Q-tip explores ECP at last! 


Ready in the cockpit, waiting to blast off! 


And we're off! 


Deep sea exploration 


One seriously wet dog who needs a bath! 

Had a great day today with beach, bike and bimbo dog. It was Q-tip's first time out at ECP and her first bicycle ride too. There must be some discrimination going on at the bike rentals because when the rental clerks cottoned on that we wanted a basket to carry our dog in, they wouldn't let us have any bikes. Is it a safety thing or what? So we had to do it the underhand method. June parked herself some distance from the next bike rental outlet then I went to get a bike with basket for myself. Having scored a bike, I went back to get a second bike, somewhat smaller, for June. Only then could we load up Q-tip and show her the sights. How bothersome.

June ended up with the basket as it was so low-slung on my bike it dragged on the front tire. We thought Q-tip would freak out in the basket but from the outset it looked like she was really enjoying the ride. She was smiling all the way, tongue hanging out, very relaxed on the towel we provided for her comfort.

She didn't like swimming, however, not like when we were at Sentosa a few months ago. The waves were higher and stronger at ECP and she just couldn't cope. Swimming was over in less than 5 minutes before we headed back to return our bikes.

We got the scare of the day when on the way back, Q-tip temporarily misplaced her brain and jumped out of the basket from the moving bike. Both June and I narrowly missed running her over as she landed badly -- belly up instead of on her feet. She must have suffered some shock as well, immediately righting herself and running aimlessly across the grass verge with me in hot pursuit. It took a while before she recognised my voice again and slowed to a halt in sitting position. Whatever was she thinking? Q-tip doesn't have the guts to jump off the sofa; what could have posessed her to jump off a bike? A mystery to solve before we take her on another biking expedition.

We rode very slowly back to return our bikes (again one at a time) this time holdng very tightly to Q-tip's leash in case she decides to take another unauthorized skydive again. No incident, this time.

Home again and Q-tip's got her bath and is nice and fluffy again. In need of grooming, she is.

Went for dinner at The French Stall, on Sembawang Road opp. Khatib Camp. Nice French bistro. The layout is half indoor dining and the other half al fresco. June and I both ordered the same beef set but replaced the Aubergine dish with French onion soup. The soup didn't disappoint in taste but presentation-wise I'm still looking for a French onion soup that comes with a layer of mozzarella completely covering the top of the soup bowl, the way I'm used to in TO. Also, maybe it's because most people don't like it, but the soup came devoid of parmesan. I had to ask for it and it came freshly grated in a saucer; that's service! French onion soup needs a generous sprinkling of parmesan to fully bring out it's flavour. Try it, you won't regret it (unless you already can't stand parmesan, that is).

I ordered the Beef Entrecote to remind myself of the one thing I was specially looking for when I visited Quebec City those many years ago. I had heard that this dish was a specialty of a particular eatery in the old part of QC (by old we mean that that part of the city hasn't been updated for 200 years and is now a major tourist attraction). Mom and I managed to find that particular restaurant and the beef, as I remember, was really special. At The French Stall, the entrecote was juicy, tender and came in a tasty creme sauce on a bed of potato gratin. It's nice that when we asked for our steaks to be done rare, they were actually served rare. Some places, you ask for rare they give you medium because they can't stand the sight of blood or something.

The choc cake for dessert was nothing to rave about. It just... was. Next time, I'll try the lamb and maybe follow up with the ice-cream thing we saw carried past our table. Altogether, the meal cost us a few cents short of $50. Ouch. What the heck! It's payday!

Had another sweat-a-thon this morning and I think we're making progress. Lena came to join us so we have one more member of our team getting a feel of the routine. She's picking up quite fast, but then, she has a good background in dance anyway. Had a look at the actual location and, boy, it's a lot of ground to cover. That's going to add to our sweat output, that's for sure. It feels funny, muscles aching yet it's a healthy thing to do. Well, it would feel better if I didn't screw up my knees. The left one is a bit wobbly now. I hope I haven't done any real damage to it, but I don't see how I could have. Maybe it's just not used to this kind of stress, not having done anything like it for so long already. To everyone involved, thanks for all the hard work, and I promise, we will improve!

I did manage to catch The Punisher at Bishan J8 in the mid-afternoon. Was starving since I hadn't had anything to eat since the Oreos-Os for breakfast. Wanted to line up for popcorn and coke (great -- healthy exercise not being supported by healthy diet) but I just barely got my ticket before the movie started. Then I realized that perhaps I could have lined up for food after all 'cos the pre-show commercials ran on for quite a while. Good thing there were no ads for food products, else...

As expected, not many in the audience. Just a few Marvel fanboys and that's about it. The run isn't going to last long. You have to be a fanboy to appreciate a movie like this. After all, the lead character is a psycho who's lost everything. How else do we expect him to emote? He's just grim all the time, no emotion left in him. With the death of his entire family -- and I mean cross-generational extended family on both his and his wife's side in the same hour -- and his own attempted murder, he evolves into what is basically the Angel of Death on his 'resurrection.' Nothing supernatural about his return to the living, it's like the Bride in Kill Bill. The assassins just didn't finish the job well enough.

It's not really giving away the plot because it's quite obvious what game Punny is playing from the time he sets his plan for revenge in motion. If you haven't got time to watch 4 hours worth of Othello at the Arts Festival, you can get a quickie version with lots of guns and explosions in The Punisher. It's not as 'cultural' but it's probably more fun. There's even a tip of the hat to Homer's Iliad ('Troy,' for the more pop culture inclined) at the end. I won't say which part 'cos again it's quite obvious.

So we have a story about a loony who does terrible things to terrible people who did terrible things to him and to other people. It's hard to support a guy whose cruelty and spite matches that of the one who caused him harm to begin with. The Punisher is not a character we sympathise with. He is not a hero, not a role model but rather an unnatural disaster that befalls evildoers who deem themselves above the law. Maybe that's why this movie is so disturbing. The lead is not one to root for, not one to cheer for. Apart from the misfits and outcasts of society who become Punny's inadvertent neighbours, one of whom suffers for his sake, they, I think are the ones who show true courage, standing up for what they think is right: friendship, community, family. And they don't have guns either.

Do I recommend it? Go if you like the Punisher already, or if you like guns, bombs and fisticuffs to go with your popcorn. If you're still interested, be warned: it's been censored to NC16 although it was released as R in the US.

My CD-RW is giving trouble again. I've managed to burn two CDs worth of stuff before the burner seems to have given up. The device doesn't seem to be recognised any longer and I'm getting frustrated. I can't tell if it's a problem with the burner or if I've bought a bunch of bad CD-Rs. There! What do you know? It's started burning again! That's good news then. 'Unreliable' is how I would call it. Sometimes will write, sometimes won't. It's so annoying!

Exciting that our CT T-shirt is in the works at last! Nige seems to have got the colours problem solved and we should be able to wear it soon. After the hols we hope, eh, Nige? Now, I haven't actually seen the design yet but I'm hoping to, if one of you will forward me a copy. Thanks!

As far as movies are concerned, it's a quiet week with nothing opening that I'm really dying to watch. The Punisher is opening tomorrow but it got quite bad reviews in the papers today so I doubt June will be interested to go watch it. I'd still support it as Frank Castle is a pretty interesting character in the Marvel universe where everyone is super-powered but Castle only has his training and combat smarts to rely on. He's at an obvious disadvantage, yet he can hold his own if he has to. Maybe I can go sneak off to watch it tomorrow, after our work out session, on my own, which I haven't done for a long time already. At one time, I wouldn't watch a movie with company 'cos I always found company too distracting. Also, I couldn't find anybody to go with, which was sad. It was always either one or the other.

OK. Disks burned at last. It was such a waste to burn a single track on a whole CD so I randomly stuck in a bunch of filler tracks to use up all the space on the disk. Hope the work out crew will be happy.

Ouch. Body hurts again, especially my right butt which seems to have cramped up. Rythm and movement sure is taking its toll but it's worth it, just to be able to move and sweat again. I gotta get the moves down, but it's difficult. It helps that the music has a strong beat but while I can execute specific moves, stringing them together in sequence addles my poor brain. Maybe that's it! Use less brain and just move! Let's try that next time.

I'm sort of ok if there is someone to watch for cues, but on my own, PANIC! Oh well, I guess we're doing fine for the first two sessions. Things must improve from now on!

Jong Yann and I are the first ones to try out the steps, having had a headstart last week. Today Cara and Jeremy came in and while Cara should be able to pick things up pretty quickly, Jeremy looks like he's under a lot of stress. It'll be interesting to see how fast Lena and Thaddeus are going to pick up since they've already missed the first few sessions and we have to catch them up soon.

Really have to thank our instructors for taking time off to help us work out. You guys are already so busy that helping us isn't necessary but we really do appreciate you for it. To chief instructor, S_, you've been so patient with us, the uncoordinated, going over the steps again and again for our benefit. To H_, R_, and er..., sorry I can't remember your name, thanks for keeping us company and showing us what the more advanced of us can do.

As for NSF:U, I'm now third in the rankings driving the most obiang Mazda Miata MX-5 fully kitted out internally and externally, wearing a coat of 'pearlescent' green paint, and floating over a pulsing pink neon undercarriage. What to do? It's the only way to attain a 5-star reputation in the game world! In reality, I hope I never meet my car in a dark alley in the middle of the night. It'll make the Bengest Ah Beng go blind.

Met June for dinner at Yishun Central in my sweaty t-shirt, fresh from this afternoon's workout. Apparently, I was an affront to her olfactory sense. As soon as we got home, she banished me to the bathroom where I took an early shower for once. I can go sleep right after 'Smallville' if I so choose, and maybe I will. I am that tired.

You are a Technologist. You may not have any magic
--but you either don't want or need it. Whether
you are a spear-throwing Barbarian, an Imperial
Mechanist or even a humble Tailor you build
what you need, rely on your own strength and
follow your own path. You are happy doing your
own thing and thinking your own way. You are
extremely self-reliant and have a hard time
trusting others.


Which Magical Order Are You In?
brought to you by Quizilla

Well, that description seems to fit! See entry below:

You know your mind is empty when you cut yourself off from the rest of the world. Then you go look for things to fill it up with, not necessarily healthy stuff either. Anything to pass the time, break the boredom, and procrastinate from doing the things you really should be doing instead. When June left for the flea market again yesterday, I was left to my own devices and I decided to spend my time alone again at the PC. All day. Not doing anything profitable, just immediately gratifying and terribly frustrating at the same time.

Same thing today. Was supposed to join the rest of the men >ahem< for the staff hike but when I woke up it was pouring rain and I thought I should pull myself out on account of the weather. I don't know if the hike was called off, I just didn't go. Lazy bum! Spent the day with the PC again (his name's Watson, by the way) while June was at the office.

What's Watson got that's been holding my attention? 'NFS:Underground,' that's what. I'm developing blurred vision, risking epilepsy and suffering from carpal tunnel syndrome and for what? The satisfaction of moving up the ranks of an entirely ficticious racing circuit for the glory and honour of building the most Ah Beng looking car imaginable. As your successes mount, so do the car accessories accrue to your disposal until you can drive around the ultimate Bengmobile, complete with chassis modifications, neon highlights and blinking lights. An addictive RPG, if you can see it from that perspective, and an obsessive gamer are a deadly combination. I'm feeling quite ill now. I wonder why?

Hmm... I missed an entry last night, and I'm not bowling tonight either. Wow, just look at all the stuff I haven't done all weekend. Thanks, NFS:U! Should I feel guilty?

June went off with a suitcase and a couple of large plastic bags. In her best ah soh outfit complete with a humongous fanny pack to keep her change in, she headed for the flea market in one of the void decks in Sembawang to sell off the junk we have lying around but have never used. She even thought of selling off some of her rock paintings but being too busy this week, her attempt at a PPG Blossom portrait is left incomplete. Oh well, maybe next time Sembawang Town Council has another flea market then.

Some stuff she packaged together to be sold off as 'Father's Day' gifts, like the coffee brewing paraphenelia, and like the incense holder with incense sticks. Business wasn't exactly brisk but she still managed to sell off, count 'em, four items! From the proceeds, she shelled out $5 to buy a throw rug for Belle and Momo to sharpen their claws on. Aren't they lucky? Knowing them though, the cats will ignore it like they do with every other toy we have purposely bought for them. They like to play with stuff they aren't supposed to touch instead, like interesting-looking pieces of garbage and Q-tip's bone-meal biscuits.

Me, I went crazy in the afternoon and bought 'NFS:Underground,' which is quite thrilling to play especially if you are the sort who has a driving licence but can't afford a car. Not at these super-inflated prices, anyway. My simulation personality is very different from the 'real' me, I notice. When I'm driving my sim car, I have the worst driving habits and the foulest mouth imaginable. The fact that regardless of my conscious control, my unconscious instinct is to drive straight towards oncoming traffic rather than avoid it doesn't help my disposition much. Instinct always wins, hence the mouth. In a real car, however, I am such an Ah Pek. If you want to get somewhere fast, please don't ask me to drive. Sim or real, the experience just isn't worth it.

Just watched Prisoner of Azkaban. So dark, so gritty, I swear, even the director's colour palatte has changed. The Dementors and their effect on their immediate environment literally take your breath away. They are so much of a nothingness that the damage they cause is terrifying. The kids have grown up and it's great that Columbus doesn't hide the fact. I liked the balance in the kids' costumes -- they were in their teen outfits as much as they were in their Hogwarts uniforms. As teens they display as much of their own personalities and tastes as often as they can, while their school uniforms are strictly for school.

PoA however, seems like it's missing a great battle to end with a satisfying punch. It's like the feeling I got at the end of The Empire Strikes Back: what, that's it? Credit goes to the movie because despite its length it doesn't feel draggy and you don't feel the passage of time. So, erm... yes, as contradctory as it sounds, PoA is exciting to watch moment-to-moment, but the build-up fails to reach epic proportions. No, it doesn't have to, but perhaps I'm just a jaded old cynic, already over-entertained to death. Even so, I've got 3 words for the movie industry: Bring it on!

I am having such a healthy holday. So far I haven't yet slept past 7am, I'm having a regular breakfast and am walking Q-tip to Yishun Park and back before I start my day. It's a routine now.

I'm aching all over at the moment because I've taken up a commitment of er... let's just call it rythmic exercise. It's so much more painful and harder, sweatier work than Monday nite bowling, which is truly chicken feed, and even more strenuous than the badminton session I had last week. Can feel muscles that I'd forgotten I had shrieking at their abuse, from my back to my upper thighs and even my left elbow, for some reason. Next week, I can imagine what kind of shape I'll be in what with the Monday morning staff hike to Bt Timah summit from MacRitchie Reservoir, Monday nite bowls, and Tuesday 'rythmic exercise' all over again. Oh, the pain, the pain!

Met June for dinner at this little bak kut teh place on River Valley Road, next to UE Square. Everytime we watch a performance at DBS Arts Centre, we try to eat there 'cos the BKT is nice and garlicky in a dark soup and lots of pepper. It's still not quite the standard of the one in what was once Hill Street Hawker Centre (now it's a wasteland), but it's close. Good thing June had some cash on her -- I forgot to use the ATM and I was carrying around a grand total of $2 in my wallet without realising it.

We shopped for Japanese snacks and candy at Meidi-Ya Supermarket at Liang Court. Discovered some tempting-looking Japanese eating places too. Perhaps next time we're in the neighbourhood, we'll give BKT a skip and try out some of the Japanese cuisine here instead. Any advice from anyone who knows this area?

We joined Cara and some of the Drama Club for 'The Magic Paintbrush' by Brian Seward. Anxious moments as Cara made a dramatic last second appearance (in her new car!) and 3 of our fellow audience members got so lost they only showed up just as the play was ending. We've arranged for them to join Hasif's group tomorrow to make up for their lostness. Note: DBS Auditorium (Shenton Way) is not the same as DBS Arts Centre (home of SRT). Taxi drivers don't know this. Next time you cab it to DBS Arts Centre, tell the cabbie to go to Robertson Walk. You won't get lost then.

Will try not to give too much of the story away as I don't want to spoil it for tomorrow's audience. It was highly enjoyable, family entertainment with themes both children and adults can identify with. Simple set (not quite to Brian's liking), and the use of black-light and regular puppetry, loveable characters who sing and dance, all make for a wonderful family fare, Saturday morning cartoon style. I thought my sister's kids will be quite captivated by the story, so I recommended it to her. Who knows, maybe they'll take me up on it. I'm sure they'll have a great time.

Nice surprise to see Serena playing Shrimp, the smaller Imperial Guard. She's got so much experience now and she seems to have carved out her niche in supporting roles quite nicely.

Oh yeah, and we bought Brian's book as well, and got him to sign it. Don't mind helping him out here and there. He's done so much for us. $12 (u. $14) for a good cause, stocks are limited!

Just a dream
a noble dream
Just a hope gone up in smoke
I hear that sound, that simple sound
It gives me hope
only to fall back to the ground
Chan, M. Opiume. 2004

Got complimentary tix to the above performance. Jumped at the chance 'cos I doubt I'll get another ticket to another Arts Fest event this year. Mary scored the tix for us and since she couldn't get hold of Jen Lim, Adrian came in her stead. As typical of Adrian, he was making his way towards Jubilee Hall when Mary called him this evening and redirected him to Victoria Theatre to meet us. Tell Adrian to meet at Far East plaza and he'll wait at Lucky Plaza for us.

The fact that Opiume is performed by a theatre company leads one to assume that the production is a theatrical-type show. It's a common misconception and we now stand corrected. Instead, it is a beautiful classical musical performance with theatrical production values thrown in to enhance its marketability. C Wong was a compelling storyteller, melancholically delivering her tale of the drug-related death of a friend as the framework of the main story. The main story was, hmm..., apparently set during the period of China's Opium War; and there isn't much to say about what went on because the setting of the story supersceded the story itself.

The performers had beautiful voices to go with the music, but there was little interaction between their characters and hardly any discernable motivation behind their movement. Walk here. Sing. Walk there. Sing. Cross paths. Sing. Sit down. Sing. Stand up. Sing. Die. erm... Yes, there was that problem of having a dead body onstage that could not be gotten rid of apart from a miraculous resurrection which did happen. Hee Hee.

As a theatrical production, it lacked pacing and high points and low points to sustain interest. It wasn't until I realized that it was the music that was the most important element that's when I began to enjoy it. When I decided to ignore the backdrop, the movement and the attempt to appreciate the lyrics I discovered a treat for the auditory sense, credit being to the T'ang Quartet. Too bad T'ang was placed as part of the background when the guys should have been fronting the production. Everything I was looking for, movement, mood, tone, pacing was in the music and it stayed there.

As with the above excerpt, Opiume is a noble dream in the fusion of the different elements of music and drama. Sadly, the balance heavily favoured the former over the latter, hence the dream went up in smoke. There were one or two occasions when the audience thought the production had ended but the hope fell back to the ground when the music picked up again and the performers launched into another song. If you're going for this production, be warned: go enjoy the music, ignore everything else -- it's just fancy packaging 'sall.

After the performance, Mary brought us to the cafe at her workplace and we split a seafood pizza (I covered my slices with Tabasco sauce like in the ad) and destroyed a peach pie with honey ice cream, and a mud pie amongst the four of us. Good way to round up the evening!

Dim sum for breakfast with in-laws. Went to Fortunate Restaurant in Toa Payoh central as nostalgia set in for the Wongs. It was their favourite eating place way back when they were still living in the area. We were starving 'cos we woke up early thanks to Belle but Sis-in-law only came to collect us at 9:30. The food isn't bad, but the main attraction, shrimp cheong fun, took a long time to arrive. While we waited, we over-ordered as usual and made ourselves sick eating various pao, and other deep fried stuff. I think it was the deep fried shrimp heavily wrapped in some kind of vermicelli that finally killed me. Surfeit of oil, and then I had to help finish the cheong fun which finally arrived. OK, for dim sum it's not too bad, but just lay off the oily stuff and go for the steamed instead. A much better idea, and healthier too.

Dropped in at June's old place since we were already in the neighbourhood. They collected some leftover junk they want to sell at the flea market this weekend. Oh, the family doesn't live there anymore but the ownership of the place is still theirs. Likewise the junk. Perhaps more on the flea market in subsequent posts.

Spent the afternoon comatose on the floor of my living room. Don't know why I was so tired. Must be Belle's fault. I gotta blame someone!

Actually, we just got back from celebrating Halim's birthday. It was such a surprise for him, seeing all of us at dinner. He didn't expect Mrs Halim to get so many of his old colleagues together to wish him many happy returns. Me, June, Anthony, Wendy, Gerald, Kim, Weng, Luanne, Vince (by himself) and Luanne's sister, Charlene (by herself); all staff, ex-staff and spouses/dates. It was like the breakfast club extended. Nice to see everyone again. Finally got to see Alexandria a.k.a. Mrs Halim, who planned the whole thing. So, she is a real person after all! Good dinner with halal sharks fin soup, pineapple rice, lemon chicken, deep fried garoupa, garlic kai lan and butter prawns. And of course great conversation, gossip and insults hurled around the table, the subjects of which may or may not have been present.

And speaking of present (how convenient), we got him a set of Lipton infusion teas, in orange and chamomile flavours. It didn't look like much so we also threw in a pair of teacups and since Sis-in-law had just returned from LA with a great bunch of cookies in tow, we also put a couple of packaged Mrs Field's cookies in the box as well to round things out. It's great having a wife who can come up with these wonderful gift ideas. Me, the stingypoke, would just have said a box of teabags would do.

Vacation time can be boring, especially on days when you don't make it a point to meet people. There is time to sleep, but I woke up early again this morning. When Belle wants out of the room, she wants OUT! It's non-stop meowing and if there is still no response from either of us, she'll treat my stomach as a fashion model's runway. She's not shy about using her claws, and she's no lightweight either. Then you have to feed her breakfast.

Since I was up early, I went for breakfast with Q-tip then took her for a walk around Yishun Park again. Where else can we go, right? Q-tip is such a manipulative little girl. On long walks when June is with us, Q-tip will beg to be carried after a while, the manja queen. Today, with just me, she walked all the way. I even gave her the choice of taking a shorter route but she pulled on the leash and insisted we go the long way instead. Humbug!

I had to get a replacement for my MP3 player's earphones 'cos I carelessly left it on the sidetable on Sunday night and Momo chewed through the wire. It's quite useless now. MOMO! I'll never learn. Momo's chewed through an assortment of cell phone charger cables, the stereo's FM antennae and partially through my PC's mouse cable. One day she's going to get electrocuted. Why, oh why, do we still keep her around? Oh yeah, she's cute.

Earphone replacement is a cheap Sony Fontopia type which doesn't have the same quality as my original Creative one. I mean the sounds are clear and distinct but it sounds like it comes from far away. I'll live with it, I suppose. If you have cats, you can't have nice things.

Ever get the feeling your PC needed an upgrade, but there was no real justification to shell out good money for it? Went to Sim Lim Square to shop but for all the peripherals there were on offer, I could see that I was doing just fine without them. I'm not playing any of the new games that need a state-of-the-art Radeon or GeForce FX and my speakers are a cheap, good-enough set that will not make the most out of an Audigy 2. I don't need any more memory, 512Mb is enough for now. I'll just have to keep tabs on the shipping date for Doom III. Once that's out in the market, I'm sure I'll have an excuse to spend money again. *Waits in anticipation...

Spent the evening watching Chinese serial after Chinese serial. I can see how addictive they are. When your cable box supplies you with Channels 8, U, and another couple of subscription Chinese channels, you can't escape. Let's see, "Double Happiness I" (TCS 8); "Greed Mask" (from HK); "Witness for the Prosecution II" (also from HK); must have been at least 1 more though my memory fails me as to the title. Well, there really wasn't much to do this evening since we ate at home and it looked like it was going to rain.

Feeling a bit cooped up, though. I want a beach, sun and sand. I want a bicycle or a pair of in-lines. I know how Belle feels like: I want OUT too! But there is the one fatal flaw in the attainment of my desires -- too lazy. Maybe too much work too, now I think about it. Now I don't want to think about it. Sigh.

Did something that I've always wanted to do but never found the opportunity for. Connie rounded me, Yee, Cara and Annie up to have a dramatic storytelling session recorded at Xinmin Pri Sch. Yee and Cara got lost as usual, and having misinterpreted my directions was also par for the course for them. It didn't matter that they were late, anyway. The Xinmin staff were having some kind of meeting and we couldn't start recording until 10, although we arranged to meet at 9. Connie was nice and bought us breakfast while we waited.

It's fun to do 'voices' while reading a story. We read from a couple of kids' stories; one about a non-conformist little bunny and another about a curious little boy and the tooth fairy. We also read excerpts from 2 grown-up stories, "Tuesdays with Morrie" (Albom) and "Jonathan Livingston Seagull" (Bach). Both stories very inspirational, also about non-conformist individuals -- the first about a withering college professor with the most positive attitude to dying, and the second a young seagull with a passion for life and for flight. If you haven't read them yet, please do so quickly. Bach also wrote "Feathers" which is just as thought provoking.

Xinmin has a cosy little studio for the recording of video and audio projects. Quite pro, with photo-shoot backdrop, lights, sound system and studio-standard video cameras. In the control space there is a video editing PC and a complicated-looking slider setup and a synthesizer keyboard. The things we could do with a studio like that! The whole thing is so new the operators are still at the flipping-through-the-manual stage for certain functions that they haven't tried out yet. We had to be patient while they got their act together, in the meantime we decided who would read what and rehearsed.

Knowing the complexity of voice-over recordings, I was prepared to stay the whole day recording and rerecording take after take. Surprisingly, we were done by 2:30 which shows either how excellent we were at reading, or how low our standards of acceptability were. I prefer to think it was the former. Ahem. We heard clips of the recording just to sample our readings and I think we sounded ok.

Next thing to do is to layer in sound FX and music to set the mood. We also might need an attractive CD jewel-case design and then the readings can be used in primary and secondary schools in English classes. What fun! Thankfully, we've done the most major part of the production and the rest is just a lot of tedious and exacting work which someone else will be doing. Yee is so addicted to this idea now, he's suggesting we do a recording of Roald Dahl's kids' stories as well. Now, that is ambitious, and could well be worth doing. We'll get around the copyright issue somehow!

Now then, who's up for Monday nite bowling?

Locked, loaded, ready for deployment! 

Day began unusually early for a Sunday morning, Friendship Sunday notwithstanding. Woke up before 6am. The sky outside our bedroom window was bright for some reason and I thought we were late for our appointment. Thankfully, we weren't.

We brought food for 3A2 who was on community service, road marshalling and timekeeping for the Kebun Baru 4.5 km run. Assorted buns and tetra-pack Milo and Ribena was all we could provide, I hope it was enough.

We parked ourselves at one of the stone tables in the void deck of blk 177 to look after bags and belongings and tried to eat some of the leftover buns for breakfast. It didn't seem right, though, just sitting there and eating while all around us the other participants were busy warming up for the run and engaging in different kinds of exercise. Somehow it felt like the "one of these things" game from Sesame Street. It didn't help when June scooted off to the market across the road and soon returned with a tau suan for herself and a tau huay for me. We really know how to spoil the market for all the health nuts around us. Oh, and the cops too, who had to set up their crime-prevention exhibition around us -- hey, if we left we would be in dereliction of our guard duty!

After the run, we took a group shot with the guest-of-honour, MP Inderjeet Singh. I suppose our mugs will appear in some community newsletter soon.

Hmm... sometimes I wonder if I don't give 3A2 enough independence. Whatever they're doing, I seem to be there too. Does it cramp their style? It's tough trying to figure out the limits of being responsible for one's charges and being too controlling. I could use an honest reply on this.

Fast forward to this evening.>> After dinner we went to Northpoint to pick up some Complete for my contact lenses. I love this stuff 'cos it's so trouble free and it matches the salinity of my eyes perfectly. No stinging, no clutching of eye sockets, no screaming "yaaaahhhh!!!!" while your eyes adjust to your CL solution. Just stick them in and go. Simple. Complete's got a free coffee mug for every 2 twin-pack you buy as its current promotion. It's the aluminum type, not porcelain, for keeping coffee warm and spill-resistant. So now I have a coffee mug I can be proud of when I use it in the Staff Lounge during my hot beverage breaks. Come to think of it, I've never had a hot beverage break in the Staff Lounge before. Couldn't bear the thought of borrowing someone else's mug to drink coffee out of. My caffine levels are going through the roof come next term! Heh heh!

Postings for the last few days have been quite heavy and heavy-handed. Cathartic for writing, but perhaps not so reading. Sorry. I've just been thinking too much. The Day After Tomorrow has been an excuse to reflect on the things we are doing as individuals and as a global community and it's not really a happy reflection. As individuals, what we do in our lives is in reality so insignificant. The futures we plan for ourselves and work so hard to build; are we able to pick up the pieces and build a new future if things just don't go the way we plan? Collectively, can we see that our insignificant comings and goings add up and the cumulative effect of it all can cause such dramatic changes around us and place us in just the state of jeopardy that we are working so desperately to avoid? And as individuals, will we care only after it's too late (c.f. the Vice Pres)?

The concepts Day After considers are quite profound, but because the scope of destruction is so tremendous, the movie's focus on how the cataclysm affects one single family feels narrow and claustrophobic. It's admirable how Dad braves everything to go fetch his son, stranded in the NY Public Library in the middle of an overnight Ice Age, but you have to ask yourself, "What the heck for? And what does he hope to accomplish once he gets there?" If anyone had survived the flash freeze -- and many people did -- then a far more efficient rescue operation would have been mounted for them. Dad's only excuse to traipse from Washington DC to NY over fresh tundra: "I made a promise." Forgive my skepticism but, yeah, right. Makes for a storytelling device but it does stretch credibility a bit. Besides, the focus on this one tough trek means so much less sympathy for everyone else who was caught unprepared for the freak storm. It's like oh, everyone else is dying around our heroes; erm... ok, nothing more to see here, let's just move on. I left the movie knowing that I wasn't impressed, but I couldn't articulate why. It was June who mentioned this point first, and I thought she hit the nail on the head. Maybe I can convince her to write reviews from now on?

Like I said, too much to think about. This morning I made myself happy with a couple of prata and a wadai then sat in front of the TV watching Saturday morning cartoons. You should see the grin on my face now. I'll stop blogging in time to watch Kung Pow: Enter the Fist (click the link and play with the "Dub your own flick" toy -- be patient, it's hilarious!) on STAR Movies in about a minute. Wonder what my face will look like then?

Our Career Seminar today, particularly the one on fashion and media design was a great success, judging by the number of students who stayed behind and plied our guest speakers with so many questions that they missed their lunch reception and Mei Lian had to take them out to lunch herself. It helps that Melvin and Peng Kiat (sorry, I can't remember the exotic name you introduced yourself with) are a couple of shuai ge and living proof that even if you look like a total dweeb in your class photo, a couple of years in professional training can do wonders for your image.
UPDATE: I remember now! He introduced himself as Calaeo Tan... wonder what his friends in college called him back then?

As speakers, they weren't exactly captivating but their passion for their art was inspirational. Despite their work in the glam industry, it really is more about work and less about glam than people imagine. They talked about their long hours, days on end without sleep; and their constant contact with people in order to raise sponsorship and to keep their ideas fresh. And yet they believe in what they are doing and that's really what counts.

Considering that they didn't take art as a subject in college but rather the more "practical" math, economics combo, the artwork they showed us is really quite amazing. And they said some nice things about economics and gp as well -- how their other classmates struggled with research and essay writing because they lacked the analytical rigour of the humble general paper, and how economics is helping them understand market forces better and so be able to strategize and position their work to their full advantage. Maybe they just had to say it, but it's good to hear the truth from an alumnus. It just sounds more credible.

Despite my initial misgivings, I'm glad to have hosted this career talk. I have hope in the students who simply won't stop asking questions. I see many talented students who draw so well, but due to practical reasons they feel they can't focus their attention on what they are good at. So I hope this session will help them raise the value of their talents and abilities in their own minds and see that there is an avenue for developing themselves this way.

My CT abandoned me to play badminton alone with 3A1 and 3A3. I had 1 good game before being too worn out to continue. Lost the match but it's good to know that my reflexes are still as good as they were 12+ years ago. I was never a good badminton player anyway. Kenneth did something nasty to his shoulder while playing. We thought he had a cramp at first so we left him to suffer while we continued the game thinking that cramps usually sort themselves out very quickly. When the pain didn't dissapate however, we got worried. Vince tried to sort of immobilize his arm with a long piece of fabric and a towel and then drove him to TTSH. Kenneth's got some good friends who helped him carry his stuff, bag, racket, shuttles, from the hall into Vince's car. Duds supported him all the way and Gid and Adam accompanied him to the hossie. What a way to begin summer vacation.

And yeah, it is the start of summer hols. We bade goodbye to Sheena who's going to the US on an internship, and Kevin who gave Pegasus an impressive start in Wednesday's Staff race. Don't know if Mun Yee is staying on, but we've received a new bunch of staff into the English Department as well. Don't know them just yet, but soon, perhaps. Oh, did I mention it was the summer hols? Yes, we still have lots of work to do and to catch up with, but hey, it's the SUMMER HOLS! Yeeeeeaaaaahhhhh!

Warning: food for thought ahead. Ingest in small chunks.

We're pretty much at the half-way point of our 2nd year. The final stretch looms just up ahead, but the hard thing is, as always, the end is the beginning of something new. For some, it means moving on to National Service, for others to work and to most everyone else, further studies. It's meaningless not to be able to see beyond the finish line, for the effort expended in the race then has no purpose other than to finish. People thrive when they can continue looking forward to the future with hope and anticipation. To put it simply, Nintendo says, "Welcome to the next level!" As long as we focus on "welcome" we will do ok at the "next level."

We're showing our students the next leg of their lives with our annual Career Seminar for Year 2s. We've led up to this point with an excruciating programme on preparing resumes and gearing up for job interviews so that they might see that what they are working now has a function in their lives and in their futures. The reality of working life for the Year 2s is so close now. It wasn't long ago that people started looking for jobs at the age of 12 (PSLE), 16 ('O' Levels) and 18 ('A' Levels) and today jobs still exist for holders of these qualifications. Gwyn, alumnus from 2002, is already working full-time -- gainfully employed, as they say -- and the hours she works is no joke: 9-11 because in the workplace there is no timetable. It's do until done, by specified deadline, or if you can't do it, someone else will elbow you aside for the opportunity. The nonsense that students do and will try to get away with in College will not be met with understanding and forgiveness in the real world. That's because people are an expendable resource; there will always be a constant supply of people, especially as Colleges and Universities now churn out qualified personnel en masse. Education was once a privilege, now it's standard issue.

How are we to approach "The Job" in such a nasty environment? Is all we have to live for meaningless drudgery for the rest of our lives? The staff's usual comment, "College is hard work but it's nothing like working life!" doesn't seem to promise much for our students. In a world that's become 24/7 can only Animal Farm's Boxer survive? If our students think they are being groomed to be Boxers, it's timely to remind them that Boxer was turned into glue when he became a liability due to age and fatigue. Boxer was no survivor. He focused on a solitary goal and refused to learn more than what was required of him to fulfil his task. When his task was done, so was he.

The survivors were the pigs. Smart, constantly learning, experimenting with their knowledge, teaching skills to others whom they could exploit later, forging links with others in the larger world (including the enemy!); they did it all and they stayed on top. The only thing the pigs lacked was a set of scruples, a moral code and a sense of value for their own community. So we try to teach our students to be like the pigs: work smart, thrive, survive; but we also balance the survival instinct with community spirit and a sense of compassion for the less privileged so that everyone can live and be happy. Well, ideally speaking anyway.

Oh, "The Job." If you're going to be working 24/7 at something, it makes sense to enjoy what you are doing else it won't be long before you're knackered, literally. If at the moment you don't enjoy any particular activity take every opportunity to try something new (within your moral limits, of course), or forever remain in ennui. Go, seek out and develop your passions. Whatever it takes.

At the same time, remember that when you are starting out, you really are nobody, so be prepared to do stuff that nobody is expected to do. The late William Teo's policy is for new actors to step onto the stage only to sweep it clean for the more experienced actors to perform on. When you've learned to sweep the stage well enough, you might land an extra's role. And so on. When employing your passions in a profession, first learn to sweep the floor.

Wow. What a bunch of conflicting messages. Congrats if you are still reading. Take whatever truth you want from this mess, but that's quite enough for one day.

Beautiful day for a Track & Field Meet. Mainly Track today, though. Clear sky, summer sun, reminds me of one of the more muggy, humid days in TO.

Must congratulate the guys for amassing a bunch of medals for House Pegasus. Sarab, Iqbal, Firdaus, Fadzli. You guys showed great spirit and enthusiasm running your events and taking turns to whack the kompangs for us along with 'sif and Ramzi. Unfortunately, a few heroes aren't able to carry a whole team. We need a lot more pegasii (is that the right plural?) like you if our House is going to do better next year. I am, of course, disappointed that Team Pegasus has gone to the bottom of the House standings after today, but that still doesn't take away your achievements. Congrats, boys!


House Pegasus. We'll be back! 

Duds, if you're reading this, my congratulations to you and House Phoenix, and to your House Masters, Vince and Lena. Vince may have lost the Bowling battle to us, but his prize today more than makes up for it. Can't help comparing your success with Hogwart's House Griffindor and thinking, red is a fitting colour to launch the our new Houses in the College. Your cheerleader who hurt her leg deserves mention as well for her courage and determination to continue with the routine. Hope she'll be ok.

It's a rare sight, but the Milo truck made an appearance at the track today and kept us supplied with the chilly, chocolatey beverage. It's no substitute for breakfast but it comes a close second. As Richard pointed out at brunch, the Milo served from the truck tastes way better than if we were to concoct it ourselves. Strangely enough, it's also better than the Milo in tetra-packs and sold in shops and vending machines. Shouldn't Milo all taste the same since they all come from the same manufacturing plant? Perhaps it's just the mystique of the old Milo truck that serves up unlimited quantities of cold Milo on hot, sweaty days when everyone is thirsty from exhaustion and exposure that adds to the taste. In the farthest reaches of my memory of the truck, MacRichie Reservoir Annual X-Country 1978 till today, the truck's been working it's magic. And the magic must be in it's generousity, freely providing what is needed to those who need it. A lesson in life maybe?

Nephew, EJ's birthday today. Went to Sembawang (mom-in-law's place) to celebrate. The kid is completely obsessed with Thomas the Tank Engine. Everything he got was Thomas based: Thomas school bag from us, Thomas figurines on his birthday cake (more on that later), and a Thomas battery operated train set that runs on its own set of rails. He wore a Thomas t-shirt too. And to think that Thomas has a face that would have scared me when I was a kid! There's something disturbing to have an organic face fused onto an inorganic chassis. Soft tissue melded into unyielding hardness with no visible transition. Dunno why the concept upsets me, I can't explain it, but there it is.

My mom-in-law is a baking marvel. It was she who baked our wedding cake out of a real fruit cake and marzipan, decorated with silver candy sphereoids and a Precious Moments wedding couple figurine on top. The last item of deco was an inspiration of June's who found a use for the wedding gift from our mutual friend, Joyce. Nice touch. EJ's birthday cake was a sponge layer cake sandwiching an assortment of thinly sliced fresh fruit including kiwis, strawberries and peaches. The whole thing was encased in a coat of fresh cream making it look like it had just recently been snowed under. On top, as I mentioned, was a small plastic Thomas who appeared to be passing by a ranch comprising 2 plastic fences and a horse peering out at the techno-organic transport whizzing by. A couple of plastic trees rounded out the diorama. The candles were of course the anomaly.

College sports day and a WITS presentation to look forward to. Hope the day really is as short as promised. The latter part of the programme is the more worrying of the two. Well, see how, lah.

Swiss Alps 


Vive la Paris! 


Somewhere in Ireland 

OK, nobody get excited. I haven't run off to exotic locales over the weekend. I'm just testing Hello from Picasa as a possible means of hosting pix everyone can see. It's a bit bothersome and the initial learning curve is steep. I hope the post works. The pix, by the way, are my bro's.

SAFRA Yishun no longer has tikam-tikam night. There's nothing to win for our high scores any more so boo. Games are cheaper though -- a 10 game set @ $2.60 per game -- problem is that immediately after our last game, the computer resets itself and wipes out our scores so it's impossible to make an end-of-game analysis of our individual performance. So from memory, I've worked out my 3-game average for today is 131. I've done better before. June pulled a thigh muscle on her first throw and had to watch the rest of the game from the sidelines. I'm going to rub it down for her soon. With nothing to win, we did the usual: losing team buys the drinks. Madly enough, Anthony agreed to give a 60 pinfall handicap to our opposing team, Ed and Cheryl. Despite the outrageous handicap Anthony and I still managed to score our drinks off them. The alley now serves a bottled root beer that is so smooth going down. Can't quite recall the brand... IBG Root Beer, or something. It's nice.

Now at home and I've got Belle cradled on my lap. She's got her right front paw stuck in my face. She's not comfortable with my face getting too near her's hence her defensiveness. Momo is similarly defensive in the same position, but not as polite. Rather than using her hand to fend off an intrusive face, she uses her foot instead. Bleah! Anyway, cat cradled and purring on your lap, hot Horlicks on the desk, courtesy of the Missus (thanks, June!) and blogging it all down. That pretty much rounds up a pleasant evening. Night!

You represent... angst.
You have an extremely cynical outlook on just about
everything. It's okay to sulk and be
depressed, but life is short, and you only get
one. It's only what you make it, and only you
can make it improve.


What feeling do you represent?
brought to you by Quizilla

What? Angst? Me? I guess we never outgrow it.

Q-tip got her walk in Yishun park today and picked up a bunch of red ants along the way. It's really exasperating to hold her steady while June and I comb her fur looking for every last one of those pests. Anyone passing by us must think we're abusing our dog because she's struggling so hard to right herself. She really hates being turned onto her back. But if we don't do anything, they bite her and the pain shows in her walk and on her face, the poor thing.

Finally mustered enough willpower to bathe Momo today. She hasn't bathed in more than a year! *sings "Smelly Cat." Well, from now on she's going to get a bath once a year whether she needs it or not! Had to trim her claws before her bath and wear my crappiest T-shirt since she's bound to tear it to shreds while in the shower. Momo is such a yowler, a scratcher and a biter. It takes both of us to hold her steady while spraying her with warm water and lathering her up with tea-tree oil based flea and tick shampoo. Not that she has fleas and ticks, but better safe than sorry. She goes into a complete panic when we turn the dryer on her. A few minutes of blow-drying is all she can take. We give up when we think we've done our best to dry her and the rest is her own look out. 2 animals abused in one day. Must be a new record for us.

Bro dropped in on us later this afternoon to return my digicam and get his pix burned on CD-ROM. He's got some nice shots of his tour in Ireland, France, Switzerland, and wherever else, although his shots tend to focus on old photographs and other publications rather than on his traveling companions and exotic scenery. Well, he has got some of those too. He's not completely mad, you know.

We all went to Changi Airport for Popeye's chicken, which we've been looking forward to all week. Forget what I said about it earlier. It's gone down the tubes although it still is marginally better than KFC. Portions of mashed potato and coleslaw are a little smaller, chicken is dryer and tougher than before and as such it was a small struggle to down our order. *sigh. Perhaps it was too good to last. Maybe we came on a bad day, but I'm sure we'll give Popeye's one more chance to redeem itself in our esteem... in the near future.

Finished our day at the Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf in Terminal 2 with a caffeine fix and pleasant conversation. He had an Espresso Americano, June an ice-blended mocha and I had a ku-niang ice-blended black forest mocha, cherry on top. So I like my ice-blended sweet with crunchy ground coffee bean and maraschino cherry bits; it's supposed to be dessert, right?

Looking forward to the coming week. June hols begin after Friday -- last chance to rest up and psych up for the final sprint towards the 'A's. 03A2, if you think you've been working hard till now, Term 3 will raise the bar for you. If you think you haven't been working hard, it'll be time to press the nitro button. Soon, you'll be speeding out of my life and on to your own and I'll miss you terribly. But it's too soon to talk about that now...

Dragged myself to a vitally important workshop on the appraisal system the teaching profession will be rated under from 2005. As useful as the information was to us, there was no way they could have made it interesting. It's just that kind of a subject. So it's more than "these are the hoops, jump through them," it now adds on a component of "we know how well you've been jumping through them because we observe you jumping in this particular manner."

In a way, I suppose it's good to have a systematic means of setting specific standards for employees to live up to or aspire towards, but it also means that the things we do as a necessary part of our jobs, things that we don't give a second thought about because of how common sense they are, now become obligatory and no longer fun. When we do something right, we want to forget we did it right then the next time we have to do it again, it feels fresh. When we do something wrong, we want to forget because it would probably have been an unpleasant experience.

You might say these memories are important to keep otherwise we won't learn from our experiences, but I say let our subconscious minds do the learning while our conscious minds focus on the practical, daily, mundane stuff of getting through the day. That's putting the right parts of our minds to work on the right jobs. Instead, what we have here is a system that records and monitors every individual at ever single little turn so that whatever you do good or not-so-good, you have to take the time to consciously remember every single little detail about it so it can go in your report for the year.

The tedium of do-record-do-record-ad infinitum sort of makes you not want to do anything any more so you can avoid recording it just to break out of the cycle. (To those of you embroiled in PW, I assure you, I know your pain). Then again, I seem to be recording everything in my blog and it doesn't seem to be so much of a bother. Hmm... I guess the audience and the motivation for writing and reading these records have something to do with it. I blog in the hope of being entertaining (er.. you are being entertained, I hope) and perhaps of being understood. The appraisal is a record to show that I know how to do my job at the level of expectation placed on me by dint of my official capacity as an employee of my employer, and to show I am doing my job better than the next poor schmuck who is destined for a 'D' or 'E' grade. Better him than me. See why it's so painful?

Whatever. I'll continue to do my job as far as I'm able and not worry too much about it because I know the veritas of this situation: Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose. Tell me if I'm not right.

Watched Shrek 2. Funny, irreverent, lots of fun! Worth watching once. And don't leave the cinema until Donkey's problem is resolved.

Another late night! Just got back from Sun Plaza, finally getting June to watch Troy with me. We were supposed to go last night, then she remembered it was the last episode of the HK serial she's been following on cable TV, so we postponed it to this evening.

No regrets watching Troy a second time. Very humanistic, aethiestic portrayal where the main theme is not to trust too much in the Gods or reality will hit you smack in the face. Achilles says, "The Gods envy us... because we are mortal." I guess so, and all the heroes go off to seek immortality on their own terms, in death and death-dealing. Ironic but how else, if the Gods are not on your side? That says a lot about the kind of wars we face especially today, if you think about it.

Have a blah workshop to attend tomorrow morning. Something about the new, improved job appraisal system. Hmm... I joined Education to get away from this industrial rating system, but I guess there's no getting away from annual assessments, tests and appraisals even when you are this close to your 4th decade. If ever there's a course I would have to attend with a bad attitude, this would be it. If the tests were more real or realistic, then I would be just fine, but I suspect this series of tests will only reward those who show more agreement and support for the Emperor's new clothes. I wonder if our students feel the same way about the tests they have to take? Probably.

Lunched with Anthony and Cara at Katong Laksa, located at the junction of Boundary and Paya Lebar. The outlet is smart enough to keep the sambal on the side so patrons can choose how much of the deadly toxin they will add into their own dish. With my delicate stomach, I kept the sambal completely at bay and had my laksa totally mild. Thus I had the best of both worlds, the potent lemak flavour without the eventual regret of having flaming innards and a case of the runs. Today I wimped out, so sue me! We went whole hog with an unhealthy lunch, washing down our laksa with a whole coconut each including both the water and the meat. Not being used to opening my own coconut (even though it's been commercially packed and pre-cut) in my struggle to get the top off I succeeded also in getting my shirt front splashed with coconut water. I also wasted quite a bit of water pouring it into my cup of ice. Anthony learns fast from other people's mistakes. Thinking laterally, he poured the ice into the coconut instead. No wonder Dad always told me never to be a doofus (do-first). Watch. Observe. Learn. Oh well, Dad can always adopt Anthony if he wants.

At the risk of sounding completely vague, I have to maintain my diplomatic posture and simply make a satisfied observation that the staff is able to unite and stand up to decisions that are clearly misguided and even dangerous. Sometimes the upper echelons make certain observations and, with the best intentions, radically try to change certain norms without actually experiencing the situation on the ground. Perhaps there can be too much of a spirit of "I&E" when we "think out of the box" and implement "something different" without considering that such changes to the norm can result in making the situation even more dangerous than before. There are some norms that we depend on in order to ensure public safety because we know that everyone will follow the set rules and hence behave in a predictable manner thus reducing the element of random, disorderly, dangerous behaviour. This is particularly true in the context of traffic safety laws that guide the behaviour of both drivers and pedestrians. As long as everyone follows the rules, safety is maximized. There is no call, therefore, to make a decision that directs one party to disobey the established laws and as a result cause more chances for an accident to occur than if we simply had left things alone. Our staff on the ground, who speak from real experience, has shown an ability to unite and collectively speak up against change that is arbitrary, and literally a matter of life and death. I'm happy that we can be flexible when decisions come down from on high that seem strange but harmless, and that we can identify decisions that have real consequences and can act together to resist such. We may be easygoing, but we are not sheep. My respect for our staff has been raised a notch. Let's see how this situation will be resolved in the days to come. Let's hope the uppers will hear our voice and make the right decision and not overreact and make an even worse decision. To be honest, this matter is really very trivial, but it's funny how things can blow up when people make decisions on the assumption that students cannot be trusted to do the right thing when left on their own. It's this lack of trust that's going to kill all the things we do right in Education. Then again, sometimes students don't exactly help their own cause. *sigh.

Wow, what a day! Must be grateful to all our students who were cooperative and well-behaved while visiting Tekong. As it turned out, the trip proved most popular as I had to turn a few hopefuls away. I could only take on those who came in direct replacement of their fellows who for one reason or another could not make the trip. As it turned out, I had a total of 130 pax, including Mark who stood in as a last minute replacement for Vince.

It was quite an experience for me, whose Basic Training was on mainland Nee Soon so many donkey years ago. The only time I went to Tekong was for my Marksmanship Test. We stayed almost a week on the island in an old abandoned school, sleeping on concrete and shivering every night because it was so cold. The wet towel we used as a blanket didn't help much. The mornings were so different, hot, humid, sweaty and did I mention hot? Of course, with the new computerized marksmanship training facility, such old fashioned training programmes are now things of the past. It's now like a realistic, yet boring video game that trains a soldier in the firing of his weapon without having to actually use any 'live' rounds. Looking back, I ought to be jealous, but I can't be. There's nothing like sleeping on the cold, hard floor for a week that makes a man out of you.

Was very interested to view the contents of the combat rations package, 'cos although I've been issued with such things before during training, I never opened up the green packages to eat the mess inside. I'd always preferred to survive the day on the biscuits, hard-tack, flavoured either butter or chocolate. The supplementary package also used to contain a chocolate bar and a fruit bar and an assortment of Horlicks tablets and Ovaltine biscuits and these would usually keep me going all day. Not doctor-approved, but in the field, you'd want to minimize the number of times you'd have to go potty too. Er... in the literal not figurative sense, I mean. The mysterious green packages come in non-muslim, muslim and vegetarian varieties and they are either a rice-based or pasta-based food. Even after sampling the stuff, I can't say much about how it tastes other than "palatable." Biscuits still taste as good as I remember, perhaps even slightly better because of the buttery and chocolatey flavours where in the past it was simply flavoured "bland."

Personal equipment also seems improved -- a bit lighter. The helmet, Gore-Tex jacket and combat boots have a fibre mesh built into them to make them lighter and more airy. Saw the recruits' bunks and rec room; we really know how to take care of our NSFs these days. Tough training, with an eye for safety. Good attitude to take.

A trip is successful, I think, if there are no bored faces and there weren't any that I could see today. The instruction delivered by the Army trainers was so clear, practiced and the pedagogy is designed to convey the most meaning in as efficient a manner as possible. Instruction is designed to be understood by everyone regardless of intelligence quotient. With a closed curriculum and lots of repetition, the trainers are competent and confident in their jobs. Our students are most likely to have learned something today. Or otherwise, they at least had a good time. One or the other.

I'm trying to journal at least half and hour a day as a discipline. Looking back, I think I've been doing well so far, and I've got lots of stuff written down to show for it. But there are days, like today, where I'm feeling dry and there's nothing really worth talking about. How far can I go on talking about nothing? Hmmm...

Step one: Sift through the mundane
Organizing a trip for 120 students and staff to a military installation is something to look forward to, yet so many things can go wrong.

Step two: Find point of conflict
As it is only 120 are going instead of the 150 expected and of the 120 who have signed up, what are the actual figures going to be like tomorrow when I have to take attendance? I've got help from Jong Yann and San Chye, but I'm going to miss Vince and Tsui Wei who have classes that they can't miss. I gave a briefing this morning to our contingent, but how many were there to actually listen to the briefing? How many will remember? Which tutors will flip because I'll be pulling so many students out of class prematurely on Wednesday morning? Will they make it a point to be punctual tomorrow so that everything will run according to schedule? It wouldn't be so much of an issue if our college was the only one going, but we are just one of many colleges visiting the same place and it wouldn't do to keep everyone else waiting for us.

Step three: Examine psychology behind the conflict
It seems like I'll be just going along for the ride, but it's also my responsibility to see that we conduct ourselves appropriately and I just can't relax until the whole visit is over tomorrow evening. I may look calm on the surface but inside anxiety has free reign while "the Sword of Damocles is hanging over my head."

Step four: Derive conclusion (regardless of how lame it is)
For now I can only hope everything goes well tomorrow and then maybe I can rest again. Hur hur...

Other events to note to avoid writing off today as being completely boring:
Had dinner at mom-in-law's place and I realise that I haven't paid her a visit since Chinese New Year! Q-tip came with us to pay a return visit to Mimi. Celebrated bro-in-law, Tong's, birthday with a beautifully rich lemon cheesecake from Hiestand Swiss Gourmet Bakery.

June met the cat auntie at the square while doing her rounds and they got to talking as usual. Auntie has some wonderful horror stories about our neighbourhood strays. It so happens Void is missing today and June is so worried for her. Cat auntie is telling this story about some nutty Thai guy leaping into bushes to catch stray cats for dinner. Void is such a friendly sweetheart. We really hope she hasn't ended up in someone's tom-yam soup. Cats in our neighbourhood have been known to disappear from time to time only to reappear in their last known location after a couple of days. Maybe she just went on vacation? We'll keep our eyes open for her in the next few days. Hope she's ok.

Right. Not bad, I guess, for a day of "nothing."

So close to midnight, almost bedtime. What's wrong with Blogspot tonight, anyway? Graphics not loading properly.

Watched the Nick Berg execution video with 03A2 today. Everyone so grossed out and quite upset. Understandably so as no one can imagine such a horrible thing happening in a world that is supposed to be humane and civilized. Unfortunately, while pockets of sanity exist in the world, the vast majority of our human population live, and even thrive, in squalor, misery and horror. Civilization is the exception to the norm, a truth we don't really want to acknowledge.

So the beheading is ostensibly in retaliation against the abuses in Abu Gharib prison. So what's going to be the response to the retaliation? More violence? It doesn't seem to have an end and on the one hand, I'm saddened that this is the world I'm passing on to my students (sorry we've made such a mess of things for you), and on the other it is so necessary to see the world for what it is instead of deluding ourselves that everything is 'just fine' when it obviously isn't.

I recall these thoughts as my phone rang in the middle of my last bowling game tonight. You're wondering right now how I could get so frivolous by changing the subject so abruptly, right? Just play along, ok? My caller was in pretty bad shape, facing a situation that no one should have to. I would love to lend a hand but I also realize my limitations and I know there are many things that lie beyond my ability to control. How do I advise in this kind of scenario? I'm sorry, but all I have is common sense: identify the areas that are your primary responsibility and take control over that which you can take control over, regardless of how small it may seem compared to the big picture. Seek help and accept what help you can get. All that stuff outside your scope of control, don't pretend it doesn't exist, but avoid expending more energy worrying about it than necessary. Seek to control your areas of primary responsibility first and be grateful always for small triumphs along the way.

In our own way, we deal with the frighteningly enormous picture of a world all gone to pot. Individually, there is so little we can do, but that doesn't stop us from doing what's necessary as an individual. We can only trust that our collective efforts (whether intentional or not) will take us human beings to a higher plane of existence in time. Considering where we are now, it'll take us many more generations to get there; so all you young'uns, listen up -- learn where we, your predecessors, went wrong and do it a little better, do it right, when your turn comes around. Teach your young'uns to learn from you, and so the cycle goes.

And on the the frivolous stuff.

When my phone rang, I was having a real lousy game. I just couldn't keep the ball straight and hit what I was aiming at. As I took the call, June had to stand in for me for a couple of frames and I must say she did well to maintain a reasonably respectable score for me. I felt energized after the call and though it was a tough struggle it came down to having to score a strike on my last roll in the 10th frame in order to win a(nother) keychain. 130 pinfalls awaiting 10 for a score of exactly 140. I am now the proud owner of 2 new designed flashlight keychains from 3 games in total. Messed up my first game and missed the keychain by 4 pins! Grrr!

Good company tonight with regulars, Anthony and Wendy, June joined me at last and bowled a credible 90+ average, and Celine and hubby, Chang Wei, came as well. Under pressure from lanes on both sides. On the right lane was a guy who scored a 6-in-a-row and chalked up the lane's high game of the day! On the left, the SYCC-Cathay Bowl league championship was going on and the bowlers were of the above 200-250 pinfalls category. I bowled a 3-game average of 147, which I should be proud of. And I am.

Other thing to be proud of: The Odyssey got a Bronze award at the SYF. Well done, everyone! We've worked hard at it and we have achieved a very decent result. You've kept the tradition of English Drama alive at our college and we are grateful to you, NYeDC 03-04, for your enthusiasm, teachability, and tenacity that got us this far. Celebrate we shall, so maybe this Wednesday for a change, NYeDC will focus on putting together the all-important PSYFP. Lookin' forward to it!

Blah! No such luck with Troy last night. Hard to make charm work if subject has pulled a sleeping beauty on you. Yup, wiped out on the carpet lost in dreamland. Hong Kong serials can be quite a powerful sedative, especially if you've seen the episode once already. June only woke up at 8, time enough to go to dinner and back for a DVD in front of the TV. Nvm, there's always Tuesday's cheap movie night!

Watched The Missing (Blanchette & Lee Jones) on DVD. Wasn't quite the movie I was expecting. I thought there would be horror elements in it (where did I get that misconception from?) but the story turned out to be quite mundane after all. Bunch of Army deserters of Apache descent have a career switch and make it their mission in life to kidnap 8 (lucky number) nubile females and sell them off in Mexico. They happen to make off with Blanchette's eldest daughter and she enlists the help of her estranged Pappy (Lee Jones) who had abandoned her during her childhood to live as an Apache in the wilderness. Heaven help the kidnappers and their shaman leader when father and daughter pick up their trail.

Typical of made-in-China DVDs, the movie went well until the climactic battle when the picture started freezing, jerking and losing resolution. Who needs the censorship board when there's always poor quality recording you can count on? As soon as the battle was over and it's time to count bodies and see who's died, picture's back to normal again until the end of the credit roll. *sigh.

For most of what happened today, however, see yesterday's entry. It's like deja vu or Groundhog Day, only difference is, I'm leaving for dinner at my mom's place in 10 minutes. GTG!

Woke up at almost 10 this morning, a new experience for me since I'm usually an early riser. Sometimes it's not by choice, but most of the time I can't sleep any more after 7-8 o'clock. Too restless, I guess. Had the intention of breakfasting at the Ya Kun Kaya Toast place that just opened at Northpoint. Ya Kun's advertising is so counter to that of the trendy coffee joints; I appreciate the candour and the veritas of it. But seeing how late it was already and how excited Q-tip was about the prospect of her weekend morning walkies, we made things simple and ate downstairs instead.

Took Q-tip on a trek through Yishun Park. We saw a line of ants, a section of which was carrying an unfortunate worm off to dinner. It was amazing how fellow ants swarmed to help carry the worm over difficult terrain even though many ants would have known they wouldn't be sharing in it. Once they had helped the main carriers over a bump or crevice the 'volunteers' would go on with their own tasks again like nothing happened. June must be part ant 'cos she heeded the call for assistance and picked up the entire dinner party with a twig and transported them straight to their doorstep a staggering 3 metres away. How altruistic. When she discovered the worm was still alive, however, she felt bad and wished she had helped the worm instead. Veritas, one can only do so much, I suppose.

Q-tip had her bath on our return home and the pet supplies arrived on time. I spent the afternoon replaying KOTOR and munched on Ruffles (cheddar cheese and sour cream flavour) for lunch. (Read Mei's entry for today -- the coincidence is eyebrow-raising).

Wonder if I can persuade June to go watch Troy tonight. She missed out on Thursday's treat 'cos the show was too early for her and she couldn't get off work in time. I know she'll regret missing it on the big screen. I want to buy the DVD (Code 1, preferably) but there's nothing like watching an epic like this in 70mm, Dolby Digital sound. Time to put on the >ahem< charm... Wish me luck!

It's nice to look at your weekend and think, for a change, that there's nothing pressing on your schedule. At least, nothing more complicated than waiting for a delivery of pet kibble and kitty litter tomorrow and breakfast with the in-laws on Sunday morning. The rest of the time, hmm... who knows? Think we all worked hard for this weekend, and we are going to enjoy it by doing absolutely nothing. Such inactivity makes for uninteresting blogging, but I don't know. We'll see, won't we?

Finally got my bowling trophy 3 weeks after the event. It was presented at assembly yesterday, but I forgot to mention it in my previous entry. The trophy is actually a quite smallish gold cup bearing the college crest. It is heavy for its size and feels satisfyingly substantial to carry around. I can't decide whether to bring it home and clear a space for it (like as if it's the size of an amphora) or leave it on my desk to accompany the growing collection of aluminum root beer cans waiting to be recycled. Hope I don't recycle it by accident.

Promised to send 150 visitors to Tekong next week, but final count only comes up to about 120 including staff. Hope Ee Ling isn't too inconvenienced in helping us make these arrangements. She's on MC today, so she must be under some stress already. Feel a little bad about making her work on this trifle when she returns to work tomorrow.

Lunched with Anthony, Vince, Cara, Darrell and the new relief, Sheena. What new relief? Sheena was in the Student Council the first year I arrived at college. My first CCA was the Council, and Sheena, of course, remembers me from then. It was the year June and I got married and we invited all the Councillors to dinner. All I remember that they were very happy guests who after discovering our cache of red wine became even happier guests that night. The Councillors gave us the most thoughtful present of all, erm... practical things to use on our honeymoon. Thank you, Clifton and the 22nd SC. 'Nuff said.

It was only a matter of time that someone I might have taught would turn up again as my colleague. Now that she's experiencing college life from the other side of the staff room door, much of our mystique has vanished for her. One lunch was all it took. In case you haven't seen it yet, I'll sum it up as: Veritas, no one truly grows up.

Lunch was at Nonya Wok in Bishan. Food prepared by an authentic Nonya lady in the kitchen. I ordered the Special Fried Rice which came with bits of luncheon meat and crabsticks, but the secret ingredient was the sprinkling of what I thought was ikan bilis but Cara said it was silverfish(?). Whatever it was, it was light, crispy and flavourful. So was the rojak, the turnip bits in particular were so fresh, just slightly sweet and very juicy. There is much freshness in the otah too, lemak with chunks of fish meat to get your teeth into.

Nonya Wok is right next door to the McDonald's at Bishan bus interchange.You can't miss it. Just outside the round building housing the two eateries is a small playground in which there is a concrete children's slide. The slide is spray painted with graffitti that reads, "Max Sux." Considering the kind of food you can get next door, I have to agree.

Overwhelmed. How many of us can say they sat through Homer's Iliad AND Odyssey in one day?

NYeDC gave an excellent showing of the Odyssey -- the best performance to date, and sadly, possibly the last performance too, finally putting the old girl to rest after so much hard work. Cast energy was high and relationships between characters were better fleshed out today. There was a small technical hitch with our miscued music, but the cast performed admirably, recovering and continuing like it never happened. Strong performances by Ramzi and Sam, who persented taut exchanges between the two in-laws. Nice tension and the audience could feel it too. Gid was starting for feel something for his character, Odysseus. It was Odysseus who stood on stage today, not Gid. Hasif, crowd pleaser, kept the audience quite amused with his campy Hermes, and as Tiresias he opted for a blend of what we rehearsed -- deadly serious -- and yet kept some of the fun we used to have when Ain played the same role at Drama Night. The audience got the "blind old bat" gag and Gid did well not to overplay it. Meixian has gained much more confidence delivering Circe's dialogue and the audience reacted well to the cheeky minx. Durga's transformation from stern bouncer to airhead was a nice surprise for the audience and it lightened the scene a bit before the play got too dark. Crew and judges performed credibly although I would say a few more rehearsals were needed to sharpen the comic elements of their scenes. Chorus, clear, coordinated vocals and movement, sharp and disciplined in execution. Well done, folks!

P was in the audience and she was genuinely startled at our ending as were many of our audience members too. Gerald and Anthony came to support us along with a number of Year 1s. Thanks for the back-up, everyone!

SYF judges are a strange lot who seem to be moulded from Simon and company from American Idol, only not as vocal. My guess all judges look like that after a number of auditions. Wonder how they took to our parodying them in the 1st suitor scene?

Anyway people, you did good today! All we can do not is wait for results and see what the judges really thought of us. It's out of our hands now so there's little that worrying can do. Just take the opportunity to breathe and relax for now, and maybe -- when you can fit your lives around it -- go study! Do us as proud at your 'A's as we are with your SYF showing today!

Watching the Odyssey before Troy feels like putting the cart before the horse. Nevertheless, most of us made our way to PS for Troy. Of course the "gergers" must drool over Bloom, Brad, Bean and Bana; muscular things they are, hunky and smart. Battle scenes were beautifully choreographed, particularly with Achilles and his favourite airborne assault maneuver. It's Saving Private Ryan all over again only this time it's men in skirts hacking at each other and trying to poke each other's eyes out with their pointy sticks. Sets were lush and gorgeous, poignant scenes were moving, there's a lot that can be done with the right budget.

Might say a bit more about Troy, but not tonight. It's been a long day, too tired to think anymore. Goodnight!

Set 03S3B an essay assignment to work on and decided to keep them company by writing an essay of my own from the choices of questions I gave them. I wanted to see how I could cope with the 90 minute time constraint and to see if I still had it in me to write an 'A' grade paper. I estimate I took about 75 minutes to come up with this Cambridge not approved 994 word monster which I will not force anyone to read. Understandably, the essay does contain argumentative flaws, underdeveloped and unsubstantiated points and some clumsy phrasing. Nevertheless, I wonder how I did in the eyes of an impartial 3rd party. If you want to read and grade the essay, "What value do you place on privacy?" click here. Let me know what you think.

The essay is mainly in it's unedited version apart from correcting a small number of annoying initial typos. To save time, I planned the essay and wrote my first paragraph simultaneously. This method is likewise not approved, but it did save me at least 15 minutes writing time.

By the way, I'd also like to know if people are having problems loading up the pictures I'm hosting at Geocities. Please feedback if you can or can't see them. I'd appreciate it.

One day left to Odyssey SYF central judging. Last rehearsal is done, we've done everything we can with it and now it's totally in the hands and voices and bodies of our cast and crew. We trust you enough to let go now and to call it truly your show from this point on. You are well trained, fully prepared and ready-to-go. You are motivated and willing to give all you have to our endeavour. There is nothing that stands between us and a good showing tomorrow, one that we can all be proud of. We ended rehearsal early tonight, so rest well while you individually psyche yourselves up for tomorrow. Be bold, be confident, be aware. NYeDC, stake your claim and rule the stage!

How apt that Troy opens the day we perform The Odyssey at the SYF central judging. Cast and crew deserve no less than a treat from the Drama Club, so we’ll go north where we are more able to get a block booking. I just hope they won’t be too tired to join us for an evening of popcorn, coke and Greek mythology. All Odd-balls, please join us, ok?

One more rehearsal to go before we finish the journey we started last year. How does everyone feel, I wonder? I feel proud, anticipatory and I know that we’ve got a good show on our hands. We have everything to be proud of. It’s not easy to compress a classical epic into the “short half hour of monsters, storms, romance and treachery” but that was the challenge we set for ourselves and that’s exactly what we’ve done. So let’s go in knock everyone’s socks off and leave with a sense of accomplishment and achievement. And then we’ll go see how Hollywood does it on a bigger budget with Troy, the prequel to our Odyssey. I’ll take my 1% inspiration any way I can!

Had lunch again at Jalan Riang. The drinks uncle knows our “usual” drinks, not that he’s 100% correct all the time, but he makes good guesses, and the economic rice is definitely a draw factor. Went early today and it’s so nice to see the trays of dishes almost untouched for once. Discovered that he has a tray of sotong that must be very popular because I’ve never seen it before today. I’m not a big fan of sotong, though, so it makes no difference to me, I’m not likely to order it anyway.

Took a rain check on June’s homemade (can you get it anywhere else?) corned beef rice to go bowling at SAFRA last night, so tonight we had it for dinner. I used to think Libby’s corned beef was the best we could get, but June said it tasted too much of cow so she tried a substitute instead. Her choice was a good one: S&W, which seems to fly off the supermarket shelves leaving poor old Libby’s behind.

Good stuff, corned beef rice. Simple to prepare. Just mix up a can of corned beef with steamed rice while it’s still in the rice cooker and let it steam a little longer to make the mixture nice and hot. Also thrown in to steam are some baby corn (fresh, preferably, but canned will do) and broccoli. A note about broccoli: please don’t ever overcook it! The closer it is to raw the better. Raw broccoli is perfection, but many people don’t like it raw. Too “green,” they say. Serve corned beef rice with a liberal sprinkling of pepper and some fresh, sliced chilli padi. Q.E.D.

Arrgh! I lost my previous posting 'cos not familiar with the new buttons on this site! Nice that everything's new and there are lots more toys to play with, but have to learn to be careful what I click or lose an hour's work.

Not to say that my last entry was irreplaceable, but I don't feel like discussing that topic again. Too much thought, not enough entertainment. Anyway, it didn't sound like me. Don't want to scare my audience away with too heavy stuff. At least not yet, until we get more used to each other.

Good to have Tina drop in on us at this evening's rehearsal. Though we still couldn't round up full cast due to the odd early timing, it was enough for her to spot areas that could use strengthening and work on them. Various cast were put on the spot and worked over and the results are most satisfactory. Tension between Mother and Penelope is more dynamic and credible and the windbag scene makes much clearer sense now. Rest of the cast would do well to follow Tina's advice for themselves as well.

The simple rule that when you walk don't talk and when you talk don't walk is a very powerful rule to remember. Stand your ground, but also, don't root yourselves to the spot either. Move as your motivation moves you. Don't move because the director told you to do so. Either way, it's very clear to the audience why you are moving. Hopefully the audience will see more of the former.

Also, don't be discouraged when we repeat scenes over and over again. Few of us ever hit the mark on the first attempt. Do->repeat->learn->repeat->add on->repeat->practice->repeat->perfect. Repetition is a key strategy in the learning process. Get used to it.

Rehearsal ran a bit longer than I had budgeted for. Had to leave during our wrap-up briefing but I had to get us a lane at SAFRA for Monday Nite Bowling. Shoulda' stayed till the end of the briefing 'cos Anthony & co. came late anyway. Anthony's pride and joy, his Mazda 3, got it's first major dent after 2-3 months since he acquired it. Proximity sensor apparently didn't pick up the pillar he was reversing into. Key point: when driving, trust your eyes and not your ears. I nearly failed my driving test because of this principle. Now that he's got his first dent, the pressure to maintain his car's pristine condition is off. Guess there's a bright side to everything.

Joining us on the lanes tonight were Wendy, and two of Anthony's petanque teammates, Edward and Cheryl. Vince and Lawrence came too. Edward took a couple of games to warm up but he finished his last game very well with 176, winning a drink for himself. Anthony was a bit distracted because he kept thinking of his new dent but he, too, on his last game hit 202, which was the lane's high score for the day. He won the coveted silver pewter keychain and I know he'll gleefully show it off to Eunice tomorrow.

Me, I got in 4 games tonight the first game missing the gimmick keychain by 3 pinfalls. I won 3 keychains in my subsequent 3 games, bringing my average up to 152 tonight. Quite happy with my performance. All I have to remember from now on is to line myself up properly, aim for the middle arrow and power the ball down the centre. Striking well, sparing accuracy could be better. Next target average: 170. I'm confident that it is reachable now.

Just a quick note: By request I've put up the link to Iraq the Model in my Blogroll (see sidebar). Blogger, Ali, has included other Iraqi blogs in his sidebar. Dear_raed is still on "hiatus" but you can read Raed and Salam Pax's archives detailing their experiences during the "liberation" of Bhagdad.
Counter views can be found in Baghdad Burning written by an Iraqi girl. Trace her links too!

Spent most of the afternoon plowing through blogskins looking for a design that I could use for this blog. As nothing's changed you can guess that I couldn't find a skin I liked. I was toying with the idea of a skin called "The Pressure's On" featuring a silhoutte of the Grim Reaper and the text, "Get better grades or else," but it's so unsubtle and not me at all. Just have to keep looking, that's all.

Q-tip just loves car rides. She watches intently everything that goes on outside the car windows and always has a big grin on her face. We don't take her out too often, though, because taxi fares are expensive and we can't bring dogs into buses or the MRT. Oh, the places we'd go if we could!

We did take Q-tip to "Pets' Night" at Robertson Walk this evening. We got lost because there were no direction signs telling us where to go. Saw lots of other dog owners wandering around the place trying to find the event too. Took a stroll along the river and eventually had to ask for directions. Oh... along the river is Robertson Quay; where we came from was Robertson Walk. Ah ha!

In the process of our wanderings, Q-tip managed to shake off and lose the clip holding up her topknot and we misled a Jack Russell and a lab who assumed we knew where we were going. Finally as we retraced our steps, we met a chihuahua who happily followed us to the right location this time. Of all the stupid...! Robertson Walk is actually the name of the the square of restaurants just behind SRT, where we usually hang out during the intervals of plays we watch at SRT. Doh!

The square was full of dogs and their owners today. By the time we found the place, all the goodie bags had already been snapped up and the lines for the free dog massage(!) and free hand-drawn dog portrait were too long to bother with. Food, food, we need food! Considering that we hadn't had any lunch barring the leftover Ruffles potato chips and the bar of Lindt chocolate, June and I were starving. Food was our #1 priority! Everything else could wait!

We settled for Sketches which offered a better variety of food options than the other joints and because the crowd hadn't arrived to fill up the al fresco dining area yet. We ordered a side of chicken wings which Q-tip had a share in (it was, after all, a dinner date with your pet), a warm mushroom salad, a spaghetti vongole for June and I had a linguine served with 2 lamb chops.

Wings are wings; what can I say? Q-tip was quite happy to share them with us. Vegetables in the salad were fresh and very green topped with sauteed shiitake in a creamy, tangy dressing. June's order was very generous -- lots of clams on a mountain of spaghetti. I don't know how it tasted; she polished off the lot all by herself. My lamb was meaty and tender, cooked in plenty of garlic (whoo!) and served in a pleasant honey sauce. Q-tip was not averse to sharing some bits of lamb with me either. Nice thing about Sketches: they leave the carafe of ice-water on your table so you can help yourself any time you want. Too full for dessert.

We sat between a schnauzer and a (possibly) mini-maltese sporting a schnauzer cut. The latter was excited and quite noisy, intermittently screaming at all the other dogs around it. Cute, but irritating after a while. It's times like this we appreciate Q-tip and her quiet nature.

Hey, gimme a break! My day has barely started! A couple of links to keep you occupied while I go live:

Little shy girl (We all know someone like her, don't we?)

Pingu Extreme (Let me know when you beat my score of 1281)