pengerang trip--part 1

my very first "trip" since i've started working! together with some colleagues from tos, we spent last saturday at pengerang, johor

too short to be a vacation but at least it was a good break from the weekly mundaneness...apart from the butt pain from all the cycling, i thoroughly enjoyed myself

our day began at changi village where we met for breakfast. afterwhich we made our way to changi jetty


you needed at least 12 passengers to book a bumboat which will then ferry us over to pengerang

all on board our bumboat

leaving singapore island...

captain of the bumboat

view of our beloved pulau tekong...

after crossing the m'sian customs, we had to hire cabs to get us to the bike rental place
all i can say is it isnt like those you normally see at east coast park...hehe

my ride for the day

stuff you get to see while cycling there

and after a tiring morning ride, we had a feast at this zhichar restaurant...

after lunch we visited this ostrich farm

where they did stuff with ostrich eggs...

and had many many ostriches...

Ford GT Rodimus

finally got me grubby mitts on this beauty...

and the eye twitching continues...basket...

Eyelid Spasms (Eye Twitching)

Eyelid Twitch.
The cause of minor eyelid twitching is unknown. A slight spasm of the lower eyelid or even both eyelids is common and of no concern.

been having eyelid twitch for the past dunno how many days...according to the definition above it's of no concern, but it sure is irritating the shit out of me...

scientifically it would only mean i'm probably stressed out and not having enough rest

based on chinese superstition, twitching on the right eyelid means sthg good is going to happen and the opposite for the left...

and it just so happens my LEFT eyelids are the ones doing all the twitching...isnt that great

last week wasnt a particularly good wk i guess...rough week at the office...to top it off i lost my thumbdrive for some reason...

saving grace for last week? i managed to find a new friend! and it's a she! hehe...not everyday adrian gets to befriend chabors you know...hehe

you light up my life

guess what came in the mail yesterday...i miss her lots...

curve ball

Click to Play!
something i found on ian's blog...i am up to level 5 so far...heh

Mahna Mahna

something nostalgic from the muppets...no idea what mahna mahna means though

263rd

official results out...came in 263rd for ahm 2007

shelf-o-gundams/transformers

did abit of re-shuffling with my shelf-o-gundams to make space for MG strike freedom...

off to serve the country for the next 2 weeks...sleepless nights, lack of sleep, jungles filled with mosquitoes, IV needles, here i come...

MG strike freedom full burst

ahm 2007

i signed up for this year's run (like what every good citizen should do)...i wasnt a very good citizen last year cus i gate crashed and even managed to snag a finisher medal...heh
good thing i signed up cus this year u needed the championchip to exchange for the medal.

this year's ahm was more enjoyable mostly due to the fact that there werent any human jams...apart from the usual slow start at the flag off point of course...they opened up 3 full lanes on the highways and it was nice and spacious...

i was really hoping to improve upon last year's timing and it was looking pretty good up till 16km...but once out of ecp, my legs started to tire, couldnt maintain the pace and started slowing down...

finished in abt 1hr 41min on my watch (only improved slightly compared to last year)...

went for a muscle rub down (which hurt quite abit) and i think it made my muscles ache even more...hurhur...i think i should have did some warm down stretching first...hmmm

anyways...next race is NB real run followed by vertical marathon if i register successfully...so mafan one the registration...must send mail/fax+cheque payment...warao...and only got 1200 slots only...32bucks also...bloody hell...

my 4 day break

took friday off to enjoy a long national day weekend...on paper 4 days seems long but heck time always passes so darn fast...

opened up my MG strike freedom full burst...must say its one of the more enjoyable kits i've done so far...the process of putting the parts together to create one of the best mecha designs...i tell you that feeling is just wonderful with an OMFG added on top... will post pics once its done...

ran to bukit timah plaza yesterday...sthg which i've been planning since my long distance trng picked up to prepare for the ahm...reached there in an hour and continued running for another 20min before i decided to stop.

this time round i brought along a water bottle...last year i didnt and almost died of thirst by the time i reached henderson park... thing about this route is its nice and long with a target to run to...however once u reached the target, u end up a tad too far away from home...

i started off at 6pm yesterday and by the time my tired legs walked me home, it was already 8.20pm!

knocked up

a very endearing comedy i caught some weeks back...moral of the story?...if you drink dont do it...if u want to do it irregardless of whether u drink or not...at least wear protection....
for movie synopsis...visit http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0478311/

cashback

watchable movie about a guy who can literally freeze time...how cool is that...hurhur...
anyways for detailed movie synopsis...visit http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0460740/
the movie ended with this quote which i thought was pretty deep...
"Once upon a time, I wanted to know what love was. You just have to see that it's wrapped in beauty and hidden away in between the seconds of your life. If you don't stop for a minute, you might miss it."

mizuno wave run 2007

venue changed to bedok reservoir this year...woke up to some early morning rain which quietened down to a drizzle at start point and thankfully rain stopped once the race flagged off.

weather was great but the rain make the trail muddy sandy watery....shoes and socks were soaked...

but that was not the worst thing that could happen. the event organiser for some reason only put a 5km route marker...didnt put any finishing point marker...the water point which usually comes after the finishing point was placed before the "finishing point"

completed the run in 43min. could have been abit faster if they had made known the finishing point...i actually ran past the so-called finishing line without me knowing and the officials were yelling "can stop already can stop already!"...the finishing point which i saw and was running to turns out to be the one for the GRC walk and jog...the GRC walk and jog HAD a finish point banner hanged up high while the wave run didnt even have a bloody proper finish point...geez

no bananas and watermelon this year...only bottled water...queue for goodie bag was horrendous...we never stayed so long after a race just to get our goodie bags.

compared to the one at kovan last year, i'd say this year's wave run was very poorly organised...bet it has to do with the GRC event which was also held there instead of the race as an event on its own...

passion run race results

came in 53rd...timing was 46.13...haiz...i was thinking... if i could repeat my 40min timing for 10km from last year, i would have been able to squeeze into top 10!

3rd race for 2007

saucony passion run. very very disappointed with my timing. 46min...for 10km last year i could hit 40min.
like i said...very frigging disappointed.

june's purchases

motoko kusanagi from ghost in the shell 2nd gig(by far one of the best looking pvc figures around imho) and classics bumblebee(doesnt get any closer to the G1 cartoon design than this) and grimlock(not shown)

pen-spinning...wow

another classmate got married

another one of my primary school classmate (minyi from rvps) got married last sunday...dinner was held at noble house at tanjong pagar

food was good...above is the dessert dish...well half of it...the other half was red bean soup

one of those things you watch and you go "WOW"

infinite justice gundam completed!

took my time to complete this kit...the sculpt is by bee-craft...smaller head+longer limbs(particularly the legs)...a pretty good kit i must say proportion wise...it makes the old justice gundam kit look like crap...

my saving grace after a disgusting week at work

when it rains, it frigging pours

just when i thought i was going to safely pass my 1st anniversary at tos without any major catastrophes, some major shite just had to happen...it's the type when u throw a pile of shite into a ceiling fan that's on and it splatters all over the frigging place...

wawawewa...cant believe i came up with such a great analogy man...cus when you throw shite onto a stationary fan, only the fan gets it....now when you throw shite onto a ceiling fan that's turning....hoho...shite starts flying man...and not only will you have to clean the fan, you have splattered shite all over the place to clean up...

so what was the shite bomb i kenna-ed...a frigging part supposedly repaired in 2004 failed and caused an engine failure...my company is being accused of being the repair shop that last overhauled the parts. there's no concrete evidence as to who actually repaired the part as yet.

so that shite just led on to more shite...being the product engineer i had to be involved in investigating whether our shopfloor is performing certain operations according to tech data...that just dug up even more shite...now my boss is personally auditing my product one on one with me...line by line from the engine manual to the op sketches...an enormous load of shite got unearthed...stuff which i wanted to clear on my own time and thus didnt want to bring up all gets discovered by my boss...

you should have seen that kind of disappointed look my boss was carrying on his face today...although he said "maybe it's not your fault, you weren't given enough training"---i think he only said it once though...after which the tone of his voice i could tell he was saying "knn this kind of thing also dunno? this kind of thing also never go and find out? this kind of thing also do until liddat?"

and of all times it happens at a time when we might be getting our performance review pay increase...knn...

and it's as if i dont have enough daily shite to clear by year end, now i get this kind of nonsense to clean up...wtf man...cleaning somebody's else's leftover shite somemore...i dont see anyone digging up so much shite when there were no engine failures and when the company was making shitloads of money...

so there...so much shite already...and it's only monday...

Zhen Fa seafood restaurant

according to mum, dad has wanted to visit this place for the longest time since his friends brought him there. so we went there for dinner on friday. the place is at marina south and it's $12 per person. you have to queue for your food, you have to collect your share of 2 crabs+1 bowl of prawns, you have to mash up and clean your own crabs...well impt thing to remember is you cannot expect too much when you are paying $12 for a buffet style meal.

anyways the crab was really good...a pity we only had 2...prawns were fresh...char siew, fried chicken wing, satay(u have to queue for this and only 8 sticks were given each time u queue) were good...

this was my share of trash...the baby corn were sourish...eewww

our table of trash...

and this my dear friends is a scallop...still in its shell...this of course is my first encounter with fresh scallops...my encounters with this delicacy is usually when its already in its processed, white, savory, meaty form...

this is what inside the shell...notice the white center...that's the yummy stuff we usually eat...well in this case the stuff that's around it is also edible...
fresh scallops tastes just like seehum...hurhur

mobile phones

above are the 3 mobile phones i have bought since 2000.

i'm a fan of chocolate bar phones...those sliding, clamshell, twisting and what not stuff you find on some other phones are too much for lazy adrian

my first phone--panasonic GD92
it had blue coloured backlit+polyphonic ringtones which was all the rage back then.
i can still remember i signed up with M1 and got the phone at $198. (it was sort of my reward for passing my SOC test during that weekend) awfully expensive for a phone with the specs it had if you compared it with the phones of today, and with line somemore.

it lasted me a good 4+ years and it had this voice recorder which allowed me record the happy tree friends theme to set as sms alert tone (correct me if i'm wrong but most phones during that time could not set special sms alert tones). the phone however couldnt read bloody chinese and it could not delete your smses all at once.

my 2nd phone--sony ericsson J210i
during a time when everybody else are already carrying phones with camera and coloured display, my GD92 decided time and again to give me more and more hang time. so i had to get a replacement and (for some reason) not really gian at phones with "more features", i decided to get a $0 phone.

just so happen M1 was having this promo for J210i and thus i got my "basic" phone. no camera (comes in handy for army camp visits and places where no camera phones are allowed) function. coloured display which cannot be viewed under the sun. got IR. can put wallpaper. wawawewa, what a major upgrade in phone specs compared to the GD92!

my 3rd phone--sony ericsson K550i
with my J210i coming to almost 2 years of service, the charger plug starts getting a bit loose which in turns affects the charging of the phone. i contemplated on getting a new phone and with more spending power, i now wanted a phone with "more features".
having already eyed the k550i, i pampered myself with my first "feature phone" wawawewa

Tao's restaurant

celebrated a belated birthday for mum by dining out at Tao's restaurant...food was not too bad...service was excellent!
only took photos of the main entrees we had...for more info, visit http://www.taos-restaurant.com/menu.htm

my baked atlantic flounder with cheese---it's some fish with cheese on top

edwin's oven roasted steak

mum's slow cooked pork back ribs and dad's marinated lamb cutlet
and they served their cold fruity beverages in these small jugs..we had tropical grapefruit tea, rose apple tea, ice summer peach tea, grape mallow tea...good thing about eating with your family is you get to try out more flavours...hehe

here's one for the digital photo album...

look what i've got!

March/April sales were good at TOS, so senior management decided to give EVERY employee (yes all 800+ of us) a dvd player...wawawewa...not that i need one cus my home already has one...but this one can play divx, mp3 blah blah...wawawewa

got myself TF classics rodimus and jetfire from the least likely of places to get my toys...carrfour! wawawewa

Ramly burger

to all Ramly burger lovers out there...we no longer have to wait for the arrival of pasar malams (which seems to take forever to come to my area) or make a trip across the causeway to enjoy our favorite burger.

if you are craving for one right now...you can make a trip to tanjong pagar railway station, there is this Bambai food catering eating place...got prata, murtabak, roti-john, meegoreng, banana ball, goreng pisang and all the malay/indian makan stuff and of course the main attraction-our Ramly burger!

many thanks to guorong for unearthing this gem of a place...*slurp*

Murphy's Law

for the past 2 days, in between feeling sick, sleeping and what nots...i had alot of time to think...i thought about alot of things...most times i thought about her...and i remembered this entry Ian made in his blog sometime ago about Murphy's Law

i quote from wikipedia:
It is most often cited as "Whatever can go wrong, will go wrong" (or, alternately, "Whatever can go wrong will go wrong, and at the worst possible time," or, "Anything that can go wrong, will," or even, "If anything can go wrong, it will, and usually at the most inopportune moment")

then i thought of my relationship i have with huiyi...indeed...everything and anything that could go wrong went wrong...

for the first time i gathered enough balls to ask a girl out face to face...i find out she has a bf...

when we were getting really close, she finds out she's pregnant...

when i'm so sure she's the one for me, she has to return home to get married...

friends have been telling me to forget about her...that there will be another one...i understand where they are coming from but moving on is sthg extremely tough for me...because for the times we were able to spend together, she really made me feel complete...and that naive side of me still really hope that someday we will be together again...

i told myself this morning, my door will always be open for her but at the same time i have no other choice but to keep a look out for other gals...

growing old is scary...but growing old without a partner is even scarier

2nd race of 2007 and my first MC

started to feel abit feverish with itchy throat on wednesday and decided to skip gym...went home to rest for the race on thurs...same feeling still persisted on thurs...still i endured through the workday and made it to the race...funny thing was i didnt feel sick at all during the race...

made it back in 24.19min(on my watch)...was hoping to do slightly better by maintaining 4min per km but couldnt keep up at the last 1.6km...oh well.

the aftermath...fever came back...went to see the Dr...diagnosed with throat infection which was giving me the fever...so there...thank goodness the race was only 5.6km...exercising when "unwell" is not the brightest thing i've done i guess...

my first MC from work...so sick that i even had to give my saturday at motherland a miss...sigh...