thoughts if any

-met nadia and natt tis week. met at specialist centre(nadia).went HMV to get Chicken Rice War for her thesis. Then after a jam and a detour went to Adam Road Food Ctr for din. Ate lots. details to be found on nadia's blog. Natt came by later to join in the self-engourging.was nice to see them both. must do it again soon...and again...(to be blogged in detail more later)

- met Joyce a lot since the last blogs. what else is new, we meet so often it is almost not newsworthy anymore.we meet more after we broke up than we did while we were together. Love her still.(needs an entire blog for itself just to contain the whole story)

- The gay xmas party SnowBall.04 has not been given approval by the local authorities cos of it was "contrary to public interest". I dun approve of the gay lifestyle but in my view this is a step back from the so called all inclusive rheteoric from a few months back where the government was saying how gays are now part of society and homosexuals are allowed to be employed in the civil service and all.Another point is how inconsistent policy can be when last year the gay community had a high profile party at Sentosa musical fountain yet this year it is 'contrary to public interest'. What has changed after a year? Or has Singapore suddenly become more conservative as we liberalised(an oxymoron)? Maybe it has something to do with it not being in the Christmas Spirit? lol

- have you seen those sensor taps at public toilets? They just don't work as they are supposed to. You have to place your hands right at sensor (which is often just inches below where the water sprouts from) and if you move out of sensor range it shuts off. Added to that is that the water pressure from such taps are almost a trickle. It is comical to watch others trying in vain to get their hands clean, but not so amusing when you are the one. A giant step for technology, a small step back for humanity.

-on the topic of toilets: recently heard in the media about how a local petrol staion proudly boasts of winning the Happy Toilet award by the Restroom Association of Singapore. The RAS (wonder where they hold their weekly meetings) was impressed enough to award the maximum score of five stars to the station. Caltex has a maintenance programme that involves inspection and cleaning of the toilets every hour. The new toilets have been rebranded as "refreshrooms" and feature automatic activation of the flush, soap, sink and hand dryer. A must see for tourists to Clean and green Singapore.

- more toilet humour: Restroom Association of Singapore website features fun downloads and the organisation logo is the initials RA! Going to the loo has never been so much fun. You can find out about upcoming events and activities. You can even nominate your toilet for the Happy Toilet award. Please remember to read the rules and regulations though.Quite strict these guys are.
You just have to check it out for yourself to see what I am waxing lyrical about.

- Tiger Cup is on. Singapore drew both their matches so far. Vietnam and Indonesia joust tonight. A win for either side will mean our Lions will qualify for the next round if they win their remaining matches. A draw however will mean Singapore has to register big wins to qualify. Do we still remember the previous Tiger Cup where Indonesia and Thailand played to a draw just to avoid facing Vietnam? A farce it was...

- I got fined $12 by the LTA.$2 ERP charge and $10 administrative charge. I have to pay the fine by 27th December, failing which a Notice of Traffic Offence will be sent and compounded to the tune of $70. Was just wondering what the $10 admin fee is for. Maybe it is one of those civil service things where a simple letter sent goes through many levels to approval. To justify the cost of manpower and all the LTA charges $10 to recover costs. Of course this comes from someone whose section charges people $38 transportation cost to go to their premises to inspect their goods.

- Speaking of fines, the other day in JB I got a summons for parking without a parking coupon. I have to pay....*drumroll please*...RM 30!! Beginning to sound like the Malaysians are beginning to pick up a few pointers from their Singapore counterparts.

- Those of you with a craving for critically acclaimed masterpieces by local filmmakers please move on to the next entry. You will not find anything like that here. For the rest of you check out the latest offerings from the Central Narcotic Bureau in their bid to achieve a drug free Singapore. A collection of videos can be found. Just be prepared to wait a while whilst they download.Meanwhile you can do other wholesome stuff like learning how to construct a bomb from easily found household items or just surf to your favourite porn sites. Read the synopsis. Really gripping human drama. 6 movies can be found here.

-Singapore Idol rants: Taufik wins!! Sylvester loses but gets a contract anyway!!
What a load of crap! The least they could do was wait until Taufik had his day in the sun before announcing that Sly was not the real loser anyway. To rub salt into wounds, TCS also decided whilst they were at it to announce that Taufik would not be representing Singapore at World Idol as was reported earlier. In the light of protests of lack of fairness in awarding a contract to the LOSER of Singapore Idol, TCS issued a press statement stating that 'technically' Taufik is still the winner since Sylvester was not 'assured' of a contract in the first place whereas Taufik as the winner was. Well...duh! And today we also found out that the now ever-smiling Sylvester has also won an endorsement deal for Smile toothcare products. It shows what a smile can do...

- Camou has long nails. Dogs nails should be trimmed regularly. In fact you should start trimming them from pups (the nails...not the pups in case you wondering).

Anyway Camou's nails are long and yesterday night as he was enthusiastically greeting Noel and Paula as they came home his dew claw got stuck somewhere and was left hanging(the nail not Camou). At first it was unclear what was wrong with the bitch-spawn. But despite having no formal training in doggie medical school we surmised that something was wrong with his toenail. This fact was made apparent when Camou on more than one occasion licked the injured part. Now that we had sucessfully identified the problem without having to make a fish-bone chart and a bar chart, it was now time to find a solution to the problem. Short of calling for the formation of a WITS team or calling in the Marines, we decided to do the next best thing. We called Dad.

We asked him where the toe nail clippers was. No one had ever seen one before but we knew it existed somewhere,someplace in our house. After a few misguided directions and much searching we managed to find the set of toenail clippers. It was found in pristine condition in its original casing.It was as though it has never been used before. Which of course was true, but which is also besides the point. Now what remained was to actually do the cutting off of the offending cartilage without hurting the pooch. The realisation of this utopian ideal proved elusive as Camou struggled and yelped as even light pressure was applied on the affected area. At our wits (there is that word again)end, we decide to call the Mount Pleasant Animal 24 hr clinic. Whilst Noel did the necessary calling, I rushed to my pc and furiously typed in words related to dogs nails such as 'trimming','toenails', 'dog', 'bleeding to death', 'permanent paralysis' and 'weapons of mass destruction' on the Yahoo! searchengine. I found to my relief (and Camou's and everyone else in attendance) that bleeding from a toe nail is rarely fatal as I had alluded to earlier to Noel. The filipino at the other end of Noel's call told us to quickly pull out the toenail and bandage the paw.As it was not a medical emergency we were told to bring him in the following day. Non-medical emergency my foot!

After that we did our best impersonations of a filipino veterinarian attendant before,"Pwrease quigly pull the nails out and then bandwage it", getting back to the task at hand. Camou was not very amused by our stand up comic routine and looked rather close to tears actually. Party pooper!

Paula tenderly held Camou in her arms,close to her bosom, whilst Noel attempted to concentrate on the task at hand and not on the bosom.It required someone with nerves of steel and a steady pair of hands. Noel proved unable to complete the task for some reason so it was left to me to pretend to be unaware of the bosom and cut the toenail. After much ado, I finally managed to cut the nail as Noel looked on worriedly (for Camou...not Paula's bosom...which by this time was covered in white fur). With that done it was left to Noel to bandage the paw up. But first we had to find bandage and surgical tape. We found the bandage easily enough but the tape took a litle more resourcefulness and ingenuity. Noel then did the honours as I helped to cut out strips of tape. What would they do without me?

With the bandage on 'securely' we set Camou down to take his first steps with his new footwear. He stumbled and fell a few times as we all do when we had just undergone a toenail trim and a bandaged appendage. After finding his footing, Camou then proceeded to do what any self-respecting domesticated animal would do under the circumstances. He proceeded to pee and poop, after which he commenced to get down to the serious business of irritation irradication by gnawing at the bandage to get it off.