Runs

Yes. I'm back in blogosphere again. Been a couple of days of absence ;p Would like to thank all my wonderful friends for leaving such lovely encouraging comments on my blog :) Leaves me with such a nice warm fuzzy feeling reading all of your kind words ;p *dare I say, keep them coming hohoho*

I thought I'll write about runs today! Running season's back in full swing again. It's gonna be back to more intensive training for yours truly.Back to the days where I will wake up at like say 3am on Sunday mornings, grab breakfast and head off for my runs at 4+am ;p

Let's do a quick count of the number of runs coming up (based on my memory and radar):
1) 1 July Milk Run
2) 8 July Passion Run
3) 22 July Mizuno Wave Run
4) 26 Aug Army Half Marathon(AHM), Sheares Bridge Run
5) 9 Sep Shape Run *yum yum*
6) 21 Oct Great Eastern Women Run
7) 28 Oct Real Run
8) 2 Dec Stanchart

My real interest lies in the AHM, Shape Run and StanChart.

For Stanchart, it's always this internal debate as to which distance I should do. I had a terrible experience doing the full marathon (shall share that one of these days) and have since taken a 1 year hiatus. Am I ready to take on this challenge again? Or should I just stick to my safe and comfortable half marathon and concentrate on bettering my timing? Hmmz...tough choice. Shall give myself more time to decide :)

Love the shape run for the wonderful goody bag that it comes with! With no offense to the guys, it's actually a better feeling running and jostling among a pack of ladies in a women only run as compared to the mixed run. If you're a regular female runner like me, I think you will agree that running the shape run is a more comfortable experience than running say the Army Half Marathon ;p Just imagine squeezing your way through a brood of sweating males ;p As for the other women's only run, let's just say that, purely on economics ground, it makes more sense to do the shape run than the other run ;p

Am in 2 minds for the Real Run. I like the idea of running on different terrain i.e. running on tarmac, sand etc. Am a little disappointed that they shifted the Run from Sentosa to Changi. Still, Changi is one of my favourite areas around Singapore, hence, I'm still tempted to give the run a go ;p Only thing that is really holding me back is that, I'm not really too sure if I fancy waking up at 3am and doing a 10km run on the day when I turn 28. Thought I should be treating myself better ;p Oh well, we'll see how it goes again. There's still time to go :)

Calling all my lady friends out there :) If you've signed up for the shape run, and is looking for someone to train with, or to meet up together before or after the run, my door's always open :)

Tentatively...

Hi There. Time now is 11.32pm and I've just finished my work for the day. Haiz. sad. Screws up my original plans. Wasn't intending to do work tonight, given that the next working day is but a mere 8 hours away :(

I thought it would be nice to do a nice long blog for today to kind of round up my 3 days away from office. Had plenty of ideas of topics to blog on e.g. long distance running, tax agents, road trips, holiday plans, home decor, ermz sleeping alone etcetc ;p Yeah. I may not talk that much some times, but those screws in my head are constantly churning :)

Sleep beckons. Looks like I gotta KIV my grand plans till another day. It's gonna be a long day tomorrow...first meeting at 9am (I think?) last meeting for the day at 5pm...lots of items on the agenda...I predict that my phone will ring non-stop again now that those people know that I"m back....dread those calls cos I know that I do not have the answers that they want.....wish me luck!

Loyalty

I guess I haven't been exactly that consistent in updating this blog ;p Unlike some of my other friends. Bravo. I can finally comprehend how much efforts it takes to do that :)

Well. Day 2 of my official leave. Gotta say that the current leave period is a rather pseudo one. I've taken to doing my own things, going for appointments in the day time. But logging in to do work only late at night when I get back. Am finding it difficult to fall asleep afterwhich. End up waking late the next day not feeling very refreshed. Rather screwed up huhz.

Anyway, on the issue of loyalty. Nothing too serious. Just wanna talk about it in a light-hearted tone.

My friends are all supremely confident of me being a loyal person when it comes to many things. gotta say that I disappoint them greatly when it comes to hair salons.

Yepz. I paid a visit to the hair stylist yesterday. Was itching to bob my hair originally. But was persuaded by many of my friends, who consider themselves to be connoisseurs of female beauty not to do it, so I decided to be really good for once and not rebel :) Nothing too drastic this time round. I'm actually rather easy-going with hair. Afterall, I've long decided that there are no permanent mistakes when it comes to hair. We always outgrow it after a while. At most, it's money gone down the drains ;p

Back to hair salons. I flit from salon to salon. To whoever offers the best deal (especially via credit card offers, b'day promotions, vouchers via women's only runs ;p). Sometimes, it could merely be a matter of proximity of the salon to wherever I was at, at that moment in time. However, agressive marketing and promotional tactics at some of the salons really put me off. Especially those salons which offer prepaid plans, where after plonking down $x, your cost per session would actually be cheaper. Based on my current experience, I think there's only one chain which offers this currently ;p The people that they put at the counter at the end of the session to hawk these plans are really agressive. Totally kills off the good experience that I've just had, having my hair done at the salon. It's usually bye bye to such salons. Or I'll probably go back only on the days when the agressive marketer is on his/her off day ;)

By now, I've probably got a good collection of hair stylists' namecards tucked in a corner of my home. Quite a waste, I gotta admit. I should have refused the namecards when they were offered, especially since I know that's probably the last that those stylists will see of me. But I feel bad rejecting the cards, so I end up hoarding a collection. Along the way, observed that almost all the stylists sport english names. Not just that, many of them have the "newer" forms of english names i.e. where the spelling differs from traditional ones but sounds the same, or are hybrids of 2 english names ;p Helps to leave an impression on potential loyal clients I guess. This disloyal client can still remember some of their names and the salon that they come from ;p Guess it's quite a winning formula.

We are expecting!

Now that my blog has come out of its closet (forgive the pun ;p), I feel more motivated to write :) I've got plenty of ideas on what to blog about.

Firstly, let me thank stardust, kopitiam-uncle, DK, momomui,Ms Low for reading my blog ;) If there are any of you out there who have read my blog, let me know please..leave comments..or tell me over msn/sms...indulge me ;p And Yes. kopitiam-uncle, I just changed my blog template again....

Hmmz...on to the topic for the day. "We are expecting". Been wanting to share my views on it for a while. No mistakes. Yepz. I do mean "expecting" in the context of having a child ;) Not that it applies to me ;p

I recall reading an article in ST-Life a few weeks back. They did two interviews with two bad boys turned into good daddies ;p Oh yeah. Everyone loves the idea of reformed rakes. Guys who have done it all. Probability of them straying in the future to try out newer experiences is low. Anway, what struck me was the phrase that one of them used when asked about why he got married. His simple answer was "we got pregnant". It struck me then how times have changed. Instead of the concept of only the mother getting pregnant i.e. responsiblity of the unborn kid rests with the mum alone, fathers these days do seem to take an equal role and pride in the pregnancy process. Attending pre-natal and post-natal classes etc..Kudos to all these fathers. :) (Princess M's mummy, I suspect that I've probably been reading too much of your blog ;p)

Was at a colleague's place the other day. One colleague's wife is pregnant. When he used the phrase "my wife is expecting", many of those present pointed out to him that he should be saying "We are expecting, my wife is pregnant" ;p To which, my colleague readily conceded. Looks like this trend of verbalising equal ownership of the pregnancy is getting widely accepted and hopefully not a passing fad. I see this as a good thing :) A good example of the evolution of societal roles in the family unit.

Back to more mundane stuff. Need to confess that I mistook Phomn Penh to be a country today :( Arrghz. This coming from a person whom others turn to for tips when playing drinking games on country names and capitals. Haiz. Need to brush up on my geography of Indochina.

Back to blogging...or rather attempting to blog ;p

Yepz. I'm back again. Not that I have much readership for my blog, since it's not publicised to all, not even to most of my friends ;p

Social experiment as mentioned in my first post in March has sadly failed. No one has stumbled onto my blog haiz.

Shall try social experiment no. 2 now. Another attempt to "guide" my friends to this blog of mine via msn. Dear friends. If you are finally reading this blog of mine. Please let me know ;p Let's see how this goes. Will give a quicker update. :)

My friends tell me that I am a rather transparent person cos the personal messages that I post on msn clearly betrays my current state of mind. Duhz. Yes and No I guess. Subconciously, when those personal messages were posted, those are the things that I do want people to know or do not mind people knowing about me ;p

Enough of those rambling about my amatuerish social experiments :) some updates about myself, for those of you who finally reads this blog of mine ;p

I would like to proudly announce that I'm finally on a short 5 day break! *big grin* 2 days for the weekend and 3 working days. Not that it would be a long complete break (I'm still expected to check my work mails intermittently cos there are some outstanding issues for which my head is still on the chopping board!), but oh well, a somewhat form of break is better than none at all.

It's been a mad and intensive 6+months, close to 7 months since my last 1 week break way back in Dec. The past few weeks have been extremely stressful and trying. My friends even said that I'm back to grinding my teeth in my sleep during my short weekend sojourn in Bintan. My backaches are coming back. Extremely glad to be able to be on this short break. I guess I gotta thank my enlightened boss for approving my leave ;)

I've got grand plans for the next few days.

a) Catch up on my running and swimming - I took a one week break. Too much work and too many post work engagements this week

b) Go shopping - my wardrobe needs an overhaul. It's actually quite troublesome when my weight keeps fluctuating at different points of my life. I haven't had a participative piece of action in the GSS.

c) Be a local tourist - I've always liked travelling. Always felt that leave should only be taken for urgent matters or for overseas travelling. Since I cannot afford the time luxury of travelling overseas for this occassion, perhaps it's time to revert back to the good old days of me, myself, backpack and my pair of legs to go trudging through Singapore ;p I would love to go tramping in the wilds, but I guess that would have to wait till another time.

d) Tidy up my finances - Need to put my money to more efficient use. 'nuff said.

e) Cook - there's something that I've been rather keen on experimenting with. Finally, I can find time to get down to doing it. Too bad my oven's spoilt. Baking experiments have been halted for so many years. Just chanced upon a new brownie recipe today. Haiz.

Sounds like an ambitious list huhz. I hope that I can do at least half of the items listed.

*yawnz* Time for a good rest. Happy to declare that I survived 2 consecutive shots today. My first attempt at drinking shots. Not too bad an experience. Most importantly, it tasted good :)