It’s not like I have been extremely busy during my off days so not sure why I am not back here more often..for starters, this platform is really not conducive for posting which is baffling really. It doesn’t work well on safari, and there are no good apps for it, not even third party ones! Guess nobody really uses blogger anymore (or even blogs much) and to be honest I am still here only for sentimental reasons - realistically Wordpress would have been a better platform but oh well. 

So close to five months of the year is over...can’t say nothing much has happened. But nothing new has happened, which explains why I don’t feel like writing sometimes because it gets repetitive. Let’s see...

Chinese New Year - went on the usual BKK trip. Actually the mother has been questioning if we should go somewhere else in recent years but I think my sister and I were kind of unwilling to change much - for me this is kind of a family tradition and something I associate CNY with, and something I tried to hang on to even though there isn’t really a good reason to la to be honest. To the extent that we go the same number of days every year (I am willing to compromise on this though), and almost kept to the same routine every year other than the odd random new places we go and never go back again. And my dad doesn’t even do much when we are on trip, basically just finding somewhere to chill while we walked around because of lack of interest and just general old age catching up with his physicality.

I do wonder sometimes what will happen if we do start our own families eventually. This tradition will cease to exist probably haha. And just writing this statement alone is pretty strange considering my sister and I are both in/nearly in our 30s. 

Post CNY - the first thing that I remembered was that I injured my left foot on a Monday morning on my way to work. It rained overnight and the kerbs were still wet and as I stepped up a kerb on my left foot it slid off and I dun reli know how/why but I think the end result is that I stretched a ligament or something. Thought I could walk it off but it didn’t happen and I was limping around for the rest of the day with significant amount of pain, couldn’t apply any pressure on it whatsoever. And stubborn me didn’t even visit a doctor or even a 推拿 shifu because it felt better the next day. And progressively better for the rest of the week so I just limped about everywhere I go -.- and cabbed for longer distances like to and from work. And hosted a long overdue house warming BBQ at the end of the week even lolol.

It took me almost three weeks before I felt like I can walk with my normal pace and over a month before I can wear my shoes without feeling a thing or slow jog a bit. Duno if this is a sign of age or what hahaha. For the record there is still a slight tinge when I apply pressure on my foot sideways though not that I need to do that usually.

Speaking of house warming (cooling) - one of the items on my agenda post-CNY was to negotiate for a new tenancy deal. Priority was to stay on but I wasn’t opposed to the idea of shifting really. But eventually got lazy and new house search didn’t go too well actually, halfheartedly messaged a place which I thought looked excellent and didn’t get an enthusiastic reply so that bit of fire went out. Tried unsuccessfully to lower rent, also halfhearted coz I wasn’t expecting that anyway, was gonna ask for 1 year extension as per my original contract and the agent asked if I wanted to sign 2 years instead so I thought I would make this a condition. Because they need me just as much as I need the place mah. This place isn’t exactly renting very well I feel. No lowering of rental in the end coz owner’s reason (or more like agent’s reason, I suspect she didn’t even try) is that this is the market rate alr. Lol actually based on my research market rate is even higher la so nvm I went with it and all I negotiated in the end was to fix the toilet down light finally hahah which they were even reluctant to zzzz. Could have done it myself but it needed a bit of false ceiling patching work so nope. I suspect all these went down without owner’s knowledge actually and agent just forked out on their end but whatever. 2 more years here.

On a similar note, out of curiosity I went to take a look at a new condo launch and got myself harassed by this uber persistent agent. It’s somewhat affordable, one of the most affordable ones in recent years and the location is not too bad, so I was almost tempted to finally purchase my first property. But stopped short because I was still cutting it a bit too close financial wise and given that I am seriously considering citizenship it would have been a waste to spend on the Additional buyer’s stamp duty for non-citizens so I decided to just wait it out, something the agent disagrees with and on surface appears to respect my decision but continue to passive-aggressively pursue her agenda weeks after our meeting until I decided to stop replying her messages. Jeez. Agents. 

But the decision is there la. Parents were in town for transit a couple of days after the decision to wait and took the opportunity to get their blessings for what I am about to pursue i.e citizenship. Dad was all for it or more specifically he was all for me to make my own decision while mum was a bit hesitant but didn’t say much. Yep. Submitted and now...we wait. 

Then was sick for almost a month. Caught something just prior to a Qing Ming trip to Malacca and when I came back (doesn’t help that mum was full on coughing in that trip) it blew up. Actually end up taking 3 days of MC in total which came at a bit of an inconvenient time coz of Lornie (maybe that one deserved a post on its own) but was grateful nonetheless. Doc actually wanted to give me the week off ahahaha coz he said it’s a virus that just needed rest for it to go away. Good one doc I shall visit you next time even though your queue is horrendous. But it took me almost a month to shake off the last bit of cough, and to be fit enough for...

Sabah trip! Ok so story is, over CNY we found out that San is getting married! First in SLSTV (and looking increasingly like the only one) so we all got excited. Wedding date is next February so plenty of time to get fit and what not but we thought there was a bit of regret maybe? Over the proposal which was really lacking from what we hear so we thought of doing something. Found a window to travel so with the excuse of trying out glamping (we alr talked about this late last year) we tried to secretly get the 男主角 on board for a re-proposal to no avail oh well. Coz we couldn't exactly say it upfront and dude didn't really catch the drift. In the end it’s just an impromptu photoshoot with lots of quality time spent together. Picked up where we left off as usual and loved every minute of it. And amazing how technology made everybody a qualified photographer hahaha.

Ok that’s about all. There’s a trip coming up again so whoops the next post is probably gonna be travel related again. In fact planning a couple more trips this year including the long one with the gang! Yay in my 30s and everybody is getting married and having kids and what not and I am thinking about trips ahahah.