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Showing posts from August, 2021

Recalcitrant Cat

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Most of my neighbours love cats. There are five cats living with my immediate neighbour. Each cat has a different demeanour. Today I am going to talk about Nek, an alley cat that my neighbour rescued. At first, he told me that he would send it to Pasar Borong Serdang, but in end he adopted Nek. Recently, Nek found a liking to exploring rooftops. Nek would slip out from a second floor window and jump to the other houses. But there's a catch, the houses are on a slope, so the roofs are not level. So when the silly cat jumps to a house on a different level, it can't return. Nek would start meowing in the most pitiful way to catch the attention of its owner. My neighbour would then have to mount a rescue operation by dragging a ladder to my porch. Unfortunately, the rescue is not so straightforward. Instead of running to the arms of its rescuer, Nek would run away! My neighbour would have to make several attempts to lure Nek with its favourite food or favourite toy. When my neighbo...

We Need Numbers

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Over the weekend, colleagues across the whole group received hurried Teams meeting invite from the management. Judging from the timing, I guessed it was a long due townhall meeting. Some colleagues found it alarming and was wondering whether it was an 'earth-shattering' announcement. We didn't have one the previous year because we were too busy dealing with the start of the pandemic. And suddenly, my CEO decided to talk to all of us. The whole tone of his speech wasn't very uplifting at all. The general message was that we were surviving. The group consisted of four entities, but he merely touched on one company, ignoring the rest. The second half of his speech turned alarming when he started talking about investors and revenue numbers.  "We might not have a job next year if we don't have the numbers." "Even if you do your job well, but we don't have the numbers, then we all fail." I bet alarm bells were going off in the heads of junior staff...

Tokyo 2020

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The Olympics Tokyo 2020 ( which happened in 2021 ) came and went. Felt a tad underwhelming. Just paid attention to the highlights.  Misc. news . Interestingly, Tokyo was in a state of emergency during the games, which also meant no serving of alcohol. And then there was news about the so-called anti-sex beds in the Olympics village.   Opening ceremony .   Didn't sit through it, but the live action pictograms were cool because it used the concept of the kabuki kuroko or stagehand. Very fast-paced and I got a bit dizzy from the ever-changing camera angles. And the talk of the town was the Tongan flagbearer, Pita Taufatofua, who was topless and looked like he fell into a vat of pork lard.  Artistic Gymnastics . Daiki Hashimoto. He's a natural on the pommel horse, and I would find it very natural to see him being pummeled in a COAT Athlete video as well.   Diving . Tom Daley was often in the limelight, either while in skimpy swim trunks ( SimonLover commen...

Much Ado-rian About Nothing

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Durian just doesn't do it for me anymore. You can wave the most premium Musang King in front of me, and I won't pay it any mind. Creamy, bitter, sweet, fleshy, whatever. Not tempted at all. Even in other forms, I would reject durian, for example durian cake, durian dodol , durian bingka , durian ice cream, durian cream puff, etc. It wasn't always like this. Back when I was younger, I did eat durian. But my body's tolerance for it wasn't very high. Durian would make me heaty, and in no time at all, my throat would be dry, and sticky with phlegm. The end state was a sore throat. Got sick of getting sick. Haha. So I swore off durians. KH would call this extreme behaviour.  P.S.: Just the other day, mum bought some Musang King and I decided to try a little to find out what the fuss is about. Although my durian memory is kind of rusty, it really just tasted like D24 to me.

Little Connie Turns 5

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As promised, Connie organized a small birthday 'party' for her daughter who turned 5. In part, the party was to make up for the lackluster birthday in 2020 as well. KH and I arrived a tad earlier to help her decorate. As it was a surprise party, Connie got her best friend, Lynette to bring Little Connie out for a spin. Connie had settled most of the balloons ( thank goodness, I hate blowing balloons! ), so we were responsible for setting up the playhouse. Pretty much a construction job. Found that KH's pretty hopeless even with an instruction manual. With our combined efforts, we managed to set everything up in time. Little Connie was already restless, and wanted to return home. When Little Connie saw the decorations, her face lit up and gave a squeal! She loved the "HAPPY BIRTHDAY" balloons, and was excited with all the presents and pink unicorn soft toys that were stacked in front of the playhouse. And there was also a Frozen jelly cake to top it all off. Once a...