so much for secrets and the number two

Dayana:

bought Dayana a jacket for her the other day. told her to keep it a secret from Daddy and let's surprise him when picking him up at the airport that weekend. she readily agreed.

when Daddy called on Skype later that evening, the very first thing that came out of her mouth was, 'Daddy, Mommy beli jacket for Dayana!'

T__T

Daddy misunderstood and thought that she wanted him to get her one. so he said ok he'll get her one when he gets back.

'tapi Mommy dah beli dah la Daddy', annoyed that he didn't listen properly to what she just said.

so much for keeping it a secret, Miss Blabbermouth.

Dinara:

after recording the kids singing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star on the iPad, i told the kids to give me the peace sign with their little hands.

'Peace!' the eldest said obediently, holding up two fingers, successfully making the peace sign.

'TWO!' the youngest yelled triumphantly, only managing to hold up her thumb and forefinger in her attempt to do the peace sign.

two? i mean seriously?? apa kaitan making the peace sign and the number two? two fingers? where did she learn that from? i didn't teach her that @_@

********************************************************************************

i was merely resting my eyes while lying down on the bed when Dinara comes to me, slaps me on my face and proclaimed, 'wake up!'

T__T 

insistent, eh?

little SOHO

i don't exactly remember when we got our keys for the unit because to me it felt like forever since we paid for the keys LAST December, but i think it was a little over 2 months ago. it's already been 2 months and i'm still fighting with management over their handling of the unit defects. mau mati kot. one part i hate in buying property - you pay so much, only to get so little in terms of quality.

at one point i had to practically yell at them because our doorknob was faulty - we couldn't lock the unit, so if my furniture got stolen i'm simply gonna pin it on them, yes? so they said okok they'll do it immediately, but you know what they did? i dropped by the unit a few days later only to find my door totally KNOBLESS. wau. apparently they thought that a door without a knob couldn't be broken in to?

T___T homaigod.

(they finally fixed it after another yelling-visit to them).

to be fair, the person i brought my complains to was being a 'bit' helpful, what started out be so-many-defects-i-can't-even-keep-track-of, is now i-can-list-them-one-by-one-from-the-top-of-my-head.

here are photos of our delivered unit. we bought it furnished to save hassle on the renovation process (it was a nightmare for us with SR, i guess it all depends on who you choose to be your contractor kot?). the unit still needs renovating though, although only minor like adding more light and power points to the unit, including the installation of electrical appliances, not to forget the grille and curtains.

furniture provided in the unit, including tv, fridge, washing machine

kitchen window overlooking Subang Jaya. we get the morning sun

the built-in kitchen cabinets

the one and only bathroom downstairs

stairs leading up

a duplex, you could call it

the only items upstairs, including the bed mattres and a tiny side table

as of yesterday morning, i labelled a total of 15 defects in the unit. i purposely bought those florescent yellow stickers to stick everywhere per defect. telling them by mouth or writing them down no use one, only enter one ear and stream out the other.

need to get started on renovation pronto. and also tenant-searching.

big bad wolf

when i asked Dayana if she wanted to go to the bookfair, she thought i asked her if she wanted to buy a book about wolves -___-

when we arrived she asked me, 'where's the wolf book?' LOL.

this is my first time going to a BBW sale, mind you they held it at MIECC which is so out of my jurisdiction that i would've gotten lost getting there if my friend Maz hadn't brought me there to fix my iPod in the first place (my iPod is still rosak, just in case you're wondering).

weekend parking at the convention centre costs rm3 on weekends, rm2 on weekdays.

people kept tweeting and FBing photos of their haul that i just had to see for myself what the fuss was about (kept reading about how people practically lugged suitcases of books around and borong-ing like no tomorrow, it was that dirt cheap). i even heard they opened til the wee hours of the morning during weekends, betui ka? a friend cautioned that if you were specifically looking for a book title then you definitely won't find it. that would mean trouble, since it's just the same as going grocery shopping without a grocery list - you end up with more than you bargained for.

ok la, the crowd the day i was there was manageable, so long as the restrooms were clean and readily available =P.

i didn't really know what books to get so we just headed off for the children's section to browse. the kids were interested in the books but the youngest was more interested in darting among the tables and trying to hide under them T_T so up she went in my Kanga. i was surprised that she actually did want to be carried. tere pulak tu bila orang squat, dia lilit tangan around my neck and hugged her legs around my waist, lol.

boy was she heavy. i passed Dinara book after book to read while was on my back. Dayana spotted someone holding a Tinkerbell book but no matter how many times i walked in circles among the tables and tables of books, i just couldn't seem to find it =( i didn't have much time to browse the other sections, having kids around you is distracting especially when one starts to get cranky and demands for water while the other one slowly feels like a ton of bricks on your back @_@.

luckily at some point Significant Other took over the weight =P.

we didn't really get so many books because we didn't want to end up with what's more than necessary just because they were cheap. i only ended up with one book for myself on the first day. the kids got a few books too, i wasn't looking forward to having Dinara destroy and coloring the reading books either. Significant Other got some photography books for himself and a couple of others, one of which was related to - what else? - aircrafts. Dayana was a happy camper too, she was happy with what she came home with, balik rumah terus mintak Atuk baca.

Daddy's haul. ade lagi 2 book he brought back to LGK with him to read

i went to Mines again yesterday after work, tak puas hati that i didn't get to browse to my hearts content. took me 1 freaking hour to get from mv to Mines @_@. too bad 2 hours of browsing just wasn't enough. i couldn't find that blasted Tinkerbell book either. i traversed the fiction section and didn't see anything i might have liked save for Tess Gerritssen. i spent awhile at the Cookery section trying to figure out what was worth buying. called my mom to see if there was anything she would like. so many Nigella Lawson and Jamie Oliver books strewn about.

apparently my sister already went to the fair last Saturday morning and didn't tell me, chis.

i ended up with a few more books for myself, and 5 more books for the kids. my search criteria for kids books would be that it had to be bedtime-friendly, as in colorful photos and huge wordings in easy English for my kids to understand (homaigod some books were too advanced and wordy i felt like i wanted to fall asleep just by reading out loud haha).

erm, mine?

activity books for Dayana

i find this set of books quite interesting to read with the kids. now if only i can borong a couple more... =P

easy books i can actually read from Start to Finish with the kids =P

updated: Maz was so nice to brave the books again and get three more books for me. thanks Maz!

p/s. i finally found out how to upload pics into my blog from Picasa instead of waiting for ages for the pics to upload directly! wheu~

the good vs the bad

people love to post stories of themselves on FB, don't they?
about oh i don't know, how 'happier' their lives seem to be compared to everyone else, or about how 'successful' they project themselves to be promoting some business product.

sometimes when people do that they seem to be:
- genuinely wanting to share (which i like);
- showing off just to make people envious; or
- trying too hard, it's just sad.

just saying. which is why you should think twice about allowing your FB account to be visible to outsiders.

some people are sincere in sharing their life story with others, i'm not against that, sharing is caring, right? but there's a difference between those two types of people: the sincere ones, and those who share and diss at the same time. so you slimmed down, wow, does that mean you get a free ticket to diss-land?

in my opinion, if you boast to people that you are a good person or a good leader, yet you speak ill of others about how they don't seem to be up to your level, it kinda cancels out all the good deeds you've done so far.

also, just because you dress all modest you think that makes you a saint, and those who does otherwise isn't? i mean i'm happy that you found your groove when you did. but that doesn't mean you've been granted allowance to pass judgement to others who aren't like you. especially those people who talk big i.e riak.

people who are humble with the good fortune that has been bestowed upon them, always leading others to the right path, never passing judgment easily, now those are the kind of people you should look up to.

Facebook shouldn't be a place to convince people how happy you are, you're only trying too hard to convince your own self.

i'm happy to spend less time immersing myself in group chats and spending more time pondering about the things that are right in front of me. things that seemed to be important then seem so shallow now. i spend less time keeping up with trends, and spend more quality time with those who matters. true, life is still a bumpy road. but if you're life is made out to be too perfect, then i'd think that it's a perfect lie.

the past week i've been feeling like i wanna 'make' something. Significant Other would pfffft because i'm still a lousy cook =P (he's expecting Malay style, which to me is soOOoOo complicated because their biggest ingredient would be 'secukup rasa') but one could learn, right? my accomplishment so far was to make my own tuna sandwich (the rye bread i bought was delish), mashed potatoes which tasted abit weird (the sauce i cheated and bought McCormick's chicken gravy, does anyone know how to make it from scratch?) and macaroni and cheese i copied from elly (which the kids liked), i have yet to make something to completely bowl over the one person who mattered. hmmmm. i've been baking a whole lot of potatoes for him. any nice potato recipes to share?

beauty & the beast musical

was on our way to Jusco when we passed a counter selling the tickets. since Dayana was practically singing to Beauty & the Beast when she was about 2 years old (and almost memorizing the whole script in the process) the Daddy decided that it would be a good idea to bring her for the show. we bought tickets for the 8th.

there was an offer for Maybank cardholders, so we got our tickets for a discounted price. we went just the three of us, poor Dinara got left behind because i wasn't sure she had the patience to sit still for 2 hours for the show (i'm reminded of the time when i had two entertain the two kids running up and down the cinema stairs when i brought them to watch Cars 2 T___T never againnnn).

have you ever been to Sunway Lagoon's Amphitheater? i haven't. bear in mind that it's open air, which meant that everything was exposed to the elements. hahaha. first we had quite an exercise just getting there. who would've known that the escalators heading down to the entrance was situated somewhere near the Sunway Hotel? @_@ and once you reached the bottom of the escalators you still need to walk on foot some 5 minutes to get to the Amphitheater. they provided trams for transport to get there, but the personnel there were so smart into directing blur people like us toward the 5-minute walkway to reduce the congestion of people waiting for the trams, they were lucky this pregnant lady didn't decide to sue them for her feet blisters. i was practically sweating when i arrived.

the Amphitheater, Sunway Lagoon

no food and drinks were allowed (they checked your bags before entering the premises), so they had a concession stand selling junk food, popcorn, sweet corn and hotdogs. our tickets had us seated at PS1, which was at the side but to me had a perfectly good view of the stage. the show was supposed to start at 7.30pm but you know what started instead? it started to rain.

T___T

waiting for the show to start

the show was delayed almost an hour due to the tempias the downpour unleashed on us. did i mention to you that the Amphitheater was open air? hahahahah. everyone seated at the far ends of the Amphitheater had to be temporarily relocated from their seats while they waited the storm out. some parts of the roof was dripping water too @_@. the show couldn't be started either, it would've affected the instruments and electrical equipment too (so they say lah). i laughed at Significant Other earlier for bringing along his jacket. now look who' s laughing now T___T.

Dayana seemed to be enjoying herself despite the show being delayed. she happily entertained herself with our iPhones (for some reason my stupid phone couldn't receive data while Significant Other happily Facebooked away grrrr i mau Note 2 boley? =P). she finished 3/4 of a bag of potato chips by herself. oh you should stuff your face first before you come, don't expect much from the concession stand.

so! after the rain finally seemed to let up, out came the staff to 'dry things up' literally. lol. there were so many of them really, about half of them went onstage to dry the stage floor (with rolls of tissues!!! egad what would the environmentalists say) while the other half went about the audience to dry the seats so that people could go back to their seats.

presenting Disney's cinderelly cinderelly

Live musicians hailing from Philippines performed for the musical under the direction of director and conductor, David Laugharne, someone big in West End productions that i don't really know about =P. don't expect the musical to be as linear as from the original Disney movie, only a couple of songs were taken from the original. the rest? well, let's say even Gaston can do the gangnam style T____T. i guess they modernized the storyline. i don't recall witches being in the movie save for the person that turned the prince into a Beast (erm, but wasn't that an enchantress?). Dayana was quite confused i reckon. i guess she was expecting Beauty & the Beast, the original. i was, admittedly.

details of the musical:

Date: from 1st December until 31st December
Time: Daily at 8pm (no show on Wednesdays)
Venue: Amphitheater @ Sunway Lagoon
Ticketing: RM180, RM130, and RM90 (Adult), RM150, RM 100, and RM70 (Child)

the excited spectator

er... be my guest?

Beauty & the Beast

the cast

see you again next time!

starry starry night

image source: Oscha Slings FB page

hui... first time after so long trying to upload a photo in the opis! #*($(#)@(*#@@#(*#$)(@#@%$! itu pun after leaving it to load for about 2 hours, perhaps? sempat tertido depan skrin PC ok T___T

anyway, Starry Night Nebula on top, Starry Night Eventide on the bottom. now i finally know which one i really like =D

happy Friday!