Cleaning Time

It was a shock for me when I arrived in the ward this morning for my ward round. All the patients had been moved around and things were stacked up at the corridors. A nightmare scenario wading through the ward as all the patients were squeezed into a small room. The main ward floor were being polished. Spring cleaning time!

In the last few years, since the major renovation were done on Menara Timur where my ward was located, we have had problems with infection. The renovation in the last year were directly below my ward. Since then, we had been doing regular cleaning and polishing - I think the major clean-up were being done every three months. The results from this intensive cleaning had been very good. It was rather inconvenient on the day though, but being clean is important!

I couldn't wait to get out from the ward with the noise from the machines, as well as the smell of the chemicals they poured onto the floor was driving me nuts. If I felt bad, imagine what it would be like as a patient?

Finished the rounds, and is now enjoying the air-conditioning in my room. Argh! Careful! I might fall asleep. Hunger is a potent inducer for sleep for me!

Sunflower Paper Passions

In the last five or so years, the only place we got our Raya cards from was the Sunflower Paper Passions at IKANO. They print their own cards and they were gorgeous. A few years back, we actually got some cards printed from them, but we ended up printing far too many. In the years after that, we would rather just pick some of the ready-printed ones from the store, located on the Lower Ground Floor of IKANO, on the way to IKEA LG entrance.

The designs there were unique, not only in terms of motif and design, but also the actual quality. They made cut-through cards, laser-edged of course, and some of them had wooden bits as decorations attached on to them. The selection was huge.

Anita was especially keen on the envelopes for 'duit raya'. Very colourful and would set it apart from other envelopes come the big day.

When I say lego blocks, I mean lego blocksRight after, we also ventured across to The Curve to see if the decorations there were already up. It was just being set up, with the central foyer again turned into stalls area. It was still tiled out like lego bits today, but I was sure by the weekend, everything would be up and running.

If you need more information about Sunflower, you can surf here, or email by clicking here.

Great Start

Three points are three points. They will all tally up at the end of the campaign, and may be the difference between being the Champions, or the next title pretender. And it was great to have those points wrapped up in the away column, something we failed to do ten times last season in the Premiership.

This season will be a transition on a number of fronts. The aging squad has been injected with exciting new blood. Phil Jones looked a great buy, and Ashley Young looked to have played for United all his career. The third addition, the goalkeeper David De Gea, looks like he would need time to establish himself. After all, one thing being a Spanish International, but a United number one goalkeeper is a different thing all together. He is only 20 after all, and goalkeepers mature in their early 30s. There were arguments that United brought him in too early. I actually agree with that, but we still had to buy him. Buy him, but make him an understudy to the great van der Saar for a season. Following that argument, we should have invested in him last year.

He played a couple of televised games and made three blunders that cost us goals. But, that does not mean that he is the next Massimo Taibi, the rather unfortunate ex-AC Milan goalie who played six games for us, and was then quietly shipped back home. A folklore story at the stands at Old Trafford.

Exciting times none the less. Something to look forward to, and it will be a great season, with Citeh, Liverpool and Chelsea strengthening and Arsenal having their tail in between their legs! Next game, Spurs at home!

Dato' LCW, we salute you!

Another gutsy performance by our Datuk, but yet again he came up short. This time by the finest of margins. He could have easily taken the Championship at 21-20, but it wasn't to be. He tried. And he again made us proud. The question now is who to fill his shoes when he finally call it a day?

The rest of the Malaysian contingent has been disappointing, especially the Koo-Tan partnership which carried the nation's hopes in the doubles. Apart from them, we had nothing much to show for in the major competitions.

Time to take stock, learn and look to the future. I didn't think Chong Wei would be the force he was today after next summers' Olympics. He had almost single-handedly carried the nation's hope for the past few years. And he did us proud. We had to get the next generation of players to step up to the plate and be counted.

So, here's to Chong Wei. Well done. A true Malaysian hero!

Return to Marmalade

We moved Idlan's Lego camp to today from initially yesterday. That meant that I had to spend the afternoon at Bangsar Village, watching Irfan finish his delicious-looking pizza at Marmalade.

We have not been back to Marmalade for quite a while. There was a birthday party going on then, so we ha to settle for a table near the entrance. The good thing about Marmalade - and for that matter Fit For 2, on the top floor - they cater specifically for children. The menu was just right for them, basically a mix-and-match affair. You take one meal, and pair it with your drinks for a fixed price, and the choices were pretty good. and there were nice desserts to go with it for the parents.

And the milkshake to go with the pizzaIt was all done. Contrary to the reports on Facebook, I did not give a hand to finish off the pizza!There were macaroni and cheese, pizza and other pasties. Irfan had a mini-pizza and vanilla milkshake. As usual, he would pick the pieces of onions away from the main dough. But he managed to gobble everything down by the end - minus the onion bits of course!

Just in case you were with a child the next time you were in Bangsar Village are, do give either Marmalade on level 1 or Fit For 2 on level 3, a visit. You would be pleased!