I'm such a big baby..

30th September 2005, Friday

The final day of September as well as the final day of the week, and what an eventful month September has been... Birthdays for my lass and my dad...I came back from my Japan to find out that several of my old comrades at work are leaving for greener pastures... I thought my hard disk crashed and went on to get a new PC to find out the DVD writer was giving me whole lot of problem which turned out to be petty incompartible media problem all along... I had tried my best to do up my travelogue to to be awakened by the rude fact that the free domain which had served me so well for the past year or so, had not throwing whatever files I had uploaded into oblivion...and last but not least, a stomach flu to end the month with....

Well hope October would be a less eventful (but not necessary dull) month...

Back to work and more little remnants that JxMMy left behind to welcome me in the morning, notifying me not to wipe off the data of our German collaboraters..yada..yada..yada...
Then later on, he "suspected" the current of our of the machine was not quite normal (then again who would check the current when everything is going on fine without any discrepancies in the results) and tried his best to figure out what's wrong..
I dunno could be a combination of factors of my body still reeling from my illness or the work recently has grown a bit stale to be excited about or I just lose any zest and passion for anything... For the whole of today I felt I am just going through the motion, and my mind is really blank...even had nothing to look forward to do when I get home later...

Anyway with this stomach flu I felt I am still a big baby, even at an age when I am capable of making a few babies myself (as my mom would always want to remind me)..
My parents would keep checking on me on how I am feeling, so would my girl who would keep bugging me to take more vitamin pills (which she would be selling nonetheless)..
But been a person who is a remote stranger to the term "independance", I actually survive on such attentions showered to me though I know it's all wrong..
But it's always good to have a few loved ones constantly on the look-out for you, instead of fending this cold, cruel world by yourself.

Hey look..Mom even packed some bread she bought purposely for me yesterday, just in case I still do not have the appetite for rice for lunch....
well she had been saying that I couldn't live without my PC for a day, which is true to some extent but I couldn't live without her with a greater extent...hey you can call me Raymond from this day on man...

Japanese word of the day: 赤ちゃん~a-ka-chan~ (Baby) Have you seen one as ugly as me?

I feel weak...

29th September 2005, Thursday

A 2 days hiatus from my daily blog-writing practise is pretty unheard of for my standards but on Tuesday suffered from a writer's block while yesterday I was decimated into a weak entity as my body was subdued by a stomach flu which I was afraid it might be dengue since the endemic had been widespread on our island and Yishun has been a hotbed for such incidence...

But fortunately after consultation with the doctor, just glad that it was a mild case of stomach flu which left my tummy bloated (I know it had been bloated all along) and left me short of appetite ( that to me is like an apocalypse)... I was down with fever, chills and totally weak to move around....

But a good rest and some medication, today is a great day to just slack at home and my lass came over last night to stay by my side which is always great as if not for this I doubtwe can see each other this week..

So the illness was perhaps not so bad after all...

Japanese word of the day:食欲 ~sho-ku-yo-ku~ (Appetite) still not really recovered from a full appetite but to me should be a good sign afterall

My Dad, Richard Simmons

26th September 2005, Monday

No no...not implying that my dad has turned into a sissy health guru , but he did became very concious of his health lately especially after been diagnosed with extreme high blood pressure weeks ago while I was still in my Japan trip.


He's definitely not my dad...

The fear of a stroke actually hit him, resulting him becoming a liability for us was unthinkable for him, thus he really heeded the advice of the doctor and went on full fledge exercise regime including a walk/jog session on every evening, rain or shine...
He was repeating his new found hobby over and over again when my lass was having a chat with him when we celebrated his birthday in advance.
His discipline to becoming healthier definitely threw myself to shame...and recently I definitely feel not as fit as I should... but the self-discipline is really something I lack but with the new work year of Remedial training in the pipeline, I hope I could inculcate a more healthy lifestyle in the coming year as well as shedding a few kilos to make myself a wee bit more presentable if I was to get married next year..instead of a pock-marked uncle with huge hunch in front...

So it's yet another Monday at work and BY was infatuated with the guys from "Final Fantasy VII Advent Children" and kept chastising me for causing such a phenomenon but it was later soothen when I send her links to download nice wallpapers of Cloud & co.
Meanwhile Bobby for once said he dread coming to work...on Monday at least, who doesn't....

Been really into the idea of getting my own paid web hosting space so that the irritation of broken links from my current free domain could be resolved.
But it is really down to the point whether it is quiessential to me or is it just a luxury I could always do without. Despite the low cost of less than $10 a month, if I don't constantly update and no one actually visited my site, it would be a white elephant anyway.
However that didn't stop me from looking out for a good, reliable and most importantly budget webhost with local helpdesk just in case I really feel I want to get one.

*Note: from this point onwards Blogspot just snapped and kept asking me to re-enter my ID and password...and I lost what I had typed TWICE!!! BLASPHEMY

A latest piece of good news...from 8.40pm...my DVD writer finally managed to write its first piece of DVD..GMD!
I heeded CS' advice to change another media and bought a 16X speed Verbatim DVD-R and it work mircalously..sure lit up my day..and i buzzed CS to update on that good news and he even offered to purchase that stack of TDK DVD-Rs from me..such great soul

Anyway written a little write-out on my newest infatuation before the snapped blogspot...the Fuji TV summer dorama, "Densha Otoko 電車男"... it's about the love story between a loser otaku (oh yes couldn't get better than that) and an elegant OL from the Ginza area which resembled so much of his virtual fantasy, an aniated character known as Miina (designed by Gonzo)...

Itoh Atsuhi (伊藤淳史) was great as the otaku lead while Itoh Misaki (伊東美咲) had became more of a refined wine as she exudes such charm that made her one of the most celebrated actress in Japan now with CMs non-stop for her to be in (she's even a fave of Hiroki, my Iwate's host now).. Not only she had managed to charm Atsuhi's character, Tsuyoshi but pretty much the entire otaku population in Japan right now...


Can't find a more loser face than this

The BBS which was the support of Tsuyoshi was a true indication of the only channel lonely people like otakus bang on for advice and in the show it definitely played a very important..

At the end of episode 2 where I left off, Tsuyoshi transformed himself to not reek of otaku-ness and braced enough courage to invite Misaki's character, Saori for dinner and I couln't wait to find out what would happen next....Believe me if you are into anime, and had a little otaku traits in you, this dorama has to be the bext thing that could happen ever....

Japanese word of the day: ヲタク~o-ta-ku~ (Otaku) It's a lifestyle one chose to live in, so please try to appreciate it and not despise it...

State of Depression

24th September 2005, Saturday

It's rare to submit a post on Saturday, but the start of a wonderful is not the most ideal one...

Firstly I woke up with a sore neck once more, making my entire head movement very restrictive..my nose is running as well for no clear reason except for that foul weather and persistant flu bug

& this was after last evening when I made a "1-to-1" of my LG DVD writer in hope it could be my original unit that is the root to why I could not use Nero to burn DVD-Rs...apparently that was not so and the niggling problem still exist which baffled me and of course CS who I woke him from his slumber to whine about my problem..
Fortunately it did not irked him enough to slam down the phone, and he suspect it could be the media dsic problem and that would be the last resort before we may have to come down to the decision to re-install my windows as Ferris had assumed it could be some configuration problem...

Then again my new 50 megs account went disappeared once more... GMD! ....I posted my Wonder Festival report on my regular forums hoping to recieve some accolades from my fellow toys collectors only for the stupid free web-hosting service to go down on me once more..I really did not want to relive the point that I had to create yet another domain and meticulously upload my thousand over files which could be why my neck is sore now....
I am really contemplating on getting a paid web host locally so I could have a help desk here always ready to answer any problem... but first i would have to contemplate the fact that would it be worth it to set aside some money a month to create one...since there was no monetary input at the end of it as I am not running a commerical web page afterall

To compound to my misery, my previous post which I thought would be the most delightful to read so far about me and BY (in our best impersonating Indian accents) assuming the role of the little Indian girl and the syndicated bird-seller from the haunting Visa card advertisement, starring a certain Richard Gere with no lines, just disappeared into thin air overnight as well....sigh

I also heard about the passing of a cousin from my mother's side in Johor Bahru, from a suicide when he deliberately respirate carbon monoxide in his car... I doubt I had even talked to this particular cousin (hey man I had got like 1868758646775476 long distance cousins and I ain't no the social type) in my lifetime, and now he is gone... didn't even know the reason and could not even feel a trace of grief except the shock to hear about it...

perhaps he was suffering a bout of depression which he felt unresolved and helpless like I am today before any pilgrimage trip to La Tendo to make my life more fulfilling once more (less say lessening my bank account)

Oh yeah before I leave off as I accompanied my lass to have dinner with her secondary friends at Bishan last evening, it would once again proved that the world is so small when her best sceondary pal, Pris came with her boyfriend whom my lass had enquired from me before that he was formerly from my secondary school and from my batch somemore... His name was Efrem and how many Efrem could there be in a batch less say the entire school history..
I had met Pris once and thought she would be the wild type meanwhile this Efrem guy ain't the most happening guy on the block...I know because we were classmate for a year in secondary days and in the same class once more in our "1st 3 months" stint back in SRJC
So I was all too surprised to see it was really him last night, and he was perhaps one of the last (together with the Big "O") that I wanna reconciled with... of course it did not help that he and Pris was more captivated by each other's company (alas Foo & Michelle back in a dinner a few years back) instead of enthused into mingling with the rest of us

Life is good when it get that wretched... and for not my footballing idol would be Jonathan Woodgate to emphasize that fact...

Japanese word of the day: うつ病 ~u-tsu-byou~ (Depression) I feel despite the fact that the world is coming to an end anytime soon, commiting suicide is definitely not the best way to combat depression

But there is only enough for one bird

Damn... I actually had a post here

But as nothing goes right for me for the freaking past week..it disappeared as well...

Just in the right mood to write everything all over again...

So they found their FORTUNE!

22nd September 2005, Thursday

And yes there went the finale of "Rock Star: INXS" and yes I went from on the verge of becoming an INXS fan when Marty took on a INXS' classic, "Don't Change" for the final round after Mig was ousted from the brood (he shouldn't had taken on Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody" to begin with).. I told myself within that if Marty would actually be assuming a role the late Micheal Hutchence had been so popularly been doing while incorporate his own unique character into a talent band, I would be hooked for life...Then while J.D. was performing his tune with INXS, I was so unbothered that I went to do my own stuff...

So when Tim (in his usual serious "you are not suitable for our band" tone) took off his glasses (oh no!) and proclaimed J.D. Fortune as the winner of the contest, I just felt I might had saved a few dollars not to indulge in a band that I had been listening for since my teens and yet not too inclined to their sounds... Basically as By mentioned in the replied SMS, they are afterall looking for someone who sounds a lot like Micheal and they seemed to find that in J.D....well I don't I would be seeing the last of Marty anyway..like the same for Mig & Jordis as they would continue rocking the stage if they were offered a chance...as for J.D., he got his wish and a great reward for the most illustrated character of the whole contest...



Had lunch with Boon Hoe, my old comrade on the pitch back in the poly days and for the last 3 years a comrade at work. He would be leaving officially tomorrow with greener pastures discovered in the pipeline; so he felt it was a fitting time to dine together (like it would be the last supper or something). We had some nice, nostalgic talk about our younger days of hanging out for soccer training or skipping lessons to play soccer back in my SRJC days. Then on the way back i asked him so what would he be missing the most after he left our workplace...without a second of thoughts, he answered, "the char-bo (girls)" I was like "Pardon!?"

He was the same guy who told me that our workplace was a barren land, void of prospective dating targets, and now he gave me such a reply, of course I was taken aback. I mean the answer itself was a bit shallow but for a normal. healthy lad that has yet tasted the sweet nectar of soul mate companionship in his 27 years of existence (not referring to you TW, you are totally an isolated case!) , I could understand his plight. Then again his supervisor is a reforming Japanese asshole while his colleagues did not vgive much damn about him. The company did not recognised his hard-earned degree, restricting him with such minimum wages and benefits. No wonder he did not feel much to be leaving, except for the mass of young nubile ladies here that might his own social circle...

Talking about young docile things, I was pretty petrified by a video which Liz from the neighbouring lab had forwarded to YM. It was labeled with warning to girls who fancied showing their physique in tube blouse or other flesh-revealing outfit. It showed a poorly made home video taken with the backdrop of a developed Asian city, perhaps Taipei or Tokyo.

The show had snippets of a young lad with cascaded face scampering at the rears of unsuspecting ladies (victims' faces shown), and then forcefully pulled down their tops, bras included, revealing their assets... and many distraught victims were left lost of how to react except frantically covering themselves from the intrusive exposure...

I wondered it was supposed to be a prank or joke, or to satisfy the sick minds of lecherous men around the world... this was totally tasteless.. Pornography is one thing but the clip was just disgusting. It could be that the victims might be willing parties but the clip felt like it was taken from a hidden camera afar... I shuddered at the thoughts that the victims could be your loved ones, and how traumatised they could be...as much as cases of rape or molest...sorry to sound that incensed but the acts were uncalled for, and the scary part is that they got away with it for several attempts and managed to tape down the whole process and circulate around on the world wide web

The email had a disclaimer that request ladies not to send this to guys who might reciprocate here, but guess what, I think it was the guys who started circulating this in the first place...

Man, for a moment I'm grieving for myself to be in this gender...

Japanese word of the day: 勝つ　~ka-tsu~(Win) J.D. might be the winner but he didn't win my heart

Ugh... Not again

21st September 2005, Wednesday

Today is a day filled with plenty of "ugh... not again"

Case No. 1

After happily uploaded plenty of my travel photos onto my domain, I logged in this afternoon to upload some html files to the same domain and found out that the domain provider had closed down my domain overnight...DAMN!!
This is the 2nd time and I realized that it could have been my domain name which was both "gr" followed by a number in both cases which led to the closure. My other domains bearing other names by the same provider are still intact. Well just had to meticulously and patiently upload everything from scratch again...

Case No. 2

JxMMy is on urgent leave...yes again... and heard that he had to sent his wife to the hospital once more...poor JxMMy's wife...
Well I really took his absence with a pinch of salt and with Bobby been very much attached to the girls to learn their project as to assimilate him over to cover for the departing BY, I had pretty much the liberty to run my own show, which had not happened in a while, especially good on a midweek when the demand of our service is very much reduced.

Case No. 3

After looking through the online help to rectify my DVD-R problem, I tried the 2 possibilities mentioned that might be the cause of my burning failure. However my DMA was okay and after flashing my LG super multi writer with the latest firmware, my problem persisted. Ugh..Not Again.. I immediately left my dilemma on both CD-R Zone & Hardware Zone, hoping some kind souls would lend their expertise but the response was worse off than just lukewarm.
Well at least I managed to got contacted with CS who is in in-camp training for the next 3 weeks thus a bit more time than usual. His simple advice is for me to bring down my DVD writer for a one-to-one exchange from the retailer as it could be the best solution...

Case No. 4

Following up with my parents' (actually more of my mom) interest in the free Digital Voice plan under my cable subscriber, I made yet another call to the sales hotline, hoping to get it over with especially with Dad intending to cancel our home telephone line today. Everything was a breeze till the sales officer mentioned that the free plan is only for a limited period till 2007. (Yup there's a catch from them once again after my fracas a few years back when I first applied the cable internet service)
Which looks to me to left only 15 months or so of free service before they would actually charge us again. The modem and the installation fee accounted to around $160 which was already the subscription fee for 16 months or so, so it's not that free afterall.. So after confirmation with my parents, we all felt it would be less hassle to just maintain the line we had...

Looking forward to the "Rock Star:INXS" finale tonight as well as more uploading to do into a brand new domain...sigh..not again...

Japanese word of the day: もう一度~mou-i-chi-do~ (Once again) something just come back to haunt you over and over again

Online help...

20th September 2005, Tuesday

Watched the 57th Emmy's Awards last night and personally I felt was one the better ones I had seen in years.. despite knowing a few shows been nominated such as "Lost", "Desperate Housewives", "24", "Everybody Loves Raymond" etc, I was really into the jokes by people like Ellen deGenerees, Jon Stewart and Conan O'Brien who's prize-giving segment for the "Best Actress in sitcom" made me giggling silly even in my verge of dozing off..It also reminded me how much I miss watching "Late Show with David Letterman" when he came out of the show to paid tributes to the late Johnny Carson
All in all, the show made me stayed up all the way to 1 a.m which a toll on me as groggy was an understatement as I staggered my way to work today...

My sketchy communication barrier with the girls got rectified a little from the start of this week and with Se Ban, the obnoxious despot that can be fickle-minded and showed impartial treatments over everyone, we definitely shared a common enemy to curse about.. We also had a session of comparing some of BY's old polytechnic classmates' (JxMMy included) changes in appearance over the course of last 14 years as BY revealed a class photo taken back in her first year and it's astonishing to see a few figures grew to a point beyond recognition.. it's not just putting on weight nor a few more lines of wisdom on the face, but a total make-over.. Bad as it is, it sure was entertaining scorning on others' misfortunes....

With the problem of my DVD Writer unable to burn DVD as it was supposed to, I decided to go online to search for the reason behind the error and see it what ways beside bringing in for one-for-one exchange, that I could rectify it..
Indeed with the vast particpations of computer expertises worldwide, I did get a solution that might seem to able to solve my dilemma, let's cross my fingers that that's true tonight...

My parents after been advised by a cousin that being a subscriber of my cable internet provider, we are entitled a free Digital Voice (Internet telephony) service which we just needed to pay for the special modem and a one-time installation fee, we could enjoy unlimited local calling for free, and only required to pay for overseas dialling..This of course was very appealing to them and since then they had been on my back to get it done... well we should be able to see the progress in the next couple of days

My lass informed me of joining her and her secondary school friends for dinner on coming Friday evening as her friends would be bringing their other halves as well..wow, now I am like an accessory..plus it really antagonizes 2 soft spots of mine..having to pay for dining with strangers on a night which i should be resting at home...well but it's one of those one-off request and I felt obligated to be subdued to her request....

Japanese word of the day:変化する ~hen-ka-su-ru~ (Change) Dunno how much I have changed from myself 14 years ago...

(R)uined (P)riority (G)uage

19th September 2005, Monday

It feels pretty weird to work on Monday once again after been missing from work for the past 4 Mondays...sure feel the brunt of the manic Monday as the Bangles would verify..

So it was a pretty unproductive Mooncake Festival weekend for me... was supposed to do a few things as described on last Friday's post such as drawing the rough budget spreadsheet for 2006, but just not felt compelled to do so...

However something common had been pre-occupy my entire weekend...

The notion of Role Playing Games was very prominent...
On Friday evening, Ferris beckoned me to dropby La Tendo (which i would even he didn't beckon me) to be screened the premiere of the highly anticipated "Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children"....
Getting quite excited about the direct-to-DVD CG movie by Square-Enix to tie up the loose ends of the RPg Playstation/PC game that rocked the scene back in 1995, I brought along with me a packet of Lays Potato (Salt & Vinegar flavor, don't try it unless you had craving for really salty and sour chips) and a gallon of lemon tea, only to find out the crew were already nearing the end of the 2nd screening.. This was followed by a 3rd and 4th for the day to a point that Karen who had been there since 9 in the morning as she was taking lesson in building resin kits from Ferris had gotten a bit sick of the whole show...

Seriously I had not get the full grip of it which I I think I would after I actually sit down and watch the entire movie from the very first second till the end..but then I doubt I would either

As Howe Chern who messaged me on MSN last night that unless you actually played the game, it would be like watching for fantastic CG of beautfiul metropolitician characters with rebond hair-do engaging in some of the most well-choreographed fight scene that might put Jackie Chan or the Matrix to shame...well it definitely was nostalgic to see Cloud and the game again even Sephiroth, Aeris & Zack despite their brief appearances...and Tifa was a babe once more..hubba hubba...

I wanted to rip a copy of the movie with my newly-acquired LG Internal Super Multi DVD writer to find out that the DVD writing function on Nero kept hitting error...so I tried writing CD-R and that could work...I tried other programs to burn DVDs and none seemed to be able to work... I felt a tinge of been cheated and definitely will wanna resolve this issue by end of this week....

I mentioned about playing "Football Manager 2005" on my new PC and that did not turn out well either as I could not load nor start a game with my copy...so I diverted my attention on the Microsoft/ Gas-powered highly raved sequel to "Dungeon Siege", an action RPG game which reminds me a lot of "DnD Baldur's Gate", "Fall-out" and "Diablo" series... Actually I just wanted to test how powerful my processing speed and graphics card can perform in a high-end gaming environment, and slowly as the game progressed I could see how it managed to make my good friend, CS addicted to it (not hard, trust me)...
However it was pretty tough battling through the very first act, and defintely a no-good gamer scum like me would definitely be requiring a trainer to help me through...

So basically played the game for the most of the Sunday which was the 15th of the 8th Month on the Lunar calendar and my lass came over for a reunion with my family.

After knowing that she had to foot half the bill for the dress made customary for her friend's wedding which accounts to around $100+, I was lambasting her of spending way too much for someone else's leisure. Well you should know me by now of been to self-centered to care about other people, so it would be a natural reaction from me which irked her...well that is another stark difference between the 2 of us...

Japanese word of the day: 遊ぶ ~a-so-bu~ (Play) think will spend a bulk of my next few days playing my new-found addiction

Rearranging my Life

16th September 2005, Friday

Not as serious as my title implied..just would like to make a new year resolution (yes I know it's only September) as to clamping down my expenditure for my hobby... It would be tough but I would at least keep it within that allocated sum each month unlike now when I am constantly exceeding the budget as been too easily succumbed to the temptations of the new products churned out by the vicious and inhumane toy companies month in month out...

Think I have to come out with the budget for 2006 (alpha version) and give myself a rough idea on how much I could save for the money-taxing project, known as wedding.

Did some arranging of the toys collection under my super single sized bed last evening with a carton box, remnant from the newly-acquired PC casing, and managed to create more space for future storage, for the next few months at least. Once again, I am dreaming about that display shelf I had designated to place across one of the walls of the living room to nicely organise my collection as they should be treated.

Been also longing to play my fave PC game of all time, "Football Manager 2005" on my new PC as the higher processing speed and much power graphics card can bring the gameplay to a whole new level which I could have not experienced with my older system.. The only limiting problem is the time factor as I still need to finish up my online travelogue as well as the travel video which would take even more time...

So looking forward to a weekend which I have a list of things to accomplish...

JxMMy is on urgent leave today leaving me and Bobby to run the show which was pretty much ok despite the heavier workload with people sensing the service would be closed for the next 2 days and rushed to submit befor the day draws to an end..
Still pretty limited interaction with the girls..could I become a brand new JxMMy to them? surely hope not..and with BY leaving a month remaining here, sure would be even more crucial to have that relationship in mend...

The dengue epidemic has really reached critical point for the past month, and Yishun is a hotspot of incidence, so I better keep my eyes wide open for any buzzing mozzie (a new term from the papers for mosquito)

So sweet, sweet Suzie McNeil had been the last to be eliminated in "Rock Star: INXS" which proved my point correct since the premiere of the contest that INXS would feel it would always be a guy to front them, not been sexist but it makes 100% sense to have a guy to croon "Suicide Blonde"...
This lead the jittery finale for Marty, J.D. & Mig as the 3 musketeers have been faves of mine in the several points of the contest and I feel rightfully they should be up there...I just couldn't pencil who would be the ultimate winner despite Marty holds a slight edge over the other 2 being the only one not in the bottom 3... but we just have to see the finale performance to have a clearer picture..
By the way, Mig finally had a chance to perform an INXS number in his first appearance in the bottom 3 and he really delivered it as Mig would ...

Japanese word of the day: 関係~kan-kei~(Relationship) Clueless about my relationship with my colleagues at the moment

~ You & Me, up in the Trees~~

15th September 2005, Thursday

Been contracted with the ear worm called "Trees", an original composition by one of the finalist in "Rock Star: INXS", Marty which he encored last night after many inlcuding INXS themselves felt injustice for not been picked for encore last week..
That honour was given to J.D. with his "Pretty Vegas" which he too performed last evening, for the 3rd time...
This week the final 4 had to go face to face with the band for a in-depth interview and it was pretty clear who the band actually favors from the lot..
Suzie seemed jittery and fumble when been asked some questions, perhaps due to nerves and that didn't impress the lads while they felt Mig was too much a theatre-guy, which might not be the right one they are looking for...

So it was J.D. & Marty who seemed more composed especially the latter who exudes self-confidence that impressed the band...

For performance, each did 2 songs chosen by the band and all four did splendidly well.. Suzie hit the spot to warm the audience while J.D. add some aspects of interactivity to his performance.. Marty's acoustic rendition of "Trees" with Dave Navarro on guitar was splendid while Mig showed a dark side of him with the Rolling Stones' "Paint it Black"...

So it's hard to imagine to figure who would go out to reveal the final 3..Personally I think it might be Suzie but Mig got the least vote when the line was opened last night..so we'll see later on...

Used my parents' OTO Trimax to ease the niggling sore on my neck and it did wonders after 10 minutes of vigourous electronic massage...

Found out a weird phenomenon shrouding my brand new PC... despite choosing "Turn Off" in the WinXP to totally shut the system down, it will reboot on it's own all over again and require a hard turn off from the casing's power supply...

Back at work today, I felt the girls been giving me cold shoulders since yesterday but perhaps I haven't had taken much initiative to talk to them for the past week, meanwhile Bobby has grown inclined to them as I was when i first got to know them well...

Had a conversation with Mom yesterday about something that had kinda got on my nerves recently...

My lass was invited to be one of the bridesmaid troop for a former colleague of hers. It was her first time and of course was pretty upbeat about the whole process of discussing what to do, making matching gowns, throwing hen party with the bride, going for manicure and pedicure session, in expense of taking annual leave for someone she might barely knows...

What really irks me is that most of these affairs she would have to foot the bill herself? Hey wait a minute shouldn't the bride be the one paying?
You get someone to do you a favour, to take leave to go through all these things for you, might even have to give you and your groom an "ang pow" and you expect them to pay the charges for almost everything? I don't quite get it man... But obviously my lass and other gullible ladies are willing to splurge for someone's happiness...

Then the fact of these bridesmaids are to spice things up on the actual day of ceremony by sabotaging the groom and his band of nitwits...er sorry band of brothers/ bestmen and extort money from the poor grown before they allow him to step in to fetch his bride..Even then they would come out with some crap ideas to put the groom (if it's me I'll snap by then) to proclaim his love for his wife-to-be...Reminds me of Freshmen Orientation Camp back in my university days all over again..

This maybe why sometime I feel I should do without the whole frigging ceremony...

Japanese word of the day: 唄~u-ta~ (Song) for now Marty's song is been embedded in my head

It's been a while...

14th September 2005, Wednesday

So my girl had her "mee-sua" to commemorate her turning to the age of 24 last night. She even got a new hair color which needed much reassurance from me for the entire evening. But there were some nonchalant notes along the way like when she wanted me to sing her "Happy Birthday" song as she was about to blow the candle off the pathetically small tiramisu cake I had gotten from her from Four Leaves, I was sneezing non-stop and was more concerned about the wax dripping off the litted candle. Feeling jaded, she whined about me not indulging her needs when I began berating her about my running nose, which left a bad taste in her mouth..

I also sort of told her off for buying me 2 pair of toe-socks when I am tight in my budget... which I really am sad to say, especially after getting my powerful PC...

But we did spend the remaining of the short night together as her plan to return home was hindered by a passing shower...
However I had to spend a good hour or so chatting with my buddies, CS and TW on MSN when TW was more preoccupied with his other contacts earlier on and CS reporting for night duties to his other half for the latter part... But nonetheless it had been a long while the 3 of us really chat together which definitely filled whining about life sucks as well as trying to fish out the latest scoop about each others' lives especially between them 2 since I am always like the middleman to both of them especially with TW now thousand of kilometres away physically...

Think my stiff neck got worse after sleeping in that confined mattress beside my bed the entire night as my girl still is not used to the air-con vents blowing directly towards my bed... will try to remedy the sore neck with that OTO Trimax my parents had gotten during my Japan trip

Got a surprise visit by BH yesterday afternoon as he beckoned me to join him for lunch just before his resignation actually kicks in next week.. Through our short conversation, I could sense and even empathise with his angst and discontent with the admin of our insttute as they continually refusing to acknowledge his newly acquired degree which could prompt better pay & benefit package, a situation faced by LF as well. Leaving with no choice, he had to leave for greener pasture else where which at least bother to validate his degree which he had painstakingly acquired. He constantly jibes about how disillusion staff feel these days especially with pay increment is going at such slow rate and benefits here seeems to be much inferior to the sister institutes under the same company. What's worst is that the admin has no urge to make the staff to stay especially when they view everyone dispensable and replacecable and the fact that there maybe hundreds of applications from fresh graduates make it much easier for them to allow senior staff who had slaved for them for years to go at the blink of the eye...

I might actually have to seriously look into other career alternatives (something I had been preaching for a while but never practise what I had preached).
One good channel might be the service facilities I am in charge of doing. If it did turn out well, perhaps I could persuade them to sign me as their full time staff, at least they could give me a better renumeration, benefits and bonuses. I'm seriously fell way shot of my target of 3K per month within my 3rd year of working.

Well I always let fate takes me where I should go..sadly unaspiring but that's me...

Anyway learnt from my lass that her brother rejected my kind offer to pass my old PC to them, which made me wanna sell it off cheap, at least I could recoup some money..but first I might need to seek guidance from CS on whether that is feasible...

Japanese word of the day: 仲間~na-ka-ma~ (Buddies) Hope there would be a reunion of the Wreckers soon but doubt possible

It's her birthday, she can cry if she wants to...

13th September 2005, Tuesday

Back to work after another long weekend for me and ain't too good as I had pretty bad sleeping posture resulting in a sore neck for the entire morning

Things didn't started off too rosy this morning as YM implied I had caused some confusion in the ongoing project for Seban which resulted in JxMMy throwing doubts over their usual online submission... But it was much more than meets the eyes and the information after been passed down was well filtered and the truth is that it wasn't a big deal and I found out that I played no part in the confusion after all.

I had to rush for a meeting for the external service and it was pretty affirmed that they wanted to really kick-start the shared facilities into full flow by early next year, and hopefully I would play a part in which I could propel my own reputations in this scene, now that JxMMy had been stealing all the thunder for himself...

Just finished reading Dan Brown's "Da Vinci Code" and it was a pretty compelling yet profound read which might leave many clueless if had no slightest ideas of the non-fictitious characters and monuments described in the book. Really recommend the illustrated version as Chan had gotten, as claimed to be very useful.
The ending was a bit dour but it would be too fantasy like Harry Potter if it was to be what we thought it would be.
Now I am expecting to see the likes of Tom Hanks, Audrey Tatou, Jean Reno and Ian McKellan in the movie adaptation in May next year.
I would love to read the prequel (actually they just used the same lead character in, Professor Robert Langdon), "Angel and Demon".

Well as the title implied, it's my lass' birthday today. Over the past year it had been pretty hard on her in terms of work and family.
She had been striving to do her job properly despite all the uncertainties in her industries and now trying to pave a 2nd career despite the lack of time on her hands.
Family-wise, the infidelity of her father resulted in a fissure in her family which she is trying to mend, especially to make her mother and siblings happy.
Most importantly she had to deal with the shit I had thrown to her, especially when we couldn't see each other as much as we wanted...

So on this very day, she would turn 24, and when it's her 25th birthday, i would want to make her wife (legally of course)

Japanese word of the day: 幸せ~shi-a-wa-se~ (Eternal Bliss) want to give my love of the lifetime that in this birthday of hers.

Got a machine so powerful....

12th September 2005, Monday

Finally got my new PC setup but my buddy CS today...

My new PC configuration is as follows:

1. MSI 915P Neo2-FR ICH6-DDR2 PCI-E with INTEL LGA 775 630 3.0GHz Processor (Motherboard with Processor Chip)
   
2. TWINMOS 1024MB 4300/533 DDR2 (512MB X2) (RAM)
3. Maxtor 200GB 7200RPM HDD SATA (Hard Disk Drive)
4. PowerColor X800GT 256MB DDR3 PCI-E (Graphic Card)
5. LG GSA-41678 16X DVD Writer
6. ICute 1286SL-8S Casing 400Watts PSU (Tower Casing)

Got the entire package from Fuwell from Sim Lim Square (where else?) and after been cajoled by the attendant, I agreed to allow them to fix the whole thing up for me as to ensure the BIOS of every part is working well...
At first CS was a bit skeptical and felt we should fix up on our own, but after checking the worksmanship, he was pretty impressed and felt we would not do a much better job in the end

The entire package cost me around $1200 which is slightly above my budget but from CS, I have got a machine powerful enough to summon SCUD missiles to bomb any 3rd world countries

We were lucky to reach home before 3 as the storm was about to arrive and spent the good next 4 hours, installing all the programs I needed (CS got ALL the LOBANG!!) as well as formatting my huge HDD and installing the Operating system...

Beside the speedy processing speed, I was really salivating over the possibility to read/wrote DVDs now as well as able to connect my graphics card to my TV, which allowed me watching comfort as the PC monitor would strain my eyes over long exposure..

CS also is very efficient in bantering me to join him into endless hours of fun with PC games like "Guild War", "Dungeon Seige II" & "Dragon Shard" but more than once I had been telling how preoccupied my time will be for these days

But overall it was a great day to get together as once more both of us got head over heels about building a powerful PC which is always CS' fave hobby to indulge in

Japanese word of the day:強い　~tsu-yo-i~ (Powerful) that is what my new PC setup is

Shake up my Space

11th September 2005, Sunday

Ahhhh....just came out of shower, after feeling hot and sweaty in this humid weather, after rounds of vigourous......s......squaring up of my room...

Well it's never something a lazy bum like myself would want to do on regular basis but there is a dire need to do some cleaning up especially with the truckload of stuff I acquired from Japan still lying all around for the past week or so... Tomorrow I'm meeting CS to rig up my new PC and thus I had to clean up my computer workstation as well, while digging up some installation softwares I might need to gear up into the new hard disk...

Seriously I think if I am to quit my current job, I would be a great rag-&-bones man (or what affectionately known as karang guni here). I really have way too much junks mounting up everywhere in my small, space-restricted room...

From nice plastic or paper bags I had accumulated, hoping to put to some good use in the future but never to old packaging boxes for my toys, electronic gadgets, accessories etc., to brochures enough to distribute to the patrons of Comex & Natas Holidays combined...
Something got to be done, and I had to be ruthless in discarding some unwanted stiff some I think dated 10 years back and eventually generated 1 big bag of garbage with 3 smaller rubbish bags...

That aside I recieved 2 rude awakenings in the cleaning process:

1. My room is like a bloody magnet for dust and mildew and regardless how studiously I had been wiping them away. My displayed toys collection has always been on the brunt of dust accumulation; despite my heart sore everytime I witness the process, I had totally no control about it. Mildew is even worse, they clumped together with my fallen hair follicle to form a unsightly dustball which like the human population in India, cannot stop growing in numbers..
2. I had to seriously cut down my collection. It's not down to my budget but space is the major factor. Now I have no enough space to store my toys already and I am green with envy towards Karen who has a spare room just to store her collection. Next I wonder how many display shelves I need to make to display my entire collection of mini figurines which I'm sure numbered to around a few thousands now.

Well with neater and cleaner environment to work and live in, my mood is definitely slightly better as well...

Japanese word of day: 掃除する~sou-ji-su-ru~ (Cleaning up) Not the big annual Chinese New Year spring-cleaning but good enough.

Disorientated

9th September 2005, Friday

Coming to the end of the week and felt a tingling feeling of disorientation with respect of what to be done and where to go for the next few days...

Been cracking my brains on where to get a nice b-day card for my lass and I could only visualise Kinokunya at Liang Court where once I got a overly-priced but elegant Valentine's card (or was it X'mas?)
I knew Chan would be going down in the weekend to collect the manga magazines we had ordered months back and I had vouchers to utilize, so that would be the most logical choice as I feel the cards that can be found around my neighbourhood lacks lustre blatantly...
However the utopic situation for me was go down to collect tomorrow and head towards La Tendo together but it was not going to be so as he chooses to head there after his weekly pilgrimage of China Square Central on Sunday...

Well for the nice card ( I pray so) and for the voucher I could use to redeem my magazine, I might had found the exact reasons to leave the comfort of my room on Sunday afternoon and spent that transport fee to town...bummer...

It's BY's b-day today and I joined the gang to have lunch at this eatery joint known as "Philly's corner" within our workplace where the girls had been harping over the tasty sandwiches and set meals...
Price-wise it was still reasonable for a huge cheeseburger complete with fries, egg and bacon and a soft drink, only $8..
But the waiting time was a bit too long and when the food was finally served we found dead ants on the fries and frantically the waitress made a fresh serving but after a good 20 minutes as the frying oil might be filled with dead ants altogether, yum yum.."Fear Factor" style delicacy...

After 2 weeks of sabbatical, I finally managed to catch "Rock Star:INXS" again, but there was a new-found fellow fan of the show in BY who found this gem on TV a wee bit too late, and was totally crazy about Marty...

The final 5 were Marty, Mig, Jordis, J.D. & Suzie with Deanna & Ty been eliminated weeks before respectively; and on Wednesday the 5 had to do a couple of performances, first a requested song from viewers worldwide as well as a self-composed song...

Marty's and J.D's self-composed tunes were both superb but the audience voted for the latter to do an encore last night while I actually preferred the former's "Trees'...

Despite the encore presentation, J.D. was one of the bottom 3 together with Suzie and surprise surprise..Jordis...
It was the powerful Jordis who seemed very much distracted over the past 2 days and INXS had to axe her despite she promised so much...

Tearful departure for the youngest contestant of the competition but it would be the last we see her for sure....

Japanese word of the day: 蟻~a-ri~(Ants) Found some in out fries today

Miraculous Revival

8th September 2005, Thursday

Just like in my dream the night before, my PC's hard disk revived with a touch from the heavenly beings last evening as I attempted to switch it on again...

Despite so I could felt something wasn't right as before in terms of processing speed and other glitches, which prompted me to hasten my backup of the important, treasured files to my portable hard disk before it decided to gone for good

I'm also adamant in my decision to do an overhaul of my PC which suddenly donned on me that it is definitely the right time afterall, just a bit tight on my budget for the rest of the year that's all...

This fiasco also provides me a golden opportunity to meet up with one of my buddies, CS whom I had not seen for a good 8 months as well mainly due to his work and domestic commitments, so I'm actually quite looking forward to coming Monday which I had requested for off from my supervisor for the special request to come back to work on Saturday not long before...

Well unexpecting a revival of my hard disk, I made a special request to my lass to loan me her laptop for the next few days in which I could at least work abit on my travelogue and was pleasantly surprised by her new hair-do which has to be her shortest and thinnest since I had known her, and proven that my disillusion about her looking bad with short hair is not justified...

In return of loaning me her notebook, would be helping her to download stuffs of her fave Taiwanese boyband who is pretty busy to appear on TV these days with the release of their brand new album...que sera sera....

Beside chatting with CS over the phone for a while in which I was made known of the fact that he and his girlfriend (nicknamed QTee, stands for quality time) are planning to apply for a HDB flat and yet he got the cheek to be bothered by not be able to find the opportunity and plan to do his proposal; I had good chat with Cheryl and TW over MSN, making my hard disk revival even more worthwhile...

Cheryl been pretty cooped up with her job (who isn't?), hang in there girl....okane no tame ni, isshouganme shigoto o ganbatte kudasai...

Typhoon Nabi had been hitting southern Japan ,Kyushuu and Miyazaki especially and was supposed to head pass Osaka which TW was actually anticipating despite the detrimental results it might incurred..strange guy as always...

Back at work today, my supervisor and colleagues (mainly the guys) had been pretty jittery of the safety audit of our service lab as we are been auditted under a seperate institute, which might also open the door to get some reprieval from the failure that hit our institute hard the last time...

It would be BY's b-day tomorrow and the gang are buzzing with organising a karaoke session and seems like the new lad, Bobby can really click with them in one hand and adopt a stoic mode with JxMMy at the other; really is flexible...well perhaps he was the bit of fresh air they had been ooking for...
YM had been on my back to do my rendition of the Spanish/Brazilian song which bring them such joy and entertainment the last time round but it is had to do the same exact performance with the same choreographed feel and tempo which makes me reluctant to condescend to their ardent requests...

Talking about birthdays, my lass' b-day is around the corner as well, next Tuesday to be specific, I had already bought her a watch for a gift earlier the year and don't really have the cash to get her a lavish dinner and present this time of the year but I hope I could think of something to reprieve myself on the dour proposal to her...man I'm feeling more and more as a piece of huge, unromantic deadwood....I need a mentor in this field man...

Japanese word of the day: 復興させなさい(Revive) Our of miracle, my dead hard disk came back alive, good grief

The Day my Hard Disk Crashed

7th September 2005, Wednesday

6th September 2005 would be known as the day my faithful hard disk of my Dell Slim Tower PC crashed into oblivion....(;__;)

As of any day after work, I would gleefully galloped to my PC, trying to do my routine activities and especially now after the trip when I'm in "form-groove-feel" to update my travelogue..However upon the first stage when the computer is entering the Windows XP operating system, the screen just hang on the activation process which to me had happened before as my PC is pretty old and frail, some hiccups are bound to happen...

So not concerned I did a hard reboot by holding onto the power button on my tower but my monitor could not sense that the PC is actually rebooting and in constant hibernation mode...
I froze for a few seconds, shuddering at the thought that this might not be a small hiccup afterall..
Thus immediately I shut the pwer supply which is the last resort that shouldn't be done ever unless in dire situations...switching on again I was glad to see the monitir finally responding to the CPU but this time upon the "Dell Computer" screen I got a harsh "beep" error sound...

The black DOS screen read:

"Primary Disk 0 not detected
Secondary Disk 0 not detected
Primary Disk 1 not detected
SecondaryDisk 0 not detected"

"Press F1 to retry boot, Press F2 to Utility Setup"

WTF!?!

I'm no computer wiz and these boolean reads greek to me...

so I kept hitting on the "F1" button (which I have almost never used before last evening) and the error message kept replicating, each closely accompanied by a beep sound....

Man I was as frantic as the last time I was caught in the act in office and in wild attempts I tried the utility setup, to see if I could ingeniously did a miraclous ressucitation of my PC back to live...but once again to no avail...

I'm now very sure I need professional help, so i quickly buzz help from Loke but couldn't get him after like 19708790 redials on his handphone..
I tried to call my lass but she couldn't be reached as well (I need some comforting badly)
Finally I called CS who is always the gadget-boy in our brood, and managed to get him

It was fortunate that he was off work and just got back home..

After stating my problem, he quickly diagnosed that my hard disk is most probably gone with my CPU and RAM very much intact..which leads me to 2 options:

1) Get a new hard disk.
2) Get a brand new PC setup

In any case I would be losing the files in my current dead HD which in blessing did not contain much important files except the backup for my personal webpages, my budget spreadsheet, some mp3, video and picture files I held dearly in my heart...

Luckily I got my portable HD which holds more precious files which are still available...

Anyway I'm glad CS was available to help on coming Monday when he would be on leave, and I felt option 2 is more viable since I am already prepared to do an overhaul of my ageing PC within these 2 years though I didn't expect to be that soon..So moneywise I kinda have to draw some reserves, but trying to keep to the minimum since I need no lavish LCD monitor or top tier graphics card as I don't play games as much as he would...

Another fortunate point of view is that I'm just starting to do my travelogue and not at the ending stage, so not that much was lost
But I did ponder on the possibility of getting some expertise to draw out important files from my dead HD but once again had to consider how much cost would be incurred...

Nonetheless the entire fracas was not as detrimental as it would if it happened a year or 2 back as I am mentally prepared in some ways...
But life without PC for the next few days would be hard to endure..just more rest and TV I guessed

Japanese word of the day: パサコン ~pa-sa-kon~ (PC) Time to mourn for my faithful companion of the last 4 years

Safety Failed

6th September 2005, Tuesday

My first day back to work after a good fornight of vacation...

My lass had been kinda clingy of me as we had afterall seeing each other for everyday for the past 2 weeks, even on Sunday evening, I stayed over at her place as she had requested (well the weather was a bit cooling, so fine for me who was too used to sleeping in a cool room, ran by an air-conditioner)

Yesterday we spent the early part dozing off while watching "世界の中心で、愛をさけぶ" DVD borrowed from Karen, and I must say I actually prefer the dorama version...
After lunching at my place, we proceed to get the proposal ring changed for the correct size she would be comfortable with, which was when we had our eyes locked on a pair of wedding band made of platinum (god knows how true is that) and had vine engraved on the rustic silver band, something she knew I would like and she herself had grown accustomed to...
This pair from Goldheart Jewellery cost close to 1K each and we both felt it's better to wait for some sale like when I got my proposal ring from...

Spent the rest of the evening, starting to concot my travelogue; something I think would be preoccupying my free time for the next couple of weeks...
We took an astonishing 1000 over pictures and even after scrutinising selection, there still was close to 1000 and if I put 20 in one page, I would have to compose a good 50 pages...wowee...

Anyway the big news to welcome me back to work is the fact that our institute failed an impromptu safety audit drastically which drove our usually-composed director into pique and lambasted the respective P.I.s to sort out all the safety issues and restructure our respective labs as they tried to persuade the auditors to return for a 2nd chance..for us it's the same thing: to do correct the wrongs, not incurring any safety regulations and hopefully beautify the dreadful state of our labs...

My supervisor was pretty upbeat about having the full strength back for close to a month..
She was glad everything got onto track smoothly and hopes we can work as a well-oiled engine...
However little did she knew that BY has already got a job offering in our rival institute (just across the road) and would not goes down too well with Old Hag (our administrative director).
But it's still down to BY, 'cos the other side definitely has greener pastures as they would not be the apple of the eye of the company for nothing...Just hope her prospective lab is not as clouted with politics as rumored to be...

The girls bugged me to give an account of my proposal while updating me the latest scoop about the happenings in the lab..
JxMMy told me about his enthralling visit to the States when he got to see high technological and immense throughput which deep inside he was dying to introduce over at our side (fat hope!)

Bobby seemed to start carving a niche in the lab, one month into his stint and sure entertains the girl with his lifestyle and norms (who doesn't entertain the girls..maybe JxMMy)

Well beside BY, a few people around the place would be resigning soon, including my old soccer team-mate BH as well as Has, my old university lab partner who I felt guilty shoving her into the cold, inhumane chasm of Se Ban...
Gotta wish everyone all the best and if our current institute doesn't improve in correctly rewarding their staff, many would follow..maybe myself if I could find a better option soon...

Japanese word of the day: 安全　~an-zen~ (Safety) Our institute totally fails it

疲れた

4th September 2005, Sunday

YES..I'm back and reaping the rewards of my fulfilling trip to Japan...

I have almost accomplished all the objectives I had set before the trip..
The Numero Uno has to be the proposal to my lass... It did materialized despite not a original plan went awfully wrong and not a tinge of romanticism in it which she would chastise me for the rest of the days we spent growing old together..

But still I'm better than most stoic Singaporean men out there..at least I did not just say "we should go apply a HDB flat" shit ...

Anyway I would give the entire scoop in my travelouge which I am trying to do as soon as I could before my focus got shifted to something else...

It was really great to see and experience everything we had set out for...
Meeting people who helped us so much along the way...Vincent, Miyano, Reedy and Matthew were great companions for the Wonder Festival... Hiroki and the Mori family as well as Eriko & Sou are such hospitable souls which made us so reluctant to leave Iwate...
My buddy, TW had been a great guide as well in Osaka and it was sure "retro" to talk shit with him once again...

The food we got to eat was sumptous and taste unforgettable, from Okasan's Oden, onigiri and spaghetti to the famous Takoyaki and Okonomiyaki found in Dotonbori-suji in Osaka to that nice little restraunt with that pink elephant logo embedded under the Ueno eki railway tracks as well as the tasty croissant offered in our daily buffet breakfast in Hotel Riva Nankai...

Shopping was great as well as my lass could verified with am absurdly overweight luggage which nearly got us to pay more as we returned...

Well the trip was meant to let us take a breather from our hectic working lives and a rare opportunity to spend quality time (as quoted from CS) together which was an objective well-met...

Now 14 days later and back to our little mundane island free from the earthquakes and typhoons we are so dreaded to meet but lucky to dodge...
We just gotta face the reality of our lives now the vacation has ended...

I was actually glad to have the local weather especially with the characteristic sogginess these weekend...
We got well burnt in Tokyo and Osaka from the gruelling summer daytime...

The one-hour difference in time was not supposed to be too great but we had accustomed to sleep at around 11pm Singapore time and waking up at around 5 in the morning since the sun was up as early as 5 am Japan time...so we actually is suffering for a mild level of jet-lag

Now there is actually some butterfly in my stomach to go back to work on coming Tuesday after absence for half a month or so...

It was great to see my family again despite I received a not so happy piece of news of Dad suffering a blood pressure so high he nearly got stroke, now he started to get into a more healthy lifestyle (as if he has not adopted one so far).. sure pray he will attain that clean slate of health for years to come....

My lass' family woes need plenty of resolution and at times I am lost on what I could for her except to be her listening ears and constantly giving her reassurance and advice...
But things are rosy as we starting to plan for our holy matrimony soon...

Glad to reunite with my La Tendo clique yesterday, all was present, even Ferris' brother, Bryan but Chan was working overtime...
They love the goodies I brought back for them and the photographs sure effectively enticed Karen to yearn for a Japan vacation of her own...

Well it will take a while for my life to get back on track to before the trip and hope the next Japan trip could come on soon...

Japanese word of the day:帰りました ~ka-e-ri-ma-shi-ta~ (Returned) home after 14 amazing days in heavens...