Dinner in Pattaya by the sea.

On one of the 2 nights we spent in Pattaya, Thailand, we had dinner in this restaurant by the sea, on a row of shops and night life activities. 

 

 Though the food we ordered was mediocre, it was fried rice and tomyum (what else), I thought the environment was rather special and comfortable, with the slight sea breeze blowing in your face.

It seemed like we loved fried rice and tomyum all the time, but really, we do not know what else to order and yes, we do like those 2 dishes, but that was the last night we said, ok, that's it, no more fried rice for the rest of the holiday.

This is how it looked like during the daytime.

Since this trip was in end of last year, I forgot where or what we ate on the other night we were in Pattaya. Memories failing me, but I would believe it wasn't anything spectacular since I didn't take any picture of it so it should be nothing worth remembering.

Well, there's more of that Thailand trip posts yet to come. Still not done yet. :)

Another one succumb to wearing glasses.

Last 2 weekends ago, we went for a full eye check up, me and didi, at the Tun Hussein Onn National Eye Hospital.

It was for sometime that I wondered didi needed glasses, though he kept saying he could see well and clear. I took him to check his eyesight in a couple of optician shops, but not trusting them fully, since, well, logically they have vested interest in their business.

An opportunity arise when hubs' cousin told us she has a friend who is taking a degree course in becoming an eye doctor and need to do a number of eye check ups for free for this final year to graduate. I asked her to contact him for us and make the appointments.

When I was there, I learned that you don't really need to know anyone to get these free eye check ups. You can just call its number (I'm sure you will look it up if you are interested) and make a booking. There are quite a few of their students who needs to conduct 100 checks each in their final years of their course.

I took didi and meimei there myself, hubs was in somewhere else for the whole day whilst korkor was in school. Both didi and I were checked separately by 2 handsome cute young boys but no fret, we were being watched by their supervisors and the supervisor would reconfirm their checks on us as well.

The check up was pretty complete, with several tests on its pressure, health, power, color blindness, 3D and lots of others. It took 1 hour and more.

At the end of it, I was told didi needed glasses. Big sigh.

So we went scouting around a few opticians and settled back on our usual supplier. His quote for the myopia control lens is RM360, compared to others which ranges from 400-600.

Well, didi is now a 4-eye-dude. How sad.

Having a baby.

Boy meets girl, girls meets boy. Fall in love. Get married. Have a baby because so in love. Feel so happy bearing a child inside, feeling it growing and going to pop soon. Then baby comes, and oh, he is sooo cute. Well, not all the time, but enough to feel blessed. Then it's about time to have another one so to give the firstborn some company because you have only that much energy for baby shows, baby songs and baby stuffs.

Ahh.. then there's where everything else falls apart. 

All the bickering, shouting, fighting, attitude issues, school issues, and worst of all, they are NOT cute anymore! Give them 12 years of cuddles and kisses, they don't want you to go near them and they prefer to go out with friends, even for holidays! 

There are couples I know who think that having a baby would strengthen the love between them. The truth is, it could break them. Especially when the parenting methods are so in contrast or maybe the man is just not keen to change diapers or stimulate their minds like the woman does.  What they do is just be there, plopped on the sofa having some shut-eyes, whilst the kids on their iPad or TV, whatever that interests them. OH, maybe I do that too sometimes, ok, lots of times, but hey, moms are entitled to these privileges, ok!

When the little individuals become more matured, you only wish they grow up to be prim and proper, and truly find their purpose and happiness in life.And then perhaps, it's time to rekindle the love or find your own life and live freely again. 

Nevertheless, being a mom has been the best thing that ever happened to me in mine. I had wanted children since I was young. Though the 3 of them still driving me crazy, my maternal instincts still makes me think of having another baby, especially when I see the cuteness of others, like Lolly. But no, their cuteness lasts for only those few years, so, I'm hanging on here. I'm good.

What I want to say here is that....err... there's a point I wanted to make somewhere, let me get to that later..

Our latest purchases.

So far, every visits to some home exhibition or fairs prove to be rather "cash-drenching". Just last weekend, we spent about 5k for 2 items, one the Coway water filter/ dispenser and the other a vacuum cleaner. We were having our eyes on a juicer too, and Coway had us sold with a comparison study between the few brands we saw thus far. But that baby has to wait.

The water filter we are using right now is several years old (akin to 88yo in a human's life) and needed replacement. Every day I had to boil a big pot of filtered water and move it from one spot to another and yet to another. Now, with the cool babey, the filter and dispenser for hot, room temperature, and cold water, my work is reduced by, I calculated with a sophisticated formula, 0.914% each day. Yay! I have that more time to be busy on something else ( like being entertained by real life stories of certain groups of weird people on FB) The kids, korkor especiallly I would say, are super excited over it, after korkor saw that awesome cool thing in his friend's house last year.What is it with boys?

As for the irresistible vacuum cleaner, all hail to the sweep/mop 2 in 1 and functions like a mini Rainbow to suck the dust mite from your bed, with just a fraction of the original coveted Rainbow cleaner. To be more precise, about 1/8 of the cost. Only worry thus far is the effectiveness and reliability of the product. Hope it at least could give me a more squeaky awesome smooth touch to the floor that we walk on day in day out. 

This home is becoming a junk yard, I kid you not.

On a low, hope to be right back where I was.

It's been a long hiatus from this space. I had been wanting to come and write something to relieve my "stress"  or thoughts, but ... oh well.

Lately, I had been pondering on my "career path", if I had one, may I say. Tending to my own family gives me this much pleasure, but it would be denial if I say I do it selflessly and not expecting any gratitude, results or appreciation in return.

It breaks a lot of me when I see the hubs not appreciating my contribution enough, when the kids misbehave, when the test papers come back with not so favorable marks (when I am pushing myself spending this much time to their books) and my face is sprouting with pimples all over. Jeez, when some of the stuffs go the wrong way, everything else follows.

It's time to pick myself back up again and start afresh. I'm sure things would look better. OXY10, khao saai nei!

Only Time Will Tell

I just finished reading a book that had been lying around for some time on the table in my living room.

It's really something catching up a good read. Before the last page of the book, all I could think of most of the time of the day would be to open the book from where I left off and excitedly uncovers the plot and before you know it, it was several hours away and damn, you need to put it away to do something else that can't be put off to a later time, like take a shower, or go to sleep.

It could be so frustrating that it wasn't the ending yet, but yet, when the ending came, the emptiness that envelopes the whole being, oh, so unbearable. Suddenly life bores no meaning, no direction and sit not, stand also not. What to do now?

Lucky it's just the first book of a saga of 5. But the 3rd one was only released just this month alone. The big question is, do I go get the 2nd book now? By the rate the books are being released, the 3rd book would be done reading even before the 4th is out, and I would be pining for it. Damn, this author really had us conned.

Guess maybe I watch the 4th series of Big Bang Theory first. Equally addictive.

Rant post.

I wanna rant a bit here today.

The other day, I sent the boys to their extra-curricular class and stopped by the parked cars at the side to let them down. I stopped further away knowing that the boys, especially didi would be too careless and might just hit the car next to ours. Before I finish my sentence "careful, don't...*small thud sound* knock the car".

10 secs later, korkor who went out after didi, was scolded by the big-sized driver of that car "hey, you! you banged my car". Korkor looked stunned standing there and at first I didn't know what happened, then the man appeared before me and started scolding me as well. Watudo, keep apologizing profusely lor, kan? I'm so sorry, really sorry, truly sorry...

But he kept on and on and on about how parents should be responsible, and not just stop at the side to let the kids off as and when we liked blah blah blah...

WTF, what do you want, right? Want me to pay you for that slight little scratch? Want to take the chance to extort me, izzit? Or do you want to scratch my car back? Of course I didn't say those words la, of course I didn't want to anger him further and try to avoid being extorted by him. So, I just kept on saying sorry profusely while his anger subsided (I think)

So in the end, he waved me away, and I yelled out loudly "I'M SO SORRY, SIR!!!!"Jeez... my heart was truly thumping away, fearing he might want beat me up or something. People these days, are craZZZEEEE!!!!

And I can't get this off my mind, why do people care so much about their cars, huh? Little bit of scratch, such a big deal meh? Want to drive around in crazy traffic KL, be prepared to get some scratches on your car la. Else, keep your nice shiny car at home in your garage la. Or just get an old car and drive around, then won't be so heartpain to see it bumped.

I'm not saying that I was right. I try to avoid these little mishaps as much as possible and I teach my kids the same thing too. But sometimes, you just can't be 100% careful. In the end, a car is just a car, be it an expensive car or a cheap car. Of course, features wise, it's a different story, but a car does not have a soul, so there's no need to get all worked up over some minor little scratches! I'd say, it's just too pathetic if one thinks a car is more precious and valuable than people or even strangers.

Then I heard of this resident in our area who was so worked up over her guest's car parked at the visitor bay who later found it scratched. She kicked up a big fuss over it, and even demanded that the management employ more guards to GUARD THE CARS! My goodness! That's like so wasting precious manpower and OUR MONEY in the end. Is our own safety less important than the shiny expensive cars?

So, if you scratch my car, really, I would wave it off, and tell you "it's ok, no biggie" and then I would go home, still feeling happy about myself. Maybe not the car, but still, it's running fine, all is well.