Coolcat's Jottings

After deliberating on what should be done with my defunct Powershot A70 camera (repairing the CCD will cost me RM299), I finally decided to take up the generous offer by Canon to buy a brand new Powershot A400 for RM550 (retail price = RM699).

Talking to Joshua helped a lot in clearing my mind about this. Heh, I think I'm one of those people who need to talk things out in order to think clearly.

Canon will then return my A70 unrepaired and I will sell it to Mike who will send it for subsequent repairs. Sounds complicated, eh? But it's the best deal I can strike under circumstances. Hope to get the A400 soon. It is not the camera that I've been dreaming about but it's all I can afford. I keep reminding myself that money is not to splurged on the coolest gadgets in town. So this will have to last me for a good many years to come.

If and when I feel the need for some serious photography, I can always use the Nikon 8700 camera which my boss loaned me. It's a bulky thing but I love the macro mode function!

My boss came back from his week-long holiday in Thailand today and the first thing he said was, "I could have been part of the tsunami (tidal wave) death toll!"

Tat, a friend of mine who's holidaying in Bali is also unaffected by the chaos that rocked southern Asia on Sunday.

So I was totally unaware of the natural disaster that never before in history happened in Malaysia. My family and I slept through it all that morning and felt nary a tremor. However, there were a few people I know in Port Klang who saw their books moving about in the bookshelves, the hanging potted plant rattling above wooden beam and the fish behaving strangely by huddling only at one side of the aquarium. And they came to the conclusion that an earthquake has come to our shores.

I wonder what I would have thought if I saw these strange happenings. But I doubt that I would so easily thought of the possibility of an earthquake. The victims of this tidal wave probably didn't know what hit them either. It was such a shock to see such a high death toll in Penang and the other countries that were affected. Something that we never expected had finally happened and it just drives the point that we never know when or how death may knock on our doors.

The holiday-makers who perished and their families would never have thought that it would be the last time they say goodbye to each other. Pray for the surviving victims and families as they are suffering from anguish and lost in this tragedy.

Thanks, everyone for your Christmas wishes and comments! I didn't send any sms greetings out but I did reply to each and every single one I received. Figured that it amounts to the same thing anyway

The lack of updates for the past few days were due to the bad phone lines at home. Apparently, I couldn't get connected to the Net whenever it rains because the rain degrades the quality of the line and makes it crackle and pop.

I felt mildly frustrated that I couldn't blog, check my mails nor check out important info via Google searches. But note the word 'mildly'. So, I'm not the Net addict that I feared I was... hurrah!!!

Some notable highlights during my Christmas break (other than watching DVDs at home with my bro):

• Aussie friend - My long-lost friend, Siang came down for a visit and wanted to attend DUMC's Christmas celebration. He looked the same and said that I looked the same, so we were both pleased that we could still recognise each other. After the Christmas celebration and lunch with friends, we hung out at his aunt's place and I had a nice chat with his vibrant and vivacious grandmother who kept feeding us with drinks and yummy snacks. Being partly Phlegmatics, we spent the afternoon as full-fledged couch potatos - surfing the Astro channels, watching whatever that catches my interest because you see, Siang gave me the remote control.
  
  I couldn't recall the last time a guy handed me the remote control. They would ask me what I wanted to watch or if I was alright with the channel that we are currently watching. But none have actually handed over the remote for me to control. So, this is quite an eye-opener. Hee!
  
  
• Forgiven pics - Was pleased to see the Forgiven photos displayed on the last page of Floodgates (our church magazine). Siang said that it didn't look like me at all. However, the guy sitting on my right kept looking back and forth at the photo and me.
  
  He finally gathered enough courage to point to the photo and ask me, "Are you this person?"
  
  When I said yes, he gave a big grin, "Wow, I'm sitting next to a star!"
  
  Hee, that was a really pleasant conversation!
  
  
• Christmas/Appreciation Meals - What can I say? Lots of good food and great company. And the get-together held at J-son Ho's house yesterday was kinda weird. I thought it was a Punctuations gathering. Chriselle and Jass (the organisers) thought it was a sub-zone gathering. And a few others including Pastor Moy How thought it was because of Nicholas' birthday. So it got pretty confusing for most of us, seeing unrelated faces all around.
  
  At the end of the day, we just went ahead and achieved the objectives of all the three reasons, including a birthday cake cutting ceremony for Nicholas. Pr. Moy How truly surprised us when he threw a bucket of ice cubes on poor Nick. Didn't know that this normally serious pastor was so mischievous! Raymond completed the descration of Nick's well-groomed hair by pouring corn flour all over it, and Nick retaliated by giving both of them a bear hug each. Heh heh.
  
  All in all, it was a funtastic Christmas. It really does get better every year!

Received three Christmas dinner and appreciation invites this week (one of which is organised under duress (or so I heard!) by a certain Mr. Ho). And as the fact of these invites sank in, I started feeling Christmassy.

To me, getting into the Christmas mood entails great fellowship and lots and lots of good food. Celebrating Christmas means being with the people who are dear to you and it's also a time to enfold others who might be alone this time of the year. That's the beauty of having gatherings such as these.

Other things to get the Christmas mood going are as follows:

• Christmas Story - There's nothing more meaningful and cosy than to remember the reason of Christ's birth with our dearest family and friends gathering close to us and having someone read the Christmas story (Luke 2) in a clear and cheerful voice.
  
• Christmas Carols - But of course!
  
• Christmas Movie/book - A good movie to watch or a good book to read during Christmas would be 'Little Women' by Loisa May Alcott. Not only does it have snow (lots of it!), it also has a lot of heart.
  
• Christmas Pudding & fruit cake - Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum!
  
• Christmas Cards - There's something about the end of the year that makes people reminisce of old long lost friends. It's a great time to write some words of appreciation to someone and tell them that they are still dear to you even though you haven't bothered keeping in touch with them at other times of the year! Still, it's the thought that counts.
  

Notice that I did not put gift exchange in the list. It's not because I hate receiving gifts, far from it! But to me, getting a gift for someone entails quite a lot of stress (shopping amidst the throng of people during Christmas sales, the hassle of finding a parking spot, the long queues, etc, etc, etc!). And this kind of stress sort of dampens the Christmas mood, I feel.

Anyway, just in case I forget to wish you guys later, a very Merry and Blessed Christmas to everyone! Joy to the world!

Paul posted some photos of our trip to northern Malaysia recently in his webshots site (Paul, can share the link ah?). They are all taken by Mei Fong - thanks, girl!

I didn't take any pics there because my Canon Powershot A70 conked out on me then So now, you know what's on top of my Christmas wish list. A digital camera. It's something that has become sort of a necessity in my life.

Now that I don't have one of my own, I have to rely on my friends' digital cameras. And while some of them conscientiously upload the pics as soon as they can or burn them on cd for us (Mei Fong, you da gal!), most of the pics taken somehow fade into oblivion

Anyway, here's a pic of my feet encased in the best pair of slippers I have the pleasure to own which Paul wrote a nice but rather cheeky comment to:




Check Out The Pedicure. Ladies were doing a catwalk showcasing the spoils from Haadyai. Can't show the ladies unless with permission from them!


Yes, Paul - you have my "conditional" permission