gnatweds

We went to try out our snowboarding gear again; and I have to report that it is extremely fun but extremely crushing for our weary old bones.

Out of three lessons we've had so far, two of em were taught by 16-17 year olds. And they are going like, yeah, just keep practicing. Erhm... the 16 year old body is tres differenet from the 30some-year-old body!

For instance, I crashed on my knees so often that now I have knees sporting bruises you would not believe. They cover the entire kneecap, I jest you not.

I also whacked the back of my head really hard.... think land on butt then whiplash down to bonk head. Lucky no concussion, got super bad headache but am okay. My neck on the other hand is stiff as a board.

Gene's wrist is better but his shoulder and thumb are now iffy.

So, just cos we're sadistically enjoying the new sport, we're starting an injury meter.
0 = we're getting good! we managed not to hurt ourselves at all.
1 = muscle aches from the exercise, or minor stuff sure can walk and laugh about it the next day. 2 = injuries, wake up groaning. Need to pop painkiller type.
3 = more serious, must wear some kind of supporting splint thing, and need to pop pills.
4 = wha piangs, kena whacked damned hard, need to visit doc.
5 = must get to A&E.

So right now... gnat's combined injury meter is about 2.5

hehe. Onward ho to more adventures!

Ho ho ho! Merry Christmas!

And true to style, we bought oh, about $200 worth of booze - wine, rum, scotch and vodka - for the holiday season.

KL-ites: check out the size of that Skyy bottle! Guess what? It's was only about US$16. Hummm. Do you wonder why we drink so much here? Oh, by the way, that stuffed toy is something Gene bought on impulse for Halloween. He thought it was cute.

And being the good Santas Clauses that we are, we decided to bring the folks here a bit of Christmas spirit (well, literally) and good cheer.

Ta-dahhhh! Vodka Jellies! Thanks to master chef Gene, they were whipped up in a flash, and were pretty to boot. The first test batch were however so strong that they got even us choking on the alcoholic fumes. So the next batch were made at half strength; could be stronger, but we were too worried about sending the people here to St Mary's Hospital for alc poisoning...



But they did sit ever so pretty inside our fridge though! Want a recipe? Use about one cup water and more than half a cup of vodka, but don't go to a full cup. That's going to be waaaaaay tough to eat. NB: I had one of those super strength ones and turned beet red within minutes.

Tis has been a quiet few days for us. Despite all our good intentions to snowboard, the last time we went (on Thursday) Gene took a reallllllly bad spill.
So much so that I thought his arm was fractured when I saw and heard the slamming of his arm on the slope.

Actually, it was crappy weather to go out snowboarding - it had rained and the slopes were all icy. But we were too gian to try out our new equipment so we went anyway. Bad move.

G refused to go to A&E that night, but he went the next day, and they apparently took a gadzillion x-rays and turns out that he didn't fracture anything.

But am forcing the chap to wear his wrist braces and/or bandage for the time being.

Don't know when we'll hit the snow slopes again - not that there's any of the white stuff falling by the way. It has been a totally not-white christmas.

And according to the locals, warmer than its ever been. It's a La Nina thing apparently, but all the better for me because it did dip to -12 deg C for a couple of days in early December and gawd, that was tough.

Hope your Christmas went okay? Drop us an email sometime and tell us all about it sometime.
We're missing the scene back home. Here, everything is shut down tight for the holidays, it's almost like a ghost town but on the upside, the post Christmas sales start tomorrow. *yay*

Labels: Christmas, Vodka Jellies

Zouch! We just went and spent more than we meant to. Hummm... when does that NOT happen with us? Sigh, us (me in particular) and money are simply meant to be parted.

With a dreary day here in Minnesota, we forewent the ski slopes and went to "see" snowboard packages instead in the cities. We ended up buying our equipment. G says he will take photos tomorrow when the light is au naturel and better.

G's board and bindings very very garang; there's a spectacular illustration on his.
Mine are, apart from being horribly expensive, in Singapore's National Colours. I jest you not.

Curious are we, dear readers? wait for pix!

So, this just gives us extra motivation to hit the slopes. It's an expensive sport, but wait, all our sports are... diving, wakeboarding... I sense a pattern here, do you?

Speaking of spending, the last week has been a happy oh so happy one. I got shoes for Christmas! And a pair I ordered from Amazon also arrived. Happy happy day! *gnat is delirious with joy* As Ms Chang so aptly puts it... call me Imelda Soh, dahlinks.

Anyway, Christmas and the New Year is coming up. And for the first time in years, Gene and I (well, me by default anyways) are off the entire Christmas weekend. Will blog about what happens to us in the next few days.

Waiting for the snow and the white Christmas to happen. So far, its just been averaging about 0 to -2 deg C and there is none of the white stuff.

Oh man oh man oh man. I am finally back!
Smartly, after being tempted by the "all-new blogger" tag, I switched to the gmail account. And ta-effing-da. I was locked out for 2 weeks.

After fiddling and fiddling with cookies, security settings and blah blah de blah - am finally back with Mozilla Firefox. First impressions: It's pretty darned good!

And well, I guess I am back on the blog. Poor G will have to do the same (switch to a gmail id).. lets see if he needs to get Firefox as well...

Anyway! The update: We've been bitten by the snowboarding bug - and we're on the verge of buying equipment, if only because renting is 25 to 29 bucks per time. This is not inclusive of the ski lift fees and lessons. Gak.

Oh man, it feels good to access the blog all over again....

Labels: blogger, firefox, gmail

Ok, a quick update:

Mom and Dad have arrived safely back in Singapore after a whirlwind two and a half weeks here. Brought them to Lutsen - a snowy mountain in the north shore of Minnesota - to see snow, and all we got was rain.

But the upside is that we definitely got some pounds piled on because of the fabulous food mom cooked up: Babi Ponteh, Kuah Lada, Laksa, Mee Siam, har cheong kai...shiok man. Gene and I, erhm, theoretically know how to make mom's Laksa now. Theoretically.
The folks here in Rochy also got to sample mom's cooking and they were suitably impressed; and whacked the food... amazing how much laksa can be consumed in one night.

As mentioned earlier - we haven't had much snow, but the hour mom and dad was due to go to the airport, there was a brief snow shower! So, at least they got to see the white stuff.

Christmas season is in full swing. It's pretty organic here - not the organised hullabaloo like in Orchard Road. People are putting up lights on their homes and you can see lit Christmas trees everywhere. Shopping Malls are chock full of people too! Managed to find G a gift (phew) after missing several birthdays and Christmases because I never manage to find him a nice enough present. Though last year, he did get a beautiful leather laptop bag thing which he never uses!
*sigh*

Yesterday, G and I tried snowboarding for the first time. It's a pretty good deal... three days worth of passes, equipment and two lessons for US$89 each. Our first lesson was like one and a half hours long and honestly, it was completely exhausting. It was like learning to wakeboard all over again, we were fumbly and awkward and totally out of our depth. And the morning after is just as bad as a wakeboarding morning after - discovering new muscles I never thought actually existed. There are also huge bruises in unmentionable places. That said, think we need more "surface time"... so maybe we'll get to do it in the next couple of days.

But a more urgent task is to fix up the Porsche. We have been having a pretty bad run of luck with our vehicles. The Ford has had to be fixed one too many times and now we just want to sell it. The karma with that one not that good. Then, just on Saturday, the Porsche started acting up.
Gah.

Okay, gotta go. Lots of laundry, and the apartment is filthy by my reckoning. Plus need to go get some groceries as we're cooking tonight.

Remember us and wish us a smoothier time with the cars. We're thinking about everyone back home (and yes, whining about how much we want to go home too) and in case I don't get a chance to blog in next couple of days: Merry Christmas!