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There’s Always a First

26 Nov

I’ve been wearing rimless glasses for as long as I can remember, alternating between my Silhouette and Lindberg over the years whenever my power increased and I had to change the lens. The last few years, I have been wearing the Lindberg pair and totally forgot that the Silhouette pair was made as a spare.

Over the weekend, I broke my glasses! Now, I have dropped my glasses several times before (the Silhouette more than the Lindberg) but the many times, it survived the fall. Alas, this time the Lindberg was not so lucky as the nasty drop cracked the lens and caused it to break off from the bridge.

It was after a golf game and I was in the locker room when the mishap occurred. Sigh… and the worse part, it wasn’t my home club and we were a good hour away from home. Thank goodness, hubby was driving otherwise it would have been a challenge to drive back, being visually-impaired without my glasses.

At that point, I was more worried that I didn’t have a spare pair to use because I honestly couldn’t recall about the Silhouette pair. So I had to manage moving about because it was several hours later before we got home.

When we finally reached the house, I decided to look for the Silhouette, hoping maybe it was made as a spare and I just simply forgot about it. True enough… I found the Silhouette glasses without having to turn the whole wardrobe upside down. Phew.

Being a dinosaur, insignificant things tend to be forgotten. How would I know this insignificance would be just the opposite? I’ve never broken my glasses before.

Obviously the power is different being an old pair but luckily still wearable. So for the time being, best to just use it or continue to be visually-impaired while the Lindberg goes in to be fixed.

I must admit I have been facing issues with the Lindberg’s power these past few weeks and I have been procrastinating to go have my eyes checked. But now with this unfortunate incident, it’s a definite push to have that eye appointment pronto.

The glass breaking is a first for me though and now we know why we must always keep a spare pair of glasses–and remembering we have it too–for an unforeseen and unfortunate situation such as this.

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The Lindberg cracked and broke near the bridge; thank goodness for the spare Silhouette!

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A New Direction

8 Nov

After the bout of carving six Citizens not too long ago, I was ready for another big piece. Suddenly carving big pieces is the way to go! This latest attempt at another Ginormous Gnome is again a combination of three Meranti wood, making it the second piece with three glued pieces.

This time there’s no add-ons for depth, learning from the previous piece. Also I am unfazed by the height because I know what to do. And there certainly won’t be any hole in the cap because I sketched the Gnome to be smaller with plenty of room to shape.

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Let the carving begin!

These days I seem to prefer carving big pieces over little Gnomes as it does not aggravate the left wrist because I don’t need to have a dead grip with the left hand. If you must know, carving Citizens is not painful because it’s on soft balsa, not semi-hard Meranti wood.

But I still have to find the right balance with this new direction because at times, the right golf elbow can still be aggravated if I’m at it too long – the repetitive motion on the semi-hard Meranti.

Sometimes if I have a weekend game coming up, I’d carve less to prevent any recurrence of pain. However if the pain persist on game day, I have no choice but to pop painkillers and use Salonpas patches to subdue it.

Perhaps with the new lighter golf set making golf enjoyable again, I can find the middle ground to have satisfaction to enjoy both golf and carving simultaneously without giving up one or the other.

I’ll see how, until then onwards with the new piece!

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Slowly but surely it’s coming along!

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A Timely Change

5 Nov

I changed my golf set recently! It was a decision made after mulling over it for months. Prior to this, I felt I couldn’t improve my game anymore especially with the recurring injuries and change wouldn’t help anyway. Why change when playing better golf was also not at the top of my priority anymore?

Factor in my desire to carve and I was at it constantly, golf was no longer my focus. But constant carving came with a price – aggravated pain on the right elbow whenever I did a little bit more than necessary. And when there’s pain, it affects the golf; and if playing good golf was out of the question with the recurring problem, why bother to change? I was at it in circles for months.

But a good deal came along and I caved.

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My new set… here’s to playing better golf!!!

So I gave up my TaylorMade RBZ irons, Maruman Conductor driver and wedge, Cleveland woods, hybrid and wedge for a lighter pre-owned Srixon XXIO MP900 set to replace them. The only thing I kept was my Scotty Cameron Squareback putter. Less clubs in the bag, 10 instead of 14, this made my approach on the game changed too. But for the better. Also the lesser clubs means a lighter load and we’ve been walking nine-holes carrying our golf sets instead of using the golf trolleys the last three weeks. Very good exercise as I find myself sweating buckets each time.

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The old set, thanks for the good times!

It took me a few games to adjust my swing to the new clubs and know the distances. The new driver however, loses to my previous driver’s performance but that is only because I have had the Conductor for years and have been so in-tuned with its ability. It’s just a matter of time before I am able to master the new driver to maximize its performance. After all, every new piece of equipment will require time to get used to them, some just take longer than others. So I’m not worried.

Overall, all the clubs feel good and even with some nagging pain on the right elbow, I am striking the ball better and further. This means I can still carve but with care of course. A win-win situation nonetheless. I love the new 3-wood as it’s giving me the distance I couldn’t get previously.

It didn’t take me long to master the new Sand wedge for my short game though. With just one club to use for the 50 meter (or less) range instead of the three choices I had previously – the Approach, 52˚ or 56˚ wedges, being indecisive on what to use has suddenly been taken out of the situation, making the approach so much easier. And I must say it has been super accurate, cutting down strokes to get on the green and pretty close to the flagstick. A real confidence booster to come back with better scores. I love it!

And this was evident when I played in my Club’s November Monthly Medal bogey-play tournament over the weekend; I came out tops in the Ladies category! Woo hoo…. however due to the low turn out of just six ladies (a minimum of eight participants was required for the winner to receive a trophy), I was an ‘unofficial’ winner without the showpiece. It’s okay, I’ll take it as is and am glad I made this timely change. I just hope it won’t be a one-time wonder and definitely looking forward to playing better golf from here on.

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One Problem Resolved

4 Nov

I’m glad to say that the plantar fasciitis that I was experiencing several months back has disappeared. How did I do it? Well, I certainly didn’t walk any less, in fact, I walk more but with an arch support for the shoes. And this helped.

After the problem disappeared, I bought a new pair of Skechers with good memory foam for better support. Being new and spongy, it’s certainly doing its job so the additional arches are not required anymore, at least for this new pair. But I still use them for my golf shoes. And after a round of 18-holes, the feet are fine without issues.

The old pair of Skechers has been quite worn down, maybe that’s why the insole arch support was necessary when the problem came about. And thank goodness the problem is resolved and not escalated further. I have enough challenges as it is with my endometriosis and the golf elbow that has been acting up.

At the end of the day, it’s all about taking care of ourselves, being at this dinosaur age, you just can’t wing it to get by.

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Garden to Plate, Part 2

29 Oct

The third papaya, weighing a whopping 1740gm, was harvested from the tree whilst it was still semi-green last week. Hubby said best to pluck it and let it sit on the kitchen counter to ripen than leaving it on the tree, exposed to the insects, birds and garden squirrels.

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Over the weekend, I decided to inspect the papaya tree at the side of the house, a spot which I don’t normally go to. Wow. There’s a whole lot of fruits! Looks like we will be having papayas a fair bit in the coming weeks.

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It’s okay, I’m not complaining because papayas are actually very good in terms of its vitamins and nutritional values. This aside, I should visit our garden especially the side more to know what Green Fingers have planted for us to enjoy.

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Garden to Plate

25 Oct

It’s the wet season again but this has not stopped hubby aka Green Fingers from working the garden well. Besides the habanero chilies that are holding up despite the rain, all of a sudden the papayas sprouted too. Or maybe it’s been growing healthily but I never knew considering I hardly venture out to the garden.

The pesticide-free care for the papaya tree has yielded two fruits so far and we ate one already – so sweet I tell you. We await the second fruit to ripen before enjoying it.

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Top: eaten with satisfaction; Bottom: measured, weighed and waiting for it to ripen.Yum!!!

As I write this, the third fruit, by far the biggest one is just a matter of time before it can be harvested. It’s so nice to have a garden to plate from our own efforts, or should I say his effort mostly and none of mine.

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Letting Go

15 Oct

It’s a good thing this weekend I am going away. A timely change in routine in view of the recent heartache. Unfortunately hubby is not coming along as this trip with my high school girlfriends was actually planned ages ago.

I hope being away—albeit a short one—will heal the broken heart to be at peace and accepting with life and the daily routine. Death really grips the heart and we must learn to overcome this or forever be sad or even burdened.

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Emptier Nest

14 Oct

The past few days, the home front felt different and odd. Not used to it. The coming home and being home routines are unfamiliar without official pet number one around. The empty nest is now emptier.

No more sight of him waiting for us, no more insistent barks during our dinner time, no more demands to share our fruits or more of his snacks, no more snores or unabashed farts to break the silence, no more presence. In short, no more routines that we are used to. Sniffle…

Rooney was certainly a family member and a very vocal one, not just a pet like the fish or the tortoise, visible but silent.

Sad as it is, this is inevitable. We should be positive and look at the bright side; he lived a good and happy life – giving us many wonderful memories, annoying moments included.

He was a month and a day short of his 12th birthday, far longer than the eight to ten years typical for bull dogs. He will be dearly missed… Sniffle…

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Devastated

11 Oct

Yesterday our beloved senior citizen official pet number one, Rooney passed away from an infection and internal health complications. No words…

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Our Poor Frangipani Tree

1 Oct

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It looks like the rust fungus has acted up again on our frangipani tree and hubby had no choice but to chop off the branches with the affected leaves.

Otherwise how else to contain this problem so that it does not spread and contaminate his air plants hanging on the branches? Poor tree.

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