Archive | Activity RSS feed for this section

MCO, Day 6

23 Mar

It is Day Six of our partial lockdown and I must say, it’s been surreal. Everyday felt like a Saturday until we lost track of the days. But we have not been bored which is good.

This month alone, I completed four, one in progress and more to come!

Everyday I carved and cooked two meals whilst hubby tended to the garden. And every now and then, house chores were thrown in and the days passed by albeit slowly.

For someone who has not cooked for the last 12 years because we had a lived-in maid to do this, I find myself still quite adept in the kitchen. Thank goodness because eating out is not an option. For the record, our maid went back for good this year in mid-January and so we’ve been “help-less” for the past two months. But we’ve managed well.

And so far, the lockdown menu has been impressive and varied because I have more time now to plan than the last two months. And mind you, it’s none of the easy way out of opening a can of whatever and just warming up. I must admit, this cooking task is rather enjoyable. A nice change from carving, keeping me occupied to pass the time quickly.

As for our movement, it’s been controlled. The last five days, we went out only two times each. Briefly on all occasions – once together to the office to copy some work files home, then only hubby to the pharmacy for some supplements and just myself to replenish some groceries.

When I was out to the nearby grocery store, I was early. So I stood in line, far apart, with the rest of the shoppers waiting for the shutters to open. Senior citizens, allowed to go in half an hour earlier before the crowd, certainly took advantage of their allotted shopping time without stress.

The half hour wait outside felt rather long and when it was time to go in, I took merely three minutes to get in and out, picking up only what I needed. I was second in queue, so it was a fast turnaround.

People were more disciplined and I noticed less panic buying. Most just picked up what they needed. I guess by now, most people know what to do compared to the initial days when there was so much confusion and some level of fear.

We have another eight days to go until this Movement Control Order is lifted and this is if the public continues to be disciplined in following orders. However the situation keeps changing and staying put is best and for our own good.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

MCO, Day 3

20 Mar

We have been under Movement Control Order (MCO) as instructed by the government and today is Day 3. I must say it has been good so far. I wake up when I am done sleeping. Then I have my tea at a leisurely pace because I don’t have to get ready for work to face the challenges ahead.

The number one worry-free plus point from this experience: no stress over the car next to our reserved parking lot at the office. The lady driver always, without fail, parks her car very close to our lot (and not in the center of hers) whenever she arrives before us, thus giving me very little room to get out of my car. A two weeks’ break from this daily annoyance is certainly welcomed.

We’ve been enjoying the comforts of home as I spent most of my time carving whilst hubby would be out in the garden tending to his plants. In between, I have been preparing meals and doing some light chores around the house. So domesticated. Hahaha…

My daily routine now: carving Whales

After lunch, I carved. And carved and carved. Then I would get dinner ready. The best part, we have been having pre- and post-dinner drinks more often than before. Whiskey, gin, wine and beer… we’re doing it all.

Then it’s Netflix all the way until bedtime. And this routine will be repeated day in, day out until the end of the month.

The downside from this partial lockdown: no golf until the end of the month as well! We contemplated taking walks in the evenings to address the exercise portion of our lives. Hmm… then again, doing house chores is exercising too.

The upcoming weekend may see a break in pattern or most likely not. Everyday feels like a weekend now. And so far so good, we are still sane.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Living in Fear

17 Mar

When 2020 came around, there were many positive thoughts and attitude towards the new year. After all, it’s the start to a new decade, and maybe a better outlook after what felt like a dismal 2019. It will be the best year to come, many thought.

How wrong we all were! Barely three months into the year, humanity has been threatened by a new contagious virus never encountered before: the Covid-19. As such, everything has been disrupted with daily routines being thrown into disarray to circumvent the spread. You could say the whole world has almost come to a standstill with the pandemic outbreak. Unprecedented!

My country has not been spared. With a surge in cases at the beginning of this week, the government of Malaysia has imposed a partial lockdown starting tomorrow until the end of March. Panic buying has also occurred here. Luckily we were sensible enough to stock up our food supplies last week.

It’s as if the virus is a smarter-than-us alien attacking mankind like a gripping sci-fi movie from Hollywood. Always one step ahead to avoid detection, it lurks then pounces on the unsuspecting and weak. The intention: to take over our world and make it their own, wiping out mankind in the process. Horrifying thoughts in overdrive mode here. Shudder…

Do we need to collectively pray for divine intervention and perhaps a miracle to overcome this? Or should it be social consciousness or even civic-mindedness to prevent the spread? I can’t find the right words for this…

Every single human being has to do their part and be socially responsible, whether directly or indirectly to combat this together. The phrase “United we stand, divided we fall” is so apt right now. Otherwise the whole world will be living in fear until there is a breakthrough to fight this infectious virus. When? We don’t know… God help us all.

Tags: , , , , ,

Impulse Buying

16 Mar

Sometimes the act of impulse buying is merely to appease the buying urge than the need for the item itself. That’s why it’s called impulse buying.

Once in a while, I succumb to this impulse when I am cooped up too long doing the daily routine and feeling like a robot. Life has been without excitement lately, and especially so given the pandemic Covid-19 that has gripped the whole world and crippling all sorts of movement and activities.

Like everyone else, we have been keeping abreast with the daily development of the situation and have been dutifully avoiding crowded places. Practising social distancing to stay safe, we haven’t gone to the mall for ages. So much so, routine has become so predictable, dull and boring.

Over the weekend however, I was at my golf club and there was a golf equipment sale and I bought a Maruman Conductor 5-wood! Honestly I don’t really need it because I already have my XXIO MP 900 golf clubs complete with the 3- and 5-woods plus a U-5. So why did I buy it?

Well, the impulse buying urge for one. Secondly, I haven’t bought anything of late and grocery does not count. So the purchase was for some form of gratification to excite the otherwise predictable, dull and boring life.

img_8449-1

My shiny new 5-wood to complement the other two clubs of the same series!

The new 5-wood complements the Maruman Conductor 3-wood and U-4 that I already have and had been retired for some time. Maybe from here on, I might change my XXIO MP 900 woods for this set for variation to make golfing more interesting.

This—my game that is—has been too routine and boring as well; there’s no excitement anymore approaching the game. Same routine, same mistakes, same near misses… so predictable.

Well, put it this way, this impulse buy may be just what I need to vary the mundane, predictable and dull, be it my golf game or my daily routine, the story of my life now.

Tags: , , , , , , , ,

The End is Nearer

10 Mar

You know how apps are automatically updated? Of course this is if the device is set up for it to do so. Over one mid-December weekend, something unusual happened with my iPad Mini. It was updating Candy Crush Saga in the background whilst I was playing the Soda version.

Suddenly the game quit unexpectedly and a black screen with the Apple logo appeared. Uh oh. Then the next thing I knew, the Candy Crush Saga app disappeared! Is this a sign that the end is nearer for the iPad Mini?

I had to do a complete shut down, wait ten seconds then switched on the device again before the app appeared. Haish… why do this to me?

Seriously methinks the Mini wants to retire for good.

Tags: , , , ,

Friday the 13th

9 Mar

A day before the ominous Friday the 13th in December last year, my MacBook Air crashed and died. I never saw it coming although there were tell tale signs of instability after installing MacOS Catalina 10.15.1 a few weeks earlier. I caved in and updated because of iTunes and my iPhone XR. To cut a long story short, I had to update the OS in order to have the latest version of iTunes that could sync with the iPhone XR. Otherwise, I could not back up my phone, something that I don’t do that often.

So all was fine and dandy except a few small matters like several of the softwares. The Adobe and Microsoft softwares that I have—essential but not critical—could no longer be used because the versions I have were not supported with the 10.15.1 OS. But since I hardly use those softwares these days and I could back up my iPhone XR, this was all that mattered I rationalized.

On that faithful eve of the ominous day, I had my Skype launched and ready to have the weekly session with M1. Suddenly, the app was acting up and I had to restart the laptop. Several times in fact. A prompt came up and caught my eye – the OS needed to be updated with Catalina 10.15.2.

Reflecting back the several instances of instability and the recent wonky behavior of Skype, I thought perhaps it was best to update the OS. Bad idea, really bad, bad idea.

The laptop could not install the OS and hung several times. A black screen kept appearing with each restart. Uh oh. Even with Global Network Recovery and all the steps I could find online could not save my MacBook! Oh no….

The next day, Friday the 13th I went to Machines, a local authorized Apple reseller to see what could be done. To my dismay, Machines no longer provided support for older devices. Oh no! The apprehension of this ominous day struck.

My 11” MacBook Air is a 2012 model and deemed a vintage device and as such, do not qualify for further technical support. I was advised then to go to a third party repair shop. Do I have a choice at that point?

So off to a third party repair shop I went. Thankfully, these guys fixed the problem (they took a few days though) and I also had all my data recovered for an additional fee. Phew. My MacBook Air is now downgraded to MacOS Sierra 10.12.6 and should remain at this version for optimum performance.

But less than a month after that, the laptop acted up again resulting in the decision to do a total reformat. This was after backing up all the recovered data to an external drive. So so problematic.

While updates are good, it does not necessarily add value to older devices. One should be cautious before doing so, otherwise be prepared for some stress of losing data and then a little hole in the pocket to fix the damage and retrieve the precious.

Hopefully nothing disastrous will happen to my laptop on this ominous date this coming Friday. And I have since been backing up my iPhone XR on iCloud.

Tags: , , , , , , , ,

Maybe I Can Bake, Part 2

2 Mar

The baking bug seems to have gotten me. After the success of the carrot cake, I itched to bake again! And so I did. This time I picked up two boxes! A the Zesty Orange Cake Mix and a Banana Honey Muffin for various reasons.

img_8308

Green’s baking mixes make you look good in the kitchen!

The main reason being I had leftover milk and butter from the last baking episode. They are food that I don’t usually consume, so baking was the only option to use them up.

Reason number two: the brand’s website showed an orange cake with poppyseeds choice but our regular grocer did not have this, only the one sans poppyseeds. And because I love poppyseeds—I used to eat poppyseed bagels whenever I could when I was living in New York City dinosaur years ago—I went out of the way to buy a pack of poppyseeds to add to the orange mix. Clever, ain’t I?

Reason number three: I actually have a muffin tray. Yeah… I know, for someone who doesn’t bake, my baking gadgets seems to be quite comprehensive. Previously, the tray was used to make mini quiches for M2 to bring to school. But now with her being away in college, the tray has not been used.

Back to my baking novelty, this time I was super efficient and needless to say, the Orange Cake was simply delicious as it now comes with poppyseeds. Next week, muffins! With poppyseeds as well.

img_8327

I skipped the icing topping and the cake is just right with a slight crunch of the poppyseeds

I must attribute the baking success to the brand, Green’s Baking of Australia and not so much of my skills in the kitchen. It’s the mix that makes me look good and feel good. Forget the 16/8 diet for the time being until this baking novelty wears off.

Tags: , , , ,

Maybe I Can Bake

24 Feb

I gave up the idea of baking with my Kenwood Rapid Bake but not baking itself. So another box of cake mix I bought and another attempt.

This time, I opted for a carrot cake that comes with icing! An improvement because there’s another step involved instead of just adding eggs, milk and butter to the cake.

The cake itself was easy – this time, an egg with water and oil instead of milk and butter to add to the mix. And for someone who doesn’t bake a lot, if not at all, I have a fair bit of baking essentials, like the loaf pan that I found. So I didn’t have to use the round pan.

img_8219

Top: straight out from the oven; Bottom: drowned with icing

After 40 minutes in the conventional oven, my cake was done! Excited I literally drowned the cake with the icing that was mixed earlier, a separate fun task I must say. Maybe I’m not supposed to drown the cake like this? Hmm… but the overall taste was good, not too sweet and just right.

Maybe I can bake after all if I put my mind to it by using the correct equipment, that is the conventional oven and not a bread maker. Having said that, true baking skills come from doing it from scratch and not from a ready-mix box. What I have attempted the last three times was simply novelty and I’m far from being a pro at baking.

If I truly want to pursue baking to hone my kitchen skills, I should keep trying. But do I really want to? Hubby says we will gain weight from having to eat all the cakes, muffins and what nots. Given that we are still at the 16/8 diet, I think this baking novelty will be short-lived.

Tags: , ,

Consistently Inconsistent

21 Feb

Just when I thought golf is fun again, back to using my driver and woods, reality sucks. After the Iron Challenge Tournament on Sunday, I played a game on Tuesday and couldn’t get used to teeing off with the driver.

I have been so in tune with my 4-iron to tee off that switching back to the driver felt so strange. My coordination was off and consistently inconsistent. There were times when I could fly the ball off the tee, the ball would go so very far. But when I couldn’t launch it, the ball would just sputter off the tee to a pathetic 20 or 30 feet in front! Terrible.

As a result of this problem, I lost five balls playing at the Lakes course! What a confidence spoiler. Hopefully this setback is a temporary thing. I need to play more games to get my rhythm again for better golfing days ahead.

Tags: , , , , ,

This Is Why I Don’t Bake, Part 2

18 Feb

So I attempted to bake again, on Saturday. And you wouldn’t believe the process of this second attempt. It’s simply incredulous.

I bought the same brand of cake mix but this time Vanilla instead of Butter. Despite this little flavor difference, the ingredients needed were the same – eggs, milk and butter to add to the mix.

Like a pro, I put everything into the pan efficiently and switched on all the buttons and my Kenwood Rapid Bake came alive. It was put to work to churn the ingredients before baking. Oh yay I thought, let’s hope it works this time.

But no, that’s when all the problems started!

It went straight into Mode 1 before I could even select Mode 7 for cake. Then it was user problem because somehow, I couldn’t press the buttons—any button or all the buttons—in a semi-panic state to change the setting. After that it was machine problem as it went into overdrive mixing because it was in the bread making mode. Quite a comedy…

Finally hubby had to help me and he managed to change the setting. By now, the ingredients were thoroughly mixed which was probably good. Or maybe not… I don’t know.

With Mode 7 selected, the machine started another round mixing the ingredients all over again. Gosh! Can a cake mix be over mixed? Suddenly several funny knocking noises could be heard…

The next thing I knew, there was a power outage!!! My Kenwood Rapid Bake in cake mode setting tripped a fuse in the house. Amazing or is it just me being totally hopeless?

As for the thoroughly mixed cake mix, into the round pan again and into the conventional oven again. Thirty minutes later, the Vanilla cake was done but a little bit more crusty on the edges and more brown than the first cake last week. The taste? Quite nice I must admit in spite of all that crazy problems.

A little burnt, a little brown but yummy

If I had known baking with the bread maker can be so hazardous, I wouldn’t even attempt. But will I bake again? Hmm… it’s hard to say because both cakes did turn out okay. It’s the idea of using the bread maker that was problematic.

So if I do want to bake, the easy way of course, I should just bake the conventional way and leave my Kenwood Rapid Bake as an extension of the upper kitchen counter.

Tags: ,

← Older Entries
Newer Entries →