Still lost in transit.

mood amused

Workplace Quote

W: Hi there, can I have the product specification for plum concentrate please??? With bells on top, jam in the middle, and of course chocolate sprinkles too.

mood playful

What took you so long?

Summer has officially ended, albeit a month too late. It all began a few nights ago when I was awakened in the blind of the night by the giant gush of wind blowing outside my bedroom window. The trees were swaying, the leaves were rustling, and for the first time ever since I arrived here, I actually felt cold. And there wasn't even any aircon on!

I spent the remaining hours of the night curled up like a shrimp in between the cold sheets and when morning finally came, I crept out of bed, tiptoed out to the living room and opened the door to the balcony. I watched the gaunt trees lurch violently back and forth while the wind whooshed past and sent chills down my spine, and I instantly decided that I like autumn :)

Anyway, last sunday (backdated as usual, sigh) we went to Dreamworld! Unlike Movieworld which had lots of quirky things to see, Dreamworld was more action-packed and it was rides all the way!

Other than all the thrill rides, there was Tiger Island, some wildlife experience thing (which is kinda lame cos there wasn't much animals), some koala show and a farm show where they showed you how to shear a sheep. We didn't take as many photos as we would have liked because the whole time we were there, Wayne was walking so damn fast like as though the rollercoasters were going to disappear before our very eyes unless we shuttle ran to the rides in thirty seconds. NO TIME TO LOSE! So we didn't see any koalas too.

The highlight of Dreamworld is the Big 5 Thrill Rides, which are supposedly five of the most mind-boggling, eyeball-popping and gut-wrenching rides you could possibly imagine, or so they say. My favourite of the lot was The Claw, this massive 9-storey pendulum thing that sways dangerously from left to right, coming full circle at 360 deg while the "passengers" scream helplessly with legs dangling out like little octopuses.

We went on it twice!

This is how helpless we looked.

Then there was also The Cyclone rollercoaster, the Tower of Terror, and the Wipeout, where we sat in a row of seats hinged at both ends to a structure which rotates in every possible direction that you could imagine. It was like being tossed in a tumble dryer, except that this one goes in a significantly slow stomach-churning motion, and you are just being spun and twisted left, right, up, down, on your belly, on your back, everywhere.

It didn't seem to make a lot of sense to scream when the content of your guts is busy doing a hula, but it was so just so amusing feeling myself being tossed about like a ragdoll at the mercy of a mass of steel. I was absolutely in hysterics even after we landed.

The Thunder Ride, some water rafting thingy.

Haha :)

Random pictures.

As you can probably tell, I am rushing through this entry because I want to get to the main point and talk about The Giant Drop! The name itself is quite self explanatory and it is supposedly the tallest free-falling ride in the world according to the Guiness Book of World Records. Basically you are slowly pulled up to the top of the pole and then literally dropped, free falling with legs dangling and all. The pole is 120 metres/ about 39 storeys high.

Wayne said the last time he went to Dreamworld he figured that if he got "dropped" often enough, he might actually get used to it and not be scared shitless when he's up there, so he went on it SIX times. But in the end his efforts were futile because by the sixth time it was still as equally petrifying as the first. I seriously can't decide whether to commend his guts or to laugh at his stupidity. But knowing Wayne, I shall probably settle for the latter.

The bugger had been since been tirelessly taunting me with it for days. We had countless debates about it in the car everytime we pass by The Giant Drop on the way to and fro work. Go figure. But just two days before the visit when I mentally decided that what the heck, I am just going to go for it, he sat me down and with all the kind intention that he could muster, told me that I really shouldn't go for it if i'm not comfortable, and that he will not call me a wuss if I don't go, because it really is very very scary.

YEAH RIGHT! Not til hell freezes over, he would.

*smirk*

When we were all queueing for the ride with chattering teeth and wobbly knees, all I could hear from the batches of people that went before us was the creaking of the machine as they were being pulled up, and then WHOOSH, and silence. Seemed like the friggin' drop was so fast that their brain cells were still busy processing the adrenalin to start sending signals to bloody SCREAM!!!!

The only positive side about the ride was that the view from up there was really stunning. Even though to be honest I wasn't exactly in the mood to look at scenery when my body was being dangled 39 stories halfway up in the air. And while Maysan was busy exclaiming "Oh, look, can see Brisbane from here!!", I was busy panicking and sensitizing every nerve on my body so as to detect any sudden jerks that would prepare me for the plunge. Ten thousand thoughts were running wild in my mind. What if the machine malfunctions? What if my seat drops off? What if the safety seat belt unbuckles? What if this whole thing collapses?? What if...

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRHHHHHHH!!!!!

Then it was over.

Three seconds was all it took.

Never again in a thousand years will I go on that ride. I completely agree with Wayne, it was just not worth all the mental torture I put myself through. Good experience nonetheless, now I can say that I've tried plummeting down from 39-storey high and survived. Well, sort of anyway.

Came back exhausted because our adrenal glands were working way overtime. T'was a fun weekend though!

Blimey, only 5 weeks left :(

mood indifferent

Hello?

I'm this close to having my capacity burst at the seams for people who don't help themselves. I'm so acutely aware of my waning tolerance that it's almost scaring me. Maybe I'm just prejudiced. But seriously, if you are so adamant that your way of doing things is superior to others' and are too opinionated and stiff necked to accept the fact that you are not a ten-year-series answer book for every single problem revolving you, then two words. Too bad. Stop living under the shadows of other people. Learn it the hard way. For pete's sake, get a life, or some semblance of it.

Okay?

mood grossed out

A Toad The Size of a Small Dog

A giant cane toad has just been found in Darwin, which reiterate my point that Australia is seriously full of strange animals! We heard about it on the radio on the way back from work but when I clicked on yahoo and saw the picture I started to get goosebumps all over and instantly felt nauseous. The toad is 40 cm long with its legs spread out and is just the most hideous and disgusting thing! Blearrrghhh...

Anyway, toads are actually poisonous, thus killing lots of animals that accidentally bite or eat them. Wayne once said that one of his favourite hobbies include running over toads with his car until they go Splat!

Ok, over and out... This is getting a bit too gross for comfort.

Read article.

mood sleepy

Meet My Alter Ego, Miss. Sloth.

My entries are ridiculously backdated, thanks to the force of nature greater than myself that is laziness. The more eventful my days are, the lazier I get about blogging it because every time I thought about the one thousand and one photos to resize, sort and upload, I just couldn't help but sink deeper into the couch.

Incoherent thoughts and super non-chronological posts aside, it is about darn time that I post the pictures from the Mt. Tamborine & Purlingbrook Falls trip 3 saturdays ago, hey? 17 days overdue! Oh, the shame...

Anyway, moving along! So last last last saturday Wayne took us to Mt. Tamborine to do a bit of bush walking because he had to do some delivery at the vicinity. We also went to Purlingbrook Falls to see the waterfall and did some more bush walking. God forbid, we have all become bush-walking maniacs. I'll just let the pictures do the talking ya? Noone likes wordy posts anyway :)

(see how expert I am in justifying my own laziness)

This was at the Gallery Walk, which is this stretch of road at Tamborine with lots of little wine shops, souvenir shops, chocolate shops, yadda yadda.

There was also a cuckoo clock shop, which totally blew my mind. There were like hundreds of intricately designed wooden clocks ticking and cuckoo-ing away on the walls. I was so tempted to march up to the cashier with a cuckoo under one arm and my purse in another but thankfully my common sense got the better of me before I do anything marginally stupid that would jeopardize my dangerously depleting bank account. Cos even the tiny ones were like 200 bucks, it was just insane. Look at the top right picture, the price tag read $469 ok! Don't play play.

We were going from clock to clock to find those whose hour hands were about to strike, just for the fun of seeing the cuckoos come out of their respective clocks. :D

I heart these two postcards. The first one is an Aussie Slang postcard and the second one is the Slacker Postcard. After that I was bugging Wayne to explain all the bizarre slangs. My favourite was Don't come the raw prawn! which meant something like Don't bullshit with me. hahaha.

Click on the pictures for a slightly bigger version.

Then we went to the Cedar Creek Section of Mt. Tamborine to do our bush walking and also see the rock pool. It was just a wee bit of walk, only took us around 30 minutes. The Mt. Warning walk still takes the cake. But as with all bush walks, the views were beautiful :) the rocks, the gullies, the tall trees, the little waterfall, I love them all.

The evil and scheming Wayne pretending to pose when he was actually discreetly scooping water to splash me with. Should have seen it coming, that stealthy thing!

The rock pool. Apparently there are people who like to climb up the steep rocks and dive into the pool, even though there were warnings all over the place after all the accidents that happened. But still, it was a great place to chill. There were kids sliding down the rocks too. It made me half-wish that I had my bikini with me so I could take a dip!

On the way to Purlingbrook Falls we stopped by Hinze Dam to take a look-see. The poor dam wasn't that full because of the drought, but still the views were great!

While driving out of Mt. Tamborine we spied throngs of people huddling at the top of a particularly steep hill and being the curious cats that we were, we got down the car to join the commotion. Turned out that there were people doing hangliding!!! and parachuting too. We saw each and every one of the gliders run down the hill, take off, and glide through the sky. It was soooo cool!! But as expected, it was very very expensive too. Wayne made some enquiry about it and apparently the tandem (pair) rides are about 200 bucks, excluding the beginner's course. SIGH.

Finally, the last stop of the day was Purlingbrook Falls. The previous bush walks we had always started with a climb, and then a descent on the way back. But at Purlingbrook it was the other way round. We had to first climb down to where the waterfall was, and then slog our guts out climbing back up. But when we got to the waterfall, all was forgotten. It was just the most beautiful thing!

The walkway was a little path that goes through behind the waterfall and as we slowly inched our way through, we could see the water cascading down on top of us, not like a gush of water vomitted out of the rocks but small drizzles that seemingly froze mid air before doing a bungee into the river below. We all got a bit wet from all the splashes but still, I could stay there forever. It felt somewhat surreal hanging out behind a waterfall while feeling the droplets of water in my face.

Me and Wayne acting like retards. I heart uncle Wayne :)

The whole walk took us around 2 hours.

To finish off this intellectually unstimulating and super backdated entry, a picture of the super veggie-laden pasta that we had for dinner a week ago, after Wayne bought back a whole plantation of vegetables at a Bi-Lo closing down sale.

Not to mention that maysan and I did our massive grocery shopping at harbourtown on the same day too. It was so hilarious just looking at how absurdly chock-a-block the fridge was with 10 capsicums, 3 kg of grapes, a big ball of cabbage the size of a soccer ball, Wayne's squashy plums, and a plethora of other greens enough to feed a village of hungry Ethiopian children. It was so full that me and wayne had to resort to fighting for lunch box space.

Anyway, last saturday we went to Dreamworld! Will blog about it HOPEFULLY tonight.

mood amused

What A Man Wants

Once upon a time, two little couch potatoes were sitting in the living room doing their most favourite routine, watching TV. Lets call them A and B. Extreme Makeover was showing, much to the delight of B, because that means lots of interesting scoop with lots of boobs! And true enough, it was very interesting. However, it was thought-provoking too, with many women requesting nose jobs, chin lifts, boob jobs, tummy tucks, face reconstruction and the works, supposedly to make themselves feel more worthy of their spouses' love. A was obviously distressed. Whatever has happened to all the cliche one-liners, Love is blind, I love you for who you are, and all the very hyped up discussions about inner beauty?

So, A turned to B and said,

"Isn't it ironic? What if you have a girlfriend whom you love very much. She is ordinary looking, not that pretty, but still, you fell in love with her for who she is and how she looks. She is perfect as she is. Then one day, she goes and get herself a complete makeover and comes back looking like Angelina Jolie. What would you do??"

A was very distraught. She was hoping that B could give her some kind of an answer that would at least restore a little bit of her faith in the goodness of mankind.

B looked at A and said,

"If she comes back looking like Angelina Jolie, then what's the problem??"

The end.

Note: Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, are purely coincidental.

mood blank

Somewhat inspired by keiko and further aggravated by boredom at work, I re-took the love language test that I took a year ago, and found that it is still the same. How very true, too.

The Five Love Languages

My primary love language is probably
Quality Time
with a secondary love language being
Physical Touch.

Complete set of results

Quality Time:		10
Physical Touch:		8
Words of Affirmation:		6
Acts of Service:		3
Receiving Gifts:		3

Take the quiz

I was re-reading some of my old posts as well, and it created such an intense feeling of nostalgia, that for a moment I was immobilised by a dulling ache in my heart. The realisation of how much older I have grown, and how much things have changed, and are going to continue to change.

There are no magical steps to falling in love. love is not a science, it cannot be explained, and yet it is true and real and wonderful. Jesus is the same. he cannot be explained, and lots of people create arguments as to why he is not real, or why he's not God, or whatever, but i think that's just silly, because Jesus is not science. knowing him and following him are like being in love, and being in love is great and true and real.

I can doubt anyone, or anything. But I can never doubt You, because You have changed my life. You are true, You are real, and You are the only constant in my life.

mood tummy ache

The Things I Don't Want to Leave Behind

Something really exciting happened at work today. There was a friggin BLACKOUT. I was happily packing salt when everything went dark, all the machines died down and the production floor went all silent. So we bummed around doing nothing, not being able to eat our lunch too because guess what, we couldn't microwave our food! About half hour later we decided that nothing was going to happen, no angels were going to descend down from heaven with flaming torches, no wizards were going to vaporize out of thin air and transfigure a battery-operated microwave with a flick of the wand, so what the heck, we just ate our lunches cold.

And so, we sat in semi-darkness, basking in the sweltering heat while eating our cold rice with cold stir fried cabbage and cold potato beef stew. What a way of celebrating the beauty of summer, what say you?

The supervisors took the opportunity to conduct some staff training which we had to sit for. Barely thirty minutes into it, I started to get a little fidgety and began counting sheeps. Then I felt my eyelids droop while the little troops of army in my brain started doing a system shutdown. All of a sudden I felt like I was back in NUS in a lecture theatre, and I didn't really like the feeling. Speaking of NUS, yesterday I was casually mentioning to Wayne about the prospect of doing honours when he said that he felt it would be better to go for it. Now I am thrown back into a whirlpool of indecisiveness and uncertainty, and I really hate the sense of helplessness that it entails. :(

Yesterday I spent the whole night in the living room watching Murder in the Outback and talking to Wayne (if you consider crapping as talking). We were arguing about the colours of capsicum, sorting out rotten plums and discussing about vegetables. Oh, the retardedness of it... but it felt very nice. It reminded me of my first year staying in hall when everyday was full of yaks and chatters, when every other night Suz would flip-flop down the corridor and peer into my room after which we would waste the whole night sprawled on the bed or crammed in one corner of the tiny hostel room having girly chats, heart to heart sharing, pillow talks and whatnot, while our tutorials and assignments lay abandoned in heaps.

I really love talking to people. It makes me feel alive.

It's a pity that Suz and I drifted away like that, and I guess deep down I still have a wee bit of hope that one day our paths will cross again.

Anyway, today we watched The Anatomist - Gunther Von Hagens, which Wayne insisted I watch because of the sheer fact that the title sounded gross enough and he wanted to witness me throwing up on his couch. It was a documentary about this German medical freak who plasticize dead bodies and design them into various eerie looking exhibits, supposedly for the betterment of science. It was darn spooky how his eyes lit up everytime he talks about his work, and how he was slicing the bodies as though he was slicing bread. Together with Wolf Creek, the murder movie we watched on Saturday, that makes THREE gory movies in a row. I'll be damned if I don't start seeing dead people from now on. As of now, I officially have no more faith left for Wayne's taste in DVDs.

I trudged back to my room close to midnight feeling utterly exhausted from all the gore overdose and also from clutching the couch cushion so tight it went all lumpy. But NO, the night was only gonna get more exciting! And that was when Wayne stomped over from downstairs and very matter-of-factly informed me that there was a snake sitting in the garage that very moment.

HOLY GUACAMOLE, look at that thing! It was about 60 cm long and quite fat too, all curled up around the roller of the garage door.

And the two of us just stood there like goons for a good 15 minutes staring at it, somewhat dumbfounded and too wussy to do anything that would jeopardize our lives and put us on the front page of Gold Coast Times.
Wayne wasn't comfortable with the idea of having a possibly venomous snake making home in his garage so we spent another half hour doing some research before discovering that it was just some harmless carpet snake.

Clearer picture from the net.

Geez, lets just hope that it doesn't start getting greedy around here. Read article.

Exciting, hey? life in Australia :)

There are so many weird animals around you that you just feel compelled to start memorising the names and colours of venomous snakes and spiders. Just in case.

mood amused

My Generous Boyfriend

Quote of the day:

R: Here's a big HUG for you. Plus three hundred cookie points. But minus 200 for that big HUG, so you're left with 100. =)

mood full
listening to Colours by Amos Lee

Somewhat Sombre Saturday

This morning at 8am I started tossing and turning in bed for a good 45 min before finally deciding that only bums with nothing to do would do such a thing. So I crawled out of bed at 8.45 feeling surprisingly darn awake.

Everyone was still deep in slumber and the whole house was still in the morning air. I took a warm shower, did a whole load of laundry, had a bowl of cereal, and still found plenty of time in my hands, enough to toss my two cheese rolls into the oven, baking them into a crisp while I took time drying the dishes, arranging the placemats, wiping the table, fluffing the cushions, and did a little bit of tidying in this house that is not mine but I have grown to love. Then I sat down on the rug reading the papers while munching on my hot piping cheese rolls. All by myself, while the world around me slowly began to stir. It was the best feeling on earth.

My mind seemed to have been running on cruise control mode up til yesterday. Everything had gone in a somewhat fast forward mode and then faded into a blur. Before I knew it, weeks had passed me by. I have unknowingly settled down too well into this comfortable routine that I have become so attached to. Gee, when they said Industrial Attachment, I didn't expect it to be so literal.

Yesterday I was writing the date on a QA form when a pang of realisation hit me like a rock. And I said it aloud just to test its effect.

"I'm sad. March is ending."

And as though on cue, Wayne parroted out the exact same thought that was on my mind. "Yeah. Very soon you will have only a quarter of your attachment left." And then we started to talk about crying at the airports and this and that, and all of a sudden I just felt like bawling my eyes out in the lab there and then.

I would really miss this place, the way the silhouette of the mountains accompany us on our way to and fro work, the way the stars gleam by the thousands in the clear sky at night, the way the people say G'day everytime they pass me by. I would miss Wayne, the way he stares bug-eyed at the computer screen everytime I teach him new microsoft shortcuts, the way he makes a total monkey of himself just to make me laugh, the way he can't stop talking crap because that's just the way he is. And I would miss myself, the way my mind runs free unobstructed by the rigmarole of academic life, the way I could be myself, completely carefree and oblivious to the hustle and bustle of the city beat, the way this place made me realise how truly beautiful God's creations are. The deep valleys, the azure blue ocean, the rolling waves, the cloudless skies.

If I could have my way I really don't want to leave. I want to stay until December, I want to see winter turn into spring and spring turn into summer, even if it means I have to eat bread for lunch every day and survive on AUD$100/week.

Then Wayne joked, "If you don't cry at the airport, I think I will be very disappointed."

Well, I think he won't be disappointed at all.

mood contented

Ten Years Younger

After much anticipation, yesterday marked the historical date when we finally visited Warner Bros. Movieworld! I had so much fun that I am now slightly suffering from rollercoaster withdrawal symptoms. This taking into consideration the fact that it has been absolutely elephantillion years since I last went to a themepark. I think I was 11. And that was to Dunia Fantasi in Jakarta, which didn't even begin to compare!

The moment we entered Movieworld I felt like I was in another world. A world where Bugs Bunny and Tweety bird roam the streets and Batman parades around in his ridiculous skin suit even though it's summer. I even half expected Harry Potter to zoom past me in his Firebolt. It was just amazing how much physical aesthetic can transform the feel of a place. Speaking of Harry Potter, there was a Harry Potter store in Movieworld selling all sorts of funny wizard stuff! And the thing I love about Movieworld is that the shop keepers dont throw dagger stares at you even when you prance around the shop with a $26 purple hat on your head or when you squeeze a Tweety bird to your face so tight it threatens to burst at its yellow fury bum.

They even have Bertie Botts' Every Flavour Bean! Even though I wasn't exactly keen on spending money to eat earwax-flavoured jelly beans. You never know the sense of humour these people have, y'know. I attempted trying on the kids size wizard robe, but instead of looking like a wizard, me thinks I look more like Wicked Witch from the East.

And just when we were snapping away in front of the store, Harry Potter jumped out of the front door and pointed his wand at me. Literally. It was quite funny actually, except that this Harry Potter might have woken up late and rushed to work and hence, instead of drawing his scar in the middle of his forehead it was above his right eye.

-___-

Took picture with a perv-looking Zoro too!

Loved the Looney Tunes Village with all its funny looking trees and carrot dustbins!

The first ride we went for was the new Batwing Spaceshot, which was right smack in front of the entrance of the park. It was 10am and I was still recovering from the normal sunday morning syndrome with maroon 5 playing in my head when Maysan dragged me along and plonked me right smack in the middle of Batwing Spaceshot queue before systematically planning out a list of what rides to go for at what time yadda yadda. And that was when I was jolted out of my sunday stupor and went uh-oh, what have I gotten myself into??

>

Anyway Batwing Spaceshot is this massive pole-looking thing where you sit in one of the rows of seat stuck to it and it propels you from bottom to top and down again, all in about 5 seconds. It wasn't that scary and is apparently way milder than Dreamworld's The Giant Drop but STILL! I didn't have much mental preparation and hence was scared half shitless. And bugger, it was only the first ride!

And so, that kickstarted all the rides-frenzy we got ourselves into. We were screaming so much for the whole day that it was as though the past ten themepark-less years' worth of screams were tumbling out all in a single day and at the end of it my lungs felt twice its original size.

We managed to go for all the rides, except the really kiddy ones like the Sylvester & Tweety Carousel where parents rode with their kids. We actually half-contemplated it but in the end decided against it lest the carousel toppled because of our weights haha.