Car Check

Got my cert of health for the little car, have to do it every 3 years and it’s goldie’s turn to have her checkup. Passed with flying colours. The whole process was rather fast but there was a queue and the taxi in front of me getting checked up ran into problems it seems as the car took forever to clear the stations.

Race Pack Collection - 2XU

I had signed up for my first run of the year the 2XU Compression Run – 12km. Went down to collect the race pack and since last year I did the bid number display thingy. I figured this year why not show what the goodie bag was about.
So this is what was in the goodie bag. Had the standard Race T-shirt, timing chip plus the race map and details. A shoe string the easy lace type for triatholon’s. A gel to warm up the muscle and the reason why I signed up for the even the hand carry water bottle. They added in the Pocari Sweat information pamplet on the benefits of Pocari.
I picked up my goodie bag at Velocity and as there was the 30km challenge run in October and they were having a road show. I signed up for that too and got a MIO watch.

PC Show

I was at the recent PC show held here. Don’t think there was any records broken this year for attendance or sales as there was no mentioned of anything in the newspaper’s unless I missed it. But it was still crowded. I decided this year to go after work on a Friday (I figured I’ll beat the weekend crowded) but man it was still crowded. So many floors could not even find the Apple booth. I went to check out the Singtel booth but it was so crowded that I gave up. Headed for the StarHub area to see if I could get a better deal on my subscription but could not get a free helper there to answer my queries so in the end I just did a quick walk around of the floor area. Wanted to get some more photo paper but again queue was too long. Was about to head dome when I spotted the Camera bag area, it was not too busy and I had seem their advertisement for $30 camera bags. Lowepro pretty good brand. I saw their cheap $30 bags but it was really too flimsy. Then I saw their $80 bag usual was $260 or there about. It was a backpack and big enough to fit my camera with the battery drip it also had a place to hang the tripod which I though was good since during the visit to the zoo I had to lug around the camera bag plus the tripod. This really saves me a lot if I am carrying a tripod. There was a side quick access panel as well. It even had a ‘raincoat’ cover to protect it in case of bag weather. You can take it out at the base and it wraps around the bag. Again the zoo visit highlighted a need for some water proofing since it rain as well there. Pretty happy with the bag now can sell off my other 2 Lowepro bags that I got ha ha.

My Bag that I bought from the PC show and the only thing I got from it.

Speaking of photography, I got myself a simple water proof camera it uses normal 35mm rolls of film and man it has been a long time since I loaded one of these.

 

Finally got it loaded, Remembered to fire off the first few shots to clear the roll and it was off to take pictures. Photo’s actually came out, well at least something came back however really do miss the digital age where you can manipulate your shots after you have taken them but these cannot do that. Really should not be taking babies with these cameras wasted many picture like that but still great fun and it works.

Best Place to Practice Music.

You would never believe where people go to practice. I was at Toa Payoh park recently and as I was jogging through the park, I heard the sounds of a Violin playing. As it turns out it was someone practicing their violin playing in the park. At Macritchie Reserviour Carpark encountered a man playing his Saxaphone !! That probably is the strangest sight ever.

Japan will recover !!

I’m amazed at the devastation the recent Earthquake / Tsunami has done to Japan. After seeing Christchuch in ruins, hey I’ve been to the Cathedral that looks like it is going to have to be demolish now, hopefully they can fix it. It’s the talking point these few days. The Japanese seem very calm in the face of this disaster, you see the news reports very practical people asking just to have the services restored, they queue up even if only 1 store is open to buy food you don’t see mad rushing around, everyone walked home after the quake hit as transportation came to a halt. I think some of the Japanese would have gone back to work if the authorities had not closed down the building. Heard this story about a company who had a branch in Japan and they called in to the head office here and in a calm manner requested permission to evacuated the building !! I’m thinking what the hell just get out and call later man. But then I think that company probably got the news here first even before the cable networks were able to report on the Earth quake. My prays are with the people of Japan. 

GUG

Growing Up Gifted - the kids weekly play group which we have just signed them up on. It has been 2 weeks already since we signed them up and today they went for their second lesson. Much better behaved this round and not like the first time where little boy just wants to do his own thing. Just dread the day he goes to school can just image the teacher calling up on the first day "your son does not want to sit down". Little girl was better at least she likes the story time she could sit there and listen and look at the book that the teacher was reading on. There was songs,activities, play time, crafts and story time. This week both were slightly better behaved.

 Little Nat with her dirty dress after the painting class on the session with GUG

TREE

I took this by the side of the road one day astonishing how the tree cold actually grow through the fence !

Adrenalyn Champions League Tournament 2010

The Adrenalyn Champions League 2010/2011 Tournament or what the organisers called the Grand Final was held recently on 6th Mar 2011 at Velocity. It was my first time at this tournament decided to partake in it since I tried out the Adrenalyn World Cup tourney and found it interesting. Rules and stuff were basically the same.

The Tournament started at 11am with a briefing on the rules and regulations (something which would haunt me later) and then we were split into our groups. There were 8 groups and 4 players in each group with the top 2 going on to the next round. I was in group 5 and as someone did not turn up there were only 3 of us in the group. All 3 were adults so did not get a chance to meet any young kids. But I heard from my friends who faced these kids they were tough to beat as well.

I lost the first game 5-6 but won my second 6-5. So it was between the other 2 players and the outcome from those matched. Turns out the guy I lost to in the first game won so he had 2 wins, me I had 1 win and 1 lost and the other guy had 2 loses. Managed to get through to the round of 16. So that ends the round robin play.

Elimination round starts. I was picked to play Nas a friend I met recently to do some trading and he went for the friendly games recently, he had just picked up the game and in the friendlies he was basically white-wash by the other players. But now he has made it into the top 16. I won the toss and went first which was the advantage. This was crucial and I manage to win 6-5. So it was off to the top 8 and at least got some prize money as well. The Top 8 will walk away with cash prizes.

Quarterfinals I played Edwin. He won the toss and had the advantage. He played a strange formation 4-1-5 and started with a Midfielder, everyone I had played always started with a Striker. It kind of blew me away and I had to think a bit. I managed to catch him at the right time and won 6-5.

Semi-Final play offs was again the defending Champion Luk. I lost the toss and basically was no match for him and he won with a resounding 7-4 victory. Had a hard time trying to catch him.

I still had one more game and it was the 3rd/4th placing $50 for the 4th and $300 for the 3rd. I would be playing against the guy I lost in the first round. With the help of some friends I did some quick tweaking to the deck and went into the match. He won the toss and first card I though I would get him but he fooled me and I lost a major card to him. I was going oh dear that’s it lost game here. But somehow I managed to get back into the game with some timely placement and caught him the second time. Score was 5-4 in my favour and I just needed 1 more point to win with 2 cards on the table I have a Goalkeeper and Striker and he had the same. It was my turn, I played my Keeper Cech against his Ronaldo and SAVED !! The shot was saved by my keeper score 6-4 and only 1 point left. But then to my horror when the last card was slip my striker turned out to be a Goalkeeper I had made a wrong substitution and that cost me an immediate Disqualification ! I guess lesson learned here and anyway if I had not tweaked my deck with the help from my friends I would have lost anyway. So 4th place for me not bad.

I won a lucky draw prize and took home a mini speaker as well as a Vuvuzela (cheap one) for answering some trivia question. The Vuvuzela was a real hit with my little girl she loves it and thinks its a vacuum cleaner.

of Chestnuts and Durians

I’m not a big Chestnut fan, I don’t really like those boiled or fried chestnuts however the roasted variety I absolutely LOVE them. You know those roasted in coal and put into paper bags. Recently saw a road side store that sold those and bought a packet. Delicious !!! it has been a long time since I tasted those. That evening I had durians as well and I nowadays they usually come in those pre-wrapped and packed variety which you can get in the supermarkets. I went to the neighbourhood store to get some of those still in their shells. SO fun to break them open and eat the durians like I used to when I was young. My dad basically taught me the smell kind of way to find a good durian. Brings back old memories but the missus wasn’t too keen on the smell

The Lion King

The Lion King is in town. I saw the production in Canada a couple of years ago, my cousin got us tickets for the event. I have to say it was one of THE most impressive shows I have seen. From the shots and costumes that has been making the rounds in the papers, the Singapore production will be spectacular. I would recommend it to anyone. Go catch it if you can.

Lasik 3-D

Well finall decided to go for another check up on the eye's seems it needs an adjustment. Went for another round of Lasik surgery, third time lie on table to go under the laser but this time I am not sure what was done as the procedure was different. Faster and less things to do seems if you go for corrective surgery it's faster. Made my appointment and was the first one for the day. Met the doctor and got my eyes fixed in about 10 minutes but then it was 2 days of rest at home to make sure the eye's heal properly. This round it was just the left eye. I had my Lasik done 3 years ago and at that time after 6 months I went for another one as it needed to be corrected. I think it's due to the old age "lao hua" thingy. Anyway this the third time and it has definately improved the vision to be better than before. Hopefully I don't need t adjust my right eye too.

Haze-O-Meter

This missus woke up this morning and told me "the haze is back" and I said "where,where, it looks the same " She kept going on that there was haze in the air and the place was getting all hazy but I could not tell the difference. Finally as the sun came up I could see that indeed the sky was not all clear. The missus has this uncanny ability to snif out the haze !!