Ah the holiday mood has set in but I don't have the time to really enjoy it. So much work to do, not enough time. I've updated a couple of links on the right bar and I am pretty sure Shu Shu will ask me again why I changed my blog template.
3 new photo albums updated and added into my Web albums.
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| KLRC Inter DTE Bowling |
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| FLARE Outing March |
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| Annual Dinner and Dance |
| http://www.myheritage.com |
After a full day of hunting on Saturday, I am totally exhausted and even right now I can feel the effects of it up till now. Being it the first time participating in a treasure hunt, my tactic was that I drove because I felt that I had a good sense of direction and I needed my two other colleagues who had more treasure hunt experience to help solve the clues. In total, 4 of us left Kelana Jaya Seafood Center and ended up 8 hours later at Corus Hotel Port Dickson completely exhausted.
It doesn't really help that it starts at 7.00am and my trusty Toyota Vios has to travel around all day to ferry us around searching for the clues. The route brought us from Kelana Jaya to our first destination which was SS15 in Subang where we spent almost an hour looking for 3 clues. I guess it was rather difficult because no one managed to solve it in the end!
After SS15 we headed towards Kota Kemuning and then finally towards Nilai Utara. After taking a quick break at the Seremban R&R, and receiving the next set of questions, we headed towards the small town of Mambau and from there onwards the clues led us all the way to Port Dickson where we were greeted by a cool sea breeze and warm sand.
The weather was quite good with the exception of a little rain here and there but I managed to trot about on the beach with my camera and took a couple of random shots, some of the people in the area and others of my colleague who was just standing there.
In case you haven't read about my earlier post about a photography conference which I attended led by Louis Pang, his blog was recently nominated as Best Photography blog at the Blogger's Choice Awards. Do check out his blog and the photos which he has posted up and believe me, you won't regret it.
An extremely humble and down to earth guy and an awesome photographer so head over here and vote for him!
Registration only takes less than 5 minutes, so what are you waiting for? Go ahead and vote for him!
Find out more about Louis and his services here.
Only when men reach the age of 40 do they think of living the life and trying to fight their mid life crisis. How true is that? Well to play to the normal cliche of how middle aged men are portrayed when going through a mid-life crisis, Wild Hogs just shows the true nature of it.
Boasting a star studded cast of Tim Allen (Doug Madsen), John Travolta (Woody Stevens), Martin Lawrence (Bobby Davis), and William H. Macy (Dudley Frank), the movie starts off by showing these four individuals in their own personal life, living in a not too perfect lifestyle where everything may seem fine on the outside but they are crying a river inside. Not entirely satisfied with their life, these guys look for the very thing that changes them from being pussy cats into hungry lions.
The one thing that they all have in common is that the four of them love to ride their bikes and hang out at their local bar. Forming a group and calling themselves the Wild Hogs, they set out every week to have a drink and ride around hoping to find that very adventure deep within their souls. They got rather tired from just riding in their town's national day parade and wanted to do more than just that.
The story begins when Woody (played by John Travolta) was declared a bankrupt and his wife is leaving him. Feeling extremely down in the dumps, he then manages to convince the rest (Dudley, Doug and Bobby) to embark on a road trip all the way to the other end of the country in two weeks just on their bikes.
From there onwards they start their journey with plenty of hope and with their funny and hysterical antics along the way, they found certain bit of trouble with a gang of hells angels. Of course it didn't help that Woody blew up their bar as well. From shy encounters with gay policemen to giving families the wrong impression, their journey is definitely far from boring.
Of course a comedy wouldn't be without a little love interest especially with Dudley who has trouble with women and ends up falling in love with a local bar owner in a small town where Sheriffs were hired based on availability rather than qualification. From there on, the group went and saved the town from the evil clutches of a proper biker gang.
A good blend of funny antics and jokes coming from four grandmasters in their own comical right, this show is definitely one of the funniest shows to be released this year. A must watch and great for the family and kids.
Rated at 4 out of 5 stars.
The past four days have been just absolutely wonderful for me because I managed to get a break off work and headed down to Singapore with Boon for a short holiday. If you asked me what the purpose of my trip is, I would say, it was just to chill out and relax and most importantly, eat some pork!
Instead of the usual shopping which people head down to Singapore for, I hardly looked at any gadget stuff (including the Nike+ Ipod running thing which I wanted to get) as well as looked at any shops selling computer stuff or guitars. What I ended up doing was visiting several restaurants such as Marche's and Tony Roma's and of course other shopping complexes as well other than the ones that I've visited previously.
If you are asking me why I would head all the way down to Singapore just to eat at those places especially since Marche is found at the Curve and Tony Roma's at Sunway Pyramid, I would just say that I wanted to eat pork!
Yup that is right, pork sausages with rosti at Marche's (although I wanted to eat the roasted pork knuckles but by the time I saw it, I already had my pork sausages) and roasted pork ribs at Tony Roma's. Price was no object and I believed it was worth every cent I paid. Finger licking good! Absolutely delicious and the servings were way bigger than I expected. The Marche's over there had more variety and the place was packed, I had to line up for about an hour before I could get a table there.
The trip was a great way to just relax and forget about things. Shopping was definitely on my to-do list and after trotting about in my old worn out shoes, I knew I needed a new pair. So I headed over to Queensway to get myself a pair of walking shoes. The best part about the last four days was that I received a nice hand made silk tie which made me extremely happy.
Will definitely blog more about it and post up some photos. If only my computer at home didn't take so long to edit a single photo, I think I would have posted more photos. So please, if only I can get a gazillion people to click on my Google Ads, I guess I could get my new computer pretty soon.
Funny quote of the day:
Boon: I get darn scared when my boss sings Justin Timberlake
Me: *slaps forehead with my hand
I stumbled upon this on the web when I was checking out Switchfoot's website and it is their new single! Even right now as I listen to it, I think its great. Definitely a great preview to their upcoming album?
Song dynamics are superb offering a wonderful blend of high and low tones throughout the song peaking at certain parts of the song.
Remember the good old days especially during Sundays when TV3 was showing the cartoon Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles at 7.00pm? Remember you singing to the tunes of "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" and remember craving for pizza right after that? That was definitely the era of when most young adults now can relate to. A piece of history, which we grew up with, and now, the turtles are back with a vengeance in full CGI graphics and hitting the silver screen.
The build up and anticipation towards the movie was rather large for me personally and to be frank it has not been lost to hype. With the emergence of recent technology, gone are the days where we see cartoons taking the stage using old technology unless you are extremely anime inclined.
Our favourite characters are all back, Leonardo, Michaelangelo, Donatello, Raphael, Splinter, April, Casey and of course, the very food which keeps the turtles happy, pizza! It has always been Pizza Hut's best effort to have their pizza commercials when this cartoon was shown, definitely made me want to order pizza using their age old number, 755-25-25.
The story starts off with a scene dating back 3 thousand years ago talking about a king and his legendary warriors. The king has opened a portal bringing in 13 beasts from other dimensions and his 4 best warriors were turned into stone. Not only did his army got wiped out, the king was hit with a curse as well, immortality.
Meanwhile back in the city, the once feared team of turtles are no longer a team with Leonardo gone away hoping to achieve to know what it is to be a leader. Because of his absence, the rest of the turtles resorted to trying to live "normal" lives but the turtle blood (ninja blood) within them still flows freely through them causing them to itch once in a while hoping to kick some ass.
The story goes on to tell about how Leonardo returns from his training and reunites the turtles against the beasts that were released over 3000 years ago who are currently terrorizing New York City. Of course, we wouldn't want the fearless turtles to be still stuck within an unknown cliche of uncertainty.
Meanwhile, the warrior king who was cursed with immortality is now trying to gather these beasts and his warrior friends (still in the form of a statue). To do this, he recruited the help of the foot clan (Shredder’s old group of ninjas). Well who wouldn't want to miss them out of any Ninja Turtle storyline especially since Shredder is supposedly dead and the foot clan is now being led by some quirky female with an Asian accent.
The story takes a turn when the statues agreed that the warrior king has indeed gone soft and turned against him. This time, the turtles finally decided to work as a team to banish the beasts and the enemy and at the same time broke the curse of immortality for the warrior king.
Now if you have the time, do take a breather from your everyday life and catch this movie. Definitely one you will not regret especially if you are a Ninja Turtle fan or just someone who wants to relive part of your early childhood memories of this series.
Yes, I will be heading down to Singapore tomorrow for the 3rd time in my life for a holiday. Yes I am totally jakun and yes I am extremely noob about Singapore and the places I should visit. What I don't seem to anticipate is the long journey I have to take just to get there. Sitting in a bus for half a day is not what I call an exciting adventure. None the less, I intend to make this trip a little worthwhile for me by taking as many photo's I can.
Thanks my colleague, I've managed to get a free accommodation there so that is much easier on my pocket but I do know that I want to go and eat pork ribs at Tony Roma's over there. Hopefully I wouldn't be too disappointed with it considering that I ate the Lord of the Ribs at Checkers in Bangsar. This time again I am heading down there with my partner in peril, hoping to savour the moment of sinking our teeth into succulent roasted pork ribs.
Yesterday I wasn't feeling too well at work and the fact that I had to rush about didn't really help. Worse of all, it was extremely hot here in the office and the fan I hijacked was used by my other colleague. Best way to get rid of the heat is to take a cool refreshing shower, which I did (pays to have a gym in the office) and after that I felt refreshed.
Of course by night I was already reeling from all of the work which had piled up and running from meeting place to meeting place was taking a toll on me. Then came a blessing of unseen proportionate, a good friend passed me a lovely cup of chamomile tea, medicine and cake. This was totally unexpected and after drinking the tea and taking the meds, I felt much better and feel exhilarated. Thank you sooooooo much!
By the way, I went to Saisaki at Wisman UOA yesterday and noticed that the place has changed a bit. The decoration looks slightly nicer but unfortunately the taste has not improved. So much for RM52++ per head, definitely not a place I would want to recommend to eat Japanese food unless its the buffet that you are after.
Another hot day again.....I am just melting away.
At least there are somethings I can look forward to in the coming months.
May:
Philippians 4:6-7Totally feel that my faith level has increased and my confidence level has risen. For that I have to thank my friend for giving me plenty of encouragement yesterday and helped me realise a couple of obvious things about myself. Cheers to you mate!
6Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. 7And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
Philippians 4:13
13I can do everything through him who gives me strength.
Hebrews 11:8
8By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going.
I need to remind myself that I should be patient. Always be patient, patience is a virtue, patience, patience and more patience. Even my own self-conscience is driving me up the wall because it speaks to me in a little voice which keeps reminding me that I am not patient enough. "Mark, are you being patient?", or "Mark, patience is a virtue!", these very words ring through my head all day long. I wonder if someone is trying to tell me something. Who knows?
Focus, focus, focus! The next word that hits me like a bullet, shattering the very train of my thought. Well, that train isn't too long anyway, about 10 seconds of focus time at most without getting distracted by things like, "Ooh that car is coming close, I better give way to him" or "Hrm, what should I eat for lunch today" or even work matters! How does one discipline their own minds to stay focus?
Sometimes when our minds start to build an image in it, whereby in that image you see something you really want happening in your life, you tend to put your whole life and effort towards trying to achieve that reality. We can try with all our might but definitely certain things are beyond our own capabilities and sometimes these things we cannot control them.
The journey of finding out the truth or a possibility can be one that is difficult and sometimes one that is sorrowful. At times you might feel the moment when you thought that things are going right and there is hope and at other times, you feel as if you are lower than the gravel on the road. A man searches for hints but sometimes to no avail could it be clear to you. Judgment could have been clouded by certain thoughts and actions controlled by mere emotions rather than logical thinking. But you can't blame him sometimes, because try maneuvering a stretch of road coming down a hill on a bicycle and not have any street lights!
I find it tough especially at this moment, not knowing how things are going. Anything could happen at anytime and just having a negative thought about it and my soul is crushed. I wish it would be easier but then my other sense thinks that this is a challenge. Its not easy weighing possibilities and planning for the worst but I trust God in all of this. Well I try to tell myself that I think so.
But faith means having total reliance on God and I know my heart and mind sways from the 100% mark as we ourselves are not perfect. I may think I have put in effort, but all of that effort and time might have not gone to good use. That's the negative side of me thinking right now. I tried to see some sort of signs, some that might at least give me a glimmer of hope but whenever I think about it, I am sure to have negative thoughts about it and it just sends my spirits right into the pits. So much for saying that I am a rather positive thinking person.
Some people had it easy and some people had it tough, my previous experience was quite easy considering it to be purely on God's grace for me but now I yearn for that very grace. Focusing on other things is tough right now, motivation is low because of a negative mindset but perseverance is absolutely needed, just as much as my morning coffee fix (Nescafe white coffee ftw!). I need to continue to strive harder and harder. But what if striving harder means pushing back that which I seek? Is it truly what I deserve or has the very potter who created me not molded me well enough? (I doubt that since He is perfect in every single way!)
Is this the part when a potter sees that his product is not to his desire that he completely destroys the clay, turning it into nothing but a lump? Am I that lump right now, have I been completely broken down by the potter? Will I be built up again? I truly believe that whatever person that we have turned out to be, God has made us unique in our own individual ways.I never knew that Women were like irons and Men were like light bulbs.
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