Taking Things for Granted or Just Comfortable?

Taking things for granted, that happens fairly often and we live with it. Its really not that bad to take things for granted, makes life easier, simpler. Not true? Take example :



I recently did an ebay search on handphones and i discovered something. Under the description of almost every handphone, it seems fairly important to denote the phone as unlocked. My initial reaction was surprise, for i didn't know a phone could come in locked or unlocked status. But what did locking or unlocking a phone do?



Apparently, a locked phone means the phone is locked to the service provider. Say if SunHub locks your phone, then the phone can only use Sim (the actual phone line identification device) cards of the same network from SunHub. If a phone is unlocked, then it can use any Sim cards of the same network from any service provider. There are even online companies that offer to unlock a phone at the charge of five usd.



Yet, whenever we purchase phones, we simply assume, without knowing we've made an assumption, that our purchase would be able to use Sim cards of any service provider. But if a person is not going to change service provider, sell/lend his phone, then what would this person gain, other than trivial info, by knowing whether the phone he is buying is locked or unlocked. Taking handphones for granted seems 'ok' enough, but invariably, one would ask, "What if the thing you take for granted is another person, or a relationship?".



It certainly doesn't sound good, but is it neccessarily bad? What exactly does taking something for granted mean? One definition could be making assumptions that something, usually a good thing, would last. So based on this definition, let me put the phrase in a different light.



Husband says to wife, "I'm going out with a friend for a couple of drinks tonight." What happens if the wife does not take it for granted that her husband is just going for a couple of drinks and not going out to have an affair? Wouldn't that result in the wife always keeping tabs on the husband whenever he goes out? Wouldn't the whole saga eventually degenerate into a life of paranoia if some of the things weren't taken for granted?



The example brings to light the fact that taking things for granted requires a certain level of trust. But does trust facilitate taking things for granted or does taking things for granted facilitate trust, one might ask, of which i have no answer.



I think a friend of mine does not want me to talk about, on a blog, whatever i'm going to say next. But since she doesn't know that i have a blog, or i assume so, she didn't exactly ask me not to talk about it. "No beat around the bush.", that's my slogan, if anyone doesn't want me to talk about something, they should tell me directly : p



Anyway, my friend shall remain anonymous. This friend of mine has a boyfriend for couple years already. Of course, me being the loud-mouthed insensitive (while i can't stand people bashing me, somehow, i like to bash myself : D) guy, asked when she was going to get married. She went like, "unlikely."



Apparently, the guy has bought a house and my friend had moved in with him and they were becoming a little too comfortable with the scenario and the guy doesn't want to get married. Not that my friend doesn't want a marriage, but want and hope are two different things. Marriage has become to them, little more than a piece of paper. Some would feel sad for them, but i would not and i advise you not to. To each his/her own life, who are we to pity anyone.



I shall digress. I had a pretty lengthy discussion with another friend of mine on the differences between pity and looking down on someone, of which there isn't much. But there is a significant difference between pity and sympathy. How does one pity anyone? The mose basic requirement is the perception that someone is leading a life that is considered inferior/lacking compared to another which is perceived to be a better life. More often than not, that other is oneself.



Who are we to pity anyone? If not arrogance or self righteousness, how could one ever pity another person? You sympathise misfortunes, but you pity, not sympathise, lives different to a perception of better life.



Back to taking things for granted. It is obvious that whether taking things for granted is good or bad depends vastly on the context it is being used. So is taking things for granted in general good or bad? I have no answers for you, i offer you only food for thought.



Oh and a happy new year : )

I had this wierd dream last night. I dreamt that my defecate had worms in it. The worm were of varying sizes. Some were thread-like, others had a thickness similar to that of an udon noodle. Some squirming some rearing their heads, well, one end of the worm that is, the rearing end has got to be a head right?



Anyway, in the dream i went to see a doctor. The doctor, after examining me, confirmed that i needed further examination. He left my dream through a door and i was expected to turn up in his office for the further exam.



After the doctor went off, there was a nurse left in the dream. The nurse was actually my colleague Siew Ling. I think in the dream, the nurse was supposed to take me to the doctor's office. While i waited for the nurse to take me to the doctor she takes her time by packing and filing her stuff.



There i was, waiting with worms festering in my bowels, possibly dying, and all this woman cares about is the neatness of her table! : / Then i heard the alarm clock ringing, and it was time to wash up and come to work.



And the funny thing was i sent an sms to my lil cousin yesternite saying i was gonna go and dream about pretty gals. And instead of pretty gals i get a... a... watever it is you call a group of worms, worms.



Okie found it, bed/clew/bunch/clat of worms.



Anyway, i dropped my handphone onto the rock solid pavement yesterday. The handphone cover cracked and now i do not have an on/off button anymore. It was the blue cover : ( I kind of liked the blue cover. Anyway, other than aesthetic deformity, the handphone seems to work fine.



Oh well... just another day : \

Condolences to all affected by the tsunami.

Yippee! My 'Archangel' alternate art japanese promo magic the gathering card has been shipped. I should get it in my mailbox in around five working days. Maybe next week monday. I'm sure everyone would be saying that i'm crazy to pay such a large amount for one puny card. But who cares, not like i'm saving up for marriage or anything ya? Oh there's this other card which i'm also very keen on getting, but that'll have to wait, need to replenish my reserves.



I think i'm picking up a love all things jap craze. And today is three days after christmas, three days before new year. What has this particular day got to do with me loving all things jap? Absolutely nothing, i just feel like mentioning it that's all : p



Maybe i should get a jap wife or something. Then she can whisper into my ear all the sweet nothings in japanese. Doesn't matter if i don't understand a single word of it right? After all ain't they just sweet nothings? I mean how could anyone not love all things jap? Look at all the divas... anime... sushi... hmm... sushi... hungry...



Darn, i took my jacket back for washing and i forgot to bring it. The aircon in this office is absolutely freezing. Gotta hit the publish button now before my fingers freeze in place. Ciao.

Played around abit with the digital camera today, wheee, its fun. I could just go snap happy with it.



Anyway on with the 'turn left turn right' canto version saga. I didn't get the vcd, so where did it go? Well, during the explosion, pigsticker (cousin) mentioned jokingly to my aunt that if she wasn't gonna give the vcd to me, he didn't mind receiving it.



Apparently, loud mouth and careless words wasn't the way to go : p He ended up getting the vcd for christmas. Oh not as the gift exchange, it was part of a so called lucky draw present. Apparently it wasn't really a random draw since presents were pre-designated.



For me-self, i got a wallet for the lucky draw. Well, my wallet was kind of broken, so that's why i got a wallet. See the wallet below, courtesy of the new digi cam.







In addition, at the end of the gift exchange programme, there was this fan handout or something. I got a yellow coloured mashi maro fan!







Oh, for those of you wondering what happened to my other fan, i broke it. Contrary to what you see in the 'wu xia' movies, fans aren't really suitable for fighting : D Maybe the fans in the movies were reinforced with stainless steel or something.

Anyway my fan is broken and i'm still looking for a replacement. The shop which i bought the fan from, has finished its stock and wasn't stocking anymore : (



Of honorable mention is pigsticker's gift exchange for this year. He got a lego set. Which doesn't sound too bad until he mentions that he is twenty-three years old and the lego set had a 'For ages 3 to 6'...



And the present was from my brother... why didn't he get the 'dungeon and dragons booster box' which i told him about? A little more expensive, and a little more random, but certainly much less of a doink... Oh well, i guess not only are my cousins wierd, my brothers are wierd too : D



Anyway, for my gift exchange i got a small cat from Russ! Haha, guess this will be dedicated in memory of that Gippy gray cat which has dissapeared for more than a month already.







Oh and i do realise it is difficult to gauge the size, so i took another pic together with my handphone.







Hmm... the cat really is very cute : ) Yippee!

X'mas yesterday didn't end too badly. We had a gift exchange. The process was such that each particpant would be randomly assigned another participant. The idea was to secretly buy a gift for the participant you're assigned to. Of course, many times things turn out to be not so secret and not so random.



Anway, my auntie got me as the assigned participant. And ages ago, i mentioned that i was looking for 'turn left turn right' vcd canto version. Well, i didn't mention that i was getting it for my lil cousin. So anyway, i did get the vcd mandarin version for my lil cousin.



But that was ages ago, so not too long ago, my auntie bought the 'turn left turn right' vcd canto version. Considering that it was a mandarin show, it was kind of a funny effort to get the canto version... Anyway, some weeks ago, i wanted to watch 'turn left turn right' again. So i borrowed from my lil cousin. And when my auntie discovered that i actually bought the vcd before, things kind of exploded.



She said, "How come u didn't say that you have the 'turn left turn right' vcd when i asked you that time?" Well... it was really true that i didn't have it, coz i've given it away and it wasn't mine so i didn't have it. She went like doink. Anyway, she traded the assignment with taekwando kid before christmas, and i end up not getting the 'turn left turn right' vcd. I'll talk abit more on what i did get next post : p



Anyway, the budget for the gift exchange was only $10. But quite a number of people went over the budget. And the gift which i think that went over the budget most was the present from my auntie to my mom. Me auntie got me mom a digital camera!! And the happiest person can only be me, coz now i'll have a digital camera to use!! Yippee.

What's worse than not having any dates on x'mas eve? Well, that would be going home for dinner and while waiting for dinner to miraculously appear, you hear your brother say, "Mom's not cooking." who btw is already well-fed for the night... I really should have made an episode of Happy Tree Friends that night...



Anyway, i really should make an episode of live Happy Tree Friends these days and invite all my friends to come. But i doubt anyone would turn up.. Coz it'll be like asking a turkey, "Hey turkey, wanna join me for x'mas dinner?" Of course, i needn't mention what would be for dinner : D



Then today on x'mas, it would seem that being on time wasn't enough for Yvonne, i met up with her at coffee bean. She showed me some pictures, which turned out that Mei Mei was her primary school friend and they had a KTV session, what two nights ago. What a small world indeed. Anyway, Mei Mei did look more pretty in the KTV photograph. I guess it was the smoke from the steamboat that night.



And somehow, along the way from bishan to my cousin's house in sengkang, i kind of forgot about lunch. And the only food i had was my morning milo (1 spoonful of oats to thicken the milo and lower cholesterol levels), the coffee bean drink and Yvonne's cookie. Only one cookie for lunch!! Oh why must god punish me so!!



Anyway, on my way here, i made a couple phone calls to my cousin on how to get to her house. Don't really know the place, house number or even block number. Took a feeder bus and didn't miss the "church temple church turn left" land mark. Went up block 314A to try and all the levels in the block. Turn out that it was the wrong block :(



And i thought, if it wasn't 314A, it'll be 314B. And so one 314B later, i discovered that there was 314C and 314D... Anyway, i gave up and decided to send sms once more. And to top the day of mis-Givings, i sent the correctly keyed sms to ask for the block and door number. And i had to send it to the wrong person... three times in a row...



Let's see if anymore 'doink's come up before the night is over. Oh btw, i slept very early last night. Around 2345. Really had to catch up all the lost sleep of the week.



Of honorable mention was Yvonne's question that goes like, "how many x'mas sms did you get?" It kind of makes me feel pretty anti-social when i say i've got nothing, and her handphone was beeping non-stop whole night.



Oh well... welcome to the darker shade of life, where behind every sunshine and rainbow is a story of Happy Tree Friends : p In the spirit of giving and mis-giving, Merry Christmas to one and all, and may every higher power of every religion bless you(plural).



And one last before i sign off, Merry Christmas - Lov Hon Choon

I eavesdropped on an advertisement over the radio some time ago. It was a Caltex advert, and they weren't promoting fuel, atleast not directly. The Caltex advert went on and on saying that Caltex toilets were the best. Man.... advertising toilets.... Tell me, which journey in SG would be so long (distance) that you'll require a refreshment stop to rest away tiredness.



Anyway, this other day, i managed to find Yvonne's card and was on my way home, using the mrt. There was this guy, think his ass was fat or something, who had to occupy 1.5 seats. Me having to sit beside him, occupied 0.75 seat, which means i was spilling over to the other seat, which happened to contain a girl. Cheekiness aside, it is never fun to sit on something poking your buttocks.



So i tried to shuffle my buttocks into occupying 0.5 seat. And that guy thought i was some kind of a gay trying to squirm into him actually elbowed me!! I can understand why people elbow when the try to fit into the mrt, when the stand in the mrt, and when they try to alight. But fancy elbowing me when seated??!!



Me being the nice guy and all, continue to sit on the hump in the seats. But that's not all, just one stop before the one i would alight, that guy actually had the audacity to look me down and dust his sleeve. As if i was some kind of a diseased dust. [Vulgar expletive deleted] !!!



If i hadn't got a job i would have 'seh' his head ten times over liao. Grab his oily face and punch it through the windows, grind his face onto the tunnel walls till he is left with blood, flesh, bone and pulp, muhahahaha, i love happy tree friends.



Anyway, when i was purchasing Yvonne's card, i saw this really really huge card. I think i was standing in front of the card, staring at it, and kept saying, "OMG, this is so huge." Coz at some point of time, one of the plain clothes staff who was standing near the card agreed with me by saying "Ya, its very big."



The card was atleast a meter in height. And that's without exaggeration. The card really was atleast one meter in height. Anyway, i looked around then came back to that really huge card, and picked up one of the smaller cards. The staff then went, "Buy the big one lah." After another short exchange, i decided that i really didn't want such a huge card. The larger the card the more things you have to think of to write : p.

Ever had a vaccination before? Where the nurse pokes a needle into your arm, vein or even butt cheeks. I'm sure everyone in SG has had a couple before, for measles, small pox, and all the other diseases created by man. The after effect of a needle poking is never nice. Although there is no visible blood, the needle had pierced through skin and flesh. And thus explains the numbing yet painful swell at the point of entry.



Numbing yet painful swell... that's exactly what my finger felt like when i vaccinated myself with a durian shell... The thorn of the shell to be precise. After that, I did the most sensible thing anyone could think of. I took my revenge on the durian. Never again will its seeds grow into saplings, muhahahaha.



Funny how some people say eating eggs are cruel, that the unborn chick would never get a chance to experience life. Doesn't the same thing apply to fruits? Don't think i'll call you benevolent if you eat the fruit and sow the seeds onto the ground to give 'em a chance. Coz in SG, that's considered as littering.



Heard in the news yesternite that some new piracy law is gonna come into effect in a couple of days in SG. Which made me recall an article in the newspaper which had an interview with some irrelevant guy. Anyway irrelevant guy was telling the journalist that the government couldn't possibly catch them all.



Which is probably true. But to think that the new laws are a useless waste of ink on pieces of paper is wrong. Here, we practice punishment system, not reward system. You don't get rewarded for being a good citizen, but you get punished if you are a bad citizen.



In response to that irrelevant guy's comments, yes the governement can't catch all of them, but no, the government doesn't need to catch all of them. All they need to do is catch a couple, fine them severely to make an example and fear will propagate through the population and piracy would drop.

Haha, don't you just fall in love with this girl? Oh wait, i fall in love with just about every other girl, but that's beside the point : p Xiaxue is auctioning her msn address!! Check it out here.

Yipeee! I received more X'mas cards, i must be popular : p The cards were from my lil' cousins. From lil' couzin,







The background is actually gold color, but the scanner is not good with the colors and i ended up with black. The card opens up into







Not bad huh? Look at all the "Merry Christmas" scrawled around the border of the card ^.^



The other card is from my lil' cousin.







I really did get a card from korea after all. Coz it opens up into







Look at that, Qoo from korea, Macs from korea! The card's got to be from korea despite the local postage label on the envelope : )



And the other part of the card







I guess by now you would have notcie something about the cards i put in my blog. The personal messages are pixellated. Well... they are afterall what they are, personal messages.



And together with the card in the envelop is a postcard from korea!







Now i really feel bad that my lil' cousin sent me a card and i didn't send her anything. Some of you might be thinking that its still not too late to send a card now, the most was that it becomes a belated greeting card.



But it doesn't work that way, ya see. Coz in the previous post, i wrote about having one extra card, that was supposed to be for Yee Mui. So if i send any cards out now, i'll probably be sending that card out. And the receiver of that card is gonna think, "this card wasn't really supposed to be sent to me". And this line of thought is really mind boggling considering that i've already sent out one card to KL and one card to Gippy, and those cards are gonna be late...



Anyway, for those who sent me a card and didn't get one from me, all i can say is better luck next year : p Oh i still haven't buy Yvonne's X'mas card. Its kind of abit hard to find... Oh well, guess no OT for me again today, or until i get her card : p

I bought a card for Yee Mui, but didn't send it to her. The reason being that i've lost her address and i feel kind of bad asking for mailing address when x'mas is just round the bend. It only means that the card could only be late.



A little on Yee Mui, i didn't really get to know her until her last couple days in gippy, she went back to malaysia after that. Anyway, at that time i was hanging around with Ben and Bryan my dinner-mates. At that time, for some reason or the other, there was this little craze about the movies "Young and Dangerous". Bryan kept calling me the "Old and Stupid", but that's beside the point : p



Anway, Ben kept his hair lengthy and we began calling him Chen Hor Nam (acted by... now wats that guy's name in english? You noe, the long hair guy...), and Bryan called himself San Kei (acted by Chen Xiao Chun (pinyin)). They called me Dai Fei the worst possible character... these bunch of friends are really nice guys.



Anyway, we began calling each other (canto) which translates into (pinyin). We were at some mid-exam party. Yes party in the middle of examination weeks, but that's becoz we've finished early and couldn't care less about the others who were still studying.



Anyway, Bryan the wise bugger introduced me as . So Yee Mui, began calling me , even though she knew my name, i think. Anyway, since she calls me , i began calling her my 'leng mui'. I've no idea how to translate 'leng mui' into mandarin. Well... it means young sister of our 'hong heng clan.version.gippy' : )

A little on the guys at char-kway-teow dot com. Couple nights ago, we were talking and one of the guys, yong keat, mentioned that he went undefeated in a tournament hosted not too long ago. The next then question was that if he was undefeated, why wasn't he in the first place. Apparently, undefeated was strictly only undefeated, he had a couple of draws, which means he did win either... doh.



Ya guys (gals) remember the olympics that wasn't too long ago? The table tennis event... I was undefeated. In fact, i was undefeated in every singles event in the olympics : D Aside from the fact that i wasn't competent enough to participate in any of the events, i was undefeated... and to borrow a phrase from Xiaxue, "Pui!".



Anyway, i had my very first team event for magic the gathering yesterday. Our team had pigsticker (my cousin), Kar Hoe, one of the more friendly guys from char-kway-teow dot com and last but not least, 'moi'. The thing about team events was that we had to think of a name for the team.



We went through a couple crap names like "Team One", "Team Cool" etc, but those names were either a little too arrogant or uncool and therefore crappy. We wanted a super cool name, atleast if we don't win a single match in the event, we would atleast still be the most funky named team there.



Anyway, in our usual tourneys, if we're paired against each other, we would call each other 'leng zei' (handsome guy in canto) and politely ask the opponent to concede before we actually sit down for the game. So in honor of what we usually do there, i suggested that the team be called (pronounced leng zei sahm in canto), which is literally translated into handsome guys three. Pretty catchy name huh.



Unfortunately, they don't accept team names in mandarin characters so we had to write 'Leng Zei Sahm' as the team name. Turned out that the tournament organizer couldn't pronounce our team name and therefore didn't even try, he just went, "your team, that table".



There were six matches in the team event. Aside from losing four out of six of the matches, we were pretty much undefeated : p : D

Hmm.. i didn't know yvonne set her blog in multiply for viewing by everyone. haha, so here's another advertisment. Visit yvonne at Yvonne's Blog!! Yippee!!

*Tired*



I'm very tired today, had to sleep, and i mean really sleep not the usual fake shut eye, in the bus on my way to work. I didn't even put my handphone to radio mode. I think i forgot to pull the blanket over myself last night, coz i woke up this morning feeling very cold. Mom woked me up two minutes before my alarm clock did its job.



Since there was another two minutes, i pulled my blanket over myself and curled myself up into warm cozy bliss. When the clock began thundering two minutes later, i snucked my hand out into the freezing air to put the alarm clock into snooze mode. And it wasn't long before i began to wonder, "How come the second snooze is taking so long to ring?"



Turn out that i've only taken another six minutes of napping, four more minutes before the clock began its reminder. Well... four minutes is quite a long time, so i dragged myself out of the bed. And i felt like a swallow like my nest was being grabbed by someone to make dessert.



*Sigh*



Atleast its friday.



Oh.. and read this Concubine Chicken and Longevity Abalone Rice, quite interesting.

Yester-night was kind of interesting. The night before, i looked at the street directory to try and figure out where Super Bowl was. The instructions that i set for yester-night was pretty easy. 'Come out of Marina Bay mrt, walk along the road until i hit Super Bowl'.



But maps had always worked their magic on me, and this time was no different. I emerged from the mrt only to find that there's a lack of clear indication of where the road was. But there was a bus stop near the mrt and that bus stop sported only one bus, bus 400. Plenty of people waited at the bus stop so i guessed that we were all headed for the same destination.



When bus 400 arrived, it had a sign on it saying that it was terminating in Shenton Way. And i began to sort through my thought processes. These people at the bus stop couldn't have taken mrt from Raffles Place (Shenton Way) to Marina Bay just to take a bus back to Shenton Way right? So the bus has got to be the correct bus and is headed towards Super Bowl. Pretty logical and flawless thinking eh?



Anyway, 15 minutes later, i took a cab from Shenton Way to Super Bowl... A friend of mine once said, if i'm ever lost, just take a cab. I've held onto that lil' gem of wisdom for many years and it has never failed me, not once : D



Ok, i'm just kidding you. I didn't end up in Shenton Way. But i thought it would be pretty funny if i went through all that thinking process and still ended up in Shenton Way. I had absolutely no idea where to alight. But following the crowd was my best talent. So when a huge amount of people alighted, i followed.



Upon alighting, i am faced yet again with more choices, should i turn right and walk up the road or should i turn left to walk down the road? I decided that right makes right, but apparently it didn't. Along the road, i overheard a girl talking on the phone, she was saying, "Which one? There's two Super Bowl u noe?" And i thought to myself... ~what a wonderful~world... I could imagine myself taking a cab:



"Uncle, Super Bowl please." says me.

"Which one?" says taxi uncle.

"I don't know, just any one will do." says me.

Then one Super Bowl later,

"Another Uncle, the other Super Bowl please." says me.



Anyway, Super Bowl wasn't too elusive, i found it rather quickly once i realised that i was in the wrong direction. Met up with Karen and she brought me to the table where they were having steamboat. I had expected to see just Yeat Yee and Ken Ming. But the crowd kind of surprised me.



At the table was Ken's Sharon... Yes, i have to refer to Sharons as Ken's Sharon, Tee's Sharon, Bryan's Sharon... there's just too many Shaons around. Anywhere, there was Ken's Sharon, Ken, and Mei Mei. Oh... Mei Mei is not as mei as i last saw her. Maybe working stress or something.



Anyway, has grown from pretty to 'OMG you're god dam gorgeous'. But no one ever believes me when i tell them that...



Then later on, we were joined by Marco and i can't remember his wife's name. There was Ben, Daphne... speaking of Daphne, Ken told me that she works in some entertainment company, and i think she somtimes get free tickets to concerts. Well, since i don't really know her, i didn't ask for S.H.E. tickets : D Anyway, i think her name card can get you a couple free drinks in Zouk.



Ming kor kor wasn't there. But don't worry, Ming kor kor and are still together. Anyway, I asked when she was planning to get married. She told me... oh wait, i wasn't supposed to talk about it...



Anyway, when i told that i gave yinyin a call the day before, she went like, "You and yinyin got anything happen anot?" She adamantly does not believe that there was really nothing between yinyin and me. But then she did point out that i gave yinyin a call but i didn't give her any calls. Maybe its just me, but i do feel kind of weird to call up someone who's attached to chat, me being the shy-der and non-chatty type of person. Anyway, throughout the rest of the night, she kept saying that i'm gonna hafata save money to go hong kong...



Anyway, hopefully by the time starts handing out wedding invitations she does not forget about her . Oh that's wat calls me in cantonese, .

Slumber Jean 13 Dec 2004 post is rather interesting. Something about how we know whether we're getting old anot. and... visit my couzin's blog at Paint me pink clouds against purple skies!

Xiaxue's post, which was mere hours ago, about her cousin getting married, is rather sweet. Don't you hate it when i put so many commas in one sentence? Anyway, in her post, she mentioned something about funny dreams, which brings to mind the dream/nightmare karate kid mentioned to me couple days ago. It goes like this :



A vampire jumped out of a coffin and charged at her. Seeing an incoming vampire, karate kid turned and fled. When the vampire caught up to karate kid, she thought she was gonna die as the vampire was gonna drain her dry of blood. But turned out that instead of biting her, the vampire began to talk to her trying to reason with her, saying she didn't need to run as he was only looking for someone. The vampire went on and on talking, nagging and very 'loh soh' in short. And in my cousin's own words, it was a fate worse than death : D



Anyway, I manage to catch this piece of news off the radio this morning: Christmas is ten days away! Not that christmas is very exciting, christmas being ten days away implied a couple of things:

1. Pay day is five days away! Woot.

2. I'm very likely late for my card to yinyin.

3. My cross stitch will never be finished on time.

4. I gotta buy and send cards soon, or yvonne's xmas card is gonna be late.

5. Couzin's badae and xmas card too.

6. I'm like left with 16 days to complete the job my boss assigned to me.

Five out of six things are incompleted stuff... Christmas being ten days away really isn't very exciting.



Anyway, i finally made a phone call to yinyin yesterday. Been trying to phone her, but kept forgetting. Think that hour long of phone call to gippy is gonna burn a hole in my pocket, even with singtel's christmas discount. Anyway, she passed and is on her way to graduation, yay!

Something about the cross-stitch thingy. The feeling of dejavu is enormous. As i stitched the thing up, i could swear that i've either done it before or seen it being done before. So much that it is starting to become eerie. As i spend hours hunched over the piece of cloth, a dull ache takes up residence in my neck. Maybe i should just throw the piece of cloth away. Or maybe i shouldn't have watched the movie 'Shutter'...



Xiaxue has done a pretty good job. Her votes in the 2004 Best Asian Blog Award is around 3187 votes. Xiaxue's blog outstripped all the other nominees in the race, with the 2nd place bagging only 630 votes. Total votes was 5166. There's another poll coming up soon. Hope she gets nominated in the Best Singapore Blog poll.

Apparently, only karate kid was kind enough to point out to me that my usage of mandarin characters was wrong. Two posts back i used the word when i really should have used the word instead.



Anyway, yesterday's dinner was kind of different. At the end of the dinner, we ordered some dessert drinks. I ordered something called advocado shake. It was pretty good, it had none of advocado's tasteless-ness. Apparently, they mixed the fats up with some brown sugar. You know, the type where they use to fill up the green oni oni (I have absolutely no idea how oni oni are spelled, or if wat i'm calling them is correct...).



Karate kid ordered a fermented glutinous rice drink. My first impression when i read the menu on what she was ordering, i didn't even think it was a drink. I thought it was gonna be some moldy rice ball served on a dish on something. Maybe some parsley to go with it....



Anyway, it really was a drink. And it being fermented, was somewhat mildly alcoholic. I took a sipping of it and it was like how my cousins always exagerate on quality of food. A flood of memories rushed to me as i re-lived my childhood. Ok, maybe not childhood. But i do remember having tried some of the same stuff in gippy when i was visting Jeannie's friend, Tony. Think tony's wife was called Eileen or something... Doesn't matter, anyway, I hadn't made a connection between the two foods considering that i really thought it was gonna be some greenish moldy rice ball : )



Big sister is coming to town on wednesday. Karen sent me an sms (yeah, i noe, it should be 'a sms', but i like the sound of 'an sms') saying to meet up for some steamboat. That was kind of good, since i hadn't seen Karen ever since she left gippy. Think that was around more than a year ago. The meeting on wednesday would be netting two birds in one swoop.



Ok, some would say things like, "Its only one year. One year is not a very long time" But suerly time is relative to two things. The perception of the person, and the topic at hand. I've heard of my lil cousin talked about her bgr stuff and there's loads of anniversaries in a single year. There's the one week anniversary, one month, 3 months, half year, and finally the actual thing.



I don't know what to call these things... maybe young romance or something. Its the kind of thing couples like, ya know, like walking beside the river at esplanade. Its really just one big drain ya noe? Ok, maybe i'm not the daily romance from paris... Hmm... i wonder why romance are always linked to the french. Maybe they are great lovers or kissers or something : D



Anyway, alot could happen in one year. Afterall, couldn't people fall in love and get married in one year? So i guess meeting Karen on wednesday would be kind of interesting. Maybe she's grown taller or something : p



And before i go, i'll add one more story on the adventures of bus 91A. I usually board the 0745 bus. And the at the stop where i board the bus, it's usually pretty empty. People start packing in from the mrt at the next stop. Anyway, there's this girl who always take the same seat of the same bus. And i generally take the seat behind hers. Nothing special, i just like to take the seats on the left back of the bus, closer to the pavement so i could look at babes.



Anyway, i always took the inside seat, the one closer to the window, so others could sit beside me. But lately, there's this guy who alights later than me but always takes the seat beside me. End up i have to point, some kind of 'i want to alight' gesture, to indicate to the guy i wanna alight. What a waste of my precious energy, requiring me to gesture before i could actually alight!!



Anyway, back to the girl, she alights later than me. So i thought i'll take up the seat beside her even though the bus is like empty, so i could save myself the energy of pointing. And on friday, i did exactly that. But i think i scared her off coz she ain't in the bus today : D

I don't think i'll be getting any cards from korea this year. Unless my lil cousin put the card into the mail system before they left... But i'm still hopeful about cards from australia or malaysia : ) Or maybe somewhere closer to home... i don't know, maybe telok blanga or something.

Anyway, i've discovered something rather interesting, and it is taking up alot of my time. Cross stitching is so fun!! You've got to count the squares/holes to make sure you're stitching the correct spot. But it does seem kind of a girly hobby to me, so i'm gonna just stitch just this one piece only.



I was going through my daily doze of thoughts just now. Funny how i have so much to think. Anway, since i was eating durian, i didn't think i was gonna choke on anything, maybe if i swallowed the entire seed... Hmm.... where was i? Oh yes, my daily doze of thoughts.



I can't really remember what got me into thinking the following line of thoughts. Coz there's something wrong with my ICQ, and there's a flashing message from yvonne to remind me that we're meeting on monday. She sent the message only once, but somehow, i think the message cache on ICQ server didn't clear. Which is also a good thing, since everytime i read the message, i realise i've forgotten about it...



Yes... my line of thoughts before the flashing messages takes over... I was thinking earlier about this one line of wisdom that many people love alot. I think it goes something like, "You don't know what can happen tomorrow, tell the people you love that you love them today." And my verdict, it's a fine piece of crap : p



Why so? Conversely, if i were to say, "The world is gonna end tomorrow and you should go kick the ass of people you don't like, less you never get the chance to do it.", no one would do it. The very simplistic reason is not because people are peaceful by nature or some other holier than thou philosophy, but becoz of the underlying possiblity of, "What if the world suddenly didn't end tomorrow, won't i be like kicking myself instead?"



Ah yes... possiblities. I was thinking about possiblities before that. It is a possibilty that extra-terrestrial beings are among us already. It is a possiblity that this whole world is just a dream of some other being, and we would all dissolve like whispers in the wind when its time to wake. Anything is a possibilty.



But if anything is a possiblity, why aren't i kicking everyone who i don't like. Here, we must differentiate, likelihood from possibilities. While the world ending tomorrow is a possibility, how likely is it going to end tomorrow?



But still 'possibility' is a powerful word. I won't be doing alot of the things that i do these days if i didn't believe in possiblities : p

Managed to meet up with Erica yesterday. It was really nice, she's one of the few friends whom i feel more comfortable talking to. She doesn't feedback wat i say to my colleagues, doesn't feedback wat i say to that someone, talking to her has that no strings attached kind of feel, and she doesn't asks me to forget anyone or someone for that matter : D



Although i hadn't been to Sydney that many times, i somehow feel like i've been to Sydney alot. I can recall the first time i went to sydney, it was with Erica and Roy. Roy and i were travelling light, we brought clothing that was enough only if we washed and dried them for use later. Erica on the other hand had finished her course and was bringing all her barang barang along, ready to leave for home from Sydney.



To describe the trip from Melbourne to Sydney with just one word, agony. Economy train seats, shaking journey, and crying babies, there was little sleep to go around. The trip itself costed ten to eleven hours. I think we were in sydney for around one week, Erica was going off back to SG and we were taking another train (another 10 to 11 hours) to Gold Coast to meet up some other friends. These friends had it easy, they took a plane!!



Anyway Roy and i were sending Erica off by waiting with her for the bus that would take her from Sydney city to airport. And it was really sad watching Erica board that bus. It has always been painful to see loved ones walking out of your life, and i would say that the same is true for good friends too. Good friends are hard to come by!



While SG is a small country, and some would even say the world is a small place, it is quite possible that people never meet one another again once they part. I think at that time i told Roy :

I've just formatted the computer i'm using in the office. Seems like i'm formatting computers everywhere i go. Muhahaha.



I'm gonna go off earlier this afternoon to raffles place, so gonna start tuning up my babe watch radar now. Muhahaha.



I've recovered pretty much from the run and i can now walk properly without any pain in the legs. Muhahaha.



Muhahaha. Hahaha. >:)

How do you know when you've been buying the same thing from the same stall too often? Recently, i've been drinking coffee in the morning and teh C (Tea with evaporated milk) in the afternoon and its times like this :



The drink stall uncle instead of asking, "What do you want?",

He asks "You wanted coffee packet right?"

The drink stall uncle's wife hears me say "Teh C", but repeats to uncle "Kopi C"

Then uncle takes a look at me and asks me to repeat my order to prove her wife wrong...



Chicken rice stall auntie doesn't asks me whether i want sauce on my rice, she knows i don't. Morning noodle stall auntie doesn't asks me whether i want chilli, she knows i do. All the tiny bits come together and i'm like known by them personally :)



Dear opp JB,

are you sure you've sent your wishlist to the correct person :p It seems you're more like speaking to aunt agony rather than santa :D In any case, if you do see santa, could you help me beat him up, coz he is owing me 26 years of christmas presents... with compound interest.

Yours sincerely L Bandit.



For the benefit of those who don't do C or java programming, "Not" is represented by "!" so !Dislike actually means my friend "opp JB" likes this "cute" friend of hers. Just a note to those who are pedantic and think too much, "cute" friend of hers is NOT me despite me saying that someone thinks i have a cute smile couple posts back.



Anyway, i've been telling some of my friends, it takes two hands to clap. And ideally, it takes one of your hand and one of his hand to clap. And if the hands are not clapping, never forget that you've only used one of your hands to clap. You've still got another hand free, so plz, learn to multi-task... Use your free hand to slap him lah. Oh wait, since the extended hand is not clapping, you now have two hands free!! While one hand is slapping him, the other hand pick up a chair and "lei" him lah. Then use one leg to kick him and the other leg do your yoga stance or something :D



Okie, i'm hanging out with the char-kway-teow guys too much liao... No, i'm only kidding, dun hit him. This is a world of sunshine and butterflies, happy rainbows and smiling clouds, all things furry and cuddly until Happy Tree Friends came along :p



All i can say is that santa is one fat lazy bum. Which explains my 26 years of missing presents. So rather than waiting for fat lazy bum to do your dirty work, why not send the gentle query yourself? Ask him lovingly, what is on his mind. And if it is still not going, i personally dun think he is zhuge liang. San(1) gu(4) mao(2) ru(2) won't make a difference.



Obtw, plz do read my couzin's blog, Paint Me Pink Clouds Against Purple Skies. She's got a wishlist in the form of lyrics ^_^

My big sister is coming to singapore ^_^ ! Haha, i can imagine people going, "Big sister?". Yeah, i've got jie(2) bai(4) cousin and i've got jie(2) bai(4) .



How'd i come about so many jie bai members? Well, my is actually yeat yee, me housemate back in gippy. At that time, yeat yee was like always volunteering to cook, so when she was around, i hardly did any cooking at all. So i began calling her my to denote a seniority in status. I mean, i'm eating what she's cooking afterall, gotta show some respect :p



Anyway, she was younger than me so it kind of pisses her slightly for me to call her . Anyway, she's coming to sg, gotta blanja her abit. I still remember the good old days, playing mahjong the day before my exam...

Let's talk a little about the run i had on sunday. I'll begin with saturday. Saturday nite, i went home after my game of magic and did some carbo-loading. I didn't realise i was eating alot more than usual (my appetite is pretty small these days) until my mom saw me eating from the rice container and went like "That's alot of rice". Then later on, when i finished the remaining pot of curry, my brother went like, "You finished all the curry!!" And i went like, "but it's only eight chicken wing drumlets." i really didn't think it was alot, since i didn't have anything else beside the rice and drumlets.



Morning arrived, my auntie borrowed her brother's car and fetched us (my brother, cousin's hubby, taekwando kid and me) to the start point. Everything began as late but alright. Nothing much interesting in the babe watch news. A couple of babes here and there, but not as many/much compared to sheares bridge run. Maybe the sheer mileage turns them away. There were two interesting babes though. One was wearing a top that had the words, "Uniquely Gorgeous" on it. Woooo Gorgeous....



At around 16km, i started to have cramps and it was impossible to jog without having spasms in the muscles. And i did what i did best, i walked. In fact, i out walked a whole bunch of other walkers, there were even some who jogged slower than i could walk. I would have done the same thing as them, walk and jog alittle, except that i could not make more than afew paces before the spasms return.



I was hitting 33+km when i come to the other interesting babe. My initial thought was, 'hey, she's running in the wrong direction.' But turned out that she was in the right direction. Maybe she started late or something, anyway, she was some 6+km behind me. Nothing much i could do, xcept to clap for her.



Closing on the finish line, it was quite exhilarating. Took alot of discipline to continue walking and not jog the last 100 meters. Coz if i tried to jog, i would have limped the last 75 meters of the finished line. Kind of feels good when the other runners who have completed hang around there to cheer you on.



Race complete, i forgot to return the rfid chip. Which in turn meant i didn't get my extra t-shirt and medal. Oh well.... Anyway, i grabbed some lunch in suntec, took a cab home and played a round of hide and seek with uncle zhou's daughter.



The only thing that pisses me about the whole ordeal are the abrasions. Can u believe it, i got abrasion on my buttocks. Now that hurts.... Sunburns and all... yeah, pretty good run... i mean walk.

I'll begin this post with a rant. Begining with a rant is much better than ending with a rant right? I've recently been hearing alot from the radio media about the show singapore idol. All was well, the entertainment and telephony industry making money, contestants earning a bmg contract, and audiences watching a show they love. In fact, audiences interacted with the show, by sending sms to vote for the idols they like.



The problem begins when these people who votes actually voted for both contestants. Like eight votes Tulfik (i don't watch singaore idols, i don't know how to spell his name), and three votes for Sylvester. And that's pretty lame. Didn't these people know those three Sylvester votes would cancel out three Tulfik votes? Which actually effects making five votes for Tulfik for the price of 11 sms....



Anyway, i've gotten my first christmas card for the year :







Which brings to mind, since i didn't get a birthday card from korea, maybe i'll get a christmas card from korea. I did get a christmas card from holland last year though. Still hopeful about cards from australia, maybe even one popping over from malaysia :p I'll be sending a couple cards out myself, and dun be sad if u didn't get one from me. Just join the queue :p



Where's the queue u ask? u see the long line of girls from here to woodlands, that's the queue. and i'll be dam if someone is reading this in woodlands :D