Wednesday, May 27, 2009

What Do You Do?

What do you do if you fail to wake up regularly each morning. I think I have depended on my mum banging on my door to wake me up. I somehow ignored her calls now. Maybe I should just tape the phone to my ear or get a bigger alarm clock :D. Its fun reading other people post with the new Nuffnang Xchange widgets. Its that thing on the bottom right corner of this page, that you can click to read other people's blog. There are 65000 nuffnang members, so its a good way to randomly read what other people are writing. The good thing about this new widget is they promote blogger who has less than 300 people reading it each day. So you just get normal people such as you and me who writes blog for their each and own purposes. I still refuse to open Kenny Sia blog :p, even though I read somewhere he is the most famous Malaysian blogger :p. Envy? perhaps, sore loser? maybe, my choice, definitely :D, sometimes the simple things in life is probably the funniest and best to read.

Monday, May 25, 2009

New Old Oven

Heloooo new old oven. Yes "new" old oven. Basically we fixed our old oven, yay \^_^/ The glass that was covering the door came off during a baking session last Raya. Only now we have managed to fix it. This is the only two pieces of appliance that still remain in use in the 12 years that we bought them all at once, the other one is our Toshiba TV. The rest of our appliances has gone ghost (washing machine, microwave, vacuum cleaner, fridge) So this oven is basically older than my youngest sister. My mom is a clean freak so the oven still looks new.

This the oven we used to bake cookies and stuff. This oven is also used a toaster oven where we toast bread or baked nuggets, burger, pizza and potato wedges.


Now I could bake more cookies at half the time since I could load more cookies in. Now it takes just 1 hour and half to finish making and baking one batch of cookies.


Saturday, May 23, 2009

An Inside Story

The old faithful has to be sent to the workshop again. All is forgiven if you are an 18 year old car that traveled half of the USA and then rode a ship to Malaysia.
My engine was spewing white smoke, I was told the engine lubricant was burning in the combustion chamber. "Taukeh" told me one of my cylinder is having problem. Erkk.. we are having a financial crisis right now, perhaps we will have a look at it later.

I have no what this is, but its rusted. "Taukeh" said they will clean it out.


One of the reason's I can't change the cylinder right now is my car has 6 of them. You need to change all 6, if not the car will be unbalanced. This is an in line 6 cylinder engine. Most car's in Malaysia has 4, with Kelisa, Kancil and my Viva having 3 cylinder only. This is the cylinder head cover. You can see the pathway for the valve, for the intake and exhaust.



These are the valves for my engine. My car has 2 valves per cylinder, which is a basic format for an engine. Most car's now have 4 valves per cylinder, with certain cars having 5 valves per cylinder


My cylinder head has a hole and they have to weld it. They told the best way is to just do a complete overhaul which includes replacing the cylinder head. Err.. it will be almost RM 5k.. let us try welding and polishing the head first. Car's are expensive, but I will blog on how to get a car that won't cost you are fortune maintaining it.

Thursday, May 21, 2009

Dream come through

Do you have that dream when you feels its true and then you woke up and realised it was just a dream? I had a lot of those. It's kinda exciting a bit because you are doing something or knowing something you are not supposed to. Sometimes things about life that I want to be true but its not true but ended up being through in the dream. It's as if my subconscious mind is playing a trick on me. Bad subconscious mind, bad T_T. I still feel a bit groggy from last night, and I did not do anything last night. I need a boost of excitement today, other than the chocolate fondue from yesterday's lunch.

On an even lighter note, they are opening a Carl's Jr in The Mines. Possibly a fast food place that sells the biggest and messiest burgers. (My picture chopping on a charboil chicken burger is at the Carl's Jr at Mid Valley)

Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Hot


Yeah, the weather has been pretty hot lately, everyone is saying it, so I am too :p. For me today it was a bit unbearable. I had a great buffet lunch with lots and lots of food, which includes a chocolate fondue. As the result, I am still digesting the food, even though its already 10pm. Another side effect I did not notice is, I felt much hotter than usual. I guess my body is trying its best to process what I have eaten. No gym tonight T_T but its okay. I don't mind having this big body, because I like food and I will continue to eat. However another inch of my waist is not so bad :p. I am okay, I am fine by my gym. Just like the trainer said, if you are comfortable with what you have now, who are other people to question it?. Back to the issue, I have been trying to sleep with just the fan on, but today is unbearable with my body going to max trying to detox me out, so I feel quite hot, even though I already drank 4 glasses of plain water. Beside its only 26 Celsius. My sister sets the temperature at 16 Celsius. Now that is crazy.

Fondue


Yes, I want one of these Fondue Machine in my house. I seen it on television but never had a chance to use it. However today, during our Recruit meeting at a hotel, the Fondue Machine was there glistening with it melted chocolate. I was estacted, I foundued everthing from fruit, cheescake and dried fruit. It was fun and it was messy, but most important of all it tasted good :D. Melted chocolate taste great :D. My kenduri/party/makan2 will be much more exiciting with this toy :p

Tuesday, May 19, 2009

Touch and Pad


Life would be very stressfull if I had a advisor who is as technologically savvy the cartoon above. They would know how to contact me in every possible way, they would know my online activities are and they would be right behind my back. Lucky for me, my advisor is not that interested in computers and internet. He just uses it for his basic needs as a lecturer and professor. Generally most advisors are like that, but some are just as up to date as the rest of us, which includes my Helminthology lecturer, who is a medical doctor and the head of our unit (Hi Doctor :D). Nothing wrong with letting out a bit of steam and frustration online by typing it down.

Monday, May 18, 2009

That's Hot

Yeah, I feel hot. So hot it hurts, literally. The weather recently has been incredibly hot and dry that even the grass are drying up. This in turns make me sweat even more, but using my brother's technique of using a roll on deodorant first and then applying the spray on anti perspirant makes me clean and dry all day. My sister told me, when she sprays her chest and back, it kept her dry in those area too. Anyways, I started hitting the weights again out of sheer boredom. So what did I achieved out of this? I was sore all day long. I decided a heating cream would do the trick to relieve the pain. It has been a long time since I needed to used it. Well it has been to long, since I forgotten I should not have applied it liberally. As the result, I felt like dancing half naked in my room. This is because the cream felt so hot and it stings like heck. Suddenly I had groove and rhythm. It was not funny to me because its like trading one pain for another. At least now the heat turns into a nice cooling sensation, which why I could type now.

That's hot

Losing It

I don't mind losing a game, because who ever is the best will with the game. However I hate losing items. It can be a small a rechargeable battery or something expensive such as a leather shoe or something irreplaceable such as your photo album or your thesis. I feel like I am losing my mind along with it. I can't think straight, I can't do anything till I find what I have lost. It makes me want to run as far as I can and never look back. It a character flaw that I have that makes me me. I have to retrace back my steps or clean my room thoroughly to find it.

Oh yeah, you are probably wondering what I lost? I lost my set of keys which includes my pendrive. Damn!

Value?

I love peppermint tea, its taste like regular tea that you drank after you brush your teeth :D. Very refreshing and cool. Once I freaked a friend out by giving him this tea. My friend is very old fashion and very malay, since the tea he drinks are teh o, teh o ice, and teh tarik. I love seeing his reaction when he exclaimed "Ko letak ubat gigi ker nih (Did you put tootpaste in this)". If you are at those high end cafe, or restaurants, ordering tea by the pot can be the best value. Since it comes in a small teapot and refilling with hot water is free, you can get up to 4 cups of tea from one bag. Although after the second cup, the tea becomes rather bland since all the flavour are in the first two cups.
Dominos, introduced their newest card. Its basically the same "buy one get one free" card for takeaway purchases. Its more expensive now, but since you can use it as much as you want, it is good value, since they hiked up the price on their pizza. I love Dominos because they are generous with their sauce and their pepperoni taste better than Pizza Hut.

Die Hard

These mice are very hardy now. Its means they live longer than I expect them too. I usually can predict how long they would live after I innoculate them with my parasites depending on the how heavy the dosage is, usually about 4 days. Somehow now they can live an extra 2 or 3 days. I need to know the death date so that I could salvage their peritoneal fluid and infect other mice. It would be very inconvinient to have them die on a weekend. So I try to make sure my next innoculation would fall during the weekdays. I think due the constant exposure to the mice, bedding and feeds, I am getting allergic to it. Now I have to take extra precautions to ensure none of those touches my skin.

Sunday, May 17, 2009

Blog About It

I love blogging because it helps me to express myself and allows me to put my thoughts and feeling on that day on digital format. It's so weird when looking back at previous post, that I could still remember how I felt that day. If something happens, I feel like I want to type it on the spot and post it. Alas, most of the time I am not on the computer or I am busy doing something else. I already set up the email option of posting up my post (I can just email it to blogger and it will be in blog format), too bad the mobile blogging seem to not work in Malaysia, which uses MMS. I need a phone with Internet capability so I can post anytime or any day (but most likely there is connection). Those small notebooks (with out DVD drive and runs on XP) are nifty with its 8 second start up time (as claimed), are a good way to update as soon as possible. There is this option on blogger where you could type as much post as you want and then put a timer on it so that it will be updated through out the day or week. Other bloggers such as Saharil and Red Mummy, makes full use of this, since they already have a busy and hectic life. Its a cool feature but you need to have something to write about right. I think pictures are important too, since they speak more that word do sometimes.




The new E75, I don't red, but for this phone I would like it in red. So nice, with the sliding QWERTY pad to make typing much faster, but its gonna cost me an arm and a leg.


E63 is nice too, although the QWERTY pad does not slide, the display is much bigger though. It cost half of the E75, so it will cost me an arm only.

Thursday, May 14, 2009

Of family and of memories

I could not parallel park at IMR because the space was not long enough to fit my car. It does not help that there are other people parking illegally and blocking the access to this space to every car except the Kancil and Smart Fortwo.


It was a weird moment for me, when I accidentally bumped into my mother at Tesco today. Why is it weird? Well for once I still live with her, then when it comes to groceries shopping, it’s either I go with her, she goes alone or I go alone but never going together separately without knowing that the other is going. For me it’s like bumping into my relatives that I see once a month or a year instead of everyday. Hmm a glimpse into the future perhaps, when I am living on my own?

Well, she went to Tesco, driving my car the Viva while I had to drive the Naza Ria. This is because my sister is at home for her semester break, so she has to drive my sister to and from school. It would be inconvenient to drive the huge silver whale (Ria) to the school with all that congestion that consist of cars, busses, parents, children and motorcyclist on the road.

I think she loves driving the small, fuel efficient, easy to park, easy to drive car for those short errands. 80% of the time a small car can do most of the things that we need from a car. I like driving the Naza Ria, the huge size, the great stereo and the commanding view of the road is nice. Its easy to deal with road bullies because you don’t have to go fast, you can just block their way by driving the speed limit and smile while doing it.

Speaking of cars, our other car is in the workshop. The mechanic is running around looking for spare parts, used spare parts that is. Even the used spare parts will cost us almost RM 2k. Its expensive because Mercedes don’t need to be repaired that much. Our car is already 18 years old, but still drives better than most cars that is half its age. Well we will see how long before my dad gives up and sells the car. Although I secretly don’t want to….

Tuesday, May 12, 2009

So Hard?


Is it hard to return things that you borrow to where they belong? Is it hard to just ensure whatever you borrow is returned back in a condition where they were borrowed at the first time? Is it hard to return the items that you borrowed before the owners need to use it? Is it hard to ask first? I hate these kind of people. They should replace lab animals so that we can conduct all kind of experiment on them. I mean that would be the only good use to these kind of people. Monday mornings are bad enough, but to be frantically searching for the SMART TAG in the morning, is not a good sight. Stress level high, blood pressure rises, and the liberal usage of profanities is typical on a Monday morning to some but I don’t need extra frustration that is unplanned and easily prevented to be added to my Monday mornings.

SMART TAG is a device where we insert the Touch n Go card in, so that we can use in the SMART TAG lanes. Its those automatic toll paying device, where you don’t have to stop to pay for tolls, but merely slow down till a “beep” is heard to know that you have paid for your toll. Other countries have similar devices that is used for tolls in there highway’s or toll for driving in the city. I live outside of Kuala Lumpur (KL), so most roads that leads into KL is toll based, although there are some toll free roads, the congestion and time it takes, is not worth it. Even my trip to the University cost RM 1 at the toll, I could go into Kajang town and go through 3 traffic lights along with the traffic congestion.

We have 5 SMART TAG devices in our house, because we have 5 cars. This is to prevent from the devices from being transfer from one car to the other car. It’s very stressful to drive a car and then realize when you arrived at the toll booth, the SMART TAG is not in the car, so you had to queue up with the rest of the drivers who are paying cash (the only reason that you need to pay cash now days is because you want to collect the receipt).

It’s so frustrating that even though there is a SMART TAG for each car, sometimes one the car’s will be missing a SMART TAG or a Touch n Go card. Yes, it was missing. Its like WHAT THE F@#K is wrong with you people. WHY THE F#@$ING hell did you have to take it out from my F&#@ING car, when I F&#$ing need it. I don’t borrow your F%$#ing stuff, so don’t borrow my F#@$ing stuff you F##$ing S%$T head.

Wedding?

Last Saturday, I went to my lab assistant’s son’s wedding. It was a nice wedding, Simple but cheerful. Most important, they cook the feast for the banquet themselves instead of catering. Cater food does not taste as good as those home cooked feast. The wedding itself has a very “kampung” vibe to it, judging from the food and atmosphere. When I told my mum about it, she said the people who cooked and organized the feast must be from Melaka. I guess so, since I felt very much at home at the wedding.

Left and right people I know are getting married. I got the shock of my life when one of my friend was getting engaged after 7 months of dating. I was like, what!, no way!, really?, wow!, hey congrats to them. I also know a friend who has been married for 12 years and he is only 34 years old. Which means he was married at the age of 22. I was pursuing my bachelor degree when I was 22. Then, there was this one couple that I know that got married after they finished their degree. Now the husband is doing his PhD in Japan while the wife stayed in Malaysia to her PhD. They both are converting their Master degree into a PhD degree.

The funny thing about me getting the surprise of my life when hearing and knowing these news, is not that immediately jump on the bandwagon and get hitched, nor do I feel inferior that they found their special someone. I mean we are all created on earth to find our soul mate right. I feel well a bit weird, since I do thing some are quite young to be hitched or that some got married too soon, but then that is just me. I have no desire to built a nest anytime soon. It’s not in my nearest plan for the future anyway.

I do sometime see someone, either from online, from my friends acquaintance, or that occasional psychopath that you meet out of coincidence. However none of them made me feel like I want to settle down. The thing I think about the most is the next car I would like to own. A pickup, a SUV, a large sedan or a sport car. Who am I to judge on their choices, if they are happy on the path that they choose, I am too (although a bad day can literally feel like your life is hopeless) with my own choice.

I wish them all the best in their marriage and relationship. It’s probably not my thing now, but who knows right, once I meet the right person I might settle down….but only after a Mazda Rx8 on my car porch :D

Sunday, May 10, 2009

Homecooked feast

My friends and I had this wonderful feast last Saturday. Instead of the host preparing the food or the guest bringing in the food ala "pot luck", it was decided that the guest come over with raw ingredients and cook in the host kitchen. We all got to show off our culinary skills in the kitchen. The theme was "my mum's cooking" which is basically the simpe food that our mum's make that so good, it can be also called as comfort food.


Kerabu Sotong a marvelous mixture of cucumbers, tomatoes, onions, squids, vinegar, salt and other veggies.


Sambal sardine, sardines cooked in tomato sauce and chille, while garnished with deep fried potatoes.



Ayam Percik, grilled chicken with a special "percik sauce"




Ikan selar goreng, simple friend fish that is fried extra crispy.

It was requested that I made these fresh chocolate chip almond cookies. I had to use an old pictures because the cookies were gone as soon as they were out of the oven. Another satisfied group.


Smoking...

I was driving home after driving my sister to KLCC for some motivational camp/course thing that her school made, when I saw white smoke on my rear view mirror. The first thing that occur in my mind was, damn 2 stroke motorcycle, polluting the air. However I realise there was no motorcycler that was following nor overtook me. The white smoke came from my car. I know there is not much I can do, since the car was not everheating and still could move. The only problem was I am giving out smoke signals to people on the moon.

Before I send it to my workshop, I did my own research about white smoke coming out from the exhaust. White smoke is the result of your engine burning off your coolant, black smoke is burning your engine is burning off too much petrol and blue smoke is when your engine burns off your coolant. I gave him my point of view, but judging from his poor malay and english, I have no idea what he said to me >_<, but he said a valve that control the oil is broken and leaking oil in the cylinder and exhaust system. What it really means that its going to cost more than RM 1k to fix this car.... X_X
This is the first scratch after 3 months we painted the bumper of my sisters car which is done by the owner which is my sister.

Saturday, May 9, 2009

Mobile Banking

You gotta love Internet banking. You can do almost everything here, transfer account, pay bills, pay loans, pay credit cards and even reload. Everything that does not require cash or cheques. I mean its great for me, since I plan to use the car as often as I could (as soon as get home I will pay the credit card so that I will know my money has ran out). As a result I have become the source of reloads, and account transfer to everyone in my family. This is great since I don't have to go out in the middle of the night just to get prepaid. However I have to have an Internet connection in order to do so, and sometimes when I am on the road, my family would sms me for prepaid reload which makes it very inconvenient for me to stop to find an ATM (you can reload prepaid at the ATM), or any regular prepaid shop.


CIMB does offer mobile banking, but sadly both of my phone are not compatible with the system. They offer a list of compatible phones with Nokia topping the list of most phone compatible with CIMB. I could get a second hand phone, but somehow my experience of using a second hand phone is not good, I mean come on, it's a phone, it could be dropped, thrown, water damaged and so on. So it's based on luck when buying second hand phones. I am not sure should I get it or not, its nice to get a new phone and its nice to be able to just reload anytime and anywhere where the connection is strong.


Friday, May 8, 2009

An Old Friend Is Hard To Rid

Yes, my Mercedes 190e is an old friend. This is the car that has been with us the longest. Almost 14 years, this car has served my family. My dad brought it back from the US, when he studied there. So yes, its a left hand drive car and its still brings smile, stares, and curiosity to anyone and everyone.
I went to the workshop for alignment of the tires. The car tend to go the right when the steering is straight ahead. So all 4 wheels need to be align. RM 30 sounds well priced. They had this machine with the data of almost all vehicle makes in the world as long as the chassis number can still be read.
You must be a real car lover or someone with a lot of patience to own this car. One of the main reason for this, is the difficulty to obtain spare parts because this is such a rare car on the road. Even the tires size is rare 205/60/R15, most of the shops will carry 3 or 4 pairs of it. The tires are also quite expensive since it is relatively thick and wide. I end up just changing a pair of the tires instead of all 4 of it. So the front and rear tires are of different brands. It won't be a problem really as long as the pair is the same brand. Many times my family wanted to sell the car, but sometimes when it is working well, we did not have the heart to let it go. I don't have the heart to let it go either, many things have happened to me in this car, lots of life changing events happened in it. Let's see if we can keep it for another 5 years :)

Wednesday, May 6, 2009

Protein

It's common knowledge that protein helps to build muscle. It is even more important when you are using it extensively such as doing hard labour, doing strenuous jobs or lifting weights. Protein your muscle to recover faster so you can go and do the whole process again. That is why these gym rat will have a protein shake after a workout. It keeps their muscle for deteriorating and strained the day after the workout. I don't think I am at that stage of drinking a protein shake yet (its cost almost RM300 the good type), since I haven't really properly lift weights on a regular basis. It takes a lot of time really, you can easily spend 2 hours lifting weights and not even realise it. Besides, all I want to do is, to go on the cross trainer and get off as soon as I can. I should watch my diet more instead of replacing the calories I lost :p, but it's okay for now. I did went back to lifting weight after a 2 week pause (I was in no mood in lifting anything), and I had a good workout. However I made the mistake of just eating dinner like nothing happened, which mean I did not add a bit more protein to the meal (usually 2-3 poached eggs is enough to prevent muscle fatigue). So now my chest and arms are aching for two days straight.. Erghh.. bring on the lean protein now to repair these muscles. My weight did not really move that much (it fluctuates), but at least I look trimmer according to relatives and friends, so that gym membership did not go to waste after all :D

Monday, May 4, 2009

Underneath Your Clothes, There Is A Different Story.

I hate sweaty arm pits. I hate it when I can actually feel the sweat trickling down my arm. A damp pit on your shirt is not very appealing to many. It kinda ruins your whole look that you do. One cannot be like the Hollywood stars and get botox injection to your armpits. Apparently other than wrinkles, it works great to prevent excessive sweating. However its too expensive and I am not sure having a needle jab into my arm pit. What's worst that is that sweaty arm pits can cause B.O.

There is nothing worst like body odor or known as B.O to some. It ruins job interviews, failed relationships, causes panic and increases anger level. Exaggerating? I think most of us has experienced how B.O can really make your day turn sour. What does one do? Do we have to become mouth breather, practice holding our breath as long as possible, or spray some perfume and that god forsaken pits. Don't confuse this with natural body smell. Some people do smell naturally good, blame the pheromones for this unique scent that is present in everyone.

These two problem related with each other and can cause discomfort to the person and those around them. Sure there is deodorant and anti perspirant in the market, but sometimes certain brands or certain application of deodorant do not work well on others.

My brother has terrible anti perpirant problem. He gets so sweaty and wet, it turned into the most horrific and foul smelly B.O. He tries to wear deodorant from all brands and type but none of it worked well enough for him. Somehow along the way, we noticed he stopped smelling foul and is dry enough for us to touch. He told us his secret. He uses a Speedstick Anti Perspirant and Deodorant and a Nivea Dry Impact for Men. He claims this was the combination to stop him from sweating. A stick type deodorant that is then covered by a spray type. I did not really believe his combination until I tried it myself. However, I used a Rexona Roll On deodorant and Nivea Dry Impact combination. The result, my underarms were dry. They usually get wet easily even by the slightest sweating, but not when I used the combination. It was a pleasant surprise for my self. Maybe some of you may think that the Nivea spray deodorant is the reason for the dryness, but I used the spray before and did not like how the vapours enter my nose. So I do believe both combination provided an excellent protection and coverage to me.

A friend of mine has this terrible B.O problem, but so far we did not pin point it to excessive sweating. Since his underarms were relatively dry. So it has to be B.O. A blogger friend of mine swears that using Nivea Whitening for women has cured his problem. It sounded strange, but it worked for him. So I decided to try and recommended it to my friend with the B.O problem. He hesitated at first but after I told him he really did stink and before this I did not had the guts to talk about it to him but after he said his girlfriend sometime complain that he does, I straight away spilled the beans to him and he gave in. The results? It really worked, Nivea Whitening roll on work to combat B.O. Now I don't have to open the windows when he rides in my car.
Note, this is not a advertisement for the products mention above (I love to, but I don't think the company likes me mix matching their products and other company's products together)