theory of relativity

after a week of being on leave, i went to work yesterday for half a day - it was my shift anyways. i figured i could clear my gazillion emails before i start work for real on the 8th. i had brekkie with my colleagues who kept me up to speed with what's been happening while i was away. then logged on to check emails. i tried and tried .... to remember my passwords. damn you T for teasing me abt those ginko pills! ITD said that they couldn't reset my passwords till next wed. my simple plan was thwarted.

instead, i spent the hours reading the news (i had no idea that saddam was going to be executed nor the extent of the internet downtime; amongst other news.) very gripping stuff. i had spent the last 7 days totally absorbed in my family where life went on while my little world spun it's own in a galaxy not far away. rather, i have been sucked into a black hole where space and time stood still but didn't. doesn't relativity rock.

but i digress .... so my disability became my advantage. i managed to catch up with the world before i crawl back under a rock again for the next week and brace myself for angel girl's adventures at primary school.

luck for the downtrodden

my grand uncle passed away on 24 dec. xmas was just not the same. family was pulled together, but for different reasons. we all brought our xmas cooking to the wake. but the mood was solemn.

he's my granny's brother - we are 2 generations removed. but coz we are a tight family, the death (although expected) still hit hard. he died of cancer - the 5th member of my family to die of cancer.

we had the final mass on 26 dec. watching my grandmother cry was gut wrenching. i see and am around death a lot at work, but watching family grief is a different ball game. she was with her brother as he died, praying together with him, asking him to surrender his soul to jesus.

both takes balls. watching a loved one die and surrendering yourself to fate. both were brave. i know my uncle is happier now, in a better place. i know my grandma is happier too, that she managed to get some jesus into her wayward brother.

my uncle led a hard and lonely life. but he was a good man. my mom in law says it's good luck to die at xmas. about time he got lucky. i can almost hear his wickedly cheeky laughter as the rain pelts against my window. i know he is happy. i know i'm happy for him.

self portrait

i walked home with my fly open ...

.... not a soul told me
i checked the mailbox
then bought tohseh
smiled at the kopi soh
scanned through the DVDs at the video van
walked to the mamashop
made small talk with the neighbours
.... all with my lacies hanging out
i have no shame

should have sensed something was amiss when all the old men were smiling at me coz i really looked like a dead beat coming home from work today. oh well, some excitement is better than none. say 'thank' you dover road

presenting xmas

xmas is an emotionally stressful time. personally, i prefer bdays where it's clear who is the giver and who is the receiver. at xmas, there is always guilt and rarely graciousness when people give you gifts and you have nothing to return. so most set the ground rules of a non-gift exchange xmas. then if one party breaks the rules, ta-dah ..... the guilt sets in. it's better to give than to receive.

then there are those, who received "bad" pressies last year and decide to re-gift. tricky coz you need to remember who gave you that gift and which circles they move in so that you dun get discovered. (c'mon, dun gawk, we've all done it sometime.geez)

but that's the real irony of it coz on one hand, you've got the rationale that it's now YOUR gift so YOU can do what you want with it but on the other, you dun want to hurt the feelings of the giver who may have felt that they "knew you" hence bought you the perfect gift.

so this year people, i am buying gifts and if you din receive one, it's not coz you didn't make the list. it's coz i din see anything that i think you would like. know that i was thinking abt you anyways. and for those whom i did buy something for, it's all good - no buts, no ifs and no guilt.
kapesh :)

creature of habit

i have been on leave this week. on leave from work not family. i brought work home to do but have not inked my pen once. i put first things first ... and to me that's family ... unfortunately at the expense of my work.

extract : Put First Things First - the third habit - says Steven Covey (7 habits of effective people) who describes a framework for prioritizing work that is aimed at long-term goals, at the expense of tasks that appear to be urgent, but are in fact less important.

i just got promoted. not that i'm unappreciative but the thot of new workload is daunting. sadistically, i'm always up for the challenge. how do i keep putting family first and continue with the rat race? actually, i'm not interested in racing but my bosses feel the need to "recognise my contribution". my work is urgent, but less important because my long-term goal is being a suportive mom.

so although i'm guilty abt not touching my work, i'm thankful for the time i had with my family especially the kids whom i had the chace to enjoy and relish.

balcony seats

12 years ago, da godma and i were colleagues. we were such snobs to each other. then one fine smoke-break, we were forced to talk (coz the smoking area was really small - REALLY!) and found that we had many common friends, that we are the same age, that we are both convent girls and most imptly both scorps with bdays just days away from each other. how cool is that! A FRIEND WAS BORN.

from that mo, we gave humour and laughter to each other when work was shit. comforted each other's sore asses whenever our boss eff-ed us for something we didn't do. i think we may have almost given each other lung cancer as we smoked our way thru many late nights and burnt weekends. A good support group (and marlboro) are sooo impt when work is overwhelming.

thru the years, our relationship morphed from friend to family. when angel-girl was born, hubs and i knew we wanted her to be a part of our family for life, so we made her da godma to our precious first born. don't you love it when you can actually choose your family?!

she has taken this role very seriously. she comes round every weekend to hang with the fam. when the kids are finally asleep, we get to do what we like to do best, out-wit, out-goof and out-geek each other. (but she wins the geek race hands down).