ooof

Been my own punching bag for several weeks now. 

Need to get out of the 圈圈。

一步一步来

往前走

#!%$%^@$@!#

Hate dealing with a certain person from the parent ministry.

Hate having to deal with high achievers with snooty attitudes who write in circles, and use exclamation marks to emphasise certain points in their emails. (How rude though. It's a professional work email.)

Maybe I am just not good enough & cannot understand their "angmoh". 

Sorry lah, laoniang is not from that strata, I cannot comprehend things beyond a certain level. Sorry lah, I ish also not a full-time policy-maker. I ish just a 打工仔 who is trying to 过日子 and 混口饭吃。

AND, laoniang 不是 scholar. Laoniang brain not so good. 

Deep breaths. Let's not ruin my Friday night. Maybe feeling emo & dramatic cos menses coming soon? 

Options...

That feeling has come again. 

Wondering how long more can I "last" in this job...

If I can't anymore...what are other options in the future? 

Can I quit & get a data entry job or an office admin job instead? Knock off on time, no need to OT, no need to handle staff, no need to handle stakeholders.....

In a blink of an eye

And so Christmas is over, New Year is over and now CNY is also mostly done & over with (though we still have Chap Goh Meh on 12 Feb). 

This year's CNY was relatively quiet. Quieter than usual. We had 4 house visits on Day 1, 2 on Day 2 and that was it. Good also...else too much ra-ra and hala-ing zaps my energy. :) 

Spent the whole afternoon yesterday tabulating the girls' angpows. They had a smaller "haul" this year partly cos we shifted out of our apartment and hence did not receive any from the neighbours lol. But till a good haul nevertheless. Both are 小富婆s..... :D

..........

有心无力，要咋做才能更精力充沛呢 

That feeling of being stuck in a rut and just cruising along with no real growth & improvement. 

Mid-life woes?

Lack of exercise & hence motivation?

Shio........Pan.......

 I am not done with my shio pan phase. We're heading to Bedok Mall later today for lunch.....

A trip to Breadtalk is necessary. :D

7 February 2025

Happy Birthday Mama!

I miss you alot. 

From time to time snippets & memories of you float into my mind. 

Like how when I was in primary school and I often did my homework in front of the TV while sitting on the floor with my books arranged in a circle around me, with you sitting in your trusty orange armchair (with wooden arms) on my right. You'd have your eyes glued to the TV which was airing some rerun of a Channel 8 drama (and occasionally cursing in Hokkien at the baddie on screen lol). It was you whom I learned some choice Malay & Hokkien cuss words from lol. 

Like how I helped you to make kueh pie tee cups from scratch, dipping the metal mould into the flour mix and then quickly dunking the mould into hot oil and finding the right time to flick out the cup and fry it to a crisp. 

Like how we squatted in the kitchen to wrap bak zhang. I was too young & too clumsy to know how to  hold & fold the bamboo leaves properly but I helped to scoop up the filling & dump it into the small hole you made in the middle of the glutinous rice, and I helped to cover up the filling with more rice too!

Like how you'd make yummy yellow sticky rice with ikan kuning fried to a level of crispiness I cannot imagine, and other lovely side dishes to accompany the rice like egg omlette and sambal ikan bilis. 

Like how you'd make your own fermented rice and leave that huge bottle in the fridge...occasionally sipping on the liquid that resulted from it (I didn't know then but I think it might have been some type of rice alcohol.

Like how you always insisted on sleeping on your tilam on the floor next to my bed even though we had a proper pull-out bed for you with a proper thicker mattress. You always said you still preferred to sleep on the floor. 

Like how you regaled me with stories of when you were young, or stories from the war, or how life was back then in those days, etc. 

I miss you. It's been almost 11 years since you passed. 

Pondering

Wonder what will become of me next time. Me who is not a high flyer nor a super high achiever but just a regular office worker. 

We're in a performance appraisal phase right now. I'd been through a round of grading at my level with my boss. He went through a moderation with his boss already and shared the current results with me. 

One older staff from another team within our division seems likely to be given a lower rating. Just because of bell curve fixed quotas that we have to meet, and just because he is older and about to "retire" in another 2 months and be converted to a contract staff. I wondered if it was fair for someone to be designated a sacrificial lamb in such a manner. I wondered if his work performance was actually satisfactory. My boss wasn't sure about that staff's quality of work but it is not the first time this has been done within the organisation as a whole....sigh. 

Sad realities of life?

On the other hand, we'd given a staff  under me a low rating as well. But given that she had the lowest job grade designation out of the entire division, she was "saved" from this lower rating and given a slightly higher rating. Both good & bad news for me I guess. 

Oh...I dislike dealing with HR matters.....

The Bus

Took the bus to work this morning.

Nerve-wrecking given the long hiatus. I can't even recall the last time I took the bus to work. Might have easily been 3 years ago.

Glad that the bus was not crowded given that the usual bunch of school-going kids had probably cleared by then. 

Glad I had a nice corner seat by the window. 

Let's keep this up Michelle!!! 

Hope to

1. Read, Exercise, Reflect more
2. Maintain & nurture relationships with family, friends, colleagues
3. Continue being present for the kids 

2025

New year is here. 

I don't think I have any new year resolutions yet except to exercise more. 

And I wish for more stability, tranquility, peace, good health, happiness and blessings. 

Not just for myself, but for the family & loved ones too.

Staff

I'm on leave. But I am chasing one particular staff for her workplan submission. 

Angry. Testing my patience. I reminded the team at least 2 times. And I reminded her a 3rd & 4th time. She still missed the deadline. And amendments needed to be made to the rubbish submission. Amended submission is still not in after a week. 

$#%!@#$ 

"Scolded" her this morning and told her I should not need to have to chase you for this when it is your responsibility to look after your submission yourself. I don't want to have to do this while I am on leave! 

She is already on performance monitoring, and still not putting in enough attention to these things. I don't know what else to say or what else to do to help. Already given enough guidance & extended more flexibility than I should to support her. 

I pray for patience and direction on my end, greater effort and awareness on her end, and a tiny miracle. 

19 Dec 2024

Shifted. Back at JS. After 10.5 years. 

Myriad emotions. 

Movers came on 19 Dec morning 9am. My guesstimate was right...they were done with the shifting by 1030/11am. 

Unpacked 70% of my stuff over the past few days. But the girls' stuff and other common items are still 50% unpacked. 

Things are in a big mess with clutter everywhere. I hope to clear them soon. 

We still have things at our own place, and I'm wondering how to settle those things. Have pushed it at the back of my mind for now. Too many things. One at a time. 

Jiayou...

Emotions

Did not realise how emotional I might be packing things up for the shift.

A little piece of something, another article, yet another memento.

Each long forgotten till I set eyes on them again. And once seen, each triggering some long hidden faded memory and bringing to surface things from eons ago.

Also threw away various things. Things which I kept all these years, thinking they would come into use one day but somehow never ever did. 

Decluttering stirs up dust. Both literal & metaphorical ones. 

Slaps!!

Recently hired a temp staff. Over-qualified for the post cos she has degree (from distance learning) and a Masters from one of our local unis. 

She's 17 years younger but we get along pretty alright. I like her. Easy to talk to. 

Only thing is...I feel old sometimes. 

Gosh, the Gen Z slangs.....

For e.g. in a typed conversation over Teams....

She: The taste of the fried udon slaps!

Me: ah so it's ur go-to order

She: ya and what slaps even harder is the udon beef, then u add chilli....wah slaps!!

-_-''

Ok laoniang sibei old..sibei old school lol....

Resorted to google....In Gen Z, "Slaps" means something is excellent or amazing, and often used to describe food or music o rother items that are well made. 

Shio Pan

Laoniang's latest craze. 

I'm averaging 3-4 shio pans a week over the last 2-3 weeks...still not too bad la hor...not as if I am having it everyday. :) 

So nice..so buttery...so simple. 

Japanese version of croissant, with less mess & less oil lol. 

Didn't realise I was so into it till the Saturday just past when I went to a bakery and found out its shio pans were sold out. I got quite sad haha. 

Year-end

It's the year-end headache again. 

What to get for some people for Xmas. The rush and never-ending list of things to get. Coupled with the many things to do for work, and for the shift back to FIL's. Food items to plan for gatherings, venues to book, appointments to fulfil....and some obligations to try to fulfil also...

I wish I could have a few days of doing nothing. With no one to jump on my bed and annoy me. No incompetent colleague to test my patience. No responsibilities to meet or people to look or "chase" after. Wish I could just stay at home and do some stretching, some dumbbell exercises, watch videos, crochet, nap, etc. Something that feeds me and soothes me....

At this point, I can't seem to even find some time or space to reflect abit on the past year and to think about next year. 

Morton's

K wanted the girls to try a more fine dining experience. And, the last he & I went to Morton's Singapore was more than 10 years ago. And, he was craving for beef....

And so we went this evening. Lol....

Food was good like what we remembered. 

The asparagus side dish was a little off for me though. N loved the onion bread & had tons of it. The girls shared a salmon main. A tried some of K's beef and really liked it. That's my girl! A meat-eater! hahaha...N as usual stuck to fish, breads & dessert, and refused any form of red meat (that is not cured or processed) lol. 

We had a bacon & onion mac & cheese side dish which turned out to be nice but quite "jelak". We didn't manage to finish it and dabao-ed it home. 

A requested to come back again for her 10th birthday...Errrr...we said "see how"....I calculated, the bill could probably feed our family of 4 around 15-17 sessions of McDonald's. 

22 November 2024

Company's Family Day! 

I brought Alyssa there in the morning and then K brought Nadya to meet us there around 12pm, after her Math class. 

Think I spent almost 5 hours walking non-stop with very short breaks of 2-3 mins at times. 

In the evening, I discovered that my shoulders were red lol. I got tanned but it was a fun day! 

Lotsa birdies and I had a nice "conversation" with a birdie friend too. It was some sort of duck which responded when I spoke to it. We carried on a "conversation" for almost a minute before I had to go lol...

???

I don’t know. Is it a must to go overseas for a trip during the school holidays? Or to have a short trip somewhere or even a staycation? 

Why am I viewed as an oddity and rarity when I say I am not going anywhere during this school holidays? 

Maybe the last big trip 6yrs ago put me off travelling. 
Maybe the anxiety is putting me off travelling too. 
Maybe I'm too lazy to plan when there are already so many things going on. 

There is that little bit of mum guilt though. When the kids see their friends going off here & there. 
Sigh.