Sunday, July 29, 2007
the society we lived in
A day after i wrote about first aid, and how i was afraid of blood and etc. I must have jinx myself. While i was driving and waiting for the traffic lights to turn green, i heard a motorbike from afar, Vroom Vroom, Broooom, ear blasting. Who was this Mr cool, trying to be cool on road on Sunday afternoon, when it was congested? Ah ha, Mr Bikey,this is not the place to show off. In a split second, there was 'THUD'. He lost his balance, fell onto the road, and his bike was on top of him.
Great! It happened next to my car! Should i get out of my car to help him? Motorbikes are heavy and it is on top of him. Had a quick look, none of the drivers around me helped. Should I? Should i even be bothered when others don't? In the end, i didn't, and saw that he managed to stand up again on his own and wasn't injured at all. Phew, great relief, no blood!
This speaks 'highly' of the society we lived in. Is there such a thing as good Samaritan?
Friday, July 27, 2007
First Aid
Today at work, I saw a colleague (Karen) cutting out few printed pictures of my other colleagues. To me they looked like a fugitive, one of those fugitive shot, carrying a plate with a serial number.Me:Karen,what are they for? They all look funny
Karen: These are for First Aid, First Aid rep
Me:Ok
Karen: They're all males. I've asked some females, but they didn't want to be part of it
Me:Ok, ermm what does it take to be part of it? (In deep thoughts thinking that maybe i could volunteer)
Few seconds later
Me: Karen, i don't think i can, cause i'm afraid of blood, and i can't see people in pain
Karen: Hmm, in this case i don't think you can either. I've learned something about you, the 'bleeding people' or people in pain shouldn't come to you, cause they will die or you will make them die if they come to you.
Me: Hmm, maybe! (I can't perform first aid on people)
Thursday, July 26, 2007
Ben Elton-Past Mortem
Finally! I've managed to finish this book. I've had this book for a while now since May, only to read 2 chapters since i bought it from Myers, Myers can have pretty good sale on books, 35% RRP. Better than Dymocks, Angus and Robertson and Borders. Well the advantage of Dymocks and Borders is they often have 3 for the price of 2 books, and they're popular titles.It is my first Ben Elton and I really enjoyed it. It is entertaining, engaging, a clever plot and easy to read. I wouldn't have guessed the killer, and only to find out at the end of the chapter. On a separate note, the language usage is a little coarse. MA and S scenes. I give it a 4.5/5. Ben's other titles are quite appealing, Dead Famous, High Soceity, Blast from the Past and etc.
Will have to read his other titles next year.
Time for Potter and more Potter.
Sunday, July 22, 2007
gifts and birthdays
Yesterday was a remarkable day. It all began with the usual marketing chores followed by an intense shopping. I had to visit Borders, and one would know that it was terrible day to visit any bookstores. It was the release of Harry Potter, finale. I couldn't believe my eyes, the long metres of queue outside Borders, some carrying marked balloons (We love Harry). Inside, 5 checkouts assigned for pre-ordered pickup, staff dressed up in black cloak, black/purple wizardry hat and ONLY 1 checkout was assigned for other purchases. To sum it all, terrible wait.I had to join the queue since i had the need to exchange a cookbook which i've bought earlier with another cookbook. I've decided that my friend (Jane) deserved Bill Granger, everyday cookbook as a birthday gift. Bill's recipes are simple, less complicated and suits her.
The next thing was visiting T2 tea shop. I found a perfect birthday gift for another friend (Sema), a stack (3 different types of herbal relaxation tea) and it wasn't that expensive too! Worth the money and quality. Ahh, i'm 100% sure she will like it.
And....... after this, i made my way back to Borders. I line up for Harry Potter's book and got myself a white Hedwig too. A nice super cool owl. Currently, am reading Ben Elton's Past Mortem, and the next book in line will be re-read the Harry Potter (5th), 6th and the final one. Shall see whether i can finish them all by the end of the year (i doubt).
*Jane's Birthday*
It was great to celebrate a 25th birthday last nite. The 'usual' close friends were invited, her parents came along and was good to see the familiar faces again. Her parents were glad to see us too, ahh the 'close' friends get together. How I met her? 4 years ago, i was living in a different state and happened to be in Melbourne for a conference. We conversed, exchanged contacts and most importantly we are the foodie of the future. Later the year, i made a move to Melbourne and somehow throughout these years, i became part of her life. Thank you Jane!
Made an interesting discovery during the nite. Midori + lemonade + cherry. What a combination! *Sema's Birthday*
Celebrated a 40th birthday today. A milestone birthday! and Another 'foodie's' birthday. It was another good get together session out of working hours. A typical motherly character whos always checking on me at work. "Are you ok", "You're very quiet today", "Please eat more, you need to eat". 
What a busy weekend, need to get some sleep!Friday, July 20, 2007
Sala Thai Restaurant
266 Brunswick Street, Fitzroy VIC 3065
I visited this place few weeks ago. I didn't know that there is a Thai restaurant in amongst other shops (clothings, homewares) on Brunswick Street. It was a cozy, relatively small, dimly lit place. There was an option on either dining on table with chairs or on table with cushions on floor. It didn't take that long for the food to come. We ordered few dishes-Tom Yum Soup, stir fried vegetables, red curry chicken and curry fish. I must admit the soup, vegetables and curry fish sauce all tasted sweet (too much palm sugar, maybe?). Oh well, a nice try.
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
Weird humour
Weird humour of the day:-At work, I was at one of the packing lines I'm responsible for. The scenario was, when i arrived at the line, they had sealing problems. The operator of the line, in trying to be funny said to me:-
Hey, why do we get problems when you come, when you do not come we don't have any problems.
I was quick at responding to him. Please explain, why do i hear problems when i come to work? and we both laughed.
Weird.
Monday, July 16, 2007
Literary Awards 2007
I like visiting the local library when i get the chance, maybe once in every 3 or 4 weeks. Few weeks ago while i was at the checkout station, this yellow flyer caught my eye:-"Boroondara Literary Awards 2007 Young Writers". Interesting, enteries close on Friday 31st August 2007, a writing competition of prose and poetry for young people in Boroondara. I could give this a shot, and most important of all I'm still young (in my own definition). I'm starting to enjoy writing. A friend once said that I should write a book on my life stories, reason being I always have something to tell him whenever I see him and he enjoys listening to them (i think!!).As i read the inner page of the flyer, one of the headings was why enter?
*free
*improve your writing
*be published
*write any topic you like
Sounds good. Besides, winning entries have a chance of being published in the Progress Leader.
As i continued reading, there was another heading called Young Writer Categories which defined the junior writers and senior writers.
Junior writers as defined here referred to people in school year levels 7-9.
Senior writers as defined here referred to people in school year levels 10-12 or 15-18 years of age as at 31st August, 2007.
Hmphhh, I don't fit in any of the category, neither junior and senior and NOT YOUNG, thereby can't enter.
Friday, July 13, 2007
IL Dolce Freddo
116 Lygon St, Carlton VIC 3054
IL Dolce Freddo, one of the Italian ice-cream (gelati) place people like to visit during warm weather. During summer in particular one would expect to see a constant stream of people in and out of this place, gripping tightly in their hand an ice-cream cone topped with flavours of their choice. Let me warn you, in a hot 40 degrees summer, if you're a slow eater like me, you will be experiencing a melting ice-cream moment and would end up with sweet sticky hand. So, hurry up and swallow them as fast as you can.This gelati place has a staggering variety of ice-cream, you name it, cookies n' cream, lychee, pandan, mango, coconut, green tea, tiramisu, chocolate roche, nutella and even durian. Ah, durian is a Malaysian thing, known as the king of fruit, the considerably big round fruit with thorns and green in colour. Nevertheless, it carries a distinct smell. If you happen to walk around this ice-cream place and smell some strange smell, this is the contributor.
Few days ago, a friend from interstate visited me and i brought her here after dinner. Goodness me, in this cold weather i can't believe there are still people who would like to have ice-cream. It was a win-win situation where she get to have her ice-cream and i get to take pictures. The happy gleeful smile.
It was a perfect timing where there was no one in the shop apart from us and only a worker was present. For once i could snap all the pictures i want happily without any interference, taking my own sweet time.
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
Typical working day
A typical working day:-Supposedly to start work at 8.30am, but never on time. Hopefully no one noticed that i have been arriving at 8.40am. Blame it on the weather! It is too cold.
Drop my bags in the lab, head to my locker next to get my uniform, off to the ladies to put it on.
Back to the lab to have a quick look at the retail products left on the bench for me
Out to the production area to see what the production workers are up to. Say my good mornings to them, if not some of them will be upset at me. Why didn't you say good morning? Why didn't we see you this morning? Where were you.....etc? Are you happy? Everything ok? Full of concerns from these people.
Today is somewhat a little different, it is one of the girls birthday, i have been reminding myself not to forget about this. Wished her happy birthday, and the next thing i know she grabbed my hand, handed me a chocolate roche, looked at me and indicated stay silent! I have no idea how she sneaked a box of chocolate roche into the factory. Not even sure whether this is acceptable or not, told her so long i don't see anyone in the factory eating roches it is fine.
The routine follows, into the lab to do some benchwork on the products and then out to the production area to keep my eye on the 5 packing lines which i'm currently responsible for. I'm constantly on my feet and the only time i get to sit down is during lunch time. On a good day, there will not be any issues at all.
On a more interesting day, i get products/packaging that do not meet specification. Ahh, not particularly happy about this but it happens every now and then.
I get nervous all the time when i hear complaints from customers. Have i signed off on something which i shouldn't have signed off, have i overlooked some of the details? Really have to be cautious about my judgment.
Do I have an interesting job? Sounds interesting? It is exhausting and the beauty of this is i've done enough exercise everyday, in fact more than enough.
Sunday, July 08, 2007
Campari
2 Waterfront Place, Port Melbourne, VIC 3207
I was at Campari earlier this afternoon for lunch. The interior is huge, nice and cosy. It felt as though the place is separated in sections:-for meals, desserts and drinks. There is a mini bar like set-up offering a selection of drinks. The exterior of this place offers waterfront 'dining on the deck' experience. It would be great during summer, autumn and late spring, basking under the sun enjoying the food at the same time.
Few of the interior pictures which i've taken:
Let me warn you, the meals are quite pricy in this place, mains averaging of AUD 28-35. The Entrees are approximately AUD 20. I had Pappoutsakia-stuffed eggplant topped with cheese. Yummy, i love eggplant. I shall attempt to make my own stuffed eggplant in near future.
The huge range selection of desserts will make you salivate. If you're a sweet tooth person, i'm sure you won't be able to resist the temptation.
I chose to try something which i haven't tried before, which is Diples, a Greek sweet type dessert.
It wasn't that bad, quite nice, soft, not crunchy, a deep fried pastry, served with honey, crushed walnuts, Halva ice-cream and cinnamon sprinkled on them.
The service was great, it didn't take long for the food to come. I would definitely come back again to try other food, awww there is just a huge selection of dishes from all corners of the Mediterranea to try on, tapas, pizzas, pastas spit roasts and my next selection would have to be the Portugese style rotisserie chicken and this is going to cost me AUD 28. Won't visit this place for a while, maybe not till end of the year.Saturday, July 07, 2007
New baby named-Toshiba
After few months of contemplation, I finally bought myself a new toy! It wasn't a cheap toy and I wouldn't have part with my old toy if it wasn't because it is sooo old that it will die anytime from now. There were constant symptoms of old age, one of them being:--couldn't shut down, 3 days in a row (the worse i've ever experienced) and i had to conduct an emergency shut down (unplug the power cord).
-built in fan/cooler was operating really loudly
This sent me off to the 'paranoid' farm instantly! I did a whole system recovery installation afterwards, but it didn't improve at all. It gotten worse afterwards and started:-
-shutting itself down nearly every 2 days after 4 hours max of operation
-passed the shutting down, but yet unsuccessful and i could hear the fan/cooler running really loud
It probably had had enough of me. Yes, I'm referring to my laptop. It didn't take me long to do some research or rather pretty much I know which brand I would go for. I settled on TOSHIBA, without doubt. I wanted something that is reliable like many of us consumers expect, meet the basic operations and most importantly budget. Instantly, TOSHIBA Satellite A200/M01 met all the needs on my list.
I'm happy and love you baby, you have everything I need. I'm such an old school, how did i live without CD writer, DVD player, no wireless internet, no build in camera. I was on Intel M Processor. Geeee!
Time for a change!
Wednesday, July 04, 2007
Chocolate Dream
Few days ago, i had a little adventure. Actually,it all happened in my dream. In this dream, i had won myself a Chocolate (Cadbury) factory tour ticket. I was experiencing the 'Charlie' character in the Chocolate Factory. Charlie and Chocolate Factory is a famous children book written by Roald Dahl.I was surrounded by chocolates and many happy chirpy people (strangely, they weren't Oompaa Loompas from Loompaland). It was an overwhelming experience, the smell of cocoa in the air and surrounded by loads of chocolates. Sadly, it was all dream, wouldn't it be nice to work in a Chocolate Factory.
Cadbury UK has an interesting web-page http://www.cadbury.com/, currently it has a Cadbury new Flake girl, chocolate games and mini cards which you could send it to your friends.
Sunday, July 01, 2007
Scones
I made some scones this morning for the Destinos Cafe get together meeting held in the afternoon. Destinos Cafe is a cafe in Richmond AOG Church at Griffiths St, Richmond. We were asked to bring a plate each to share amongst us. My initial plan was to make some sweet potatoes patties which is healthy and helps bowel movement. I changed my mind due to few reasons:--i do not have enough sweet potatoes
-preparation + cooking time required will be more than 1 hour
-it is cold and wet out there, don't feel like visiting Safeway, too cozy to stay indoor
Scones, came to mind instantly, scones with cream and jam and a cup of hot drink is always good during winter. All i need to do is prepare the dough, bake it in the oven and i have few packets of plain flour, self raising flour, few blocks of butter handy at home.
I'm glad it worked, nice and soft. It makes me happy. Yayy, I can make scones! Recipes can be obtained from various web-page.
I'm glad it worked, nice and soft. It makes me happy. Yayy, I can make scones! Recipes can be obtained from various web-page.