Raising 10

I sprained my back yesterday while bending over and pulling some love grass out of my kid's pants. Yea i know. Doesn't sound as macho as spraining my back doing sport of lifting heavy furniture. So yes....I'm getting old.


Anyway, while resting at home, I was watching Jon & Kate plus 8 on TV. It's a reality show of life family of twins and another set of sextuplets. As the series on TV are pretty old, I decided to google them. Man ...was I disappointed. They're getting divorced.





The Gosselin children have been under the limelight ever since they were young and with their parents splitting up, it's gonna be very tough on the kids. Most kids wouldn't be able to google about the parents and find all the smut and gossip news about their estranged parents. The impressions that they have of their parents will definetely be influenced.


Before finding out about the divorce, I had been talking about the missus about the type of attention or publicity that the kids will get. How their lives would change and their exposed to the media. Not many kids get to see themselves on the television. And having a series shot about your whole like is a totally different ball game. I'm really concerned about the repercussions of the divorce on the kids.


Imagine bringing 8 active, noisy and crying kids to the mall. I need to pee, I'm hungry, Mommy, he touched me, I wanna go home. Now multiply that by 8! As a parent of two, I have really been very impressed by how they raised their 8 children of 2 age groups. And regardless of age, there will be arguments and fights among the kids.


It's just to see such turn of events. And the media's having a field day taking advantage and publicising the incident.

Schools are safe? Think again.

It's been awhile since I last posted anything. But having read this article, I felt it was my obligation to spread the word as well.

A kid's classmate wanted to take his pencil but the kid didn't allow it. As a result, the classmate grabbed the pencil and poked the kids eye and threw the pencil on the floor!! Talk about being vengeful.

The arrow points to the tear in the poor kid's cornea

When did it become unsafe for kids to go to school? Fine. A kid will always be a kid and get into mischief. But the school did nothing to inform the parents. The school authorities just kept their hands in the pockets and hoped for the best?! The name of the school should be made public and black marked! Does the school think that by leaving the kid alone, the kid will automatically heal?? Let's even say that we give the benefit of doubt, that the school did not know what happened exactly. Open their bloody mouths and asked what happened!! Why would the kid be crying non-stop? How did the grandma, who went to pick up the kid realised that another child and use a pencil on her grandson when the school authorities acted dumb?!

I am sure nobody wants this unfortunate incident to happen at all. But the school should have informed the parents immediately. What if the situation could have been improved by informing the parents or if the school took immediate action, but yet, they did nothing?? Would the school be remorseful if this kid's vision is permanently damaged due to their......words fail me to describe their attitude. Incompetence, laziness, non-chalant, tidak apa, stupidity...you take your pick.

Tainted milk. How did this happen?

How on earth can a substance, that is supposed to be used in the making of plastics find its way into milk powder? Who in their right minds would do that? How can anybody do such a thing so that the protein content in the milk powder appears higher than it actually is?

Being a Chinese myself, it is really a disgrace to read of such reports. The Chinese have been branded as unscrupulous and will stop at nothing to make a buck. And this just goes to add weight to that argument. We should never be prejudice and lump them all together. But just thinking of the number of sick babies out there.........Where is the humanity in all of this? Why are innocent children made to suffer???!!!!

Granted that life is tough and everything is very competitive, but knowingly tainting a product to appear as what it is not.....words really fail me. Time and time again, China has proved itself. Nothing changes. And at this point, there are still loads of finger pointing as to why this happened. That the authorities were not notified earlier. Consumers were already making complaints since December!! How much heads up do you need??!!! Want to know the main reason all of this happened? Only one. GREED!!!!

And the government is in full swing now, trying to clear up its mess by firing officials. I do wonder if these officials are fired because the did not do their job, or because these dismissed officers have information that could lead to the fall off people higher up in the food chain.

The Chinese Premier has said that he will mete out stiff penalties if such incidents were to happen again. Stiff? How stiff? Send them to prison? It's just prison time. Slap a hefty fine? They can pay their way out of it. Sending them to the firing squad is more like it.

Cultivating the reading habit

I know what we should cultivate the reading habit when still young. But what I saw on my way to work it utterly ridiculous.

A lady had her newspaper spread across her steering wheel while driving! And you can see her periodically looking down at her papers and then back at the road. I was driving beside her for quite sometime and she seem pretty engrossed. Wonder what juicy gossip she was reading. We are not in a jam where the car remains stationary for a long period of time. Her total disregard for her safety as well as other road users is really frustrating to say the least

Just a bunch of fakes!!!

What the hell's going on? First we had imitation handbags and watches. Then fake eggs. Now, China has done one better. They have fooled not only the thousands of people in the bird's nest, but also the millions of people watching the live telecast of the Olympic opening ceremony into thinking they were watching a little girl in red singing her very best. In actual fact what they were listening to was actually another girl, which they had deemed not pretty enough to appear on stage to sing. How demeaning is that?!

How did the parents of Yang Peiyi convinced her into doing it? What does it mean when the organizing committee said they wanted to portray the correct image? Is this the correct image that China wants to portray to the whole world, a country that will do anything at all cost to paint a false picture? What about the emotional impact you little Peiyi? Aren't her feelings equally as important?

Imagine being told by the whole country that you're just no pretty enough to appear on stage. Imagine how little Peiyi would feel when she watched the live telecast and hear herself singing but it was somebody else on stage.

The fact that the Chinese government is standing behind this decision is even more disgusting. But of course, one might say, what else is there for them to do? What is done is done. There have been many cases of lip sync, but the reason that this was done is totally unacceptable. She's never going to be good enough just because of the way she looks?? One of their own has been ostracised just because she had crooked teeth.

There's reports that Peiyi might be part of the closing ceremony. But what does that mean? Are the organizing committee doing this to be pardoned? To gain sympathy that what they did was in the nation's interest? And, should Peiyi even step on stage during closing? She has already been insulted once and this is just adding salt to the wound.

There were many hopefuls who went to audition for this particular role. And I am just curious, weren't they able to find somebody that they deemed pretty enough and could sing well enough? Rather than get somebody to lip sync. Why was the change last minute? Was there money involved? Somebody got his/her arm twisted?

My heart really goes out to this little girl.

High School Musical

My girls, have taken a liking to High School Musical. They like it so much that they wouldn't even let me touch the remote while they're watching it. I wanted to watch a live telecast on another channel. Wifey told me to just give up. :-P Nicole even tried to hide the remote from me. It's kinda amusing to see her be so captivated by this show, as she hums and tries to sing along to the songs. Daphne on the other had was happy to move and dance along with the tunes. :-)

I was very surprised when I saw my cousins children, who are older than my girls be so engrossed and captivated by this show. They had watched it over and over again, able to read out the actors/actresses line on cue. This was when part 2 had just been released. I had given them my copy of part 1 cause I didn't like it. Well, guess I'll have to buy part 1 & 2 for my kids now.

Hurray for Pocoyo!

There are 265 (and counting) sites talking about the recent fuel hike. So I believe there's a fair share of resources on how to get the your rebates or how much extra money the country has to spend on other more important stuff, like building multi million dollar buildings for municipal councils and alike. So...here's something to divert all the attention.

I'm quite a big fan of Pocoyo. Their cartoons are good for both the young and old alike. Check out the blog too. There's talks of an upcoming movie as well. That would be cool.

I bet if you looked at yourself while driving to work, especially on a Monday morning, you wouldn't look that much different compared to Sleepy Bird below. :-)

A poll for the most favourite character was carried out. No prizes for those who guessed Pocoyo won. Pato's the Donald Duck equivalent for the 21st century, albeit much more quiet.

Gender gander

Now I've seen it all. This is a screen capture from the registration page of a government website. I guess it speaks for itself.

Why I want to strangle somebody - Part 2

Bring it on!!! I'm facing problems left and right now. I'm moving into a new house soon (hopefully). And when I purchased the house, I was supposed to get upgraded tiles. But during the construction, I noticed that the tiles that they fitted were the lower grade ones. Damn. When I asked the contractor, they realised they made a slip up and will rectify the problem for me. When I asked one of them, when this will take place, he sarcastically replied 'Are you gonna move in now?'

So I was thinking, 'Fine. don't want to piss these people off as they are building my house.' So now, after getting the keys to my house, they promised me they will get it done soon. But after weeks of follow up, they have now called me and told me they will not be upgrading my tiles, but instead will reimburse me a portion of the costs to upgrade the tiles. I'm like 'OVER MY DEAD BODY!!!'

I told the developer to go back to the main con-man/tractor and tell him what I feel. I'm not going to pay an extra cent to get this done. They have even given me the option to get my own contractor to do it and they will pay for it. I asked 'When will I get the money to pay my contractor? Before the tiles are laid or after? What kind of reassurance do I get that the main con will pay me? '

It's good that I have all these terms and conditions in black and white on my contract, still have some leverage on them.

p/s: Sorry there's so much angst in my last 2 posts.

Why I want to strangle somebody - Part 1

HR. Human resource. The thought of them really makes me wanna puke. All they do is give you lousy excuses of why they are late in getting things done and asking you to sit tight as they twirl their pens and type some words on their keyboard and say that they've tried their best. Until I'm proven other wise, I don't really see what good that this so called department, that's full of directors, can do to improve or secure the well being of employees.

When the over pay you, it takes just a blink of an eye for them to deduct it from your next pay check. BUT....if they need to reimburse you, it takes ages and ages. There's so much procedure to follow, so much red tape, SO many people to blame for the mistake. Even when it was highlighted to them that there would be an issue if they proceeded as per their initial plan. Do they listen? NO!

Either I'm just unlucky or they're just out to get me. :-) They can even mix up my I/C number with my bank account number. Imagine that! Banking in my pay to a bank account with my I/C number! You don't have to be a rocket scientist to realise that the sequence of bank account number are WAY different from the I/C numbers.

Then when you change roles and your pay isn't reflected correctly, they say it's due to the system not being able to accommodate changes in between cycles...blah blah blah. And when it reaches the cut off date, AND it's not reflected correctly again, oppss...somebody missed it out!! And because the back end somehow is managed by somebody else in a different country, it will take 2 weeks to get it all sorted out. After 2 weeks, what happens??? NOTHING CHANGES!!!! What a bunch of incompetent bungling idiots!

And they even have the cheek to tell you to sit tight and wait as there's a lot of backlog to clear as I am not the only person effected by all this. SO?! Should I take comfort that I am not the only person that is being subjected to all this? Or should I be extremely worried that this multimillion dollar company cant get their books straight? For the record, I've been waiting since January to get this sorted but....sigh...

What happens to the money that's supposed to be deducted as part of my pay to go into EPF? What happens to the compounded interest as a result of that? Of course, I wont be a millionaire because of this, but it's still my entitlement, right? And don't get me started on lost opportunity cost. The management always wants the employee to feel secure/happy/part of the family/well take care of (you take your pick). But when such things happen time and time again, you begin to wonder, 'Do they really mean it?'.

Earth Hour

Want to do your part to save the environment, check out Earth Hour. I'll be the first to admit that I didn't realise there's such a big movement to conserve energy.

Check out earth-hour.blogspot too.

Double chicken special

"Bang. Bagi satu double chicken special, tak nak bawang, tak nak cili & tomato sos. Mayonnaise saja. Bagi garing skit. " Those in the know, will know what I'm rambling on about, the ramly burger.

A ramly burger with works will cost more than a burger you get at the golden arches. But man, they taste great and you get to 'customise' it exactly to your liking. But of course, there are some stall which are better than others.

When I see a ramly burger stall by the road side, I will always remember what my primary school teacher, Cikgu Putih, said once while reprimanding some kids for not doing their home work. 'Kalau tak rajin belajar nak buat apa? Lain kali buka gerai burger bawah pokok main gitar?' (If you're not going to study hard, next time you'll end up strumming your guitar at a burger stall which you open under a tree.) It was a bit harsh, but words that I remember till this day, not that I suddenly become extra hardworking.

I've seen a guy open a burger stall right outside his house, running it together with his wife, while his kids watch TV at home. The stall's not his main source of income as he works around my office during the day. He seems well to do and I can't link it to what my ex-teacher said bout burger stall owners. To me, he's just a regular guy who makes use of his extra time to get some extra cash.

Recently, while on a burger hunt, I found another stall. Been there once. It was not bad. Went there the 2nd time. Made my order as usual. This guy's pretty good, even wears a chef's hat. :-) When I reached home to enjoy my meal, I noticed that the plastic bag which the burger came in had some writing on it. Then, I noticed that this guy had written down his name and phone number so that you can call him to order your burgers. Talk about good customer service. Also, when I was making my order, I saw that he had already set aside about a dozen burger buns. I asked him do I need to wait long cause it seems that he has a larger order to fulfill. He said it was meant for a customer collecting later. Not bad.


Anyway....back to my burger. :-) The 2 patties are slightly crispy on the outside but juicy on the inside, just the way I like it. Wrapped in an omelet and topped off with a slice of cheese,mayo and greens. As you slowly savour each and every bite, the cheese slowly melts in your mouth and the distinctive taste of the burger patty accompanied by the infamous maggi seasoning sauce is absolutely to die for. Coupled with the extra mayo, it can get messy.You want to eat slowly so that it will last longer, but you just can't stop yourself from taking the next bite. Damn. It's so good! Oh well, there's always tomorrow. ;-)

Doesn't look like much, but it's really good. We're talking about a road side stall, not some posh restaurant. The white gooey looking thing is actually the melted cheese. Just took some random shots as I was in a hurry to dig in. :-)

Note to self: Need to improve on camera skills

Click!

Time for some random pics.

For all the DIY fans out there.

Couldn't they have made the buttons any bigger?

Capturing the moment

Starry eyed

There's light at the end

What the!?

I saw this on a HUGE billboard by the highway. It's actually a billboard for a restaurant. (I'll try to snap some pix soon). The establishment is trying to entice customers by using the phrase

What happen's here, stay's here.

As promised, picture of the offending billboard.

I mean, it's a restaurant not some sleaze joint. Guess the guy who came up with it liked the phrase, 'What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas'. He/she must be feeling very smug. Talk about punctuations. To further add salt to the wound, these billboards are cheap. We're talking like tens of thousands of ringgit a day!!

I feel like calling up the restaurant to get the contacts of the advertising agency. Then call up the agency and embarrass them for what they are worth. ;-)

My bro told me about this book titled, 'Eats, shoots and leaves', and we're talking about a panda. Want to know what's a panda, click here. Ladies and gentlemen, the comma, IS important. Punctuations are there for a reason, not decorations or so that you can catch your breath when you read a long sentence.

We always get forwarded mails showing horribly translated signage from other countries. But I think we don't have to look so far. We've got plenty right here at home. I'm no grammatical guru myself, far form it actually. But when in doubt, use spell check. It's there for a reason.

I'm back

Yes. I'm back. But I do wonder, if anybody notices my absence..hehehe. Things have been pretty hectic, with a new job and the process of selling my current house and getting the keys to my new house. It's been more than a year that I signed the papers to my new house, and will only be getting the keys to my house in a few days time. The standard answer that I got from the developer when asking for a date when I can get the keys were always 'Next week. Sure next week.' Weeks came. Months too. But..sigh. Now, FINALLY!!!!

Now, it's time to looks at the different designs for the house. With so many people willing to pry the hard earned money from our hands, it gets really overwhelming as to who to go with and also what design to use for the house. Different materials,different concepts, layouts and not to mention, the different costs.

With the increase in petrol price since a few years back, everything has increased in price as well. Most of the time, I think it's just a lousy excuse to over charge the customers. Anyway, my advise to would be new home owners, don't be rash and play hard to get. ;-)

Isn't it slightly inhumane?

I was watching a program called 'the F word' last night and chef Ramsey's well known for his short fuse. In this episode, he was going to slaughter some home bred turkeys, which his kids had raised as pets. And they were even given names of other chefs, people like Jamie and Nigella.

Before they turkeys were to be slaughtered, he brought his kids out to say goodbye to them and even gave the kids the option of which turkey to slaughter first. As he and the kids left, he said to the turkey, see you later in the oven. All this was done in a very nonchalant manner.

I was slightly disturbed, to say the least. I don't think it's just right for little kids to raise pets and then eat them. You shower pets with all sorts of affection but you certainly dont eat them.

Wouldn't kids, with their active imagination, think that they might one day suffer similar fate after being raised and cared for by their parents? I know it's a bit farfetched, but I just feel it's not the right thing to do.

English

Can you read these right the first time?

1) The bandage was wound around the wound.

2) The farm was used to produce produce ..

3) The dump was so full that it had to refuse more refuse.

4) We must polish the Polish furniture.

5) He could lead if he would get the lead out.

6) The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert.

7) Since there is no time like the present, he thought it was time to present the present.

8) A bass was painted on the head of the bass drum.

9) When shot at, the dove dove into the bushes.

10) I did not object to the object.

11) The insurance was invalid for the invalid.

12) There was a row among the oarsmen about how to row.

13) They were too close to the door to close it.

14) The buck does funny things when the does are present.

15) A seamstress and a sewer fell down into a sewer line.

16) To help with planting, the farmer taught his sow to sow.

17) The wind was too strong to wind the sail.

18) Upon seeing the tear in the painting I shed a tear.

19) I had to subject the subject to a series of tests.

20) How can I intimate this to my most intimate friend?

Let's face it - English is a crazy language. There is no egg in eggplant, nor ham in hamburger; neither apple nor pine in pineapple. English muffins weren't invented in England or French fries in France . Sweetmeats are candies while sweetbreads, which aren't sweet, are meat. We take English for granted. But if we explore its paradoxes, we find that quicksand can work slowly, boxing rings are square and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig.

And why is it that writers write but fingers don't fing, grocers don't groce and hammers don't ham? If the plural of tooth is teeth, why isn't the plural of booth, beeth? One goose, 2 geese. So one moose, 2 meese? One index, 2 indices? Doesn't it seem crazy that you can make amends but not one amend? If you have a bunch of odds and ends and get rid of all but one of them, what do you call it?

If teachers taught, why didn't preachers praught? If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat? Sometimes I think all the English speakers should be committed to an asylum for the verbally insane. In what langua ge do people recite at a play and play at a recital? Ship by truck and send cargo by ship? Have noses that run and feet that smell?

How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites? You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language in which your house can burn up as it burns down, in which you fill in a form by filling it out and in which, an alarm goes off by going on.

English was invented by people, not computers, and it reflects the creativity of the human race, which, of course, is not a race at all. That is why, when the stars are out, they are visible, but when the lights are out, they are invisible.

PS. - Why doesn't "Buick" rhyme with "quick"

You lovers of the English language might enjoy this .

There is a two-letter word that perhapshas more meanings than any other two-letter word, and that is "UP."

It's easy to understand UP , meaning toward the sky or at the top of the list, but when we awaken in the morning, why do we wake UP? At a meeting, why does a topic come UP ? Why do we speak UP and why are the officers UP for election and why is it UP to the secretary to write UP a report ?

We call UP our friends. And we use it to brighten UP a room, polish UP the silver, we warm UP the leftovers and clean UP the kitchen. We lock UP the house and some guys fix UP the old car. At other times the little word has real special meaning. People stir UP trouble, line UP for tickets, work UP an appetite, and think UP excuses. To be dressed is one thing but to be dressed UP is special.

And this UP is confusing: A drain must be opened UP because it is stopped UP . We open UP a store in the morning but we close it UP at night.

We seem to be pretty mixed UP about UP ! To be knowledgeable about the proper uses of UP , look the word UP in the dictionary. In a desk-sized dictionary, it takes UP almost 1/4th of the page and can add UP to about thirty definitions. If you are UP to it, you might try building UP a list of the many ways UP is used. It will take UP a lot of your time, but if you don't give UP , you may wind UP with a hundred or more. When it threatens to rain, we say it is clouding UP . When the sun comes out we say it is clearing UP.

When it rains, it wets the earth and often messes things UP.

When it doesn't rain for awhile, things dry UP.

One could go on and on, but I'll wrap it UP , for now my time is UP , so............ Time to shut UP!!!

Can you spot it?

Spotted at an optical shop. Must be a new trend.

hmmm....wonder what awaits the unsuspecting recepient

Welcome 2008

It’s been quite awhile and but Happy New Year anyways...hehehhe…wish the break was longer though. Yes…yes…I’m greedy…but then, who isn’t? Anyway, went up to Genting Highlands for a couple of days during the break. The kids really enjoyed the rides…but take my advise, don’t be a hero, 2 days just ain’t enough if you wanna go on all the rides.

We arrived quite late actually, at bout 4pm. During the journey to the top, the kids had already spotted the cable car and it was the first ‘ride’ we went on. RM10 for 2 adults 2 ways is pretty reasonable as it's quite a long journey.

As for the theme park rides, I was told by a friend that you can get a daily indoor & outdoor pass for 2 adults for bout RM70+. That's very cheap considering I paid RM90 for a indoor family package on day 1 and RM76 for 2 adult fares for the outdoor park on day 2.

As expected, the weather's very cooling and a nice change to the swealthering heat.

Some pix taken with my new toy..hehehe

Sunset from cable car

Indoor theme park

View from ferris wheel in outdoor them park

Fully charged

From personal experience....Always make sure that your handphone has juice in it. Why? So that you can call somebody to come rescue you when your car breaks down. Don't take things for granted. At minimum, have a car charger.