Not A Desirable End to the Year of Chicken

28th January 2006, Saturday

Ok minutes away to the reunion dinner but it's an ordinary week-day dinner for my family since we always dine together for dinner..just swap with extra-festive sumptous meal (since mom's cooking is always sumptous to begin with)..man the thought of the delicacy cuisine is activating the stomach acid and triggering my salivary glands.

Anyway the final day at work yesterday was a pretty prompt affair.
YM was given a day offer to compensate the 3 days of leave "eaten" by the administartion since she tendered her resignation before utilising the remaining days left on her annual leave.
Seriously you can't have a boss better than ours.
The "prep" crew was also endorsed for an early depature since there's nothing much they could do as no one would return to off any equipments in the next 3 days or so.
As for our service side, pretty lukewarm demand as most of the PRC "Ah Tiongs" had managed to rushed it for last afternoon's batch and merrily planning to make their way back home.
My supervisor came in and said we could be secured if nothing cropped up..
However JxMMy was very much muted cos his stoic yet "passionate" attitude did not justified that he sshould go back early since he always came in the office around 9, so he felt he should slave his way till 7.
As for Bobby with me handling 2 batches of our project, he felt it would be right for him to do the final batch which was ready only after 4pm.
Actually I had schemed for that to happen as well..made him feel bad for not lifting a hand for the entire day (I actually ate lunch later so as to accomodate one batch after my early gym session); so that he would do the last batch which would end around 5 plus (normal knock off time) while I duly took up the kitty dangled by my supervisor and left at around 4.30pm
Hey I would be a sucker if I don't..not to forget that's part of the plan as well....

So I headed down to Suntec City as planned.
Man...there are people streaming in and out, here and there...getting on my nerves and I started to feel that claustrophobia eating in.
I did managed to make it to Suntec, vamoosed my way to the uppermost storey to where "Family Link" is and prayed that the gashapon set I had desired was available for "tikam" at Toys Room despite claims on the forum that it had been swiped out days earlier.
My prayers were answered as I spotted one full machine..but just only one and there might be a high chance for recurring pieces if I tikam at random..which is why I hated to do "tikam", it may be cheaper but you might ended up with plenty of extras, if you are lucky enough to form a set in the first place...
So I changed around $20 of $1 coins which would warrant me 10 tries and hopefully I'll just need half of that to complete my set.
After the first attempt which really shows how rusty I am with the art of manuveoring the capsule machine which needs to turn clockwise then anticlockwise or is it the other round...
Then the 2nd attempt and guess what.. the machine consumed my coins but no capsule was regurgitated and even the knob was stuck..
I thought I just need to seek assistance from the staff but little did I know that this Japan-imported capsule machines can only be rectified by the dedicated service-man who has the only key in Singapore..woo yeah..Life is good and blissful for me as always..so I had to wait for like light years for that darn service-man to come fix it and return me my $2..who care's about the money?
I'm here to get my gashapon toys!!!
Well unlike typical grouchy Singaporeans, i did not kick a fuss and recede once I knew my whole effort to travel here had very much backfired..more like so near yet so far...
Then I saw a couple of trading figurine series sold on the shelves which La Tendo did not managed to bring it in...however not guaranteed a complete set if I tried "tikam" again and at an exorbitant price...$14.90 for a 500 yen (around $7.50) item..GMD!

I stormed off to La Tendo next and started raining..oh great..
I was quite excited about a new shipment which was scheduled today but looking through the list I guess I was spared from spending for this week which definitely bring a smile to my face...
So the whole effort and time wasted for my toy hunt ended with a miserable capusle toy...Wish the Year of the Dog could promise better haul and ensure I need not incur the wrath of playing the capsule machines which has a tedency of breaking down as frequent as CS spending QUALITY time with his lass...

Japanese word of the day: 惨めな終わり~mi-ji-me-na-o-wa-ri~(Miserable End) Perhaps it beat having multiple attempts and just short of one piece before the machine broke down...