Must be blog fatigue. Feel more tired after my vacation than before. Can't say much about the last couple of days. Mostly running from one possible checkpoint to another on another scavenger quest. Not that the experience hasn't been a fulfilling one: It's great having some kind of excuse to go look at some places where normally I wouldn't dream of stepping into -- places of such poshitude that the first thing I would expect to see is the bottom of the security guard's boot.

But oddly, despite the rags June and I were wearing, we got the same courteous service everywhere we went. The auntie at Katong Antique House offered us her homemade Peranakan cookies to sample (and June bought a couple of jars after that). The lady at Amor Meus showed June a secure way to tie a sarong. Even the tailor at Victor York was patient with us though we showed up at his doorstep after closing time, and he was still busy with a genuine client at the time. We discovered a very quiet, comfortable library at the STB where we could just sit and read in peace. Even the poised receptionist at the Fullerton abandoned her post temporarily to get me some info that I asked for.

We also made a few detours along the way, "since we were there already." Style:Nordic, on Ann Siang Road, sells decorative hand-crafted household items, clothes (Nudie Jeans, anyone?), shoes, and all things Swedish. June took a fancy to the wineglass rack-chandelier combo on display, but she restricted herself to a wooden gnome and 100g of assorted Swedish candy.

There is also a collection of Makansutra-approved hawker stalls next to the Esplanade where we found a slightly crispy version of o-luak (oyster omelette) which I thought was very good, though ordering $6 for a medium sized portion soon became a demonstration of the law of diminishing returns. Greedy, lah!

Oh, and somewhere in the last couple of evenings, we caught Jackson's Kong. Another example of man's cruelty to animals, whom Jackson is careful to emphasize are sentient, intelligent and just as deserving of life as we are. Leave them and their natural habitat alone, please. And stop trying to turn everything we touch into profit. Remember what happened to King Midas?