This (badly needed) vacation I…
- watched movies — They Call Her… Cleopatra Wong (a screening at The Arts House, it was funny in a kitsch way, especially the cable car-Chinese garden scenes — check out a recent photo of Marrie Lee / Doris Young), Dynamite Johnson (well, we tried to watch it right after Cleopatra Wong, but it was too much same old same old), Fearless (the first Jet Li movie I’ve seen in the cinema, it’s a kungfu movie much like the ones I remember watching as a child, and I got to chow down on popcorn and sip Ribena), and Fun With Dick and Jane (much better than I had anticipated, and the popcorn and Ribena were just as good the second time around).
- read books — Escape from Paradise (which I now call the ‘gossip book’, as the story is about dishing the dirt on the wealthy and powerful and extolling how wonderful and special and different the protagonist is as a Singaporean woman, and here’s a little tip for the writers: please make sure an editor works on it if there is another printing in future, the appallingly poor English made it extremely difficult for me to enjoy the book), The Time Traveller’s Wife (as recommended by Kristen, a very readable, delightful story), The Little Friend (it reminded me a little of To Kill a Mockingbird, in that it’s based around the life of a young Southern girl, but nothing’s as good as Harper Lee), Blink (again, recommended by Kristen, and I enjoyed it so much that I went out and bought The Tipping Point, which I’ve not yet read), 4 Blondes (prior to going out and buying more books, I sat and read one of my mum’s “brainless” books, and it wasn’t as bad as I expected, but it wasn’t so good, either), and Cobweb (I want Neal Stephenson to have my children)
- ate at Black Angus three times — I ordered the prime rib each and every time, which was good, and Neil thought our Aberdonian server was from somewhere in Scandinavia because we could understand what he was saying
- whacked some burgers at the Spize Cafe (yes, you read that right) based on Garvin’s recommendation, although he had had food poisoning and could only whack a mutton chop (which was pretty massive and spicy on its own) and maybe steal some of his wife’s beehoon, and I also had a very nice lychee drink
- ate loads and loads of prata (garlic prata, butter prata, mushroom and cheese prata, onion prata) at The Prata Cafe and made it to Neil’s old favourite prata stall at Farrer Court for breakfast (I am a fan of the raw fish platter at the stall in the opposite row as well)
met Kristen at Father Flanagan’s on our first day back (it was her last day in Singapore on business), managed to go to Loof only once (not a place I would hang out at regularly, but it’s lovely to have the option, and the Seabreezes weren’t bad), checked out Zouk because Neil wanted to see Paul Van Dyk (I’ve been over this), and (kind of) watched a snowboarding demo (and nursed a pint of Erdinger for an hour) at Indochine — we must be getting older, as evidenced by a fading desire to party and get drunk- ate home cooked tapas (including Scottish ‘tapas’ — haggis on toast) with some of Neil’s friends
- met Evon at Art Friend (she gifted me with one of her cool amigurumi bag charms!) and went to Spotlight, both places I visited far too often these past three weeks (I have so much craft stuff I’m in ecstasy), and Evon recommended I check out Golden Dragon as well, then I found Mix and Match in the same building, then I also discovered The Knotty Shop was still open)
made two amigurumi animals for Mum’s home decor — Fidelius the zombie mouse and Crispin the 80’s duck / pigeon / some sort of avian (I had only a limited number of colours to choose from as I’ll be damned if I’ll pay more for Singapore-bought acrylic yarn than Xiamen-bought wool yarn, lucky for me Mum liked a few of the colours very much)- gave my sister a crochet penguin / bird of some sort keychain whose name is Reginald (yes, I named him, and yes, I named Crispin too, but no, I did not name Fidelius)
- made my annual pilgrimage to Shashlik — this is a Singaporean tradition, at least in our family (the fact that the place has stayed open with no change in its menu or service for at least two decades proves that it’s not just us), and it is TOTALLY WRONG of me not to order borscht and beef shashlik AND cherries jubilee at least once a year, and apologies to Mum who thinks the place is “so old-fashioned!”, but has to take me whenever I come through
- turned 30, and changed my IC because I had to, although I won’t be able to vote in any election if I continue to wander around overseas and not be a patriotic Singaporean in the armed forces, in training as sponsored by the government, or employed by an “an international organisation of which Singapore is a member, or any other organisation designated by the President under the Constitution of the Republic of Singapore” — just so you know
Fare thee well, don’t let mofo eat you
Princess No-One-Wants-To-Leia was sold yesterday. There was no goodbye party this time (yes, I am lame) because I spent most of my waking hours yesterday proofing the latest issue of What’s On Xiamen that, by my reckoning, should be published while I’m away, but, by experience, will not be printed until I’m back.
Princess NOWTL has gone home with Winki — who also has a dog (mofo) — and, if I may tell Winki, the princess really doesn’t wish to be mofo’s toy… but since ownership has changed, if Princess NOWTL gets torn apart, I will share my photos and fond memories if Winki wants them.
Ahem.
This weekend I…
- went to a very smoky Londoner (where the wussy smokers couldn’t bear leaving a window open for us non-smokers because it was bloody cold)
- stood outside at the barbecue stall having a little supper
- watched Wedding Crashers (better than I’d expected)
- slept in
- went to Andy’s bar for a quick dinner
- watched Garfield, Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery, and Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story on satellite at The House
- stayed in bed and crocheted
- got out of bed and crocheted
- had xiao long bao for dinner (mmm, soupy dumplings)
- met up with TuTu at Javaromas to return his DVDs and get some books (I got so many books yay!)
- watched Transporter 2 (hmm… complete suspension of disbelief, anyone?)
G’bye, you evil little fella
There was a little goodbye party held on the sofa here the other day, as Darth Made in China had to be on his way to New Jersey.
He’d been purchased!! I’m happy I’ve sold a sock doll, but I’m also a little sad — one of my creations has left the fold.
I didn’t know I could pose my dolls in a hug. Nice to know it’s possible. I think Darth’s cape made it work, though.
Here we have Jetlito giving Darth the homeboy something or other handshake.
And Titch wants Darth to bite him, just this once. (Darth declined.)
Godspeed, Darth Made in China. I hope China Post and the US Postal Service treat you well and you get to your intended destination safely.
Baby Savage
Baby Savage is a Christmas gift for Georgie and Gary, whose little savage was feeling a bit lonely in his savage garden. I like his crooked smile and lone tooth. I had not intended them to turn out that way with my half-arsed embroidery, but it worked, I think.
What sound does a penguin make
Meet Nigel. Nigel is my first successful amigurumi thingamajig. I was initially going to make a rabbit following the instructions on Roxycraft, but I got taken with the idea of crocheting amigurumi paperweights — ornaments / softies with a practical use and all that. Nigel is stuffed with polyfill and has a bag of aquarium gravel wedged into his middle to give him a little more density.
Nigel is far from perfect, as I’m only beginning at crochet. The hardest part for me was working in the round, as I’m not very good at paying attention and counting stitches. I used a safety pin to mark the last stitch in a round, and was very rude to Neil as I was always trying to keep track of where I was in the stitch sequence.
The stitches aren’t too uniform, but they’re close enough for my liking and I imagine I’ll get better with practice.
This weekend I…
- had dinner at City Mark (we have vouchers, loads of vouchers)
- went to The House for a mint tea (and watched Seabiscuit, part of The Whole Ten Yards because it was shite, and the last half of Van Helsing, which was also shite)
- slept in (I’m beginning to wonder why I note this since I sleep in almost every day)
- went out to buy pastries for a Christmas party / gift exchange
- watched a couple of episodes of Monk
- went to said party and exchanged gifts (note to self: never, ever hand sew a sock doll as a gift for someone who doesn’t know about hand sewn sock dolls or my sense of humour — I predict it’s already in the trash)
- finished watching Monk season three (this season wasn’t as good, far too predictable)
- had an early dinner at Le Mezina
- chatted to a bunch of young punks (literally) for a couple of hours
- ate a barbecue supper
Ned and Senga
Back in early October, I let out a little teaser. Now that they have reached their intended recipients, I can let everyone in the whole goddamned world know who they are. Yes, I made myself (well, I made Mark and Kristen) a Weegie chav and chavette. These are the first dolls that have required the use of non-sock, non-felt fabric. Neds and Sengas love Burberry, y’see. So I took Neil and myself down to the fabric market and found some 100% genuine Burberry cotton/polyester mix material, all for the sake of making these little caps you see here. These are probably the most expensive sock dolls I’ve made, since I also splashed out and purchased metal bracelets, a tough manly one for Ned and a 100% genuine Dior one for Senga. There’s nothing too good for my pals.
It’s hard to tell in the photos, but Senga is expecting a wee bairn. According to Neil, being preggers is a fairly frequent occurrence amongst the senga set. In case you weren’t aware, her baby is made of polyfill, too.
Here are a couple of chav-like phrases we can all learn to say:
“Gie’s a gonk, ya dobber.”
“Check the nick ae’ you, ya fan dan!”
Neil’s afraid to tell me more in case I start calling him Ned.
(Kristen assures me that Ned and Senga live on a high shelf and Rosie can’t get to ‘em.)