glowing old

yup, glowing old and not growing old...

i have always been advocating growing old graciously. cos i believe that youth, external beauty and all things associated is impermanent. that is the law of nature. everything and everyone will grow old with time. there is no escape. but i strongly believe that we can grow old graciously. and when we do so, we will naturally glow with age! and i reiterate here again after coming face-to-face with a few rather disturbing experiences recently.

firstly, i have a friend who is petrified of getting and looking old. never never ever mention the "o" word to this friend of mine. and no, it is not "orgasm". i would be very happy if it was orgasm... but that is besides the point. the "o" word to this friend is "old". and probably to this person, it signifies weakness, loneliness, whatever... and so, to not look her age (ya, i am not even saying, looking like a teenager), this friend would go for botox treatment every few months. need to keep the young look, she maintained. and i was thinking... hmmm, if at 30, i want to continue to look 30, i go for botox and manage to do so... and at 35, i still want to look 30, and at 40, i still want to look 30... imagine the impossibility of such desires. what's most important is to look healthy! no?

and talking about looking healthy, this friend of mine, and many other gay friends too, have been trying hard to look thin. and thankfully, they have not gone to the point to want to look pencil thin. but really, i personally think older people should focus on looking and staying healthy rather than thin and/ or losing weight. the thing with the human body is that as we get on with age, our body will shrink (in part due to loss of muscle mass). and when this happen, we will begin to look a little saggy. after all, our size is like our clothes. once we lose our mass, it becomes oversize. and so, if we still force ourselves to be as thin as we can, we will end up looking very "saggy" and haggard. but on the other hand, if we focus on being healthy and not be too bothered about the little bits of padding all round, we can glow like santa claus. and i seriously think nature has bestowed this on us cos as we grow older, we naturally will look a little fatter cos our metabolic rate will drop. no? haha... also, think of this, ever see a healthy dried prune? yup, you should get the point.

and lastly, i wanna write about someone i know. he was (and still is) a reasonably handsome person. straight, and very successful in his career. he is in the airline industry and used to have a to-die-for happy family that was the envy of many people. but alas, due to his expressed desire to stay young and want to be forever young, he end up exchanging his family for his desires. his family is now broken. he had divorced his wife. his children have been placed under his wife's custody and they moved out of his house a couple of years ago. i can only suspect it was a direct result of his desire to maintain and prove his virility and youth for he has always shared that he is afraid of growing old. and even while he was married, he continued to led a carefree lifestyle with young women and engaging in dangerous sports. he is now pushing 50 (or perhaps already in his 50s), and still live a lifestyle of a swinging bachelor. he has a girlfriend, goes around public places wearing a straw hat, loose singlet and berms. and he strums his guitar and sings old songs too. he reminds me of a hippy in the swinging 70s. i saw him recently and he told me he is having a bad bout of flu, yet he planned to head off to thailand to wind-surf and to have fun. and in his own words "if i don't play now, i will not be able to play once i get old"...

while i celebrate their strong conviction to youth and the efforts, i also feel a little tinge of sadness for them. it seemed like they have allowed their desires to stay and look young consume them without them realizing it. desires... sighs... i can only wish them peace of mind when the time comes for them to reconcile the fact that they need to eat sleep shit their age. in short, live their age.

ok, enough of the rantings... i need to go do up my face now...

hmmm... where's my sk ii mask?

lol!

ps: have posted the song titled "forever young" by alphaville above. it was a superbly popular song in the '80s and was banned in some countries. accordingly, some people were reported to have committed suicide after getting so hooked onto this song and didn't want to grow old... 

new beginnings...

people get into relationships, and people fall out of relationships. i see this happening amongst many friends and i too have gone through them. but it is so bloody different when i see my own dragon-year niece going through it, so bloody bloody different. over the past couple of years, i saw her gone into a relationship, commit her all, and then fell out of the relationship... and then recover and found a new love after some time. and finally she's getting married this year! and no, i did not become emotional and cry buckets like how mummies, aunties, and some more emo uncles would in movies. but i certainly felt a little emotional (just a wee little) about the whole thing. it seemed so recent when i carried her in my arms. and i bought her her first toy, a blue cookie monster! i still remember how she was just about twice the size of the baby cookie monster. haha! and now, she is getting married! ok, to be exact, in sep this year, but well...

anyway, i will not be invited to her wedding. my eldest sis continues to hold grudges against me and insisted that my niece do not do so. and knowing my niece, she will feel very upset cos she was very close to me. and as expected, she apologized to me earlier after i whatsapped her to ask her about the date and to also remind her to invite my mum. told her that mama (my mum) is really looking forward to it and had purchased a blouse for the occasion. thankfully, my niece said she would do so... and no, please don't feel bad about not inviting me, i understand, i told her. and please do not be upset with your mum for i do also admit i had said some unpleasant things to her during the days leading up to my dad's demise in 2008. what's important is that you are happy. and to know that you have the thoughts about inviting me is all that matters.  

she seemed a little more cheerful after i told her i understand. glad that i had released her the tensions about it. i wish her all the happiness in her life. 

ps: ya, i know i have blogged about this when i saw her wedding shoot photo, but i wanted to write about it again cos i am feeling a little emo after whatsapping her about it...

picture from http://www.westfield.com.au

emo nemo

ok, ok... let me first say that there is really nothing about nemo the movie in this blog posting. the reason why i am using the title emo nemo is becos i thought i want to use something bright and cheery to depict something that is happening so often that it is really wearing me thin and bearing me down, and that i suspect will also bear down on anyone who has been reading this blog.

it's my mum again (no prize for guessing it right)! she's gone emo again today. shan't go into details except to mention that it is about her tensions of me heading out to do my exercises. understand from sis that she suspects i am actually not exercising but planning to harm her (yes, again). ok, won't go into details here. enough enough. i get tired of writing it again. and really, i am beyond getting angry already. she is a sick person (see! even typing this sentence felt a little too repetitive!).

so, ya... wow! look at that bright orange color! emo nemo (darned! apple has constantly auto-changed the word nemo to memo, cannot take it)! nice! cheerful! and yeah... i have once again, locked myself in my room to get away from all the emo-ness...

:-)

picture from http://blog.oregonlive.com/themombeat/2010/07/helping_your_kids_tune_out_the.html

the zoo

it was a long and tiring day. managed to get mum to go to the rehab after some slight coaxing this morning and met up with bee for breakfast before he headed to work. but what was interesting was that in late morning, my brother suggested i bring his wife and kids to the zoo cos it is school holiday. and i thought it would be a good break for mum and picked her up from the rehab center before picking my bro's family. we arrived at the zoo after lunch, baby in pram, toddler in arm, and elderly on wheelchair and all complete with bags and bags of baby stuff. heh heh... 

and the zoo staff all thought i had brought my wife and kids for an outing. thank goodness my sis-in-law didn't quite understand english. else, it would be so awkward. and yup, it was hard work pushing the wheelchair, helping to hold my niece and at times looking after my baby nephew... but it was rather fun. and of cos, we saw the animals... big cats, pandas, rhinoceros, etc etc etc... and hmmm, when at the zoo, i wondered again who was looking at who. was it us humans looking at the animals or was it the other way round? hahah...

whatever the case, it was a good but tiring day out.

:-)

pool of blood

i am very angry now. have been angry since 2 hours ago...

in the past 4 days, mum fell 3 times. and all 3 times, it was avoidable. 3 days ago, it was at the car park. she got out of the car and stepped onto her panties. yesterday, she fell at the car park after lunch. and it was becos she has the habit of throwing herself onto the car seat even before she fully got into the car. told her so many times not to do and many a times, i have to rush to her and hold her back before she throws herself onto the seat, and there had been many near misses, yet she still do it. and today, she fell again. and finally, things got bloody. very bloody for that matter. here're the details...

my sis did her laundry at my place and i helped her dry and fold her clothes for her. she was to come over to collect her laundry in the evening. and becos mum was feeling weak, i waited for sis to come before heading out to get groceries and household stuff at the nearby supermarket. mum asked me to go ahead, no need to stay by her as she would be fine. under normal circumstances i would proceed, but today i refused to cos i knew she was weak. so once my sis came over, i left. and to make sure she sleeps well, i administered her medication to her before leaving. once again, before leaving, i told her my sis would simply collect her laundry and that she should lie on the sofa and sleep (she refused to sleep in her room) and not move about unnecessarily. 

i went out and came back less than an hour later. when the lift door opened, i heard sapphie barked. i knew at once something was wrong for sapphie would usually not bark when mum was asleep. and when i opened the door, i found mum sitting on the floor by the kitchen door. and there was a pool of blood on the floor. mum looked a little daze and when she saw me, she said she fell. i spared no time to quickly get some water and tissue to clean the blood and checked where the blood came from. and i traced it to her toes. the skin on her toe joint had hardened and due to the fall, it cracked and bled. the crack was really bad. in fact, when i first looked at it, i thought her toe was about to fall off. it was just that scary.

as i cleaned her wounds and the pool of blood on the floor, i asked why she didn't take my advice and sleep. she said she wanted to close the kitchen door! omfg! her reply got me one helluva freaking angry. she has this bloody freaking fear of people coming into the house and she would go about closing doors and windows to ensure no one could come into the house (to harm her). and come on, this was not even a normal door! it was a kitchen door. a door installed to make sure the oil do not fly into the living room! and when i told her that since she was so fearful of unclosed doors, i might as well remove the kitchen door. after all, i rationalized, i do not cook much and this door was as good as non-functional. and she said, if you remove the door, i will move out of the house. what! it got me angrier. go, go and find a house in singapore that has a door between the kitchen and living room! hardly! and to think she threaten to leave the house just becos of a door. totally not logical! geeze! anyway, after cleaning up the blood, she couldn't get up. she was too weak to even carry her own heavy weight. and i couldn't carry her nor lift her up too cos my back was bad and still weak. it was not until some 10min of pulling and twisting that we managed to slowly get her to stand up and move back to the sofa. 

fucking hell! all the falls and the blood. just to close a freaking non-functional door.

totally illogical and not worth it.

vomit blood

today was vomit blood day. thankfully, i am no dracula, else i would have died of starvation. here's why...

i had to sign the contract today and had been told there will be a briefing of sorts for me after that. and since the contract signing was at 10.30am, i suspected i would only leave the office earliest by about noon. and so with this in mind, i told mum i will be in a meeting and that she should not call me. i needed to prep her cos it was her habit to call me at about noon daily during her lunch break. and given the fact that she was feeling the after-effects of yesterday's infusion, i told her she should rest at the rehab center and not do any exercise. i closed the loop by calling the rehab center and giving them instructions to let her rest. finally, i pushed my lunch appointment till 1.30pm. and with all these arrangements in place, i thought everything would went well and good. until...

i signed the contract at 10.30am. and the briefing went as planned. while i was in the middle of the talk with my chief, my mum called. i looked at the time. 11.30am. hmmm, she was early, i thought and ignored her call. the phone was in silent mode thankfully. the meeting ended at 12pm. i walked out of the office and i took a look on my phone... 11 missed calls. sighs. ok, not as bad as last week where i had 15 missed calls. i called back and she said she felt uneasy and her body ached. yes, it was to be expected for the next 3 days after her infusion i reminded her. she said she had never felt so pain before (as usual) and she wanted to take painkillers. normally, her medication timing was at 2-3pm (both painkiller and mental-medication for her paranoia). but ok, i said, since she was uncomfortable, i reckoned it should be ok to take it at 1pm. but do not take it any earlier i told her. i was conscious of the need to space out the mental-medication to balance off with her evening dosage at 9pm. she said ok and hung up. 5min later, i called her to check if she was feeling ok and she said she had taken her medication. wtf! arghhh... ok, ok... no choice. since she has taken it, so be it. but please rest and don't move about, i reminded her. her session normally end at 3pm and i would wait for her at the lift landing to escort her up, i said. she said ok and i proceeded to lunch with kwang.

i was in the middle of lunch when i got a call from the rehab center staff. your mum said she was feeling unwell, we want to send her to the hospital, he said. huh? no, no, there is no requirement to, i said. in fact, i had explained to their boss that mum would feel unwell today and simply needed to rest. yes, he said, but your mum said she feels very unwell and we do not know what to do. tell you what, can you come and fetch her home? we do not want to hold her. hmmm... wtf, ok, i will do so, i said. called mum and insisted she was ok resting at the rehab center. nonetheless, i ended the lunch early and rushed to the rehab center to fetch her. and when i reached there, i realized it was movie day. everyone was simply relaxing and watching a movie. it was then that i realized mum simply wanted to go home... 

somehow, i felt superbly agitated by the way things unfolded. i had done so much mental prep for her. i had given all sorts of instructions, i had called and checked, i had... yet, she simply insisted on her way. finally, i told her, if she goes on like this, it will be very difficult for me to start work. and her reply? ok, in that case, i shall simply stay at home and not go rehab center... faint, i placed her in the rehab center precisely becos i need to work!

sighs. as i noted earlier, an anxious mum is one helluva problematic. but what else can i do?

sighs sighs sighs...

signed!

i finally signed the offer today. and after signing, both my chief and my head went through with me quite a bit of stuff. and by the time i ended, it was about noon. it was a good session. quite unnerving and a little anxious about starting work given the many many things to be done. but well, bring it on!

with this, it marked the final closure to my job search. well, i am supposed to be happy. in a way, i can say i was... cos it laid my mind to rest for a good while. but in another way, i am conscious of the need to manage mum's anxieties due to the impending change in routines...

i start work 1 apr. 

:-)

unreasonable old man

brought my mum to the hematology center to have her infusion today. when we arrived, there was a bloody angry old man. i will not write the details of what transpired between the old man and the nurses, but suffice to say this old man was damned too bloody hostile and downright unreasonable. from the conversation (or rather, more like screaming on the part of the old man), here's what i managed to piece...

the old man had dropped the wife and daughter at the porch of the hospital block and proceeded to park his car. as he couldn't find a parking lot in the same block, he went around and managed to only get a lot 2 blocks away (which by sgh's standard and crowd, he was actually very fortunate). he arrived at the center 25 minutes later, obviously agitated. and when he saw his wife and daughter still waiting for her injection to be administered, he blew his top and blasted the nurses present for not attending to her.

now, what happened was that he had only brought the billing sheet and as it was not a prescription, the nurses could not order for the drugs. as such, the nurses had to call the doctor who issued the treatment to draw out a new prescription. not satisfied with the nurses' explanation that they could not start the process without a proper prescription, he scolded them for being inefficient and wasting his time for accordingly, he would therefore be late for his next appointment. and he went on to scream at the top of his voice that he was a paying patient and as such to get such a service was unacceptable.

he then turned to his wife and daughter and scolded them for being stupid and allowing the nurses to bully them into waiting unnecessarily. the wife simply looked helpless, kept quiet and let him scold. but the daughter, who seemed a little retarded, was obviously not happy at being scolded in public and rebuked him. she instead blamed the delay on him and said that he should have brought the other form instead (which i suspected was the prescription). the old man insisted he was right and that she should just shut up. he then turned back to the nurses and continued scolding them.

by that time, a team of nurses had gathered and they were frantically checking the patient's case file to see if there were any prescriptions issued. the old man continued to lambast the nurses for their inefficiencies. the poor nurses could not do anything but continue in their desperate but futile attempts to find the prescription. and through the whole period, the old man continue to blast every single one present. and he went on about how he and his wife (and daughter) had rushed to the hospital and that he had to drive at 90km/hr to meet the appointed time just to be kept waiting. and he demanded and insisted that they give the injection straightaway. the nurses held on and insisted they could not do so as there was no proper prescription, and that made the man even more agitated "you mean after 25.. no, now 30min the medication has still not arrived? this is not acceptable! you mean all these while you people were just sitting there and wasting my time?..." the old man went on and on. by this time, the old man had snatched one of the documents and started chiding the nurse for charging him for something that was not properly explained to him in his last visit. with no way to cool this man down, one of the nurses decided to call the nursing manager.

the nursing manager came soon and did a quick check on the situation and the cause of the issue. she apologized to the old man for the delay but insisted that they have to follow protocols in the interest of the patient. she tried to explain again about the need for the prescription before they could proceed to get the pharmacy to release the medication. the nursing manager also asked the nurses to prepare the equipment so that once the medication arrive, they could proceed immediately. all these happened and amidst the non-stop accusations of inefficiencies and lousy services by the old man. when finally the medication arrive, the infusion proceeded within seconds. even then the old man was not happy for he now scolded the nurse for the slow administration and payment... the room only had some quiet after he stormed out of it. sighs. you very well know how hostile the whole room got. there were quite a few other patients in the room too and all looked at the old man with eyes full of disgust. but what totally pissed me off was:

• he was downright unreasonable and hostile. there may be inefficiencies in the hospital, but he should not take it out on the nurses. and if there are any service lapses, he should have taken it up with the management and not throw his temper on the nurses. don't shoot the messenger, especially when the messenger were trying so hard to help you solve the issue. 

• i find it totally wrong when the old man's starting point was that the nurses were out to bully his wife. he shouldn't have gotten personal about it. who was the wife to the nurses that they have to deliberately bully? not a logical conclusion. simply emotional. i thought it reflected his own bad character instead.

• from what his daughter said (when she rebuked him), i could only suspect he was the cause of the whole delay since he did not bring "one particular document". and if so, he did not have the right to chide the hospital staff!

• it is not the first time he had brought his wife to the center. i am sure he would have waited too previously. and if so, why make so much noise now? i am sure he flared up and took it out on the nurses becos he was agitated with something else (finding a car park lot?).

• lastly, i find it totally unacceptable for him to scold his wife and daughter for being stupid and allowing people to bully them. whatever the reasons may be, no one, seriously... no one, should be called stupid, least from a father and a husband.

on the other hand, i was rather impressed with how the nurses kept their cool. of cos there were areas they could have done to calm things down. but certainly, their keeping the cool and escalating the matter to the nursing manager was the right thing to do. and certainly, i could see how the nursing manager had tried to focus on the issue and not the person. and when all things failed, all of them just focused on getting the right treatment to the patient, and leaving the old man to vent... that i thought was the right thing to do. i certainly do empathize with the situations that nurses can get into at times such as this. but well, there was nothing much i could do except to tell them they had handled the situation well and that it was well done! and as for mum, she had a classic response. she was so pissed off with the old man that she kept looking at him and saying out quite loudly that if he was so pissed off with the service, he might as well go home and not gone to the center for treatment. how's that for being direct! hahaha!

:-)

oz the great & powerful

managed to catch the midnight show, oz the great and powerful, over the weekend with bee.

and we were totally blown over by the movie. and despite reading all the wonderful reviews and building up my expectations, i was still wowed by the experience. it was exciting, colourful, vibrant, and well-paced. there were moments of avatar, there were moments of superman, and there were many many moments where i couldn't distinguish between what is real and what is computer graphics. and no, it did not come across as a kids movie. the themes of jealousy, hatred, greed, etc were all so adult. and it was certainly not about dorothy and her adventures with the lion, tin man, and the scarecrow. rather, the story in the show pre-dates dorothy's time and gave hints to the origins of the characters in the dorothy-version of wizard of oz. and this includes the scarecrow, the lion and certainly the background to the reasons behind the dynamics between the witches. good show. very entertaining. 

very well done. disney has done it again!

totally love it.

ps: and yes, i thought the guy who played oz (james franco) was really cute!

first picture from http://www.showbiz411.com, second picture from http://wonderwomanrises.blogspot.sg, third picture from http://www.sequel-buzz.com

"where did you go?"

last evening, i decided to head out of the house for tau huay in the evening. and in order to make sure mum does not freak out, i deliberately prep her mentally about it throughout the whole evening. and she seemed ok with it. so, after putting her to bed, i left.

when i returned not too long after, she had fallen asleep. quietly i brought the dog for her pre-sleep pee before retiring to bed. being a light sleeper, i was awaken about 1-ish by someone opening the main door. well, mum must have woken up to check the door, something that i have gotten used to cos she would check all the openings to make sure everything is locked in the middle of the night. and so, i went back to sleep. i was awaken at about 2am again, this time by her switching on her bedroom lights. hmm, she must have gone into her room to sleep, i thought and went back to sleep again. at about 3.45am, i was rudely awaken by sapphie's bark. next thing i knew, i heard mum calling out to me. immediately, i jumped out of bed to check and when i opened the door, it was a rather pitiful sight i saw.

mum looked all worried and scared. and she said she dare not sleep cos i had not returned. she had switched on all the lights in the house and added that she had been chanting non-stop through the night to ask god to protect her. she went further to question why i did not return till the wee hours of the morning... huh? i thought, what wee hours of the morning? of cos, i was not happy that she had over-reacted again. much as i wanted to get angry, i tried hard to hold back and reasoned with her that since sapphie was not in the living room, it could only mean that sapphie was asleep in my room. she then retorted that she thought i had taken sapphie out for a long walk and did not return through the night. hmmm, she was getting defensive i thought and i asked how come she did not check the presence of my slippers at the main door since she opened the door earlier? she kept quiet.

i told her she had over-reacted and that all her fear were totally unfounded and illogical. she kept quiet and went on to switch off all the lights again and went back to sleep. sighs. it seemed like her anxiety is working up again. and at this rate, i will probably end up being tired out again even before i start work 2 week's time!

but well, let's hope not. 

mum had a fall!!!

mum fell again yesterday. i panicked when it happened, but when i was more composed and smsed my siblings about the fall, i couldn't help but laughed out loud to myself. what happened was this...

i had brought mum home after breakfast. and as usual, i parked my car near the lift to minimize the need for mum to walk. i was careful not to park at one particular corner cos she had a fall previously after tripping on the uneven flooring. after i parked, mum alighted. and as usual, i reminded her to only stand up after placing both feet on the ground. she did so and seeing that things were ok, i got out of my driver's seat and closed the car door. after closing the car door, i heard a rather loud "thud" sound. i looked through the window and noticed mum was not around. my only conclusion was that she had fallen. 

i rushed to the other side of my car and true enough, she was on lying the ground. ran over to help her up. i asked her if she had knocked on her head or any specific parts of the body. no, i landed on my kar chng (buttocks) she said. and that was when i noted that she was trying to pull something from her leg underneath her sarong. i lifted her sarong and upon looking closer, i saw her struggling to pull her panties that was caught between her feet and her sandal. it was then that i realized, and she confirmed, that she had fallen becos as she was getting up, her panties had fallen off and she had stepped onto it. apparently, she had not realized it becos she was wearing diapers and did not feel it dropping off. 

i took the panties from her and yes, it was that particular one whose rubber lining had lost its elasticity over time. the same one that i had wanted to throw away many a times but mum, being mum, had protested as she insisted "it can still be used". well, that fall presented a perfect reason for me to throw it away although she still protest on grounds that it could now be used to wipe her feet. i threw it away nonetheless. and so... 

yeah, now you know why i laughed. it sounded rather illogical, and considering it happened in broad day light at the car park, it was rather funny... and this was how my sms sounded... "mum had a fall this morning at the carpark becos her underwear dropped off, but she's alright. her diapers cushioned her fall as she landed on her butt..."

second childhood

i decided this title second childhood cos i do observe a lot of similarly between mum and babies. for example, whenever i look into my baby nephew's open mouth and see the toothless gums, i get reminded of mum... haha... but of cos, there is nothing that could beat this.

i brought mum to the bedok hawker center for breakfast yesterday and decided get you char kway for mum. there was a long queue and being afraid of mum getting anxious, i passed my iphone to her and switched on a short video clip of my 3-month old nephew. she looked at it and she started laughing and soon was talking to my nephew in the iphone video. ang-gurrrl ang-gurrrl she cooed happily. soon enough, she got so engrossed in it that she didn't really bothered when i told her i'll leave her alone. in fact, when i came back with her you char kway some 10-15 minutes later, she was still deeply engaged with the video (she had tapped the screen to replay the video non-stop while i was away).

funny right? this is no different from how parents would pass their ipad to their kids to distract them whenever they are busy...

:-)

dreams

have lots of dreams over the past few days. and unlike 2 weeks back where my dreams were generally very disturbing, those that occurred recently were rather neutral or neutral-positive. and interestingly, i would stir from my sleep immediately after the dream, reflect about it, and think about how to capture it in writing when i wake up fully in the day... but by the time i wake up, i had forgotten every contents of the dreams.

weirdly, i do remember the broad structure of the dreams and they were something like a dream within a dream (wait, can't recall that show... inception or something). but yeah, like 2 days ago, i had a very long dream. i could only recall the structure of the dream. no, it was 2 dreams. i cannot recall if they were 2 separate dreams, as in one after another, or if the second dream was a dream within the first dream. but i vaguely recalled that the first dream was quite a negative one and it involved my mum. as for the second dream, conceptually it was almost the same as the first, except that it was repeated in a very positive angle, or to be specific, a funny angle. in fact funny enough to make me wake up and think through how to blog it.

weird right? haha... but yeah, i shall not waste my efforts in trying to think too hard about the details. dreams, to me, are after all a result of an overactive subconscious mind that continued to work after we fall asleep. the events that occurred in the dreams are simply the manifestations of how we perceive and handle our daily lives. and so what's important is to live well and minimize stress.

:-) 

injured insects

sometimes i wonder if by doing what i did, i would be inflicting more pain on the insects. but i reckoned as long as the intentions are good, and i take the utmost precaution, my actions would be justifiable. and if the insects were to die in the process, it would be totally regrettable. also, i reconciled that by doing something, it would be better than not doing anything. cos by doing something, there was a chance that things might turn out good (of cos, might be bad too), but if nothing was done, i am sure things would surely turn out bad. hmm, do i make sense? i share 2 real happenings here.

two days back, at the hawker center, i found myself a seat after getting my lunch. and as i was about to eat, i noticed a housefly on the table. its innards was spilled out of its abdomen and it was dragging its body around the table with the innards trailing behind. and being wet, the innards would stick to the body of the housefly, thereby making its effort to move about very difficult. and obviously, as long as the innards was attached to the housefly, its chance of leaving the table was next to nil. and so, i decided to save the housefly. it didn't matter that houseflies are agents of sickness. after all, why blame the hosuefly if the cause of sickness is usually traced to our own (lack of) hygiene habits. anyway, i decided to cut off the innards. but i wondered if by doing so, it could survive long. nonetheless, i was sure what it was experiencing was probably more dreadful than anything else. and worst still, given its remote chance of being able to leave the table, it simply meant that it would be exposed to higher danger. someone might just come along and kill it! and so, i took out a 2 dollar note and use the edge to slice off the innards. once freed, the housefly started to walk about quite normally... ok, not totally normally, a bit slower than normal. but hey, it could move about! i continued eating my lunch and did not take much note of the housefly. when i had finished my rice, i looked around and the housefly was no where to be found. it must have flew off.

yesterday, as i was about to retire to bed, i walked into my toilet to pee as per my usual routine. and as i was about to pee, i noticed an insect upside down on the water in the toilet bowl. it was as though it was lying backwards and looking at me in my full glory! haha! then again, it was struggling to get out of the toilet bowl but couldn't cos the wings were wet. poor insect. it must have fallen into the toilet bowl. instinctively, i looked around for something to help me pick it up and decided my tweezer would do the job. managed to lift it up and shook it off the tweezer after doing so. the insect landed on my washing basin. by that time, the whole insect looked like a wrangled piece of mess. oops, i apologized. i was afraid i had killed it. but seeing the wee bits of movements, i knew it was still alive. i was not sure how long it could last. and seeing that the insect still had much water stuck onto its body, i used the tweezer to drag it a bit. oops, the insect got more mangled. aiyoh... this time round, i was sure i had injured it beyond hope. sorry, i apologized again. i tore a piece of tissue and placed the wrangled mess of the insect on it with the hope of sucking the water off the insect. nothing moved. it was just a dried mess. i left it as it was. half an hour later, i went back to take a look, expecting to see a dried insect carcass. but lo and behold, the insect was up and walking. of cos, one of its leg was injured, but it was walking! and it's wings were stretched out in its full glory. hahah... i left it to do its own physio (haha!) as it recovered itself from the trauma of falling into the toilet bowl. and by this morning, the insect was gone!

:-)

picture from http://blog.brasurespestcontrol.com/

anxious again

my impending start of my employment means that there would be a change in routines and i had expected to see mum going mental again. yup, here we go again, same old shit again... at the mental institute yesterday, i told the doctor to give me a review date in a month's time and not 6 weeks as per usual. and i did so as i had observed signs of anxiety since i told her i had accepted the job and would start work 1 apr. i thought a date closer to my start work date would help. 

and for a start, i noted her questioning of who i go out with, where i go, what time i will be coming back is increasing. these are signs of anxiety. and to make things more tense, her line of questioning is always from a rather confrontational angle. she would scream out at me and asked questions like: "you went out last night again right?" or "later, who you meeting?" or "how come you are not going to stay at home?" and all these questions even before i can utter a single word or even to tell her that hey, i will not be going out. and when i tried to convince her that i will not be going out or that i will only be going out for a while, she would then get defensive and give responses like "you wanna go out, you go lor. who am i to stop you?" this pattern had played up many a times lately. and even when i go out, she would call my siblings (according to her) that i have left her alone at home. naturally, my siblings would be very concern.. oh how can he leave you alone? they would say, according to mum. then again, i do suspect these things were not my siblings expressed sentiments but her very own.

and yesterday, things turned out a little hostile. i had to conduct an interview for an executive at a mall after office hours. and so, i left her at home. i told her i would be home about 8 or 8.30pm latest. and at 8.15pm, she called me and screamed out at me: "how come you have not come home yet!!!!!!!" frankly, i was pissed off. i have not even taken dinner and had just done an interview and here she was, screaming at me. i rushed home and she gave me hostile looks. i told her i have not taken dinner and asked if she wanted to head out to do some shopping and she replied sarcastically, "you wanna go out, you go lor, i didn't stop you. also, why you come home without taking dinner?" it was very frustrating and i chided her for making a fuss out of nothing, considering the fact that it was not even 8.30pm. and i told her that if she were to go on behaving this way, i might as well not start work. she kept quiet and sulk.

so... ya, can see she is showing signs of anxiety again.

vroom... speed vs skills!

"it's not the speed baby, it's the skills and good sense of judgment..."

i found myself uttering that to myself after seeing someone terrorize people on the road and in the end, still end up slower than most of us. what happened was that yesterday as i drove passed geylang serai towards bedok on my way home, i heard a low yet loud humming behind my car. i looked into my rear mirror and noted a a bright red sports car-wannabe revving its engine. well, i call it a sports car-wannabe cos it was a nissan coupe and i do not consider it a sports car. sports car to me would be in the likes of ferrari, lotus, lambo, and so on. but ok, let's not digress. it was post-working hours and the road was crowded. cars on the road was averaging 30-40 km/hr and moving relatively slowly. the driver was obviously impatient and continued revving his engine. 

and soon enough when we reached eunos, he overtook me. i took a quick glance and noted that it was a chinese guy. he was in his 20s. chubby. fugly. and has a cfm ah sia kia face that look so bloody yaya papaya (proud, high and mighty). he had a cigarette hanging between his lips and he seemed to be talking on the phone. i also noted the car carried a public housing car park label. well, i am not one who stereotype people usually, but this guy obviously reeked of a spoiled hdb-brad who's socially irresponsible and in a hurry to show off his car. nonetheless, i ignored him and continued my journey as did every other drivers on the road. this guy, however, spared no time to terrorize other people. once he overtook me, he sped up and without signaling tried to cut into another driver's lane. many times he failed cos the space was too tight, but whenever he succeeded, he would immediately step on his brake and that would freaked people out big time. and he continued doing so, weaving in and out of people's lanes as far as one could see. and i also noted he tried overtaking people using the bus lanes. very bad behaviour i thought. and whenever he found a clear stretch in front, he would pick up speed like no tomorrow. vrooommmm... it roared. and i heard it couple of times, and with each roar, the sound got softer.

nonetheless, as per all singapore roads, there were umpteen roadworks, traffic lights and the frequent irritating uncles who like to drive very carefully (read "s-l-o-w-l-y") on the outer lanes. and given that it was peak hours, cars had to keep off the bus lanes. when faced with such situations, experienced drivers like yours truly would know when to pick up and when to slow down and how to avoid slow uncles. and so, by the time we reach bedok, i found myself overtaking the red car as he got himself bracketed by a few other slow moving cars and trucks... and it was with this so called skills and sense of judgment that i absolutely love the feeling of catching up and overtaking the guy who drove the red sports car-wannabe.

then again frankly, i wish these people don't exist!

picture from http://www.nissan.com.au/Cars-Vehicles/370Z-Coupe/Overview

of the bird in the hand...

last week, despite deciding that the offer that came was better than those feel good factor interviews, i decided to updated my facebook with this: "one bird in the hand is better than 2 in the bush?" and soon enough, i got comments from 2 of my friends... take a look at the comments below... (names changed/ shortened, pictures and hyperlinks removed to respect the privacy of my friends)

J Peace

Saturday

    

one bird in the hand is better than 2 in the bush?

• Lhall and BWong like this.

• J Low: One bird in the hand.... Sounds porno leh

  Saturday at 11:42am via mobile · Unlike · 1
• J Peace:  darned! never thought it that way...

  Saturday at 11:47am · Like
• J Low: 2 in the bush is even worse! Hmm... What did you eat this morning? Or ate something wrong for lunch?

  Saturday at 11:48am via mobile · Like
• J Peace: hahhahahahah... i am so slow this morning! and yup, horrible breakfast experience... hahahaha *peace goes temple, get flower blessed and wash eyes with flower water*

  Saturday at 11:51am · Edited · Like
• J Low:  What you meant was 胜券在握，好过两手空空，是吧？

  Saturday at 11:50am via mobile · Like
• J Peace: http://www.wisegeek.org/what-does-a-bird-in-the-hand-is-better-than-two-in-the-bush-mean.htm
  

  
  

  What Does "A Bird in the Hand is Better than Two in the Bush" Mean?

  www.wisegeek.org
  

  ‎"A bird in the hand is better than two in the bush" means that having one small thing is better than taking a risk for two...

  Saturday at 11:51am · Like · Remove Preview
• J Low: Just like what I understood and replied in Chinese!

  Saturday at 11:52am via mobile · Unlike · 1
• D Lee: I love one bird in the hand 

  Saturday at 12:42pm · Like
• J Peace: 哎哟，我的朋友都很可爱咯！haha all focusing on the bird lor!

  
  

and i was like... oh dear, seemed like my message was totally missed out and everyone focused on the "bird" lor... and even then, the wrong type of bird!

lol!

picture from http://thedoghousediaries.com/2635

job search - lessons learnt

it had been an stressful job search process. and reflecting on the process, i would say there are 2 key lessons learned.

firstly, there is a need to stage this whole process. have a clear game plan when it comes to staging the job search and the interview process, especially so if there are more than one interview. if not managed properly, it will convolute one's decision-making process and stress one out. just look at how i (did not) manage the interview process between the 2 jobs. of cos, i would also say there was a little bit of luck cos if i had not had a bad back, perhaps the other company would have made the offer. and the second interview for this offer would have come a little later. but things did not turn out that way. my bad back delayed things. and so things turned out the way it did. in a way, from the company's perspective, the key thing is - strike while the iron is hot. but heh heh, in life, luck, just like hope, is not an option.

secondly, there is a need to prepare ourselves well. doing so would allow us to be in a better position to negotiate. we need to be fair to ourselves. negotiating a good outcome is a win-win thing. there is a need to do our homework before we even go for the interview. in my case, i asked for a certain amount. it was based on my gut feel of the market rate. and although i was right about it the market rate, the number i quoted was a tat at the lower end. and when the company came back with a number, i started getting greedy. and when i found out the market bracket, i wanted more and i started to think how to negotiate. it stressed me out. but the point was, i had no grounds to negotiate.the company had been fair to me. in fact, they gave me more than what i had asked for.

having said this, i am still happy. the company had been more than fair. the overall package is still better than what i had asked for. and certainly, it is more than my previous employment. 

:-)

greed

thinking through the difficulties i went through and all the stress that affected me, i can only conclude that greed is a potent cause for all my stress and suffering.

you see, one of the jobs came with an offer. the offer was a reasonable one. above my previous pay packet and would have met my basic needs and slightly more. i was ready to accept it, but i was greedy and wanted to know more about the other jobs (whose interviews had been fixed). and so i went ahead. and it turned out i felt good after the interview. and then i began to wonder if i should drop this offer and wait for the new jobs, expecting that the pay would be better, the people factor would be better, and so on... 

with this possibility in mind, i began to wonder how to maneuver myself. i started to consult friends, thought through all sorts of possibilities and got all flustered. should i reject this job, should i pressure the new company, should i try to hold back this offer or for that matter, should i negotiate for a better offer. every possible scenario went through my mind. how will i come across if i try to delay the decision, will i be seen as calculative, will i give them a bad impression, etc... the contingencies that went through my mind were plentiful. i ended up feeling all stressed up and started having sleepless night and nightmares. the whole weekend was ruined and i was a total wretched as a result.

finally, after weighing through all the possibilities, i finally decided that a job at hand is better than one that is still quite wishy washy. just look at the experience i had with the previous company. feel good factor and all, and in the end, kept me waiting for 5 months, only to tell me that they can only made the decision in jun 13 earliest. i would simply try to negotiate for a better pay and reject all other jobs. with this, i finally got a good night sleep on sunday night. but this relieve did not last. 

woke up this morning and i started pondering how much more should i could negotiate. how to do it, which angle to go in from, should it be 300 more, 500 more, 800 more, etc. again, the whole process got me all stressed out again. i started consulting friends, researching the net, etc. and finally came to a clear way to how i should steer the negotiation conversation. it was an interesting process, nonetheless. but one thing i was acutely aware of, the package they offered was above what i had asked for and technically, i do not have grounds to negotiate. finally, with this fundamental clarity, i decided that i would go in from an angle of clarification and if need be, not negotiate. with this clarity, i got my composure and i called the company. it was a good conversation. and i finally decided i would accept the offer as it was.

reflecting, this whole stress i put myself through was totally avoidable. but i subjected myself through it. and the key reason why i did so could be traced to one factor - greed. 

accepted the offer

today, i finally accepted the job offer... it was quite a dilemma for me last friday and i had sleepless nights and nightmares over the weekend. but after a lot of deliberation and consulting my friends, i decided that perhaps what is important is that what i have at hand is more important that some good feel that may or may not materialize. just look at the previous one, made me go through 4 interviews and in the end tell me i have to wait until jun! and that was a super feel good job too! 

and so, with this clarity, my stress lifted. i called the company up and accepted the offer.

i start work on 1 april. let's hope it does not turn out to be a joke.

haha!

:-)

is uniform sex fun?

so? how is sex with bee? army officer and police officer. sex must be very exciting right? all the kinky things you can do with the uniform, the hand cuffs, batons, and oooo, just think of the ceremonial garbs, the no 1 uniform, the peak caps, the tight pants...

hahah... you get the drift. but of cos, the questions may not be exactly like this, word for word. nonetheless, the drift is there. and this seemed to be a constant question that i get from many friends for many many years. in short, is uniform sex fun? admittedly, when i first get such questions, i felt rather offended by it, but after a while, i learned to laugh it off, although i admit, i felt quite irritated. but thankfully, such questions have gradually eased off. these days, when such questions come again, i'd just sigh to myself and go through the ritual of answering it again resignedly. and let me just answer the question again before going further... 

i don't know! (surprised!) 

and this is cos we did not, and still do not, engage in such "uniform fun" 

frankly, i always wonder why people ask the question. it can be curiously exciting, especially for people who are turned on by uniforms, or more fundamentally, turned on by the concepts of authority, and power. and when people ask me such questions, the chain of thought seemed to be that since we were regulars (contract staff) in the respective uniform services, we would engage in and enjoy having uniform fun. actually, the truth is far from it. come on, if this chain of thought is valid, then it would also mean butchers would enjoy having sex with pigs? or cobblers would enjoy using hammers and nails as sex toys? cannot be, right? haha...

well, back to the issue of uniforms and us. you see, firstly, one cannot assume people in the uniform services will definitely engage in uniform fun. conversely, for bee and i, and i believe, many many of my regular friends, we have this very deep respect for our profession and our uniforms and would never reduce it to become objects of sexual desires. also, for those of us who enter into relationships with people in the uniform services too, we do so becos we see each other as individual human being and not as individuals of our trade. 

but yeah, all said and done, i can still expect this question to pop up again in future. 

:-)

job offer

i wrote about having a few options previously. well, here's the situation i am in now.

i went for 3 interviews this week.

the interview for job 1 happened on wednesday. it was the second interview and it was for the role for something i was familiar with. the company is an mnc and had been in the red for a while. the top management team had just changed and the latest quarter results is in the black. the company is expected to be in the black possibly next year or two. as far as the role is concerned, it is a (near) individual contributor role, and the people are ok, not fantastic and so-so environment. 

the interview (i chose to call it an interview) for job 2 came kinda out of the blue. what happened was that i got a call from an ex-colleague from the saf who had left the service and started his own start-up early this year. we met up on thursday. he wanted me to join him and be a project director for one major project that he is hoping to win from mindef. ok, shan't go into details except that the offer was very good, profit sharing and all... but i already knew before he went into details that regardless of package, i will reject him. no more dealings with government people, especially mindef. pwee!

the interview for job 3 was on friday. this was for a school and the role is a newly created one. for this role, i will be overseeing the whole management team of the school and there seemed to be an urgency to get things in place. in short, tons of work and responsibilities. compared to the first interview, this one would possibly pay a lot more money too. also, although i wasn't too impressed after reading the details in the web, my sensing after the interview was that the environment/ people factor was actually very good. nonetheless, the vibes after the interview was very good.

this was where i ended up with huge dilemma by the end of friday. you see, i knew from the start that i didn't and would never take up job 2. as for job 1, the boss came back with an offer just before i went for job 3 interview. the offer was reasonable and i actually thought of not going for the third interview, but in the end, i went for it cos everything had been arranged. through the interview, my initial discomfort with job 3 totally disappeared and i walked out of the interview feeling good about it. and so, all things being equal, job 3 would actually be a more favorable choice. so... i was totally torn between job 1 and job 3. 

i did a quite facebook poll and asked quite a few of my friends. almost all said i should go for job 3. there factors were mostly to my advantage. potential, pay, people factor, workplace environment, etc. but here's the decision-making factor. job 3 has not made any offer. and if i know the system of the school, it would probably take some time before they can get back. feel good factor is afterall, just a feel good factor. nothing is guaranteed until an offer is made. just look at my previous 4 rounds of interviews... so, the fact remains that only job 1 has made an offer, and want an answer very quickly. so, all things being equal, i would go for job 1. but of cos, i would have to first negotiate for better terms first...

and if all goes smooth, i start work 1 april. let's hope it does not become an april fool's joke.

:-)