IT'S A PANDAN LIFE ...!

Muse: The last time I ******, I left the States and came back to Malaysia. Now, where shall I run to? I'll leave for Indonesia, then! *Amused tone, probably joking* Me: *Thinking: 1. If he got a penny for every time he said he wanted to leave (he uses many variations of the word e.g. run, migrate), he'd be a millionaire now. 2. My heart stops every time he says he wants to leave - the ruthless manner in which the word is uttered sent icy-cold jolts to my heartstrings. 3. I don't think he is aware that the word is associated with loss. When someone leaves, either by death or by choice, it is a  great loss to the people who care about him/her.   4. I'll probably lose my cool the next time he utters the word (or its variations).*                      

Muse: ... Please do not assume my life is like a walk in the park ... Me: *Taken aback, thinking: Why is he talking to me like I am a stranger? Like I do not know him at all? When have I ever assumed any thing about his life? All this while, what he told me is what I know. My life is not a walk in the park either. Even if it is, it is a bloody lonely walk in the park!* Moral of the story: What we say can sometimes affect people for days and days.

“It was not the feeling of completeness I so needed, but the feeling of not being empty.” ~  Jonathan Safran Foer Recently I discovered how to know whether you're important to other people who matter to you. Just keep quiet at home and don't get in touch with them. This is what I did for 4 days. Except for those calls from banks offering loans and what not and those spam texts telling me about sales here and there, no one actually called and text! I couldn't believe it! My own family didn't even bother to call me! If I died at home, alone, my body would probably rot for a few weeks before people discover them! Great! This isn't a game of popularity. It's a simple game of whether people care about you. I'm not angry at anybody. I learned not to get angry at people I care about. When I'm angry, it can become really ugly.The last time I got angry, my best friend didn't talk to me for six months! Sometimes I wish I didn't have to go on a study leave...

     A tribute to my feline son, Izzy, 21.09.2002 - 08.11.2011. I'd always thought, perhaps I'd even taken for granted, that you'd live a long healthy life. To hear that you died in so much pain was really heart-wrenching, I felt like killing myself. Please forgive me Izzy, for not being there. You came into my life when there was really a large void in my life. I'd been divorced, had moved in to my new house. At the same time my family, my main pillar of strength, had  moved from KL to Johor. The emptiness was simply too much to bear. Words can't describe how much joy you brought to my life when I adopted you. You were barely 4 or 5 months old when I took you home. Only a kitty, totally helpless and dependent on me. Well, yeah, you did bring some headaches during your formative years but those were really  peanuts compared to the happiness you brought. You'd wait  eagerly for me at the sliding do...

                          A stroll in Lower Earley, Reading, with Faiz.                                                                              Picture credit to Hassan. Some ramblings about my third trip to the UK. The first was back in 2003, second was in 2008. This time around I took comfort in the fact that my buddy Faiz was there - accommodation can be so damn expensive in UK, as I learnt in 2008. So yeah, Faiz was my main motivation. I wouldn't have embarked on the tri...

Once upon a time in history.... Me: (Fuming) So, tell me about this female buddy of yours? Muse: Well, she comes from a rich, broken family, bla..bla..bla... Me: (Listening attentively) Muse: ....She even cooked for her boyfriend.... Me: (Eyes rolling and thinking: Don't I do that for you sometimes?) Moral of the story: A woman would do things that she normally wouldn't do for the person that she loves.

History, though, shows us that the people who end up changing the world—the great political, scientific, social, technological, artistic, even sports revolutionaries—are always nuts, until they’re right, and then they’re geniuses. ~John Eliot, Ph.D. Apps available for Androids or iphones or whatever computer-cum-smart phones out there, can do wonders. Really. Like the Zombie Booth. I almost fainted when I saw my Zombied face. I've never seen anything so hideous! And so funny (this realization came after I overcame my paranoia). The use of Apps has got me thinking. Those geeks out there should really come up with an App for people like me. Believe me, if I could come up with it myself, I would. Well, for ease of reference, let's tentatively call this App - The Nut Graph. It's an App that would record the high and low points in my life  in the form of a graph. Like those bell-curve graphs you did in Physics or Add Maths. The rationale for this App is plenty...