Flying North...

Yup, we have been here for 4 days now. Currently in Coronado (San Diego) to get our car, get some maintenance done, get the stuff we left behind in our last trip and lastly for WEP to get some work done :( in his vacation time.

But what I am here to talk about is not our days in SD (altho it has been quite wonderful). In preparation of this trip, we had sacrificed quite a bit of sleep. For sunday itelf (our flight is 28 Sept 5.40am), we did not sleep at all and left for the airport at 2am. So we are dead tired and flying NWA.

So what a delight it was for both of us to discover that we were upgraded to business class on our Tokyo to LA leg of the journey (10 hours of better seats)... We did absolutely nothing for this, we didn't attempt to ask for any upgrade, we were just happy with what we had, our individual TV screen in economy class, having meals thrown onto our flip up table. Just happy to have an empty seat next to us (we were on the center aisle) where the rest of the section we were seating was fully packed. Actually, I was already feeling delighted and very blessed at that point. EP too was extremely delighted with the TV screen for himself.

But what a great gift to receive so much more and we know this could only be the work of One.

If that was not good enough, when we reached Coronado and checked into the Inn, we got a room with a kitchenette, paying the same amount as another friend, we got a bigger room.

Praise the Lord, our God for all that He provides. Yes, it is true that perhaps flying a better airline would have been a delight, but it will not compare to things provided without expectation or want. Such delight is really of a different world, nothing compared to the reward one gets from working for it. No, I am not saying that things just keep dropping off the sky and everything is a breeze and easy...Life is hardly like that for anyone I believe. I am just glad, just glad.

Cooking Experience

Now that my contract work has come to an end and I think I have rested more than enough, I decided I should experiment cooking with some new combination of ingredients. So on Aug 30, I decided I had some apples that had been sitting in the fridge for ages, maybe I could try cooking them with the chicken thigh bones that had been in the fridge for awhile too.

So I with the apples washed and chopped, chicken thigh bones de-frozen, a pot, some water and a dash of salt, I started slow cooking my new soup. It tastes strange at first, then became a little better, but nothing close to a soup taste. So with more preservance, I just let it cook longer at slow heat....After an hour of slow cooking, the taste did not improve but got really sour.

Lesson learnt, apples cannot be cooked with chicken. Hahaha, WEP would have thought that that would be the end of the apple soup idea, but he would be surprised that he is wrong. I am not giving up the apple soup idea, just the apples with chicken idea. Poor thing, I doubt he know that.

Just glad that those were some old apples (not spoiled, I checked) and thigh bones. If not, I will surely get hung by my mum for wasting food. But then again, how would I know it won't work if I didn't try, right?

How do I know my home is clean?

I am not too sure if we are the only household that experience this on a regular basis. 

Every time I clean the house, I always know when it is indeed clean. Because I have visitors when the house is clean. 

Bugs always fly in once I am almost done with cleaning and always at exactly the same time. When I am seconds of being done with cleaning. 

And I am not a great lover of bugs, so my satisfaction of a clean home is always affected by these visitor bugs. 

But I have trying to think of it positively. Trying to tell myself that they are my judge. So who knows, one day I will get upset if they don't appear when I am done cleaning the house. 

Funny thing is I tried this experience of just cleaning one room and as expected, they only visit that one room. Hahaha. 

Southbound

What do you do when you have to face a southbound? When you hope and wish and just thinking... surely this is too soon for the southbound. But then it is just right here, as if it has been on an express journey, rushing to make delivery to you. A delivery you are not looking forward too. What do you do? 

Do you face it and just take the ride, or do you fight it, overcome it, run from it? Yes, run I must, as hard and as much as I can. Run I will, run and run some more. If need be, I shall jump, hop, climb the highest mountains....I shall overcome though I know over time, it will surely overcome me, it will surely still find me, when my energy will be too little to run from it. But for now, just for now, I must learn to run, to overcome!

What am I talking about... ... ...

My Gluteus Maximus

BTW, this is no April Fool's joke. It is the truth...

In memory of our hamster, the gymnast!

Today, my bro's hamster died while having his regular bath. Why he died, no one has any idea. It was a regular routine, when their cages get clean, they too will get a bath each. My bro had two hamsters. One minute he was jumping in the tub, the next min, he was lying motionless. 

He was a crazy hamster from the start. The two hamsters used to share a cage, but Mr Gymnast loved to fight and bullied his cage mate. The fight got so bad once, Mr Timid was bleeding from Mr Gymnast's abuse. So my parents created a cardboard wall to separate the two, but the wall lasted one night and then a hole was created. If you are thinking, it must be Mr Gymnast doing all that work, you are right, but only half right. Because Mr Timid loves company. He loves it so much, he joined in the effort to create the hole, forgetting that the company he was hoping to get is going to hurt him again. Very innocent. It seems like no matter how many times he got hurt, he doesn't seem to remember....Sigh.... Well, when all else failed, they both get their own cage. But Mr Gymnast, being a hyperactive, super crazy hamster that he was, could not stop at staying still. When there became no fight to pick, this became his way of using his energy. 

BTW, he was 30cm off the ground, hanging on to the disposable chopstick which is swinging from side to side. He loved it especially when the chopstick was moving. Really a hilarious thing. Every time we stuck a chopstick in like the one in the picture, he would use all his might to jump and catch hold of it. He would attempt to stay up there as long as he could. 

Don't Run Ahead of Him...

Some time ago, a friend recommended me to read a book "The Hiding Place " by Corrie Ten Boom. Didn't get to read it until very recently and one passage really struck me at the core and I thought I would just share it though I am sure maybe you already know.

Before these words, the author has just returned from visiting a family whose baby has died and while waiting to be tugged into bed by her daddy...

"....But that night as he stepped through the door I burst into tears. "I need you!" I sobbed. "You can't die! You can't!" Besides me on the bed, Nollie sat up. "We went to see Mrs. Hoog," she explained."C0rrie didn't eat her supper or anything." Father sat down on the edge of the narrow bed. "Corrie," he began gently, "when you and I go to Amsterdam-when do I give you your ticket?" I sniffed a few times, considering this. "Why, just before we get on the train." "Exactly. And our wise Father in heaven knows when we're going to need things, too. Don't run ahead of Him, Corrie. When the time comes that some of us will have to die, you will look into your heart and find the strength you need - just in time."

The book is packed with so much good stuff that if you do like this tiny bit, go and get the book. It is a treasure.

The ants in my household

I remember I love to watch ants at work as a child, they would risk their lives from my mother's ever relentless effort to exterminate them, and come to collect our cake crumbs and bread crumbs which we might have dropped while eating. We all know ants love sweet stuff, a drop of honey, a drop of sugar, a little piece of cake. These things attract them and it is I guess what everyone knows.

Well, the ants in my household, they are different. They always go to where our water is. I have no idea why. At first I thought it was the warm flask they are attracted to or that boiled water is perhaps sweeter. Because we only find them in our boiled water. Then one day in a hurry, I left my half drank orange juice out and when I came home, no ants in them. I started an experiment putting all sorts of sweet sugary things near the boiled water. But each time, I find no ants in those things, just in the boiled water, swimming. Maybe they like to swim to death. I have no idea, they just seem rather silly to me. And it actually does frustrate me a little no knowing what I could do with them really.

So anyone has a swimming ant problem and know an answer to exterminate them, please do tell me. At this point, I would try anything.....

The ants of my household, they are definitely swimmers with no brains......