Ikea binging

So I went with L to Ikea last week, cos i had a $50 dollar voucher to use up and I hate shopping for furniture alone. And seeing as there was nothing that particularly appealed to me, we decided to use it at the cafe. The only problem was that you wouldn't get any change back. So we decided to see if we could spend all $50 dollars of it.

The final bill? $53.30 something cents. We had 3 main courses, soup, drinks, and more desserts than you can count. Somehow, the two of us bottomless pits managed to finish it. Even though I'm not sure I want to see a swedish meatball anytime in the future.

Hanging out with L was fun. I told H that what I value about a lot of my closer friends is that I get to be goofy and silly, which is my natural state. That's how you know how comfortable I am with you, really -- it's how silly i dare to act around you. A lot of people always think I'm really stern and unyielding on first impression (and there is that side to me), but then realise i'm just mostly a soft teddy bear.

But yeah, L is one of the few guys I can be completely goofy around. Which is neat. Probably the only other local guy is J from JC. But he's married and has a 4 year old kid now (!) so I hardly ever get to see him. So L will be the EGMYB for now ;)

L also passed me Final Fantasy 7 : Advent Children. It's a CG movie sequel to the FF7 video game. Awesome awesome graphics. And can i say that they got the fighting sequences perfectly. Gotta love them super-heroic fighs. All of this just whets my appetite for FFX. What can i say? I'm a super nerdy video game geek.... although I am going to get some UFO pants (see post about 10 things that make you a geek)


On other fronts :

The ankle still isn't fully recovered, and I keep having to postpone the appointment with the sports doctor. It's alright, i will keep running someday.

Going to Wisconsin for work in a few days. Should be an interesting trip, especially since I don't have to be the main person staffing. The good news is that I might be able to take a side trip to Michigan to see H :) Talk about pleasant surprises.

Things you will NEVER EVER catch me eating :
1) Omelette
2) Raw worms
3) Broccoli
4) Liver
5) Congealed pig's blood

Ajantis has nightmares of monstrous swedish meatballs....

Of Male Cheerleaders and Wacky Otakus

Was surfing through one of my favorite video game website and saw this game today.

http://www.gamespot.com/ds/puzzle/ouendan/preview_6132078-2.html

Yes, the Japanese truly have a wacky sense of humour. Only they could come up with a game where you play a trio of male cheerleaders who must make their way around Japan helping people who need cheering. Yes, you heard me. Japanese. Male. Cheerleaders. And it's a rhythm based game.

Ossu! Tatakae! Ouendan! :)

Decided not to go for the Army Half Marathon today. Pulled my ankle 2 weeks ago. It was recovering, but I pulled it by running 10km again on Tues as part of my warm-up. Since I was planning to originally go for the half-marathon in December anyway, it's not that big a deal. Although the ornery part of me was still deliberating about it up until the last moment. Oh well.

Played a funny game with J last week. We were rating potential one-night stands and partners (different!) in the lindy community . Our tastes weren't too far apart, apparently.

Which got me thinking... what do i find attractive in a person? Some thoughts for tonight :
1) Someone who I can talk with (and not just talk to)
2) A good voice
3) Liberal
4) Sense of humour
5) Good-natured
6) Calls me out on stuff when i'm being silly
7) Good cook
8) Huggable
9) Non-ugly (I just need to not be scared to death when I see this person in the morning)
and many more, but those are the few that came to mind. And what's funny is that I already have a person in mind who has most, if not all of those qualities, and that i'm chuckling even as I write this. H might not dance, but that might still change :)

Time to sign off.
Ajantis is smiling....

AHM

Have decided. Am going to run the Army Half Marathon . Brrr.

My original promise was to run either a 10km or a half marathon at the end of the year. Am up to 38km a week now, with the longest run at 17km. My boss tells me I can do it... even if the last 5km is gonna be a pain and a half.

Reflecting back on the training over the past 6 months, I have to say that it's been quite a trip. After huffing and puffing through the first performance class, and realising how relatively unfit I was, I resolved to work on my fitness. Pounding the treadmill that first time for 3.4km was not fun, I tell you.

So yes, there is a sense of accomplishment at having reached 17+km. It's kinda zen-like, almost. Running so regularly, combined with regular workouts, have really helped my fitness. Funnily enough, my complexion has also improved.... don't really get huge zits on my face anymore, or is it just that my face has finally decided to stop rebelling and wallowing in its angsty adolescent years.

Only problem now is that various parts of my legs take turns to complain after each run. Some times it's the calf, sometimes the shin, sometimes the ankle. Knowing how ornery I can be about such things, gonna have to be extra careful so that I don't hurt myself in trying to keep up with the mileage, so to speak.

I'm definitely going to keep on running after this. It is de-stressing, and quite relaxing (ah, those endorphins at work!). Before I commit to any other races though, we'll see how the AHM goes :)

Watch this space for more updates!

Ajantis keeps running...

Doggy bags

Was pondering over whether to get this game tonight.

Nintendogs.... it's all the rage in Japan. Essentially, it's a glorified Tamagotchi (for those old enough to remember that phase). You can train your puppy to perform tricks upon voice commands, play with it, pat it etc etc. So tempting, but it's 310 bucks down the drain (250 bucks for the DS system and 55 buck s for the game). Can I help it though if i'm a sucker for puppies?

I've always wanted dogs, but circumstances always conspired to prevent that. Childhood allergies to dog fur, Singapore's restrictions upon dog sizes in HDB flats. You get the idea.

But i've always been more of a dog person than a cat person. So if and when we move out of our current HDB flat, you can bet that we will be getting a dog (allergies be damned!)

Thankfully, H is a dog person too, although we have slightly different opinions about which breed to get. We eventually settled on pugs, bulldogs, or frenchies. (I flatly refused when it came to rottweilers, and H thought Golden Retrievers were dumb). Why bulldogs? Most people think that they are ugly, whereas I tend to find their features uniquely cute. Don't ask me why. It's probably the same reason I hate vegetables and refuse to eat egg, even in fried carrot cake. :P
If you really pressed me, I might say that it's because they are compact, supposedly loyal, and because their squashed features just seem to fit so well with the way their body is shaped.

Vegetables, eggs... blech. But that's a story for another day.

Ajantis is turning green

Boob bibbies

It's been a long time since the last blog.

This weekend has been kind of a recharging weekend. Had a tough time at work last week, and was a little in the pits. But taking the time away from work this weekend, going to Harry's, going to performance group, was a good way to shake myself out of the doldrums. There are things to do, and moping around isn't gonna get them done :)

One of the things I did this weekend was to run a 10km race. It was surprisingly easy, and i was quite pleased with the 49 min time since I was still hacking like there was no tomorrow (finally caught the flu bug that's been going around). Made me realise how de-stressing running had been. And it feels good to be healthier and fitter. For one thing, my complexion has definitely improved... fewer huge zits... (having said that, Murphy's law dictates that I will now break out horrendously tomorrow). They also had free massages! And it was a real sports massage... which made me realise how excruciatingly tight my thigh muscles were. Time to get some physiotherapy.

Performance group was fun today. While I still couldn't do forward rolls properly (which is strange, considering I used to be able to do them in JC), I did manage to get off a handstand and a feeble attempt at a cartwheel. Learning aerials is also a different way to think about body awareness and lindy hop.

And Harry's was good last night. Even if we did spend some time talking about boob bibbies and assorted other geeky stuff that annoyed P to no end. Well, maybe that's why it was better than usual ;)

Ok, time to sign off before this degenerates into more blather.

Here's to the new week!

31 kilometres and counting...

That's how far I ran this week. 7.5km on Mon. 9km on Wed. And 14.6km on Sat.

Amazing to think that I was at 3km a run and 9km a week only 4 months ago. The human body is an amazing thing. Resilient.... and yet so fragile. Lance Armstrong's story always amazes me. How a person can come back from testicular cancer, to win the Tour de France SEVEN TIMES running, is simply amazing. Guess that is a testament to the strength of the human mind as well.

Was at a National Day Dinner last night (yes, that's part of my job description now). They had some very professional entertainment on stage, including a famous singer from Taiwan. While I enjoyed some of the acts, what hit me was how much MORE some of the other guests were enjoying it. Try as I might, I couldn't completely enjoy it like some of the dialect speaking aunties and uncles at the dinner.

That's one of the things i've always been struggling with. Am I a banana? :P My family all speaks dialect and we all come from very modest backgrounds. I still recall the story of my youngest aunt eating a baby rat. Heh. But I've also gone to the US, spent 4 years there. And while I don't spend much on eating out, i do go to chi-chi (to quote Ming) with friends (like ..... Les Amis) which my family usually won't go to. That's part of the reason why I've always been interested in Asian-American culture; I identify with the same sense of duality that pervades Asian American literature and culture.

Also got to meet a charming man at the dinner. We hit it off right away even though there was a 40-50 year age difference. And guess what we connected over? Chocolate :) That's one of the things I like about this job. That it gets me out of the office and allows me to meet so many different people, both great and small. Keeps one humble.

Ajantis is dreaming of Royce White Chocolate...