Recognize this?

"I had fun today .....ZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzz"

That's what the small one said before falling asleep in the car.

Slipped my mind that the big one had to go off to Hanoi this morning. I had invited a couple of my friends and their kids, the small one's friends, over for lunch. But the party had to go on and so after dropping off the Big One at the airport, it was cook cooking all the way till noon.

On the table:
Japanese curry with rice.
Romaine lettuce salad with 2 kinds of cherry tomatoes, alfalfa sprouts & feta cheese & some of my lovely pickled carrots and onions
Steamed tofu topped with homemade meatballs & ginkgo nut
Steamed crab claws garnished spring onions

On the curry paste package, it says, makes 12 portions.........but 6 adults and 4 kids (all under the age of 5) managed to polish off a bucket of steamed rice, a full pot of curry, 2 tubs of tofu/meatball and about 50 crab claws (albeit tiny ones) and a huge bowl of salad.

Later, we all went swimming and when we came back, the little people started asking for biscuits and between them, consumed about 20 biscuits and a jug of milo in about as much time as it took to put them on the table.

(",)

...I had fun today too! Goodnight*

It's $10!

After all that trouble! The bank called. Tells me it's $10 and that it's been credited into my account. (",)

One hundred Jonathan(s), Jon(s) or Jonny(s)

ONE HUNDRED!!!! I'm *connected* to 100 Jonathans, Jons or Jonnys by at least 1 mutual friend on facebook. I'm so amazed!!! Really... !!!

Was looking for a Jonathan... kinda lost touch with a group of *friends* I used to hang out with, from somewhere in my past.

4D

Not the Singapore Pools 4D. But I've been trying to understand what is 4-Dimensional for the longest time. I still don't get it!!!

>> Coming from someone who:
(i) doesn't play 3D games simply because it makes her giddy and confused
(ii) doesn't dive because the sea body is in 3D
(iii) doesn't like flying because ...again the sky above is 3D

Unlikely the brain-lock will be broken anytime soon.

Face Value

So for some reason, the big one kept a $10 note for a very very long time... long enough for it to disintegrate upon touch and become two separate pieces. It also was infested with some tiny powerdery black dust... and I suspect that was what ate up the note. YUCKY!

But who throws money away right? So he put the note...or rather pieces into a small recycled zip-lock bag - those plastic ones that holds medication type. Anyway, he kept it for a further many more weeks before going, "Eh, when you going to the bank? You go to the bank ok?"

And so I went to the bank, like any good wife would. *sigh*

Anyway, visiting the bank was good, because I learn today that you can never trust the face value of the note that you're holding!

The front desk lady took a look at the note, went to the back office with it, and came back to me saying, "Need to send it to MAS. Maybe it's only worth half now."

The comment threw me off!

"What do you mean by it's only worth half? It's $10 isn't it?"

Well, apparently, if only half the note / or if you don't have a single note with both the horizontal and vertical serial number showing in the same piece, then potentially MAS will only refund you half of the note's face value ( which apparently happened before).

Ok, so I asked her - you have both pieces, so how can it be HALF the value when you have both the pieces with matching serial numbers?

Her response... "Your security line is missing!"

Alright, no point arguing... let's see what MAS says about the value of my ( yes, mine now! ) $10.

So, how really? Put money in the bank not safe, keep money at home, it gets eaten up by bugs!

***to be continued...

Iron Lady's Replacement

The iron lady stopped calling... quite a while back actually and I did forget about her until yesterday, when I picked out a dress that I bought - a while back but have not worn and noticed... a small hole. On closer inspection, I realized that it's a small hole with an accompanying streak of melted fibres. Arghhhhhhh!!!!

But hey, on the cleaning front. We hired a new part-time helper.

On her first day, she broke my new box of blusher. She reported the event to me, telling me that she dropped it. (I didn't think much of it until I saw an empty box. The cake must have broken off from the casing and she cleaned it up! Threw them all away and left me with a very new empty box...To feel 60 odd dollars go POOF!*** just like that, is upsetting)

The next thing that she threw away, was her own IC. Yes, she threw it down the chute when I gave it back to her after scanning it! Thankfully, the door to the end of the chute at the basement was not locked and we ...well, she, managed to retrieve it.

Anyway, first day blunders aside, she's been great.

***THINK**** Have you ever made mistakes at work that resulted in a loss for your employer? What did they do?

12th April EGGHUNT

Save-the-date for this year's EGGHUNT... it's going to be MEGA! The kids have grown...it's not going to be a simple case of placing it on the floor and urging them towards it, nor easy pickings off the most obvious places.

Plus this year, I'm going to introduce something new - $$FINE$$ for any parent caught helping their kids out! ***Hahhaha!!!*

By the way, RACKS and racks of KINDER SURPIRSE EGGS are back on the supermarket shelves! (They went missing last year!) Even better, they are back with more heat resistant packaging!

Keep your ears open!

A problem.

boy: Can we do different things every day?
me: Yes.
boy: But then there is something we cannot do differently.
me: Okay, ...what is that?
boy: You got to work right? ...
me: Yes...?
boy: ...and I got to go to school right?
me: Yes!
boy: That is a problem that we need to solve!

***I burst out laughing!
Well well well my dear boy, you are most welcomed to solve that problem!

A gem...

I asked X, whom I happen to have hired and therefore worked with me, to explain something 'technical' to me... after 2 tries, I was still confused and told X so and X subsequently came up with this:

Give an example scenario.

Let's say for some human error, A and B were given the same IC number (they were not the same person.Purely strangers).

Both of them were not aware of that.

One day A went online to check his account. He found that no book were borrowed under his name.

He was very happy and decided that he would be going to the library later.

And B, coincidently, was already at the library borrowing books.

When A reached the library, to his confusion, he noticed that his books quota was already filled.

But he was not the one who those books.

Is that a good example?

Please let me know if you are stilll confused.

It made me laugh so hard!

And hours later, I realized I still don't get it but have decided to park it, for the gem of such a story spun.

1st attempt at a career

I was very proud of him when this morning, he queued and paid for something on his own. This bravery somehow extended to this afternoon, when the same four and a half year old decided to launch his first ever career.

The boy, who has never had his hair cut by a professional, somehow got his hands on a pair of scissors and opened shop in his grandma's kitchen. His first client? His very own soon to be two year old cousin.

He's probably still standing at a corner right now.

Tadpoles

We caught 15 tadpoles on Sunday.

One died last night...and another this morning. Still 14 left (apparently I have miscounted).

After some discussion with my niece today, she recommend, rather than let tap water stand in the sun for 5 days to neutralize the water, that I should find a pond from which I should scoop some more water from.

Did that.

What do tadpoles eat by the way? I've been feeding them bread crumbs.

Google Adwords | World Population

I was playing around with Google Adwords earlier... punched in some keywords like 'clothes','handbags' and 'reduced prices' and it was interesting to look at the results.

These numbers below are the approx. average monthly number of search queries that were performed on Google and the search network over a recent 12-month period.

Shoes = 45.5 mil
clothing = 30.4 mil
shirts = 20.4 mil
dresses = 13.6 mil
boots = 13.6 mil
hangbags = 7.6 mil
jeans = 7.6 mil
hats = 4 mil
cheap clothes = 0.1 mil

I also checked THIS
There are about 6.7 billion people on this earth. (I didn't know that)
There are about 305 million people in the United States of America. ( I didn't know that either)

Change & Organizations

...there is nothing more difficult to carry out, nor more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to handle, than to initiate a new order of things. For the reformer has enemies in all those who profit by the old order, and only lukewarm defenders in all those who would profit by the new order, this lukewarmness arising partly from fear of their adversaries...and partly from the incredulity of mankind, who do not truly believe in anything new until they have had actual experience of it.
—Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince

I think the ideal size of any company of the future is no more than 250 employees. Even if you ended up with 40,000 employees, the 251th employee onwards just creates work for the rest of the other employees. I'm definitely guilty of that too...since when I joined my company, there was 17,000 employees...

Money

Him: Citibank shares at $1.50... AIG is 42 cents
Me: Arh? So cheap arh! Can buy a not?
Him: I don't know how to buy US shares.
Me: Wait, they need the US garmen to bail them out right?
Him: Yar...
Me: So they shouldn't even be worth that much!
*pause*
Me: Whey, our money in the bank safe a not? Should we put them under our pillows?
Him: Our garmen guarantees all saving deposits.
Me: Oh. Right.
*pause*
Me: But so where do they keep their money? Under their pillow?
Him: ??!??

Hilarious!

Here’s the note the teacher received the next day.

Dear Mrs. Jones,

I wish to clarify that I am not now, nor have I ever been, an exotic dancer.

I work at Home Depot and I told my daughter how hectic it was last week before the blizzard hit. I told her we sold out every single shovel we had, and then I found one more in the back room, and that several people were fighting over who would get it.

Her picture doesn’t show me dancing around a pole. It’s supposed to depict me selling the last snow shovel we had at Home Depot.

From now on I will remember to check her homework more thoroughly before she turns it in.

Sincerely,
Mrs. Smith