little miss may

Ahhhh…

Can’t wait, can’t wait, can’t wait!

I know it’s still November, but I couldn’t wait any longer to get some Christmas decorations up in our house. We don’t celebrate Christmas at all, but somehow my family puts up with my whimsical fancy of having a tree full of tinsel and glitter every December. They find it amusing, and I’ve a feeling that they quite like having it around the house for a few weeks, too.

The very same time last year, our house was under renovation — dust everywhere, floor full of holes, ceiling being plastered, a new front grille for our home. It went on for a couple of weeks until mid-December, by which time I only had a week to enjoy my Christmas tree. Aiseh!

This year, in gung-ho spirit, I had it up much, much earlier. Last Sunday morning I busied myself with taking out the 5-foot tree and decorations from cold storage and putting them to good use once more.

Oh Christmas tree, oh Christmas tree
Of all the trees most lovely…

First up, the tree…

Laid out a little red mat at the corner of our living hall…
Set up the base for the tree…
Secured the bottom half of the tree nice and tight…
Spread out its many, many “fingers” of leaves…
Popped the top half of the tree on.

Ta-daah!! We now have a tree!

Unravelled and tested out the lights, which were still in good working condition. I don’t know how the others do it, but I tend to put up the lights first before the ornaments, because I like my tree to shine from the inside rather than just on the outside surface. Odd, but that’s the way I do it.

Silver bells… silver bells…
It’s Christmas time in the city…

Up next, the ornaments.

Over the last few years, I bought bits and pieces here and there, always sticking to my favourite classic colours for the season — red and silver. I had odd bits of blue, green and gold which normally went onto the tree anyway, but this year I was fussy and stuck to just the two colours.

A few red orbs here, some silver bells there…
With mini parcels and little drums all around.

And the last touch, ribbons and the star at the top. Simply lovely! Funny thing, though… As I arranged the star on top of the tree, Corinne Bailey Rae’s “Like A Star” played in my mind instead of a Christmas tune…

All that’s missing now are some presents under the tree. Care to contribute?
*Cough* *Ahem*

How does it look at night with the lights on? I’ll keep that for another post. Let’s not get too excited all at once, yea? *wink!*

To be continued…

I had the inspiration to write about “friends” when I read angel’s little post-of-a-dream on d i s a p p o i n t m e n t and friends, and king’s wife’s I turn to you. Some of the comments to those posts got my brain ticking too.

While driving home, I had all those thoughts and sentences forming in my mind.
Even when I showered. And dressed. And dined.

And then…
When I finally had some time to pen down my thoughts…

They’d all disappeared. Damn it.

I remembered a post I did about compartmentalising people, in the lunchbox of friends.

I read the comments.
I re-read them.
I felt so sad.
I wept as Vitamin C’s Graduation (Friends Forever) played over the airwaves.

And I wondered in all the naivety of that post, if I’d ever imagined how drastically things have changed, in the last seven months.

If I could turn back time, would I have done anything differently?

Perhaps.
Maybe.

But I wouldn’t be where I am today if I didn’t go through what I went through. Have to take in the good with the bad, that’s what they say. Comings and goings. Ebb and flow. Seasons and reasons.

I wish there weren’t such things, for my own selfish sake.

It’s hard work building bridges and maintaining them in good condition.
It’s even tougher to handle when they crumble to pieces despite your repair works.
Or when your attempts go unheeded.
Unreturned.

That’s when the soul weeps.
And the heart breaks.

Regretfully yours.

Ah, almost wanted to prolong my little disappearing act from my blog for awhile longer, but how could I leave my audience wondering when my next post would be, and leave them chup-less? And with all those photos taken of the food I had devoured (not by myself, ok) for the past three days, I just had to do some justice to them. After all, sometimes they make the prettiest collages…

Italian for Two…
Dinner on Friday night at Italiannies, 1 Utama with cocka. The formaggio and Florence platter were absolutely scrumptious! With a pitcher of sangria to tantalise the taste buds, and a delicious dose of Starbucks‘ new Toffee Nut Latte to wind down.

Party of Four…
Pancakes at Paddington House,The Curve for tea with angel, velverse and sengkor. They do very good savoury as well as sweet; we licked our platters clean, almost literally.

After an evening movie, a few light Chinese-styled snacks at Just Dessert — pei tan porridge, fried lobak gou, creamy fah sung woo, cute egg tarts, and salted hak loh mai. Don’t you just love that smiley santan face?

Feast for Nine…
Afternoon lunch at Shanghai 10, Bangsar with almost a full table — angel, inevitable & girl, king’s wife, nonya penang, sengkor, winn, zeroimpact, and of course yours truly. The best dish out of the whole table-ful we had was the dumplings, or siew loong pau. Despite missing out the shredded ginger and vinegar, they still tasted pretty good.

After a tussle at the local pasar malam trying to get angel’s car out and a quick walkabout around the shops, it was dinner with the Winged One at Little Penang, Mid Valley Megamall of chow kuey teow and fruit rojak. Almost as good as the Real Thing™, to be savoured at yet another food escapade in the near future…

*urp…*

Wow.

I finally did it.

Handed in my resignation on Tuesday, and told my boss the “bad news” the next afternoon.

I could see the little twitch of a smile on his lips that said, “oh boy, here it comes” when I mentioned I had one last thing to tell him during our project status discussion. It wasn’t hard to notice that he was trying hard to hide his stress and disappointment. He hadn’t been receiving good news all this week, and I guess mine just added to the pile he had to deal with.

I felt bad.

In all my times of resigning from a company, this was one I truly felt like I’ve let my boss down with my leaving. It’s not like I had been unhappy or unrewarded for the hard work I’ve put in, which would’ve made me feel better for dumping it all behind if it were so. Sure was tough.

He had asked me, as a personal favour, to consider staying for another month after my 2 months’ notice is up. On one hand, I would like to help him sort out a suitable replacement and hold the department together for a little longer, until they’re more settled. On the other hand, the more selfish me really wants a break before relocating after CNY. I hesitate in changing my original plans because I don’t want to give myself any more excuses for delaying the move yet again.

Hmmm…

Stay a little longer?
Leave as planned?

Decisions, decisions, decisions…

Ugh! Can’t decide now. It’s something to think about over a couple of weekends. Had to get my mind off the guilt trip and the conscience that pecked at my brain every now and then. And the best solution is…

Watch a movie!

Accompanied by cp1 (thanks for the popcorn, babes!), we indulged in Happy Feet and found ourselves tippity-tappity-tapping throughout the movie. Well ok, at least my feet couldn’t stop moving every time them penguins started singing and dancing, especially those 5 Latinos!! Oh gosh, we had many a good laugh watching those 5 little penguins help Mumble find his heart-song.

The ending was kinda bizzare and abrupt, but I ain’t complaining considering it gave us 98 minutes of wonderful entertainment. Won’t write any more about the movie to spoil it for those who haven’t seen it. Well? What are you waiting for? Go watch and enjoy! Be a Fred! Do the twist! Shake that bon-bon! Or, as a^ben would say, io ka ch’ng!!

M A M B O ! ! !

… and she’s mine, all mine!!

Arrived in my hands last night…
Oh, so red…
Oh, so sexy…
Oh, so light…

nano-nano…
nano-nano…

whee!!