As the decade draws to an end, I'd like to conduct a retrospective research on my soul's well-being for the emotional year ended 2009.
for the earlier part of the year, there was the tumultuous relationship that dragged my soul to hell. it was a long time coming and while I knew I was miserable, I did not know how to let go of something which I've grown so attached to for the longest time. but times have changed, he changed. wait what am I talking about, i knew he changed and I was still living in the past. while it seemed that I appeared unaffected to my friends, as cliche as it may sound, I was slowly dying inside. I mean, yeah, sure, I know how to have a good time and I'd also like to think I provide a good time to my friends, I don't like to have to put them through my tears. oh well, I only have myself to blame.

then there was the fucked results, the after months of feeling that nothing is going right for me which is better known as quarter-life crisis.

well it wasn't all that bad a year...
i did a grad trip to Aussie and enjoyed the biggest adrenaline rush ever from skydiving. some say it's better than sex but maybe reason only being they have yet to experience great divine sex? beats me.
oh wait I had to cancel the flights to Melbourne and Tasmania, no thanks to the swine of a swine flu.
I was so liberated after the breakup, like it was an emancipation of some sort.
and I made a couple of great friends this year, which I hope to keep! oh did i mention the eyecandy....

things were getting better for me and distractions of different sorts sure helped...

that is until the bomb was dropped on me today. it's news of the worst kind, and it's only good news for people who love bad news.
I can't even bring myself to say or think of it now after being in tears the entire day. there's so much to think about and do from here.
how do I gracefully accept the terms upon which this universe operates? let's save this for 2010

it's my mummy's birthday tmr, I will end the year in style for her.

emotional profits are in the negative for 2009

as for now, beer is the only proof that god wants me to be happy.

Mein Kampf X'mas

not what i wished for, but still blessed.

Super Sunday!

Gifts of the Sea

Sooooooooooo cute

Giving me photography 101

what's to love about national geographic? EVERYTHING!

i will steal ek's photos of our photo painting at keppel marina with
torchlights once he uploads them... they were so awesome!

The Past Week

December is a bank-breaking month, with the line-up of birthdays and merry making.
to add to the unfriendly list, a new laptop has to be purchased.
i feel so helpless without it!

2 boxes of green tea straight from japan. thanks S!
watch that expanding waistline.

Dinner at Werner's Oven

i wonder what they did to the porkchop, its super yumzz!
this gives all the other porkchops out there a run for their money.

A study between iPhone and Women

A very narrow-minded comparison of iPhone and Women
(by eng keong, both an iPhone user and Women user))

1)Plenty of Uses
everyone wants them
both are so pretty and slick, slim and touchable

2)Expensive
-the battery doesn't last forever.. (credit cards needs to be top up)
-you have to pay a little bit more for each thing you want them to do (apps)

but you can JAILBREAK THEM (catch them sleeping with another guy, they will do anything to make up for their mistake)

3)They like to be accessorized
women with prada, gucci and LV, iphones with skins and pretty casings

Final words:
To conclude, iphones are very similiar to women. they have a hole... for the charging jacket..
actually, plenty of holes. one at the top, one at the bottom.

today, while trying to think up ideas for 2010 v day promo,
i was casually asking eeky what kind of promo would entice him to buy a cake

[eK] says:
HAHA!
50% off and a Grace Action Figure to go with it.

grace says:
hahahaha!
Grace the sacred bun protector action figure (a joke that stemmed from a previous convo)

[eK] says:
hahaha.. =]

grace says:
can u imagine how it'd look like?
im trying so hard not to laugh here
LOL

[eK] says:
hahahhaaa
it'd look really retarded.
bigini sorta outfit
with the famous f l o s s buns as your bikini breast covers =P
and on the bottom piece also, WITH ALOT OF F L O S S. makes you look like you have lotsa blonde puuubbbss hair


later on in the afternoon, while scouring for sth on the co's public folders, i chanced upon a folder containing pictures of an event that showcased the signature products - personified.
granted from the above convo, it came as a shock that right there staring at me was this lady gracing a mini runway in -no prize for guessing- a f l o s s bikini!
too bad eeky, someone else beat you to that idea.

Monday Night Laugh

so this hawt guy was seated diagonally across us while we were having our dins at carls jr,
whom i did not notice until Ah Chan pointed out to me when i returned with our food. i would not go into details on our fervent discussion about boys and that hawt guy during dinner (read: deprived) and our giggly fit which rendered us 14 all over again and go straight to the main highlight- hawt guy announced/asked his friend out loud "shall we make a move?", and in true Ah Chan fashion, she gave an instantaneous and resounding "NO!!". they looked at us. FML.

There never fails to be an embarassing moment with her around. Take for example, the incident at PS Cafe and during ESAP lecture. First reaction is to reel in shock, second is the urge to want to bury your face from the face of earth. But it has proved to be of high entertainment value when we bring up those incidents, and oh, her 'macro guy'. Thank god for this crazy girl!

Thereafter which we headed to the gala premiere of Storm Warriors, and caught a glimpse of Ekin Cheng for like, what, a split sec? And as if New Moon wasn't bad enough, it was an ordeal to sit through this C grade movie with an A-list cast. did i mention Nicholas Tse looked really hot?



Tuesday Office Laugh

this is gonna be lame. don't say i didn't warn!

i experienced my first papercut. yes, you read that right.

my right index finger was oozing fresh blood (which will ignite the bloody Cullens' senses)
and my colleague was mildly shocked when she saw it.

"oh it's just a papercut" "oh do you know this is the first time i got a papercut?"

"what? u've never until now?"

"yea, i just lost my papercut..."

wait for it...


wait for it......



"VIRGINITY" we said in unison.

a neighbouring male colleague looked at us in disbelief. super funny.

BlackBerry Presents VeryAce

Too-good-to-be-true niche products

my heart broke when i saw her, so thin and gaunt. i don't ever remember her being this frail-looking. or did i not take a good look at her the last time i saw her?
her eyes lit up when she saw me. she opened the door, but before she let me in, she peered out to see if there was anyone else with me. i think she was a lil disappointed to see me alone. 'why didn't you bring your friend with you?' she asked me in canto. i was momentarily puzzled, like why would i bring my friend to see her? then it strucked me whom she really meant by 'friend'.

Talking to her was both a happy and heartwrenching affair. at times, i was trying so hard to contain my tears. i feel like sucha douchebag for not making the effort to visit her more often. all the empty promises of bringing her out. i think i should do it more often, go to her place after work with my dinner and have a chat with her. bring some hk drama serials for her to kill her time since shes almost too weak to go anywhere.

Te amo, grandma.

When Heaven and Earth Collide

here i am, unable to work, with an unrest within my soul that'ss ever growing with each minute.

i'm whining and repeatedly bugging my colleague to look at my comp(it's one of the better days where we ain't flooded with an avalanche of work, plus people are at meetings)

This is gonna overwhelm me ahhhhhh!
The cause?

This surreal and magical place called Salar de Uyuni, part of the Altiplano of Bolivia.
It's a salt plain, made up primarily of lithium chloride.

Lo and Behold...

I am so inspired to travel through South America now just like Che Guevara,

a la The Motorcycle Diaries. albeit not on a rickety bike.

Office Chaos

Its been nothing short of drama this week in my dept in the talking buns office.

over the phone, shouting matches ensued
superiors to subordinates, saying unpleasant things
poor phones, being abused by rough treatments
everyone's lamenting about everything and everyone
everyone's rushing everyone
and today, a fiery 'I QUIT!' was heard, followed by the slam of the door
no one has the luxury to breathe.

when it gets too noisy to bear, with angsty voices from my side,
and fish market style of chatter from the dept across, my best and simplest
trick to get away from it is to give the wheel on my ipod a clockwise spin.

but above that all, everyone's still nice intrinsically, so that's great.

It would have been more interesting if it were nude models they were attempting to sketch.....


Plastic Nation

all hail Willard Boyle and George Smith, one-half winner of Nobel Prize in Physics 2009.
Without them, space photography wouldn't have been possible, and neither would digital cameras.
Without them, i would not have known what i would have been missing

Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair

who is the happy? happy is who?

I am the happy, happy is me

for I have finally laid my hands on ........

-drum rolls please-



Ta-dah!























only piece! touching it and owning it alleviated a considerable part of my touchiness today:)

and speaking of touchiness, the conversations today on msn:

me: i'm feeling touchy today

so-and-so: who ya wanna touch??

yea yea i don't only wanna touch,

"i want to do with you
what spring does with the cherry trees"

Noisy Noir

played around with the 'film grain' effect on the cam. it looked nice on the cam's lcd screen but when
blown up to its actual size, the images are way too noisy. perhaps my disappointment was drawn from an expectation for it to replicate the grainy old skool black & white film effect.

Flora & Fauna, Antics & Action

There was the flora and the fauna... and the adorable kids...

And my sister with her crazy antics and puberscent jokes...



As well as people engaging in extra curricular activities...

Breezy Saturday Morning With Good Music and A Good Book

part of my playlist for a cloudy breezy saturday morning:

Hall & Oates - You Make My Dreams
Bee Gees - How Deep Is Your Love
The Temper Trap - Sweet Disposition
The Walkmen - The Blue Route
Youth Group - Daisychains
Modest Mouse - Float On
Yael Naim - New Soul
Maria Taylor - Replay
Lykke Li - Dance, Dance, Dance
The Dandy Warhols - You Were The Last High

being groggy after having been woken up involuntarily, some good music instantly
lifted up my mood. it's amazing what music can do for me :)

Friday night kakis

Friday night kakis

Oh secret heart, what are you made of?

The title is a lil tribute to (500) Days of Summer, an indie romcom which i caught today, and which i thoroughly enjoyed! Such fickleness of the heart; Such undying obsession; Such uncertainty; And a crazy thing called fate - All of what you call love. I think i feel so much for it is partly due to the music they share (Sid Vicious and The Smiths). great soundtrack there.
Anti-climax is me but the part where Summer mentioned how she met her husband "i was reading Dorian Gray and he asked me about it" strucked a chord with me... I'm not surprised at her choice of husband because personally, i'll be impressed with anyone who reads and enjoy The Picture of Dorian Gray! I don't know why Mitch said it sucked but i reckon she's right, I'm a sucker for lovey-dovey flicks.

And since i was around the area, i made a trip with CJ to my fave quaint lil secondhand bookstore and picked up Eat Pray Love and When We Were Orphans.
Thank you CJ for the haribos all the way from germany!

What really boggled me today was some people's complete disregard for their public image/manners despite their young age. We were chilling at the starbucks when this girl seated at the table next to us decided to, horrors of horrors, lift up both bare feet and aplombed them onto the table. Look at her blackened soles. Wasn't it festival of lights over the weekend, not thaipusam? and there was this guy who placed his legs on the table too, albeit with shoes on, ON HIS MACBOOK.

want some visual idea?
sorry ah hansel had to use you as an excuse to snap the pic






















So effortlessly, Hansel managed to convince me to impulsively splurge on this kinda pricey Zara bag but I think i'll be thanking him for it in the future :) I say he'll make a good salesman.

Now I shall attempt at lulling myself to sleep, for work beckons tomorrow and i'd want to impress, wouldn't i? Well then, this officially puts an end to a sloth's life and 4am chats =/

Oh secret heart, what are you made of?

random shots by yours truly
19/10/09