pesky pests

Hate them. Just hate them. There I was, seated on the sofa peacefully mending a loose button on hubby's coat when I noticed to my horror, a creepy crawly moving its feelers a few inches away from my legs. What did I do? I shrieked like a little girl and leapt off the sofa in a bolt.. then I wiggled around, making sure it didn't somehow land on me.. eeee, geli geman seluruh badanku! I was quite a sight there. Never mind if the insect is the size of your pinkie fingernail. Any insects especially the flying ones is enough to squeeze a screaming banshee out of me and send me galloping across the room! I won't be in peace until I see the bloody thing drop dead or out of the house. A sneaking insect on the other hand, could give me a momentary coronary. It's that bad, yes.

One good thing about the cold weather is that most insects go in hiding except for the one I mentioned above... I suspect they come from the wood beams we have in the apartment. I don't even wanna imagine what other crawlies we might find if we were to pry open the beam.. but of course that will never happen.

We always open the windows during spring/summer to let the breeze in but along comes unwelcome 'visitors' as well, most commonly mosquitoes, bees and flies.. and the flies here are mostly the big fat ones - gross! Curiously though, the whole time I've been here, I haven't seen any coackroaches or lizards (not that I'm eager to) and that's a huge plus point.

Well my mom used to say "Ah, bende kecik gitu pun nak takut! Dia lagi takut pada kita." Well Mak, it's not the size that matters.. it's the look and the potential feel of those pests on your body. Ask me to hold any snakes (non-poisonous ones of course) and I'll gladly do it.

choc me up

What melts in your mouth, not in your hand but melts when you run a fork through it? Why.. a melting chocolate cake of course! I've been wanting to make this but found out that they sell it frozen.. so I just had to pop it in the oven, let it bake and voila, out comes a heavenly scented chocolate dessert, ready to be devoured. Best eaten warm and can be accompanied with pouring cream, whipped cream, vanilla ice-cream or just by it-good-old-self. A sure winner dessert.. miam-miam!

ber-htlm-ing

After days of brain-smashing, eyes-popping, butt-cramping spell, I'm finally satisfied with the outcome of my blog's new look. Being a painstaking perfectionist can have its drawbacks.. I wanted everything to be flawless that I ended up playing seesaw, changing the tiniest of details. I did like a hundred (not really) different designs for the header and finally settled for the one above. Not being an expert in the html field made it a more time-consuming project for me, having to do it through trial and error.

If you wonder why I subjected myself to all the troubles of editing my blog's layout instead of just making do with the run-of-the-mill version from blogger, well I just don't like the look of blogger's templates and wanted a touch of my own. At least I did learn something from all those editing.

So the transition from old to new was finally made and since I cannot satisfy all browsers, I've opted to adapt the look to that of IE.

a tutelage & 5 new posessions

His name is Gaspard (go ahead and laugh.. I did when I first heard it :D)... he's 18 and he's my (our) first ever 'student'. Let me explain... well hubby's colleague asked if I could help her son in his English since his level is below average and that he'll be taking his A levels next year (this was asked before we went for our Singapore vacation). I was pretty hesitant in the beginning since I've never taught/tutored anybody in my life before and have no idea how to teach. But after toying with the idea a little longer, I decided to give it a go and see how things will evolve.

So we had our first session today and it went pretty well I'd say, albeit with an awkward start. Well he seems earnest and willing to learn and try to improve his English.. and that's a good sign. We've arranged for a twice a week session, so we'll see how it goes.

After we're done playing teacher, we headed downtown to scour for some good bargains and we did buy some stuff (mainly for moi). The winter sales is wrapping up its round this weekend so it's the best time to shop since they're making sales on top of sales. So I got myself another coat (again?!), a couple of wrap scarves and a couple pair of shoes... c'est trop, c'est trop!* But they were really good buys though, so I thank my dearest hubby for all that... I'm being dangerously spoilt here! Ok, no more shopping for me until maybe the next sales :P


* it's too much!

home quiet home

Back in the cold, in the quiet, back to blogging and back to cooking for me! After a long, tiring journey, we've reached home safe and sound with our treasures from Singapore all intact, safe for a broken wheel on our brand new luggage due to (very) bad handling in Paris but lets not elaborate on that (menyakitkan hati aje).

We had 3 glorious weeks in Singapore, thanks to our dear family and friends. Good memories, wonderful moments, great times... thank all of you (you know who you are) for making our stay a truly memorable one. 3 weeks seem to whizz by so fast and in a blink of an eye, it's back to the airport to catch our flight back home.. what a miserable feeling that was. Well this is just but a temporary home for us.. we hope to be back in Singapore for good in the close future, insya'Allah.. we're crossing our fingers.

I'm already missing everybody especially my 2 darling nieces, with their chattiness and laughter.. how fast they've grown up! I'll sorely miss hearing them uttering 'Bik Julie' in their little voices.

After a long dread, I've finally unpacked and put everything away. Lets hope it won't be too long before we bring out the luggages again and head back to Singapore.. pour de bon!

what bleakness

It's only 4 pm and the light in our apartment is already on. It's grey, cold and wet outside.. depressing sight indeed. It has been raining every now and then, which is quite odd during winter. But that indicates that the temperature is not as low as it should be during this time of the year.. not that I'm complaining. Well it's still butt freezing to me. If it goes on like that, there won't be any white winter this year.

We're impatient to get off the layers and get defrosted in warm and humid Singapore.. counting down the days!

back online

I've been out of touch with the web world for a week and that left me handicapped for a while. Thanks to Mr Technician, our HP that died on us upon our return from my in-laws after the Christmas weekend, has been given a new lease of life and we're now contented :D

The new year came and gone and we welcomed 2007 with a clink of the champagne glass in the warmth of our living room.. no fireworks display or whatsoever here (not even in Paris apparently). Normally, we'd be over at my in-laws during Christmas right up till new year but that didn't happen this year since hubby has used up all of his vacation days for our trip to Singapore.

Here're some photos for you folks back in the warmth (click on it to pause):