Typical day...

Spent the afternoon hunting for a fridge, a washer, a dryer and a TV. Bought 2 of 4.... the washer and the fridge. And they gave us like 26 lucky draw slips to fill in? Well, thats 26 chances to win anything of your choice that costs below $4000 within the store. Chose a 40" TV and a DVD recorded which costs like $3698. Had to fill in the code...which was like DVDHR755XXS~250GB and A40A550P1R755XSS on top of the description, the model and the price.... 26 times!! It's times like this when we appreciate Mr Carpal (for finding Carpal Tunnel Syndrome).

Evening time... i was driving to a local coffee shop to ta pao dinner. Many things crossed my mind. Seems like I just had tons of minor unimportant things to do. The moment I stepped out of the car door, I told myself, get those things done. I got off, holding a cashcard and an URA fine slip. Made an order at the 'zhi cha' then proceeded to the AXS machine. Got the fine paid, then topped up the cashcard. Then proceeded to draw money and collect the food. Ended up forgetting to get new parking coupons.

After dinner, had to send a present to Joshua. He turns 3 today. Bought him an airport with cars and cones and an airplane and stuff. The moment I got there, I wished Josh happy birthday, and he practically jumped on me. I don't know how he did it, but he ended up on top of my shoulders while doing the titanic scene with both arms spread!! His mom seemed to have so much confidence that I wont drop Josh... but I'm not taking any chances, so I let him down the moment I could. Natt came over and collected the present from me. Like it was her birthday. We ended up opening the present together. Josh on one side, Natt on the other...and me in the center mediating the opening. When we opened the present, the maids gasped in horror at the number of small parts they had to deal with. I apologised profusely to them, then looked at the kids having the time of their lives. Even Bel Bel got her hands on it. She took one piece of the luggage pick up ladder and started putting it in her mouth. Good thing the ladder was a huge piece, and no way was it going in that tiny mouth.

I was really tired from all the furniture hunting and reno stuff. So I swallowed my share of the cake, downed the orange juice and bid my mom and the family good night. The maids carried the two smaller kids, and together with Natt, sent me down to the carpark. It's just heartwarming, watching those kids waving and shouting Byyyeee!!.

I drove off to the new place and spent the next hour off loading stuff from the car to the house. Don't understand why I have so much stuff. Maybe I've never gotten to throwing away the things people give me. Thank god I bought that Nike bag in London. Saved me from having a backache or slipdisc.

Drove over to coffee bean, and got my cafe latte, before driving back home to blog about this.

Will get a few more things done, before i call it a day and hit the sack. Gd nite!!

Desktop Tower Defense

Test how good u r..

My record is completing normal mode with 10 lives left..

Download here
Desktop Tower Defence (367kB)

I can tell time...no I am no psychic..

A few months back, the battery of my watch went off. It got off at 10.30am sharp on a certain morning, probably while I was meddling with some word documents or drinking coffee outside (probably the latter).

For over 3 months, I have been telling myself that I have to go over to People's Park Center or Complex or whatever u call that pink building to get the batteries fixed but I've never gotten to do it. Call me lazy, or procrastin-ist (is there such a word?).

The closer friends would notice it, and then forget about it, and ask me for the time. And the response was always 10.30!! The excuse I gave was that 10.30am was good. Cos it signifies tea time...and for me, anytime is tea time!

Well, I dun have to take out my handphone whenever I need to know the time now.

I can now tell time... no I am no psychic... I just got a new watch.. haha

Encounter at coffee bean

After lunch, we decided on coffee at coffee bean. We ordered 2 cafe latte, one passion fruit tea latte and an ultimate mocha. The mocha was ready, but they were taking a little long for the lattes. They told me to take a seat and they will serve the lattes to the table.

A while later, a waitress brought 2 identical looking drinks. Thinking that this had to be 2 cafe lattes, 2 of us took a sip, and realised that we both have passion fruit tea. We saw a waitress and informed her there was a mistake with the order. She nods, took the receipt and proceeded to move to the counter.

A while later, the waitress appears with 2 cups of cafe latte. Added with the 2 cups of tea latte, we now had 5 cups of drinks on the table. Considering that the aunty that was supposed to have the passion fruit tea wasn't keen on sharing our natural mouth fluid (saliva sounds a little coarse..so I'm sticking to natural mouth fluid), we asked the waitress if it was possible to discard the two cups of tea latte, and replace it with a new cup of tea latte, explaining the mistake in the order and the mistake we made. The waitress looks at us and says "You can have both the tea lattes" and we explained the scenario once more and asked if it was possible to replace the 2 cups with a new one. The waitress curtly agreed and proceeded to remove the two tea lattes.

A moment later, the waitress comes back again and passes a cup to the aunty. The aunty takes a sip and goes "ewwww.. its coffee" and then proceeded to the counter to change the cafe latte back to a tea latte.

Pant pant!... Unless you're a genius, you probably can't understand a word I am saying up there. Really, it doesn't matter. Its just that I've spent the whole day taking statements from witnesses, it feels like I'm writing statements again. Job hazard.

PS: After today, I can foresee a lot of people telling me that they totally understand what I wrote. Haha..

Bumper stickers..

A farewell..

We had a farewell for a friend today. It was her last day at the company. Everytime I see someone leave, it goes with mixed feelings. On one hand, I feel happy that that person has found some greener pasture. Be it a place with better experience, better returns, less stress, or simply is more comfortable to be in. Everyone moves for a reason. And the reason should always be positive. On the other, it feels wierd not to see that person around.

I was lucky in my first job, to be one of the first ones to leave the organisation. I left most of my buddies behind, and although I've found many new friends, I still do miss those guys i left back there. It really explains why I feel elated whenever I see an old friend.

Sometimes, I feel stupid, eminating joy over an sms or an email from a friend. Other times, I wonder if they're busy with something.

I guess its inevitable, that eventually everyone would go somewhere. Heck, we all need to retire sometime too rite? So all in all, think of it as part of lifes experience. For everyone that misses a friend, know this: To be able to get to know people, and keep them in memory - till days, months, or years later - when you do meet again - if it still feels as though the person has never left - then you've gained a friend.

Wow... I think I can qualify to be a pastor..

No sleep..

Don't worry. Not me. I slept like a log. Haha..

We got lights!!

Finally... the lights are up. Just a few more finishing touches and I can move in. Have been struggling and staying at a rented place for years! Finally, staying in a $320 room with family after family... and not succumbing to the pleasure of renting a whole unit is paying off.

Spent the whole morning sweeping and mopping up the place after the electrician finished each light. When he finally got the last light up, I was already half dead.

Was supposed to have dinner with my sister and family and my mom. My sis called to tell me that the car battery was out. So I headed to town to rescue them and bring them to Ivins for peranakan food. Half way through, they told me they got a mechanic from Subaru to change the batteries. So, headed down to UE Square to have dinner at Swensens.

Her kids are just a racket. Natt was pretending not to know me. When I caught hold of her.. I asked "Who am I?" and she looked at me and said "Uncle Quito!!" Got to the car after dinner and the two monkeys wanted to sit in my car. Can u imagine... I had to drive at 50kmph!!! The whole journey!! When we reached, I tried to reverse park... but the only thing I could see on the rear view mirror was the two monkeys!!

Finally, they got out and went for their tour... and the kids couldn't stop running about the house. They went in the restroom, wet their hands... and started putting hand prints on the wall! Almost fainted. Natt said "I can reach the light switch" and then went around the whole house turning on and off every light she can find. Josh and Natt took turns to run about the house. After about an hour (I guess), we went downstairs. The maid carried Josh over and said "he wants to give u a goodbye kiss"... hahaha... he did.

Got home feeling totally exhausted... and the 10 yr old kid of the house was watching her dvd. When i got in the house, she paused the show, kept Mojo in his house, made me sit down and started doing a dance to a Rihanna song! I was tired, but I guess resting would have to wait. She ended the song sliding and laying on the floor while the maid threw scraps of shredded paper into the air. It was just so amusing. I guess she got wind that I was leaving. The maid even said that I must get a maid after one year, cos thats when her contract with this owner expires. Sometimes, I just think I have an affinity with kids. Haha... maybe I am one... just a slightly bigger one... hahaha.

Last few weeks in Villa Verde

Informed the owner that I'd be moving out. The landlady wished me luck and we had a chat on how expensive things are nowadays and how difficult things are especially when you have kids, all while the landlord was pacing back and forth, perhaps worried that he'd need to arrange for people to view and rent the room again. A few times, she apologised for the noise they made and I reassured her that I was partially deaf and couldn't hear a thing. I guess its just family woes. Problems with the kids not studying and stuff, with the teenage girl finding a boyfriend and a couple of other things, but all in all I would say that they are nice, or at least they were nice to me. Sometimes, coming home to mojo's incessant barking, or their youngest daughter showing me a drawing or a something she is doing really takes the weight away. The older son is mostly on the pc, but still finds time to pass me his latest mmorpg disc. The landlord scolds me for parking my car too far away, that I have to walk. Its just like I'd not only rented a room, but also got a part time family. I guess I'm always blessed that no matter where I go, everyone always seem to find a need to take care of me.

Oh god... I'm loosing slack!!

It's a bad sign when u feel a transition from being slack to loosing slack.

In every organisation we go to, we always start at a slacked nature. As time goes by, depending on how much slack the boss cuts us, we progress slowly to take on one or two menial tasks. After a few tasks, and depending on how well you conceal yourself, you get n numbers of new menial tasks, normally called workgroups or cases or even committees. n is inversely proportional to the ability to conceal oneself multiplied by how slack you were.

Then when they think you're ready, whether u feel prepared or not, they start to hit you with 'god knows where they found so much work from'.

Current events indicate that I've unwittingly passed the 'I am new' stage, and unknowingly moved on to the 'I am no longer new and u can give me work' stage. Its a signal that I've somehow left my invisible blankie at home and that I'm starting to loose slack. Where I used to find conversations, I now find heaps of papers on the table. Where discussions with the boss used to be on 'what we want to do', now it becomes 'when we have to get it done by'.

And meetings are not getting any less. I suppose that really means that the honeymoon period is over. Either we find another honeymoon elsewhere, or start to face reality that more and more tasks will come.

Having said that, I'm not one to be bothered by the number of tasks I get. Give me 5 and expect 1/5 the quality of that if u gave me 1. Give me 100 and expect 0.01 percent of the effort. I guess, all in all, it really depends on how important you see these as.

Tiring..

2day is a tiring day... went to work, then got a request to do interviews... started on one guy and it seemed to be ok, although it took something like 3 hours to get 1 done.

When I started the second guy, it made me really frustrated. He totally gets everything wrong, got a cert but doesn't know a thing on what his job is about, and feigns to know everything. He looks at the plan on the table, sees two dots on it... and claim that there are 2 people there! Thinking that someone said that! If I put 5 dots there, he will tell me there are 5 people there!! Then he tells me that something swinging on a machine, can fly 20+m away! I mean I can't really put details here, but the guy is a total nut case! Ended up with a colleague telling me to reschedule the interview and get him a translator. I doubt a translator would help. Almost puked blood, though I was parking a pained smile the whole time.

A friend reminded me that he might be afraid that he says something wrong and gets deported. Perhaps he is trying to pretend that he is not a liable witness and hence we shouldn't use him...(that's smart leh!)

Got into a discussion with the boss on a new thing the dept has to take on, for a second time in a row, and he says he will do something about it, though I doubt he really would. But it's not going to stop me from agruing a case with him anyway.

Went back to a cubicle and saw an email. So tired, just click on reply to all and sent the sender a response. Another friend came over and asked me if I knew that the Director's name was in the list!??!

Drove over to the new house to see the false ceiling. The floor was really dirty, so ended up mopping the floor. Finish aredy, drive to foodcourt for dinner. Had to queue a super long queue just to get some noodles.

So tired..I think I can sleep straight away...

gd nite...zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Current Polls..

Current polls indicate that the number of people thinking that its ok for guys holding a girls handbag is at 50%. With the assumption that the same mix of gender visits this blog and those that click on the posts are equally gendered, that might mean that all the girls agree while all the guys disagreed. On the contrary, lets say u r a guy, and u think that its ok to carry a girls handbag... that would probably mean that some girls don't find it right to have guys hold their handbags!!

Almost 50% of voters think men should do all the housework. On the contrary, 65% of voters disagree that women should do all the housework. Seems to suggest that a higher percentage of people think that women should not be housewifes or should not take on house chores. Considering that the society is now more of equal rights, I was thinking that the polls would be 50/50 for both. And a higher agreement that women should do housework would imply that there are still some chauvanistic men around. But surprisingly, it seems to be the other way, indicating perhaps that women are starting to uphold their rights, or that more men are staying at home.

That being said, whats up there is just a stupid poll I put up out of boredom.. so dun get too attached to the results!!

Progress of house...

We've been doing a lot for the home every weekend. But after spending so much time and effort, the only thing thats really visible now is:

An inverted bed...










..and some small furniture.

Ge Tai at Bukit Batok

Seems like Ge Tai's are getting more and more retro after the 881 film. A lot of youngsters were there listening to Hokkien songs in remixed in techno.

Waaa...

Saw this dark blue Daihatsu Coopen parked right beside my car.

Cool..

Manager's Elbow


Two-Legged Stool


Coffee! Think I'll try this for my next appraisal....

For those who lack motivation to work.. like me..hehe

Need for Speed?

Part 1
First time da boss took my car. As usual, I would kick in the disclaimer, to deny all responsibility on the safety and health of passengers sitting in the car. Confidently, he reassures me that he is heavily insured, with sufficient left for his wife, kids and other family members.
Once he got in, I told him that this happens to be the third most dangerous car in the company. First being shorty's car, cos he's a road demon. He probably grew up eating dust and smoke. No matter how I tried, mine only managed a distant third. Puzzled, he asked me who held the record for the second most dangerous driver. Casually, I said "the lady sitting beside shorty". Surprised, he asked, "She drives recklessly??" And after pausing for 2 seconds, I said "Err, she can drive?" (I'm going to get killed for this)

Part 2
Once, da boss drove us to a meeting. As we were reaching the carpark, a car came from the back and sounded his horn before overtaking our car and turning into the carpark. After parking the car, we went up to the meeting room and saw his colleague there. My boss looked at his colleague and casually asked, "Eh just now u horn me ah?" The reply was....."Must be la, u drive so dem blardee slow."

Currently watching...

Shounen Onmyouji...

Hmm...

Wonder why my colleague keeps saying that I look like
a) Shigeji, or








b) Panda-jiji








When in fact, I should be looking more like:
a) Yoshimori, or








b) Kanda

Saw Kung Fu Panda!!

Oohh....Master Oogway...

Hahahaha...

Haha... a colleague was looking at me so intently that she banged herself on a cubicle wall while walking along a row of cubicles. Hahahaha...that was so comical...

Either its something to do with the shirt, or I look like Brad Pitt.. hahahaha

Aaarrrggghh!!

This is the third time she beat me in Daytona!! I'm not going to play this anymore!

USD $6,100 for one watermelon!!

Saw this on Yahoo!








Way more expensive than someone's watermelon!!

A take on longevity

Was looking at this article outside a Japanese restaurant selling Okinawan food (whatever that is). The title says "Why the people of Okinawa live longest", and in the article, it explains that although some people believe that longevity is genetic, stats reveal that Okinawan's living in US or other parts of the world don't live as long as those staying in Okinawa itself.
So, they went to Okinawa and did a study. The findings attribute their longevity to a healthy diet of fruits, vegetables and fish, along with a non-hectic lifestyle. Their lifestyle revolves around a small community of people who interact at a frequent basis and life is never too fast or hectic for these people.

Over here, I guess u could have control over your diet. One time, when I went for health screening, my cholesterol levels were so good, it felt like I had to go to Burger King and grab a burger to celebrate.
But stress wise, I guess its something that we can't achieve. People here want everything fast and good, heck caring how it's gonna get done. Work keeps piling up, and there is really much much more to do than we have time to do it. Added with the motivation level of a mosquito, work just piles up and never clears.
So I guess we can't have longevity like what the Okinawans have. Perhaps, if we control our diets, we may be able to live till 70. If we don't, count our blessings if we reach 60 (I am rooting for 60... in line with my coffee intake programme). But having said that, I'd rather have a fruitful life and live till sixty, than have a ultra long uneventful life and live till a hundred and fifty. Agree?

Mini Reunion?

Met an old friend yesterday night for tea. When i got there, we ordered drinks and he asked how was the house. After telling him that i got the keys and that the condo has TOP, he told the kopi aunty, "ta pao".. and asked me to get my car and drive him to see my new condo.
So we went from teck whye kopi tiam to the condo. It was already like 9pm, and the only light that was working was the restroom light they used for testing. Went in and showed him around. He had a torch, so that was about the only way we could see the unit.
Gave me some tips on turning the kitchen window into a plate drying rack and told me about his homogenous tiles too. Seems like he wanted to have the tiles really close, and because of that, after a while, the tiles started warping.
Haha. Ended up being a tour guide instead of catching up.

Tiring day..

Phew... end of the day... time to sleep
T'was a tiring day. Brought my gf to see dentist in the morning. Saw part of the defect rectifications being done, and then met up with the carpenter and the PUB guys.
PUB cause there is a problem with the water pressure. Problem still not resolved, as the pressure outside the house looks fine. Must be something to do with internal piping.
Carpenter, cos we're doing our own ID work. Somehow, I realise why people get IDs. Although they mark up the price by 50% to 100%, the coordination is really hectic. Choosing colors alone is enough to crack your head. Add that with type, texture and dimensions, it's a miracle if u don't get a headache afterwards.
Oh well, we've got the carpentry done at close to 50% of the cost and we've got ourselves a false ceiling and painting contractor. Now, all thats left is the lighting and the rest of the furniture, before I can start shifting in and subscribing to internet and cable.
Gd nite!!

Errands...

They say "All good things come to an end"... but errands never seem to end..

1. Send the car for IU check DONE
2. Send the car for 50,000 servicing (Got nail in tyre and busted 3rd brake light also dunno...my god) DONE
3. Get utilities on (now can use toilet) DONE
4. Inspection of defects (and u think ur 200 is a lot? We have 5000 defects!! Muahaha!!) DONE
5. Buy mop, broom and floor washing liquid DONE
6. Get egg shape chair from Paya Lebar TODAY
7. Call carpenter for meeting MONDAY
8. Buy full latex matress, washing machine, dryer POSTPONED

The house is not feeling well..

That explains the plasters all over the place..