On more serious note, going to be heading for first ICT (in camp training) right after I get back from the trip. Guess my unit finally caught up with me! Will be back to familiar grounds in the West so just like good old/bad? times.

An IPPT (Individual Physical Profficiency Test) was conducted during Session 8 and it seems that a good number of people passed but Phase 2 still seems very packed. Most people are probably going to labor through the next 12 sessions which will be more running (interval and speed training). Counting down till the last session and Taiwan trip already.

The latest episode has references to the latest Trek movie (also by Abrams) with “renegade Romulans from the future here to change the timeline”. Khan Noonien Singh in Star Trek II – Wrath of Khan also gets a brief mention and Emmanuel Grayson “Spock” gets to makes us all laugh at the references. This all leads to surprise surprise, Leonard Nimoy (THE original Spock) who plays William Bell!

Today, I’ve just finished the last book in the “Legends of Dune” series. Had to re-read “The Machine Crusade” as my last read was couple of years back and “The Battle of Corrin” rounded up the trilogy nicely. For now, I’m just starting on “Hunters of Dune” and am looking forward to “Sandworms of Dune” and the “Heroes of Dune” series.

What’s weird is that all this old “stuff” is coming back into my life. Trek, GI-Joe !, Transformers… Can’t help but feel nostalgic when your childhood memories come back stronger and with more bang

Last Sun, I had a interesting birthday.

I spent a good few hours at TTSH’s A&E as my mum is suffering from symptons of Dengue Fever / Chikungunya. As patients are only allowed 1 companion, I had to hang around the foodcourt while my sis accompanied her inside the waiting room. At least I am of some use buying food and drinks for them. After 2 hours, the doc sent my mum for a blood test and they had to wait for another 2-3 hours for the results. I left after 3 hours as I had plans for the afternoon and my sis stayed with my mum for the results. All in all, the wait took abt 5 hours. So much for A&E efficiency in Singapore…

Mic and I later celebrated my birthday over a spa pool and massage session, followed by a delicious meal at Carnivore at Vivocity. As the lighting was bad, we did not take any good photos of the meal. Most of the meats are delicious with our favourites being butterfish, chicken thigh, and the beef. But surprisingly, the dish that I keep asking for seconds and even thirds is grilled pineapple, which is really refreshing to the palpate after we ate so much meat.

On Tue, I went with WY, TL and Chin to Hanabi Restaurant and Sake Bar at Odeon Towers. It was Chin’s treat for the 3 April gals (thanks, Chin). The food is soso to me and I find the variety lacking (there was not even much Yakitori to choose from) At $33++ per head for buffet, I think I am unlikely to come back to this restaurant often.

On Good Friday (10 April), the gals and I had elaborate plans to do something different for KP’s and my birthdays, which are about a week apart. As usual, grand plans (including a day trip to Batam / picnic / high-tea / museum visiting / baking cookies etc) came to nought eventually with everyone’s various restrictions and other commitments. We ended up having our usual makan and dessert session at Pasta de Waraku and NYDC at The Heeren. Hope we are able to put our grand plans to action some day

A week before my birthday, I had a KTV session with my chums from Uni and they had very kindly treated me to a delicious dinner at Coca Restaurant.

Thus concludes my birthday celebrations this year. Funnily, this year I did not get to have any birthday cake and candles at all. Not that it is a neccessity but it does add a nice birthday touch.

It does feel that as we age, the celebrations get simpler and fewer and sometimes, we don’t even make an effort for a gathering. Friends are busier over their careers and families. Nowadays only the elders and the children in a family get attention during birthdays. Adults seem too busy to celebrate? So if there is no childen, who will still celebrate my birthday in the years to come, I wonder…

Vegetable salad and mayo potato / egg salad by me! Took me much time to process the ingredients.

Roast lamb and baked macaroni with beef sauce by Joey. We were impressed by the standard of his cooking. Yummy!

Left: RA surprised many of us that he can actually whip up a dish! This is his honey spare ribs. Not bad! He brought red wine but ended up bringing it back unopened. My Riesling (white wine) was at least 75% drunk. Hee.

Right: Mun Kit prepared this very delicious and very appetizing dish – Thai-styled beef. It’s a bit sour and very refreshing and really whets our appetities. I have asked for this recipe already. Yummy! She also bakes cupcakes garnished with chocolate. Wow! Alas, they were served later and we forgot to take photos. They were great too. Maybe Mun Kit can give me recipe for them too.

Left: California Pizza (Peking Duck) contributed by Wanyee. Lucky she didn’t order 2 of this!
Right: Sushi party set brought by Kelly and James. Looked and tasted lovely.


Left: Ha, yes, KFC!!! 无鸡不欢的 Chin decided that he has better bring his own chicken rather than rely on us. Hahahha. Cute!  He had wanted to bring chicken wings at first but as dinner plans were changed to lunch, and he had problem finding a stall that sells bbq chicken wings, he bought KFC instead. As there were really too much food, he had to bring 40-50% of them back home.

Right: Tian Lee brought Oreo Cheesecake from Baker’s Inn. She was teased about not bringing her own baked cocoction and had used the switch in meeting time for justification.

We had the above food for lunch at 2pm, then had the 3 Cs – cheesecake / cupcakes and coffee for teatime at about 4pm? Then at 6pm plus, we had jelly beancurd and dumplings, brought by Bee Jin for dinner! Pity there was no photo taken to show for them.

You can imagine how stuffed we all were… Nevertheless it was a good makan session!

We conveniently celebrated Joey’s belated birthday as well.

Group photo

Tags: Friends

Wanted to find time to bake some cookies (only had time for pre-packed type) but now don’t think so, as still got cleaning up to do (windows and packing old clothes for a donation drive) as well as gatherings with friends etc (this year lucky no gathering at my place haha)

This year, we will have a chance to go back to my parents’ for CNY reunion dinner with my extended family after an absence of 2 years.    My in-laws side wanted to do reunion dinner earlier as my sister and brother inlaws cannot do reunion dinner on the 25 Jan as well. 

Ever since 2009 started, work has been busy. Last 2 weeks were bad. Had to run all over the place to settle some CNY corporate gifts and to find fitting boxes.

I think this year would just fly by before we know it as well.  I’m not one for resolutions, but just some things to look forward to or hope for this year?

Good health and safety for all my families, relatives and friends
A better year for Mic and myself and our siblings in our careers
A cute and healthy little niece or nephew come July
More good times with families and friends
Bliss in our marriage
Self-improvement, patience and wisdom gained for Mic and I
Happiness, prosperity and peace for all
Happy 牛 Year, everyone.

It’s no-mood-to-work-cos-it-is-Friday. Long time no blog, suddenly wanna come in but dunno what to write. Days just fly by in a blur. It’s Christmas and CNY again. One year after one year, getting old very fast hahhhaa. Sigh, back to work…

I always had a thing about celebrating one’s milestone birthday in a more significant way than others. Mic was not particularly keen on a getaway to Sentosa for his birthday like he did for mine, and I felt I should do more than just a dinner / movie / spa massage etc, so an idea of a surprise party came to me and took shape in my mind.

It was not easy to plan for it as I had to anticipate all the possible giveaways and all possible obstacles that could occur every step of the way. I had to lure him out of the house on the pretext of a massage session at the spa while giving a friend, Jo, the keys to our place so that she and the gang could do up the place while we are gone.

For his actual birthday, I ordered a B cube cheesecake from nydc, which he blew out the candle at 12am but we left it till morning to eat as it was too late for such a rich cake. That’s NY cheese with brownie bits in it, which is pretty nice. Actually Mic’s all-time favourite is still chocolate, but I’m not too sure where I can find really really delicious chocolate cake. Any suggestions?

The initial plan was to catch a romantic dinner at Sizzling Rock at Boat Quay. However, as luck would have it, my mobile broke down the day before his birthday, which means I needed to get a replacement in order to be contactable for the all-important birthday party which is on the next day ie Sat. So in the end, we decided to forgo Sizzling Rock (for the 2nd time!) and check out the phone shops in Vivo City before we have a nice dinner there. We bought tickets for 9-ish screening of Quantum of Solace and ended up racing against time as we adjourned to Plaza Singapura to get a LG Secret handphone instead, leaving only 50mins for dinner. We decided on Shabuya at Vivo City and ordered a steamboat set meal, some salmon sashimi and sake and we made it in time for the movie.

The next day, we set off for our usual massage appointment at Elements Spa at The Cathay. It would already be half the battle won by getting him to agree and indeed go out of the house for this appointment without hiccup. Alas, I sabotaged myself by closing our bedroom door as we were going out, which aroused his suspicion as we do not usually do that. He questioned me and caught unprepared, I came up with some feeble and unconvincing explanation of having a secret surprise present in the room for him. DUH!!! He seemed to have bought it. I hoped he would quickly forget about it. haha. That’s Fumble no. 1.

After the massage, I used the excuse of having a headache to make him take a cab home. He suggested to grab some dinner before we head home but I came up with excuses to refuse and insist on going home straight away.

Finally we reached the lift. Phew!

Wait! What was that? The delivery bike from KFC, which was one of the food I had ordered for the party in advance!

Oh my! Don’t tell me that’s my delivery!

I prayed that we would not run into the delivery guy at my doorstep, which would have given the game away.

OK, he’s not there. Phew… lucky!

Mic unlocks the padlock of the gate, twisted the handle and yanked. It would not bulge. It then dawned on me what had happened. We do not have the habit of locking the gate but somehow, our friend Jo had thought to lock it…!

Oh my goodness, I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry then. Despite all the planning, I had not thought to brief Jo about the gate! I stood frozen, not sure how to react to the situation. Mic was shocked. He fumbled with his keys and kept asking why the gate was locked. I kept quiet, yearning for the moment of discovery.

The main door swinged back. Our friends sang “Surprise”. Camera clicked and JW sprayed ribbons on Mic.

Mic was not one to be easily surprised. So it was also of no surprise that he was pretty expressionless when the action unfolded around him. And it did not help that there were so many incidents to prime him. Apart from the gate, my giveaway of the bedroom door and atypical behaviour about insisting to go home immediately also added to the spoiler.

Nevertheless he was appreciative of the effort made to organise this get-together with his secondary school chums. : ) Well, that’s all it matters.