Home improvement

Spent the whole of yesterday doing something for the home.

Firstly, I bought 2 different kinds of lizard glue traps to try to solve the lizard infestation problem at home. There are MANY lizards in my home. I have never lived in a home that has some many ants and lizards. It's not a "house" problem (nothing wrong with this Toa Payoh flat), it's a "home" problem, meaning there's too much food around in this home to attract all these pest. I prefer to tolerate and turn a blind eye to the not so clean habits of my family members, because i believe in 家和万事兴, and try to resolve this problem using other methods.

So far, the 5 traps got 2 lizards. I also cleaned up the washing area and saw 2 lizards flew for their lives out of the window. Hopefully they did not come back secretly in the dead of the night.

While shopping for the lizard traps in the DIY shop, I came across some wall decal, and decided to update the look of my shoe cabinet. I bought 2 sets, and used 1 and half for the shoe cabinet, and the other half on Lynn's brown chest:

Looking for the old taste

I'm not a foodie. I seldom blog about food. But of course I have my favorite food. If I have the supernatural gift of not gaining weight no matter what nonsense I eat, I would be stuffing myself silly with luncheon meat with beehoon for breakfast, plus youtiao, curry chicken or chicken rice or laska or any other Singapore 美食. I like sweet stuff, like bubble tea, kuehs, desserts, etc..

Anyway, now I have time right? Actually not only last week, but once a while when I have the time, I will go to Amoy Street hawker to eat my favorite fish soup. I first come across this store when I was in audit, more than 10 years ago. Wk and myself both like fish soup a lot. There was one week when we had an assignment there, and we ate fish soup for every lunch for one week.

Unfortunately, either their fish soup is no longer the same as last time, or my taste had changed. I no longer enjoy it as much as last time. In the past, they have the bean paste （豆酱） that goes with the chilly and lots of ginger. Now, they don't serve the bean paste anymore and the ginger is little.


I like Lor Mee too. But I'm particular about it, because the taste from one store to another is very different (some are terrible), so to avoid disappointment I seldom eat it. It's again an old taste that I'm trying to look for. When I was in primary 4, my family moved from Bukit Merah to Havelock road. Near to my new school, there's a old and dirty coffee shop that has a stall that sells Lor Mee, which my whole family likes. The stall owner is a fat old man, who will oblige my mum when she ask for more 烧肉 which my sis likes. Those days, there's no TV programs that gives out certificate to stalls that people voted as best food. But if I remember correctly, when such TV programs started, that stall did get recommended. But I think not long after that, the fat man (store owner) probably died. When I went there some 7 years ago (in 2005), the coffee shop is still there, but the store's gone.

Ever since I moved to Toa Payoh, I started eating Lor Mee again. I guess I learn to get use to this store's taste, which is actually not bad, so that I have a steady source of Lor Mee. The store owner is a old woman, not sure how long more she can or will carry on her trade.

Bad translation and bad sounding names

(i) One of the Japanese airlines is called "All Nippon Airways" (ANA). The chinese translation is:
ALL = 全
Nippon (Japan)=日
Airways = 空

I wonder how an airline called "全日空" (whole day empty) can make money...

(ii) I passed by a shop selling TOTO/4D at Bishan last week. The shop name is call “南发”. I wonder how many people queuing in that shop actually took notice of the shop name....

"Mummy, the car can drive by itself!"

Whenever I drive Lynn alone (without WK), she sits in the front passenger seat. Last weekend, we were approaching a traffic light that just turned red. There is no car in front of us, but I stopped the car about 2 meters from the traffic light. I took my hands off the steering wheel, and then lifted my foot off the break slightly, so the car rolled forward a bit. Then Lynn exclaimed "Mummy, the car can drive by itself". I stepped on the break to stop the roll forward, and look at her with a wicked smile on my face. I realized that she didn't know that we control the car with both hands and feet, and she thought that the car is controlled by managing the steering wheels with hands only. I was in a playful mood, so I told her "Really? You must say "Car, drive!", then the car will drive by itself!" She was still a bit stunned, but then she recovered slightly, decided to give it a try, and so said "Car, drive!". After she said that, I quietly and slowly lifted my leg off the break again, and so the car rolled forward again. She was very excited and said "See, the car drove by itself! I must tell Popo the big news!!"

WP/YSL saga

I only become aware of some politics last year due to the GE. Before that I was totally ignorant. Not only me, a lot of other people that I knew expressed their opinion, no matter how humble, about our country's GE, our country's leader, our fears and frustrations, and of course our opposition party.

In overall, I'm a PAP supporter. However, I really think very highly of LTK and some of his party members. If i were in Hougang or Aljunied, I may not vote for PAP.

It's a terrible set back for WP. I think no matter what they do now, they have lost my trust. I'm disappointed because I thought highly of YSL. After the GE results last year, I kept asking/telling everyone "did you hear YSL's victory speech? This guy 有前途！ He thanked the Hougang people, then he thanked his mentor...." I thought he's a great politician, someone who had worked the ground and won over the people and his mentor's heart and vote. I don't want to judge his private life which I don't know. However, I think the way he handled this shows that he's not suitable to be our leader.

I also want to be thankful that our other leaders are good man.

So much to update

Not sure where to start.

There's a saying "times flies". Well, these 2 weeks, time "moved", not "flew". Cos I've been enjoying life, at a relaxed pace. Things that I've done so far since I came back from my seoul trip (last Wed) were:

i) Unpack my luggage over 1 week instead of 1 day
Last year when I traveled for work, I usually unpack my luggage in a few hours or within one day at most. I don't bring a lot of clothes or accessories for biz trips, so unpacking were easy. This time round, since I'm "jobless" after coming back from my seoul trip, there's just no urgency to unpack. Also since this is a shopping trip, there were a lot of purchases to put away. For example gifts need to be distributed to various people, and new clothes need to be washed before they go into the cabinet. The super "nuar" pace for unpacking really signify the start of my jobless state!

ii) Clean Lynn's toy boxes
I do this occasionally (once a few months). During the weekend that I was in Seoul, there's a family gathering at my place (Yuan Xiao), so the toys were all mixed up in different boxes. I think I'm a compulsive sorter, haha.. Although I scold Lynn for not sorting the toys, I never attempted to instill the discipline in her with much force. I suspect its actually because I enjoy sorting, hahah!

[I always think that Lynn takes after me a lot. However, I always wonder if this thinking is true or not. She's still young, so of course she places her things all over the place (i.e., not very organized). I always wonder when she grows up and have a home of her own, whether it will be messy like WK mum's, or full of stuff like my mum's or organized like my.. I wonder when she becomes a teenager, what will her style be like and what will her room be like. I always clash with my mum when I was a teenager (and in fact even now!), cos I'm very very territorial when it comes to my room, meaning I never let anyone touch the way I organize things.]

iii) Pack unwanted clothes for giving away
Like I say, I'm a compulsive sorter. One thing that I wish to achieve during this break is to pack my house. Other than clearing out stuff that I don't want/need, I also hope to remind myself to buy less. One of my new resolution, which is to lessen my carbon footprint on mother earth.

iv) Burning petrol, cash card balance and parking coupons
I learn that my biggest spending when jobless is parking cost!! Everyday I spend about $6 to $7 on parking!

In the day, I'm don't spend much time at home, because I don't enjoy having someone else at home with me. This is not targeted towards WK's mum; even if it's my own mum I will still feel "scrutinized".

So I end up hanging out most of my time. Unlike last time when I always take the public transport, nowadays I so used to driving everywhere. Most parts of Spore have parking charges of $0.5 per half hour. Really heartache.. Got to strategize my traveling for next week onwards liao.. Save money and save the earth.

v) Exercise
Went to NUSS gym/pool for 2 continuous days already. Going for a run at TPY stadium later today.

There was once I told my friends, that "my age is not a secret; my weight is!". They all laughed. Every woman has her weakness/insecurity/obsession, I guess my is weight. I'm not fat I know, that's why I call it my obsession. The problem is that I don't control it well, so it yo-yos a lot, going from 52 kg (4 yrs ago), to 49kg (when I did my 2nd 10km run in 2009), then balloon back to 53kg now, due to 2 yrs of crazy working schedule and meals on planes. So I'm back to my weight loss plans again.. So the bigger challenge is not slimming down, but keeping slim forever.. Ha, looks like this is going to be my yearly resolution (positive point of view), or life long battle (negative point of view!)

vi) 泡 ／ 混 TPY and Bishan library
Aircon + free wifi + desk and power point for laptop. So far, I cleared emails and apply for jobs. Going forward, I will be updating blogs too. Got 2 trips to do (Perth Oct 2011 and Seoul), before I go for my next trip, to Shanghai, on the last day of Feb!

vii) Errants/others
Open OCBC a/c for Lynn; clear mails/bills; scout for a home safe deposit box, piano lesson for Lynn, MPM maths; facial and hair treatment; read newspaper; read on investment; sign up for free CPF public talk on health insurance; etc.. etc.. etc.. etc..

OK.. I have taken a big risk to "slow down to smell the flowers". Of course I'm enjoying myself right now. I wonder how I'm going to judge or measure the "return" on this break. Most importantly, got to be true to myself.

Will blog again..

Last day at GF

Finally, after a very long and hectic 3 months, today is my last day at GF. A lot of mixed feelings, because one on hand I'm the one who initated the parting, on the other hand I really can't bear to leave a lot of people here. It's not a clean break. Well, could be that it's not meant to be a clean break right from the first day when I gave the letter.

I stayed up to 2am yesterday night to clear my laptop of personal stuff, and to draft the goodbye/thank you emails. It's sad to say goodbye.

Now, I finally close the page on this wonderful chapter in my life.

(I thought of writing about what I'm going to do tomorrow and during the break, but I think this posting should end here. Another chapter will begin right away, but let me linger at this chapter's ending for a while more....)