Momentary

As of today at around 4pm, I.... Mindy... have no more pending work on the branch. I don't care if you don't understand me, I need to announce this so that I can remember the feeling of being able to breath easily. I'm fully indulging in the moment of temporary relief, freedom and sanity.

Hopefully this marks the beginning of the end of rushing to work with uncombed hair, driving with sport shoes on the car roof, restless dreams about solving bugs and talking in my sleep (I once told the hubby in my sleep, "Yin How, got colorful pills?") and rushing home after work to a sulky hubby to has to cook and wait for me for dinner.

Hopefully la.... it's good to hope right? :)

And I foresee that the hubby will not be sulky tonight. The hubby is going to be a happy boy tonight. Aha aha...

;)

It's just one of those days

Had an early meeting with da remote boss this morning. I set my alarm clock earlier so that I would reach work on time. It was a rushy rushy scramble in the morning to get ready to work.

Went down and my car remote control decided to be cranky and refused to unlock my car. It's somehow always when I have an early meeting when something must go wrong. I had no choice but to open my car and let the alarm go off, probably waking up a few residents in the process. Rushed over to find the "secret" red button under the glove box to turn off the alarm.

Zoomed off in the car and as I made a turning, something fell down from my car. Dunno what it was, don't care either. Gotta get to work, gotta get to work.

But then realized that my access card was missing. Hmmm.. thinking about it, I think I left my access card on my car roof when I was trying to turn off the alarm.

Drove another circle around my condo hunting for my access card on the road. But then started to realize people were staring at me. Was my little Kelisa that noisy? Passed two old ladies who were laughing and pointing at me now. Okay, maybe I should stop.

The two old ladies were nice enough to tell me that I was driving around with my sport shoes on top of my car. If it wasn't that I was hunting for my access card, I would be driving on the highway all the way to work with my sport shoes on my roof.

Reached work 15 minutes late. Yup, it's just one of those days....

So if one day, while you are driving to work in the morning and you suddenly see one sport shoe flying towards you, don't be alarmed. It's probably just me rushing to another early morning meeting.

....

The day started very early for me. Super early. Early as in pitched dark in the morning early. I woke up to find myself facing Russell's ass on my pillow. I got annoyed and pushed the dog away. For some reason, that made him start gagging and choking. I got up panicking, grabbed him by his paws and just as I was about to pulled him down from the bed, the dog vomited last night's dinner... right in the middle of my side of the bed.

No more mangoes for Russell anymore. Not when it ends up on my bed at goodness knows what time in the middle of the night.

And after changing the bedsheets, I couldn't sleep. I counted from 1 to 100. I counted how many times the hubby snored. I counted how many times Sparkle snored. I counted a whole bunch of blue sheep gracefully jumping over a fence and after another. I counted every freaking thing that I could think of counting. And after the air-con went to sleep at the end of the 1 hour timer, I was still wide awake.

Seriously, no more mangoes for Russell.

I really do think that the dog's sole purpose in life is to annoy me. Him and the hubby both. They both gang up and have daily brainstorming sessions on new ways to annoy me. I'm absolutely positive about it. They are both evil.

Going off to sleep now. Sleep deprived brain is shutting down. Zzzz....

Back in the office

I'm back at work. And you know what? I was actually looking forward to going back to work. I even started thinking about work yesterday, planning which SPRs I was going to fix.

I know what you are saying. Yes, you.. and you... and you at the back there. You are all thinking the same thing. So everybody, all together now say, "SIAO WAN!!" (translation: you crazy nut case, how could you be happy going back to work during CNY?).

But wait, let me explain why I'm so happy to be at work.

While you out there are sweating your balls out in this damn freaking it's-so-hot-I-could-die weather..... I'm enjoying the cold office air-conditioning, so cold that I may even have to wear a cardigan.

While you out there are stuck in an hour-long traffic jam at Gurney Drive..... I'm driving at 90 on the highway, reaching work in 10 minutes.

While you out there are circling round and round like a desperate vulture, looking for a parking space..... I'm seeing so many empty parking spaces that I have to make tough decisions like, "Should I choose the parking space nearest to the door? Or should I should park at the one further but under the tree shade? Hmmm...."

While you are out there are having to queue up and kiasu-ly fight over a free table in a chaotically full restaurant..... I'm at a calm nice restaurant being served immediately.

While you are out there sitting among screaming children and extremely loud relatives, so loud that no matter how much you turn up the TV volume, you'll still have to read the subtitles..... I'm enjoying the peace of the super quiet office where the sounds of the typing on keyboard and the humming of my machine are like music to my ears.

Other reasons why I'm glad I'm at work.

1. To the hubby, CNY means eating unhealthy food and drinking sugar-water (can and box drinks) the whole entire day. Give him plain water and he'll say, "Dowan... no taste". And I, who is too lazy to get my own water, ends up drinking sugar water as well which never quenches my thirst. By the 3rd day of CNY, I gave up and got up to get plain drinking water.
2. No more chaotic reunions. Peace and quiet. But I have to say CNY this year is a lot more better. I only received one "when are you going to have a baby?" question, a large improvement from last year when I received multiple, "You gained weight la, are you pregnant?" questions. In fact this year, I received a, "Ah How, lu eh bor sui loh" (You hear that, hubby? Somebody said your wife is pretty AH!!). I knew aerobics for the past one year would pay off. ;)
3. Now that I'm back to my old routine, it means I'm back to eating my apple in the morning, my brown rice for meals, and my vitamins at night. No more unhealthy sweet stuff, no more rubbish, no more skipping main meals because of losing my appetite due to excess sugar water. (I was damn constipated for the past few days because of all the junk I was feeding my poor body)
4. And seriously, the weather is really WTF-ly hot lately. It's the only time you'll see me sprinting 10 feet in front of Yin How, mumbling "it's HOT, it's HOT, it's HOT". The moment I get out of the car, it's a mad dash to walk towards the shelter. 

Anyway, I was feeling very happy to be back until I sat in my cubicle and the boss who has one and only engineer left in office, took out his machine gun and starting shooting SPRs at me at full blast. 

Oh well... SPRs or chaotic CNY??? I'm thinking SPRs...

:)

The inexperience

This is what happens when a person with no experience with children decides to take a hyper-active 3-year-old and a 1-year-old to the playground.

I clearly have a lot to learn about handling children. ;)

The value of RM7.35

1 raspberry Secret Recipe cheesecake = RM73.50/10 = RM7.35 per person.

Having an engineer pretend to throw in a resignation later during a 1-1 with the boss (and a wonderful actress she was), then have the whole team walk into the conference room with the cake singing Happy Birthday, then seeing the boss stand up staring at us in confusion for a few seconds only to realized that he was tricked, face turning the reddest I've ever seen, watching him jumping hysterically around the conference room holding the rubbish bin for some weird reason,  trying recover to from the shock of the fake resignation to the shock of the birthday surprise.... Fuiyoh... it is PRICELESS.

So worth the RM7.35 I tell you....

On the last day of the year

While everybody is out to celebrate New Year Eve, what is Mindy and the hubby doing?

Something....

Happy New Year! May 2010 bring better things and less white hair to all. :)

Today is Monday not Sunday, Monday not Sunday

I ate Nasi Lemak for dinner yesterday. And I woke up early to have Nasi Lemak for breakfast today. No words can describe the satisfaction.

The satisfaction is even better than you-know-what. ;)

2 books and a green tomato

Book 1: The Memory Keeper's Daughter

A story about a couple during the 60's. Husband was a doctor, wife was a typical wife of the 60's. Wife was in labour with twins and when husband saw that his baby daughter had Down Syndrome, he asked the nurse to take the baby away and lied to his wife that the daughter died. The story goes on from there.

I enjoyed the book, though I was kinda expecting a more dramatic ending.



Book 2: A Thousand Splendid Suns

I loved this book. ABSOLUTELY LOVE IT. I know I'm loving a book when I read it until late into the night, then wake up the next morning and continue reading it before even getting out of bed. The last time I loved a book so much was Marley and Me.

The Kite Runner revolved around the relationship between 2 Afghanistan boys and this time the author wanted a story about 2 Afghanistan women. The story resolves around two women with very different backgrounds who found themselves in a unlikely beautiful relationship due to the twist of circumstances. The book gives a picture of the sufferings of Afghanistan women living under the terrible Taliban era. Their pain, their desperation, their fight to cling on and survive.

All I can say, I'm glad I'm a woman here and not there. Read the book and you'll start counting your blessings as well.

And not forgetting of my precious growing green tomato. If the doggies want to live long lives, THEY BETTER NOT TOUCH MY TOMATO.

In the cube again

I disappeared from the cyberworld for 2 weeks. 1st week was because I was too busy at work. 2nd week was because I was too busy enjoying my holiday.

How fast can a week pass. And here I am, stunned that the holiday has already passed and I'm back here in my gray cube. It's almost like I'm that guy in the movie Groundhog day, where no matter what he does to change his day, he always finds himself waking up to the same morning to the same repeating day over and over again.

Still in shock, I try to remember what I did during the 9 days of holiday. I remember being very happy. Meeting up with old friends. A trip I made just to prove to myself that I could. A new haircut. A lot of reading. A sick hubby and an overly worried mother-in-law. A salted chicken from Ipoh. A growing green tomato. Too many donuts. Sudoku. Two doggies who haven't had a bath in two weeks.

And that's about it. I honestly can't remember anything else.

Will blog more about 2 books and a green tomato later.

Welcome, little one

Hello, little U-Shern. Welcome to this world.


I went over to visit the happy but tired mother. When I reached there, I was lucky enough to see the nurse pushing U-Shern out from the room back to the nursery but couldn't take out my camera fast enough. Little U-Shern is actually quite a big baby boy. :)


The happy new father wanted to make the tired new mother happy by buying instant noodles for her but ended up getting scolded that instant noodles are not exactly the best thing for a recovering mother to be eating right now... hehehehe...


Congratulations Shu-Yin and Peter!~~ I can't believe my childhood friend has a child of her own. I can't wait to carry U-Shern one day. :)

I bumped into....

I went to Queensbay for lunch and guess who I bumped into?

Mun Yi!~~

For a moment I was stunned and confused wondering when Mun Yi changed her job to become a credit card seller. Took me some time to realize that she was there promoting her dad's e-learning site.

For RM50 a year, you get to go online to answer primary and secondary school questions. It auto-marks and explains the answers given. It emails you the scores and records the scores of all the past tests you took.

If you go to Queensbay, go and give her your support ya. But unless you're a primary or secondary school kid or have kids of your own, or you suddenly have this need to prove that you are still capable of answering primary and secondary school questions, you can't really enroll in her programme. ;)

I tried a Form 1 Science Quiz...
http://www.mygir.com/icd/ICD(Flash)/ASP/User/main.asp
And didn't do so well. Hehehe.... But in my defense, I wasn't really trying very hard when I answered the questions (though if I was trying very hard, I'm not sure whether I would have done any better).

Mun Yi and her team will be at Queensbay opposite the JJ foodcourt today until Sunday. And when I say her team, I really mean her team as in she interviews them, hires them and leads them. So cool huh...

Have a good weekend!~~ Unfortunately I'm going to have to spend it finishing a paper. Makes me feel like I'm back in college rushing to pass up an assignment. Sob!

Today's challenge

See... *blink*, *blink*, *blink* and it's Friday already... not that I'm complaining about it. :)

The challenge for today -> to arrive for dinner later at 7pm SHARP.

I am DETERMINE not to be late. I have realize that making other people wait shows that I don't value and respect their time and I feel bad. Bad bad bad thing to do.

I know Mun Yi is skeptical that I'll be on time, but I shall prove you all wrong! Yes, I will!!~~

At least I hope so….

;)

But if I am late, please remember I'm coming from Bayan Lepas through the Friday jam all the way to the other end of the island ya...


**Update**
I managed to reach on TIME. I left a little later than I should because Yin How's family dropped by for a surprise visit. So already a little late, I was forced to take the scary Vale of Tempe road(which I have driven there only once myself when I was desperately late for Shu-Yin wedding). Parked my car, and ran like crazy to the restaurant.

I arrived at 7:01pm with my hair messy. I'm so proud of myself. :)

A new toy

Mindy has a new toy to play with... :)



Was chasing Russell around for hours, trying to get him to be my model.


And towards night time he was in a horrible horrible mood. :)

So called meditation

Towards the end of the aerobics session today, we were asked to lie down on our mats and relax while listening to calming music. The instructor said, relax... listen to the music... free your mind... be one with the universe

I was lying on my mat staring at the ceiling, trying to free my mind while random thoughts rushed through my head...

• I'm feeling stupid lying down on the company floor staring at the ceiling
• The ceiling is so gray, there are so many dots, how many times have I stared at the ceiling to calm myself from pulling out my hair in times of stress
• Hmm.... what's for dinner?
• Oh no... i forgot to tell Genny to take out the fish to defrost for dinner
• I wonder whether she cooked dinner...
• Aiks, must remember to go home and find the telephone bill under all the mess
• Forgot to transfer money to the savings account la
• Need to remember to pay the car loan
• Need to cut my nails

The instructor might have seen my eyes opened so he continued, close your eyes... relax... control your mind... open the 3rd eye...

• Crap, I don't have time of a 3rd eye. My 2 existing eyes are busy enough
• Which reminds me I didn't send the status update yet
• Crap, just remembered i didn't reply an email yet
• Sigh, work is hard...

At the end of the meditation, I felt more tired than before. I think the only time I can truly blank out my mind is when I'm watching TV. This is why I cannot live without the TV. It is my form of meditation. ;)

My forced leave

I'm so glad that I was forced to take half a day off today. After QF and WY went back to work after having lunch together at Kim Gary, I was alone in QB and since it was JCard day I thought, hmmm... I'd just take a look.

And me just taking a look took me almost 3 hours. :)

The atmosphere in JJ was choatic... and I happily jumped in to all that choas hunting for cheap clothes. There were sales people sceaming on the top of their voices, "HAPPY HOUR, HAPPY HOUR, 80% OFF ON ALL LADIES BAGS... ONE HOUR ONLY... BE CAREFUL... DON'T PUSH... DON'T PUSH.. MORE STOCK IS COMING OUT". It was like a war zone and I made sure I kept my distance away... I didn't want to get killed...

Went up to the 3rd floor and it was just as chaotic with sales people screaming out discounts on the bedsheets. Started to get a headache from all the noise so went down to the 2nd floor to the Gents department to see whether I could get anything for Yin How. It was nice and calm there, no one was screaming, totally different from the ladies department... :)

Anyways, after more than 2 hours of hunting, I got these.

I bought this dress for Rm24.... RM24 for a dress.... can't believe it!~~~



The top is RM40, tube top RM8, shorts RM 23.


And for spending RM103, I received RM10 voucher. I'm soooooo happy!~~~

The is the first time in my life I shopped by myself and I have to say I really enjoyed it, not having to worry about a very bored looking hubby following me around like a lost puppy.

If all forced leaves are like this, I'm looking forward to my next forced leave. :)

The happy Friday post

I woke up in the middle of last night and for a while, still in the confused state of being half awake and half asleep, I was wondering why my head felt so heavy and I couldn't move when I tried. Took me a while to realize that Russell was sleeping on top of my head across my pillow. The chicken dog was afraid of the thunder so he found it safer to sleep on my head. Dumb dumb dog.

Anyway, it's Friday, it's Friday, it's Friday and I'm doing my "I'm happy it's Friday" chant. Have a good weekend!~~~~ :)

Forced to take....

Which employee has to be forced to take a day off from work because the number accumulated leave is about to reach the maximum limit?

Yours truly, ME (I can hear some people saying “siao wan” and I KNOW WHO YOU ARE hehe).

For the past few weeks, I’ve been getting weekly reminders to take leave and each week I’ve been ignoring it.

Until now… because if I don’t take leave by next week, my leave is going to burn. And even knowing that my leave will burn if I don’t use it, I was still hesitating to apply for leave next week. I’m so STINGY. If I could cash out my leave like what I did before, I would. But can’t exchange leave for money now… so sad… so I’m forced to take leave. I’m weird. I know.

After considering for some time, stingy me finally applied for half day leave next week. But I’m gonna be forced to take 1 day of leave every 3 weeks to prevent it from reaching the max limit again. It’s not that I’m a workaholic who refuses to take a day off. Just that I feel that it’s such a waste to take a day off just to stay at home. And I’m too lazy to plan something else. I’m weird. I know.

Boss of course gleefully suggested that I burn off my leave since I don’t really want to take leave. Well I’m weird… not crazy… would you ask a stingy person to burn money just because that person is too stingy to spend it? No right…. so it’s the same concept. I’m weird. I know.

I think I need to take a long holiday somewhere.

It's Friday already?

It’s Friday. I can’t believe it. It’s not that I’m not happy that it’s Friday (which crazy person is not happy that the weekend is almost here?), it’s just that I blinked and suddenly it’s Friday. Where did the whole week go? Where did the whole of last week go?

I usually update my blog a few times a week but this week passed too fast. Partly because I’m learning up some new freaking alien stuff at work and partly also because I’ve suddenly got this crazy urge to do something which I’ve hated ever since school. This sudden inspiration caused me to drag Yin How yesterday to Tesco, spent 10 minutes at Popular, then 15 minutes at Tesco, then went back to Popular for another 5 minutes just to compare color pencils. Yin How of course was in a sulky mood because it was almost 8pm and he was hungry and tired and couldn't understand why I needed half an hour to choose color pencils. :P

I was at the dining table happily coloring with my new color pencils until I missed American Idol. Genny says I’m having one of those “mid-life” crisis where I’m going backwards in time. I actually can’t wait to go home later to continue my coloring but I have a dinner later to go to. :(

Don’t worry, I’m not crazy, even though it does sound crazy. :)

Why this sudden urge? Let’s just say I find my work colorless so I’ve been fascinated by anything colorful lately. If I was talented, I would rather be a graphic designer. Or a psychiatrist because I find the human mind interesting. I still love coding though, so my dream job would definitely be to work in Google (who wouldn’t want to work in Google?) or any web-based company where things make sense to me.

Well, it's just a dream. :)

Done

Finally declared my income tax. And I overpaid my tax which means the government owes me money. Yay!~