Wednesday, November 13, 2024

Interview with a Vampire

I have just finished reading Interview with a Vampire by Anne Rice. An old novel (published 1976!) it is well known in popular culture, along with the movie in 1994, and apparently a recent reboot in the form of a tv series. Now, I must preface this post by saying that I have somehow, at the ripe old age of 34, avoided all forms of contact with anything Interview with a Vampire-Anne Rice until now. I had a vague idea of the movie starring Brad Pitt, but that was about it. I remember changing the channels when the movie used to appear as reruns on Channel 5. I simply do not care for vampire fantasy anything. I get it intellectually, but don't really see the appeal. So even though I know the novel by Anne Rice is of some significant acclaim, I didn't really feel the push to read it, that is until it came up in a conversation I had with a friend, Fin. Fin is a huge horror movie buff, and somehow that book came up when we met at a coffee shop sometime in late Aug (or maybe early Sept, it was before E started Kindergarten). Anyway Fin urged me to read it, and I said I'd give it some serious consideration. 

I was looking for another book in the library when I happened to come across a copy of Interview with a Vampire. I was quite surprised because it was a small library - just like all the libraries in Bergen County are small - and I knew they frequently weeded their collection thanks to the forever ongoing book sale right by their front entrance. Yet there it remained, so I pulled it out of the shelf... and immediately burst out laughing. I did borrow the book, but texted pictures of the front and back cover to my friends to also laugh at:



Anyway thanks to that ridiculous cover, I didn't really have much expectations about the book. But boy was I fooled. This novel was no pulp-y, easily digestible thing. Instead it was deeply introspective, wrought out, and required focus to fully appreciate it's many intricacies. And given that I seldom have time to read or the mind to focus, it has taken me at least 3 weeks to finish this novel, because I am so tired from what I am reading. It feels draining to inhabit the passive, agonized world of Louis, and all his feelings and thoughts. 

I took notes of some sections I enjoyed reading: "Not try to separate that loss from some other oppressive realization: that in Europe I'd found no truths to lessen loneliness, transform despair. Rather, I'd found only the inner workings of my own small soul, the pain of Claudia's, and a passion for a vampire who was perhaps even more evil than Lestat, for whom I became as evil as Lestat, but in whom I saw the only promise of good in evil of which I could conceive." and 

"Before, all art had held for me the promise of a deeper understanding of the human heart. Now the human heart meant nothing. I did not denigrate it. I simply forgot it. The magnificent paintings of the Louvre were not for me intimately connected with the hands that had painted them. They were cut loose and dead like children turned to stone... and of course... they could all be reduced to ashes."

Anyway, you can get an idea of the sort of lyricism that this novel abounds with. Every word and every sentence required focus and attention, and that left me tired. I had to take a nap after I finished the climax of the novel, before starting Part 4, the last section of the book. But anyway I am done, and I am glad to have read this book.

Monday, November 04, 2024

Weekly Schedule 2024 - 2025

This year E started attending Kindergarten 5 times a week, and M started 3 times a week at a nearby day care too. I also make an effort to attend yoga at least once a week, and call my parents in the morning. A typical week thus goes as follows:

Mondays

Drop E off at school by 8:50am, bring M to gym from 9:30am to 10:15am. Sometimes do chores like grocery shopping afterwards.

Pick up E at 3:20pm, bring E to girl scouts if there is a meeting that week (lasts usually an hour), finding a way to entertain M in the interim. Attempt homework with E. The evening routine (and for all days of the weekday) is usually cook dinner/reheat dinner, bathe girls if there is energy and time, feed girls if Jon is coming home late.

Tuesdays

Drop E off at school, drop M off at school right after. Chores/go home.

Pick up E, bring her to Kumon. Wait at Kumon for E to finish. Go to pick up M together. Attempt homework with E. 

Wednesdays

Drop E off at school, drop M off at school right after. Chores/go home/yoga. 

Pick up E, bring her to gym. Wait at gym, go to the nearby library, or go grocery shopping. After class is finished, go to pick up M together. Attempt homework with E. 

Thursdays

Remind E to return her school library book. Drop E off at school, drop M off at school right after. Chores/go home/yoga.

Pick E up, bring her home to finish any undone homework (!!!) Pick M up and bring her home. 

Fridays

Drop E off at school. Play with M at home (or library nearby if I have energy... I usually don't)

Pick E up, bring her to Kumon. Wait at Kumon with M (which SUCKS), or bring her out to the grocery store nearby to get nonsense. Pick E up and head home. 

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While on one hand it seems like I have a lot of spare time (and I do! I am very lucky compared to others), so much of my spare time is just spent napping because rare is the night that I get a full night of undisturbed rest. M wakes me up every night, either because she is suddenly itchy, or wants my arm, and I am right there next to her in bed for her to disturb. Furthermore, on days that M goes to day care, she naps there too and I can only get her to sleep around 10pm. And if I don't get enough rest, I am so drained by 6pm and start to get headaches and/or crazy stomach symptoms, so I need to nap. I am so tired in general, and of course house chores are never-ending. And so, thus is my life nowadays.

Tuesday, October 29, 2024

Trunk or Treat

This year we participated as Trunks in two Trunk or Treats - one at E's school, and the other at one run by our church. I originally didn't want to do it twice, but because they were sorely lacking volunteers at the one at E's school and would have cancelled the event otherwise, I signed us up. It was a nice experience, and I know more about decorating and what to expect for next year. 

What I didn't like however, was us ending up going home with giant bags of ungiven out candy (I was worried there wasn't enough, and had brought more to give out), and my kids gorging themselves on it instead during the week. Furthermore, during the Trunk or Treat events themselves, when Jon and I were busy giving out candy to other kids, E and M were tearing through their entire bounties. I feel slightly nauseous just thinking of the sheer amount of sugar that has been consumed. Meanwhile, we haven't actually had Halloween yet - that's a few days away. Who knows what will happen on that day, Jon will be working and I will have to manage both girls myself, since it seems people tend to go Trick or Treating on the earlier side in NJ.

Wednesday, September 11, 2024

Cycling

 Last week I bought a second hand bicycle off FB marketplace. It was my 2nd attempt at buying a bicycle - the first one at 26" wheel size was too big for me to stand comfortably - and I had hoped this one would work out. E was with me at the time, because her school hadn't started yet, so when I was trying it outside, she of course wanted to join in on her own little bicycle. 

I don't know when the last time I cycled was, but it was at least 10 years ago. I don't recall ever having cycled in the US, and the 2 years preceding that I was busy working and don't think I managed to cycle with my Dad at East Coast Park on a rented bicycle (although I have fond memories of those sort of outings). I was not a good cyclist 10 years ago, and now 20 to 30 lbs heavier and with messed up hips (thanks pregnancy!), getting on a bicycle again was very stressful because 1) I didn't want to fall (of course), 2) Falling now would suck a lot more than falling 10 years ago, 3) I had a little child following me around and unable to actually properly cycle on her own.

So after going up and down the road a little but last week, and managing to figure out how to brake properly, not fall off, and change the gears, I put the bicycle away in favour of being Mum and helping E cycle somewhat. We ended up meeting the neighbours and their kids, and the oldest boy ended up helping E the most while I chatted with Grandma who was watching them outside. 

Anyway this week, E has finally started Kindergarten, and so she is off at school. M is at her day care on Tues, Weds, and Thurs. So last night, while trying to sleep, I suddenly got the idea that I could cycle to the town library (since it's all small residential roads) to pick up a book that I had requested. My aim was just to be familiar with cycling, and if I couldn't make it to the library/make it back, I'd just walk home and drive to retrieve the bicycle. 

I ended up taking about maybe 10 minutes to cycle to the library. It was a very nerve wracking 10 minutes, because I also never noticed before how the path there is ever-so-slightly downhill. My tailbone also ached like hell. Once I got to the library I was just so relieved, and I ended up taking a break there to read for a bit before setting off for home. While almost halfway back, I saw one of the other Moms from E's class, and doubled back a little to say Hi. This Mom told me about another path that goes around the North end of the lake (the road and route I took is to the South of the lake), and so after saying Bye, I went to explore a little bit. Well, I found the path after asking for directions, and am happy I found it. Then I cycled back, and it was such a pain because I was going ever-so-slightly uphill and my muscles are very out of shape. 

Overall I am happy I managed to go on this little excursion/exercise and sustain no injuries.

Wednesday, August 21, 2024

24 Hours

The last 24 hours (ok, 25, to be precise) have absolutely sucked. Nothing life alteringly bad, but endlessly shitty nonetheless. It was already a busy and tiring week, with E no longer at the town summer camp, but instead the much shorter gym camp (9:30am to 12pm vs 8:30am to 2:30pm), and M waking up and screaming multiple times a night, every night. Everything was tiring but still OK until Friday (into today), when for some reason all of the bad luck and crappiness happened all at once.

The first bad thing that happened was when I was in the library yesterday with M. We were there for Friday story and playtime. M wanted me to carry her, and while I was carrying her to the adult section so I could browse, my left ankle twisted and we both fell down. Luckily the library was carpeted, but it was still awful. The last time I had a big fall like that must have been close to a decade ago, Anyway because I was carrying her and she fell too, M was crying, though I think it was more from shock than injury. I ended up rolling onto my back and just staring at the ceiling for a while to gather myself. In some sort of weird fluke, no one saw us fall, and I guess we made no noise besides M crying, so no one came to help either (maybe that was a good thing, less embarrassing?)

The second was when I was drinking my usual afternoon tea at the computer. I had sipped maybe 5% of it, and was thinking about the things I needed to do (schedule fall classes for the kids, reschedule a doctor's appointment, etc.), when I knocked the cup over, all over my left thigh. While luckily the tea wasn't scalding hot, it was still quite warm and I am sure I burned off the top layer of skin cells. Not to mention, there was so much tea and it spilled onto me, the upholstered chair, the floor, and my current knitting WIP. And because I now had to clean up and wash off the tea, I had no time to make another cuppa, so I would have to forego my caffeine for the afternoon. 

Finally the last for Friday was when I couldn't find my phone after coming back from Kumon. I had given M my phone while E was in Kumon class, and I read a library book instead to pass the time. Sometime during the session, M had pooped and I could smell it, which made me feel stressed because I am sure everyone else waiting for their child could smell it too, and I felt bad. The usual getting-into-the-car chaos ensued when E came out, and I drove home thinking to bathe M immediately. Right before bathing M however, I decided to get my phone from my bad and couldn't find it. Worried, I used Google Find my Device, and it said my phone was at Kumon. Fuck. 

After bathing M and stressing to myself, I drove back to Kumon. I walked in, fully expecting that my phone had been found and was in the possession of a teacher. Instead, I found out to my horror that no one had seen my phone, and that I had unintentionally created a small commotion in the quiet classroom. All the kids that had been quietly working had heard me, and had turned to look, excited at the occurrence of any unusual event. E's teacher however, recalled that she had seen M holding the phone when we left, and asked me to retrace my steps. I went outside to look around, and while looking around opened the passenger door to the car to poke around further, and saw my phone lying on its side between the passenger seat and the car door. FUCK. I went back inside again to tell them that I had found my phone, faffing that it was "somewhere outside", and went inside the car to cry.

That night I basically stayed in the bedroom reading by myself while Jon dealt with the kids. The next day I somehow woke up at 10:30am, and felt restored. I thought the run of shitty things had ended with the dawning of a new day, but I was wrong. Instead, after we all piled into the Rav4 to head out to lunch, we found the car battery had died. We switched gears to drive to the nearby grocery store to pick up already prepared food for lunch, and luckily Jon figured out that he could jump-start the car and drive it straight away to Valvoline to get a new car battery. He managed to borrow a jumper cable from our next door neighbour, and he even came over to teach Jon how to use it, which was really nice to him. This whole time period however, was immensely stressful. We didn't know if and how to fix the problem initially, and how long the whole process would take. I needed the car during the weekdays to drive the kids around. Jon proposed taking a taxi to work at one point and I would use his car instead. I felt under so much strain, and I was so exhausted from the previous day, so when Jon finally came home in the mid-afternoon after getting the car fixed, my sense of relief was palpable. 

It can't get worse than these 24 hours, right?



Monday, July 22, 2024

Tahdig

I've been lucky to have been exposed to a huge range of cuisines throughout my life, so now at the ripe old age of 34 (lol), there are few dishes I haven't tried. Still however, as of about a year ago, and cemented definitively by my cravings this year, there is a Persian dish that has now become one of my favourites - Tahdig.

I first learned about Persian food throughout my twenties, from literature like Chicken with Plums by Marjane Satrapi. And from similar sources like that I learned about Fesenjan, stewed chicken with pomegranates, which is one of the most famous Persian dishes. I wasn't too interested in it however, the combinations sounded odd and jarring, too exotic for my tastes.

The first time I tried Persian food was in NYC with Deni. It was at a small eatery in the Flatiron district that had a few vendors. I think it was soon after halloween, because I remember taking to Deni about the Spirit Halloween store nearby being on clearance. I don't even remember what year it was, but I guess it must have been before she moved to D.C.. It might also have been a weekend, because the eatery was half closed, but the Persian side was open. It was run by a jolly middle aged man, and that was the first time I tried Fesenjan and was overwhelmed by the clash of flavours. I don't remember exactly what else we ordered. I left the experience thinking I was glad that I had tried it, but that I wasn't exactly keen to try it again. 

In STL however, after we moved to Creve Coeur, Jon and I saw on Google maps that there was a curiously placed restaurant in Bridgeton, in a dead strip mall right by the 270 and a Chic-Fil-A (that was always busy, of course), called Esther's Persian Kitchen. Bridgeton is well, a little dumpy. It's utilitarian, but boy it is an ugly place. It also seems like a weird spot to have a Persian eatery, so out of curiosity we went there to try it out. It was also probably at least 5 years since my last experience eating Persian food in NYC. 

Esther's Persian Kitchen turned out to be another one-man show. Esther was the name of the guy's daughter, and she encouraged her father to set up a little eatery. There was never much foot traffic every time we visited, but it was just as well because the owner was always running around doing everything. We visited at least 3 times, and it was during one of these trips that I discovered the beauty that is Tahdig, and fell in love.

Tahdig is basically burnt rice crust, usually served with stew. It is so simple an idea, like the brunt rice that sticks to the claypot in Claypot Chicken Rice, except there is more of it and it is consistently burnt in a disk. Mmmmmm. I can't logically explain why I love something so simple so much, but I do. I guess by the same token, I also love Guo Ba.

Anyway one of the things I was sad about moving away from STL was missing the food. We had a Nicaraguan place we loved (Fritanga), a fusion Asian place (Lona's Little Eats), great BBQ (Salt and Smoke, Pappy's), Southern Fried Chicken (Grace Meat + Three), Balkan food (Balkan Treat Box), diner breakfast (Original Pancake House), and etc. It turned out however that in the case of Persian food, we lucked out moving to our current location, because for some reason, there are not one, but two Persian restaurants in nearby Ridgewood. So far we have tried both of them, and the Tahdig they serve satisfies my cravings. 

These two restaurants, Pardis and Parisa, are both very nice and elegant places. They have table cloths and water glasses made of glass. They also of course, have nice prices to match. While I am happy that I am able to easily satisfy my craving for Tahdig, there is still something I prefer and miss about the Tahdig made by the one man place in STL, in the run down dumpy strip mall.

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This disjointed post, which falls far below my own expectations of my writing skills, but which I will post anyway, is brought to you by my children who have (during the time I was trying to write):

  1. Did their homework half way and then ran around
  2. Threw all the toy food out of the bin
  3. Spilled Capri Sun somewhere in the house
  4. Crawled under the computer table and poked my foot
  5. Run off to poop
  6. Chased after the one running off to poop with a broom
It's no wonder I feel like a gormless moron nowadays.

Tuesday, July 16, 2024

Things My Kids Did Yesterday

Yesterday was an especially aggravating day. It started normally for a Monday - get kids ready, drop off E at Summer Camp, attend toddler gym class with M, grocery shopping, etc., but after E got home it all went downhill, and by the time Jon got home at 6:30pm, I wanted to punch something. 

First were the two giant messes the kids created yesterday that were very hard to clean up: E knocked over a bottle of maple syrup and didn't notice until much later, and M scattered Jon's 'Smart Bran' cereal all over the couch. The maple syrup was sticky as hell, and unrelenting in it's decision to adhere to the floor tiles (Jon told me even after I cleaned it took him 1hr to get remove all of it), and I had no choice but to start cooking dinner even though the floor was still sticky (which pissed me off even more). Then, I was in the midst of cooking when I saw M dig through the cupboards to take out the box of Smart Bran, and could have lunged to stop here, but was in the middle of a task. Next thing I heard was E screaming that M made a mess, but of course I couldn't see how bad the mess was until later. 

It wasn't until I finished cooking that I saw the mess. The Smart Bran looks like hamster cage food/cage liner, and it's the same bloody tiny size. And it was ALL OVER THE COUCH in thick layers. There was so much that I had to empty out the handheld vacuum. Meanwhile, every time I lifted up the cushions to get to the bits that had fallen through the cushion gaps, I saw more cereal shower through the foundation of the couch and onto the floor. I was so angry, I yelled at the kids to go shower (which to be fair they dutifully did, because In I think I startled them).

Second were the fights. After E got home she started playing with her dollhouse and her new Ghost Spider doll, and M wanted to join in. They kept fighting and there was some hitting and crying and screaming. Totally normal for them. It was quiet for a while when they found the Play Doh (that I now have to go clean up, 18h later). But after I shouted them up the stairs to bath, and was already seething trying to clean up the cereal, they started fighting over the positions in the bathtub and were screaming for Mummy. God damn it. 

Third were the unnecessary (but also typical) bullshit that the kids do. At one point, I think after E shoved her away from the dollhouse, M somehow found a pair of scissors. I was at the computer and suddenly heard a snipping sound, and turned around to see whole locks of hair all over the ground and I screamed. I was just trying to get a short rest before cooking dinner. And now there was a toddler with chopped off hair (somehow not that noticeable, but now she has hair shorter on her left side), and lots of fine hair flying all over the place. Even before that however, I had been nagging E to do her Kumon work. Every day, especially when M is around, I need to constantly nag E to focus and concentrate on doing her Kumon. One time it took her 1 and a half hours to finish it, when it normally takes 30 minutes. It is just aggravating getting her to focus. Then of course later, while I was cooking, I saw M dump snacks out of a plastic bin for no good reason. She just thought it was funny. I later made her pick it up. 

Fourth was the weather. There has been a heatwave in NJ for the last 2 weeks. Yesterday I finally started developing a heat rash. Urgh.

Fifth was the lengthy time needed to make dinner. I was making chicken pot pie, with the idea that it would give a good amount of leftovers for at least two dinners + other lunches for the week. That did mean however that I spent at least 1 and half hours cooking yesterday, not even including the actual clean up. Cooking for that long is just exhausting, meanwhile you are distracted and the kids run wild (see: M grabbing the Smart Bran).

Anyway today M is in daycare. She started 2 weeks ago, and every day except for the first day drop-off has involved a lot of screaming and crying. Today however, she didn't fuss at all. I tried bribing her with Youtube on the way to drop off and a new unicorn stuffed toy, and maybe it worked. I don't know. Let's see how drop-off tomorrow goes.

Saturday, June 29, 2024

June

My June has basically gone like this:

1 week slightly manic and exercising often

2 weeks depressed and lying in bed a lot

1 week down with a slight migraine, so still lying in bed a lot.

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In other news, I have started to learn how to knit. I've knit on and off for many years, but it was all simple knit and purl stitches, so I basically did ribbing and garter stitch items. This time I am learning for real. The current project I am on uses a 15 row repeat sequence that has ssk, s1-k2tog-psso stitches. Thank goodness for helpful YouTube videos on how to do those stitches. 

I finished the crochet top exactly a week ago, but I need to finish weaving in all the ends. It is so soft, but horrendously heavy because I used a bamboo viscose cotton mix. Idk how much I will be able to actually wear it, but I really do like how it looks. 

Saturday, June 01, 2024

Songs

M's favourite current song is: Twinkle twinkle little star

E's favourite current song is: Invisible Touch by Genesis (idk why she likes Phil Collins so much)

I don't have a current favourite song, but the for the last week or so, Never Stop by Echo and the Bunnymen + Blue Monday by New Order have been playing through my mind.

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I am currently working on my first crochet top for myself. I did a sweater for M years ago when she was about 1 year old, and it was such a pain in the butt trying to estimate the size and stitches to make it bigger (the pattern was for a baby, but I wanted a toddler-sized one). I spent a while finding an nice pattern on etsy, and deciding on a cotton blend yarn that I wanted to use. I was very excited when the yarn arrived on Tuesday evening, and started on it on Wednesday afternoon. 

So far I have completed 14 rounds and am currently working on the 15th, and it looks like this now: 



I am excited to see how it looks when it is finished.

Tuesday, May 21, 2024

M Words

 Funny things M says, in her toddler babble at age 2 years and 4 months:

1) Chum - means 'some', usually refers to seltzer

2) Mote - means 'remote', i.e.: the TV

3) Marshall - means 'paw patrol', which she loves to watch - all of the paw patrol members are called Marshall

4) Yok - means 'look', which she usually says when she wants us to see something

5) Oh-kay - she says this in a very resigned tone of voice, usually when we are telling her to stop doing something

6) Juju - means 'pacifier', which she is STILL addicted to, gosh

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For the longest time, M referred to colours as "Mommy", "Daddy", "Baby", etc. I thought she was being slow/daft, but it took us a while before I figured out that she was saying that because she associated colours with the Baby Shark song. Mommy Shark is pink, Daddy shark is blue, and Baby shark is yellow. Now after a momth+ after we figured that out and constant teaching, she is able to say colors mostly accurately. The one that trips her up is blue and green. Generally I think compared to E, she doesn't speak as much, mainly because she doesn't care to. 

Her favourite word for the last few months is, "No". When she is particularly agitated, like after I deliberately annoy her (which is very easy to do), she gets upset and yells, "No no no no!!!" and shakes her head violently. I don't remember when she started doing this, but she was already doing it when we visited Singapore in Dec 2023, so it's been a while.

Friday, May 17, 2024

Things

My Mum will leave tomorrow to join my Dad in Greece, for a well earned holiday. She came to the US with me in mid-Feb, to help bring the kids over from Singapore and accustom me to NJ life. And she has been a great help with house things and the kids. For example every day, she empties out the dishwasher, and gives the kids breakfast (I am the worst morning person ever). Then almost every night, she makes dinner. For quite a while, she also slept with M at night. But of course like all things, she has her own idiosyncrasies that can drive me nuts. For example she loves seafood, so almost every time we went to 99 Ranch or H Mart for groceries, she would buy so much fish and we would be eating fish for days on end (I am not a huge fish fan). Then there is her ability to go shopping for hours on end - she once spent 2h in a Burlington store, and M and I went nuts from boredom. It will be nice to be on my own for a bit, but I will miss her company.

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A current general list of things I'd rather do than housework and chores:

1) Read manhwa

2) Play Witcher 3 - I have the Blood and Wine expansion left

3) Crochet the rainbow granny square blanket

4) Crochet sling bags for Shome and Meghna (just finished one for my niece, K, and made 2 for my own girls)

5) Watch Marvelous Women, the current Chinese drama that has stolen my attention (usually done with number 3/4)

There is also:

6) Read the two library books I've borrowed

7) Finish the animal cross stich pattern that I started 2 years ago

Sunday, April 28, 2024

Walking on a Monday

Last Monday was Earth Day, and incidentally also the day where I walked 4.8 miles/about 2 hours, back and forth, to pick up the car from the tire shop because we needed new tires. The weather was nice thankfully. I think it was the most I have walked in years. Perhaps the last time I walked this much in a day was when I lived in NYC and had time, so I'd walk instead of taking the subway or a bus.

Anyway now that the tires are dealt with, I don't anticipate making a similarly long walk for a long while.

Sunday, April 21, 2024

Solar Eclipse


On 8th April there was a solar eclipse in our area. I had gotten two pairs of free solar eclipse glasses from the town library the previous Friday, and so was all prepped to see the solar eclipse. When the eclipse started, I was in a playground with my Mum and the kids, and it was cool to see the start of it, but eventually they got tired of the playground and we headed back home. After we got home, I sat outside in the front yard, on a tree stump, and watched the eclipse while reading a book. It started to get very cloudy however, and you couldn't see anything through the solar glasses, so I ended up using a pair of sunglasses to see the eclipse instead. 

Anyway this is a photo I took shortly before the sky got completely blotted out by clouds, close to the peak of the eclipse around 3:20pm local time. It was cool to see.

Tuesday, April 02, 2024

Dead Squirrel

Yesterday during the car ride home from school, E's mood started to sour, and by the time we had reached home she was starting to have a full on meltdown. It started because I didn't bring any water for her, which is something I usually don't do anyway. I forgot what the rest of her other complaints were, and her mood also wasn't helped when I ordered her to pick up her old garbage off the floor of the car when we got home. Anyway she started having a meltdown and I was getting annoyed and tired, when I suddenly spotted the dead squirrel across the road (not a dead squirrel, because I had already seen it earlier in the day). At a loss of what to do to make her stop having a tantrum, I said to her, "If you pick up the garbage and give it to me, I will show you a dead squirrel. Do you want to see a dead squirrel?" 

I had initially just expected the weirdness of the statement to catch E off guard and just make her pause in her tantrum, but what I didn't expect was for her to immediately stop her tantrum and reply, "What dead squirrel? I want to see it." She then picked up the garbage and handed it to me without complaint, and so I held her hand and we walked into the street to look at the dead squirrel from about a metre away. Its head was relatively intact, and I could see a bit of tongue lolling out. Anyway I asked E if she wanted to get closer and she said no. After that when we entered the house, she started excitedly telling Popo about the dead squirrel she saw. 

Anyway this morning when I left the house to send E to school, the dead squirrel was gone. 

Tuesday, March 26, 2024

Differences

As the second child, a lot of what M likes/wants seems to be determined by what E likes/wants. M likes Paw Patrol, because E likes Paw Patrol. Any time E wants to eat something, M immediately wants it too, because she sees E enjoying it (never mind that we have established time and time again that M doesn't like pickles). E also dictates the activities they partake in together - dress up, drawing, painting nails (E actually painted M's toenails before, which she really liked). M loves her big sister very much and always seeks to emulate her, and luckily (most of the time), E loves her little sister very much. 

Still however, there are some things that are unique to M. These are the few that I thought about last night while trying to fall asleep:

1. M is very very stubborn and opinionated, more than E. One of the earliest things I noticed about M when she was born was that because she hated having her diaper changed (she was born in late Jan - so it was quite cold the first few months of her life), she would kick her little legs like crazy. Then when she was about a month old, she figured out that if she didn't want to drink milk anymore, she could use her tongue to push the bottle nipple out of her mouth. This has continued till today when if she decides she does not want to something, she will throw it and fling it away, and will refuse to try it at all. It can get very tiring and annoying to deal with.

2. M loves chicken, not fruit and veg. E on the other hand, loves fruit and veg and not meat. Both girls have very different food preferences, and it's a pain trying to feed them. M also loves chocolate, even dark chocolate, whereas E does not like chocolate at all. On the other hand, they both love candy (of course, which child doesn't?)

3. M loves her stuffed toys/animals, whereas E has never really been into them. It started one day when we were visiting the Annie Oakley Museum in Ohio, and we were in the gift shop. While Jon was carrying M, we noticed her gesturing like crazy to a stuffed spotted pig, which I remember trying to dissuade her from. In the end we relented and from then on, M became inseparable from Pig/Oink/Oinky. While driving from Ohio to NJ, M was just happy in the back of the car as long as she had Pig with her to hug. Oink also came along to Singapore, and Long Island. Since then we have added to the menagerie, with Chicken and Dino, plus other old 'rediscovered' toys from storage.


Anyway here is a picture of Oink. I have ordered a back-up Oink in case anything happens to this one.

 

Wednesday, March 20, 2024

Irish Soda Bread

I don't know why, but I've managed to live in the US for 9 years without having eaten Irish Soda Bread. I know of the whole St Patrick's Day festivities: leprechauns and green clover decorations, the parades, the excuse to drink, and of course (the best in my opinion) corned beef and cabbage, but somehow never encountered soda bread until this year. Maybe because all the places I have lived before weren't very Irish American. 

Anyway, while visiting Stew Leonard's with family a few weeks ago, I got to try a free sample of the soda bread with some butter - and it was amazing. I'd describe it as being similar to a scone. I ended up buying a bag and eating it for breakfast for almost a whole week. Well, come this Monday, the day after St. Patrick's Day, we ended up at a grocery store and they were selling their soda bread at a discount so I bought more. This one had caraway seeds in it, and I think I am not a fan of this version, but I'm probably going to finish the whole thing by myself as usual.

Friday, March 08, 2024

Tired

Even though I had a large cup of very-steeped black tea about an hour ago, I am still feeling very exhausted and tired. For the last week, I have only had one night of uninterrupted sleep. I am tired and my mind is unable to think clearly and my body has a slight ache all over. I am not a happy camper. What I most detest about this feeling is that it inevitably ends up with a wasted day because I am too tired to do or enjoy anything except the bare minimum. And that stinks, because of course I have things to do and better uses of my time than napping or working at a sluggish rate.

Anyway that is my rant. 

I can't recall, but I think this night time wake ups (the girls take turns, or for a double whammy wake me up one time each in a single night) has been going on for at least 2 weeks+ This is in addition to the fact that their behaviour has seriously gone downhill and I find myself discipling them/yelling at them all the time.

I am tired.

Wednesday, February 28, 2024

Sudden Passing

My 39 year old cousin, Shuying, passed away suddenly last week. 6 years older than me, I never really hung out with her much because the age gap was significant when we were growing up + the limited times our families got together. It's funny but I definitely interacted with my Uncle, Aunt, and her two brothers more than I did with her. It wasn't until I was pregnant with E that I really spoke to her during CNY 2019, and she told me a little about breastfeeding and I learned that she was still somehow breastfeeding her 2 year old daughter. I remember being amazed at her tenacity. She also passed a bunch of baby items to me afterwards, one of them being a KKH baby bath towel, that ended up travelling to the US. 

We became friends on Facebook, and from afar I just saw her post about her family - her oldest daughter entering Primary school, the birth of her 3rd son, a boy (just 10 months old), and their recent family trip to Japan. I remember thinking that they were crazy for travelling like that, in a quasi-admiring way, because I couldn't think of anything I hated more than the idea of travelling with an infant. Well, I am glad they managed to go on that trip because it turned out to be the last one they would ever go on as a complete family. 

The second day of CNY, a Sunday this year, is always dedicated to my Mum's side of the family. In the past we used to go from house to house, but since the death of Guo Mah, it's been toned down by several notches. Gone was the visitation (and believe me, it was a lot, since my Mum's side has 6 siblings), and instead everyone gathers at the 2nd elder's brothers flat in Lorong Chuan. This year when we arrived, the first people we saw were Shuying and her family eating at a table outside the flat, because it was simply that full inside. Inside, I instantly felt overwhelmed from so many relatives, and since I had hong bao giving duties this year too, I also felt more overwhelmed. Somewhere during this time Shuying appeared, and I confessed my confusion/overwhelming feeling to her, and she brought me to her daughters and at the same time passed hong baos to my girls. We didn't interact after that, and I'm not sure if they were around even for the lion dance and the luo hei, and I later heard that they had tickets to the Zoo for later that day and were going to go with their family (grandparents and brothers + their families). I marveled at how much energy they had.

The first we heard about Shuying was on Tuesday morning, US time. Shuying had been admitted into ICU at SGH, and her organs were failing. When my Mum spoke to Shuying's husband, he said they were praying for a miracle and preparing for the worst. The rest of the day was spent in disbelief and shock, what had happened? We had seen her just a week and a half ago. I was in denial, I had heard of people boucing back from organ failure before. She was young and had no pre-existing conditions. Her oldest was only 8, and her youngest not even 9 months. 

By Tuesday night, the news came that Shuying's organs had failed, and they were turning off life support. It was over. I sobbed while changing M for bed. It hurt to think of my nieces and nephew losing their mother at sing a young age. I couldn't imagine the sheer devastation my Uncle and Aunt, plus her brothers and her husband must be feeling. A void where a once vibrant life had been. That night after I had fallen asleep, my Mum was on video call and got to say goodbye to Shuying before they turned off life support. 

News trickled in after that, and we spoke to my cousin Rebecca and my Aunt Rosalind a few days later. Apparently Shuying felt sick on Thursday, just 4 days after we had last seen her. After high fever and vomitting, she went to the ER on Monday and suffered a heart attack there. They rushed her to the Heart Centre at SGH, and admitted her to the ICU, and shortly after her organs started failing and she never regained consciousness. I still don't know what to think except to feel an immense sense of sad numbness, and a desire to not think about it, because after all, what does thinking do anymore?

-----

Coincidentally, I had been thinking about grief and mourning a few days before, but it was the kind of saying goodbye to lives long lived - to Artie, to Suze, and quite possibly soon for my grandfather. I was in the middle of writing out my thoughts but had to stop with them half completed because I had to deal with other pressing things. And so now I don't think that post will be completed because I can't and don't want to ruminate on death any further. There is nothing to be done, and it just is. 

Tuesday, February 13, 2024

Travel Anxiety

I'm not sure exactly when I first started to feel travel anxiety. It was probably when I first started living overseas in 2009, when I went to the UK to study. Even though I know I have it, and its an issue, I somehow either manage to gloss over it or forget about it, and leave my anxiety medication behind. I really wish I had them, because since last night (~72h before travel), I have felt those all too familiar feelings of generalised anxiety, to the extent that I am having trouble going to sleep and focusing. At least because I was busy today, I had some respite while I was out. I managed to bring E to ride on the bus and MRT, do some last minute shopping in Clementi, meet Steph at Jurong East, and then hang out with JH, Ianthe, and Vincent, at their place nearby. So all in all it was a great day, except for the looming spectre of impending international travel.

One of the things that causes me quite a bit of anxiety is the prospect of an early wake up time, which is also the case for the flight. The flight leaves Changi at 6:40am, which means a wake up time of roughly 3am. The only saving grace is that the overall flight time is shorter as we are flying through Japan, and we are flying ANA. And I am of course thankful for the fact that my Mum is coming along with me, because handling kids is no joke. Today when I had to somewhat coordinate meeting up with Steph and all, plus navigate, plus handle E in a crowded area, I was already starting to feel somewhat frayed. When E and I met up with Steph, I started to feel more at ease because at least there was a trusted adult around, even if only to follow mindlessly as she navigated (she did more than just that though). 

Going back to the US, also means going back to the reality of my life there. While of course I love my husband deeply, and care a lot for his family, the US (particularly at this moment) feels nothing like home. It also means the reality of a house in the middle-of-renovations, loans, mortgages, worrying over money, worrying over errands, and worrying over house cleaning and assorted chores. In contrast everytime I am back in Singapore I become more useless than usual, where I really don't need to think about much at all. Plus, I usually always know what to expect - little things like the bus numbers and routes always being the same, the same haunts my family likes to go to (Clementi and Jurong East), the family and friends I love. Things are predictable and safe, a balm for my frenzied emotions.

Still, this is the life that Someone Up There has decided to grant to me, and overally it really isn't that bad of a life at all. I am blessed with a wonderful spouse, his family, and a great living environment and circumstances. I also have very supportive family and friends. I shall do my best to endure (not quite at the level of taking it on the chin), as I always do.

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As an aside, I don't think I have eaten so much over the CNY period before. 

On CNY eve, I had lunch with Steph in Holland V and I had this really great but extremely filling risotto at La Nonna. Then dinner was steamboat at Mama's with the whole family + Deni. On the first day of CNY I ended up really full from brunch too (how? I didn't think I ate that much pen cai). Dinner was even worse, because Mama was arriving later, I ended up for the first time being able to decide the menu for dinner at Owen, and boy did I abuse my priviledge to order the most random items. Matthew and I were positively sick after that meal. 

For the second day of CNY, Mama cooked up a whole lot of different foods like siew yok, steamed fish, and steamed chicken (one plain and one with chili + soy sauce), and I ate alot then too. Then at my Uncle's place in Hougang, I had yu sheng and a piece of sushi (there was a lion dance there for the first time too - that was amazing). For dinner, Merlina made beef rendang, which made me really happy because that was the first time I've had it for this trip back, and I ate too much even though I was still full. I ended up going for a short walk to drop stuff off at Ianthe's parent's place because I was so stuffed, but I still felt full after the 45 min walk. So much for all the exercise I was trying to do - I definitely gained weight from those 3 days alone.

Monday, February 05, 2024

Reappearing Gem Biscuits

Sometime last week I was downstairs in the living room with E (I think I was getting her to do some work) when M toddled by holding an almost empty bag of those old school gem biscuits. When I looked up about 30 seconds later M had vanished out of sight, and I knew she had gone upstairs to look for a grandparent. This of course is not a problem, but I looked around briefly and didn't see the bag of biscuits anywhere, so I went upstairs to get the bag of biscuits from her. 

When I got upstairs she was with my Mum in her room. What was strange was that my Mum said she never saw M carrying a bag of gem biscuits...? I then looked around all of the 3 upstairs rooms, and didn't see any bag of biscuits. Was I mistaken? Anyway I forgot about it and went downstairs again to continue whatever it was I was doing.

Today however, when my Dad went down for dinner (carrying M, who had been hanging out with him in my room), my Dad was pissed and going on and on about how he had told me to never bring food upstairs, and that M had made a mess all over my bed. I was perplexed because I don't have food in my room, at least not food that M could reach and/or be easily opened and accessible (I don't think she wants to open pre-made sauce packs of Prima taste Hainanese Chicken Rice, and she can't open the tub of love letters I bought because of the tape around it). As usual my protests that I hadn't brought and left food upstairs went ignored, and my Dad kept ranting at me. Great. 

Well, now that I've eaten dinner and gone upstairs to clean my bed, I can safely say I know where those bloody gem biscuits have ended up. What horrifies me however, is the thought that M had somehow stashed them away in some place that was unknowable to all the adults, and given that it is Singapore, the amount of pests it could have potentially attracted. And I still have no idea where her hiding spot is! Goodness.

On a separate note, M is sick again. This time with some sort of gastro-intestinal bug that has been making her throw up and have diarrhoea. She had about a total of 7 days well before she came down with her current bout. Poor child. This illness however, also meant that she escaped my ire after messing up my bed. In that sense, she lucked out.

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Nonsense phrases I say to my kids:

1) Crunchy gabunchy
2) Stinky gabinky
3) Oogedy boogedy

Friday, February 02, 2024

2023

I realised that I didn't really write down much during 2023 itself, probably because I spent most of it either feeling overwhelmed or in denial, in what was one of the most stressful years I've ever experienced. Any time of introspection was right at night before trying to falling asleep, which then of course resulted in a delay in falling asleep, and so it goes. Last year was also an interesting year in that both sets of grandparents were very present and heavily involved, and without their support and help, I don't know how Jon and I could have made it through.

For the first few months of the year, Jon's parents were around. They came before Christmas 2022, and stayed all the way into Feb. We celebrated M's first birthday together. That birthday was memorable in the the grandparents wanted to spoil M, and so I ended up having to drive a car with a trunk/backseat full of balloons, and couldn't look out the rear view mirror at all for the entire trip from the Party City in Olivette back home. Shortly after they left was when Jon and I receieved the news from SGH/NNI, and started looking towards other opportunities in the Northeast, to be closer to them.

In March we saw my in-laws again when we went on a weeklong trip to Miami to visit Jon's brother. We stayed in an airbnb together with them in Coral Gables, and that was nice. Somewhere during this time Jon was juggling a few options/offers, and we ended up choosing NJ together (other options: Long Island, White Plains, Boston). Then at the end of April, Jon had a conference in Boston, and so we all flew to New York together. While Jon went off to Boston, I stayed in Long Island with the girls at my in-law's place for a week.

Late May, my mum arrived in St Louis. She celebrated E's birthday with us, and was with us as we tried to get the house declutted, semi-packed, and presentable for sale in August. Together with our agent Sharla and her crack team of assistants, it was still an uphill ordeal and my God soso stressful. Then we all flew to NJ together to scout for houses for our upcoming cross-country move. With the help of Maura, an acquaintance from my Spanish lesson days at Teacher's College, we manage to find a few suitable places in Bergen County and successfully put a bid in for a fixer upper. 

In early Sept my Mum flew off to meet my Dad in Portugal, and in late Sept my Dad arrived, after making a stop-over to see my Aunt in D.C. I spent Oct packing slowly and inefficently, and trying to enjoy the last month in St Louis, making time for friends. Halloween was Jon's last day of work (and my goodness that day was exceptionally bone-chillingly cold in STL). Finally 5 Nov we had cleared the house, and the PODs were picked up, and we set off on a road trip towards NJ.  Our itenerary was STL-Indianapolis-Akron (Cleveland)-Mt Joy (Lancaster)-NJ, and we spent 7 days on the road.

We arrived in NJ to find the house in an utter mess, and uninhabitable. A combination of delays and miscommunication meant the renovation on the house was still at a very early stage. We ended up having to change plans and spent some days at Jon's parents in LI, then heading back to NJ optimistically for 2 nights at a hotel, and finally heading back to LI for Thanksgiving. Jon and my Dad then went to NJ to try and fix up the house, and so my Dad ended up spending his 60th birthday with Jon alone, and then had to fly off for Singapore without being able to say goodbye in person. I was in quite a stressed out funk then, so thank goodness at least for the safe space of my in-law's place.

Finally, 4 Dec, I moved with the girls back into the house. We went grocery shopping, we came home to find the new fridge has died. Besides that the house was still a mess (dust + dirt + where-the-hell-is-everything-and-anything?), the girls were finding dangerous things lying around like hardware, and the bedsheets were missing. That night, I almost had a meltdown from all the stress and worry. How were we going to live in a place like this with two young girls? I think I didn't cry because I was too tired. Day by day however, things got better, starting with Ramiro and Collette, our contractors bring a new fridge to the house the next morning in the pouring rain. 

We stayed in that house for a grand total of a WEEK before flying to Singapore (needless to say I am still very unsettled and don't think of it as home). At least we managed to familiarize ourselves a little with the area. The flight to SG via SFO was also stressful because our flight leaving Newark was delayed by 1 hour+, and we had to run off the plane for our connecting flight. Then we discovered on the long-ass SFO leg that M has meltdowns and throws tantrums when she is bored, which of course she is because it's a long-ass flight. God, thinking of the flight back now is filling me with dread...

Anyway that brings us to my stint now in SG, after being away for about a year and a half. This time staying in Mama's place felt less foreign, maybe because now I'm used to staying there when Jon is around, so that helped with adapting back slowly. My Mum also bought black out curtains this time, which is really one of the best improvements ever because the bedroom in Mama's house has basically floor-to-ceiling windows, and so the heat and the light blast you right in the face as you try to rest. 

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In summary, 2023 was not a fun year at all. Even thinking about it now makes me fell tense all over again. I am also not looking forward to going back to NJ, and trying to start a new life there, because the unknown and I have never been good friends.

Tuesday, January 30, 2024

Repeating the Past

The year is 1999, or maybe 2000, or perhaps even 2001. It's an afternoon of a school day (or not, it could be a school holiday, but it's definitely in the mid or late afternoon), and I am with Mama in her room at the old family house in Jalan Setangkai. After sitting with me for probably an hour (but it definitely felt more), and dragging me reluctantly through either reading the Chinese textbook or doing assessment books, Mama is now forcing me to skip rope at least 500 times before I am free to do whatever (not that I remember 'whatever' is anymore).

I can still picture the scene as she sits on the bed, the old CRT TV in front of me, and the massage chair behind me, as I skip rope and try to avoid hitting things. I don't know if it's the same exact skipping rope I am using in this(ese) memor(ies), but I had a pink one and a purple one where the rope portion was filled with water and glitter. The late afternoon sun is a nice solid yellow, and you can see the dust motes float in the air. 

Today I am at least 2x heavier and 3x older than the girl I was in that memory, but today for the first time in decades I took a skipping rope and did 100 skips. And boy did those 100 skips seem bloody hard. I was inspired by one of those little clips (a FB reel? a YouTube short?) of a black lady who was skipping rope to lose weight, which is also something I sorely need to do. I feel all doughy and soft all over, and I don't like it one bit. Unfortunately it's been very hard to exercise consistently since having two kids, and I'm not sure if I want to commit to buying a treadmill even though jogging has been my most consistent form of exercise for ages. So, I got a skipping rope and a pair of walking shoes from Decathlon today, and after I got back from my physiotherapy session (and buying dinner for everyone from Domino's Pizza and My Cozy Corner), I skipped 100 times in the kitchen.

The similarity doesn't just end there however, because I've also started trying to read Chinese again. Even though I am working with a kid's book I picked up from Popular Bras Bersah when I went there at the beginning of the month with Tiffany and M, it is definitely harder than anything I remember actually reading and paying attention to. Ironically I only picked it up because I thought the cover was cute - of an orange cat dressed as a Chinese Emperor. I started this because I felt that I needed to practice my own Chinese skills if I was going to non-hypocritcally encourage my own two children to learn Chinese. 

And so there you have it, I am reapeating the past in a way that is unexpected and surprising even to myself. I suppose I should tell Mama about this, she would be quite pleased to know that the things and values she tried to inculcate in me still endure (and have suddenly popped up!) till today.

Sunday, January 28, 2024

Fever

Unlike the last post, which took a little bit of thought and recall, I can easily recount what happened during the last 5 days because I was basically doing the same thing every day - dealing with a feverish 2 year old who was sleeping poorly. I had to give M child acetaminophen/paracetamol almost every 6h, because of how high and constant her fever was. 

In the end, we didn't celebrate M's birthday because she fell sick at 3am on her birthday. For the whole of Friday and Saturday too, I didn't leave the house and just stayed with her. Yesterday I was so wiped, the two of us basically spent the entire day sleeping, napping in both the morning and the afternoon. This morning however, when M and I both woke up at 10:30am (after a 3am wake up), she finally had no fever, though she started to get a non-itchy rash over her body. I don't recall E having ever had such a long fever with no other symptoms like this, even though apparently 3 to 5 days of a fever is normal for children.

Anyway thanks to that, I've gotten through almost 160 chapters of the manhwa version of the Omniscent Reader. Thank goodness for being able to read stuff for free on the Webtoons app.

Tuesday, January 23, 2024

SG Jan 2024

After spending a grand total of about a week living in the NJ house, Jon and I flew with the girls to SG on 11th Dec. As always, he had to leave earlier, and left on 28th Dec. Meanwhile, the girls and I will remain in SG until 15th Feb, enabling us to celebrate both Christmas and Chinese New Year in Singapore. I personally haven't celebrated Christmas in Singapore since I left in 2014 (so the last Christmas would have been 2013), so even though it's not such a big event here, it was nice to be around again. 

Anyway, a quick recounting of the days I can recall for the past week (time spent writing it all out a large limiting factor):

17 (Wednesday) - My parents had an important meeting at home with the social workers for Ryan today, so I brought the girls out. My parents dropped us off at Holland V, and I brought the girls to the Artgrounds at the new shopping mall (I don't actually know its name). We were the only 3 people there, and the girls had a lot of fun. Towards the end, they started to get hungry, and after being unable to get hold of my folks (still busy with the social worker), I ended up bringing the girls to lunch by myself. E said she wanted to eat ramen, so we went to Ippudo. Eating alone with the kids, was stressful and an ordeal as usual. They fought over the endamame, which I'm sure they enjoyed because it was very well salted, and the yakult that came with the kids meal. 

After that, I managed to manuver them through the hawker centre (2nd teh ping of the day), and through the old Holland V shopping centre and to Island Creamery. There, I got them to try my favourites (Isfahan and Milo Ping Pong), and they really enjoyed them, which felt gratifying. When they finished (somehow making minimal mess!), I managed to bring them up another floor to say hi to the TCM lady I've been seeing, Nana. She and her colleague were very charmed by the girls, and she said she now knows why I am so tired, because M was being naughty as usual. My parents had finished eating lunch nearby at this point, and so they came to pick us up to head home.

18 (Thursday) - Everyone went along to drop Ryan off at his care centre today. My dad left and my mum brought the girls to the playground. Meanwhile I went off to a nearby kopitiam to have onion thosai and teh ping. This time the guy offered me fish curry with my thosai, and it was so deliciously satisfying. The kids played, ate ice cream, and had sugary drinks, and I was unable to intervene or offer an alternative. Around 11:30am, my dad picked us up and we went to a nearby placed to da bao our lunch. I managed to find chicken chop, which I had been craving for a while, so I was happy. 

After lunch, I made E do some work for a bit. Then I read some of a chinese book I have been working on. Finally around 2pm, my dad's friend came and we chatted to him for about an hour. When he left, I went upstairs to nap.

19 (Friday) - Took a bus to Orchard Road with M to meet Shu and check out her new place. We met her outside Wheelock Place, and walked to her new apartment with her. There, we hung out for a while, and E got a kick running around in circles. Eventually, she settled down and ended up watching two episodes of My Little Pony, before we left to get lunch. Lunch was at Prive outside Wheelock, and I really enjoyed the crayfish pasta I had, while also marvelling at how spicy the 'mild' level was - I should have known this would forbode bad things. 

After lunch, we continued to Toast Box downstairs, where I had a second teh ping (this probably did not help). I hadn't drank much of it however, when I noticed I was starting to get a headache. We walked out with Shu and towards the bus stop, and purposely waited for bus number 7, because E had been talking about wanting to ride a double decker bus for a while. I noticed I was feeling very exhausted. At Holland V, we changed to our regular bus and reached home.

At home I lay down for a bit, and noticed my stomach was starting to feel bloated. My headache got a little bit worse. However, I had already made an appointment with Nana, my TCM lady for 4:30pm, and so even though I wasn't feeling great, I still left the house again. During the TCM session, maybe because I was in so much pain (hello Tui Na, Gua Sha, Cupping, and Bloodletting), I didn't really notice much. When I stood up after the session however, I noticed I was feeling a little faint. My bloating and burping also felt way over the top. Not good. Still, I had also promised to pick up dinner and meet my dad at Holland Close market, and so I walked over there in the drizzle. 

It wasn't until the food was obtained and I had gotten into the car however, that I started to feel really, really, really, fucking sick. I was in 6/10 discomfort/pain. I had a pounding headache, and I was nauseous and bloated. I ended up throwing up multiple times, to find that I hadn't digested much of lunch at all, and that my nose now was REALLY FUCKING SPICY. Anyway I spent the rest of the night feeling like death and wishing I could be put out of my misery, and as usual I couldn't fall asleep until past midnight, and so I was awake and miserable, because life sucks. 

20 (Saturday) - Ryan's swimming lessons started again this week. We ended up at Clementi, and after my dad took Ryan off for class, I went to the hawker centre with my mum and the girls to have teh tarik and prata. I ended up barely having any prata, because the girls absolutely loved it with the sugar. There was also a point when M knocked a big cup of soy bean milk over and made a huge mess, so that was a small ordeal. We walked through Clementi central, stopping by the CNY market in the middle to buy random items. Then we ended up in the mall for a bit, but a lot of things were still closed, and then it was time for us to meet my dad and Ryan again. 

In the late afternoon, Uncle KL came to pick up me and the girls, but E threw a huge tantrum and in the end only M and I went with him. We went to Junction 8 in Bishan to meet Matt for dinner at Genki Sushi, and it's a good thing we ate early, because a formidable line started up around 5:45pm. After dinner, we wandered around random stores for a bit, like Popular and Best Denki, which was nice. Matt has gotten far more pleasant to hang around with than before, a sign of maturity I suppose. Then, Uncle KL dropped M and I home, and we discovered my parents had gone out with E and Ryan. It was nice enjoying the quiet for a bit, before everyone else came home.

21 (Sunday) - My mum and dad went to church in the morning so I watched the 3 kids(?) at home. While hanging up clothes to dry outside, I heard E yelling a lot but decided to ignore her (it was her MUMMYYYY non-urgent yell). By the time I finished almost 20 minutes later, I walked in to see her wrestling a diaper onto a naked M. Apparently M had pooped and E was trying to tell me, but when I didn't reply, thought that I had also left the house and hence decided to change her sister. M however, declined to be as cooparative when it came to putting on clothes, and instead ran away E tried to put clothes on her. Later, all 3 kids ended upstairs in Ryan's room, and they played around him and he lay on his bed and tried to serve him plastic play food. 

After my parents came back, I caught a ride with them to Holland V where I was meeting Deni and Ryan (another one, lol), for lunch. I didn't know what was unique and good, so I suggested Xiang Xiang again. The line this time was less forgiving, so by the time Deni and Ryan appeared I was still lining up. I'm glad we stayed though, because they ended up enjoying the food and agreeing that it was unique. Even though I was running thin on time, I couldn't resist grabbing another teh ping from the hawker centre with them. Then I made the mistake of sitting down to chat. By the time I realised the the time, I was going to be late for meeting up with Shu at MBS. Even the cab took a long time to finally arrive to pick me up. 

By the time I got into the cab and was on the way to MBS, I realised I should not have had a second teh ping. My stomach felt awful and I didn't feel great. By the time the cab reached MBS, I wanted to run out and look for the nearest bathroom. Anyway, this meant I was exhausted and physically not feeling great, as Shu and I traversed the exhibition halls looking at all the art on display at ArtSG. We were struck by how crowded the place was, and she told me it had been even more packed on Thursday when there was a pre-opening party. On the upside, the B2 exhibition halls were less crowded, and the art appealed to us more. While wandering around there, we ran into a friend of HM, who said this meant we had more expensive taste, because the bigger and more reputable galleries were exhibiting downstairs, lol. 

My parents had someone decided to bring the kids out again in the evening, so after MBS, Shu and I took a bus to Marina Square to meet them. I was feeling very drained and not-great-at-all, and after being unable to contact my parents, we ended up just sitting on the stage set up for CNY for a while. When we finally found them at the indoor play area, my mum was so tickled as she kept recounting this story about this little girl who was so fascinated with M that she followed her around the play area. At one point M wanted to ride one of those coin-operated cars, and so she scrambled after M to put coins that she had in a little pouch in. When the car started moving, 5 different other kids all suddenly piled into the car, and then when it ended they all melted into the teeming mass of other manic kids in the play area. 

Shu declined to join us for dinner, and we ended up at Chickenboo. The kids loved the food, and my parents were happy, but I could have done without considering I was still feeling like I was dying by the second. By the time I reached the car, I felt so incredibly relieved that I had survived the day intact.

22 (Monday) - My mum and I took a bus to Holland V with the girls to bring them to Artgrounds before meeting family friends (Aunty SF and Uncle HC) for lunch. This time the Artgrounds was more full with lots of mums and their toddlers. E was the oldest kid there by far. While they had fun, by the 1hr mark the girls were bored and hungry. We left early and walked around for a bit before meeting Aunty SF and Uncle HC at La Nonna for lunch. The food was good and enjoyable. I left a little early towards the end with E to pick up a teh ping from the hawker centre and a coconut ice cream, before rejoining everyone else outside La Nonna. 

In the end, we finished the ice cream while waiting for Uncle HC to pick us up by car and head to their place. When we reached their place, the girls immediately gravitated towards their pool. Soon they were completely soaking wet, and my mum and I were tired from squatting by the girls to watch them/stopping M for jumping in. Both E and M were manically delirious from splashing at the pool. I haven't seen them so happy and enjoying themselves in a while. After they dried off and had some ice cream, they started playing with the rocks and the flowers in the garden while my mum chatted with Aunty SF. Finally, Uncle HC sent us home when we were done.

23 (Tuesday) - The stated agenda for today was to bring the girls to a water play area. After picking up my new passport at the Ghim Mo h post office, we were headed towards Kallang Wave, only for my mum to find out after a quick look-up that it was closed on a Tuesday. We diverted to the West towards Jurong, and went to the Science Center, only to find out that the water play area was closed for 2 days for maintenance. Lol. We then headed to Jurong Lake, and while there was a nice and large water area, it was very simple. E enjoyed herself nonetheless, while the rest of us waded in. M however, was not having it. She threw a fit and refused to go into the water. Even after I coaxed her in and she relaxed a little, she still wasn't very pleased. Go figure. 

We went for lunch at a kopitiam and I shared this really nice but spicy chicken curry with my mum. After that, my parents were still determined to find a 'proper water play place' for the kids (WHY???), and we ended up at Westgate, where they found the water area closed (LOL). I had wandered off by then to walk in circles around the 4th floor, and later found them with the kids doing the window colouring art. I managed to pop into Kiddy Palace and Popular during then, so my inner consumer was satiated. 

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Tomorrow M turns 2. Haven't yet quite figured out what to do, but it will probably involve some sort of indoor play area, and a chocolate cake.