Musical #1

Was so excited when knew that another musical is coming to our shore. It feels just like it’s been forever since a musical came. I heard about Hamilton but that’s all I know about this musical - the name. I totally have no idea what the story is about, what are the songs. So anyway, bought the tickets last year - 25th Nov 2023. Feels weird that I only clicked one ticket, feels weird that my payment is cheap 😂. But I don’t have any friends who likes musicals so … take it as a good spending time on my own relaxing.

View from my seat

The disadvantage in getting single ticket (or sometimes double tickets in an empty space of 3 in between) is that the system do not want to leave any seats in the row. So I kept moving back and back until this - 9 rows behind and slightly to the right of the stage - is finally allowed. 

As I’ve mentioned, I always go without reading anything so it was a shock to me when the music isn’t the usual sombre orchestral music. BUT …. I LOVE IT!! It’s a refreshing change to jazz, hiphop and rapping. They go really fast (obviously) so one needs to really pay attention to the words. 

That was “WOW!” and must tell Che-che about it and see if she wants to add in this Hamilton musical in NY. She’s been booking the musicals and entrance tickets to the places since 20th. 

Trying to declutter?

我讲一道、做另一道 🤣. 

I often say I try to declutter the house but yet I still have rubbish at home 😂

I have vacumn sealer, which I think not many household would bother buying. If they have extra food, they’ll wrap in plastic bag or put into containers but aunty needs to be one step better than others lor... (haha!) 

Really good use. 

This sealer - one can choose to use the vacumn or not. I only noticed it doesn't work 100% well with this Effiel Tower cellophane bag material. I ended up using the bottom orange sealer to seal the Synders into individual packs. 

Never mind I have these too …. 🤣 

Actually should I even put it into the SArmy donation bag? 

You say whether I'm collecting rubbish or not? Heehee!

Honey lemon

Suddenly craved for sourish drink and saw the Sugi Bee Garden honey in the kitchen. It’s been a long time since I drank honey lemon…. Eh…. like when I started keto way back. 

Squeezed some lemon juice and craving settled. Happy! 

 

3rd Thursday of Term 2

3rd Thursday of Term 2 and I need to find something to fill in the void from 7+ till 9+am. 

I managed at least half hour of snooze in the car, parking near the lobby to the studio, in a non-busy corner. I think I can zzzz more?? But maybe it’ll be too hot in the car. 

No more eating breakfast. I don’t have the habit of eating breakfast but when filling the void, I decided to eat but everytime after I eat, I’ll end up needing to visit the toilet. 

Sigh...  the life of a taxi-ah-lao

Ms Thermie to the rescue

Lil’ one is gentler in her speech now coz she’s losing voice 🤣. For half of the day, her chao-hee-lang (deaf) mother has been struggling to hear what she’s saying. Can’t be the 🌶️ spices from yesterday’s tom yum soup and basil chicken that triggered her losing her voice right? 

I was still pondering and wondering and mind wandering what to cook for her lunch tomorrow. Even thought of using Ms Thermie to fry her noodles now when she asked to bring barley to school tomorrow but daddy finished the rest of the barley. 

Then decided to boil chrysanthemum drink for her. Boiled 1.5litres. Initially I thought I would be smarter by putting the flowers and other herbs in the simmering basket, so I don’t have to filter it later. But it seems like although the flowers and herbs are submerged 刚刚好 in the water, it doesn’t seem that it’s being cooked. I probably would have wasted 20 mins just stirring rock sugar in water. Poured it into the bowl about 5 minutes later. (Next time I shall put in 2 litres of water and experiment) 

20 minutes later, as I needed Ms Thermie to cook nottie girl’s lunch, I used the strainer and poured the chrysanthemum drink into my saucepan to cool down before transferring into the container. It’s so so fast! I usually  use the ladle and strainer. A tedious messy process follows from straining into plastic measuring cup with spout to the container with two teabags filter over it trapping any smaller particles. Now I only do the teabags filter after pouring into the saucepan.  Ok, now I’m a convert. I shall start boiling all the liang shui in Ms Thermie. Make my $2398(?) worth it. 

Lunch for that troublesome girl

A quick wash after that and I started cooking nottie girl’s lunch for the next day. Used the fried bee tai mak’s recipe. Chaipoh

Not sure how it taste. 不是我吃的、我不管乐趣！ I should have used my own old recipe. 

Boiling liang zui

Superbly lazy to boil the weekly herbal drink over the stove. So I did it in Ms Thermie instead where I don’t have to worry about splatters. 

Did a check in the fridge 3 wks ago on the peanut roots and noticed we have a lot of barley, popcorn and winter melon strips left in the fridge because I rarely cook it. Reason? Read below. 

Told myself to boil barley the following week but obviously I didn’t coz there were leftovers of chrysanthemum in it’s original packaging (another problem of trying to organize everything in similar boxes) after I boxed them. Boiled chrysanthemum instead and it was also chrysanthemum last week and most weeks 😄 so this week I HAD to boil barley. I will need to force lil’ one to drink since now I have one less kid to coerce. Good news is I’ll only shorten my life span -0.5x instead of 1x. 好像给孩子毒药的，I don’t understand why but they used to drink barley on a regular weekly basis when growing up and now they both don’t like it. 

Don’t ask me about the measurement coz I eyeballed the quantity fitting for 1.5litres. I usually boil barley drink using china barley 生薏米 (also known as jobs tear?) + cooked barley 熟薏米 (I call this popcorn 😂 coz it bears a resemblance to it) + winter melon strips + sugar (I used my lakanto) 

Simmering basket on top to prevent splattering.

I shall increase the water to 2 litres next time 

Filled up the container and into the fridge. 

I was curious if Cookidoo has recipes for barley drink and surprised to know that they use pearl barley and pandan leaf. What is pearl barley? And why do they put pandan leaf? Pandan leaf in a drink gives it a weird taste. It does have its benefits though, namely reducing stress, make you orh orh 😴 better, control blood sugar, prevent cancer, increase appetite and relieve symptoms of arthritis. 

What’s china barley, cooked barley & pearl barley

China barley （生薏米）： known to act as a diuretic and remove excess fluids in the body ('dampness'). In TCM, it is considered cooling in nature and has nourishing benefits on our spleen, stomach, and lungs

Cooked barley (熟薏米）：was told before that this is used to neutralise the cooling of barley. Therefore it’s normally cooked together for barley drink and soup. Of course this is from TCM point of view. Thermomix and other online recipes has never asked for cooked barley at all. 

Pearl barley (样薏米）： pearl barley helps control cholesterol levels and promotes cardiovascular health in general. It also helps control blood pressure and reduces the risk of heart disease and stroke. 

Difference

One more difference to note between pearl barley and Chinese barley is that the former 会生痰.  

However as barley is known to be 寒 it’s not advisable to drink it everyday. 

To end this blog entry, found something but is too wordy and in Chinese for your reading pleasure. 

Forgot I did this

Was going through my Cookidoo looking at recipes. Sometimes looking at it also gian, just like I like to watch those house cleaning videos too. 

Haven’t done menu planning for long, it’s been more like whims and fancies cooking now.

Wanted to change the imperial measurements to metric on phone app and then I saw this. 

Haha! I forgot I even did this. Yup! I did some editing to get my logo done, did lil’ one’s too! Had them printed out in stickers. As if we’re doing business like that. But cute lor….ok so this is where I spend my money on. Waste money 

On this day - 10th Apr * Reminders from FB *

10th Apr 2011

Weirdest things ppl use to 'chope' table. Spectacles!!

I see also laugh, woman rushes up to table n put specs down; followed by tissue paper. The owner of the specs came by 30secs later n put on his specs.

I'm surprise that he even found his way there.

What hv u seen?

10th Apr 2011

My ah girl tells me happily "mummy mummy when a sperm meets and joins with an egg, it's called pollination." I want to faint!!

** edit - if you'd like to know. The ah girl I'm referring to is che-che. 

10th Apr 2012

A part question asked "bullfrogs Z and Y died in the 3rd and 4th week resp. Explain how they could hv died." 

Answer : They choked.

?!?!?!?! ROFL. Siao liao!

** edit - if you'd like to know. The ah girl I'm referring to is che-che. 

10th Apr 2012

Two days of handbells practice, dunno if they'll put in another additional practice next Monday as well. I hope the girls do well next week

10th Apr 2012

How irritating can it be - when you go into the shop and ask SA about their products and she has the slightest inkling knowledge. How can they hire such staff?

10th Apr 2013

Mei-mei's class work which is bullshit!! Hahaha! "My mom's favorite thing to do is COOKING". ???? I don't like to but I love to bake.

10th Apr 2013

For the past 2 days, I hv been seeing property agents standing outside the school giving out pamphlets for a new launch, knocking at car windows. I managed to evade the group of 3-4 agents each day. Now outside PP, kena approached again by 3 agents.

Haiz! Took pamphlet and gonna use it to wave off the next agent who's going to approach me.

Getting phonecalls at home if we wanted to sell our home all these years. Rather irritating .... Oops! No offence to my property agent friends.

10th Apr 2014

A vy happy child, she looks forward to Art class. Her work today. And she proudly told the teacher that I display her art piece on top of the piano.

10th Apr 2022

Lil' one just said something that made me laugh out loud.

Whenever she does any work, her mouth also moves in tandem to the question or whatever 😅 more so when she's doing MA or POA.

So today, she was talking n sighing away and before she could say anything I commented "your brain's fried " which is her usual comments. Then she looked at me "I see numbers flying around me. I really see numbers flying around."

My daughter is a visionary I told her. Do you see any 4 numbers? predict any numbers so I can buy 4D?

Let me strike 1st prize.🤣

Pauline Patrick Teo - kor, your niece got another pattern 🤣#realtruthidontgamble# #thejoker#

Terry retirement village

It’s always so nice to receive an email from Terry (aka Terence) coz he doesn’t write that often and he don’t believe in social media. Thus making a challenge to keep in constant contact with him. 

He dropped an email to inform that he has moved out of their home into a new place. Kapo is my second nature 😁, checked on his new place on map and google. It’s a nice retirement community in Kingston with different flats (different layout and number of rooms). It has a nice communal place for the residents to gather. It works for him as K has her own family. He will spend the time chatting with the other retirees, return to his flat, do some activities together. Why not? When you have a bunch of people with you. Better than dying in your flat without anyone knowing until body is decomposed as it has happened numerous times in Singapore. 

The caucasians are not like the asians where we kinda expected the kids to care for them in their golden years. 

I feel it works for Terry and started thinking about the man and I in 25 years time. Two of us shall 一天过一天. Hopefully none of us have any major illness. Houses all fully paid, we can go Kopitiam to lim Kopi, walk around the longkang outside our house, go for a swim in our ‘will never drown 1.2m pool’, jacuzzi just right outside our balcony, water plants, talk to plants when I am bored and the man doesn’t want to listen to me etc….

Retirement village is not a common thing in Singapore, but there’s one in JB. Will we get thrown there? 

I can’t help but envy R & I who seem to be travelling all the time, really living life to the fullest. I wish we can do that but no…. we’re not rich to fund that kind of lifestyle. Maybe living in Malaysia, Thailand, China where it’s lower cost of living? We can’t afford to live in Europe as what R & I are doing. 

Should I or

 ……should I not? 

Went through my flight reservation and menu is up. Yay! Saw my favourite satay where we will always pray no pax asks for extra servings and we can eat, better still if more pax DND. 

SQ satay is so so so so nice. 

🫡 YIPEE! MEAL ORDER DONE! 

Now will wait to be fed in the plane, kissed goodnight to Zzzzzzz, pee, walk and talk to crew, Zzzzzzzz

-2 FightDo class

Haven’t been going for Fight-Do for 2 Thursdays. 

Last week, I woke up with an intense unbearable pain that I had endured for the past few days. I was trying to pick up something with my left hand the day before and endured the pain, but I think I aggravated the injury? Thus woke up more ‘crippled arm’. No way I can move my arms in my already so-slow-manner during Fight-Do. I can’t go any slower 😜. Went for tuina and was nagged at by the doctor. 

Today, I woke up with a terrible headache and was ready to go slow. I had a restless night, slept on my right side; turned to my back and I had to do kee-chiu exercise at one point coz my left arm was numb. Before I know it, I think I only had 2hr of restful sleep. Feeling like a zombie 🧟‍♀️ I need some blood. 

Sent lil’ one to school and went to OTH, thinking maybe a little nap might help me. I hid out in one corner, saw an old man napping and an old aunty reading newspaper there. Wah…. why am I in the senior citizen corner? 🤣. I set alarm for 45mins but couldn’t nap at all. There’s no ventilation there, the only place with nice cooling temperature is just at the entrance/exit from carpark to shops, with people walking in and out. No way! 

45mins of closing eyes but obviously not resting coz my mind was awake. Head still throbbing after that so decided I shall skip today’s class as well. 

But …… I’ve promised lil’ one I’ll buy her Mee Rebus for her lunch. And I was supposed to pack mom’s lunch as well. In the end, I decided to switch my plans and went to mom’s at 10+ with her lunch and flowers+fruits to give thanks to 观音菩萨. Give thanks for protecting che-che during her spring break … and she told me she’s going Toronto again this long weekend. Huh? I 拜拜 buay hu leh… (uni closed; no classes coz solar eclipse. So good. Even the city’s City Hall is closed, trash collection delayed, business is closed. So deserving for this eclipse meh? As if the aliens 🛸 are coming to earth 🌎.  In SIN it’s school and business as usual.)

Left at 11.30 to go to her school and only reached home 12.16pm. Thursdays - I usually don’t have time to clean the house at all. I’m tired and sweaty but just had to vacumn n mop the house. Just feel so awkward when I 没有做家务. Was wondering what’s for nottie girl’s dinner, I’m lazy to go into a mall to pack for her later before picking her up. Saw that the fresh fishballs will expire on 7th Apr so cooked that for her after my lunch. Easy peasy. My first attempt of chapalan soup base from tangchye, 1/2 ikan bilis cube stock, pepper, salt, onion powder, smoked sole powder for the umami taste. I tasted a weird-tasting soup, maybe coz of the lozenges after taste. Soup + fishball cooked. Had another pot with water to blanch the noodles later.  

1.30pm : rest on bed after shower n arm exercise and it’s time to Zzzz all the way until 4pm. Popped a Panadol, played this : 

and woke up more alive. 

Really need to attend class next week. 

On This Day - (3rd April) #Reminders from FB#

3rd April 2020

Convo with brother.

Haha! Got SARS still went to concert. 

#musickillsthementalvirusinus#

3rd April 2020

Made a trip to the supermarket before the announcement commenced coz of a failed attempt trip (long queue) before picking lil' one up from school.

Che-che volunteered to go with me coz l'll hv lots of things to carry. To make her happy l asked if she needed to stock up tidbits again. Haha! She didn't buy much tho coz we already did stock up some biscuits n their tidbits way before. For the first time I had to leave all tidbits in the bomb shelter.

3rd April 2019

Athena Ting Che-Che would love to do this.

Footnote written in 2024 : honestly I’d be too fearful to run, not that I can run fast lah! But run later cannot jam brake in time how? Drop down the cliff, confirm die! So better to walk.

3rd April 2014

Class #2: A vy happy girl.

Pretty!

3rd April 2009 

* message in my wall from Sensei MeiLing (Shichida)

Haha!!.. I miss her... She is blur at times, cute at times and cheeky at times, miss everything about her... But I am very glad that she is doing very fine..

Not my usual Tuesday

Usually on Tuesdays are days when lil’ one starts early and end at 5pm. It’s a day where I can do the need-to-take-a-longer-time things around the house but not today.

The TCM doctor told me last Thursday that I 拖 my between treatments too long each time, thus it’s taking me a longer time for recovery. 😢 Therefore starting this week I’ll have to be more hardworking and forgo some work around the house and go down to the clinic twice a week. 

Helped that hubby sent lil’ one to school so I don’t waste anytime driving to and from school. Was able to wake an hour later to vacumn and mop the house, cleaned all the mirrors in the house, laundry into the washing machine, cleared the cleaned dishes in the sink into the cabinet (see! If I don’t do this, nobody does it at all.) 

Hungry but went for my 6th tuina with an empty stomach. Spent around an hour plus in the clinic. Since I had around 2.5hrs of free time before my errands at City Gate (grocery shopping and pack dinner), I dropped by Flower Dome for my instant fix of happiness. Only 50mins spent in there and left for Raffles City at 2+. Was craving for my chilli crab pasta but no table available. Really frustrating, it’s the second time I’ve been turned away. I deliberately chose to go at 2+ after the lunch crowd but …… staff was quite rude to me also when I asked if there’s a possibility of sharing table. (O Coffee Club underwent a renovation and when they re-opened in June 2023, they had their tables to sit 4!!! No table for 2! Crazy! Another customer previously also complained that the seats are all left empty with just 1 or 2 pax. Can make a few more tables to sit more customers.不会做生意）Initially wanted to head to City Gate immediately but I realised I’ve exceeded the 10mins parking grace so decided I’ll just grab my lunch here then pop by City Gate for less than an hour (possible for me to grocery shop and pack dinner). Since was craving for vietnamese, I dropped into Nam Nam.

Lil’ one is suppose to end school at 5pm today but at 3.03pm she called to say she’s done. WHAT?! I just placed my order. She 🚂 down to me and ….there goes my trip to City Gate. Heng ah… if I was at City Gate the time she called, she would have problem getting to me. I would have suggested she bus home but she wouldn’t want. Think she has this fear of being alone in the house. Because of that, I should be thankful that I didn’t have to gobble down my lunch or early dinner. Settled her dinner and we left at 5pm for home. 

Sakura Floral Display - trip #2

12th day since the cherry blossoms display is on in Flower Dome. 

I made an impromptu trip. So no DSLR, as if it’ll make any difference to my crap photography skills (what skills?)

The flowers are nicer looking today, I see more light pink flowers. Hopefully I’ll have the chance to go next and following week. 

Wah…I join FOG really very worth it! 

New term = new schedule

Turns out this term this birdie 🦜 will need some food 🐛from home 3x a week. I’m beginning to feel cheated of my money coz I have to buy her food and she gets to save the money daddy gives her. 

3 2 days of 想来想去

Tuesdays : similar to Term 1 it’s PE after lunch on so will just pack bread for her. Nothing heavy for her. 

Wednesdays : will be a 9-3 day so I’ll need to pack lunch.

Thursdays : Thursdays is always a rush for me in the mornings. With this term starting 2hrs earlier means I have lesser sleeping hours and a fight between having that extra 15mins for sleep or to wake up and prepare her food and prepare myself to leave the house. 

Two choices - to cook for her or to buy 

If I choose to cook, I’ll have to prepare something either the day before or ….. I can slow cook a dish overnight (because it’s ridiculous for me to spend one hour cooking for her and feel so sweaty after that, I’d want to shower after that which means I need more time) then pack it the next morning. Now reminds me maybe I can look for slow cooker recipes OR cook extra portion of one of Wednesdays dinner’s dish and extra portion of rice to steam heat the next day. I just have to deal with the dirty dishes left in the sink till I return home at 5+pm. I’m the magician at home, it sucks! For such arrangement, it means I can just pack mom’s lunch and get stuffs then head over.

If I choose the easy way out of packing food for her, it’s not entirely a clear cut task either. After FightDo class ends at 11am, I have to pack her lunch, mom’s lunch and probably drop by NTUC to get my groceries and a little groceries for her. It’s a chop chop quick quick rush from one place to another for these tasks within 30mins. Always doing these for them that I can’t even have lunch with my FightDo class people 😔. Her lunch time is at 12pm but sometimes she ends class at 11.30, 11.35, 11.20 really very unpredictable. So most times I’ll have to wait outside her school under the hot 🥵 sun until she calls me and then I drive in to pass her food. There are days too when I’m still waiting for the food or OTW to her when she calls. Can get really frustrating not knowing what time each day each lesson ends. 

After I pass her her lunch. I’ll go by mom’s to pass her her lunch and I’ll stay there until around 4 to leave to pack dinner for lil’ one. Normally I’ll take a shower, chat then take a short nap. I would love to go back home where I have things to do but it’s like the only time I go back to see her, so I usually stay unless I have errands to run. Lil’ one ends at 5pm, really no point in me cooking. Won’t die in Singapore, so many kinds of food here. But maybe I should buy something while packing for lunch which I can heat up close to pickup time and put in a thermos flask for her. Very cham leh! My girl eat so slow that every minute in the ride home is precious.  

If mom is not in Tampines

I’ll just head back home straightaway and get some work done around the house, pack lil’ one’s dinner the same time as lunch then go over to pick her from home. 

Always lots of washing to do. Thermos flask, containers etc…just to make sure her food is piping hot. 

Adapting to her stupiak lunch arrangements

Now that I reach OTH on Thursdays earlier. Then what? What am I going to do? Eat? Nap? Non-perishables grocery run? 

GIRL AH…..CAN’T YOU JUST QUEUE UP AND BUY YOUR FOOD? YOU GIVE YOUR MOMMY SO MUCH WORK TO DO.

School hols come to an end

After 3 weeks of break it’s back to Term 2. 

How did it pass so quickly? 

Official school holiday started on 18th March. 11th March that week was exam week but coz her last paper was on the 8th she didn’t have to go back to school after that.  

3 weeks of lil’ one bugging me to bring her out, I wasn’t going to do it on a daily basis. She’s free but I’m not. She was so bored that she wanted to go on a holiday but nobody was going to bring her anywhere coz we (adults) have things to do. Daddy obliged with a short weekend trip to KL. Brought her to cat cafe twice, haircut and her uncle wanton food fix. 

Term 2. Jiayou! HBL today. And now I have to plan how many days I’m going to cook.