (for the first time!) the night before. The drive was fine - no encounters with cops whatsoever despite multiple warnings from lots of people about cops hiding behind bushes waiting to spring speed traps on you. And, time passes pretty fast when it's past midnight, there's company and you're doing 130 kmh while belting out songs from the radio.

I'm considering driving up more often, although there's the fact that I can't yet bear to subject Sam to the perils of M'sian highways. Pity though, cos Sam's built for road trips. Just imagine, driving all the way up Peninsula Malaysia, up to Thailand and maybe beyond. What a trip that would be!

Anyhow, the next few days will be a mixture of work and play, with the balance hopefully skewed towards the latter. You guys have a great week :) I know I will.

*GRIN*

Snippets from Beijing

Here's a few snippets I've gleaned over the last few days.

1) Watsons in Beijing (and maybe the rest of China) does not sell medication. They sell a shitload of other stuff, but no medication.

2) Soft drinks are literally 软饮料. And using that logic, Microsoft's name in Mandarin is 微软. Teehee. That cracks me up.

3) Chinese pear with honey walnuts, feta cheese and mustard is a delicious combination. We had dinner at Green Tea House, a fusion restaurant, 2 nights ago and it was the best dinner yet. A bit pricey (although we did have 2 bottles of wine) but well worth the moolah.

4) Apparently one of the best clubs to go to in Beijing is 唐会, which we stumbled into by accident because it happened to be next to Green Tea House.

5) Chinese people are the funniest when it comes to clubbing, probably because they look so serious while they're dancing. It's almost like, they're trying too hard.

6) There's a park in Beijing, 景山公园 where you can get a great view of the Forbidden City. Bear in mind, however, that if your group is travelling in 2 separate cabs, there are 3 entrances to the park. And it's no fun walking around in 0 degree weather trying to locate the other members of your group. Brrr.

Off Again!

Different week, same shit.

Except that when I flew back on Friday, I was on the new 777-300ER with the superduper new business class. WAH. The moment you walk in, your jaw just drops and you're filled with glee that you lucked out by stumbling into (and somehow managing to retain) a job that lets you travel so much. The look of the cabin is totally different from the usual business class cabin, with only 4 seats per row. Each seat is like its own booth, the TV screen is HUGE (15"?) and you get to stretch out like a king. And, if you wanna sleep you get a bed. WHEE! I'm definitely taking that flight again.

And now I'm back at the Silver Kris lounge, waiting to board yet another plane to go for yet another work trip. The good thing is, I get to catch up on all the movies I've missed and I get to wear my winter clothing. The bad thing is, I have to work my ass off, and I'm missing out on hanging out with the other two-thirds of the trio, who both happened to come back to SG at the same time on very short notice. Luckily I had already decided to come back for a day and managed to hang out with the gals for a few hours.

Anyhow, blogging may be erratic over the next few days. Depending on how much work I decide to do, how bored I get in the hotel room and how much entertainment there's going to be :)

Happy Sunday!

Almost Back!

Sorry for the lack of blogging, I've been busy and, rather surprisingly, have had nothing much to say.

Not much to update on, except that I've discovered that when it comes to Korean food I like it spicy. Which is strange since I tend to avoid adding chilli into any food. Maybe it's another sign of aging? Haha.

Ok, back to work. Have a great weekend, y'all!

All A-Twitter

Woohoo!

I've just made a couple of changes to the sidebar. I've added Twitter which allows me to update on my whereabouts and doings from my mobile or from the web. So, basically it's 24-7 information (assuming that I update it that often). Whee. It's on the sidebar but if you want updates delivered to your phone and if you want the same functionality, then you gotta go sign up for an account here. I have to say, it's pretty fun. Except when messages come in from your contacts at weird hours of the morning, but you can easily disable that I think.

And, I'm psyched that I managed to work out HTML enough to make the sidebar look pretty. At least now I think the variable width thingamajig works so that it should look the same on all screen sizes and resolutions. Fingers crossed! (And FYI, this is a big deal because I'm no techie. I'm more of a reverse-engineer.)

It's a lovely day. Sun's out so I'm in a chipper mood. YAY!

As Fate Would Have It...

It does not bode well for the coming year that it's only the 10th working day of the year and already I'm bored. Maybe because it's a nice sunny day and I'm chafing at the bit to be outdoors instead of being cooped up in my cubicle. Thankfully my cubicle has lots and lots of natural light; I don't think I can deal with being in a cubicle with no view and nothing but the harsh glare of white fluorescent lights the whole day.

Anyhow, recently I've been thinking about predestination. The topic came up during a lunch session with a couple of friends as we were discussing the efficacies of fortune tellers and astronomers. I personally don't believe in any of this but I know people who swear by their various soothsayers and whatnot.

It's uncomfortable for me to accept the notion that our paths are predestined and hence they can be foretold. Because if our paths are predestined, then it takes all the effort out of living. You could just adopt the attitude that what will be will be and not try to change things. Predestination takes responsibility away from our actions. (And I really don't like the idea that we're living in a giant snowglobe for the amusement of some higher being who dictates our every move and occasionally shakes everything upside down just for fun.)

However, I do believe in fate. It sounds contradictory, but maybe it's not. Maybe our lives are like giant probability trees and every step we take moves us further from or closer to various outcomes. At certain signposts some things of great significance happen, which have greater influence on our decisions; maybe that's where fate comes in.

Having said that, I wouldn't mind visiting a fortune teller or an astronomer just to hear what they have to say. Any takers?

And, I learnt a new word today: "gunchang", which apparently translates into "wanker". And I know just who to use it on :D

Solitude

It's grey outside and freezing cold inside. From my window, everything just looks really gloomy.

On days like this, I wish I was here.

Or here.

Looking back, that ranks as one of my best holidays. A solo road trip may not sound like much fun, but what I love about that holiday was the chance to just chill out, rack up the miles at my own pace, stop as and when I liked, and not have to interact with anyone else. There was one day when I probably spoke less than 10 words, and I really enjoyed being able to hear myself think. And I love the feeling of being on my own but not being truly alone, like when I messaged my sister from half a world away to tell her I was on the boardwalk watching the sunset, and got a reply instantaneously.

Maybe sometimes you just need to let your private self out.

(If I'm not making much sense, I put it down to having a late night and being kinda sleepy at the moment.)

Anyhow, week 2 of 2007 is almost gone! Time, it really does fly by :D Ok, one small cuppa and then back to work. Happy Thursday, all!

Addendum: 3' 28" for Sudoku! Hahahahaha.

Onto Better Things

I did my first run of 2007 yesterday and it sure helped clear my mind. Maybe extreme pain is the answer :)

Anyhow, time to stop being maudlin. A year's not long and it'll definitely give me time to get rational. So you go figure out what you want, and I'll work on getting what I want. Sweet.

Okie dokie, now it's time to do my year-in-review.

1) Weddings attended: 2 really important ones amongst the few this year.

2) Parties thrown: not too many this year, thanks to crazy travel schedules and generally being busy. I've got a couple of themes in mind for 2007 though.

3) Mileage racked up: maybe about 10,000 km. Hm... I'm driving less and less.
3b) Petrol: $2054.21 - driving less, paying more. Damn it.

4) Holidays taken: 4 - NZ, M'sia, AU, US.
4a) Work trips taken: HK twice, Seoul, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Beijing twice, Shanghai twice, LA, Mumbai, Goa, London, Barcelona. GOSH.

5) Jackasses: a few minor ones, one major one. Pun fully intended. I gotta get rid of the jackasses.

6) Most ridiculous thing I've done this year: Aside from the painfully obvious, it'd have to be showering with goggles on. Which I still have to do, btw.
6a) Funniest thing I've seen this year: 2 year old kid who's high on one sip of red wine and starts singing at the top of his lungs. Damn funny. Guaranteed to put anyone in a better mood.

Ok photos from NYE are up here. Go see!

Crossroads...

'tis been a long break. Hope everyone enjoyed themselves, and had a good time off from work/school/slacking off/whatever else it is you guys do. Me, I've just spent the time holed up in my room sleeping and sleeping and sleeping. It's amazing what sleep can do.

It's almost time for the annual year-end review, so I've been spending some time thinking about what I've done this whole year. On the whole I'm pretty happy with everything, but then again I've been easy to please. (Until I get pushed to a point where I just throw my hands up in the air, say "FUCK IT" and walk off. Which, sad to say, I've done quite a bit this year. Maybe I get bitchier as I age...)

Right now I'm staring at a crossroads. Two paths; one well-travelled, the other much less. What to do, what to do... Maybe it's time to be selfish and do what I really want, for a change. And maybe it'll make all the difference.

Random Stuff

Some random things while I gather up my thoughts.

1) QOTD: From my horticulturally-inclined friend, on Saturday night, as she described one of her housemates.

"His underpants sometimes have a brown patch on them, so we always say, 'A_____, wipe your ass, PLEASE!'"

Ewwwww.

2) My Lab snores... Almost as bad as my dad. I found that out the hard way when I took a nap in the living room on Saturday.

3) House-hunting is the biggest pain in the ass. If the location is good, the size of the bedrooms are tiny. If the layout's appealing, the units left are the crappy units. If the size of the bedrooms are big enough, there's no yard.

And then, when you find the perfect place, it's way out of your budget.

Sigh. I feel very very poor right now.

4) In a fit of I-dunno-what-I-was-smoking-but-it's-some-crazy-shit, I promised my brother-in-law that I would start training for and participate in a triathlon before I turn 30. OMG, what have I gotten myself into???

5) 3' 49" for my sudoku game, Evil level! :D

Wishlist and (non)BQOTD

These are just too cute! And very apt, given my current disposition.

(And I really should update my wishlist...)

I can't decide which one I like... Anyhow, those who are interested can find them here.

Also, 2 QOTDs. The first one, about 2007, comes from Serene, the wise one:

"Brand new start to a brand new year!"

Woohoo! I'll drink to that :D Girlfriends (and sisters of course) rock!

The second one, in response to my current MSN nickname, comes from a HOB:

"Girls suck... Boys lick."

Hahaha.

Weekend Update

Hey Martha's back! Woohoo! (And btw, the cookies that she baked were YUMMY.)

Anyhow, nothing much to blog about. Highlight of the weekend: going for the Wakin concert. In a word, "GREAT". Such fun and such value for money, considering the guy sang over 40 songs in 3.5 hours. Woohoo.

Other news: A big hearty congrats to Moo Moo, who completed her first marathon on Sunday despite a gimpy left leg. Good for you! I know I'll never be able to do what you did :)

This week looks to be a fairly quiet week; things at work are winding down, people are in the holiday mood. Maybe I should spend some time clearing out my desk... but a better idea would be to clear some leave and go shopping! Haha.

QOTD and other stuff

Nothing much beats spending time with good friends and hanging out with the girls.

Today's BQOTD comes from dinner last night with a Berkeley pal:

"You have the propensity to be attracted to jackasses."

Yah, you know who she's referring to.

And during lunch, I spent a good 2 hours absorbing life lessons. Suffice it to say that I now have a fairly realistic (read: cynical) view of life and marriage and all that jazz.

It's a good thing I'm an optimist :) Happy Friday, y'all!

Quick One

I'm still here, but just a little busy catching up on errands and personal stuff that I've been neglecting.

Nothing much to blog about as a result, except for this appeal to anyone who is free on the morning of December 10. Come down and run 5km at MacRitchie Reservoir and support the Singapore Womens' Softball team - entry fee costs $10 and every participant gets a goody bag (well, don't expect like a really nice goody bag). Those who finish the run/walk get a chance to participate in a lucky draw. Anyone who's interested, drop me an email.

I need a holiday...

Snippets

I'm in an introspective mood tonight so just some random snippets for now:

1) Hold the presses! I be back from my trip :)

2) I am typing this with one hand as I foolishly decided that I wanted to give my nails a French manicure at the same time. Which leads me to snippet #3...

3) My left hand is retarded. The only thing my left hand can do is write backwards. And the only reason I picked up that skill was becausely I was supremely bored during one company meeting 2 years ago.

4) I only saw one Starbucks throughout my Barcelona trip.

5) This was hilarious:

6) As were these:
" The surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere in the universe is the fact that it has never tried to contact us."

"Sometimes the majority only means that all the fools are on the same side."

Split Personalities

By now the astute amongst you might have noticed something different in the last few posts. That's right: I am officially a schizophrenic.

Hahaha.

In other news, London (if you hadn't already gathered) was a blast. The weather was nice and cool, the city is awesome and being able to hang out with friends/colleagues was great. The only gripe I have about London is that things are so bloody expensive there. At the airport I was considering buying some snacks for the flight to Barcelona but when I realised I had to pay the equivalent of S$1.80 for a small pack of chips and $6 for 500ml of water, I changed my mind. Little did I know that the freaking flight I was booked on was apparently run by a budget airline so not only did they not serve food, they didn't serve water either. And now that Heathrow doesn't allow bringing in liquids over 500ml, that meant I was w/o water for the whole flight. The shops in Heathrow are doing a roaring trade selling bottled water. I smell a conspiracy theory somewhere...

I always feel like I'm in a game of Monopoly everywhere I go in London. And the city's full of quaint places with names like St Andrew by the Wardrobe. It's like some CS Lewis novel. I love how historical London is, and it's really admirable how good a job of conservation they've done. (Having said that, my office building sticks out like an eyesore, all green glass and angles. Yucks.) And it's so cool how just by turning the corner, you sometimes discover an alleyway that looks like it's right out of the 1800s.

Maybe I should really consider moving up here for a while. It'd be fun... Expensive, but fun :)

The Adventures of Silly Girl: Silly Girl Goes to London

Silly Girl goes to London!

Of course, Silly Girl snoozes too much when her alarm clock rings at 6am this morning. Good thing is, Silly Girl's dad wakes her up at 0645, just in time to catch her plane to London. Bad thing is, Silly Girl's travel agent has screwed up her reservation so she ends up spending 15 hours in cattle class with 3 screaming babies in the cabin.

This makes Silly Girl slightly grumpy (or groompy as some might say). But then Silly Girl gets cheered up when she arrives in London for the 1st time in 5 years. (Speaking of which, Starbucks and Subway seems to have taken over London with one outlet on every street corner.) Best of all, there's free wireless internet in Silly Girl's room! Yippee! (Silly Girl is in danger of turning into a geek.)

Silly Girl is off to take a nap. Later tonight, Silly Girl will get to catch up with some friends. Yippee!

Tagged!

Super duper long meme from pblossom:

1) Are your parents married or divorced? Married
2) Are you a vegetarian? MEAT!
3) Do you believe in Heaven? I'd like to believe there's an afterlife that's not filled with brimstone and eternal pain...
4) Have you ever come close to dying? Once when I was 4 and I was crossing the road next to a big fat guy who blocked my view. He took one step out, I took two and then there was the sound of squealing brakes.
5) What jewelery do you wear 24/7? Right now I have to wear earrings to keep my newly-pierced holes open. Else, there's nothing I wear everyday.
6) Favourite time of day? Hm. Any time when I can laze.
7) Do you eat the stems of broccoli? Yup.
8) Do you wear makeup? Of course. This face needs all the help it can get.
9) Ever have plastic surgery? Nope.
10) Do you color your hair? Yup.
11) What do you wear to bed? Nothing much when I'm home, pajamas when I'm travelling, lingerie when... :)
12) Have you ever done anything illegal? Minor stuff, sure. Major stuff, not yet...
13) Can you roll your tongue? Yup.
14) Do you tweeze your eyebrows? Of course.
15) What kind of sneakers? Nikes, Skechers and Vans.
16) Do you believe in Abortions? I condone it.
17) Hair colour? Right now it's brown w/ blonde highlights.
18) Future child's name? I like Megan and Jake.
19) Do you snore? No one's complained so far.
20) If you could go anywhere in the world where would it be? Oh this is going to be a long list: Alaska, Greece, Turkey, Antartica, Machu Picchu, Sipadan, Hawaii, Tahiti...
21) Do you sleep with stuffed animals? I sleep with my baby pillow and bolster.
22) If you won the lottery, what would you do first? Apply for a sabbatical and buy air tickets.
23) Gold or silver? Silver (but if someone wanted to give me gold, I'd take it.)
24) Hamburger or hot dog? Both!
25) If you could only eat one food for the rest of your life, what would it be? Potato chips.
26) City, beach or country? Beach.
27) What was the last thing you touched? My keyboard, duh.
28) Where did you eat last? Toast @ Raffles Place.
29) When's the last time you cried? Sobbed like a baby on the plane when I watched "Almost Love", a Korean flick. Thankfully the cabin was totally dark.
30) Do you read blogs? To echo pblossom, "duh".
31) Would you ever go out dressed like the opposite sex? Sure. People used to mistake me for a boy when I was younger.
32) Ever been involved with the police? Nope.
33) What's your favorite shampoo conditioner and soap? Dove and Dove.
34) Do you talk in your sleep? No one's complained so far.
35) Ocean or pool? Ocean cos it's prettier but then again there aren't any fish in the pool. Hmmmm....
38) Window seat or aisle? Window all the way!
39) Ever met anyone famous? Andy Lau! Edison Chen!
40) Do you feel that you've had a truly successful life? Hopefully it gets better but I'm grateful for my family and friends.
41) Do you twirl your spaghetti or cut it? Twirl or slurp.
42) Ricki Lake or Oprah Winfrey? Neither.
43) Basketball or Football? Baseball.
44) How long do your showers last? 5 mins at the most. Any longer and they're called baths.
45) Automatic or do you drive a stick? I love stick but unfortunately Sam didn't come with that option.
46) Cake or ice cream? Ice cream.
47) Are you self-conscious? Yes, unless I'm with people I know.
48) Have you ever drank so much you threw up? Duh. Of course.
49) Have you ever given money to a begger? Nope.
50) Have you ever been in love? DUH.
51) Where do you wish you were? At home in bed watching the rain pouring down.
52) Are you wearing socks? Nope.
53) Have you ever ridden in an ambulance? Nope.
54) Can you tango? Nope.
55) Last gift you received? Playmobil keychain! (Thanks, Ms. B!)
56) Last sport you played? Softball.
57) Things you spend a lot of money on? Clothes, shoes, make-up, food, books...
58) Where do you live? At home w/ my parents but am looking for a place to move out to.
59) Where were you born? Singapore!
60) Last wedding attended? HM's wedding in Wombarra, just over the weekend.
63) Most hated food(s)? I don't eat corn.
65) Can you sing? Yup.
66) Last person you instant messaged? The Phantom!
67) Last place you went on holiday? Cairns/Sydney/Wombarra

and finally

69) Tag 3 friends:

MOOMOO!
DES!
SQUEAKY!!

Back, But Not For Long

I'm back in town for the next 3 days and then off again on Saturday. I had a blast in Australia, although in retrospect I should have had the dive trip after the wedding instead of the other way around. That way I'd have come back looking tanned and relaxed, instead of looking tanned and stressed out.

If I feel like it I'll blog about the dive trip and the wedding individually. Many many things to do before I leave again; photos to develop and scan, work to finish up on, pple to meet, sleep to catch up on... But just in case I don't get into the mood of blogging here's the executive summary:

Dive trip was GREAT!!! Saw manta rays (WOOHOO!), sharks, turtles, dolphins (albeit from the surface)... And the food, oh man... the food. I can still taste the sticky date pudding.

The wedding was super busy, freezing cold but wonderful. I'm glad to see one of my oldest friends looking so happy and I have a good feeling about this one :) Also got the chance to hang out with old friends and make some new ones. Pictures will be up (I dunno when, but it will be up) but check out the picture of the day for a quick peek.

Ok, back to work and to my 250 mb of emails that I had to download. Later, 'gators.

Gallivanting Again

Off to Aussie-land for the next week and a half. First half of the trip will be spent diving at the Great Barrier Reef while the second half will be spent in Sydney helping out and attending a very good friend's wedding. What fun!

I'm so looking forward to this trip, not just because my good friend's getting married but also because I'm tired of work. I've been working and travelling flat out for the last few months and after this trip I only have one more work trip left before I can hang up my suits for the rest of the year. YAY. Then I can get down to the dirty job of cleaning up my desk, which should keep me gainfully occupied for at least a week.

Entries may be sporadic for the next 2 weeks. But before I go, here's a gem of a quote from my grandma. During my dad's birthday dinner, she turned to me and said: "Since you came back from India, you don't look Chinese anymore. You look like a Dutchman (or person, whatever...)."

Huh?

Home Sweet Home

I'm back from India 2 days earlier than I had originally planned, with a nice tan to boot. Woohoo. One more work trip for the year and I should be done with travelling for a bit. Yay.

Highlight of the trip: hanging out with my friends from the other offices who I only get to see once a year and seeing everyone togged out in traditional attire for "Bollywood Night". (Non-incriminating photos should be up fairly soon.)

Next up: diving at the Great Barrier Reef. Wheee!

Goa-ing to Goa

So here I am in Goa, which reminds me a lot of Mauritius. We're staying at the Taj Exotica for our offsite and the resort is just lovely. 53 acres of lush greenery with the sea right by our doorstep. Tomorrow morning I'm going to wake up to palm trees and the sea behind that. Yay!

Thankfully I was on the later flight, which left at the slightly-less-godforsaken hour of 0630 this morning. We all had to meet in the lobby at 0515 (compared to the other group, at 0415) and fight the hassle of domestic travel in India for the next 40 minutes. Then, when we had finally boarded we were told that there was bad weather in Goa so our flight sat on the tarmac for the next hour and a half. The good news - the other half of the team, who had gleefully looked forward to an extra hour of sitting by the beach, actually had to turn around and head back to Mumbai due to the bad weather. In the end they took off AFTER us and we got there more than an hour earlier. Hehe. Poor saps.

I'm so glad to be done with the formal part of the conference. My group did 16 meetings in 3 days, which is better than some of the other groups so I'm not complaining. But still, it's good to not be in a suit and high heels the whole day. And we just have one more day of internal meetings left and then it's party, party, party. Yay!

Okie dokie. Time to get ready for bed. Later, 'gators.

Off to India

Ok folkies, I'm off to India for the next few days. Back in town on the 18th.

I've done some reorganising of the photo site, just because I seem to be adding a lot more clubbing photos. So there's a new category unimaginatively titled Party Time. Photos from the recent (slightly disastrous) trip to Mambo are here.

Ok. Time for dinner. Good thing I enjoy Indian food :)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Happy birthday to my dearest (by default, haha) sis!

Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday to June
Now will you make me an aunt?

Hehe.

Random thought of the day: Sometimes a girl just wants to be taken care of.

Hong Kong, cont'd

Finally found the time to sit down and blog about the rest of the week in Hong Kong.

First off: Duran Duran rock!!! They must be in their 40s at least and they still brought the house down. And, they still look really good too. Hehe.

Second: HK is a great place for single gals. Lots of cute guys, lots of clubs to hang out in, lots of ways to meet new people. After last week I'm seriously considering moving up to HK. I danced so much the whole of last week that my thighs ached even after I got back. (Note to self: it is not good to attempt to bowl on weak legs because you run the risk of falling flat on your arse.)

My clubbing schedule last week:
Monday - Japanese dinner and loads of sake. Slept at 12.
Tuesday - dinner with colleagues, drinks at a club and then a quick round of dancing in Wanchai. Slept at 2.
Wednesday - dinner, Duran Duran and dancing. Slept at 2.
Thursday - drinks, dinner and then clubbing in Lan Kwai Fong. Slept at 4.
Friday - dinner with colleagues, bowling and then clubbing in Central. Slept at 5.
Saturday - dinner with friends, drinks and then clubbing in Wanchai till dawn. Slept at 7.

Woohoo! And btw, this wasn't a holiday - it was a work trip. I still managed to make all my meetings and get into the office on time.

Third: only in HK do you get to rub shoulders with Edison Chen, Wong Yat Wah, Miu Kiu Wai and ANDY LAU!!! Wah...

OMG!

This is a totally frivolous entry but I just have to put it on the record that today, at 1500 in the Grand Hyatt cafe in HK, I bumped into Edison Chen.

OMG is he hot. Hot hot hot. For the next hour, I could barely pay attention to the poor analyst sitting across me - I can't remember what he was talking about. All I could focus on was the fact that Edison Chen, the cutie, was sitting a mere 5 metres away from me, tucking into some food.

*drool*

For Goodness's Sake!

Ok dudes, I am slightly high from the vast amounts of sake I have consumed tonight. But hopefully not high enough that this entry doesn't make any sense...

I had a ton of fun tonight. It started out with a session at a car simulation place called the Sideways Driving Club. (BTW if I haven't already mentioned it I'm in HK this week.) We got to 'drive' Porsches on some Austrian race track for about an hour, and I won the 1st race and came in 2nd in the 2nd race. For my effort I came in 1st overall and am now the proud owner of a black cap that says "Sideways Driving Club" - I got to pick the colour since I was 1st.

After that we headed over to dinner at some Japanese restaurant which was fairly yummy. My favourite dish came right at the beginning and was some kind of tuna tartare dish with crunchy tempura bits inside. Yummalicious! After that, they kept plying us with sake, loads and loads of sake. And not just sake where you could sip at it in peace, but sake where you basically had to keep downing it in endless rounds of "bottoms up". And knowing me and the fact that I am super proud of the fact that despite my size I can pack it away like the rest of them, I just kept plugging away. At least now I have won the respect of the guys on the sell-side, or at least I think I have... (Interestingly, this has nothing to do with whether I'm a good analyst or not, haha.)

So now I'm kinda high and extremely mellow. Wheeee. It's a good thing I have a very late start tomorrow - basically I have one optional meeting at 3pm, and one compulsory one at 6pm. Hehe. Looks like I'm going to sleep in tomorrow! Woohoo.

Top 5 Things...

... I learnt from my recent China trip.

1) Never ever travel during the 1st week of September, or whenever the school holiday is. On the flight back from Shanghai there must have been at least 100 kids on my flight, from at least 3 separate school groups. They were pretty quiet on the plane (and for that I am eternally grateful) but in the departure lounge it was pure havoc. Tens of kids running around screaming, taking photos, yelling out "Who's sitting in 51K?" does not make for a peaceful 30 minutes.

2) Diet Coke is called 健怡可乐 and Equal sweetener is called 怡口糖. As for Evian, it's 依云. Fairly useless information but essential to know if your colleague (who is actually a superior whose good books you need to be in) doesn't speak any Mandarin and only drinks these 2 drinks.

3) The maglev train from Shanghai to the Pudong airport takes 3:15 minutes to accelerate to a top speed of 430kmh (from late night to early morning the top speed is only 330 kmh due to noise levels). It stays at this speed for 45 seconds and begins to decelerate at 4:00 minutes. By 7:20 minutes the ride is over. It's a collosal waste of money - just imagine the energy that it takes to get up to top speed and to stop. Given that I only paid 40 RMB (I got a 20% discount for showing my air ticket) for an economy seat one-way, I'm pretty sure this is a bigass white elephant.

(And btw, there are 2 airports in Shanghai; one at Pudong, the other at Hongqiao. Both have international and domestic flights and are located on either side of the river so if you get the logistics wrong you're basically screwed.)

4) Whoever runs airports in China is loafing on the job. It does not make sense that the Beijing-Shanghai flight does not have a gate assigned; instead, on what must be one of the fuller flights in the schedule, everyone has to cram onto a bus to get to a plane that is seeming out in the middle of nowhere, so much so that for a while it seemed like we were going to take the bus the entire way. It also does not make sense that you would have 2 flights assigned to a gate that take off 10 minutes apart, so you have twice the number of people (with the afore-mentioned 100 kids running about) crammed into the departure lounge. This makes even less sense when you realise that the 2nd plane is actually parked at Gate 12, while the 1st plane is parked at Gate 14 and only the departure lounge for Gate 14 is open for both flights. It can't be that they can't find enough people to man both gates; for goodness's sake, there are 1.3 mn people in that country...

And in case you guys think all I ever do is complain,

5) The Chinese restaurant in the Beijing airport (Viojoy restaurant), where the waitresses wear yellow and purple uniforms, serves the best shrimps I have ever had in my life.

Scrabby in Beijing

It's an unbelievably lovely day in Beijing. The sun is shining, there's practically no smog and it's not too warm.

The only thing to gripe about is the traffic - the state of Beijing's roads leaves much to be desired. Last night, our ride from the airport which, at 11 at night, should not have taken more than half an hour, took more than 2x that; most of the journey was spent bumping along backroads with no lights and multiple potholes. Good thing we had a fairly late start today, so I was able to get some much-needed sleep, after waking up at 6am yesterday.

Everytime I come to Beijing, the scale just astounds me. If it's impressive now, imagine how it would have been during the imperial times with willow trees lining the broad streets leading to the palatial estates.

By happenstance, we chanced upon the flag-lowering ceremony at Tiananmen Square. My colleague had wanted to see the square, so after our meetings we headed over just before sunset. Turns out, that's when the daily flag-lowering ceremony takes place, so we were fairly lucky to witness it. It's quite an impressive sight when the soldiers march out from the Forbidden City, the traffic on what could possibly be the widest road in the world comes to a halt, and there's hundreds of spectators standing at attention watching the ceremony. Even the cleaners stand at attention.

Tomorrow it's another day of meetings, followed by a late night flight to Shanghai. I much prefer Beijing to Shanghai; Beijing is the grand old dame as opposed to Shanghai being the brash young upstart. Life here in Beijing seems to move at a more measured, stately pace, as compared to the hustle and bustle of Shanghai. Plus, the streets are much wider here so it gives one the impression of wide-open space, versus the urban jungle that is Shanghai.

Okie dokie, dinner time. Oh, before I forget, my phone seems to have decided to renege on its vow of silence. This morning it actually made some noise. Maybe, as my sister says, it's because it was made in China? Whatever it is, I'm glad there's a ringtone again. Yay!

Quatrociento

Wow. 400 entries and counting! Woohoo. I can't believe I've not only kept this up for almost 3 years, but at the same time I've actually expanded to 3 other blogs.

Cool. Anyway, nothing much to write about except that I will be out of town for most of the first half of September. I fly off tomorrow, I get back on Friday at 2200, I fly off on Sunday at 1900 and I get back the Saturday after at 1730. Makes me tired just thinking about it. I will still be contactable since I'll be in mobile-friendly confines, and I will definitely be online at nights in my various hotel rooms.

And, thanks to my crowded schedule I had to sneak out for an hour today to get a facial, and boy did it feel good. For that brief shining moment, I felt like a tai-tai. Hahaha. I definitely have to get some of the gal pals together for a "tai tai for a day" session sometime soon.

Fact of the day: A 150g packet of Honey Stars costs S$3.30 at the Marketplace. (It'll probably be slightly cheaper at Cold Storage.) So, one month worth of Honey Stars, assuming a pack a day (like some bad cigarette habit) will set me back almost 100 bucks. Grr...

Should I...

... stop being a cheapskate, disregard a policy I've adhered to for 5+ years, and actually pay good money for this?

Hm. Decisions, decisions...

"And as I try to make my way..."

Severe sleep deprivation today, which in itself is not necessarily a bad thing, it just depends on the reason why.

Anyhow, I think I'm going to get to see Duran Duran live! Woohoo!!! Growing up, Duran Duran was the band my older (read: cool) cousins listened to. Their room was plastered with posters of the band, and my favourite band member, for reasons that are now unknown to me, was Roger Taylor. (Maybe it was the whole bad-boy but slightly shy drummer persona that got to me...) I had no idea what the lyrics were about, and the song titles were certainly quite strange (come on, "Hungry like a Wolf"?) but Duran Duran was the first band that I really ever listened to. And now, I'm going to get to see them live.

WOOHOO! :D If anyone is interested, fly yourself up to HK by Sep 13th. I can only get one extra ticket.

And, yesterday I went back to my old school to have lunch with Ms. Educator and another school chum. After that we popped by the staff room to say hi to a couple of our teachers and amazingly, my Pr. 4 form teacher (she's now teaching at my secondary school), whom I haven't seen since I left primary school, remembered me. Name and all. She took one look at me and said "Oh I remember you. The face is the same, but not the tinted hair." Then she screwed up her face with all the mental effort, ran down our class list in her mind (good thing for her I was 6th in alphabetical order) and came up with my name.

Wow. So apparently I look exactly the same as I did when I was 10. Hahaha.

The Lighter Side

It's Friday, the boss is away and so the mice shall play! Heh. (Witness my pathetic attempt at rhyming.)

Anyhow, this came into my inbox via my colleague today. For your sakes I have left out the not-so-funny ones.

Thesaurus for office workers
Blamestorming: Sitting around in a group, discussing why a deadline was missed or a project failed, and who was responsible.
Seagull manager: A manager who flies in, makes a lot of noise, craps on everything and then leaves. (This sounds very familiar...)
Assmosis: The process by which people seem to absorb success and advancement by sucking up to the boss rather than by working hard.
Salmon day: The experience of spending an entire day swimming upstream only to get screwed and die.
Percussive maintenance: The fine art of whacking the crap out of an electronic device to get it to work again.

And my personal favourite...
Ohnosecond: That miniscule fraction of time in which you realise that you've just made a BIG mistake (e.g. you've hit 'reply all' or in my case, hitting the restart button).

In other news, they've brought back the milkshake at MacDonald's! (I remember dragging Flyboy all over the western half of SG in a futile search for a MacDonald's chocolate milkshake when I developed a craving for the drink about 4 years ago.) I wonder if it's as good as I remembered, although I've often found that most things seldom are.

And, I'm now here, here AND here, and somewhere else as well. Let's see how long I can keep this going...

Have a good one y'all!

Cyworld!

It's finally here! Cyworld, the killer app that's taken the Korean internet world by storm for the last 2 years, is finally available to the rest of the world. Check it out here. No prizes for guessing where my minihompy is at.

Promotional plugs aside, the system looks like fun but only for a while. Editing takes a while and there are so many items that it takes a long time to scroll through everything to pick out the stuff that you really want. And I'm probably too cheapo to pay actual money to update my room every other week, but that's just me. I can see how a lot of people would spend a couple of dollars a month on this thing.

Maybe I can write it off as research :)

Weekend Snippets

Lots of snippets today, all from the weekend.

1) I was wrong. We had to play at the god-forsaken hell hole after all. But it was a fairly nice day and the field was in as good a shape as I've seen it. We won again and ended the season undefeated. Woohoo. The team dinner last night was great fun; I love playing with this group of gals. Photos soon...

2) The combination of 2 tipsy guys and 1 toy moose (i.e. Murphy) makes for at least 15 minutes of hilarious conversation. Driving home from Butter Factory on Friday night, R & I were treated to 15 minutes of gut-busting conversation about the size of Murphy's nose and what it meant, which then led to the topic of monkeys of all things. I have never heard the term "promiscuous monkey" used so many times in that short a time span. FYI, the actual term was supposed to be "proboscis monkey".

3) Today's QOTD comes from my brother-in-law and if anyone can understand what he was trying to say, you get a prize of some sort.

Me: People say I'm kiam but I think you're even more kiam than me.
BIL: Me? People say you, but me is only you.
Me: WTF???

Snippets on a Friday Afternoon

It's a slow Friday afternoon and I'm just waiting for the clock to point to 6pm.

I took Thursday off, and spent most of it lazing around at home with the folks. Why is it that when I'm in the office it takes hours to get past the day, whereas when I'm at home it seems like the day starts at 4pm and just zips by?

Softball season will wind down on Sunday, weather permitting. Quite fittingly, we play our last game against our juniors and we're playing at our home ground of the Padang, instead of the sun-baked, ankle-breaking god-forsaken hellhole that is the Kallang field.

After softball ends, I will finally be out of excuses for not joining my sister/cousins for their Sunday morning biking/running. It's then that the world will know exactly how much of a lazy-ass I am. But come on, waking up before 7am on a Sunday to run could almost be the purest form of torture.

And finally: A couple of weeks ago, you asked me why I hadn't been calling. Quite simply, the answer is because I don't know if you'll pick up. Sometimes I wonder if I should try calling but so far I've managed to resist. Still, it would be good to hear from you, just to see how you've been getting on.

Have a good weekend, y'all.

Little Things...

... that could make your day.

(Btw this list is non-exhaustative and vaguely hypothetical.)

1) Hearing a nice cheerful song on the radio just before you get into work. Like today, for instance, when I heard Erasure's A Little Respect which totally got me in the mood for dancing.

2) Having a nice hassle-free drive into work.

3) Having lunch with the girls, to chat about everything and nothing.

4) Bumping into the cute guy on your floor when you're dressed to kill and, frankly, smokin'.

5) Getting your favourite parking space, which in my case is right by the exit.

6) Waking up to a bright sunshine-y day.

7) Getting an unexpected phone call from someone you thought would never call you.

8) Popping out for a quickie during lunch.

9) Knowing that the next day is a non-work day.

Again, this list is vaguely hypothetical. I just thought about it after some stuff that came out of today's lunch.

Facelifts, Asslifts and More!

On Saturday night, we had an impromptu dinner that threw up some really interesting facts.

I'd been itching to cook for a while and I finally found some time on Saturday to cook so I made an Asian-inspired chicken stew (with basil and lemongrass), prawn fritters and mashed potatoes. At the same time, my cousin decided to make Penang laksa so we threw together a small dinner gathering at my place. (Yes, I have photos and I will try to post them soon.)

So anyway while at dinner, we started talking about facelifts and liposuction since my cousin-in-law is in the business. Along with the traditional liposuction, you can now do something called smart liposuction, where the liquefied fat that is sucked out then gets inserted elsewhere in your body. Recycling in the 21st century! You can now choose to augment (such a nice-sounding word) your boobs, your butt or even your privates. Yes, guys, help is on the way - you can now choose to put what was previously your beer belly into your privates to make it thicker. Heh. And, if you choose to put what was previously in your butt into your lips, people can then literally kiss your ass.

After liposuction, your skin could get a little saggy due to the decrease in volume. So why not try threading? Instead of the traditional (and very painful-sounding) stapling method, where you basically staple your loose skin together, you can now put threads that are then anchored to other parts of your body to essentially hoist up whatever is sagging. So, you can tighten your face by anchoring the skin to your scalp, and you can even lift your ass by inserting threads and tying it into a knot. The threads are really sutures that dissolve in about 2 years, but the effects can last up to 5. Essentially, you'd be a life-size puppet.

Just beware that you don't laugh too hard or do too many squats, cos the threads can break. Then you'd end up with half an ass hanging out of your pants.

Heh. Aside from this very entertaining dinner, the rest of the weekend was spent playing softball and hanging out with pblossom and friends at km8. Not much eye candy on show, and please, guys, stop wearing the Speedos already! I'd much rather imagine what you have under there, than see most of what's actually available. And most of you could do with some smart augmentation, if you know what I mean... But do try the signature drink, the Sarong Fly. It's yummalicious!

Catching Up

Ok. I've been busy or, more accurately, busier than normal. Hence the lack of updates.

First: a shout out to Texas Gal. You know who you are. I didn't know you read this until Spider told me over lunch on Thursday, together with B. So, hope things are going smashingly well :) Come back and play ball some time ok?

Second, to Spider: Please stop cutting your own hair! The front's fine but the back could do with some help. So, go visit my hair stylist ok? Sabun Cabane @ Tanglin Mall, 62352910. Honestly, they're really good. Pricey but worth it. And while you're at it, get some colour too :) I'll go hold your hand if you want. Haha. Or, I'll cut your hair for you. That works for me.

Third: My phone's gone bonkers so that's why I'm not picking up most of my calls. I dropped it for the umpteenth time earlier this week so the phone's decided to throw a tantrum and go all mute on me. As a result I'm missing practically all of my calls unless I'm holding onto the phone with a deathgrip or within 3 feet of it.

Of course, there are some of you out that that I'm intentionally screening out. But you'll never know, will you?

Haha. Kidding lah.

Fourth: I spent a good amount of time over the past two weekends watching Laguna Beach on MTV. And man, I could empathise with a lot of what the show featured. Way too much in fact. It's a reality show following 8 main characters and a whole host of minors and it is just so high-school but totally real. Like, when the guy screws up and comes over to apologise, and the girl asks a tough question with an almost-smirk on her face: totally familar. Or, how the guy almost never makes eye contact with the girl while apologising or fessing up, choosing instead to stare into the distance: again, totally familar. And how people freeze each other out after fights: need I repeat myself a third time?

Which just goes to show how high-school my life has been over the past few months. (Sad, but true.) So, I'm cutting out all the drama and going with the flow from now on. I've had enough drama to last me for quite a while, thank you very much.

Okie dokie. Time to head out :) Have a good one, you guys.

Bored Bored Bored

There's about another hour of the workday left and I am F*CKING BORED. There's stuff to do (I have a presentation next Wednesday) but since I'm not in panic mode yet I feel no compulsion to start working on it.

Anyhow, here's a few more pics from last week's game. And for those who think we stand around doing nothing every week, check out the 2nd photo - that's from getting hit by a pitched ball, even with a helmet on.

30 minutes to go. Will this day never end???

Weekend Update!

So much for a nice quiet relaxing weekend at home. What was supposed to be a chill-out weekend with an emphasis on a healthy lifestyle turned out instead to be one of the more entertaining weekends in a while, and all of it on a spontaneous basis.

What was supposed to happen
1. Mountain biking on Saturday
2. Early morning run on Sunday
3. Mid-morning softball game on Sunday

What actually happened
I ended up meeting a friend for dinner on Saturday, after flaking off on the mountain biking. My excuse: improper tyres, greyish skies and a trail that was definitely not for a beginner like me. In the end, it turned out to be a great decision cos dinner led to a night out at Butter Factory.

Butter Factory's a pretty nice place but man, the drinks are WEAK. Rum and Coke? More like Coke and Coke. The only drink that was respectable was the green tea whiskey combination; the rest was just watered down. As for the music, even for a non-dancer like me, I have to say it was pretty good. I was planning to stay till midnight at the very latest but in the end we ended up staying till 4am. And yes, I was dancing without the influence of alcohol. Hahaha.

So I ended up only doing 1 of the 3 things I had planned to do and yes, we won the game. All in all, it was a great weekend. I made a couple of new friends (what is with me and guys in uniform?), crossed some stuff off my to-do list, played softball and got a tan. Whoohoo. This probably explains why I came into work this morning all bright and cheery instead of feeling the usual Monday blues.

*grin*

All Mapped Out

I just spent most of the afternoon mapping out the rest of 2006 in terms of work trips.

It is not a pretty sight.

1) 4th Friday of August: I have to be in Beijing for a day, so I'm thinking I might as well spend the weekend in Seoul and do some visits for the first few days of the next week.

2) 1st week of September: Beijing and Shanghai. (Did I mention I hate Shanghai?)

3) 2nd week of September: HK

4) 2nd week of October: India

5) 1st week of November: Sydney but thankfully this one's for fun.

And somewhere, somehow, I have to fit in a trip to London (most likely in the 3rd-4th week of October), study for my GMAT (yeah I finally got off my lazy ass and booked a slot) AND find time to take a dive trip. Shoot me, shoot me now. But hey, at least I'll get some miles out of all this.

So, anyone who wants to tag along on any of these trips is more than welcome. You get free accomodation and since I'll be out most of the time, you'll basically get the whole room to yourself.

And, this post is hilarious. Everyone should read it.

Have a good one :)

Finalmente

It's taken a LONG time but I've finally done it.

I've finally gone and pierced my ears. Haha. While most people get their ears pierced by the time they're 16, I waited until yesterday to get the job done. With the support of two good friends, I walked into the Wisma Atria shop (ear piercing in SG seems to be a monopoly because this is the first name that pops into everyone's heads), where the lady took one look at me and knew instantly that it was my first piercing. It could have been the petrified look on my face, or the fact that I was being frogmarched into the shop that gave it away.

And in the end, it wasn't even painful. Kinda of a letdown actually. I sat on the stool, the lady took out these 2 plastic cartridges that look almost like staplers, fiddled around with my earlobes and then there was a stapling sound. And that was it. I felt nothing at all. Geez. The only pain I felt was handing over 100 bucks for the earrings and some lotion. Who knew piercing your ears would be that expensive??

Anyway, once this piercing heals, I'm going back for more. Hahaha.

For the next 2 years, all presents should come in the form of earrings please. Bring them on, in all shapes and sizes (well, not too gaudy please). I have quite a few years to catch up on!

Akan datang: My next tattoo :D

Lunchtime Escapades

Today's lunch was one of the more interesting lunches I've had in a while, and it happened totally by chance.

My sister and I decided to check out the new food court at the Botanic Gardens so we headed over there at around 1315. Since almost everyone else in the Orchard area had the same idea, the place was packed and we had to share a table with these 3 fairly elderly dudes. Somehow or other we started chatting and to my surprise we actually got along really well. Sure, the topics we touched on weren't anything out of the ordinary, but someone from another table would have thought the 5 of us had known each other for ages, from the way we talked.

The probability of meeting any of these people again is practically nil, but at least for 1 hour today our lives intersected. It's these random moments of touching other people's lives that make my day because it helps to know that someone else is just a smile away.

As for the food, well, I think the food court's going through teething problems. The food quality's ok but waiting times tended to be on the long side. After a couple of weeks when the initial rush has settled down, things should improve.

Random Snippets

23 times over the last 7 days is over-doing it, don't you think???

(And don't bother trying to puzzle over what I just said.)

Quick update on the weekend:
1) Kudos to my sister, my cousin and Ms "May for a day" for completing the Shape Run in 67 minutes or under! Well done! I promise I will join you guys once softball is done. I will drag my lazy ass out to jog with you guys. (Notice I didn't say "run".)

2) We're done w/ the league for this year, but there's still the mini-tournament to be played. Made 2 outs and scored 1 run on Sunday, but my batting is appalling. I'm going to have to put in a lot more training for next year. 3 more games and the year will be done. Sigh.

And finally, this succint phrase:

"OWE $$ PAY $$"

Coldplay!

Went to the Coldplay concert last night and it was easily the best concert I've been to in a while. It sure beats the last concert I went to hands-down, but then again it might have been the company as well... Great music, great atmosphere, good crowd. The band played for almost 2 hours so it was pretty good value for money, unlike the Blackeyed Peas concert where they showed up almost 2 hours late and played for just slightly over an hour.

Amongst my favourites:
I was scared, I was scared
Tired and under prepared
But I wait for it
If you go, if you go
Leave me down here on my own
Then I'll wait for you

Everytime I hear this song I think of studying for the CFA. Hah.

Then there's this one:
Nobody said it was easy
It's such a shame for us to part
Nobody said it was easy
No one ever said it would be this hard
Oh take me back to the start

And finally: It took you long enough. I was surprised; I thought it'd have been one of the first things you would do. But then again, I'm a poor judge of character as these past few weeks have blatantly demonstrated. So, who's the angry one now? :P

Weekend Snippets And A Surprise

Another weekend spent doing nothing much, which takes up a surprising amount of energy. I've been yawning through the whole of today and coffee isn't helping much.

We won on Sunday, with a score of 4-2. Check out this series of photos for the highlight of the day: the tail-end of a double play with the runner on 3 getting tagged out at home.

2 more games to go before the league's done, and then another mini-tournament before I hang up my boots for the season.

In other news, I came out of a meeting today to find a surprise on my desk. One of our funds was the top-ranked in its category for 2005 and since I'm a member of that team I received not one but three plaques to commemorate the occasion. I guess I'm not that shitty as an analyst after all :) I'm going to leave one in the office, put one at home and... use the other one as a tray?

Coldplay tonight! Woohoo!

Shades of Ghost Recon

I don't know why* but lately I've been filled with the urge to take classes where I can either learn to kick someone's ass or shoot things. So I checked up on kickboxing classes and archery classes. Next up on my list is a visit to the Singapore Gun Club to get some hands-on experience with a firearm.

I wonder what the range** of a sniper rifle is... 500 metres as the crow flies? With the proper equipment I could take someone out from my office, just like Captain Scott Mitchell from Ghost Recon. A sniper rifle with telescopic sight, a silencer and some armor-piercing bullets should do the trick pretty nicely, I suppose.

"Mission accomplished, Sir!"

Hahaha. Kidding lah. Don't get all worked up. 'tis a good sign when I can joke about things; it's not like there's latent anger in me.

Though I wasn't kidding about the kickboxing (which I've always wanted to take up) or the archery (ditto) or the gun club, but all this will happen after softball ends in August. The boss-woman is thinking of organising a company day at the Gun Club. Heck, if we can't outperform the competition, we can just shoot the competition. Heh. Maybe that should be our new company motto from now on.

40 minutes more before the weekend begins! Tonight, it's boozing at Harry's followed by dinner and a movie; tomorrow it's dinner with family followed by boozing/hanging out at Altivo. And of course, Les Bleus vs the Azzuri on Sunday. Woohoo!

Oh, and I just got this in my email:
'A crazed anti-soccer fanatic has caused chaos in Berlin by chaining concrete-filled footballs*** to footpaths. Two fans suffered broken toes after attempting to imitate their World Cup heroes. "Whoever sees one of these balls chained up, please ignore your instincts to kick it," a police spokeswoman said.'

Hahahahaha. Happy Friday everyone! :D

* I lie, I do know why.
** Just checked it out, it can be more than 1 km though with a silencer it goes down to 300-400 metres. Amazing what kind of information you can get on Google nowadays.
*** I wonder how you fill footballs with concrete? I imagine this guy probably spent A LOT of time with needles and a whole bucketful of the grey stuff.

Calling All...

... divers and people who just want to laze on a beach for a week:

If you fit the bill and want to get away from 5th - 13th August, I'll be going to this place for a dive trip. We've still got space available (right now there's 4 of us) and if we can get a group of 8 to go it's cheaper for all involved. So, drop me a comment or email me if you want to go.

Here's a picture to sweeten the deal.

Come along... you know you want to :D

In other news, it's a slow day at work today. But I discovered that a little graciousness goes a long way when I held the lift for someone and asked her which floor she wanted. Then, as I exited the lift on my floor, she smiled and said goodbye to me. How nice :)

2 days and 3 to 4 hours to go before the weekend arrives! Hang in there folks!

Snippets on Friday

Happy Friday! Just some random snippets today...

First off, thanks to Mr Picky for this link. It's really fun! I've played for 30 minutes since getting into the office today. Hahaha. I haven't got past the damn dog but soon I will... At least now I have another game to play besides Sudoku.

Second, we now all have nicknames! Heh. There's Ms Busy, Mr Picky, Mr Deathwish, Mr GPS, Mr TALOS (figure that out yourself), Ms Educator (although that may change really soon since she doesn't like it) and Ms Kiam Kanna. No points for guessing which one I am.

Germany vs Argentina tonight! I hope the Argentines win.

Addendum: I just heard the funniest ringtone at Borders while shopping over lunch. Pity I can't download it onto my phone, which is yet another reason for me to get a new one!

And here's the JOTD, sent to me by my boss. (Yeah we're not doing much work today.)

In pharmacology, all drugs have two names, a trade name and generic name. For example, the trade name of Tylenol also has a generic name of Acetaminophen. Aleve is also called Naproxen. Amoxil is also called Amoxicillin and Advil is also called Ibuprofen.

Thought for the day: There is more money being spent on breast implants and Viagra today than on Alzheimer's research. This means that by 2040, there should be a large elderly population with perky boobs and huge erections and absolutely no recollection of what to do with them.

And, finally, to you: I miss you still.

Tagged...

... by Nat so here goes:

4 alcoholic beverages I enjoy from time to time:
1. White wine
2. Lychee/espresso martini
3. Negro Modelo
4. Alcohol-laced coffee or coffee-laced alcohol
(only four???)

4 fantastic destinations I would like to go on vacation before I pass out:
1. Greece
2. Hawaii
3. Tahiti
4. Alaska

4 celebrities I would like to go on a big date with:
1. Kevin Bacon
2. A-Rod/Derek Jeter
3. JC Ferrero (hehe)
4. Vincent Ng (if only to feel his abs)

4 gadgets I do not have, which I would like to have:
1. A mobile phone that works (Nokia please, if anyone wants to get it for me)
2. A digital SLR (Canon please, if anyone wants to get it for me)
3. An antique typewriter (because I really like the clickety-clack sound)
4. A waffle iron (because I really really like waffles and my sister hardly makes any for me - HINT HINT)

I'm supposed to tag 4 other people but since I can't think of 4 other people who haven't already been tagged, this stops here.

In other news, there's a Lamborghini on exhibit downstairs! *drool*
Me like. I'll take one in black, and one in yellow. Failing which, I'll take a Vespa. (What a downgrade!)

Tech Bites, Yet Again

I was all set to be a good girl last night and spend a few hours happily cataloguing and uploading my photos. Photos of recent trips, photos of S's wedding, photos of recent cooking escapades.

Then the gods of tech decided to throw a spanner into the works such that everytime I turned my scanner on, it either screwed up my USB ports or caused the whole computer to hang. The gods, they hate me. (And a sidenote: who's been f*cking up my scanner???)

So tonight, I'm going to try and not screw things up even further by reinstalling the driver. Hopefully it works. Stand by, my 2 resident techies (that means you, Mr Picky and you, Ms Busy); you'll be getting an SOS very shortly.

Weekend Update

'twas a fairly fun weekend with good food, good friends and alcohol in full flow, which is always a good combination.

Friday night: drinks at Que Pasa, dinner at an Okinawan restaurant at Tanglin Shopping Centre (my advice: try the pineapple beer, the noodles, the ox tongue and the miso stew), more drinks at Este (beng club that plays live Chinese music - definitely an experience) followed by more drinks and pool at Dbl O.

Saturday night: BBQ dinner at M&J's, followed by drinks at Suba. If you're looking for a place where you can lounge about and be heard without having to shout, Suba's probably it. The music was ok but the drinks could definitely be stronger. Many thanks to R for introducing a new game, no thanks to H for his very inventive forfeits. And that's all that will ever be said on that particular subject. Hah.

As for dinner, damn it was good. Cuban pork, grilled mushrooms, grilled beef, 3 fantastic desserts. Mmm-hmmm. Just thinking about the pork makes me hungry :)

The (main) downer of the weekend: what is up with this weather?!? It's been raining almost every weekend so all my games keep getting postponed. I've barely touched a softball this entire year. Sigh.

On another note, I've decided to start a new photo album here just so I can aggregate all the random clubbing photos. There's probably more floating around so maybe I'll get around to putting them up this weekend. Oh, and the food photos - I keep forgetting...

Have a great week, everyone!

Road Trip!

I really really want to do this.

Here's a picture to sweeten the deal:

So, who's in? I'm thinking sometime next summer, seeing as how reporting season for me is going to kick off again. Damn quarterly reporting.

Weekend Update

I spent most of my weekend being surrounded by incompetence.

Examples of incompetence:
1) Starting out 2.5 hours LATER than expected.
2) The route planner getting lost when everyone else did fine.
3) Not providing maps.
4) Providing a van as a safety vehicle for bikes AND not emptying out the van beforehand.

Having said that, I wouldn't mind doing some night cycling at some stage. That, and camping out at East Coast Park.

P.S.: Thanks for all the kind thoughts folks. As I said to Squeaky, if there's one positive thing I take away from the last couple of weeks, it's knowing that there are people out there who care about me. I'm almost back to normal - you'll know things are fine when I start making bitchy remarks again :)

Pow!

Everytime I see one of those walking mascots or life-sized cartoon characters, I feel like punching them in the gut. Not because I hate them or anything, but because they look so furry and round that it looks like it would be really fun, for me at least. Plus, they look like they've got so much padding that I think it can't hurt the guys in the suits.

Just thought I'd share this with you guys on a lazy Wednesday afternoon.

That, and the fact that I fucking hate working and want to quit my job.

Ring Ring

Tagged by pblossom so here goes:

01) What is the phone brand?
Nokia 3100

02) What are the last 3 digits of your mobile number?
457

03) What does the 2nd message in your inbox say?
Strangely enough, the 2nd message is from a wrong number and it's in Malay. It goes: "Ko a beng, ini grace. Ada kar ga jdinya? Untuk 2 org"

Translations would be appreciated.

04) Who's the first person who comes up under the letter M?
My auntie "Mai Kee"

05) Who's the last person you rang?
Home

06) Who was your last missed call from?
Berkeley pal

07) Who's the 2nd person who comes up under D?
Dad

08) What does the last message in your inbox say?
"Nothing. What are you doing tom night?"

09)Who comes up under J?
Jackie, Janet, Jason, Jasper, Jeannette, Jenny, Jieqi, Jill, Jimmy, Jimmy, Josephine, Jose, my sister's various numbers, Junning, Jurn, Justin and Jyh

10) Go to your Sent Items - what does the 10th message say?
Emptied it out already

11) Who's the 4th person who comes under S
Sean

12) Who's your network provider?
Singtel

13) How many messages are currently in your inbox?
11

14) What do you have as your background?
A blue gingerbread man

15) Who's the 2nd person who comes up under R?
Rachel

16) Who do you have on speed dial 3?
From 2 onwards: Mom's office, sis's HP, Dad's HP, Mom's HP, sis's home, BIL's HP, 8's empty and home

17) If you're on Pay as you Go, how much credit do you have?
NA

18) Who's the first person who comes up under C?
Carina

19) How many bars of signal do you currently have?
Full

20) What do you have as your main ringtone?
The ringing tone by Nokia

Back!

After a long long trip, I'm back at work and not really raring to go. Hah.

Nothing much to blog about about my two trips except that I spent a shitload of cash on shopping in the US. I'm (almost) all shopped out so aside from necessities and must-have stuff, it's going to be quiet on the shopping front for the next few months.

Ok, back to work. Amazing how much shit can pile up on your desk after 3 weeks away...

C is for Cabazon

First day of E3 today, but today's schedule was just chock full of workshops and meetings. The main exhibition starts tomorrow and that's when the booth babes come out in force. It's the male gamer's dream come true.

Teehee.

I indulged myself yesterday with a spot of outlet shopping. C was kind enough to lend me her car, so I drove out to Cabazon in the morning to shop shop shop till my credit cards couldn't take it. I would put up a detailed list of what I bought, but even I'm a little ashamed at how crazy I went. But, hey, in my defence, some of the stuff I bought were presents and I only go outlet shopping once in a long while.

Cabazon's great. Lots of shops, not too far out from LA, free parking... It's an outlet shopper's dream. The loot gets divided out on Saturday when I get home. Yippee :)

2 more days before I head home. I'm in two minds: I'm tired of travelling and living out of a suitcase but I most probably won't be in the US for a while after this. No more baseball, no more cable TV, no more shopping... Boohoo.

La-La Land

So, here I am in cold and overcast LA. Yup. Cold and overcast.

Today, we spent a whole day at Magic Mountain. In case you didn't know, Magic Mountain is an amusement park about 45 minutes north of LA. My friend scored us a 1-for-1 deal so it was great value, and since it's still early in the season it was crowded enough to have a lively atmosphere but not crowded enough to make the lines superlong. We did 5 rides and had lunch as well, and whiled away 7 hours just chatting and screaming and laughing and generally having a great time.

Then we came back for a home-cooked dinner. Yums. Thanks to C&J for a great day out, and to C for letting me crash at her place. Right now I'm stealing internet access from someone in the neighbourhood, so it's all good.

The only thing is, there seem to be a huge flock of rabid parrots in this neighbourhood. Last night they started squawking at 1am for almost an hour, and when I finally got to sleep I was woken up sometime around 4 am by a msg on my cell phone. I wish I had a BB gun. I'd shoot those damn things. Hopefully tonight will be much better!

Berkeley Revisited

Today, I headed over to Berkeley for a quick visit. It's fair to say that things haven't changed one bit.

Driving down University Avenue and seeing familiar sights like the pink Taiwan Fandian and Plearn Thai across the street, Videomaniacs (which I never thought would survive this long), the car wash that I used to visit, Au Coquelet and Crepes-A-Go-Go, it brought a smile back to my face. After parking the car near my old apartment complex (it's amazing what wonders are wrought by a fresh coat of paint) I headed over to campus for a stroll around. Aside from a bit of construction here and there, things were almost exactly as I had left them.

It's good to be back. Not just so that I can revisit old haunts, but also because I get to taste the food that I've been missing for almost 6 years. I started off my food tour at Durant Food Court, where the stalls were the same as before. At Kingpin Donuts I ordered a custard donut, specially for my mom because when she first came to Berkeley with me she ate one of those everyday. The guy behind the counter made me a special order when he learnt that I had come all the way from Singapore.

After walking around campus, I headed over to Sufficient Grounds for a club sandwich which I'm saving for breakfast tomorrow. Lunch was a Persian burger from Bongo Burger, which I savoured by the sea at the Berkeley Marina with a book in hand.

The only downer is, I still have a ton of things on my to-try-again list. Darn it. Next time I have to stay for at least a week. That, and become a cow with 4 stomachs so I can eat everything I want.

Back in the Bay

So, here I am back in San Francisco. Man, this place feels like my 2nd home even though it's been a while since I graduated.

Got into SF about half an hour ahead of schedule, on one of the crappier flights I've ever been on. There was a lot of turbulence and given that I had just watched the first 2 episodes of Lost the night before, you can safely assume I didn't have a great time. The one saving grace was that the movie selection this month is awesome, which is great since I'm going to be doing a lot of travelling in May.

At the immigration counter, the officer behind the desk was this old Chinese dude who asked me a couple of questions about myself. What was I doing here, how long was I staying, where did I work in Singapore... And when he found out the name of my company he asked me to name a couple of our funds. Turns out, the guy is an investor in two of the funds that I work on. Talk about a small world. Once I told him that, he became MUCH friendlier and with good cause since we've been giving him a great return over the last few years.

And, I decided to go all out and spoil myself so at the car rental counter I tried my luck and asked if they had a Jeep Wrangler. (There weren't any available on the web site when I made my reservation.) Turns out, they had one left in the system. Yeah so it's a white Jeep Wrangler but hey man, it's the car that's important, not the colour. So, I'm going to be cruising the streets of the Bay Area in a Wrangler for the next few days. Woohoo!

Anyhow, the plan for the next few days is just to drive around and revisit some of the old haunts. Shopping, eating, having a cuppa at Strada and breakfasting at Sufficient Grounds in Berkeley... mmm, this is the life. We should all be on holiday perpetually.

Oh, and I'll put up photos of the burger party I had over the long weekend when I get back. It was a pretty good turnout and most people liked the burgers and the ice-cold Sangria. Yay.

Highlight of the Day

Today's highlight: the office building's conducting some electrical exercises. So, that means we have to leave at 6pm on the dot! Whether we like it or not.

(Of course I like it. My colleague, not so much. He's a market spoiler, that one...)

Woohoo.

Of course, it's kinda sad that I'm so excited by the fact that I get to leave in 6 minutes' time. The idea of becoming a housewife (aside from the having kids part) is appealing to me more and more; everytime I'm home on leave or on MC, I grab the opportunity to cook something. Last night, I made a chicken quiche and a strawberry tart for dinner. The weekend before, I made 3 types of burgers in preparation for my upcoming burger party: garlic chicken stuffed with camembert and served with cranberry sauce, pork with oregano served with apple sauce, and beef stuffed with brie.

Yum.

Stingrays And Cuttlefish and Sandflies, Oh My!

Aside from blasted sandflies, I had a great time in Tioman over the long weekend.

The diving was great. Clear skies (though more sun would have been nice), calm waters, good visibility up to 30 feet underwater and good company. Best of all, the dive sites were teeming not with divers but with marine life.

We started the journey at 6am at Serangoon, and from there we took the Causeway into JB. It was the usual hassle of getting on and off the bus at various intervals, interspersed with a couple of traffic jams, and longish queues at the immigration checkpoints. After we finally made our way into M'sia, we headed to Mersing at breakneck speed - thankfully I slept through most of the journey, due to the fact that I only got home at 0430 on Friday morning, and had to wake up at 0515 to leave for the trip! From Mersing, we took a ferry over to Tioman that took another 2 hours, so it was about 1330 by the time we got to our little hut at Salang.

If you've ever been diving at Aur or Dayang, you'll know how uncivilised everything is. There's only 1 common eating area, and 1 strip of beach. There's a common dormitory and then some "private" huts for those who want their own rooms. At anytime there's clothes and dive gear hanging all over, so the place takes on the appearance of a refugee camp. All in all there's probably space for 30-40 people at any time. And once the sun goes down, everyone either hangs out at the common eating area or they go back to their rooms to sleep. There's nothing to do there if you're a non-diver.

Tioman's different. First of all, there's various 'resorts' all over the island, and there's even a hotel with a golf course. We stayed at Salang, and just there alone there were restaurants, pubs, shops and a mini-mart. And of course, the ubiquitous Ramly burger stalls. For RM 6 you can get a special burger: the works, with 2 beef/chicken patties wrapped in egg and topped with cheese, lettuce and 2 sauces which look like ketchup and mayonnaise. Mmm-hmmm. And the accomodation is much better too. We had a chalet all to ourselves, with room for 5 people, AC, a fridge and a TV. Outside the chalets there was a central garden with deck chairs for sunbathers to lounge in, which had to be shared with various monitor lizards, monkeys and cats that roamed the premises. I now know from first-hand experience that monitor lizards eat worms, and they use their front feet to dig for food.

Our first dive started at 3pm on Friday, at the house reef. For a house reef the quality of marine life was surprisingly good. We spotted a puffer fish lurking in an abandoned tire, a giant garoupa that was just under a metre long, a spotted moray eel, a Spanish dancer (a sea slug that has frills so when it floats in the water it looks like a dress), some nudibranches and of course, scores of fish and coral.

The second dive of the day (and also the second night dive of my diving career) also took place at the house reef at 7pm and it's amazing how different the site is at night. Armed with torches, we spotted some coral-banded cleaner shrimp, the same puffer fish still lurking around its tire, a very pretty blue starfish with 6 arms, some hermit crabs and a score of smaller shrimp hiding amongst the coral; you can tell where the shrimp are because their eyes are almost glowing. This night dive was a much better experience than my first night dive, where I didn't see shit and kept bumping into rocks.

The next day, the group did 3 more dives at various dive sites nearby. The more exotic things we saw were blue-spotted stingrays, a cuttlefish that kept changing colours on us and a huge moral eel that looked very dangerous. Aside from those there were the usual suspects of little Nemos in their anemone homes, sea urchins (my sister and I saw one shitting, which was kinda funny), sea slugs, damsel fish, angelfish... the list goes on.

But, the one bad thing about diving in M'sia is that sandflies tend to feast on your body. I now spot about 15 bites on my left arm, and another 12 bites on my left leg. After being kept awake all night last night by the itching, I saw my doctor today, who scoffed at the OTC medicated cream I had bought and proceeded to give me three types of pills AND another cream to apply.

I hate sandflies.

Anyhow, photos from the trip should be up soon and I'll probably take a shot of my bites as well. I've been told the scars last for a year! Crap.

Long Weekend!

Apologies folks for the lack of posts.

There's stuff going on, but nothing much to blog about, no BQOTDs or anything of that sort. I'm busy hanging out with friends and that's about it. Work-wise, well it's reporting season again (I absolutely detest quarterly reporting) so it's back to listening to results calls and updating my models. Having to do this every 3 months is a major PITA.

I have a couple of work trips coming up (gotta maintain my Elite Gold status, you know...) to LA and Shanghai. And somewhere before the end of June I should slot in trips to Korea and India as well. How fun. That's one of the best things about my job - the travel opportunities.

But, the best thing is, this weekend is a long weekend! And I'm going diving in Tioman. Yay. Time to veg out on a boat, catch some sun and get bitten by fish. Heh. Hopefully I will come back brown as toast.

Okie dokie. Back to work. Happy Easter everyone!

3 Cheers!

Today marks the first day of my mom driving herself to work, so for once I was actually early for work.

Well, ok so I was merely 5 minutes early, but the point is, I no longer have to wait for my mom to get ready for work. (Of course, the guys at the office don't have to know this since it's a convenient excuse whenever I'm late. Heh.)

Plus, I don't have to drive into the CBD to pick her up anymore so that's groovy. I hate having to drive into the CBD during rush-hour traffic when all I really want to do is go home. Picking my mom up used to be at least a 20 minute detour, and it cost me $1 everytime too, thanks to ERP.

So, thanks Mom for buying yourself a new car :)

Out of Action

One long long week just passed, and now there's another long long week ahead. Last week's was probably more preferable since it involved major partying; this week I am in HK attending a conference. *yawn*

Right now I'm sitting in my hotel room waiting for lunch to be delivered, and then I'm off for 3 meetings. I'm so tired of working - I just want a break to recharge and relax but I can't take off for at least a month. Crap.

On to happier things: recap of last week. Major sleep deprivation with 4 hours of sleep on Wednesday, 4 hours of sleep on Thursday and 4 hours of sleep on Friday. Add to the mix the fact that my boss and my future CEO were in town so things were fairly dicey on Friday morning when I was struggling to stay awake the whole day. And, half of Friday night was spent running around trying to deal with 2 drunk guys (Air Force people obviously can't hold their liquor!) which was very stressful at that time, but hilarious now that I think about it.

QOTD on Friday night at MoS has to be this:
"Oh I know Snoopy... Hi Snoopy!"

- said Drunk Guy#1, to his neighbour's dog.

Hopefully this week will be a quiet one. I'm just going to hole up in my hotel room and rest, and declare myself out of action for a bit. Man, whoever thought a work trip could actually be relaxing?

For A Laugh

This is too funny.

The answer to that proverbial question:

The egg, looking a bit pissed off, grabs the sheet, rolls over, and says, "Well, I guess we finally answered THAT question!!"'

Hehehe.

In other news, why do companies persist in releasing results in a pack!? They have had 2 freaking months to release results and 3 of my companies choose to do so within a 2-day timeframe. Man... This sucks. It'll be yet another late night at the office.

Weekend Update

Man, it's been a tiring week. And I've been carrying around a sore throat and a runny nose that just refuses to disappear. Of course, the fact that I partied most of the weekend didn't help either.

Quick recap:
Friday I cleared leave and ironically ended up waking up earlier than I normally do on a workday to send my granny for a doctor's appointment AT MY OFFICE BUILDING. Man... Then I spent the day in the sun helping out at our annual softball carnival, followed by an enjoyable night out watching a local play plus drinks in honour of St. Patrick's Day.

Saturday I helped out again at the carnival and met up with friends at Loof. Interesting place, would have been better if Odeon Towers wasn't just 3 storeys high. The crowd was a little bit atas for me but then again, my preferred hangout spot is the neighbourhood coffeeshop. We did meet a couple of new people who were pretty fun to hang out with, and the whole gang of us headed over to Double O after that.

By the time Sunday came around, I was too tired to do anything but sleep so I went to bed at 1700 and woke up this morning at 0730. 17 hours of Z's. Yay!

This week promises to be another hectic week, with overseas colleagues in town and at least 2 partying sessions before the bride goes off to Wellington for good. Sigh.

And, PJ's been suspiciously nice(r) to me recently. I wonder what's up...

*Yawn*

So, the big dinner came and went on Saturday night, and aside from one technical breakdown everything else went splendidly.

Saturday started bright and early with breakfast with the folks, and then I went to get my hair cut and a manicure while at it. It's a great idea for hair salons to provide nail services as well because sometimes you get people who are in the salon for a special occasion and what better way to save time than by getting your nails done as well. And, it makes you feel like some kind of bigshot to have 4 people clustered around you. Heh. I now sport a super short spiky do which I love, and will keep for quite a while.

After that, I went home to get ready for the dinner. Caught some sun, did a facial, pondered on which of my many many dresses to wear and then I went off to pick up the happy couple, along with another friend.

I'll skip over the dinner details, except to say that the speech went down well, and I managed to make the bride tear, which was my objective all along. So to those that gave their feedback, many thanks :)

After dinner a group of us headed over to New Asia Bar and here's where things got interesting. I met 2 new guys and exchanged phone numbers for about the first time in my life. (Yah, I know that's very loser-ish of me.) I mean, with strangers in a bar. Well, they weren't really strangers but more like friends of a friend. Anyhow I hung out with one of them till very early on Sunday morning, which was fun too.

I guess my aversion to meeting new people and socialising disappears when I meet the right kind of people, or people who are more on my wavelength. Either that or beer is a great leveller.

Anyhow, after a tiring weekend where I barely had any sleep, I had to take the morning off today. I called in and gave some excuse about having to send someone to the doctor, rescheduled one meeting and went back to bed. Woke up at 1230, which gave me a total of 14 hours' sleep over 3 days. Woohoo.

Another interesting thing: I chanced upon the blog of my 1st boyfriend, and after reading it I'm glad we broke up. We just weren't suited for each other and reading the blog now makes me wonder how we could have ever got together in the first place. Not that he's a bad person but he's become very religious. VERY. So not me...

Tick Tock...

It's Friday afternoon and I'm bored to bits.

There's stuff to do at work but it's not pressing stuff so I'm not really concentrating. I just can't wait for the work day to be over. Not that I have major plans tonight but still, anything beats trying to look like I'm working when all I really want to do is go home, curl up on my bed and read.

Tomorrow I'm off to cut my hair. Nothing cures heartbreak/sian-ness/boredom like getting a new hairdo :) The only gripe I have is that since I've had short hair for almost forever, save for one forgettable 9-month period in Cal when I decided to grow my hair, it's really difficult to change my style. Sometimes I toy with the idea of getting extensions just so I can change to a bob or something. Other times I toy with the idea of shaving it all off. And occasionally I think of getting a wig just for the hell of it.

Man, it's March already. Where did January and February go?? At this rate I'll have to start making preparations for my big 30 bash soon, which admittedly isn't for another 22 months but the way the months are flying past that day will creep up almost unnoticed. Egads, 30! It seems like only yesterday that I was still in JC, playing softball almost everyday and not having a clue as to what to study in university.

And yet, even though the days fly past, the minutes don't. It's still only 1550 and I still have another 2+ hours to go. Crap crap crap crap crap.

Back!

Sorry for the long absence. Work has been slightly crazy, and on the personal front there was a little upheaval over the weekend that should be sorted out soon.

Anyhow I've finally finished writing the speech, so hopefully it goes down well on Saturday. My main aim is to move the bride to tears, haha, so I'm going to use that as a yardstick.

Other than that, nothing much to update. Yesterday I realised my computer was left on overnight so before I left for work I checked email and immediately got 2 MSN msgs when I signed in, both asking if I was skipping work. I'm not sure if that means people miss me on MSN OR that they know I'm a malingerer. Hm...

It Was Good While It Lasted

Sigh.

For 2.5 weeks, I was able to relieve the tedium of work by chatting with friends. Now, that's gone or at least it seems to be since I cannot for the life of me get my Gmail chat to work anymore. I take my hats off to the tech guys in the US who seem to have managed to clamp down on it.

*sob*

Now I'll actually have to do real work again to pass the time. Damn you, evil tech guys.

Transit, Aussie Style

So, here I am in Sydney, waiting for my flight back to Singapore. (I'm hoping that this time around my luggage makes the flight... fingers crossed.)

The wedding's over, though there'll be a dinner in SG in 2 weeks' time. Speaking of which, since when was "timekeeper" synonymous with "wedding coordinator"? I thought my job for the SG wedding was just to tell people the time, but now it turns out that I'm supposed to morph into Crazy Bitch again and actually coordinate the entire thing. And here I was, thinking I'd done my job by showing up, wearing a yellow cheongsam and freezing my ass off, walking down the aisle with a long-haired Kiwi groomsman, and holding packets of tissue paper in case the bride started to tear.

And, I have to give a speech! Argh. It's so difficult to give a speech about someone who has always been a paragon of virtue and has no deep dark (read: funny) secrets to reveal to the world. The bride's brother did give me a gem of a quote so I'll have to incorporate it in somehow. Any ideas/stories are most welcome!

Photos from the wedding should start trickling in soon, once I get my act together. I just realised I was supposed to put up photos of my risotto and porkchop/pasta from last year. How characteristically efficient! (And somehow I'm being tasked to coordinate a wedding...)

Okie dokie. The monitor here is giving me a headache. Time to go enjoy a coffee and relax before the flight. Later 'dudes.

Oh and one more thing: PJ comes back tonight! YAY!

Hours to D-Day!

Quick update from Wellington: it's a couple of hours to go before the big day and I finally found myself an internet cafe.

So far we've been busy just doing stuff, and my luggage (along with 2 of the bride's luggages, one of which contained important stuff for the wedding) finally arrived more than 24 hours after I touched down. Apparently the Sydney airport is famous for not putting baggage on planes at the right times and apparently there was one instance when an entire flight had their luggage left behind. So anyway the luggage finally arrived after being left behind in Sydney and being delivered to the wrong address in Wellington, despite our repeated calls to make sure they had the address right. So much for efficiency...

But thankfully everything is here and nothing is missing, save for my combi-lock which I'll have to replace before I get back. The dresses are all ironed and ready to wear, and in a couple of hours (0545 to be exact) we'll all have to drag ourselves out of bed to get ready for a long long day. (Advice to all couples: just elope. I'll still give you an angpow. Probably a bigger one for saving us all the hassle!)

Okie dokie, time to head out... When I get more time, I'll blog about my pedicure/manicure experience. *shudder*

Off to NZ!

Flying off to NZ tonight to attend the wedding of one of my oldest friends. Woohoo. In the meanwhile I'm yawning every 5 minutes at work since I stayed up late last night to pack, and to make a crummy-looking present for her.

So, blogging will be sporadic while I'm in Maori-land. Hopefully internet access will be easily available since I do need to do some work while I'm out there. It just sucks that I have three companies reporting while I'm away so the timing could not be worse. (The only good thing is that both PJ and I are away at the same time...)

Hm. I just realised the keys on my keyboard are wearing out. Soon I'll be typing on blank keys, which is kinda cool when you think about it. There's actually a keyboard (great gift for geeks) being sold for like 85 bucks that comes without any markings whatsover. I will sell my blank keyboard for 20 bucks if anyone is interested. Haha.

Okie dokie. Time for lunch and then heading home to pack some more. Baa-baa land, here I come.

Weekend Update!

You know how you have these lists of things you want to do/achieve/experience before you die? Well, on Saturday night I crossed one item off my list. Hehe. No points for guessing what it was. Actually it's no big deal; I should have done it a long time ago in Berkeley but I probably didn't know the right pple. It was kinda a letdown though...

Other news over the weekend: Went to China One for drinks on Saturday night. We've (a new girl gang we've got going) decided that every Saturday night we will go to a new place to hang out. So, the first place was China One and it was pretty fun. Great live band, comfy beds, good snacky food. All in all, a nice place to just chill out and relax. Only thing is, for those dancers out there (thankfully I'm not one of them) there's no dance floor so too bad, too sad.

And, I went for the first training of the year and promptly got hit on the shoulder, but through no fault of mine. It was during fielding practice and I was playing 3rd as always. The coach was supposed to hit balls to the outfield but he hit a line drive straight at me instead. Thankfully I was paying attention and while I didn't manage to field the ball, I did manage to move my face out of the way. Now I have a nice bruise on my arm. Heh. If you look close enough you'll see the imprint of the seams. How cool is that?

Just Wasting Time

Hm. It's 0910 and I'm the first one in the office! Where is everyone? Is today a holiday I don't know about?? Anyhow, since no one is around I'll just start the day off with a spot of blogging. Heh.

Since my dad semi-retired he's been spending part of his day forwarding jokes to people on his email list. Yesterday's joke of the day was one of the better ones; my colleague was staring at me wondering why I suddenly burst out laughing. So here it is:

Stay away from these names if you speak...

Mandarin

• Nelson Tan aka 鸟生蛋
  
• Faye Chen aka 灰尘
  
• Anne Chin aka 安静
  
• Jane Tan aka 煎蛋

Hokkien

• Carl Chng aka Buttock
  
• Monica Chng aka Touching your buttock
  
• Pete Tsai aka Nose Droppings
  

Hehehe.

Another Side to Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day folks!

For those who think this is a commercial day meant to shore up the sinking revenues of florists, chocolate makers and Hallmark cards, here's a comic just for you.

This one's funny too.

Hehehe. And for those looking for some distraction from work, Comics.com is a great site for chewing up a couple of minutes a day.

So anyway, apparently in India there are 3 days in the year where you can be arrested from working. (This is according to one of my sources in India.) The 3 days are January 26 (Republic Day), August 15 (Independence Day) and October 2 (Gandhi's birthday). When I heard this I thought "That is so cool, I have to blog about it." But then just now, when I verified my facts with my colleague (cos you never know about your sources nowadays) he said "What nonsense". Which is kinda a downer but still worth wasting about 5 minutes of your time.

Teeheehee. Back to work!

I LOVE...

... GOOGLE!

The good folks at Google (despite bowing to the Chinese government on censorship issues) have integrated a chat function into Gmail. Now I can chat with my friends again! Yippee!! So all you folks who don't have a Gmail account, get one now! Then we can chat during work hours. Hehe.

Still zonked out from my India trip and the various activities over the weekend. 3 hotels in 3 nights, 2 internal flights and a combined 8 hours' worth of sleep over the weekend tends to do that to you, I guess. Unfortunately there's a pile of work to do but before I go, a spot of ranting:

If you have a question for someone, ask it directly! Don't keep asking me questions that I cannot answer. Don't bother telling me why you want to find out about a certain thing. Don't expect me to ask the other person, and have to explain to the other person why I'm asking. Just pick up your phone and ask the other person yourself. Geez. Stop using up my precious free msgs.

And FYI, explanations like "She wants to know so she can make plans with her family" piss me off even more cos if it's so important to her to know, she should go find out for herself. Grrr.

Weekend Update

Busy busy but very enjoyable weekend.

0930, Saturday: The day starts off bright and early with a spot of breakfast, and then my sister's CNY party.

1430, Saturday: After helping out with the food and the decor I head off to yet another CNY bash all the way up north in Woodlands. My friend's mom is a great cook! She makes the best kueh lapis and paper-wrapped chicken. Yum.

1645, Saturday: Back to my sis's for more feasting and gambling.

2100, Saturday: I head home to get ready for a hen night.

2230, Saturday: With the bride-to-be and Nat driving, we turn into a taxi service to pick up the rest of the girls.

2300, Saturday: The hen night at Double O begins! Things start out slow but as the pitchers of Screwdrivers get rolling so do we. The highlight of the night happens when 3 young guys, one of whom has nice abs (thus fulfilling the bride-to-be's wish), join our table and hang out for a while. We leave only when the lights come up around 4 am and head off for a spot of supper. (I'm slightly ashamed to say that one of the young guys paid for supper.)

0600, Sunday: I crawl into bed for some much-needed Zs.

0815, Sunday: Time to wake up for the family paintball tournament! In case you're wondering there are 2 paintball sites in SG - Orchid Country Club and the Discovery Centre. Paintball is fairly strenuous and the balls do hurt, especially if you're in close contact. We play for almost 3 hours, by which time everyone is groaning and panting from all the running around. To put things in perspective, here are snippets from some emails sent out (from different individuals) after the tournie:

1) "Walking with a limp now... strained my thigh muscle..."
2) "I had cramps to both my thighs walking from the carpark to the office. Best part, it happened in the lift with 2 strangers, tried so hard to not show the pain on my face and had to pretend I was simply stretching my upper body when I was holding on to the rails for support!"
3) "... the bruise has gotten bigger and rounder... can't turn my head either..."
4) "[she] is now on crutches."
5) "The muscles in the front of my thighs are so tight I can't even make it down the stairs of my house!"
6) "6 bruises... butt and thighs burning... BTW [our grandma] thinks we're mad."

And the best of the lot, from my dad:
7) "I must apologise to my team-mates for losing our games. The only evidence of my physical exertion is a slight stiffness in my left thigh. Since I cannot be fitter than the rest the obvious conclusion is I did not try hard enough.
Sorry folks. Will try harder next time."

Yeah yeah we're that unfit.

1400, Sunday: After paintball and lunch, I head home and use the excuse of charging my phone to get some shuteye.

1500, Sunday: With 45 minutes more sleep under my belt, I head down to Chinatown to pick up my bridesmaid dress and attend a softball meeting.

1915, Sunday: Dinner, with my uncle and grandma.

2100, Sunday: Quick drive out to Nat's to pick up a phone cable.

2145, Sunday: Quick drive over to my cousin's, to drop off some stuff and then over to PJ's.

0030, Sunday: Finally, sleep. After reading 1.5 annual reports, I throw in the towel and crawl into bed.

In the end, I had to take a half day on Monday just so that I could go home early and take a nap. *yawn*

Anyhow I'm off to India for a work trip tonight. Back on Saturday morning. Whoop-de-doo.

Addendum: Am blogging from the Silver Kris lounge in Changi and I just had the best chicken breast I've ever had. Black pepper chicken breast with mashed potatoes. Yum yum.

Happy New Year

Since it's the year of the Dog, I thought it most appropriate to put up this picture.

Greetings from Ziggy! Ziggy's one of two dogs in my car; the other is 小狗, the anatomically correct minature bull dog who came to me courtesy of Cheng. I never thought I'd be one of those people with lots of toys in their car but I have 4 and counting. (The other two are Murphy and Frodo, which is a pen holder in the shape of a purple gila monster.) Granted, they're not the typical stuffed toys but still...

Anyhow, it was with a heavy heart that I dragged myself off to work this morning. And when I realised how much work I have to do over the next 2 months, my heart sank further. Walking back to work after a pee-break, I suddenly realised I wouldn't mind being a housewife with kids. Yep, this is how bad things are at work right now, so much so that I actually wouldn't mind having kids.

CRAP-ola. If I could quit, I'd do so in a jiffy.

Win Some, Lose Some

A while back, I blogged about a certain bet and put up a really ugly picture on the sidebar. Well, the picture's gone and yes, I have lost the bet. But I'm keeping mum on when I lost the bet cos a girl doesn't tell, y'know? The upside is, at least I had a good time while losing the bet. Hahaha.

I now have another bet going on, and this one is a doozy. It's a fairly major thing to be betting on but I'm very confident I will win. Not that I would deliberately sabotage the rest of my life to win (how stupid is that?) but judging by the way things are working out in my life it's not going to happen anytime soon.

Other than that, work is really heating up. I'm already planning my third trip of the year and we've only gone through 3 weeks of 2006! The silver lining is, I'll get lots of free miles. Woohoo. I've already redeemed 75,000 miles for a quick trip to Maori-land for a wedding. BTW I never knew you still had to pay airport taxes if you redeem miles, and airport taxes are a pretty hefty part of the overall ticket fee. CAAS and Changi Airport must be making money hand over fist!

Okie dokie. Time to get back to writing up my notes. I need an assistant!

And Today's Weather Report...

... is a cold 2C in Seoul. It's kinda nice actually, it reminds of skiing in Whistler.

Anyway, from my hotel room window I can see people skating at a nearby park. The last time I saw something like this, I was in SF in 2002. Which brings up a whole lot of memories but we'll leave that for another day. (I'm saving up material for my bestseller, haha.)

How funny is this - I have to go all the way to Seoul to get onto MSN to chat with friends because
a) I have no internet access at home, and
b) access at work has been disabled for god-knows-how-long.
Right now I am chatting with 3 friends. It feels SO GOOD. Hahaha.

And The Year Begins

Just back from my first work trip of the year, and on Monday I will be off on my 2nd. Woohoo...

Anyhow, entries will be sporadic for the next week since
a) I won't be in town for most of the week, and;
b) I have no internet access at home! I feel so deprived, it sucks.

And, PJ actually picked me up from the airport yesterday. Which was really sweet considering that
a) he doesn't do pickups;
b) I didn't ask him to do it, and;
c) he was sick and on medication and he still bothered.

All together now... *awwww*

Whatever will happen in this on-going saga? (And trust me, it IS a saga.) Stay tuned...

Bye Bye '05...

... and happy 2006!

I commemorated the new year by spending it with friends, friends and more friends. NYE was spent at China One with an assortment of pals, and I actually got happy enough (not drunk, just happy) to climb up onto a bed and dance for a bit. Woohoo.

Then, the next day my primary and secondary school friends came over for a reunion with some of our teachers, which was really cool. It was great to see the teachers again and test their brain power to see if they remembered all our names.

Finally, last night the Cal gang came over for another reunion. The turnout was surprisingly good, and I got to see some faces that I hadn't seen for a while.

All in all, a great start to 2006. To bid a fond farewell to 2005, here's my year-in-review.

1) Weddings attended: not too many this year, just 2 that I can think of. (Although one was fairly important since it kinda catalysed the whole thing with PJ...)

2) Parties thrown: quite a few recently since the cooking bug suddenly bit me.

3) Mileage racked up in a year: not more than 13000, which is slightly less than 2004.
3a) Amount spent on Sam's petrol: $1858.64!!! Damn you, high oil prices...

4) Holidays taken: 2 - USA, Bintan. How pathetic is that?!?
4a) Work trips taken: India twice, Hong Kong twice times, Shanghai once, Beijing twice, Seoul, Brazil, US

5) Days out on sick leave (some real, most fake): Too few to count... Plus, now that the workload is getting heavier the price to pay for malingering is getting way too high.

6) Items bought on eBay: not that many actually, my addiction is getting better. But, now I've started shopping a lot more at retail outlets back home. Crap.
6a) Items bought on VSC: also down from last year :D

7) Boyfriends: zero/one depending on definitions. Hahaha.
7a) Flings: one/two depending on definitions. Hahaha.

8) Stayovers there: 5

That's it. All in all, 2005 is probably best described as "the year I worked a lot harder". Which explains the raise but doesn't explain why I'm still not promoted.

Happy Holidays!

Hello folks! Happy holidays to one and all.

I'm back at work after an extended period of clearing leave and boy does it suck to have to go back for work for the last 2 days of 2005. So, instead of working I'm sudoku-ing and blogging. Take that, evil corporate firm.

This holiday season has been eventful, to say the least, what with all the clubbing, parties and stayovers. (I am slightly ashamed to say that I woke up at 5pm on Christmas Day, and at 3 pm yesterday.) The best thing about this holiday is that lots of my friends are back in town so I've been busy meeting up with people I haven't seen in ages. Next on the agenda: NYE! So far it looks like it'll be a fairly quiet NYE celebration but you never know, things could start looking up.

Ok, time for a long long lunch. Man, time does pass slowly when you've got nothing to do... Tomorrow I'll do my wrapup of the year, and maybe blog a little about PJ if I feel like it.

For Pity's Sake...

This is for pblossom because I also pity you... Hehe.

Four jobs you've had in your life
1. Current slave job i.e. equity research analyst
2. Grader for one class in college
3. Accounts assistant for my mom
4. Intern w/ a financial services firm

So basically, I've only had one real job in my life!

Four movies you could watch over and over
1. A Room With A View
2. Any Indiana Jones movie
3. Dirty Dancing
4. Son of the Bride

Four cities you've lived in (longer than a year)
1. Singapore
2. Berkeley

I need to get out more...

Four TV shows you love to watch
1. The CSI franchise
2. Seinfeld
3. Star Trek: TNG
4. Scrubs

Four places you've been on vacation
1. Argentina
2. Maldives
3. Cape Town
4. Most of Western Europe on a whirlwind 3-wk backpacking trip

Four websites you visit daily
1. Hotmail/Gmail/Yahoo! Mail
2. Web Sudoku
3. NY Times
4. MLB

Four of your all-time favourite restaurants
1. Skates on the Bay
2. Vis-a-vis
3. Ruth's Chris
4. Ivin's

Four of your favourite foods
1. Chicken rice (no breast meat, with giblets)
2. Roti prata
3. Wanton mee (no chilli, preferably with ketchup sauce)
4. Potato chips

Four schools you've attended
1. UC Berkeley
2. Hwachong JC
3. RGS
4. NYPS

Four places I'd rather be right now
1. On a beach in the Maldives with an iced tea in one hand and a book in the other
2. At home, sleeping
3. Shopping at Gilroy
4. Whistler

Four things you find yourself saying
1. Man, I hate work
2. Wussup?
3. Piece of shit / dipshit
4. Various swear words while driving. Wait, who am I kidding? I cuss all the time!

There you go, pblossom. Cheer up, and see you real soon!

The Bet

Eagle-eyed readers will notice a new item on the sidebar, which is a fairly hideous attempt by yours truly to draw something like a temperature chart. Hey, give me some credit - I did this when I was supposed to be working, with only a Paint program.

If I find some sophisticated ticker tape software, or rather if someone finds it for me, I will get rid of this eyesore. But in the meantime you guys are stuck with it.

And what's the bet all about? You can get some idea here but suffice to say that IF the needle ever points to "CRAP", that will be the day when I will have lost all pride (and yet hopefully have some kind of glow. Hahahahaha.) And WHEN the needle points to "You owe me a meal", well you two know who you are, and it will be a well-deserved meal for depriving me of what could very well be "TLOML". Although even now I still can't say or read that phrase with a straight face, so I guess I'm pretty safe.

Let the countdown begin!

P.S.: Still wondering what the bet is all about? More informed readers should know where to go.

Friday Friday Friday

Who has the mood to work in December??

Certainly not me!

I've spent most of today either playing Sudoku on the web or shopping or doing anything else but working. The closest I came to doing anything that remotely resembled working was when I decided to clear out the piles of research on my desk, which I accomplished by simply carrying them to another table. Oh, and I took a quick nap as well. And I bought a dress during lunch time, just for the sheer hell of it. In fact, I worked more during lunch running someone else's errand than I did at work.

Hehehehehe. They don't pay me enough to do this shit. Or do they??

Anyhow, it's Friday again. Yippee. And since I'm clearing leave on Monday and Tuesday it will be a super duper long weekend for me. Anyone who wants to hang out on those two days, drop me a line. I still have 7 days of leave to clear this whole month, which means that I only need to work 7 more days in December. Woohoo.

I'm toying with the idea of popping over to the Maldives for a quick beach getaway - my tan is slowly fading and soon I will be pasty and pale. Again, if anyone wants in, drop me a line as well. Or if anyone wants to go anywhere else, drop me a line too.

Cheers folks. Off to start getting piss drunk to celebrate my turning 28. TWENTY EIGHT!

Another Year Goes By

Many thanks to those pple who either wished me a happy birthday or, better still, gave me a present.

This is probably one of the more subdued celebrations I've had, since most of my family is away. But I'm toying with the idea of a bash on Friday night. After all, what better way to spend your birthday than getting piss drunk?

And as for those of you who forgot, well, how dare you?! You all should be publicly flogged... :D

Addendum: OMG OMG OMG. I have just received the best fucking birthday present ever! Absolutely!

Brazilian Update

Just checking in from Buzios, a beach resort somewhere near Rio. We spent 3 hours on a bus with extremely poor suspension to get here and that, coupled with very bad roads, has led to an aching butt. At least I whiled away the 3 hours getting to know our newest hire, a fairly cute Argentine male. Plus, he studied in the US so he has a very nice American accent and we actually have things to talk about, besides company visits and work.

So anyhow, here we are in Buzios for the last 1.5 days of our trip. After these few days my body is almost 90% alcohol, fuelled by all the caipirinhas I've been having. If you lit a match within 5 metres of me I would spontaneously combust.

It's been a great trip, but bittersweet as well since I know this may very well be the last time I meet my colleagues. And I will miss this group, except for one glaring omission, if I really do leave. The worst thing is, I can't say anything to them because nothing has been decided yet.

Anyhow, it's way past my bedtime and we have an early start tomorrow. Yes, we're here to work, despite all the boozing and partying that goes on. But before I go, I just have to say, after these past few days, I hate that bitch more than ever. Fucking useless bimbo who talks a lot but has nothing of value to add.

Just Checking In

Hi folks! Just checking in from Sao Paulo.

I haven't had any time to walk around but my first impression is that Sao Paulo seems like any other American city. The standard of living is higher than I expected but then again, Sao Paulo is supposed to be the commercial capital of Brazil so things here shouldn't be an accurate reflection of the entire country.

I had lugged along my laptop and my Blackberry to Brazil and surprise surprise, neither of them work. There's no internet access available in the hotel rooms (even though there's a cable and all) and the stupid O2 network doesn't have any tie-ups in Latin America so the Blackberry is useless as well. Great, 4 kg of mechanical crap for nothing. And now, I have to pay (ok my company has to pay) almost 17USD for 30 minutes of internet access. Which, of course, I'm wasting on blogging but that's another story altogether.

Okie dokie... time to grab dinner. Back in a week!

A Long Hiatus

Hello folkies. I know it's been a long while since my last post and no, I haven't been away. I took most of last week off and then I fell ill on Sunday. So now it's Wednesday and I'm back in the office for the first time in 8 days.

Right now my inbox is updating itself and it still has about 50MB to download in about 50 minutes. So I thought I'd make use of the time to blog.

Last Saturday was my grandma's 90th birthday dinner. 90 years... wow. She had a great time, with family and friends gathered round to celebrate. Photos will be out soon, I promise.

Other than that the highlights of my week off were the two meals that I cooked. Pork chop with caviar pasta and mushroom risotto. Photos and recipes to follow, I promise.

Oooh. The meds are kicking in. I'm getting woooooozy. Back in a bit.

FRIDAY!

Joke of the day, courtesy of my dad:

The doctor said, "Joe, the good news is I can cure your headaches. The bad news is that it will require castration. You have a very rare condition which causes your testicles to press on your spine, and the pressure creates one hell of a headache. The only way to relieve the pressure is to remove the testicles."

The salesman shook his head, "You can't wear a size 34. A 34 underwear would press your testicles up against the base of your spine and give you one hell of a headache."

And, many congrats to the Chicago White Sox for a thoroughly dominating performance in the recently-concluded World Series. Game 3 was a gem.

No more baseball till March 06! What are CTG and I going to talk about now???

Cute Guys, Shrunken Heads and the Way of the Tao

1st fact of the day:

If you gather 3 women and 1 man in a room, make them listen to a conference call in which they have no interest and have nothing to say, and given that 2 of the women are fairly mature (read: older than me), inevitably the conversation topic of cute guys comes up.

Note: I'm fairly sure the above scenario can be expressed in a mathematical formula of some sort...

Yesterday's call was no different. While our other colleagues went on (and on and on and on) about Japanese banks, our cosy little foursome went on (and on and on and on) about cute guys.

The thing is, this conversation has been rehashed ad nauseum for the last few months. The names never change, the list of cute guys stay the same, the conclusions don't differ (i.e. no cute corporates/analysts in Singapore). So I have to wonder why they keep bringing up the topic. I think it's weird. And I pity the one single guy who has to listen to all this female bonding sometime-crap.

Onto topic #2:
The ancient headhunters of old stalked out unsuspecting passerbys in woody areas, killed and decapitated them, and shrunk their heads for good measure. All in broad daylight. Modern headhunters, on the other hand, merely call you up, make sure the line isn't recorded, and convince you to send in a resume and give them a few names as well, but all this is conducted in the most cloak-and-dagger way with code names, secret drop locations and private lines for phone calls. Ah well, at least they won't attempt to shrink heads... or do they?

And lastly:
The Way of the Tao. No, it's not some religious mumbo-jumbo; it's just my 2 patented looks. Zoolander had Blue Steel, I have my "fuck off and leave me alone" and my "go away" looks.

The first is reserved for when the company is of poor quality. Classic incident: At a recent party at Gotham Penthouse this weirdo kept hitting on three of us. He was weird, not cute and drunk, which makes for a lethal combination begging for a putdown. After a couple of minutes of silence he suddenly asked me: "Do you like hip hop?" to which I replied, "NO." Nice, short and simple with a "fuck off" look on my face. My other friends, being nice sweet girls, actually deigned to answer him with the result that they had to talk to him for the next 5 minutes while shooting me pleading looks to rescue them.

The second gets used more often. In fact, it's my default look. Put me in a large group in which I know less than 10% of the people and I clam up. If I don't know the people I don't have anything to say, and if I don't have anything to say I keep quiet. It's as simple as that. So, I'm not tao though I may occasionally be trying to act cool.

Okie dokie. Back to work. Thursday already! Woohoo!!

Of Flatworms and Nudibranches...

Hola folks!

Over the weekend, I went diving in the Riau Islands. Yes, there are actually dive sites in the Riau Islands, some of which are actually fairly good. I saw lots of nudibranches, a couple of sea slugs, 2 miniature crabs, flatworms, lots of clownfishes in their anemone homes, batfish, damselfish and angelfish. Conditions at this time of year can be fairly challenging; the best time of year to go would be in May or June.

One of the best things about going to the Riau Islands is that it's hassle-free. If you've ever gone on a dive trip to Malaysia (especially to Aur/Dayang/Tioman), you'll have experienced the horror of getting through 2 immigration checkpoints where you have to alight with all your gear, squeeze through the crowds to get your documents looked at and then endure a 3 hour bus ride and a 4 hour bumboat ride. Going to Batam is exactly the opposite. Everything's so convenient; even the immigration forms are printed out so you don't have to fill in a thing. And the whole journey takes under an hour.

Thanks to the dive trip, I am now salmon-pink, which is about 40% cooked in my book. Somehow I always forget that even if it's a cloudy day you can still get burnt.

Now I'm back at work (BOO!) and hating every minute. As I told CTG last Friday: "Work sucks. Work is for losers."

Welcome to loser-dom.

Lotsa Lotsa Snippets

Lots of little snippets to write about today.

1st (and this is for you FJ): We had a really long but yummy dinner yesterday and my sister and I got bored somewhere between the 5th and the 6th course. So my sister and I decided to msg our cousin in Australia. Here's how the conversation went:

June: Poooot. That was a stinky fart.
FJ: What the.... ?!
Me: I was telling her abt your "Burp... That was a beer burp" msg so she wanted to send you a stinky fart.
FJ: We are one cool family, really! (no idea if he was being sarcastic!)
June: Hi five! Oops... Miss (cos when we were younger we did this thing when we pretended we wanted to hi-five someone, and then pull our hand back or deliberately miss)
FJ: Me thinks you guys are drinking? I know I am! Ha!
Me: We aren't surprised to hear that. Cheers, mate!

2nd: What is up with people in SG and driving at roundabouts?? Do they not know the ABCs of roundabout driving?!? If you're exiting the roundabout immediately, stick to the leftmost lane, not the rightmost and then cut through everyone else's path. Go to the lane that corresponds to the exit that you're going to take, so if you're the 2nd exit, go to the 2nd lane from the left. Dipshits.

3rd: My new favourite word is.... "dipshit". Hahaha.

4th: Late one Saturday night, I was driving home and I saw a huge-ass snake on the road. Hella cool. It must have been at least 2 metres long.

The Fine Art of Time Wasting

I have just spent the last hour doing the following:

1) Found 8 map pieces of my neighbourhood on the web
2) Saved and printed the 8 pieces out
3) Cut them by hand to make one big map
4) Figured out the scale on the re-sized map
5) Measured out the distances of my various jogging routes (remember Geography classes and the threads? Once, I had to tear thread out from my pinafore for a Geography test when I realised I had forgotten the thread.)

So, I'm pleased to announced that on Monday evening, I jogged 5.05km, which is the furthest I have ever done. And last night, I jogged 4.4 km. Woohoo. Let's see how long I can keep this up...

Update: Jogged 5.88 km on Saturday night!

Procrastinating, As Usual

I should be working on 3 initiation notes but instead I'm chatting with my cousin in Australia. I hate writing these damn things; they're a waste of time and no one reads them anyway. Hopefully I'll get the drafts done by tomorrow and then I can take my own sweet time to write the formal ones.

Stupid new policy.

Anyway, I heard some funny shit on the radio today. First: what do you call a sheep with no legs? A cloud. Hahahahaha. Nice no-brainer of a joke. Second: on the morning show the topic was "What would you exchange your wife for?" with the condition that you couldn't exchange her for another human being. There were the usual answers regarding fast cars and peace of mind (haha very funny) but one guy stood out from the rest when he called in and said in a very plaintive tone: "Some good home-cooked food!"

Teehee. The longing in his voice was quite palpable. Poor schmuck.

Ok. Time to sleep so that I can have enough energy to "zo-bo" tomorrow. Nite nite!

Oh, and just one more thing. Next time, tag the batter just to make sure, dumbass. Quit your whining.

Miscellaneous Stuff

Just a few random thoughts that I've been meaning to blog about.

1) QOTD:
After meeting one of the big kahunas in the company, I mentioned to my dad that one of the topics the big kahuna and I had chatted about was about hiring people. The big kahuna said that his principle was to always hire people smarter than him, else you would just waste time managing people rather than letting them work and create value. Whereupon my dad said:

"No wonder I cannot find anyone to work for me."

Hahahahahah. My dad is such a joker.

2) My friend (you know who you are) just told me that she thinks I'm weird. I am the most normal person I know, so this statement has totally taken me by surprise. Am I really weird???

3) I don't know why but recently I've been smiling at strange kids. Just cos they look cute. Shoot me, shoot me now.

4) 1589 emails!

5)And finally...

Happy birthday to you
You were born in a zoo
You look like a monkey
And you smell like one too!

Happy birthday to my bestest sis!

4.75 Years = 15 Boxes

Always nice to be back, except when I get into the office only to find all my stuff in 15 boxes.

Fifteen unsorted boxes of assorted junk and valuable research materials/personal stuff. I spent the whole of yesterday sorting through the 15 boxes and trying to figure out what I wanted to keep and what I wanted to junk. In the end, I junked about 11 boxes which is great! I'd been meaning to clean up my desk anyway.

Now, I have to figure out some kind of high-tech filing system that will enable me to keep my desk fairly neat (yeah I know my limits). If anyone has tips, that would be greatly appreciated.

Okie dokie. Time to get started. *yawn*

Day 5: Scrabby Looks Forward To Going Home

One more day and it'll be home sweet home for me. I (almost) can't wait but tonight I'm going to take some time off and have a nice relaxing (and hopefully gossipy) dinner with some of my colleagues here in HK.

So yesterday was a fairly hellish day. We started off with an 0830 meeting and got there late because traffic in Shanghai was just horrible and even though the two hotels were 10 minutes apart it took us almost 40 minutes to get there. Then we had to rush to Hongqiao Airport to catch an internal flight to Beijing and thanks to the 40 minutes we spent sitting on the runway we were late getting into Beijing. We were supposed to have a 1430 meeting and the flight only landed at 1430. We had to cancel one meeting and then we had to scurry back to the airport to catch our flight to Hong Kong. The only saving grace was that we managed to get an earlier flight so we didn't end up getting into HK at 1am.

Which explains why I'm all zonked out now. But, the fact that I'm done with the meetings is enough to keep me going. That, and the fact that we'll have a nice dinner tonight and probably some karaoke as well.

See you guys soon!

Day 1: Scrabby Goes To Shanghai

Yo folks.

Here I am in Shanghai, barely a week after I just got back from HK. Once I get through this trip I'm hoping everything will be smooth sailing for the rest of the year. Not that there's much left of the year, but if I can make it through the killer schedule for this trip I can see myself getting through the rest of the year.

So, anyhow, on the flight up to Shanghai, I was flipping through the channels available and I happened upon something fairly interesting. Apparently in some part of rural England, there's an annual cheese rolling contest. What happens is, they roll a block of cheese down a rather steep slope, and then the competitors start running/slipping/rolling/falling down the slope. First person to get down the slope, which looks like it's about 100 meters in length at about a 45 degree incline, wins the cheese. They do this a couple of times and then everyone goes home happy, some bearing cheeses, some bearing head injuries/broken bones/sprained limbs. It's kinda bizzare to see people tumbling down a slope like dolls.

Another interesting snippet: in the breakfast menu for room service, the hotel offers "The New Yorker's Big Breakfast" and this is one huge meal. Get this. The breakfast offers OJ/milk, lamb cutlets, crispy bacon, sausage, poached egg with potatoes, toast with butter and preserves, coffee AND a 4oz grilled tenderloin of beef. Who in NY eats this for breakfast?!?! This is like breakfast, lunch AND dinner all rolled into one, for the princely sum of RMB180 which is approximately 22 USD. Maybe I should order this in preparation for tomorrow's schedule which doesn't seem to have lunch included...

Okie dokie. Time to sleep. Have a good week folks! Leave me comments so I'll still feel loved, even in Shanghai. Hahahahaha.

Back In The Office...

... and it actually feels good, after 3 full days of company visits around the sunny island set in the sea. It's been a busy 3 days but at least we did get some interesting ideas out of it.

I had been doing a good job at staying awake at all my meetings but today, at the last one, I just could not keep my eyes open. Not only did I not understand the company's business model, but the guy from the company talked in a super-soft voice that I could barely hear. In the end, my notes ended up barely legible, and in one sentence where I had meant to write "Motorola" I ended up writing "Quickie-Mart" instead.

Don't ask me why.

Time to head out. Hopefully I'll get to bed before 11pm tonight, instead of staying up late the past 3 nights reading annual reports.

Peas! Peas!

Just back from the Black Eyed Peas concert. All in all, pretty good except that they were on stage for just over an hour. And, they made us wait an hour for them to start. The three girls in front of us, none of whom could have been more than 10 years old, nearly had heart attacks from screaming "We want our Black Eyed Peas" the whole time.

I'm in such a bitchy mood today. I think Nat brings out the bitch in me - while hanging out at the concert she spotted this chick who was wearing an empire-waist top and asked: "Is she pregnant?"

To which I replied: "No, she's just fat."

And then there was the whole SMS conversation in the car with PJ where he wanted to know where we were.

Us: Mobil
PJ: Many Mobils
Us: The one that we just passed, right before the one that's coming up across the road.

Yeah it loses a lot in blogging but trust me, it was hilarious while we were in the car.

And, finally... is CTG a medium or a large???

Back!

How's this for cool? I'm on the Airport Express, on my way to HKIA to catch my flight home on Friday and my cellphone rings. Turns out, it's the help desk calling, and the guy on duty loops in two other people to solve my Blackberry problem. So, I'm in HK on a call with the US, Sweden AND the UK on my Singapore cellphone.

Of course, it would have been much cooler had they actually solved my problem. But, it's no biggie since the issue got resolved later that night. Plus, it's always a bonus to chat with CTG, even if there are 2 other persons on the line.

So I now have a Blackberry. As CTG put it, "Sweet. Welcome to addiction."

Today marks the first day of the Fortnight from Hell. 4 days of company visits, followed by just one day to prepare for another week of travelling and visits. Crap. And the next trip is going to be tough since I have to travel with a colleague that seems to be difficult to please. As far as I can tell, there's only one silver lining to my heavy travel schedule, which is that I get some much needed distance from (new character alert!) PJ.

Sometimes I wish there wasn't this much shit going on in my life, but then when I stop and think, life wouldn't be as much fun...

Right?

Day 5: Homeward Bound

Sitting in the HK office waiting for my colleagues to get their acts together so we can head to the airport and go home. Finally. One week of living out of a suitcase and trying to figure out how to look different every night with only 2 tops and 2 bottoms is becoming quite a challenge.

So. It's been a fairly interesting week. It's always great to meet up with my colleagues here and since this is my first trip to HK this year there was a lot to catch up on. And on the work front, I really need to sit down and think about what I want to do. A decision has to be made pretty soon and the longer I dither, the higher the opportunity cost gets. I've got some pretty good advice from the senior people here so hopefully I can get off my lazy ass and figure out what I really want to do in the next few years.

I'm not trying to fish for compliments here but sometimes I really wonder what the hell people see when they look at me. One of the higher-ups said that I was smart, I worked hard and I could probably get into a top business school and I just sat there projecting an air of serenity while inwardly I was simultaneously thinking he was smoking some serious shit and quaking at the thought that they might one day find out it's all fake and I just seriously lucked out at landing this job etc. And during meetings and such, I'm asking questions of people who are far more accomplished than I am, while wondering at the same time if I'm just asking rubbish questions. So either I'm learning by osmosis and not realising it or this is a house of cards that is going to tumble pretty soon.

Anyhow. These are not good thoughts to be having after finishing a week's worth of meetings but I just wanted to put it out there and not have to dwell on it. There's enough shit for me to be thinking about so I definitely don't want to add stuff to that list.

Okie dokie. Time to head out. Later dudes.

Day 4: Almost There...

Day 4 now, and I'm almost done with the conference. I just have 1 more meeting tomorrow, and then I'm free as a bird.

I have to say, one of the best things about coming to HK is that I get to eat at Pret A Manger. They make almost the best sandwiches that I've tasted (the best sandwich award has to go to Sufficient Grounds in Berkeley - the club sandwich on focaccia is to die for) and luckily there's a branch just 5 minutes away from the office here. For sheer variety and freshness, I don't think you can beat Pret. I'm just waiting for the day when they bring the chain to SG.

Last night, we had the big social event of the conference, with the highlight of the night being James Brown. It's kinda weird to see a 70+ year old dude on stage trying to groove... Definitely not one of the better performers I've seen. So I had a relatively mild night and crashed at 1am.

Ok. Time for lunch. Yumyum.

Day 3: Slightly Hungover...

It's day 3 of my HK trip and I'm already slightly hung over. And for that I blame the mojitos. I think I must have had 5 mojitos at least, and 3 beers, thanks to the open-bar policy at the party last night.

So this morning, I'm wandering around with a slight headache and feeling a little fragile. Thankfully I only have 3 meetings today, one of which I've already completed.

Tonight there's going to be another party, and this one promises to be even bigger than the one last night. I'm not sure how much more boozing I can take! And yes, I know I'm here to work, not play. Which is why I deserve some credit for taking off last night at the relatively early time of 2230.

*yawn*

Maybe I should just head back to my room and crash for 2 hours...

Day 1: HK

I'm sitting in my 18th floor hotel room waiting for the last meeting of the day to start. In the meantime I'm watching Cartoon Network and buffing my nails.

That's right, you heard it. Buffing my nails. They're all nice and shiny now... I feel like such a bimbo but my nails are so shiny now I keep staring at them as they catch and reflect the light from the table lamp.

Hahahahaha.

Other than that, the highlight of my day has to be hearing Bill Clinton speak in public. He's an excellent public speaker, and he covered a wide range of topics from North Korea to oil prices to China and India to clean energy to people who inspired him. And his comments on the people who have inspired him; truly touching. After hearing him speak, I just have to wonder how America could have gone from him to Dubya.

Okie dokie. Time to start preparing for my meeting. And stare at my nails a bit more. Later, dudes.

Greetings...

... from HK!

It's that time of year again when I make my annual pilgrimmage to HK to attend a weeklong conference. One week of schmoozing (yucks!) and boozing (yay!) - how fun (not). Anyhow, if anyone wants anything from HK, drop me an email.

There's one piece of good news at least... the TV set here is a standing model, so there won't be any crazy shelves to fall onto my feet. Although, I wouldn't rule out my walking into a door or something like that. I'm such a klutz when I get distracted...

Sleepy Sleepy Sleepy

Just back from taking a nap in the loo.

Yup, you heard it right the first time. I was taking a leaf out of FJ's book and napping in the restroom. I don't know why I've been so tired lately, even though I haven't been keeping very late nights. Whatever it is, I've been falling asleep in the office fairly often over the past few weeks.

And for some strange reason, Phil Collin's Separate Lives keeps playing in my head.

You have no right to ask me how I feel
You have no right to speak to me so kind

It's such a bitter, angst-y song. I love it.

Pblossom's Tag

Apparently, I've been tagged by this person. So here goes:

7 things that scare me
Cockroaches
Running meetings with my bosses around
Losing my family
Losing my mind
Having to depend on others when I get old
Losing the ability to communicate while my mind is still clear
Not knowing what's beyond the white light

7 things I like the most
Playing softball/tennis/basketball/volleyball
Tanning on a beach
Diving
Hanging out with family and friends
Driving on Highway 1
Living in the Bay Area
Reading/quiet time

7 important things in my room
My bed
My computer
My plush chairs
My baby pillow and bolster
My books
My art and craft junk
My clothes/makeup/shoes

7 random facts about me
I am freakishly untidy
I can sleep till 3pm on weekends
I have big hands and feet for someone of my height
I love buying new clothes/shoes but I hate wearing them
When I drive on my own I have mini concerts
I didn't realise I actually like eggplant until about 4 weeks ago
I hate papayas, cucumbers and corn. Eggplant was on this list up till about 4 weeks ago

7 things I plan to do before I die
Learn to ride a motorbike
Travel to Antartica amongst other places
Clean up my room and organise my closet
Work/live in another country
Learn a couple more languages
Sky dive/bungee jump
Build something with my bare hands

7 things I can do
Karaoke (especially Rene Liu and Sandy Lam songs)
Speed read
Remember people and numbers well
Play ball
Curse like a sailor
Drive fast
Bitch for hours and over-analyse things

7 things I can't do
Clean my room to save my life
Organise my closet to save my life
Slide while baserunning
Hit a home run
Roll my "R"s
Resist potato chips
Make the move on any guy

7 things I say the most
"Fucking signal, you fucker!" (when driving)
"Man, I hate work" (when bitching)
"I mean, like, what the fuck, man!" (when bitching)
"Nah bei" (mostly when driving)
"You suck" (mostly shouting at the TV screen when baseball is on)
"Hey, wussup?" (when catching up with friends)
"Damn, he's hot. I'd do him." (just in general)

7 celeb crushes
Kevin Bacon
Juan Carlos Ferrero
Edison Chen
Rodrigo Santoro
Vincent Ng
Carl Ng
Orlando Bloom but only as Legolas

7 people who have to do this
* Not that there are 7 people who read this... but hiyah, it's the last category
Des
Marie
June
FJ
Squeaky
Cheng
CTG? Hahahahaha

One Down, Four To Go

Almost at the end of a long work day in which I only really woke up and started working at 4pm. I spent most of the morning pretending to work while actually dozing. (It's times like this I wish I had long hair to cover my face.)

Which brings me to the best and worst things about working in an open plan office. Best things: collegial atmosphere, easy exchange of ideas, and ability to listen in on gossip. Worst things: almost impossible to sneak a nap unless you pretend to work, too much noise going on sometimes when you're on a conference call, and ability to listen in on very private conversations that you really really don't want to hear.

And it always seems like whenever there's a private conversation in which things start to get ugly, everything in the office quietens down so you can hear almost everything. At moments like those it just gets so obvious that everyone can hear what's going on and is just pretending to not be able to hear. Last week one such incident happened and I got so uncomfortable I started making unnecessary phone calls just to make some noise in the office; when my friend called on my handphone I could have wept with relief since it gave me an excuse to leave the office.

In other news, I rode my bike for the second time on Sunday. Woohoo. I'm still fucking slow but at least my neck didn't ache as badly as the first time. The posture's gonna take some getting used to though.

And, I made mooncakes on Sunday. For the lucky few, mooncakes will be delivered soon. For the not-so-lucky few, if you really really want then drop me a line.

Ok time to start packing up. Yet another work day goes down the drain... :D

TGIF!

Starting the weekend off with a joke from my dad. Since he semi-retired, he's been sending emails out everyday. My dad is now an amateur spammer.

Here goes:
A couple goes on vacation to a fishing resort. The husband likes to fish at the crack of dawn, the wife likes to read. One morning, the husband returns after several hours of fishing and decides to take a nap. Although not familiar with the lake, the wife decides to take the boat out. She motors out a short distance, anchors, and continues to read her book.

MORAL: Never argue with a woman who reads.

And, we may have started a new trend... Most of my friends now want to relive the Mambo experience all over again. Hehe.

*Yawn*

Man, I'm beat.

I'm almost too old to stay out till 0330 and still get to work on time in a semi-functional mode. But, I'm not old enough to not have a good time at Mambo. Surprisingly, we weren't the oldest people there - I think the award has to go to these 3 Japanese businessmen, in their suits and all.

And yeah, the synchronised dancing with the cheerleaders on the raised platform is hilarious. There was this one dude, in a white shirt, that just cracked me up. Not only did he have the moves down pat, but he had this smug grin on his face the WHOLE time, and in his spare time he was almost blowing kisses to girls in the crowd. I'd go back again just to see him. And the moves - cheesy but so so very funny at the same time. And the groupies who ape every move, but with such a bored look on their faces you kinda have to wonder why they're there.

As for the music, it's not so much 80s anymore as it is 70s, 80s AND 90s. But still, this beats the weird techno/trance music that barely has a beat. (Since I have no internal beat of my own I just can't dance to that.)

All in all, I had a good time. I'd do it again, maybe in a couple of months or so. So, pblossom, the next time you come back ditch your oh-so-cool friends and come along with me and my oh-so-very-not-cool friends. FJ, you too! You and pblossom can be cool together.

Addendum: (added at 1748)
I have done NO work at all, and my head hurts.

Retro Fever

Almost 10 years after JC and tonight, I'm off to revisit a part of my youth.

Mambo Jambo BABY!

Hahahahaha. Call it a very early-stage hen night, or call it an attempt to see if reality stacks up to memory; whatever the deal, there's no denying the power of 80s music.

Time to dig up what I used to wear in JC. Hahahahaha. If that doesn't deny me entry, I don't know what will.

Random Stuff

This entry of random items may be a reflection of my state of mind, or it may just be that I'm too lazy to write anything longer than a paragraph on each item.

Here goes:
1) The phrase "hit the ground running" is one that can never be applied to me, especially when referring to coming back to work. Instead of hitting the ground running whenever I go back to the office, I fall like a stone and hit the ground with a thump. I sit and stew for quite a bit, before gathering up enough strength to maybe flop onto the other side. Then it takes almost a day to get up any type of momentum to flop over again. By the time I get any momentum going it's time for either another work trip or a vacation.

2) We ended the season yesterday with another win so we're 12-0. Woohoo. Sad to think that for 2005, softball is over and done with. What am I to do with my Sundays now???

3) The older I get, the more intolerant I seem to become. Little things just bug me and I've become much less accomodating. Either I need new friends or I'm slowly morphing into spinster mode, neither of which is desirable.

4) Over the past few weeks some people have told me that I've lost weight. Which definitely isn't the case, according to the scale in my mom's room. And, it leads me to wonder: What kind of a fucking fat-ass was I previously?!?!

5) I love it when all my teams win on the same day. Sad to say, this hasn't happened very often this season.

6) I just finished reading "The Toyota Way". Everyone should quit their job and apply to work at Toyota; the company is that good.

7) While out clubbing on Saturday night, to celebrate a friend's birthday, another friend informed me that I give off a "Fuck off and leave me alone" vibe. So that explains why I'm still single...

Day 3: And The Rain Came Tumbling Down

In a flash, the weather's gone south. From clear blue skies on Tuesday, I woke up today to an overcast sky and as the day progressed the weather just got worse. Right now, looking outside from my vantage point 18 floors up, the streets are shiny and slick with rain, with fairly strong winds gusting about. If I listen hard enough I can hear the sound of the falling rain.

All in all, nice weather to sleep in to, except that I have one more full day of meetings to get through tomorrow, and then I get to fly back home. There's really nothing like going away, even if it's for just a few days, to make me realise that I do like being at home. Yeah so I bitch and moan and grumble about it, but I do like living on my sunny island set in the sea.

Having said that, I'd still like to get away for an extended period of time. Plans for leaving are still being internally debated in my head, whenever I have time to plot my escape (and hopefully triumphant return?) and hopefully I'll have some clarity on this issue before the year is out. All you guys in the US, if you want fairly cheap domestic help that can't really clean, likes to iron and can cook decent meals, I'm your gal!

Okie dokie. Early start tomorrow = early night tonight.

Later, dudes.

Day 2: Hunk Alert!

It seems that Korean men are getting cuter! Today, at lunch in a restaurant at Star Tower, I saw the cutest Korean guy ever. Tall, lean, chiselled cheekbones, nice hair (not the namby-pamby curly hairdos that just look gross)... Pity he was sitting with his girlfriend. But then again, it's not like I would have done anything about it. I was content to sit there and just admire a fine work of art.

And this wasn't an isolated incident. In general, it seems like the guys are looking better this time around. Maybe it's to do with the sectors that I'm covering on this trip, where the corporates are younger.

Anyhow, Day 2's done with 2 more days to go. I think I'm getting slightly better at running meetings, or at least meetings without my colleagues around. When my boss and my mentor are in meetings with me I just blank out and have no questions to ask. Basically I look like more idiotic than usual. Which probably explains why I'm still a lowly associate after all these years...

Day 1: Kimchi, Anyone?

A TV just fell on my foot. Fucking A (although I never did understand how that expression came about)...

Anyhow here I am in Seoul, and judging by what just happened you'd think I'm in some crummy hotel but I'm not. Great, now my finger's busted again. I busted it a week ago saving 2 wine bottles from breaking. Yeah, I know - bring on the alcoholic jokes. At least this time around I busted it saving a TV from breaking, which seems to be a slightly nobler cause. Woohoo, what a start to the trip. After this, the company visits just have to be good. Yippee.

Right now I'm partway up a hill overlooking some part of Seoul, facing westwards watching the sunset. It's actually kinda pretty. For those looking for travel ideas, August seems to be a pretty good time to visit, on the weather front.

On the flight up, I caught 3 movies: Madagascar, The Notebook and A Lot Like Love. All 3 were pretty good, with the latter two surprisingly so.

Madagascar
Animated film that works on both adult and kid levels. The guy sitting next to me must have thought I was slightly mad with all the chuckling noises coming from my seat. Worth watching again, in a couple of years or so.

The Notebook
Aw, it brought a tear to my eye. But seriously, when the movie first came out I'd written it off as another soppy/sappy love story but I take it back; it was actually enjoyable. Touching ending, which made for some uncomfortable sniffing moments during the lunch service.

A Lot Like Love
I like Amanda Peet, ever since I first saw her in the short-lived TV series "Jack and Jill". She's got this grin that's just infectious, plus she's really pretty to boot. And Ashton Kutcher, he kinda grows on you. So anyhow, this movie (did I miss it in SG?) was enjoyable too; I found myself rooting for the two to just get it on.

But having said all that, I still blame Hollywood for propogating unrealistic ideas about romance, love and THE ONE. No, not Keanu Reeves but THE SOULMATE. Ideas like eyes meeting across a room, or friends finding out that they actually are meant for each other, or some stranger suddenly sweeping someone off his/her feet. Yeah, like that really exists. Statistically it's just impossible to find the person you're meant to be with in the time that's alloted (i.e. before your expiry date). Plus, now that horizons are expanded it makes the pool almost an ocean and what's the chance of finding that one single drop in the ocean? Which, to my mind, explains why people are either getting married later (cos they're holding out for that one guy), or getting married and divorced and married and divorced again (cos they think they find the guy, find out they're wrong and ad nauseum).

If I sound bitter, it's cos the TV fell on my foot. Fucking A. Oooh, dinner time. Catch you later, dudes.

A Mishmash of Stuff

Yeah, it's been a while since I blogged. It's been a fairly crazy week what with results, work, staying out till late and fighting a flu all at the same time.

So anyhow, this entry is devoted to miscellaneous stuff:
1) 1225 emails and counting! I have enough material to write a book.

2) "Jackson Raine"

3) Work blows. But then again, what's new about that?

4) Apparently, echinacea helps boost your immune system. My boss recommended it to me after seeing how I fall sick regularly during results season.

5) I'm off for a work trip next week, to the land of kimchi and soju. Back in the wee hours of Friday morning, if any kind souls want to pick me up...

Happy Friday everyone!

3.3...

... million dollars.

THREE POINT THREE MILLION DOLLARS.

That's how much I made for my company today. Holy shit, dudes. That's the type of money I'll never see in my life, and yet today I had a hand in making that amount for my company.

And, if I don't see a cut of this in my year-end bonus, you can bet 3.3mn dollars that I will be raising a stink about it.

HOLY SHIT!!

And hell yeah, staying up till 4am was worth it.

Procrastination

When will I ever learn?

Procrastination is bad. Very bad.

It's almost 4am and I just finished working on something that I should have done over the weekend. And, if the deadline hadn't been moved up by a day I doubt I'd have done anything about it tonight. Somehow, I need to get into a near-state of panic before I actually buckle down and do some serious work.

Oh well, at least I had CTG for company most of the night. Exchanging emails does help relieve the tedium of working on a model and writing research notes in the wee hours of the morning.

Time to sleep!

Wanted!

A holiday companion for the long weekend of Aug 5-9.

Requirements
Before applying, please ensure that you fulfill the following requirements:

New Toy!

Today I added this beauty to my growing arsenal of gadgets.

to go with my existing

In other news, if you're looking to eat porridge (and not the mid-end porridge at Crystal Jade outlets) at or around the Paragon, you're in luck. My 2-day quest to find porridge or congee ended today at the Orchard Emerald food court. (Don't bother going to Scotts, PUB or the Kopitiam at the Youth Park for congee; it's non-existent.) Fairly yummy, lots of seats, and they have a dessert stall as well. The only weird thing about that food court is that everytime I go there they're showing Tom & Jerry cartoons.

Wussup with that?

And finally, today's non-bitchy QOTD:
"Peeing out of my ass."

(If you want to know why, email me or leave a comment.)

Call Me A Leopard

First day back at work and I'm bored AND sleepy. Some things never change, I guess...

Since I got a haircut on Saturday, I now sport a super-short crew cut with a longish fringe that I can push to either side, so now I look like an effeminate boy. I love getting my hair cut; I always leave the salon with a smile on my face. If it didn't cost so much, and if I didn't have this need to continually change my hair style (and since it's almost always short this tends to be difficult to do), I'd cut my hair every 3 weeks instead of every 2 months.

Otherwise there's really nothing much to blog about. I could have blogged about my new bike (I bought a bike the Sunday before I left for my work trip), a road bike that's mainly yellow in colour and seems to be pretty fun. I say "seems" because I only had 10 minutes to play with it before I had to leave for the airport. I'd been looking forward to playing with it when I got back but thanks to some strange Indian flu bug I was under house arrest for most of the weekend. So that scuttled my bike-riding plans.

That, and the strange weather we've been having. What is up with all this rain?! It's July man, it's supposed to be super duper hot. Instead, it's been raining almost every other day. How weird.

3 more hours. 3 more hours. 3 more hours...

Day 2

Free broadband rocks! Aside from that, it's been a long long day with 6 meetings and almost 4 hours in total spent travelling within Mumbai alone.

The lack of infrastructure is one of the key drags on India's growth. All over the place, traffic is just horrendous. For some industries, transport costs takes away half of the profit, and this is just transporting within the country. (Yet somehow, they still remain competitive, which is testament to the strength of the private sector in this country.)

Tomorrow is another long day...

Greetings from India!

Hello folks. I'm blogging from India with free broadband access, thanks to the very very swanky Grand Hyatt in Mumbai.

Day 1 is done; 3 more days of pure pure torture to go. I hate work trips.

My Cousin The Genius

Hooray to my cousin for completing my ABCs.

U for Uber Pils which he tells me is a German beer
X for X.O.

I can't believe I forgot X.O. but I bow down to his extensive (and probably first-hand) knowledge of alcohol and alcohol-related drinks.

But instead of "U" as in "U are an alcoholic" as he suggested, I humbly proffer "W":

W for We are alcoholics

My Hero...

... is Davinder Singh, for the moment at least.

Just read the transcripts in today's Straits Times. That man is good.

Lesson of the day: Don't bring defamation suits against people/newspapers when what they have written are facts. You just end up looking really really silly.

Weekend Update and BQOTD

Where did the weekend go?????? It seems like barely hours ago that I was packing up to leave on Friday and now I'm back in the office again, for yet another work week.

Couple of things to blog about:
1) So it turns out that the bet is indeed on me. I have 3 months to lose 3 kg, assuming The Bitch doesn't lose any more.

2) We're 6-0 for the season; the 2nd round of the tournament started yesterday. And for the first time in a very very very long time, I punched the ball past the pitcher (for a single) instead of pulling it down the 3rd-base line.

3) CTG seems to have disappeared off the face of the earth. Boohoo.

And for today's BQOTD...

The difference in weight right now between myself and The Bitch (I actually have another name for her but it's really quite bad) is 3 kg. Over a beer on Friday night with Nat, this is what I said.

"She's slightly taller than me and 3 kg lighter. The difference is, her head is empty."

ABCs

Hanging around waiting to go home, so I thought I'd come up with a new way to look at the alphabet.

A for Ale
B for Beer
C for Champagne
D for Daiquiri
E for Eggnog
F for Frangelico
G for Gin
H for Heineken
I for Irish Cream
J for Jagermeister
K for Kahlua
L for Limoncello
M for Moonshine
N for Neat
O for Ouzo
P for Port
Q for 青岛
R for Rum
S for Sex on the Beach
T for Tequila
U for
V for Vodka
W for Whiskey
X for
Y for Yellow Chartreuse
Z for Zinfandel

No points for guessing what's on my mind... Anyone can help with "U" and "X"?

Blackberry!

I'm getting a Blackberry!

I'm not sure whether to be elated or upset. On the one hand this means that I'll be in constant contact with any person who wants to know about my stocks/sectors. Imagine having to work while on a holiday. But on the other hand, this means constant emails with CTG! (assuming that he still emails...)

It's Thursday! One more day to go before a very very long work week comes to a close. I need a nice cold beer.

Not That I'm Trying to Kissass...

... but my boss is seriously one of the nicest people I have ever met and in my (albeit very limited) experience, one of the best bosses that I could ever have.

Not only does she look out for her subordinates, but she also cares about them as real people in terms of their personal development. She doesn't evaluate us solely in terms of what we can add to the company. It's good to know that she's got my back, both professionally and personally.

Which makes it harder to leave, should I decide to... But it's something that I need to seriously sit down and think about. If I'm going to leave it should be sooner rather than later.

Eurythmics

CTG and I are dating!!!

In my dreams, at least... Good things do happen, if not in reality, then at least in some metaphysical plane.

Sweet dreams are made of this
Who am I to disagree

My (kinda) New Toy

Armed with my trusty new scanner that has the ability to scan negatives and slides as well, I've been spending the past few nights scanning away. Well okay, it's not that new - I bought it a couple of months back and it took me 3 weeks to get it out of the box, and even then I wouldn't have taken it out of the box had it not been for my cousin, who needed me to scan some documents for him. That's just the way I am; this explains why I have a closet full of new clothes but I persist in wearing my old ones. Because the new clothes are NEW and if I wear them then they won't be NEW anymore.

But the point is, I now have a scanner which I have begun to use in a serious manner, and along with the scanning I've started Photoshopping my photos as well. Nothing fancy; just some adjusting of levels, color balances, brightness and contrast.

The scanning is a pain in the ass though, since it takes almost 25 minutes to scan one negative strip of 6 photos. I started off scanning at 600 dpi, which took about 35 minutes and left me with photos that are 24MB in size; I've since cut it down to 400 dpi with photos that are 11MB in size. Yeah I know it's large, but these are the raw photos which I then burn onto CDs for safekeeping. The scanning takes so long and sucks up so much of my computer memory that it's almost impossible to do anything else except play some Spider Solitaire or read blogs while I wait. I even came up with a song while waiting (click below for the lyrics)...

So, expect to see more photos soon. E.g. the Mauritius trip that I took a year ago.

I feel so... enabled, technology-wise. Welcome to the 21st century. Now, if I can just photoshop away my tummy, that would be perfect...

The Scanning Song:

Scanning photos is no fun
Scan from dawn till the set of sun
Scan from day, scan till night
Yet I still can't get it right

More stanzas to follow once I get more inspiration from more scanning!

More Miscellaneous Stuff

More random stuff:

1) We're 4-0 for the season, regardless of my efforts otherwise. I suck. I'm getting worse with age. Meanwhile someone else's team is 0-8. Hahahahahahaha. I'd say more but I doubt he's reading. That, and the karmic factor that probably explains all my horrible errors.

2) The Mystery of the Embarassing Email (sounds like the title of a Three Investigators book) is solved. The one major failing of a Blackberry is that if your mailbox is full, you'll still be able to receive emails on the BB BUT you won't be able to send any out. And, you won't know that your emails aren't getting sent out.

3) Blogging at work is a useful way to make it seem like you're actually working. All that frantic typing does wonders for 'productivity'.

4) Kudos to my sister for saving me 400 bucks and stopping me from buying yet another dress to add to my overflowing closet.

5) 834 emails!!!

Miscellaneous Stuff

Just some random stuff that doesn't fit neatly into an entry:

1) I did NOT tiptoe. I am taller than you, Cheng.

2) I am in love... with this dress.

3) There's a temp girl (ok, woman) in the office and she has the same name as me so I feel really weird calling her by her name since it's also my name. Plus it's causing a whole lot of confusion when she answers the phone.

4) 2 weddings in 2 days has caused my wallet to slim down dramatically. Boohoo.

A Minor Confession

When I was 12 or so, I had to read "The Hobbit" for school. It was a great read and consequently I dragged my mom out to Times The Bookshop in Centrepoint to buy the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy.

I never got past the 1st 2 chapters of Book 1. Thanks to all that description with no action, and the long sentences, crammed with adjectives, that never seemed to end, I nodded off everytime I opened the book. Plus, the fact that most of the time it was on hot afternoons that I tried to read, lying on my bed.

Years later, the movies came out one by one by one. It wasn't until I watched all three that I decided to give the books one more try. So, I picked them out from my bookshelf where they'd been languishing for more than a decade, and started reading.

It is SO MUCH EASIER to finish something when you already know the story.

Next up: "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy"

The Suaku Singaporean Reports: #8

The Suaku Singaporean is back after 3 weeks, 2 of which were spent on work and the last on play, 22000 miles in the air, 3 rolls of film, a 17-hour nonstop flight and A LOT of shopping.

Let me first say that the nonstop flight by SIA is fantastic. With a 2-3-2 configuration in Executive Economy class, the seats are roomy enough for me to actually lie on my side and sleep. And the generous recline and footrest makes it really comfortable. If you find it tedious to be stuck in a seat for 17 hours there's a section in the back with snacks and drinks laid out where you can walk about and stretch your legs. And then there's the movie selection, which enabled me to catch all the movies that I've missed. On the flight out I watched 3 movies (In Good Company and 2 others); coming back I watched 4 (Hitch, Spanglish, The Pacifier and Closer).

While on vaction, I drove about 1500 miles over 8 days in California and covered much of the coastline in my trusty rental Ford Focus. The scenery in Northern California and Southern California is very much different; NorCal is greener and more rugged, SoCal is browner with rolling hills. Amongst the cities that I visited, I'd rank SF first, SD second and LA a distant third. I just don't like how LA sprawls across the region and the freeways are just a mess.

It's been a fun-filled time for me. A lot of alone time spent travelling on the freeways and when I got to my various destinations it was great to catch up with friends, some of whom I hadn't met in ages. I also managed to make some new ones while I was there. Best of all I got to meet up with my college roommate. It's strange how we were only roommates for about 3 months, but we're still quite close despite that the fact that she lives in LA and I live here. She was such a hospitable host when I was in LA, so I look forward to returning the favour if she makes the trip down to SG.

Most of all though, I think this trip has served to reinforce my desire to get out of SG and go to the US. I'm sad to think that I'd have to leave my job (which I have to admit is cushy, plus I do like my team members) but I just have this fear that one day I will realise that I am 35/40/(insert age here) and have done nothing with my life. And while I have the flexibility to move around, I should do so before circumstances force me to be otherwise. Plus, I do miss living in the US and while I realise that grad school/working life will be vastly different from the very sheltered undergrad life that I experienced, I'd like to know that I can make it in a new city without a social support structure. I already know I can travel on my own; now it's time to find out if I can live on my own.

So if things go well, I'll be out of here by mid 06. Stay tuned...

The Suaku Singaporean Reports: #7

Today was one of the best days yet!

The day started out with dimsum with my college roommate, and then we headed off to pick up the rest of the posse to go outlet shopping. We went to the Desert Hills Premium Outlets in Cabazon, which is just about 20 minutes away from Palm Springs so it was a LONG drive. The selection at the outlet was extensive with over 200 stores.

But the funniest thing was, along the way we started talking about Taco Bell. I have this thing about Taco Bell; I love the chalupa. (If you live in the US of A and you haven't tasted a chalupa, you're missing out man!) So we decided that we'd all get a chalupa but somehow along the way there just wasn't a Taco Bell in sight. So we decided to go shopping first but then at around 2pm we got hungry so we hopped back into the car and headed back towards LA to search for the elusive Taco Bell.

In the end, we had to call someone in LA and make the poor guy search for Taco Bell locations near to where we were, and we found out that there was actually supposed to be one on that very street we were on. We drove up and down Ramsey twice before finally spotting a vacant storefront that USED to be a Taco Bell. That whole detour took up like 30 minutes of precious shopping time and we ended up not eating anything and heading straight back to shop.

After shopping for another couple of hours we headed back towards LA and finally saw a Taco Bell about 30 minutes into the drive. I'm so happy I got to eat my chalupa at last; it's so good I'm going to try and have it for breakfast tomorrow!

After that we headed over to have dinner with my college roommate's parents. Needless to say we were pretty full but there was a TON of food on the table. 8 dishes for 6 people. Wah...

Sadly, tomorrow is my last day in the US of A for a while. The plan is to drive around Pasadena, find the last few presents on my list and chill out a bit. This whole vacation has been so much fun. I can't even begin to contemplate the horror of actually having to work on Monday.

F*ck.

The Suaku Singaporean Reports: #6

Just back from my trip to San Diego.

San Diego is about 2 hours south of Los Angeles, depending on which highway you take. From where I'm staying I started off going west on 210 and then turning south onto Highway 15. After a while I got bored of the 15 (it's inland and the scenery gets dreary) so I got onto Highway 74 to get to the 5 which goes by the coast. Highway 74 is a nice winding drive that goes over some mountain ridges and has really nice views at the top.

When I got to San Diego I took a quick look at Old Town and then headed to La Jolla to hang out with a college friend. She took me to see UCSD (Berkeley's nicer! Haha!) and then we drove around the rich area gawking at houses. They are swanky with a capital "S". And they're all ocean-facing so the view is fantastic. From there we headed to the beach to check out surfer dudes and then over to La Jolla Cove and the downtown area to just walk and talk. Dinner was at a Greek diner right by her place; the food was delicious and so affordable. I had a Gyros Jr. Pita which cost US$3.99 and it was one of the best meals I've had so far. (Maybe I should have ordered 2!)

After that I headed back to LA on the 5 and made it back in an hour and a half, passing by Angel Stadium on the way. I was going to catch a ton of baseball on this trip but baseball's not that much fun on my own so I'm leaving it for my next trip. Which means the next time I come to California I have to watch the Athletics, the Angels, the Dodgers AND the Padres, on top of watching the Giants. Woohoo.

Today SD; tomorrow outlet shopping. YAY!

The Suaku Singaporean Reports: #5

Without a doubt, Highway 1 is one of the best drives I've ever been on.

I started off on Monday morning at 1030, leaving SF behind me and taking Highway 92 to get to the coast. Half Moon Bay was the first stop on my coastal drive. From there, I stopped at random turnouts and vista points to take photos of the amazing scenery, and just to get some fresh air. There's really nothing like driving with the windows down and Alice 97.3 blasting on the radio.

Lunchtime was spent in Carmel-by-the-Sea, which is a really quaint little town. The main street heads down to the coast from Highway 1, passing by little shops and very pretty houses and ending up at a wide expanse of sand. I spent an hour sitting on the beach people watching and getting some sun. Then I headed back up to the trusty little red Ford Focus, got a sandwich from the deli and headed off.

Along the way, I passed through Big Sur, San Simeon and San Luis Obispo, the latter of which was made famous by the movie "Sideways". There's tons of campgrounds and state parks/beaches along Highway 1, so next time I'm going to take more time to go camping. I spent the night in Pismo Beach where I saw a Motel 6 for US$39.99 a night which is hella cheap! I spent the evening watching people surfing near the Pismo Beach pier and catching the sunset.

It's been an experience doing a road trip on my own. The good thing about travelling on Memorial Day is that there's lots of travellers on the road as well so I never felt lonely. Plus, the drive itself was so scenic and challenging that I didn't have time to even need any social interaction. I probably only spoke like 10 words on Monday: "Do you have rooms available?" and "Do you guys want a photo?" (the last said to a couple travelling down Highway 1 as well). The only part where I felt a little sad was when I lost the signal for Alice 97.3 somewhere past Big Sur, driving home the point that I had finally left San Francisco, the Bay Area and Northern California behind.

I'm now in LA after 2 days of leisurely driving. I have to say, Northern California appeals to me more. The scenery here is nice with the beaches and the palm trees but I think Highway 1 up in Norcal is much more rugged and breathtaking.

Today LA; tomorrow San Diego!

The Suaku Singaporean Reports: #4

I LOVE the Bay Area. Especially in summer time when it's sunny and warm with a mild breeze blowing to take the edge off the heat.

Yesterday we did a leisurely drive through wine country, passing through Napa, Yountville, Oakville, St Helena and Calistoga. I saw my favourite man again (photos up later) and finally managed to make my way north of the St. Helena Premium Outlets, which used to be the northernmost point of Highway 29 I'd ever gone to. Not anymore! Calistoga now has that honour.

So yeah, we did a leisurely drive, stopped at the Oakville Grocer for lunch and picnicked in the grounds of the Franciscan winery. We also visited the Niebaum-Coppola winery and man that is one swanky winery. Unfortunately, since I'm going to be driving back to LA, I decided not to lug any wine back with me. Which leaves me a convenient excuse to go back! (and preferably sometime soon.)

After that we cut across to Highway 101 via Highway 128, which is another very scenic drive. From there we headed back down to SF, passing through Marin county (where Skywalker Ranch is located), and stopping in Sausalito for a quick walk. Dinner was in a HK-style western cafe where I had a really good baked pork chop with mushroom sauce over rice. Cheap too, at 8 bucks and feeding two people.

Today is another beautiful day; the sun's out, the game's gonna be on in a few hours and after that I'm meeting up with some college pals. Man, I need to plot my return to the US and fast.

The Suaku Singaporean Reports: #3

So Vegas totally sucked.

Ok maybe I'm not giving it enough credit. But having my flight delayed out of Chicago, getting my bag broken by some luggage handler and getting into the hotel at 2am combined to make me seriously grouchy when I got to Vegas. I'm not ashamed to say that after I got to my room, I was so miserable and lonely that when I saw my sister online I started bawling my eyes out.

Once I got over that hump I started enjoying myself a little. The Bellagio is a seriously swanky hotel, and there's lots of development going on both on and off the Strip. Vegas is probably the only place in the world where at 2am and 8am people are sitting at the slot machines and gambling away. They even have slot machines at the airport, right by the gates!

Right now I'm in SF, squatting at a friend's place. It took me 5 hours and 40 minutes, including one pit stop, to drive from LAX to Redwood City, which is slightly more than 300 miles in distance. I think I made pretty good time, given that I'm driving a Ford Focus, though by the end of it I was getting really sleepy. It's great to be back in the Bay Area. And, my friend's place is seriously nice - I'm so envious. The most bizarre thing on the whole drive was somewhere along Highway 5, where I saw like ten thousand cows. It was stinky.

After this long work trip I've pretty much made up my mind to move back to the US for a while. I really want to go back to school and I should do it now before I'm needed in Singapore or anything like that. So when I get back I'm going to start on my GREs etc. It'll be sad to leave my job but I guess sometimes tough decisions have to be made.

Ok, vacation time has started. Tomorrow I'm going to drive to Napa and relax, and then Sunday it's game time. Woohoo.

And June, I had another hotdog at LAS. Not bad, not bad at all.

The Suaku Singaporean Reports: #2

Last few hours in the east coast and once again it's a rainy day.

But the weekend was great! I went to sleep on a cold rainy Friday night and woke up to bright sunshine on Saturday. Hung out with some new friends, which turned out to be really quite fun. And then on Sunday I caught my first baseball game in 3 years, so that was great as well.

Just two more days of work and then I'm free as a bird for 8 blessed days. I can't wait.

The Suaku Singaporean Reports: #1

1st report from the Suaku Singaporean:

So, E3 was a blast! Checking out the new games and the consoles... I can think of a couple of people who would love to be in my shoes. But as it turns out, as long as you have some kind of company credit card or you can show some vague tenuous link to the electronic entertainment industry AND are willing to pay at least USD325, you can definitely get it. Not worth it to me, but to some people who really really want to see models dressed up as their favourite game characters, or try out the newest games (some that haven't even been launched yet), or just revel in the biggest loudest geek party of the year, then E3 is definitely for them.

After E3, I headed over to the east coast of the US of A to pay tribute at my company headquarters. Turns out that United Airlines now have these self-serve e-ticketing check-in counters which makes checking in a breeze, especially if you don't have any check-in baggage. They've installed these self-serve counters at the old check-in counters so instead of seeing a row of people behind the counters there's now only 2 to 3 max. You go up to any touchscreen, swipe any credit card and they'll pull out your name and confirm your destination, then they'll show you your assigned seat and you can try to change seats or upgrade using your miles, and then if you have any check-in you print out a luggage tag else you're done! The only thing is with check-in baggage you still have to wait for the airline personnel to come get the luggage from you but it sure is easy. Checking in took just 5 minutes as opposed to lining up for at least 30 minutes like before.

But since 9/11, they've really become a whole lot more vigilant so all passengers have to pass through baggage screening where you have to take off your shoes, empty out your pockets and take out your laptop/camera to be screened separately. And woe betide you if you misplace your boarding pass! As opposed to pre 9/11 where anyone (even without a boarding pass) could walk into a domestic terminal, right up to the gate and wait around.

So I'm now in the east coast and I'm tired, sleepy AND cold. Turns out that it started raining here yesterday so it's wet and gloomy. And I don't have an umbrella or a windbreaker. )!*#@ Luckily my new laptop bag has a rain cover so that helps a little! And I'm grumpy too because I spent over 2 hours waiting in the lobby of my service apartment because the keys that were left for me were the wrong ones. Grr. 2 hours that could have been spent SLEEPING.

To sign off, here's the tip of the day: Never ever take a red eye.

Success!

It's ironic that I have to traipse across the Pacific to be able to log on to MSN or any type of messenger but that's how it is.

I'm at the Ritz in Pasadena and DAMN it is swanky. Even though I'm a good half hour (with light traffic) away from the convention center which is where I have to be, I'm mighty glad that they booked me here for no apparent reason. It seems like in downtown LA things get really quiet after work, much like Raffles Place. At least here in Pasadena there's some night traffic and my college roommate stays just 10 minutes away. Makes it really easy to hang out.

I'd forgotten how much I miss American TV. Baseball almost round the clock on ESPN, The Tonight Show, SNL, sitcoms... I'm definitely staying up late!

Seeya!

Ok dudes, I'm off for my trip.

I'm lugging along my laptop so I'll have full internet access. Send me mails, pictures, whatever. And, I think I've figured out a loophole around the no-messaging rule while I'm away so I might be online once in a while. Woohoo.

See you all in 3 weeks :D

Countdown

In another 124 hours, I will be leaving on my longest work trip to date. 42 meetings and workshops spread over 8 days. Woohoo. Just think of all the miles I'm going to rack up on my Krisflyer card. Free tickets, here I come!

Oh before I forget, all fans of "Desperate Housewives" MUST go to the official website if you've been watching the show in Singapore and read the recaps. It's censored! And Monday's episode had 2 fairly interesting bits that were cut out. If you don't want to see anything else besides the recap for Monday, and you will if you click on the main page, then click here.

That was my good deed for the day. Now I can go back to being my normal bitchy self. Heh.

So many errands to run, so little lunch hours to do it. My to-do list has 35 things on it and so far I've only crossed out 17. Hey, I'm almost half-way there! Of course, you could point out that instead of wasting time writing a to-do list and updating it every so often, I could have done more important stuff. And of course, in the time it took to blog this I could have crossed off maybe 1 item. But hey, give a girl a break. I'm cranky and tired from taking my laptop home almost every night this week to catch up on work that I honestly should have done weeks ago. Yeah yeah, procrastination bites you in the ass and when it does it hurts like a bitch.

(Chances are though that I won't learn this lesson and sometime in the near future I will be bitching about this topic again.)

Time to reopen my to-do list and try to tackle more of it. In the meantime, more math for you: If it was 387 mails on May 6, and 467 as of today what does that mean?

Addendum: Jokes of the day

A guy gets on a plane and finds himself seated next to a cute blonde. He immediately turns to her and makes his move.
"You know," he says,"I've heard that flights will go quicker if you strike up a conversation with your fellow passenger. So let's talk."
The blonde, who had just opened her book, closes it slowly and says to the guy, "What would you like to discuss?"
"Oh, I don't know,"says the guy. "How about nuclear power?"
"OK," says the blonde. "That could be an interesting topic. But let me ask you a question first. A horse, a cow, and a deer all eat the same stuff--grass. Yet the deer excretes little pellets, the cow turns out a flat patty, and the horse produces muffins of dried poop. Why do you suppose that is?"
The guy is dumbfounded. Finally he replies, "I haven't the slightest idea."
"So tell me," says the blonde, "How is it that you feel qualified to discuss nuclear power when you don't know shit?

The Internal Revenue Service sent an auditor to a synagogue. As the auditor reviews all the paperwork, he turns to the rabbi and says, "I noticed that you buy a lot of candles."
"Yes, we do," responded the rabbi.
"Well, Rabbi, what do you do with the candle drippings?" he asked.
"A good question," noted the rabbi. "We actually save them up and when we
have enough, we send them back to the candle maker and every now and
then, they send us a free box of candles."
"Oh," replied the auditor somewhat disappointed that his unusual question
actually had a practical answer. "Rabbi, what about all these matzo purchases? What do you do with all the crumbs from the matzo?"
"Ah, yes," replied the rabbi calmly. "We actually collect up all the crumbs
from the matzo and when we have enough, we send them in a box back to
the manufacturer and every now and then they send us a box of matzo balls."
"Oh," replied the auditor, thinking hard how he could fluster the rabbi.
"Well, Rabbi," he continued, "what do you do with all the foreskins from the circumcisions?"
"Yes, here too, we do not waste." The rabbi answered. "What we do is save up
all the foreskins, and when we have enough we actually send them to the Internal Revenue Service."
"Internal Revenue?" questioned the auditor in disbelief.
"Ah, yes," replied the rabbi, "Internal Revenue. And about once a year, they send us a little prick like you."

*YAWN*

It's 6pm on a lazy Thursday and I've been awake for 1 hour from my afternoon nap. *yawn*

Yeah, on MC today! Woohoo. Thanks to my scratchy inflamed throat which, according to my doctor, has mucus dripping down it. Yucks.

Anyhow, everyone should go read this blog entry now. As in NOW. Before you read the next paragraph.

Done? That, my friends, is the KEY reason why I hate going in public toilets. All those sounds are just too embarassing for words. If I'm forced to go in a public toilet I will wait until everyone has left the restroom.

Once, I had a really bad stomachache but the executive restroom (executive just means there is only one toilet) was being used so I had no choice but to use the public restroom. When I got in there were 2 other people and the cleaning lady inside. I had to wait about 5 minutes before they all cleared out, while my insides were screaming at me. Not fun.

Back to work tomorrow :( Boohoo.

Weekend Update

I love long weekends. Especially when the extra day off falls on a Monday, because then the following work week is effectively a four-day work week.

This past weekend was fairly hectic. Training on Saturday, baking-barbecue-poker session back-to-back-to-back on Sunday AND training on Monday morning followed by swimming. I feel so virtuous with all the exercise!

Back!

Back from a quick trip up to Bangkok, and my observations are:

1) Things are cheap cheap cheap in Bangkok. Except, of course, at the airport duty free shop.

2) The traffic, despite the costly expressways and metro system, is still fairly horrific. Imagine being stuck on a 2-lane elevated expressway and wanting to pee really bad. Although, I've been assured that things are much better now, so I shudder to think about how things were.

3) I had one of the best meals of the year at the Four Seasons Hotel. We were there for a lunch meeting and let me just say that thank goodness the food was good. I had spiced duck breast, which was SO good. And the garlic mashed potatoes that came with it? Oh my god. And all for the princely sum of 580 baht which works out to be S$23, for a 2-course meal with an appetiser buffet, a main course and coffee.

Long weekend's coming up! Yippee! Happy Friday everyone :D

Happy Monday!

Mondays get a raw deal. Just cos they come right after the weekend, most people hate Mondays. But see, it all boils down to nomenclature. Mondays could come right before Saturdays and then hey it'd instantly jump to the top of the favourite weekday list. Assuming of course, then Saturday still came before Sunday and remained a non-work day.

Anyhoo. It's the start of a new work week and I have a funny feeling in my tummy. I suspect it's cos I had to microwave water for my coffee earlier on, and when I took it out of the microwave it looked funny. Kinda grey. Plus it tasted strange as well... As to why I had to microwave water? Well, the last person who changed the water container failed to notify us that it was the last bottle of water so on Friday afternoon, when I went to get some water to drink I realised that there was not a drop of drinking water left.

Now I guess there's no choice but to shell out 5 bucks for Starbucks. 5 FREAKING DOLLARS! Oh wait... my boss just bought me coffee. Hahahahaha. My boss is the bestest boss-woman in the world ;)

Here's wishing all working folk a happy Monday, and to those who are still schooling:
Stay in school! Work life sucks!

Where's The Beef??

I know exactly where the beef is. Hahahahaha.

Last night was the most fun I have had in a long long time. In fact, it ranks right up there in my personal Hall of Fame, next to getting my tattoo. (Speaking of which, I want another one!) Unfortunately, I can't say another word. Interested parties can email me to find out what the hell I'm going on about.

Me so sleepy... Oh and the comment by Moomoo on this entry? Hilarious.

MOO!

This entry will only make sense to people in Singapore.

I WANT A COW!

And now, with this I can actually get one. Though I'm fairly sure I can cram a cow into Sam, but this is for charity. If I can't get one the legitimate way, then I will steal one in the dead of the night.

Those who want to know what the hell I'm going on about can go here. If not, check out the picture of the day!

Moooo.

Birthdays and Other Matters

First things first.

Happy birthday Des and Moo Moo!
Sorry Moo Moo, this is one day behind since I was going by US time.

For some reason, April's a really popular month for having kids. So many of my friends are born in April. When I was in school April was a particularly lean month on the pocket money front since I had to buy presents for so many people.

Anyway, I'm just back from lunch and I'm not fired! *shew*
It was a catching-up kind lunch rather than anything else. In fact, I told my boss as we were leaving that I was afraid it was going to be bad news and she found that amusing. There's still no news on the promotion front though...

In other news, NY beat the "Red Sux" to pull out of last place in the AL East. But the Giants lost to the Dodgers again (after a heartbreaker yesterday). Early days, I know, but still it would be nice to get some wins especially against division rivals.

And I know I was supposed to write about CTG but one of my companies is reporting results today so it's been a slightly crazy day at work. Maybe tonight...

11 Hours To Go...

Egads! The dreaded lunch with the boss-woman is tomorrow or, strictly speaking, in about 11 hours time. Da-da-da-DAAA!

I'm in two minds about getting fired. On the one hand, it'd be nice to have some time off to relax. On the other hand, I'd basically be royally screwed with no income and not enough savings. And I wouldn't get to travel to HQ to see CTG again! (I've just been assured that CTG doesn't read this so it's fairly safe to write abt him.)

More about CTG tomorrow; as they say, early to bed, early to rise, means you can catch NY vs BOS at 705am tomorrow. If I do get fired, I won't be surprised that it's for watching baseball at work...

Snippets, Cont'd

More snippets from the past week:

Snippet #5: Continuing on from snippet #4, black sesame gelato tastes like "dirt" and durian has some onion-thing going on. Guilingao is yummy.

Snippet #6: People who take part in triathlons, mini or not, are MAD. Stark raving mad. And it should be a sin to have to wake up at 0645 on a Saturday morning to practice transitions.

Snippet #7: Apparently I have a Jekyll (how many L's??) and Hyde thing going on. I kinda like that...

Snippet #8: This is from a Friends episode a couple of weeks back, one of my favourite episodes. Anyhow here it goes:

Chandler: I'm very happy we're going to have all the sex....
Phoebe: You should be. I'm very bendy.

Snippet #9: This just in! From an on-going MSN conversation now:
Friend: ... how abt creating "moments"?
Me: moments? what "moments"?
Friend: i dunno how to explain. creating moments of intimacy?
Friend: ok i just heard myself say that...
Friend: sounds like something out of a soap opera :P
Me: it's hard to be intimate in a coffeeshop with about 20 lau ah peks sitting around you "lim"-ing kopi

Snippets

Ok. This post is just for Nat, since she emailed me to ask if I had been so busy entertaining that I haven't been blogging.

If you must know, I haven't been blogging because there hasn't been much to blog about. Just a couple of snippets here and there.

Snippet #1, also the BQOTD: My dad went to the doctor recently for a regular checkup. If you guys have seen my dad you'll know he kinda has a belly. If you poke it (as I often do) you'll find that his belly is kinda hard instead of being soft and flabby. So anyway he asked the doctor if it was muscle (since it was hard) and the doctor said:

"No, it's just a big lump of harder fat."

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAH. Incidentally I've given my dad a new nickname - BBB. Go figure it out.

Snippet #2: So my boss asked me on Monday to have lunch with her on Thursday, i.e. today. This is the first time ever in 4-odd years of working with her that she's ever asked to have a solo lunch with me. I wonder if she's taking me out for lunch to tell me I'm fired, in which case the lunch would be a consolatory gesture. You know, like "I'm sorry you've been fired but hey you had a good lunch!"

For the past few days I've been going around pondering on the significance of this gesture. But now the lunch has been pushed back to next week so I have a couple more days of going around dreading my impending dismissal. I wonder what kind of redundancy package my company has... Anyhow, if I suddenly start showing up on MSN next week, it'll be THE sign.

Snippet #3: After the great dive trip recently, I'm going to organise another trip in early June, this time to Perhentian. All are welcome to come along!

Snippet #4: Apparently, lime juice tastes like Gatorade and tau huay tastes like oatmeal with syrup.

Back!

Hello folkies! I be back from my dive trip, mon...

Over the long weekend I went with Martha Wannabe (who is still maintaining radio silence on the blogging front) and her hubby to Aur for 3 days of diving, sea and sand. I hadn't dived since 2003 so I'd been itching to go for quite a while, and the trip exceeded my expectations.

The most exotic creature I saw was a cuttlefish. It was blending into the sandy bottom but some eagle-eyed diver spotted it. If not for some slight movement I would not have been able to pick it out from the sand. Then after a while it changed to a brilliant white colour and swam off. It probably got pissed off by the 16 divers that were crowding around it.

Other creatures we spotted on the trip: turtles, nudibranches, slugs, eels, urchins, batfish, titan triggerfish, barracuda (including one giant male that was probably 2 feet long), humphead wrasse, lionfish, lots and lots of starfish, little Nemos in their anemone homes and lots and lots of corals.

The fellow divers were a pretty friendly bunch, as were the dive masters and instructors. On the first night, I was reading in the canteen and the DMs and DIs were playing cards and then they started dunking each other in the sea. There were 3 other girls from the same trip who were chatting and reading as well, and when they picked up one of the girls, chair and all, and dropped her into the sea, the remaining 2 girls and I looked at each other and decided to go back to our rooms. Luckily I escaped but the other 2 girls weren't that lucky; though they managed to get back to their room the DMs/DIs had a spare key and threw both of them and their sleeping roommate into the sea.

I also got stalked by 2 batfish that were about 20cm in height. *shudder* They kept swimming across my line of sight and everytime I saw them I would swim to the opposite direction but after a while they would swim past again. Ewww...

And, I also did my first ever night dive, which wasn't as scary as I had expected. The only thing was, I barely saw anything on the night dive but when we surfaced as a group everyone was saying stuff like "Did you see the crab? Did you see the stingray? And the shrimp?" and I was like "I didn't see SHIT, man."

Anyway I had a great time. Now I just need a buddy to go on dive trips more often. Perhentian, Sipadan or Manado, anyone?

Something Fishy

I hate fish.

I hate their beady gelatinous eyes that stare in one direction and I hate their scaly bodies. I hate how some of them look like mutant freaks from other planets, and how they travel in schools. I hate how they move in a solid mass and churn up the water when you feed bread to them. I hate how when they die, they float upside down. Most of all, I hate thinking of how, if all of a sudden they decided to attack you, there'd be thousands of them to fend off.

My fear of fish stems from a childhood incident which I still recall with blinding clarity. There used to be a fishtank in my grandmother's house, right next to the restroom. Inside the fishtank there were goldfish. (Incidentally goldfish are one of my most hated fish. It's the bulging eyes.) One day, we went to visit my grandma and I saw that one of the goldfish was floating upside down. At that time I was probably 4, maybe 5 years old. When I asked my aunt what was the case with the fish, she said that it was dead.

Naturally that freaked me out. But what was worse was that she said she would flush it down the toilet bowl. I started bawling and bawling, and to reassure me she said she wouldn't flush the fish down. So, with my fears allayed, off I went to play with my cousins.

Some time later, I had to use the restroom. I went in, locked the door, did my thing and when I looked into the bowl there was a goldfish floating around in my pee. With one eye still staring up at me. And that, my friends, is why I hate fish.

(This story also explains why I also hate sitting on the toilet bowl for extended periods of time: for fear of what could come up through the plumbing. Imagine, a whole school of mutant sewage fish. Who knows what they could do... And once, I caught an X-Files episode where a serpent got into the plumbing thanks to a freak storm. It was an antsy few days for me after that, whenever I used the restroom.)

Having said all that, I'm off for a diving trip. The irony!
Anyhow, I'll be back on Sunday! I hope the fish leave me alone.

Things That Make Me Go *drool*

Man, I'm super sleepy and I'm not sure why, because I had more than the requisite 8 hours of shut-eye last night. Must be the lack of coffee in my diet recently...

Anyhow, after spending the weekend at the softball carnival and conducting extensive research, I have definitively decided on the body types that I find physically attractive. In a word, the most appealing body type to me is "lanky" - I just have a thing for tall and lean guys. And by "lean", I don't mean to the point of emaciation; well-built but not overly muscular is what attracts me. If they're too skinny then they look under-nourished.

For the face, I think "angular" attracts me the most. Sharp chin, well-defined bone structure, slitty eyes... Kinda like Kevin Bacon but more Asian. Sounds awful I know, but somehow I just like the look. The boyish type works well for me too, maybe because they look more cheerful.

In fact, I spotted one guy at the carnival who physically suits me to a T. He plays 2nd base/pitcher for a certain team and he's rather good. (I also have a thing for pitchers. Maybe because somehow most pitchers tend to be tall and lanky.)

It's a pity he's 18.

EIGHTEEN! I can't believe I'm ogling 18-year-olds. How come, when I was 18, my team members looked nothing like this guy???

It's Friday BABY!

And, I'm on leave! WOOHOO. What a great way to spend a Friday :)

Except, I have to go back into work at 5pm. For one single solitary stupid meeting. GRRR. And, I have to get all dressed up for it as well. Sian. Which means, I have to cart a suit around with me if I'm going out, and find some place to change and grab a quick shower before I head back into work.

(Plus, now that the cute guy has left, there's less incentive for me to go to work. Haha. Oh wait... it should be boohoo. Boohoohoo...)

In case you're wondering why I'm moaning about wearing a suit, it's cos it's super hot. That's the key reason why I try to schedule all my meetings on the same day, so I minimise the number of days I have to look presentable. So on meeting days, it's shirt and maybe a suit; on non-meeting days it's tank tops/spaghetti strap tops.

But the absolute worst thing for tomorrow's meeting is, and I will bet good money on this, that I only spend at most 15 minutes in the meeting AND I will probably have to hang around until sometime past 6pm just to have my 15 minutes of "fame".

Super sian. Ah well, at least I don't have to work over the weekend :D

Weekend Update!

Hello folkies :)

'Twas a busy weekend for me, thanks to the softball carnival that my club is organising. BTW if you drive and plan to go down anywhere near the Padang, I'd advise you not to. Just this weekend alone 4 cars were dented and many more were hit by foul balls. I don't know why the club doesn't put up more fencing but one day someone will complain or there will be a fairly serious accident and the carnival will be cancelled, which is a pity cos as far as I can tell the kids have a great time.

(I now sport a pretty nice tan, thanks for 2 days of sitting in the sun and swimming. Hehe. If you have a couple of hours to spare, come down to the Padang over the next 2 weekends and catch a game or two.)

Then, when I got home on Sunday night, I just crawled into bed and slept till this morning. 13 hours of sleep, to make up for the sleep deprivation over the past week. That probably explains why it's the first Monday in months that I haven't woken up grumpy. I really should sleep more...

More Scary Numbers and A Puzzle

Following yesterday's entry, here are more scary numbers.

By July 18 2006 it will have been 15% of my life.
By May 1 2008 it will have been 20% of my life.

Please kick my ass on July 18 2006, and if I still do not repent please kick my ass again on May 1 2008.

And now for the puzzle (this is called the Monty Hall puzzle):
You are a contestant on a game show, and the rules are simple. There are 3 doors and behind 2 of the doors there is a goat and behind the other door there is a car. You have to choose one door. Once you have made your choice the host opens one of the other doors to reveal (tada!) a goat. Now, he gives you the option of either sticking to your original choice, or switching to the remaining door.

What do you do, and why?

The answer will be up within the next few posts. If this is popular I'll add like a brainteaser section to the blog.

In other non-related news, coffee w/ Flyboy yesterday was good :) Which explains why even though I only had 6 hours of sleep, I'm still in a good mood today. Hehehehehe.

Work Trip!

Off to Beijing tonight! Where it is currently -5C. Brrrr.

I'll be back on Friday. In the meantime, hopefully Martha Wannabe will post something... *hint hint*

See ya!

Physics Lesson #1

Useful physics tip for everyone:

Counterbalancing will help stabilise an object.

Especially when said object is a wheelchair and your objective is to manoeuvre the wheelchair down a step about 10 cm high.

My dad took a fall last Friday night in the spirit of science. He was trying to show my grandma that a person sitting in a wheelchair can manoeuvre it down a 10cm high step without external aid. So, he sat in the wheelchair and as he moved forward he leaned BACK in the wheelchair instead of leaning forward. Of course, this caused the wheelchair to tip backwards so my dad fell back and hit his head on the floor.

Don't worry, he's fine. He played golf the next day so I think that's symptomatic of a full recovery. (Though you could make the argument that anyone who chooses to play golf for 5 hours on a blazing hot afternoon is really suffering from the effects of a fall, and I would not disagree there.) Aside from a bruised ego from us poking fun at him, he's fine. In fact he even suggested that I blog about it.

And so I did.

Oh and I can now swim 50 m freestyle without drowning in the process. That's progress, BABY! *grin*

But I still hate swimming, biking and running.

It's Friday, BABY!

Woohoo. It's Friday! And not a moment too soon. I'm suffering from sleep deprivation, from all the damn exercise I've been getting. Never in my life have I showered as often as I have these past 2 weeks.

I need a holiday... sometime really soon before my 2 days of leave from last year expire. Any takers for a dive trip in the next 2 weeks?

UPDATE: Ok a fairly large slice of my toe nail has just flaked off, and the 'cool' thing is, the nail polish is intact. So, the 6 coats of polish stands up to chlorine overdoses but the actual nail does not. If I super-glue it back to my toe you wouldn't be able to tell... Hehehe.

Does this not tell you how bored I am at work?!

Bored bored bored...

... at work. Only 6 hours before I can call it a day and go off to try and drown myself swimming freestyle yet again. I can't wait.

Today is the 10th day of the Lunar New Year, and I am happy to announce that my nail polish on both my fingers and toes have yet to chip. I painted my toenails on Feb 7th and my fingernails on Feb 8th so they've lasted for more than 10 days, despite 2 swim sessions and multiple tennis/gym/softball sessions.

The secret:
1 base coat, 2 coats of nail polish and 3 (THREE!) topcoats for my toes.
1 base coat, 2 coats of nail polish, 2 coats of clear glitter polish and 2 topcoats for my fingers.

Ergh. I think I'll go shopping. It's either that or attempt to clean up my desk, which is way way way too messy right now. I have 3 piles of unread research stacked almost 3 feet high on my desk, plus various piles of paper cluttering up my workspace. Shopping is definitely more attractive...

Have a great weekend!

P.S.: If there are no posts by Tuesday you can safely assume that I have drowned while trying to swim freestyle.

Update

Hello folks, happy Lunar New Year!

MSN is still down, boohoohoo. Now the error message that comes up tells me that I need to install a newer version but to download the program I have to be logged in as a local administrator, which I'm definitely not. Sigh. So, if anyone wants to chat during work hours please look for me at ICQ.

I can't imagine working life without Messenger! Maybe I can save it on a thumb drive and install it that way...

LATEST UPDATE (1510):
I'm back online! Thanks to Piglet IM, which is a web-based version of MSN Messenger that is not (yet) blocked. Let the chatting begin!

Get Ready to Crow!

Two more days before Chinese New Year comes around. And, then, crunchings and munchings for all! (Brownie points for anyone who can tell me where this phrase came from.)

I was away in India for most of last week. After 3 days of meetings and getting stuck in traffic all the time, I am super psyched to be home. While the private sector in India seems to be flourishing, the public sector still has a ton of work to do. Physical infrastructure in India is almost non-existent; roads are badly planned and very congested such that people in India don't measure distance in terms of kilometres but in terms of time taken (which can vary depending on the time of day). I think the efficiency of the public sector can best be summarised by this example: At the Bangalore airport, my passport was checked by 3 different people within the space of 5 metres. The first guy took my departure card and stamped it, the 2nd guy checked my passport, and the 3rd guy checked it yet another time and gave me another stamp. I'm fairly sure all those jobs could be condensed into one.

After a trip like this, it makes me thankful to be living here in our sunny island set in the sea with lane markings on the roads, no shanty towns and efficient immigration procedures. And many many thanks to my great friend B, who very kindly picked me up from the airport at the horrendous hour of 4am on Saturday morning. What a pal!

Addictions

I think I am seriously addicted to coffee. Not because I feel sleepy without it but because I seem to get headaches when I am deprived of my cuppa.

Yesterday, we spent most of the day baking pineapple tarts (more on that in another post). After the baking ended at around 6pm I sat down to watch some TV and I developed a really bad headache. Even Panadol didn't help, and I mooched and grumped around the house for quite a while. Finally, at 2300 I managed to get my hands on some coffee, the first coffee of the day, and voila, my headache disappeared.

But then again, maybe it had to do with the company I was keeping... Hehe.

In other news, Marat Safin downed Lleyton Hewitt 1-6, 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 to win the 2005 Australian Open. I had a tough time deciding who to root for - the dishy Safin that took out the #1 seed Federer or the tough competitor that is Lleyton Hewitt? It sucks that there has to be just the one winner.

Happy Puppy!

Hola amigos. Yo soy muy feliz porque he acabado mi proyecto. Soy un perrito feliz.

Hehehe. And I had a great weekend too! I spent Friday and Sunday making cookies for Chinese New Year with my mom and sis. Now there's stacks of cookies in the hallway, and it's starting to look really festive. Hopefully Martha the Domestic Goddess Wannabe will post something about the cookie-making process.

Next week we'll start on pineapple cookies so volunteers will be greatly appreciated. We're going to need help to transform 10kg of pineapple paste into 500 tarts. It seems like a lot but when you start packing up the tarts into the containers you realise that for a whole weekend of hard work you only get like 16 containers. Boohoo.

Anyway now that my project at work is done, I'm back to 吃蛇, which is really really yummy when you think about it...

Ooh. Half of Monday is gone already! 4.5 days more to go. Yay!

Tales of the 3 Miscreants

This entry is dedicated to my dad and his 2 fellow miscreants.

When my dad was much much younger, he studied overseas in Maori-land (that's where he met my mother but that's a story for another time). There, he had 2 good friends and together they were responsible for many a prank on fellow students.

Prank #1:
My dad, together with his 2 friends, dragged a fellow student into the shower and turned the cold water on at full blast. The poor sod got soaked to the skin and snatched up a screwdriver, brandishing it at the miscreants while screaming and yelling at the same time.

Prank #2: (this one is good, I wish I had thought of it...)
A senior in college had the habit of leaving his dorm room on weekends to go gallivanting around Maori-land. One day, Uncle K decided to play a prank on the senior and called on the other two miscreants, Uncle S and my dad. The plan was to open the window of the senior's room and lob wads of newspaper into the room until it was filled to the brim. Uncle K even said that since the senior would be gone the whole weekend they would have 3 whole days to carry out their dastardly deed.

So, the whole weekend my dad and his two friends stood outside the window, lobbing newspaper into the room. And they'd have filled it to the brim had they not exhausted the university's supply of newspaper. As it was, they managed to fill the room to the halfway mark.

When the senior got back, imagine his dismay when he opened his door and balls of wadded-up newspaper just kept rolling out. Sadly, someone ratted on my dad and his friends, and they received a good scolding. (The senior seems to have been exceedingly patient - had someone done that to me I'd have done more than just scold the culprit.)

What with spending half his time playing pranks and the other half going out with my mom, I'm surprised my dad managed to graduate!

P.S.: In his defense, my dad 'claims' that he was never the mastermind, only the accomplice.

Free as a Bird! For Now...

Yay. I have finally finished the draft of my upcoming presentation so now I have some time to take a breather. Of course, when the comments and demands for rewrites come back, I'll have to go back to slogging but for now, this half hour is for my beloved blog :)

Anyhow, it seems like not many people know the song "Friday I'm in Love" and the band behind it "The Cure". Last Friday I changed my screen name to "It's Friday, I'm in love" because I always feel it's such a cheery song and when I hear it on a Friday it makes my day a little. But with the exception of 1 guy, all my friends did not know the reference to the song. Since a day is wasted if you don't learn something, the lyrics are included below. There, I just made you not waste your day.

(Of course, you already wasted part of it just reading this, hehe.)

Friday I'm in Love by The Cure
I don't care if Monday's blue
Tuesday's grey and Wednesday too
Thursday I don't care about you
It's Friday I'm in love

Monday you can fall apart
Tuesday Wednesday break my heart
Thursday doesn't even start
It's Friday I'm in love

Saturday wait
And Sunday always comes too late
But Friday never hesitate...

I don't care if Monday's black
Tuesday Wednesday heart attack
Thursday never looking back
It's Friday I'm in love

Monday you can hold your head
Tuesday Wednesday stay in bed
Thursday watch the walls instead
It's friday I'm in love

Saturday wait
And Sunday always comes too late
But Friday never hesitate...

Dressed up to the eyes
It's a wonderful surprise
To see your shoes and your spirits rise
Throwing out your frown
And just smiling at the sound
And as sleek as a shriek
Spinning round and round
Always take a big bite
It's such a gorgeous sight
To see you in the middle of the night
You can never get enough
Enough of this stuff
It's Friday
I'm in love

Attention! Big Brother Alert!

Heh. Thanks to the help of a super-geek friend of a friend (who wears his geekdom with pride), I now have the ability to tell exactly how many people read my pithy posts, thereby setting myself up for major disappointment.

So come back often to boost my stats! And in today's BQOTD, which isn't bitchy at all but makes me chuckle everytime I read it, taken from this interview:

"You've never lived in SF until...
Like my friend Tzufen, you've witnessed an old Chinese woman non-chalantly snap the neck of a chicken on the 30 Stockton after the bus driver informed her that she couldn't ride his bus with a live one."

I'd like to get to that level of self-assurance and nonchalance where I too can snap a chicken's neck to get onto public transport.

Happy Friday!

Age Gap Perhaps?

This may lose a bit in translation so apologies in advance if after reading this you're scratching your head and wondering what the hell I'm smoking this early in the morning.

There was this hilarious scene last night on the nightly drama serial and I was laughing so hard my dad asked me what was going on. This was the scene:

As she goes to open the door and unlocks it he pushes the door open so she gets hit in the face, falls onto the floor and her nose starts to bleed.
Him: Aiyah! Why is your nose bleeding again??
Her: You try getting hit in the face by the door and then tell me if your nose doesn't bleed.
Him: Aiyah! Why did you stand behind the door??
Her: Where else am I supposed to stand if I'm opening the door?!

Hahahahaha.

My dad, on the other hand, just gave me a look of pity. So, either there's a really huge age gap or really, my life as I know it is a joke.

Happy 2005!

Hm. I just realised my blog has been around for slightly over a year.

Happy belated blog birthday to me
Happy belated blog birthday to me
Happy belated blog birthday to me-e
Happy belated blog birthday to me

And yes, I am indeed 'bored' enough to type out the same words 4 times in a row. I just learnt a new word here and it totally describes the way I feel but short of bastarding the word or inventing a new one (velleity-ize courtesy of Des, velleitious courtesy of me> I couldn't figure out a way to put it into a sentence so just go read the definition.

Anyhow, last year I did a year-in-review post and since there's no better way to make a tradition stick than by actually keeping to it, here's my 2005 review.

1) Weddings attended: 4 that I can think of, with two of them falling on the same day!

2) Parties thrown: too few to count, boohoo

3) Cars bought: 0 since faithful Sam is chugging along fine.
3a) Mileage racked up in a year: at least 13000
3b) Amount spent on Sam's petrol: $1552.51!!! Man, that is way too much dinero to be spending on petrol.

4) Holidays taken: 5 - Argentina, Mauritius, Bali, Bangkok and Canada
4a) Work trips taken: India twice, Hong Kong three times, Shanghai twice, Beijing, Seoul

5) Days out on sick leave (some real, most fake): 6 only! Too few man...

6) Items bought on eBay: not that many actually, my addiction is getting better.
6a) Items bought on VSC: Uh-oh...

7) Boyfriends: still a big fat zero, nada, nicht, niente, nien, 아무것, 何も, ничего (btw Babelfish rocks!)
7a) Flings: see above

8) Newborns: 2 - babies Jake and Oliver

My resolution this year: to not be overly critical. I was aiming to not be critical at all but then I realised that would render me silent for the entire year so that plan went out of the window fast. So instead, I shall be critical but not overly so. If you see me clamping down on my lips you'll know I'm dying to say something bitchy but I just can't. Heh.

I shall also try to be brutally honest. Which should give me some leeway in adding bitchy but honest comments to my conversations. Heh.

And yesterday, I hung out with my two ol' pals. I've known them since I was 9, which is two-thirds of my life. And even though we hardly meet up, it's good to know I'll always have them to count on for support. What a great way to kick off the new year :D

Thanks Santa!

It's snowing! First real snowfall the whole time we've been here, and it couldn't have come at a nicer time on Christmas Eve.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Greetings...

... from a not-so winter wonderland. The trees are still green and I can actually see the sidewalks. Boohoo. But at least there's still some snow on the mountains for skiing, though it's getting icier by the day. Hopefully Santa will bring some snow before Christmas!

I'm in the Mood for...

... my holiday! Tomorrow at 0820, we are off for 10 days of holiday (and 2 days of flight time, boohoo). Yippee!

So this entry will really a catch-all entry, or as we say it in sunny Singapore, a chapalang entry (I'm not sure if it's spelt like this!) or a rojak entry. I had some nascent topics that I didn't have time to fully develop so I might as well get it all down while waiting for the work day to end.

If you're truly bored (like some server admin types that are freezing their asses off in the server room) read on, if not Merry Christmas!

1) Movie review: Caught Ocean's Twelve, loved it. It's great fun to watch a good movie and know that the cast was also having making it. 12 names is a lot to handle but the chemistry between them is really great. It's not that much of a heist movie like the first one though, so if you're expecting a repeat you may be disappointed.

2) To my two bestest pals: Just learnt that one of my oldest and bestest friends is moving away from our little island next year, once she gets married. BOOHOO. I'm going to miss her - even in this age of discount airfares, VOIP and instant messengers it's still going to be hard to keep in touch.

17 years ago, 3 little girls met for the first time on the first day of school. Throughout the year we became friends, then good friends and finally by the time the school year was done we were best friends. We shared another 6 years in the same program but looking back now I don't think we three were ever together in the same class again. While that didn't stop our friendship from developing, there is a consistent pattern to the way we were separated. It was always 2 of us relatively near each other, with the other being further away. Think isoceles triangle with 2 long equal sides and a shorter third side.

Example: in sec 4, we were in 3 different classes, but I took some classes with H. In JC, we were in different schools but H was in the school just across the road while S was a good distance away. In college, S trotted all the way to Maori-land while H & I decided to go to the US but while I was on the west coast she was somewhere in the middle. And now, H lives in Australia and S is moving to NZ while I am here.

Sigh. We've got to work out some rotation for visiting one another! And no, I am never perming my hair...

3) To someone who could have been a good friend and maybe more: I'm 27 now and almost too old to go through the school-yard style of "I friend you, now I don't friend you" shit. So if you're reading this, and you know who you are, you and I both have to be blamed for letting our friendship deteriorate. (And yes, I do believe that once, before things got complicated, there was a friendship. It is that belief that has made me not throw up my hands in exasperation and just not care anymore.) But while I have comprehended that fact and apologised for it you don't seem to have done so. You have treated me like shit, especially over the last few months, so I think we are at the point when it's either we finally put everything behind us and become the kind of good pals I know we can be or we just not speak to each other ever again. The choice is yours; I have been accomodating in the past and if you want to be friends you have to do something this time. It's not a one-way street; it's not your world alone; the ball, this time, is truly in your court.

Hm. What a somber way to end. I'm off to shop for presents. Hopefully by the time I get back I can tag something else onto this entry so that it ends on a better note.

* * * * *

Ok I am back after an interval of about 4 hours, during which I bought my presents, ran my pre-holiday errands, grabbed lunch and decorated 4 cards. I hate having to sit around in the office doing nothing and just waiting for the clock to strike 6 o'clock so I can go home and pack.

Anyway I didn't mean for this entry to be a sad one, although Des informs me it is precisely so. It's just that I wanted to get this off my chest and not carry it over to 2005. So there. It's gone... FIN.

Woohoo. 1.5 hours to go... tick tock tick tock...

Back At Last

I'm back home, finally.

This last trip has been one of the more tiring trips, starting off with 2 days of meetings in HK, then a weekend in Shanghai bringing some of my colleagues around, 2 days of meetings in Shanghai, 1.5 days of meetings in HK and then finally another 1.5 days of internal meetings in HK. Add to that 6 straight nights of team bonding (i.e. late nights out) from 26 Nov till 1 Dec and we're talking serious sleep deprivation here. By Friday, my eyes were so tired with really dark circles. Thankfully I had the weekend to recuperate.

One good thing that came out from the trip was that my colleagues were pleasantly surprised to hear me speak out more. Being on home ground really helped on that front, since I had more defined views about the companies that we met. We were all given 2-minute slots to talk about one company that we had visited over the course of the week, and I think (at least I hope) my succinct review of a mobile company went down pretty well. The funny thing was, when we sat down at the conference table everyone around me had at least 1 A4-sized page of notes on their companies, whereas I had a piece of scrap paper with 4 points on it. When I saw how well prepared they were I was thinking "Crap, I'm going to look so under-prepared" but while everyone else went through what the meetings were about (a waste of time in my opinion since we all attended the same meetings) and didn't really give a conclusion, I just gave a quick intro of the company, the 4 reasons why I didn't like it and a conclusion. Short and sweet in 30 seconds. If only more meetings could be like that, we'd get through an awful lot of crap without wasting time.

The only thing is, I wish I could meet up with my colleagues a lot more than just once a year. This team that I'm on, it's a good team and I get along well with most of them. In fact, if not for the strong team dynamics I would have gone back to school a long time ago. Sadly, being stuck in a satellite office means that I rarely get to see anyone outside of the Asian team. Which explains why I was willing to stay out 6 nights in a row to hang out with the other team members!

Anyhow I'm back now; I'm supposed to be working on my project but it's tough to get back up to cruising speed after being away for so long. Plus, having to work on my birthday is just the crappiest feeling ever. Yet another thing to tack onto my platform when I run for politics: No one should ever have to work on his birthday.

Next thing to look forward to is my skiing vacation in two weeks' time :D

Finally, A Break

Wah, finally I have a break from work. I've been too busy to even go to the business center and log on to check mails, let alone blog.

Anyhow I am back in HK after 4 days in Shanghai. I have to say, my Mandarin seems to have improved! And, with a Beijing qiang, no less. Taking 5 foreigners around Shanghai for the weekend will do that to you, I guess... We went to Xiangyang Shichang and Jiu Huan Jie and probably got majorly ripped off.

I've also been spreading Singlish around the world by teaching my colleagues - they find it really funny. Simple stuff like "You got take my things? Why I take your things for what?" will get them scratching their heads in puzzlement.

Ok, another meeting. I cannot wait to get back home.

BQOTD

Today's BQOTD comes courtesy of Des.

Des and I have known each other from Primary 4, and we became close friends because we were the only two softball players from 4N1; the others were all from 4N2. 4N1 students sang Madonna songs; 4N2 students sang the Smurf song. Need I say more?? (We don't believe in school days, we want our Sundays, blah blah blah...) Anyhow, we invented our own games to play before trainings while the 4N2 students huddled around singing the latest theme song from the Ch 8 Mandarin serials. Our most famous invention: Carnival, where the object of the game was to try and throw a softball through a basketball hoop. Remember, we were midgets then (only 10 years old!) so the hoop was really tall. The game was called Carnival because we would do an inane running commentary, like "Step up step up! First person to throw the ball through the hoop gets this lovely stuffed toy!" And even now, we're still teammates on the rare occasions when Des can tear herself away from her beloved lovable loser Cubs and get her ass back home.

Anyway, I had to put her comment on BQOTD cos it was just too funny. This is her reply to my post on my parents' wedding anniversary, which "paved the way for the existence of my sister and myself":

"Gee thanks, Mr. and Mrs. X. You should've just stopped at one."

Har de ha ha.

Second BQOTD comes from my dad. Said he, to my mom and me:

"With all the time I spend waiting for the two of you, I could have built the Great Wall of China."

In other news, I'm off for my last work trip of the year. Woohoo. After that, bring on the holidays!! Fa la la la la, la la la la. Just a couple more minutes before I head home to pack. Back in 9 days.

When Drinking More Would Have Been Good

OH. MY. GOD.

My colleague, from the whole wedding dvd saga, just informed me that I actually saw the cute guy, i.e. Carl Ng, earlier this year at some broker-sponsored party. He was standing a few feet away from us, on his own, and we were all ogling him. Even in the semi-darkness I had thought he was cute (with a bone structure so sharp you could cut ice with it) so every couple of minutes I'd check him out.

ARGH. This is one instance where drinking more would have been good. If I had been more drunk I might have worked up enough courage to go chat with him. Ok, maybe a lot more drunk but still! The lost opportunity!! Why oh why did I not get super raging drunk?!

Sigh. And, as my colleague wisely pointed out:

"You missed your chance lah. Now that he's become famous, he won't be standing alone next year at the party anymore."

I don't even think he will attend the party anymore! Sob.

On a side note, this (the chance of running into celebrities) definitely goes into the plus column when considering whether to relocate to HK!

Day 3 of Operation FatAss

It's been 3 days since I decided to start losing some fat. My dad is very amused that I took him seriously but whether he meant it or not, it was high time that I started toning up anyway! I've been letting things slide and now that the softball season has ended my main source of exercise is gone.

Anyhow, I've started a spreadsheet to monitor my diet and exercise regimen, and I now weigh myself every morning before breakfast. Thursday was Day 1, and I can tell you exactly what I ate. On Thursday night, I jogged for about 15 minutes, covering 1.8km. I am a slow jogger, I know. Grandmas with walking aids could cover more ground in less time. But still, it's a start! Based on that one jog I lost 800g. Tonight, I jogged for 22 minutes, covering about 2.6km. So hopefully tomorrow morning when I weigh myself I will be lighter than this morning! Jogging at night is way better than in the daytime since it's so much cooler and there is less pollution.

As for how I am estimating my distances, there are two ways. I either get into my car and drive the actual route, or I go to this site and calculate the distance from there.

Ok enough about the diet. It's been a while since I contributed anything to the BQOTD category, so here is one. I can't divulge the exact circumstances that led to this comment since it's too sensitive, so the full power of the quote is lost. But suffice it to say that this comment is about Person A, who is quite deluded as to the worth of Person B.

Me: "So, A said only B can do this task. I mean, how difficult is it to do? It's not like some special code that only B can break! I think A must be smoking some serious shit!"

The Straw That Broke The Fat Ass's Back

SOB.

Last night my dad told me that I was as fat as him. My dad is about 165 cm tall, weighs around 62 kg and has a small beer belly. I am only slightly more than 10 kg lighter than him, and I am about 4-5 cm shorter.

If that's not an incentive to start dieting I dunno what is.

Anyway I have set myself the target of trimming 3 kg off my weight by the end of November, and then take things from there. Nat is now my personal trainer, and I'm going to start a spreadsheet to monitor my food intake and the amount of exercise I get.

Wish me luck folks!

Culture Vulture

Whoopee! Let the record show that as of 0230 on the 30th day of October 2004, I have achieved my first Cultural Victory after 6+ hours of play.

Settings
Playing as: Babylonians on Chieftain setting (just trying out my strategy!)
Against: Zulus, Germans, Celts, Persians, Arabians, Ottomans
Map: Pangaea, huge, least water coverage, temperate climate

In the end I had 37 cities and had built 19 Great Wonders and 2 Small Wonders. While I didn't manage to get the mega-cultural city (20,000 cultural points) Babylon came pretty close and probably would have achieved it had I not triggered the 100,000 CP mark in 1976.

Now to replay on a higher difficulty level :) But first, time to sleep - I've got to get up early to make waffles for breakfast.

Serendipity

The cute guy's name is Carl Ng. I was just flipping through today's Life! section and saw him on page 2. Not a flattering pic but still drool-worthy!

Yum yum.

My computer's back! Yippee! What happened was the RAM died on me so I had to shell out 190 clams to get a new card and have it installed. My dad's theory is that I overworked the card through my incessant game-playing. To prove him wrong, I stayed up until 2am this morning Civ-ing away. Heh.

Allergies

I consider myself to be a pretty healthy person. No lingering ailments, no asthma, nothing much other than the occasional flu (mostly of the Monday-morning variety), cold sore and indigestion/gastric attack.

*knock on wood*

But when Monday rolls around, invariably I feel sick or tired. It's funny how I can sleep at 3am on Friday night and wake up at 8am to play tennis without feeling bad, and yet when I sleep at 11pm on Sunday night and wake up at 8am on Monday to go to work I wake up feeling very very groggy. And throughout the work week, this persists even though I get more than the requisite 8 hours of sleep.

Some may say that it's the lack of sleep on weekends that's catching up on me but I beg to differ. I get plenty of sleep on weekends cos when I don't have anything on in the mornings I have the ability to sleep till 2, sometimes 3pm.

So after almost 4 years of researching and fine-tuning my hypothesis, I now publish my thesis with the following conclusion and recommended course of action:

I am allergic to work. In the interest of my health, I really should quit and become a lady of leisure.

Heh :)

In other non-work-related news, I was Civ-ing yesterday.

Settings
Playing as: Persians on Warlord setting (yes yes snigger away)
Against: Ottomans, Arabs, Zulus and Babylonians
Map: Pangaea with least water coverage

The world is shaped like a C on its side, and I have the unlucky honour of being right in the middle. Arabs and Zulus on my left, Ottomans and Babylonians to my right, and the idiots keep waging war against each other. I've had to emulate the Swiss and maintain neutrality throughout the entire game, even to the extent of allowing open warfare to be waged in my own territory. This really slows down the game because the AI builds a ton of military units and since the war is being fought in my territory I have to watch each and every one of these units moving every single turn. *yawn*

To prevent wars from being waged on me I've also had to bribe the other 4 into leaving me alone, by giving occasional gifts of cash, technology and luxury items. Anyway, I managed a Diplomatic Victory last night, so I guess the moral is that it does pay to be like the Swiss. Then I reloaded the last saved game and was trying for the Space Victory (again) when I discovered I didn't have uranium for the fuel cells and none of the lousy buggers was willing to share.

ARGH. What to do, what to do...

My next aim is to go for the Cultural Victory (100,000 cultural points and at least two thirds the cultural points of the next civ) but that looks like it's going to be pretty difficult to achieve. I've been reading up on strategy guides (yes that's what I spend my time doing nowadays) and the recommendations are to have at least 25 cities, if not more. The most I've ever gotten up to is 18 so I'm way off the mark. I read one guide last night that guaranteed victory with 40 cities. Guess it's back to Chieftain setting while I test out the strategy.

66 Days And Counting

It's the 20th of October and already the Christmas decorations are starting to pop up along Orchard Road. As I went to get my lunch, there were workers stringing lights across Orchard Road, along with large bunches of poinsettias.

66 days to Christmas! Soon all the department stores will start playing Christmas carols, and sell Christmas decorations by the ton. By the way, the wholesale market at Queen Street has Christmas decorations that are way cheaper than those sold in the department stores. They also have ribbons and wrapping paper as well.

To get you in the mood, here's the familiar old ditty, courtesy of my cousin FJ:

Jingle bells, Batman smells
Robin laid an egg
The Batmobile broke its wheel
And the Joker got away, HEY!

Finally, A Break From Work

Finally found some time to blog about the weekend. Work this week has been crazy, since I have a presentation to make on Wednesday and results have been coming out as well.

Last Sunday, a good friend and ex-teammate got hitched. Nothing really much to mention, except that she did the bouquet toss thingy for single girls and in my haste to escape it (the damn thing was headed straight for me) I did a nifty side jump and sprained my waist slightly. Boy am I glad she had us come out of the ballroom to do the toss, cos I sure wouldn't have wanted everyone in the ballroom to see it.

Gosh, it's freezing cold in the office. Brrrr.

I bought a new toy yesterday, an MP3 player! Yes I know MP3 players are nothing new, but I tend to have to be dragged kicking and screaming into the high-tech world. Basically I'm a Luddite. Anyway, many thanks to Nat who did some 'hand-holding' while I researched various models, asked her countless questions on flash vs HDD and user interfaces etc (and then after that I found a report on my desk that I'd been intending to read, all about MP3 players), and even brought me to Sim Lim yesterday to get it.

Sim Lim is one intimidating place for non-techies. Every store looks the same and there's people all over the place handing out price lists. I always feel like I'm liable to get laughed at for not knowing the lingo whenever I go there. Plus, it's so crowded on weekends I always wonder where all this tech-geeks come from!

In the end, I decided to support local home-grown enterprises so I got something from Creative instead of the IPod. Now I'm trying to write it off as research since Creative is one of the companies I cover. Heh :)

Okie dokie, back to work. GO Yankees!!!

My Goddo, It's Hotto

During my school days, I had a teammate who, for a couple of weeks, decided to add an "O" to everything she said. Today's entry title pays homage to her kookiness. Said teammate also co-invented the "Chicken Tonight" dance and pioneered a trend of speaking in what we fondly thought of as Hindi.

During this phase, there was one training session when we were doing fielding practice, and one of the assistant coaches (or semi-coaches as we used to call them) hit a ball out to our left fielder who wasn't looking his direction. Our catcher (Des!) then yelled out a long stream of unintelligible Hindi-like gibberish to our left fielder. The semi-coach looked at her in amazement and asked "What did you just say?" and Des replied "Be careful."

Training was halted for about 5 minutes while we laughed. Of course, the coaches thought we were mad, but it was little things like this that really helped build our team spirit. I miss my teammates! It's a shame that only 2 of us are still actively playing now, but at least we went out on a high note back in 1993.

And yes, it truly is a HOT day today. Way hot. It'd be a great day to tan, if I wasn't stuck in the office.

I had lunch with Martha Wannabe today; for those who enjoyed her debut and are wondering where she's disappeared to, fear not! Unlike the real Martha S., Martha Wannabe is just really busy at work and hasn't managed to find the time to log on to her computer and blog. (Unlike me.) Anyway, since I was at Raffles Place, I decided to kiss-ass by getting some of the boss-woman's favourite curry puffs for tea. And it worked! I now hold the 'favoured subordinate' position in the office, but since there's only 2 subordinates in the office that's not really saying much.

Okie dokie. Back to work. Happy Friday everyone!

Weekend Update!

This time, I'm really just wasting time. My computer has apparently been infected with tons of spyware so the help desk has remoted into my regular PC to try and stem the infection. While waiting, I thought I'd blog about our weekend trip to JB.

For those not in the know, Singaporeans like to go to JB for 3 main reasons:
1) Golf
2) Cheap food
3) Get cheap petrol (petrol prices in M'sia are artificially low because of heavy subsidies by the government)

Cast of characters:
Me, my sister (J), my brother-in-law (K), sister's friend (C), another of sister's friend (L) and sister's friend's husband (L2).

On Saturday night, we went to JB for the second and third reasons. Right from the start, there was an ominous feeling hanging about when C, who had come up with the idea in the first place, revealed that she had a vague idea on where to go and no idea how to get to that vague destination. Luckily we had one map (a pretty crappy map but it did show our destination) so off we went.

When the convoy of 2 cars got to Woodlands at 1800 we were greeted with the mother of all jams. Ok I exaggerate. The jam coming back was the MOTHER of all jams. This one was like, the auntie. By the time we got to JB, which was probably about 4 km away, it was 1930. It took us one and a half hours to clear two checkpoints situated about 2.5km apart.

You see a lot of funny things on the bridge to the Woodlands checkpoint.
1) There's a river of motorbikes. I kid you not. The number of motorbikes on that bridge is astounding - on one single lane there are at least 5 motorbikes side by side. And the fumes, they're strong enough to knock you out. Or at least induce hysterical laughter. We were laughing so hard at inane jokes that all the motorcyclists were staring.

2) There's always one or two guys on motorbikes who either are trying to save petrol or have had their bikes conk out on them, because they're pushing their bikes all the way across.

3) People get off at the weirdest places and I don't know where they disappear to. There were people getting off motorbikes at various points along the bridge, and after that I didn't see any sign of them. I was reminded of the classic PC game Frogger, and maybe they were trying to leapfrog on to various motorbikes?

4) There's always a couple of idiot a-holes who try to cut the queue by using the motorbike lane on the bridge and then trying their darndest to cut back in. So, all the cars on the right lane always try to squeeze as close as possible to the car in front, to block off any such 'attacks'. Kudos to C and K for not letting anyone cut in front or in between us.

On another note, can someone please explain to me why there are two ways to get to the checkpoint at Woodlands? There's a bridge on the RHS and then another lane on the LHS. The LHS is supposed to be for trucks but we saw plenty of cars there as well. Which way is faster?

So finally we got past the SG immigration point, and then K's car started acting up. It stalled at least 5 times on the bridge and I had visions of us getting out to push the car across. Geez. The lesson here: Never try to drive a car that is older than you across to JB.

Finally, we arrived at our destination, Taman Sentosa. Having no idea where to go, we decided to eat at various roadside stalls. For those crazy/bored few who are inspired to go after reading this entry, from the main road you turn right into Jalan Sutera and on the LHS it's all Muslim food while on the RHS it's all Chinese food. We ate at both sides, but I think the Chinese food looked more yummy (plus there was no language barrier on the Chinese side).

Later checks with various friends revealed that we had unwittingly landed ourselves in one of the toughest neighbourhoods in JB. Apparently, we were extremely lucky not to have gotten car-jacked, robbed or pickpocketed.

After that, it was time to head back again and this time around it took us slightly over 2 hours to clear the checkpoints. Fender-benders abounded and people just kept trying to squeeze their cars into 3 lanes. (BTW the 2 lanes on the RHS head to Pusat Bandar, while the 3rd lane from the right is the fastest lane thanks to a design flaw at the M'sian checkpoint.) It was a relief to finally get back onto the BKE and head home.

Our journey probably was no longer than 30 km each way but here's a breakdown of the time we spent.
Getting to Woodlands: 20 minutes
Going from SG to JB: 1.5 hours
Getting to Taman Sentosa: 20 minutes
Eating: 2 hours
Getting back to the JB checkpoint: 40 minutes
Going from JB to SG: 2 hours
Going back home: 20 minutes

Priceless: NOT!

As for the food, I thought it was fairly ok. Probably not worth driving in all the way but it was quite yummy. We had barbecued stingray, cockles, mussels, squid, rojak, mee goreng, nasi goreng, otah and some porridge. That plus drinks came up to 70 ringgit for the 6 of us.

On the other side of the road we had some dimsum and dessert. The ice kacang was particularly yummy; really finely shaven ice and some additional ingredients like peanuts gave the ice kacang a nice crunch. There were also various stalls selling very yummy-looking laksa, prawn mee, BBQ chicken wings and fried mee hoon kuey. If I ever dredge up the enthusiasm to endure a 4+ hour journey I'd try all those out.

Civ 3 Update

No, the time stamp on this entry isn't wrong; it is 535am and I just finished a game of Civ 3.

This time around, I picked the Babylonians vs the Egyptians, Iroquois and Koreans, on a Warlord setting. That's just one level above the easiest setting, but hey I never said I was an adept gamer :)

Anyway, the Koreans were hell-bent on waging war on me, but the first time they did I sacked two of their cities and then they came crawling back for peace. Then I decided to go for the Space Victory, and I was happily researching and building my spaceship when I suddenly realised I didn't have a source of rubber, which was needed to build the last component. The only two civilisations that had rubber were the Koreans and the Iroquiri, and neither of them were willing to share, the buggers.

So I declared war on the Koreans to try and get my hands on the rubber and on the next turn the Iroquiri decided to trade. Damn! I was stuck in a war that I wasn't prepared to fight, and my stupid bombers kept missing their targets. To distract the Koreans, I callously abandoned 3 of my cities but before I did that, I took all the workers and military personnel out.

Luckily I was able to stick it out for 6 turns, which was all I needed to build the last component. I even managed to launch a nuclear weapon on the Koreans, which brought the Egyptians into the war against me as well.

Once my spaceship was built, I blasted off with my Babylonians, leaving the other 3 civilisations to continue fighting amidst nuclear waste. Hee hee hee :D

This was my highest score ever!

Weekend's Almost Here!

This morning, I woke up at 8am and for one delicious moment I thought it was Saturday. Just as I was about to go back to sleep, I realised it was actually Friday. Man, that sinking feeling in my tummy when I realised I had to drag myself in to work... Not good.
But at least it wasn't a Monday!

Well now, it's almost Saturday so I'm definitely in a cheery mood :)

Lunchables!

It's lunch time! The daily dilemna about what to eat... Working at Orchard Road has its perks but one of the drawbacks is expensive food and lack of choice. The other day, I went to the food court at Taka and spent 4 bucks on rice, 1 meat and 2 veg. You can get 2M+2V for 2 bucks at Golden Shoe!! So even if you factor in the transport cost, food at Golden Shoe costs about the same and tastes twice as good. Yummy :D

MLB update
AL: MIN 1, NYY 1; BOS 1, ANA 0 (looks like it'll be 2-0 to Boston soon)
NL: HOU 1, ATL 0; STL 1, LA 0

Replay of the MIN-NYY game tonight, 8pm on ESPN.
Tomorrow, bright and early at 8am, it's Game 2 of the STL-LA series.
Saturday, bright and early at 8am, it's Game 3 of the MIN-NYY series. Anyone interested in watching at my place? :D

Introducing...

... a guest author - my sister! She's going to be a regular (I hope!) contributor, largely on food-related issues.

My sister is a Martha Wannabe and, before you say I'm being mean, let me forestall all accusations by pointing out that not only is she proud to be a Martha Wannabe, she also came up with that name by herself! She (my sister I mean) is a great cook, and she makes the meanest tiramisu. Pity she only makes it once a year, and only for her hubby's birthday. Yeah, we grew up together and she ONLY makes it for her hubby nowadays... So, whenever it's his birthday we all find an excuse to pop by, just so that we can get a taste of the cake!

Anyway I digress. Without further ado, I welcome June with her very own category and icon:

Domestic Goddess Without Domestic Help

Fashion No-Nos and Shaker Fries

It's 6pm on Friday! No more thinking about work until 9am on Monday. 63 work-free hours :D

Getting back to the first subject of this post, I was on a bus back from lunch today and I saw a woman in her 20s wearing a long, fairly see-through white skirt. Nothing wrong with that, except that underneath she was wearing black-and-white striped undies.

Tsk tsk tsk. The zebra look went out years ago.

Now on to the second subject.
Blast from the past! Remember this?

Yummy! Mamee Monster Snacks - the original shaker fries. Everytime I eat this I always think of Cookie Monster! And speaking of shaker fries, I used to ask for extra packets of seasoning and bring them back to the US to eat whenever I had a craving. "One large fries and an extra paper bag, please!" and then "Shake shake shake"...

Other tips for students/pple overseas: if you like zhang you can freeze them, pack them into your luggage (inside another plastic bag of course) and then unfreeze and steam them whenever the craving hits. Another thing you can do, though I've never tried, is you can go to your favourite char kway teow seller, pack as many packets as you want, freeze them and pack them into your luggage. According to my friend, char kway teow can keep up to 1 month.

One more thing: If you ever want to figure out how things work this site is GREAT! I've spent two days learning about TV, cable TV, digital TV and other shit.

Happy weekend!

Unclean!! Unclean!!

Gawd. My cold sore is killing me... I feel like a leper prowling the streets of Singapore. Everywhere I go, people point at me and shout "Unclean! Unclean!" Mothers have to cover their children's eyes while whispering loudly, "Don't stare! It's very rude and who knows, you might catch something!"

Sigh...

Anyhow, last night in a stunning triumph for feminism I made one of my girl-Sims propose to a guy-Sim. It's not easy to propose to someone in the Sim-world, I have to say. First he'll complain that he's hungry, and then after you've fed him he'll say he's not having enough fun, or that you guys are not communicating enough... But when you finally get the Sim to agree to getting married, both will morph into wearing wedding clothes, and then the Sim who got proposed to will move in and take on the last name of the Sim who proposed.

So, meet Megan and Jorge Salamander (formerly Santili). She's a cat burglar and he's a runway model. They're currently enjoying their newlywed status and, thanks to Megan's stunning heist last night, their new-found riches. No plans for kids yet since they've only just gotten married. But, Megan doesn't get along with Maria Santili, Jorge's bossy older sister. So there's always some tension in the family...

Ok back to work :) I think I'm getting too caught up with my Sims! Not a good sign...

Back to My Blogging Ways

Ok folks. Rejoice! For I am back! Back to bring you 5 minutes of joy every day as you read about my inane adventures. Oh wait, that's my alternate life speaking in the parallel universe of vector 0,1,1.

No adventures whatsoever in this life.

Anyhow, I've just restarted the Sims. I got tired of bullying the various other civilisations and I kept achieving the Space Victory, which got to be a bit of a yawn so I decided to play something else for a change. So, back to the Sims and of course, our favourite sim-family, the Sim-Leongs.

Last time we visited, the Sim-Leongs had just had two babies in a matter of sim-days. Which reminds me, I'm supposed to put up photos of that. You'll be happy to learn that Picasso (the eldest girl) has an average of A+ and Nemo (the youngest boy) has an average of A-. I've been making them study at a furious pace, so much so that the computer keeps breaking down.

Both kids have their own rooms, and the parents now have an attached bathroom so there's no clog-up. I'm toying with the idea of redesigning the home into a 2-level rather than the current single storey. Because of the need to look after their kids, Sim-June and Sim-Kim have been neglecting their friends though, so that is something I need to work on. And thanks to that neither of them have been promoted.

Other news: I have a giant cold sore, thanks to the price of medication in HK being more than twice the price in SG, and also to my stinginess. A tube of cold sore cream costs S$6.45 and HKD65 (approximately S$15)!

Back to toiling...
Lesson of the day: Stay in school kids!

An Attempt at Ode-ing

It's a sunny day outside
At the condominium behind my office
Someone splashes around in the pool
Another tans
And yet another has a tennis lesson.
While I am stuck in a freezing cold office
Where is the justice in that?!

Heh. Note my pathetic attempt at non-rhyming poetry, i.e. BAD poetry. I think I'll just stick to prose from now on. Good old solid prose.

'Tis Wednesday my friends, which means that there's only 2 more workdays to go before the weekend arrives. 2 blessed work-free days.

When I think of the toil and drudgery waiting for me for another 30-odd years, I just get depressed. Suddenly the thought of being a tai-tai becomes very appealing. I could find time to indulge in pastimes like computer games, cooking, various arts and crafts... Only thing is, I have to find the guy first! *sound of me falling back to earth*

Ah well.
Guys, schmuys... :D

Weekend Update

¡Hola amigos! ¿Cómo era su fin de semana?

Softball season is almost over - the last day of the season is this Sunday. Get your softball fix before it's too late and you'll have to wait another 10 months.

The 2nd game last Sunday was the busiest game of the season (so far) for me. Of the 12 outs we recorded, I had a hand in 5 of them. Most of the time I see limited action, if any at all, so 5 outs is big. HUGE! I had 2 tag plays at 3rd base, 1 bunt, 1 grounder and 1 foul flyball. Yippee! Oh, and check out the wishlist - I've just updated it.

Other than that, nothing much to blog about. Basically my life nowadays revolves around my family, work, softball and my computer games.
*yawn*

Tapping My Red Shoes

As the wise Dorothy pointed out in her tornado-induced stupor,

"There's no place like home."

Indeed. It's good to be back, finally. (Although I have to leave again next Sunday but that's material for another entry.) My family is well, my plants are blooming, Sam's revved up and ready to go, the dogs are running around alternately barking and shedding fur all over the house, my games are waiting for me to play... Yippee :D

Living out of a suitcase for 11 days ain't no joke, especially since I really hate packing and unpacking. In 11 days I have stayed in 4 different hotels, and twice in 1 of them. That is just way too much packing/unpacking for me.

Anyhow, I didn't manage to find my springrolls, sob sob. Everything in China is not as I had remembered. Trivia of the day: Starbucks in China is called Xing(1) Ba(1) Ke(4). Other than that, nothing much stood out about the trip, from a non-work perspective. *yawn*

Ok that's it for today. It's a crap entry I know, but I have to get back into the blogging (i.e. bitchy) mode first :)

Bright and Early...

... is a phrase oft-used in Hong Kong. As in, "Today's meeting is bright and early at 8am."

Just look at the time stamp on this entry!! Man, I'm working harder here than in Singapore.

Let's do some math.
People in Hong Kong work from 8am to 7pm on average. So, that's 11 hours of work vs 9 hours of work for us in Singapore.
Total extra hours = 2 hours * 52 weeks * 5 working days = 520 hours
Total extra 9-hr workdays = 520 hours / 9 = 5.7 days
Ok, I hereby resolve to be less envious of my HK colleagues who have more holidays than we do.

(Intermission while I go for my meeting)

Ok out from meeting. A meeting which I didn't even have to attend!!! Somewhere along the line, someone screwed up and as a result I had to wake up at 0645. Well, at least it wasn't a boring meeting.

Snippets from Seoul

Having concluded the kimchi leg of my trip, I'm now at the hargow leg. That's right folks, I'm now in what has to be a very hot (but thankfully not-so-humid)Hong Kong.

Snippets:
1) It takes 20 minutes to fly over Taiwan. I know this because on the redeye flight to Seoul I woke up at 0330 for breakfast just as we fly over the southern tip of Taiwan and finished breakfast 20 minutes later just as we flew over the northern tip.
Another mini-snippet: There's Tainan and Taidong and Taipei but no Taixi...

2) Korean girls are slim and very very fair. White is the way to go in Korea, and even though our friendly broker told us that suntanning is in I found no evidence of that. And, I didn't see one fat Korean while I was there, so either they incarcerate all Koreans with a BMI over 25, or kimchi burns both stomach lining AND fat.

3) Apparently in Korea, there's this phenomenon called booking bars, which popped up in the 80s. What you do is, groups of same-sex friends go to these booking bars and the sexes are segregated. The men have to get a table (and tables aren't cheap, starting from a few hundred USDs) and if a guy sees a girl he wants to talk to, he tells the waiter who then goes over and physically drags the girl over. It's up to