Today, the campus’s case management system went done. The first major downtime since it’s inception in April 2010. That’s a whole 2 years, not bad, I would say.

 I activated the downtime plan, and got the department’s staff to revert to manual forms and memos. There were minimal changes in workflow.

 The newer staff looked helpless. I suspect they are unable to calculate certain eligibility without the system. Some patient’s got upset that we had to re-ask them information which we should, or the system should already know.

 It reminded me of last evening. I was on a bus home when the driver detected a brake problem. She had a hard braking at the junction before, which threatened to throw passengers off their seats. The driver was rather concerned and decided to call the control station for advice. The interesting thing was that the whole conversation was on speaker for all passengers to hear. Those passengers who were really worried, or in a rush for time, had alighted at the first sign of problem. The rest of us decided to hang around for a little more, to see if the journey can be continued.

 There was this man who raised his voice at the driver, demanding an immediate decision as to whether he should leave the bus. He claimed that he was in a rush for time. This was barely 15 seconds after the driver had called the control station.

 My point was, if he was in such a rush, get off like some passengers did. If you could spare 5-10 minutes, sit down, and let the driver report the problem clearly. A safe judgment call could then be made. His loud voice in the foreground didn’t help the communication process between the driver and the control station much.

 Why do we now have so little threshold for breakdowns? I admit that I was a bit upset that the bus broke down when I was comfortably seated, and my system could not work this morning. Yet, the “inevitable” has happened, and so we deal with it.

 Why is there a need to raise our voice, up our pressures for something beyond our control, and in the process of it, cause another person’s pressure to be affected as well?

looking forward

人生有勇气的时候，也许也是最傻的时刻。

2008年，10月的某一天，我也曾勇敢过，傻过。

就让那没人回复的电邮留在记忆深处，或许他日，你我都会觉得当年多么可笑。

或许他日，我没你那么勇感。

counting down to the last 2 weeks.

it has been an exciting journey so far. we had our little arguments here and there, but we both agreed that we have and are enjoying the process.

this morning, after yesterday's helpers' lunch and discussion, mika sent out a plan for gate crash. i felt strange looking at it, and realising that this time round, it is for me. i don't have a role to play. i am the one supplying answers to some of the questions the girls were planning to ask the hubby and his gang at the door. i have a couple of gate crash plans, emcee scripts and wedding day schedules sitting in My Document. I often wondered when i can put my skills at such affairs to use for myself. finally, here it is.

i can't put it in words. its a very different feeling when i am commenting or helping to draft a plan / speech for a friend's wedding, as compare to when i am doing it for our own.

“baby-sitting” took on some different meaning for me and the significant other this week. while I have done once-off duties on and off  since my niece and nephew were young, this time round, it’s a one-week’s stay with 2 teenagers.

Some stuff which stumped us so far:

-my nephew came into the room late at night, crying for his parents

-he calls me after school to say he is on the way home. the first day, I din really know what to say. Over the last 2 days, I built up a repertoire of “have you had lunch?”, “do you have homework?”, “anything interesting happened in school today?”

-The significant other and I had a major adventure in the kitchen preparing burgers and nuggets for dinner last night.

-writing excuse letter for my niece who skipped extra Chinese class

It has been an adventure and experience so far. Makes us relook the whole thing about having kids.

i am excited about the wedding. happily excited, that is. after i resolved the vip tables issue between both sides of the family, i started feeling excited about the whole affair which will take place 7 week from now.

while looking forward to it, a part of me hope that it will not come so soon, so that is always this excitement bubbling within me.

one personal goal of the whole wedding preparation is to keep my complexion glowing. most people who know me know that "fair" and "glow" have never been my trademark. i have never been inducted in the arena of skincare and make-up. when i was growing up, i washed my face daily with just water and a face towel. i recall a day when my mum rubbed a soap bar all over my face. she must have felt that i was really dirty then. i only started using facial wash in mid teens, and i would save up to get Neutrogena, 'cos that was the brand shown in a tv commercial. when i ran out of Neutrogena, i would use my mum's kao biore. my dark skin genes didn't help either.

my er-jie very generously got me a full set of make-up from bobbie brown when i turned 21. however, i never knew how to use them. the liquid foundation caked on my skin, and my blusher made my face looked like i have just been slapped. i poked my eyes with the eye-liner as well. when i started work, my ex-boss used to openly laugh at my make-up. she then marched me to a dermatologist with his own line of skincare products.

since then, i have almost stopped using make-up, and i would rotate the dermatologist’s products with off-the-shelf one to save costs. i did my first facials when my best friend signed up for a package to prepare for her wedding.

however, since late last year, i have been wanting to be less stingy so that i would be a beautiful bride with beautiful glowing skin. over the past few months, i have amassed a collection of SK II products, along with my dermatologist's ones. And also the 2 facial packages which were supposed to help brighten up my skin. for Christmas, my supportive colleagues also gave me loads of masks.

with the hardware all in place, its about telling myself to be less lazy. its still a struggle to peel myself off the bed every morning and night, into the bathroom for the skincare routine. sun block is another torturing one. now, i have internally convinced myself that i only need sunblock for weekends.

hang on in there ... 7 weeks to be a glowing bride....

"so we are basically seeing the same group of people again." the hubby said.

yah, in a way, in the same order.

we spend the chirstmas long weekend with his friends, the GR group and my besties and their hubbies in that order. one meet-up a day, nicely spread out. This new year weekend, we are basically down to the same schedule, minus his group of friends.

and the gatherings involved chilling at someone's place, with simple but nice food. simple games, baby-playing, diaper-changing.

at this age, i take pleasure in cosy chill-outs, instead of expensive meals in fancy eating places. i look forward to friend's home when i can curl up on the sofa in comfort. places where i can go in my comforty clothes and birkens. people whom i can talk to, laugh with and grumble at, without a care in the world.