I have always found my offices too warm but the new office is unbearably cold. Now I have to wear my cardigan everyday and the cold hovers ard my body even when I go out for lunch etc. I suspect my recent little cold/ sore throat was the result of the Antartica-climate in my office. BUT... apparently boss and MIA neighbour's cubicles aren't as freezing as mine! I suddenly realised it today during discussion with boss, cos both of them have window panels where the warm sunlight can stream in to neutralise the cold. But my station only has walls and no daylight :( Perhaps it's time to get help to make my officer warmer.

We've barely started with wedding preps (so far, have gone to look-see at a few bridal studios and mainly did online research for venues) and the "road ahead" already seems somewhat intimidating. This afternoon, we attended a caterer open-house; and the salesperson seemed pretty surprised tt we were still pretty hazy about what we envisioned our wedding to be like despite planning to hold it in about half a yr's time. And then there are all these horror stories floating ard abt having to book venues more than one yr in advance... Another immediate hurdle ahead is successfully finding a cosy non-hotel/convention centre venue that can take like 300 guests or more... Hai, foresee many dilemmas and frustrations ahead!

On a brighter note, I stumbled across a lovely gown yesterday that almost looked like it could be IT. But sadly had to let it go 'cos it had to be bought (not for rental) by today :(

Cute finds I sighted at Wood Would (stationery + paraphernalia store) this afternoon, captured with my new camera!

Lovely ribbons!

A craft book I wanna get!

  

 

New Toy!!

I finally bought a new compact camera over the weekend... and am pretty satisfied with the first few shots I took with it this morning. Looking forward to more fun pics but without the weight of a DSLR :P It also comes with a few fun artistic filters, which I used on my shots of my office:

 

 This is what HDB Hub looks like from across the road..

 My little 'cosy corner' on the drawer-top

 

My cutesy stuff close-up, in dramatic mode :)

 This weekend in pictures 

Some pics from the NDP preview on Sat evening; and my quick attempt to use my long-neglected oven. Heh, but my apple cinnamon muffins are instant-mix ones, from the sorely missed Trader Joe's...

 
 

 

 

Invisible enemies

My stuff fell prey to some creepy floaty neighbours TWICE this week at my workstation! Ok, I am not talking about the real creepy supernatural beings (though I also hope they are not lurking around) but an enemy by the name of.. MOLD. I thought my office was freezing enough to keep such thingies away, but I was very wrong. Earlier this week, I happily bought a box of blueberries and strawberries from the entrepreneurial fruit-stall uncle (who has a stall at the basement food court, but now regularly pushes a cart to various floors to hawk his goods at lift lobby). I then left them out in the open since we didn't have any fridge in office. But I discovered with horror yesterday some white furry stuff on my remaining half-box of strawberries... so had to throw them away. Guess the freezing temp was not freezing enough to keep these hardy fungi away :( Err... a tuperware that I used to bring some fruits to office also kenahed cos I forgot to wash it and left it out for maybe 2 days :(

Heartland gem!

Today my dinner started with a warm green tea baumkuchen cake... not from any fancy/atas pastry shop but a little cake/noodles cafe at Toa Payoh Central called Wheat Baumkuchen. It was really yummy - even better than the baumkuchen from Taka B1. Yay, now I have yummy green tea cake right at my doorstep :) This little shop also sells five types of cold noodles, each named after a creature (most of them were sea creatures, like penguin; seal; dolphin etc). Somewhat random, but I guess it's kinda cute. But due to the faint association between the creatures and the contents of each dish, I alri forgot the creature that endorsed the soba I had :P I would def go back there for dinner!

I suddenly need to be very well informed and well read and it feels somewhat intimidating and exciting at the same time. Exciting because I will hopefully grow much less ignorant in the next yr or so but intimidating cos I am expected to know so much more about everything (trends, current affairs, econs etc), Have unfortunately been suffering from partial brain-rot the past few years :( Perhaps I now need to set aside one hour or so everyday to read newspapers, newsmags etc but doubt I'd have the discipline and willpower to last for more than 1 week ha. Well I will try lah, though I know I'd never get very good at doing these things... At end of day, they are just not 'my element'...

Today I asked my MIA neighbour (who's no longer MIA) a random qn about his namecard - whether he had any preference for the Chinese translation of his designation.. cos these chapalang stuff just got sent to me since I'm the lowest life form in my tiny office of 3. NMIA neighbour (in his late 50s I think) walked over and told me that it didn't matter to him since he didn't know any Mandarin (he learnt Malay in sch instead). The reason? Cos the Chinese teachers in sch then were really fierce; whereas the Malay teachers were much nicer and gentler...

Today's Day 2 of work back at HDB. Things are still relatively peaceful; and the environment is very quiet. My office is a little set-up tucked away in a little corner behind the lift lobby, with a total of... 6 workstations and a tiny discussion corner. So far, there's a total of 2 inhabitants in our little office (in the past 2 days at least). The 3rd person (someone senior) has apparently been MIA, so my boss and I have had the whole place to ourselves! Hopefully this MIA neighbour is easy to get along with... i mean, when there are so few of us, 1 unpleasant colleague makes a huge diff... :P

I get a nice corner with lotsa wall space right at the end, but it's currently relatively empty and undecorated, except for my santa mug with a santa-holding-on-to-cup-rim spoon; a few postcards of takayama/ gassho-style farmhouses stuck on the side of my big cabinet; an unmagnetic whiteboard; self-decorated IKEA magnets on my magnetic cabinet door and a little dish cloth with black cat-face prints covering the top of my little chest of drawers. I want to make my workstation feel more homely, but have yet to decide on what pictures/ posters i should put up. Maybe a potted plant/ cactus or two and cute vases would help.

Hope things will remain peaceful in the weeks to come! Heh. So far so good, except that I have to readjust to using LN (instead of Outlook) all over again... Am also not used to having to meet/ co-exist with so many people at the lift lobby... The exponential increase in number of fellow lift-riders is somewhat intimidating.. though I dun even know many of them. I suddenly cannot imagine/ believe that so many ppl actually work at HDB Hub... Guess I had also better start working bucking up, so as to live up to my fanciful title of "Head Strategist"... Right now, these shoes are too big for me to fit comfortably in; and what I need to do in the coming months is still somewhat hazy :(

By the way - this is my cute santa mug hehehe.

Tmr is my 2nd last day at work; but I feel so unready to leave. I mean not really because I dun want to leave; but more because there's still quite a bit of unfinished business and housekeeping stuff to attend to! Things to file away and shred; compiling outstanding work items to handover to colleague and such. Meanwhile, some emails still continue to creep into my mailbox, waiting for my reply/ further action. New boss has also been happily sending me things to read/ do, but realistically I prob wun be able to get to them till I start work proper next week. If only life could be more leisurely sometimes...

This is my last week of work at MND, and hopefully everything will be peaceful. Or even if there's chaos somewhere, hope it wun spread to my territory :P So that I can do some last min filing, clearing up etc in peace heh. Next Mon I will be back at good old Toa Payoh; several impt things also lie ahead in the next yr or so it feels pretty scary. Hope everything works out well.

3 particularly cool things happened during the trip.

One is kinda frivolous actually. I think i have been slightly brainwashed by L'Occitane ads and tourist postcards to think that Provence is synonymous with LAVENDER LAND. So like we were quite baffled (when we drove past some fields and took pics in midst of the lavender) why the very recognisable scent of lavender couldn't be detected at all at any of these spots.. Halfway thru the trip J decided to experiment with one lil stalk she picked... We sniffed pretty hard, but still no smell leh. One middle-aged French guy apparently noticed our 'antics' and gestured with his fingers to rub the lavender 'buds'... and voila! We smelt the fresh lavender fragrance immediately! It totally didn't occur to us that the scent had to be 'released'... cos I guess too used to smelling the processed lavender oils/ lavender satchets. But made me wonder how come the lavender satchets smell go good... have they all been pre-rubbed heh? :P

The second one was closer to my heart... Met up with Jeannice on the later part of the trip and had a really fun time hanging out together and catching up... Though (similar to J when we visited her in Japan last year) she initially had some initial reservations abt being a light bulb, her company was really enjoyable - and it prompted Derek & I to do stuff we prob otherwise wldn't have... like dining at the top few trip advisor restaurants more than half the time; disappearing into interesting stores we may not have stopped to explore etc.

The last one and most significant one involves a cute little Provencal hedgehog named "Sweet Hubert" we met on the trip... was somewhat smitten by his cuteness when I first sighted him at a souvenir shop. I took pics for keepsakes... and thought that was the last I'd see of him.

Hubert in my hands, his friend on D's shoulder...
 

Little did I know that he would suddenly make a guest appearance as a "ringbearer" on our last day in Paris...  :)

Just got back this morning; and totally conked out in bed till 4pm. Provence was really lovely - with great company, awesome weather, good food and lovely sights. We felt slightly cheated though that the extensive lavender landscape featured in many postcards were nowhere to be found. Maybe they were located in more secluded areas bah... thankfully we managed to hunt down a couple of nice little fields along the way. Will blog more again later this week! :)

Halfway thru my trip, I realised the importance of recognising some basic French.. Esp when it comes to food : p but thks to advancements in technology e.g. the prevalence/availability of free wi-fi in my hotels/ b&bs it wasn't too difficult to look up stuff or download free French-English apps to my iPod on the go heh. Cannot help wondering why the french word for mushrooms sounds like champions/champagne though...:)

Tmr we head to Provence... So far the pastry selection in Paris and Normandy have been somewhat disappointing- the Isetan basement at Shinjuku San-chome wins hands down heh. But we shall see... Interestingly I also chanced upon an elderly Japanese couple three days ago and chatted with them a lil in Japanese :)Looking forward to better weather and lovely fields of lavender in full bloom :)

Typing this from a T3 computer terminal... and am about to board my flight to Paris. Yay! :)

Oh mum...

Just didn't feel like doing anything after I reached home today and I did something I hadn't done in ages - hung out in parents' bedroom to watch TV with mum. I never quite realised how much my mum cared/ minded my behavior/ actions... but she does. My heart aches somewhat just thinking about it...

So we were watching Channel 8 news when I caught some brief footage of the crane hoisting down the stupid Sembawang water tank (where this maid was murdered and dumped) from the HDB block. It stirred some interest in me cos just this evening HDB came and updated me abt this and I almost had to staff up something related to the removal of the water tank. But like many channel-surfing restless viewers mum switched channels to Channel 5 and both of us were suddenly carried away by this program revealing the trick behind how a woman can disappear from a curtained-box in a magic show that we missed the news snippet on the water tank. I naturally expressed my disappointment - not cos it was anything really worth watching - but more 'cos I failed to satisfy that kpo urge in me. Anyways just too bad lah and so i went about other stuff like showering and my nightly ritual of wasting time on my computer.. when all of a sudden mum hurriedly came into my room to ask me to get ready to go watch TV 'cos the water tank snippet was going to be replayed on Channel U news... and I suspect she had intentionally kept the TV on so she cld monitor whether this wld come up again during the 11pm news.

You know - I had quite forgotten I wanted to watch it (cos it was really not that impt) but sweet mum like cannot sleep without achieving her mission for that night like that. So I eventually caught the 3 min footage of the hoisting of the Sembawang water tank, all thanks to mum.

I dunno how she does it, but her selflessness just makes me darn ashamed of myself.

D sent me photo evidence of my 'hairdressing session'...
Though they were a little 'chor lor' I was nonetheless amused by my little hairstylists..

I left work feeling rather sian and demoralised yesterday, but two little sweeties at cell group chased the blues away... I've never been very popular with kids (cos I am usually unanimated and thus not so fun to play with perhaps) but for some weird reason these two little girls (Julia is 5+ i think and Judith ard 7) endeared themselves to me the whole night, as if I had known them since forever.

It all started off when the elder sister decided to come sit on the cushion on my lap... showing off her flowery rubber band and like a tiara-thingy to me... then soon after the little one also jumped on the bandwagon and suddenly 3 of us were like the best friends. They quickly pulled out their pre-sch class photos to show me; and asked me to guess the names of their classmates. As with most class photos, names of everyone in the picture were all displayed at the bottom, but Judith got genuinely thrilled/ surprised when I managed to "guess" her friends' names; and kept asking me "how you know them!". Hai, such innocence was indeed endearing.. :) Our friendship wore off a little as the night progressed; but towards the end of the session, they decided to friend me again. Judith tried to tie my hair unsuccessfully (naturally lah, her hair was the nice smooth silky sort) and accused me of not using any conditioner on mine.

I didn't know what to make of the whole episode (esp cos the kids have seen me before several times at church - just not at their house, and have never been particularly chummy with me at all)... It really felt quite therapeutic when the little sister quietly sat in my lap when everyone sat around in a circle to sing some songs -- though my feet later became temporarily achy as they were rarely sat on when in a cross-legged position :P Cannot explain why, but somehow under such circumstances you feel like you only bear to show the 'good/happy' side of yourself to them... [OK, perhaps I will feel less so if I hang around them everyday lah]

Perhaps I am less kid-disabled/averse than I think haha.

I had to buy 3 different farewell cards today... It was slightly problematic 'cos nice 'custom-made' farewell cards are pretty hard to find... compared to say birthday cards... I was debating whether to get this slightly quirky one which read:

YOU'RE LEAVING

[You have to imagine a drawing of an orange chicken standing beside a sausage that looks like a plaster]

May the Chicken of Happiness
and the Sausage of Prosperity
FOLLOW you wherever you go

Wasn't sure how the recipient of this card wld react so I lingered around in the store for some time wondering whether to get this or not. In the end I got it - it's for a guy anyways so he prob wun get too offended or upset even if he thinks it's weird lah.

On a random note, many ppl in office seem to be raving about Kungfu Panda 2... maybe I shld really go catch both KFP1 & 2.. ;)

Last Fri was my director's last day at Hsg Div :( Though I'm not particularly close to him, he's a really sincere and nice person. And I have after all worked under him for close to 2 years... so it was somewhat awww... when J & I went to say goodbye to him before leaving office on Fri... Quite a few Hsg Div "alumni" also turned up for his farewell lunch on Tues... somewhat indicative of how long he has actually been around! My last day was finally firmed up last week too. It should have been this week; but have been asked to stay around for a little while more. But come 18 Jul, I shall resume status as HDB staff proper :)

Quite a bit of the weekend was spent doing research for upcoming trip. Also snipped off some 5 cm of some split ends/spoilt locks yesterday... and hairdresser tried to change my parting. I find changing parting a very troublesome business... perhaps cos I've stuck to mine for the longest time, so it's pretty annoying/awkward when a certain part of your hair cannot fall the way it has always been the past xxx years... Hai, I suppose as with all things, the resistance is great at first... but after you get over the initial painful few weeks, then things turn for the better! Hopefully I persevere in this change hair-parting business cos it will be for the better... Meanwhile i have also attempted to do the little poofy fringe that's somehow quite popular now... but just cannot pull it off glamly leh, so it's pretty sad :( I have this secondary fringe of stray hairs that's particularly annoying.. Alright I shall stop blabbering but bad hair is unfortunately a daily affliction for me :(