朽木百哉のブォグ

I finally see the light after working hours; finished work at 6pm after the monthly departmental meeting we had, and awaiting for dearie to finish packing up her work area.

It has been almost 2 months that I left for home from office in the darkness...something that our TM has discussed with us that this endurance era will last another 2 months till the newbies become effective.

Rain greeted the evening that made the evening significantly cool while sending dearie home...this evening of light won't last long.




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Another mysterious caller who called me immediately after no answer on a wrong timing; I'm not allowed to use my phone during office hours based on house rules.

An evening of work that ended onlu at 8pm; thus the arrangement for early release won't be affecting me in anyway; it had been for so many days that I've been working at such hours.

I managed to get a mind-relief after going to C328 to get some tanks in preparation for my breeding project -so far 5 from the first drops of Red Mummy are growing healthily.

The hours are late and it's time to retire for the day.

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Another evening where work is till sundown; sky's getting dark and it's time to make my way home to set things right; aquarium cleaning; tidying up, and setting the fry tanks on a salvaged table that is pretty sturdy.

Is dearie halfway home already?

Time to get moving since the work has been done for the day; composure intact and looking forward to Home Run.

That feeling of the inability to enter slumber is felt, like how Alex described the unspeakable frustration of not having enough time to do our personal stuff after work has come to past; I could lie on bed only at 3am after getting a replacement airpump which was to replaced the broken down Redsun pump that supplied air to my 2 tanks of fries. 

It was a cold and quiet journey to Poly art in the late hours of the night.

Massive cleanup of the tank done, so the females now have a cleaner home to reside in.

Next will be the male tank as lots of poo from Yellow Mummy's drops were found...RIP to Yellow and Lavender-tailed Mummy whom has turned massively sallow and passed away in their quarantine tank; at least Yellow's survived by the 3 Guppy-Musketeers.  My role to raise them well.

Hope this lag feeling doesn't last too long.

A lonely lunch as dearie will be lunching with her poly-schoolmate Charlene; fortuntately, with a "provided" lunch, I was able to lunch in a save walking and perspiration of walking to Maybank to pack something back.  The noodles given by dearie was "more than meets the tongue"; spicier than it looks...

Managed to catch up with Shirley whom I've finally heard from, after almost 4 months since my email to catch up with her; she had went back to her home country for a treatment on her insomia that had plagued her for the past 6 months before she went back in Sep 2009.  Finally hearing from a friend who is now teaching English for a living.

Almost time due for the lunch and back to battlestation, but though it'll be good for me to deposit my thoughts here as a mental stopover to rest my mind.

Seeing dearie just now brought a sparkle to my heart...without the chest-rubbing action of Zhu Houren in the TV serial starring Lee Meng Soon and Zheng Geping.

Lunch is provided today, thus I was able to lunch in; first day without her company for lunch of the week and the day had been challenging with massive calls, 8 people on sick leave and a shortened lunch.

She has got a pack of the spare shares created by those who were absent from work today, so I had kept a share for tonight's dinner and brought another pack for "refuelling" during lesson break.

Lessons was mentally heavy as statistics seem to talk all about Mean, Median and Mode; something we had learnt during secondary school days under Elementary Maths which I had been poor at; might be a good tiem for me to brush up with some practises; so exams won't be knuckle-muscle challenging with questions that require us to whip out explanations in endless paragraphs.

Mental "hangover" detected and couldn't enter slumber immediately; so stayed online after doing some reading on aquatic forums that gave me sufficient information for my next move on guppy breeding tank setups.

It was an unusual fellowship as I got to see an old pal, Alvin Toh, who was also a regular during my tour of duty at ammo base.

It was a sunny day which the setting a jetty under a bright yet windy surrounding; and seeing Alvin with his neatly styled hair, Hawaiian shirt and straw hat, we all look set to go out on a sea trip via fastcraft...was able to feel the closeness and reunion of the good old times we all had back then...

Poof.  It's the morning and I had dozed off at dearie's place.

I made it to lessons after the settlement of the final instalment; it was another subject required in our core module.




Today's lesson:  Business Statistics, that will last for another 4 weeks before examinations on 17 April; a date that clashes with my ICT which the unit must make arrangements for time off.  Work schedule's still too busy and they're still playing hide and seek with me.


Temperature's exceptionally low now at McDonalds, despite the dense crowd that had gathereth within.

Dearie's on her way back from Bishan after a minor shopping session with her classmate Karen in Bishan, after her lessons ended early.  I too, had an earlier ceasure of today's lessons at 4:40 PM.

An amusing game called Angry Birds on iPhone made the lesson filled with a little giggle after watching Justin play it.  I've got my copy and I'm sure it's going to be fun...unlikely myself playing and dearie can enjoy it when with me.

Awaiting for her arrival now...

It's been 4 days since I've last live-written an update.

"It's raining man, hallelujah" came to my mind while walking back from halfway house, lunch with dearie.  The assignment is not yet submitted and that sure brings a substantial stress in my mind.  In fact, the rain was acclerating in torrentacy that we had to move to the inner side of the coffeehouse to dine.  Completed well with a coffee that was oversweetened in my personal preference.

It was the first "stroll in the rain" with dearie, considering the intensity of today's midday shower...Spring@Langsat is almost done as it alreasdy has it's plague mounted, completed with a small playground.  The PSF for this project is really atrocious.

Mild chilling the arm due to drenching from the natural shower.

Another day of waking up at 7:48 AM and greeted by 15 fries in the breeder box from Flame Tail mummy who had dropped them; most probably last night; more new lives to what I have kept so far; but am still looking forward to see drops from my own breeding efforts.

Quick mummy evacuation was done before I got ready to make my way to work.

Retiring pretty late for the night as I was reading through some articles on Arofanatics and AquaticQuotient about removing nitrates from water; in cconsideration of the increased mortality rate in my tank lately.  I have to be more prudent when selecting new members for the tank.

Managed to pick 3 pregnant females from Polyart, with the company of dearie, and then getting 2 breeder boxes with a 10% discount; learnt from auntie that the "red mummy" breed of guppies will arrive tomorrow so Saturday will be a good time to have a peek there before I commence lessons.

Not sure if dearie is keen to have a small aquarium set-up in her room so she has something to see when doing her revision, but I'll be helping her with the maintenance since she's not a very "aquafanatic" person; just watching it on her part will do while I apply my knowledge.

A night of quest completion was done at Dungeons & Dragons online; some of the skills are unavailable at the moment as my level is still too low to gain those feats, such as Exotic Weapon Proficiency - already owning 2 Dwarfen Axes +1 which are still out of my usage capacity.

Soulsleep awoken but a groggy feeling has crept in. Mind typhoon, that same feeling I had several times upon waking up.


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A little heaty on the way as I was greeted by a row of foreign labour workers resting along the towards halfway house.

What a sight; anyone will take a second look considering the scene at such an hour in te heat of the day; reminds me of the days where I worked at Trademart Singapore that was fully laborous and lunch hour is spent snoozing after eating. A somehow heavenly session during the lunch hour.

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An extremely hot hour for my walk to Maybank for lunch; could almost feel the invisible flames licking through the fabrics of my clothing as each foot set is also where the wamth seeps through the soles.

It's another lunch day without dearie's company; though we spent the evening at my place after lunch, it's still no enough despite staying late at her place after sending her home.

Tonight's another lesson on the last module; 1 more subject to go before completing the first round of part time studies that had been part of my life for the last 8 months.

Been a busy morning so far, with a missing jumpstart workout in the morning.

I need that boost after lessons tonight before the day is considered duly completed.


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It's such a sleepy session for the last coupls of hours after having playing mind games with 3 agents who made a fuss about calling in. I had made my stand so they can't deviate. High time for agency department to lay down some drastic rules to make them comply.

This is another mentally gruelling week as I have 2 lessons in a row to complete before the exams in Sat evening; that means I can't join dearie and her bro to attend Fang's birthday.

Return to battledesk after a quick disposal.


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Returned hom e and being able to settle down to do my PTCs.


The evening had been filled busy while watching Yellow Guppy Mummy dropping of her newborns into the breeding trap; considering the total of 44 drops, not all the fries get to have the best of genes. Manual culling to be done after observing their growth in their new home.


It has certainly made the tank spring up to life with more wrigglies moving around, looking for food or making themselves at home in the new world they see. I hope there will be no need to expand my aquatic kingdom with more equipment.



Dearie had been worn out by work, considering her rate of reply at work and also the fatigue has caused her to be able to turn in earlier for a longer rest.

Returned to dearie's place after a shower and bringing Gold Sword back to save it; it looks much better now after settling it down in a hospital tank; 4 of his peers have died due to inability to adapt to the unchartered waters of the new tank.

Red Mummy has delivered 8 drops; certainly was done last night; a beautiful sight for 8 new lives introduced into the tank. Cobra male has passed away without any apparent signs; it could be due to overloaded bioload in the adult tank.

Another group of lives to take care of; I'm sure they'll all be happy living together but will soon be time for segregating them.


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I must have dozed off the previous night after a long day at Orchard Road with dearie after lessons; the bus ride had really been something wonderful after a long time.

The fatigue must have crept in that caused me to doze off instead of heading home the night before to do some chores including the weekly change of aquarium water.

Swimming plans this weekend has to be caled off for the moment; as dearie will be having her prelims this week, and for myself, Saturday, is the examinations for Business Accounting.  The tension can be felt al over me despite keeping a cool composure as I didn't want people around me to worry, however, the tension builds up with each approaching day of the examinations.

I have to keep cool to conquer the exam good.

I've managed to balance the figures for the trail questions this time; only the figures inputted was wrongly; thus unable to balance at one of the portions.

It had been a wonderful experience to be able to learn as a group; like Tristan, Kulvim, Gary, Justin, Louis and Stephanie, all together.

Lesson ended at 4:40PM where I got prepared to see dearie at Dhoby Ghaut MRT station to prepare moving to Orchard to shop for Fang's present as they will be attending her chalet, cum birthday this Sat, which is also my examinations.

Weather is searingly hot despite having a thin-materialed top; heat could be enhanced by the high rayon contents within.

It’s a non-sushi, sushified lunch at Niwa Sushi with dearie. The sight of her happy delights me as it tells me that she is no longer upset with what happened yesterday at her workplace, where the agent Nicholas Tham had raised his voice at her.




This evening will be a g ood time for a trip to Parkway as it will certainly help to make the evening more special for both of us, instead of just going home after work.



Tomorrow will be once again another OT session of emails where I can clock more hours of work and better rewarded at the end of the month.

It’s a late evening after the Netgear router has been giving me connection problems after multiple troubleshooting attempts. It finally went live. Workout accompanied while I did a catch up on Bleach that I had missed several episodes over the past 8 months of studies.




Dearie had been traumatized by the fact of work pressure and having to face the nonsense of Spider Nicholas Tham who raised his voice when told to queue up to get his work processed.



It had been something really overboard, and what made the matter worst is that she could not get help from her superiors after calling or notifying via email. It had made it such a uncomfortable event where she needs to bear it all on her own…



Well it might be a good time for her to prepare the next move….



I’m still in the midst of preparing the path ahead; just to hang on there.

Lunch done in the not so blazy day but the atmosphere was filled with tensions about unhappiness that dearie has experienced at work – slow system and the overwhelming – becoming a norm workload. None of her superiors have assisted her after numerous failed attempts to get help.




It certainly feels saddening to be in such a position, even so if there’s no one else working beside us…it makes the day at work dreadful.



I’ve too, experience 2 hits as cases were not reverted on time, as a result, getting that share of earful. Anyhow, case will be resolved as time goes by, so such has to be easy on the heart to avoid builtup of dark steam which can have a devastating effect if unmanaged.



Maybe it’s time for a getaway for a mental reorg before joining the siege again.

The heat of the sun has somewhat made the day much more glaring in view of the temperature increase; which at far, the highest at 35d C.




Though a deepened slumber, the rest felt much better compared to the previous days.

The heat of the sun has somewhat made the day much more glaring in view of the temperature increase; which at far, the highest at 35d C.




Though a deepened slumber, the rest felt much better compared to the previous days.

In my mind, it was the thoughts of the fellowship that left a wonderful aftertaste after sharing with Bert about those good old days in 2 Sig Bn that certainly brought back wonderful memories. The previous RQ Er Sam Hock, whom he was under, was learnt of to be a great boss with good credentials that made him respected across the battalion. I shared about some of those era which some people lapped over his time, in to those during my time.

If you're hungry and happen to be around Cuppage Plaza area, here'a something worth trying:


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Oh yea, much of the assignment has been done; that leaves only the balancing still at large.

Making my way home after a wonderful 元宵節 dinner at dearie's godfather's dinner's place...their warmth made me feel so at home. Thought it's a good idea that we helped out with the rice and dessert distribution before making our way back to her place for study revision; I got much of the heavy-weighted question done.

Now destination: homebase. Miss dearie!

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Saw myself walking past a jetty like shelter, which is paved with attap-like leaves atop. Sun was mildly bright yet windy. Three ladies were sitting there as if they were waiting for a boat, which I identified one of them as Gek Choo, one of the ex-colleagues at my current workplace.

We had a casual chat and a glance to the landscape behind the shelter was hilly, that reminded me of the previous incident where I drove into this vegetated area that represented the winding road up Rifle Range Road.

Scenemorph - I now appeared at a colonial house that was greened with age, yet havin that nolgastic feeling with the surrouding shrubery which carried an aura od peace. It had reminded me of wedding shots done by many couples based on the scenery for a special touch.

Many things flooded my mind - I had been looking for a serenate gettaway where I can reorganise my thoughts even while appearing in this scene.

Beep...5:30am on a Sunday morning.

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