Pics from the airport

So I'm taking a looong break from studying and putting up some of the pics from the airport yesterday.

The EGAT riders...
The tin in the bike shop to collect donations for Kale's charity ride at the end of March to Cherating

The man and his pregnant wife (at 24 weeks)

Got a quick call from the hubby who said that today's stage was insanely fast and that he's completely pooped. Bleah. He seems to be in good spirits though, so that's good. Hopefully tomorrow's better for him and the rest of the "open" guys. The vets fared significantly better apparently.

Didn't get as much studying done today as I had hoped. Just occured to me that I only have 3 more days to study all the material for this exam. And I haven't even started looking at 4 of the 6 topics yet! hah. Most of the stuff is still at our place while I'm based out of my parents' for the time being. Need to go get the stuff tomorrow. sigh.

My cousins and aunt came over in the afternoon to bring my niece for a swim and to have dinner.. they left not long ago. That little girl is really shaping up to have a personality. Very cute. She's into babbling now.. heh.

Hoping to get some serious studying in tomorrow. Hope to at least complete // imports, remedies and perhaps start on US patent law tomorrow. That'll leave US patent law and Biomed for Tuesday. And if I have time, I'll go back over the IT section and attempt to read through the US antitrust law on Wed. We'll see... I like to set myself goals so I can feel accomplished and relax if I've done what I'm supposed to have done for the day.. now it's to see if I can actually achieve them!

mr dawn

turns out i won't be meeting the best friend tomorrow after all. the poor thing is down with a throat infection and sounds like a man. i kid you not.

i griped to the hubby (yes, griping is the flavor of the week so get used to it) via sms this evening and he replied with a smartass comment - "aha! mr dawn"

see, the running joke is that dawn plays the role of the "mister" whenever the respective other half of her close friends isn't around. so she's been dubbed mr. dawn by vanessa. it's a clever nickname, ain't it?

so yeah, guess i'll be studying tomorrow after all. no more excuses to not study in the afternoon. doh!

off to bed now. totally bushed. long day today. wasn't the best day i've had by a long shot but wasn't as bad as i had expected. after all, i didn't start missing the hubby till oh, about 5:30pm when i stepped into church.. so i consider that an accomplishment. one day down, 5 more to go. goodness, i'm pathetic!

friday before a long weekend....

you would think i'd be excited about the long weekend, but instead i'm just bummed. the husband and the parents are going away this weekend. oh wait, the hubby's gone till thursday.. sigh. and they're going for fun too. double pout. him to cycle and them to golf. makes me want to pick up a nice hobby that i can go overseas to do. hah.

anyhow, quick update on the past couple of days. finally got down to some studying and turns out the paper went ok. think i'll pass.. phew. my bladder almost burst though after not going to the bathroom for 3 and a half hours and drinking half a bottle of water. whoa...

so after the exam, i didn't feel like studying anymore so went gallivanting around town with mom and finally bought some big ticket baby stuff - aka a breast pump. man, i'm really going to feel like a cow. it's kind of a rude shock when you turn the thing on and it sounds so mechanical... i mean, ok, i know it's a mechanical device but you would think someone would have figured out how to make it more "nurturing" rather than sounding like the suction device that it is. hmm.

kale's friend josh is in town too.. with his gf, so it's been eating and more eating. meeting up with kale's friends' wives tomorrow for lunch and then josh and jill (how cute is that?) for dinner. have plans to meet up with the bestie on sunday to hang out. she was sweet enough to offer to keep me company. =) i love that girl.

question now is - where do i find the time or the motivation to study these couple of days? good question. most of me wants to keep busy to stop myself from moping, but the other part of me wants to be alone so i can study. man, i don't know WHAT i want.
yeah, big surprise there.
ok, i promise, last week of griping. i'll be much better next week. come thursday. exams will be over, husband will be back and everything will be peachy-keen. yeah. can i fast forward to thursday? puhleeezzz???

off to school we go

it's wednesday, my next paper is tomorrow.. so i'm trying to be disciplined and hike off to school soon to get started on some last minute cramming. had breakfast already (what a change for me) and am almost set to go down to the library.

dad's back from the US with the playpen and some other goodies. shall go check it out later.. =)
kale's friend is also popping by (or at least supposed to) so that's going to be another distraction for today. heh. thank goodness the exam is tomorrow morning so i can relax (somewhat) tomorrow afternoon.

motivation is running low. let's just hope it goes better than monday's paper. i have faith that it will..cos i actually get to pick my questions as opposed to having to do all of them. and if history prevails, i'll do better on the essay exams anyhow. or so we hope.

okies, over and out. time to hit the books, y'all.

shopping for the baby..

so, i finally managed to get something for the baby over the weekend..

- 3 little sleepsuits from mothercare (size 6-9 mths just cos i'm kiasu and the baby may outgrow the 0-3 mths and 3-6 mths too quickly). figure bigger is always better than smaller. and if the babe comes out anywhere close to the hubby's size when he was born, she won't fit into any of the 0-3 mth stuff anyhow.

- a sleep positioner thing to keep the baby on her back while she sleeps.. supposedly safer. one of my colleagues told me about it, so since there was a sale on at robinsons, decided to go get it.

so there, i've officially bought baby gear before i'm out of my 2nd trimester. heh. still slow compared to most other moms-to-be that i know.. but heck, it's not a race, right?

not good..

the exam did not go well. bleah.

there were entire questions which i know i got entirely wrong. not for lack of studying either, i specifically skipped those sections thinking they weren't important. felt like slapping myself when i saw those questions. ack. it wasn't a fair paper in my opinion, but what do i know?

most of the people in the class who deal with patents for a living faired better, but i hope the rest of the class is in the same boat as me. all i need is a "pass" grade. trying to convince myself i'm being overly pessimistic (as usual) and that all will be fine... still working on the convincing part.

back at work in the afternoon to clear some stuff..and then it's back to hitting the books for the next paper on thursday... *ren*...

deadly concoction

2 parts pregnancy hormones + 1 part exam nerves + 1 part separation anxiety (getting more by the day) + 1 part work stress + 1 part general unhappiness with the state of the world (yes, i'm very drama-mama) = a very upset, depressed and frustrated me.

i wonder if this is what's considered pre-natal blues. i used to think my PMS was bad but this is way worse. usually i know i'm illogical and i can work my way out of it cos i know it'll only last a couple of days. but now, i'm so caught up in my own head-funk that i can't talk myself out of it. no matter how illogical it really is, it all seems PERFECTLY justified to me. every little thing adds up and becomes this huge, unsurmountable obstacle where the whole world is against me. i'm self-centered and wallowing in my self-pity. i'm sheer joy to be around right now. no one can do anything right by me. not even me. sigh.

my first exam paper is tomorrow. i didn't study AT ALL today. ok, i did, a bit, if you consider going through the Act one more time to make sure i didn't miss out anything as "studying". it's crunch time tomorrow. time to see if my pregnant brain can retain any of the 60 or so sections of the patents act that i've tried to stuff in it. wish me luck.

bleah.

pity party

i'm throwing a pity party at my house, so if you're interested, feel free to show up.

sigh.

motivation?

motivation, motivation... where art thou?

sigh, on study leave, and once again, the day is half over and i've done nada. zip.
i'm so screwed. sigh.

HELP! can't keep all these biomed cases straight in my head.. how to remember which case is about endogenous/exogenous DNA activation and which is about HIV test kits or anti-histamines? arrrrggghhhh...

baby names *hee hee*

the hubby and i were surfing baby name websites and came across the following.. by themselves they're not funny, but the hubby's comments made me crack up..

Jetta - "meet our daughters - jetta, passat and golf. we were going to name our son toureg but it's a little hard to pronounce"
MariaBella - "mariabella buonerba, how-a many times do i have-a to tell-a you-a to clean-a your bedroom eh?" (in a thick italian accent)

and the winner... latondra shanehneh buonerba.

heh heh

looong weekend

man, every weekend should so be a long weekend.
i'm getting all depressed thinking that the weekend is coming to an end.

trying to split my time between studying and enjoying myself/baby-dreaming.

made it down to kaki bukit to go check out the baby's hyperstore and baby kingdom. wanted to look at playpens, cribs and strollers. we were all a little overwhelmed when we want into the first store - too many strollers and no idea where to start. got a good idea of what we're looking for after checking both stores out, so now it's to hunt around to see if we can get the same model for anything less at john little or robinsons during a sale.. if not, guess we can always pick it up at the baby kingdom place. we're thinking of getting a basic stroller, nothing too fancy.. altho the one-hand-fold ones look really cool too... even if they weigh almost double of the basic ones.

eyeing a playpen to be parked at my parents' place in the long run so that the baby has somewhere to sleep when we're over there.. and we're looking at the graco pack 'n play since it can be folded up if we go on trips and it looks a little sturdier than the baby star ones we saw at john little. since we'll at least be going on one vacation before the year is up (to wherever christmas is this year), it'll be a necessary purchase anyhow. my dad's going to the US for a biz trip and will see if he can pick one up while he's there since it's almost half the cost there as it is here..

ok lah. bed time... get some zzzs. more studying/resting tomorrow. hubby's not going riding so we get to sleep in!! woo hoo!

Quick random update

Since I'm supposed to be studying, this post shall be short and sweet (i'll try) and in point form.

- took yesterday and today off to study for my exams. sigh, finally some time to myself to study despite it eating into my annual leave.
- can't seem to make it through more than one case without having my eyes glaze over.
- am sick again!!! what's up with that?? my nose is blocked, my ears are blocked and i can't breathe. grr. the hubby's down with a cold too so you can just imagine the germ fest that's going on each time we kiss each other goodnight. hah. think i caught the damn bug from a classmate or colleague. bleah
- am afraid to take any meds for this cold in case it does something to the baby. probably going to hike it to the doc later to get some doc-approved drugs.
- it's a long weekend this weekend. Thank Goodness!
- good korean food is sooo hard to find in singapore. why oh why?
- i'm like a sponge - i'm dehydrated so i drink. i drink therefore i have to get up in the night to pee. i'm back to being dehydrated again so i drink. what's up with this? sigh... just to sleep through 1 nite without waking up to pee or scratch or blow my nose. argh.

ok, back to banging my head against a wall. aka studying. sigh.

It's a girl!

So we had our 20-week detailed scan this past Friday. Due to scheduling issues, I was already in my 21st week, but eh, who's counting?

Anyhow, after 45 mins, I'm pleased to announce that everything is going well.. the baby looks like she's doing just fine. Everything is where it's supposed to be, all major organs are functioning well, and as far as the scan goes, we've been given a clean bill of health. =) Of course they have all the usual disclaimers about how a scan can't pick up small issues, but I'm happy with the results anyhow!

The big news is that we've confirmed the stowaway is a girl.. Selene now has license to go hog wild in the pink department! hah. This also means we can start thinking about names! Woo hoo! I would also say that we can go shopping, but I'm trying very hard to put off baby-goods shopping till after my exams. Emphasis on "trying".

The baby is also bigger than the 50th percentile. Which I'm pleasantly surprised to hear. All I've been hearing all along is how I look too small, how I don't eat enough and how I haven't gained enough weight. The fact that the baby is thriving and is slightly bigger than average means I can't be doing too much wrong. Checked with the doc about my weight and despite the *reasonably* low weight gain so far (I'm clocking in at 51.2kg right now), she says I'm a-ok. I'm sure the pounds will pile on in the next couple of months anyhow. I've seen too many of my colleagues balloon in the last few months to expect anything less.

The funny thing was that during the scan, the doc doing the scan was trying to get the baby to uncurl so that he could get a clear look at the vital organs. He poked and prodded with the probe and the babe looked pretty nonplussed. At one point, the doc pointed out the left arm and went something like "...erm... and i'm looking for the right arm...". The babe had moved and the right arm that was in the screen, was now not. After moving the probe around.. the doc located the other arm. The kiddo had moved the arm around behind her and, get this, was scratching her butt!! I kid you not! That's what the doc said! This one is definitely her father's daughter! hah.

Just wanted to give a quick update. =) It's late, and there's work tomorrow.. so I'm heading off to bed.. G'nite y'all.

Belly fight

For the fun of it.. Kale and I had a little competition a while back.. heh heh

Kale and I at 20 weeks..

Cyfora race on 2nd April

Here are the much-delayed pics from the Cyfora race in Sepang last Sunday. Ok, so we're about a week behind in posts. =(

We hit the Empress Hotel in Sepang at around 10:30pm on Saturday night, ordered some room service since we didn't really have dinner and Kale got his race kit from the "race central" - aka Mimi and Saiful's room. Showered and crashed into bed.

Woke up bright and early (again) in time for a rushed breakfast before a quick drive out to the race start which was just 300m down the street.

As usual, racing in Malaysia entails a wait in the sweltering sun... we sit around for close to an hour waiting for the race to get into full gear. Grab a couple of pictures while waiting...
Sweating it out in the sun while waiting for the race to start. In true M'sia fashion, the race didn't start anywhere close to on time..
Us at the start of the race..
Hakim getting a massage from Jonchiton - another satisfied customer
The pack at the start of the race
Kale, John and Raymond
Danish - Mimi's son, in the race support vehicle

The race starts off with a 30km rolling start. Because our team is the reigning champion, ahem ahem, we get to be the first car in the support car convoy...

After the loooong rolling start

A crash happens pratically immediately after the official start of the race (one had happened earlier on), since it happens on a narrow country road. Rumor has it that someone road off the road, tried to get back on the road and fell, causing a domino effect. Some of the riders were caught in the crash, and Kale had the unenviable decision of choosing between riding over Uncle Richard who had fallen right in front of him, or riding over his own wheel and hub which was now on Uncle Richard's bike due to an earlier puncture. He chose the latter, and is now facing a $150 repair on the rim. ouch.

Ivy and I were pretty caught up in the excitement what with having to move the car and take the spare wheels out since we were the first car on the scene following both crashes. Note to self: pregnant women should not attempt to run in a race crash environment bearing bike wheels. Can you say "wide load approaching"?? Thankfully Ernest's wife, who was riding in the car behind, had the state of mind to take the wheels from me and run them over to Mimi! See, the power and might of the female support crew!! hah.

So yeah, Uncle Richard broke his seat off (don't ask me how) so Troy had to sit out the rest of the race and loan Uncle Richard his bike. Poor chap. More excitement ensued with locating an allen wrench to raise the seat and actually getting the allen wrench to the right person. You would think this would NOT be a hard thing to do... think again.. hmm.

Anyhow, a bunch of our guys were caught in the crash... here are some pics of them after the crash. Kale was all bummed cos after riding on his own against the wind for 2 days, he had hoped to catch some slack and ride in a pack for the race! But alas, that was not to be...
John playing catch up after the crash
Kale in a "splinter cell" (new phrase i learnt) after the crash..
"so much for sitting in a pack..."

We finally chanced upon the lead pack...
KL International Airport in the distance

Mrs Yusoff, our one and only female rider pulled in a commendable performance to beat the girl she had to beat, despite crashing and being brought to the finish by only 1 domestique - her bro-in-law Saiful. Saiful was totally smashed by the end, but heroically pushed on.. now that's heart for you..

Good news is that the team as a whole came in first again, and are again the reigning champions... Guess all the crash drama and pain were worth it, eh?
The aftermath

After the race, we rushed back to the hotel to wash up, grab a quick lunch and then we all hit the road in a convoy. Finally made it home close to 7:30pm after being stuck on the SG side of the Tuas link for an hour and a half. Bleah. We were both waaaay glad to be home.

That pretty much sums the insane weekend where Kale rode some 550+km in 3 days. Yeah. I don't think he's doing that again anytime soon! heh. *grin*

oK, back to studying before church...

house-y chores

So, on the weekdays when we do get a chance to eat together at home, I usually pop by the store in my building on the way home to buy stuff to make dinner. I get home, and we make dinner together. Sometimes more me than him, sometimes we're evenly matched.

Buying food for dinner always puts me in a bad mood cos I need to juggle the basket at the store with my laptop bag (usually) and then have to carry the food plus my oh-so-heavy IBM laptop on the subway. Bleah. Especially on days when I get out of the office late. By the time I get home, I'm grumpy (cos I've usually missed the train and had to wait 6 mins for the next one) and tired. So making dinner is sometimes a mental/emotional challenge for me even tho I don't have to do it alone. It's usually the last thing I want to do.

The point of this whole story is that it usually doesn't take more than a "thank you" from the husband to make me feel better and feel appreciated. Suddenly I don't feel so grumpy, and everything is a lot more bearable. It's all about feeling appreciated and realising that he notices the little things.

Thing is, as I type this, he's in the kitchen doing the dishes from yesterday... without me asking. Which, to me, makes him my hero. Cos I totally didn't want to face those dishes. And the thing is, I know he won't expect so much as a thank you from me.. cos he doesn't need to feel appreciated the same way I do. I NEED it. If I don't get a "thank you", I feel taken for granted and get grumpy.

So yes, I'm thankful he's so supportive... and I'm going to try to be equally supportive and non-whiny back. These are the times I'm glad that we're such different people!

And yes, I know I still owe the rest of the pictures and a write-up from the weekend, and I have a picture from the scan yesterday as well. Just haven't gotten the chance to take a pic of that and upload that either. Soon, soon...

finally... pictures from the weekend

UPDATE:
ok, all the pics are up... have tried to include a short write-up in between the pictures. Will follow up with a separate post on the race on Sunday..

We started off bright and early on Friday morning to meet the TDS crew and Mimi opposite Kranji MRT. Loaded up the car and drove over to pick my mom up. Were running a little late and the entire crew minus Mimi was waiting for us at the meeting point. Mimi rolls up a little later after dropping his kid off at school... we pack everything up into the cars, say goodbye to my mom and roll off to the Causeway checkpoints.

Drive up to Penggarang. Running quite a bit late. Got caught in some bad traffic near Kota Tinggi. Finally made it to the Penggarrrang Ferry Terminal (which is really quite ghetto) at around 10am-ish. Kale got suited up, had his sugar checked (first time of many) and then mounted his trusty steed.. (sounds like something out of a romance novel.. haha)

Starting off at Penggarang with the Doc and the nurses hovering around anxiously
The entourage raring to go
Still fresh and smiling, weather's holding up

About a half hour into the ride, the clouds loomed over and it started to rain.. pretty heavily. Luckily, it was a passing rain cloud. Turns out we would have been better off with the rain, cos it got blistering hot really quickly after...
Lovely malaysian scenery...hah
The sun is out and beginning to burn...bleah

We stopped for lunch at Kota Tinggi, had a quick one and then rolled off to hit Mersing by 6pm. We stopped every hour and a half or so for the doc and nurses to get Kale's sugar readings. The ride was harder than Kale expected cos of the very unforgiving headwind and sun.
At the afternoon pit stop at some dinky road-side stop

My hives started flaring up cos of the heat... and I proceeded to get REALLY uncomfortable. Began to feel for the hubby cos he was out there in the sun riding while I was feeling really gross just being inside a vehicle. Geez..
A shot of my hives...

Finally pulled into our pit stop close to our ETA. The flush didn't work in our toilet. Eugh. Bed was ok though... washed up, met the rest for a quick dinner in the hotel cafe (food was so-so) and then had an early night.
At the end of day 1, in the parking lot of Hotel Seri Malaysia in Mersing

Woke up early the next morning before dawn, packed up, had some breakfast and rolled out... today's target distance of 250km was slightly longer than the distance of 210km the day before so we had a long day ahead.
Day 2 - A little up, a little down, but mostly flat..
A picture worthy of Amazing Race - rustic Malaysia
Through a sleepy fishing port
Kampong scenery

Had a chance to get up close and personal with some of the M'sian animals. The lead car had to slow down at one point to distract a baboon that was seemingly intent on chasing the cars and Kale. The baboon actually leapt up and down trying to attack the windows of the lead car while Kale gingerly rode by!
Goat family... more of the animals spotted on the ride
Ironing out the kink in his foot during the afternoon break
Proof we're really going up to Kuantan...
Monkey see.. monkey run

Once we left Mersing, we were pretty much on a coastal road that left Kale pretty much at the mercy of the coastal "breeze" which made the ride that much harder.. the scenery was pretty good though...
East Coast of Malaysia
Aerodynamic butt shot

We finally made it to our destination a little later than we expected. Kale was totally knackered by the time we got there.
Ending point of the journey - Legends Resort, Cherating
Us at the end of the ride

AFter the ride, we showered, the TDS crew were nice enough to ask the hotel to pack some food for us for the drive, and Mimi, Kale and I packed in the vehicles to drive cross-country (literally) to Sepang in preparation for the race the next day. We finally made it into the hotel at about 10:30pm. Phew.

Tomorrow's a big day - it's my next detailed scan. Tomorrow we get to find out for certain the gender of the baby and get to see the baby again on the ultrasound. Hopefully we can get some pics..

karate kid

so 1 more milestone passes in this pregnancy. kale got to feel the baby move last night. usually the kiddo's hitting out pretty regularly but by the time kale gets his hand to my belly, it's suddenly radio silence. last nite, on a whim, i just suggested that he try again, even though i half expected the kiddo to stop moving just because.

but no, the kiddo was actually really cooperative (phew, does this mean we won't have a stubborn child??) and kept on moving.. as in REALLY moving! so yeah, was neat. kale could finally feel it for himself and not just take my word for it.

pushing blame...

this is my tech-savvy husband's response to my request for him to upload the pics from this past weekend onto my blog..

"i don't know how... i've never uploaded pictures on blogger before...i don't use blogger"

hah! bullsh*t! ye who can fix my wireless internet connection, solve my parents' weirdo computer problems can't upload pictures on blogger???

but hey, it was a good try... and the oh-so-innocent look he gave me totally sealed the deal. haha

so yeah, we're both to blame for the pics not being up yet.

it's official...

1) i'm losing my brain, slowly but surely. i can't even cope with the simplest things at work. you sure babies don't suck up brain cells along with nutrients? cos i swear i'm slowly losing my brain cells...

2) i'm a human punching bag. ouch. this kiddo has rapidly learnt how to inflict little blows on my insides. sometimes it tickles (which is fun), sometimes it just sorta nudges (which is cool) and sometimes it just plain HURTS! man... what am i in for if i've gone from not really feeling anything to feeling all this in just a week and a half? i've got 5 months to go!!! eeps. i'm going to be yelping by june when this kid gets more coordinated and stronger! gee

3) i definitely look pregnant. i'm wearing flat shoes. *gasp*. i bought my first pair of totally flat work shoes today. and promptly got blisters. hmm.

4) i'm perpetually tired. nothing new here... just thought i'd reiterate it in case you missed it the other 437 times i've mentioned it in the past 20 posts. hah.

good nite. off to bed. phew. long day ahead again tomorrow. bleah.

we're back and we're zonked

man, that was 1 crazy weekend. remind me never to do that again while pregnant. hah.

so yeah, we're back. we were both so worn out that we were on MC today. him cos the 500+km he rode totally took it out of him, and me cos by the time last evening came around, i could barely walk. bleah.

we have pictures.. some decent ones too, but i'm too tired to wrangle with blogger to put them up so they'll have to wait.

tried to get some studying done today while at home since my exams are in slightly over 3 weeks time. sad to say, only 1 case and 1 set of notes was read. =( i have to say that pregnancy is not exactly a motivating factor when it comes to studying. all i can think of when i have some free time is sleeping. trust me, it's barely 9pm and all i can think of is my lovely bed.. ahhh....

one last thing - there's nothing like a weekend away roughing it out in malaysia to make you realise how much you like your own bed and your own toilet... a toilet that actually flushes - what a thought!! phew.

ok, heading off for a shower and then bed. going to be a busy day at work tomorrow. grr.