Hello & Goodbye

Restarting the running machine after nearly 3 weeks (although my two trips
were really strenous with all that walking, hiking and abseiling we did).

Oiling the machine certainly takes time, am hoping to run a marathon soon to add on to our list of new adventures and to fulfil our (more mine than his) 2012 new year resolution – to do/experience at the minimum one new and different thing/activity every month. I would give our resolution status green (so far so good) but our mini project status red – it’s been 5 months delayed!

I don’t mean taking huge steps in terms of our resolution (too practical and not brave enough) but I guess it is to break away from that routine we are used to. Don’t do now, then when? When I’m bogged down by family committments and kids? I guess we’ll have plenty more time to stay at home in future (I shudder at the thought of my Saturdays filled with kids-related activities and no more me-time/us-time) with kids and all.

Although that being said, I spent my weekend repaying some much needed slep debt! Snoozed the whole weekend away, shiok! Haha..

Losing weight is such hard work and my running speed is so freaking slow, I am almost ashamed to put this up.

I am trying to squeeze in as much workout time as possible admist all the night calls that I have. I actually quite like that I now have an alternative to working out at home, although the Insanity workout is so insane I feel that I might just die in my sleep or collapse from heart failure. I can totally see the effects it has on the BF though so I guess the next best alternative is to mix it up a little with a lil bit of walking everyday to/fro Toa Payoh mrt (10mins), run/insanity where possible.

1. Kick Ass- I had oodles of fun at last Thursday’s muay thai lesson =) It was just mel and me when the BF got lazy didn’t feel well enough to join. We were late and missed the warm ups but quickly got into the action where we had to hop around on one leg all the while grabbing onto your partner’s other leg. The instructor said we weren’t doing it right, but what are we to do if one’s leg is too short for the other ;p It was a day of legs training and we proceeded to do more drills. We were giggling throughout the whole session. It was mega fun and I ”kissed” and “hugged” Mel alot that day. I am so loving the intensive workout. Doesn’t matter if at the end of the day, I don’t get the stance right, that I look ridiculous in my fighting mode, the thing is I get to work out and have fun at the same time. Execpt, we almost always seem to be the ones playing a fool in the class while them macho guys kick up a storm.

2. Sunday lovin’ – Our own ride has also become our very own Karaoke booth with us belting out and grooving to the music. I love such sessions with the BF, with no care in the world how others think about my grooves and moves or my terribly squeaky voice

3. I don’t know about you, but to me birthday celebrations are pretty important and it shows how much a person cares about you. It is the only one occassion where you can show true appreciation for a friend. I like celebrating birthdays and I enjoy making someone feel extra special on this one day (actual or otherwise). So even if I may not quite enjoy whatever it may be, I would go with the flow, baby.

4. I am quite glad that I am getting my opinion and point of view back. For a little short period while I was extremely stressed out at work, all I wanted to do was head home and rest and my mind was a total blank. Nowadays, I am actually quite glad I have started “talking to myself” again, or I’d much rather say forming opinions and point of views in my head.

The BF and I have continued our “dates” on Saturdays and I am so loving the time we are spending together.

Aloy!Tom!Cycling!

On one of the Saturday, we headed to Shaw Towers for Thai Food – Ah Loy, highly recommended by The BF. I must say the food was really good. I loved most of the dishes that we ordered and the price was very reasonable too. The Thai Pineapple Rice was adequate for two to share with generous amounts of seafood. Across Ah Loy is Tom’s Palate, an ice cream joint that serves creative concoctions and changes their menu almost every other week. This time round, we tried the Fizzy ice cream! It was filled with chocolate pieces infused with the sweet that goes fizz in your mouth. Oohh.. after New Zealand’s Natural Hokey Pokey, this comes second.

With all that food, we headed to East Coast for a lil’ cycling. We cycled all the way, for nearly 2 hours before getting a call for duty from Vices Captain and we headed to Seaview for a bolt of Mj!

Sports Day!

Last Saturday, we had a blast! We worked it! In the morning, we headed to the range for a bit of golf and spent a good 2 hours in trying to perfect our stroke. Sometimes, I don’t understand why I still continue to play, perhaps I am like what his Brother says – “You no talent” – I just can’t get it right. While I have improved, my progress has been turtle slow and am so bad at it, sometimes, I just want to dig a hole and hide.

After that, we headed over to Kallang Leisure Park where we had lunch at Coffee Bean (the food sucks!) and then had an impromptu bowling session! I lost to him in the first round but kicked his ass in the second round, but of course with points given to me =)

We rushed back to his place to send his parents to their dinner function before heading to Bishan Park for a jog. That was our Sports Day and boy was I tired out from the day’s event. The BF even had the energy for some Royal Rumbling at home while I was totally zonked out. It sure was tiring but I truly enjoyed myself and very glad we are working at our Fitness level together =)

I’m lovin’ it. Our date Saturdays.

The ijclique celebrated B’s birthday this year with a Bang the wall! We met for a little rock climbing at Yishun Safra. We signed up with an independent climbing “school” located there. They have several climbing walls and when the instructor led us to the tallest wall, we all exclaimed – “are you sure?”.It was a  3 storeys high wall when there were other smaller scaled walls around.

A 2 hours climbing package with an instructor was only SGD100 for the six of us. Our instructor, Adnan (if I didn’t remember wrongly) was very encouraging and despite us signing up for the wrong thing (we chose to engage a harness instructor instead of signing up for a beginners climbing workshop), he was very detailed in his explanation and guided us through the rocks on the wall. He was shouting all the time and basically “walked” the course for us.

I enjoyed myself thoroughly, though a lil’ nerve-wrecking at first but we soon got along with the help of Adnan.

Gung-ho, fearless YW went first… and she set the benchmark so high, it was hard to beat until of course long limbs WY broke the record.

Yit climbed amidst a lot of screaming, B lacked some of those mental strength of Yit’s and Mel turned pale with blue. Me? My only aim was to not be the last! Hehe.

Side track: I have always wanted to try rock-climbing because I’ve always wanted to test my own mental strength or maybe really because of one of my favourite blog author. I have pestered the BF to go together but we haven’t found the right opportune to, so it was a good experience to try it out with the ijclique That said, I do want to go again!!! To challenge myself and go to greater heights! – literally. Perhaps I should ask the peeps along – don’t just waste those iron-pumped muscles on tight-fitting tee-shirts.  

After our 2 hours, we headed over to AMK hub for some lunch – Popeye’s and Koi!! A reward for our hard work. We then proceeded to B’s place to wash up, chit-chat and plan THE event of the year – The October Wedding!!

Girls being girls, we took nearly 2-3 hours to wash and dress up before we were ready to drive to Picotin at Bukit Timah for our nice dinner. We learnt our lessons from over-ordering, so this time round, we ordered and shared the dishes all around. I think we had steak, pizza, pastas, pork belly and some sides. This way, we could try a little of everything instead of being stuck with one lousy dish.

As usual, the topic of the day was the Wedding of the Year and our Hens’ night party in Bkk – although along the way we kept deviating from the topics. Hehe.

It was a fun-filled day and well-worth the hole in the pocket and the ache in the arms.

The BF dated me out on Saturday – our first brunch together (alone!) as we headed to Riders Cafe. We finally got a chance to try it out after the previous failed attempt with Di. As usual, I had the usual English Breakfast – Rider’s Breakfast – I thought the food served was rather standard but liked the potatoes on the side very much. The serving was rather small for my standard, thankfully the BF ordered some sides to share - more of those potatoes and a plate of smoked salmon. The “eggs-intolerant” BF had to settle for the Pancakes with Berry Compote – the serving was huge but a tad too jialat to be eaten on its own.

After our rather enjoyable brunch – it has been a long time since we had such a long chat about random stuff – we headed over to Sunset Way where we finally tried “The Daily Scoopz” – the ice cream cafe. We both had 2 scoops each – him the strawberry and avocado and me the kookie monster as well as peppermint. The peppermint was a little too overbearing and I didn’t like the combination much.

(very sad incident happened afterwhich…)

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In the evening, we headed to the Golf range with Soon, the seowsis and hai after a hiatus of so many months. It was nice whacking the balls although I am still consistently bad at the game =_= Gotta work harder at it and no more breaks. Gotta work it, baby!

I don’t usually go about setting New Year Resolutions – I just go about life, living a day to a day. This, however, does not mean I don’t have ambitions or improvements that I want to make to/in my life. Afterall, I ain’t getting any younger.

This year I am resolute to lose some of those darn weight – the damn thing about aging (other than the wrinkles) is the burgeoning size of my ass/thighs/tummy. I’ve never been SO fat in my life and I am disgusted at what I see in the mirror – not just a  lump of fats but also the body of someone without the mental determinatiion and willpower to continue her training regime. Someone who has taken her metabolism rate for granted.

I am seriously contemplating signing up for a gym membership. This has been on my mind since forever but I just haven’t gotten down to doing it.

For 2010, my gym buddy Di and I have signed up for a kickboxing class and I love it. While it is only once a week and I doubt we can lose much weight given the heavy dinner/supper we usually consume after the class, I suppose we are doing something, right?

With the differing work schedules, I suppose a gym membership would come in handy.

The question now is.. should I or should I not? Or is there a better and more motivational way to lose weight and keep fit.

I really don’t want to be the f a t t e s t brides-maid come October =(

This trip is dubbed our luxurious – “don’t care about the $$$” trip. One of our main criteria in choosing the hotel was that they must provide breakfast (the BF’s criteria). After reading reviews from Tripadvisor, we settled on Pathuwam Princess . I would recommend this four-star hotel to anyone looking for a hotel that is reasonably priced, suitably convenient (it is linked to MBK which is linked to the BTS Station – National Stadium), very clean and modern.

The room was nicely decorated. They provide basic amenities like soap and shampoo (from their in-house spa) and all as well as drinking water in the bathroom for you to use to rinse your mouth. A glass panel separates the bath room and the bed but for those who likes privacy, there is an automatic curtain that you can draw. For those who prefers to shit / bathe without someone else peering in =)

One thing though, while they provide enough pillows – the pillows weren’t too comfy for both the BF and I. It was a tad too soft for our liking but the extra pillows was good as bolsters and extra support.

Let me introduce a very important item for this trip – our trusty new luggage – aptly named Ah Mus. Because of him, we spent an hour searching high and low, digging around Mustafa. It was his first trip abroad and to commemorate, here’s Ah Mus in his haven for the five days.

We made use of some of the facilities of the hotel on one of the days – tired from shopping. We tried out their world class gym, comparable to Fitness First in Singapore. A well-equipped gym with alot of  new equipments, trainers around to help and teach you how to use the equipments. There were about 15 of threadmills and bicycles each – more popular among the ladies so I suppose there wouldn’t be a queue for the use of one on a busy day. They even have various aerobics classes which you could join. Be sure to pack in gym wear and shoes if you were to stay at this hotel. You can’t miss out trying the gym. There are other activities too – tennis, badminton, squash and even a jogging track – you can rent the necessary at their sports area. Anyway, check out the gym at The Olympic Club.

After our short gym session, we headed to the lap pool for a swim. We were actually goofing around more than swimming. We found two float boards and the BF was showing off his surfing skills while I was trying desperately to stay afloat and upright. We also had a relaxing dip in one of two jacuzzi pools, enjoying the night breeze and the romantic aura with live music from the restaurant and the sounds of Bangkok.

The International breakfast spread was good, they do pretty good eggs and I love, love their pancakes, french toast and waffles with all the different condiments – berry compote, whipped cream, maple syrup, chocolate/vanilla sauce – fantastic. If you know me, you’ll know I love my bacons and I had them every single time and with almost every helping (except the fruits). The bacons were so nicely done – so crispy and sooooooo extremely yummy. Oh, I miss the daily dosage of bacons =( The other food was pretty good too and the BF likes the hot dishes – the fried noodles, rice, potato and porridge. The salad bar was a nice touch – very fresh vegetables with no raw vege taste.

The hotel room was so convenient and comfortable, we found ourselves heading back to it more often just to rest, have a shower and for little naps.

All in all, I think it was money well-spent for the hotel. I would definitely rate it a 4 out of 5 stars. Or perhaps, I have been short-changing myself with less worthy hotels =P