Happy Birthday Sharks!
28/02/2007
What makes or breaks a great work environment isn’t the size of your cube or your bonus.
It usually is the quality of your co-worker relationships.
Since buddy Sharks has moved on, I’ve felt like the company lost a little of it’s personality. That coupled with the changes in the Big Why eventually contributed in a slide in energy levels.
Confucius say, heart disenchanted, will cold.
Then today lil’momma showed me a perspective that has eluded me for a whole quarter. She’s absolutely right, though. Instead of stewing, perhaps I should start grilling instead. If it doesn’t work out, I can always fry away. 
What this means? Stop looking at everything that’s wrong. Look towards what would make things better. If you don’t find it in one place, find it somewhere else.
With great pregnancy comes great wisdom, I suppose.
你喜欢Asia吗?
27/02/2007
Everyday something reminds me of the pitiful job I’ve done learning my mother tongue.
Of course where I am now looking back it seems like a waste that I didn’t make full use of my education and time.
But of course, back when I was receiving my education, all I could think was that it was a waste of time.
Reality is such a painful perspective.
oscar monday
27/02/2007
I can’t believe The Departed won best picture. That’s gross. That’s like saying burgers are gourmet. Ok. Maybe this was one of those expensive burgers, the kind with truffles or foie gras in it.
But a burger’s a burger. It’s still makes for unglam eating.
apples and oranges
25/02/2007
We spent yesterday at our pal RC’s new place. The family moved to a really quaint old-style terrace in Changi, complete with the little 1×1 inch coloured tiles that make up the floor, wooden window louvres, a small yard in front and a kinda attached storage room out back.
Very retro, very pre-WW2, very cool.
His kids are also doing pretty well. The eldest is now a chatty little ball of energy, who apparently isn’t able to sit still just like RC. Mrs RC had also settled in well in the new place, and the baby looks really different from the last time we met them.
I should’ve brought a camera. But I didn’t. I’m still struggling over which camera to get, but am still undecided. At this point, the Canon 400D is the frontrunner, although I really don’t fancy dropping another several hundred bucks on lenses. The Lumix fz-50 is next on the list, mostly because of the lens.
In other news, we went to the Orchard and I got myself Orange. Yay.
Happy Day!
22/02/2007
Happy Birthday Michael (though not related to KF) Chang! *muaks!*
And Happy Thinking Day to you girl guides out there!
Think harder, and maybe therefore you’ll be.
imdb revamped
19/02/2007
Gee. What a difference a day makes. Yesterday I went there and it looked blah. Today I go there and it looks, umm, weird but still blah.
Good job though, IMDb! Nice CSS! Try harder, you’re getting there!
lunar looniness
19/02/2007
The worst of CNY is over, at least for me. While most people revel in meeting their family and extended family, I don’t think they’ve met mine.
As a kid, CNY though dreadful, was often quite lucrative. My mom has a huge family, so though meeting her entire family – having to remember to call all my uncles and aunts in order, and remembering who was paired to who – was fairly unpleasant, it often paid off.
I’d have to be there for an hour, maybe more, socialise (or not) with my cousins, some of whom were so much older so I had no idea what they were talking about, the ones around my age – well we just outgrew one another – we could sit next to each other for the entire session, and despite having played with each other each time we met for the first 12 years of our lives, we’d be able to just sit there, not move and not make conversation, aside from Hi and Bye. We’re that tight. The ones younger than me, well, we don’t have that much in common.
So now that that’s over, it’s a relief.
It’s just the way Chinese New Year was designed – to inspire dread so you can feel relief when it’s over. Ahhh… the mysteries of life.
I’ve to get out of the house now, because I spent the whole day in bed traumatised by the day before (notwithstanding the $60 I made from my dad’s siblings at the poker table).
Have a good Tuesday!
moving on
17/02/2007
It’s the eve of the New Year. I don’t know if the whole atmosphere will change, but I figure it’s a good time to reassess things, and decide on a fresh start.
And there’s no doing it without spring cleaning. Spring cleaning is probably a metaphor for clearing the crap in your mind and sending your emotional luggage off with the rest of history, since the mind is so powerful, clearing it so good chi can flow there probably has the biggest payoff. But for that to happen, the physical clearing and cleaning has to happen to, and once a year is probably a good regime.
So despite feeling all but inadequate as lil’momma goes on about cleaning every nook and cranny of the house, I’ve taken a more practical approach and prioritised my clean-up operation. What I mean to say is, it’s the eve of the New Year, at about 1pm, and I’m not done cleaning.
This year, as with all years, my horoscopes advise very strongly on holding my tongue and my temper. I used to scoff at those predictions (Who says I’ve a bad temper? What do you mean I say the wrong things?) but I guess with more recent introspection, let’s just say I know exactly what they’re referring to.
So before the year begins, lemme just get it all out there -
1. To everyone that has an opinion about where Yahoo! should be: a big-supernova success or a hole in the ground – let’s hear from you when you actually run a business that has the largest internet audience in world, generate a billion dollars every quarter (3 months, not 25c) doing so, and is paymaster to more than 10,000 employees around the world. Let’s hear you out, when you run something like that, or maybe close. If you’re still writing for Wired, your blog, some news agency, some financial magazine – how do I put this in a Feeling way – I know you really have an opinion, and you feel you really have something to share, but you’re not adding any value with your harebrained, two-bit opinions, so shove off, have a cookie, buy GOOG and stop pretending you know better. You can yap again when I’ve no more stock or options underwater.
2. To the bus drivers over at TIBS – your luck is running out. An accident is 1 in a million chance, maybe less. But you guys drive on the edge of your seat everyday so it’s time to release the pedal from the metal.
3. To the people who have issues that keep them from admitting they’re wrong and I’m right, you may be an insolent little newt, some of you might be more important to me than others, but I’ll forgive you all the same. Because I’m a lotus on a lily pond, and you’re a guppy and you won’t faze me. That’s what I’m going to try. Success rates vary.
4. To my relatives whose kids are going to receive a red packet from me this year – don’t make a big deal, don’t make a fuss. Just because you didn’t get an invite to my wedding dinner means I don’t give two hoots shouldn’t be an issue since I probably don’t give two hoots and neither should you. In fact, your kids or grandkids are probably going to get four hoots in their red packet since I hear that’s the market minimum these days.
Ok done. All on the eve of CNY.
Please everyone, it’s supposed to be a chill out year of the Fire Boar, so take the time to smell the roses, and take good care of yourselves!
Have a Happy, Healthy, Joyous and Eventful Year of the Boar. May you find the energy to hope and dream, and may your hopes and dreams come true.
dong dong dong chang!
16/02/2007
It’s the eve before the eve before the eve of the Lunar New Year.
My day
Inspired by lil’momma, I managed to sneak myself a manicure/pedicure over at Summer Nails at Great World City. Not the world’s best manicure/pedicure – I’m sorry but it was a little ill-equipped for my liking – but like most small outfits, the girls there were really nice about things, and they use OPI colours.
If you’re so inclined, Summer Nail Salon (tel: 6732 5449) is at #03-05, Great World City.
Classic Manicure – $25
Classic Pedicure – $35
CNY extra – $5
The classic includes a massage and a scrub, but if you don’t mind doing without (you won’t be missing much) the Basic version is $7 less.
My other half’s day
KF started out with a pit in his stomach. While leaving for work, he couldn’t find his GBA. KF never leaves the house without it, and has even lost it twice. But each time he squirms his way until he gets a replacement – he’s only too willing to pay for it, it’s usually me that’s throwing the hissy fit about spending money on another one – and this morning when he couldn’t find the one he named “Latest Edition”, even he was about to give up.
We had dinner at Great World City last night, and then we went to the supermarket. So he went over to look, but no luck. He came to the office all downcast.
I came home before he did, and checked under the bed like he asked. No luck. I searched the kitchen, looked in the fridge, followed his trail from last night, no luck.
I decided to take a shower right about then. I went to the room and turned on the water heater and noticed he stacked a bunch of things on the night table again. This time, he stacked a plate precariously on a stack of stray documents on a small base on a book, on another stack of documents. Typical.
And there, sandwiched between the documents holding up the plate and the books, was Latest Edition.
Another mystery solved.
Happy V Day!
14/02/2007
Despite it being as important as, well – getting married – in my books, nonetheless Happy Valentine’s Day to everyone and anyone who’s still a hopeless romantic.
You’ll need all the love you can get.
