We Are Going On A...Summer Holiday

We're all going on a summer holiday
No more working for a week or two
Fun and laughter on our summer holiday
No more worries for me or you
For a week or two...

Well if only lah we were going off for a week or more. With the long weekend coming up we is finally able to make it for a trip with the Klangites, this time to...*checks GMail*...Sg Sedim/Kulim for some whitewater rafting and suchlike. Not to mention a brief stop at Penang as well. This one's been in the works since the middle of May, not long after the Klangites last trip.

Whattopackwhattopackwhattopackwhattopackwhattopackwhattopackwhattopackwhattopack...

We're taking the afternoon off today so that we don't have to stress ourselves with the necessary packing. As usual we've to make do with our hiking bag, and we always pray everything'll fit. Good thing about these kinda trips is that there's no need for anything but casual/rough wear so there's no need to keep things overly tidy. Still...

ChargethecamerachargethephoneforgetaboutbringingtheiPodheckitbringtheiPodbringthespeakers...
Toiletriesbagdon'tforgetOriginalSourceshowergeltoothbrushtoothpasteshavingbladecontactlens...
SandalswehavenosandalsdowewanttosacrificeourCrocsforwhitewaterraftingorfindapairofsandals...
Howmuchclothestobringhowmanyteeshowmanyshortsjeansorthreequartersorpants...
BringbookGunsGermsAndSteelmaybebutneedtowrapthatfirstbringNDSforgetaboutboardgames...
GotoFitnessFirstgetlotsofplasticlaundrybags...

It's bad enough that yesterday kept feeling like Friday already. Shall try not to dwell on it but focus on this month's Baskin Robbins: a quart of Espresso and Cream mixed with Rum and Raisin. Otousan told us that they're having the 31% offer from the 29th till the 31st for this month, which allowed us to get our quart last night (we thought we would be missing out this month).

We quite perasaan that we attracted attention as we were leaving The Curve yesterday. Rather obvious that people's heads turned to follow as we made our way to the car park. Felt a bit smug, we did. Because we had something they didn't. This.

Guys at BR packed this in super large paper bag that our humble quart looked like a tub.

Okays. We'll be back when the weekend's done. So have a good Independance day ya.

Things On Tuesday Nights

We learned last night:

Laundry Bar closes at 1am
Done with our first round (still don't know what's the difference between House Wine and Premium House Wine - asides from the RM3 difference only) and just ordered our second, only to have the waiter return to tell us that they can't serve drinks past 1am or they'd be fined. Ish, should have convinced psike to just get a bottle of WolfBlass between us. Then again how many people make it a point to go drinking on a Tuesday night when it's still a working day the next day.

Apartment and that new place, Bavarian Bierhaus, also closes at 1am
'Nuff said.

7-Eleven open 24/7!
Like nobody knows this :P So we ended up getting beers from 7-Eleven. And wee cups of Häagen Dazs at RM8.50 a cuppa. Comes with this plastic tab/spoon thing inside. We had Cookies and Cream, psike had Macadamian Nuts. Can't really taste Macadamian Nuts with beer in our mouth, though. Cookies and cream nice, very nice.

McDonalds Mutiara Damansara doesn't have soft-serve ice-cream at 2am
Or maybe their ice-cream machine was on the fritz.

Nasi Kandar's Maggi Mee Goreng very the spicy
With green chili padi. Thankfully there wasn't a lot and we swept the noodles clear of the hidden mines before digging in.

Rocky is now Pocky
That box of munchies filled with strawberry/chocolate coated biscuit sticks has changed to a funkier packaging and the price has gone up from RM1-something to RM2.60.

Alcoholic high wakes us up early
At about some time 6 in the morning, after getting back at 3am. Because the bladder doesn't take no for an answer. Also to bathe after an entire day spent out. It was raining something lovely this morning, that after our shower we went back to bed instead of staying up.

Oh. Finally it's A Good Riddance to psike (like his text says) as he heads to Sporeland for work. Won't be long before he gripes about it there.

Hirsuit Pursuit

That's what l'agneau orange calls her attraction to the hairy Heroes that she likes - Dr Mohinder, for one, and Isaac Mendez, for another. Well, we'll leave her to her hairy men then.

Our issue lies a little closer to home.

We dropped by home in the afternoon and noticed in the mirror that our morning shave didn't seem to do anything - because our face looked as if we didn't clear away the nuclear-blasted mutated wilderness that it was. And we knows we did shave in the morning.

How is it that, by not even half the day, the facial hair has grown out of control? And we don't get that 5 o'clock shadow kind of look, rather, the 1 o'clock nuclear jungle more likely.

Probably because we didn't shave as how Kyan would have instructed. Terrible prep, no lather, the blade bit ada, the technique's rushed, and no after party. To the uninitiated, it just means we splash cold water and drag the blade in a few quick swipes (rinsing the blade in between swipes of course). We've stopped shaving against the grain a long time ago (although the results actually looked better). And we don't tszuj.

Probably we were asking for it after all - a few miserable hacks with a sickle when we should slowly work our way methodically with the lawnmower? What were we thinking? We were thinking - that extra time can be put to better use, like sleeping a little while longer.

In the end we just couldn't tahan the face looking as it was and subjected ourselves to another, more proper shave. Broke out the 3-year-old Nivea shaving gel (which is still some three-quarters full after all this time), lathered up and took our time. Results? Looks slightly better, but only slightly. Only, we've to avoid that bit where there seems to be a pimple hiding among the follicles.

Decisions decisions decisions...to Oxify the spot and bleach the hair, or to slice through the whole thing and cause some blodshed? There is no way we shall leave it to grow - lad's experiment at leaving the facial hair unmolested scared us badly when we saw his MSN pic yonks back.

Oh, that we didn't have to shave every day!

"This Game Is Called...?"

Can't say it. Can't use gestures to describe it. Not allowed to use certain related words to it.

Still, it's a good party game to get the entire group to join in - and it's never really played to the point where you know all the words (too bad the same can't be said for Cranium). And this was what we played at NJAPF's and Lingo's housewarming party last night (which is MONTHS late, but hey, it's still a housewarming).

Had warned NJAPF that we may be late (10ish turned out to be...*checks call log*...11.14pm) and so they started off playing Cranium. By the time we reached 'Vin had already left, leaving psike and us as the final guests to arrive. Helped ourselves to the Syrah, the celery stick and dip, the tasty pineapple tarts and the chocolates while watching the two teams crack their heads on Cranium.

Then after a short break where we tried the new Twisties potato chips (tasty but a bit expensive) and broke out the coffee liquor.

After that, it was on to this party game also with two teams. Doesn't matter if we didn't know some of the other guests (thankfully our team had NJAPF's old friends whom we're acquainted with), and the teams were quite even, 3 girls and 2 guys on each side (oh, if we knew that there was a good mix of people we would have gotten Twister!).

Quite a number of funny moments...

"Men wear these - girls like to collect wan."

"Another word for thongs - dirty word wan!"

"The black man who goes around using this ball of his to destroy planets."

"Er. Blanka. Where does he comes from?"

Interestingly, when we were monitoring NJAPF during her turn, she hesitated on a certain word - EJECT. We recognize the hesitation for what it was, "You're thinking about sex, aren't you?"

Better yet was when NJAPF was describing the word:

NJAPF: After sex what happens to the guy?
Lingo: Erect!

Wah. Guess things were never the same after our session at Ethancya's and Renzze's where instead of describing verbally, it was done like Charades. NJAPF should still remember how we described 'tear-jerker'.

So, this game is called...?

Doth De Devil Defy Death Daily

Oh heck. Unlike Leggy we can't play about with alphabets that well :)

When the parents returned from their quick trip to Sporeland last week mum passed us something we've not seen for a long while - our The Devil Wears Prada book.

To start. We were on a trip to Sporeland for company orientation last year in October, and while at the airport in KLCC we realised something was wrong.

"Eh, shit. No book."

See, it's our normal tendency to buy a book whenever we're down at Sporeland. That's because we never had Borders open here yet, and Kino's a bit to far for us to go regularly. Oh heck, we'll admit it. It's just an excuse to spend money buying new books. Price-wise it isn't any different and would probably have been cheaper to just buy it locally, since given our selection of reading material we have yet to venture into more niched titles that aren't available locally (whether it's due to some blanket censorhip or whatever) so whatever we buy in Sporeland is readily available here too.

The problem while at KLIA was this - while we will be buying a books while at Sporeland, we weren't there yet, and we have nothing to read while on the plane/in the hotel/having dinner/while walking about until we have time to browse the bookstores the next day. And that was unacceptable. So in desperation we hunted the bookstore at KLIA, and found The Devil Wears Prada. Having watched the movie we happily snag the book. And it's a good simple read.

Only that once we'd finished the book, sis wanted to read it too and so we left it in Sporeland for her.

Now the book has finally found its way back home. And in time for a rereading. Only thing, while rereading the book it broke out a rash of wanting to watch the show again. Every time we pick up the book the rash got bigger and itchier. So we gave in today and headed down to Borders to pick up a copy.

Yay. Our own Devil.

And if that wasn't enough, we were also eyeing the Death Note manga - book 7 to be exact. We're rather curious as to how Light chumps L, see. Borders only put out Book 8 as the browsing copy, where Mellow and Near have already been introduced. And we've the impression that the episodes we've managed to catch on YouTube were the chapters in Book 6.

But an English copy of the manga isn't cheap. A book goes for about RM30-something, the price of a normal book. Then we realised something - we have a RM10 voucher that we got last week when we bought Guns, Germs and Steel (for a mere RM40!) at the Borders concourse sale in the Curve. So we could use that voucher to get that book next day. All we have to do is go home, find the voucher and buy it next time.

It was a good thing we didn't get the book, because while at Sun Comic in Cineleisure Damansara next door, they were selling those exact same books for RM8. Just too bad that they only have till book 5 for now. We gave up and caved in for this instead.

Our own Death Note. Yeah so it's not the book to kill people but the complete anime episodes on DVD. Comes with silly handphone strap thingy. Selling for only RM56. Why buy? Because we don't torrent. And we prefer to watch on telly in comfort than in front of a monitor.

Hurrah. More stuff to watch during supper, only to cause us to continue sleeping late.

Sugar, Ah Honey Honey...

We've had friends borrow money before and we ourselves have also done the same. No biggie really and all it takes is a gentle reminder that "you still hutang me RM-so-much," to settle it. But why is it that in this particular case we don't feel like we're lending money, but rather we feel more like a sugar daddy?

That we perasaan that way is a bit...not good, really. And this is the second time it's happening and we feel the same way. No, we really are not becoming a sugar daddy to be leeched on. We is poor. Poor people make bad sugar daddies.

We're keeping track of the amount owed - all the playing about doesn't mean we're that mindfucked till we forget all about it. Not that mindfucking is bad. Screwing about with the mind at least makes us laugh, if only for a while...only we have to be careful when driving back home later that we don't end up crashing into something.

Oh. Mental note: to get FCI some diddly birthday prez so FCI can use it much to the excitement and delight of the gym members. Must disregard FCI's text reply: "U wish dun u." We don't have to wish. We knows.

Heavy Rain

We were raining heavily during dinner. Not emotionally but literally.

We took a long time deliberating our dinner options when we were suddenly reminded of Ajisen Ramen, located at our second home. This place was recommended by otousan some time back and it was on our KIV list.

Trust us to not pay attention to the menu. Following otousan's recommendations we ordered their Volcano Ramen - only to notice that the dish was rated '4 chilis'. A quick look and preventative measures presented itself in the form of Cold Ocha (refillable).

A lovely large bowl was placed in front of us, with a very large piece of serviette paper and disposable chopsticks. Disposable chopsticks never fail to remind us of Osaka, and we go into a slight narcoleptic trance as we split the chopsticks *snap*. Heh.

The first bite into our meal and we knew the weather forecast, "Shit..."

It started raining. Heavily. While we were in full office wear, tie and jacket inclusive. Our hair started wilting under all the weight of that water.

Good thing the serviette was large and absorbant. And the ocha ice-cold. Man, we're terrible with spicy food. Still, the Volcano was filling, the ramen and soup of a rather good texture and consistency.

When the bill came it was almost the same price as a Carl's Jr meal - and we once again cursed ourselves for not paying attention to the menu. Still, like Carl's Jr, for the price we paid it was filling and well worth it.

Melting Sin Away

What better way to absolve yourself of sin then by melting it down? Burning it away?

Or would it be more preferable to be like Lady Myria LeJean, and dive into sin, either to perish in it or to come through the gauntlet, alive and new...

...Heck with it. It's just chocolate. Who are we to refuse a chocolate orgasm?

Given we've never succumbed to sin at this extent, we wasn't too sure if it would have been a good idea to have done it alone. So we turned it into an chocolate orgy instead.

We had the Bourbon Fondue. It was warm. Ooo so much fruits to dip! We melted with our first bite.

There was a glow. Everything was hazy. See even our watermark got a nice glow already.

Even the words were blurry after a while. Lemon thought the logo was a Levi's logo when we MMS him this pic!

Strawberry Fondue. In dark chocolate. Wouldn't you want to be fed this. But you're only given this long sharp skewer, be warned not to get into a tiff (if that's possible while in the throes of a chocolate orgasm) else risk undesired stabbings.

Chocz KLCC wasn't prepared to have a public chocolate orgy, but they bore up quite well when we showed up, pushing tables together to accommodate. The fruits ran out before the chocolate but that didn't stop all of us from cleaning the fondue bowls clean.

And don't worry, the chocolate doesn't go to the hips. It's all been burnt away in the fondue!

Tele.Phoney

Well. Gone are them days of the house phone, where we had to spring out to answer the phone (sometimes needing to take 2-3 steps down the stairs at a time if we were upstairs), or remember phone numbers by heart, or sometimes even, identify voices as Uncle or Aunty So-and-So. No more sitting by the piano on some hard rosewood chair with no ventilation. No more parents watching telly at a volume that meant anything in a whisper cannot be heard (yet if we had that telly at saidsame volume mum would have yelled for us to shut the damned thing off).

Hah. We used to hang out at a friend's place, mostly to play games, only to leave when we hear a phone call around 7pm. There's no need to answer that call - we'll just breeze out of the house while the friend tells mum we've left and are on our way back. And mum will call the club (or get us or sis to do so), asked to be connected to the game room (where the men play chap kut aka Gin Rummy using tiles instead of cards) and bug dad home for dinner.

If at anytime we can't be reached, then we can't be reached. Bliss of ignorance.

Nowadays the only phone numbers we remember by heart are the immediate family members' numbers. Alternatively we remember them by their speed dail button. And we identify people by assigned ringtones - so we know the urgency (answer ASAP/blacklisted don't touch). And if the house phone ever rings, we know it's never for us.

The wonders of the mobile phone, eh?

Didn't help us today when we had a call from an unidentified number. We didn't expect it to be regarding work (whatmore it being a mobile number), and whoever who called hung up before we could answer.

Normal line of thought would go, "If it's important, whoever it was would call back." Right?

But we were curious. We called back to find out who our mystery caller was.

Mystery Caller: [Janvier], hi! It's a surprise to hear from you!

Die. Now not only do we not know who it was (except that it was female), we seem to have lost the initiative as well. She knows us, we have absolutely no idea who she is. And we were to shy to admit and ask. First things first.

Janvier: Hey! Say, you just called us just now, got a missed call from you.
Mystery Caller: No, I didn't. Maybe accidentally called you because my handphone is inside my handbag.
Janvier: Ohhh, like that yah.

Cheh. Keyguard lock, if you please!

Mystery Caller: So where are you now? Last I heard you were working in Tun Perak?

Now we're getting somewhere. Pharmacist. Guardian possibly. Not kept in touch since beginning this year when we changed our phone, so number may be in Nok7710. The conversation tango went on finding out how each other are, promising the exchange of emails and catching up some time later.

And when we hung up we still haven't identified the caller but we suspect a certain colleague. Lad wondered how we managed to get through the conversation sounding as if we knew who we were talking to. We've learned a bit on how to, since with a poor memory and a tendency to run into people whom we think familiar but just can't place we need to be able to get by with the bare generalities (is there such a word?).

Now, the Nok7710's charging up so we can check the Address Book so we can confirm our suspicions. Thank goodness we keep full details of contacts where possible.

Sing, Sing A Song

Make it simple to last a whole life long?

If we were to try to identify the songs in our own list, we would only be able to recognize about 9 of them. That's because we don't really pay much attention to lyrics unless we likes the song. Also, we've gotta find time to spring clean our iPod a bit more.

To make sure that the lyrics were identifiable we'd actually Googled the lot too. Only in a couple of cases the search engines didn't turn up correct hits.

Anyways, kudos to both Aik Yong and Savante, scoring 3 unique corrects each (although in Aik Yong's case we wonders if the question marks meant he was just taking potshots in the dark)! Now here's the list of all the songs we went through for the 25!

1. 'Moonlight Densetsu' by DALI
"Gomen ne sunao ja nakute..."
The opening song for Sailormoon. So happy we were to start off with this one.

2. 'Beauty And The Beast (Work Tape And Demo)'
"Tale as old as time..."
Not the Peabo Bryson and Celine Dion duet but no way to know, is there? A recording of Alan Menken working on the song.

x. Men Staked On Blitz
A track from Final Fantasy X.

3. 'Notes/Prima Donna' from The Phantom Of The Opera
"'Mystery after gala night' it says 'Mystery of soprano's flight'..."
No problems with this one. We loves the motif for the two opera owners.

x. 'LEI-LEI Winning' from Vampire Hunter Soundtrack
Music from the Capcom fighting game. Skip.

4. 'Be With You' by Enrique Inglesias
"Monday night, and I feel so low..."
This was during the college years? He had only a few songs that we like, and they were the upbeat ones.

5. 'J'Irai Ou Tu Iras' by Celine Dion
"Che moi les forets se balancent..."
From The French Album. One we didn't and wouldn't have recognized ourselves.

x. 'Medley: Always There - Theme to 'Howard's Way'/Anyone Can Fall In Love - Theme to 'Eastenders' by Richard Clayderman
Skip.

x. 'Rough Lands Theme' from Heroes Of Might And Magic IV
A nice Celtic-themed song but of course, skip.

6. 'Lady In Red' by Chris DeBurgh
"I've never seen you looking so lovely as you did tonight..."
And we thought the good doc might recognize this one. Although personally we might need some time to have placed it ourselves.

x. 'Light's Theme' from Death Note Soundtrack

7. 'Kaze no Mon Ami' by Sakura Nogawa, Azumanga Daioh Character Series (Kaorin)
"Hizashi no aizu ni kakete kuru"
Azumanga Daioh had a series of extra soundtracks sung by each character from the series, as we found out to our delight.

8. 'The Song Of Epona' from The Legend Of Zelda: The Ocarina Of Time
"Epona Epona soba ni oide..."
We initially thought this wasn't a song but some music track initially. From our Mario & Zelda Big Band Live CD. Once we get a Wii then we'll start catching up on the Zelda games we're missing out on.

x. 'Flight Of The Bumblebee' by Maksim
This version used to be our alarm clock tone.

9. 'PPR: Kut' by Cheapshot/Jubacca
"Why does it feel like night today? Something in here's not right today..."
Answers of Linkin Park would also have been accepted. This is the Reanimation take. Nope, wouldn't have recognized this ourselves.

10. 'Keep The Faith' by Bon Jovi
"Mother mother tell your children, that their time has just begun..."
Mental note: delete Cross Road album from iPod and hard disk.

x. 'More Lemmings' from Lemmings 2 Soundtrack
Never heard this song within the game, though.

11. 'Stand By Me' by The Temptations
"When the night has come and the land is dark..."
Stephen King, anyone?

12. 'Stuck' by Stacie Orrico
"I can't get out of bed today..."
Initially once we'd completed this quiz (we wonders how can this be a meme) that for some songs, 'one line of lyrics' proved too short and so we added an extra line. Somehow we missed this one, sorry!

x. 'Narcissism' from Sound Of Death Note Soundtrack
We should delete this album too. The movie soundtrack and the 'music inspired by...' albums aren't good.

x. 'Harkonnen - "Saboteur..."' from Dune II
Remember Dune II, the game? If you had extended memory and a Soundblaster card then, not only you'd get background music but synthesized voices announcing stuff. This one was the voice for House Harkonnen, stating that a Sabotuer...something. Usually, "...destroyed." But this isn't a song.

13. 'Superstar' by Jamelia
"People always talk about all the things they're all about..."
If we had put the 'ay oh ay oh ay oh' would that have made it more recognizable?

14. '21st Century Kid' by Jamie Cullum
"There's maybe a way I can tell you 'cos with everyday things continue..."
From Catching Tales, an album that we don't listen to much.

15. 'Raspberry Heaven' by Oranges & Lemons
"Kokoro ni hane wo motte tsutate mune no sasayaki..."
We hearts Azumanga Daioh. Although admittedly we wouldn't have identified the lyrics. If you're gonna watch the MV as linked above, watch till the chorus at the least to see just why we likes this anime!

16. 'The Most Beautiful Girl' by Harry Connick Jr
"I met her but I never thought she'd belong to me"
We must have gotten this from lad.

x. 'Cleopatra In New York' by Nickodemus
This from Hotel Costes Etage 3. Great stuff.

17. 'Adestes Fideles' by The Vienna Boys' Choir
"Adeste Fideles laeti triumphantes..."
Carols always give themselves away in the first line, heh. We were introduced to this during our choir club days in Glasgow, where the sopranos (lucky them) got to sing an extra descant part.

x. 'Boredom/Taikutsu' from Death Note Soundtrack

x. 'Feria sexta in passione Dominii (Good Friday)'
Gregorian chant. If we had the exact words chanted we might have put it up.

x. 'The Sacrifice' by Michael Nyman
From The Piano. Lovely piece although we finds it a bit too short.

18. 'Everything' by Alanis Morissette
"I can be an asshole of the grandest kind..."
The last song we'd ever gotten from her. Correction: second last song. Last song is 'Wunderkind' from the Narnia soundtrack. Still prefer her Jagged Little Pill album.

19a. 'One Night In Bangkok' by Vinylshakerz
"One night...and the world is your oyster..."
Considering that it's a remix for clubs (or BodyStep in this case) and the first line wasn't the full line ("One night in Bangkok and the world's your oyster") we were considering skipping this track. Then we thought, put it as a side option instead.

19b. 'Miss You Much' by Janet Jackson
"Shot like an arrow going through my heart..."
Would recognize the music but not the lyrics. :P So long ago!

20a. 'S.M.S.' by Juwita Suwito
"Little castles in the air..."
The Juwita Suwito who was in Malaysian Idol 1 for voice training or summat. She used to be in our church (WMCK!) and so a churchmember got the album for us. We didn't have the lyrics with us then nor did we bother straining to transcribe it, so we just put in the first line and made it another optional.

20b. 'I Only Have Eyes For You' by Jamie Cullum
"Are the stars out tonight? I don't know if it's cloudy or bright..."
Really, think we might as well delete the Catching Tales album too.

21. 'When It's Over' by Sugar Ray
"When it's over that's the time I fall in love again..."
Sugar Ray kept us company a good deal during our secondary school years when we did our homework in front of the radio. Don't know how Eagle Eye Cherry came into the picture there.

22. 'Crash And Burn' by Simple Plan
"One more day before you go, we'll stay up late for one more show..."
When we saw the title on the iPod our first thought was Savage Garden.

x. 'O Tennenbaum/Minuit Chretien/He Was Born The Holy Child' by Richard Clayderman
His christmas album.

23. 'Immortality' by Celine Dion
"So this is who I am and this is all I know..."
Featuring Bee Gees! Goes into our Depressive playlist! :P

24. 'Moroccan Peoples Revolutionary Bowls Club' by Blur
"The trees are spinning oxygen, they're the rockets we should fear..."
Erm. We enjoys Blur, and got the Think Tank album because it was cheap at that time. Blah. Guess we'll just stick to their 'Best Of' then.

25. 'Valentine' by Jim Brickman & Martina McBride
"If there were no words, no way to speak, I would still hear you..."
Almost skipped this as well, thinking it was just a piano piece.

x. 'Lose Combat' from Heroes Of Might And Magic III

x. 'Julie' from Final Fantasy VIII Soundtrack

x. 'Watermark' by Cerise
From our Celtic Circle 2 compilation. Took us a while to place it as a cover from Enya.

x. 'Outdoor' from Lemmings 2 Soundtrack
We loves the music from Lemmings 2! We hearts Lemmings (even tho' we suck at the game)!

BONUS. 'Crawling In The Dark' by Hoobastank
"I will dedicate and sacrifice my everything for just a second's worth of how my story's ending..."
Guess most of us will only know Hoobastank for 'The Reason'.

There. 46 songs in all just for 25 songs.

Plink Plink Plonk Plonk Plinky Plinky Plonk

Guess we really fail when it comes to datelines - but then again, this isn't work related. We just thought of scoring out I Giorni, courtesy of Amiable Aix, as it didn't sound complicated. A quick experimental tinkle and we found the song to be in D Major - making the job easy.

What didn't make the job easy was the fact that we rarely touch the piano in the presence of family members, not to mention that the parents would be watching telly till bedtime, and that we're not really playing the piano but thunking on keys till we get the correct sounds.

Yes, we're rather bad to make it seem like all them lessons were a waste of time and money to our parents. Oh, they do know we can play, but ever since we've stopped playing for the Evening Service we have not really played for pleasure in their presence. We've only played for the Evening Service at church because the Evening Service then allowed us to use the piano rather than tampering with the keyboard (which we're totally incompetant at). And with a congregation with an average age of 50, just keeping it simple as shown in the hymnal was what they liked.

Then again, we're not much of a player in the first place. We can't play any piece without the score sheets, and we don't play that well even with the score sheets. Our sight reading is horrendous. Our timing is off. And while we might probably be able to get the melody of a song down on piano, we have to normally default to the key of G major (not even C major!). And remembering back to Aural Exams?

Doesn't stop up from causing sound pollution while we are over at our friend's places sometimes. :P

Now - as we were to score out the I Giorni, big-mouthed us happened to asked if Amiable Aix had the actual score as well. He did. We thought, okay. We'll give ourselves till Friday to attempt to score it. By Friday evening we'll have to print out the actual score because we will have the weekend and the piano to ourselves. So we'll try and see how good we are at scoring a piece. The time that we have available to us for scoring? Midnight onwards.

Progress? Monday we got most of the melody (right hand part). Tuesday the Wee Wog Wasn't Well. Wednesday was an early night for us to recover from the lack of proper sleep, but we did figure the essential left hand bits...slightly. Yesterday night we were intimidatedly surrounded by artists of all genres. And it's Friday today.

Oh well. Fail dah our project, and not like we care anymore as we've already printed out the original score now.

"Da Da Dadada Da Da Da Dadada Da"

Came across this from -C. Was fun racking our brains there because some lines were so recognizable and we were trying to place 'em.

Quiz time, and with an eclectic collection of music for us to sound from. So what we've done is told the iPod to 'Shuffle Songs', and we'll take the first 25 with lyrics and list the first line of the lyrics here.

First to name a song and artist gets credit for it. How many can you recognize?

1. "Gomen ne sunao janakute..." [Female]

2. "Tale as old as time..." [Male]

3. "'Mystery after gala night' it says 'Mystery of soprano's flight'..." [Male]

4. "Monday night, and I feel so low..." [Male]

5. "Chez moi les forets se balancent..." [Female]

6. "I've never seen you looking so lovely as you did tonight..." [Male]

7. "Hizashi no aizu ni kakete kuru..." [Female]

8. "Epona Epona soba ni oide..." [Female]

9. "Why does it feel like night today? Something in here's not right today..." [Male]

10. "Mother mother tell your children, that their time has just begun..." [Male]

11. "When the night has come and the land is dark..." [Male]

12. "I can't get out of bed today..." [Female]

13. "People always talk about all the things they're all about..." [Female]

14. "There's maybe a way I can tell you 'cos with everyday things continue..." [Male]

15. "Kokoro ni hane wo motte tsutate mune no sasayaki..." [Female]

16. "I met her but I never thought she'd belonged to me..." [Male]

17. "Adeste Fideles laeti triumphantes..." [Males]

18. "I can be an asshole of the grandest kind..." [Female]

19a. "One night...and the world is your oyster..." [Male]

19b. "Shot like an arrow going through my heart..." [Female]

20a. "Little castles in the air..." [Female]

20b. "Are the stars out tonight? I don't know if it's cloudy or bright..." [Male]

21. "When it's over that's the time I fall in love again..." [Male]

22. "One more day before you go, we'll stay up late for one more show..." [Male]

23. "So this is who I am and this is all I know..." [Female]

24. "The trees are spinning oxygen, they're the rockets we should fear..." [Male]

25. "If there were no words, no way to speak, I would still hear you..." [Female]

BONUS: "I will dedicate and sacrifice my everything for just a second's worth of how my story's ending..."

For 19 and 20, there's options (will explain later). Also threw in a bonus just for kicks. And we realise that just by doing this, we've a bit of spring cleaning to do on our iPod, clearing off songs we won't ever listen to.

Have fun!

Wee Wog Wasn't Well

Partly due to our fault, really. Prior to bedding down for the night (and early some more, for once we were gonna sleep before 2am) we needed to satiate our itchy mouth and slake off thirst. And as the Wee Wog normally sleeps in our room at night (unfortunately for her mum doesn't allow her to be Queen Of The Bed any more) she'll follow us around till we knock out in bed.

This means, the Wee Wog also gets supper (shush shush parents not suppose to know). Normally we'll give her a dog biscuit followed by some kibbles (a third to half her normal mealtime's size), but last night we happen to mooch on fruits. A chinese pear (lei), to be specific. And feeding pieces to the Wee Wog.

Unlike our earlier woggies, the Wee Wog just swallows fruits. Doesn't understand the concept of chewing. And we thinks, "Best we give her a much larger piece, force her to chew on it." Bloody vacuum cleaner just somehow scarves the piece! We gave up making her chew.

We were just done with The Golden Compass and was reading the 'Lantern Slides' bit (the trilogy we bought has extra bits!) when we hears the poor wog 'sort of' choking. Understood - she's prolly had trouble with one of the pieces and is trying to get it down or up. It's not blocking her breathing - but semacam a tablet that's lodge somewhere at your esophagus, kinda thing?

*pats Wee Wog on back, chest etc*...Wee Wog is now quiet.

When we leaves Wee Wog alone and lounges once again to finish the book, Wee Wog starts her gag reflex again. This time we're immediately off from the couch, grabbing the house keys and ushering the wog out unto the porch.

Poor miserable thing wasn't looking good (slightly troubled and semi-guilty), and so we took a look to see if the piece is visible. Nope. Then we decided to get her some water to drink. After filling her bowl with fresh water, we returns to see the doormat filled with some white foam. Nooooo idea what that foam was, not bile because it's white and there was no smell, but we can't place it.

It could be that this wog is much more...pampered, or that because Malteses are bred mainly for companionship, or that her puppy license hasn't expired, but we didn't get exasperated, just somewhere along the lines of, "Aww poor thing, better now that you've thrown up?" No "Hai-yar now we got to clean your mess!" but rather, "Good thing you did it outside and not in the bedroom."

No, it didn't occur to us to be horrified too. Somehow we didn't think the wog was in mortal danger.

We got kitchen tissues to clean her up, move her to another spot, takes the mat to the hose to rinse off. When we got back to the wog she'd thrown up again - this time there were the chunks of undigested lei in the foam. Good - she's done with the suffering. And the look on her face? No more misery, just pure guilt and shame and she wouldn't, just wouldn't look us in the face.

Cleaned up the wog again, scrubbed the doormat, hosed the porch, fed the wog some of her Nutra-Vite vitamin gel to get her perked up again, showered, propped her in her box...bed at 5am.

And ended up taking a couple of hours off work this morning - to sleep in the carpark because mum wouldn't let us sleep in peace at home.

Author Review

l’agneau orange: oh we is reading this chuck palahniuk book....u know, fight club guy?
Janvier: ooo
l’agneau orange: it's the grossest thing ever hahahhaa
old chuck has always been...erm..."macabre"....but he might have outdoneimself this time, judging from the first chapter
*outdone himself
Janvier: hahahha
l’agneau orange: so theres this character...we knows him as saint gut-free
so he keep munching chips nonstop but hes freaking skinny
Janvier: hahahagut-free
l’agneau orange: and then saint gut-free tells his story
and we find out he is gut-free...literally :S
Janvier: hahahahahah
l’agneau orange: he practically has no intestines
Janvier: eeeks
l’agneau orange: due to a...erm....mishap
Janvier: like our ... patient?
l’agneau orange: wat was the moshap in ...? or was that congenital?
*mishap
Janvier: think it was mishap
blur doc took out the pts intestine for godknows what reason :S
l’agneau orange: oh yahhhhh we remembers!!!!
the one in the book is erm....even less delicate
chuck has always written abt sexual obsession....either with someone else or with oneself
Janvier: :s
sooo...this gut-free and chuck?
l’agneau orange: so saint gut free talks abt teenage boys erm..pleasuring themselves
no no, theres no chuck in the book
Janvier: saint gut-free
sry
ok
:S
l’agneau orange: so he goes tat when he was 13...he had a pool in the house
n his ultimate pleasure
was when theres noone home
he'll b underwater
Janvier: and pleasuring hisself...or other boys?
l’agneau orange: fondling himself....PLUS getting suction on his nether regions
Janvier: :S
suction from who???
l’agneau orange: via the pump thingy of the pool
Janvier: or what
ooh
l’agneau orange: the pump thingy of the pool
Janvier: okaaay
l’agneau orange: so one fateful day
our guy gets stuck
Janvier: :s
l’agneau orange: and hes underwater remember
Janvier: :s
l’agneau orange: he usually holds his breath for as long as he can then resurfaces
so when hes stuck he cant
n he attempts to free himself
Janvier: he's stuck on the pump thingy?
l’agneau orange: we take it u can imagine how he loses his gut?
while freeing himslef?
Janvier: no
first
'nether regions' here...
we're talking...?
we thinks it's best that this bit be...specific
l’agneau orange: the other end of ur digestive tract
Janvier: ah
suspected...
so yes
but but but tbu tbut
HOW does he get stuck???!??
eeeewwwww
l’agneau orange: cos it's suction
like a vacuum cleaner lets say
Janvier: but THAT strong???
l’agneau orange: erm yah we guess
so there we go
saint gut-free
:p
Janvier: gaaaaa
thats rather graphic
l’agneau orange: hahahahhaha
yep
in another book he talks about this model
Janvier: thankfully he wasn't in the
deep end or summat
l’agneau orange: who got shot in the face n no longer has a mandible
so the tongue hangs out n she cant talk etc etc :S
to say hes not averse to gross images is an understatement
Janvier: so is she still a model?
l’agneau orange: no
she goes ard the world with a scarf ard her face
cheating ppl
with a guy whos semi nuts, n a transexual
we cant describe more hahaha
Janvier: oh gr8 the author's really skewed
who IS semi nuts or HAS semi nuts??
l’agneau orange: who IS semi nuts
hahahhahah

No, we didn't eat lunch late because we were grossed out. We were just too lazy to move from our seat. Honest.

'Uncle Visit'

First time we heard of the term 'aunty visit' it was during our houseman year in UH - what to expect, out of the 10 of us 8 were girls. 'Course, surprised some of them as well when they found out we knew the rudiments of plaiting and the difference between pantyliners with wings and without...However, when the topic of 'aunty visit' hit the table, one of them was actually rather heatedly expressive on the topic.

We initially thought an irate relative was coming to town.

Took us probably the entire day before light dawned.

Anyways. We've just ended the day only to get a minor visit from uncle itself. Slightly black mood only and the apathic attitude (Mr Cranky seldom shows). Prolly because we're flushed out of the proper happy neurotransmitters to keep our spirits perky. And when that happens our iPod somehow finds all the correct songs to further increase our melancholy and despondency (without even having to resort to our playlist for depression).

Prolly a good thing that there's still ice cream and chocolates in the fridge. And Philip Pullman's Dark Materials is a rather interesting read (plus we've pictured Nicole Kidman and Daniel Craig in the roles already). And we've this inclination at scoring out I Giorni (oh, now the song increases our despondency).

Whatever it takes to keep busy then.

8ight

We think of it as something to post up. And something to pass on to others (to quote a doctor: Update, dammit!) to give them something to post up.

So anyways. The one where 8 bits are shared - but first, for the sake of them who would need some guidance...

Rules of the tag:

1. Link to your tagger and post these rules.

2. List eight (8) random facts about yourself.

3. Tag eight people at the end of your post and list their names (linking to them) [OPTIONAL].

4. Let them know they've been tagged by leaving a comment on their blogs [OPTIONAL].

Now that that's out of the way, let us just admit that probably it isn't all really randomly chosen facts.

1 - We're a purebred night owl - and so our parents decided to drug us.

It must have been in Form One that we started sleeping later and later (definitely the pre-op days). Happens that our sleeping time started pushing later and later, or that we started heading down to the living room in the dead of the night. We enjoyed the peacefulness and tranquility ourselves, but initially it led to mum awaking to find a light source from the gap under her bedroom door.

Rather frequent she had to barge out of her bedroom to question goings-ons downstairs to find us cozying up with a book and a cuppa Milo or something (caffeine didn't have it's appeal as much as condensed milk then), totally innocent, we tell you (angel). She'd then coerce us to go to sleep with threats.

In retrospect, the parents did bed down rather early last time. 10.30pm and they were bunking down already, dead to the world. We couldn't have been up past 1am in those days. Not like these days.

Anyways the parents were initially concerned with our then 'late nights' (not that we knew), and dad testing the waters by asking us if we were being bullied in school or such. We were rather surprised at this bit of questioning and of course answered in the negative (because it was true - all our years in what we think of as a gangster's school and we never run into any of them).

So the parents had us see a doc in HKL. All we remember is that we were going to see a doctor because we were sleeping later than expected, and that we had a short interview with this Indian houseman before seeing the actual doctor. We don't even remember the bit about meeting the doctor though, only the interview with the houseman. Whether we were consulting a psychologist or whatever, no idea.

And so we were given some a strip of tablets to take at night (no, no idea what they were, they looked about the size of them generic BCo tabs, definitely smaller than lorazepam tabs). We never finished those tablets nor did we ever had a follow up session. What was more likely was that we ended up training the parents to accept our late nights instead.

2 - Compliments: we're bad at accepting them, and we're lousy at giving them.

Honestly, whenever we're paid a compliment we get all aflustered and try to brush it off with a, "No-lah! Where got?" It's somewhat considered an offense to do so in the Western cultures we guess but we'd have done the same rather than accept it graciously. Embarrasseses us somewhat, getting compliments.

In the same vein we find it hard to pay a honest compliment unless:
i) It is something very, very good; or
ii) We do it in a very over-the-top manner. This is more common. But doing it in an over-the-top manner doesn't mean that we're bullshitting - we mean it. We just can't say it properly, it won't come out somehow. Else we wouldn't even compliment.

3 - We do one of three displacement activities while dining alone.

Read something, as this has been something we've done since young. We will be forced into a bookstore to get some form of reading material if we ever do meals without a book and have nothing else to do (while we eat).

Watch something on telly, like an episode of Sailormoon.

Play something, Sudoku being the best example because we eat with our left hand and write with our right. Or else we'll take a bite, then pummel on the joypad while we masticate the food into tiny tiny bits.

Come to think of it, it's more like eating is the secondary activity...but we need the displacement activity or go crazy.

4 - We once BodyJammed in work attire.

This was before we were thick-skinned enough to just saunter into class no matter how late we were. As it happens, we were just in the nick of time for Riyo's Jam class so we just changed into gym shoes and did the entire class in a black shirt and work pants. Then changed into gym clothes after showering to head home.

We're actually tempted to do so again actually, if we didn't sweat so heavily nowadays.

5 - How we became us.

We were corrupted by l'agneau orange during our housemanship years. We didn't understand why this woman would use 'we' instead of 'I' when she talks but two months in the same department and we soon became us. Maybe it was being in the presence of all those cytotoxics. This is the real reason we end up referring to ourselves in the collective rather than the individual (although not always).

6 - We lazed on railings back in college.

This was a defining feature of ours when we were in college. Our classroom was on the second to third floor depending on the semester, and we will be sitting on the railing facing inwards whenever we're not in class. And no one tried to kill us, nor forbid us from doing so.

7 - We used to go into Silent Mode.

Ah. Primary school. There was a time when we were upset with a couple of close friends, that we ended up not speaking to them, even though we still hung out together. We just wrote to them on scraps of paper instead.

Not like we've given up the habit, we noticed. Only, instead of Silent Mode, we went Off-The-Network and broke off communications with everyone except those that we had to (like our parents, boss, colleagues and our customers). Yeah, we didn't answer calls and such.

8 - We can't talk straight sometimes.

And bullshit a fair bit. Call it being somewhat of a compulsive liar. Like, when asked what does 'stiff upper lip' mean and we spun a yarn about it being a disease that attacks the generally well-to-do in the British society. And when another friend texted us to find out how we were doing, we told her that we weren't working and living from the earnings of our blog (which isn't earning anything yet btw haha). Or about when we changed jobs. But thankfully we're not viewed negatively because of that, because the truth does out and set you free.

Okay!!! That piece of long-windedness is done! Now to spread the word to others...what was the saying again? "Let's care, let's share?" Or was it, "Misery loves company?" However you like it lah. Here we go:

C'est La Vie. Because some family secrets aren't meant to be shared.
F e R ' s. Because you don't need a camera to do this meme. :)
Not Just A Pretty Face. Because we don't hear enough from you.
3-Second Memory. Because you need something forget about the flu.
Chewing My Legs Off. Because you came back alive, so here's some inspiration.
Let Sleeping Tapirs Lie. Because we don't want you to stop after two posts.
Heng's Gaming Report. Because since changing sites there hasn't been much.
Fu Onn. Because we'd like to read something other than football.

Yeah, to requote again (for some people): Update, dammit! :D

They Will, Will They?

Be recognized, that is.

We so happened to just write out this name and we realised we didn't have to even do any work to make this.

Of course, we just know that this name won't be readily recognized. Lieh Men is not a name you come across everyday.

Then onwards. A simple one, or so we thought - it always seems simple until we try it out and then see the problems. We had about 2-3 versions of this until yesterday, while waiting to collect our meds and listening to I Giorni (and thinking of trying it out on the piano one day when nobody's home) we scribbled this out.

Psike made it out but preferred another version we had on this, while bewildered rhyen kept guessing. We didn't enlighten rhyen as we claim, "If it's not readily recognized, we have to work on it."

We're Totally Exhausted...

After being pummelled senseless by Amiable Aix. Beneath his sweet exterior lies this fellow who's been in at it for a very long time now...He's been throwing powerhouse after powerhouse the whole night and we're just weak, so weak. And he casually throws out names of who he's been through while we were at it, to further impressed our already jelly-like mind. Just before leaving to shower, he left us one final blow that made our eyes tear.

Can we just die now? We've trouble breathing. We can't think straight. But we don't want it to stop. Gawds we want more...
















The Karl Jenkins Requiem pieces! The Adiemus variations! Variations of classicals we've heard, and lots of others pieces we've never heard of before!

First thing he throws at us tonight was a string variation of the Adiemus - that totally floored us. Then the Dies Irae from Karl Jenkin's Requiem - the lemon that's placed in the mouth. Then Karl Jenkin's Grey - the flicking of holy water. The In Paradisum from same Requiem - the stake through the heart. The final blow of the night, the I Giorni - the beheading.

Musical orgasms.

Inama Nushif

We're an impulsive shopper, we won't deny it. So at times when we hear something we like, our ears prick up and we go, "Gotta have that."

Happened when we heard the 'Kyrie' from the Death Note anime. Hunted high and low for Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children OST just for the 'The Promised Land' track (haven't heard of the One-Winged Angel then). Happened with Gladiator (although we got the OST as a present from sis, we remember). Grabbed War Of The Worlds CDs because we liked the in-game music.

But nothing beats this so far. Our number one favvie. The 'Inama Nushif' from Frank Herbert's Children of Dune miniseries.

Trailer for the Television Critics Association

Westwood's Dune did a lot in terms of exposing the gamers of the nineties to Frank Herbert's work. We loved the Dune culture that David Lynch created - leather-clad fremen, black aba-robed Bene Gesserit, the Guild Steersmen in what looks like a trash bag, not to mention Baron Harkonnen installing heartplugs in everyone. Yeah, the show sucked a fair bit but it was dripping in flavour. We were definitely glad that Westwood followed the same style in the cutscenes when they made the later Dune games.

Trailer: Eternity

Then came Frank Herbert's Dune. Longer, fleshed out the show much better. But we complained as hell about a lot of other things, mostly regarding their attire. Shall not go there. That miniseries tried to be a fashion show. We did like Ian McNiece's portrayal of the Baron Harkonnen, though.

Trailer: Sins Of The Mother

Anyways - fast forward to 2002, in Glasgow. We think we saw it in an ad banner, that Children of Dune was coming soon. And it was pretty.

Jessica Brooks as Ghanima was pretty.

James McAvoy as Leto was pretty. Prettier than Mr Tumnus.

Daniela Amavia as Alia was very very pretty.

But what kept us enthralled wasn't the prettiness (nor the fashion show that still prevailed). It was the song. And we weren't the only victim, as many others were asking about it as well. Azam Ali and Brian Tyler had us when they used the Inama Nushif in the trailers. In fact, we remembered the week we got back from Glasgow, we hogged Astro because we found out Children of Dune was showing!

Well, gotta say we were thankful we had a debit card and access to Play.com when in UK - we ended up ordering the soundtrack online (one of our few online purchases!). The song fits many purposes: caraoke, zen and cave time, to reminding us of Glasgow. And it can never be overkilled.

The rest of the album turned out to be rather good too, head to Brain Tyler's site for a sampler. Initially we had the lyrics from The Lansdraad, but turns out that that's more of a phonetic guide. And it's another counterpointing song! Okay, enough.

Inama Nushif

Inama nushif (She is eternal)
Al ­asir hiy ayish (No malice can touch)

Lia-anni (Singular and ageless)
Zaratha zarati (Perpetually bound)

Hatt al-hudad (Through the tempest)
Al-maahn al-baiid (be it deluge or sand)
Ay-yah idare (A singular voice)
Adamm malum (speaks through the torrent)

Hatt al-hudad (Through the tempest)
Al-maahn al-baiid (be it deluge or sand)
Ay-yah idare (A singular voice)
Adamm malum (speaks through the torrent)

Inama nishuf al a sadarr (Forever her voice sings)
Eann zaratha zarati (through the ages eternally bound)

Kali bakka a tishuf ahatt (Sacrifice is her gift)
Al hudad alman dali (one that cannot be equaled)

Inama nishuf al a sadarr (Forever her voice sings)
Eann zaratha zarati (through the ages eternally bound)

Kali bakka a tishuf ahatt (Sacrifice is her gift)
Al hudad alman dali alia (that Alia will one day equal)

Inama nushif (She is eternal)
Al ­asir hiy ayish (No malice can touch)

Lia-anni (Singular and ageless)
Zaratha zarati (Perpetually bound)

Be Some Kind Of Super Star

Warning. Food post. Go satisfy hunger pangs before continuing.

Let's see...yes, it was on Wednesday night, when Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix was out that we happened to notice renovation works going on in 1U, announcing the arrival of Carl's Jr. Oh how our heart skipped!

Not that we've ever eaten Carl's Jr before. First time we ever heard of it was during our much younger days (somewhen primary school lah but not too sure how young) - it was a latecomer, opening after Grandy's Fried Chicken and White Castle. Carl's Jr and Grandy's opened in Port Klang while White Castle was found in Klang Town. The only reason we were excited with the opening of Carl's Jr was because they were giving out these keychains that had their Star logo and a led at one point, so you could press the star and it'll emit a light.

We were young lah, please.

So yeah, our excitement that Carl's Jr was opening once more (and in 1U, no less!) is due more to nostalgia than for the quality of their burgers.

Still, that didn't lessen our interest in giving Carl's Jr a go. And yeah, we were secretly hoping that they still had that keychain. :P

Queued up for ordering, and had the waitress give us the spiel which decreased in volume and speed as she spoke...her colleague started laughing because her battery was dying. That's where we found out that staff was doing full-day shift (or maybe it was just her shift). Can die one lah, especially on a weekend where you're gonna open till 11pm.

We had the Super Star. Hyperion had the Chicken Santa Fe Sandwich (if we remember the name rightly). Added on the Beef Chilli Cheese Fries instead of going for value meals, for the variety.

Instead of waiting for our food we gets it served to our table. Good touch.

We can see that it's not really a children-comprehensive place, this. And they seem to promote messy eating, worra waste of food.

The Super Star is Carl's Jr's version of Burger King's Whopper. Only pricier. Slightly bigger? Can't remember. But the good point is that they wrap it in 2 layers, the outer one that identifies the burger and an inner one for you to hold! It's a considerate idea (especially when they harp on messy eating) for a good reason - there's no sink in the place at all. Only a tissue dispenser.

Super Star = Whopper is fine. We should have ordered something different for sake of novelty but we were hungry. What was not fine is that the burgers were cold when they arrived!

The chilli was okay, but also cold. And could have been a bit more generous, as the chilli cheese congealed in the middle of the stack of fries. But no complaints, it's better than just fries alone.

Will still head back to try out some of the other burgers next time, but our Carl's Jr urge has been satisfied for now, at least.

Dinner At 2.25am

Because we had lunch at 5.30pm. No lunch earlier because we were busy getting lost in KL looking for Nuffnang's office with no road map (we've lost ours and haven't gotten to replacing it yet), then deciding to head straight to Cheras without doing lunch. It's a stressful business making our way to Cheras, doubly so because we weren't expecting traffic to jam up at 4pm. Left Cheras around 5pm in trepidation that we will be late for BodyJam at The Curve, but blessedly it was smooth sailing leaving Cheras. Ended up in O'Briens, having their Lunch Meal Deal as we weren't gonna risk a heavy meal just before cardio classes...

Shouldn't have worried, since Ezra Lee was putting out the call for companionship to lepas geram. Ezra brings out the alcoholic in us somehow - we'd left Jam halfway (2nd half of BJ38 somemore, after Sean Paul's Temperature!) to have a Freefall cocktail at The Apartment before heading back for Combat. Then after Combat, met up with Ezra again for red wine, free bread in oil and vinegar and Bread Pudding at Italiannies around 10pm. Trust Ezra to be cost-effecient when it comes to getting high on alcohol - one glass is enough to get woozy. We're a bit envious, we tend to be expensive.

So by the time we got home we weren't really that hungry yet. Had a quick nap first. Maybe shouldn't call it dinner...heavy supper probably. Sorry lah Mr Circadian Rhythm, ever since uni days you've been living in the twilight zone.

Hmmm. Maybe we have sunken eyes and dark rings because we try to sleep at normal hours.

Camwhore Club

Hmmm. We were never one for clubs and societies during our secondary school days. Only because during Form Five where we found out that we'll have testimonials to receive showing just how active we were co-curricularwise (is there such a word?). And so we'd join in some clubs, served in a few positions, did our time.

Little did we know what fun the Photography Club could be. Oh heck, Kelab Fotografi would never have been as fun as the Camwhore Club.

There's no joining fees. And you don't even need to own a camera. Camwhore model already can.

In this club you'll learn how to whore for the lens as a Photo Poser - your makeup a thick skin and the powers of Photoshop (also a skill to learn in the Club!). Professional cameramen will direct you so that you will shine in full glory. Flinch not when faced with the protuding lens of the DSLR, and make the surreptitious shots from the slimcams and phonecams part of your natural surroundings!

As for photo-taking - the Camera Clickers consists of DSLR Dominants, the Slimcam Savvys, the Phonecam Pros. Owning an iXus 55 we fall into the Slimcam Savvys that, unfortunately, is only good at Shooting Shakey Shots (Liam, yer not the only one with shakey hands, fret not). Which means, once we've uploaded onto our PC half the time is spent deleting pictures and leaving us with bare minimals that we've to make do. Thankfully there are gems littered here and there.

Meanwhist we've the DSLR Dominants to take care of the heavy work. Hearing that our recent entire shoot took about some 300 pictures on one of the Dominant's camera, we cringes at the amount of downloadwork it might take to get all the photos. Pass you guys empty CDs you guys burn for us can?

Image Idealists will then work their wonders, turning raw material into the works of art that they are.

Members were not limited to a single category - most fall into two categories while so far there's one working full time in all three! And there's talk of opening yet another category - the Youtube Yuppies. This one may take some time to work out.

And how do you know if the club was successful? Proud to say that we'd a stranger wanting to join during our final photo shoot, and he brought his own DSLR too!

Zen. Lying is not one of the Seven Sins. What does that say about this post?

Under 32 Not Allowed

Talking to Leon yesterday, and he tells us that the word is out that BodyJam instructors can't use tracks prior to BodyJam 32 anymore. This is saddening news for us, as that means that we will never hear nor dance to quite a number of songs anymore. Yeah, we fall into the category of Jammers that love the old tracks, because there's a better variety of songs to do. Nowsadays har, Jam tracks are in blocks, meanings that you learns a choreography in a span of 4 songs liddat. Easier lah, but less variety. Just have to hope the songs are good.

It's funny really, when we first joined Fitness First back in August 2004 (we'd just left UH and was bumming for a month) we were mainly interested in the cardio classes. Not really in the resistance machines (we do think of hamsters when we look at the treadmills tho') although we realise that those are necessary if we're going to bulk up (which, nearing 3 years now, we still have not bulked up in any way...).

The first cardio class we ever entered was BodyCombat - instructed by CalvinC. Otousan and us were eager and it was more fun to try out the class for the first time with friends - feel less malu that way when we did something wrong. When lad joined a month later we dragged him along into class (although with the sales pitch we've been throwing at him he was interested too).

CalvinC's class left a good impression because it was super hyped up with members shouting, loud music and high intensity tracks. Not to mention (because of his taekwando background) his execution of the moves got some gaya one lar. After that first class (which did almost kill us even when we survived for the entire class) we've always attended Combat. Till today still not sien yet, although we don't go so often.

Oops, promote him too much already (not like he needs it). Anyways, for Combat, the class has gotta be highly motivating and intensive - otherwise no fun.

As for BodyJam, we remembers that the first class we ever entered was on a Saturday morning (was this with you as well, 'Nic?). Can't remember who was the instructor tho', some petite gal. Our first time doing BodyJam also felt rather awkward - hip and butt swinging was a start but shimmying was a bit too much for us. We were under the impression that that move was for ladies to show off their lovely lady lumps and so what were the guys suppose to do? We weren't overly keen on Jam from that first impression.

Can't say how and when, but otousan, lad and us ended up one day in Riyo's Jam class. What a difference - her class was the Jam version of CalvinC's Combat. With her Jam classes she gives the option of going full out on certain moves - rather intensive and definitely not diva-looking. It was fun and we didn't feel self-conscious at all. Oh yes, we never knew that a high percentage of guys doing BodyJam were said to spend the pink dollar. Wondered if we all would have walked into a Jam class in the first place if we knew.

We have seriously gone off-topic...we thinks. Then again we just let the fingers flow over the keyboard. Oh yar, BodyJam not doing old tracks anymore. Well, a list of our favourite songs (those we recognize...there're some songs we haven't identified) we'll be missing:

BodyJam 31
Royal Gigolos - California Dreamin' (!!!!!)
Jamelia - Superstar

BodyJam 30
Outkast feat Sleepy Brown - The Way You Move (!!!!)

BodyJam 29
Outkast - Hey Ya
Umboza - Sunshine (!!!)
Whitney Houston - I Will Always Love You (!!!)

BodyJam 28
Safri Duo - Bongo Song (!!!!!)

BodyJam 27
Umboza - Cry India (!!!!!)

BodyJam 22
Te Vaka - Pate Pate (!!!)

BodyJam 18
Geri Halliwell - It's Raining Men (!!!)

We Thought We Went Deaf...

...turns out that our iPod just killed off our fifth pair of earphones. Fifth! The original, then we bought the earbuds kind, resorted to using our old earphones...all came to the same end. First, static can be heard in one side, then later on one of the earphone will not emit any sound. Jiggling the connection might bring back sudden stereophonic happiness, but only for a second or so before it dies off again.

As to the lifespan of each earphones, honesty we can't remember. Some longer some shorter. But how can they die like that in the first place? It never happened with any of our other gadgets before! Not like we manhandle the iPod/earphones roughly, although we might unplug the earphones from the iPod rather often. Not to mention the occasional yanking outs when the cord gets caught on something. Still, 5 pairs of earphones is a bit too much!

You would have thought that after bombing for the iPod that's it, no more further expenses. Mana tahu now we've to occasionally invest in new earphones (we've totally run out of any more spares sitting at home). Well, at least we can get green-coloured earphones. Or maybe get back the white iPod ones.

Has anyone else ever had this problem? Ours be an iPod Video 30GB.

They Have No Sole

Our shoes finally gave out during Jimmy's Cardio Dance today - the soles were practically frenching the floor, fer goodness sakes'. Had to tear off bits of the soles during class just so we didn't stumble - thankfully today's choreography didn't involve much spinning about else we might have pirouetted into some poor member (or worse, into Mad Lady *shudder*). Note to self: as Cardio Dance is different every class might consider scribbling/sketching down the moves somewhere.

Remembered something about shoes that are more suitable for the gym, so decided to sought a couple of opinions:
FCI: "Just get something light n you r comfortable with."
otousan: "Cross training is good...Running shoes not flexible at the toes but light! So entirely up 2 u."
Great. Now to shoeshop. We checked out Al Ikhsan The Curve ('cos they've some good yet cheap gym stuff) but didn't find anything we'd fancy. Same thing happened at Nike and Adidas in Cineleisure - nothing stood out nor fit the abovementioned suggestions. About gave up and was gonna try our luck tomorrow at 1U when we walked into Young and Kickin'. And found it.

No prizes guessing why we picked this pair.

'Course, colour wasn't the only reason. It's cross-training shoes, it's light, and best of all, it's 60% off! We weren't expecting to get a branded pair this cheap. Heck we don't care if it's 2 years out of season - it's gonna go through a lot in the gym so might as well make it practical.

And while we were there, we picked up a pair of Reebok track pants as well (darn it, the only pair of three quarters was a size L!). Great, turns out almost all our gym togs are now Reeboks (still one Nike three quarters left!). Ah well, they work for us, that's all that matters.

So now old pair of shoes have a coffin.

What's left on the list: 1-2 more Dri-Fit-like tees (optional), socks (important!), and we think we'll get a pair of sturdy sandals for outdoors stuff like trekking and the upcoming whitewater rafting. And we need a haircut. Lawks. We're really gonna have to survive on bread and water or start selling backside :s