Thu 5 Feb

It was a long day, as usual for Thursdays. The highlight of the day was when my colleague pulled me along to Siglap with him and a few others for lunch at the Yong Tau Hoo place. The food was good, but the ingredients I picked were all sent to be deep-fried (even quails' eggs!) except for the vegetables. I had an extra bowl of noodles in addition.

I think I am going down the path of fat ruin.

Fri 6 Feb

After a relatively short day in school and settling some work, I went to my in-laws' place with my wife to bring Jadon home. Jadon seemed to be trying to crawl (before he can even sit up), but with his strength he could only push himself backwards, so he kinda looks like he is breakdancing and doing a worm-like crawl backwards.

Sat 7 Feb

My wife and I settled some household chores before bringing Jadon with us to Downtown East for dinner. We strolled there (and back as well) since we brought him out on a pram, and had a good dinner at New York New York. We did a little bit of grocery shopping before calling it a night.

Sun 8 Feb

I had service and cell group with my boys as usual, and headed home by 3 pm to receive some friends. Finally, I got to play mahjong! I started the session with a man tai zi mo, which gave me a boost in capital of $9.60 for the day. After some wins and losses, I had a nett profit of $6, but it was a good day. I was so close to winning man tai many times, but was foiled by the rest who won fast enough. Compared to some bad days when the possibility of winning wasn't even there, today was exciting.

Mon 9 Feb

I was on paternity leave today. Before I went over to see Jadon, I made a big detour to Orchard Road. I headed to Shaw House to pick up a free iPod nano from Citibank, which I recently won in some promotion. After that, I went around shopping a little, but only managed to buy one tee-shirt. I detoured to Heeren to have dessert at Shokudo. I had a $10 voucher from my last visit to New York New York (apparently they are both managed by the same company), and I thought I might as well spend it. I had this massive mango ice-kachang-equivalent, and I added one more scoop of ice cream to it. I could easily wolf down a big dessert, but the mango was sour, and the ice cream was only so-so. I still don't understand why there are people who tell me the food at Shokudo was good. The hot food I have tried so far were sub-par, and the desserts I had were equally mediocre. If I had the same amount of money to spend, I would rather be in Ministry of Food.

I wonder if I can sell off the iPod nano. The money could really help me recoup the cost of exchanging my Xbox 360. I am now a victim of E74 (error message 74), which generates one red quadrant of death. Unfortunately, that one is only covered in the normal 1-year warranty (and mine had expired), so I had to pay $159 to exchange my current console for a brand new one (which, for all I know, could be a repaired console). How I envy ZH, who was hit by the red ring of death (three red quadrants), which was covered for 3 years of warranty!

Tue 10 Feb

The highlight of the day was an impromptu decision to go to Old Airport Road for lunch. Perhaps we could resume our weekly pilgrimage! Out of sheer greed I had a bowl of prawn noodles, and a plate of hokkien mee. After school, my wife and I went to my in-laws' place to spend quality time with Jadon.

Wed 11 Feb

I spent the day settling some administrative stuff. For lunch, a whole group of us went out to the coffee shop opposite to eat zi char. An ex-colleague, who had left the teaching service, came back to catch up with us. We hung around to chat with her for a while before I had to head back for civics lessons, staff conference, and a meeting with a vendor. In the meantime, my wife and some other colleagues were at Teachers' Network for a SPA course, so I arranged to meet my wife in town for dinner.

We ended up going to Ministry of Food at Bugis Junction for dinner. We each had a bowl of pork ramen, which was absolutely fabulous, and a californian handroll. On top of that we ordered a dessert, which was, like the rest of the desserts I had tried, superb. We then went around to shop a while. I managed to find a tee, a polo tee, and two shirts that I liked, and my wife also found her fair share of purchases. The only unfortunate thing was that she couldn't find the correct size shoes for herself; Charles & Keith was having an up-to-70% sale.

Thu 12 Feb

It was my long day of the week. Other than all my lessons, I had two long meetings that only convinced me of the mountainload of work about to befall me. My wife hung around to pack her table and wait for me, and we went over to my in-laws' place to spend time with Jadon. He's so cuuuuute!

Fri 13 Feb

It was a long day today. Inbetween, a colleague drove us out to Block 216 market at Bedok for lunch, and knowing that I was in for a long haul before dinner, I had a bowl of ban mian and a bowl of laksa. I had a make-up lesson in addition, and following that, there was the college road run. Although the intention to shift the road run till the late afternoon seemed good, it was still, unfortunately, very hot. After the whole occasion was over, it was already 7+ pm.

Thankfully, a colleague drove my wife and me back to my in-laws' place, which was along the way for her, and after dumping all our bags there, we went over to have dinner at Botak Jones. The food made the long day appear a little less wearying. After dinner was done, we brought Jadon back home for the weekend.

Sat 14 Feb

It's my first Valentine's Day with a kid in tow. My wife and I wanted to go out by noon for lunch in town, but Jadon woke us up early, made us exhausted, and all three of us went back to sleep till about 11 am. By the time we got ready, i.e. packed all the baby stuff, fed him, bathed him, and etc, we left the house around 2.30 pm. By then, I was positively famished. We went to Coffee Club at White Sands, and had lunch (or should it be called tea?) there. I tried their salmon coudibliac (can't remember how it is spelt), and it had a unique taste which I found to be quite delicious. Seriously, the worst food I ate from Coffee Club was still above average in quality, and that was the ordinary carbonara. I tried their cocoa mango blend drink, which was refreshingly different yet nice.

When we were done with the meal, we headed down to Marina Square. Along the way, I bumped into many students, current and graduated, but all of them were with friends and not partners. Oddity, considering that today was Valentine's Day. We did a massive amount of shopping. My wife managed to find many nice working wear tops, and I bought a pair of loafers from Crocs, amongst other things. We found some good stuff for baby too. We took turns to handle Jadon while we settled our dinner and shopping. He somehow didn't want to sit in the pram most of the time till he got drowsy. In the end, we decided to save ourselves the agony of squeezing with the crowd on the MRT, and took a cab back. Now that we have decided to get a car, suddenly all the troublesome parts of public transport appeared more unbearable.