Lost in space

What happened? I was lost in space.... This happens a lot to me lately; too many things to do with too little time.

1) I was caught up with the repair work in the house which was finally completed sometime in March. Then there's that clearing up to do which by the way is still piled up in one corner of the house.

2) My family and I went for two weeks holiday in May which of course was another excuse to be 'spaced out' prior to the holiday; then the recovery period after the holiday!! Not to mention having to spend one Saturday night at the hospital for swine flu observation!!

3) There's still that addictive Mafia Wars to level up! It takes so long to wait for energy regain (I should probably just quit this game all together...)

In a blink of an eye, it is now JULY! What happened to all the days that just zoomed past me? Today is a good day for me to take stock of those days bygone..

Having said that, these definitely falls under the URGENTLY TO DO list:

(a) complete and pass up that assignment before Aug 1st
(b) finish painting that old looking stairway wall
(c) hang all the pictures that's on the floor right now
(d) get rid of that pile of old documents stacked up in the corner
(e) spring clean the wardrobes
................the list could go on and I will be overwhelmed and might just returns to space city...

P.s. I am still mourning the loss of the world's King of Pop! Michael Jackson, I love you!!!

Rescue me....

Whoever destroys a single life is as guilty as though he had destroyed the entire world; and whoever rescues a single life earns as much merit as though he had rescued the entire world.

The Talmud, Mishna. Sanhedrin

Last Thursday about midnight, I heard this most pitiful whimpering sound. Through my windows with just enough lighting from the streetlights, I could barely see this tiny pup trapped in the monsoon drain located at the back of the house. I spent the night agonizing the little pup's helplessness. I didn't have enough courage to go retrieve the pup in the middle of the night but I did it as soon as it was conducive to do so. It took me almost an hour to coax the frightened pup to trust me to carry it to safety. I took it home, gave it a good bath, fed it with milk and called it Rescue. As I know its mother roams the backlane, I kept the little pup at the backyard. I have every intention of adopting this female pup however, coming home later in the afternoon, I discovered that it had somehow managed to squeeze through the chain link fencing. We saw Rescue happilly trotting around reunited with the mother. That's a relieve but my girls were very disappointed. They refused to believe that I had nothing to do with the little pup's escape.

Rescue frightened and hungry, after I bath her.

The chain link fence which Rescue managed to squeeze through.

I had to climbed down the ladder to reach Rescue and carry it up to safety.

Coincidentally, three days ago, I found another puppy; right outside my front gate! Its a stray male pup, playful and adorable! I went around the neighbours checking if the puppy belongs to anybody. Having established that it is indeed homeless, I took it home, bath it and fed it. This time, I kept little Rascal at the front yard, leashed and installed some kind of reinforcement on the main gate. I do not want my girls to go through another disappointment of losing a dog.

The first two nights Rascal kept some neighbours awake with his ruckus! Luckily the neighbours are very understanding people (having dogs of their own) and that this is just temporary . Soon enough Rascal got used to being leashed at night. He's now behaving well and only cries when he needs attention.

I am proud to say that Rascal has now become the latest addition to our family.

Rascal looking rather handsome and adorable :)

Why do I love my husband (tagged by Dora)

A great marriage is not when the 'perfect couple' comes together. It is when an imperfect couple learns to enjoy their differences.
Dave Meurer, "Daze of Our Wives"

I was tagged by Dora on this subject; hers was "Why/How do I love my husband". My first reaction was OMG!...this is quite personal. I wasn't keen to 'participate' but I don't want to be kill-joy at the same time. What the heck... so here goes:

There are many reasons as to why but I'm going to limit them to ten*(in random order); and I am not going to the "How" lest I cause many to blush!!! Shush!!

Why I love my husband? Its because*:

1. he's cheeky when he's tipsy :)
2. can still make me blush
3. praise my cooking although we all know that his mum's cooking is his favourite
4. understand my needs for shopping, movies and girls night out
5. tolerate my short comings and lets me rant when I'm having PMS
   
6. acknowledge my intelligence when it comes to electronic/electrical gadgets
7. of his sense of humour and the silly games he still plays with our girls
   
8. he's resigned to the fact that I'm an FB (Face Book) addict
9. of his commitment to the family and
10. he still makes time for little chats with God

There you have it, a little peek to my personal life. In view of the coming Valentine's I will now then tag Phil, Joyce and Nina Diane to share their bits of information.

Cheers!

Quotable quotes

I love quotes. I think there are fabulous quotes that just suits the right occasion to quote. Though I love quotes, I don't actually go around talking in quotes.. that would be very weird. I might add a quote in my card to you or simply send you quotes once in a while but really, I don't speak in quotes.

Talking about quotes, I am going to post here something that I found written in one of my old address books of which I think is quote-worthy. I can't remember the source of this particular quote but I think that it is awesomely inspiring.

"The Road to Success is not straight,
There is a Curve called Failure,
A loop called Confusion,
Speed bumps called Friends,
Red Lights called Enemies,
Caution lights called Family;

You will have flats called Jobs
But, if you have a spare
called Determination
an engine called Perseverance
insurance called Faith
A driver called JESUS
YOU will make it to a place called SUCCESS!"




Cheers to all.

The grass is always greener on the other side...

This little yellow bird comes knocking on my glass windows everyday without fail. Some days I'll sit by the window and watch this bird try 'flying' through the glass. It must be wondering why couldn't it crossover to the other 'realm' that is so close yet so far... I guess its the reflection of the outside 'world' on the window that prompts this poor little bird to repeat its daily routine.






Lately, there are days when I'm done with the chores and spent, I am contented to just sit by the window and let the world go by... and (also) watch the antics of my little yellow bird. Many thoughts come to mind, contemplation and ideas of what to do next. Mental notes of these ideas fly out the window the moment I get up from that rocking chair! I am wishing dearly that somehow my thoughts could be transmitted to a 'hard disk' so that I can refer to it later. Great ideas comes to me when I'm idling away.... Alas! most of these contemplations remain just that! The old adage of "mind willing but body not" is certainly an apt description...





One of the things I want to complete sometime this year would be my scrapbook. I've got the idea of doing this "Project365" from Becky's blog. It seems easy when others write how they're doing it and how its looking artfully creative too... I'm that little yellow birdie, looking at another person's project and thinking "wow..."



Still, ending on a different note, Chinese New Year is coming and yet another round of merriment. Though we don't celebrate it at home, one particular company never fails to send us a CNY card since we bought our first carpet floor from them.

A book in a bag is always a good thing

Books may well be the only true magic.
Alice Hoffman

We have all experienced at least once where we have to wait somewhere for hours with nothing else to do. When that happens, don't we start to think of all the things that we could have accomplished in that very hour! Recently, I had to spend a lot of time waiting on two occasions that involves my daughters.

On new year's eve day, I thought it was a good idea to get my daughters' international passports renewed as supposedly it would be less crowded that day. Bad idea! Although we got our queue numbers at 11.15am, we only got back the passports (renewed to year 2014) after 4pm. That's a lot of time wasted at one place! In between the waiting and lunch, I had to buy two tabloid magazines to keep Alex and Ashley off the complaining streak. Lucky for me, I had my book.



Our friend Michelle sent us two tickets to watch Mama Mia the musical on 2 January at the Istana Budaya theatre. My daughters had just watched the movie and they really wanted to watch the musical so I let them have those tickets. I did try to get a ticket for myself too but the one seat available cost way too much, over RM500. Since there's no Pierce Brosnan, Meryl Streep or Collin Firth in that musical, why bother. I drove my kids to the place, got a nice parking spot and waited till they got into the theatre. I've probably reached the age where one can no longer be bothered shuttling back and forth in the crazy traffic, plus there's a decent enough cafetaria in the building. I wish I could say that I had enjoyed the long wait (3 hours) but there were some very persistent mosquitoes that kept buzzing near me! I was earlier seated indoors but it got too cold in my sleeveless blouse so I opted to sit at the patio. Thank goodness, I had my faithful book with me.

Yesterday, our 15yr old Philips television reached its use by date! We were halfway watching rerun of "Bad Boys" when it just went blank. There's no running to Harvey Norman in a jiffy coz dear hubby says "due to the global economic situation we are now scalling down on all extravangant expenditure". I guess we're back to watching tv on the old 14inch telly for now.

This clearly gives credence to my point of carrying a book in my bag, almost everywhere I go.

Happy New Year ...

"Do something every day that you don't want to do;

this is the golden rule for acquiring the habit of doing your duty without pain." Mark Twain

What a year 2008 has been! We have so much to thank for and yet so much to want for in 2009! Isn't that typical of us mere mortals?.....

The year 2008 saw the death of a distinguished uncle (Lloyd) in February whilst the following months brought good tidings of health recoveries by another uncle (Cyril) and a close family friend (uncle LA). It was especially wonderful that my family from Sabah came to visit more regularly. We also bade bon voyage to our good friend, Michelle and her family who emigrated to Sydney, Australia last December. Emotion will ride high yet again for today is the day that my bro-in-law and family will emigrate to Melbourne, Australia. It was also a proud moment and elation of emotion for us that our daughter Alex scored straight As in her PMR exam.



The year 2009 is yet another year full of hopes. We hope that the good Lord will continue to bless us with good health, wisdom and tolerance to take on this year.

"Always do right. This will gratify some people and astonish the rest." Mark Twain