+/-

:-)
Very smooth traffic during CNY. It was like a Sunday drive everyday…
Got to wake up a bit later than usual to start the day. even theson woke up late.
My sis is back for 5days. She bought some Layer-cake from Indonesia. Taste ok.
The office is at 10% capacity and there is no one bothering me.
Enjoyed meeting up with relative and friends.

:-P
There are a lot of irritating cars on the island from other states with A, W, B, J, N plates…..
Thewifes chocolate chip cookies are finished. what will sustain me now?
The avril-eragon song is starting to get to me. they have been playing it non-stop on the radio.
Canteen food is at its extreme low.
i have 2 technical papers to write that i have not started on yet.

CNY dinner at our place

had thewanderer over yesterday for dinner with another one of my old friends, KAB.
2 others DGK and WIA could not not make it. WIA is working and DGK is having his wisdom tooth looked at.
Less man, more share….
Thewife cooked spaghetti olio and fried chicken.
we finished 1/2 of the chicken and all the spaghetti.
it was that good.

we sat around talking for a good 2 hours.
always good to just sit back with friends to eat, drink and talk.
theson was very quiet though and very shy.


Spaghetti olio recipe...

This was how I did it the last time...

Not sure how different from thewife's modified method...

Heat olive oil in pan on slow fire with
Chopped up garlic,
Chopped up onions,
Pepper,
Chopped up dried chilli/cilipadi,
Prawns,
Chopped up mushrooms,
Chopped up bacon.

Stir till garlic and bacon are golden brown.
Shut off fire and cook spaghetti.
Boil spaghetti with a pinch or two of salt..
Once spaghetti is nearly ready, restart fire on pan.
Drain spaghetti and mix with the stuff in the pan on slow fire.
Toss for a minute or two and make sure they are mixed well.

Note:
You need to estimate enough olive oil to coat your spaghetti...
Too much oil and it too oily, too little oil and its too bland..
I normally cook more spaghetti and keep adding to the pan till its just right.

Vesuvius

it was 20hrs into Valentines day and all was well....
that is until I screwed it up….
sigh…

I sigh because, as usual, I had to say something stupid to the wife.
the some thing that I said was of no consequence to me but had very much meaning to the wife and it pissed her off again.
Does this mean I have to watch what I say ? well hopefully not as i always forget anyway :-)
I hope she does not have the illusion that marriage is a happy all the time thing.
well, married people fight all the time and as i say its always a compromise.
and dont hold grudges...
and dont forget important dates..
i cant imagine life these days without thewife or theson and thats how I feel.

aftermath

6 days have come and gone just like that
Had some minor trouble with getting theson to school today but overall he was ok
Thewife came back last night at 230am from gambling at her bosses house. She was ahead by $30 but got reduced to $4 only

We were quite organized this year and had activities fully packed for the whole week.

CNY eve: Steamboat lunch at thewife mum place.
CNY eve: Dinner at my mum’s place. Thewife cooked.
CNY Day1: visiting on the island with my relatives
CNY Day2: visiting on the mainland with thewifes relatives at her mums house. Lion dance at neighbours house.
CNY Day2: Dinner at the babysitter place. a very nice, simple and filling meal.
CNY Day3: Dinner at thewifes friends place. BBQ.......
CNY Day4: Lunch at my mum with my sis. thewife cooked also.

we just ate and ate and ate....

Ash Wednesday was on CNYday4.
we totally missed the church service. We need to be better catholics for theson.

Sigh
back to work….

bringing up theson

Theson is still crying every morning before he goes to school.
At least now he can go to the toilet by himself to pee but yesterday he took a dump in his pants by accident. The teacher said that he looked as shocked as she was and started crying. Well, we taught him to call the teacher if he has to go potty when he’s in school.

3yr olds have a really short attention span and we always find it hard when he’s got homework or when we’re teaching him how to read.
it takes patience, lots and lots of it.........

double choc chip

thewife made a new batch of double choc chip cookies with exxxxxtra choc chips for CNY.
this batch is very good and better than the previous one.
i hope they can us last till next week.

last weekend

Had Dinner with friends last Friday and I took theson along. He was pretty excited and kept saying that we’re going for a party. hehe....
We got there early and walked around the mall a bit before meeting them at the bookshop. We went for dinner at an ice cream joint. dinner choices were extremely limited. Ended up eating a chicken sandwich with fries. Theson enjoyed fries/ketchup and butterscotch ice cream. They even gave him a balloon. theson was very shy and did not hear a peep from him. he was very well behaved.
while we were at the bookshop, james blunt's beautiful was playing over the store ceiling speakers and theson who was reading a book at the time stopped and dragged me along to "look" for the song. "where beautiful?" i told him that there was no TV and he had to look up at the speakers... :-)
Thewife joined us later at the reataurant to “pickup” theson while I continued with the gang to a movie. The wanderer also joined us later at the restaurant and tagged along for the movie. thewife says that he looks older.
The movie? It was Blood and chocolate ..eer, it was not very good.. quite slow actually. Went home after the movie.


Reunion lunch at thewifes mum’s place last Sunday. They always have it early as thewifes eldest sis goes back to her husbands home for reunion dinner on the actual day itself. Picked up thewife’s younger sis so she didn’t have to drive. As usual, we had Steamboat. I think I ate around 6-8 rounds and I was stuffed by the end of the 1st hour. Declined beer though. Theson had fun playing with his 4 cousins. We left at 3pm and put theson to sleep.


Dinner with thewanderer on Sunday night. Went to a seafood restaurant near the jetty. Ordered prawn curry, fried bean curd, fried soft shell crab, peanut soup, fried leafy veg and tamarind chicken. i rate it 6/10 only as the crab was dissapointing and the "service" sucked.
oh yea, thewanderer brought his “friend” along.
i wonder if they are an item yet? well he is driving her car.

valentine day is coming again..

i need to follow my own advice more...

yuo only need to do 2 things to make a woman happy
-shower her with love and attention. make her feel wanted.
-buy her stuff that you now she likes/want but would never expect you to buy for her.

i need to do both more..........

doing "our" valentines on march2 which is our annivesary...

skip school, sushi and music school

Theson missed school yesterday. He seems to be sleeping later at night and waking up earlier, with short naps in the afternoon. i dont think he gets enough sleep.
Anyway, Thewife and him woke up late (they blamed me for not waking them up earlier) so they were lazing around the house til noon.

They came to pick me up for lunch and we went to have sushi at the new place at the new mall near my office. Food was not too bad but slightly a bit pricey. Thewife was not happy with the service though :-)
i'm too easily satisfied at restaurants. as long as stomach happy, i'm happy.

Thewife followed us to music class last Saturday. Surprisingly theson participated very well and I was very proud of him. Need to play the CD for him more so that he can catch the lyrics.

back from holidays

My parents are back from their 3week holiday in the capital. My mum looks tired but my dad looks refreshed. He was actually scouring the city/malls and watching movies while my mum was asleep in the hotel, as she tires easily and cant really walk much.
I believe they visited a lot of old friends and relatives and sampled more food that I did when I was there. And they got lots of rest too.
Well, I think they needed a long holiday “away from it all”. My sis was their host and she was a bit stressed as first. I’m sure shes a bit relieved that they’re safely back on the island.
The double-decker express bus that they rode back on looked pretty cool. And they even serve food during the 4hour trip as well. i dont think i will drive down anytime soon after seeing that bus. save $$ for fuel and toll.

Dad was back to work on feb1 and sometimes I feel sad that my dad still has to work. Sigh….
i wait for the day that i can ensure my family dont have to work anymore.

Will I need to work after I retire as well?

pre-CNY 07

CNY is coming in 2weeks time and we are rushing to :-
-clean the house
-decorate the house
-buy stuff for both families. (canned food, biscuits, beer, packet drinks, coke, canned fruits)
All this entails more $$$. We always spend a lot during xmas and CNY.
This year our pockets are stretched slightly tighter since thewife and theson spent some time in the hospital.
And we bought the roomba and a sewing machine as well :-)

Anyway,
Thewife is already in baking mode for the coming CNY celebrations.
Cupcakes
Peanut cookies
Butter cookies
Choc chip cookies (my recipe/my sis recipe/thewifes modified recipe, depending on who you ask)

roomba

We bought a Roomba Discovery last month.
Its really cool, Slightly a bit noisy but very effective.
It can clean our living room in 1hour and the bedroom in 30mins.
Normally, we turn it on before we leave the house and let it run by itself.
When the batt goes low or it has finished cleaning, it goes back to its docking station by itself.
Thank you irobot people… thewife is happy.

tv these days..(well sorta...)

TV shows I’m following these days:
Lost S3
Galactica S3
Heroes S1
Daily show and Colbert Report, whenever I can.

actjually, i am not watching much of the Sat-TV that i'm paying for though.

money money money

Took theson in for a meningitis vaccine shot yesterday. we actually postponed this shot 3 or 4 times already. we were either too lazy or theson was sick.
anyway, It cost $297. Jeeeeeez………..

I don’t recall going for a $300 shot when I was a kid or going in to the hospital when I was sick. Stay in bed with soup, porridge and biscuit or bread.
Are parents these days too protective?
Well, as long as he’s healthy, right?
theson screamed a bit but was generally ok.
After that went for dinner at KFC then to a coffeeshop.

Oh yeah, I finally found the lithium batteries I needed for the thermoscan. Cost $10 a piece and I needed 2. took me more than 1week of hunting as the shops where we live dont carry them.