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Friday, February 29, 2008

A post on a leap year day

If I don't do this, I'll have to wait till 4 years later.

I know I'm taking a painfully long time to update on cny and to reply your comments and tags. The truth is, I haven't even got started coz I was soooooo bz with work and other pressing issues.

Anyhow, continue watching this space.

Thursday, February 21, 2008

~*Taggies*~

7 Feb 08, 13:21
canny: Hi babe!! Happy CNY! Gong Xi Fa Cai!!~ oh, now living with hb here, i no longer do that anymore, got to be more xian qi (not liang mu yet) =p so got 2b tidy & pack them nicely! I'm a NEAT person! Hehe
14 Feb 08, 15:08
canny: I certainly enjoyed d photos in the slides.. really a sweet sweet entry on Vday. So tian mi mi~
Canny babe, by the time I reply to your CNY wishes, it’s already so late but nvm got 15 days of CNY and I’m sure you would have read the tag I left you too. =) When be liang mu? Come back sg first? You and your darling hubby also very tian tian mi mi! Love to read your stories about life with him in the states.


12 Feb 08, 02:09
viv: yo girl, thanks for the clear instructions on my xmas card. Entertaining!
Ya lor, I every step also take photo all by myself. I scared in time to come the card will become old and worn out so at least got these photos as memories.


12 Feb 08, 10:01
ly: Jo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Update update leh. My off day come here nothing to read!!!!!!!!!!!!!
20 Feb 08, 14:39
ly: Jo! WA so many updates? Realize last wk said off day actually mean leave. The lizard looks scary leh. You mean its cute? The ladies all dare to touch? Brave leh. You make me want to eat French food
20 Feb 08, 14:42
ly: but it is cut throat ex leh. Great work with the slides. Makes me wanna go to New Zealand for holidays. Nice work with the old photos too golden hair gal. My long leave ending soon. *Cry
You’re lucky to have such a long leave!!! I would kill to be in your position. Hahaha… Yes I realize ju ju looks scary in the pictures but I think it’s really cute in real life. Yupz… a lot of the ladies at work dared to touch the iguana. Quite surprising eh? Once in a while indulge in food is fine. I live to eat. Yes, you should try French. It’s worth it.. NZ is indeed fun. Be prepared to spend a bomb but the memories are priceless.


15 Feb 08, 05:28
silver: so sweettttt, he proposed to u! nice one!!! =) and looking at ur v day entry, it so sweet! =)
Hottie mummy silver, thanx! Your life is sweet too!


15 Feb 08, 09:49
YY: The slides are really nice to look at with great music too. Look like great fun at NZ and both of u are meant for each other. The photos are just so sweet. A match made in heaven.
Thanx YY! I love the slides and music combination too. Thank you for the kind words. That’s very sweet!


18 Feb 08, 23:04
Missy T: I love the slides. They're really sweet. NZ looks fun. Shall put that on my list. Congrats, when is the wedding? The french food look ex jus from the photos. Sound delicious. Thanks for the review.
Hi there, you left a tag some time ago right? Thanx for your kind words. The wedding dinner won’t be so soon. You’re most welcome. Maybe you can try the food there. Looks pretty good but quite limited choices from the main menu.

Sunday, February 17, 2008

Valentine's Day Dinner at The Cliff

We celebrated V-day not on the actual day itself but on Saturday.

I could hardly wait to knock off from work yesterday coz we were supposed to head for The Cliff. I planned to treat kh to make up for all my lack of gifts over the years.

I was surprised (or rather tickled) by these in the car.


I always tell kh never to buy me flowers on V-day coz I would rather he gives me the money instead. Such a hopeless unromantic girlfriend right?

My suay mouth… Now, he has become such a hopeless unromantic boyfriend. He really doesn’t gimme flowers anymore lor. Hahaha… When I saw these in the car, I immediately asked if he had bought those in school to support his friends who were selling them and he went guffawing away.

You know how I knew? The red roses were about to wither, the bouquet was amateurishly wrapped and the single stalk of pink rose was tacky. Moreover, he’s those kind who always buys things to support his friends.

I’m gonna bring the roses to work to pass to colleague A (the one with the green iguana) who is into extracting essential oils.

Off topic a bit…

On V day, there were 4 bouquets sent to our HQ. While all the ladies were crowding round the bouquets and admiring them each time they arrived, hopeless unromantic colleague A proclaimed that roses are best appreciated when they are changed into essential oils. He even requested jokingly that they could pass him their roses if they did not want them!

I’m sure he would be very happy with my roses. =)

Back to last night’s dinner.

I love the place. Perched on a cliff overlooking the South China Sea, the beautiful water features, walkway and the gentle breeze lent a hand in creating a romantic resort-like ambience. This alfresco style restaurant is a “heaven for connoisseurs of fine seafood and wine”.

The beautiful walkway


The Valentine’s set

[Click to enlarge]

My initial intention was to try their steak (as recommended by jw). However, we opted for the 6-course Valentine's set just so that we could sample more food. What to do? We are typical yao kwees. What was so unique about the Valentine’s set was that every course, whether sweet or savoury, had a hint of chocolate in it. The waitress assured us that it won’t be too sweet and chocolatey.

The great ambience




Bubbly champagne on the house


Starters


I had no idea what that was as it wasn’t part of the menu. I thought I heard the waiter saying “foie gras mousse” but I may have heard wrongly as my whole mind was filled with foie gras at that time.

Fresh oysters


This wasn’t in the set meal. At $13.90 a piece, the oysters were slurpilicious! The first time I ate raw oysters was in Perth and those were good. Most of the raw oysters I’ve tasted after that often gave me the compelling need to swallow them quickly without much chewing and wash them down with water. I could never take more than 3 raw oysters as I could not stand the bloody, metallic taste. However, these oysters have what was described as a smoky finish. With a squeeze of lemon and a touch of mignonette, each oyster was oozing with richness. Being firm and slippery at the same time, they slid down the throat smoothly. Heavenly!

Meditarreamn spices and olive oil


These were dips to go with the bread. Simple but delectable.

Mint Chocolate Muffin


This isn’t the usual chocolate muffin. It reminds me of a tiny burger. The muffin part isn’t chocolatey sweet and the middle portion is savoury.

Seared Foie Gras




I LURVE foie gras! Yes, I know how cruel it is to the goose but I really like the springy texture of foie gras which soon melts into soft, buttery smoothness on the tongue.

Pan Seared Langoustine




Okay non-foodie me didn’t know what Langoustine was before this. I thought it was prawn and popped the whole thing into my mouth. How I regretted it coz I felt like I’ve just chowed down lobster in a few seconds. While I was lamenting over my few seconds of gastronomical pleasure, kh was cutting up his langoustine and savouring every morsel by the minute. The caramellised fennell was lip smacking! Kh finished every bit of them just with fork and knife. I could not pick all up without a spoon and did not attempt to wipe my plate as clean as his.

We waited a long time for our main course to arrive and chomped on bread in the meantime. During the 2nd course, kh and I decided that we had to go for supper after the meal. However, the wait time between each course certainly sped up digestion and soon we weren’t hungry anymore.

Chocolate Braised Wagyu Beef Cheek


This was our main course but it was the same size as all our other courses. It was served with 24 karat gold and risotto. Just a few weeks ago, I was shocked to learn that gold is edible. Few weeks to now, I was shocked to find myself eating gold. It was also my first time sampling wagyu beef. I’ve always read about wagyu beef and have been dying to try them out. It wasn’t what I’ve expected. I don’t like beef that’s too tender. I prefer to chew my juicy steak. The taste was great but I soon got sick of the texture and had to pass the rest to kh.

Warm Chocolate tart




The crust of the tart is very hard as it had to act as a cup to hold the alcoholic liquid chocolate in the middle. What we did was to bite a “hole” in the cup and sipped the velvety chocolate slowly. The egg-looking chocolate on top of the passion fruit coulie was cocoa sorbet which felt like ice cream. I didn’t know it was cold, popped the whole thing into my mouth and nearly died. It was so cold that my molars hurt like shit.

All Grown Up "Hot Chocolate"




Shooter glasses filled with chocolate shavings were brought to our table. After which the waiter poured warm milk into the glasses and told us that the milk had vodka in it. That explained its name. We took a bite of the walnut fudge that was served together, found it cloyingly sweet and threw it into the glass. The drink tasted great after that.

A pot of tea to end the taste of French flair



We dined from 7.30 till 10.15. No wonder the French take so long to finish a meal.

The bill came up to $529.65.

As mentioned earlier, I said that I was treating kh but at a place like this, it doesn’t look nice when the lady pays. He also didn’t wanna appear like a xiao bai lian and insisted on paying coz the meal was too expensive. However, I was equally emphatic as I was already prepared to splurge on him. Finally, the decision was to go half-half. Little does he know that I’ve just transferred the money to his account. =P


Food: * * * * 1/2
Exquisite modern French flair with small portions and long waiting time in between. Go only if you can afford spending 3 hours on a meal.

Ambience: * * * *
Breezy alfresco dining with comfortable setting. One would definitely feel totally at ease.

Service: * * * * 1/2
Warm and friendly. Not uppity at all. Minus ½ star for their grasp of English. I had a hard time discerning what most of the staff were saying.

Price: My most expensive meal after Morton’s. I think it’s worth every single cent. Anyway, splurging on fine dining once in a while is fine. The most eat good hawker food for the next few months lor.


This is no hell's kitchen!


They worked so neatly that I told kh he would never wanna see me cook in the kitchen.

Gifts from the restaurant


The deep red roses are beautiful and I will be passing these to colleague A too.

Spa gift




The beautiful loo











Oh yes, my ring has finally made its way back from New York after resizing (Aside: So dumb rite? Must send all the way to NY for resizing). Now it fits my finger like how Cinderella's foot fitted her glass slippers. It can only be taken out by rubbing soap.



~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Replies to tags coming up! Please continue to tag or leave comments. =)

Thursday, February 14, 2008

Happy Valentine's Day... Happy 7th Anniversary

14th February 2001 was the day he asked me to be his girl.

It has been 7 years. We have grown so accustomed to each other. Just like lao fu lao qi. Yet, there will always be this spark that keeps the flame going.

I love him more and more as the days go by...



Recollecting our first 3 to 4 years together in slides:





And a whole slide show for our December 2004 New Zealand holidays. It was one of the most memorable holidays ever!





I started this blog and started recording my thoughts in mid 2004. Hence, there is no need for slides from 2005 till current as the photos can all be found on my blog. Besides, I started owning a camera since then and have simply too many photos. =P

We won't be celebrating on the actual day again. In the past, I minded a lot and wished he could be in sg. However, now I don't mind a single bit.

=)

Maturing mind? I really dunno. I guess it's a case of can't ask for more especially when he's such a great guy a gal could ever ask for.



Happy Valentine's Day to all of you reading this.

@>-->----

<3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3

Wednesday, February 13, 2008

We have a new pet at work today

Presenting chit4 chit4 the iguana!



Now, you have to pronounce chit4 chit4 in staccato, 32 beat-count if possible and make it sound as if you are a lizard calling.

There you go... chit4 chit4. Sounds cute doesn’t it?

One of our animal lover colleagues (let’s call him A) caught it from the road lest it got knocked down and decided to keep it as a pet.

However the majority of us felt that A kidnapped it when it was simply minding its own business trying to cross the road…

… which made us ponder:

“Why did the iguana cross the road?”

To get to the other side?

To find its daddy and mummy?

To chase its girlfriend?

This was the first time I touched a WARM lizard. It was basking in the sun before this.





Its skin is a brilliant shade of green which looks like fabric and feels like fabric.

When I commented on the texture, colleague A said,

“Ya… your Prada bag is made of this what.”

Hahaha… If only I have a Prada bag.

Later, more and more colleagues streamed in to check out the latest "exhibit".

When more females commented about how it felt, he went, “Ok… so how? Coin purse? Pencil case?”

Poor lizard tried to sleep but we kept disturbing it…





It looks scary here but it is actually quite cute and harmless. Even joyce the lizard-hater thinks it's cuter than house lizards. So there, that attests to the fact that it is cute.

We learnt from colleague A that iguanas are herbivores and won’t bite.



See no sharp teeth.



It has very sharp claws though. They are for climbing and clinging onto trees. When it scratched the plastic tank, it made those fingernail-on-blackboard screech. Puts a shudder through your spine eh?

Taking a photo of it on one's shoulder was virtually impossible with its long and sharp claws.

We googled and learnt more facts about iguanas. We also you-tubed illegally during office hours and watched some iguana videos.

We’ve found out that iguanas can grow up to 1.7m in length and that it loves bananas and strawberries other than the usual plants.

However, when it was feeding time, it refused to eat.

I accidentally captured it licking the banana.



Now, don’t your dirty minds go wandering.

*sniggers and wags finger*

As much as we wanted chit4 chit4 to be our office pet, we knew it was quite impossible. A said that he would bring it back to show us how it has grown after 2 months.

When I related the whole iguana incident to kh, the ending snippets of our conversation went like this...

kh: Maybe two months later you all cannot see the iguana…

jo: Because it died?

kh: Because it takes another form -- a briefcase.

-_-



All photos taken using the lousy Nokia 7390.



BTW, my hp is spoilt again. Callers won't be able to hear me. It's a recurring problem which would fix by itself as and when it pleases and I totally hate it. I've already sent it for servicing once. I don't wanna lose all my contacts again.


Will update on CNY soon (how soon is soon?)

Thursday, February 07, 2008



Hope the cute rats (not mice hor) have put a smile to all of you reading this.

Collect lotsa ang pows… smile sweetly at your annoying relatives… zone off when they start raining questions on you... eat lotsa bak kwa… stuff your face with tarts… chomp all the new year goodies (or baddies)… hu many times for mahjong… huat at the blackjack table… and

ENJOY YOURSELVES this lunar new year cum long weekend!

This is one year which I actually look forward to CNY. I’ve been sooooooooooo busy at work and at home that I’ve been averaging 3--4 hours sleep every night. I’m very proud of myself for completing all the tasks at home and at work. Time for a break!

Wheeeeee!


~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Replies to tags


1 Feb 08, 13:53
Canny: Gambette in spring cleaning ya!! Jiayou jiayou!! =) btw, i used to be like you, just slot & dump all my stuffs in whatever space i have in the drawers, cupboards.. LOL!
Canny dear, well I hope you are not like how we used to be.. Hahaha… if not the stuff will just accumulate in the drawers and the time would come where you have no more space to stuff things. Then, you’ll spend the next few nights packing like siao…Hehehe… Hope you’ll have a nice ang mo CNY celebration!

3 Feb 08, 22:49
Yoo Min: Wonderbra, on the contrary I think Jolene use to be even funnier. I ave been reading her blog on off since 2005. It was really funny last time. Now its more like a diary for friends to read. Its still nice to read o offence Jo but I miss your witty writings like about Fiona Xie's breasts and Paris Hilton Letter. It seems like youre too busy for such writings now. Bring them back if you can! And since this is the first time I'm leaving a comment I would like to extend my congratulations to you!
Hi, thanx for leaving a mark here. Well, indeed my blog is more like a diary to update my frenz of happenings now. I do remember the times when my frenz commented that my blog machiam Apple Daily and reads like a gossip magazine. Those were in 2004 when I had more time on my hands to poke fun at people. Don’t think it’s 2005. Wow… you’ve been reading silently for so long all these while? Well, I certainly missed writing like that too and I hope I would have the time to write more of such entries. No worries, I did not take offence. In fact, I’m glad to read something that is different. Continue leaving tags or comments. Don’t remain quiet! =)

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