Promo

It never fails to surprise me how many people read my blog early in the morning. I got some very sweet greetings with the news of the promotion and that was heartwarming in the morning.

I've been having trouble sleeping these days.. waking up at 5am and ending up at work at 7am so it was good to hear nice things in the morning.

Some, actually just one, have said that i was hao lian to say "...promoted...again". Well, there need to be a background information. I've been promoted four times in the last three years and frankly, while it's a nice feeling, it's in some way a declining utility. In some ways, i get too embarrassed that i dont really tell my colleagues till they see a change in my signature.

Some interesting conversations went like:

Shortbin said my rank quite high now. I said where got as high as Teacher leh... then she said, i'm shortbin, so you'd still be higher all the time. True.. cant argue with that.

Shitfong said that my title's equivalent in the military would be an OC status, which means Major. I told him i hope im not a major cockup. hahah.. in any case, he's getting promoted soon too. From CPT to Mr.... that's a huge one.

despair told me not to anyhow put cactus cos got bad fengshui..

frenligal merely said... oh well i forgot what she said.

we're welcoming 4 more noobz to my office this Friday. I told my boss not to hire and hire but he's still going on and on. I told him my credit card running out of limit to pay for 4 lappies liaoz.. but he just said use his lor..

Green and Blue

To soften up the office environment, my boss wanted to buy plants. We get to choose what we wanted. Being the prick that i was, i decided to get the cactus. Here it is on my window ledge beside my smurf.



Here're some other pictures of the other plants in the office. It looks like a forest now.







Oh and i got promoted.. again.

LongKang

My dad heard of this new place to eat from his kopitiam kakis and he brought us there.

Turns out to be this big zi cha place that is beside this huuuuuge long kang.. but the way they did up the place, made it seem like we are having a riverside dinner along Clarke Quay like that.

But the food was quite nice la, so not too bad.

Back

This week was a week of comebacks.

I met Julia up for a meal after 10 years+ so that was a pseudo-mini-quasi-comeback. But enough about her.

SPUG is back. Yes. After a hiatus from October 2006 due to a HDD breakdown, SPUG is now back in the business. Back into the fray and back into my life. I'm so happy that words elude me.

My PC's also back in business. It's actually quite stupid really. I bought a backup HDD a month back and installed the software on my PC. But then lo and behold it changed the BIOS and made it the first bootable device when my PC boots up. But after i disconnected it to bring to office, my PC cant find it when it boots. And I stupidly, mistakenly thought it's my PC's HDD that crashed.

So dumb.. so yeah, my PC's back. No need to spend money on Mac.

Another comeback kid is.... DUNKIN' DONUTS

Seems like some entrepreneur has brought this back to Singapore...

Some SPUG conspiracy theorists think he's jus a kid who travels to JB to buy and then takes the MRT to deliver. I think it's a brilliant idea.

GSS

The GSS kicked off yesterday and I thought it'd be nice to start things off with some shopping since Hugo Boss had a sale this weekend..

Ended up buying a pair of jeans and a tie..wanted to buy a pair of berms but no way am i going to pay S$360 for a pair of white berms..



Then wanted to buy some shoes.. Im a member of Pedro and i kinda like their shoes.. that is until i was told that they're the male range for Charles and Keith. I always thought the male part of Charles and Keith was Keith, since Charlie can be a girl's name.. So all this while, I'm wearing C&K shoes.. oh well.. wanted to buy one pair then ended up with two..



There's always something to buy at watson's. Ended up with an extra shaver for my luggage bag, powder for travel, Hello Panda (huge version) for those lonely nights in the office and of course pore pack...



I actually bought this pair of cufflinks in New Orleans.. only thing i could afford after buying mummy the bag... very nice though. I wear the angel on my right hand since im right handed.

More Snippets

Hi guys, havent been blogging as there's nothing much happening. But i noticed a steady stream of visitors, so im pretty happy. As before, this entry will be in a snippet form.

1. I remember some time back when i blogged that i always bump into people when i go ome early or just simply move around in more godly hours. It happened again when i met FLG in vivocity that saturday i was back from New Orleans.. THAT was FREAKY cos i just spent quite a few hours talking to her on MSN while in New Orleans and then lo and behold. I figured i had enuff of bumping into her like before so i decided that we should catch up. So we did that day. And it was good.

2. Among the things we talked about was the numerous Freudian slips i make, like the cup story and then i told her another one. I was at the chiroprator that day cos my neck was locked again. (That was cos i fell asleep awkwardly at home on my tempur). When i went in, the pretty chiro receptionist i mentioned before asked me "how do you feel today?"

I said "stiff". Catching myself, i then quickly said "erm.. i mean my neck"

DIAO :(

Then when i went inside, he said he needed to do some "traction" on my neck. This means, he uses this machine to pull my head away from my body, i.e. stretch my neck la. Before i started, i asked him if that thing can make my neck longer, he said only if you're younger than 25 cos after 25 then stop growing liaoz. After that i felt so good and i felt my neck like longer.

I asked " can this be used to lengthen other parts of the body?"

There was some silence.... too long for comfort.

Then i said "erm, i meant my legs"

Damn i always say the wrong things at the chiro.

3. I'm finally going to Dubai. I think the client decided that having me there for 6 days at US$12,000 was too costly. HAHAHA.. i did that on purpose. So they decided that i wasnt that much needed at the workshop.. 2 days for US$5,500. Flight and accommodation excluded.

But i was surprised that they booked me on an SQ flight. Business class some more!!!! WOOT! First time taking Biz for work.. 7.5 hr flight some more.. YAY!

Snippets

I havent recovered from jetlag, so for the entire week now, I'm waking up at 4am and reaching the office at 8am. I've been meaning to blog but just kinda lazy and it feels quite lame to be blogging at 4am. Anyway, here're just some snippets of recent happenings..

1. Talking about jet lag, the plane i took from LA to Singapore was great. It was an Airbus A340 made for long haul flights. The seats are wider and because all the trays are attached to the side of the chair as opposed to the front of you, you can recline all the way from LA to Singapore, which is a mammoth 17-hour flight. So i was nestled in my little cocoon watching movies, working, eating and sleeping in air-borne bliss. The good thing also about long haul flights is that there'll be a little sback korner at the back of the plane where there's a choice of sandwiches, instant noodles, biscuits etc. There was actually a box of kripsy kreme on this particular flight but it was empty by the time i could get my paws on it.

2. I got a new phone.. here are pics of it beside my blackberry... there're two pics cos i used each phone to take the other.





3. My home PC's hard disk died for the second time in two months and this means im not a happy camper. Im now contemplating on moving over to using a Mac *gasp*

This is the sweet baby im thinking of..



4. Dont know if many people know but there's this donut shop in Raffles City which people queue for two hours and the max no. you can buy is 2 dozen. I've been raving about wanting to try it to my colleagues cos now we work so close to Raffles City. But no one wants to queue for two hours. Yesterday A&W gal brought 3 boxes of donuts which her mamma brought from Jakarta. Not too bad la..



I think that's all for now man... cant think of anymore things.

Mum

In line with Powto's advice on buying your Mum's love, I bought my mummy a Coach bag...not uber duper expensive but still substantial for poor ol' Cornball.



It's really a mother's day cum birthday cum thanks for everything gift.

I asked my sis what my mum thought of it and she said that mummy said that it has to be a good brand cos the kleptomaniac from Singapore stole Coach bags as well.. :(

Duno want to cry or laugh..

New Orleans

The sleepy little jazz town that was ravaged by the worst hurricane to hit the US.

A town steeped in history as one that was occupied by the Spanish and French long ago.

Against a backdrop of the Mississippi River, which we all use to count the seconds.

A mixture of these brings us to a small town that has rich French architecture and music in the air but there is a lingering feeling that the town used to be more populated.

We stayed in a district called the French Quarter in this hotel..



Quite a nice hotel really. Quaint and full of character..

Here're some pics of the vicinity of the French Quarter..





I did have some of the Mississippi River but it's in my boss's camera when we went Gap shopping.

Like all typical singaporeans, i went to Hard Rock Cafe..very dark though





I saw this shop.. Bubba Gump.. for those who remember, Bubba is the friend of Forrest Gump..



Going to America, must definitely find Krispy Kreme.. I asked the conceige but they said the shop closed after the floods.. but there's this drugstore which has a counter...he gave me the directions... *slurp*



I bought this...i chose this cos i wanted to put it in my office to remind me how i'd look if I put a black (or blue)face..

Tony

Tony Blair will step down as PM on June 27.

I think not many people like him anymore, especially in the UK.

It's a pity really, i kinda like the guy. He did some pretty good things in terms of economy and during times of crises.

However, people focused on his mistake of following Dubya Bush to iRaq.

Poor thing. Sometimes the mist of one mistake can cloud the opinion of others. Can totally erase the good you've done before.

Good bye Tony. You're a jolly good fella..

Here Finally..

After a long journey,

1. 6 hour flight to Tokyo
2. 40 minute transit
3. 9 hour flight to Los Angeles
4. 5 hour transit in LA
5. 3 hour flight to New Orleans

Im here.

But my boss's luggage got lost in transition.

So we went shopping today..went to Gap but i ended up buying more than him :(

More on New Orleans later.

More Maldives Pics

My colleague finally sent me the pics that she took while we were in the Maldives.. basically it was pics of this stingray feeding session the resort had..

here's a pic with a pretty hot marinebiologist..check out the raw fish in her hand.



Stingrays... yummy!









Another pic of the marine biologist



One last shot of the yummmy sambal dish we've grown to love..



Leaving the resort... tata *wavez*

Thirsty, friends?

There's a new restriction on the contents of your hand-carry luggage when you fly out of Singapore (and some other countries) from 8 May 2007. Since everyone in my office travels so much, I got one of my colleagues to do a writeup on the new restrictions and send it to the entire office. Among the whole long document was this..

"Containers must be placed in a transparent re-sealable plastic bag with a maximum capacity not exceeding 1-litre. These containers must fit comfortably within the transparent re-sealable plastic bag, which must be completely closed"

The same trying-to-be-funny guy replied to a few of us to say

"wat if the containers feel uncomfortable? can they come along with me?

or can we just check in the transparent bag and hand carry the rest of our cabin sized luggage?"

I replied..

"I think you’re very stupid, Underling. Very.

If the containers feel uncomfortable about traveling with you, they wont. They have minds of their own.

You disgrace (insert his university here) graduates worldwide."

He replied..

"that is not the attitude Cornball.

if the containers feel uncomfortable, its your duty to make them feel more comfortable. like putting some cushion or cotton wool in the transparent bag or something. dun forget to add some coke or water in there.. in case they feel thirsty during the flight."

I replied..

"Thirsty? Is that why when you leave a container with water out in the sun, the water disappears? Cos the container is thirsty?"

He replied...

"exactly. i'm glad you are beginning to understand and feel for others."

I replied...

"I care and feel for all my friends."

That's what you do when you are bored at work.

Trying to be Funny Again.

I sent out this email to four of my colleagues this afternoon...

"Hi friends,

Following our meeting early this morning, please make the relevant changes and give me the revised figuresby today. Please also update the data in the excel file called “Summary” found here - server address hidden to protect my identity

I’d likely be staying late tonight so please feel free to come to my office to discuss.

Thank you all.

XOXO
Cornball."

I got this reply...

"This is not the way to treat your friends"

My reply was...

" What makes you think you're my friend? :)"

Car

It's one of my dreams to own a car. Always the perennial chase after 5Cs.

I like to drive. There's a sense of freedom and adventure when you drive. A sense of liberation and exhilaration. Of course, that sense somewhat diminishes when you drive your dad's company-provided 1,300cc Proton Wira. But it's still driving.

Since I always like to be a bit different, I thought a Mini Cooper would be quite cool. But more than 1 person told me that if i drove that, it'd look quite tight inside the car. :(



So i decided on something bigger.

I saw the Audi TT in the 2002 show "About a Boy". Maybe it was Hugh Grant but golly this car smokes!



And of course, the BMW 6 series... *slurp*

Pillow

To alleviate my chronic neck problem, I went to buy a Tempur pillow today.. I tried it at Taka and was kinda complaining to the salesman that it was a bit ex.. then he told me that Isetan Scotts has a 10% discount... ooook.. I trooped down to Isetan and got it there. It's doubly good cos I am Isetan member.

Here're the pics.





Check out its contours.



Here's a mini wrist guard thingy i managed to sponge (mind the pun) from the guy after some sweet talking.



Maybe I can finally sleep more than 6 hrs.

Passer Bys

You know sometimes we are just passer-bys in another person's life. A person who features in a period of time in someone else's life where your sole purpose is to be there and render whatever help/aid/listening ear/money/time/money/love they need at that point of time.

After that, you're not needed and they just dont really chat with you anymore.

You sometimes console yourself that this is the life led by angels.

Then you wish you weren't one.

Random Pics - Maldives

Because I didnt know if my meals would be complimentary as well, I didnt dare to order so much. But I was hungry. That's a bad conundrum to have. Anyway I ordered fried rice and coconut creme brulee.. very very yummy!!



I was very shocked that the creme brulee came in sucha small cup. grrrrr.. US$12 leh.

Here's a huge huge tic tac toe set.



Here's a pic of the coral reef i took while in the seaplane.