Saturday, May 30, 2009

Adamantium, Anyone?

*This is a much delayed post

Some of them at work refer to one of our colleagues as Wolverine (not because he looks like Hugh Jackman - otherwise you'd be having the ladies fainting every few seconds but because he seems to be having sideburns that look so much like Wolverine's)

I took the opportunity of the long Labour Day weekend to watch the movie; X-Men Origins: Wolverine. Yes, in case you're looking at your calendars and scratching your heads, that was on 1st May. Now, admittedly, I'm not much of a movie person, having the kind of attention span that I do, but occasionally, I do catch a movie here and there and enjoy it.

The movie started off easy enough, we were introduced to the beginning of the life of Wolverine before he became officially known as Wolverine. His childhood, his roles in the different wars through the ages alongside Victor Creed. Along the way, due to their indestructible nature, they're employed by the 'Government' for some secret projects, which I feel is the turning point of the story, because Wolverine (or Logan, as he was known then) opts out and his own story begins.

Over the 107 minutes, we get a glimpse of Logan's alternative life as a Canadian lumberjack, and how the single event of an important person to him being murdered sets him out to seek revenge, which in turn leads him to fall into the clutches of a certain William Stryker and makes him into what he is in the following X-Men movies.

Being what I'd call a moderate fan of action movies, I found the explosions teribbly exciting, and watched some of the fights in nail biting anticipation. It was interesting to note how Wolverine's claws turned to what they are now, and why he has no memories whatsoever. What I found particularly endearing was somewhere towards the end, when Victor Creed saves Wolverine from Weapon XI and says... "Nobody gets to kill you but me" So much for brotherly love! I was also amazed (but glad) that the Malaysian censorship board seemed to have overlooked certain parts (Wolverine's ass, for one)

I thought the movie was pretty enjoyable.... I know I did enjoy it, although I found the dialogue somewhat cheesy.

Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Vicious Haikus

Old man dies on hope,
Eyes gauged out, strangled silly,
All rejoice inside.


A kick in the ass,
With a football boot, no less,
The footprint stays on.

Edited version
A kick in the ass,
With a football boot, no less,
The *studmarks stay on.


Red blood on the floor,
Mystery killer around,
Smothered Gollum at the door.

Too much rage and not enough time. I will be back.

* An alternative suggestion

Monday, May 25, 2009

Of Geeky Smiles and Procrastination

There should be a category in any award giving ceremony especially for procrastinators. That way, I can achieve
a) Immediate (but somewhat reluctant) fame
b) Some cool prizes
c) Meet other famous people

About a year ago, I had blogged about some wisdom tooth issues that have been plaguing me for as long as I can remember, but certain events led to making the task of getting it removed similar to the act of pushing a (very stubborn elephant) up the stairs. Allow me to explain...

It would have began in July 2007. I had gone to a dentist to have my teeth checked, which is a usual thing to do. The only unusual thing about it is that I had neglected doing so since I was in my teens. Nevertheless, no problems were found, except that the dentist had informed me that my teeth was all compacted at the back! Now, she could have recommended an orthodontist for me to visit, but she didn't, instead she asked me to check with my HR to see which clinics were available. The lady at HR instead told me too look one for myself. I got a number from one of my aunts, and while I attempted to make an appointment with the orthodontist, I had to deal with his receptionist/secretary/slave/goodness knows where she put her brain moron. Now if this woman either refused to understand my simple request of fixing an appointment, or really couldn't understand me is beyond my knowledge, but suffice to say that she couldn't get me an appointment and I met with a dead end. And with this being sent to run in circles until I met a dead end in view, I never got my wisdom teeth extracted.

Fast forward to nearly two years later, the pain caused by the wisdom teeth inching their way up in my over-crowded mouth has ceased, leaving me with only with a somewhat geeky smile, which I noticed was very obvious in a rather recent photo. A slight push from my mom, and another phone number of a different orthodontist saw me going through yet another attempt at getting an appointment, at least for consultation. Once again I was met by a moronic woman who couldn't seem to understand that all I want is a consultation. She takes my phone number and never calls back. And so I wonder, is it just my luck or is it a default situation whereby moronic receptionists are only hired by orthodontists? (A better way to ask the question would be: "Do all orthodontists hire moronic receptionists?") Nevertheless, I try again (after some pestering from mom) and finally get the lady to fix an appointment for me (which is somewhere in mid June!!) after a week of negotiations.

Friday, May 22, 2009

Laugh! It's Friday...

I'm not feeling creative enough to come up with a proper post of my own, so I'll leave you with something I got via e-mail. It made me laugh, and was begging to be shared. It's titled What if God has Facebook.







Click to enlarge if you're not easily offended.
PS: If you're religious, please note that this post is not meant to offend anyone or any religion for that matter.

Tuesday, May 19, 2009

Shouldn't Have Bothered, Really.

Alarm bells should have sounded some warning this morning, preferably with those flashy red lights that make you believe that you were stuck in some *seedy disco from the past.

I suppose I could say it all began with a certain degree of reluctance to wake up (on my part), I could hear my brain protesting... "we need to sleep" it said. I ignored the protests and trudged on with my morning routine despite yet another protest from my tummy, which had a strange sort of pain. I could have listened to Chiquita's radiator as well, when it said that there was a problem. Possibly minor... but no. I didn't listen.

So that is how I, upon insisting on leaving the house anyway, ended up reaching the workplace late because there was a bloody accident halfway through the journey. There was no blood, though, but broken glass everywhere and ogling onlookers, and a terribly damaged car. It would have been alright if I was respectably late (for instance if I was 15 minutes late or more, but instead, I was only four minutes late, which seems pretty pathetic)

I really shouldn't have bothered. Should have let the brain get it's rest, done something for the tummy and checked out if the radiator needed any help. Oh well.

*I really have no idea how a seedy disco looks like, it just sounds fitting into that sentence.

Monday, May 18, 2009

One Red Light


It was a slow and boring drive to work this morning, despite the fact that I'm not particularly susceptible to the ubiquitous existence of the Monday blues. Now, my daily commute involves a slightly long wait (3 to 4 minutes only, actually... but in the mornings that is a rather long wait) at a particular traffic light, thanks to the overwhelming number of cars that need to use that particular intersection to get to their respective destinations. The placement of a traffic police personnel there has improved conditions beyond belief the past few months, but still, the wait (sometimes short, and sometimes long) is always inevitable.

This morning while I was *applying lotion on my hands while awaiting my turn to move, I came up with a list of things that I have possibly done throughout while **waiting for the lights to change colour

1. Look at cloud formations and create conversations for them
2. Watch people head bang (quite a rarity, though), or head bang myself!
3. Look into the rear view mirror to unnerve the person behind you. People have done this one to me before (mentioned by sis)
4. Comb my hair
5. Clean the specs
6. Put lotion on hands
7. Eat breakfast (chocolate milk from the tetra pack is the safest)
8. Compose a blog post in my head (or paper, if available and so desired)
9. Read (doesn't always work though)
10. Stare at the sign, attempt to influence it to change sooner/or have the traffic policeman change directions of the traffic flow
11. Fold shirt sleeves until a comfortable level, just slightly below the elbows.

That is all I got in my 3 minutes there. What would you do at traffic light stops?

* Yes, I happen to have a small bottle of lotion lying on my dashboard at all times. There was once even a bottle of contact lens solution (for emergencies) until about a week ago which I threw out because it had unfortunately dried out/evaporated
** Note the word 'waiting'

A Tale of the Runaway Crows and a Badminton Net

This is a scenario we don't often encounter that I just have to share it because the whole thing seemed to be very funny at that time.

Despite having all windows closed, a wonderfully advanced ventilation system, and dust prevention methods using double doors (one remains closed while the other one opens) and the amazing contraption that is known as an air shower, two runaway crows (wingspan at least 12 inches/30 cm across) have managed to weasel their way in and and are now flying around the factory on the first floor area. A badminton net is fixed upon one corner to trap them, and three maintanence staff are assigned to catch those crows before anything terrible happens to either the crows or to the people who are working in that area.

It looks like a hopeless situation, though... the crows are still flying and are going nowhere near the net, they're also avoiding the windows that were thrown open just for them (perhaps they are traumatised by their previous encounter with the windows that would have sent them flying backwards for a bit)

How do you tell a crow that you want to help it get out safely and not hurt it?

Update: The crows have finally been caught and left where they belong. We apparently had to get in a crow expert (and I bet you never guessed they existed), and the whole maintenance team. From where I was, it sounded like cheers and jeers during a particularly exciting football match!

Friday, May 15, 2009

Of Jostling Crowds

Otherwise known as "Mommy's gonna kill me"

It probably was an unwise thing to do to make a decision out of the blue like that. I couldn't sit still the whole of yesterday, maybe it was the breakfast I took, and it got worse as the day wore on towards the evening. I needed to run (away from the workplace - not run as in run) So run I did, and where else could I run to but the gym?

Now, a design fault of the gym I go to is that it sits in a building that houses a shopping mall. A big one at that, and of all things I failed to realise is that they were having a member's day sale yesterday. I sort of knew something was up upon seeing the jam, but it only hit me much later that they had sent a text message mentioning the sale and providing a number to call for enquiries, but me being me, I had just read it, and put the phone back into my pocket.

A peek into the mall showed unimaginable crowds pushing their way with trolleys and children in pyjamas tottering about. I walked outside and came across a car idling in one of the parking bays. A harassed looking man was sleeping inside the car. I thought it was funny. I bet the rest of his family were inside - shopping.

The gym was rather empty (which was good for me, because I would otherwise have to wait in turn to use the equipment as is often the case) and about one and half hours later I decided to get back home. On my way out, a woman almost killed me with her shopping cart (the crazy woman actually tried bringing it down using the escalator instead of the elevator!) which then left me a bit disoriented that I attempted leaving the building from the first floor instead of the ground floor. "Hey where are the exits?" So I got stuck in the jostling crowd and had to weave my way out. I saw them with slips of pink paper lining up in aisles, shouting at their kids, their carts full. It was madness. I even managed to think for a moment if the economy was really that bad for a sale to be held at such an extent.

I managed to escape in one piece at the end and thought to myself about how I need to remember these things. Always pay attention to what those text messages say. It will save you from being stuck in crowds and being traumatised forever!

Scraps of Honesty - part II

1. I had a pet goldfish once, called Blondie (after the band) It used to swim without a care in the world in one of those small bowls until it suddenly died one day. This upset me terribly that I buried it in our front yard.
Answer: False. I never had a pet.

2. When I was much younger I used to spend all my time not doing anything else with a book. Even while walking. This has caused a couple of twisted ankle incidents due to encounters with drains.
Answer: True.

3. When we were kids, my sister and I used to play 'civilisation' type games in our front yard (backyards were a no go zone due to it's tendency to attract snakes) with stones, sticks and self made flags.
Answer: True

4. In August of last year, I had gone for a team building training in the jungle. However, I had twisted my ankle even before entering the jungle. Nevertheless, I was determined to complete the training, so armed with painkillers and a good bandage I entered the jungle, fed by adrenaline. When I came back later, my ankle was so badly hurt that I had to walk with a cane for two weeks!
Answer: False. Everything else happened, except for the part about walking with a cane.

5. I'm actually very, very afraid of water. I wouldn't call it hydrophobia, but I'd rather not enter water if I had a choice. I even believe that it is possible to drown in a bathtub!
Answer: True

6. I am an unbelievably organised person. I alphabetize my CDs and books and keep everything very neat everywhere I go. Even my wardrobe is colour coded.
Answer: False. Me organised? Pigs will fly - and not in airplanes!

7. During my school days, I was very active in sports. In fact, I was the captain of the table tennis team, played softball, volleyball, and was a champion javelin thrower. Alas, I have totally sworn off sports these days.
Answer: False. I played sports only for fun, which included a bit of table tennis, and was forced to represent my sports house for javelin throwing. Never touched softball, and only liked watching people play volleyball!

8. I usually eat with my hands at home, but for some reason I cannot explain, I need to use cutlery when I eat outside, regardless if it is the same type of food that I eat at home.
Answer: True.

9. There's this weird thing about me, whereby I always need to park in the same spot each time I go to a certain place, or shower in the same cubicle each time I hit the gym showers. I find it hard to explain why this is, but I somehow feel that something is wrong if I don't get to do so.
Answer:True. Parking spots may be a bit tricky at times due to other people using them, but at work, I particularly like spot #42, 43 or 50.

10. Being an only child for almost 5 years, I had always wanted a brother, so when my sister was born and was old enough to understand, I 'introduced' her to my imaginary older brother!
Answer: False. It was an older sister I wished for, and it was an imaginary older sister I created.

Wednesday, May 13, 2009

Scraps of Honesty


If someone asks you to state 10 facts about yourself, what would you say? Right at the top of my head are, I'm female, 29 (gasp!!) years old, with bad eyesight who likes to read a lot and suffers from self diagnosed insomnia which may be the result of my addiction to coffee. There's 6 facts right in that sentence itself. I could continue but I won't.

I was tagged by Ricardo awhile ago for this particular meme where I'm supposed to state 10 things about myself, but lets face it... throughout the years, I've done lists of this sort, from the 6 weird things about me, and it's sister version of 9 weird things about me and most recently, 25 random facts about me. That 25 random facts took me 3 days to compile - of course not 3 whole days, but you get the picture. Is there anything else left to say? I don't know...

For that reason, I've decided to modify the meme... I'm going to list 10 items, but only 5 of them are true and another 5 are either exaggerations, or downright nonsense, and I figured the best way to make this fun, is to have you who are reading this to guess which are true and which are not.

1. I had a pet goldfish once, called Blondie (after the band) It used to swim without a care in the world in one of those small bowls until it suddenly died one day. This upset me terribly that I buried it in our front yard.

2. When I was much younger I used to spend all my time not doing anything else with a book. Even while walking. This has caused a couple of twisted ankle incidents due to encounters with drains.

3. When we were kids, my sister and I used to play 'civilisation' type games in our front yard (backyards were a no go zone due to it's tendency to attract snakes) with stones, sticks and self made flags.

4. In August of last year, I had gone for a team building training in the jungle. However, I had twisted my ankle even before entering the jungle. Nevertheless, I was determined to complete the training, so armed with painkillers and a good bandage I entered the jungle, fed by adrenaline. When I came back later, my ankle was so badly hurt that I had to walk with a cane for two weeks!

5. I'm actually very, very afraid of water. I wouldn't call it hydrophobia, but I'd rather not enter water if I had a choice. I even believe that it is possible to drown in a bathtub!

6. I am an unbelievably organised person. I alphabetize my CDs and books and keep everything very neat everywhere I go. Even my wardrobe is colour coded.

7. During my school days, I was very active in sports. In fact, I was the captain of the table tennis team, played softball, volleyball, and was a champion javelin thrower. Alas, I have totally sworn off sports these days.

8. I usually eat with my hands at home, but for some reason I cannot explain, I need to use cutlery when I eat outside, regardless if it is the same type of food that I eat at home.

9. There's this weird thing about me, whereby I always need to park in the same spot each time I go to a certain place, or shower in the same cubicle each time I hit the gym showers. I find it hard to explain why this is, but I somehow feel that something is wrong if I don't get to do so.

10. Being an only child for almost 5 years, I had always wanted a brother, so when my sister was born and was old enough to undertand, I 'introduced' her to my imaginary older brother!

Monday, May 11, 2009

Sunday, Bloody Sunday

First there was a croak. Unlike a frog's of course, because it came from her. She took her blanket, covered her head and went back to sleep. In her head, she thought. I'm not going to work. Not on Sunday... she will wake up extra early to sneak in an hour's worth of work on Monday!

Sunday: Mother's Day.

It started well enough, only to have an adequate amount of crazy thrown in by the afternoon. And not the nice kind of crazy, but the cruel, wicked kind. My sister and I had gone to get our 'new' broadband connection (yes, my internet problems have not been fully solved since September last year!!), only to be told to come back at 5pm because they had run out of stock for the modems. I wanted to forgo the whole thing but my sister insisted that we come back later that evening! The thing is we were supposed to go in one big jim bang for some Mother's Day dinner (which was supposed to actually be Mother's Day lunch at first but thanks to people who don't pay attention, reservations were made for dinner instead!!) And then we tried to get mom something else (we had previously given the parents a massager seeing that they're old and all and it was supposed to be an all in one present for them - birthdays, Mother's Day, Father's Day and wedding anniversary all encompassed into one) which we were to find out later didn't fit her as we thought it would. Bummer.

A mad dash later, and we are home, only to go through the process of getting ready to go out again. More mad dashes and the new modem and a few freebies are in our hands. One more mad dash towards the highway. We're supposed to meet *Uncle Paul after the first toll because:

a) I've never been to the place we are going
b) My hopeless sense of direction
c) We couldn't find a proper road map there!

As we are leaving after the first toll, Uncle Paul tells me. " You just follow behind me, Terra. I'll drive slowly" I nod my head, but think that if Uncle Paul drives any slower than he usually does, I'll definitely get bored on the road!

So we finally reach the place where we're supposed to eat. The reservation for 17 people (really? that many?!!) was split into two tables. We were fine with the seating, where the plan was the 7 kids (including yours truly - a female peter pan in the making) and my mom would be on one table (dad wasn't around) and the adults will be on another table. But then comes another uncle, swoops in maniacally at the person who arranged our tables and forces her to give us one long rectangular table right now. He was incredibly rude at them. I've had a few friends who used to bartend back then, and rude customers were sometimes given flavour enhancers in the form of spit or urine. Who knows what our food would have been laced with after that?

The scared folks in the restaurant gather a few tables and give us a new table. Broken hearted, we leave our cool 'young and hip' people's table and join the rest of the group at the 'long and boring' rectangular table. What happened after that was a series of disasters. No one could really communicate with anyone, because it was right in the middle of the restaurant, and the space being limited and all, one particular waiter kept having disasters. At one point, he accidentally poured some hot soup which not only scalded his hands, but also scalded a customer who was sitting near us! And people at her table started yelling at him and were being so rude. It was horrible. They can be angry, yeah, no doubt, but to yell at the waiter that way in front of everyone was just plain ugly. And apparently maniacal uncle himself decided to make a scene (about what, I don't know exactly because I wasn't paying attention, and I was also trying to ignore the fact that we were related (thankfully only through him marrying my aunt!))

But seriously, perhaps due to the overwhelming crowd, although the food was pretty good, their service was less than desirable. My request for plain water was ignored that I had to drink my sister's water!! See, problems can be solved without making a scene!!

Anyway, thankfully it was all over around 9 pm. We went back to our respective homes.

With a new modem in our clutches, we decide to install it into our respective laptops. It installs fine, but we're unable to connect. A call to their 24 hour customer service does not help although I was on the phone with the customer service guy for about an hour. I mean, I understand if the modem can't connect on one computer, but it's inability to connect to two separate computers? It was the most frustrating thing ever!! And right before I go to bed, I feel the sorethroat from Friday morning creeping back. As much as I scout around the house (this was almost 2 am after the frustrating attempt with the modem) I can't seem to find my packet of Fisherman's Friend. So I just drink water and hope that it doesn't get worse by the morning. I wonder how can a day turn so particularly awful!

I wake up early this morning with a swollen lip ( allergy?) And I also find out that my neat freak cleanaholic of a mom had put my packet of fisherman's friend into my gym bag! Of all places! Tonight I have the task of rectifying the problem with the modem. Wish me luck!!


*Nickname given by my dad

Wednesday, May 06, 2009

A Haiku

Empty screen staring,
I pause to yell come back here
Muse has gone missing

Friday, May 01, 2009

Sunday Afternoon Happenings


It was an ordinary Sunday. Almost lazy-ish, the temperature reaching oven-like proportions and well... just an ordinary Sunday.

We had just walked out of the gym, my sister and I, and were looking for a place to get shoes, talking about nothing in particular as usual. She needed a new pair seeing that her old one had long passed it's expiry date. As we were walking, I passed by someone from work, and since everyone knows everyone, we acknowledged each others existence with a nod, smile and the usual greeting of "oh, hi!".

Hardly a few steps were taken before my sister blurted out somewhat excitedly

Sister: Who's that?
Me: Someone I work with
Sister: Did you see how hot he is?
Me: What?
Sister: I spotted him from afar and was going to point him out to you and suddenly you're smiling at him. He looks like Sawyer (from LOST) ... the hair, the dressing, the swagger.

At that moment, there was nothing I could do but laugh... funny how I never noticed it before. He did look much better outside than he does at work, but that's a common occurrence with everyone at work.

Now what bugs me the most about this is although this happened about two weeks ago, I still find myself unable to look at this guy at his face (which I have to since we also work in the same department and need to communicate regularly) without having the urge to burst out laughing.

Edit: The sister says he does NOT look like Sawyer, but REMINDS her of Sawyer.

IT's THAT TIME OF YEAR AGAIN

Time for the Annual Appraisal again.  It's a cloudy Sunday afternoon, and I had just finished giving scores to my subordinates on their ...