Let it snow Let it snow!

So, I haven't really been blogging for quite some time. Probably because I have lost my inspiration to really write anything funny or even anything about my life. And more importantly, I realized I may have also lost my sense of humour to all the overwhelming new experiences and new feelings I have to deal with.

So, here I am, trying to write something about today. I hope I don't sound as boring as the weather channel. (Man, am I finally getting into talking jokes that only the American can understand or what?)

The weather today was snowy. Really snowing heavily since the morning all the way till the afternoon. Just cannot believe how much it can snow here, though it's really exciting and I am screaming like a kid to go out and play inside my heart, but physically stuck in a boring meeting room.

So when finally the official email is broadcasted to close the office early, I was just waiting for my co-worker to send me back home asap! But then hor... both hardworking Japanese seemed determined to stay until the storm is over. Luckily one kind soul that stays at neighbouring town offered to give me a ride back. So happily I brought my big bag of coats for dry cleaning and wearing all my 'gear' getting all ready to go out for his car which he parks outside.

The moment the door open, I was squirming happily with all the snow floating outside and 3-inch thick on the floor... Both my colleague and I tripped over the kerb which wasn't really visible with so much white stuff on the floor. Happily I hopped towards the parking lot and went inside his car while he got to the back with the scraper to scrap off the snow from his car. Enjoying every moment of it inside the car, looking at the snowy weather outside...

Then we are off to the road. This is when I reazlied the horrors of snowing and probably I won't be driving back home during winter on snowy days. So he had to start his SUV real slow because his tires are dry and the road is cold with a frozen layer of ice. Throughout the whole trip, he was trying to switch between 2 wheels drive and 4 wheels drive to see which is better (basically 2 wheel is smoother to drive but higher danger of skidding, 4 wheels drive will be rougher but more stable). A few times I can actually feel the tires are spinning as he is slowing down to a stop, which converts into the danger that the car may not be able to stop at all. Doesn't help to calm me down when he explained to me all the technical stuff about his car skidding and SUV has higher chances or flipping over when making a turn etc. etc...

Luckily I am home safely and typing down the little adventure on snowstorm on the road. I have to thank my colleague who really really is a kind soul that offered to give me a ride back eventhough it is a detour. I think this kinda incident will continue to happen throughout Dec to even Feb. I was told that I don't have to worry that I will miss any snow because there's going to be a lot of snow in this cold winter.

Departure Lounge - Jetlag Dreams

One of my favourite album. This is an all-instrumental album with only 7 tracks. I do not think the other albums by Departure Lounge is of anything like this...


Album: Jetlag Dreams
Artist: Departure Lounge
Released: 2001
Label: Bella Union Records

Tracks:
1. "Equestrian Skydiving"
2. "Runway Doubts"
3. "Too Late To Die Young"
4. "A Strange Descent"
5. "Purple Fluffy Haze"
6. "Charles de Gaulle To Belleville"
7. "Beyond The Beltway"

Listen online:
http://mp3.rhapsody.com/departure-lounge/jetlag-dreams

Changing

After shifting here for more than 3 months, I finally realised that life needs to be re-thought. Resetting my goals, dreams, lifestyle, and people relationship.

This is a stage where I need to get in touch with my inner self again. To communicate with myself, re-assure that when evertyhing changes, I need to find something that I can hold on to and have faith in, when all else fails. There has never been a period of my life that I felt so empty inside, total lost of what I should do everyday I get back from work. Cooking is mundane, so is watching tv while waiting for finally, the time to sleep and to reset the this whole procedure to start again for next day.

Weekends I woke up early, looking at the near empty but messy room, with cartons unpacked but not tidied, thinking about what to do next as weekends is out of the routine period. During the day, I have to find some activities to do during weekend, not wanting to give myself a chance to feel back the emptiness and loneliness that I feel after work.

My dream, it seems, has been attained. To finally be able to live alone abroad all by myself, and everything starts new, from friends, to house, the environment and culture. Though not the dream country, I still believe this is what people meant by dream come true. But, what about next? So what happens when your dream came true? What should I do next? Dream came true, it seems, is like the typical fairy tale storybook ending of 'Happily ever after'. Which, as you grow up, sets you wondering what goes after happily ever after. You live in the castle with your prince charming, and what's there after the adventure? What's is after that? Does the prince sets out to another adventure? Awaits the newborn prince? Gets into the daily life to dealing with the commoners' problems and make the country a better place?

Now, is the stage of reflection, to set myself a new goal, probably a new dream, and to decide what I want to be, at least for the next 2 or more years in this foreign land far away from home. Even though the weekends I do have appointments, trying to find myself some activities to be involved in, I seldom feel the same fulfillment that I felt with my life back then. Probably, I am not busier than I used to be, so I need to find something more, to get away from this feeling of lost. Or maybe, I just need to rethink if I am not having enough friends here, or just not used to living alone here... that I am homesick. I am not strong in the heart to understand what's living alone and starting everything new. I am not admitting to myself that I still have some complex inferiority about me that I cannot 'live life to the fullest' like I thought I could.

This, I hope, is a transition stage, that will make me a better person and changed myself. An exploration journey. Which, should I fail, will probably make my stay here miserable and unhappy. This, I sincerely pray, will not happen to me. I want to feel, life and see what difference I can make for myself and probably deep inside, to make me feel living again.

Stoopid Me.

Just reached home at 8.31pm and I think I have to write this down so as to remind myself to stop being so absent-minded because not everytime I can get away with it.

I left the office around 6pm today and took a free ride home as usual, thanks to T-san. So he wanted to go to a Korean supermarket at Fort Lee and so I left the office in a hurry because the stoopid laptop wouldn't shut down fast enough and he was already waiting for me.

Didn't really have time to check if I got all the things with me (like wallet, staff card, watches, etc.). By the time the shopping was done, reached back Edgewater and happily saying goodbye to T-san, I opened my bag to search for my apartment keys. To my horror, I realised I cannot find my keys at all! After flipping through the messy bag and finally confirmed that I must have left it in the office jacket pocket this morning and forgot to put it back into the bag...

I immediately called my boss and check if he is still in the office, which luckily he was and said that he will pass the keys to N-san who stays in the same place and who drives me to work every morning. At the same time, T-san saw me still outside and turned back asking if I need help. I explained to him with embarrassment that I have absentmindedly left the keys in the office and he kindly offered me a ride back to the office. He then drove back to drop his grocery stuff and said that he will picked me up later.

After he left, I called N-san to just make sure that he is in the office so that T-san does not need to send me back office again. Luckily he was about to leave the office and has received the keys from my boss.

So I phoned back T-san, telling him that there was no need for him to send me back to office because N-san will be coming back with my keys in a while. He then offered me to come up to his home to sit down and watched TV as it was really cold outside. Not wanting to trouble him, I rejected his offer and told him that N-san will be coming back very fast.

Left in the cold outside alone in the carpark, I started reflecting to myself why I am just absent-minded and cannot be more careful and more mindful with important things like the keys since I am living alone now and obviously nobody will have the spare keys nor will there be anyone at home to open the door for me. I am really grateful that people here are more than willing to help me and I just didn't want to trouble them further. I now feel sorry that I have turned down T-san's offer to go his house and wait alone outside for N-san because by doing this, I am being too 见外. In fact, I have been scolded once before by friend here that if they offered help when I really needed it, I just have to accept it with gratitude and not try to be too 见外. Since, there will be some day that I can repay them by giving them a treat of in-turn helping them back.

So, here I am writing this episode for all to see my forgetfulness and also the fact that I have turned down a chance to become friend with someone who is really kind and helpful to me. Sorry for everything.... =_=~

Fire Prevention Day

Last weekend on my way back from grocery shopping at Target, there was a big event in the carpark just in front. Part of the carpark was blocked with a lot of big cars, big lights and tons of people surround that area. With the red and blue lights dancing away, I thought some major crime or accident has happened to have cause such a scene.

Walking towards a fireman uncle and asking what's going on, I realised that it was not anything bad as I have assumed. It was the Fire Prevention Day, when all the nearby towns (probably the Bergen County towns) local fire station gather at a place and promote the awareness of fire prevention and also to showcase their tools.

It really looked like a typical town fanfare that I've always imagined or seen from TV. Where kids are running and jumping about, going in and out of the fire trucks, playing with the safety equipments and fire rescue tools, with free balloons and even Ronald MacDonald was there for some reason, probably because MacDonald's is just around the area.
Parents are going all bout, taking photos of their kids with MacDonald and some doggy fireman mascots, taking photos of the fire rescue trucks, talking to the firemen and firewomen (I admire these ladies, really).

Staying for about 20 minutes in that area, I took a few shots of the different fire trucks, with the town names printed out and all different designs. There was even a showcase of a few firemen hanging on to the rope tied to the fire truck ladder some 30 meters high and going down in a few seconds. All-in-all, it was really impressive, although I did not see any brochures nor much demonstration on fire prevention or awareness.


Cliffside Park fire rescue truck.


Fairview fire rescue truck.


Fort Lee, just up north of Edgewater.


Leonia fire rescue truck, with a fireman in the driver's seat looking very bored.


Ridgefield fire rescue truck, showcase all the equipments to people


Firewoman cleaning up the stuff


Ladder that went very high up.


Impressive performance of fireman coming down, applause.


Free balloons and fireman helmets were given out to kids and adults.


Kids in the truck


Ronald MacDonald, proud sponsor of the event?


Doggy in car, moves around automated. Kid was trying to post a shot with the doggy.

Online Shopping

Recently I have been into a spate of online shopping. From carpet cleaning services to buying vacuum cleaners and laptop even to online 'window shopping'. The problem is that this place is just too wide and a lot of things that are available at the branches nearby really requires at least an hour's drive, and I do not have a car.

So after settling here for a while, I got into the trend of the Americans to do online shopping for my needs. Started out with buying a vacuum cleaner, I shopped for a few evenings doing my research and looking at a few reviews before I decided to go for the Eureka. Placed my order at allbrands.com, made payment and one week later, the whole package was delivered right at my door front.

Excited with the new toy, I opened up the package and went straight to assemble... in a minute, all was done and the new toy is ready to start! I tried vacuuming the tile floor and works really well, except the sound of the cleaner is unbelievable loud in the ears, I assumed this is really due to the small apartment and I am not used to loud noise alone. The next target was the carpet that I was dying to get it cleaned... The moment it reached the corner of the carpet, I suddenly see smoke fuming out of the carpet as I moved the cleaner along! Flabbergasted, I immediately switched off the cleaner and examine what was the problem.

What was the scene of the steam cleaner at work was but the sheer amount of dust that has accumulated in the carpet, probably which hasn't been cleaned since the last tenant left. Obviously, this cleaner stirs more dust than it sucks more dust. Taking a closer look, I realised that the dust has settled all over the exterior of the tool (which is black thus more obvious), definitely disgusted by the fact that the vacuum cleaner did not work, and that the landlord did not clean the carpet as promised... : (

So in the end, the cleaner is really good for bare floor, suction power is satisfactory, but works bad for carpet... probably because my carpet was too dirty. And, never trust all the reviews written, unless there are more than 1000 of them and all said good. Because the review did mention that this vacuum is good for cleaning carpet as well, but it did not work for me.

I will probably write another review for my next online purchase, a gateway laptop from eBay. The M-6862 model.

Bed, Bath & Beyond, and the coupon

The first day when I surveyed the area around my new apartment. I was really excited and happy that Bed, Bath & Beyond is just within walking distance. So day 1 evening after coming back from work, I happily hopped towards the shop for my first shopping on household needs and bathroom stuff. So after spending like over 100 bucks, I went back happy with all the so many stuff I bought, still thinking of more stuff to buy during the weekend.

When opening the mailbox, I was even happier to find that there is a 20% discount for Bed Bath, Edgewater only. The weekend Saturday, I woke up especially early, took a nice long walk along the river and had a nice breakfast at Starbucks... Then the whole day was shopping time! Happily buying off another hundred over bucks of stuff, I came home to realise that the 20% coupon is lying on the kitchen counter looking back at me.... =_=~
Nevermind, since I have so many other things that I have yet to buy, I will remind myself to bring it the next time... After 3 rounds of going to Bed Bath AND continously forgetting totally about the 20% discount coupon. I finally remembered to go back house and stuff the coupon into my pocket, happily trotting there....

After paying for all my stuff and back at home, I reached to my pocket and to my horror, found the coupon is still inside, unused. What can I say... I spent almost close to 300 bucks and not using the 20% discount coupon which could have probably save me at least like 60 over dollars.

New Place

It's been almost a week since I am here, the official move-in date was the eve of 911. So excited on the night itself and on 911 that I totally forgot it was 911 until the day when colleague was telling me about it when he drove me home.

Was able to see the lights up from my window to Manhattan... Absolutely fantastic. Couldn't imagine how strong they need the lights to be in order to shine all the way into the clouds, and it reminded me of Batman, just this one don't have the Batman sign...

So, almost a week and this house is stil not very fix. The toilet counter needs to be changed, and toilet probably renovated and very much needs a good wash. The window fell off the latch during the weekend one-by-one, not only I cannot close the window now, I have to worry if children below will be running at the spot should the window fall due to strong wind...

Weekends had been surprsingly busy, not fixing the house but shopping, hanging out at colleague's place for bbq and parties. In the end, didn't really leave time for myself to fix my own things...

And then, now this place has no network, no TV, no radio. The only thing that really kept me alive is my iPod and the speaker, thank goodness.

Today is Day 3 of using internet here in new place, grateful to the good neighbour who don't secure his/her wireless network. First day I was a bit paranoid and really just use it to check email and that's it. Day 2, after half hour of usage, totally forgot about it and was using skype to chit-chat with friend, opening a thousand IEs as usual... Sigh... Really cannot change myself to become a better person in this aspect.

Hopefully things will get better, the top of my wish list is to get the bar stools from Ikea up and working because I have no where to sit except for the carpet floor and the airbed. Hopefully I can post a photo of the empty apartment which I call home. :)

The Lost of a Handphone

I don't know how to start with this, since I have been babbling so much to SD and he says that I should be blogging it...

So in anyway, the incident happened last Friday when I went to the usual gathering session at a colleague's house. So we were drinking, chit-chatting, eating and stuff... So when the usual ritual of my colleagues started to dance, I went into the house to grab my only camera phone to take a few fun photos for them to share.

So the night continued with more drinking and stuff.. obviously, I was either too drunk to remember to bring my phone back or was too busy going in and out of the house for no reason...
and the phone was left outside. Then while watching DVDs inside the house, it started to rain outside...

Was a rather cool night and was watching the rain come and go, come and go while watching DVD inside... totally forgetting that something important like the phone is still outside with other leftover food (yes, chips and other stuff were left outside after the party).

The next morning, by the time I recalled my phone, I found it on the table shivering in cold and wetness from the rain yesterday... I tried to revive it but unfortunately, it finally went off and never moved since that day...

I wanted to go home and get a new phone in SG, because phones in USD is rather expensive, so is it to get a mobile phone plan... sob.. sob..

Nuttin' But Stringz

Yeah, I tend to be a bit late when it comes to really good music. Especially when my genres for music range from Indie to Jazz.

So today, I came home working and switched to NBC watching the AGT (America's Got Talent) live. The thing I don't like about reality show is always potraying stupidity of some losers who cannot get a grip of their lives, but anyway, this is not the main point.

Switching between NBC which is broadcasting AGT live, and some other channel showing dog academy competition (reality show no. 2), I happened to be in time to see the last contestant for the evening, Nuttin' but stringz. Probably have watched too much crap performances before them, I didn't think it will be good till the end with the judge putting crosses at almost every performance...

They are two brothers violinst, but they play no classical music. It is a very intense, emotional, captivating performance of hip hop, rock with the classical instrument. Their music was soo intense on the TV that I can feel the blood rushing up my head. Really really impressive and talented performance they gave. They have also managed to stage good music with good performance that captured the heart of the whole crowd and me who is watching from TV.

So, here I am, exciteding blogging over this new found talent artists after I realised that they were already artist and have records way before AGT. Listening to their own creation and mix of the music, I really think America's got talent.

Anyway, cut the crap, here's what I got from youtube on Nuttin' But Stringz:
Clip from AGT:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QbWRkulvXbE
Records - Dance With My Father
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WLgfj6YrTTY&feature=related
Records - Sucka For Her
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xRv5UT9mkL0&NR=1
MTV - Thunder (MTV tries a bit too hard to potray their Hip Hop genre)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZ78f1gUa5Q&feature=related

Enjoy and let me know if you like that too... :)

Homestead Part 2

With reference to the very nice (or not nice) hotel pictures that you see in below post Homestead, after 1 month of staying, I realised that this room is for handicapped de... So everything is actually extremely low and no bathtub!!!

The kitchen area is low, so sometimes I have to stoop down to see how's the cooking of the pot on the inside stove, because the oil filter machine is blocking my sight... sob sob... and I was thinking how come Americans so tall kitchen build until so low... kaoz~~

Aiz~ Anyway, I going to leave this dread place for 1 month. Dread because nearby are only expensive restuarants and no fresh food market which isn't good for aunties like me. Moreover, this is a temporary place so I cannot buy a lot of food to stock up, which is a real pity and pain for me everytime I go to Walmart...

All in all, I am just so glad hotel stay will be over in 2 weeks' time and I am going to build my new home here~!! Hee.. :) Can't wait to stay there and see Manhattan across Hudson River... sooo nice!!

Welcome to Secaucus

Ladies and Gentlemen,
Welcome to Secaucus!!!

Isn't this place just lovely? ... The ideal corpses-dumping place!

This is a photo taken when the NJ Transit train was heading towards Secaucus Junction Train Station from Rutherford Station.

The Great Cook of TKPS

This is an old post before I went to US, I finally went to TKPS to peek at the great chef called mama and her workplace... The food is really great... All 真材'食料' yo~ Got free please come and have a bowl of prawn noodle or yong tau foo.


^ Mama, the great cook, has finally got her own store and selling noodles!! Happy 的 mama!

^ 上等湯頭！真材實料！童叟無欺！First one is the soup base for Prawn Noodle, the below is Yong Tau Foo soup base. Made from big bones and 黃豆.

^ The working area and noodles galore~ Displayed outside are the yong tau foo. According to the chef, the best-selling ones are seaweed chicken and quail eggs. I thought kids don't eat quail eggs nowadays...

The whole day from morning till late afternoon was very good business. When the bell rings, the bunch of little devils will rush down to queue up for food, and helper (me) is in charge of money and repeating orders. He/She(me) has to be fast and quick in calculating money (esp the yong tau foo) and giving out the food correctly.

I hope mama can continue this business, is hardwork, but I think she likes it a lot. She remembers most of the kids and what they like, and she is really happy while chatting to them and taking down their orders. Mama, you are the best!

Homestead

Here are some pics of the current hotel that I am staying. Little studio suite with a small kitchen which is really great. Except that the hotel's corridor reeks of curry smell morning till night....


- The very messy bed, messy the first time till now...


- Little closet, complete with iron.


- Bathroom area


- The little kitchen cum table for the laptop, dinner and everything else.



- Living room, just besides the bed, less than 2 metres away from the table earlier.


It's a nice cosy little place, there is like weekly cleaning services etc. Location is quite good too. Getting to NYC is around 20 minutes through Lincoln Tunnel. However, the jam is always there and horrible... Takes more than half hour during weekends to get to NYC.

失った感動

今日はニュージェージー州のElizabethという市へ行きました。シンガポールからアメリ カにきたもう１週間過ぎた。本当に今まで特別な感想がない。なんとなく、わからな い事を見たり、知らない場所にいったり、新しい人とであったりがあっても、思ったとお りの感動がなかった。

でも、今日はElizabethへ行く途中、バスは高速道路に走っているところ、窓から青 い空が目に入った。高速道路の隣は高い建物がないので、遠いところまでが見えた 。アメリカに初めてそんなに広く遠く空を見た。本当に周りの景色は特にきれいでは なかった。だが、何とか空はきれいだった。太陽が照らされていた真っ白のくもは大き くて、潮（うしお？）のようだった。その雲はこの青い空で静かに浮かんでいると感じていた。不思議 だけど、バスの中には人を込んでいてにぎやかだったが、私の心を静かになった。

今までシンガポールに住んでいてきた。小さい島なので土地がたかくて、建物はどこ でもなるべく高いほうに建てた。会社でも、うちでも同じだった。空はその高い建物が 隠されてしまった。私は小さく狭い空しか見えず、本当は空はそれだけだと思ってて 、もう頭を上げなく、空を見ないようになってしまった。いつの間にか空は覚えたようばきれいではない。

Elizabethに行く途中でまた何年前に北京の万里長城ではじめてみたそんなに広く きれいなそらのを思い出した。あのとき空を見たと自分がまだ夢があることを 思いを浮かべた。そして、夢がかなえると思った。今はまた見たと、なきた かった。だって記憶の中に今まで何をやっていたのはぜんぜんないから。

Commuting Nightmare

Let me complain first before I update all other things that happened this week...

After work today, I decided to rush back at earliest time to the hotel, put the laptop, and go to Edgewater to take a look and shun bian shop shop..... This is the worst of the bad decisions I have made so far and thus begin the series of commuting nightmares in US...

Before the bus reaches the hotel, the road was already congested, so, being the very clever me, I decided to bypass the hotel and go to NY directly with my laptop, since I already have prior experience of waiting for 45 min around evening peak the last time.

Obviously the slight congestion at suburban meant something larger. I was stuck on the stoopid way to the tunnel for 1 hour, felt asleep while the bus is jerking is way there....

Finally, after reaching the place, feeling giddy from the bus-jerking journey. I went into shopping, looking around the area...

THEN, going back is another nightmare. I had to take a bus back to NY, transfer to another bus back to hotel... and.. the bus to NY came only after 1.15 hr... so the whole trip, just getting into jam and waiting is more than 50%!!....

Seriously, unless I can live and work in the same place with everying all like shopping etc. all within walking distance, then I will have to get a car, if not then is just like no 'kah'...

Day 2 at US...

Raining... Raining... Raining...

I am on the verge of starving to death because I forgot to pack life-saving maggie mee into my luggage!! Grr...

So the the first morning after waking up (or not sleeping at all) in the hotel, I realised that it was thunderstorm... and is not going to stop until the end of the day. There isn't anything inside the fridge, and the nearest eatery is so far away. The best thing is I even forgot to bring umbrella with me!.. Sigh, so unprepared..

Anyway, I was tuning to the weather channel that keep broadcasting bad news that its gonna rain until flood everywhere...

Luckily luckily... The rain finally stopped for a moment and I rushed out to the nearest Wal-mart which is 20 mins' walk from the hotel. I brought all the essential instant ra-men, eggs, frozen broccoli, fish fillets etc. etc.

Food at supermart is not that expensive, compared to the restaurants. Day dinner brought 天丼 from a restaurant 'Niko Sushi', is like USD 7 plus. Way too expensive for like white rice and 2 pieces of shrimps, not nice somemore. I decided not to eat outside whenever possible.

In anyway, I still stopped by Dunkin' donuts to get some food for breakfast, by the time I went back to hotel, I only managed to put the stuff into the fridge before going out to meet the realtors to see the houses.

I don't really have time to think much about other things right now, hopefully I can get my housing settled really fast...

Yokoso America!

Today is day 3 at America. Finally got my work laptop and able to surf the internet from the hotel!! Excited...

Arrived at Newark airport on 23 July evening and it was drizzling a little. The first thing I realised is that I'll have to pay a USD3.00 for the trolley to put my luggage on... Didn't know until I pulled a trolley from the front and the auntie asked me where I got the trolley from...

I just replied that it was pulled from the front and she pointed to me that I'll have to get it from the back and pay USD3.00 into the machine so I can use it.

I never knew that trolley needs payment on any airports, so this is the first I've seen, wasn't very 'shuang' about having to pay and was struggling whether to get the trolley or not since I have like 2 baggages with me. So after thinking for like 3 minutes, finally decided to pay. I still feel the pinch about the USD3.00 now.

Anyway, this first episode of my encounter with the ang moh country and I will update more as I go along... Hopefully, I can post some pictures soon, because I don't have any connection from handphone to this laptop.. @$#%$&...

A note of thanks

Dear Blog,

I hope you will be happier because I think I am going to update you with news more often than ever, hopefully, everyday...

A lot of events have been happening lately. I have had a lot of farewell gatherings, final farewell gatherings, finally final farewell gatherings... etc etc. Which I really appreciate a lot. Not to mention the goooood food I ate and grrrreaaat gifts that I received.. hehehehe...

More importantly, as a summary, I think I appreciate things here more than ever. Maybe even more after I leave this little summer island. Friends, family, food... Even the weather and the smell of the air now has a different meaning to me. I will use every brain cell to remember as much of the details and events over here so that I can reminisce if I should ever miss home.

Lastly, thank you friends who have helped me a lot and bothered to really tell me lots of information about NJ, packed lots of survival food, even ask for housing information from cousin's friend, remind me of things to take note of, organized tons of farewell parties etc. etc.

So I know I am a person who really cannot be bothered about a lot of things, don't really plan, cannot take care of myself, careless and forgetful, lazy, don't mind going without food for a day or two etc... (sigh..) However, I am blessed with a lot of friends who really care about me, be part-time mother(s) to take care of me and my a lot of things. Wonderful people, thank you.

Lastly, Blog, I will post nice photos of the last, final and finally farewells gatherings, slowly. (nono.. is not an excuse of laziness okay, I promise)... I will have tons of times after I reached NJ... ^^

I must thank ah sampat and kana cai and wing-chan...

So long never update this blog, because I got lazy... and busy with neopets, facebook and dramas as usual. Eventhough I stay long time in Internet, there has not been an urge to update my blog.

But, my life still stays the same. Go work, slack, go off work, sleep, with eating all done in between. So, is so boring as it should be, but thanks to sampat, kana-cai and wing-chan... my boring life lite up a lot with all their crappy jokes, chit-chatting and ba-gua'ing, all during the office hours.. hahaha..

That really entertained me a lot, at a time when I have problems with my work (or no work?), they gave me advise, cheered me up, made me felt so much better and stopped me from tearing off the very last strain of my hair.

So, I must give credits to all of them. Thank you very much~ Without you people, I think my life will perhaps die of boredom. I will always remember you wonderful friends.

冒険かな～

前の何ヶ月、ずっと悩んでいたんだ。行くかどうか本当に心からはっきり答えられなかった。本当に行きたいだろう。。。他人にそう言われた。ちょっと怒ったけどね私。確かにここから出ていたいやけど、どこでもいい。。じゃないんだわ。しかもそんなに遠いところだ。

ここから出てゆきたかったがあそこではないんだ。やっぱりそんな遠いところが行って、心配しないと言うはずではない。給料も高くないし、友達一人でもいないし、場所は大都市ではないし。だれかがいきたいんだよ！しかも２年だ～～～

って、そういう挑戦は目の前にあって、心はトキドキしている。自分の限界はどこまでか、知りたい。だから行く、だからただの旅じゃない、だから逃げられるだけじゃない。

私の出発、準備中。

DnD 2008 - Jungle Mania

Introducing my new colleague:



Introducing our DnD invitation 'bugs'. We got lots of it on the table during that night, so we decided to put all together and made it into some extreme delicacy... How delicious they look! Yummy! Roasted and nicely served on to the plate, ready for consumption while listening to the lucky draw numbers:















So, what do you think? C'est tres exotic!

We got a department group photo, but I realised that the 3-layered fat showed so I decided not to post it here in case the kong ba pau makers use it to advertise as one of their ingredients... That's all folks!

Spoil Motherboard

I think that I am out to spend money on PC on a yearly basis, because it always fails on me towards the end of the year, I think this is the product life span period. Damn sianz, these few weeks have not been using my PC to play games (Sims2) and do the stuff I like (downloading), kinda suffering from withdrawal symptoms... gosh... **addict**

In anyway, here is a little calculation of what I spent within the 30 minutes of shopping in Sim Lim, only one shop:

- Motherboard (because previous board AGP slot spoiled, which caused me to buy another graphics card costing at 67 bucks). This is a whopping 100 bucks
- 2 new DDR2 RAM, total 60.
- Addition 10 over dollars for graphics card, because the motherboard is using PCI-Express, so I went for an exchange, and changed to a much better card
- Power supply, most heart-pain, because is a good brand that is selling at 85 bucks!
- Wireless keyboard/mouse... because I wanted it all along... 42 bucks...

All in all, I again spent almost 300 bucks... and did not bargain for discount this time... just because 1 motherboard AGP slot spoil...
Actually I think I deserve it, because I was rather happy with all the 'toys' I bought, courtesy of my PC good friend. kekeke...

But THEN... the headache part... After spending 3 hours of figuring out which pin to which socket etc. etc... (while watching Coffee Prince the Korean Drama)... The whole PC failed to startup!!! Arggghhh... started for 3 seconds and shuts down automatically... So the next day evening, which is today, I reviewed the whole damn wire-pin socket thingy to see what I have connected wrongly... and still no clue.. Given some hints from my friend, I decided that maybe the pins were plugged in wrongly le... so I went searching how to input it.... and.. is correct leh!!! Then why cannot??

Basically after doing my research on the Internet since evening 8.00pm, I surrender!! So I decided to write this blog to tell newbie PC builders... get someone experience to guide you first! Unless you enjoy tasting the mother of success at every push of the power switch, and risk spoiling the whole god-damn thing, then is better to find experienced friends to guide you along...

At the time of writing (if you are thinking how, am using the comp's laptop), I am still waiting for my friend to provide me some guide... because I am rather eager to get it start and running... my Sims2 handsome guy is still waiting for me to build his house leh!!

PS to my PC-Wizkid friend: Please ignore me... this is one of the withdrawal symptoms I am suffering from.... I am definitely not hurrying you... ok... **sob**sob**