Thanksgiving dinner conversation

The turkey was carved out, we laid tender! meat, stuffing, steamed sweet baby carrots and broccoli on our plates before a friend poured lovingly prepared sauce on...

Friend one: Jit, you eat like a Bird!

Friend two: She IS a bird!

Friend three: She's Eating a Bird!

We have amongst us, a teacher, a broker, a forensics/investigator and a public slave.

Tomorrow I'm going to the dermatologist who's going to give me cockroach pills.

Cockroach pills

I think I need to see the dermatologist to ask for roaccutane prescription. My skin has gotten real bad, the worst it has ever been.

So what is stopping me?

ROACcutane reminds me of ROAChes. Very time i think of this medication, I think of cockroach pills, and I hate those gross little smelly things, esp the flying or spotted kinds, or worse flying spotted ones.

Sigh, better go make an appointment soon, roach connotation pills or scarred skin. what is my priority?

Sports Day

We had a company sports day yesterday.
We were all initially not ON about it, there were rain predictions and work was piling up at an exponential rate. I attended two meetings back to back in the morning, and rushed through lunch and made it to the park for the games. Alamak no rain. yet, but we did manage to skip the group cheer.

We grudgingly took part in the warm ups. Then we had to take part in some water balloon game. A colleague pouted, and another asked, "Are we going to get wet? I really don't want to get dirty." Pout again.
Our department manager said, "ok girls, it's not about winning, it's about the process, do it slowly, we must still maintain our glamness and not get too frazzled or dirty." All of us R Girls nodded in unison.

Overhead team member, who's from another dept, said to another," Hmm, that's the difference between the R Dept girls and us."
Then the game began. Dirt or no dirt, our competitive streak emerged. Our group head, an usually friendly funny chap, yelled "Hurry up! Cheat!" Then he took out his camera to catch us cheating in action. We won by a clear margin.

Deepavali Spa

I'm so glad we are a multi-racial society, and that Deepavali is celebrated! Horray!!!!!

Went to House for a massage session. The recep explained that I will lie on the bed, and the therapist will stand on the bed, and hold on to a hanging rope, and use her feet to massage my back. That sounds interesting, I thought. But before that, she will stretch my body/muscles in various yoga positions. Great! that's like benefiting from Yoga but without doing the workout yourself. Lazy yoga... and the session was very good. I did panic at various points though:
1) I agreed to having someone step all over me, but it was ok when I met my therapist, and realized she was skinnier and probably way lighter (i.e. 25kgs) than me, so she probably won't damage my internal organs.
2) During the yoga session, she was seriously contorting my body and I experienced PAIN.

After all that, I had a hot ginger tea in a very restful nonSingapore looking area.
Reminds me of US (crate and barrel shabby chic "country look") Indiana.


Then I had a freshly baked strawberry shortcake, and a pineapple-cucumber juice out in the sun. This was backdrop.
While chilling out, my boss sent me a SMS and asked for a report. Sigh... I explained that I was at a spa, and he agreed to extend deadline till tomorrow.

I am so drowsy as I'm typing all this out. I will have a very good sleep tonight.

Japan eats

I was FORCED to eat and drink SAKE. My friends do not see a problem with that. I woke up the day after with a sore throat and japanese virus. Fell sick and took a week to recover. But I still had lovely lovely memories of the food. Japanese food taste better in Japan. I love Japan but I love Japanese food better! Getting to the point where I miss Japanese food along with mee pok tah when I travel (not to Japan). Of course, I'll miss Mee Pok Tah when I'm in Japan.

Very succulent meat with yummy fats that melt deliciously in the mouth.

Very good sashimi! I like that they are not cold. First time that I have bonito sashimi (top left). Why did I not try this in Singapore before? Not that I liked it alot, but wondered if it was always available in Singapore and I always overlook it when ordering sashimi. Bonito is meaty red, and doesn't taste very good, I thought.


Scallpss and mushrooms. Very juicy. I'm getting hungrier as I'm writing this blog.

J Sights

Pictures discreetly taken in between meetings with sterny faced Japanese, while out with company clients.

Japanese like to use transparent plastic-ky umbrellas.
They are very polite. If they are sick, they will wear the white thing over their respiratory system so that they won't rudely infect others.

Japanese

One of the links on my blog, fashionation..., I've wanted to talk to them for abit about local designers, then... I met one of the girls on the plane ride to Japan. I knew she was going to Japan as she blogged about it, so when I saw her, I shamelessly went up to her and introduced myself and arranged for meet up when we're all back in Singapore. And then she blogged about me. She must have felt ultra-stalked!

Japan is tiringly fun. Go out the whole day and turn in at night to work till 2. Just came back from Shibuya 109... and tah-dah... what did I not buy? I did buy a chanel tweed jacket lookalike! It's going to be one of my classic pieces moving forward. Not cheap ok... but the fit is perfect. Going to season it in Antartic-weather office first, and baptise it in Hong Kong. Planning to go there for a hiking trip in Nov with Sze... crossing my fingers that it will happen... need a break and hiking cold China mountains sound very shiok and spiritual to me, esp the dim sum breakfast that comes right after it.

I love East Coast Park

Hey all, this has been a crazy week again, but I'm sure no one wants to read about work whinings!
The weekend started with a giant burger at Carl's Junior. They have entered the local scene for over a few years but I did not see the need to get there fast to grab a burger or two. And now that I've tried a burger from Carl's, all i can say is gimme a steak anytime! No burgers for me, at least from fast food joints. Then we sat at the beach, chat about the financial markets, and looked at the bright ol moon and stars and lulled by the gentle wave sounds and soft sea breezes, I slowly unwind from work stress. On our way back to the car park, an animal appeared from the shadows and the friend pointed at it and went "MONKEY!!!". I though it was obviously a CAT. Very obviously one. Then the friend explained that she spotted two monkeys in the same area before. Okay....well that was a cat, not a monkey.

New name card.

My company issued new name cards for us all.
Now our faces are on the name cards as well. Yeek! I'm not happy. I always associate name cards with pictures for trades such as insurance, house property agents, or car salesmen. S***, now I'm one of them.
Why do we need photos on name cards? I asked around, no one had impersonated as an officer of my agency before, so why why why? Aren't we too paranoid?

I'm not photogenic. But I must say, they did a pretty good photoshop job. All my pimples are gone! But I forgot to wear a corporate black generic jacket on the day of shoot. I wore instead a frilly turquoise chiffon top. So I don't look very corporate, but I don't really care. They could have photoshopped a suit on for me if it was very important.

Swept off my feet by puddle.

After a satisfying meal of won ton noodles, I crossed Lucky Plaza on my way to Takashimaya, and then it happened. I fell on my butt. People around me gasped, and a crowd gathered, and when all realised I wasn't bleeding or had broken any parts, they tsked about the water on the floor being the cause of my fall, and wondered off. NO ONE offered to help me up.

I was slightly embarrassed, but more than anything I was in pain for a while and almost wanted to cry. But kept reminding myself to think positive (it could have been worse), and that I'm not 5 anymore, so shouldn't cry. I reminded the owner of shop closest to the accident scene to ask mall management to mop up the water, and she gave me this LOOK like I'm asking for the sky. Then I told her if an old lady fell down instead and hurt herself badly, the shop and mall can be sued, just to frighten her abit into action. I think it worked.

Pimples and the spa owner.

My pimples are in full bloom.
And they operate in gangs and form little territories on their landscape, which will be my face.

I attended a meeting recently, where all the spa owners attended. I wondered if any would comment on my face.
One did. After the meeting was over and we engaged in small talk in the corridor, she leaned over to me and said, if you don't mind me saying, I think you're suffering from a breakout because of your hormones. All you need to do is drink lots of water, flavored with a little bit of lemon, to flush out toxics in your system, and eat chap chai pheng instead of fried stuff. You'll be alright very shortly. No need to do facials. And no coffee hor.

A friend remarked that she would be offended if someone talked to her like that. I wasn't offended, the spa owner did it in a very non-offensive, sharing, maternal manner. I thanked her, and then looked for water to drink after.

What kind of shoes do Singapore girls wear to work?

My two colleagues compared shoes they were wearing for the day, which they bought without consultation with each other, from different places. Sharp shiny patent blacks.
Me? I'm wearing prissy round tip classic pumps, one of which is peeping shyly at bottom of photo. I'm so demure by comparison.

I'm 80s woman in chains, hear me roar.

Galaries Lafayette. At night when no one is around. I was taking a night walk with a pair of Singapore designers. One of them mentioned that in his younger days, he might be in his early 50s now, he would traipse around town until 3 in the morning so no one would bother him when he's taking pictures of displays. Now he just admires window displays of stores near his hotel. With me and the designer, the much younger people. But, obviously we have less drive. We were perfectly content with no desire to wander too far. Very windy lah.

Window display of Galaries Lafayette at Boulevard Haussmann. Collaboration between the department store and Vogue to dress up windows.
But no French girl dresses like this. They dress in an extremely non fussy manner - they love their trench coats, scarves, Gerard Darel bags, ballet flats and skinny jeans. Hair can be artfully messy, like French farm girl.

Have a tea break at Printemps

Galaries Lafayette is for the tourists, Printemps is for locals.
Both are huge department stores spread over several buildings located across each other on Boulevard Haussman. Both choose to deny each other's existence. Both provide maps to tourists and both maps conveniently leave out their competitor (in place of competitor is an empty plot of land, how is that possible on prime shopping real estate??)

But I prefer Printemps, because of their cafe, located at the top floor of the store that comes with a gorgeous rose window ceiling.

The right orangey ball is not my fat finger, it's an orange floating ball at the cafe.

Bears in Paris

At the show, a chair made of teddy bears. The bears look so soulfully sad stuck onto a chair.

Bear ATTTTack! at Tsumori Chisato store in the Marais, completed with bloody claws and all. The glass window panel was also smashed to illustrate how dangerous bears can be, when they're not stuck onto a chair, and stuck in store.

Usual Paris suspects

I was expecting a normal yellow-brown tower. But I got a neon blue one that twinkles light at the start of every hour. Plus the EU was in town having a meeting, so that explains the stars.


The tower and the lonely moon. Looks like a quiet poetic scene but I was surrounded by gawking tourists and illegal immigrants selling mini neon souvenirs.


The seine at dusk.

French food..

If you're feeling wimpy, have the fish dish, said the cafe/bar romain owner.


If you're up to something delicious and literally rare, have our beef tartare, which we have been serving for the last 50 years.
It was good, but there was TOO MUCH of it. I thought the French believed in smaller servings. It was good though. Well marinated.

Or order the canard. I have a regular saying. You can't go wrong with chicken. In Paris, it's possible, so stick to the duck. Medium rare pls.

Befuddling Day

Me and the boss went to a government agency yesterday night for a dinner meeting. We were a little early so the host switched on the TV for us, and it seemed like a fake program was on, Lehman down, Merill got acquired. AIG in trouble...

I was a finance major at a US uni, and joining an i bank was like the nirvana job, anyone who could make it to Goldman, Lehman,
Merrill, ...you're the envy of your fellow classmates and are set for life. Now, the banks are falling like dominoes.

Perhaps that's why I'm doing OT, subconsciously, I'm insecure about my job so I'm out to prove that I can finish my work despite jet lagging. How now, brown cow? Should I start buying shares? Have they hit rock bottom?

J'aime beaucoup Paris!

I'm in the City of Lights! And when I practise my French on people here, they understand! But unfortunately I don't understand them when they speak. And they think I can understand because I initiated the conversation but I really don't, so I ended up nodding my head trying to look frenchly intelligent but it's just not happening! So to make the locals more comfortable, I speak English with a French accent.

The French (or Parisiens)are horribly misunderstood. All the people I met were very nice people. And not just the people who were trying to sell me things. And there are less dog crap on the streets too. Today I performed the ultimate service test -Wore flip flops to Galaries Lafayette and Printemps because it was raining and I didn't want to spoil my good shoes, and the service was still as good. Maybe the service staff just think I'm bohemian like Nicole Richie and I'm actually, secretly, very very heiress-rich.

Unfortunately, I'm leaving tomorrow. I'm glad I went on this trip - what a great learning experience! More pics when I get back home.

Some Things that money can't buy

That would include BaluKu fruits. I LURVE them, they are sweet, sour, juicy.
They are usually imported from Malaysia. In the good old days when we were living at Bedok Reservoir Road, Mum and I would consume about 1 kg of balukus every night when they were in season. But now, they can hardly be found in the streets for sale.
Mum bought some from the market this morning - Balukus making a rare appearance! Wished she had bought at least 3kgs worth so that I can eat until I puke. I have not had balukus for a few years. Long dry baluku spell.
The one in the picture is the last remaining Baluku in the house.

Stiletto Test

I was very groggy today as I took my cold medication last night. The effects did not wear off until this evening. Then I took the medicine again, which means I was able to maintain groggy status.
This is the perfect time to try out a pair of stilettos that I bought and have not worn yet. If I'm able to walk alright in such a state in THOSE pair of shoes, it means I can wear them anytime anywhere.

No voice now but the ice cream sure was good.

I'm in trouble. I'm falling ill. I have mild body aches, and a sore throat, signs of an impeding cold.
It has been raining the whole day and the climate's real chilly and clammy. Sore throat.. . can't talk... but can eat DARK CHOCO Ice cream. My voice is gone now, and I have a morning presentation. I'm going to go the Kenny way tomorrow.

I'm just a Girl

I visited a company last Friday. They carry a wide range of products.

As I was leaving the office, the CEO handed me a sample. I thought, Cool...What can I do with the macho pair of heavy industry gloves? Split open durians, or hold thorny stems of bougie plants with no fear?

And they gave me a pot scrubber. Is it because I'm a GIRL?

You dream about stuff you think about

I attended a professional report writing course last Monday and Tuesday.

Last Night I dreamt that I was shot, and while I was lying on the ground, dying away, with a pool of blood fanning out from the wound, a stranger came up to me and said, could you write a report on the shooting, please.

Huh?
Hmmroph!!

Today in the Afternoon, I initiated conversation with my boss during lunch, and mentioned the dream to him. He replied: So, are you dying to write a report?

Hmmmmmmmmpf!

Magic Technology

I'm in awe of... I might be signing up on a mobile broadband plan soon. Quite exciting! Technology has advanced to a stage where an IT ignorant can tread without fear anymore. Just plug in a dongle (in early 2000s' thumb drive size) and off you go. Surf from any part of Singapore. There's no need for passwords or software installation. NO more messy wires. Sounds Disney Magical, like Dumbo's ears.

Endless opportunities abound... I can now surf on the beach (I will worry about sand getting into laptop later), in a garden surrounded by lush greenery, by a pool (when I find one), until the laptop runs out of power or when it pours.

Hmm, I can't decide though on whether this is considered a lifestyle upgrade? Maybe IT lifestyle upgrade.

Kenny? Where are u?

Today is Monday, and this morning, Kenny was not at the cubicle. I thought, wah... so smart...Kenny can read emails and understand human English... he's made a quick escape/migrated to another floor in advance to escape the fogging that's to take place this coming weekend.

Then in the afternoon, while I was at the pantry, Sam another colleague remarked that she killed several fruit flies in her room. Oh NO! Kenny must be visiting his friend residing in Sam's room and met with an untimely death! (Timely is this weekend by fogging).

Ok, ok, no more fruit fly updates after this blog.

No more Kenny after next week.

Kenny is going to DIE.

Alot of people in the office are not as enamored of their cubicle flies as I am, and so the Administrator has called in pest control.
Next weekend, they're going to fog the office.
So long, Kenny.

And Happy National Day everyone!

Kenny, whom I share my cubicle with

There's a fruit fly in my work cubicle. There's one in my boss' room (his fruit fly is a tad bigger than mine, that's how I know it's not the same fly stalking me).
Today, two girls swung by my office space. They added that they also have a fruit fly each in their respective spaces. These are territorial, solitary flies. Not two or three, but always just the ONE fly.

These fruit flies are generally friendly. They like to leisurely fly in your face to say hi.

I've named my Kenny, and help to christian my colleague's fly Marissa. The office is pretty clean, the flies must had been surviving on paper clips.

Really much more common than I thought.

So freaky, when it rains, it pours.

Just met another girl who has a scar between her eyes. She was cycling and met with an accident, fell on her face, in fact, while she was very young.
I think I found enough people to start a mini-scar face club.

Yesterday, I had three back to back meetings that lasted from 9 in the morning to 4:30. I was really tired and feeling sickly before the meetings commenced, but no choice- bad day to call in sick. However, I noticed I did dress the nicest amongst all on dress-down Friday. Sometimes when you bother to dress up a little, (as a friend puts it, match your underwear), it has a positive effect on your overall mood.

Look@me I have flamingo legs!

So what do you think? Will this style take off?

For people who think their calves are fat, this could be a quick and obvious solution.
I love the graphic aspects, very modish, don't you think?
But I do dread this style to a certain extent. Legs, esp. calves are meant to be gracefully curvy. The stockings shade half the legs -the curvy half, Oh! The sin!



I think I know what's wrong with the concept. I think if the black portion is in front instead of back, it will work better - curves obvious but overall, legs still slimmed. That's the beauty of stockings - can be worn front/back, just like a convent girl's pinafore.

Images from UK Vogue website. Even though the title reads "Look@me", it's not me. Also the second pix looks the best, the other two just look too busy.
I feel the brand logo distracts and adds no value, but others may disagree.

Scarface Meets Another.

I have a little scar smacked right between my eyes.

When I was very young, my sister and I had a wild time jumping from bed to bed, but oops, slipped and fell from one bed heading towards the direction of the other. I hit the corner of the wooden bed frame exactly right between my eyes. This means showers of incredible blessings. If the fall was at a slightly different angle, I would have hit the bed frame corner on an eye.

A little scar souvenir still remains, but it doesn't bug me at all, no one stares at it rudely and in fact, I often forget about it.

Just realized a colleague was incredibly blessed as well. He had a scar EXACTLY like mine. And he obtained it in EXACTLY the same way - He ALSO fell hitting the corner of the bed frame, and he was ALSO playing with his sister when the accident occurred. And his, also, wasn't obvious.
Wow! Maybe alot more kids out there get into this sort of accident than I realized.

Do you agree with MTV?

MTV program says the greatest export of Norway is A-HA! which gave us TAKE ON ME.

I totally agree. The video rocks. I also have this song on alot of my IPOD songlists. A lift-me-up.

If you watch the video now, you would think it's very retro and very low-tech, like how a Video player looks next to a slick DVD player, but still, the music video brings a smile on my face every time I watch it.



Why... because it's like the one and only song I can play on an organ nowadays...La-La-fa-re-re-so-so-so-ti-ti...

Oh, and another great export will be Salmon of course!

Australian humor on a Friday night.

Karen and I went for the Melbourne International Comedy road show yesterday night at Robertson Quay (Repertory Theatre). Enjoyable.

There were probably five Singaporeans in the audience. There were alot lot of Australians. It was like when we went to Hokkaido Niseko, Japan and we were surrounded by Australians. So very briefly, yesterday night, I felt like I was in Japan.

The jokes were fast and furious, some low-brow, some in music form. The third standup comedian wore tight skinny jeans. A friend informed that it's a common Melbourne guy trait: skinny jeans with checkered long sleeve shirt. I haven't been to Melbourne but I think it'll be strange to be surrounded by a lot of guys in such apparel combination. Just a tad surreal.

We had Japanese food before and after the show, and played ketchup on our respective career developments.

OHTellMeAboutIT!

Today.
Venue: office canteen.
My boss and me lamented...Huh ah... it's only Tuesday?!!
I need today to be Friday. Badly.
Hair therapy session. Tonight. Compulsory.

My toes are acting strange.
Sometimes, when I remove the heels, and try some innocent feet rotation/move, the one middle toe will "twist" and go in opposite direction. Didn't follow the other toes. Rebel without cause. Painful. I would reach out, straighten the toe, and the pain goes away after 10 seconds. Weird huh.

Must add body scrub session to hair mask therapy.

Dumb Luck & Hair salvation Mask.

It's the weekend! TraLaLaLaLaLa!

Today I had traffic blessings - I made my way from Bukit Merah to Orchard Road via Redhill without getting lost. I'm very proud of myself! On my way back from Orchard Road, I got lost because I parked at Paragon (first time), I usually use Marriot lots. I was seriously confounded but my really sharp homing pigeon instincts KNEW it was the wrong direction. A useful road sign informed me I was on way to Ang Mo Kio. I panicked and exited via Moulmein, the next highway exit, and made my way home via Balestier past Mountbatten. I felt guilty for getting lost and wasting expensive petrol so I switched off the air-conditioning.
However, later on, a friend informed me that I missed a really bad jam on the PIE as I exited before I hit it. What dumb luck I have! Excellent!!

While we were at Taka, I decided to pamper myself, so while a friend went on a very determined mission trip to the Guess store, I went off to L'Occitane and got myself a jar of Shiny Hair Mask. For 43 dollars, I expect very nice radiant hair in 4 weeks. The mask had previously won awards, so I have adjusted my expectations to be of a higher scale.
Nothing beats coming home after a tiring work and taking time to stone out, followed by a self-beauty and deep breathing regime. Now this regime will extend by another 10 minutes to accommodate the hair mask. Shiok. I also couldn't resist a bottle of massage oil of lavender, tea leaf and geranium. I will now smell of dreamy country fields every night. I think this oil will improve my morning appetite - the scent is a little sweet, like vanilla, I will dream of desserts.
Good Night!

Rose syrup, Green Bag and a forgotten cousin

Alamak!!! No more rose syrup in the office pantry. WHo finished it!! I wanted to baptise my new mug with that cloying sweet drink, now I have to settle for cooler water.

I attended another event this morning. Thankfully, I'm not the organiser. It's so big scale that it's crazy. There were security checkpoints as the Prime Minister (Guest of Honour) was present. I arrived later than him... so I'm more important.

The door gift was a cute lawn green hard canvas laptop bag. There were four laptop bag colours. I wonder which color the PM chose. I liked the green alot but I suspect my colleagues all secretly think that colour is ugly. Which is good - it means no one will take my laptop bag away from me. My previous chic Andersen black laptop bag was stolen from my desk and I remain permanently scarred by that experience.

Called up a friend after work for a quick catch up session over cooked Japanese food. On our way out, a guy sitting near Ya Kun kept waving over at us. Friend was chatting away and didn't see, so after some really frantic waving from the guy, I finally interrupted my friend and asked, "Hey is that your friend?"
The guy heard, and he proclaimed loudly I'm your COUSIN! This would be COUSIN Simon whom I grew up with. I blame it on work, it numbs my brain, I can't remember people from my past anymore. We kind of grew up together. His mum more or less raised me, taught me Maths and English, and he and his older brother took turns walking my sister and me to school. It is rather unforgivable that I didn't recognise him, I shall try harder to be nicer and carefully scrutinise people who wave frantically lest friends and relatives start disowning me because they think I'm ignoring them.

I used to wonder why I don't bump into people from my polytechnic days. Maybe I've always been surrounded by them, it's just that I don't recognize them anymore.

my poor feet

My feet ache real bad. I've been on my feet continuously from one in the afternoon till about six. There was a media launch and I was part of it, and it ended well, 5% to my credit. Whew. My first media event. Not looking forward to anymore anytime soon. TIRING Lah. One in every six years sounds right. Kudos to friends who are from the PR industry. You must be mad to be in it. Give me detailed pedantic financial investigations any time. My feet still ache. I hope any photos with me in it show my sharp black heels that I tortured my feet into. And I left my car at the work place because I was too lazy to go back for it from the city, was a little fuzzy from wine, and not blissfully happy as there was no cute door gift for me when I left the event (we ran out of them).

My bosses don't really recognize me, as in the ultimate big boss and one of his deputies. One of them almost gave me his namecard and introduce himself to me (he thought I was one of the guests at the launch), as for the other, I went up to him and just told him I was from his side and shook his hand (because I needed to pass him some info). Low profile is good.

Hmm what I like about my new work place... includes... the magic hot drink machine at the pantry. It makes cappuccino, mocha coffee, Teh Tarik, Milo and Kopi, Kopi-C. I just bought a really big mug so that I can drink refill alot at one go. Strangely, the other drink option would be rose syrup water. There's a stray bottle of it in the pantry and I've been having a little everyday. I like some other stuff from my new work place, but too bone-tired to continue. Another blog, soon.

Oh, and I have a NEW gorgy bag!!!

Another debt.

I've decided that to have a trimmer tummy, I should embark on a 10 sit-up exercise, every night before I sleep, and a little stretching after. And to motivate myself not stray far from my objective, I would carry over any sit ups I've not executed to the next sit up session. That is, if I miss 10 sit ups last night, I'll have to execute 10 (today's quota) + 10 (carried over from yesterday), or 20.
No compounding of sit ups though. That would be too messy to calculate and remember.
So, to date, I owe myself 13*10 situps. Alamak! Too many and too disheartening. I shall write off the debt (which I know will be uncollectible and therefore be a bad debt, I'm a bad debtor). And start anew. 10, from TOMORROW onwards.

Sleep debt

Sleep has never felt so good.

I have gathered that on average I need 8 hours of sleep. So by Friday night, I owed a sleep debt to my body to the tune of 9 hours, due to stubborn staying up despite knowing that I have to wake up by 7 in the morning.

And paying off a debt had never felt so good. I was so tired that on Saturday, I woke up at 2pm. I got out of the house for a quick lunch and viewing of a peranakan house at Joo Chiat. Got back to the house and watched Persepolis. The book was much better. And slept for another 2 hours.

Now I'm going out to meet friends visiting Singapore. Looking forward to sleeping again tonight.
Perhaps tomorrow I can squeeze in some exercise. Bliss.

Boing boing bags

I really really want a quilted bag right now [said that in my extra whiny voice].

Quilted reminds me of old armchairs from the professor's house from the Lion, Witch and Wardrobe production set, of armchairs in Starbucks on a cold rainy day, and, of the Godfather's armchair.

And fashion-wise, you can't get more vintage than quilted when it comes to bags, I feel. They add a dash of much-needed cute ah-mah seriousness to any outfit you're wearing.

Current favourites:

Smythson's Nancy. From an attas British stationery shop. So dressy, and I love how there're no logos on the bag. Look at the oversized buckle. The bag just looks unbelievably well made. Soft calf skin leather. Super Granny chic. I can carry this until I'm 85.

Chanel's 2.55. The original. But I refuse to pay so much for the bag. It's a crime. Delicate Lambskin

Balenciaga's Matelasse. Love the sponginess. This is my favourite. It manages to look a little modern too. Made of scrumptious hardy goatskin.

The Errant Nail: A little drama

My fingernails do not generally give me trouble. They're well behaved nails. The cuticles self-groom themselves. They are not weak, and do not snap under pressure (such as when opening soda cans).

Well, the unimaginable has finally happened, and it must be a foreboding sign of aging or at the very least, calcium deficiency.

One of the nails strayed from the normal course. The nail had split a little on one side, and it didn't/couldn't heal. And it got worse, the split deepened. I couldn't execute normal tasks like hair shampooing with efficiency, and have a constant fear of the little split getting worse. I even have hair strands caught in the split when conditioning my hair. So gross!

One week after the split occurred, I couldn't take it any more.

I was at Parkway Parade, and so I stepped into the nearest manicure salon, and got the bad nail overlaid with an acrylic nail with enforced gel protection. It is now thankfully out of sight. The manicurist assured that that the fako is strong, can withstand my carrying any household chores (but to be on the safe side, I shall NOT do chores for three weeks). The nail cocooned under all those layers of protection can now grow without further agitation, and I can clip off the split part in two weeks' time, and have a fresh new split-free nail. Yayaya!

Can you tell which is the fake nail? I think it's really obvious. Even though it's not exactly plastic surgery, I feel a little unnatural with the acrylic nail. But overall, I feel relieved.

Siglap before the fall of Night

View of Siglap at Dusk from Siglap 24-Hour Medical Clinic.

The father caught a cold a few days ago, so the entire family (Mother and I) accompanied him to the clinic. Didn't want to wait inside the crowded clinic filled with unhappy sick people emitting millions of viruses/germs every second, so I stood outside with the resident cat for company, and played with the camera phone's panoramic function again, it's so handy!
Siglap is pretty picturesque, I've not appreciated that before.

It's been a few days, the father is feeling much better. He normally misplaces medication or stop taking them after a short while, but the Mother noted that he has finished most of the cough syrup. Hmmm, me and the Father have the same taste in medication. We both love cough syrup!

Rain tree outside Clinic main entrance. There were lots of bird squawking sounds coming from the trees, but thankfully, not bird crap fell on me.

little bits here and there

I'm signing up for a 10km Nike run, which takes place on August 31, but as I do not run well, I will be walking instead. Hope I don't turn up last. Nowadays, you can't rely on the old folks to take the last positions. They are extremely fit, and would probably win the run instead. I hope the tshirt that Nike's giving out is pretty and not some gaudy blue colour crap.

And yeeek! A friend called me an Ah Lian Accountant! I didn't even know how to respond to that.
Let me put it on record here that I'm NOT an Accountant. I'm not certified. I don't even have a major in Accounting. I just have a better understanding of accounting compared to the average person. As for the Ah Lian comment, aiyah, I don't think I'm one, but that's a matter of opinion.

I'm going out to the Frankel Avenue coffee shop for lunch today, it's a very important lunch trip.
Recently, I notice the Won ton noodle store has very irregualr closing hours. The store used to stay open until 2:30pm, but recently the lady boss closed the store pretty early. I'm quite worried she will ultimately close her store due to family emergency or other problems. Her store is very very important to me. That's where I had out of the world delicious won tons for the past eight years. Her soup is fantastic, no MSG, the won tons are slurpy sweet and smmoth. I spied her using ikan bilis to make the soup stock. Her prices are also very very reasonable, I even asked her to raise her prices so that she can cope economically and make the same profit margins, as prices of raw ingredients have all gone up. Got to go now and check on her won ton business.

A little mystery solved

I wondered why J's son insisted he's 22 when he's actually 4.
It just hit me, he's into NUMEROLOGY.
2+2=4.

How to not interact with a kid.

My friend J's son is now 4 years old, and is very expressive and opinionated. When I last met him two years ago, he was very shy and concentrated on scribbling in his book. Now, he is a little sunshine boy. He claims he's 22, but doesn't want to work, and only sing and play the whole day. He's either mature for his age, or we all have the mentality of a four year old.

He categorizes people: if he likes them, they are the three little pigs, if he doesn't, they're the Big bad wolf.

How did I interact with this little boy today? No good start. I frightened him.

I picked up mother and son from the train station and proceeded to our Jap lunch destination. I was trying to get the car into a Parkway Parade lot and couldn't get the elusive right angle to turn into the lot properly.
J then commented that a car is coming up behind me, and he might steal my lot. I roared out a war cry, "If that person dares to steal my lot, I'm going to freaking KILL HIM!!!" J's son at this point stopped singing and there's this Silence in the car. OOops!! I turned and glanced at him, and he, in turn, at me with startled eyes. "My son is a little timid" Joy said.

Things can only get better. "The only way is Up", Yazz sang.

During the meal, we discussed colours that can be found on our lunch table. I taught him the word Transparent to describe items with no colour and have see through properties. I was encouraged by his enthusiasm in identifying all the transparent things, so I took things a little further and tried to improve his appreciation of colours. For instance, Emerald instead of just Green, or Cornflower blue instead of Blue. He got confused.

Well, I had a fun lunch. Catching up with J was good. I hope J and son had a good time too. Maybe, next time, I can show Mongkut to the little boy. I heard he likes cats.

The mom has not reverted on whether I'm one wolf or three pigs. But I note that he refused to hug me when his mom asked him to. I think he's just Shy.


He loves light soya sauce. Would carefully press chopstick ends into sauce, then bring to mouth and taste.

Edit: One day after: J responded to my sms. Yay! The son likes me! I'm pigs!
His favourite word now is Transparent.

One of my dreams from last night.

When I do dream at night, I'll have, and remember, a series of dreams, about three to four on average.

Last night, I had a strange one that was even kookier than my usual ones.
I dreamt of an ugly light grey fish with pronounced thick lips floating leisurely in air, specifically outside my old Bedok Reservoir apartment balcony. He was about 1/2 the size of Mongkut, which would make his weight about 2.5kg. I don't recall eating this kind of fish before.

The glass balcony doors were closed, and locked. He saw me peeping from behind the curtains at him, and floated nearer for a closer look. I made a monkey face/sneered at him and he got pissed. Things got ugly very quickly. He smashed his body repeatedly against the balcony door which shook under the impact. And where he body-slammed against the balcony door, there was a print made of yellow putrified pus.

When he realised that he couldn't break the doors, he floated (with a purpose) with mean glint in eyes to a hanging plant in the balcony (money plant?) and vomited like three times of his body weight of yellow pus crap, also putrified, into the plant, gave me an evil grin and left (floated away). Somehow I knew that his vomit would cause a pungent stink that induces fainting spells and nausea, and worse still, is permanent.

Could anyone interpret this for me?

Acne Bloos.

Today I went to Holland Village to visit Dr Low at Sloane Clinic. Just got back from Holland now go to Holland V, like very Gian.

The doctor is gorgeous! She is a walking endorsement of her aesthetics products, and she talks very very fast. I surveyed her patients, they are all like me, drabby normal people. Not the doctor, she was wearing a skirt which is pencil-style, but made of some shiny soft material, a crisp white shirt, topped off with a huge gem ring and a bracelet made of strings of jade pearls (I think). Very well put together. I could observe her entire wardrobe as her consultation desk is made of glass. I bet alot of her patients harbour secret dreams of looking like her, glamourous and gorgeous. But let's go back to my problem.

I have an uncontrollable permanent hormonal-based acne problem which occurs when I have stress, when the weather gets a little hot, when I sleep irregular hours, or any other reason my body system can latch on. For this visit, I was prescribed topical treatment which are acne preventive medication, and after, when the situation is under control, I was recommended to go for chemical peels or microdermabrasion. Nothing too abrasive. I liked her, she was upfront and told me she could do nothing much for my hereditary eye rings problems. Stuck with them for life.

After the consultation was over, her nurse brought me to another room where they cleaned my face and took shots of my face from three angles, which was fed into a laptop. The nurse then pressed a button and my face shot came out. Then another b/w shot came up. The second shot was horrendous! All the marks, wrinkles were all accentuated, and pores enlarged on the face. The computer program has projected pimples on the Entire surface area of my face, I kid you not. The nurse explained that if I don't treat my face, I'm going to look like that in five years. BullShit!!!!

I understand it's her job to encourage patients to take on skin care packages, but it's hard to keep a straight face as she proceeded to point out every flaw and make a big deal out of every single one of them. "Wah look at your eye wrinkles! And look at your enlarged pores, they will get even bigger, you know. You have oily skin..." I tried to remain as polite as I can, asked her to read the doctor's diagnosis on my skin, explain that it's already done by the former and please don't give me conflicting advice, refused to sign on packages, and paid for my products and left.

Let's say the amount I blew on my consultation and medication is not a small amount, but as a friend assured me that positive results would follow, it would be all worth it. Because You're Worth It!

I walked past the Holland V hawker centre on my way back to the car, and visited my current FAVOURite tee shirt store. Yay! the deal is still on. First tee at $18, second tee at 50% off. I selected two designs and asked the SA for size, and he told me with a straight and earnest face that there is only one size, but not to worry, these are Magic Tees which will fit any person of any size. Rrrright. I laughed because I did find it ludicrous, but honestly, do I have a gullible face today or what, everyone is trying to smoke me. But still, I bought the shirts and we chatted about incoming fall season colours. Violet is going to be hot, and they are also bringing in Violet tees, due to arrive tomorrow. Too bad, new stock should have arrived today for me, a deep purple tee sounds cute though.

I left with two tees (a green & a dark blue) in my bag and had a YaKun black coffee in the car while the air condition cooled the car to a decent temperature before I head back to the east.

June Ugly Bag of the Month

I like Takeshi Murakami, but the new LV collection, nah.

weightier now

Pig knuckles, potato, BEER, sausages, and cheese all contribute to my 1.5 kg gain in weight over two weeks. I thought I walked it all off during the tour but I guess not! My tummy is jet lagging too. Around midnight Singapore time, it demands for a second dinner.

On a more positive note, my fringe has finally grown to a decent length. Yayay! Don't think anyone would call me Ah Wang the retard anymore.

Kolner Dom at Cologne (Koln), Germany

Very old church. Construction first started 600 years ago, stopped, started, stopped again and finally completed in1880. Houses THE three wise mens' relics. Built in the Gothic style.

It's not my camera - the church is really this dirty looking. Church exterior has not been cleaned for a long long time. Water could not be used to blast the walls to clean them, as the church may fall apart. Interior of church is gorgeous.

OK, this is one very Modern-Art Rose Window. Gorgeous, and somewhat appropriate.

Amsterdam Canals

Three main canals semi-circle around the Amsterdam city, and are pleasant to walk along, however, if you happen to step onto the cyclist's lanes that run alongside the pedestrian's anywhere in Amsterdam, be prepared to be run over or sworn at, they are very expressive, these cyclists. "I HATE ZHE TOURISTS!".

Basically, when crossing a street, it pays to turn head fast both directions many times. You will be crossing a lane for trams, a lane for cyclists, and a lane for cars, all in two directions, so that's six lanes. After two days, we were lao shous (old hands) and road cross like the locals.

Traffic boo boos, Jit F wanted to press a traffic button so that the lights will change in our favor, and it was awhile before we realized she was pressing on a small acrylic traffic light meant for cyclists' sight instead.

The drivers sit on the left hand side of the car. I forgot. When we arrived at the airport, we got a taxi and I promptly took the driver's seat. Everyone was amused...parents, taxi driver, people standing in the taxi line, the taxi line guide.

The Rijksmuseum is located at the end of our B&B street. It's undergoing renovations so only major works were shown, which worked out for us, I LOVE Vermeer's use of colours. Rembrent, OK Lah. But Vermeer, I like alot, maybe because of Colin Firth. I was disappointed that the Girl with Pearl Earring painting was not shown. Maybe the museum doesn't own that specific painting.I really liked the paintings at this specific museum, not alot of religious art, but instead, tons of stuff which showed how the extremely wealthy and the bourgeoisie led their daily lives and their fashion in the 17th? or 18th century. The ladies sure liked their pearls.

P.s. in Vermeer's The Kitchen Maid, the lower side of the painting showed old Dutch kitchen tiles. The same tiles can be bought at the 9 streets for Euros 35 up.

We visited the Van Gogh Museum as well. Again, disappointed that Starry Night painting was not displayed. Perhaps the museum doesn't own a copy of it. (Googled: there's one at MoMA, NY, and another at Musee D'Orsay). The Van Gogh museum was informative as it shows the then contemporary influences on Van Gogh's art. Theo was a good brother.

Well, we know what happened to VG, he cut his ear off and shot himself in the chest only to pass on two days later. Rembrent died poor. Vondel, also poor, ended up as a pawn shop doorman. I conclude alot of prominent Dutch who later became tourist attractions had tragic lives. Anne Frank comes to mind as well.

We are family.

The ultimate highlight of the trip was that we get to meet up with Sam & Jit F.

Come to think of it, the only times when we sat down together to chat as a family was when we were waiting for the food to be served. All other times, we're busy resting or walking non-stop through the city.

We had a particularly long sit down at a restaurant which was within walking distance of our hotel. The waiter wasn't too efficient and had the disgusting habit of scratching his hair, and with the same (bare) hand, reach for ice. I shall stop here, it's too disgusting.
I have just discovered the panoramic option on my camera phone on this trip.

Me & the Sis. Same smiles. I like this pic because my face looks smaller here, but in real life, my face is a little bigger (Sam judged).