HOMELESS

Yeap. That's my state for the Penang trip. Yes I'm going to Penang. No its not for fun. I have my 1st night's stay at a business class hotel. After that my lodging is indefinite. YMCA is fully booked. Apparently the Hong Kong Hotel is quite dodgy and not suitable for three women. And I don't feel too good about bunking out at my colleague's friend's house because

I know Ange for less than 2 months...
Not so nice lah...
Its a guy's house...
Not like I know these people very well also...

I'm repeating myself I know.

I'm going to bunk in with Jece. That's in Island Glades.

Anyway.... Hi penang.... if i don't get Internet access, I'll be away for a few days. Photos await, of course.


  ¶ 22:30

  IN A BOX

My coursemate's 11R sized photograph decided that it should sit NOT in any of our bags, but instead, head onto the box that we're packing the seminar materials with. All of us will be carrying canvas lugging bags, and the photo would not fit at all, plus the additional 8 R sized stuff might just get crumpled/folded and all... Well, here comes my claimage.... Its a freaking RM 50 bucks for the photo!!

I'm still having trouble getting cheap accommodation. I was supposed to be sleeping with Jece, but because I promised to share the room with my two colleagues (when I thought it was cheaper considering the fact that we were continueing the company seminar package price)... but now apparently we're told that after splitting the bill, we would still have to dish out about RM 150 per person for a very nice and comfy 5 star hotel room which none of us really need. Another colleague promised he'd try to arrange lodging for us, so whilst I have personal lodging, because... well, you know what... we're rather prepared to spend the night at the beach. Rather a romantic notion, don't you think?

My boss said, 'Enjoy yourself this weekend!'

She's not coming with us because the long weekend's supposed to be quality time with the family, for her.

Little does she know that we're going nuts with the business of working, looking for accommodation, listening to the authors whine... and myself, studying for the exam that is supposed to be 3 hours long but for which I'm only going to sit in for 1 1/2 hours the most BECAUSE I need to get to the airport on time to catch my AIR ASIA plane.

I'm still worried about the accommodation. I guess if we really had to, I'd have to split the cost of the hotel room with them. Means be more thrifty lor.... no more gifts for friends. SORRY!!!!!   ¶ 22:30

  ERM....

Today was not a bad day at all. Completed the manuscript editing of the new Excel in English book (its written in line with 'the ministry approved textbook') and allowed the authors some leeway by promising to help them compile the stuff ... I'm supposed to be still under training, so I'm not supposed to complain so much. And I'm supposed to be studying, although right now I can only think of 'height of tongue' and 'degree of tongue retraction'... I'm in that part of linguistics studies where you learn phonetics and phonology, and I actually did an entire course on this earlier this year and hated the course so much, I can't believe I'm studying it all over again. Talk about deja vu at its worse. Now repeat after me, height of tongue : close, half close, half open, open...

Speaking of tongue, tastebuds, lips, protuding, oral cavities... what do you think of?



Just for the heck of it. I thought it looks quite gory and scary. Poor chicken. Tasted delicious though.... Ahem. Its pinkish because long hours of boiling the lotus root dyed the skin red.

  ¶ 23:30

  BLOGGER'S BLOCK

Four days of not blogging and I'm still suffering from blogger's block. Its like up there in the mind where all the creative juices are supposed to flow... well, everything's dried up like one of those Sunsweet prunes. Yuckie. I'm resorting to a 'reportative' entry:

This coming Friday morning's going to be my General Linguistics mid semester paper. This is the only masters course I'm taking this sem that actually requires a mid-semester paper. Costs a whopping 50% of the total 100, and well, its a 3 hour paper and I have to study well enough to be able to finish it within 1/2 hour. Going somewhere this merdeka weekend for a company seminar. My brain's all locked with this jamming shots of worries that seems to send warning impulses every 10 minutes: DEADLINE UP! DEADLINE UP!

Deadline's not up, but that's how it goes in publishing. Any publishing. While newspaper publishing goes by the day, we go by certain targeted weeks or days. The biggest differences is we're looking at at least 160 pages of manuscript or page proofs per editor, whereas in newspaper, we're looking at the day's news, which can vary from a short article to a full fledged cover story which may run several pages. Either way, publishing is one hectic career to head into. Team that up with a personal will to do a post-graduate degree at the same time, and you get over kill.

Sometimes.

Other times, I really enjoy it.

I guess that's life. Oh well, can't wait for the weekend when I can go for my very first working holiday, all transport and accommodation expenses paid.   ¶ 18:27

  THURSDAY IS HELLO KITTY DAY!!!!!

To all that hate Hello Kitty, I'm so sorry for this dedicated Hello Kitty post. But if you're Malaysian and speak at least two languages and own a blog of your own as well, stay a while 'cos after this 'presentation' of my new train set, there's serious things to attend to...

But before that!!!!! Here's the goodies!!!!!!! The final set of the McDonald's Hello Kitty trainset... this is Flower Girl Kitty ...



HEHEHE... CUTE? OKAY OKAY ... down to business.

Doing Research

This totally applies if you are Malaysian and are fluent in at least two languages, dialects included. I need a HUGE favour from you all.

Well, Minishorts is doing some 'armchair' research for one of her papers entitled 'Bilingualism'. I have one week to compile the data for this short research. I know that the language of blogging for Malaysians is typically English / Malay, but I do read excerpts and posts where the writer lapses into strings of sentences where he/she code-switches (code switching is a linguistic term which basically means, in layman's term, mixing two or more languages together in a sentence).

Do you see where this is going? Minishorts hopes that she'll be able to compile a few blog entries that are written in what is typically known as 'rojak' Malaysian. Notice I did not label the language 'English' because, well, in some cases, code switches occur so frequently in strings of sentences that what you get is no longer one language. "We switch codes so often that I have no idea what language we are speaking, but it makes perfect sense."

That's the sign of a true bilingual, I think, and which many Malaysians are. Now a typical multilingual blog post would be something like this one here which I wrote quite some time ago and in which I got flamed by someone who said that it was bad English.

So here, if you can find your old posts that are written in mixed languages, as well as following posts that rectify the mixed-language post by giving reasons to why you are doing so, please write to me at my e-mail!!!

This shall serve to be one of my pilot studies in my efforts to discover a good observation setting to work my postgraduate thesis. And I think you have an idea already about what I really have in mind.

THANK YOU VERY MUCH! ARIGATO GOZAIMASU! TERIMA KASIH, DOR CHEH, GAM SIAH and XIE XIE NI MEN!!!

  ¶ 23:08

  MINISHORTS DOES A MUM-MUM

The closer blog-pals who've been on a personal chat basis with me would know about my recent addiction to both Wena the darling and her blog, and how I've been inspired to be take photos of food as well.

Mom was making Wan Tans the other day, that's chinese dumplings. Its a non-halal dish in my home, cos our wan tans have minced pork, prawn and coriander leaves in it. Here's what it looks like before it hits the stove:


My hands were a little shaky when I took this one, not very good at taking photos when my mom is chasing me away. HAHA... Oh well, there's the wantan waiting to be cooked. Flame's on medium, btw. And that's clear water. The stock's supposed to be chicken stock, my mom boils it in another pot and dishesout the wantan first, then only pours the clear soup over it, so that it looks better.


Ready to be served. Garnish with coriander leaves and spring onions.


Oh yeah, by the way, I thought this pic looked quite nice:

These are roasted chicken wings. They have very good ones in Jalan Alor, near Bukit Bintang, but where I stay, near Steven's Corner, the chicken wings are good as well. Very, very nice, very, very tasty.

And my staple diet at Steven's Corner everytime I go there (that's at least once weekly):

This is Roti Tisu (pronounced 'tissue'). Its a crispy, conical wafer coated with sugar on the underneath. I really, really like it.  ¶ 21:51

  GOOD TESTS

Rarely does one come by these. Sharing them with ya:

Take the easier one first....


Then this...

  ¶ 23:04

  HIT IN THE FACE

I'm so insulted. My new over 50-years old colleague just told me that I have eye bags. "Surprisingly you have eyebags for someone at so young an age!"

She was telling me about her intention to get her eyebags 'surgically' removed.

I had to say this (stupid thing, stupid choice of words), "Well, usually people with larger eyes do have eye bags you know."

"Your eyes are SMALL. Not really big."

I terasa pulak. Like pinch in my ego. I'd always thought that I had reasonably sizable eyes. Not huge. But larger than many people. I smiled.


"You don't get enough sleep is it?" said the woman again. I was simmering inside, and I managed a friendly, "Yes, you know lah... have to study at night."

"Oh... yeah me too. 2-3 am every night. Chatting on MSN chat ler..."

Minishorts tried to look at her work and pretended to be as busy as possible to quit the subject before I burst in embarassed anger after being 'constructively' criticized like that.

See if you want to criticize someone, use more 'society-friendly' words please.

I thought I was brutally honest. Apparently there are people who think that everybody walks around with crocodile hides as skins.

If you're wondering why my new colleague is over 50, that's because in my department, usually people who have 'acceptable' English come from the colonial period education policy generation. Didn't I tell you that I'm the youngest in my department?

That probably serves to help me overcome this bubbling fume over the 'eye-bag' business.  ¶ 15:33

  SLEEPY

I have no idea what got into me. I've been sleeping non-stop for two days. Yesterday after work, the sofa downstairs (now ignore the fact that its not a very comfy sofa being antique rosewood with a very, very thin piece of mattress) play-acted as Minishorts' bed for 3 hours. Then I had dinner. Then I had some fruits. Then, after a good viewing of Bruce Almighty (VCD, clear, very, very clear), I washed up and sank into the REAL bed at 11 pm. I have not slept at 11 pm for 3-4 months. That's not supposed to be strange really, the strange thing is how I could 'nap' for 3 hours in the afternoon and still feel lethargic at 11 pm.

Nonetheless, woke up at 7 am this morning, drove out to Klang for prayers and came back, loafed around Carrefour Sri Petaling stuffing my stomach with free samplings and all. Came home at 3 pm, took a nice cold shower (even though the weather's rather cold) and then... yup... fell flat on the hard mattress sofa again. I think it was around 3.45 when I eyes shut (under two COLD used green tea bags). When I opened my eyes again it was 7 pm.

Nuts.

Oh well, took a look at the stuff I'm supposed to do over the weekend... there's like 11 chapters for me to complete and hand in tomorrow, so that I can start with the soft copy editing, and here I am. I wonder if I'll fall into bed right after Taken tonight. Been surfing around for 15 minutes and was shocked to see that she is going on hiatus. Said goodbye and all that. What's with the people on my blogroll??!!!!!!! Almost everyone I love to read is going on hiatus!!!!!!!!! AAAARGGGGGGHHH .... consolation aside, this phenomenon is scary.

Maybe I should do the same thing?   ¶ 21:39

  TRACING HISTORY

As my blogging 1st year anniversary gets closer, I thought I wanted to trace a little bit of the history. Well, a few months ago I guess clicking on the previous posts where I was still 1 part of a 'healthy' couple would hurt too much, but now since I'm better... tracing history has become kinda fun... and sorta made me realise several things. In particular, reading the 100 things about me posts: #1-#20, #21-#40, #41-#60,#61-#80and #81-#100 that I wrote way, way back in October near my birthday then, well, I guess I finally gained enlightenment in some ways.

A line from the 100 things about me lists opened my eyes:

72. I cry a lot. My boyfriend says I'm a faulty water tap. He says he doesn't know how to fix me.

Scary huh?

You know, after he left me, as in, after I finally got a grip of myself, that's like 2-3 months or so after the break, I finally stopped crying. And right now, I wouldn't cry if you made me. Even with the ordeal on Tuesday, Minishorts could not cry, because there's no need to cry.

I really wonder, was I happy with him?

See, now I know what I want. I want someone who will actually accept me for who I am. Take me for my idiosyncracies and my silly blogging habits! This crazy penchant for Hello Kitty and this horrid tendency to behave partly Chinese educated - partly Western educated and this horrid tendency to get nit-picky about grammar and structures when confronted with formal texts written for formal domains. Someone who can 'tahan' my sometimes what hokkien people would call 'ai bin' (literally, 'want face') attitude - since I was born in Singapore, I also want someone who can accept that I'm naturally kiasu. Somebody who knows how horridly messy and clumsy I am, forgetful and sometimes disgusting (I sometimes dig my nose in public if I think no one is looking) habits... the morning sinuses and the urge to go take a bath everytime I feel sticky. Someone who can take it if I go say that 'URGH you smell,' toss a towel at him and send him into the bath, several times until I'm happy that he's sweet smelling (see I like clean, clean people even though I'm not very clean myself). Someone who can take it if I'm right most of the time, or if I'm wrong, someone who can tell me cutely... I want someone practical, not someone who comes near to me and uses 'baby talk' to try to make me happy or call me silly names in front of people, or do weird, possessive 'She's my girl' signals to friends and family in public.

Demanding, eh?

OK. Cut the crap. I want this: someone who makes me laugh and makes me happy, who will never make me cry.

Had a chat with a good friend today. He was telling me to get out and date some people. I told him that I wasn't looking, is that fine. He said to remember that I was already 22. And remember about 'long term' investments. Apparently a female colleague of his told him about genetically programmed mindsets of males and females. That its okay to be a 40-ish guy without a girlfriend, but its not okay to be a 32 year old woman without a partner. If Minishorts is doomed to be single the rest of her life, would 'doomed' be the right word?

Who wants to date Minishorts?

If you're nice I might consider ya, but remember what I said: I'm not looking!   ¶ 01:22

  THURSDAY'S REPORT

Thursday's report has to be cheery no matter what because, Thursday is the day when Hello Kitty comes a-visiting!!!!!! Herewith, I shall present to you, Railway Station Kitty, with Shinkansen 3 near the famous Coffee Bean Tower!!!



Apart from that I've just handed up my Second Language Acquisition term paper that will supply around 20% of my grades. Now that I look at it, I think I wrote an absurdly long piece, or maybe Prof. Karen was kidding when she said that its got to be between 20 to 25 pages long? Today's going to be another long night as I attempt to catch up on my Applied Linguistics reading materials and think of something to write into the AP journal. And then, yes, tomorrow I have classes from 12 - 2.30, discussion from 2.30 to 3.00, another class at 3 - 6 pm and then finally, General Linguistics with Prof Loga from 6-9pm. Now where can I find time for lunch and dinner?

If you're interested in reading my paper entitled 'Second Language Acquisition: Understanding Motivation and Attitudes as Challenges of The Individual Learner', you may click on this smiley:

Be warned! Its very technical, and quite dry. But for those of you who are interested in pursuing your studies in the field of English language studies / linguistics, it'll give you an idea of what we nutsy people do. Nothing to do with lots of languages, really. Don't say I didn't warn you!  ¶ 23:40

  AT THIS MOMENT

She feels calm because she knows that she was not in the fault. At the same time she feels sorry that she was unable to brake on time. Right now he's in the ward with a broken arm and a leg that went through surgery. For how many days, we still do not know. She thinks that she will get some fruits and visit the guy tomorrow, apologize regardless. She looks at the cracked bumper and curses silently at the horrible luck that just befell her on the 15th day of the 7th Chinese Lunar Calendar month, and she guess that she's fortunate she's not injured in anyway, although emotionally and mentally shaken ... well, that - she is.

She thinks she's got to get some things for the very kind colleagues at the workplace who accompanied her to the station to do the reports, as well as to send the guy to the hospital. More so, to scare away the fierce, gangster-like men who tried to scare the wits out of her by forcing her to give them her handphone and her IC Number. "Don't give it to them, just stay put and wait till we come," the colleagues had said.

When she thinks about what happened, she sees everything moving before her in slow motion. The lights turned green. She pushed the car forward, ready to turn to the right. Then a motorbike appears before her, swerving and falling. She horned. The car couldn't stop in time. He fell, hitting her bumper. The guy started cursing at her. She stood out, in horror, because she was just driving the car back after a RM 110 service at the EON service centre which included a car wash. She remembered the money she spent just 3 days ago for polishing. She stares at the man, "How could you speed out like that? Are you okay?"

And he had said, "I can forgive you, just send me to a hospital."

"I don't know. Goodness, I just sent my car for servicing. How can you speed out like that? Are you okay?"

And the scary motorists had appeared as she tried plunking the number pad of her mobile to get her colleagues to come 'save' her.

And that was how the nightmare started. Now that the guy is in the ward, she's still worried sick. About everything, the guy, her car, her friends from the office, the job, the studies, her mom, herself.

Right now, right now...

*I thought everything was going okay, after what happened in February. I thought I'm okay. I need to go do something.*   ¶ 22:53

  BAD DAY

I had an accident today. I'm not going to tell you the details. I had an accident today. We don't know whose fault it is. We were both turning into the same corner... My car just stopped. The guy was hurt. We took him to a hospital. I'm okay. My car is hurt.

I'm okay. I guess.

Times like this I really miss having someone to care for me.

This is when I would really appreciate a good hug and a kiss on the forehead, someone telling me, 'It'll be okay, because I'm here for you.'   ¶ 21:37

  THE EXPERIENCE

I remember the time we were a couple, that was eight months ago. How he used to promise me that I was the one. We were meant to be. That marriage was in the books. How we used to quarrel so much, but because he 'loved' me to pieces, he would do whatever it takes to move our relationship out of the rocks. Take things slowly and bring it forward from there. Because 'we were meant to be.'

A month later, he suddenly wanted to stretch away. Like a rubber band, he stretched far, far away, and I was reluctant to wait for him to bounce back. Actually, I was so confused, that the cold turkey syndrome washed across me. Uncontrollable, like a pitiful wreck, I begged for his return. I called him several times, telling things that I would never had told him in the entire three years that we were dating each other. I even threatened to take my own life! But the rubber band had snapped, and he was not going to bounce back.

I was fortunate to have friends holding on to me. These people called, from far and near, some even drove down every weekend from up in Penang and Perak just to make sure that I was okay and didn't do anything stupid. They called him names and said that he was evil. They told me not to love a man as bad as he was. 'He's not bad. I'm bad. I'm the evil one. That's why he left me.'

But when you convince yourself that 'he was meant to be the one', you lay like a dejected little kitten, wallowing in self pity and yet hopelessly grasping for that single glimpse of light that would tell you, 'Yes, yes, you are right! He is the one... look there, this sign, that sign, these signs, they all show you that he's going to come back!'

In such angst and agony, I was, that I turned to prayer. But that wasn't enough. I needed to know. I turned to divinition, because several little happenings in my life felt like little 'signs' of hope. I asked questions and the answers came back: "He will never come back. You will be friends again, but no more than that."

Three months down the road, I eventually learned to pick up myself. Whilst my love life was a horrendous failure (at that time I thought this was the case), the other aspects of my life began to look up. My friends, whom I've neglected in most of the time when I was totally dedicated to him, they had returned, and together, we worked to build up our neglected friendship ... We have since improved to the extent that now, I wondered what was it in him that made me put my friends aside like that. My studies and career proceeded to improve and I felt happiness and jubilation in the minor successes that I have achieved. At the time that he chose to leave me, I was in the midst of my final year exams and thesis, and the trauma made me want to quit. But thanks to friends and family who forced me to move on, I managed to graduate anyway... and you all know where I am now...

I learned to be happy, because I met new friends. I learned to accept life as it was, and learned to view the world in different perspectives. I noticed that the world was capable of happiness without him, and most importantly, I realised that he made me sad, and whether I love him or not, it was fruitless. Why would I want to be with a man who made me sad and made me think of suicide? That made me realised there was nothing in him for me love anymore, and I had to stop doing so.

But sometimes, I remember the little divine reading that I made for myself based on the readings and calculation. I know the part where we will never be together again is true, but the part where 'you will be friends' has yet to show itself. Accordingly I was supposed to call him sometime ago last month and we would have a quarrel again, but that part never did occur.

The question is, if I have a reading now, that tells me to be wary in making a decision that will most probably affect a good part of my life in the future.... well, if this certain reading foretells bleakness and .... bitter ending.... should I heed the warning?

Sometimes, non-believers would say 'that's all bull'... but you know, when things happen almost exactly as they were forecasted to happen, how can you say that its actually crap?   ¶ 18:14

  BARRY TROTTER AND THE UNAUTHORIZED PARODY

This was what I bought for RM 44.90 yesterday. I should not be spending, but I had to spend. Its a book that has 'not been authorized by J.K. Rowling or the publishers of the Harry Potter books.' But the blurb sounded promising, and the reviews behind were pretty cool.

I'm just plucking a part out of the book for your amusement. This is Chapter One, 'The Trouble With Muddles'... the opening lines: The Hogwash School for Wizards was the most famous school in the wizarding world, and Barry Trotter was its most famous student. His mere presence made sure that each year, twenty candidates applied for every open spot, no matter how rapacious Hogwash's tuition became.... Putting down his copy of 'Existentialism for Beginners', he pulled his wizard pipe from his pocket. He had bought it in Catty Corner, the magical shopping district down in London...

Some people may hate Michael Gerber for making a joke out of it, but well, if the names Alpo Bumblemore, Ermine Cringer, Lon Measly, Serious and Valumart amuses you as much as it does me, why not, right? RM 44.90 is expensive of course, but since OotP was RM 89.90 ... I figured out it would probably be something I'd regret if i didn't buy it.

Here's a pic of the 'unauthorized' copy.

  ¶ 23:23

  PHOTOS

One photo that I'll be submitting to the Mirror Project. This was taken about an hour ago at Siam Kitchen, The Boulevard, Mid Valley.


Actually the point of this post was to show you my Sisley shirt.

  ¶ 23:27

  MINISHORTS DOES A CONFESSIONAL

Disclaimer: I got this from sixthseal.com. I think its a good questionnaire, that's why I'm answering the questions. This is going to be a very long post. You don't have to read it. If you read it and you feel offended, don't hurl bricks at me. I'm just being confessional. And that's not entirely a bad thing. Here goes!

When and why did you start your daily reads list?
You're talking about the links? When I first started blogging, I surfed around other blogs and I saw that it was 'customary'. Obviously it was a part of blogging culture, so I followed suit.

Do you truly visit your daily reads DAILY?
Not every daily read. Some of them I visit several times a day. I know some are on hiatus, and I hope that they come back soon. Others don't blog everyday, so I go in a few times a week to see updates.

Why do you add these people as your daily reads?
Mostly because I enjoy the sites a lot. When I started blogging, my goal was to get as many people as possible to read my blog. Basically I just marathon surfed and collected about ten people that I really enjoyed reading, tagged their guestbooks / tagboards and got linked to theirs. Cool thing is, I actually became friends with some of them! Nowadays, I do reciprocal links only if I enjoy reading sites. And if I find a site that's really great, I do a link, although its not necessary for them to link me in return. In fact, I'd rather not.

How many people are on your daily reads?
In my 'Minishorts Addiction' section, that's the blogroll, I have 35! Now please don't blame me for not visiting all your links everyday!!!

Have you deleted people from your daily reads, if so why?
Yeah. Doesn't everybody do that? People go on hiatus permanently, some of them wrote me personally to ask me to take them off (the really ultra-personal blogs) .... that type. Oh to be really confessional, I do deletion to what I call link-mistakes as well. As in, I thought the site was good, but then it became not so good after that.... so I take it off. Since I don't read it anyway, what's the point?

Do you comment on your daily reads DAILY?
No lah. Are you nuts? Not everything is worth commenting. If I did comment to everything, it'd be like ... saying something just for the sake of saying something. What's the point?

How often do you modify your daily reads?
Often enough. That's thanks to blogrolling.com. Dream come true, that one.

Do you link people on your daily reads only because they linked you?
Yes sometimes. Not all the time. I think I answered this already. If they link me and they're nice to read, nice to see, then alright. If not, I'm not bothered. Usually I go back to sitemeter to see who links me... once in a while you get referrals from new sites, and you'll know that you've just been linked. If the site's worth linking back, then I'll link back. But just because I link back, I still don't go to those sites daily. The ones that I religiously visit remains those very first few ones that I linked up. But they don't blog all that often.

Does daily reads have special meaning to you?
Since I had so many 'rules', OBVIOUSLY YES!!!!!

Your daily reads are mostly (F/M):
You know, there's actually an equal balance there. That's score one for minishorts!
Okay. After typing so much I realized that most of them are Male.

What do you get from reading your daily reads?
Emotional de-stress. Intellectual input. Ideas for me to do my masters dissertation. Updates in 'style' for literature studies. I'm doing my masters in linguistics, but if I were majoring in Literature (which I almost did, but unfortunately didn't because I'm just too lazy), I'd say there's such a myriad of styles in blog-writers' output that its worth doing tonnes and tonnes of ground-breaking research on. Forget Hemingway, forget Dickinson, blogging has since become an art. Amazing. Whoever said that literature, Malaysian literature, is dying out because of 'low standard of English' should really go online and start plugging into Project Petaling Street and get inspired from there.

Are you likely to read LONG blog entries from your daily reads?
Uh oh. Oh dear. My entries are VERY LONG eh? That good or bad? But I read long stuff. Minishorts is a speedreader, and this is not boasting or anything. Its because in my field of work (I'm an editor) I have to hone skills to produce high-volume but quality output. I skim and scan the work, and if its really good, I'll make a second round for the details.

Do you expect your daily reads to read your blog everyday in return?
Are you nuts? Crazy ah? No ler... I'm not even bothered if they link me back in return.

Who on your daily reads has the coolest name?
Wait ah lemme go see.... Issy. That's Isabel. Cool name. I wish she updated more often though. And she writes a mean thing, has great photos.

Who on your daily reads has the coolest layouts?
Go see Arches' site. I think he's a genius.

Who on your daily reads is most likely to comment in your blog?
That's easy. Ryuu. Sixth Seal. Shadowlight. Chocobo.

How many people on your daily reads are your friends in "real life"?
Lesseee... Shadowlight, Ken, Nicster, Gerrard, Darrell, Chui and Chocobo.

Who is the most intelligent or insightful person?
Used to be Teddybwear!!!! But she's gone into permanent hiatus. No substitutes. I don't like substituting people.

Who is the least favorite/most annoying person on your daily reads?
Tarak. If got they wouldn't be on my list would they? Hiaks.

Who is most likely to give you news about the world or internet?
Hmm previously didn't have anyone like that. Niki kua....

Have you ever wanted to meet people on your daily reads?
Yeah why not. I've just never been able to go to one of those big blog meetups because *eeks* I'm a workaholic who works almost 15 hours a day! Not including the time for my studies. *Sniff sniff.* Be glad I have the time for this.

Who do you admire the most?
Graceshu!!! This woman just 'kills' me literally. Amazing stuff.
Archesray!!!!!! Wahlau, his site design is FANTASTIC. F-A-N-T-A-S-T-I-C!!!

Who has an attitude problem?
Who says that having an attitude has to be a problem? Most of my daily reads have attitudes. These are the cool ones: sixthseal.com, Grace, Likki.

Who is the funniest?
That has got to be Gerrard. Oh yeah, he's also hilarious in chatrooms.

Who is the sweetest?
Used to be Cindy. VERY SWEET. Sometimes so sweet you need to tambah air. But she's on hiatus now. Miss her though.

Who is the most out-going?
I have no idea how come sixthseal.com mentioned me as the most out-going... and that my posts are personal!!!! HAHA!!! But for me, the most out-going should be Chocobo. That's cos he's always going out!!!!

Whom can you trust the most?
Wena. Shadowlight. Chocobo.

Whom do you know the best?
Shadowlight, this budak literally lives next to me. Really one. Same kampung. The other one is Chocobo, I think.

Whom do you talk to most online?
Wena and Chocobo.

Who is the lastest daily reads you added?
Rachael. Welcome to my addictions list!!!!

Whose blog do you wish to drool all over on?
Why would I go dirty people's blog like that? HAHAHA. None.
Correction: the more I visit Wena's the more I want to eat up her site. Drooling saliva all over my keyboard!!!!!!!

Whose blog do you enjoy reading the most?
You know. I don't have a clue.

You are least likely to comment on which blog(s)?
What a strange question. I don't know. Its not a non-committal answer. I just really find this a strange question. Probably because I'm not one to go around commenting.

  ¶ 11:12

  HELLO KITTY!!!!!!

Joyce - that's my colleague, thought that she was walking with a crazed 23 year old gal, who, according to her, "Girl, you wear so nice so pretty so sophisticated and you ask me to come and teman you to buy Hello Kitty???!!!"

I bought both the train and the cat.

Tada!!!!!!!!!



Well, a warning: you may prepare for the invasion of the Kitty / Shinkansen family for the next 2 weeks!!!!!!   ¶ 23:05

  WELCOME TO BLOGGER NATION

You know how you have your regular blog-visits to this and that homey-domains? How you walk in eager to find out what's happening in this and that person's life at the moment? How you are greeted with exuberance, anger, joy, excitement... cascades of emotional outbursts, page after page, day after day that you walk into that very private yet so public, almost oxymoronic site that reveals so much, yet so little about that person who chooses to be the entire real self, or not-so-real self... depending on how you really want to look at it?

You get addicted to these people. You read about their lives and you laugh, sometimes you cry. You form an affinity with strangers who are no longer strangers, as the more you read, the more you seem to know these people. You read the excerpts that seem to spill blood, sweat and sometimes, yes, even vomit, and you think, 'Good Lord, what on earth is this person talking about?' but most of the time you go, 'He/she's amazing,' as you see the words flow, line after line, the liquidity of the fluency.

If you own a blog, like I do, you'll get the racy fan-comments. Like 'I love your site!', or 'This is amazing!' and your heart flips happily... you get frequent visitors who come back day after day to read what's going on in your life. Soon you'll find that writing that blog does not become something that you do for yourself entirely, no matter how much you convince yourself that it is. It becomes a kind of a duty to yourself, and tyou readers... you want people to know you're okay. Or if you write pseudo-fictitious posts, you make it a point to drag your a** to the computer and start typing some crap.

And then there are the bad times, for all the good times. You get spammed! By bots promoting porn sites. By people who come in leaving private guestbook messages tell you, 'I'm glad you're fine now,' but not having the guts to tell you in person even though they possess knowledge of how to contact you in real life in all manners possible. You get insulted by people who say that you write bad English *when they don?t even know that this particular blogger just so happens to one of the people who has reviewed many of the MUET exam guidebooks in the country as part of her job*. You get people who either intentionally, or unintentionally test your patience with what you consider accusations and insults. Most of the time its unintentional, I hope.

But most of all, you get addicted to both writing and reading the blogs. You form a relationship with the blogosphere; something that I think has become a living organism of sorts. You know that in this evolutionary and revolutionary thing, there's birth, growth, death and well, several re-births. You visit sites that go on hiatus, either temporary or permanent, and you pray for the owners, hoping that you'll see them return to the society of bloggers again. You pray so earnestly, that you make it a point to leave their links on your blogroll, and you visit the empty sites at least weekly, if only to see a sign of their return.


Mostly, I'm talking about Malaysia. Include the world, and you'll know we're worthy of a pseudo-UN membership... if only to have our voices heard, and our rights protected.

Welcome to Blogger-nation.
  ¶ 09:10

  SHINKANSEN!!!!!!!!!

Whatever it means, it looks mighty cute..... its a little late, and I'm not quite done playing with this super cool flash site that wena told me about! But hey, there's the 1st locomotive in the McD's Hello! Kitty / Dear Daniel trainset.... pretty cute in a freakish way eh? Especially the eyes and all..... but trust me, you'd be impressed by the quality of the toys in this series...

  ¶ 02:51

  STATION MASTER DANIEL!!!!!


Today, Minishorts went to McDonald's and fell in love with the Station Master Daniel!!!!!!!! This is 1/8 of a little railway set featuring Hello! Kitty and her boyfriend Dear Daniel, and 4 cute little locomotives.... Being 20-something sure doesn't make Minishorts lose her penchant for cutesy-cutesy stuff especially the Sanrio buddies!!!!!!!!

Thus begins the Minishorts quest to build this cutesy-cutesy railway set!!!

*BTW, for the ladies only: you know that with the Megasales, Metrojaya's lingerie counter has pretty low prices on the Triumph bras. Some RM79.90 price stuff are going for RM 40 per piece only!! Absolutely worth parting with your dosh to get those essentials.... Seriously. Just head on to any Triumph section in any Metrojaya. Oh yeah, the designs are pretty good, and they even have one of those 'cosmetic-bra' going under the 2 for 50 bucks label.*   ¶ 17:18