Yeah, I think so. I have just been…I don’t know. Wondering sometimes what it all means. Then, I realize that it is known to many of us as L.I.F.E.

I am just rambling on. I have no idea what I want to talk about. There’s so many things on my mind right now. Of course, none of them life-threatening but nevertheless, something to think about. I am glad at this stage, the kids are still young and we have time to figure out what we want to do with them. There’s talk of migrating; MIL brought it up again after a long lapse. It’s no secret but we have thought of it a couple of months back but shelved it because of PIL’s health and condition.

What else? Shopping? I did a fair bit for the past 2 weekends. Didn’t buy plenty but enough for me because although I don’t mind shopping but I’m not the type to comb the malls. The more shops, the more overwhelmed I get. I honestly get intimidated by the great variety of selection instead of embracing them with open arms. It’s an honest to God truth. That explains why even though, the idea of having or owning a fashion boutique did appeal to me but it never took off because I simply won’t know where to begin. I think I’d be afraid of the many types of clothes the wholesale apparel supplier has to offer. I won’t get turned off, just afraid.

Oh it’s August. Some of us are fasting due to the holy month of Ramadhan. After which, I am so going to pig out at our friend’s place. I love malay dishes. So yummy so lovely so…emm..i am hungry right now, I think I’m gonna grab a bite.

Before I was a mother, I never really paid attention to pregnant women smoking. I am sure they are everywhere, it’s just that I never paid attention to them. However, when I became one (a mom), I also became more observant. ANd, guess what happens when your eyes suddenly widens? Yep, you catch the first pregnant woman smoking!

I was appalled naturally. Who wouldn’t? At the same time, my mind started wondering; I wondered if she was puffing djarum? Then, after 5 seconds of wandering, I slapped myself for even thinking such thoughts. How can I when my first reaction was to call the expectant police? “Send her behind bars. Make sure she goes for countless hours of counseling” – my mind went on and on.

I ended up keeping my gap shut. I didn’t say anything to her. I wish I had the nerve to but I didn’t. I feel bad but not as bad as how I was feeling for the little kid inside. She/He must’ve been suffering with all the smoke. I have no more words for such blatant disregard for life. Really. I don’t.

Taking the kids to the bird park. We’ve been there with Ash before but this will be the cousins’ first trip there. I hope they’ll enjoy it. Otherwise, all we have to do is head on home early after heheh…

We spent the days indoor today with nothing much. The weather was pretty relaxing today. Plus it rained so was pretty cool throughout. Something which was seriously lacking if you ask me. Everyone’s been complaining about the scorching heat the past couple of days. So was I if I’m being honest. Really unbearable. Not only was I sweating buckets, my face had massive breakouts. No amount of nodular acne treatment will help I tell you! If the weather’s back to it’s deadly hot high tomorrow, I’m slapping extra sunscreen on myself!

You may be wondering what I’ve made myself do. Nothing fancy or out of the ordinary for sure. I merely enrolled myself to the local gym. I’ll tell you something else, the enrollment took place some 6 months ago!

Guess what’s happened to my membership? Yep, it’s all gone down the drain; along with my hard earned cash and very much suffered the same fate as my best weight loss supplement.

That’s not the best part – to get my gym membership re-activated, I’d have to pay a hefty penalty! Talk about bummer. It’s no wonder no one exercises and everyone gets fat…*sigh*

YES – it does make you feel good when you see something nice or a pair of shoes you had always wanted. The adrenalin rush begins at the time when you pick the shoes up from the rack and pass them on to the salesperson, telling him your shoe size.  Then, it continues when you try on the shoes in your size and when it fits, the rush gets to a heigtened level when you tell the salesperson “I’ll take these..” — with a smile I might add. Then, the rush sort of calms down when you start paying for the shoes at the counter. It hasn’t completely left you yet but it’s now not at peak level.

You go home, try on your shoes. Feeling satisfied, you start thinking of the occasion when you’d be wearing the shoes and imagining how you’d look. You take the pair out for one last try before you stuff them back into the box waiting for that ocassion. Yeah, you are happy. You serve the internet and possibly a round of more shopping – online shopping

NO – the next day, you look around you and everything is the same. You think about the new pair of shoes you had bought but you can’t wear them yet cos the occasion hadn’t arrived. Everything is now a downhill spiral; your life is the same. If you are working, you are at the same desk, staring at the same computer looking at the same paperwork you couldn’t figure out last night and which you ditched to go shopping with the intention to clear your mind. Now that you have done your shopping, you have bought that pair of shoes, your mind is definitely clear but why do you still feel like you need another round of therapy?

The answer is simply – retail therapy doesn’t always work. In fact, it doesn’t at all.It’s only a temporary high.

So, what do you do now. You are as depressed as you were yesterday evening. There could be another solution – online shopping. It’s not the solution but well, when you are an addict, it fills the gap!

Disclaimer : The last sentence was intended for some humor. Author’s stand is and will always be shopping doesn’t cure anything, it kills. It’s always better to have self-control and self-discipline rather than “shop till you drop”.

As you know, women are generally obsessed with their weights and are constantly asking this perennial question “how to lose weight?”. Please don’t tell me you’ve never heard of it because I’ve been hearing about it like a thousand times. And a sure fire way to do that would be to clean your house and apartment. I think Gnat has successfully achieved that yesterday.

We were at our apartment, with the intention of course to clean the place but of course, we didn’t expect that for such a small space, it was so much work.  Just sweeping alone, you’d burn about 1,000 calories. Don’t you just love the sound of that??!!

Anyway, we were at our apartment, waiting to meet up with the RA cos she has found us a new tenant. It felt like a new thing that happened to us since it’s been a long time since we did the whole RA, tenancy and all that mumbo-jumbo. Our very first tenant was with us for a very long time and now, since she has moved out, we had to start from scratch; looking for new tenants, getting all the paperwork done up and getting to know our new tenant.  Plus, we left the place vacant for about 2 months and as usual, we procrastinated a while before getting our butts moving. And like true procrastinators, it was only when we received a call from the RA that she has secured us a tenant that we decided to move our butts. Otherwise, we would’ve left things as it is.

Frankly, we are a little surprised at how fast the RA managed to find someone for us so soon cos we had only contacted her barely 2 weeks ago. And there wasn’t any haggling over the rental either; the prospective tenant accepted the terms and it is. Which is actually great. And considering the economic outlook these days and the coming year; we didn’t want to end up on the losing end. I mean, sure, we are concerned about the economy, who isn’t? Oh right, the Jones’ and the Wongs’ but we are neither so, the uncertainty better matter to us.

All in all, we are happy how things have turned out in view of our apartment. At least, that is one less worry to have. The only concern would be whether they will remain for as long as our previous tenant and/or whether our place remains intact when they choose to move out. I never had that problem before and overall, I must say that I am  pleased with them. Of course, we were easy Landlords to deal with otherwise, they wouldn’t have lived there for almost 6 years.

This RA of ours was very good. We told her specifically the sort of people we wanted living in our home and she did her job. So, no complaints there for the time-being. We can only hope for the best. Wish us luck!

And it got me thinking, why are women like that? Why can’t we just be happy the way we are? I mean, if we are of a larger size, we want to slim down. If we are of the slimmer size, we want to fatten up. This is especially true when we start comparing ourselves with other people. I bet you that out of 10 women, 9 would have their image changed if they were to bumped into an old friend or an acquaintance whom in their opinion looks like a sex-goddess. These women will go to extreme lengths including plastic surgeries, popping pills, starvation and even orovo detox just so that they could change what God has intended them to be. I find that so incredibly ridiculous!

OK, you might think that “sure, you probably look perfect, so bite me!” On the contrary, I am far FAR from perfect. But, I’m not going all out just so I could look like some movie star or my super “body-licious” friend. I haven’t had my hair dyed even for crying out loud. True – I’ve never dyed my hair EVER and you could still spot some greys here and there.

Well, I’m just saying – why can’t we just be who we are and accept us for who we are? I guess not isn’t it? We always strive to look a certain way because we want others to have rave reviews over us. We want to hear that “you look great!“from other women and we want to go out on dates with men (it’s just the age old theory that men are only attracted to the appearance and nothing more etc…).

It’s just that isn’t it? I mean, if opinions didn’t exists and if we were robots, operating mechanically without emotions, without the ability to think for oneself, we would do no such ridiculous act like changing. I mean, in our mechanical minds, everyone would look the same and we would not judge others and neither would we judge ourselves. Seems to be that that is such an ideal place to be but the reality is, it’s never happening. Reality does bite!