I spy with my little eye

If you're wondering why the sudden outpouring of posts.....it's because I've been wanting to post but I've been too lazy.....and well I'm on medical leave today and I've got some spare time...:)

Woke this morning with part of my left eye being red. Freaked me out. Anything to do with the eyes always makes me queasy and squeamish. The last time something like that happened (earlier in Feb this year actually when I discovered I had a big floater in my right eye), I had a panic attack and got woozy in office.

When I saw that reddish patch on my eyeball, I felt that same woozy feeling again, coupled with palpitations. Damn it, I told myself. Get a grip. I could feel the blood draining from my lips too. Things felt light.

Eventually, I didn't go to work. K, being the dutiful husband, accompanied me to the doc before he went to work later than usual.

And so...apparently, a small blood vessel in the membrane covering the eyeball had burst sometime during the night, hence the reddish patch on my eye. The doc said it was something common. And I asked him if he was sure because nothing like that had ever happened to me, nor my family members, nor my friends in all my 32 years of life.

Sigh, the doc said it'll take about a week or two to clear up on its own. FML.
No contact lenses till it heals. Ok back to my nerdy self.

Looking on the bright side, HENG it only happened after the wedding. 

The Aftermath

You know the (almost) sudden screech to a halt when things have been going at a maddening pace? That's what it felt like to me after the wedding was over. Lol.

The sudden quieting down of things. The realisation that hey, the event's over. (so fast??)

Well, not to say that there are totally no more things to do. Just that things are not that pressing, there are no more hard deadlines on the personal front. And we are settling down together.

I am settling down too. Into the new place. Shifting was a drag. But I think most of the work has been done on that front and I am glad. Event my mint, basil and fittonia terrarium has been shifted over.I hope my parents don't feel too lonely. Or maybe they are glad to be rid of me lol. To quote my Dad: "Oh now that Michelle's out of here, we can buy durians already!!"   -_-'' 

Onward into the future we go! Building each step and crafting our world together!

Some pics

Lol, I've not had the chance to consolidate photos from various sources. So here are just soem pics uploaded from my phone. :)

There's the dragon candles hidden in the box. The candle holders are at the back. And yes that's the teapot set which was used by my parents during their traditional wedding ceremony back in 1973. My brother used it as well for his wedding back in 2001. And now it's my turn to use it! :D 

And to the right is the bowl and soon set used for our eating of mee sua when I come back to my own house for the tea ceremony.

The night before the actual day. Bright, red and cheery "shuang xi" slippers!

Coupled with pink satin PJs which my mum insisted on buying for me. Couldn't worm my way out ofit and so I had to wear them the night before....

The bridal bouquet. Ignore the paper ID tag please. 

We're known as couple 5604 to the bridal studio. zzzz

Voila. Me waiting for the gatecrashing activities to end. Am grateful for a bunch of super innovative "jiemeis" who connected with me via skype so that I could view all the gatecrashing activities. Lol.

p/s: I love my yellow room!

I didn't have a picture of me in my kwa on my phone. Anyway, I changed out of it and into this lovely magenta dress when I had to leave home and head to the hotel. checked in, did some camwhoring shots, showered and then crashed into bed. 

I loved the hairstyle the make-up artist did for me in the morning. And I love the hair accessory to bits too! 

It took me 15mins to get the hair accessory and all 30 black bobby pins out of my hair for this hairstyle. And another 15-20mins of shampooing and conditioning to wash all the hairspray off. Looks like a simple style but oh so much spray and pins and effort went into it!! Much prefer this hairstyle compared to the first style she did for me for the evening.

Make-up artist doing her magic. Transformed me from blah to fwah. :) Thank you Candy!

不晓得

有时候真的不知道自己要把东西弄得那么仔细和organised来干吗？

是我个人的作风，我个人的性格，我个人的怪癖还是是我对自己和对别人的要求过高? 还是这是职业病？

不晓得。Maybe it's abit of everything.

话说回来，有时身边的人不理会你的好意或忽略了你的effort, 那又怎样？是自己心甘情愿的去做，就不应该要求什么。

不晓得。

嗨，算了，去睡个觉， 明天又是新的一天。

.........

And so the numbers keep decreasing again.

Aunt's unwell, had a transient stroke. She won't be there both in the morning and the evening. I won't be able to serve tea to her.

A colleague's gran just passed on. He won't be able to make it for the dinner already.

Some who matter to me won't be able to make it for the morning activities.

And the most recent news of all....Granny's not doing well these 2-3 days. She refuses to eat. And she's relieving herself on the bed for all matters big or small. She's not talking much, she's not calling the nurses. While she can still recognise people, she's lethargic and only wants to sleep. She has not eaten much in 3 days.

There was family talk. Of not bringing her back for the morning tea ceremony at all. And there was even talk of...what if she passes on before Sunday arrives and what if we bring her back on Sunday and she passes on at home.....

Wah lan. WTF.

Seriously. WTF.

I did not want to part of that conversation. I left and went back to my room. I was upset and feeling angry.

It's supposed to be a happy time. Why do I have tears in my eyes?

Perennial Weaknesses

These stores never fail to make me part with my money! In no order of merit:

1. Daiso : oh love love love!
2. Cold Storage *beams*
3. Old Chang Kee
4. Watsons
5. H&M
6. Muji

Oh and I can't resist nice pretty notebooks too!

Work

I value discretion and diplomacy, especially in a work environment. Unfortunately, not many people are like that. Sigh.

Cool calm zen

If you ask me, I'd say that love is between two people, marriage is between two families and a wedding's between everybody and anybody else in between.

Myriad versions of "you should" and "it should be done this way" and "you shouldn't do it" has been thrown at us from various angles.

While I definitely appreciate feedback and advice, I also appreciate them dished out in a more diplomatic, as opposed to autocratic, manner.

Oh right, I don't even know why we can't use the bedlinen that we had bought. We spent many afternoons looking for it and now it's been rejected for some reason. Hmm.

Don't sweat the small stuff. Don't fret, some might say.

Right.

Ohm.

Ohm.

Ohm.

staff work woes

写了说我罗嗦， 不写又说我不够详细

到底要我怎样呢？

有事情通知了说我太紧张， 不跟你讲又说我没把你放在眼里

到底要我怎样呢？

嗨， 员工之苦。。。

Skype Dad Skype!

I set up a Skype account for my dad over the last few days. And taught him how to use it yesterday evening. :)

All because my parents’ good friends are stuck in Vancouver for 2 months (to help their son look after his kids while his helper is back home in the Philippines to get married) and both couples miss each other quite abit. Right now they are only emailing each other and so when Auntie Mimi and Uncle Robert suggested that they Skype one of these days, my dad came to ask me how to do it.

Think I'll do another run through with him again this evening so he remembers how to do it.

I think it’s great that they are trying to keep pace with technology. Especially my dad. The only thing that I’m not teaching him is how to get onto Facebook lol.

Effort

Sometimes, when you’ve been around someone for too long, you reach a phase of familiarity where either party takes the other for granted, or both take each other for granted.

It happens all the time with family, between friends, with spouses and other loved ones. I am guilty of it, no doubt about it, and I’m sure many others are too.

I guess, it takes a conscious effort to remind yourself to be mindful of the other party’s feelings. I don’t think I’ve done well at this but I’ll keep trying. And of course, I’ll need to temper my impatience as well...

??!!??!!

There was a tense discussion at my desk over a paper my colleague and I submitted. And then the boss sort of threw the paper on my desk.

I was fuming inside. As a last response, I said…

“FINE. YA. Ya, Ya, I’ll change it LOR!”

Is that the best I can muster?? -_-

Sigh. When your boss is in a foul mood, it sucks when you’re in his radar.

Jason Mraz!!

When I told K yesterday that it was strange that I wasn't really feeling excited about the concert tonight, he said "oh, it'll come..."

And he's right.

The excitement IS building!! I've been listening to J Mraz's songs the whole of today and am counting down to 5:30 when I get off work! Woot! hahaha....

Boo-boos

The amazing amount of careless mistakes I am making these days is appalling. I don’t know if I am being complacent or it’s a result of too much multi-tasking.
I can’t believe I sent a contract to my Malaysian partner with 13 pages missing from it.
And I sent out another contract that day to a local partner with someone else's company name on it
I missed sending a letter of notification out to someone else as well.

Sigh. WTF is happening.

Here I am correcting my staff's careless mistakes and there I am making these mindless blunders of my own. These mistakes SHOULD NOT happen at all.

My bar is set high. And I just failed myself miserably....Sigh. 

I used to pride myself with my meticulousness....I think I need to pull up my pants a whole lot higher to be able to tell myself that again.

I see shadows

From time to time, I scare myself because I think a fly or an insect is flying right in front of me. Or I think a cockroach just scuttled over the floor. Or I think a bug is in a corner of the room. 

I see a dark spot here, or a shadowy small spectre there.

And then I realise, it's that dumb big piece of floater in my eye. Coupled with a few small ones.

Sigh.

I look a little silly sometimes because people and passers-by around me see that I duck at nothing or wave my hands in front my face for nothing or "siam" for nothing. 

:(

Great, now I can't go for another business trip. This time it's to Tokyo.
UGGGGHHHHH.

That issue

The contractual matter has been settled today. Finally. I am glad but why don't I feel like a weight has been lifted off my shoulders? Hmm. In fact, there's a niggling feeling about the days going forward. The days of event preparation.

May the Lord help us put forth this event in the smoothest, most impressive and most cost effective way possible!!

Mr Mint

And this here is Mr Mint. From a teeny cutting about 15cm tall back in Nov 2011, he has grown to almost 10 times that height and now stands at about 130cm tall. New shoots are still growing everyday from each leaf node too. It's quite a joy watching him grow from week to week. (I know, I sound like I'm talking about my son.)

It's a hardy plant and has weathered many occasions of neglect from me (and haphazard care from my mum, the surrogate carer on days that I am away) with nary a withered leaf or a droopy stem. It never seems to be too thirsty, I can give it little water and still it survives. It never seems to reject too much water too, I can pour water till it starts flowing out for the bottom the pot and still it stands tall. I wonder how the root system is though. But it's beneath the soil so I don't think I can find out.

I have a confession. I nearly lopped off the top 30-40cm of Mr Mint yesterday. I'd intended to trim that portion off and transplant the cutting to another pot because it was getting too tall and wobbly. Even with support bamboo poles by the side, Mr Mint is in a really wobbly state. My trimming scissors was actually already positioned at a stem node and I was ready to snip.

But I somehow couldn't do it. So drama I know.

You can roll your eyes but it's the first time ever that I've taken care of a plant that has grown up so tall and so beautifully! Lol. I got sentimental about things and called a family conference. My Dad said not to cut. Ah. The patriarch had spoken. The scissors was banished back to its hiding place in the drawer.

And so Mr Mint still stands tall at 130cm (and counting) today. :)

Mr Basil

2 strong shoots are towering over the rest of the them. In a bid to encourage lateral and not vertical growth so that there's denser foliage, I decided to trim off the top 1/3 of the weaker of the two stems and transplant the cutting back into the pot. Before I could pot it, I had to remove some leaves from it first...

And voila, here they are. Some little ones and the rest are huge leaves. Yep, that's how big some of the leaves of my basil plant are. I crushed those leaves and spent the night smelling them haha.

The pot attracts some ants from time to time as well. Wonder if it's because of the herb fragrance.

trips

Will be missing 3 work trips this year....:(

1. Costa Rica
2. Prague
3. Brunei

But am looking forward to the following:

1. Personal trip to Bali in August!
2. Work trip to Toronto in October!
3. Work trip to Brunei in November!