RACONTEUR-ESQUE SCRIBBLINGS

Some time ago, there was this episode on "How I Met Your Mother" in which all the characters were trying to quit smoking. Watching that episode (and comparing it with some much older movies/literature) it finally hit me how people's opinion on smoking and smokers have changed. What used to be normal way back is now viewed with some disdain.  How else do you explain smokers being given a smoking bay where so many of them sit in cramped up spaces to get their fix AND inhale secondary smoke from their fellow smokers, or even while I was in Japan, where it seemed as though everyone smoked, they were forced to smoke in small groups at little ashtrays by the kerb - hardly a sociable activity, or in some areas, they stood in alleyways behind tall buildings in their nice clothes, smoking mournfully in the cold.  The other day, the papers had a piece on new rules for cigarette manufacturers in terms of packaging size and pricing (among the methods employed to reduce young ...

About two months ago, I went ahead and did something quite crazy. I signed up for a local 5.5 km run through the social and sports club of my workplace. Now while running itself is not usually associated with being crazy, for me it was because I used to detest running while I was young and in school. I dreaded the yearly cross country event we had to take part in and would walk the whole 1.5 km and pretend I conquered the world at the end of it. I never had the stamina nor the interest to run for the sake of running (I didn't mind running around while playing hockey though) I was also always prone to my sides aching after putting in some effort in running. So, it was a BIG thing for me to sign up for this run, which was a competition, and definitely would have real runners competing as well. I immediately started focusing on running in the gym. I tried building stamina by running for as long as I could. The first day, I jogged for about 15 minutes, brisk walked for about 5 min...

There was once a girl who thought she was turning reclusive So she went ahead and did something quite impulsive She signed up for a run Because she figured it would be fun But now she thinks she may be becoming obsessive!

Someone has gone and copied one of the most versatile food ingredient - the humble, but absolutely awesome chicken egg. You give them a peek at your design, and *3 days later you see a copycat in the market, mass produced and sold at *98% cheaper than you ever meant it to be. They add melamine and nitrates into milk to kill children. They rocked the Olympics opening ceremony when they had the chance, though. And now, eggs... A few days ago, a housewife brought some eggs to the consumer association after finding something quite amiss with them while cooking, and they were found to be fakes. Now the **whole country is quite worried if they had accidentally consumed the fake eggs (allegedly made of chemicals) without noticing it. I know for a fact that I might probably dismiss the fact that the egg didn't smell like an egg, or had the wrong consistency as just a 'batch problem' if I wasn't aware of the fake eggs story. Who would even think of such a thing as a fake egg? ...

I stupidly went and sprained my ankle all over again, and it's all because I was trying to maneouver a 15 kg bag down some steps of a bus. Actually it happened too quickly for me to realise what had actually happened. All I knew was one minute I was walking down the steps, and the next had me doubled up in pain on the curb, head bent down while I held my ankle and took in a long deep breath. Now, I'll leave the details of my injury to your imagination or perhaps to a later post. All I'll say is that my left foot has swollen to scary proportions, shows no sign of improvement and looks like it doesn't belong to me, but to the Michelin Man instead.  A reluctant visit to the doctor last night left me extremely frustrated - as all she did was give me a referral letter to get my foot X-rayed after she did the 'push against my hand' test (which I passed with flying colours, or so I think based on the fact that I could bend my foot to push her palm - and on my own, I...

Again. You learn new stuff every day. Today's lesson is, do not procrastinate, even if the reason for your procrastination is the fact that the receptionist called to cancel your appointment with the dental surgeon at the last minute. That was more than a year ago. The past two weeks saw a strange kind of pain in my right lower jaw, and because my not so big mouth was fully of healthy giant teeth (Take A from mommy, and B from daddy and voila, here's the result - even if part A and B don't necessarily match) I couldn't see what was going on at the back of my mouth. I knew I bit into something hard just before the pain started and dad reckoned I had cracked my tooth! I went to the dentist earlier today, and this time the dentist explained what was going on in my mouth. Apparently, I DO have very big teeth (all the better to eat you with!!) and a not so big jaw, which led to the wisdom tooth being impacted in such a way it had decided to drill a hole in a formerly hea...

It was a surreal moment. I could feel myself suppressing laughter as he pushed the tip of my nose up to peer into my nostrils with the aid of the torchlight. I had to make a visit to the doctor again this afternoon due to what I can only refer to as side effects of the flu that attacked me over three weeks ago, not to mention the few social invitations I had to decline, including one for tea just this afternoon with two friends I haven't seen in awhile and probably will not see in a long time because they are both being relocated out of the country! The thing is, far from getting better in time as Leona Lewis emphasizes in her song that goes with the same title, the everlasting cough seems to have hurt my ribs to the point that tears freely poured out just the other day when I had run out of my supply of fisherman's friend and started having a fitful, uncontrollable coughing marathon (I've also been taking the cough medicine prescribed by the doctor and several traditio...

This is the second week running that I have been 'offline' at nights, and I blame it all on the flu, which has now ceased being the flu, but has extended into a coughing marathon. The right side of my ribcage hurts so much now... all I gotta do is just wait for the left side of the ribcage to hurt for another 3 days or so, and then it will be the end of this current bout of sickness. I suppose the fact that practically everyone at work being sick too hasn't helped much. Self-imposed exile to the confines of the house worked over the weekend, but by Monday evening, it all got worse. I'm currently on the 4th packet of Fisherman's Friend (I bought the last packet at the convenience store at the petrol station this morning, so you can imagine the number of people out there who may be carrying a packet or two in their pockets now) Ugh...

It must be a sorry state my body is in right now. Even after 3 weeks since the declaration of the attack of the flu bug, I have not recovered. Fully. It is without doubt the sniffles have long seen their day, but the cough remains and as the days go by it seems to get only worse despite the packets of Fisherman's Friends I finished as well as my attempts to take my weekend medicine (the medication is unfortunately too strong to be taken on weekdays - read workdays because I'm left in a state of delirium which can cause nasty accidents involving staircases) And to combat this I should have done what any normal sick person would have done... take a few days off, take medication and lie quietly in bed until they totally recover. But not me. Not 'macho' Terra. She had to go to work. Let the flu fight itself.... like it always does without considering for one single moment that her workplace could be the one with potential hazard. It's swarming with chemical molecule...

Way back when my friends and I were young and silly (not that we're not silly anymore, we're just not that young anymore), a conversation of this sort took place: C: I'm so sleepy I could sleep standing up! M: Are you a horse? Now, I brought up this old conversation because I've only had an average of perhaps 2 hours of sleep a day since Sunday. I could indeed sleep standing up (falling over will occur afterwards) if it weren't for me reverting back (albeit temporarily) to my morning coffee, which admittedly has helped me go through the day, but when it comes to night, and the moment my head hits the pillow, violent coughing ensues. I think it is physically impossible to sleep while coughing, (or is it cough while sleeping?) just like how you can't breathe and swallow at the same time. The point is, lying down causes the cough to start, and the coughing makes sleeping impossible. I so wish I was a horse right now. On another note, I finally made the vi...

So, the single annual influenza attack seems to have launched itself full force on me... What I originally imagined to be sneezes due to some extra dusty encounters (after all it is incredibly dusty out there even with the rains) prolonged into even more sneezy attacks which then led to a hacking cough on Friday which I suppose wasn't helped much by the fact that we had our bi-annual stock count that day... more dusty encounters! Saturday saw me fighting a sore throat and the emergence of the sniffles. Due to my lack of sleep on Friday night (because of the cough which was really, really bad), I skipped gym just to lounge around at home, reading and battling a new addiction (a game)... It's Sunday night... the sniffles continue, and so does the coughing and sneezing fits. I might have run out of 'gesundheits'! to cover all that violent sneezing. I'm just waiting for the fever to arrive so that I can go and see the doctor (hopefully only once) for some medication.

A conversation from September 2006 HK: NK, how are your eyes now? Nan: Didn't you ask him the same question the last time you met? (May 2005) NK: They're Ok now. But the astig(matism) is still there. How's yours? HK: (To Nan) We underwent the same procedure, of course I have to know the latest news. (To NK) Mine's still dry. NK: Still using the drops? HK: Of course. I need the fake tears. I just guess there's not enough tears in my eyes.... (said in a slow, melancholic tone) (During this conversation, the others kept quiet, not having undergone laser treatment. I wear glasses (mostly), Nan uses contact lenses, and SLL has near perfect eyesight) So, here's what I heard - laser ops should only be done after 30, because apparently before that, your eyes are not mature enough . I'm still about a year and a bit away from that, so at the moment, I wear glasses to work (because our environment is filled with chemicals and stuff), and contact lenses...

It's cold. It's been cold for the past few days and it's an odd feeling saying how cold it is seeing that I'm here, in a country that is 'hot and humid' according to geography lessons from the yesteryears. Nevertheless it is still cold, and my fingers really, really don't like it. Anyway, it was last Friday I think when I noticed an increased occurence of goose bumps caused by involuntary shivering. And it takes a few minutes of heating my hands together so that they're warm enough to put the bumps back where they belong. I was in an air-conditioned place when it first started, so I thought it was because it was cold, but it didn't stop there. Throughout the week, I'd be doing something I normally do, and the next thing I know I'm all in shivers even when everyone else is not. My mom thought I might be having some sort of internal fever and told me to see a doctor. But then again, how do you tell a doctor that you think you might be havin...

With the left side of my face swollen with impending wisdom (although admittedly I don't see it coming at all), I am once again regretting my non-action on the growth of the wisdom teeth that seem to dominate my life and cause an unending suffering. That is until I take the bull by the horns, or in simpler terms, get my mouth examined by a different dentist who will just bloody well give me an appointment date to have them extracted, and after a serious amount of pain and perhaps lots of blood, I will stop looking as though I had dislocated my jaw. It was almost a year ago (short by a month or so) when I visited the dentist last. She told me that my teeth was 'impacted'? (I'm not really sure, because it is rather hard to communicate when you've got all those tingly cold instruments in your mouth - if I can't talk, I can't get what the other person is saying either!) Alas! She said that she could not remove them and asked me to refer to a proper orthodont...

"Hey where are your glasses? Can you see? Tell me, how many fingers are there?" they ask, while shoving their stupid fingers right at your face.That question used to irritate the hell of out me. The thing is, nothing much has changed and questions of that sort still irritate me. The only difference is, the people whom I hang out with these days don't ask questions like that anymore, unless they fancy themselves being the New Age Peter Pan who couldn't fly! I can't see well without some aid in the form of glasses (or contact lenses), I wouldn't be able to see if you had 1 strand of grey hair in that mass of black. Your skin looks flawless when I don't wear my glasses. Instead of a single light bulb, I get to see about 5 without the glasses (astigmatism!) And I wouldn't be able to say if your nose is slightly off centre from like say 20 metres away. Other than that, I see you, and your fingers as well! So, after a few months of procrastination, I ...

It was ages ago when I watched my grandfather with wide eyed fascination as he fed the fish in my uncle's aquarium. A tiny live prawn had escaped from the bag he was holding and lay squirming on the floor by the aquarium, twitching in what I assumed to be in pain as it could not breathe. That was also the day that I found out why he never liked eating prawns (well, come to think of it, not really, either because he referred to the squirming prawn as he said "that's why I don't eat them", and I don't seem to be able to connect the dots... perhaps there were not enough dots to begin with) Anyway, I've always thought that prawns were delicious regardless of cooking method (although I did have a slight aversion towards the curried version) Nevertheless as I grew older (in my twenties) I started noticing that I almost always had to run to the bathroom to throw up within half an hour of eating prawns. And then one day about two years ago, I ended up looking ...

Oh! What is pain? When it appears again and again, All I can do is complain! (That's an almost haiku by the way as it doesn't fit into the 5, 7, 5 rule) Oh well, the hip is at it again. This time around, it's the left hip that groans in protest at any sign of movement. About two weeks before that it was the right hip that was in pain. This continuous cycle of pain in the hip is driving me insane. Fine, I know I have to walk a lot (about a few kilometres) each day at work, but that doesn't mean the hips have any right to hurt. I can't imagine that of all things I'm complaining about body aches (besides the hip, the back as well as my calves hurt as well), and I'm reminded of the time about two years ago when I went to see the doctor regarding my leg pain. The doctor asked my age and laughed. Of course that was two years ago, and he gave me some medication but the very thought of being laughed at again has deterred me from making another visit to the ...