He's 25 today

I was guilty of being a stressed out-no nonsence-first time momma who was garang to a fault. and he was just a happy lil kid, running about with nothing but fun in his mind and not a single mean bone in his body.

Being the first, he was the one to suffer the brunt of my ignorance & inexperience.

Wasnt his fault he was born with a hole in his heart.

Wasnt his fault he also had adhd.

And me, i nearly squashed out the one, most remarkable thing he still had in abundance even through all the hardship & pain.... thank god that, no thanks to me, he still held on fast to his sense of humour.

Bcos i've come to realise that it is our sense of humour that gets us through our longest days. and its our sense of humour that helps keep it all together, and our sense of humour that eventually saves us.

 

The Boy - 1989

 

The Man - 2010

Happy birthday my darling.. our very best wishes to you forever & always, dunia & akhirat.

Steel fingers

As the kelantanese would say "ceroh bijik mato"!!

Yup, thats exactly the effect i get everytime i pay a visit to my most fav masseuse on planet earth, wak maimon ... the world suddenly becomes a much brighter place lol.

She's a 78 year old lady who still manages to pack a punch each time she prods and kneads away at those stiff & knotted muscles.  she's definitely not for the faint hearted but she knows her stuff. and even though i question my sanity every time i put myself at her mercy, i leave feeling all flushed & lighter on my feet.

All part of what one would call 'maintenance' ;p

Full of surprises

Well, she pulled the rug from under our feet once again!!

The hubs & me, we're both in the technical line.. he's in oil & gas and i'm in construction.  but our interests are wide & varied and we're not guilty of spewing technical jargon everytime we open our mouth lol. and since my love for the printed word has seen to it that books are strewn all over the house,  the kids have grown up in a pretty diverse atmosphere.  in fact, although they are all science students, none of them has shown the slightest inclination towards a technical career and seem to be more interested in language & communication.

Theres even a running joke in the family that the 3 of them was going to take over the world - AF would be controlling the youth thru teaching, AI  the masses thru media and AH the mindset thru psychiatry/psychology. talk about an overactive imagination hehehe.

But looks like that grandiose plan of theirs will be going up in smoke. looks like lil sister is bailing out lol

After the initial euphoria AH has been showing signs of stress.. especially when friends & family pop her the 'soalan cepu emas', that question of questions.. "kau nak ambik apa?" and although we gave her the space to think things thru, we thought we knew the answer.

Well.. we thought wrong.

"Ma, i've thought about it and i'm taking mechanical engineering".

Silence. you could almost hear the seconds tick-ticking away. and if my jaw could drop any further it would've reached the floor.

Now where did THAT come from?

So things are not as clear cut as it seems.  the need to zero in on a final choice has made her dig deep & re-think her options.  and to aid in that process i've been walking her thru the many career choices available and guiding her thru the maze.  edu fairs like the one put up by UiTM in seksyen 7, the MARA fair in PWTC and the one in mid-valley last week really helped.

Plus the in-put, both positive & negative, from her uncles & others in the field.

And still she is abdamant about her choice and is as certain as a young lady her age can ever be about anything. and thats all the hubs & me need to know.  if thats what she wants then we're behind her all the way!!

But its somehow a little ironic that instead of the boys, its our bongsu girl who'll be taking up engineering lol.

Yoga initiation

After my first try at yoga yesterday, i think its something worth pursuing, for me at least.

With my muscles shrinking and my joints creaking away, all that slow stretching would definitely help.  but the key is to take it slow & easy bcos overstretching can be just as bad as not stretching at all, or maybe even worse.

In the 1 hour session, i was introduced to a couple of the usual poses for beginners. 

- Downward facing Doggy/ stretches & strengthens the whole body.

- Cobra Pose/ increases flexibility of the spine.

- Camel Pose/ streches the front of the body & increases flexibility.

- Tree Pose/ strengthen legs & improve balance

- Cat-Cow Stretch/ increases flexibility & abdominal strength.

- Extended Triangle Pose/ stretches & strengthens legs, groins & hamstring

- Warrior Pose 1, 2 & 3/ strengthens legs & back.

- Mountain Pose/ basic standing pose

- Staff Pose/ basic sitting pose

- Child's Pose/ relaxes in between poses

- Corpse Pose/ relaxes at the end of each session.

After doing a little online research (read: googling of course lol) i know now that i had gone thru a Vinyasa Class i.e. a lot of movement incorporated into the stretching, which suits me just fine.

But hey, my first love will always be jumping about like a hyper monkey lol.. just hoping that the slow moves will balance it up a bit.

Dunno la.. we'll see ;p 

And just for the record, its the benefit from all that controlled stretching & breathing that i'm seeking, not the yogic philosophy or way of life.

WORKOUT.

AM - 3.8k maintenance run/TSA 
(didnt have the luxury of completing the additional 200m this morning bcos i would've been late for work).

Cyber jam

The sudden influx of online applications by spm hopefuls have jammed up the cyber superhighways well & good and i found myself right slap bang in the middle of it via my daughter.

As the mak/pak/guardian /penjaga its my duty to make sure that she's on track & not missing out on anything..  and the stress of it all is making my hair fall off in bunches (almost la lol).  sponsorship & scholarship opportunities come with datelines and the 'on-line application only' option is actually very very frustrating, especially when a million people (ok la i exaggerate lol tapi memang ramai la kan) are all doing it at the same time. depending on your luck you can spend hours or even days in front of the computer trying to get onto the portals without succeeding, or even if you've managed to log on you get stuck every step of the way. then you're thinking maybe it'll be easier logging in at 3 or 5 in the morning when everyone else is asleep but turns out, everyone's up just like you lol.

But thank god today we managed to settle most of the standard application spm candidates here have been doing since time immemorial (ipta/ipts/jpa/mara/petronas/bank negara etc) and i can breathe a little easier. dapat tak dapat lain kira, janji dah buat yang mana patut :)

Legaaa.

And after work i'll be going to my first ever yoga class yay.

Yes.. it has been that stressful lol.

Abe.... its done. its now up to HIM :D

She did it!!!

My baby might not be the top scorer in her school but she did us proud anyway with straight As under her belt  yay!!

Congratulations my darling... apapun you're still OUR numero uno mwaah3 ;D

This year SMK S9 showed an overall improvement in the spm results, as well as an increase in the number of straight A students, from 19 previously to 24.  there was indeed a lot of rejoicing going on in the school when the results were released this morning lol.

The top students & schools nationwide, courtesy of  TheStar

And in case you didnt know, theres a new grading system in place which is basically the same except that they've fine tuned the grades for the As.. theres now a super duper distinction A+ which separates the cream of the cream (but when will it ever end?).

This will probably spark off another mad scramble.. and the race for the greatest number of A+  would thus begin.

Sometimes i do feel enough is enough. in the pursuit of 'excellence' lets not take away the 'fun' completely.

Our poor kids.

D-day

I hope my baby girl gets what she wants today.














We love you yang... seadanya :D

Dont worry be happy

One cannot dismiss or deny the fact time will bring about many changes both physical & physiological. i am close to 50 and naturally expect these changes to occur... but its not that easy bcos in our hearts we're the same person we've always been, as far back as we can remember - young, free, almost age-less.

But resistance is futile.. and denial only makes it worse so i've been teaching myself to embrace each change and to reevaluate myself every step of the way. no, embracing the changes doesnt mean giving up on myself, no siree.. it just means that if i dont succeed in overcoming the latest obstacle, even after pooling all my resources to do so, then i should gracefully concede that its here to stay and plan the best ways to deal with it. no whining, no complaining but to keep managing the best i can...  even within a limited sphere, the quest for continuous improvement should go on.

And i'm not kidding when i say resistance & denial can make matters worse. there're people who come out of midlife crisis hurting the one's they love & losing everything they ever really care about. so we grow old, so what? some say its just numbers. well, maybe so but i dont entirely agree. yes, we can always stay young in spirit.. but realistically, no matter how well preserved, the body is subjected to wear & tear and will go thru some form of deterioration. so just like a runner should respect the distance, we should also respect the age.

Be realistic. jangan main hentam je semua. no pain no gain doesnt really apply when you're middle-aged lol

And whats with the reluctance to talk openly about menopause? its a natural phenomena and happens to the best of us. and even the men have their very own andropause, so whats the big deal? if we women are getting a little drier, the men are also getting a little softer so what the heck, all is fair lol. and if we really need help, there are so many options out there, both conventional & traditional.

I guess the best bet is to stay informed, be open to the changes and get on with it as gracefully as we can. the good life doesnt end just bcos we've gotten old :D

Astronomical propotions

Golfman & me had a jaw-dropping moment the other day.. the extent of which almost broke our jaws lol.

With him away most of the time, i am of course the appointed caretaker/caregiver... which means managing the finances as well as seeing to the needs & well-being of not only our household but also that of my MIL's. and thru the years i've come to expect the unexpected.

But his latest celcom bill came as quite a surprise.  after only about 15 days of settling the last payment, he received a reminder that he had already hit the RM 1,000 mark and was fast exceeding his limit!!  now this has never happened before even after years of globetrotting. and i must admit, i did suddenly get all suspicious on my man.. "hey, you having something on the side here that i should know of?" (imagine the hand on hips stance, furrowed brows and piercing stare hehehe). to which he replied with a simple "hisshhh"!!

So we went to talk with the celcom people.. getting billed for over a thousand was a big deal for us. and after a long, round-a-bout session, we eventually found out golfman had accidentally been calling up our daughter's number a couple of times (7 to be exact) and its been going into her voice-mail. which in turn had been recording the rustling & bustling of his movements to the max of  4:44 mins per call, which, for all 7 calls came up to a total of - RM 568.10!! and all that RMs for the recording of 'nothing' (and i could've gotten me a brand new adistar sheesh).

So for you people out there who roam about God's earth trying to make a decent living, please make sure you 1. disable your hp setting for voice mail 2. inform your service provider.

Otherwise be prepared to leave ghost messages and pay for it ;p

Hope springs eternal

He's gone for now.. but this time i'd like to think i've made some progress.
 

Hopefully, he has finally opened his mind to the merits of running & how easy it is to fit into his bz schedule.  last week he allowed himself to be persuaded into getting a pair of supernovas (before this good shoes were never on his priority list) and running gear.  after all, looking good can be a great motivator  ;)

And he left with the promise of building up some mileage so that we could run together.

Will i finally be realising my dream? :D

And to usher in march (already?) i'm publicly declaring my war on the stubborn 2kgs of extra whatever that i've put on since eid of last year.  jaga kau lemaks muahahaha (and no, i havent turned into a mad cow.. yet lol)!!!!