Gong Xi Fa Cai!!! Happy CNY!
Another entry that was drafted like donkey years ago but never got round to finishing itOk totally shacked - thank goodness we didn't have to go visiting hehehe. All my uncles, aunts and cousins came over to our place (cos my mom is the head of the family). Why am I shacked I hear you asking...well I went to sleep at like 5 am this morning, woke up at 7 am to wake my mom up and then slept another 2 hours. Here's why the late night...
Was over at Lynn's for reunion dinner last night. Didn't get home till about 11 pm. My mom had said that she had done most of the cleaning, all that needed to be done was for her to clean her bathroom, washdown the corridor in front of our apartment (in case you didn't know it's cement) and mop down our utility balcony. So while she cleaned her bathroom, I did the other two things - I had already cleaned, vaccummed and mopped my room and cleaned my bathroom before heading over to Lynn's. Once I was done with those two chores I noticed that the kitchen sink, dish drying area and the entire counter top had not been cleaned!!! To add on to that the windows near the sink weren't clean either and they had a layer of grease on them (my mom loves to use a lot of oil in her cooking and doesn't believe in the clean as you go). Took me a while to clean them (thank goodness for hot water and detergent) as well as the sink and counter top. Just as I wanted to leave the kitchen I noticed the top of the fridge hadn't been cleaned (We have a small fridge so the top is sort of like at eye level), so yet another thing to do. I think it was almost 1 am by the time I finished. Once I was done with that, I was in my room sewing profusely (ok so my sewing machine was sewing profusely and I was helping it lol) I had started working on my long shorts/short pants earlier in the day but cos my mom kept on bugging me I still hadn't finished. Because I don't have a serger I was using a french seam to deal with the fraying of the fabric (see
here for explanation). Anyway I finally finished making my long shorts/short pants at about 4 am and then watched tv for a bit till I crashed at 5 am.
Here are some pictures I took of my long shorts/short pants...can't decide which they are lol. Oh I used little buttons for "decoration".
Woke up at 9 so that I could help my mom get stuff ready cos all the relatives were coming over so while my mom cooked up a storm in the kitchen I was adding ang pows to the pussy willow, hanging up plastic foldable pineapples, arranging paper plates and plastic forks and spoons, and putting the drinks in the cooler.
My mom managed to finish all the cooking by about 10.00 and then went for a shower, once she was showered and changed I headed into the shower - no washing of hair, which is majorly troublesome because my hair is really long now (almost middle of my back) and it was a very humid morning. Lynn, Ismon, Adam and my dad were supposed to arrive at 11.30 but they didn't show up till 12.30!! Luckily none of the relatives had arrived yet, in fact they only started arriving at about 1 pm so the timing worked out just fine. In the end there was 19 family members there (including me of course) and later on a future family member joined us. I say future because my cousin Jeremy is getting married in May so his fiancee joined us later after she had finished her visiting with her family - she lives not far from my place. Everybody eventually left at around 4 pm, well all except for Lynn, Ismon, Adam and dad, they hung around till about 6 pm. Forgot to take pics while the whole clan was around but did take these...
Adam just plum tuckered out
Ismon, Dad and Adam - the aftermath of CNY First Day =)
The pussywillow display
Spent the rest of the evening/night watching tv (lots of Taiwan New Year specials woohoo) and eventually crashed around midnight
Woohoo half day at the office
Yup you read right...we got the afternoon off today all thanks to Chinese New Year. You're probably wondering to yourself..."if you're on half day why are you blogging from the office?". Well here's why. My boss is supposed to received closing submissions from one of the parties in an arbitration which he is the arbitrator for and well they haven't delivered it yet. Called them up to tell them that we are on half day and that there will be nobody to receive it. They asked if I could wait, told them that I celebrate CNY and had things to do but would be willing to wait for them as long as it wasn't too long. They said they'd be here by 2 pm so here I am waiting till 2 pm. They had better not be late cos I still have to finish cleaning up my room and get started on making my new year clothes.
Feeling hungry so I'm gonna raid the office pantry in the meantime. Later.
Happy Valentine's Day!
So how was your valentine's day? Mine was the same as it has been for the last few years...just a regular day for little ole single me lol.
My day today consisted of waking up, having a shower, going to work, coughing here and there, doing some work, doing a little internet surfing, having lunch with my friends Grace and Roslind - gossip, chatting and laughing session - a little more work, a little more surfing and answering a long email from Buzz Buzz. Once work was done I left and met up with my sis on the way home. Grabbed some dinner for my mom and I on the way from the train station to the apartment. Watched a little tv and now I'm blogging while watching tv.
OK so what am I watching at the moment? Well I'm watching American Idol...it's the group round at the moment. Some groups did pretty good, some groups did terrible and some were just so so.
OK gonna have a shower now and will probably hit the sack pretty soon cos I can feel the meds kicking in.
Oh and just so you know...I haven't gotten any new outfits for Chinese New Year and I haven't cleaned up my room or bathroom (mom's taking care of the rest of the house) yet and I'm running out of time lol...I think only those of us who know anything about Chinese New Year will know what I'm talking about....gonna try and tidy up my room tomorrow once I get back from work in the evening and I only have to work till lunch on Friday so that will give me the afternoon free to do the vaccuuming and mopping and cleaning my bathroom. I'm thinking of making my New Year outfit (still have some nice material lying around) so I'll probably prep that on Friday night and then sew on Saturday morning/early afternoon. Shouldn't take too long actually. I intend to just make a pair of long shorts (like clammers) and may be reconstruct an old top or make a new top - sense of deja vu, have I said all this before? - well I'll take pics of the process for blogging reasons.
Later!
Cemeteries and sleep
Woke up early in the morning to go to Choa Chu Kang Christian Cemetery where my Kong Kong (Grandpa) and Poh Poh (Grandma) "reside". First my mom and I met up with my dad, Lynn, Ismon and Adam over at Woodlands MRT and then took the train to Yew Tee where we attempted to catch 2 cabs. I say attempted because we were in the taxi queue for at least 20 mins before 1 even cab and there were like 5 lots of people in front of us. In the end we decided to call for 2 cabs and trust me it was a lot faster than if we had stayed in the queue.
We went to see my Kong Kong first, as usually my sis and I will have to clean the tomb - cemeteries here are not like in say the US which only has a tombstone, here they actually cover the tomb too (a bit hard to explain but I think you get the idea right) - and tombstone, then we all placed our flowers and walked over to my Poh Poh's plot. Here is Singapore you can't buy plots in advance, you're sort of assigned them as and when you apply for them. Lucky for us my grandparents' graves are not that far apart, just a short walk. After paying our respects to my Poh Poh we headed back to the main road to head home. The walk from either of my grandparents' plots to the main road is about 5 mins but because of my mom it usually takes us about 3 times as long cos she has to stop every few metres to rest because she has no strength in her legs (which we repeatedly tell her is because of lack of exercise but she doesn't believe us). Just as we got to the main road a cab came out of the cemetery so my mom, my dad and I caught it to head home - Lynn, Ismon and Adam were going out for the day. My mom and I dropped my dad off at home first and then went on to our place. Of course as soon as we got them my mom sent me off to buy lunch for her.
Once I had my lunch I settled down to watch tv. I'm still having a bad cough so took my meds which promptly made me drowsy so I had a short nap in the afternoon while watching tv. And that is pretty much what I did for the rest of the day - eat, sleep, cough and watch tv. I was supposed to tidy up my room and set up my printer but just didn't have the energy to do so, so I guess I have to tide up my room when I get home this evening.
So how was your weekend?
Sleep sleep and more sleep
Spent the day at home and most of it drifting in and out of consciousness thanks to the champion of cough mixtures...strange it only seems to make me drowsy when I'm at home
lol.
When I wasn't sleeping I was watching
tv...was supposed to clean my room in anticipation of Chinese New Year but just didn't have the energy. Will have to do that tomorrow. Was also gonna make an outfit for new year too - can't be bothered to go and buy something. I still have some purplish denim material which I got a while ago but haven't used yet. Thought of making a pair of long shorts - I guess you would call them
clammers or something like that. I have some other material which I could use for a top or I may just "reconstruct" an old
oversized tee to a slightly fitted v-neck...will post pictures when I finish it. Will probably start on it tomorrow after I've cleaned my room which shouldn't take too long. Oh I also have to hook up my new printer. Bought a new Canon colour printer about 2 weeks ago for about S$60 but I just haven't gotten round to hooking it yet cos I've either been busy over the weekends or been sick.
Got to get up early tomorrow morning cos we're off to the cemetery to pay our respects to my
Poh Poh and Kong Kong before the new year.
Well gotta take another dose of meds and will probably crash not long after that.
Champion of cough mixture
Do I decided to pay a visit to the company doc to get some proper meds for my cough. She says my lungs are clear, my throat is fine and I have no fever so possibly I've just gotten a mild viral flu with a lingering cough. Got prescribed antibiotics, meds for the phlegm, meds for my sort of blocked nose (the blockage comes and goes) and cough mixture. Now the cough mixture I was prescribed I consider to be the champion of cough mixtures because it works really well and quickly too. Usually all traces of a cough will be gone before you're even half way through the bottle. Another plus to the cough mixture is that it doesn't taste as icky as the others, in fact it's a little on the sweet side. This stuff is supposed to make you drowsy but I don't ever seem to have that problem.
Still coughing but I expect that I should be over my cough pretty soon because I already notice a change in my cough. The sooner the better I say.
Right now I'm watching "Equilibrium" which is this futuristic movie starring Christian Bale on tv. It's a bit boring though. It's about this guy who is sort of like a high ranking law enforcement type officer living in a society where having feelings is considered a crime and he starts to have feelings or something like that. Well I won't be finishing it, I'm just waiting for "Happily Ever After", which will be coming on in about 5 mins so not much long to go.
Msg to Buzz Buzz - so have you considered my "send her out to the woods in a deer outfit during hunting season" idea yet? hehehe Like I said, it would be considered an accidental death. Trust me I watch enough enough crime tv to know hahaha (can we say CSI)
I'm going to be glued to the tv for the next few hours... here's the line up...
- 9 pm - Happily Ever After
- 10 pm - Supernatural
- 11 pm - Survivor Fiji
Can't wait till Monday too cos that's when The Amazing Race: All Stars starts. Didn't get to watch the last season of The Amazing Race cos it was only available on cable and I don't have cable.
OK Happily Ever After is gonna start soon and I need to go to the loo.
My mom says the strangest things
So I had a really bad coughing fit (well you would too if you had accidentally swallowed just as you were about to cough), when I came out to get some warm water from the kitchen my mom said that I should go and see the doctor. I explained that it was because I had accidentally swallowed as I coughed, she went on to say that if I keep on coughing I'm going to break my chest (???!!!???). She then went on to say that I'll break my lungs (???!!!???). The way she was going on you'd think that I've been coughing this badly every day for the past year! Sorry but the last time I had a cough was like early last year, whereas she coughs every day - so why would I "break" my lungs but not her???!!!???
You're probably wonder why I haven't been to the doctor...well there's mainly 3 reasons for that - 1. I only have a cough that came about from having a sore throat followed by cold air being blown on my back (thanks to my boss who complained his room was warm and made me set up the fan right behind me while I sat on the other side of the desk typing stuff into the computer - 2. I can't really bother going to see the company doc because they changed the panel of docs we can use and the one who I always used to go to is no longer on the panel and my colleagues say the one near us isn't that great - 3. the nearest doc on our panel to my house is like 20 mins away.
Well if the cough shows no signs of improving tomorrow then I'll see if I can't pop over to the doctors tomorrow morning. The funny thing is I seem to go through long stretches of no coughing and then suddenly I'll have a coughing fit and I haven't been coughing while I sleep in fact the thing that has been causing me to wake up in the night is the need to go to the loo cos I've been drinking a ton of water!!!
Can I have a new set of lungs please...
been coughing up a storm today but that's mainly because I didn't have any cough mixture with me. I took the last dose this morning and didn't manage to get any during lunch but I picked up a bottle on the way home...which reminds me I better take a dose now... eewwwww yuck yuck...I hate cough mixture!!!
Work was pretty uneventful and that's all because my boss took the afternoon off so I spent the afternoon checking out craftster. Left the office a little late though - about 6.30 pm but that's cos I had started to reply to Cor's email at about 5.30 pm and cos of distractions it took me a while to finish the reply plus I was waiting for Julie to finish work so that we could head home together. Got home in time to watch the result show for a local English reality show -
The Dance Floor which is sort of like "So You Think You Can Dance?" except that rather than individuals, all the contestants had to be in groups of 2 to 6 members. They're done with the auditions and 32 teams got into this qualifying round. Yesterday was the first round of the dance off so to speak. They had 8 teams perform and only 2 teams got into the next round. The 5th week will be the wildcards. All in only 10 teams will get into the next round. After that I don't know. It seems that the format is similar to the Idol series just that it's dancing instead of singing. In yesterday's show there were at least 5 teams that were really good. Wonder what we have in store for next week. Oh the dancers can dance any form or format of dance. Of the two teams that went through today, one team was 6 guys who did a hip hop breakdance style routine while the outher team was a couple who did a quickstep routine. Of the 2 teams selected each week one is the judges' choice while the other is the viewers' choice.
He he watching "Happily Ever After"...one of the guys in it totally cracks me up. Last year he was the winner of this contest called on "Star Idol" on Channel 8 (one of the Chinese stations) - like Idol just acting instead of singing. He's such a macho type of guy but they've got him playing this girlie guy and I have to admit he's doing a really good job at it hehehehe.
Oh earlier this afternoon after my boss left, I took a pic of the view from his room. The government intends to change the bay area near my office to a sort of water sport come entertainment area. One of the two intergrated resorts (the government's fancy name for casino) will actually be just behind my office. From his room you can see the "durian" I mean the "bug eyes" I mean the Esplande, Suntec City, the Merlion, and also you can see them constructing the Singapore Flyer (our version of the London Eye). Here's the pic with a couple of notes...
Right I'm gonna end here cos I want to watch the rest of tonight's episode of "Happily Ever After".
Just had the weirdest thing happen at work...
..there was this apache helicopter flying by our building and then it sort of hung around flying figure eights over the bay area near my office - should of grabbed my camera but didn't think of it at the time.
If you don't know what an apache helicopter is, well to make a long story short, it's an attack helicopter that only has room for the pilot and navigator and is loaded with weapons such as machine guns and rockets.
Like I said it was a weird
Took the day off
Yup I took the day off from work today - well I do have like 41 days of leave on the books, 20 of which I have to clear by the end of the year so I might as well take a day here and a day there.
Met up with Julie at about 11.30 am and went over to JB (Johor Bahru, Malaysia) for a spot of Chinese New Year shopping but in the end all I got was a few dvds, shampoo (cos it's like 1/2 the price there thanks to the exchange rate) and some shrink plastic - stuff that you can print on and then pop into the toaster oven which causes the plastic to shrink and harden, good for making your own key chain ornaments etc. When I get round to actually using it I'll post some pics. Didn't get any new year goodies cos it was all a little pricey, even with the exchange rate.
Got home around 3.30 - 4 pm. Helped my mom to clean her a/c (she was saying that it only seems to be blowing hot air) - vacuumed the filters - that usually does the trick with mine.
Right now I'm watching tv while blogging and surfing the net on BaoBei. I'm checking out this great site/forum that I came across that has all sorts of craft and sewing ideas with quite a few tutorials too. Found some really nice bag designs there too. The name of the site is
Craftster. As for what's on the tv, I'm watching this local Chinese series (thank goodness for subtitles) which is sort of a drama but more like a comedic romance story called "Happily Ever After" - here's the
link for it. Quite funny actually and it's got a couple of my fave local actors in it. Wish I had thought to record it, oh well.
Well seeing as I now have BaoBei I thought I'd better make better use of her and blog every day, even if I have a boring day lol.
Well back to watching tv and surfing oh and coughing up half my lungs...got a terrible chest cough thanks to this flu bug that's been going round...didn't have a fever and a very slight cold but had a slight sore throat which has now developed into a cough but the cough mixture I'm taking now is helping to bring up the icky mucus stuck in my lungs so I should be getting over it soon. Give me fever, give me sneezing just don't give me a cough - it's the thing I hate the most!!!
Random discovery on the net
Was searching the net for printable stickers and discovered this very interesting website...
http://www.goawayparis.com/ The music video is really good too. Definately gonna print out a few of them stickers hehehehe
Adam just plum tuckered out
Ismon, Dad and Adam - the aftermath of CNY First Day =)
The pussywillow display 
