Life to live and explore

Dark cloud above my head

It has not been a good week, going through the whole week feeling like the dark cloud stays above my head. Depressive and pessimistic thoughts make me so paralyze mentally.

It probably has to do with the hormones that goes hay wire.  Just don’t feel like myself this days. There are tons of things to do and all are over the deadline, but there is no motivation to get them done. Running behind schedule, late in replying to so many people, hate to be such an irresponsible person.

When it rained it poured

Today is such a black day for me. On the way to downtown, my car stalled right in front of the stoplight! It was running out of gas !! I did notice the gas was running low yesterday morning and did make a mental note to myself that the car needed a refill of gas. However, due to all the running around and the book sales, I totally forgot about it yesterday and this morning. Luckily two Samaritans helped me to push the car to a place less obstructive, else every motorist will be cursing me for the backup.

Thanks goodness there was a gas station about 10 minutes walking distance away. I walked there, got a mineral water bottle from the car wash boys, filled it with gas, walked back to the car, tried to start the car, wouldn’t start, walked back to the gas station, got another coke bottle, filled up both bottles, tried to start the car, wouldn’t start, sweat like a pig, a bit panicked, tried again to start the car, and I arrived at the place of appointment more than an hour late!

When I arrived home at almost 8.00 p.m, I realised that when I was in a hurry to get out of the door this morning, I have forgotten to submit links of a few posts to the relevant networks and they were all expired by now, 12 hours later. Not only that, got a message saying my account has been suspended when I logged on to one of the networks to finish up some pending posts.

Oh well, I hope that’s all for today, no more new discoveries…..

When am I leaving ?

I really thought it’s going to take me one or two months to clear all the 1000+ books in collection, but it took less than two days! Wow, in two days, I collected enough $$ to get an air ticket to fly to IL. :-)

Of course I am not leaving now. Many of you have asked when am I going to leave. Well, the date is not fixed yet. It depends, depends on the outcome of the Visa. We are hoping to be united by the end of April or first week of May, but only if the Visa is approved by then.

Win-win for everyone

With all the Montessori materials and books being sold (Ok, almost all), the living room is staying clear of boxes now. This weekend is time to bid goodbye to clutters and start living in less messy room.:-)

I didn’t expect everything to be cleared this fast. I can’t imagine anyone would want to buy the 50,000 beads, the copper wires and the half way done Montessori bead  materials. You should see the sparkles in this two mummies’ eyes when they saw the beads, they have apparently looked for beads and copper wires like this high and low for a while and they couldn’t find them locally. The beads were bought online and lugged all the way from IL two years back!

Anyway, I am glad all my babies found their homes and you are excited about your treasure hunts. :-)

Selling all my children books

Have decided to sell all the children books that I have collected over the years. If you are interested to pick up some excellent books for your children at a great bargain, please go over to Children Books for Sale to take a look.

Please leave me a note if you are interested, I would send you the link to the flickr page once I am done taking pictures of them.[Edit: most of the books are gone and almost all the Montessori stuffs are sold before I have a chance to take pictures]

The bitch next door

Our next door neighbor at the tutoring center is a bitch. In the past three years, she created untrue rumors about our business and gossiped about us, we mostly just ignored her because we just didn’t want to go to her low. At one time, when I was not in, she even brought a few people to show them around the center, acted like she owned the place.

We recently sold part of the business to one of our teachers, again she came to poison her mind that she got a raw deal. She also called up our landlord, told her that she is letting the building to us too cheap, that she should increase the rental.

Today, we learned that she just got one of our potential buyers/tenants to rent the building a few doors from us. We all know the ground floor will have better exposure and cost more than the second floor. But why would people pay for a second floor unit at a price more expensive than our ground floor unit? Though the man’s mother is her friend, I don’t think she is trying to help as a friend. She is obviously just going after the brokerage fees, the higher the rent, the bigger sum she gets.

We are waiting to see them fighting one day when he found out he was cheated by this cunning woman. At the meantime, we would continue to ignore her, even though she brought another group of people, showed them around the center like she owned the place few weeks ago.

Will tomorrow come?

When I am mad with the big boy, I have the habit of beating around the bushes and not addressing the issues. While he stays blurry and has idea what caused it, he can tell the hell fire is burning.:-)

Who wants to be a wife who gets angry all the times?  See, for more than a month, I got all sort of excuses for not filling up a one-page form, now he says he will do it tomorrow. Hopefully, tomorrow will come.

Friend’s mother passed away

KW’s mother just passed away. Though She was diagnosed with cancer middle of last year, she seemed to be doing really well after all the cancer treatments. I think KW and his family didn’t expect her to leave so sudden.

Poor little old woman, she left the world without any of her children by her side, only the maid was with her. KW was of course devastated because that she left without knowing the Lord. It reminds of the same feeling when my grandma passed away years ago.

When will the boy becomes a man

The big boy works hard and makes good money, but often wonders where his money has gone at the end of the month. He jumped on board with me, started a budget last month, so that he could spend his money on paper with purpose.

He busted his monthly budget last month, excuse being it’s the first time and it’s holiday season, but he did it again, buying “stuffs” that he didn’t put down in the budget. This is typical of the big boy, he will do things to please me but turn around do it his way behind my back. Saying I am very frustrated with his irresponsible attitude is an understatement.

Loose ends here and there

With so many things to do and so many ends to tie up before the big move, I get a little overwhelmed today. We are talking about moving internationally and going through the migration process here.

Put all the Montessori materials in moving boxes and brought some of them home today. Going to snap some photos and put them online for sale. Undecided about whether to sell the books or not, should I sell them? There are all my precious collections, almost feel like selling my babies.:-)

Is this happened so often or just coincident?

My friend Jo called, I learned that she is going for a hysterectomy next week. Jo is in her early 50, she has gone through her menopause. Few months ago, she had to rush to the hospital to do a D&C due to some sudden unusual heavy discharge.

Ever since I discovered that the ovarian cyst is coming back, suddenly seems like everyone I talk to has something gone wrong with her reproductive system. Don’t know whether it’s a coincidence or what, suddenly I know at least half a dozen people who had found ovarian cyst and went through laparoscopy surgery!!

Photos for the passport

Picked up the passport sized photos from the studio last night. Have decided not to put on makeup or even lipstick, so I do look a little pale in the photos. But, that’s me, take it or leave it! :-)

Did you ever get comments from the officers at the custom checking points that the person in the picture doesn’t look like you? I got that quite a few times.  I think it’s also because the picture on my passport was me with the permed curly hair, and now I have straight hair.

Finished and done with the kitchen renovation

The kitchen renovation is finally done. I am yet to move everything into the cabinets to “hide” them, but should be doing it this weekend.:-)

It takes a while because of all the holidays. It’s also the peak season for the workers, they have so much work piled up, as many people were trying to get remodeling or renovation done before the holiday season.

I am glad it’s all finished and done with, no more dust and dirt everywhere!

My dream home

Despite all the fears about the unknowns and the unseens, I am actually looking forward to the move to IL. The winter in the Midwest is going to be a dread to a girl who have grown up in the tropics and think the air-conditioned room is really cold.:-)

However, I am glad we are going to live in an area with vast farm lands and less air pollution than where we are now. Do you prefer to live in the city or a small town? I grew up on a farm in a small town and I am a farm girl at heart, I would rather live on a farm than in high rise condo. The big boy may not be rich and won’t be able to provide a lot of luxury stuffs, nor can we afford to fly around in Private Jet Charter Flights. But, I think buying a little house on the farm or buying a piece of vacant land to build a house is an attainable dream.

I have always dreamed of living on a little ranch house on the farm. The big boy may work outside of home to bring in the dough. I can work at home and at the same time raise chickens, grow vegetables and berries, sort of a semi self sufficient lifestyle. :-)

Say cheese

Have really been slack off to follow up with the immigration filings. Finally got out of the house and went to the studio to take passport sized photos. Have to take twice with two different backgrounds. That’s because the photos required by the US States Department have to be in white background and for the Malaysian passport must be in blue background. They have to be of different sizes too.

Ended up paying twice the amount. My passport has expired, need to renew it soon. All this immigration filings and passport application are going to burn a hole in my pocket!

The beautiful and the dreadful

The big boy emailed me this pictures taken from his parents’ yard on Christmas day.

Aren’t they beautiful?

But, I know better that winter and cold are dreadful for a person growing up in the tropics. Bouts of the dreadful sniffles, cracked lips and nose bleeds are no fun, mind you. I really dread the cold that chilled to the bone, the cold that froze the fingers and joints until I couldn’t walk. I never expected the big boy to want to move from sunny California to chilly Illinois.

For those who have never lived in cold winter before.. I’ll have to let you know it gets really cold even if you are indoors.. you will freeze your butt off if you do not have adequate heat and these UGG boots to keep your feet warm. If anyone wants to migrate to the States.. make sure you choose places like California, Hawaii or Florida, else.. very cold!

We are moving next spring

Though we are not going to move until next spring, I have started pestering the big boy to start searching for an apartment. We are going to move into a college town, good apartments with reasonable rental are scarce. We found out many places are SOLD out until 2009!

It’s always advisable to start looking ahead of time, so we can arrange for viewing and book it earlier. I wouldn’t want to end up living at places that are old and dirty, dens for criminals, drug users and drug pushers.

We are starting the early screening of apartments through online apartment search. It’s convenient to search for apartment communities in any cities or towns with the search engine. If you are looking for apartments in Austin Texas, you can select criteria by area, pets, zip code, school district, school name, amenities, or any combination of them all. The search engine will return the apartments that meet your search criteria complete with pictures, floor plan and all the terms and conditions of the rental property. Then you can call the phone numbers listed making arrangement for viewing.